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Today's Topic – Random Question: In this setting-with all laws of physics- how would shapeshifting work?
- Questions are the foundation of Worldbuilding
- Found on stack exchange from Molua Young
- Criteria
- magic is an inherited ability to manipulate energy and matter
- Answer
- Look to the universe for inspiration
- The butterfly effect
- Egg to Caterpillar
- Caterpillar to goo
- goo to butterfly
- Really everything starts in a different form from birth through life
- Additional questions
- Does the mass of the being change
- What happens to the conciseness of the altered being
- What limits the ability to shapeshift
- Can magic speed up or slow down the process
- Can living beings change into a rock…
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The Rating
This is an advanced topic
The Worldbuilding Task for the Day
Comment the show notes page with how you would deal with this question
The Real World task for the day
Find and watch a documentary about the universe or nature. Make notes about interesting discovers you make for future inspiration about worldbuilding
The Tease 1 Minute
Do you micro climate?
Please take a moment and comment below on this episode. I look forward to hearing from you about your Fantasy Worldbuilding adventures
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You asked for comments. I’m a nerd and a geek. You brought this upon yourself.
1. The vast majority of caterpillars are vegetarians but there is at least a few that are a carnivores. http://www.bbc.com/earth/story/20150119-caterpillars-that-attack
2. Monarch butterflies have a normal life cycle (dying two to six weeks after emerging as a butterfly) until the fall when they begin their migration. Those lucky few stay alive for six months migrating to and living in Mexico until spring when they begin to fly back up. They lay eggs and die, and the cycle starts anew.
3. If you have a purely physical world, you need to account for lost mass in shape-shifting. I suggest dark matter/energy. Other dimensions could be a good go to as well (this is what I have done, but the other dimensions are not empty, so there is a cost there). Also, you would want to stick to shifting into animals with a higher intelligence or you would get stuck. If you allow for a spiritual world as well as a physical, you can allow for shifting into lower life-forms by having the soul exist outside of the consciousness of the creature and thus trigger both certain desired actions and the change back into human.
As a geek and a nerd, I love it!