From:	Erik Jameson <erikj@****.COM>
Subject:	Re: ED Races in SR; why it can't happen (long)
Date:	Thu, 7 May 1998 19:26:44 -0400

At 08:43 PM 5/6/98 -0400, you wrote:

>One simple explanation is magic levels. Although magic levels are high,
>they are not high enough for T'skrang, Obsidimen or Windlings to appear.

This would appear to be obvious, but I'm not convinced it's true.

>In the Denizens of Barsaive book, it is mentioned that with magic levels
>dropping, T'skrang have a lower egg fertility rate.

AHA!! If their fertility rates drop with the level of magic, eventually
they could reach a point there they simply can't have children anymore.
Which would mean that would go extinct. No more t'skrang, because their
genetic code can't be passed down any farther.

Let's look at it this way. If a barghest is derived from a certain breed
of dog, then that breed of dog would go extinct and the only thing left
would be barghests. If barghests were to go extinct, there wouldn't be
anything left to return back to dogs when the magic dropped. It's a
hypothetical proposition anyway, and one that quite simply eliminates the
t'skrang from ever appearing in SR. They died with with Fourth Age.

>Each of these three
>races are not necessarily directly related to humans; for this reason, it
>is possible that their resurgence requires a higher magic level. For
>example, I don't believe that the Obsidimen will necessarily appear at the
>same time as dwarves and elves. Consider the length of mana cycles; it's
>quite possible that T'skrang will appear in two or three hundred years;
>with such a time scale, FASA can safely say that T'skrang will not appear
>in Shadowrun.

That's also true. But I honestly don't believe that they will appear.
They've gone the way of the dodo and the passenger pigeon. Lost but to the
annals of history.

Erik J.


"Oh my God, they killed Dunkelzahn! You bastards!!!"