> > Ok, well, this disputes an element of Alexx's Timeline (no pun intended), > which is perhaps more reliable than the Texts themselves - Well, I'm flattered, but I completely disagree with this. While I probably look at things with a different eye than SKZB, I certainly don't have anything close to the mental time-investment or authorial authority that he has. My mandate is to try and reconcile all the textev, pointing out apparent contradictions as I find them, and, ideally, finding clever solutions to make them not actually be contradictions. Steve's manadate is to Write Cool Stories. If some of my notes are of some small assistance in that process, I am, again, flattered and honored, but I Am Not The Author. [I still have a niggling suspicion that he was thinking specifically of me when he decided to not have Morrolan physically present at Zerika's battle atop Deathmist. It has certainly been driving me slightly nuts. For the moment, I'm going with the theory involving Tazendra, but I'm not going to put the details of that theory in the timeline until it is either proved or disproved. It's a complex enough idea that it would definitely constitute a spoiler if accurate.] > > Modern Dragaerans care; I was referring to preindustrial cultures > > (those lacking fine engineering) in general (although starting to care > > about finer gradations of time helps propel such engineering research > > that then develops it). And of course, the Orb is a digital computer > > as far as timekeeping is concerned, and so could track such variation, > > if that is in fact how they wished to go about things (not that I have > > any certainty about whether they do or not). > > My assertion was that while the Empire is preindustrial, it's technical, > and as such might (I'd think must) have for millennia cared about say > how long to subject a dagger to Lady X's ensorcelling rays. But would you assert that they had any such care in the pre-Orb days? We don't have any solid textev on what the state of Magic Theory was in those days (apart from vague references to Shamans). Alexx Alexx Kay Opinions expressed are my own and not necessarily those of my employers alexx at world.std.com http://world.std.com/~alexx "...I found myself seemingly in conversation with an entity that identified itself as "One of the Nine Dukes," and then upon closer interrogation as "Asmoday." Its "body," when I asked it to show me what it looked like, consisted of a shifting and shimmering latticework of repeated spider motifs, all identical but at different scales. These, while keeping their colouring consistent, appeared to be constantly turning themselves inside out through a spatial dimension that was foreign to me, becoming on the reverse a similar shifting lattice, this time with a reiterated lizard motif. This would turn itself inside out and become the mesh of spiders again, and so on. As a constant background to this effect, there was a beautiful pattern composed of peackock's-tail eyes. The entire thing was like a 360-degree sphere or field of presence that surrounded my head, moving and speaking lucidly to me (and with great politeness and charm, it must be said)." -- Alan Moore in correspondence with Dave Sim about _From Hell_