Information on the Masks

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flibergdde
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Information on the Masks

#1 Post by flibergdde »

The Masks were the one part of the comic I didn’t get. Could you tell me any information on the Masks? Thanks

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Re: Information on the Masks

#2 Post by Cpt.Obvious »

No one here knows much about the masks. Working from memory I don't think we've been told how many they are or exactly what their powers are, but but three has been named and two has appeared in the comic. For what it's worth they can be considered to be gods or at least god level beings. The masks named are Order, Neutral and Chaos.

To Humans and Keidrans the masks are gods, though they don't seem to be worshiping them, and I'm not even sure if their existence is common knowledge. The masks created at least some of the dominant races as a part of a game, and has been guiding them trying to outmaneuver each other. From what I remember we know that Humans and Keidran are creations of two of the masks, The Dragons however I think is older having been created by an older deity who may be the original creator of this entire world and possibly also created the Masks. Neutral, also known as Ephemeral created the Keidran, and did at one time possess Flora to convince Trace to break up with her. Ephemeral also said something about lifting the ban on a forbidden race in order to save the keidran races. Speculation has been rampant but the two most popular theories seems to be that the forbidden race is Human / Keidran hybrids, and that either Ephemeral was allowing for Flora to become pregnant by Trace and that's it, or that the ban was removed for all keidran, and now a lot of keidran / human couples can look forward to a surprised to be delivered in a few months.

I can't remember if the Basitins are creations of the masks or if they are older. I'm guessing it's the later, but really don't know why I think so. Once the ice is broken someone will jump in with links and quotes telling us just where I got my supernaturals crossed.

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Re: Information on the Masks

#3 Post by Dadrobit »

The problem is that there really isn't a whole lot there anyways. Tom promised a Mini-Kinds comic about them a couple years back with more info, but it hasn't happened just yet, and they haven't even been seen in the comic for a decade now. Still, here's what I know.

Yes, Basitins were created by the third mask, Good/Order. Humans were created by Evil/Chaos and the Keidran by Neutral/Ephemural as was mentioned.

The names are largely meaningless, they're just what the mortals came to call them.

The races were created "a few thousand years before the comic".

Though their races were initially just created out of thin air, evolution is a thing still.

Their races are essentially just pawns in a big board game to them.

They are not Gods, but they are Demi-Gods having been created by the Elder God(s?).

Dragons also predate them.

They can only inhabit a willing host.

They can only attack one another when one of them is breaking a "rule".

They cannot be killed, only banished.

That's everything I know of that I can think of at the moment. I'll post more if I can think of other relevant factoids.
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Re: Information on the Masks

#4 Post by Hulk10 »

It would be nice to know more about them.
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Re: Information on the Masks

#5 Post by avwolf »

Here are the links to supplement Dadrobit's memory:
The names of the Masks
Tom wrote:They aren't actually "Good, Neutral, and Evil" though most people refer to them as that. In reality, they're official names are "Order, Neutral, and Chaos." None of them are inherently good or evil. They all just want different things. Order likes things to be predictable. Chaos likes things to be happening all the time. And Neutral wants a balance.

The three demi-gods like to play games, and they usually pick sides, but they often change sides as well, so it's no telling which mask is supporting which race at any one certain time. The mask's intentions aren't always what they seem. Order isn't always good, and Chaos isn't always bad. Imagine how much more order there might be if one race dominates all the others.
The Masks created the races
Tom wrote:Just to let you guys know, evolution does not exist in Twokinds. Keidran and humans were created by demi-gods. They all came from the earth, only a few thousand years before the current comic. This is not to say that Twokinds is promoting a specific religion, or non-religion, it's just the fact of the matter is all.
The comment on "evolution does not exist" is a mostly a matter of time frame: When you've only got a handful of thousands of years (even ten or so thousand years isn't really that much time in the evolutionary scheme of things), macroevolution doesn't have enough time for a real foothold. I don't think Tom was contraindicating against microevolution -- adaptation -- but rather that he was stating unequivocally that the origin of life in Twokinds is via gods and demigods explicitly.

Dragons were created by the "old gods"
Tom wrote:The dragons of Twokinds are said to be the creations of the old gods. They are officially classified as "greater beasts." They've been around longer then any other sentient race, and claim to have existed since the creation of the world itself, though there is no proof of this claim.
Now, note that all of these comments are very old, and Tom's been known to shift his lore without much warning, so while they are useful to know and, to my knowledge, have never been contradicted by canon, they're only as trustworthy as you're willing to invest trust in WoG comments outside of canon. I tend to take them as trustworthy, but one needs not do so; considering them as barely better than well-reasoned fan theory is a defensible position.
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Re: Information on the Masks

#6 Post by Technic[Bot] »

Tom wrote: Just to let you guys know, evolution does not exist in Twokinds. Keidran and humans were created by demi-gods. They all came from the earth, only a few thousand years before the current comic. This is not to say that Twokinds is promoting a specific religion, or non-religion, it's just the fact of the matter is all.
Wait. So the mask are Earthlings* like from a diferent version of planet Earth or am i simply misunderstanding this really old quote?
In any case hope they get reworked into the story, they are interesting but big all-powerful but disenfrachised beings/gods/eldritch abominations seem like "get out of jail ticket" whenerver the author writes himself into a corner.

*I Lack a better term in my vocabulary...
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Re: Information on the Masks

#7 Post by Schrodinger »

Technic[Bot] wrote: Mon Jan 29, 2018 2:09 am
Tom wrote: Just to let you guys know, evolution does not exist in Twokinds. Keidran and humans were created by demi-gods. They all came from the earth, only a few thousand years before the current comic. This is not to say that Twokinds is promoting a specific religion, or non-religion, it's just the fact of the matter is all.
Wait. So the mask are Earthlings* like from a diferent version of planet Earth or am i simply misunderstanding this really old quote?
In any case hope they get reworked into the story, they are interesting but big all-powerful but disenfrachised beings/gods/eldritch abominations seem like "get out of jail ticket" whenerver the author writes himself into a corner.

*I Lack a better term in my vocabulary...
The word 'earth' doesn't mean our planet exclusively, it can also refer to the soil of the land. It's a little murky on what he meant by 'they' here (my guess is that he meant the sentient races) but whomever he's referring to came not from some primordial ooze and developed over thousands of years but instead were formed like the Biblical Adam, "from the dust of the ground."
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Re: Information on the Masks

#8 Post by Cpt.Obvious »

Schrodinger wrote: Mon Jan 29, 2018 8:06 am
Technic[Bot] wrote: Mon Jan 29, 2018 2:09 am
Tom wrote: Just to let you guys know, evolution does not exist in Twokinds. Keidran and humans were created by demi-gods. They all came from the earth, only a few thousand years before the current comic. This is not to say that Twokinds is promoting a specific religion, or non-religion, it's just the fact of the matter is all.
Wait. So the mask are Earthlings* like from a diferent version of planet Earth or am i simply misunderstanding this really old quote?
In any case hope they get reworked into the story, they are interesting but big all-powerful but disenfrachised beings/gods/eldritch abominations seem like "get out of jail ticket" whenerver the author writes himself into a corner.

*I Lack a better term in my vocabulary...
The word 'earth' doesn't mean our planet exclusively, it can also refer to the soil of the land. It's a little murky on what he meant by 'they' here (my guess is that he meant the sentient races) but whomever he's referring to came not from some primordial ooze and developed over thousands of years but instead were formed like the Biblical Adam, "from the dust of the ground."
As fascinating some theological debate can be I don't think Tom was trying to imply that the masks sat about pounding dirt when creating the races. Given how similar to Terran species the Keidran and to a degree also the Basitin are it's likely that he meant that the Masks ported in both some fauna as well as some flora from Earth, Terra, Gaia or whatever you want to call our planet. Some of these were then chosen and uplifted to become the Keidran races. The humans were at least cosmetically unchanged, but might have been modified to allow for the use of magic.

This would explain why we see races such as foxes, wolves, tigers and all kinds of dog and cat breeds as well as humans. I could also explain the local humans creation myth saying that they arrived by ship. Such a ship might have been just about anything from the biblical ark to a FTL space ship.

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Re: Information on the Masks

#9 Post by amenon »

My reading of that line agrees with Schrodinger's: Essentially, 'created from inanimate matter.'

If Tom had meant the other thing, he would have presumably said 'They all came from Earth', because that would mean the other thing :P
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Re: Information on the Masks

#10 Post by Schrodinger »

My intent wasn't to strike up a theological debate, but to point out a parallel. Also I should bring up that apparently cats and dogs exist on this world.
Depending on the the timeline of events, I guess one of the masks wasn't very creative and just copied the already existing fauna to create their patron race.
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Re: Information on the Masks

#11 Post by Warrl »

Schrodinger wrote: Mon Jan 29, 2018 5:34 pmAlso I should bring up that apparently cats and dogs exist on this world.
Have we seen non-sapient dogs? (I know we've seen ordinary housecats.)

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Re: Information on the Masks

#12 Post by Qwe304 »

REALLY old forum post by tom: (from 2004 so take with a grain of salt)

Okay, here we go. This is a long story, which is why I didn't answer sooner, but I'll try to fast forward thru time as fast as I can. So....

in the beginning, the old gods created the universe. Even as they did, they began to die. As the last and most powerful one vanished, he created the three masks, to rule over one particularly lively planet. These masks were: Good, Evil, and Neutral.

As the masks watched over the world, they soon became bored. So they each created a race to live on the world. Each race today disputes which mask created which, but this is their general beliefs:

Keidran believe that they were created by good, while humans by evil, and basitins by neutral.

Humans believe that they were created by good, while Keidran by evil, and basitins, of course, by neutral.

Basitins, on the other hand, believe that both Humans and Keidran where created by evil, while they were created by neutral (as always) and good had enough sense to stay out of it.

In any case, for many hundreds of years the races lived in peace. That is, until the day came when one of the masks noticed that it's race was mixing and breeding with those of the other (humans with Keidran) For some reason, this angered it, and he quickly made it so that no human could bear the child of a Keidran, and vise versa.

The tension between the two races began to increase, and sensing this, the third mask took the third race (basitins) and moved them all on to large islands off the main lands (now the Basidian Isles).

Eventually, the first Keidran/Human war began. Many where killed, and this ammused the two masks greatly. But eventually things began to settle down. Seeing that there was no benifit for either side to fight, they developed a peace treaty, and the Keidran Boundaries were formed. The humans had won the most land in the end, but Keidran thrived in the woods they had been driven into.

As time went on, the masks fell into legend, and both humans and Keidran began to forget the treaty. after 600 years, the Templar were created, to "protect humanity". Almost the same time, the Keidran version of the Templar, "The BloodOrder," was also formed.

Today, war begins to brew again. Although not officially in a war, it's on the edge of one, with Flora and Trace at the ends of the balance beam.

Er... I kinda got away from gods for a while there and went into just history ;D sorry bout that. I guess that's all there is to know, though. Later, hundreds of years after Twokinds, Flora becomes a goddess to, ironically enough, humans. But that's another story..... ;)


source: http://twokinds.proboards.com/user/1/recent?q=gods
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Re: Information on the Masks

#13 Post by Dadrobit »

Please note that most everything from 2007 and before Tom has said is no longer true. While I recently verified, (as of June 2017) the posts avwolf supplied and a few other tidbits from that era, everything from proboards is totally defunct in terms of canon. Hence the stuff about a Keidran BloodOrder. (That was also around the time Tom was planning on making the Basitin Isles completely, (or nearly completely) dead.)

While it is certainly fun to go back and look at where the comic came from, all of that stuff in particular is author-certified non-canon.
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Re: Information on the Masks

#14 Post by Technic[Bot] »

Schrodinger wrote: Mon Jan 29, 2018 8:06 am The word 'earth' doesn't mean our planet exclusively, it can also refer to the soil of the land. It's a little murky on what he meant by 'they' here (my guess is that he meant the sentient races) but whomever he's referring to came not from some primordial ooze and developed over thousands of years but instead were formed like the Biblical Adam, "from the dust of the ground."
You are right, this particular quote is not very clear. Personally I found "they came from the Earth" as refering to the masks coming from planet Earth. After a while they got bored and proceeded,to create 3 species to pit into some global battle royal. I like this interpretation as i like my comics with a dash of aliens, but that is simply personal preferences.
In any case wether the mask decided to used familiar templates (Terran* fauna) , adapted anything that was already present on site (the actual planet when everything is happening) or sat around some promordial Klin and shaped all them out of clay is open to discussion and i look forward to 2020** when the comic will finally address the issue in a canonical way.
Warrl wrote: Mon Jan 29, 2018 9:57 pm
Schrodinger wrote: Mon Jan 29, 2018 5:34 pmAlso I should bring up that apparently cats and dogs exist on this world.
Have we seen non-sapient dogs? (I know we've seen ordinary housecats.)
I do not remeber dogs ither. On that point we have not seen cat keidran. Of course Flora is a tiger but not a cat same suborder but diferente species. Kathrin is supposed to be mixed, but we do not know exactly what type of Keidran were her parents (Or do we? I can't remember).
On that note squirrels seem a bit different from their real life counterparts.
Dadrobit wrote: Tue Jan 30, 2018 5:23 pm While it is certainly fun to go back and look at where the comic came from, all of that stuff in particular is author-certified non-canon.
As you say it is fun. We simply want to gather all information we do have and discuss/theorize for the enjoyment of it. Not trying to reconstruct Tom's train of tought and predict what exactly will happen when he finishes the comic in 2048***.

* Planet Earth
**That's a joke
***and that is another joke
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Re: Information on the Masks

#15 Post by MuonNeutrino »

Technic[Bot] wrote: Tue Jan 30, 2018 11:35 pm
Warrl wrote: Mon Jan 29, 2018 9:57 pm
Schrodinger wrote: Mon Jan 29, 2018 5:34 pmAlso I should bring up that apparently cats and dogs exist on this world.
Have we seen non-sapient dogs? (I know we've seen ordinary housecats.)
I do not remeber dogs ither.
We haven't *seen* the dogs, but in this comic Maren confirms that dogs exist.
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