Bad eyesight

[Nyard]

I was just wondering, since I've never seen this mentioned.  Do people in Zalanthas have poor eyesight just as commonly as in real life, or do they all have 20/20?  You never seem to see something about somebody doing something incorrectly because of bad eyesight or something like that, and I've never seen it mentioned at all.  So, is there any information on this, and what do you guys think about it?

[Bogre]

There have been cases I've seen with bad eyesight.

[Halaster]

I would say that no, generally they don't have as bad of eyesight as modern Earth humans.  I think part of the reason so many people wear glasses in our day and age are computers, and literacy.  If you're not staring at a computer screen a lot, or reading books a lot, you have less of a chance of having bad eyesight, in my opinion.

Considering there are no computers on Zalanthas, and most people are illiterate like Mansa, they probably see better than us.

[cyberpatrol_735]

Considering there are no computers on Zalanthas, and most people are illiterate like Mansa, they probably see better than us.

That means.. mansa is a magicker! Defiler!! krath!

Heh.. at least I think he wears glasses...no?

[Cuusardo]

http://cuusardo.digitalphantasy.com/Aaron_in_tv.jpg

[joyofdiscord]

I think part of the reasons so many people have glasses is because they are now mostly affordable to the masses (at least in the First World.)  Near/Far sightedness as well as many forms of astigmatism are genetic and have been around a long time.  Though, to be sure, eyestrain can contribute to some eye ailments.

However, I think it's fair to assume, for playability's sake, that most Zalanthans do have decent eyesight.  Just because even if, going by Real World analogies, a good chunk of the population should have some modest vision impairment of one form or another, it's just not usually fun to roleplay.  Not in that sort of quantity.  Once in a while, maybe.  But every third character having to respond to "what did that thief down the bar from you look like?" with "a red blur" or "a dark blur" gets real old.

[jackalmo]

As I found out during my last eye examination (much to my subsequent chronic low-level worry), prolonged exposure to ultraviolet radiation is now thought to be a major cause of cataracts. Cataracts have always been a problem; I've read some accounts of ancient and medieval surgical treatments for them. So, I'll that to agree that, yes, it's certainly possible that older characters could have poor eyesight.

- Mark

Edited for an embarrasing and confusing typo - sorry, hard to read the small font. :-/

[flurry]

Ah, but didn't we decide in one of these science-geeky threads that the Zalanthan sun produces relatively little UV?

But yeah...different biology, different sun, different atmosphere, different lifestyles, different diet....too many different variables.   Definitely I think people should go for it, though, if it seems right for your character.   You already have PCs who can't 'scan', which could be roleplayed as due to poor eyesight.

[Nao]

most of the people that wear glasses irl would be fine without gasses in zalanthas... I've got pretty bad eyesight... So I need glasses for driving and to read that stuff they write on the board at school or whereever. I mainly need them to READ stuff. Who cares if that little spot onthe horizon is a little blurry or not? It seems to be something HUGE, you run... No matter whether you see every single leg of that spider or just notice that it seems to be a spider...
So most people wearing glasses today would be fine in zalanthas, just the ones with really bad eyesight would have problem... One source for all the blind beggars we have!

[Cuusardo]

I have seen at least one PC with spectacles IG.  Bad eyesight isn't completely unheard of.

[Xygax]

I'm relatively sure that we -do- now consider spectacles to be an anacronysm, however.  I don't believe anyone in game currently has them or should.  So, if you're playing someone with sight problems, don't expect a scientific cure through the miracle of lens technology.

-- X

[Cuusardo]

If there are jeweler's eyepieces made and used for the sake of magnifying what a person is looking at, wouldn't it stand to reason that spectacles could be made for that purpose also?

[mansa]

Because the spectacles frames are too fine to exist in the game world.  There's a big difference between an eyepiece and glasses are very fine frames and other such stuff.

[joyofdiscord]

I think there's quite a difference between a magnifying glass and lenses that     correct for vision deficiencies.  I could be wrong, though I imagine they are rather distinct purposes.

[Larrath]

If there are jeweler's eyepieces made and used for the sake of magnifying what a person is looking at, wouldn't it stand to reason that spectacles could be made for that purpose also?

Not really.  A jeweler's eyepiece is intended specifically in order to bring out a single small area in an object (a gemstone most often) that is held very close to the face.  It could have a single spot in the center that showed everything clearly and larger and be completely clouded and blurry all around, and still work.
I'm not fond of that object myself, but it -can- make sense.

Spectacles need to show everything more or less evenly in order to work well which, given the low quality of glass in Zalanthas, isn't really possible unless special methods (by which I mean magick) were employed.

Zalanthan glass is bubbly and murky and unclear, and no common piece of glassware is anywhere near as perfect as the glass we're used to seeing in RL.
Think this: http://www.usyd.edu.au/nicholson/images/glass2.jpg

[JohnGalt]

I think that due to the savage environment of Zalanthas, those with poor eyesight would not survive so genetically they're rare.  This is not to say playing a character with poor eyesight is unrealistic, simply that it would be an unusual condition.

[Xygax]

Actually, I'd tend to agree with you, Cuusardo, though perhaps not as you'd hope.  I think the jeweler's eyepiece you're referring to is likely also an anachronism.

Based on my cursory glance over some of the real life history of lenses, it doesn't seem reasonable that one could come without the other following within a few decades, at most.

Shaped glass goes back quite a lot further in our history than does any kind of reasonably useful magnification technology.  Magick might change the story somewhat (in terms of what is possible with respect to shaping and polishing glass), but I don't think the understanding of refraction and mathematics necessary to provide this sort of technology exists on Zalanthas, nor does the spirit of invention seem to run very strong among Zalanthas' people.

-- X

[amoeba]

Working for an ophthamology practice for over 6 years I have to weigh in on this.  Bad eyesight falls under three base categories.  Those you are born with, trauma induced, and age related.  

The trauma induced I see a lot of on arm. Far more by a long shot than you see in RL.

The age related types, cataracts, and macular degeneration for example, don't occur for the most  part until after 50+ years of age.  It is quite rare to see these in young people.  In fact just pulled some statistics on caratcts in the 40-50 age group, out of 10,000 procedures, only 42 fell into this age group. If you have a really old PC, poor eyesight should be common, but not so much with the young or middle aged.

In the last group, with the exception of the extremly rare conditions, most people with poor eyesight would not see it as a fatal condition, or anything more than a minor nusiance.  You don't need to see the blood dropping off a tembo's tooth at 100 yards to know that the tembo shaped blob over there is dangerous.

In so far as Jewelers loupes.  I think it's possible that someone noticed that odd shaped piece of glass makes things look bigger, but making the leap to wearing it in front of your eyes to make everything clear, seems a bit unlikely.  Also I think that glass production is very tightly controlled and secretive, this doesn't lend itself well to innovation.

[Cuusardo]

Magicker glasses?

Scary!   :twisted: