Talk:Axis/Conflicts

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Presence and role of formians in Axis

Formians have been referred to in various ways regarding Axis: as its rulers (The Great Beyond), its natives (Tide of Honor), instrumental to the city's defense through their alliance with gigas (Shadow of the Storm Tyrant), and absent from descriptions of the city (Planar Adventures).

In direct potential conflict are three Tier 1 sources:

  • Their role in Shadow of the Storm Tyrant, which explicitly refers to them as "the formians of Axis" on p73
  • Their presence in the Irori article of Tide of Honor which explicitly refers to "Axis's native inevitables and formians" on p69, which was reprinted in Inner Sea Gods p91
  • A combination of their absence from descriptions of Axis in Planar Adventures and a clarification by James Jacobs stating that this omission is both intentional and indicative of a retcon removing them from the city (emphasis mine):
"As of this hardcover, the formians are no longer a major presence in Axis, and haven't really had a major presence there since we moved out of 3.5 content into Pathfinder stuff.
There's still plenty of non-outsider life in the Great Beyond, but formians in Axis aren't part of it."

Unpublished canon clarifications from Paizo staff on messageboards are a Tier 3 source. Because Planar Adventures does not explicitly state that formians are not part of Axis, we have an apparently unresolvable conflict—we do not have a newer Tier 1 source that explicitly states that formians are not native to or present in Axis, and therefore could not have aided in Axis's defense against chaotic forces.

For now, the mention of formians as described in Shadow of the Storm Tyrant remains. See also Talk:Inevitable. -Oznogon (talk) 04:58, 26 November 2018 (UTC)

User:PDV feels strongly enough about this to edit-war with administrators over it, so I'll mark as resolved. The conflict flag should still stand since the text of the wiki as it stands now contradicts the cited source. -Oznogon (talk) 02:27, 25 December 2018 (UTC)

Relevant forums statements

Thanks to HTD for collating these.

"In the 3.5 era, we used the Monster Manual from Wizards of the Coast, and as such were bound to choices they made for monsters that we didn't really 100% agree with.
In the Pathfinder era, we got to make those choices ourselves.
There can still be formians on the outer planes, just as there can be humans or elks or aboleths or snakes on the outer planes. But in Pathfinder, formians are monstrous humanoids. Those on Axis might have the Extraplanar trait when visiting the Material Plane, or might even be axiomatic creatures... but they're as detailed in Bestiary 4 as an example."
"Since formians are now not outsiders (we chose to go back to their real-world pulp roots as aliens), them having a major role on Axis makes less sense. If we do decide to keep them there the next time we do anything there in print, the formians there will likely become axiomatic formians or something like that... but there's just as good a chance we'll just retcon them out of Axis entirely, sicne their role there hasn't really been built upon."
"As of this hardcover, the formians are no longer a major presence in Axis, and haven't really had a major presence there since we moved out of 3.5 content into Pathfinder stuff.
There's still plenty of non-outsider life in the Great Beyond, but formians in Axis aren't part of it."

Additional forums statements.

"Quick note about formians—in Golarion, they're aliens, not outsiders. The formians that exist on Axis are going to likely become axiomatic formians or some other templated type of creature, but they're not going to be "the original formians" and as such are, in the grand scheme of Axis's history, relative newcomers.
More information to come eventually."
9) In the real world, the formians were invented as creatures in a series of pulp stories that live on Venus. For Pahtfinder, we pay homage to that by NOT making them outsiders. As far as I'm concerned, yes, they're natives to Castrovel, although I'm not sure we've nailed that down as such in print.
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