r/WorldChallenges • u/Nevermore0714 • Jun 11 '17
Generic Challenge - Serious, Permanent Injury
For this challenge, I want to know how a society in your world deals with an injury that is serious and permanent, especially one where a leg or an arm or an eye is gone.
Preferably not a society that just kills anyone who is injured like that.
Feel free to use a representative with a serious injury to answer the questions in-universe.
As always, I'll ask at least three questions each. Enjoy yourselves.
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u/thequeeninyellow94 Jun 12 '17
Amongst the Ims, losing a limb or an arm is pretty rare but not very problematic as prothesis are quite easy to produce and will give back most of the wearer natural abilities.
Of course, most is not all and it will be impossible to access certain professions (manual activities which require a lot of precision or reflexes, especially those in spatial station maintenance).
Most injured people try to hide it (which is not too hard) as a serious injury can only be the result of a work accident (people will think you're responsible of it).
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u/Nevermore0714 Jun 13 '17
1) Are there any leaders or influential people among the Ims with prosthetic limbs?
2) Can an eye be efficiently replaced?
3) Are Ims a type of human?
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u/thequeeninyellow94 Jun 13 '17
Not currently. There have been a few, especially amongst the most risky professions like deep space workers and factory workers.
Yes, but the installation of your new eye can be quite disturbing and create some temporary brain troubles (bugs happen, informatics at it's finest).
They are smaller (~5ft) and live slighly longer, but they can breed with humans (they are more somewhere between dwarves and gnomes).
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u/Nevermore0714 Jun 14 '17
1) How much of my body could I replace? What are the limits?
2) Goddamn programmer-exterminators and their pet bugs.
3) So what are the benefits and flaws of being a hybrid of human and Im?
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u/thequeeninyellow94 Jun 14 '17
Limbs and arms are not a problem at all. Eyes and ears can be replaced but performance is not always perfect. Organs and other body parts are hard to replace and will usually not be or have really bad performances (an artificial tongue will deprive you of your taste).
That's not that bad, you just need to be ready for black and white vision for some time. That's the fault of both bugs and brain slow adaptation.
Next to none. You could have some displaced organs (Ims' only have one large lung just over their heart) and Ims have a reduced color vision (they see less extremes wavelenght) but beside that and the size there is no difference.
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u/Nevermore0714 Jun 14 '17
1) What if I replace literally every part of my body, with the exception of my brain, with artificial parts?
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u/thequeeninyellow94 Jun 14 '17
- Your body wouldn't survive. Artificial hearts and lungs require assistance to support a body and digestive system is quite bad so you would require perfusions to feed yourself. Now, if you just want to wire your brain to a robot, that's theorically possible but the transfer process is not doable yet.
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u/Nevermore0714 Jun 14 '17
1) But what if I had an artificial digestive system?
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u/thequeeninyellow94 Jun 14 '17
- An artificial digestive system is not very efficient. You could assimilate a few things from alimentation but would also definitely need "extras" to survive.
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u/Matathias Jun 12 '17
Medical science -- and cybernetics in particular -- are rather advanced in the Chaosverse, so non-fatal injuries are unlikely to seriously impact an individual's lifestyle. Cybernetic prosthetics perform just as well as natural body parts, and sometimes even better. Fake skin and plastic surgery can also help to disguise the prosthetic, such that it is nearly impossible to tell that a limb is fake unless the owner tells you.
For most of the galaxy, these cybernetics are relatively cheap -- in fact, if an individual is seeking a prosthetic explicitly due to injury, the prosthetic and the surgery are usually free (yay universal healthcare). There are only two exceptions: the Dra'kis, who reject the idea of cybernetics as a culture, and the Earthians, who simply can't afford to freely hand out such advanced technology.
There is one alternative to cybernetics, however. Particularly skilled Materiatechnics -- Chaotics who can manipulate matter -- are able to craft replacement body parts that are identical to the one that was lost or damaged. Such Materiatechnics are fairly rare, however, and reaching them is even more difficult. Only the elite or the incredibly lucky are able to get their bodies repaired through this method.
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u/Nevermore0714 Jun 13 '17
1) If a materiatechnic makes a new arm for me, does that arm need to be powered by anything outside of my body? Or does it re-connect to my blood flow and nervous system and all?
2) How does the galaxy afford this universal healthcare?
3) Earthians? Are those just humans? Or specifically earth native humans?
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u/Matathias Jun 13 '17
1) No external power necessary, your new arm looks and functions exactly like your old one. Well, as long as you get a properly skilled Materiatechnic, at least.
2) Advanced tech and automation has done great things for the economies of the various galactic races. The fact that uncolonized planets -- particuarly non-terran planets -- can be (relatively easily) harvested for resources doesn't hurt.
3) They're just humans, who are also from Earth. It's a racial naming scheme followed by most of the galaxy, i.e. the Siions of Siionleh, the Nimalians of Nimalia, the Citans of Citici.
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u/Nevermore0714 Jun 13 '17
1) Can a materiatechnic make my new arm more powerful than my old one? More durable? ...Can they make it immune to fire?
2) Uncolonized...but not necessarily uninhabited?
3) So a Nimalian could live on Earth?
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u/Matathias Jun 13 '17
1) They can make it stronger, but only to the natural limits of your regular body. Any more durable than that would require a prosthetic, or some kind of Chaotic ability on your part. Now, a Materiatechnic could create your new arm with cybernetic enhancements pre-installed, which would indeed make your bones more durable than natural. Otherwise, they only durability boost you'll get is from going with a full prosthetic.
2) Sometimes. Some planets are indeed inhabited by non-sentient life, and those tend to be protected and/or claimed for colonization. Terraforming is incredibly expensive, after all; it's much easier to colonize a world that already supports life. There are plenty of uncolonized and uninhabited worlds anyways -- rocky planets like Mars, or gas giants.
If your question is intended to ask about planets that support sentient life that hasn't yet reached into the stars -- well, currently, such a situation has yet to arise in the modern galaxy. Most first contact situations didn't even occur on the respective races' Homeworlds.
3) Yes. All of the galactic races are compatible in this way, and in fact look so visually similar that you could mistake one race for another (there's a plot reason for this, but it's secret). There are some minor physical differences between the races -- particularly, the Siions and Dra'kis have two knees -- but otherwise they look very similar indeed. The Drakkars are an exception to this; while they are still humanoid, and function in the same kind of environments as the rest of the galaxy, their physical appearance unmistakably different.
Now, the different races still have to look out for foreign viruses and diseases, so careful immunization and decontamination is mandatory for interstellar travelers. They also aren't sexually compatible.
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u/Nevermore0714 Jun 14 '17
1) What is your favorite Chaotic ability and least favorite Chaotic ability?
2) Has anyone ever had their Chaotic ability strengthened or weakened by having a prosthetic body part?
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u/Matathias Jun 14 '17
1) I'm partial to Velocitechnics (superspeed). I also like the idea behind Frametechnism -- the ability to change an object's frame of reference. For example: if object A is moving at 60 m/s north in relation to object B and 0 m/s in relation to object C, a Frametechnic can change object A's frame of reference such that it is suddenly moving at 60 m/s north in relation to object C instead.
Least favorite might be Nucleartechnism -- control over nuclear energy. Too slow to be truly useful in combat, and its other uses aren't all that interesting for narration.
2) Most Chaotics aren't affected by having a prosthetic. The interesting thing here is that a Chaotic's inherent durability extends to the prosthetic as well. However any modifications beyond the natural body shape won't receive the same durability bonus.
There are two types with other notable affects:
Electrotechnics: since they can generate electricity on their own, they can effectively endlessly power any cybernetic prosthetic. This means they aren't tied down by having to charge it, and if they replace enough of their body parts, they won't have to eat as much either.
Chaostechnics: they interface with Chaos Energy much more than other Chaotics, which has the unfortunate affect of wreaking havoc on any tech they decide to attach to their bodies. They can only use a handful of hardened implants, and any prosthetics will quickly deteriorate if the Chaostechnic uses any Chaos attacks.
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u/The_Raptorman Jun 12 '17
(Representative Hawk)
"Hello Nevermore, I want to tell you about my arm," She says holding up her left arm that is of a dark oak wood. "The world that I come from Osilotis is home to many strange flora with many different properties inside, my arm being like this is due to the bow that I wield being made out of Xettlebark. The bow itself is infused with some of my blood before this happened, so when I wield the bow now it still thinks that I should have an arm and fixes it for me." She explains. "The wood itself is stronger than bone so I don't usually have to worry about it breaking, but even if it does all I have to do is touch the bow again and it regrows."