Multiple Realms Trinity

[LordHeru]

One of the elements I really like about Aberrant is that it doesn't fear changing the world. That it actively asks the question of 'what would a world with supers be like once they start doing stuff?' That unlike comics it doesn't hit the reset button every episode so that its always the world as it is. (Not that I object to this in comics, it works for them as a baseline is best, but still.)

This has lead me to the idea of how would a world where the ability to create alternate realms, and then forge the links between them, would change the world. What would happen when suddenly instead of mining our own world of its precious resources you could instead make a world covered in common, rare, precious, and exotic materials and then mine there. Same with farming. Same with ...

How would such a world be when the ability to create such realms become something known by a lot of different groups. OR, maybe as an interesting question, it is a knowledge held in secret by a certain group of Inspired people who operate in say a guild like manner.

This thread was created by me as a long standing request to get some thoughts of others when it comes to how such a modern world would change with the presence of such realms, and the Inspired that aids in creating and adventuring within them.

As a note yes, this question is basically taking the idea of Myst as an inspiration and trying to figure out a different way to go about it.

Also, I totally envision such a world not having Novas or Psions but that the Inspired do exist in some form, especially Talents.

[Mateus Luz]

That is a awesome exercise of thought...

Well, to start with values of rare materials suddenly change, for example if you are “importing” diamonds and gold may worth little, while other materials keep their value or get more expensive due to their use in the flux items. Even with a single company exploring the material, the market may be broken just because it would be better on long term business model for those exploring it.

Now a few twists on your idea:

If there is no humans (or an species to resist the exploration) the job would be easier, but a native sentience life form (let’s say a blue giant alien) would make the other side more adventurous...

Another interesting thing to add may be the “keeping balance” thing, like in Fringe, with the different realities having to balance each other, if you take something from one to the other you must compensate or the realities will bleed into each other overtime, with random objects or even people disappearing from one and appearing in the other until it’s balanced, or their counterparts sensing each other (or exchanging senses) somehow.

Using Flash Earth 1 and 2 example, the two realities may have an energetic signature or frequency that impact on regular technology (mobile phone communications for example). So if you use materials from other realities you may have some weird results, or at least leave a trackable signature behind, resulting in a good material and bad material idea.

[LordHeru]

That's actually some good points. Like if its other Earths that are being visited then the issue is different than if its just say other worlds with no relation to each other or anything like that. The same with the idea of there being some sort of cosmic antibody that works to stop such activity. I mean if us humans are able to create and travel to different realms then what is to say that some other group (either human or whatnot) doesn't also have that ability. Also, this adds the whole archaeological aspect of traveling and adventuring into a fallen empire's own created realms. And maybe trying to solve what caused that empire to fall, and to make sure it doesn't happen to the now Earth.

You're right on the whole value of materials change. If gold and rare gems are no longer rare then they become meaningless as a legendary good. Something else might take their place - like the crystals you use to make the links.

Honestly, this is something I would really love to have a lot of voices on developing as an exercise of thought. Mostly because as an idea this came to me years ago and has never really left.

Like I totally see how one would do it if some private guy or organization secretly had the knowledge to travel to other worlds (Stargate and Sliders and Myst and whatnot) but its different if its public knowledge, even if the ability to make the realms is restricted, and thus world changing.

I mean you suddenly go post-scarcity in resources. Think about it. You never have to worry about running out of metals because when your current mine in a realm is tapped out you just make a new realm and start mining there. The issue becomes workers, but its not hard to say "okay folks mine a is empty so pack up so on Monday you can go to mine b in the other realm."

So yeah, would love to hear the nuances of this thought.

(That said I do have to admit I doubt I would go the route of cosmic balance in which to take from one means you need to balance by taking from another.)

[Florin]

My group is planning on running a series of TC chronicles, each one ending with the timeline starting to unravel. I'm running the first chronicle and using the idea of the Doyen finding out the group's teleporter botched and took the group to another timeline to give them a reason to start experimenting with timelines in order to finally ascend. This will, of course, start to cause the unraveling of all timelines. We're hoping to have a kind of Crisis of Infinite Timelines after we've each run games.

[FallenEco]

This is very much giving me vibes of Flux/Inspiration write large. So something like Talent tier 3 (like time travel)