[Pokémon World] The Suocéverse [Worldbuilding June]

[Venia Silente]

Hello everyone, my pen name is Venia Silente, I am a Pokémon fanfiction writer, who has certainly been not as present here as he ought to- but hey! Time to fix that and what better time than now? I asked Bay and he said more or less why not, so, since I happened to miss on the whole World of Pokécommunity thing, I thought to compensate it would be interesting to bring a similar fan-region project thingy of mine here.

So, hereby I welcome you to my current Pokémon worldbuilding project:

The Suocéverse

A Worldbuilding June-inspired project​

[alink id="suoce.index"]Index[/alink id] | [alink id="suoce.updates"]Thread Updates[/alink id] | Official Wiki | Development Docs

This is my means of tackling the yearly Worldbuilding June challenge: an introduction to the Suocéverse – that is, my interpretation of the world of Pokémon, a vision of a world where Pokémon and humans live and govern both separate and together, surrounded by science, magic and all that lies in between, a world that references various canons and sources yet maintains its own identity.

Down the line, a world where humans and Pokémon still have much to explore, much to deal with and much to tell about to others, no matter their previous experience or alignment.

My own Pokémon world?

It is true that I have been writing Pokémon fanfiction for a long time (at least since 2008 with Elusive Goals) but they were mostly independent stories without larger themes going on. Up until a short time ago, I was also very irregular at posting stuff.

However, after the development for my successful contest one-shot Playfield for the "Short Writing Contest", and taking some lessons from Heart Gold and Soul Silver, I started sowing the seeds for what would become a larger world with a life and an identity of its own. This because over the years the various stories I have worked on have ended up following certain common themes: the identity of Pokémon and their ability to govern themselves for example has been a recurring one, for example.

Still, there was a troubling foundational issue with my writing, that being that I am more a worldbuilder than a writer. I have many many notes around about how I perceive a Pokémon world being, but very little of it converted into stories, let alone published ones. So far I have published a small amount of stories, but up until recently they did not tie together.

With the Worldbuilding June challenge coming up this year, after what has been a prolific year for me in term of releases, it seemed like a very good time to summarize the years of planning and bring them to my audience under a common banner.

For this purpose I' using the name of my fan-made region of Suocé, which will be one of the major elements introduced in this thread, and since I couldn't really think of anything better I decided to name my interpretation of the Pokémon 'verse using that name as a base, thus the "Suocéverse" came into being.

So, starting today, over the rest of the month, and hopefully beyond, you will be watching a world or more properly, a 'verse, unfold from the planning stage. If you are wondering what a 'verse is, think of the common identity and setting brought up by "the MCU verse" as a modern example, that is the live-action superhero movies released by Marvel. As such, "the Suocéverse" would be defined as the identity and setting that encompasses all my Pokémon works past, ongoing and future.

A fair note about this presentation though:

[content-warn="wall-o-text-y stuff"]I'm a writer and a somewhat wordy person, not an artist, so most if not all you are going to find here will be... Words. There's so many words, and there's things, and stuff, and emotions. I'll try to slip in a pic or two, but those will likely be xkcd quality minus the charm. Thanks for reading.[/content-warn]

So, let's take a look into it

There is a Pokémon world we all know and love: the one where young Trainers wake up every day, prepare their partners, equip their trusty hat, and become a protagonist. But… the games and even the anime don't give us any much beyond that - the people, the places, the history, we only get to catch glimpses of all that. Iroincally that is part of the very charm of Pokémon as a franchise: that barring the very simple concept of "there are Pokémon", you get to create whatever you want.

So I did.

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The calendar rolls at about the year 3700 of the current era. In this world, people -that is, humans and Pokémon, have been living peacefully over many years, with only some recent, sporadic conflicts to mir an otherwise uneventful history. All parties celebrate this history by continuing a very old tradition, that by which a young human, seeking out to bring change and prosperity to the world, will step into the tall grass and be presented with Pokémon willing to prove themselves capable of accompanying him and of providing the force and the spirit needed to realize those changes.

The tradition of Pokémon Trainers.

However this agreement, simple and convenient on the surface, was brought after eras of conflict, of misunderstandings and aggression between humans and Pokémon. Many times before any historical record commonly available, the conflict escalated to the point where the biodiversity of the world was threatened or rebooted. Very few living relics of that time remain, the most notorious ones the successful examples of the Fossil Revivification program.

There are also sparse ancient remnants of those times left to tell the story of the ancient world - or to serve as dangerous weapons by those who are too greedy to care about or too foolish to understand the delicate balance humans and Pokémon have managed to create to enjoy the world we all live in.

Many years of history, known and unknown have shaped this world. A world originally intended for Pokémon, fantastical beings created with the ability to harvest the energies of their environment and interact with them directly, manipulating the forces of nature for their bidding. Yet at some point humans somehow came into being and rose to prominence. Recorded history shows us regions inhabited and governed by humans, but also small areas of the world inhabited and governed by Pokémon, called Sovereignties. Two very different races that have agreed to, for the most part, play it fair and square. And many accidents, half truths and forgotten facts serving as bumps for that relationship at every corner. All these elements have led to the evolution of this world.

A world where one day, a random Nidorino in search of a mate might venture into a human city, trying to understand such intricate mechanisms as an automatic door to be able to reach to her.

A world where one day, two fire type Pokémon decided they had enough of racing each other and they decided to race the Sun, both for fun and for their names to live forever in history.

A world where no matter how hard it is to manage a bunch of humans, a feline Pokémon might decide gaining an empire for himself is worth the hassle -and the company of a human.

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This world is where now all my Pokémon stories, spread in sites like this one but also in my fanfiction.net profile, take place. If you'd like to see what and how I write about, these links are a very good place to begin.

In the upcoming posts we will take a deeper look into this world. Various subjects will be tackled such as geography, history and biodiversity, in accordance with the prompts left by this year's Worldbuilding June challenge. While some of those subjects will be treated from a top down view looking to the verse as a whole, others will primarily focus on the fan-made region of Suocé which is where the relevant adventures take place. Finally there will be a bit of focus at points on how these elements have shaped my published stories.

Before jumping into the index, several thanks are in order. However since a comprehensive list is at the moment prohibitive until a dedicated "development" post is done, I'll brief it. People are welcome to ask question, anyway.

* To Lounge mod Bay who has given advice and support on how to post this.

* To the Worldbuilding June staff, obviously.

* To PEFE Project mod, teacher figure and former unofficial boss Tangent, as well as other people in that community.

* To some specific reviewers of other communities for their input, such as InvictusZero, CorvusAtrox, Virgil, Umbramatic, Patricio and Saikou.

Final words

As a final note, and as I have mentioned before, this world interpretation is very reference rich. It takes features from various canons as well as some of the shared fanons I am part of. For the benefit of the reader, those references and adaptations will be explicitly tagged and explained in time.

With that, I hope you people enjoy the trip. It's gonna be a bit long, about a month or so, but I hope it is still enjoyable.

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Index: Worldbuilding June Prompts

[a id]suoce.index[/a id]

1. Introduction - this very post
2. Geography
3. People & Races
4. Cultures
5. History
6. Civilization & Architecture
7. Economy
8. Hierarchy, Power, & Governance
9. Religion & Cosmology
10. Language
11. Fauna
12. Flora
13. Food
14. Technology (in-progress Jun 2018)
15. Magic (in-progress Jun 2018)
16. Fashion (in-progress Jun 2018)
17. Arms
18. Armor
19. War
20. Fun
21. Work
22. The Sky
23. The Frontier
24. The Backpack
25. Art
26. Transportation (in progress Jun-Jul 2017)
27. Major Figures & Important Players
28. Communication (in progress Jun-Jul 2017)
29. Weather
30. Disasters

Index of Prominent Topics

[a id]suoce.wikilinks[/a id]

(To be edited later with concept-specific worldbuilding information)

The Official Suocéverse Wiki

Selected contents:

Pokémon General

• Pokémon Physiology and Nature:
• Typed Energy
• Omnicrystal
• Evolution

Organization and Culture

• Sovereignty
• Region of Suocé
• Conference Champion
• Pokémon Champion
• Ascapian League and Tournament

Lore and Concepts
(IN PROGRESS)

Development Documentation

(To be edited later with information for people interested in contributing, or in trading / sharing worldbuilding elements)

Those interested in learning details about this particular 'verse can contact me via the channels mentioned in the wiki's "Ask" page, or can just fire me a Visitor Message or PM over this forum board.

Important Updates

[a id]suoce.updates[/a id]
* 2018-06-13: Published Food, and preparing for more news!
* 2017-06-29: Published Language and added some more links to the Wiki.
* 2017-06-17: Published Power and Governance.
* 2017-06-04: Opened the Official Suocéverse Wiki. Content in this master post yet to be edited to reflect this.
* 2017-06-04: Published Economy. Yes, this thing is still going!
* 2016-09-17: This thread has been moved from FF&W's Lounge to The Multiverse Section, thanks to @Bay for that. Accordingly, the thread's Prefix has been shifted from the legacy [World of PokéCommunity] to [Pokémon World].
* 2016-07-03: Published Civilization and Architecture, still officiallyin the works so stay tuned for updates.
* 2016-06-16: Links updated for the entries published so far.
* 2016-06-10: The font for the posts is changed from Voltaire to Berkshire Swash, which is wider and more legible.

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(next post reserved for a more in-depth introduction)

 

[Venia Silente]

Hello, it's me again bringing up the topic of the... well, of two days ago:

Geography!

I could go on about how I imagine the planet and world of Pokémon overall but instead I think it is better to zoom in into where the action goes. So, tonight I am introducing my fan-made region and some of its features, as well as a couple of relevant concepts.

The Suocé Region

The region of Suocé is comprised of the northern half of a continental stretch of land, connected to the SW to the neighbour region. In a way, it is somewhat similar to how the Americas are laid out in that sense.

An early view of the Suoce Region (third revision)

Now, the concept of this region started as "The south-american cone but WITH POKÉMON!" and over time has undergone a number of revisions, currently standing at 4. During revision three the region looked more or less like the image to the left, without much markers or indications really. What we can see is a landmass comprised of two halves separated by a mountainrange terrain. The landmass is only land-connected by the SW to another region, all other borders reaching to ocean.

A couple of small stars indicate cities of relevance during that revision, though at the moment their location has been moved somewhat. Other two important markers are the red borders - these indicate the frontiers of the Sovereignties located within the region. A Sovereignty is a concept that I'll come back to examine later but for the time being I'll summarize it as:

Sovereignty:

Name given to a geopolitical division, like a province or commune, except inhabited and governed primarily by Pokémon rather than humans.

Now how's that for a concept?

I envision the region of Suocé placed in a world in the southern hemisphere somewhere right below the tropic line, which compared to RL Earth, would place it more or less like the South Americas is except the land connection is on the SW rather than the NW. I have not decided of how big the region would be but I might guesstimate that its latitude (north-to-south) would be about the same as that of Scandinavia.


Now, In order to get a better look at the Suocé region, I suggest you right-click the following link and request to be opened in a new tab. The image is a bit big! And of course I'll proceed to explain as follows.

»Larger Image View of the Region of Suocé - revision 4 (2016)«

A fair note: even as it stands, the region mapping is incomplete. Changes will be posted in due time.

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The Suocé landmass itself is actually two halves of two different continental plates forcibly thrown together long ago, resulting in the birth of a mountain range all across the center section of Suocé and splitting it in half. South of this cordillera lays an area of flatlands, itself an extension of the flatlands regions to the south, and north of the cordillera a rough and uneven land featuring elevated forests, canyons, craters and other sorts of geological features that reaches to an area of cliffs and then suddenly sinks into the sea.

Of course, people and Pokémon living in this region need to be connected. The map displays most important routes in light brown, connecting the various towns, as well as a network of light yellow paths that corresponds to the principal railroad system of the region. More details will be given as part of the Transportation and Economy prompts.

As with any continent, Suocé is surrounded by water, in this case an ocean to the west and a sea to the east. Oceanic currents go from the SE to NW in this area, except for a current that splits from the NE corner of the continent and flows E, heading to other regions including some canon ones.

As pointed out above, the only land connection for Suocé is to the SW, which leads to the neighbour region of Caledoria, another, colder and wider fanon region though I have not given much thought to it. Crossing the sea far to the NW lies the continent where Unova is placed, and at an even longer distance to the NNE, only feasible to cross by sea vessel or plane, we'll find the region of Hoenn and then some of the other canon regions.

The Southern Lands

All that lies south of the main cordillera is brought together under the colloquial name of the Cadrícean lands, though as we will see in Power & Governance^{(link pending)}, Cadrícea is only a part, even if the most important one, of these southern lands.

What is referred to as the "southern side" of Suocé is actually part of what was once a different continent; geologically speaking, it comprised one large unit together with the region of Caledoria that neighbours Suocé to the south. At some point in the far past, the plate that Caledoria resides on was split and part of the land pushed northward until it crashed against the foundations of a continent that was yet to be. According to common lore, we have a Regigigas to blame for that.

As a result of this artificial assembly process and of other events that we will see in the History section, a big part of this southern land formation is tilted slightly and has thus fallen out of sync with the horizon level. In particular the west side is slightly sunk and has a more compact soil layering, whereas the eastern side is slightly elevated, and has more explorable cave systems.

The soil south of the cordillera is firm and fertile, giving rise to cultures of both human and Pokémon built around harvesting and trading as will be seen later in the Cultures and Fauna sections. Two large forested areas also stand right in the center of the region. Some spots are also convenient for mining, though that is an activity far more valuable in the northern side. Much of this land is inhabited by stable populations of humans and Pokémon that have migrated and settled there over the last few thousands of years.

The western coast is for the most part even and rich in beaches, and is a good area for tourism overall. The interior lands are also notoriously even and have very good irrigation thanks to two main rivers and a small number of stable water sources from the underground layers. Ample forest and meadow wild lands cover much of the interior surface, in particular the center and SE zones of the region, whereas crops and urbanized areas make up the layout of the NW and NE zones. Finally, the eastern coast is a rough and perilous one, where some small rocky or sandy beaches stand at random spots tilted and pulled a small distance away from the actual sea.

An arm of land to the SW provides the physical connection to the neighbour region of Caledoria to the south, the only land connection Suocé has to any other nearby regions.

There are a number of cities and towns spread across this part of the region, mostly on the west and east side. Contrasted to those human settlements, the one feature that dominates the central and south area is the Sovereignty of Cadrícea, a well-defined region of the land governed by Pokémon, marked in the map as the huge area with a purple border, extending from the east side of the central cordillera to the arm of land connecting to next region. The Sovereignty is about as old as human population of the region is and over time has shared part of its territory with humans: this is why the homonym city of Cadrícea can be seen located within Pokémon-run territory. Similarly, large amounts of crops and arable terrain falls under control of the Pokémon-run society, marked in the map as the strands of yellow flowing from Cadrícea to the west.

Human settlements in this side of the continent include but are not limited to the port city of Vys Ocassum, one of the most important commercial poles of the region, the touristic cities of Acrasa (to the south) and Marisávile (to the east), and the aforementioned city of Cadrícea, the cultural and religious pole of the entire region for both humans and Pokémon. More information on the importance of Cadrícea will be given as part of the Culture and Religion prompts.

The Northern Side and the Island that Once Was

Lands north of the cordillera are basically a mixture of features and geographical accidents, without an immediately observable arrangement. However geological inspection reveals that these lands are what remains above sea from a once larger island, part of which was subducted under the southern half of Suocé when the region came into being.

Any more information on what the rest of the island was like is lost in the fog of time.

There's many changes in the composition and elevation of terrain across the entire northern area, creating various environmental clusters, shields and microclimates. Thus this area features a more diverse set of landscapes including a forested high land on the west, wide rivers and abrupt cliffs to the north, and moutainpasses and a small desert to the east and northeast. The higher density of features also means paths connecting them or going around them tend to be more circuitious, less straight, and overall more dangerous.

The geological events of the fusion that created Suocé took a great toll on this area of the world, which is more easily perceived in the central and southeast area of the northern half. There's many mountains, caves and river courses that from large scale inspection appear broken or unnatural and are geologically unstable. The central lands are among the few areas that are still relatively flat, the other notable one being the enclosed desert to the east. As such, paths across this entire area are noticeably more circuitious than paths south of the cordillera.

A notable geological feature of the northern half is a stable, elevated plateau formation separating from the main cordillera from the west and growing northward. The plateau ground level is relatively even except where crossed by some ravines and openings to the lands below, creating a protected ecosystem. Locals have eventually named this land La Plancha, due to the conceptual similarity to an ironing table. As you can see from the purple border surrounding the plateau, Pokémon have taken advantage of this and created the Sovereignty of La Plancha to live in.

The enclosed desert and some other areas on the eastern side are dotted by an amount of craters, most of them originating from a previous and very relevant geological era that we will examine in the Religion & Cosmology entry.

The most important settlement by far in this side of the continent is Salípolis, the capital city of the region of Suocé. It is by itself not a very large city, paling in comparison to Cadrícea. Instead, some of the habitation and commerce requirements are delegated to the nearby settlements to the south and north respectively.

Salípolis connects to the south with a longitudinal path going from town to town, from West to East including Río Quinto, an isolated and calm city dedicated to high tech industry; Isparus, one of the main residential areas of the region; and Ilvandúe and Lete, which are mostly dedicated to business related to Pokémon Training.

To the north, we find then another important city: Désona, the third largest city and the main commerce hub of the country. Désona also holds the National Library Archives and the main offices of the Pokémon League in the country. Going from there to the NW we find the nearby city of Empovi, which hosts the local casino (but don't tell that to 10 yr old Trainers!), whereas to the E we find the port city of Amace.

At this point in time, the location of the mandatory Victory Road as well as the Pokémon League have not been fully decided.

---

Would welcome questions and comments on this region. Information to be added in the future will include:

* Migration paths for some wild species.
* Longitudinal section of the main cordillera and relevant features.
* (Hopefully!) Wind and oceanic current maps.

 

[Venia Silente]

Hello, this time I'm gonna bring a different subject. We already talked about what the world looks ike, now let's take a look at some of the creatures that inhabit it.

People & Races!

One of the disadvantages of writing about a Pokémon world is that, while on the in-universe side you can take some (or many) things for granted regarding the fact that the world is inhabited by humans and Pokémon, on the out-of-universe side things are a bit harder: if you do want to explain things, how do you set up and write an introduction that doesn't boil down to "there's, well, humans and Pokémon"?

"Humans" and "Pokémon". For this entry I'm mostly trying to talk about what makes these races special, and what makes them what they are. I will not go into specific subspecies classifications this time, since given the 'verse this takes place in, that might be more adequate to explain under other sections such as Culture.

Humans and Pokémon are not the only inhabitants of this world - as we will see in Fauna and Flora, there's much, much else. However, they notably are both sapient, both very old, to the point they have forgotten or lost track of their own origins, and very prominent and developed in the world.

The Human Species

Humans… you have seen them before. "Furless bipedal apes with their clothes and machines" and all that. Truly, it would appear in the Pokémon world they would be not too different than what you can see if you look out the window.

...Except where they are.

Humans living in the Pokémon world are, and would necessarily be, fairly different in some respects to humans living in our current world. Even if it is a slow process, evolution -in the Darwinian sense- is a thing and humans have lived alongside varied sets of powerful elemental-wielding creatures for long enough time that they would have adapted somewhat.

One thing the various Pokémon canons share, be it for actual worldbuilding or for comedic effect: Pokéworld!humans are fairly resilient to harm and fairly untiring. If you thought Real World humans were already attrition predators, persistent explorers capable of venturing everywhere, and awesome at all of that… Pokéworld!humans are even more so. Taking flamethrowers to the face, recurring lightning bolts, or the pressure of fast jets of water aimed at them. Sometimes, the human actively invites the challenge, as we know from at least the games and manga canon that jumping down into caves and canyons is no rare occurrence for young Trainers, who otherwise come out of it unharmed.

Humans in the Pokémon world certainly seem to be... capable. If they can't, they'll try.

As a result of long cohabitation with Pokémon, the human body has evolved its process of maturation. Humans in this world possess a stronger and more resilient body at a younger age, as well as more open mind and mature personality, less reliant on putting in only the minimum of effort when it comes to problem-solving, to go with that body. It is important for the society that humans and Pokémon have built together that this heightened state is attained at a younger age, as these are the differences that allow a 10-year-old child to venture off as a beginner Trainer without much more protection of their own than what they can trust their Starter with.

Where do humans come from, and where do they go? The origin of humans is a subject the truths of which are lost to much more than the fogs of time. Certainly, humans are not Pokémon - but at the same time neither are the many plants, trees, small animals and bugs that contribute to adorn the environment of the Pokémon world. Do these varied creatures share a common origin? A common end?

Attempt after attempt to reach deeper into the truth of the origin of humans have crashed into the insurmountable passage of time and the loss of information. With the many eras that have passed, it is believed that not even the most long-lived Legendaries that one could feasibly reach up to for comment would know the truth… and if it is doubtful that someone, somewhere, who knew the truth would be willing to share it.

What is known is that we humans as a race do enjoy a privileged position in the Pokémon world, as we are the ones allowed to train and guide Pokémon, we are the ones allowed to extend and build across certain areas, and this position is supported not only by myth but also by verified accounts by certain Legendaries. Still, that position is not without its boundaries, as will be explored during the Culture, Work and War entries.

Just like in the real world, there is a fair degree of variance in the human species: complexion, skin, body fat, facial shape, all these partly determined by the environment they live in. Certainly, it could be said that some aspects of the world allow for higher variance in facets such as hair color. I mean, blue or green? It's not exactly impossible. Such variations across time have led to distinctive human "races" or ethnicities. The inhabitants of the region of Suocé for example, who are adapting to a warmer and windier climate, originally descended from the inhabitants of the region of Caledoria to the south, a race of people better adapted to a colder and drier climate.

The Pokémon Creatures

If a random person were to be asked what Pokémon are, they'd probably begin with something like "they are living creatures that we inhabit the world with…". Such a start is already problematic. Can inorganic Pokémon like Baltoy or ghosts like Gengar be considered living? Can a Klefki or Porygon be considered creatures? Certainly the Pokémon world is a weird one.

However it can be said that no matter how diverse Pokémon are, how varied their lifespans or lifestyles, there are certain specific traits they share.

Pokémon are known to be the original inhabitants of this world, and not much more detail is known even to the most long lived among them, but what is known is that they share a special link with this world: the ability to use "Typed Energy", which we will define as:

Typed Energy:

Energy normally free-flowing in the Universe, which has an intrinsic association with one of the various Types. Energy can be imbued with one Type at a time, at most. Energy not imbued with a type is Typeless energy, which encompasses eg.: classical kinetic energy.

Pokémon are born or created with a body attuned to interact with their environment by drawing and storing energy of those Types. This connection allows Pokémon to use their own bodies as weapons, or to perform feats such as twist vines and water, dirt and fire, or even thoughts and fears, to do their bidding. Depending on a species' biological makeup that enhances interaction with certain Types over others, we say that Pokémon "are of" a certain Type: for example, we call Ponyta a "Fire-Type" Pokémon because of their innate and more specific interaction with fire and Fire-Typed energy.

Now, how do Pokémon employ Typed energy? Most Pokémon (if not all) have physiological features such as an omnicrystal (or more usually for organics, an omnisac): a dedicated crystalline organ or structure that allows them to siphon and store Typed energy for later use in attacks and moves, or for normalization into energy that can be used to transform and evolve. Omnicrystals are spread across the body of a Pokémon in a manner not unlike eg.: the nodes of the lymphatic system for organic Pokémon.

Examples of regional divergence between Feraligatr from the areas around Johto (left) and Unova (right).

Just like humans, Pokémon adapt to their environment and develop certain variances over time, leading to "races" and subspecies. For example, a Kanjohan Feraligatr that has to deal with colder climate and steeper changes in terrain elevation, has a darker and thicker hide and is also bulkier, whereas a Feraligatr from the swamps south of Unova, enjoying flatter and more swamps as well as a warmer climate, has a lighter and slenderer build as well as larger and thinner spikes.

Interaction Between the Species

Pokémon have lived and developed in this world for a very long time. Both classes are sentient, sapient creatures, to varying degrees where factors such as species, environment and ways of life are involved. Of humans we mostly know and can extrapolate. As for Pokémon, they present a wide range of sapience where the most intelligent and capable ones are on par to if not more capable than humans; the vast majority though sit somewhere right below humans but still ways above the animals we treat as somewhat intelligent.

Those Pokémon who are sapient among their own peers have contributed to guiding their kin to organize themselves in families, clans and races just like we humans do. This also affects humans in the Pokémon world, since we must develop our own race and civilization knowing we are not the only sapient inhabitants of the world.

Over time, whether by external influence or not, a covenant has been reached - a vow between humans and Pokémon. An accord that sets the rules by which humans and Pokémon must co-habitate. Specific areas have been designated for humans and Pokémon respectively to thrive in without the other's direct interference, but contact and joint work between these two classes of creatures is still the expectation and the norm. Still, as we will see in the sections of Governance and War, a clashing of needs and desires is eventually inevitable.

The terms of the convenant are what gave origin to the tradition of Pokémon training and help regulate interaction in case of conflicting needs, and will be more deeply examined as part of the Cultures and Religion prompts.

and

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Credits where it's due

* The concept of omnicrystals was inherited from Project PEFE.
* The concept of sprites from older generations representing such things as regional or subspecies-level variations was co-developed with Project PEFE.
* Sprites (Feraligatr) from Veekun. (If you can't see them: either you have petitions to Veekun blocked by eg.: ad-blocking software, or something bad went wrong at Veekun's domain.)
* Zangoose comic: Tagg from PEFE has pointed me to Uberzers @ DeviantArt as the creator.

 

[Venia Silente]

It has been a slow couple of days of development but if you have been reading so far then you know what's coming. I have to say, it took a good while to even think of where to begin writing this.

Cultures!

Culture is, by itself, a complicated concept. When I think of Pokémon culture I admittedly can't help but mentally point towards "Pokéculture" Rare Candy Treatment comic as a "good start". However, a culture starts before, at a more familiar, foundational level, and reaches higher, at abstract concepts that can shape an entire society.

Culture is particularly a broad subject for Pokémon, where not only not much of it is exposed, but also no clear directions are implied. Rather than going for a broad view of the world's culture I've decided to cheat a little - to assume that certain things can be taken for granted for both your convenience and mine. After all, if you have been reading so far you know Suocéverse Pokémon are sapient and humans are hardy, and both thrive as collectives, so you can probably discard many "dark and edgy" scenarios about how humans and Pokémon relate.

Instead I'll introduce a look at how the culture of the Suocé region is shaped. Many later entries are going to build from this - Work, The Frontier, Technology, Transportation and Communication just to name a few, so I'd rather take a broad look at what people are like in general. We can delve into the mysteries later.

Suocéan Culture Overview

For this overview I will be focusing on humans. Some of the Pokémon perspective of things will be expanded upon as part of the Cosmology entry.

The Suocé society has grown up from the neighbouring and joining of at least two different cultural trends - that of the immigrants from the south, who now mostly live in or near the Cadrícean Sovereignty, and that of the inhabitants of the eastern and northern areas, as well as overseas immigrants, who mostly live across the northern half of the region. Each have brought and adapted their own beliefs and customs, which has resulted in a culture that is unified but still presents a clearly dual appearance. Let's call it, to borrow a term from Ghost in the Shell, an "indivi-dual" culture.

People from the north are used to having to live and work in familiar or neighbourly groups due to the geography of the area, as such word of mouth, vertical space, and ease of movement are very valued. They live without rush, and don't mind having to take a couple of turns to reach from one town to the next so long as they get to enjoy a conversation or a look at the landscape in the meantime. Most celebrations are familial in nature, with birthdays and comings of age enjoying a special place in people's calendars. At the same time, they are more territorial than people in other places; they sometimes tend to segregate foreigners without noticing, don't like having to move from one city to another, and place high personal stakes on land ownership and inheritance.

People from northern Suocé are used to things like dating, work meetings and even Gym challenges being done in motion when it's needed - as such, they like their vehicles, such as trains and elevators, to have ample room and allow for clear views of the outside. This is best exemplified by the fact that despite the geography of the area, the main interconnection between clusters of towns is by the two main railroad lines, which can be seen as yellow lines in the Suocé map, and are the result of years of communal investment.

In contrast, people from the south come from a cold and dry climate and are mostly getting used to living not only in a wide and open land, but also one that is ruled by Pokémon and where humans are allowed to stay as guests and workers. Southern people enjoy walking or travelling long distances, love hearing news from nearby towns or from overseas, and overall like to have everything in view - they don't like obstructions, be they visual, political or otherwise.

Speaking of the south, there is the certainly transversal and notable fact that most of them are, technically speaking, rentees or tenants in Pokémon land - not to mention land workers. The fact that the largest city in the country and the largest crops all reside within Sovereign territory escapes no one, and it certainly baffles most foreigners, in particular the ones coming from more human-oriented regions such as Unova. Most prominent in the Cadrícean Widefields but still present all across the region, there is a high respect towards Pokémon governance.

Human-Pokémon Relationships

Suocé itself owes its history to a particular event in the past where a trio of Muskedeers, rulers of the wild lands back then, assisted the wild Pokémon of the region in sheltering immigrants from danger. In return for this favor, the pioneers built a shrine dedicated to the trio and brought various offerings, something which enthralled the wild Pokémon in the area, and under the guidance of the Muskedeer trio the wild mons of the flatlands welcomed the humans permanently as co-habitants.

The shrine would eventually give birth to Cadrícea City, which can be seen in the map as the central city in the southern side of the continent, right inside the purple Sovereign borders.

Since then humans and Pokémon have lived together in the region, exploring and settling far into the particular geographical features of the region while at the same time maintaining a permanent worship of their common history and of the Muskedeer Trio in the area of the flatlands. A deeper look at this phenomenon will be taken as part of the Religion and History entries.

Of course, one of the most pervasive concepts present in a Pokéverse world with humans like the ones in the games, animé, and Suocéverse, would be that of the tradition of Pokémon Training. This is a cross-cultural aspect of the world, pervasive to all societies at all levels - it is involved in defining childraising, schooling, jobhunting, resource hoarding, even national borders.

A specimen of male human Trainer.
The article of clothing covering his hair serves as a cosmic marker for greatness in the Pokémon world.

What is Pokémon Training for us but a hands-on introduction to The Hero's Journey? only institutionalized, less dangerous. Get a starter, go to the wilds, befriend and battle Pokémon, challenge Gyms. A path of hurdles and principles that leads to character, for both humans and Pokémon. A path that... might be worth telling tales about to your grandchildren down the line, provided you were lucky enough to don your hat and go punish random grunts in the name of the Moon or something.

Since Pokémon Training is so transversal, I think it merits a chapter of its own. I will have to think of an addendum post or an extra chapter to cover Suocéverse specifics, certainly, and then more because you'll want to learn of the League, of the Gyms, of the challenges. But in the meantime and so as to not leave any of you hanging, I'll give you a couple goodies.

First, rather than my usual quoteblock definitions as spoken by myself, what about a quote from PEFE Project member Pykrete to introduce the concept:

"Imagine you were offered the chance to get out of school for a year and travel with cuddly creatures on government dime when you were ten and too young to think of things like poor travel conditions."

(I think it says a lot. I love to place emphasis in "on government dime" :p )

Second, in what pertains to at least Suocé specifically: children can be sent out in their Pokémon Journey at age 10-ish in what is usually referred as one's (First) Trainer's Journey. However, Trainers who wish to continue and eventually specialize will be permitted to do so by going through a Second (third, fourth, …) Journey; this experience is what qualifies most youth to apply for positions as Gym Trainers or for certain jobs.

And then… there's the people who never left their Journey, they and their teams live and breathe the challenge. Living and breathing "the dream", those humans and Pokémon have become the best and stand as beacons above their peers. Elite battlers, famous sportsmons, hardened warriors, or that fabled figure revered by both humans and Pokémon as the "Pokémon master".

Society, as we will eventually see, has to be ready for them too.

---

Credits where it's due

* The image of the human Trainer courtesy of Bulbapedia.
* The concept of a cultural division on geographic bounds in Suocé is totally not based I swear off the geographical cultural divides in South America introduced by the presence of the Andes Cordillera.
* The concept of the Hero's Journey is pretty much transversal to human mythology, but the linked article does a far better job of explaining its nature and origins than I can. I really recommend at least a cursory read.

I hope you are enjoying this trip so far, even if it is going on slower than intended.

As for a potential Pokémon Training separate entry... I'll see. It is something that should be written, I'm mostly working out the when kinks.

In the meantime, a small reminder: if you want to be notified of new posts, you can subscribe to this thread using Thread Tools, but this won't inform you of modifications and updates to existing posts. So if something of relevance changes anywhere, I'll always add a note to the opening post.

 

[Venia Silente]

History

About darn time! >:| These last... well, not few days, have been pretty hard on the writing required to get this entry to publication standards. It is, after all, the history of the world, though as I'll mention below it has been muddled for a while with some other subjects.

History. Certainly another broad subject, now we are looking at the world not over the axis of space, but that of time. Whatever the world, it had to have a beginning, and then a list of events that make up its history, up to and concurrent to when the story happens.

Going into the really far past, the origin of all things where the One with a Thousand Arms lies, is a task left to the entry on Cosmology due to its very nature and and the loosely connected influence on the here and now. At the same time, explaining the particulars of nowadays history is left the task for the stories that take place. So, the question becomes what to tackle that lies in between.

For this entry, I've chosen to try a dual approach, studying the history of the Suocéverse in a large scale, but focusing more on certain events, preferentially in the near past, that have shaped the current world "as we know it" and that also help give its particular flavorur to my interpretation of the Pokéverse.

As such I now introduce you to the…

History of the World

(Admittedly not as awesome as this History of the World, but I'll aim to be about as informational… and charming!)

The Pokémon world has seen a long history. Like other worlds we know, it has gone through a series of geological or biological Eras. What humans and Pokémon see as «history» is mere minutes, a quarter hour tops, in the larger view of the biography of their world. The circumstances of its beginning and its eventual end are more a matter for the entry on Religion and Cosmology than for the current entry, but we will take a look over certain key events.

Part Ⅰ: Times Forgotten

In the first Eras, hundreds of millions of years ago, the world and its inhabitants were much different: the distribution of oceans and landmasses was unlike that of today, there were no humans, and the native creatures, while still "Pokémon", were different than most of what we see today; created with unbound access to elemental power and living under little more than the rule of prey and predator.

Those early Eras were characterised by a number of purges intended to eliminate what higher Legendaries perceived as failed creations and start anew, with new "generations" of Pokémon that hopefully corrected the mistakes of the older designs.

Specimens of older species managed to survive and begin each new cycle with a bit of advantage over their newer, more limited co-habitants. Some of those Pokémon would use their experience to bring small clans or packs together, sowing the seeds for what later would be the concept of Sovereignties. A few others, the last of their once powerful kin, saddened or angry that they were forsaken by the world, went into hiding in wait for either a more welcoming world to live in, or for the correct time to rise in vengeance; those handful of somewhat unique creatures would survive to this day and come to be known in the present as part of what we call "Legendaries".

The fossilized remains of some of the ancient species.

Over time, many species disappeared, some of them leaving behind the remains that would contribute to creating the fossil record, from which modern science has managed to recreate some Fossil Pokémon. Some other species managed to survive and had to start from scratch every time, slowly changing into some of the Pokémon we know and love, such as Totodile and many bird Pokémon. There's even some Pokémon who survived until now and didn't even bother changing any much, such as Relicanth, which gives a lot to talk about after remaining mostly unchanged for that long.

Part Ⅱ: the Human Factor

A critical point was reached near the end of the Third Era. Some survivors of older species, familiarized with the writing on the wall, fought for dominion and security, threatening or blackmailing some of the newer species into protecting them. The Big Llama, Arceus, creator of the creators, known today as the Original One, had more than enough and departed to unknown corners of the universe.

In the meantime, the last remnants of three powerful early-generation species secured too much power and engaged in world-wide wars against each other, dragging many innocent species along and spiking the rate of species extinction. It was not before long that the first few civilizations of Pokémon would come to call them "The Warring Triad": the behemoths of antiquity we know today as Kyogre, Groudon and Rayquaza.

At some point Arceus returned with a plan… order and punishment for all creation. The next purge already planned for, Arceus decided to introduce a natural limitation in the creations of his Children, a lock that would keep them away from the powers of nature until they matured at an individual level. As such, Evolution made its way into the world:

Evolution ("Rowanian" model):

A natural mechanism by which Pokémon, born in more restricted forms, must physically and mentally mature and attain enough power to force their own bodies to abruptly change, according to a species-defined tree of designs, or "evolutionary line".

There was one other drastic change: when Arceus returned, he signalled the way for other creatures to come. A cosmic event introduced a race of non-Pokémon creatures to the world, calling themselves "humans", who quickly settled in the Pokémon world and explored it for resources.

It took much effort and building of trust for Pokémon and humans to find a way together. A dreadful point came where the newer species had little to choose but death by the hand of humans, or by the Warring Triad. Eventually, human children, unaware and uninterested in the wars of their elders, established more peaceful relationships with Pokémon, and eventually sought them out for advice and for the protection of the nascent common welfare they had from the dangers of the Warring Triad. At some point, the Lake Trio, seeing that the guide of humans was better than their own, bestowed upon three humans the title of the First Trainers, and their blessing and divine power to go fight the Warring Triad. One morning about two million years ago, at the bay of what one day would become Lilycove, the three behemoths were defeated and sealed away.

The sealing of the three behemoths heralded a new Era for a tired world, solidified as a covenant for the cohabitation between humans and Pokémon who now had to share the world; the terms for their joint work came to be known in myth as "The Vow" and carried on across history until it they gave birth to the tradition of Pokémon Trainers.

For three Eras after that, Humans and Pokémon have sought for a way to live in peace, and they have approached that ideal from different directions every time… Unfortunately, their efforts were not destined to last. Time after time, for any number of reasons, the cosmic clock rings and the world is laid rebooted for a new Era, just as it was in the times of old. However, with care and collaboration humans and Pokémon were able to save themselves from restarting from scratch every single time.

One of the most severe purges came about ten thousand years ago from beyond the boundaries of the sky. A cataclysmic event put the system where the Pokémon world was located under heavy meteorite fire against which humans and Pokémon had no protection, and as civilizations dwindled and Pokémont tried to migrate from place to place, those dark times eventually became known as the "Rains from the Heavens". At some point, an ancient evil was awoken and given the task of protecting the planet from the meteor rains in exchange for leniency, and this granted people and Pokémon the time to resurface and rebuild. It was within this Era that, seeing the overall situation, various creatures such as Xerneas and Lugia chose to resurface, becoming "Legendaries".

Part Ⅲ: The Current Era

The world as we see it now is only the current iteration of attempts to cohabitate and thrive, devoid of much of the context and the lessons left after the mistakes of Eras past. Counting four thousand years this time, the world still hides many secrets from its past, some of them deadly, laid in waiting while Pokémon and humans attempt to rebuild.

In this particular Era though, the relationship between humans and Pokémon has been slowly eroding. In the last few thousands of years there have been various conflicts where humans have tried to abuse the collaboration with Pokémon for their own ends, supported by technology. Be it 3000 years ago, such as a king gone mad, wiping countries with his light of judgment, or two houses divided trying to drag the gods of the local Pokémon into their feuds. Be it 800 years ago, a civil war over tributes reaching even to the shrines and perches of the deities Lugia and Ho-Oh, who then flew away and forsook mankind. Be it 200 years ago, where a government ruled by corporations purged their own people and their local Sovereignty so they could secure access to vast mineral veins.

Were the behemoths of antiquity to awaken, their conflict will not be this endearing.

The rumors go, for those in the circles of seers and scholars who know where to look, that things are about to take a turn for the worse, as there have been mentions that some human sects in regions like Hoenn or Kanto are looking for the means to awaken powerful super-Pokémon or even creating their own, respectively, and unfortunately much of information of the danger that such endeavours represent is lost to the fogs of time, with only some lore on the Weather Trio being of the most foreboding notice.

Recent History of the Suocé Region

The region of Suocé, born 2000 years ago from the union of refugees from the south, pioneers from overseas and wild Pokémon asking their local Muskedeers for guidance, has not been a stranger to conflict though, even if fortunately it has been more a recent matter.

Up until some years ago, people trying to mine Gems from the central cordillera and displace some local populations near the La Plancha Sovereignty was an issue that polarized the inhabitants of nearby settlements such as Isparus and Cholcone. The Sovereignty became more protective than usual with time, and only a few select Trainers have retained access to the innermost paths and nests. Among them Machalí sol Linaros rose as one of the caretakers of the area, earning a preference by the Pokémon in the area that led him to begin studies about the Gems.

Some time ago as well, a gang of mysterious bandits have been operating kidnapping Pokémon and holding them for ransom. Unique to this "Black Thumb Gang" is their means of operation, for Pokémon are without exception returned once the ransom is paid, without harm beyond a convenient amnesia of the events surrounding their kidnapping. It was thanks to the investigation of a member of the Elite Four that the gang's higher ranks were forced into the light, and a various Trainers battled and detained them. One of those trainers, Ravir Eisenhorth, rose to prominence as one of the four Trainers who arrested the head honchos, leading the rest of the organization into obscurity. The motives of the gang, if any, were never discovered.

The Pokefutures Hit

The greatest recent shakeup came just three years ago from overseas however, and it affected the entire world. Far away in the region of Angela, the activities of the worldwide conglomerate Pokefutures, dedicated to scientific research to improve the lives of humans and Pokémon, were revealed as unethical, reaching even into immoral biological experiments on both biological classes. Not only that, but they were revealed as the corporation puppeteering the government of a nearby nation that had engaged in the purge of an entire Sovereignty over 100 years in the past.

This revelation shook Suocé harshly. Not only did college research funds disappear overnight, leaving many students hanging, but the students and trainers themselves were subject to questioning of their participation and knowledge in the activities of the corporation. Private companies, police forces, many people were brought under scrutiny. Even the country's proudest project, their participation in the international Fossil Revivification Program, suffered tremendous setbacks.

Trainers were hunted down arrested left and right for the mere suspicion of involvement with Pokefutures, leading some of them, the ones considered "dangerous" because of their experience or skill that had marked them as potential recruits by the corporation, to go into hiding or on the defensive. The Muskedeer Trio ruler of the Cadrícean Sovereignty rose and demanded that the human trainers living there, as citizens of their small nation, joined the Legendaries' military draft to attack the Pokefutures facilities in nearby cities, an extremely tense political situation that was fortunately diffused by a covenant reached by then Champion of the region, Nadia Shepard.

As a result of the Pokefutures fallout, many aspects of human-Pokémon relationships have become tenser. The Starter program in many regions has been heavily questioned, requiring the support of personalities such as Dr. Samuel Oak, who backed the Pokédex Encyclopaedia Framework Extension (PEFE) project, to slowly regain people's trust. In some regions such as Suocé the added costs and fears resulting from auditing have scared many trainers away, and not even a reboot of the Starter program managed to rebuild enough trust - the year after the revelation, the yearly National Conference was cancelled, and has remained so ever since.

---

Well, if you check the calendar you'll notice this one took quite long. This one was supposed to have been ready on Saturday, but as I went writing about it, I found there was too much overlap with what would be the contents of later entries such as War and more prominently Cosmology. It took three full rewrites to get this entry to its current form, and it is still subject to changes, even more than any of the others.

Credits where it's due

* The "cute Weather Trio confrontation" artwork is (c) by lotsofmudkips @ dA.
* The fossils image is from the TCG, but the file proper comes from the Helix Wikia because they were the only ones with a resolution bigger than "Gameboy screen".
* The "Pokédex Encyclopaedia Framework Extension" is of course Project PEFE, of which I am a member and with which my 'verse shares several foundations.
* Pokefutures is a creation of the PEFE / WAAPT shared universe.
* A specially huge lots of thanks goes to Tagg from PEFE Project, and Altacera and Prismal from the Worldbuilding June Discord chatroom, for providing me with lots of input and helping me organize during the rewrites needed, both for this entry and for what will eventually become the Religion and Cosmology entry.

As a fair notice, I will exchange the order of the Economy and Cosmology entries, due to the high relevance of Cosmology giving a lot of benefits when placing it close to History.

 

[Venia Silente]

Civilization & Architecture

Sorry for the long wait.

Having Civilization and Architecture, these two concepts together, leaves me in a bit of a complicated position. As a reviewer (@vidiogamemaster101) commented on my working docs, they are tied because a city's architecture "can be used to tell where it is, since some civilization's building methods and styles are different". And this becomes much more relevant when your building plans have to also take Pokémon into account.

The difficulty comes in my ability for expression here - I simply lack the vocabulary of the field to be able to describe precisely, for example, how the space between the arc of a door and the support beam above it is decorated. Neither can I draw it - it would end up even worse. An option would be providing reference imagery, but since that will take time, I leave a fair warning: this entry is gonna be edited a lot. In the meantime, at least I will try and describe what I have.

As a fair notice, this post will be eventually EDITED with some more precise information, and hopefully a drawing or two.

Edifications and Urbanization

Let's start by picking our trusty map once again, since some of the context will require geographical awareness.

Materials for construction and tool-making are all over the place. Some construction techniques and materials are enhanced via applied Pokémon bioengineering, as will be seen with more depth in the Technology entry, whereas some other construction techniques and materials remain "classic", be it for cost efficiency, integration with pre-existing practices or just for that "natural" feeling.

North of the main cordillera, as has been mentioned before, the geography puts building space at premium above means of transportation. Towns are small and spread clustered across very specific areas, and in each town and city construction is overall well organized. Most houses are built to host a family of three or four people and tend to be two floors where construction permits. Many of them incorporate a narrow front yard for decoration and a back yard where some flowers can be grown. It can be noticed in the map that many towns and cities lie in a narrow band right north of the main cordillera - granting them a mostly uniform (if uneven) landscape as well as the relative protection that the mountains and the nearby forests provide from the weather.

In places like Salípolis, the nation's capital, or the wealthy city of Émpovi, buildings are tall and somewhat separated from each other, so that people and Pokémon in the upper floors can still keep a good view of what's around. A stable construction and ornamentation style, such as what is seen in RL!Amsterdam, helps not only the city planning but also the comfort of inhabitants be they humans or Pokémon.

The towns spread closer to the cordillera tend to allow for sparser but higher constructions, in particular airdocks used by some of the mass-transport companies in the area employing airplanes and zeppelins. Where construction allows, airdocks tend to be ground-level, Futurama style, but when that is not possible, access towers with special Pokémon-operated shielding and covering are built.

Émpovi hosts some of the most iconic buildings of the country, including the Grand Casino where unsuspecting Trainers can be distracted from their adventures, Golden Saucer style, luxurious hotels, special training grounds for sports teams and type specialists, and a special water processing plant that can recharge Water Gems.

Cholcone is a small residential city and doesn't have anything going particularly for it, but close to the city there is a transcordilleran railroad tunnel for the train service, one of the two "safe passages" to connect the towns in the north to the cities of Nartes and Cadrícea other side of the mountains. The station in Cholcone is one of the main connecting nodes of the national railroad, providing access to both Sovereignties in the area, to the capital, to the line of towns bordering the cordillera, and to the somewhat isolated towns in the west coast.

Of particular interest to foreigners is the League Gym in the city of Lete, located inside a business building, and comprising a giant cylinder four floors high made of a reflective material; the cylinder has views of many offices surrounding the structure and is also open to the sky via the top. While normal Gym challenges only rely on a standard battle on the lowest floor, rematches (see: Culture → Trainer's Journey) consist of a scenario where the Leader and her Grass-type Pokémon are siphoning away the sunlight entering the cylinder, thus preventing the mechanisms within the cylinder from providing power to the building; the challenger must thus not only defeat the Gym Leader's Pokémon, but also resolve their interference on the mechanisms in order to allow the affected floors to operate at full capacity again.

South of the main cordillera, there's more space available for constructions thanks to land being flatter, among other factors, however at the same time there is a cultural focus on preventing constructions from disrupting the landscape. As such, human settlements tend to appear close to the boundaries of the Sovereignty, except for the obvious outlier that Cadrícea, itself the largest city in the country. Much of the urbanized surface within Sovereignty territory is occupied for farming, transportation and foresting, activities with which humans pay fr their allowed stay within the territory.

Be it outside or inside the Sovereignty, houses tend to be fewer but more spacious and buildings, in particular commerce ones, tend to follow specific construction patterns aimed towards having three- or four-floor constructions where the top floor is open to the sky and connects to neighbour buildings via bridges and overpasses.

Constructions closer to the coast such as in the city of Nartes tend to be larger in the east-to-west direction and are built with transparent roofs or with bordering mirrors to optimize the reception of sunlight for the day; conversely, constructions closer to the center such as the city of Pradeimie, constructions tend to be uniform and box-like, except where branding and marketing requests a special, more memorable shaping. Examples of such box-like constructions include the international airdock in Acrasa, a unique twelve-floor structure that can receive and park zeppelins thanks to huge hollow cells built into the top floors (reference image below). This airdock is usually the first stop into the country that visitors reach when coming from the south (Caledoria) or the west via air, and the companies running transportation business in the area usually provide commutes to Vys Ocassum and Salípolis.

Human construction within the Cadrícea Sovereignty has to account for Pokémon first, and thus tends to follow codes more oriented towards easy traversal by Pokémon. Roads are wider and tend to favour large vehicles than smaller onces, for example, and tend to incorporate features for local inhabitants, Pokémon and animals living in the area to cross from one side to the other without distirbing traffic, such as wilderness overpasses. The areas around Cadrícea favour walking and moving in trains above other forms of transportation, and moving in personal vehicles inside the inner shrine radius of the city proper is usually taxed or subject to specific limitations. Similarly, no mass transit air vehicles are allowed within the inner ring of the city, where the shrine to the Muskedeer Trio is located.

The Great Works

The dedication of the population of Suocé towards great works that incorporate Pokémon can be seen in the two largest projects north of the cordillera being designed or constructed at the point of this writing.

The first project involves the region's new Safari Zone project, a dedicated area south of Cuasto (NE in the map) where the layout is being altered both at ground level and also underground in order to bring various species from overseas, including a wide underground channel that will provide a direct connection between the Safari Zone and the rivers near the city of Rasin.

The second project is an independent entertainment and battleground facility. The Lega Runa Battle Tower being finalized at an as-of-yet undisclosed location near Ilvandué, will rise to an astounding 800 m tall and incorporate various features like hanging arenas with elemental shock absorption technology, a zeppeliport, a money exchange, and its own teleport hub. It is presumed that it will give employment to about 2 800 humans and a similar amount of Pokémon.

Ancient Constructions

TO BE EDITED - Please Understand

---

A reminder that next up is not the entry on Economy, but rather Religion and Cosmology.

Also a reminder that people are allowed to make questions. Much of the construction of this setting is still open, and I hope to be able to provide pointers for people wanting to chime in once I can work up the section "Development Docs" in the opening post. In the meantime, feel free to ask!

Credits where it's due

* The mention of the Lega Runa Battle Tower is a pointer to a previous work of mine, for which I give thanks to the Serebii Forums for the contest that resulted in its publication.
* The Futurama-style airdock image is courtesy of SimCity.com.
* The skyscraper airdock image courtesy of TheAtlantic.com, source image link.

 

[Venia Silente]

Religion and Cosmology

Sorry for the long wait.

Religion and Cosmology… what people choose to believe, and what people choose to find out. Certainly another broad subject which in the particular case of Pokémon is further made complex by not only the canon keeping mum on most aspects, but also the periodic rewriting of things that can be "potentially" interpreted as creation myths or statements of origin. Mew "the ancestor of all Pokémon"? Arceus "the one born from the first egg"? And then it turns out the first Pokémon was actually Rhydon :-P

What's more, the consideration of what can be a "religion" in the Pokémon world is muddled by the fact that, unlike in our world, the creatures that are revered as deities and qualified as such, are creatures proven to exist. Not only that, barring some specifics, they are mostly like any other Pokémon: for Pokémon, "deities" are "like us".

Creation Myths

Each of the most long-lived races has its own interpretation of how things started out. Sometimes, those interpretations are quite far from the truth, sometimes they happen to be spot-on on several aspects.

Myth about the very creation of the universe - in particular those of intelligent and lasting races such as Psychics, Faeries and Dragons- share a couple of common elements. It is a shared background myth, for example, that Arceus, the "Original One", born from the first egg in the universe, created life; starting with six Pokémon known as the Creation and Lake Trios.

At some point, after more Pokémon had been created by various means, it is said that Arceus "brought" humans into the world, though nothing more specific about the why or the when is recorded. Another core shared element is that at some point in the past, humans got involved in a great war between the various Pokémon races, and managed to gain the upper hand and exterminate most races by means of a weapon called the "Sword"; however, upon being confronted by a figure that appeared from the vastness of the void and realizing how much they had weakened the world, humans forsook the Sword and allied themselves with Pokémon. However such was went afterwards, at some point Giratina did something that enraged the Original One, and by this act he was banished to the Distortion World.

This is where commonalities end and each race's interpretation of their role as the protagonists of life begins.

The 'drao', or Dragon Pokémon, see themselves as the creatures closer to creation itself. The members of the Creation Trio: Dialga, Palkia and Giratina, can be seen in the image.
(Also notice how Druddigon is the "normal" drao closer to Arceus~)

Dragon races call their kind 'drao'; they know themselves to have originated from the Creation Trio and have passed down the tale of the Original Dragon, the first "biological" dragon: thus they see themselves closest to the pinnacle of creation itself, the best possible biological beings. The Sovereignty of Dragonspiral Tower is a place of tremendous religious value for the dragon races because they know the spawn of the Original Dragon, the Pokémon Zekrom and Reshiram, reside and receive worship there. Not counting the Creation Trio, Reshiram and Zekrom enjoy the closest position to "deities" for the dragon races; after them follow some powerful "Earthly Wyrms", such as Zygarde and Rayquaza, not as deities but as elders figures to all dragon races.

Fairy types or 'fae' have existed for a long time without relying on a "mentor figure" Legendary. Their tales tell of how, in the wake of the first few purges of the world, some of the rules of the universe, left loose and without purpose, coalesced into "conscious power" that found a role in offering alternatives to the laws of nature. This created not only the Fairy Type but also various branches of "mystical" or supernatural arts to which Fairy types and other few special Pokémon like Ninetales and Milotic are more attuned to. Most Fairy types worship the elder deer Xerneas as the one responsible for binding their magical powers; however, Xerneas is nowhere close to being considered a "deity".
It is rumored Arceus created an Original creature of its own from the commands of the Unown, the Original Fae, however reports of the existence of this creature are, at the moment, unreliable.

Psychic types, called in ancient times the 'miju', have been good at passing down knowledge across generations. It is told by some myths that the Lake Trio also came up with their own Original Psychic, a creature sharing some elements of their semblance, that would serve as a tester of the Trio's designs; this creature is speculated by some to be Mew, a Psychic Pokémon that in the past was even believed to be the primogenitor to most Pokémon. Still, some races of powerful Psychics tried to outgrow such beliefs; one ancient civilization in particular, a communion between the Alakazam and Metagross species, exalted itself above lesser non-Psychic species to the point of enslaving them; scriptings and rumors say that they met a tragic end in the wake of the Rain from the Heavens, as the Psychic patron Mew denied them aid as punishment for their attempts to seek power rivaling that of deities.

Local Myths

Myths and folklore follow not only the creation of the world but also the presence of various phenomena or even the history of certain Pokémon. Sometimes, myth and history match; more often than not, the facts are lost to the fog of time and only (mostly) the belief lives on.

Suocé is of course not exempt from this. The most well known myths are the ones that speak of the birth of the region itself, and the establishment of the first few settlements; the most famous of them Cadricea, which was born as an altar where the humans delivered offerings to the Muskedeer Trio as a show of gratitude for welcoming them into the valleys. Stories say that wild Pokémon then grew interested in the concept of worshipping the elder figures, and welcomed the humans to inhabit the region to learn that aspect of their culture.

Other less well known stories speak of the history or features of various areas and landmarks that have become shrouded in myth. For example, the origin of the La Plancha Sovereignty, the kinds of Pokémon living in the underground of the main cordillera, or the history behind the craters north of Lete and their particular colouration. A rumor that has itself become forgotten except for the writings of certain historians speaks of a strange landmark somewhere in the sea west of the region; unseekable in the vastness of the sea, lies a structure created by an ancient non-human civilization, and in old times from within used to emerge the grumbles and cries of eldritch creatures from depths beyond those of the sea and the crust of the planet.

Most information about those stories and myths can be found in the National Library of Science and History, one of the most notorious landmarks located in the city of Désona. Some texts are placed there in a special archive in a protected chamber, to which the rumor says only very specific humans and Pokémon, such as the Champion, have unrestricted access.

---

And this was it. Next time we will resume our original schedule for this programme, with the entry on Economy.


Once again a reminder that people are allowed to make questions - be it here or via Visitor Message. Hopefully as questions, comments, reviews and more information flow about, I will be able to compile them in an accessory entry.

Credits where it's due

* The concept of a mixed Alakazam-Metagross civilization is a shared element of continuity with fellow author and roleplayer Umbramatic, from the PEFE community.
* The concept of Mew as an "Original Psychic" is more or less borrowed from pot shots at mythology shared with the We Are All Pokémon Trainers community.
* The "Heaven of Dragons" artwork image is © by its author at this Pixiv profile (redirected via this thread). The image was shrunk for purposes of showing it in this thread specifically. If you know the actual name of the artwork, lemme know, it's too cute! I¿ll get your username in the credits too.

 

[Desert Stream~]

Oo a new thread! I really like everything, from the pictures, the lore, and the CSS.
Can't wait to see more.
One thing I really like is that graphical differences are considered regional varients!

 

[Orx of Twinleaf]

Hum hum hum
I must say, I do very much like your canon, Mr. Silente, and the degree of forethought put into it is certainly commendable. It is no small task to have to stitch together such a world a Pokémon's, what with its maddening insistence to contradict itself when given the opportunity and present alternative schema through different media sorts. And of course there's always the matter of is-it-or-isn't-it-hyperbole when coming up against things like "Ponyta can hop the Eiffel Tower" and "Machamp throws 1000 punches in a second." And don't even get me started on things like Doduo using Fly, Diglett somehow being totally unobserved below the neck, and Kangaskhan hatching with a "baby" in its pouch.

I like the direction you took it in. I've personally made attempts to try and unify things in a similar manner, but I will fully admit to taking what might be considered a little too much "artistic license" when I did it, and it's always refreshing to see how other people handle it. I'm looking forward to seeing your canon fleshed out fully over the next few weeks, dear, and I'll be cheering it from the shadows all the while.

 

[Venia Silente]

Oo a new thread! I really like everything, from the pictures, the lore, and the CSS.
Can't wait to see more.
One thing I really like is that graphical differences are considered regional varients!

Thanks! The CSS took a lot of testing, and uses some features I am maaaaaybe thinking the PC devs were not intended to be used, such as text stretching... ^^

But it works so awesomely I couldn't stand letting it go to waste.

All the posts follow the same text template so that should not only make stuff easy to read, but also easy to correct in case it turns out it doesn't play that well with some themes or it has legibility issues.

As for the content proper, such as regional variants, I really like trying to avoid that some good concepts go to waste. I mean if you had the power to not to resign to lose such awesome things as Gen 2 Gengar... wouldn't you? :p

It is no small task to have to stitch together such a world a Pokémon's, what with its maddening insistence to contradict itself when given the opportunity and present alternative schema through different media sorts.

Definitively not a small task, yeah. This setting has been cooking since about 2010, and even now it is still mostly up to date with Gen 4 lore and mechanics, with most important stuff from later generations forward-ported in via convenient holes (such as adding future types, which can be done easily by stating Arceus's plates be "twenty-something"). Or still in the process of being integrated.

Working with the wide range of different mediums is quite complicated sometimes as well. And I'm only tackling the most mainstream ones. I haven't thought what to import, and how, from such sidegames and side media as Trozei.

I'm looking forward to seeing your canon fleshed out fully over the next few weeks, dear, and I'll be cheering it from the shadows all the while.

Yup. As with most people, I guess, I'm taking this slowly, and real life also forces me to keep this a sadly lower priority than I'd like to.

But I hope most things will get fixed once I can release the Development Docs, so that people can see how things are progressing over time - and in some cases, provide input as well. I'm still working on Economy, Power/Governance and a couple other entries, as well. I still have to solve the matter of dem damn skyrocketed bicycle prices... {D:}

In the meantime, well, this thread is open, as is my profile for VMs, I will be trying to be active in this section of the forum as well, so thanks for making your interest patent.

 

[Venia Silente]

You thought this was a post by a mod to close this thread (hi, Bay!). But it was I, Venia Silente!

I have returned, or more properly never left even if that might have been the impression. I apologize for the six months wait for those who were following this thread, but with a new Worldbuilding June, I am more officially back to the activity. So, really sorry about the loooooongcat long wait.

Of course, the best way to show that off is by continuing where we were left off the last time. So, I leave you here with the entry on Economy. But before that... an announcement.

The Official Suoc?verse wiki

Given work on the Suoc?verse is pretty extensive, I've opened up the Suoc?verse Official Wiki, a website that will contain the latest and most official information regarding the development of the Suoc?verse, its concepts, its people, and the stories released for it. The wiki will also have a permanent link to this very thread, which is the Official Worldbuilding June release for the 'verse after all. Just remember, both are works in progress.

Not only that, but people who wish to shoot me Suoc?verse questions can send me asks to my tumblr, veniasilente.tumblr.com, at least until I figure out a more official form of inbox. Of course, questions here or in my PC profile via visitor message or PM are welcome, too.

Over the course of the weekend the main index of this thread will be updated to point to the wiki where adequate, and over the course of the next weeks some of the entries will be edited to point to the relevant articles on the Suoc?verse wiki where convenient.

(This entire notice will also be replicated on the opening post, but I leave it here too for posterity.)

With that out of the way, let's get back to the exploration. This time, literally putting the verse's money where I put my mouth. So, let's talk about...

Economy

Economics. Yet another of those subjects that can be tackled upon via a Rare Candy Treatment comic on the subject. Let?s face it, the economy of the Pok?mon World, if even scantily looked upon, must be at least weird.

Here we have a world that, in theory, lives in a near-utopia condition. In terms of capabilities, Pok?mon are used for and able to do some of the hard work humans and machines need to do, and access to energy seems to be plentiful if not free, as we can see from some of the movies (LaRousse?s defense bots in particular come to mind). However, such an advanced society is quite visibly not the norm: most of the time we see farms, wildlands and towns, whereas such things as aerial bases with holographic maid AIs are limited to specific environments visible in, for example, the Pok?mon movies.

To a point, that makes sense - if there?s lot of people and Pok?mon, where are they going to get the food they need from? Surely there needs to be a lot of room dedicated to production of resources.

For this entry I'll focus on two aspects: an overview of the human element of the economy in a Pok?mon world, and the economy of the Suoc? region. For those more interested in the latter, a check of the History entry above might be of use.

Overview

Trying to establish a chain of value for products and goods in the Pok?mon world is a hard problem, due to a number of factors.

First, the scope we get from canons so far is very limited, to not much else than the world of the everyday Trainer. Up until the D&P season of the anime, if my memory serves correctly, we only had one episode delving into the career of a person into a field that remains primarily focused on humans, this being human medicine (and even that got overtaken by Pok?mon activity).

Then there?s the transversality of Pok?mon training. Given their powerset, Pok?mon are capable of introducing themselves into pretty much any productive field. Raichu and Electabuzz can assist in power generation and transmission. Grass and Ground Pok?mon in general can assist with farming, foresting and urbanization. Bug and Psychic types would be useful in a huge number of small tasks for which we were stumped until the invention of specific machines: chemical handling, intrusion detection and process and detection of counterfeits are just a few that come to mind. Ice and Steel types could have in the past been vital in the distribution of food and resources. Ghost-types would probably see use in the construction and security fields.

Long story short, we literally do not know well what economic activities do humans carry out (or not) in Pok?mon besides some very specific instances we have been shown; we do not even know at what point humans can be replaced in these activities by Pok?mon or by robots.

As things stand, an experienced Trainer with a team that sees good coverage and is not too specialized to the point of crippling, could easily find work offers in a lot of stuff in the open market, and would only be truly limited to take short or long term jobs by the Trainer?s time availability. This is where certain classes like the Ace or Veteran trainers would function at their best as part of the economy. Clearing pests, tutoring other Trainers, running the dreaded escort missions, nothing really falls outside their range. Most other classes of Trainers would likely be constrained by the costs related to their specific specializations.

Economic Activities in Suoc?

As historically speaking Suoc? started out as a weird fusion of a Pok?mon Sovereignty and a number of mostly isolated, self-sustained settlements, the economy of the region has evolved across time as a conjunction of dualities as well: from a strong focus on primary activities for self-sustentation, them being farming in the south and mining in the north, to separate but collaborative focus on securing domestic consumption for the south and optimizing the storage and transfer of goods and know-how about them for the north.

The northern lands, back when heavily fragmented, spawned several settlements focused on mining of coal and silver, with Gems becoming a fortunate subproduct. Over time, those activities were relegated as the region became better integrated. Because of the long time since mining stopped being a central activity for those areas, the environment has somewhat recuperated from the effects of the extraction process.

Nowadays, some of the mining settlements remain primarily as touristic attractions, whereas others have been refitted to fill in the role of generation and processing of typed Gems, very valuable in the professional Trainer marketplace. Bug and Steel typed Gems are the main product in the far northern area, and Steel and Rock in the northeastern. There are large deposits of Ground and Bug typed Gems in the western area but they remain unaltered, largely due to opposition from the La Plancha Sovereignty whose lands are close or right over the veins.

Over the years and thanks to the construction of roads and the establishment of air and train travel lines between the northern cities and provinces, they have grown to become interdependent, each specializing in various kinds of activities that they trade audience between. Moreover, it is thanks to this growth that architecture and urbanization became among the strong points of the region?s technology and know-how to the point in recent times the main knowledge export of the region is that of architectural development and urbanization in a context of living together with Pok?mon. Processes related to architecture, including the know-how, make up about 12-15% of the regional trade.

Of note is the city of ?mpovi, in the map located at the core of the northern half of the country. Named after emporium, the city is an eminent commercial pole of the region and considered by many the beating heart of Suoc?. Its placement, at a close distance to main courses of water, with ready access to both the La Plancha Sovereignty and to the roads to the developing north and northeast, make it a frequent stop for travellers, Trainers, and entrepreneurs galore. The city also hosts the region?s Casino, where gambling games of skill and dexterity (and Voltorb Flip, for young Trainers) flourishes open to the public.

Close to ?mpovi by the south is D?sona, which functions as an information pole and is one of the places where most people go to take a rest from the days and nights of activity in ?mpovi. Between them is a large section of private lands, the Estates of the Mezze family, among the wealthiest families in the country, who employ themselves and others in all sorts of fields including sports, schooling and garbage collection.

With a diverging geography, culture and historical background, the southern side of Suoc? has a notoriously different economical engine - and the fact that a fair amount of that land is a Sovereignty greatly factors into this. There are some few outposts near the cordillera, and most settlements and activities focus on the western side of the country. With flatter lands and a connection to the neighbour country of Caledoria to the south, the principal economic activities of southern Suoc? are agricultural such as farming, or trade-related such as storage and moving of supplies.

The fact that humans living in Cadr?cea are legally citizens of the Sovereignty also has a significant economical impact - people are allowed to work in the Sovereignty in a number of jobs, such as farmers, architects and builders. As part of their covenant with the human government of Suoc?, a portion of the Sovereignty?s western side is used to host vast farming grounds by humans, who work these lands and with the resulting produces ?give back? to the Pok?mon community that hosts them. ?Retiring to Agriculture? is in fact a valued and time-honored exit strategy for those inhabitants who return home after their adventures of youth and adulthood are done.

Agriculture of the Cadr?cean lands alone, even discounting the produce that is reused in domestic consumption, makes for about 20-25% of Suoc?s regional trade, and it employs about 30% of the workforce of the province in the age range of 25 to 40 years old..

Associated with the welfare of the Cadr?cean Sovereignty and the development of tools of the trade and know-how for architecture and mining in the northern lands, is the development of the industry sector. There is a persistent, if seasonal, push for the provision of good Trainers or officers who can take employment as security guards, escorts or security attachment for caravans; conversely, the home security segment is somewhat stagnant, not only because of the presence of Pok?mon but because of the historical background, in particular in the northern half of the region, of families actually spending a relevant portion of time out of home (in mining or training trips), and not storing much wealth there. Counting roaming Trainers, security for facilities or caravans makes up about 22-25% of the Suoc? workforce in the age range of 16 to 25 years old.

Money Meta

While this mostly belongs to the Meta, I'd like to talk about "Pok?money" as well. In particular for if one there there comes to be a Suoc?verse videogame.

Just as in our world "?" or "currency scarab" is the global currency sign, in the world of the Suoc?verse such position would be taken by a symbol not unlike the games' "P with bars" that we see in the games similar to the Euro. Local currencies exist of course, though it gets interesting to think about them - would francs be called such in a region where the "name" "French" is not there?

In our current Unicode system it is more or less possible to imitate the effect of the P-currency symbol with characters such as ? (U+20b1, the Filipino and Latin America peso sign) or ? (U+20bd, the Russian Ruble sign). In writings where I get to portray money, I will likely be using one of the two, unless circumstances force me to fall back to what I would prefer to be the Euro sign (?, U+20ac) which is internationalized enough. If your browser can not show one or some of the currencies above it might be missing the required glyphs in the "Currency symbols block"; you can install fonts such as the freely available Unifont or Gentium, or Google's Droid Sans, which usually contain the glyphs in that set. How to install fonts falls outside of the scope of what I desire to cover here.

---

On the next...

So, this is it for reopening this project. Next time comes Power and Governance, where among other things I intend to exposit on the three Legendaries who guard the Cadr?cean Sovereignty. Those interested in watching the new entry be built can request access to the Google Docs file via PM.

Monthly (heh) reminder that people are welcome to ask questions - be it here or via Visitor Message or via my tumblr as described in this reopening above.

Credits where it's due

* Some betareading and questioning was done by contributors such as Tagg and Honchkrow from WAAPT and Virgil from Serebii, among others.
* A very good refresher on some economics subjects and the preconditions for economic activity to rise, were given to me by Worldbuilding June chat regular Gyrtop.

 

[Venia Silente]

Here I am with more exposition on the world of the Suocéverse. A bit delayed as this was supposed to have been posted by Tue-Wed. Today we are getting right to the point, and next entries will be somewhat shorter than usual as their content will be aggregated thematically (eg.: Flora and Fauna will be merged into a singular entry).

Power, Hierarchy and Governance

Power!!!!! Ah-limited power!!!!!

That is probably what first comes to one's mind when one thinks of the wonderful things we would be able to do with a team of highly trained Pokémon at our disposal. Add one Legendary or two, depending on the specifics of the setting, or even any of a number of canon doomsday devices, for extra spice.

Of course, multiply for thousands of Trainers and or people who work with Pokémon and suddenly such a model is not stable anymore. For a civilization to thrive, or more than one, not only there needs be regulations on who can perform what kind of activity and who designs and gives the orders, but also there needs apply the simple rules of mathematics and statistics: not everyone can be a leader, not everyone can be powerful, not everyone can be special, or as Syndrome said, no one will be.

Let's take a look at how power and governance are distributed in the region of Suocé.

Overview

While lots of fanon takes it from the various canon elements that the regions like Kanto or Sinnoh would have organized like city-states up until recent times, this model does not really fit the specific constraints in Suocé's timeline. Most settlements in the north of the region were founded by explorers, miners and corsairs, many of them aware of Caledoria's presence to the south or even originating from there, but there was always the background idea that they would aggregate into a singular country "if only we were able to actually connect these towns sprinkled all over". The geography of the northern half of the region, and the circumstances behind the establishment of the first settlements, made that very difficult.

As we saw in History however, eventually humans joined forces with the Sovereignty to the south; this granted the population the protection and the resources to start a proper colonization process, and eventually the region of Suocé was born.

The political structure of Suocé makes it somewhat of an oddball - there is the human government and organizational ladder with provinces and municipalities, and then by the side there's the territories run by Pokémon with a looser model, and while each side has practically full autonomy over their own affairs, there are certain subjects, many related to the overall welfare of the region, where they both have a voice and vote.

The vertical structure of Suocé as a government is totally not largely derived I swear from the vertical structure and territorial division of South American countries such as Chile and Perú. The top levels of the political role is that of the President of Suocé and a Chamber (Cámara in Spanish) of Representatives covering specific matters like Urban Development, Transportation and Education. The region is organized in a number of Provinces (Provincias in Spanish) and Established Territories (Áreas Instauradas in Spanish), each managed by a Governor or similar ruler figure indirectly elected, and by a Management Committee.

Provinces and Territories are further divided into Municipalities (Municipalidad, pl. Municipalidades in Spanish), divisions that each cover a town, a group of small towns interconnected, or a city; the Major (Alcalde) of each Municipality is elected directly and the roles of the Municipality are assisted by a Municipal Council of members that are offered or promoted into the position by a number of Schools or similar institutions each contributing in their specific fields (such as agriculture, social security and urbanization).

Special consideration in the political structure of the region is taken due to the presence of the Sovereignties of La Plancha and Cadrícea. La Plancha is in general terms isolationist except where trade of food and Pokémon training are involved, featuring no human settlements; Cadrícea on the other hand has settlements and legit municipalities and is tightly integrated into the economics and production cycle of southern Suocé. Both Sovereignties are politically classified as co-hosted Established Territories; the Cadrícean has a unique "upper" management committee comprised entirely by Pokémon, and both the majors of the various municipalities as well as the designated Governor answer first to the ruling Muskedeer Trio were they to make themselves available; as for La Plancha, its ruling structure has gone mostly ignored for the most part up until recent years, when a war between wild Pokémon prompted an abrupt change in their ruling structure.

Current (as of Jun 2017) Suocé map does not showcase the division of provinces, though it does display the relative size and position of the Sovereignties.

The Cadrícean Deer Trio

The Sovereignty of the Cadrícean Widefields is one of a number of territories in the Pokémon world known to be ruled, directly or indirectly, by Legendary Pokémon (others including the Dragonspiral Moors and, in the far past, the Tree of Beginning). The three cervids Virizion, Cobalion and Terrakion are recognized by its inhabitants, both Pokémon and humans, as their protectors, usually called the "Guardian Forces", with that role taking the front seat.

More "day to day" ruling on the other hand is left to a cadre of Grass-types of various areas of the Sovereignty, dubbed sometimes the "Cadrícean Council" or the "Green Council" in comparison to the municipal councils taking up similar roles in Suocé's fully-human territories.

The three specimens of the Cadrícean Deer set have their personalities mostly documented as a result of their encounters with the successive Champions and Elite Four, with the representatives of some of the colonies under their control, and via rare battle encounters with some trainers. Although they take in their role of caretakers for their realm seriously, they only directly involve themselves in "big picture" issues; for everything else, the three employ an assortment of hoof-picked specialist Pokémon for various services, indentured for life. Among the most well known of the cervids' servants are a wild Arcanine, named Eltenios, who works for them as a courier, sending messages and moving items of importance, and a female Leavanny, named Caolené, who is the lead fighter of the Cadrícea City caravans and head of Virizion's personal escort.

The La Plancha Anteorders

The Sovereignty of La Plancha does not have Legendary Pokémon among their most valuable figures; instead, it has been ruled since the beginning by rotating groups of Pokémon of various species, most of the time selected cabals of Bug-types such as Ariados, living in the depths of the forest, or some Pokémon from the rocky mountains like the (non-native) Aggron. The leading cabal of each species in each generation is called by their communities their Anteorder, a play on the concept of "status quo ante order" or -more or less- "everything as it were". Because these species tend to have uneven lifespans, markedly different than those of humans, under human perception the ruling of the Sovereignty has been over the years all but stable: bug colony Anteorders may last as short as five years, whereas a Rock-type Anteorder might last a couple tens of eyars.

As caretakers of a realm of wild Pokémon, the Anteorders do not concern themselves with high-order issues such as economy or political planning, at least as much as they can understand it; instead they focus on keeping a baseline truce between the species that inhabit the Sovereignty - many of which comprise full predation chains - so that the geographical independence of the forested area can be retained, mostly by keeping human urbanization at bay. At the same time, they make sure to keep a rich innermost area of the realm as a shared territory safe for everyone to raise their families in as much as possible.

By the time Nadia Shepard assumed as the Champion of the region, it is said one of the votes for her came from the Sovereignty's then ruling Furret Anteorder. During the last few years, central ruling of the Sovereignty switched from a Granbull Anteorder to the most recent Ariados Anteorder, the 44th recorded of their species. Unfortunately the Sovereignty entered a period of heavy turmoil by then, as a flock of migrant dragon Pokémon claimed for themselves the mountains south of Ísparus and aimed to turn it into a permanent settlement, using the Sovereignty as their feeding grounds.

Recent news from the Sovereignty have it that the ruling Ariados Anteorder was crippled or eliminated shortly ago, and that for a while even the innermost grounds of the Sovereignty were exposed to attack by the dragons. However, there are rumors that a new order has arisen - a sole Pokémon, a powerful Nidoqueen without an Anteorder, is said to have seized control of the Sovereignty's defense and war efforts. What will the effect of this be in the relationship with humans and with the other Sovereignty now that control appears to have fallen under a singular ruler and the era of Anteorders might be over, is yet to be seen.

---

On the next...

Next entry deals with Language - an in overall terms completely glossed over aspect of the Pokémon World. After that there are a couple entries that due to their nature will be merged into singular entries, up until the Technology entry. For purposes of exploring different aspects of the world closer to each other, the entry on Transportation will likely be brought in ahead of time as well.

No artwork this time, though there are some plans for commissioning stuff in the future.

As usual, VM and Tumblr are open for questions, as is this thread.

Credits where it's due

* Betareading was largely in charge of Tagg from WAAPT and Virgil from Serebii. Other usual betareaders participated as well.

 

[Venia Silente]

One more entry, a bit later than I would have liked, bu at least we have stuff to talk about. And with talk, I mean Language, which is the subject of today's entry.

Language

Language. How do people and Pok?mon speak. Yet another aspect mostly glossed over by the canon. We do know some bare things, in particular, there is an impression at least in the anime that Pok?mon natively (or ?intuitively?) understand each other across species barriers. References to IRL languages are made in the games via their localized versions. The names of the Pok?mon species themselves express different ideas and have different nuances depending on the localization. And there?s a lot of stuff to build and play with.

The core questions there, basically, are related to how do Pok?mon record their attempts to communicate with each other, and with humans. This entry will thus delve into languages themselves, the origin of, the variations of, and the broad strokes communication between humans and Pok?mon; matters about the means of communication, senses, apparatus and techniques will be relegated to the entry on Communication.

Overview

While the different Pok?mon species have diverging, sometimes incompatible physiologies, they are all capable of some form of conveying messages. Animal-like Pok?mon would be able to bark, roar, quack or use any of a number of onomatopeia words according to what their vocal organs are capable of, and both them and ?inorganics? would be able to use various form of mechanical communication, such as buzzing and thumping, all defined by their physiology. Then there's the whole array of facets of "body language". Further details are more a matter of the Communication entry.

The convergence in the evolution of methods for communication has led to also convergent languages for Pok?mon to communicate with alike Pok?mon, such as bird-to-bird, and Pok?mon in general are well attuned for using this kind of language design. Other means of communication such as pheromones and other senses do work, but due to their nature are more constrained to work only across the same species, or across alike species, where they achieve maximum performance; they are not able to produce what we would understand as a "full language".

Over time, the progressive perfecting of these ?quick and specific? languages has resulted in the development of dialects shared by species or groups of Pok?mon as will be seen below. Even more, maybe as a result of this opaque ?regularity? of language, humans as well have developed their communication with Pok?mon around the idea of a selection of standardized, predefined shortcuts, in particular when it comes to legalized battles; those shortcuts either refer to acknowledged techniques Pok?mon can perform, or to attack and movement strategies prearranged by the Trainer, such as ?Dodge!?.

Yet besides these natural ways of communication between Pok?mon, there exists at least a form of ?language? that is somehow common to all Pok?monkind, and that allows them to understand each other?s intentions and directions to a given degree, regardless of their species. The nature of this trait is unknown and difficult to study, as it lies beyond even the nuances of body language or specific abilities such as the form of telepathy that some Legendary Pok?mon are known to employ. Whether this ability to bypass species, or even class / kingdom barriers, is intrinsic to what constitutes being a Pok?mon or has to be acquired by them somehow, is also a question not solved as of yet. It is telling that even revivified fossil Pok?mon, or Pok?mon that are created via artificial means such as Castform and Golett, seem to enjoy this same intrinsic ability despite no procedure having been found or designed to implement it.

The 'Unown', primeval Pok?mon that are thought to be a representation of Arceus' power over the universe, and thought to have inspired the glyphs seen in many languages.

What is known is that Pok?mon describe this experience as getting information from their interlocutor as a sort of foreign language which is then "commentated" for them by an unobservable source. Study of Pok?mon neurology and their perception of this phenomemon is the driver behind companies such as Devon Corporation trying to develop their own real-time translators for Pok?mon languages.

It is thought that this pan-Pok?mon communication trait itself springs from the existence of the Unown, one of the earliest Pok?mon, believed to have been created by Arceus himself when he gave shape to the ?commands? with which he could manipulate the world, and who are shaped like the various glyphs of the writing systems used in the world's languages - Latin, Cyrillic, Runic, among others.

Humans and Human Languages

Regarding humans, it is likely that they have their own languages just as we have ours and communicate as we do - via words and memes. Presumably, languages and alphabets exist that would transparently map to Latin, Cyrillic, Runic and many others, as the glyphs would be similar to the already existing Unown as described above? It could be that the various languages have developed their glyphs using the shapes of the Unown as an inspiration? The answer to that question, if any, might be held by the eldest ones among the ?terrenal? Pok?mon, as only them and the deities would know if and how things were language-wise before humans appeared in the world.

At least my current (as of 2017) headcanon has it that while a number of IRL languages exist, they are somewhat distinct to their IRL analogues due to the cultural impact of a world that has Pok?mon in it and has progressed differently. It is likely that a number of artificial languages, such as Esperanto or Ido, exist as well and are given a minute preference in fields such as archival and radio communications.

An example of the "anime script"; in this case a script apparently local to Unova.

Regardless of the status of preexisting languages, a number of constructed scripts exist in the Pok?mon world, culturally tied to specific regions, some of which are transparent substitution ciphers for Latin. One such cipher is shown to the right (images to be linked), which is apparently local and major to the regions neighbour to Unova, whereas another known one is local to Kalos and its surroundings.

Pok?mon Dialects

Communities of Pok?mon have, over time, developed their own dialects just as humans do; however the distribution of those dialects is more regular, as Pok?mon enjoy a better ability to intuitively transmit their intentions and meanings to one another and they can enjoy as well some of the technological improvements humans bring around for instant communication, thanks to their attaching to Trainers.

For an example of a dialect that has spread at the species or even family / clade level, Draconic Pok?mon tend to see themselves, at a cultural level, as the pinnacle of evolution, and over time have built an unified language which is mostly seen at dragon-led Sovereignties like Unova?s Dragonspiral Moors; this language would be similar to The Elder Scrolls? Thu?um, using short sounds that are expressed in writing as regular markings, and basically follow a similar purpose.

Dragons would sometimes invoke their might by chanting specific word sequences to which they adscribe the power to unleash a dragon?s indomitable spirit, in particular before the forces of steel and magic that threaten them - they would invoke techniques such as Draco Meteor via chants that translate to something like ?Mahfilmed Galsu?um?, or, in their words, ?meteor-like death-breath?. In these draconic dialects, the special term ?Drao? is used as a term of reverence for ?pure? or monotype dragons that are among the strongest or hold a privileged role in their society, and is derived from what they believe to be the name of the first ever dragon created by the Dragon Trio.

Examples of more local dialects exist, tinted by the historical context of the regions they inhabit. The Nidoran colonies, primarily those living in Johto, tend to delve in lore in an old dialect similar to Watership Down?s Lapine, adjusted to have significant terms rehashed to a Pok?mon context. For example, the term ?ela?, which in Lapine is reserved for predators, would in the colonies refer to those species that predate on Nidoran - in particular, species such as Skarmory and Houndoom also seen in the region; at the other end of respect lies the name ?Frith? by which rabbits refer to their lore?s Sun God, in this world refers to the more real creature known as Ho-Oh, the protector bird worshiped as the bringer of sunlight, of healthy growth for grass and crops, and of the veil of light that reveals the predators.

Meta

Details on the aspect of the "anime scripts" were brought to my attention by beta reader regular Virgil134 who sent me notice of a reblog about them. It turns out the scripts have been studied enough, and some people have even created font files to be able to use them in writing.

For whatever reason, these scripts lack the "?" for "Pok?mon". Whether this should be read deeper into or is just a sort of equivalent to the "default to White" syndrome when interpreting the cultures or races of underexposed characters and their traits in media, I guess is unknown. There is no technical reason why the scripts would lack a glyph that appears verbatim in the name of their franchise and the in-universe representation of details thereof.

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On the next...

Since advancing on these entries has gone pretty slow and we are getting into more scoped subjects, next articles will hopefully be briefer (and come out more periodically). Coming up next are Flora and Fauna, two strongly interconnected ideas which for the purpose of readability will be merged into a single post.

From there the only notorious deviation from the usual WBJ programme might be, as discussed in the latest post, that the entry on Transportation will likely be brought in ahead of time as well.

Credits where it's due

* Betareading took place under the watch of Tracer / DruddigonCuddlepile from Serebii; other usual suspects involved as well.
* Internationalized Unown images taken from Bulbapedia and resized to fit this forum. Original Source.
* The anime script font taken from PocketMonsters.net and resized to fit this forum. Original source.
* The anime script font, for those interested in adding them to their systems, is available here courtesy of https://pkmn-downtheline.tumblr.com/post/148569308815/ive-created-a-font-based-on-the-pokemon-worlds .

 

[Venia Silente]

Flora and Fauna

For today's entry, I've decided to merge two subjects that are usually pretty related to each other - Flora ("plants") and Fauna ("animals"). That be said, this requires a distinctive treatment, as the place of Pokémon in the world is not that of plants, nor animals, nor both. This is pretty noticeable in that we do have a recognizable non-Pokémon Flora in the Pokémon world, for example.

The world we see in Pokémon is a splendorous yet also curious thing: there are Pokémon, who are kind of the creatures of Just Being There™, then there are humans, who are "Terran" creatures, there are plants, who are also "Terran"... but barring a reference or two in the early anime, there are no "Terran" animals. Not even flies. No fungus and plankton either, apparently.

First things first then, we need to figure out what fits where.

Overview

The particular place Pokémon take in the biodiversity of the world is pretty strange: they cover various roles related to both Flora and Fauna, yet not only they are distinguishably not either, nor both; but also, there's too few of them (so far). It's like a huge chunk of the biodiversity of the world is missing, and the 800-something stages of Pokémon, split in around 350 species if not less, is nowhere near enough to cover for it in terms of ecological needs - that is, mostly, food.

That means, of course, that there also large portions of the entire ecosystem that should not be working. There is not enough breadth of pollinators, apparently nothing takes the necessary role that flies and maggots have in our world, and given how apparently worthless Magikarp are, what do the marine Pokémon eat to manage to sustain any stable amount of population is a mystery only known to the early anime creative producers.

For the purposes of the Suocéverse though, I've taken to separate Pokémon from "flora" and "fauna", for a number of reasons in particular their tremendous variety that includes inorganics - as such, they don't really fit the place of "animals" and only or mostly that, as we understand them in our world.

Animals After All...

For the Suocéverse I've gone with the idea that since Terran plants and trees, some very recognizable, are obviously around and in good shape, then why not the Terran animals too? It'd be welcome to have some very recognizable ones around, isn't it? That's two ways to keep an ecosystem healthy, in the least: we add a diversity of species and we cover ecological niches.

Terran Fish in captivity.

We can have the class of animals that we usually categorize as "farm animals": sheep, cows, etc…, for the developments closer to humans, and then we can have the class of creatures we usually just assume to be "under the hood" of things, keeping ecosystems running: flies, maggots, ants, some small rodents.

There is a certain degree of support to have various urban animals such as cats, crows and mice also made easily available in a Pokémon world. Even if the competition would be harsher for those who are going around without a home, those who manage to find one, or manage to assemble or integrate into a collective, would enjoy some protections that they don't really enjoy IRL, thanks to the potential degrees of technological advance in human cities in a Pokémon world: roof, healthcare, easier distribution of resources, you name it. Even in the wild, the fact that Pokémon don't even attempt to cover all ecological niches means that Terran animals such as insects and fish would have ample space and time to thrive, allowing them to function as a potential basis for a food chain involving Pokémon as well.

Going Native

A specimen of Evening Tuft

Speaking of plants, we do have some Pokémonverse-specific varieties such as the Gracidea, Berries and Apricorns (which will be deal in with more depth in the entries for Food and Technology) and, if Pokéworld-native, the flower Flabébé clings to (it's only ever named as a "Fairy Flower" in the anime). Presumably other varieties of plants and flowers exist - I am myself partial to stuff like the Thorn-de-lis, the Winterkin, and the Evening Tuft among other flowers that can be seen in Streetpass' Flower Town. They have a variety of color, shape and function that feels like it fits just right in a world of creatures as varied as Pokémon.

Beyond that, there's various things in the Pokémon world that look like they could be living organisms, but we don't really know more. The cell-like organisms in the Tree of Beginning and the Time Flowers, both showing in M8, are good examples.

The case of the Time Flower being a living organism is interesting in that the flower would react to Auran stimuli and be able to store an enormous amount of information about its surroundings - enough to produce the "playback" that we see in the movie. If a living organism, the plant likely has organs or tissue that is somehow receptive and capable of interacting with Aura, however it is manifested, and or with particles such as tachyons (common hypothetical particles related to time manipulation in sci-fi), which would allow it to record events in its immediate surroundings without obstructions (as those can not be observed in the projections it produces).

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Here we have it, two for the price of one (the inverse of how the Pokémon games are sold, go figure...). Next time, now that we are talking about creatures, we will talk about what they eat - that is, Food.

Credits where it's due

* Beta reading and consulting was in charge primarily of Serebii regular DruddigonCuddlepile. Other usual suspects as Virgil134 and Tangent128 contributed as well.
* The Thorn-de-Lis and similar flowers are concepts developed in the Streetpass game "Flower Town" for the Nintendo 3DS. The picture of the flowers is taken from the Nintendo Fandom Wikia. I can recommend the game - it is fun and pretty calming.
* The concept of the Time Flower being a living organism is original, though I do not think I am ever the first or only one to have come up with that idea.

 

[Venia Silente]

So for those who thought this thing would fall forgotten, well TOO BAD! here I am. It just took the coming of June, the "Month of Worldbuilding" to reactivate my energies enough to keep working on the entries proper. But fret not - the Suoc?verse has been seeing advances all year round. As such there's not only a new entry, but also some news which I will be expanding upon in a new post in a few days, hopefully ca. Jun 13-14th.

Food

The first 2018 entry tackles lightly on a subject that the Pok?mon franchise offers up as a "taken for granted" subject. Namely Food - what do people and Pok?mon eat and what customs are involved.

Overview

One thing that pretty much any universe has to solve is food - sustenance. How do our creatures obtain the energy they need to function, and how does this shape the cultures? In this regard Pok?mon is no different even though it tries to make things a bit too simple. For the Suoc?verse we try to make things a bit better defined but not too defined, because there's still much ground to solve.

The Hard Truths Out of the Way

Pok?mon go and prey upon each other. It's canon, no worries. Even the late games have that going on.

Sure, there are Berries? that somehow are compatible with everything including non-organics and ghosts and are used a lot as an excuse for food chain issues in PMD worldbuilding - but down the road, there?s nothing as nutritious and fulfilling as fighting, defeating and eating your prey on your own. You get the exercise, the experience, the nutrients. And for pack creatures it?s also an important bonding experience.

Fortunately for children (and for Trainer wallets)), Pok?mon have more options than just eating each other or lesser creatures.

Food range for Pok?mon also includes Terran animals and plants and probably other Pok?verse-specific non-Pok?mon creatures of which we have not seen much yet, though the mental image of a Pok?mon going in and eating the Bittercold would be impressive. Of course there?s also stuff like Steel-types like Aron eating metals.

Humans? They eat food in the form of other creatures too, even if their rituals for doing so are much... cleaner, to choose an easy half-truth wording. The human species has grown to eat pretty much anything available from plants and meat to even snails - let?s face it, the French Kalosian people are brave.

In the past humans had Pok?mon be part of the menu also - and viceversa, mind- so for example in the far past of the Suoc?verse Quilava firesac was considered a delicacy; but as both sides of society see progress, their ability to turn to other sources of sustenance grows. With the availability of Terran farm animals, sugar plants and many other things, there?s nothing to worry about: double burgers are not out of the menu and your Miltank has no need to suffer through it.

The Soft, Delicious Truths

Being unashamedly a sort of ?South American cone turned 90?? fanon region, Suoc? draws from the various cultures and influences that have shaped South America when it comes to growing, acquiring and consuming food. Slightly modified stand-ins for traditional Latin American dishes such as Venezuelan arepas (a maize dough), Argentinian milanesas (sliced veal with breadcrumbs and vegetables), Qu?chua locro (a variant of bean soup), Andean cazuelas (a dish of soup with a piece of meat and various vegetable ingredients) and Paraguayan kiveve (a creamy dish made from a local variant of pumpkin) and various wheat based preparations are common depending on locality; an important factor behind this is the presence of the Cadr?cean Sovereignty?s ample agrarian territory that provides reliable access to vegetables, wheat and cereals as well as the workforce to process it, for much of the southern Suoc?an population. Fishing and winery also being important activities, their produces spice up the traditional lunch as well.

Bread, yogurt and vegetables such as aguacate make the usual northern Suoc?an breakfast; southern Suoc? often trades the yoghurt for fruit juice. Most of these ingredients are grown and harvested within Suoc?an territories or obtained via trading with the neighbour nation of Caledoria (to the south).

You can never go wrong with a Kantonese donut!

On the other hand, most if not all of the ingredients for a ?traditional? teatime are imported from other regions, including the tea itself and a number of delicacies such as pastries or snacks various. Imports come from various parts of the world and are mostly focused around meat, sugary snacks and brewery; this sometimes causes some weird overlaps such as the existence of two variants of donuts: the round-with-a-hole variety found in western regions like Unova, Domino and Angela, and the rice-made round balls variety that is more common in eastern regions like Kanto and Johto.

For the Journeying Trainer

Suoc? as a platform for exploration when going through a Gym Challenge takes good care of the availability of food both for the Trainer and the Pok?mon. Depending on location Trainers will have ready access to fruit when across the warmer northern side of Suoc?, or cereals when traversing the flat lands of the southern side. Sharing or trading food items is a common courtesy between wandering Trainers and much attention is given to not attack or otherwise importunate any Pok?mon who is carrying food.

Most other kinds of food can be found across the various settlements in Suoc?, but by and large fruit and cereals are basically available everywhere there is a human-made route. As for the team, ranging within the perimeters of League-managed routes is forbidden, not to mention within towns and cities.

Trainers who want to keep their mons? instincts sharp ought to go outside the sanctioned routes and take care of the various rules that exist in the wilderness. While in general terms hunting other Pok?mon is allowed in some territories with a license (and not just your usual Cut license but an actual, Hunting license), in some other territories it is severely frowned upon if not forbidden and heavily punished. Hunting for Terran game is less frowned upon but still subject to special regulation, in particular nearby human settlements, where special grounds for the task are sometimes provided.

A particular case is the Cadr?cean Widefields, where entering Trainers must by government regulation be informed of the Sovereignty?s status and sign in consent to play by their rules. While hunting Terran and Pok?mon in the human-centered areas is allowed under certain conditions (which mostly involve rules like ?a prey a day? and never laying traps), hunting far away from cities or within the Cadr?cean Widefields? denser grounds will mark a Trainer and their Pok?mon as Vow-Breakers aka ?fair game? ? such a Trainer is bound to meet one of the Deers? blades with one of their vital organs, the closest and latest they will ever be to interacting with the local Legendary Pok?mon.

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Coming up next there's two entries on quite some good subject matter - Technology and Magic, where we'll throw even further shade at the various idiosyncracies of the Pok?mon world and will examine some of the differences in concept between what counts as "magic" for our world or for theirs.

Credits where it's due

* Angela is a ]fanon region from the WAAPT verse, as has been mentioned before in the History entry. The Suoc?verse and WAAPT share much a foundation in terms of worldbuilding.
* Domino is a fanon region courtesy of Tangent128's worldbuilding, located somewhere undecided yet very close to canon Unova.
* The image of Aron eating steel is from Serebii.net.
* Brock's donuts is an old and fun Pok?mon fandom meme. The image itself is from Bulbapedia Archives, modified for size.