discussing dragons

[alurianknight]

This topic is to discuss and question the nature of dragons in the universe of Academagia and how it could affect any possible future interactions between dragons and the player.

 

Background: From what I've been able to glean from various adventures and Lore texts dragons in Academagia are viewed by humanity as vile and evil creatures that are the bane of humanity and are even used as bedside tales to frighten naughty children. This is because at sometime in humanities distant past dragons enslaved humanity for a very long time (am uncertain how long) until humanity eventually revolted and after a long hard fought war gained its freedom.

 

note: I am uncertain as to the exact nature of the dragons enslavement of humanity it would be much appreciated if someone could elaborate on the topic. Also its almost impossible to find any useful or specific information on a given topic in the lore texts due to poor organization and that really needs to be fixed.

 

So my question is are dragons really as evil and dastardly as the available sources of information imply?

 

I am inclined to believe that they are not. My line of reason for this is that if you really get right down to it the dragons haven't done anything that humans wouldn't and haven't done consistently to other creatures. humans have been enslaving other living thing since they lived in caves the only difference is that we call it domestication not enslavement and claim that domesticated animals living longer and easier lives under our care and for the most part this is true. My belief is that the dragons may vary well have seen their enslavement of humanity as nothing more than domestication of an inferior creature no different than how we see cows or sheep. However since then humanity has become more advanced and has proven that even if they aren't equal to dragons they can at least hold there own against them. thereby possibly causing some dragons to view humans as more than simply stray cattle.

 

So if this is true then it may very well be the possible for interactions between player and dragons that don't involve slaying and may even be very polite cordial and even intellectual.

[Mikka]

I don't think it would be correct to refer to Dragons as evil exactly, no. Immoral, but unless there is objective good and evil in the setting (and I'm not sure that there is), it's hard to refer to a race that's so different from humanity as 'evil'. If a human had done them to another human, we would call it evil- but if a human did it to a dog, would we call it evil? Maybe. Maybe not.

 

It's worth noting, though, that while the dog is sentient, it isn't sapient- while the human and the dragon are both sentient and sapient. If the dragon thinks and percieves on another plane of existance that humans cannot touch, we go back in to the morally gray hard to judge area, buttt... I don't see any hints in the game for that to be so.

 

So no, I wouldn't really call the dragons evil and dastardly, anymore then I'd call the 'gnomes', 'dwarves', trolls and other sorts of fae we meet in the game evil and disasterdly. That doesn't mean they're nice, and I doubt they saw humans as domesticated cattle. Humans were constantly attempting rebellions and running, which cattle really don't do. They kept humans under their control because humans made their life easier and allowed them to be lazier and expand and contain more. It's the same as any sci-fi story with Artifical Intelligent, I think. Dragons might have not enslaved humanity because 'We are evil and we like making humanity suffer, lol!', but I think even the kindest dragon would just barely fit as using the 'white man's burden' excuse you would see in historical slavery (skipping the obvious example of USA history, look at how Napolean turned on one of his only remaining allies in Spain in order to bring them under his enlighted rule as a reward and was utterly shocked when the obviously 'foolish' and 'barbaric' Spainards rebelled and decided to invent gurella warfare for him rather then appreciating his infinite wisdom and kindness... of course, he was at the downhill part of his campaign by then).

 

One can also note that we honestly haven't heard all that many details about the history of humans in Academagia, save for in the broadest overview. On our Earth, enslaving other humans, limiting other humans rights for circumstances out of their control, slaughtering cultures and people wholesale, so on and so forth (and it gets much, much, much worse) is a very large part of history, and something that still goes on today: there are many parts of this world where it's incredibly dangerous to be a certain race, gender, orientation, religion, or even simply have a certain hair or eye-color or have ancestors that just happened to be from a certain place. We don't know if that is true in the world of Academagia- what we've been told so far seems like a pretty tolerant society. It may be that there wasn't centuries of exploitation, crusading, genocide, etc, etc, yuck.

 

(And, honestly, with so many other supernatural creatures in the world, that may fit- as humans as a race have a surprising tendency to close ranks whenever threatened by an 'outsider', no matter how they feel about the so-called 'ranks' otherwise.)

 

If so, the Dragons take a different point. What if there was no concept of slavery for humans until the dragons forced it on them? I doubt that, but it makes an interesting thing to ponder about. In the end, I'm sure there probably are people who argue in the setting that the dragons are overly vilified in order to further the reputations of the Founders and other heroes for the Temples gain and rawr rawr rawr. And I'm sure people counter with the Dragons completely having destroyed culture, kingdom, and lifestyle of the humans... and then that the humans turned around and returned the favor on the dragons. No matter who or not is evil, I imagine polite . To have your people shattered and broken is an awful thing, as thousands of people could tell you today- and many of them did not lose their homeland themselves, but are simply descended from those who are. The First Nations/native tribes of North and South America, the conflict between Isereal and Palestine, the thousand of messes in the ASEAN area, the Rroma... I'm sure we could come up with thousands more, who are still struggling and in some case bitter about what was done to their ancestors. For the dragons? That's not going to be their ancestors so much as their parents (if not them themselves). It's hard to be polite with someone who destroyed everything you identified as yourself, as the humans certainly did in the rebellion.

 

(That doesn't mean that there isn't discourse between dragons and humans that doesn't lead to fighting, of course. Just that I don't think it's that easy.)

 

In any case, morality can be a bit strange in Academagia. Lambert keeps a pixie in a cage under his bed for half a school-year, after all. Llaria and Girars abandon their familar for another without really a second thought. The male Avila kids are coooped up in a way that would certainly qualify as abuse and need of child protection services in the modern world. Your eleven/twelve year old student can at certain times fight other humans with what has to be intent to kill, even if the game carefully avoids allowing that to actually happen by adults showing up and/or the bad-guys suddenly surrendering. You can rob, cheat, steal, blackmail, and use Mastery to completely change someone's personality forcing them to destroy their closest friends, give up all important to them, go against their values... or you can just knock them in a coma.

 

So, yeah. Summary: Dragons, no, problem not evil- at least, probably not any more evil then the humans are. But I think there was a lot more to their enslavement then simple domestication, considering human sapiance and the ability to conciously rebel rather then instictively; there is a cruelity in doing so that is not exactly the same as the human enslaving the cow or ant. Still, I'm sure we'll be able to talk to dragons before the game ends in year 5, and probably fight them to.

 

Also, history is depressing.

[MadHatt]

I doubt that dragons would come around for being rebelled against. In almost every game and lore, dragons are arrogant beings that disconsider humanity. The rebellion probably just annoyed them.

 

It is mentioned in the game, Faux Dragon familiar quest that

 

 

Faux dragons are non-magical dragons that are suited for social and non-violent interaction with humans, whereas the ancestors of the Faux dragons are magical but not suited for habitual co-existence with humans. In order for the Faux dragon to continue to be non-violent towards humans, they have learned to live without fire

 

 

so it might even go deeper than just animosity between races.

 

I am wondering exactly what were the circumstances and relationships between humans and dragons because, like humans, I expect them to be diverse enough. It's also mentioned how dragons taught humans magic (either Gates or Mastery...I forget) and you don't do that for an inferior slave. It could be me clinging to threads simply because I love dragons and feel pangs in my stomach whenever I have to kill one in video games, but there is much more that we don't know (and that most people in Elumia don't know) about the dragon / human relationship and the reasons for the dragon enslavement.

 

This situations vaguely reminds me of "How to train your dragon".

[Legate of Mineta]

Dragons actually taught humans all forms of magic except Astrology. And...that's all I'll say about that.

[Schwarzbart]

Just play trough the Dance of Fool and then you see that the Humans are by no means any bether then the dragon are.

 

Puthing Prissoner in a Dragon Costume so that the Mob can hit them and probably there was a high dead rate at the wearer of the dragon costume.

 

I also aggre with the point that the dragons just saw/see the humans as inverior and so it was just fair to have them put under theyr rules.

Do we know how the humans came to this world? Because it could be that the dragon just where the reason for the human exist at all here.

Then do the humans realy care for the other inteligent beeings next to them, some do, but otheres are as cruel to them as the storys of the dragons tell us the dragons where to us.

Oh and don't forget the History is allways rewriten by the people who wone the war, isn't is so?

 

As a Player I am curios about how the Dragon tell the story about the human rebelion and maybe we will have the luck and get a insight in this in a future year. ^^

[alurianknight]

mikka,

 

I think its interesting you assume that dragons are that different from humans. I mean sure dragons are very different physically but mentally we have no way of knowing just how different they are from humans. matter of fact the faux dragon familiar the closest thing we've had to a real dragon and was a real dragon for parts of one of its adventures showed a mental attitude very similar to a human one. For all we know mentally there could be no difference at all.

 

actually cows some times do rebel in away. sometimes the bull(the lead male in a herd) will rebel by trying to run a away or attacking people and the rest of the herd will sometimes follow suite when this happens the owners have no choice but to kill the bull and sometimes even the whole herd.

 

I agree with you here though I don't think its because the information isn't out there I think its just buried in the poorly organized lore texts. the best solution would be if the Academagia team would post a point by point history on the forums giving a brief explanation of each major period that explains what happened how it occurred and how it leads into the next period

 

I think this is a another example of us not having enough easily accessed information at our disposal. From what I gathered of the war humans didn't really destroy the dragons in any capacity as it was they barely managed to gain independence from the dragons and then isolated themselves from the dragons. The dragons more likely than viewing it as a grievous debt that needs to be paid in blood probably view it more like how the British viewed the american war for independence in that they see it as an insult from a child.

 

Though I agree that any discussion between dragons and humans on a political scale would be tense. On a personnel level I think that would depend on the dragon and human I can't believe that every dragon approved of the enslavement of humanity after all they are intelligent beings capable of independent thought and beliefs and I don't think every human in the Academagia universe would be so affected by the prejudices of their people that they would automatically hate all dragons.

 

as for your commentary of morality in Academagia most of what you described has very common parallels and aren't acts of morality but simply the acts of a child who doesn't fully understand what he's/she's doing. As for children of 11/12 attacking with an intent to kill that isn't even the slightest bit abnormal when you consider that when they do attack in such a capacity in Academagia its usually in defense of self or another. I recall that when I was that age there were several times I felt so threatened that I would attack my enemy with the intent to maim if not kill because I thought I was in legitimate danger of being severely injured or even killed twice. Also the Belief that children so young are naturally innocent and shouldn't even be exposed to such things is a modern concept in ancient greece children were trained for the military as young as seven and were considered of marrying age at thirteen

 

History is not always depressing there is just as much good in human history as there is bad

[CremePudding]

Dragons actually taught humans all forms of magic except Astrology. And...that's all I'll say about that.

 

So... horrible monsters from beyond the stars teach the humans Astrology instead?

[Schwarzbart]

Dragons actually taught humans all forms of magic except Astrology. And...that's all I'll say about that.

Interesting so one of the Strategic advances the human haved (maybe still have) is seen as outdated thing of the past.

Together with restricting / banning other kinds of magic and adventures hinting that even in the curent allowed kinds of magic the mages of the past haved powerfull knowledge that got lost I wonder when the wall will fall if the Humans have any chance at all.

That the Wall will fall in the future, maybe even in the livetime of our Chars is in my opinion a given fact.

[Adrian]

Not that I disagree with anything that has been mentioned, but remember that the dragons kept society running though many years, and allowed privileged humans to rise to great hights indeed - something they may regret now if anyone of them realizes it.

 

Enslavement might have been preferable for some, compared to the horrors of, say, anarchy or civil war. Anywho, that is speculation, not entirely sure how life was before the dragons, nor if anyone actually knows anymore..

 

 

A bit of direct lore would be great, but this kind of vague infomation does give rise to all kinds of great conspiresy theories!

 

(Also, guessing astrology was taught by decendants of the gods perhaps?)