As dauphinos explained, the origin of the furry (as it is correctly spelled as dictated by internet slang law) started out as a term to describe people who dressed as animals. The term furry then carried over to describe cartoon or animated characters with humanoid forms with animal characteristics. Toons from video games like Starfox and cartoons like Disney's Robin Hood best fit the description. Furries have a real bad rap associated them because of stories and such describing real life furries actually thinking they are the animal they are dressed up as, and then performing rather unspeakable acts. And that is how the term evolved to become derogatory in most cases. In some places of the internet, it is best to not associate yourself with them at all.

Oh, that said I rather enjoy reading stories, and I'd love to jump in once I find a nice little spot for me to add something of my flavor.

Clarification: "Furry" isn't always derogatory. The community itself embraces the term, so it's like calling homosexuals "queers", it can be used derogatorily, but it really doesn't need to be. The terms are frequently interchanged with various styles of "otherkin" which is a word for people that think they are some other kind of thing IRL (vampire, faerie, w/e) but appear human for whatever justification makes sense.

I'm just trying to figure out what it is we're talking about because senti-beasts, as far as I can tell, are a brand new concept not elsewhere previously documented.

I assume the senti part means sentient and beast means.... well, beast. So therefore it must be a sentient thinking animal of some sort. From the rest of the speculation, I now assume that they are akin to summon creatures similar to those found in the Final Fantasy series. Intelligent thinking creatures with sometimes animal appearances and form pacts of some kind with willing human partners. Is there some gain of some kind between the two? Well I suppose that is for us to decide :3

Naaaahhhh, Nexxo, me laddie. I can shed some light. Although if you don't like the idea, we can go another way. And sorry for not posting sooner - work rears its ugly head.

I thought the sentient beasts would be from either another dimension, another planet (connected to Glar by a cosmic thread or a magical escalator) or {fill in the blank}. The glarstone is an ore found only on Glar (I like quick, gutteral names that people give for planets rather than flowery ones) that has the ability to connect the two. The concept could be (and this is where I could use some help) that the beasts on the other side of the rift can 'change places' with humans on this side, when needed (or when they want to). The beasts are sentient (assuming the definition of sentience is self-awareness, high intelligence and the ability to question such things as religion, creation, etc.) but not technologically advanced nor capable of opposable-thumb life, perhaps creating an underlying set of reasons why they allow morphing (or maybe theyre just adventurous). People morph for recreation purposes for the most part, but wizards may have another reason, yet undisclosed.

And the word 'morph' is overused. Anyone have a better one?

That's what popped into my head. Did I step too far from the shore?

And WOLT, yes, it may be fairly new an idea. So that might make it more fun, maybe? Whatever you guys think.

I don't think you stepped too far from the shore at all and this actually poses a new writing challenge for us all, so thanks for that! It's certainly something to work with that will change the whole way culture itself works on the planet.

The only thing I would recommend is that if anyone is developing major world contributions that they explain them thoroughly in the ooc notes, otherwise we're all clueless as to what was intended.

I think because the concept is relatively new and undefined I'd feel more comfortable if it were explained a bit more thoroughly otherwise I think I might accidentally mishandle the merchandise.

So lets discuss:

1) what animals do they transform into?

2) are the animals even real world equivalents or something more akin to what you'd find in the aether?

3) why does this exist at all? There must be some reason this technology happened to be developed to begin with, by understanding that defining motivation we can then understand how it should be used and abused.

4) what are the specifics of the morph? The proverbial who what where when and why...

Prepare for crazy ideas!

Maybe the world these transforming beasts came from was ravished by some diabolical plague that threatened to kill all life as they knew it. The beasts though, before they became beasts, discovered that if they could transform into animals that were not affected by the plague they could continue to exist, but just in a different more primitive forms. The technology of free polymorphism was still new at the time and they were not aware of the side effects. Those side effects being degrading intelligence. After discovering their predicament, which would essentially be being stuck between a rock and a dull place (harharhar) they decided to magically enchant these "glarstones" and send them adrift in space with the hope that one day they would land on another planet with intelligent life. Hundreds, maybe even thousands of years later, the meteors finally crashed landed on the planet of the current setting and the beasts traveled on over. However by this time, their intelligence had degraded so far that the smarter ones are the only ones left with reasoning and the others have become insane monstrous like morphers that appear from time to time to cause trouble. If you tried asking a beasty that still had the ability to think straight why they decided to adventure out to this new world from their planet of Glar they'd just say "Well it looked fun mate~" completely unaware of their original purpose.

I'm still working on the cinks from there though. I like the idea of these primitive morphing creatures coming from some magic utopia gone wrong kind of thing. Gods to animals if you would. Yes, yes, I know. Sounds needlessly complicated :3

I actually think that's pretty cool

Good stab, Nexus75. But I would think that instead of setting rocks adrift and being found thousands of years later, perhaps they should be concurrent with their own society to give a more real-time effect - what is happening at that point in time on one planet wil be accessible through morphing on the other. Perhaps the rocks were sent to the other planet through a rift?

Hmmm, perhaps the people of Glar used a type of scrying spell to locate other intelligent life and then used the above mentioned rift to transfer the stones? I'll let someone else take a whack at adjusting the story further. It would be cool to see this tale evolve.