DISCUSSION Manaverse

Something good to have would be a diagram of the 'lay of the land' of the Manaverse at large. If someone could even rough out the main layout, it wouldn't hurt to have some sort of visual for the page.

People have been denoting the various 'star systems' where their planets reside, so that might be something worth setting up and concretizing for the Manaverse page.

The Prime/Alter Split is a must. I think it's pretty solidly important to show where the divide starts and why. It could eventually become its own article, but I do think it is important enough for now to at least have some sort of mention. SCT would also be a vital thing to note, since it isn't really defined anywhere. People who aren't actively """"""in the loop""""""" will almost certainly be like "well wtf does that mean".


A good question to open up... how exactly would you guys define the Manaverse, at its most basic? What is it?

 

[02:11:49] <Shadow> The science and physics, because that's essentially what makes it the "Manaverse". It's pretty hard to do describe it in a IC sense, though. Something like... "The Manaverse is the name given to a [universe?] [more descriptors]. This universe is characterized by the existence of an energy called Mana, [etc etc]"

Most recent musing on what the 'opening blurb' could look like

 

Getting the ball rolling with this... it's not great, but it's an idea.

Code:

The '''Manaverse''' is the name given to a [universe?] [more descriptors]. This universe is characterized by the existence of an energy called Mana, [etc etc]

==Binding Principles(?) / Basic Information / Basic Concepts==
===Mana Theory===
===Magiology===
===Prana===
===Garnere===
===Elemental Spectrum===
===etc===

==Planets==
(could probably group the canons and planets together)
(an image of the 'layout' of the Manaverse on the right)
===grouped by star system===

==Timeline==
===Canons===
(could otherwise go here if nowhere else)
===Prime Timeline and Alter Timeline / Timeline Split===
===Standard Canon Time===

==Dominant Races==

 

That definition suggests that Deveron is not part of the Manaverse. Unless this particular page is just suggesting the existence of manaverses, and not referring to the overarching name?

 

Not really... It's not like it's saying "Mana is the only energy available in this entire universe, blah blah blah" which would be completely false given all of the other energies we've already established are present within it.

 

It states a manaverse is where mana is present. Correct me if I'm wrong, but every universe we have has a mana presence of some kind except Deveron, which has absolutely no mana presence at all.

 

Well, the reason it's preliminarily in this thread is because it's a (very) beta version of the 'overarching description,' and so that other people can weigh in on what would be a more accurate description.

That said, the Manaverse is characterized by the existence of Mana. I do think that Deveron (and the Malice planet) are characterized similarly by the distinct and notable absence of Mana. It doesn't mean that they are outside of the Manaverse proper, as they do conform to the same laws otherwise. That's kind of the main condition of a planet's existence within our Manaverse, after all.

 

To me the Manaverse page seems like the one we would want to be able to link someone to in order to give them the basic but sufficient understanding of what the entire thing is so that they can begin to participate in it (the main page, after all, only says, "The Manaverse Wiki is a community project maintained by those participating in or having sufficient knowledge of the collective canon that the Manaverse comprises") while also, of course, providing all of the most important and relevant material on the subject regardless of demographic. I think it would be nice to at least keep approachability as a goal in mind when making the page, essentially.

That said, the things that seem crucial to include are a simple summary of Mana Theory, a detailing of the primary canons, planets/solar systems, and other, to put it simply, universal phenomena, like how Souls definitely exist along with their functions, and places-- like The Edge, I believe-- which have a presence throughout the Manaverse. SCT seems like a good thing to include, but I'm not really sure on Races. Again, here I'd say only include those which have a wider influence throughout the universe (which narrows the scope significantly-- Edge Reapers/Soul Harvesters, and other races which affect most of if not the entire universe are primary examples).

 

After jumping into the manaverse periodic table, I decided to hop on the wiki and try to familiarize myself with the manaverse a little. Well...I tried, but to be completely and brutally honest, it's a trainwreck. Most of the concepts and theories seem to act more like a 'how-to' guide for people already familiar with the concept to some degree, rather than an informative and explanatory article. The explanations are extremely long and full of pseudoscientific jargon and lengthy, long-winded sidebars. Quite frankly, the writing for it seems very stiff and inaccessible, if not pretentious.

Looking solely at the "manaverse" article, the 'basic concepts' section is entirely too long. This section should be condensed into a maximum of five paragraphs, when completed. Right now there's two subheaders complete and totaling ten paragraphs. Furthermore, the "Domains and Soul Phantasms" subheader acts more of a mechanics guide than an explanation on what each are. I feel more lost and confused after reading it than I did before. The canons and timelines need to be more streamlined and organized rather than a short explanation that makes no sense to someone unfamiliar to the manaverse, such as me. The 'timelines' section at the bottom states that there is no continuity in the manaverse, but there is a canon. Forgive me if I'm wrong, but I understood 'canon' to be a list of what is accepted as true. Continuity is the consistency of events and characters. Essentially what that says to me is, "None of the storylines are consistent but they're all true."

Before you try to write any more articles on the wiki, please clean up and edit the manaverse page to be more accessible and easy-to-read. Explanations need to be more concise and simplified, each section needs to be more streamlined and helpful, and the article itself needs to be finished. The wiki seems to be building off of a bunch of ideas and concepts, but the basic building blocks either aren't there, aren't finished, or are so windy that they're very difficult to understand.

 

This is the kind of discourse I think we need when it comes to furthering our progress on the Wiki. I agree with Cody entirely -- we need to do the groundwork (difficult and tasking though it may be) before we can even hope to get more people 'involved' with the Manaverse. We're quite simply in need of more work on the baseline concepts. More from everyone, too, even if the contribution is as simple as saying something like "this is too complicated. Let's simplify it a little (or a lot) more."

Getting started and going forward, let's strike up the discussion. What are our baseline concepts? We need to identify what we -- as a collective -- don't know, or aren't clear on yet. So I encourage you guys to step forward and ask questions. It's kind of important that we clear this stuff up so that we can even point to the Wiki as a place that people can learn about what we're up to.

Like statplaying before it, it'll become all the easier for everyone if we can disseminate all this information. Instead of someone coming to #CoE or #Manaverse and being immediately overwhelmed by the burden of knowledge of several of us yelling out what we think is important, instead we will have the ability to point to an article that is, 1. SIMPLE enough to understand without any particular foreknowledge of the Manaverse, and 2. CLEAR enough to provide all relevant information about these concepts. And then everybody is happy.

I would point to a posited "big three" pages that need to be built up (or rebuilt) first:
-- Mana
-- Powers (Magiology, Domains, Soul Phantasms)
-- Manaverse

I've been eking out a page for Mana with @Shadow and @"CodasterTheDisaster", but it needs work. I've laid the skeleton (with an introduction) on the Mana page, but I don't want to do it alone. If you have any suggestions of additional sections, or refinements that you can make to the current outline, then I would implore you to do so. I left the rest of it blank so people don't get overwhelmed with the information -- let's build it from the ground up instead.

Since I wrote that bit, I'll step up and address it. The Manaverse "canon" is basically a network of roleplays/stories/whatever spanning (or having the potential to span) all of time and space within the Manaverse. It's not so much that there is no continuity -- there are an infinite number of "timelines" at any given time, but time marches forward all the same. It's just that the continuity of events is greatly dependent on which timeline you choose to follow.

For example, we have the "Prime Timeline," effectively our 'main' timeline in that each person's "component canon" (Kuda's Euthoran Song, Shadow's Oblivion Phantasy, Starr's Dissonant Rhapsody, etc.) follows its "intended path." The Alter Timeline, meanwhile, comprises the Cult of Ustream "canon" (and a number of plots that are offshoots of that). It is a mutation of the Prime Timeline, since many Prime!characters make appearances as a result of super specific circumstances/anomalies that allow them to take place -- the extent of which, to my knowledge, is yet to be fully explored. But there are also independent or otherwise isolated time "bubbles" where some roleplays occur (such as Fate/Lunaterra), as well as more 'minor' (and I use this term loosely) timelines like the Drei Timeline, which is another branching path conditional on certain events.

So wording the "timelines" section (and really, explaining the Manaverse to anyone) gets to be a tricky web of untangling those sorts of things and making preemptive judgment calls on what people will understand. The Manaverse is a "supersetting/supercanon" which anyone can add planets and ideas to, and that's our "baseline explanation..." but it doesn't really hold up well when it's not made clear what that means or entails.

I'm not trying to make excuses or cop out of a crafting an adequate section, or forging a better explanation. There is an infinite amount of space (literally and figuratively) to accommodate any potential newcomers! And I want to make that clear... but I'm struggling when it comes to making that clear within the pseudo-meta context of our wiki, so to speak.