Board Thread:General Discussion/@comment-31371445-20170222233857/@comment-32182236-20181020155129

"We refuse only when our soul is about to shatter during the last fight. Not when it already did. And Flowey had no soul, so his actions aren't really comparable. We don't know how it works for soulless creatures."

My argument matches Malice's.

"And now, the next question, does it make sense? You could argue that since it's there, it's canon, but say, isn't it simpler to excuse it from being canon, rather than struggling to come up with some outrageous theory just to keep it canon? Must we necessarily stick to a single method, no matter the results we obtain using it? Also, by arguing that you can get there without hacking, that makes the game's changing name also canon, technically."

The credits open the door that was ALREADY THERE. That name change? Does absolutely nothing. Really, it's the fact that the dog room is canon that makes us consider the events of the credits, not the other way around. And the dog room is canon because the door was there for the entire duration of the story.

And cite Malice's Razor 1, which matches my own. That lets us knock off a lot of events, most of which are CLEARLY non-canon.

Here's my take on it again.

If it was explicitly mentioned before within the story, pointed out, exploited, etc, it happened.

"Within the story" involves what can be reached through normal gameplay. As in, not things like the Dirty Hacker Ending.

Nobody took note to the name change. And if nobody takes note of something, we use the classical razor on whether something's canon or not, is it just a pure game mechanic? Pretty sure the game's name/title screen is the most blatant example of such a thing. Thus, it's non-canon.

After which, we move onto whether things are meta, or whether we should look for a non-meta explanation. If the meta element has been shown to be canon through the razors above, and the character could reasonably be aware of such element, we can say it was indeed a reference to that. Otherwise, it's not, and we need to think of a different meaning. Like the one I came up with for Flowey on two separate speeches. After all, what's more plausible:Flowey got Frisk and Chara mixed up like he's been known to do a lot, or the player is now suddenly an entity separate from Frisk and we've jumped straight into Playertale territory?

"That's assuming the plaques were written when the hole was already there. If the hole hasn't formed yet, or if the plaques were written when not all of underground was explored yet (so assuming they entered from the New Home end, which I consider to be the default assumption by the way), the lines could still be true."

I meant from your meta perspective. You said the plaques have a purpose of giving us, the player, indisputably correct information. This goes against that purpose. You can stop arguing that the plaques have some meta-purpose that supersedes actually using logical analysis on them now. They're just as fallible as any other written piece of information. Point is, they can make mistakes. So take that into consideration. (Do note that we don't even have to say the plaques made a (second) mistake, though. So really, this is moot.)

"But there was no reason to trash that information. From Toby's perspective, this had no point. The old facts didn't even have a chance to be utilized before getting replaced by the new ones."

And we didn't trash it. We reinterpreted it. And as Malice points out, this actually makes MORE sense than your take, even disregarding the lab entries!

"When the game said the war was short, and that there were 7 magicians, not just one."

Long battle, "hardly a war". These are not mutually exclusive. The ONE battle was long, but since not a single human was killed, and that was literally the ONLY battle, it was barely a war. Also, "they sealed them underground with a magic spell". THEY. Plural. We only see one human with a wand, but we don't really know how many other people in the crowd have a wand, since if they did, we wouldn't see them. We can just say the other six were there, or perhaps, behind the "camera", on the other side of the hole.

"To summarize, if SP is DT, then that simply means we didn't have the DT to outmatch Asriel, and that Asriel couldn't reset, which however does not contradict anything presented in the OF fight."

And involves creating a new rule not even MENTIONED anywhere in the game, and can be broken by Omega Flowey to take OUR power to S/L away, and Asriel could just do that. So, it involves a new rule to patch one hole, while leaving another wide open!

"If DT is not SP, then we're met with an impossibility: either we've had more DT, in which case, what was the big deal? Or we didn't, in which case, again, how come Asriel couldn't reset..."

The former, and the big deal in my first take was hyperdeath, and in my second take, an expansion of Malice's take, is because of our DT steadily fading, until we WOULD give up.

"Heck, you're saying my way of avoiding this weird plot point is too convoluted. Well, is it? Is my theory of soul composition playing a role in the scope of the SLR ability that far fetched? What about Malice's idea of Asriel canceling this power of ours with his immensely strong attacks? Isn't that also totally unfounded? (or idk if it was you who came up with it, I don't recall anymore)"

One involves making a rule not even mentioned at all. SOUL composition being weaker would be MENTIONED. And Omega Flowey ALSO is a composite SOUL, so Asriel not doing what OF did is STILL a problem! As for the latter, we have Flowey's story supporting the fact that you're still conscious, STARTING to leave when you have the chance, meaning that if you were killed instantly, you'd have no chance to react and LOAD. One is definitely more plausible than the other..

But I've found another take more plausible than EITHER of them, thanks to Malice.

"This is what I remember from this convo. That yes, I've made a big logical leap, but so did you."

Yours was bigger than mine, and Malice took an even smaller leap than mine, so I take that one.

"All I see is "the strength of the soul, whose power...". That's what that plaque simplifies into. That the weakness of human beings lies in the strength of their soul, which is determination. And I wouldn't be making all this fuss, if it wasn't for "soul power" being an actual defined term. Just like whenever determination is mentioned in the game, it always relates to the substance itself too, not just the feeling, as it is in the real world. And sometimes, the substance explicitly.

So why shouldn't this phrase simplify to "soul power?" The initial "its" at the beginning of the second sentence can gramatically refer to EITHER the word "strength," or "SOUL". Both are correct. And actually, the latter being the case is less redundant, so common sense would tell us that this is how Toby meant to word it.

My argument therefore is, that this phrase indeed defaults to "soul power," not "the power of the strength of the soul." "

See Malice's argument. That was better worded than I could possibly do it.

"Convince me that the argument that Asriel would have removed our ability to reload with his attacks being more plausible than my soul composition theory and I will accept that the plaques are talking about "the power of the strength of the soul" instead."

Once again, Malice's arguments match mine.

"I've never said they aren't connected."

Then respond to the sentence afterwards, which argues that this implies it IS the power of the strength of the SOUL.

"Well, she's a monster. Monster souls aren't implied to possess static levels of DT."

Yes, but for it to be used as a metric for comparison, they MUST have static levels of SOUL POWER. Else Undying would break the metric when everyone's hearts beat as one, meaning they ALL got a (probably minor, but still) DT fluctuation at the same time, enough to shatter the great metric.

"Yeah... a silly name. It reflects Asriel's personality pretty well. Alas, I'd need more proof for your statement than just the name."

Actually, I only used that name because I couldn't think of anything else for the hypothetical state. My real evidence for this state was what happened with Flowey, and applying logic to it-Flowey died, but was still "alive" to LOAD, but he was leaving the mortal coil, on his way to the second state of death, where LOADing becomes impossible. So, if someone found a way to make the second state happen instantly, that leaves no time for LOADing.

"You mean the reloading by quitting thing? Yeah. Despite being allowed to happen for that fight, I think it's an exploit. It complicates the necessary in-game explanations immensely and kinda ruins the point of everything else... which is what exploits usually do."

Grouping that with this because they both have the same counterargument..

"In other words, how can we be sure ANYTHING is "final?" What if I'm right, and us escaping from Asriel's battle IS just an exploit? What if Toby simply never bothered fixing it, because such would be too difficult?"

Let me just quote something later down... Where you do most of the work destroying your own argument.

"By the apparent logic of the fight itself, a reload should have caused a reset initiated by Asriel. That would make the most sense I think."

So why didn't he do this, if your theory is correct?

"My theories already work perfectly, and all they need, is for this to be declared an exploit. If you wanna go meta, please, include it in your explanations."

I don't. YOU'RE going meta by declaring it an exploit. I already gave you the razors I use.

"I just tend to... neglect all the HUD stuff for simplicity's sake, unless absolutely necessary and logically justifiable."

I do something similar, but define it being necessarily when it's explicitly mentioned/abused. Sans' battle makes the HUD an important part of the fight, and thus, an important part of the story. I don't neglect the words, I find alternate explanations for them that still logically fit. The former creates plot holes, the other just adds more theory. I mean come on, if it's stated, it HAS to be necessary! Otherwise you're just cherrypicking! Your theory might make a fine AU, but we need to analyze what the ACTUAL canon is, not try to find out what the best AU of canon is.

"And my philosophy is, that this system is too complicated and inconsistent when compared to the game's apparent overworld mechanics. And proclaiming even this inconsistency as canon is a bit too much for me. Chaos, simply for consistency's sake. Sheesh."

Hey, quantum mechanics is "canon" to our world, is it really that hard to believe? I even make it very clear WHERE the apparent inconsistency comes from-Since your SOUL was separated from your body, causing you to control that, being where your essence is, and it's not physical, it needs other ways of attacking, with the restrictions mostly coming from the monsters. I gave a perfectly reasonable explanation for all the main mechanics of the fight.

"Also, yes, Toby did say that these mechanics are canon, but didn't say anything about their appearance. I could still incorporate them into my theories in one way or another, just to avoid the entire 'universe-working-as-a-game' thing."

When I say the fight button, I mean a button that's used for fighting. Of course the buttons themselves might look differently, but still, we have to keep the basic mechanics as canon.

"And I think if right now, he were to go and claim, that the world of Undertale happens EXACTLY how we see it on our screens, I think it will cause many people to laugh. This isn't originality, this is simply... bad gaming concept design. Or whatever. First off, it distracts from the message of the game. And second, it's just too bizzare. How am I supposed to feel ok with this, if I don't see the point? A fun experiment without an actual point? Heck that, why are we discussing this game even, if huge inconsistencies are freely declared as canon all around?"

First, they're not inconsistencies at all, I showed how they can stay consistent. Second, Malice's point 1-HOW does it "distract"? Third, the whole game's a complete deconstruction of RPG's. It goes over the nature of how S/L/R can lead to corruption, on how even THEN, your actions have consequences.. Asriel considers the whole thing a game, playing with it like a toy. And maybe a few buttons helped lead him to that conclusion.. :3 It'd only distract if the characters weren't even canonically living beings, and I gave an interpretation of the mechanics that keeps them alive. Works like a game, seems like a game, that doesn't mean they're all toys. (If you haven't figured it out, I'm trying to rework Malice's second argument into my own.)

"A nice example of an extreme interpretation of this concept is Glitchtale. A glitched timeline, which allowed "the player" to play past the pacifist ending, to actually experience it, instead of just seeing glimpses of it in the form of the credits from a 3rd-person's point of view."

Actually, Playertale is the best example for going extreme with it. Glitchtale involves glitches, which never happened, Playertale involves what happens if the player enters into the world of Undertale, seeing it as the game it is (in that AU, that is). Of course, neither of them do I consider actually consistent with canon.

"My last philosophical question: All of this implies Undertale is perfectly self-enclosed. Everything is perfect, because everything has been DECLARED to be perfect. There are no inconsistencies, only an obscure plot, which explains all that we might consider to be an "inconsistency" as something canon. Alright, that's nice. Now, how do we explain Toby constantly changing this? How could anyone be claiming, that everything we see is canon/intended behavior, if Toby changed the code many times already, and even added some platform-exclusive content here and there?"

Toby made updates for a while early after release, then he just stopped, ONLY adding in platform-exclusive content afterwards. Why did he stop? Because he reached the point where everything became perfect. And the platform-exclusive content never contradicts the canon established earlier, the dog shrine merely ADDED to it, explaining what was under Papyrus' sink-The dog managed to get in there. Not until we reach the Switch edition, which should be considered a slight AU since something as major as Mad Dummy got altered, does canon EVER shift from that. ..We might have to start specifiying whether we're talking about the Switchverse or the Classicverse. (The Switchverse even has a new SOUL mode that isn't even one of the seven colors, so if we're talking about the Switchverse, the SOUL modes are CONFIRMED to not be the same as SOUL traits, something I've argued for a while.)

"Oh that reminds me. The entire fight would lose its meaning if Toby would make Flowey realize what just happened. Or rather Asriel, after absorbing the souls. Toby wanted this to feel like the end, not like you're meant to be stuck in there."

We ARE stuck. If we lose, (Like, ACTUALLY lose), we start over, and this is all one big cycle.

"Such a mechanic worked for the OF fight, where you meant to be stuck, but this one was supposed to feel like there's an actual resolution waiting ahead."

No, we WERE meant to feel like we couldn't win, until the SAVE button showed up and gave us hope.

"So... at least now we know how to fix this nonsense, get Toby to code in the very first reset not initiated by us, but by Flowey. You cannot possibly argue that this wouldn't make more sense than what we have right now, an inexplicable reload, when everything implied such an action would be our doom..."

Which destroys the argument that it would be hard to do. If your theory is correct, Toby very well should have done that. Because that would make your theory make perfect sense. But he didn't. Curious, isn't it? If it was THAT easy to fix, why didn't he fix it?

"Yeah. I'm still working on that. I think I'll need to clear my head first."

Well, go on and find out if there is a reason why, and what that reason is, before you say there is and that reason makes your theory more plausible than mine.

"Then why is it introduced to us as a disadvantageous situation? And with so much DT, why bother with REFUSE, when you can RELOAD? And try to come up with something better than "hyperdeath overwrites reload", that's no better than my soul composition theory. As I've said already."

As I've said before, my REAL reason for the REFUSE is that it's objectively more advantageous than a RELOAD. Why reload and have to start over when you can just continue with full health? It's hard to kill Ozma from Final Fantasy IX, but with infinite lives, it'd be a cakewalk. You won't have to worry about getting a Game Over and starting all over, so you can just chip away at his health, one of your character's lives at a time.

"And mine is the composite soul theory. Equal grounds mates? ᕕ( ᐛ )ᕗ "

Even that leaves a complication. And mine was at least somewhat supported by Flowey. But we can probably both agree that Malice's take is better, which is why I swapped.

"The opposite."

1*7=7

3*3=9

If red isn't DT, and all SOULs share the same DT value, Frisk had one human SOUL and jumped up to Asriel's level, seven. If red is DT, so Frisk had more DT, we could argue that they had three times the amount of a normal human, multiplied three-fold, that gives us 9. We could even say it's naturally four times, and say Frisk's DT only doubled itself to make 8, or if it was naturally 5x, or 6x, not even a double.

"Yeah yeah, you keep talking about some sort of a probability. And I keep saying, that the soul has two identical-looking properties. Plus the plaques."

One is the power to use magic and make/break the barrier. The other is to persist past death. They're different. "Power of the strength of the SOUL" =/= SOUL power.

"I mean, determination would be a valid answer, since the definition of determination basically allows you to say you're "determined to act according to X", thereby effortlessly unifying the 6 traits. So in a way, it's like a trait wildcard, ergo, the one and only description that fits it the most is "despite everything, you continue to be yourself", since there's no common denominator for these traits. As in, the only thing you can be sure of is yourself at this point."

Being yourself doesn't require these six traits. And I remember the argument being far more elegant-If you're not brave, you can't be determined, as you'd just cower away. Me and Malice showed how the other five are NECESSARY to be determined in an earlier post. Remember that? The six traits unify to make the seventh. So if you take one out, you can't get the seventh. But you can be yourself and be completely impatient. But, this line fits integrity very well, and I do consider it an integral part of the red trait (If it wasn't, what's it doing in the red flag text?) But you have to remember the first red flag too. And continuing to be yourself fits in with integrity perfectly. And didn't I just say you need all six traits? That includes integrity, doesn't it?

"All I'm doing is interpreting the evidence. In the case of red souls, there is zero evidence for any connection with DT, as opposed to the case of DT+SP. I'm not the one who first sticks to head canons and then starts tweaking the surrounding facts."

Oh, I'm talking about how you tossed out evidence when Asriel implied the complete opposite. You didn't even tweak the surrounding facts, you flat-out destroyed them, which is objectively worse. But take a look at Malice's evidence.

"Well, once again, if that were the case, Frisk's soul wouldn't need to REFUSE."

It wouldn't have a reason NOT to. Besides, if it dies enough times, the grip fades away. So.. this could also be an effort NOT to let that happen.

"This can also be true, since there's no proof that "hyperdeath" is even a thing, and not just some magical nonsense thought up by an imaginative goat kid."

Hyperdeath is what Flowey feared when he was leaving the mortal coil. The concept does exist. It might not be called hyperdeath, I just used that because that was presumably the purpose of Hyper Goner, and still use it because he's presumably the god of this hyperdeath, and he wants this to happen to you. And because I can't think of a better name.