Marle Paradox and Time Traveler Synchronization

[Eske]

Hey everyone!  It has been awhile.  I've thought about the Marle Paradox recently, so here is my latest effort to tackle it (after failing to do so with my Dreamline and Time X ideas.)  It isn't fully fleshed out - just something that hit me earlier today.  I'd like to submit it now for review, even though it is in its infancy and I haven't fully checked it for conflicts that arise later in the game if it is applied.  Basically, I took the Dreamline viewpoint that values perspective, removed the Entity from it and focused on the characters that we play as in-game.  The only issue I know of is that this idea (which hopefully isn't similar to other ideas presented recently, I haven't read up on everything - sorry if it is) is pretty much created with the sole intention of resolving the Marle Paradox, without influencing other events in the game - making it feel kind of forced.  Any feedback is appreciated - thanks!

Time Traveler Synchronization

For all time travelers passing through a gate, the receiving era is synced to their experience, creating a tangent worldline that only grants them Time Traveler Immunity and discards Time Traveler Immunity previously granted to all time travelers on the parent worldline.  If another time traveler enters the same era AFTER the arrival of the time traveler who created the tangent worldline, TTI is granted to them as well, from the perspective of the tangent catalyst.

In the game, we play from the perspective of Crono being the tangent catalyst because we first view 600AD (the receiving era) from his perspective and there are no breaks during his stay there.

First Time Travel Event:  Marle Perspective 1000AD – 600AD:

Marle takes the gate in Leene Square from 1000AD to 600AD.  There, she is mistaken for her kidnapped ancestor, Queen Leene, and is taken by the guards to the castle.  Soon after, Crono shows up and Marle reveals her true identity to him.  (Reasonable speculation follows.)  Lucca arrives in 600AD, runs up to the Queen's quarters, discovers that Crono is there with Marle, and confirms her suspicion, as stated in the game, that Marle is really Princess Nadia.  Lucca notes that someone was supposed to have saved the real Queen, but that may no longer happen because everyone assumes that Marle is the Queen.  Lucca suggests that she and Crono go and search for the real Queen, knowing that Marle would not be able to leave the castle.  The two discover the hairpin with Guardia’s royal crest in the cathedral, are ambushed by Mystics, meet with Frog, kill Yakra and save the real Queen and the Chancellor.  After being thanked back at the castle, Crono, Lucca and Marle say their goodbyes and return to 1000AD.

Second Time Travel Event:  Crono Perspective 1000AD – 600AD:

Crono follows Marle through the gate in Leene Square from 1000AD to 600AD.  When he arrives at the castle, Marle reveals that she is truly Princess Nadia.  After a brief discussion, she vanishes from existence due to a variant of the Grandfather Paradox that is satisfied by circumstances not made expressly clear in the game.  Unsure of what to do, he descends to the hallway adjacent to the throne room and runs into Lucca, who explains that Princess Nadia vanished because her ancestor, Queen Leene, was supposed to have been rescued but never was.  She suggests searching for the real Queen and the two head to the cathedral, where they find a hairpin with Guardia’s royal crest.  They are ambushed by Mystics and meet Frog, who aids them in killing Yakra and saving the real Queen and the Chancellor.  After arriving back at the castle, they discover that Marle has reappeared in the Queen's quarters due to the variant Grandfather Paradox's issues being resolved.  After being thanked for their daring rescue, Crono, Lucca and Marle say their goodbyes and return to 1000AD.

Third Time Travel Event:  Lucca Perspective 1000AD – 600AD:

Note: Unless one of Crono’s ancestors (perhaps a guard taken prisoner in the cathedral) is threatened, there is no reason to believe that Lucca’s account would differ significantly from Crono’s account above.

Process:

Marle Perspective:

Marle travels 600AD --> new worldline created/Marle granted TTI --> Crono travels 600AD (Marle worldline)/Crono granted TTI --> Lucca travels 600AD (Marle worldline)/Lucca granted TTI

Crono Perspective:

Crono travels 600AD --> new worldline created/Crono granted TTI --> Lucca travels 600AD (Crono worldline)/Lucca granted TTI

Lucca Perspective:

Lucca travels 600AD --> new worldline created/Lucca granted TTI

In-game Experience:

In the game, we view the event dubbed the “Marle Paradox" from Crono’s perspective.  If Time Traveler Synchronization (TTS) is observed, Crono, by default, is granted TTI and Lucca is granted TTI upon arrival.  Marle is unfortunately part of Crono’s synchronized arrival and her TTI granted by her travel event is discarded.  In other words, Marle is subject to causality from Crono’s perspective because she isn't granted immunity from her prior time travel event – she is both a part of 600AD and dependent upon events that occur there.  Though there is more than one way this story could have gone, all perspectives can be reasonably seen to lead to the same conclusion: the real Queen is saved and our three heroes from 1000AD return home.

Additional Note:

This is meant to explain why Marle is able to disappear at all - not necessarily what made her disappear and why it happened when it did.  Hopefully, with more discussion, we can work that part out and get this game that much closer to having a completely consistent approach to time travel.  Thanks for reading!

[Manly Man]

I had always thought of this as early evidence of the Entity's existence. She got warped away to a place outside of time (perhaps somewhere around The End of Time without all of the blocks and lights and buckets that Gaspar made, or even the Darkness Beyond Time, which is explained in Chrono Cross) in a gambit by the Entity to inspire her friends to not only search after her, but to further meddle with time, and defeat Lavos. The incident had led to Crono being tried or kidnapping, the subsequent jailbreak, and then managing to happen upon the one particular Gate available that would take them to the future and convince them that they need to fix things.

It is, admittedly, a pretty big gamble, but there have been bigger ones that work just fine.

[Eske]

I had always thought of this as early evidence of the Entity's existence. She got warped away to a place outside of time (perhaps somewhere around The End of Time without all of the blocks and lights and buckets that Gaspar made, or even the Darkness Beyond Time, which is explained in Chrono Cross) in a gambit by the Entity to inspire her friends to not only search after her, but to further meddle with time, and defeat Lavos. The incident had led to Crono being tried or kidnapping, the subsequent jailbreak, and then managing to happen upon the one particular Gate available that would take them to the future and convince them that they need to fix things.

It is, admittedly, a pretty big gamble, but there have been bigger ones that work just fine.

I have always favored Entity-centered approaches to the game because they give the Entity a larger role - one that is finally acknowledged when the group finally sits down in the forest and ponders what could be causing all of this.  The problem with that approach is that we are basically given a free pass to spout "The Entity did it!" whenever we cannot explain a phenomenon in the game.  Marle describes her experience as being "cold, dark and lonely" which certainly meshes well with what we see the Darkness Beyond Time to be in Chrono Cross, but "The Entity did it!" should not be an acceptable answer to the problems we find with the logic of the plot.  It is fine to say that the Entity did indeed do these things, but we should focus on why they are able to happen - not on the supposed whims of some supernatural being pressing a big red button.  That is why I decided to post this idea.  I know that it is a forced approach (TTI, TB and TE are sound ways of explaining events throughout the game while this is more isolated) and that it will take me some time to find another situation where it could apply or explain something in-game, but at least it gives logic a chance to prevail, or at least explain, the Entity's desires.
Thank you for your input, Manly Man!   

[Manly Man]

You're welcome for the input as well.

I think the reason why I can settle down on the idea that it's all the will of the Entity is because I've played D&D so much, where nearly everything can be explained by "A wizard did it," which, more often than not, is actually true.

Unfortunately, the Entity is not a wizard, so digging a bit deeper into such things is, indeed, good practice.

[ZeaLitY]

Cool. I'm not currently at liberty to imagine what influences it might have on the other TTI-critical theories (like the Time Crash and whatnot), but it works as a good feeder theory, certainly. I'll get it added to the paradox page.

[MaximusLight]

You know there may be a concise way to bring this in line with the Time Bastard Theory.

We see in Chrono Trigger one the party goes through a gate time seems to flow in both ends of the gate consistently, that is if 15 minutes pass on one side of it it seems as though 15 minutes pass on the other. We are never given specific numbers like that in Chrono Trigger but the game implies buy how events continue to happen in a time period before and after someone time travels so even if it's not at the same rate we know there is some kind of synchronization happening.
So because of this we could say that Gate must be in sync or "synced" on both sides.

Now as the party travels more and more gates link up more and more time periods until everything period we travel to is synced and time is flowing on both ends of every gate. (even in 12000 BC, the gates are sealed at one point but never destroyed).

That said we still have time bastard (theory) removing Janus and Melchior via black gate despite this synchronization but the real interesting thing I realized is that what if time bastard doesn't apply simply to when people would have otherwise left but it just eliminates contradictions in general? Kind of like a way of keeping the time stream consistent. We've assumed that Time Travel's Immunity makes that instance of a person who'd time traveled completely immune to changes in the timeline as they remain the same person but what if a person is the contradiction? If Time Bastard theory applies specifically to contradictions that would explain why Melchior and Janus still got absorbed by black gates at the point in time where them continuing to be there would be contradiction.

But what about Marle? Well remember that first part about time periods being synced once they are linked? We know that traveling back should cause the timeline to branch off into a new time stream and therefore grant immunity as the time traveler's are separate bits of information but since the time frames are in sync that could mean that while Marle is a separate bit of information she's still subject to contradiction in the synced time period and thus be subjected to time bastard theory. Kind of like time periods being in sync forces them into being one consistent timeline for the sake of eliminating contradictions.
To put it more simply Time traveler's are immune to changes in the time stream in their own personal history and will not be removed in an unsynced timeline as there is not contradiction due to being a separated dimension but in a synced timeline they can still be registered as a contradiction due to the link despite their personal history being immune to changes.
AKA. their personal history is immune to changes but they are still subject to be removed by time bastard if it's about contradictions rather than just when they should disappear.

That would mean that at the point were Marle's existence becomes a contradiction she should disappear when in sync like Janus and Melchior did. It's a bit of a stretch with what we are given in the story but by this logic we saw that point and this also leads to a prediction: Although we don't know why it was that point specifically this theory would predict that it wasn't just her being mistaken for her ancestor but another event or set of events that finalized that contradiction and when the contradiction ceases to be an issue should could potentially be added back in.  not just Marle being mistake for Leene.
What do we see in the story? It's not just Marle being mistake for Leene and Leene dying when Marle disappears but rather it's shortly after Chrono arrives and the castle and meets Marle both times. Which implies that Chrono doing something or being at Guardia castle was what cemented her being treated as a contradiction. This would also explain why she doesn't just come back right after the queen is found as Marle only reappears once Chrono and Lucca get back or Leene's chambers as the probability of Leene being in the right place at the right time is what eliminates the contradiction not just her being found but rather being back safely at the castle.

Then again I'm tired so what do I know. XD

[papercut]

Awesome!  I always assume the angle of Marle's pendant causing the gate glitch being the clue to this paradox, i.e. that relationship somehow causing further anomaly to prevent Marle complete and total time-nihilation on the spot (aside from the potential resolution provided by Crono's presence, or impending arrival or whatever).  Your take is so much more holistic, and rids me of the nagging sensation that it CAN'T be that simple. 

As far as immunity because of an instance of "non-synchronization" viewing it so technically is difficult, but not disregardable.  The only synchronization, or lack of, must originate from the mechanisms of the gate:  Marle time traveled by accident, but wasn't immune to the potential because she was destined to have the pendant, BUT wasn't immune to every single possible outcome because of that.  Again it is difficult to pin, because, after that, all subsequent time travelers will be affecting synchronization in that area (era, almost a pun XD )

  I hadn't heard or read of the Dream-line viewpoint, but I will now.  Outstanding and thank you!!  ^ ^

Also, Time Bastard?  Read my own reply to my post "A late late late late Time Bastard debunk"