So, I got a houndius shootius from an ocean shrine. Uh, lore implications? Overthinking the Constant 2 electric boogaloo

[Frosty_Mentos]

This might be another crazy rambling cause I got too much energy that I needed to spill out and that one thing in the game made me think a little too hard about game logic and lore so buckle up if you're reading this.

-----

Assuming that ancient guardian died more than once, or this is some kind of temporal displacement or whatever time shenanigans happened for that treasure to exist. Either that or this is just game logic and Klei unintentionally is gaslighting me thinking that ancient ruins were always ruins and crab people existed but also don't because idk SHADOW ELDRITCH MAGIC or something breaking the world.

Random rambling because I'm either going insane or the lore of anything weird can be filled in as 'because magic' as the answer at this point. I guess same goes with endless bottles that Pearl keeps tossing, endless treasures etc. Fuelweaver was right, the world is torn even before rifts were opened.

The ocean is but a pond with anything beyond is under the veil, the moon is literally a stage light that's keeping Constant still existing as ever evolving land. If Shipwrecked and Hamlet aren't accessible anymore via magic it probably could be assumed same thing happening like how Maxwell's door has vanished without really any explanation as Charlie took over those worlds so has shadows consumed them.

Either those worlds were consumed by shadows or not, hard to tell, cause then Wanda exist as utter anomaly that can 'travel' through those times, or worlds, times in those worlds like shipwrecked hamlet a new home forge gorge etc despite us not experiencing gameplay with her being there (mainly due to development reasons rather than lore, I beg for gorge to exist again as official and updated mode) I just think that if Pugna was right then if survivors won over those worlds so has the shadows had taken over.

Though, I still don't understand how a houndius shootius could be in a treasure chest. Assuming those few cases I mentioned of temporal anomalies, ancients resetting their own built magic and resources, ruins could have existed BEFORE ancients found it making this rabbit hole deeper into eras that are untouched and unknown because who knows how old the world is at this point to evolve into a very tame world or Maxwell had a hand in making it... I don't know. Constant's history is whack, fossils show only one creature to have existed or have survived as because of some kind of resilience to those fossils cause it's probably a demon or whatever - I DON'T GET IT

Imo Klei should straighten up their world history and lore a bit I think, or keep it broken as is I guess cause it's just a game anyway.

-----

Other anomaly I wanna talk about is all those marble statues that existed for a long long time. Assuming Maxwell started making some of those creations, seems that Charlie had messed with the material and inbued magic into marble as a whole.

How do you think we got marble trees and shrubs? She had influence over the throne once she took over making marble as main material used to build it seems that the mineral either always had some kind of malleable properties for shadows to play with or that she is the cause to make it like so.

If Maxwell was up with his no good schemes in making magic and machinery go to life she probably also set them up to look 'nice' just because they looked like chess pieces and she can do that by rearranging the board we call Constant, all the chess and Greek theming coming from those two, with Maxwell bringing life and spooky atmosphere while Charlie bringing whimsical magical type of decor as setpieces.

[lowercase skye]

I think the Ancient Guardian is just one specific guy from a species of other two-legged rhinos who also have big horns like that, so this houndius was constructed by the Ancients with a horn from a different rhino. Maybe he's the last of his kind and the ancients hunted the rest to extinction? Or it's like the dragons from Paper Mario, where these rhinos used to be everywhere in ancient times, and the Guardian was just one who happened to be pampered like a pet, locked up safe in the ruins away from any potential harm, and so got to survive all this time while the rest naturally died off? Or maybe they are alive, but just somewhere off screen in a different part of the world? I've always thought of the Guardian horn in the Houndius recipe as just a videogame balance thing, but it's interesting to imagine the horn itself actually inherently having some sort of magical properties that make the Houndius work, and I could totally see the Ancients either hunting them to near-extinction over that, or taking good care of them as pets or livestock (hence the Guardian at the center of the maze). Honestly this soft-confirmation that multiple members of the "minotaur" species exist carries very fun implications to me, there's a lot to think about!

[Frosty_Mentos]

@finn from human That's some good ideas actually about ancient guardian. If those were actually giant beasts ancients used to hunt for or keep livestock it makes sense why we have that technology unlocked in pseudoscience station. Assuming survival conditions used to be extreme they'd likely to use that technology to fend off much larger beasts than themselves or as assist to shoot them ranged, or as defensive items. Though makes me wonder if it's part of their progress towards shadow magic utilization or before, cause it doesn't look shadow magicky enough at first glance but pseudoscience stations are something of a shadow magic side afterlife intercoms as Willow says assuming regardless of what they are they still use purple gems and are shadow magic.

If you think about it hard enough, I feel like this is a total loop that's happening. One species gets secret knowledge and falls, then other, then other and keeps going in a loop.

[gaymime]

well we know that ancient guardian looks different from what it is supposed to because of the fuel(maxwell says as much) and it bears a lot of resemblance to both hippapotamoose and clockwork rooks so it wouldnt be off-the-mark to suggest that it is the corrupted form of an old species that was similar to hippapotamoose OR was the ancestor of current-day hippapotamoose

[Maxil20]

I personally always liked the idea of there being “multiple” ruins in The Constant, partially because I think it leads to fun worldbuilding. The DST ruins are large, but I don’t think they are an entire civilization large.

In particular, I really like how DS did them with 3 distinct sets (which each can be different via optional biomes) showing that there were various cities active when the ruins were at it’s prime before they had fallen. I imagine they universally had a guardian each as a sort of symbol or the like, and likely had a way to create houndius as a result of the non-fuel induced guardians dying naturally and utilizing it’s powerful horn for experiments (given it’s quite an exotic structure, I like to headcannon this was one of the last discoveries they were able to do before the gateway destabilized, which is why they are extremely rare as only a few were ever produced).

 

[Parusoid]

whats an ocean shrine?

[Frosty_Mentos]

19 hours ago, Parusoid said:

whats an ocean shrine?

Sea stack surrounded treasure that contains a very specific loot table of ruins loot.

[Parusoid]

On 11/12/2024 at 6:57 AM, Frosty_Mentos said:

Sea stack surrounded treasure that contains a very specific loot table of ruins loot.

Interesting, was it added recently?

[Frosty_Mentos]

13 hours ago, Parusoid said:

Interesting, was it added recently?

Since the crab king rework