World-Building Discussion: Fantasy Races and Modernity.

Now, after a nice discussion in the OTC thread Politics in Media - The Good, the Bad, and the Preachy, I decided to start this thread to discuss one particular idea: How would our world develop and adapt, if one day refugees from a fantasy world would start appearing in our world?

For the sake of this discussion I would go with some basic fundamentals.

First, the refugees include races like Dwarves, Elves, Orcs, Oni, Centaur, Naga and Hybrids (aka animal-people, picture werewolves and the like).

Second, the drop in large enough numbers to sustain population and do not get wiped out by following events. Things like plague or sickness will be ignored for convience sake.

Third, they appear in modern times around the End of the Cold War. This is to keep diverging history manageable.

Fourth, they appear through portals all over the world. Like orcs in Russia, Elves in France, etc.

Fifth, their portals close and their homeworld is subject to a cataclysm and is therefore of no relevance, beyond lore and initial events.

Sixth, magic is a thing, but can only used by the fantasy races or through artifacts. It is also limited in scope of what can be achieved, so a fireball is possible, but not something like a nuke.

My idea/goal is to figure out how the world would react to these races and things like magic. How society would change and adapt. Fantastical animals can be involved, though for now I would like to keep it simple, as ecological consequences are not my expertise at all.

If you have ideas or questions, go ahead. I would love to work on this and see where this takes us.

Edited by TheNohen on Dec 11th 2019 at 3:55:33 PM

Well, if you make the fantasy people refugees who come to earth to seek asylum for various reasons and also make them to be the only one that can use magic (ignoring the artifacts for a moment), I think most of the times, those fantasy people are either considered to be a dangerous menace to be exterminated on sight, especially if there are cases of magic being used for crime or hurting human (the reasons are unimportant in this kind of thing sadly if we want to be realistic here) or they will be exploited by the government or corporations like illegal immigrants. It is going to be especially bad if they arrive in countries with a bad records of human rights.

Of course, there will be people and organizations that want to help them, but they are limited in power and influence to help them just like real life. I mean we are still limping dealing with global warming and the non-fantasy human rights. The rights of fantasy people is going to be way harder to champion. Real world is damn bleak.

The existence of their previous world is one of the way that they can receive better treatment realistically. It's way harder to exploit or abuse let's say an Orc if doing so means the entire Orcish kingdoms/tribes/whatever get offended by it and launched the Greentide on your ass.

Edited by SteamKnight on Dec 11th 2019 at 10:22:20 PM

I can foresee concentration camps if I'm honest.

True, but I imagine some of them will integrate easier than others. Especially, depending on where they land. Elves in europe should have a comparatively easy time, especially if they can come with some magical goodies to smooth initial contact.

Orcs would probably get a frosty welcome no matter where they land. Looks, stereotypes and so on. Though, I imagine a lot of governments would probably exploit the physical prowess. Looking at russia or china here. Geting orcs into their military may be something they would pursue, after first reactions died down.

But I guess, I should probably clarify who lands where, so let's do that.

Large portion of elves probably land in around Europe, predominantly France and the British Isles. Some darker variant could end up in Africa, specifically South Africa, Zimbabwe and so on.

Dwarves scatter more. Enclaves in the Alps, Rocky Mountains, Scandinavia. Biggest portion would end up in Tibet and Nepal.

Orcs come in large numbers into the Eurasian Steppes. Mainly Russia, Mongolia, Kazaksthan and so on.

Oni land in Japan and pacific isles.

Naga around India and Indonesia, with some ending up in Vietnam and Malaysia.

Hybrids would scatter the most, with main concentration points being the Americas and Balkans. Various sub-races reflect on local fauna, so jaguars in Mexica, Wolfs in Europe and cats around africa and middle-east, roughly.

Question is, who would integrate quicker and where would the biggest conflict-zones be?

Edited by TheNohen on Dec 11th 2019 at 4:30:34 PM

Who would end up in South America? I think some Dwarves might quite fancy the Andes. Maybe Elves in the Amazon?

Makes sense. Though I imagine, Hybrids dominating America's the most. Maybe some Naga-offshoot settles in Brazil, as well.

I don't remember the whole quote but I remember it being that people "turn on green" when a strange being comes into the picture.

Oh, that's a Discworld quote.

Biggest conflict zones? I guess it's gotta be the African continent. The entire continent is a mess and the stable places there isn't stable enough to support an influx of magical immigrants out of nowhere.

Although, looking at the state of the world, I don't think there will be a country where they can settle nicely. Europe is already let's say banged up handling refugees from Syria. And as long as the GOP and the alt-rights exist, USA is going to be a hard sell. Russia and China are definitely out of the questions. And other countries are either overwhelmed by their own problems or simply don't have the resources to support sudden influx of magical immigrants. As I've said the dynamic of power severely disadvantage the fantasy people. I guess you could make the magic super-powerful to compensate but that comes with its own issues, so let's not go into that route.

After more thought, I guess extermination is a bit too extreme. (The "only fantasy people can use magic" part make me imagine it will trigger the Xenophobes hard) So, I guess the common responses are either exploitation or "re-education" to help integrate to the culture and society of their host countries. I can imagine Russia and China do this one.

Another interesting angle is also why there are stories about those fantasy people before they arrive to earth? This is especially more weird with something that are in legends or myths like Elves, Dwarves, Naga, and so on. Is it just a coincidence or did they exist in the past and suddenly disappear for some unknown reasons?

Edited by SteamKnight on Dec 11th 2019 at 10:56:04 PM

Good question and one I think would still be debated in-universe a lot. I imagine that the main-theory is that in the past a connection between earth and the other world existed, but was dropped for unknown reasons. The races had portals to earth, after all. But they only used them, once their own world was doomed and the refugees say, that outside a few sages nobody even knew of the portals.

Keep in mind, that our timeline begins three or four years after the Cold War. So...around 1992/93, I would say.

That would mean a united germany, Bill Clinton being president and USSR having split. Also means Yugoslavia Wars, of course and Japan's recession and the end of Apartheid.

That is basically, where the portals open and the refugees come in, if you need a timeframe.

Heck, to make it a bit easier, we can do this step by step, region by region. Like, let's start with North America.

Big drop of Hybrids in around Oregon, Great Lakes and Canada. Mostly wolf, though about 15% also consist of Taurs. The latter being of buffalo sub-race. A community of dwarves would also land in the Rocky Mountains.

Jaguar Hybrids mainly arrive in Mexico, specificaly in Yucatan.

You can add to that, of course. Always happy for ideas. More importantly, how would Clinton-Administration or Canada or Mexico handle it? What would bring hybrids to the table? Biggest issues? Examples of conflicts?

Main reason, I put it into that timeframe.

Edited by TheNohen on Dec 11th 2019 at 5:43:45 PM

It being set pre 9/11 makes me think people would be more receptive towards refugees tbh.

Great, now I'm visualising a bunch of orc gopniks/mambets wearing tracksuits, injecting heroin and listening to Kino while old khrushchyovka apartments crumble around them.

The most immediate multinational response would probably be the formation of a managing body under the UNRWA. A crisis like this would easily eclipse the ongoing ones in Somalia and the Balkans in term of public visibility, which might suck out valuable resources going into those crises. It's going to take a while for government agencies to establish contact with the refugee groups, during which tensions are going to be high. You'll probably see a lot of human vigilantes forming "self-defence" militias in the meantime and targeting any fantasy critter they come across.

Edited by eagleoftheninth on Dec 11th 2019 at 2:56:08 AM

This sounds like a fantasy version of "Alien Nation", or more recently "Bright." The main schtick common to both is that the aliens end up occupying the oppressed position formerly filled by minorities. I think Patchett was wrong, by the way— majority is majority, and minority is minority, no matter how many different types of them there are.

Later Discworld books do show inter-humanity bigotry, so that was something the man himself realized

Well, considering that the Yugoslav Wars is happening right in the EU's backyard, I doubt they would stay idle. But yes, a lot of the other crisis' during that timeframe would be overshadowed and have different/worse outcomes.

Which actually brings up a good point for the dwarves landing in the Balkans, since they would be immediately wrapped up in the whole mess there. Considering that the break-up of Yugolsavia is inevatible, I would say that in the ensuing violence, they would be affected and their numbers strongly reduced and/or a lot of them fleeing out of the region, leading to the Balkans having a lower percentage of "Outsiders" (as I would dub them for now, until I can think for a better catch-all-term) than other regions on earth.

America and Canada would probably set up Refugee-Camps, to establish contact and bring supplies. Those camps could develop into actual towns later on, as the Hybrids settle down after inital dispersion, leading to states like Oregon having a large hybrid minority, if not downright majority decades down the line. Given that Hybrids are also hardier and able to thrive in harsher climates than normal humans, I would say that dispersing their population into the low density states of USA and Canada would make most sense. Not sure how that would affect integration, though.

Which actually brings up a good point. Which race would integrate easily and which race would face more difficulties? If we place visually human-like races like elves at the top, then the more "monstrous" or culturally less adaptive races would probably go to the bottom. Hybrids would either be in the middle or, depending on regional tolerance, bottom or top. I mean, I am pretty sure Japan would have little issues with cat-hybrids.

I would keep fantasy critters out of this for now. Let's say this happens in waves, so for the first decade Earth has to deal with the refugees.

Edited by TheNohen on Dec 12th 2019 at 10:02:12 AM

Okey, this will mean A LOT, but let start.

First, let use a sort of time frame because what you are asking would take a lot, A LOT, let said something creature come in a 5-10 span in waves, in part to make managable and in part to make the comparation to refugee more likey.

Second: the start would be ROUGH as hell, people have trouble in europe for cultural differences, imagine one culture that have NEVER being on earth by creatures that barely look like humans, that said AT LOT, it could take decades for understand the language of all of them, specially since usually dwaft language and elves one tend to be overly complicated and in the second it also need intonation and posture.

But after that the species with better int score(so to speak) would integrate better, orcs would be in trouble since they are roughy, bad temper and depending of the setting, cannibalistic, but they can follow orders.

Now, some other fanasy creature are lifted stright out mythology which means people could acepted them better, after all a naga would probably fare better in india than in europe, or a kitsune....which of course would create issue of they confuse them with a kumiho(HAHA).

Now we come with magic...now that is the ball changer, depending of what magic can do and how can be manifested it can be and asset, I mean is not dificult to some goverment to torture or bride mage to teach magic or in a creepy idea, try to bread with humans in order to have mage loyal to the country, after all they are refuges....

You know how some fantasy races are very attuned with nature? Like dryads literally need trees to live? I wonder how that would affect the environmental movement and what they'd have to say about climate change and deforestation.

I could see them joining groups like Greenpeace and the Sierra Club in droves.

Personally I hate the idea of "fantasy worlds are always stuck in Medieval Stasis and they're Closer to Earth than us stupid, reckless, tech-based humans," so I put in some SERIOUS Schizo Tech with my Gaelic Otherworld—since European fairies are weak to Cold Iron, they're obviously going to have trouble industrializing on a large scale, but when my protagonist accidentally inherits a fairy-kingdom after her dad kills the king in self-defense, it's discovered that fairies also have a substance called "fairy-glass" by humans and "mountain-glass" by actual fairies, but it's extremely tough, grows like crystal, and dominates slate-heavy areas, so scientists eventually take one of my protagonist's items to study and confirm that it's a Power Crystal. It enables them to make full-on Holograms that completely transform cartography and combat training (contrasted by humans, who can only use them for public-access goods because they're so expensive) and counterparts to laptops/phones/televisions for the rich folks.

And then it turns out humans can learn fairy-magic as well, because it's well-known that the races are good at interbreeding and fairies are always talking about how they're "cousins." For things like teleporting long-distances and multiplying food-stores, fairies managed to access Hyperspace and a lot of their "magic" is a near-intuitive grasp of mathematics.

Edited by Sharysa on Dec 30th 2019 at 11:12:37 AM

If trees were literally people, people would fight to defend them. I would expect some historical transition period, during which wars are fought over whether or not to recognize their status and grant them civil rights (not unlike the movement to end slavery). Eventually, cutting down certain trees would be a matter for a police investigation.

A Detective Noir story about investigators trying to uncover who chopped down a tree and killed a dryad, with occasional references to that civil strife/war, would be very interesting.

I'd talk about my one modern fantasy world concept but I don't even know if it'd apply to this thread, since this thread specifically seems to address the idea of fantasy races appearing on Earth as we know it. In fact, that tends to be the default assumption when the question of fantasy elements in a modern society is raised, as in Urban Fantasy.

I wanted to provide a contrast to this by coming up with a straight-up constructed fantasy world that eventually - thanks to Magitek - developed something resembling modern technology. However, because this development occurred quite a bit faster than it did in real life, society hasn't quite caught up. There's cars, TV and subway stations, and yet their equivalent of the French Revolution only took place about a decade ago, and most other societies are still run by monarchies of some variety. Plus, prejudice against non-human races is still commonplace, albeit tempered by the rise of mass communication and the threat of uprisings with the aid of technology. The ultimate aim of all this being to create a dissonance between the modern appearance of the world and the way it works, which is still clearly struggling to move on from its Medieval Stasis roots. There's more than one reactionary who wishes to just go back to the 'good old days' of thatched-roof cottages, knights fighting goblins and feudal tax collectors.

So I guess, instead of introducing fantasy to the modern world, it's introducing the modern world to fantasy. :V

Edited by PresidentStalkeyes on Jan 1st 2020 at 7:39:34 PM

Sounds awesome.

I wrote a short story once with a similar premise. The standard fantasy races entered our world via a portal and had to hide the fact they there weren't humans.

The protagonist's best friend was an elf, but wore his hair long to hide his ears and the basketball coach was a dwarf who passed himself off as a midget.

The plot was about an evil sorcerer (very original, I know) reopening a portal in order to invade our world and the main characters have to team up to stop him.

Of course this largerly depend on how magic words, if magic is something a few people can use then eventually mages become a HUGE asset to....everyone.

Imagine states and coportarion steling other mages, pseudo eugenic in order to crack the magic gene, bullshit theory about it(did you know homosexuality stop magic, is true!, see this webpage!) mages reviving very lucrative contract and benefit over other and so on.

I keep coming back to this thread because i have ideas, and i keep shying away because i can't see this going any other way than extremely bad. Like, we will invent whole new ways of this going bad.

Ignoring magic and aliens (let's face it, they basically are), the fact that massive amounts of people would show up would throw the world into a frenzy. Out of nowhere, portals show up and there's a massive influx of people with a completely different history, culture, identity, language and they all are from completely different worlds. How well can they adapt to us? How well can we adapt to them? Can we even understand them? The thing about modern migration is that we really like to keep track of where people are from. The idea of stateless people with an unknown history, unknown language etc coming here is from long ago, and if we look at how that went... The influx would also be suddenly deprived of their safety and logistics, and thrust into an unknown world for unknown reasons. Panic would be common.

Adding the alien element, there's suddenly a huge influx of an incredibly diverse group of people. Aside from making all the biologists super happy (and some super mad), this is a nightmare for anything disease related, and well food related too. Can they eat what we eat? Can we eat what they eat? We produce stuff based on standards (e.g. standard shapes, sizes) but orcs are typically much bigger and much stronger. Faeries are smaller and lighter. A tauren would be a headache for a billion reasons. Standard solutions don't exist, and the standard solutions weren't doing great already.

Adding the magic just turns everything to hell. Existing rules don't apply. Anyone would fear for anything. Conjure money, food, precious resources? Conjure energy from nowhere, or convert it easily? what happens if a mage needs a powersouce and gets access to a power plant? Or god forbid, the whole power network? Does democracy even stand a chance if there's mind control? Look at how the system creaks under propaganda, now imagine illusions and whatnot. Modern society stands no chance against any of this.

Some future society that is well-adapted might be great to live in, but it would have to live through what is essentially the Apocalypse.