Print

Please login or register.
1 Hour 1 Day 1 Week 1 Month Forever
Login with username, password and session length

[Iden]

umm you do know that creature reproduce by spores and saliva doesnt transmit STDs it transmits a few virus and bactria but not STDs like aids

1) wat?

2) You do know that we're speaking of something fantastical here, and not actual real-world things?  I clearly stated that I am a firm believer that lycanthropy should be sexually transmissible, and not only that, it is commonly accepted that were-beasts (lycanthropes) spread their disease through bite. Which refers back to my previous post.

I made a statement to garnish attention and gain shock value. I see that it worked. At the same time what I said was true. To be completely honest, I remember reading a lot about lycanthropy as a young kid from an ancient Ravenloft (D&D campaign) book Van Richten's Monster Hunter Compendium, a book series released before the Ravenloft campaign was discontinued, and subsequently raised from the dead relatively recently. I formulated my views of what constitutes a lycanthrope from a lot of particulars in there. My statement, regarding my own definition, is true. Lycanthropy (at least the kind I view, and would use for my own games, materials, stories - and the one I am making the suggestion for) is sexually transmissible. It follows that lycanthropy could be considered an STD.

And to respond to your closing statement: Just because something is sexually transmissible, does it necessarily mean that it cannot be spread through saliva or other bodily fluids as well? And in a fantastical setting, is it necessary that it cannot be be possible? Especially in a world much like Dwarf Fortress, where curses are (as of this moment) the sole progenitor of lycanthropy?

[stabbymcstabstab]

I know just trying to see your sources

[Il Palazzo]

To be fair, STDs are those diseases which are transmitted almost exclusively through sexual contact(i.e.contact with the infected genital areas), and lycantrophy(and all the other were-diseases) seems to be transmissible via other means as well - i.e. contact with the infected saliva.
It does not seem technically correct to call it an STD, just as it isn't correct to call rabies, or common cold an STD, even though both can be transmitted during a sexual contact - this is simply not the main vector of infection.

On the other hand, should we imagine that causes of bite by were-persons are rather few as compared to their human-form sexual activity, one could begin to wonder if coitus shouldn't be considered the main cause of infection, the biting being an exceptional situation, which could qualify the were-disease as an STD.
But that is still providing that in the absence of biting, contact with the infected person's genital areas is the only significant cause, and e.g.casual contact, maybe inhalation of the virus(bacteria? curse?) as it is possible with rabies does not come into play as well.
Clearly, more research into werebeastism is required before a sensible qualification of the disease can be undertaken.

This is of course completely disregarding the DF-specific fact of there apparently being no sexual intercourse as such, owing to the spore-transmitted reproductory mechanisms.
Whether a spore can become a vector of disease transmission is unclear at this point, and as previously stated, requires more research.

[Iden]

I am no master of venereal diseases, and perhaps I am somewhere mistaken. Despite that, the original basis for my argument was grounded solely around the idea that the disease (lycanthropy) is spread through all forms of body fluids. As with the spread of saliva, blood, sexual fluids, breast milk, mucus, etc. may spread the disease. There are STDs, (e.g. AIDs) that may be spread through some body fluids, and not contact.

Bites transmit lycanthropy. How? Saliva getting into the blood stream. So transmission of bodily fluids between subjects will trasmit lycanthropy.

While this is perhaps not how all people choose to view lycanthrophy, this is again the standard definition with which I subscribe, and am sharing and arguing for.

Since this is fantastical, you can then play around with the rules to be more suitable with the setting as it could get really out-of-control if you have a person being contagious at all times. Drinking from the same well, or bathing in the same water can potentially become a dangerous means for transmitting the disease. If the laws of how lycanthropy is spread is such that the infected persons' saliva is not contagious while not transformed, this alleviates the initial problem. Why this might occur? I am not completely sure, as I have stated, I am no master of venereal diseases. But perhaps this form of infection is, in this way, different from any real life venereal diseases. This is a fantastical infection/curse, and it does not mean that it has to be like any specific diseases, just that it is plausible. Perhaps it is that while in normal form the lycanthrope is not contagious at all.

Again, however, the way that I view lycanthropy is that it should be spread through sexual fluids despite being transformed or not. Perhaps this form of the disease is dangerously contagious while transformed into a were-beast (spreading through saliva), but acts more like AIDs while not transformed.

And I don't think sexual transmission would ever be the primary cause of transmission, unless perhaps it is through someone who is especially promiscuous or is trying to knowingly spread the disease. However, I think that would be a pretty rare case, compared to most cases of lycanthropy. As were-beasts classically tend to be more violent, attacking peoples, that the bite would be most likely cause of spreading the disease on a regular basis.

Perhaps it is wrong to outrightly classify it as an STD, however it does not change the fact that, by this definition, it happens to be a disease that is sexually transmissible.

I also have not seen any instances where the common cold or rabies are spread by sexual fluids. Do you have any sources on that?

[Il Palazzo]

I also have not seen any instances where the common cold or rabies are spread by sexual fluids. Do you have any sources on that?

Hehe, no. A short visit to (http://www.cdc.gov/rabies/exposure/index.html) confirm what I knew anyway - that I pulled it out of my arse.
I did manage to sound well-informed though.

But, continuing anyway despite that, because I'm having as much fun as you do discussing this:
Seeing how rabies can, as the freshly enlightened me found out in the above-linked article, be spread only by contact with the saliva or nervous tissue, this seems to suggest that

Bites transmit lycanthropy. How? Saliva getting into the blood stream. So transmission of bodily fluids between subjects will trasmit lycanthropy.

does not have to be a logical conclusion. Being transmittable by saliva does not necessarily imply being transmittable by all bodily fluids.
Seeing how the mythology is full of cases of werewof-bite infection, and no mention whatsoever of sexual transmition of lycantrophy, we might make an informed guess, that it is not an STD.
Just as it is with rabies, by the way.

Unless, of course, we go ahead and use our artistic liberties to make werebeastism into an STD, by adding whatever bunch of additional magical properties to the curse, which we just might for the fun of it. However, unlike the argument to the contrary, this view is not based on anything at all, which means that we're making a completely new, and kinda redundant mythology here.

[stabbymcstabstab]

ok this thread is starting to scary me please we all know iden doesnt know whats he talking about so lets get back on topic and stay away form the gutter

[Iden]

Unless, of course, we go ahead and use our artistic liberties to make werebeastism into an STD, by adding whatever bunch of additional magical properties to the curse, which we just might for the fun of it. However, unlike the argument to the contrary, this view is not based on anything at all, which means that we're making a completely new, and kinda redundant mythology here.

You mistake me. I do not propose to take artistic liberties to change what it is. I merely care to elaborate on it. It is merely a suggestion. It may be the case that Toady and Threetoe do not agree with me, as some of you may not. There are many versions of many myths. Who is to say there is any one truth? I believe lycanthropy is/should be spread through all bodily fluids. Some may believe otherwise. I only am trying to put forth what I know and believe in order to best answer the question of the transmissive nature of lycanthropy.

I wouldn't even presume to necessarily say that it is a magical aspect dictates the reasons for spreading of a disease in such manners. How this could be possible and explained in the real world would likely require a person who is well-versed in pathology. I am not. So I cannot deign to imagine that I could describe to you the legitimate reasons for a disease to act in such a manner. However, I do not think it is outside the domain of reality that a disease could act in such a manner, or that it is necessary that it can not. Just because there is no real life example of it does not mean it could not happen. In fact, many afflictions mutate or change over time, or new ones seem to pop up.

We know for a fact that AIDs spreads through sexual fluids, yet not through saliva. We know that there are instances in which some afflictions may be transmissible through saliva, or close contact, yet their contagious aspects may not always be active (an inadequate explanation, but a rough estimation, and I presume it can be understood what I am roughly trying to say). It is not unrealistic to say that lycanthropy may be transmissble sexually (and through saliva) yet is not always.

I merely proposed that lycanthropy is (or should be) transmissible through all types of bodily fluids.

Seeing how rabies can, as the freshly enlightened me found out in the above-linked article, be spread only by contact with the saliva or nervous tissue, this seems to suggest that.... does not have to be a logical conclusion. Being transmittable by saliva does not necessarily imply being transmittable by all bodily fluids.

Seeing how the mythology is full of cases of werewof-bite infection, and no mention whatsoever of sexual transmition of lycantrophy, we might make an informed guess, that it is not an STD.
Just as it is with rabies, by the way.

No, by definition, it is not necessary that all diseases and afflictions that are spread by saliva also be transmissible via other bodily fluids [in this case, sexual fluids]. It is, however, also not necessary that if something were transmissible via saliva, that it can not be transmissible by other bodily fluids. It is therefore possible that a disease could both be transmissible via saliva and via other bodily fluids. Which is the basis of my proposal and my answer to the initial question to begin with.

ok this thread is starting to scary me please we all know iden doesnt know whats he talking about so lets get back on topic and stay away form the gutter

On what grounds do you bear such accusations? I thought this forum was for the purpose of proposing and discussing ideas, which is exactly what I have been doing. This has nothing to do with being in the gutter, I have not been lude, or improper, I am just discussing lycanthropy in a matter of real-life content and through possible means of transmission.

Someone asked a question (the topic of this thread). I responded with an answer and tried my best to support my answer. Some others have questioned that, and in order to better understand what is going on regarding the transmission of lycanthropy (the topic of this thread), a discussion has sprung forth. I fail to see how this off-topic.

[antymattar]

How did this get so derailed? *There IS no smiley*

[thunktone]

Well the topic has been broadened but I wouldn't say the thread has been derailed. I proposed a second way that lycanthropy could be transmitted and Iden has proposed a third. I wouldn't have lycanthropy transmitted through sex as in mythology it is related to cannibalism and so a bite seems appropriate. This is a modern invention I think, hollywood probably or hammer horror, but part of the fantasy trope for werewolves. If sex is introduced to the game though it would make sense to have some syndromes or curses transmitted this way.

[Il Palazzo]

It's all cool dudes. A fun conversation, in all it's whimsy and armchairness, not that much divorced from the subject and not in any way offending anybody, including our dear OP.
What's more there is to want from a thread?

[Megaman_zx]

maybe it gets even worse.... maybe lycanthropy is a recessed genetic disease which is transmitted via virus and changes the DNA of the person once every month.... (full mooon) the virus DNA activates itself and reproduces making the werewolfiness only contageous during a full moon. This would make it so that a child of a lycanthrope could be either a carrier, or a lycan his/herself.

[stabbymcstabstab]

i read a couple of books that have that and the children that were lycans were all fuzzy and snuggly till they hit puberty and all the hair fell off and the were human(till a fullmoon) and then the !!FUN!! came

[Monk321654]

The fact that a creature could impregnate something locked away five miles under your fort always made me angry.
This all sounds like one good idea.

[thunktone]

The fact that a creature could impregnate something locked away five miles under your fort always made me angry.

Well I thought it was quite funny when one dwarf managed to impregnate another with triplets through a 40 z-level well. Some kind of sharing-a-bed requirement would be good though. You could add incubi and succubi that visit single dwarfs at night. You don't notice that the dwarf that just had a baby is single and have no idea that a cambion is being raised in your fortress.

[antymattar]

The fact that a creature could impregnate something locked away five miles under your fort always made me angry.
This all sounds like one good idea.

Wow thats sigworthy.