TVTropes Now available in the app store!
Open

Follow TV Tropes

Following

Origin of Your Species?

Go To

GenericGuy Since: May, 2010
#1: Feb 20th 2011 at 12:27:57 PM

Every race has their “origins” or how their people came to be, whether divine beings created them as is (or as maggots that grew out of a certain Nordic god), were they accidents or through a fantasy lands version of evolution. My question is what the origins of yours are or what are their creation myth?

My EX: Originally on a distant continent there were two races Humans and the Dra’Khans (heh heh I’m clever, but seriously they’re lizard folk not “dragons”) both came to be by naturel selection over millions of years, but then something happened to the continent that made the Dra’Khans have to leave and take the humans (who were slaves) to a new land.

While sailing there on massive ships, one ship got stranded on an island near the cost of two smashed together continents, and it is here that the humans overthrew their Dra’Khan masters and eventually evolved into Halflings.

The rest of the Dra’Khan fleet settled on these two conjoined continents and set up a new Empire. However, they decided to make their slaves more specialized for particular needs; and so using unnatural selection (with the help of magic) bred two new races. One for magic craft (Elves) and another for war and hard labor (Orcs).

Some humans escaped before the Eugenics program and so remained humans, but others went into hiding in and above the mountains; and eventually became the Dwarves and the Ogres respectively (again through natural evolution).

Eventually massive Wyverns (closer to fantastical dragons) that sleep for 1,345 years before waking to gorge on food and find a mate destroyed the Dra’Khan Empire along with the records of all this; giving all the humanoid races a chance to build up and start their own societies and cultures.

edited 20th Feb '11 12:29:28 PM by GenericGuy

"If you make people think they’re thinking, they’ll love you; but if you really make them think, they’ll hate you." —Don Marquis
Yej (4 Score & 7 Years Ago) Relationship Status: They can't hide forever. We've got satellites.
#3: Feb 20th 2011 at 1:43:32 PM

Humans in my world come from evolution (as far as anyone can tell) but the Blues come from... themselves, in a rather convoluted Timey-Wimey Ball.

XenephulonTheOmnipotent Since: Dec, 1969
#4: Feb 21st 2011 at 12:30:42 AM

This post actually prompted me to write a proper... well, write-up of the origins of my three species, including their own beliefs and the actual (but more boring) explanation of how they got there.

Hypothesis One: (Beliefs) Humans, per origin legend, sprang forth from the heavens, after having been seen as lesser than the angels but greater than the daemons and in need of moral testing. Sent down by their god and his angels, they must now battle for their soul, serving, throughout their mortal life, their god until they are deemed either good or evil.

Goblins, according to their own tales, were molded by the stone by their creators, being sent into life as the servants of their creators. But as one by one their makers decided to leave the world, they were left without a purpose, and are now free to do with their given life as they please.

Ogres, mostly according to others as they have not formed the culture to decide upon their own story of origin, originated from the dirt, being sculpted by the wind and the sea, and given life by the flame.

Hypothesis Two: (Truths) Humans and ogres are very distant relatives, (Approximately three million years of divergent evolution) while goblins evolved along a different evolutionary track.

Nomic Exitus Acta Probat from beyond the Void Since: Jan, 2001
Exitus Acta Probat
#5: Feb 21st 2011 at 12:47:30 AM

The demons in Forgotten Lore/Zaran il Legio believe they were created by a god to be his chosen warriors, but rejected servitude in favour of ruling their own world. In reality, they evolved naturally like everything else. Maybe. There might be some influence of an eldritch abomination involved, as there seem to be a whole lot of them in the universe, and some things in the history of the demons suggest intervention by something not mortal.

AirofMystery Since: Jan, 2001
#6: Feb 21st 2011 at 3:32:01 AM

Origin of Jiangshan

Long ago, when Jiangshan was many hundreds of splintered kingdoms, slaves were kept by the powerful sorcerors that ruled the land. The Ancient Sorcerors kept the knowledge of Shadow from their slaves at any price. Some of these slaves were made to fight each other as entertainment for the sorcerors, and eventually this was organised into a series of fighting tournaments between the kingdoms. Eventually, a young man learned of how to manipulate Shadow, and taught it to his companions, who in turn taught more. At one of these tournaments, they rose up in rebellion and killed their sorcerous master.

His death filled them with courage, and they kept going, freeing the people of the south, east and west, from the sorcerors. As they did so, they drove the remaining sorcerors north, where in a climactic battle between the ten-thousand freed slaves and the twenty or so sorcerors, they succeeded, albeit with great cost. As the last of the sorcerors fled to the north, their great magical energy opened up a chasm within the earth, permanently blocking access to the wild wastes beyond it. Nonetheless, the slaves had prevailed, and in accordance made the brave young man their first Emperor, Shining Endeavour. Using his knowledge of Shadow, Shining Endeavour commanded that everything be built in a certain specific way to power everything by Shadow, thus negating the need for slaves.

edited 21st Feb '11 3:34:38 AM by AirofMystery

JHM Apparition in the Woods from Niemandswasser Since: Aug, 2010 Relationship Status: Hounds of love are hunting
Apparition in the Woods
#7: Feb 21st 2011 at 6:02:49 AM

No-one's quite sure where anything really came from, due to the whole "local time-space continuum is slightly effed" thing. In all likelihood, mostly evolution. The rest is to be blamed upon gods and space aliens.

This is, at one point, lampshaded by a talking marten, who points out that, in the greater scheme of things, his very existence is somewhat absurd ("especially these pants"). An Achillobator with a sword then proceeds to tell him to just roll with it.

edited 21st Feb '11 6:09:36 AM by JHM

I'll hide your name inside a word and paint your eyes with false perception.
AtomJames I need a drink Since: Apr, 2010
I need a drink
#8: Feb 21st 2011 at 6:52:04 AM

A Kaiju named Atomo was/is actually an alien pet from the 28th Century, who sacrificed himself and found himself lost in Time. The fallout from THE Atomic Bomb mutated the poor thing, and now it spends the rest of it's days as a mindless creature bent on destruction.

Theres sex and death and human grime in monochrome for one thin dime and at least the trains all run on time but they dont go anywhere.
stingerbrg Since: Jun, 2009
#9: Feb 21st 2011 at 7:46:34 AM

Elves, orcs, and dwarves were straight up created by the Creator and stuck on the world along with all other lifeforms. Humans, however, evolved from a hominid-like species after the elves, orcs, and dwarves were wiped out.

CrystalGlacia from at least we're not detroit (Living Relic)
#10: Feb 21st 2011 at 12:36:13 PM

I currently have, like, six different humanoid races who specialize in different kinds of magic. They all apparently descended from humans, though how those humans got to this alternate world remains a mystery.

"Jack, you have debauched my sloth."
CrystalGlacia from at least we're not detroit (Living Relic)
#11: Feb 21st 2011 at 12:38:04 PM

I currently have, like, six different humanoid races who specialize in different kinds of magic. They all apparently descended from humans, though how those humans got to my alternate fantasy 'verse, especially since there are no fossil remains over there of earlier hominids remains a mystery.

"Jack, you have debauched my sloth."
Diamonnes In Riastrad from Ulster Since: Nov, 2009
In Riastrad
#12: Feb 22nd 2011 at 10:36:18 AM

Aether was well on its merry way to evolving a sentient species. However, once the half- dozen Atar'eie landed on the planet, each except one gathered an extended tribe of these early hominids and shaped them according to their desires, and so the Kress, Orichalcans (biological cyborgs), Vaash tribes, K'leiah, and Drachta were born. The last, Nuala, was not as whimsical as the rest. She knew The Fiends would follow soon enough. Thus, she took a few members of each created species and imbued them with strength, dexterity, agility, intelligence, cunning, endurance, and skill, preserving each one in a special chamber for the future.

In Wraith, most of the current races are Changelings, descendants of a unity between humans and species from various other planes. Humans alone out of all species from all known planes (dimensions) are capable of reproducing with other species due to sheer genetic diversity.

edited 22nd Feb '11 10:38:28 AM by Diamonnes

My name is Cu Chulainn. Beside the raging sea I am left to moan. Sorrow I am, for I brought down my only son.
Anaheyla Since: Jan, 2001
#13: Feb 22nd 2011 at 11:05:17 AM

The Nojin race was created by the god Tonneau, through a process he called evolution which involved making animals take on a humanoid form, along with increase brain capacity and all that good stuff. It was not actually evolution, which is a steady process of inherited traits and shit like that that takes place over a buttload of generations, but no one contradicts him because when you're a god, you get to call the shots on what qualifies as evolution. tongue

The Nojin are the Fourth-Born race, being the fourth race to be created by the gods(after Humans, Demons and Angels, in that order).

edited 22nd Feb '11 11:06:57 AM by Anaheyla

This is still a signature.
USAF713 I changed accounts. from the United States Since: Sep, 2010
I changed accounts.
#14: Feb 22nd 2011 at 6:58:50 PM

I have far too many races to talk about all of them, but I could run through the major ones...

Humanity (standard-issue): the humans don't necessarily have a special origin; they evolved on Earth, as per standard rules. That said, the resident Precursors did cause the mass extinction that put mammals on top...

Firiakan (Lizard Folk): created by The Precursors from dinosaurs of Earth (they happened across Earth during the twilight years of their galactic rule and decided to play with the creatures there because they had the right combination of low technology and genetic diversity to pique their interest; this is done constantly—the Precursors Ascended to a Higher Plane of Existence and pull the strings from behind their veiled curtain—through time in cycles and is a major background plot point forming the Myth Arc), they were subsequently dropped on a low-grade Death World. Evolution took hold from there.

Cornan (Lizard Folk): ditto the above, except for the "low-grade" bit about their Death World. Their culture and national identity are proportionally affected by this.

Torun (Bee People): also ditto the above, except they were dropped on a living, breathing, angry Planet Eater...thing . Needless to say, they are turned into mind slaves... (The Precursors had no clue the planet was an Eldritch Abomination, thankfully).

Veneran (Fish People): the only major (militarily) race in the setting that wasn't transplanted from Earth, they evolved on their own and have correspondingly Starfish Alien-like traits, although they still stay within the realm of the understandable. They lack the Translator Microbes circumvention everyone but the Humans have, and instead vocalize, for example...(not in a way that humans can mimic, however).

I am now known as Flyboy.
RoninCatholic Petting Zoo Person Since: Dec, 2010
Petting Zoo Person
#15: Feb 22nd 2011 at 10:46:59 PM

In mine, there's actually only four sapient species native to my world (and in an even stranger way, two of them cross over rather heavily).

Humans, who were created by Crystal Dragon Jesus out of clay, have five races within their species; Homo sapiens marius, Homo sapiens fragilis, Homo sapiens glaciarus, Homo sapiens gnosticus, and Homo sapiens (lupus/vulpes/panthrus/whatever). Gnomes and elves are double-typed to also count as Fay. Giants are also the same species, but they're NPC races. As are all the following:

The Fay were created by Crystal Dragon Jesus out of various kinds of plant matter(petals for pixies, nuts for tanuki, oil for genies, and whatever else). Fay include all the inherently magical creatures, from the viciously powerful and evil/indifferent Fair Folk down to the downright decent elves and gnomes. The adjective for things related to the fay is fey; pronounced the same, spelled differently. Genies (who hate being called Djinn'') are fay whose bodies are rather fragile, whose magic is intensely potent, and (most importantly) dwell in the desert.

Goblins and their kin were created by Crystal Dragon Jesus from mud. There's no overlap anywhere of goblins with humans or fay when it comes to breeding. They tend to be simple-minded, brutish, and violent; some, however, are single-minded, clever, and violent. There's no indication that they were created this way, only that there's a strong tendency within their culture to choose to behave this way. For all their violence, however, they're not very strong.

Dragons are the most powerful and exalted species of them all, and it shows in their creator's physical form on this world. They were made from precious stones and metals. While your standard dragon follows the four legs and a pair of wings form typical of modern western RPG dragons, they've discovered eugenics; over a course of centuries, they bred a race of man-sized humanoid dragons, well outside the bounds of variability in real-world genetics, but this is a world with Functional Magic. Wild tribes who have devolved so as to lose their breath weapons are called lizard men, and are rather fond of the letter S.

My world has orcs, but they're only barely classifiable as sapient; orcs were invented by wizards, who wanted cheaply made and trained soldiers. Combining small-ish apes and a small boars through magic, they produced these bow-legged snout-nosed Dumb Muscle Blood Knights (the combined intelligence of a pig and an ape is great in the animal kingdom, but doesn't hold a candle to humanity). And as far as the "muscle" goes, they're not really all that great, either; they're exactly as strong as normal humans, albeit with a higher tolerance for pain.

I must be cruel, but to be kind That bad may begin, and worse be left behind
MarkerMage World Ends Oct 21, 2011 from My own little world Since: Aug, 2009
World Ends Oct 21, 2011
#16: Feb 23rd 2011 at 2:03:28 PM

Which species should I choose? Oh, I know!

Flower Kappa (I need to come up with a better name for them)
The flower kappa evolved from felves, which are the setting's plant people. What made them evolve differently is that felves have no instincts for selecting other felves to mate with, what with them being a race that has relied upon pollination. When a village of them attempted to reproduce without another species pollinating them, they had chosen to base their decisions purely upon personality rather than apparent health. While this criteria had previously worked for selecting pollinators, it didn't work so well when choosing those who would be providing half of the DNA of the offspring. So what would eventually become known as kappa (OK, that seems like a better name at the moment) had undergone a rather drastic change in appearance in relatively few generations. Natural selection would eventually select those of them that could choose healthier sexual partners, but not before the felves had obtained a rather shell-like leaf on their back, a greater need for water, an indentation on their heads for holding water for their hair-like roots to drink, and an appearance that many humans found repulsive. They would be used by felves as a warning against going against the tradition of being pollinated by humans, which tended to prevent felves from breeding with the kappa, allowing the subspecies to become a separate species. Now lets get into the origin of the species that was the origin for this species...

Felves
Felves evolved from a plant that saw use as an adult novelty toy. Its use as an adult novelty toy resulted in natural selection choosing the individuals that were best at Pouyannian mimicry. So over numerous generations, the descendants of the plant became more human-like in appearance, and eventually movement, and eventually intelligence. Whether them developing intelligence shows that the humans that participated in pseudocopulation with them cared about what their partner thought or just wanted to be able to give instructions to what would become known as "felves" is a subject still debated.
The felves however, have their own interpretation of their origin that they started telling their offspring back when their intelligence wasn't advanced enough to understand the truth of their origins. This origin story involves a human falling in love with an ordinary flower and producing a Half-Human Hybrid with it. This offspring got the flower's beauty, and some of the human's mobility and intelligence. They will often have the story go into An Aesop that serving and mating with humans will either insure that a felf's children will keep the gifts of the human "parent" or allow the possibility of the human bestowing the child with even more mobility and intelligence. The times when a human tells them the more complicated truth are usually met with the felves either replying that they don't see the difference between the two stories or seeing it as a test of their faith. And now...

Plant That Saw Use As An Adult Novelty Toy
It evolved from a plant that was brought from Earth. I haven't decided which one. However...

Plant That Was Brought *WHACK*
Ouch... OK, I'll stop now.

edited 23rd Feb '11 2:04:39 PM by MarkerMage

Thinking of ideas to use with a literary work that is meant to be WikiWalked through.
Icalasari Warble from Alberta, Canada Since: Jan, 2001
Warble
#17: Feb 23rd 2011 at 8:34:38 PM

Evolution, with some influence from the deities

In fact, Illusoria is actually a parallel Earth in many aspects, and even shares a lot of the same species. However, due to deities doing nudging and tweaking here and there, well, the titular creatures, Cryscon, rule (well, humans do as well but it is a MUCH closer race...)

I wonder what a strip tease from a creature made of souls would be like?
DasSoviet Since: Feb, 2010
#18: Feb 24th 2011 at 5:55:24 PM

Depends on the universe and the setting, right?

For my big setting of Caelea, the majority of the sentient races - humans, dwarves, fayn, shange, and the other humanoids - are descended from, of all things, dragons. Yep, big ol' dragons with all their magic and powers and stuff basically, through mutation, ended up significantly smaller and significantly more mortal. Could still do awesome magic though, if they worked towards it. Basically, the explanation behind this was the loss of magic due to the war between the dragons and the fey, and the dragons adapting to live in the less-magical world instead of die out. Of course dragons didn't die out, there are thousands alive - but their humanoid kin still number a hundred times that, so... yeah.

For the other major races of Caela - the goblinoids were created through fey influence on apes. Yep, the orcs come from monkeys, the humans come from dragons. It's fantasy, deal. The cyran are the result of elves cut off from faerie for so long they became mortal and essentially humanoid (in Caelea, true elves are epically powerful fey able to stand toe to toe with dragons, so cyrans are the 'mortal versions' thereof). Gargoyles are guardian statues crafted by other mortal races miraculously given life - most commonly thought to be via divine intervention. And finally, the kithkin - are a whole nother box of chocolates.

Kithkin are basically a grab bag of whatever setting they're in at the moment - since they exist across multiple parallel universes, it all depends on which one you're in at the moment. For the ones in the Caelea multiverse, they are basically the xth generation decedents of the upstart gods of a world called Cirundi. In other, more hard sci-fi universes, they evolved - I actually have the full chain laid out, including Cirundi's version of primates, the bat-like Ayran. Regardless, no matter the setting, they reach modern tech levels, world goes boom, and they end up scattered around the multiverse. FUN!

And much like the kithkin when they're putting on the sci fi, almost all of my other sci-fi races evolved naturally, without any intervention (for the most part). Notable exception being the kalfa, who are descended from human experiments thrown back in time via a very poorly thought out hyperspace jump. Oops, should've watched more sci fi. However, explains why there's a race of cyborg fox-kangaroo-lizard-human things out there, right?

BlueNinja0 The Mod with the Migraine from Taking a left at Albuquerque Since: Dec, 2010 Relationship Status: Showing feelings of an almost human nature
The Mod with the Migraine
#19: Feb 28th 2011 at 12:54:14 AM

In the FF 7 tabletop game I'm working on, there's three intelligent races - Humans, Moogles, and Deneh - that have been around for as long as history has been recorded. Then about two hundred years ago, every human and moogle in a certain geographic area woke up to find themselves transformed into Reen. Nobody knows why, despite a great deal of research into the matter, and rumors abound.

I haven't actually decided what the cause is, but I've got three different rumors about it and am planning to ask my players for more before I decide between them.

That’s the epitome of privilege right there, not considering armed nazis a threat to your life. - Silasw
Ettina Since: Apr, 2009
#20: Feb 28th 2011 at 2:00:11 PM

Well, in my one verse, the first vampire was an ancient Greek Mad Scientist / Alchemist who wanted to live forever. Ironically, he got killed off when he was around 300-400, but before that he accidentally turned one guy then (realizing what had happened) deliberately turned several others.

The humans originated pretty much the same way as reality, though there are also elves which are probably another subtype of primate (on the same level as monkeys, apes and lemurs). Haven't quite figured out where the elves came from, actually. No one in-story has a clue, so whatever. (It's tricky because they have vestigal wings on a humanoid form.)

Spirit beings, except for the constructed ones like vampires, probably originated from magical energy generated by humans and elves. They're generally thought to be immortal, but in actuality most of them have an expected lifespan of around 10,000-20,000 years, so the oldest spirit beings have died off. And many of the surviving old ones are reclusive and strange, and don't relate well to humans or younger spirit beings (all of my protagonists, in other words).

Dwarves are probably an off-shoot of either humans or elves, I haven't decided. They're very rare, and mostly only elves had contact with them. Elves in my verse are endangered (their blood is extra tasty) so they've gotten fairly chaotic and lost touch with a lot of their former knowledge. Some major theorists in my story would need to rewrite their theories if they knew about dwarves.

Sunlighters and moonlighters were deliberately created by Magitek scientists in the 1800s, as vampire slayers and vampire healers. They mostly consider themselves different species, but in actuality moonlighters were made by slightly modifying sunlighters, and they're pretty much identical in physiology. One of my protagonists is living proof of this, because he's a hybrid of the two.

That's the only verse I've pondered origins much in.

edited 28th Feb '11 2:01:37 PM by Ettina

If I'm asking for advice on a story idea, don't tell me it can't be done.
Gvzbgul from Middle Earth Since: Jul, 2010
#21: Mar 1st 2011 at 12:00:50 AM

Due to the way time travel works in my world a time traveller travelled back in time and then fell (there was no land beneath him back then) into a pool of water where he decomposed and sparked off the start of life on Earth.

Add Post

Total posts: 21
Top