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Sengir

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« Reply #600 on: <06-11-17/1440:28> »
Just when things got interesting...

Short recap, feel free to troutslap me if you feel misrepresented:
  • Wak says that mana levels are linked to the population of sapient beings, more thinkers = more mana.
  • I think this sounds far too much like Laundry Files, and also does not mesh with the Awakening being punctual to a day despite a quarter of the world's sapient population having died immediately before.
  • Somebody (sorry) pointed out that in the Laundry Files universe, decimating mankind would not prevent CASE NIGHTMARE GREEN (aka. Cthulhu awakening) because deaths also generate magical power.

But I would say that suffers from the same problem as the idea of living people contributing to mana levels: A quarter of the world population died in the years before and the Awakening didn't come a day earlier. Mass deaths can obviously have strong local effects, but on a worldwide scale the cycle of magic just seems to carry on.

Really, the fact that the Mayas could calculate the exact date of the Awakening in advance should lay all theories about the influence of human population to rest, because they could impossibly have predicted demographics 5200 years into the future. Reliable long-term divination is OOC-officially impossible.
« Last Edit: <06-11-17/1444:03> by Sengir »

lokii

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« Reply #601 on: <06-11-17/1508:45> »
Oh right, that's what I had written about.

Really, the fact that the Mayas could calculate the exact date of the Awakening in advance should lay all theories about the influence of human population to rest, because they could impossibly have predicted demographics 5200 years into the future. Reliable long-term divination is OOC-officially impossible.

I think I made the point here, that this is not necessarily the case. The "threshold" could be a bifurcation. Only once mana can freely flow into the world, the population has an effect on the mana level. So mana rising and falling to zero would be a hard timing but the manalevel in between could be modulated. (Though I don't believe that there is an effect beyond a higher population means a higher number of magically active doing magic that draws the attention of astral denizens or even facilitates their arrival -- the signal I spoke of earlier.)

I think I made another point about the hypothesized manaspike in the middle ages and the occurrence of the Black Death. Not sure where I went with this. ;)

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« Reply #602 on: <06-11-17/1649:38> »
The difference might also be akin to amperage and voltage:

Amperage is the mana level, slowly increasing available juice for all kinds of stuff
Aspecting the mana through sacrifice, mass dying and ghost dances increases the voltage, the pressure with which mana flows into this world.

A high voltage could be - metaphorically spoken - like a tesla coil, producing a visible lightning arc across the planes of existence without necessarily containing a lot of mana/electrons.
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Nath

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« Reply #603 on: <06-11-17/1731:22> »
Really, the fact that the Mayas could calculate the exact date of the Awakening in advance should lay all theories about the influence of human population to rest, because they could impossibly have predicted demographics 5200 years into the future.
That's assuming the Maya did predict it.

Ryumyo was the first dragon to awaken and Howling Coyote use magic to escape from the Abilene detention camp on December 24th, 2011. Then some people pointed out this was the exact day the Mayan calendar predicted to be the end of the World ("Some mystics point to the Mayan calendar as an authority", as Shadowrun 1st edition stated).

In real life, 24th December, 2011 was the day the thirteenth b'ak'tun of the Mesoamerican Long Count (aka "the Mayan Calendar") was to end according to a correlation with the Gregorian calendar mentioned by Michael D. Coe in his book The Maya in 1966. Coe changed that date to January 11th, 2013 in the 1980 edition, and December 21st, 2012 in the 1984 and subsequent editions.

As far as we know, the December 24th, 2011 date was calculated by Coe using the original "Thomson 1" correlation and making a mistake between astronomical year and BCE/CE date (the former having a year zero nut not the latter). If you account for the Goodman correlation, the Martinez-Hernandez correlation, the Thompson 1 correlation, the Modified Thompson 1 correlation and the Modified Thompson 2 correlation (aka "Goodman-Martinez-Thompson" correlation), and the possibility of an error with/without year zero, there are 10 different dates in 2011 and 2012 that you could claim the Maya predicted as the end of the world, plus that January 11th, 2013 date that I have no idea how Coe calculated it. You can even make that number double again by arguing over the use of a Proleptic Gregorian calendar rather than a Proleptic Julian calendar.

Ehran does endorse a Mayan prediction of December 24th, 2011, in his famous Human and the Cycle of Magic speech. He does so while also asserting the previous age of magic ended on August 12th, 3113 BC and the current one will end on April 4th, 7137 AD.

As I pointed out in my lost message, the length of thirteen b'ak'tun is 1,872,000 days, while there are 1,871,270 days between August 12th, 3113 BCE and December 24th, 2011 CE and 1,871,969 days between December 24th CE and April 4th, 7137 CE.

The Modified Thompson 2 correlation gives August 12th, 3114 BCE as the Long Count starting date and December 21st, 2012 CE as the end of the thirteen b'ak'tun. A Long Count starting on August 12th, 3113 BCE as Ehran puts it would actually predict the end on December 21st, 2013. For the December 24th, 2011 to have been predicted by the Long Count, the starting point would have to be August 15th, 3115 BCE.

In his speech, Ehran says he was "as precise as possible" when advising an Egyptian Pharaoh in establishing a calendar that missed the date "by over two years" all the while giving dates that are off by nearly two years as well. If that guy is half as smart as he supposed to be, he ought to be 1) fully aware of that, and 2) deliberately misleading his audience.

The Awakening could have occurred at a more or less random date, that happened by random chance to be one date previously considered for the Mesoamerican Long Count to reach its thirteen b'ak'tun, and various people retroactively turned that into an accurate prediction. It would be actually just as credible to attribute such prediction to a 20th century archaeologist working for the CIA (the only person we can say for sure really did write down the December 24th, 2011 date) rather than to the Mayan people.



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« Reply #604 on: <06-11-17/2025:16> »
I suggest both the cycle and the sentient/life parts are correct - in their area.

The cycle is massive, powerful, independent of the amount of life or number of sentients - the 'quality' of that life, if you'll indulge me.  The cycle is not going to advance, be rushed, be shifted by anything any sentients can do; this is more powerful than orbital mechanics, this is a function of a power on a solar, if not galactic, if not universal, scale.  In 5000 years, it'll go below the active magic point.

However, life and sentients can affect specific areas; this is the manafield/manasphere theory.  Yes, great death can affect it, sending the local mana into an insanely high peak for a time, but that peak - however it's created - will fall unless it's sustained by steady rituals or deaths or celebrations or whatever created the peak in the first place.  Lots of people in an area with no magic can establish (or reestablish) a connection to the cycle, and other things can affect the effects of the cycle, but like controlling the tide, while you can push against it and stop it (or channel it) for a time, it'll eventually destroy whatever you're doing unless you continually maintain and reinforce that dike, barrier, peak, bridge, or whatever.
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Mirikon

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« Reply #605 on: <06-11-17/2236:16> »
While the cycle as a whole cannot be stopped, or broken, by any act mortals might conceive of, we're talking about a cycle that can be measured like geological epochs. Who is to say that mortal intervention on a sufficiently large scale couldn't change the speed of the cycle by a decade or two, perhaps even a century in local areas, when you're talking about a cycle measured in upwards of a thousand years?
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Sengir

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« Reply #606 on: <06-18-17/1209:06> »
In real life, 24th December, 2011 was the day the thirteenth b'ak'tun of the Mesoamerican Long Count (aka "the Mayan Calendar") was to end according to a correlation with the Gregorian calendar mentioned by Michael D. Coe in his book The Maya in 1966. Coe changed that date to January 11th, 2013 in the 1980 edition, and December 21st, 2012 in the 1984 and subsequent editions.
IMO that is a meta/OOC issue, in-universe there has AFAIK never been another date than December 24th 2011. The only divergence was SRR, which makes sense because their campaign coicided with the 2012 craze, when everybody knew that was the official date (only SRR also took some other liberties with canon).

lokii

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« Reply #607 on: <06-19-17/1530:43> »
A version of Humans and the Cycle of Magic states that "The Sixth World began on December 12, 2011 AD". It also mentions December 24, 2011 as the date for passing the threshold. It's possible that this just a mistake and it is meant to be the same date.

http://web.archive.org/web/20070805214212/http://www.shadowrunrpg.com/fiction/fiction1.shtml


Nath

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« Reply #608 on: <06-19-17/1745:16> »
In real life, 24th December, 2011 was the day the thirteenth b'ak'tun of the Mesoamerican Long Count (aka "the Mayan Calendar") was to end according to a correlation with the Gregorian calendar mentioned by Michael D. Coe in his book The Maya in 1966. Coe changed that date to January 11th, 2013 in the 1980 edition, and December 21st, 2012 in the 1984 and subsequent editions.
IMO that is a meta/OOC issue, in-universe there has AFAIK never been another date than December 24th 2011. The only divergence was SRR, which makes sense because their campaign coicided with the 2012 craze, when everybody knew that was the official date (only SRR also took some other liberties with canon).
AFAIK, there are only two sources in-universe that give December 24th, 2011 as a match for the Mayan calendar: the first edition book and the "Humans and the Cycle of Magic" material. And the former actually attributes that claim to "mystics" and "dreamers". The third edition only mentions year 2011 and the fourth edition wording is quite open about it.

Quote
Shadowrun 1st edition, page 14 / Shadowrun 2nd edition, page 23
What we know as the Year of Chaos was actually the end of the old age and the beginning of the new, the dawn of our Awakened World. Some mystics point to the Mayan calendar as an authority, noting that it predicts the start of a new cycle of humanity on December 24, 2011. They also say the appearance of the Dragon Ryumyo is the signpost marking what the Mayan called the Sixth World.
Had they done better research, these dreamers would have discovered that the Mayans also predicted a world-destroying calamity that would herald the birth of a new, improved race of humans. Where were these things? It is true that we faced trials, disasters, and great chnge, but we do not have a new world. It's still good, old Mother Earth, even if she has entered a new phase.
Quote
Humans and the Cycle of Magic
Converting the Mayan dates to the current Christian calendar, it correctly states that the Threshold would be passed on December 24, 2011.
Quote
Shadowrun 3rd edition, page 25
The year 2011—flagged by the ancient Mayans as the year in which the world would end and a new world emerge—saw more bizarre kinds of upheaval than any year before or since.
Quote
Shadowrun 4th edition, page 25
The real kicker happened December 24, 2011. What was previously known as the Year of Chaos became the Awakening as simultaneous events spectacularly ushered in the Mayans’ Sixth World: the appearance of the great dragon Ryumyo over Mount Fuji, witnessed by hundreds of Japanese passengers on a bullet train, and the Native American prophet Daniel Howling Coyote leading his followers out of the Abilene Re-Education Center.

For the record, the 5th edition doesn't mention the Maya at all.

Quote
Shadowrun 5th Edition, page 20
There’s one date everyone needs to know: December 24, 2011. That’s the day the Sixth World started. According to the academicky types who like to sort things into boxes and put the boxes in order, this planet of ours has seen six ages, by which they mean six different levels of magic. The previous age, the Fifth World, was an ebb in magic. Magic was shady, disreputable, a bit slatternly, hiding out in dark corners and back alleys, very rarely coming out in the light of day. Then, on December 24, the great dragon Ryumyo flew out of Mount Fuji and darted alongside a bullet train full of very surprised commuters, pretty much putting the world on notice that the ebb was over. That was just the beginning; magic coming back meant big changes for the world.
In fact, some of the changes had kicked in months before, just nobody understood that’s what was happening.

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« Reply #609 on: <06-19-17/1747:40> »
A change of a decade or two isn't much when you are talking cycle of this scale. 10 to 30 years is within a statically valid range for it to be really considered a change.

Get that cycle to change by 200 years, then you are talking about influence on the pattern...
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lokii

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« Reply #610 on: <06-22-17/1030:06> »
A change of a decade or two isn't much when you are talking cycle of this scale. 10 to 30 years is within a statically valid range for it to be really considered a change.

That depends on whether the phenomenon fluctuates. Sunrise is never a minute late.

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« Reply #611 on: <06-22-17/2051:13> »
A change of a decade or two isn't much when you are talking cycle of this scale. 10 to 30 years is within a statically valid range for it to be really considered a change.

That depends on whether the phenomenon fluctuates. Sunrise is never a minute late.

Really?? Then why is sunrise at 5:19 at my house in BC, but 4:59 at my house in the Yukon? Both are in western Canada... one is just 4000 km more north
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lokii

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« Reply #612 on: <06-23-17/0805:03> »
You are joking right?

You can precisely calculate sunrise for any given date and either location. Sunrise will occur down to--well actually I don't know the precision--but I'm positive it will not be a minute late any time. The underlying gravitational process is too reliable. As long as the system is not disturbed, i.e. Earth is hit by a large object, sunrise simply cannot fluctuate by ~ .1 percent which is the same order of magnitude as 10 years in a 5,000- or 10,000-year-cycle.

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« Reply #613 on: <06-24-17/0127:19> »
You're misunderstanding what he's saying, lokii.

The cycle may or may not be uniform in nature, but our actions can change how we interact with it. Similar to how a simple change of latitude can change local sunrise, even in the same longitude, or vice-versa. Or how dredging a river to allow larger ships in to port can change the way the tides impact the beaches in the area. Or how having a magnet nearby can pull a compass off course. Magnetic north doesn't change (barring extreme situations). The tides come in and out at regular intervals. The Earth spins on its axis at a constant speed. But our perception of these things changes depending on the conditions.
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lokii

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« Reply #614 on: <06-24-17/1118:04> »
The point is sunrise is an example of a natural cycle with little fluctuation. Of course it is place-dependent, that does not mean your movement causes sunrise to be early or late in any given point on Earth. Forget about sunrise, just think of one rotation of the planet. Note this cycle does drift over time (tidal friction), it also does fluctuate but by way less than .1%. The revolution of the Earth around the Sun would be another example. There is no universal rule that every natural cycle can be expected to vary by the same x percent of its period.