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> The Ages, how does it go again?
Axel
Posted: Jul 13 2004, 03:07 PM
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It came up recently the idea of playing in times other than that of Rand, extensive campaigns based at other times of the 3rd Age or even in other Ages. Suddenly I wonder, what exactly are those Ages? Lets try putting them in order.

1st Age- Age of Discovery
2nd Age- Age of Legends
3rd Age- Dark Age
4th Age- Age of Rebirth
5th Age- ??????????


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Sharn Penndroen
Posted: Jul 13 2004, 07:08 PM
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Hmm... At the end of Winter's Heart doesn't it say:

QUOTE
And on distant Tremalking, the word began to spread that the Time of Illusions was at an end.


This lead me to believe that another name for the 3rd Age was the Age of Illusions (like the name of the netbook). Was I wrong?



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Aleshandre
Posted: Jul 13 2004, 09:19 PM
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The Time/Age of Illusions is the third age, which appears to be ended with the Cleansing.


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Entropic_existence
Posted: Jul 14 2004, 12:26 AM
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plus we have the 6th and 7th ages as well, 7 spokes to the wheel and all. One of which would be our current Age. Alot of indications are that our Age is either the 7th or the 1st, with the discovery of Saidin and Saidar happening at the end of our Age.

I don't think the third age ends witht he cleansing, Tarmon Gaidon is a little too important not to mark the end of one Age and the beginning of another.


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Sharn Penndroen
Posted: Jul 14 2004, 05:54 AM
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I think the Cleansing is a begining to the end of it. They people on Tremalking said it had ended, but I'm sure that the angreal there was an important sign to signal the end (or beginning of the end) of the Age. I mean an Age is a very long time. What is a couple more years until Tarmon Gaidon compared with the thousands of years before.


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TwangCat
Posted: Jul 14 2004, 07:40 AM
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1st Age- Age of Discovery
2nd Age- Age of Legends
3rd Age- Age of Illusions
4th Age- Age of Rebirth
5th Age- ??????????
6th Age - Modern times / age of unification
7th Age - Age of Distruction

everything must end and I think the 7th age will be a time of war and division from all people. massive war, bombings distruction of all technology so that the age of discovery can start over again.

Age of discovery = learing
Ledgends = luxury
Illusions = troubled times
Rebirth = learning
?????
Unification = luxury (even better than AoL because now both tech and chanelling work to bring happiness to the people.
Distruction = troubled times.
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Axel
Posted: Jul 14 2004, 02:47 PM
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Before we adopt the name used on Tremalking we should remember that its a small island whose people have contact only with the Sea Folk, who have no idea what goes on in the world, whose entire culture is introverted. They don't even know that the Dragon was reborn, they may not even know of the Dragon Reborn. I was calling it the Dark Age because that seemed to fit, between the fall of a great civilization and the time when a new would rise from the ashes.

Maybe the 7th Age should be: The Gamma Age biggrin.gif

how about:
5th Age- Age of Enlightenment (when we learned)
6th Age- Age of Knowledge (when we knew)
7th Age- Age of Forgetfulness (when we forgot)

This post has been edited by Axel on Jul 14 2004, 02:48 PM


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Aleshandre
Posted: Jul 14 2004, 03:47 PM
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I find it interesting that "the Age of Discovery" has been adopted by everyone on this board almost as if it was RJ that coined it, but "Age of Illusions" is questioned, because the people who said it in the book are an island dwelling people. I don't see any reason; if we are accepting my term "the Age of Discovery", not to accept RJ's Age of Illusion. Remember, the Amayar have a version of the Prophecies of the Dragon too, as do the Atha'an Miera, the Seanchan, and the Aiel. The Sharans likely have versions also.


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Darius Earthbinder
Posted: Jul 15 2004, 01:58 AM
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silly question but please forgive a lumbering old fool who cant remember his name

but who are the Amayar? where upon the world do they reside?

ta.


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Entropic_existence
Posted: Jul 15 2004, 03:30 AM
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The Amayar are the people who actually reside on the Islands of the Sea Folk, and make Sea Folk porcelain. Pretty much the exact opposite of the A'athan Miere because they hate travelling by boat and live as far inland as possible. They also follow The Water Way, which is like the Way of the Leaf.


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Two Rivers Wolfbrother
Posted: Jul 15 2004, 10:27 AM
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I don't think the end happens in one moment. I think the whole series is the end of the Age, finally concluding with the Last Battle.


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Axel
Posted: Jul 15 2004, 03:29 PM
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The Age of Discovery is the only name we have for the 1st Age, besides it sorta makes sense. Age of Illusions we know the source of, a highly questionable source, and really doesn't make that much sense.

how about:
5th Age- Age of Enlightenment (when we learned)
6th Age- Age of Knowledge (when we knew)
7th Age- Age of Forgetfulness (when we forgot)


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Zinuk
Posted: Jul 15 2004, 06:00 PM
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QUOTE
Age of Illusions we know the source of, a highly questionable source, and really doesn't make that much sense.

I don't think RJ would have included this "Time of Illusions" stuff at the end of one of his books if it didn't really matter. Although the Amayar stay clear of the events of the world, that doesn't meen they don't have some greater insight of what is happening (after all, they could have prophecies of their own that speek of the end of the Third Age). The biggest illusion was that saidin would remain tainted forever. Another one was maybe that some (like Pedron Nial) thought the DO had really been defeated.

Anyway, the problem for naming the Ages is that we don't know enough to even figure out what could happen in the 4th Age, much less in the 5th or the 6th.

The only thing we know is that the Dark One's prison must be whole in the Age of Legends and that everything about the Dark One must have disappeared at that time. This certainly means that, at the end of the 7th Age, the Dark One's prison was made whole again and that humanity had a whole Age (the 1st) to forget about the DO. This is basically the AoD scenario.

As for other Ages, to name them, we need to know what will happen. Maybe there will be another Age of Legend with, this time, a female Dragon, as some have suggested (although RJ said, in an interview, that he wasn't going to explore this possibility).

Another thing to make things coherent is to know what ended an Age. For the time being, we have the following:

End of the 7th Age: the DO's prison is made whole again and all technology or One Power knowledge resets to zero.
End of the 1st Age: the discovery of the One Power.
End of the 2nd Age: the Bore into the Dark One's prison, the War of Power, and the Breaking.
End of the 3rd Age: Tarmon Gai'don.

I think the most plausible scenario of the End of the 7th Age is that, after a War of the Power, channelers somehow manage to find a way to make the DO's prison whole. This time, there is no tainting, and it is decided that the best way to prevent anybody to bore the DO's prison once again is to reduce the technology level of humanity to that of prehistory and stop teaching the use of the Power, so that nobody will be able to even sense the DO's prison, much less dig a hole in it.

As the power is not taught anymore, most sparkers die at their first attemts to touch the True Source; those that don't die are either killed as witch/warlock or aren't aware of what they are doing (much like the wisdoms in the Two Rivers). This is when the AoD scenario comes in: as technology is regained, some people begin to understand that there is somthing as the One Power and, thanks to the high technology level, teaching how to use it is possible.

Until we have a plausible end for each age, we will have a hard time to try to name them.

Any suggestions as to what ended the 4th, 5th and 6th Ages?
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Axel
Posted: Jul 16 2004, 02:36 PM
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How do we know the prison is completed in the 7th Age? For all we know Rand seals it.

The way I was going was this:
4th- Age of Rebirth- After the Dark One's prison is resealed and with the One Power cleansed people begin to regain the knowledge and technology that was lost at the end of the Age of Legends. It ends with a series of horrible wars inwhich the technologies of the Age are put to the test. After the wars the world changes.
5th- Age of Enlightenment- Recovering from the wars that ended the Age of Rebirth new nations arise old ones fade, and new technologies are developed. By the end of the Age people have advanced beyond what was known in the Age of Legends and the Age ends when the world is united under a single government.
6th- Age of Knowledge- The people enjoy a long Age of peace and prosperity with the technologies developed before. For an Age there is no war, no crime, no poverty, and no advances. With people living in luxury there is little reason to learn and little research being done. Slowly the world fades into the 7th Age.
7th- Age of Forgetfulness- The world government of the 6th Age fractures and the comfort fades. People forget the knowledge that gave them such comfort and slowly the world begins to collapse. Finally the world is thrown into dissary, government falls apart, and a series of horrible wars tears the world apart. Finally in the rubble all is lost and the people begin to rebuild....


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Zinuk
Posted: Jul 16 2004, 05:10 PM
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That's a possible and coherent scenario. The only thing I would have to say is that, in this scenario, the DO is nearly anecdotic: he is only plays a role during only the end of an Age (AoL) and a during a whole one (AoI); that's nearly 6/7 Ages without him! For a being who is almost as important as the Creator, it isn't much.

Also, what would cause the war at the end of the Age of Rebirth? Competition between the different countries? And why is there no attempt to bore through the DO's prison just like in the AoL during the Age of Enlightment or the Age of Knowledge?

QUOTE
How do we know the prison is completed in the 7th Age? For all we know Rand seals it.


It is most likely that Rand will make the DO's prison whole once again. I was in fact supposing that the DO would be free once again at, say, the end of the 6th Age and so his prison would have to be made whole once again.

The only thing we know for sure is that his prison must be whole by the end of the 7th Age. When it was made whole is just speculation. As you suggested, it could stay whole all the way from the end of the 3rd Age to the end of the Age of Legends. But I really think the DO should play a role in more than just 1 Age. The Female Dragon theory is a way of doing this.
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TwangCat
Posted: Jul 16 2004, 05:48 PM
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since this is supposed to be earth at some point the power needs to disapear from the world.


Age of discovery = discovery of power
Age of ledgends = living happily with the power
3rd age = fighting back the dark one
4th age = discovery of technology and no new people are born with the ability to chanell (perhaps a side effect of locking out the dark one too completely)
5th age = a time of war using technology (perhaps this is modern times)
6th age = a time of peace with technology
7th age = a time of war so awsome that civilization is all but wiped out.
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Entropic_existence
Posted: Jul 17 2004, 02:46 AM
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*shudders at the female Dragon theory*

Dunno why I've never liked this theory...probably because it seems like from everything we know souls tend to be reborn as the same Gender. Plus as crazy as Ishmael is his constant ranting about he and Lews Therin fighting Age after Age sort of cemented this into my head.

Rand might have the DO's prison completely sealed after Tarmon Gaidon...possibly but I'm not sure.

I also agree that the DO should have more of a role than in simply 2 Ages, and alot of those Ages posted by Axel seem to Idyllic, like alot of Age of Legends just in different guises. *shurgs* just my 2 cents.


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Aleshandre
Posted: Jul 17 2004, 06:00 AM
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I see it this way;

Rand will seal the bore as though it was never opened at the cost of his life's blood, though his death will not be permanent. How that will happen is unknown, but we know that "to live you must die", so I would speculate that either the dynamic trio will figure out how to heal death (or more likely Nyneave will), or (as I believe more likely), the Creator will raise him. Now as to the cycle of the pattern;

War will not end with the end of Tarmon Gaidon. Between the Seanchan (the treaty ending with the death of the Dragon Reborn) will proceed with their conquering of the known world, so all of the nations will be fighitng against them. There will proably be Shadowspawn that weren't killed at the Last Battle, so the last bands will have to be hunted and killed. Padan Fain will probably still be out there with the combination of Mordieth and Shaitan's hound still wrecking his day, so he will keep trying to destroy everything. The White Tower and Black Tower will have plenty to occupy them weeding out the last Dreadlords and Black Ajah. All of the nations that Rand conquered will be duking it out with eachother and the Seanchan to decide who owns the land again, so Tarmon Gaidon will really just leave a power vaccuum and plunge the world further into chaos.
I believe that the Fourth Age will end with the Total destruction of technology as they knew it and a reverting to the Stone Age.
The 5th Age will be a building up of society again, still with the Power (since the Aes Sedai and Asha'man would have held on through the chaos, though at lesser numbers, probably reducing the number of channelers to less than .5% of the population). The Aes Sedai and Asha'man will likely combine forces to try to rebuild their power base, but by the end of the 5th Age, They will have died off, leaving no people with any ability to channel, except the occasional "mystic" or some "witch" or child who seems to have a rare gift for luck, but dies early in their lives. Technology would not grow very quickly with the lack of people who have memories of greater Civilization and By this time, Ogier would be seen as "monsters" or giants and hunted and killed, leaving the Ogier no choice but to become agressive, leading directly to their ultimate total destruction by the end of the 6th Age. The 7th Age sees the decline of several nations and empires, as well as a new rise in rational thought, but without channelers around, "magic" becomes a thing of myth again.
This leads to the 1st Age, in which along with the constantly improving technological advances, Channeling is rediscovered and channelers create organized religious orders based in channeling and the rest is history.


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TwangCat
Posted: Jul 17 2004, 06:51 AM
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Aleshandre I think you've put forward another different but viable view. My only comment would be that the 5th age and 6th age don't seem very separate. I'm still kind of latched on to the idea that Robert Jordan believes that he's talking about earth. If that's true at some point you need a time period of flurishing technology.
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Aleshandre
Posted: Jul 17 2004, 06:59 AM
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That is the AoD.


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