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A Question of Canon
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Wayne
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A Question of Canon
And no, this isn't about religion or artillery...
PostPosted: Sat, April 23, 2005 01:17 AM

(No, I'm not just posting this so that there's actually a thread here. Heh.)

S16 had a lot of plot revelations (and a few "convolutions," but that's OK-- Survivor "canon" is pretty shaky business anyway), among them the concept of a creature naturally both Void and "Essence" (Vire), the acknowledgement of multireality domains or "planes" (Carpasia*), and one very noticeable logic hole** I pointed out in passing in a final round post.

Before going into any additional details (the above paragraph was the setup, see), here's my point: Survivor "canon" is additive, that is; when hosts get the job, their works is considered canonical unless they specify up-front that it doesn't fit (like Switchblade's RT Legends). This is largely because, no matter what zany background shenanigans a host comes up with, it's all possible-- because the Multiverse is, effectively, infinitely varied.

But what happens when something doesn't fit canon-- such as someone writing drastic changes to the metaplot?

For example, say that in a future tournament Yume is actually killed off for good-- probably by another deity-level*** plot character or somesuch-- instead of just having her "essence" torn out, a la Belldandy in the movie. *chuckles* A host technically has the right to do that, and future hosts may or may not be inclined to use that element of canon. But who has the right to "retcon" that? And who has the right to approve changes to the "canon" that really should not be up to just one or two arbiters (such as getting into our increasingly nonsensical backstory)?

Set aside the obvious answers-- "hosts won't do that," "they have to get permission first," etc. Is this a Council decision? Is what is determined canon really up to each host-- and they get a line-item veto of what they want to accept or not? Who determines what's considered "official" for everyone else (and thus presumably gets a nod here on the TW)?

I don't think this has ever been adequately addressed, and with S18 on the horizon, though still a fair ways off; and S16 still fresh in everyone's minds, I figured now is a good time.

*Inasmuch as Carpasia does not seem to exist in a spatial sense (only those specifically allowed in can get there, and it can't be damaged or destroyed), and can also travel to realities by itself (as I highly doubt Carpasia spent the entire tournament hovering in orbit of Arcadia... heh).

Being a D&D guru who derives his "macro" fantasy cosmology from Planescape (rather than the muddled mishmash of "realities" we have here), a nod to the "Plane of Dreams"-- whether or not TK intentionally meant it to be so (I doubt it; he's not a D&D player)-- was a pretty intriguing one.

**The Memory Pools can apparently cross through space as well as time as well as "reality" (thereby allowing people to be pulled from any point in existence-- even from different times in the same iteration of a reality, which should be a de facto logical impossibility, since every change splits off a new reality, according to canon). Ergo, any similar means of transit-- like Vire's artifacts that let him do the same thing-- could bomb Arcadia into the ground one day, come back the next second from thousands of years in the future, and so on, until the entire place is gone. Once that's done the Eternals never have a chance at countermeasures, and since apparently their reality is unique (there aren't zillions of copies of Eternals running around meddling), that ends Survivor in a rather messy way. Didn't anyone ever... think about that? :/

***We plan to actually address what exactly constitues recognizable "divinity" in S18 in a way that actually makes sense-- although it might not gel with what some other peoples' opinions may be (though for the most part folks seem to not care-- "divine" power is completely relative, just like it is in video games and anime). Hence this might cause a change (rather, a clarification, but still) in canon-- who do I have to send my crack team of ninja assassins to to make sure it doesn't get "retconned?" Duh
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Slipstream
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PostPosted: Mon, April 25, 2005 12:23 PM

(Only just noticed this thread - wasn't aware that anyone but the three Council members could see this forum and post in it. Go me. Duh)

Shortly after we were elected, I raised the idea that at least the main Survivor tournaments maintain Eternal canon and there was a justifiable uproar. Not out of love for said canon, save perhaps for Krizak and tenken, but because people (including yourself) don't want any restrictions on their writing. Probably a remnant of the First Amendment, or anything else relating to the American right to free speech. Duh

Point being, a lot of people believe that the Council does not have the right to enforce story restrictions on a tournament. I know we might have some unpopular decisions to make, but we're also supposed to represent the community on the whole and we're not doing that if we enforce regulations most of it's opposed to.

So, no, I don't think this is a Council decision. I'll grant you that Survivor canon is a little convoluted - we could probably do with a Crisis on Infinite Universes somewhere down the line - but each host should have the freedom to take past continuity in any direction they choose. Did anyone mourn the death of Cronimus? How badly would future stories have been affected if Fabian had died in SXVI? There would likely have been some changes in future stories, but not ones that require their entire rewriting.

Yes, I know this is extremely shortsighted. If one host decides to bomb the Eternals into the ground and replace them with a collective of brains in jars, it'll severely screw up anyone planning to use them (the Eternals, not the brains in jars) in future. Thing is, I can't see a real way around this that doesn't restrict a host's writing freedom. About all we can do is follow the 'obvious answers' - get permission from creator of existing character etc, although that'll be tricky for most of them being Saint's creations.

Extending the DC Universe analogy, one possible solution is 'Elseworlds' where a future host runs a story based on 'What if this happened instead'? If the host makes that clear at the onset, that it isn't 'official' canon, they can still write the story they choose to and still contradict what came before. Of course, this has its problems too - being a non-canonical story, if another host wanted to continue plot elements in this second continuity, it would also be an 'Elseworlds' tournament, but would continue the path of creating a second continuity. There could easily be a third, and a fourth, and so on until the entire thing is hopelessly messed up even worse than it is at the moment

Another is that the community collectively agrees to drastically alter Eternal continuity and take the entire canon in a new direction. Not kill them off, necessarily, but perhaps have a different group take responsibility and control of the Multiverse. In the Star Wars EU (so sue me, I don't know many fictional mythologies like D&D) they realised reusing the same canon (movie) characters and having the Empire being the constant enemy was getting stale. This prompted the 'New Jedi Order' with new lead characters and the new threat of the Yuuzhan Vong, collectively worked on and agreed on by the EU's various writers. This one would probably face heavy opposition from supporters of the Eternals and thus would likely get scuppered.

I'll be the first to admit my knowledge of Eternal canon isn't that vast (I really need to reread the tournament archives and catch up) but feel free to reply; I'll give as much of my opinion on the matter and answer as many questions as I'm able.
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LordLocke
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PostPosted: Tue, April 26, 2005 07:45 AM

I agree with most of Slip's points. In the end, it's your story, and we don't have a right to tell you how to write it. Just remember that unpopular points may get retconned at the hands of another hostr in a future tournament, and apply a little common sense and don't go about hacking Eternals into itty bitty pieces because you can- make sure that something that big has a role in the story important enough to warrent it's inclusion.

Of course, Eternal Canon is mostly Krizak's baby, anymore- I'd suggest working with him while developing the story. Don't give him control, mind, but at least use him as a resource pool.

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Helmar
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PostPosted: Sun, June 05, 2005 09:08 PM

As for the plot hole, you've just discovered what's known as a temporal paradox, stemming from the fact that people expect time to be a linear absolute, and not a non-linear relativity.

It basically boils down to a simple fact: Time between individual Universes is relative. Millennia in one universe can be an hour in another. The only sort of linear accounting of time apparently occurs is when the Singularity Effect is in play.

Side note: "could bomb Arcadia into the ground one day, come back the next second from thousands of years in the future, and so on, until the entire place is gone" can't happen. Time is an iteration designation, and the Singularity Effect prevents iterations from being created. You can essentially say places like Arcadia exist in an eternal "now"; neither past nor future is available for interaction. ;)

When people are pulled from the same iteration as X event occurred but a different time period, it's a given that it's an iterationthat originates from that iteration, in essence simply ruling out the possibility that the character is pulled from any iteration where X did *not* happen. That's the only real criterea; it doesn't have to be the iteration that results from that iteration, just an iteration that results from that iteration.

Otherwise, you could literally cause the entirety of the Multiverse to collapse in on itself with one *single* use of time-travel. ;)
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Wayne
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PostPosted: Tue, June 14, 2005 06:15 PM

I never saw Helmar's post until now. I'm not used to new issues popping up over a month after the fact. *chuckles*

The problem, Helmar, is if it were that simple, we wouldn't have [as much of] a problem. But....

Quote:
a temporal paradox, stemming from the fact that people expect time to be a linear absolute, and not a non-linear relativity.


In the "directional" sense, yes (inasmuch as time only moves forward), but according to General Relativity velocity has an effect on time. But yeah, that's true. We'll call that statement "A".

Quote:
Time between individual Universes is relative.


It may or may not be, depending on what sort of theory you start with. (Man, I can't believe I'm actually trying to apply my brain to the nonsense that is Survivor canon. Oh well. :/)

1) In the "Branching Tree Multiverse" theory, everything began with an initial universe (call it "U0") that diverged into various separate ones as the "old gods" and various other beings created their own universes. Universes are thus major branches, and their iterations branch off further. (Krizak's mentioned this one; I'm leaning toward it.)
2) In the "Bubble Multiverse" theory, everything pretty much began all at once with every distinct universe being created simultaneously but separately, and it constantly expands. This one only really makes sense, due to the incredible vastness it implies; if the "Creator" is really God, and she's not, heh.
3) In the "Web Multiverse" theory, you sort of have both-- a core nucleus of "universes" that extend outward, forming both entirely new realities, and both old and new universes iterate. If looked at from the outside, "reality" is a big jumbled mass of realities, with the Void eating the shell and trying to get to the rich caramel center.

Anyway, in universes where time flows (presumably because the universes' movement speeds) roughly the same according to each other, there should be no disparity in time. Iterations by definition "start" at the same point in time as the initial universe was when it iterated, so it's never possible to have parallel existences at multiple points in time.

Anyway, let's call your statement "B" for now.

Quote:
Time is an iteration designation, and the Singularity Effect prevents iterations from being created.


The Singularity Effect-- putting aside the fact that it's a very poor plot device with its own set of problems in the first place-- doesn't help here, for two reasons.

1) Time is part of a universe-- and it's relative to the Continuous. That's exactly the problem, because that means that the Void can get swarms of minions from universes where time flows faster (the Astral Plane, FF4's Land of Summoned Monsters, etc.) or is alterable (Zelda's Sacred Realm, etc.), and then unleash them on the Continuous, where time may not have passed at all! My point about the X number of years was for the Void-- in places with relative timeflow-- which could be tomorrow in Arcadia, because time is an absolute there.

2) The Continuous has a past that can't be altered, and a future that may or may not be able to be divined (I don't think the plot elements talking about the future of the Eternals were ever supposed to be taken seriously). Some events definitely happened in the past-- the events of all the previous Survivors (except for future ones that are "prequels;" they get moved to the proper place in the canon, obviously), for example. Yet they all happened from places where time flowed differently, due to statement B, into a place where time is absolute. That's already happened; we can't retcon that (and we shouldn't, since that would ban multiple versions of the same character, ones that came from different timelines, etc.). So it is certainly possible for an enemy of the Eternals to strike in 1500 AY (their time), hit them on 50 ET (Eternal Time), then come back in 4000 AY... which might be 51 ET. That is allowable by canon because it has already happened-- cf. Chaos, for whom over 2000 years passed (Time Loop) during his interactions; and everyone who interacted in both S10 and any other tournament (though that's a case where the timestream is going the other way, with the Continuous not taking, say; Dewprism's flow of time into account).

...I can't believe I'm writing so much about this, heh....

Quote:
When people are pulled from the same iteration as X event occurred but a different time period, it's a given that it's an iterationthat originates from that iteration, in essence simply ruling out the possibility that the character is pulled from any iteration where X did *not* happen. That's the only real criterea; it doesn't have to be the iteration that results from that iteration, just an iteration that results from that iteration.


People don't typically think about this stuff, but most of the time when two writers pull characters from the same source material, they mean the same iteration. Bud and Lisa are pulled from the timestream together, for example. Typically this doesn't make much difference, but it is a point worth making. Sure, logically the odds are infinitely low that two characters taken at different times would be from the same iteration, but people can choose to ignore that, and we have a [minor] problem.

Quote:
Otherwise, you could literally cause the entirety of the Multiverse to collapse in on itself with one *single* use of time-travel. ;)


Well, I've already argued in the rebuttal to statement B that time travel is untenable anyway, it's just that we don't care and it happens regardless of that. Remember, if the Memory Pools have the power to ignore time like that, then the Eternals can theoretically fix any problem that doesn't arise in the Continuous, just by going back and rewriting it. But that's bad. Why would we need an "Omega" if one Sigma can hop into the Memory Pools and undo the event in universe X that caused a warp core breach that let the Void slip in through the back door? Yet that's exactly what should happen... I mean, in their millions of years of life, what else are they going to do? Duh
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Zero
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Heh
PostPosted: Fri, October 21, 2005 08:21 AM

Plots (and plotholes) are a problem. And yes, allowing anyone to willy-nilly change the Canon would be a bit harsh... until you realise that, like most comic book fans, us hosts/writers would likely retcon said world-altering event into oblivion if it was incredibly unpopular. The community helps regulate itself in that reguard, I think. Anyone who tried to 'trash the eternals' would likely find themselves faced with a public outcry of large measures, and get retconned out of the multiverse.

That being said.... I heard that Vire had possibly made a 'photo-negative' of the Multiverse... And while we <i>believe</i> the eternals are singular, we could always make a nice littl' plot device later in which we find out that each Multiverse, is part of it's own tree of 'multi-multiverses'

Yes, it's convoluted. You were expecting something more sane out of people who hang out in a place named 'Random Insanity'?
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