I think there was a thread related to this topic, but I can't find it. If anyone can link it, it would be much appreciated. So, I'm working on an anthro/humanoid species, who are fast breeders, but as a result have short lives. For the sake of math: Males age at the rate of 1 year per week, and the average lifespan is around 90 years/weeks. Females age at half that speed, so 6 months per week, and the average lifespan would be about 180 years/weeks. As per the website's rules, we maintain that the age of consent is 18 years. Therefore, would the pairing of an 18 week (18 year) old male and a 36 week (18 year) old female, be allowed?
This is the most recent thread that kind of delved into the topic I think. https://forum.chyoa.com/threads/new-author-rule-help.4327/#post-100413 The related question is around the sixth reply.
No. Paraphrasing the rules, a character is considered underage if at least one of the following is true: 1. The character is physically described as underage. (e.g. is 4'6", has not started puberty) 2. The character is mentally described as underage. (e.g. does not know what sex is, speaks like a toddler) 3. The character has chronologically existed for less than 18 years. 4. The character is extrinsically implied to be underage. (e.g. they are a junior in high school, they wear a training bra) Usually there are reasonable exceptions where descriptions that would normally indicate an underage character are allowed - a dwarf can be exceptionally short; an alien who has transformed into a human might not understand human sex; a student might have been held back and forced to repeat junior year as an 18 year old. The chronological requirement is more strict, however. I don't know why the fast maturity rate here is necessary, so I would recommend just leaving it out. If you really need it, you could have the characters exist for 18 years in some incubation period. Alternatively, you could make them robots (i.e. not constructed from living material) to avoid the issue of chronology.
Got it. Oh well. It's the short life span that was important, but I can finagle that angle in somewhere. Thanks.
Yep - got to stick to the rules - I did a few chapters with a reversal of aging, where the protagonist rapidly reverses the ages of some octagenarians, but stops it at 20-something when the characters are significantly more appealing, but not in danger of causing unnecessary problems for me! I see your difficulty though - Kes in Star Trek Voyager was being sexually pursued by Tom Paris when she was about 2 or 3 chronologically although 10 times that physically and sexually mature for her species. We hold ourselves to a higher moral standard here!
I understand and agree with the flat, no-compromise standard here. I feel obliged to point out the irony though, it's exactly where you draw the line that the taboo exists. Like everyone wants those taboo roleplay productions where they don't say step, you're literally in a another class if you want that left out. Then again it's because we are explicit about everything here *is* being sexualized, that's why we must draw a line. Like publishing an opinion article on your website (can be sued for libel) versus publishing some nutcases comment on your opinion article incidentally (can't be sued for libel). Star Trek got away with that because people didn't immediately assume that would become a sexual aspect (or did they know it but they just had stronger denial back then?)
I think Star Trek got away with that because it's not morally wrong, just legally, and Star Trek isn't actual pornography. Even then, it's not illegal to roleplay (or in this case, act) as a child if you are still an adult.
Right yeah, that's what I was trying to express with my extended metaphor. As a sex site there are different standards than a sci-fi site.
Marvel use a device for rapidly aging the character Magik overnight, by having her disappear into a parallel universe for a day or so from our perspective but about a decade or so from hers. Hence she is physically/intellectually/sexually more mature, and has (importantly) chronologically experienced the passage of time, even though from the perspective of her friends and family, they have only experienced her being alive for a fraction of the time she has. You could use that kind of mechanism I guess (eg your characters age a week on earth then zap into a parallel univerese for a year and then back to the second they left off, and repeat that every week. Therefore after 18 weeks our time, they will have aged 18 years physically and experenced 18 years chronologically too. I dont think that kind of thing would break the rules.
Sounds plausible, but after the arguments everyone else made, I'd rather not go looking for trouble with loopholes.
