There is nothing stopping you from making a population of passenger pigeons and releasing them into your world. The question is is you can get that across and if they will accept it. They are used to North America. Even the closest approximation of that on Sanctuary wold require significant modification to deal with things like the local climate, the day night cycle or lack thereof, pathogens etc...
Green Flame Rising (Exalted vs Dresden Files)
- Thread starter DragonParadox
- Start date
- Crossover Fantasy
There is nothing stopping you from making a population of passenger pigeons and releasing them into your world. The question is is you can get that across and if they will accept it. They are used to North America. Even the closest approximation of that on Sanctuary wold require significant modification to deal with things like the local climate, the day night cycle or lack thereof, pathogens etc...
I think the problem is that passenger pigeons were strongly adapted to a specific habit and niche. It's one reason their population crashed so hard.
They needed to exist in vast numbers and there to be a massive amount of deciduous forests for them to range over.
I don't think Sanctuary has a significant fraction of a continent covered in the right kind of trees spare.
How the hell did this just sit here for that long without something happening? Especially with the city basically being necromatic Mecca given Kemmler's association with it and how returning to Demonreach was a critical goal of his during WW1.
Were his kids just afraid to mess with his stuff?
Didn't we have a conversation with Lydia about how our hell was an afterlife where you can live again? Maybe we could slurp these things down and incarnate them in the courts. Probably in a new form since we're talking about a swarm of bird souls marinading in necromantic juices for over a century returned to life by the power of a hell, but that still technically fits the bill.
Personally I'd hope for a new spirit fusion species. It'd be cool if the Passenger Pigeons say became psychopomps that helped carry souls to us for entry into the courts or something after they incarnate again.
That or making them the basis of the Solicitor Scepters we were just talking about. Animal necromancy being a grey area in the laws of magic is canon, so they make for decent grey magic symbolism. Instead of wands we make them into bird spirits that act like a familiar.
Bonus points for the fact that they can have bronze ish, green, and spotted feathers in nature. So post magical rebirth they could be in our colors and covered in images of eyes.
I'd prefer an emanation that mostly stays dematerialized in an object, but they probably wouldn't accept that as a substitute.
@Yog thoughts?
Edit: should have refreshed before posting
That... might not be out of question.
That's an option. Though I am not sure if it's the best one. I want to ask more questions. First of all:
@DragonParadox is this a correct summary of the scene we have before us a collection f souls, which are the sum total of all passenger pigeon species souls, numbering in the billions. So definitely not just the souls of the last generation of the species, but likely the collective of all souls of all passenger pigeons ever. The collection is sentient, and might be low-key sapient. Enough at least, to be able to make and keep deals long-term, understanding complex commands by Kemmler. The collective has a desire - for the souls of the collective to be reincarnated,
Is that correct?
This definitely feels like an exalted grade feat. From the Age of Legends even.
Molly has no way to tell if it's all of them, but there sure are a lot of them. Other than that good summary.
This is something you can definitely ask.
There were very strong reasons why I pushed for our Hell to actually be Earth-standard.
Moot point now.
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Can we de-extinct them?
Sure. Wikipedia says there's ~1500 known passenger pigeon skins around the world, as well as 16 skeletons.
And Molly is on speaking terms with Summer.
Im even willing to bet that Summer might well have a breeding population tucked away somewhere.
Can we restore the original population ?
Probably not, at least not in the short to medium term; the passenger pigeon population was estimated in the 3-5 billion range in the 19th century. And it might not be wise given other changes.
But de-extincting the species and restoring a breeding population seems straightforward enough.
And Im reasonably sure that even with habitat changes, the removal of the pressure of human hunting should make their survival a lot easier.
Also, they largely bred in and around the Great Lakes. Which is Molly's stomping grounds anyway.
The other , and arguably much more pertinent reason is that we killed them.
In industrial quantities. As per Wikipedia:
It wasnt an accident, it was homicide.
The same thing we almost did to the buffalo.
Can the number "in the billions" be confirmed? Also, some more questions:
1) What is the total "power level" of the whole thing? How does it compare to, say, Bane (the small god we made), Porter, Lily, and Molly herself
2) Are they creatures of darkness?
And on possible solutions:
1) Theoretically, de-extinction would be a transformation splendor effect (transform pigeon ghost into some type of organic-based arcana) or a second coming variant effect (resurrect them)?
2) How applicable are Tiffany's flesh crafting skills here?
Moreover, this might have been Kemmler-driven to start with.
I don't think de-extincting them as they were is really viable. Transforming them into something new, on the other hand...
- Yes, they are blanketing the sky
- Less then an incarna, but not by much. If someone who's not combat specked like say Lilly has to fight this thing on her own she would likely be forced to run just because she has no means of doing damage fast enough
- Yes, they were bound by a necromancer and are very much dead
Possible.
I doubt it though; people are entirely capable of short-sighted behavior without external inducers.
It really is. There are mundane organizations trying it today.
They didnt die of disease, they were hunted to death. Just make sure people arent doing the hunting anymore.
Breeding a starting population in a Sanctuary biome and releasing them into the wild in batches of a couple hundred to a thousand at a time is entirely within our capabilities.
Transforming, or trying to transform them is just overly complicating the issue IMO.
The political ramifications are probably significant, but we can almost certainly avoid notice if we so choose.
It has trees. They have iron bark and feed on lightning but they exist. If we pulled them in as a normal species they'd probably need to live in the cities.
It seems a lot more practical than our other options if it works in the first place.
Pigeon spirits touched by necromancy have a better association with grey magic than chickens/living animals*, are intelligent enough to negotiate, populace enough to matter, and already in a useful form for supernatural stuff.
We also wouldn't need to wait for a manse that's who knows how many steps away to start. We could build such a splendor now and have Ordo members working with them in the near future.
* While they aren't messenger pigeons the symbolism of riding along with a passenger pigeon/sending one to carry magic into the world is neat.
So would a splendor that applied a spirit template like the one we were working with earlier, but with simulacrum bodies instead of demon matter, be viable?
It's possible, but it's also the "boring" option. They went extinct once, we should make it so they won't go extinct again.
Oh, I misread that. Sorry. Yeah, transforming them into a new spirit species seems like an interesting idea. This is rather coincidental to what we talked about, yeah. And they are a social species.
BoredMan
Dinosaurs came in many flavors. Like potato chips.
Damn, that's screwed up. I am rather curious as to how something of this scale was just left here by Kemmler's followers. Should probably have Lydia ask them.
Well yeah, I was just thinking this is a perfect opportunity to actually do what we were talking about by modifying the build a bit to do what we want but suit the undead pigeon Incarnae's needs.
We can be flexible with the details as long as the core function remains.
Bonus points in that our direct transformation birds can start at full strength in more available quantities even if their children will probably needs to start weaker themselves.
[X] Plan Familiar Opportunity
-[X] Use Crown Question on the current scene to find where other pieces of Kemmler's legacy are located
-[X] Activate Empathy excellency, All Things betray (with willpower), and Hellscry Chakra to ease the communication
-[X] Ask the spirits questions:
--[X] Would they be amendable to changes in their bodies, if those changes made it less likely that they would go extinct in the future?
--[X] Do they need to be resurrected all at once, or is a small but steady stream of resurrections ok?
-[X] If they are amendable, work on resurrecting them as natural familiars (Synergy 5 psychic phenomena)
-[X] If not, de-extinction is a worthy cause
First draft on a plan. The question is to locate where other things like this left behind by Kemmler are located. This would give us more foci on him.
-[X] Use Crown Question on the current scene to find where other pieces of Kemmler's legacy are located
-[X] Activate Empathy excellency, All Things betray (with willpower), and Hellscry Chakra to ease the communication
-[X] Ask the spirits questions:
--[X] Would they be amendable to changes in their bodies, if those changes made it less likely that they would go extinct in the future?
--[X] Do they need to be resurrected all at once, or is a small but steady stream of resurrections ok?
-[X] If they are amendable, work on resurrecting them as natural familiars (Synergy 5 psychic phenomena)
-[X] If not, de-extinction is a worthy cause
First draft on a plan. The question is to locate where other things like this left behind by Kemmler are located. This would give us more foci on him.
Yeah, this seems like too good an opportunity to pass up. You do realize that we would be basically making cranium rats, right? Like, a pigeon with Synergy 5 functions incredibly well as a hive mind. A species of such would be disruptive, and I am all here for it. I'll whip up a design in the evening, shouldn't be hard.
I dont really agree about it being boring.
There are multiple ways to handle this. Give them fallback roosts on islands in the Great Lakes.
Bind some of the dead pigeons to watch over them. Get Little Folk to guard their nesting sites. Fund mundane conservation efforts after "discovering" a surviving population. Talk to Summer and do a big magical working to put a Fortune Path blessing on the species.
Chucking them into Sanctuary is frankly the less interesting option from a narrative standpoint.
Nor am I particularly interested in having to deal with the security ramifications of introducing an entirely new species, potentially sapient, that has the interest of a near-Incarna class spirit hive mind to the NeverNever domain that is connected to Molly's soul. And then telling them they cant leave.
If we wanted to make Sanctuary a sanctuary for that type of thing, we wouldnt have made it the sort of alien biosphere that we did.
EDIT
Also, its worth noting that some ecologists appear to think they were a keystone species
Putting them back into the Great Lakes region might help with the local ecology.
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VOTE
[X] How hard is it to de-extinct a species? Do what they were promised so Lydia can set the poor things to rest
We can perform studies about precisely how to do this.
But we seem to be mostly in agreement that we do want to do this.
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If we want to help the area, their is a river infested with trout or something that goes from Chicago to the Great Lakes. That if they ever got to the Great Lakes would kill all native fish.
Even if you don't want to do anything strange with the birds, like making a pigeon god, giving them all a hivemind or whatever else, I think you should at least add a crown question. The opportunity to find all of Kemmler's caches is worth a lot.
frozenchicken
Does not have a custom title.
[X] How hard is it to de-extinct a species? Do what they were promised so Lydia can set the poor things to rest
Un-extincting a species is exactly the kind of BS an Exalt should get up to.
Un-extincting a species is exactly the kind of BS an Exalt should get up to.
I dont think its a relevant focus for Kemmler.
But its reasonable to ask the QM about it
@DragonParadox
QUESTION
Is this scene a relevant focus for finding any surviving Kemmler caches?
If not the scene, then the bound bird spirits. They were bound by Kemmler, and are held from their final rest by Kemmler's (false) promise. They are, in essence, Kemmler's creations.
The spirit in front of you is a focus that could be used to find out stuff about Kemmler, the scene could be used to find out more about said spirit
Ah, ok. Let me correct a bit then:
[X] Plan Familiar Opportunity
-[X] Use Crown Question on the spirit in front of you to find where other Kemmler's caches are located
-[X] Use the Crown on the current scene to find where we can find other spirits of extinct species
-[X] Activate Empathy excellency, All Things betray (with willpower), and Hellscry Chakra to ease the communication
-[X] Ask the spirits questions:
--[X] Would they be amendable to changes in their bodies, if those changes made it less likely that they would go extinct in the future?
--[X] Do they need to be resurrected all at once, or is a small but steady stream of resurrections ok?
-[X] If they are amendable, work on resurrecting them as natural familiars (Synergy 5 psychic phenomena)
-[X] If not, de-extinction is a worthy cause
Added a question about how the spirit views humans. Just in case it harbors a lot of resentment.
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'Pieces of his legacy' is very vague, the more specific you get the more likely you are to get something actionable.