Grrl Power #457 – Arcanum++ has better mobile support
This is kind of a weird page, in that Sydney asks a question and it doesn’t quite get answered on this page, but some of you can probably see what Ingsol is winding up to. I found the aside with the spells as programs too enticing to edit out.
In a post computer world, it’s difficult to not think of spells as nothing more than code. Really I guess that’s what they are, but you don’t often hear people talking about “My fire dart spell is almost ready, but it kept crashing at this function loop. I found a Yoda condition and fixed it, but now it hangs and just bleeds heat until I cancel the spell or run out of mana.”
Magic would probably have different enchanting languages depending on your school of magic at least. Actually it would be a mess because every branch of magic would probably have variants on common enchanting languages, and proper enchanting , that is, imbuing an artifact with magical properties would probably take a different language than casting a quick spell, vs. an extended ceremony designed to conjure something. Or maybe there’s one language which does it all, but not as efficiently as single purpose languages, and there would probably be forums where people are shitty and defensive about their favorite language, or where they share moronically written enchantments their co-workers wrote, just like in real life.
I like “Arcanum++” because it’s so on the nose and answers Sydney’s question without ever saying it directly. Even if you’ve never done any programming on your life you’ve probably heard of C++.
There was some debate in the comments from the previous page as to whether all these creatures hiding in plain sight meant something untoward was going on. (Sorry I didn’t getting around to throwing my two cents in with the comments, but I was weirdly busy with stuff last week so I’ll put something here.) Obviously, there’s a case to be made since 1) someone could be making out with a lizardman at a club (for example) and not know it, which is… I guess bad, if you’re racist against lizardmen, but if there’s no detrimental consequence to making out with one, like some kind of flu you can only get from sticking your tongue in their mouth, it doesn’t seem like that big of a deal to me. Obviously your mileage will vary with that one. I think as long as someone is honest about who they are, it doesn’t really matter what they are? I end that sentence with a question mark because I imagine I could think of examples where that’s not true if I gave it some more thought.
“I’m sorry, I’ve been lying this whole time, I’m not brunette, I’m really a… blonde!”
“You monster why would you lie to me!?”
2) And this is the big one really, some of these creatures do prey on humans. That said, the ones that do generally try not to kill or otherwise traumatize them. Most Vampires are just fine with willing victims, and there are small pockets of people who do know about them, (much fewer than know everything). Obviously as with any population like this, there are going to be some who are going to delight in tormenting or killing their prey, but as Ingsol said, they police their own. Keeping their more rampant members in check allows them to work in good faith with the government
Since I don’t plan on dissecting every aspect of The Veil in the comic, I’ll expand a little on it here. It doesn’t alter memories. If someone sees something in the raw, they either have to rationalize it, go running through the streets trying to tell everyone, (usually winding up in therapy,) or become one of those quiet wierdos who insists they saw a centaur at the corner of 5th and main and finds some private message board where he can commiserate with the other people like him. Often times those boards and UFO Cons or whatever are infiltrated by Council people who try and subtly steer people back to “rationality.” (Oh you’re a new vampire are you? How many words per minute can you type?) It’s not an easy job, but the Council has a number of playbooks on that kind of disinformation campaign.
The Veil allows the supernatural to exist along side humans without them noticing. Mostly it does this by making non-humans look human. It also does stuff like alter how humans see certain footprints and other telltale signs. It’s not foolproof, and stuff like a supernatural leaving their blood all over a crime scene can be quite a complication. The most recent and complicated additions to The Veil are things like altering how photographs and video recordings appear. Sydney will be disappointed when she checks the pictures she took earlier.
Double res version will be posted over at Patreon as soon as I get up. $1 and up, but feel free to contribute as much as you like :)
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My God, there’s Magic Geeks! And there has been for thousands of years!
Merlin and the knights of Camelot.
“Spells as code” is how I imagine most rune/sigil-based magic.
reminds me of when i had to do my coding in pascal and my html in notepad fun caffeine fuled allnighters that resulted in a mess of code
In computers, the same as with people, throughout all of history; when trying to communicate across wildly-varying systems/cultures there’s always something lost during translation…
;)
… o.0
O.M.G…
I’m TOTALLY using this in my next WoD campaign
Mage the Ascension, either Virtual Adepts, or NWO/Iteration X.
They are the ones to look at for that type of magik.
Then there’s my really weird technoshamaness Dreamspeaker that writes spiritually empowered apps and hacks the spirits inhabiting computers. As one Virtual Adept told her: “you write the weirdest code I’ve ever seen!”
Why not? I encountered an explanation of “THE Dreamspeaker paradigm”, and immediately wrote two Dreamspeaker paradigms based in modern physics.
(In one, the only truly individual spirits – the smallest ones – live in the spaces between subatomic particles and control those random quantum interactions, and all consciousness is collective across some mass of spirits. Including human consciousness. If a sufficiently large number of humans unite their will sufficiently firmly, they can dismantle a god into a mass of lesser spirits and scatter them… but humans, and other sapient spirits, don’t tend to stay united well or for long. I forget the other one; this was a number of years ago.)
Those are just the one that use that style as part of their paradigm.
Nothing says that no one else can use that style.
At least they didn’t have to worry about the Y2K bug.
But switching from the Julian to the Gregorian calendar must have been a real pain.
Only for a small group of them. You should never roll your own for things like date/times, abstract it all away with a (decent) library, and job’s a goodun.
Yea, but what happens when the Great Library burns down?
Oh, good, the cover story is still holding up.
SSSSHHHHH!!!!! Nobody’s supposed to know!
It was backed up digitally.
Just in case.
Ahh, so that is why they developed the ‘1,000 angels, on the head of a pin‘ spell program.
By the ARC-hive branch?
All the pointy ears and hooves become visible as the subroutine calls started to return a “missing library” error. Since then they adopted mirroring which caused pyramids proliferation.
Then you skip 12 days as you get things repaired.
That’s only if they used the gregorian calender.
I am pretty sure their calender is based off the Mayan calendar.
But people said the Mayan calendar predicted the world was going to end in December 2012. Maybe it really did, and the sigil spells are keeping us from noticing it.
People SAID that… the few people who claim to be survivors of the Mayans replied “say wha? You been smoking something funny?”.
The Mayan calendar ended in December 2012 in the same sense that the modern Gregorian calendar ends on Dec 31.
I posted the same circular calendar comment in another forum some years ago. The part I was never able to figure out is the cycle repeats every 5200 years. The Mayans date back to about 2000 BC and the rollover date in 2012 occurred about 4000 years later. I have no idea why they adopted their own calendar system about 1/4 the way through.
P.S. The ‘page a day’ calendars in Mayan format must be HUGE.
It is because it was not their calendar. It was a shared calendar, which had been in use by other civilisations, such as by the Olmec, well before the Mayans arose as a power.
Also, the calendar system was a lot more complicated than ours is, with several interlocking cycles.
For instance, China has a system of ‘year tracking’ that it uses informally alongside the Gregorian calendar, tracking Element and the chinese zodiac. It takes sixty years for them to cycle through the combinations and start repeating.
Just because a calendar ran out of dates about 1300 years after the civilization that used it collapsed does not mean the end of the world, just the end of the calendar. No doubt, the Mayans of 800 AD were expecting somebody would extend the calendar as the time of its end got closer, but that calendar was replaced with a simpler, less precise one from across the eastern ocean.
Actually, I know a college professor of Mayan descent. I asked him about it. The Mayans always knew their calendar would be replaced eventually, which is why it stopped where it did. Otherwise, the priests would’ve extended it even further.
It amazes me how none of the “end of the world” conspiracy theorists ever thought to ask a Mayan, since their descendants are still around! (And none of them was worried that the world was going to end. They knew it was just the end of that cycle of their calendar.)
The old world ended. We’ve got a brand new shiny one now.
Gonna go outside and play in it!
::scampers off and kicks up his heels a bit::
*runs outside and chases butterflies, with Buffy*
You really should avoid the people using recreational pharmaceuticals.
which would mean it crashed last year
2012. Didn’t you see the documentary? Just as well they managed to reboot Earth, and use a debugged version of the code, or else we would not be having this conversation! Well I wouldn’t, not having had the money to buy a ticket on an arc.
What it really did.
https://www.cagle.com/mike-luckovich/2012/12/end-of-twinkies
Twinkies have been rebooted.
Twinkies have been *patched*. Hastily. By people working on crunch time stolen from other projects.
…Dammit, it really does explain this year.
Does this mean that I will still have a chance to see a twinkie thirty five feet long and weighing approximately six hundred pounds?
Because it needs to be said…
“That’s a BIG twinkie.”
I’ve already seen one – well actually it was an Airstream trailer painted yellow.
+1 for references. Love Ghostbusters.
I told them if they’re gonna recode they needed to do it RIGHT, not just FAST.
And here is the relevant xkcd comic for that comment.
https://xkcd.com/844/
Y’know one of the funny things about the Twinkie issue? The machinery was actually seasoned by so much use that it affected the taste of the twinkies. When Hostess went out of business, and the brand got bought, the machinery didn’t come with it (though the recipe did… which means new machines are being used to make them, which haven’t received the seasoning that the old machines have, which is why there’s a small difference in taste.
So, yeah. Twinkies have been rebooted.
Hmm, I wonder if Archon has tried to train computer coders is basic enchantments, too see what they come up with.
Also, love the idea of casting as coding.
I think casting is more like executing a program. Coming up with the spell is the coding part.
I’m pretty sure that, given a book on basic spellcrafting, Leon could build one of those Drag-and-Drop interfaces you get for teaching youngsters how to code, but adapted for spells.
Maybe not the most mana or time efficient spells to cast, but rapid to prototype new ideas…
Conversely you have an Arcanum++ user, learning how to program, and finding it easier to cast her ‘contact higher power’ spell,* delegate the typing to her homonculous and consulting her crystal ball, to ensure the coding is bug-free.
* Maybe thereby tapping into the galactic programmer’s guild optimised codex. Or some other alternate Earth, which has the same primitive programming language.
So you are saying that there is a magical version of stackoverflow.com?
Depending on the mage that answers your question that may or may not be a good thing.
Stack overflow errors while casting magic are quite dramatic in effect; something similar to a nuclear bomb going off. They’ve been called various names through history, such as “misfire” or “backlash,” but it’s only referred to by the survivors of the event.
Probably because the non-survivors have a hard time referring to it at all.
In a world with magic, death is a lifestyle choice, rather than an insurmountable wall.
Can I just say, Yorp, that is an AMAZING statement. Is it yours or are you quoting something? And can I use it elsewhere?
I cannot specifically attribute it, as I have been bandying around phrases like that (and hearing them back) for a long time, in roleplaying and gaming circles. Maybe all stemming from a common point, such as an early Dragon magazine article or novel. Plus it has doubtless been used here, on these forums too.
Given that I had forgotten the snappiest way I heard it put before, I had to rephrase it the way I did above. So I am glad that the turn of phrase appealed to you. And you are most welcome to make use of it. Although it really is public domain, so no permission is needed.
This needs to be said, as quoted from the modern Mummy movies.
“Death is only the beginning.”
There’s even a few people in that very same Council Chamber that can attest to that…
Death is but a doorway.
Let me open it for you.
“There are things known, and things unknown, and in between are The Doors”
If you actually know what you are doing, drag dropping and rearranging of all those blocks ID just time consuming gumph.
Good for absolute newbies and kids, but there is a reason there is a textual back end that users can switch to.
Hacking is an entirely different skill set than programming good UIs, though. There’s some overlap, but I wouldn’t want to waste Leon’s time with something like that. But then I’m pretty sure there already are things like that. I mean *someone* had to create that hovering Interface Dabbler used when analyzing Sydney’s orbs. Or the ones inside the orbs. Or the one Sydney used to interact with her skill tree.
Btw, I would die for a job of “programming” magic user interface like those. Anyone know a mage that’s currently hiring?
There’s a John Ringo scifi/fantasy series ‘Council Wars’ that is set so far in the future that nanites provide us with everything we need basically like magic, but the council that maintains power distribution end splitting and going to war. In order to reduce the other side’s effectiveness, each side ‘password protects’ every programmable function of the nanites with gibberish. Both sides have access to all of the passwords, but in order to initiate a function (have something seemingly magical happen) you need to stand there and chant the gibberish password (spell).
Don’t get too attached though. The last book was a decade ago and he’s showing no sign of ever finishing it.
The Wizard’s Bane by Rick Cook. A programmer is spelled to a universe where magic works. The wizard summoning him is killed, and he has no idea WHY he was summoned. He then figures out that while every spell ever cast was built whole cloth and treated as if it was one indivisible process, that they have many program like features. He then creates a bunch of mini-spells that work like Forth command words and use stack processes (in a later book they write an OS for spells). The new spell activity draws the attention of the evil magic councel who then target him, however since he can now create brand new spells that nobody has any idea how to counter with no problem, he throws a MASSIVE monkey wrench into their attack, and nearly wipe them out.
Curse you Ringo finish your damn books I was actually talking with a friend about that very subject yesterday. As for the Rick Cook books they are tasty a decent read what I consider popcorn books quick and fun.
They were fun books, those by Rick Cook. I especially liked the concept of focusing on and understanding core principles while avoiding being locked into rote reiteration of experience.
These two things apply to a LOT more than just programming and magic.
::adjusts his official Fez of Understanding::
Don’t forget to wear your Bowtie of Awareness. Bowties are also cool.
;)
Impractically long scarves of Wisdom are cooler than bow ties and fezzes, though. ☺
:-D I had forgotten that part of the exchange.
Ah, the wonders of applying the scientific method and mathematics to magical analysis! Any sufficiently analyzed magic is indistinguishable from science!
Brilliant reversal of the quote. +1
Actually, it is a quote from Girl Genius. I just thought it would be appropriate given the context. If you are feeling masochistic, you could look on the associated TVTropes page.
So basically, super humans are to varied to properly code into the sigil. Powers are so unique you’d have to code an entire spell for every single person, in order to get complete coverage.
I took it to mean that the supernaturals would need to shut down the entire Veil to update it for superpowers, and they figured it was too much of a risk.
Actually kinda both, Ingsol is talking about why the Veil doesn’t cover Supers and Dabbler is talking about using an obsolete language for creating the Veil
It’s not so much that the powers are unique, it’s that there’s only likely to be one super in the family, leaving the veil with little to focus on. The veil apparently works best on large groups, so it might technically be able to work on ARCHON (now wouldn’t that be a wrinkle). This actually makes policing those who wish violence on humans even more important because those would be individuals, making the veil work harder to hide them.
Interesting connection, what holds up a veil (or curtain) better, a single hook, or many?
Haven’t read all comments yet to see if this sort of explanation is here. This seems to be the first occasion of the question reading chronologically, so it seemed the best spot.
You chose your spot well.
Let us assume that Arianna was telling the truth, at the press conference, in saying that the legendary monsters may have stemmed from supers.* Somewhere, back in the mists of time, there was a super who could turn into a wolf. Who went around making new werewolves, by either means at his disposal. Likewise someone who rose from the grave, due to his super power. Then went nibbling on comely maidens, to make more vampires.
In due course the Council formed and made the Veil. Specifically programming in the werewolf and vampire super powers to be concealed. Likewise all the other super-ancestor races** (such as the super who was only six inches tall and could fly with wings).
Meanwhile, on other planets, some individuals have also developed super powers. One branch that we know are related are the demons. Let us assume that each significantly different type (such as the one from Dabbler’s vision) is actually descended from someone with a new super power.
The evidence to support this is the fact that succubi have a racial super-power, namely their illusion capability. Note that it is not described as a demonic power. So it is plausible that the other demons have different powers (to have managed to compete with the super succubi and remain extant).
Doppelgangers actually have two super powers, namely shapechanging and psionics (see Dabber’s cast information). Thus showing that a (presumably) non-demonic race also has racial powers.
Clearly super-powers are way more significant a leap, in evolutionary terms, than a normal, small, mutation. So it is logical that any significant advantage will propagate widely through a race. Possibly completely replacing the obsolete form. Again the descriptions we have of succubi and doppelgangers, as having racial powers, supports that this happens.
Anyhow, as each of these races arrive on Earth, and fall under the banner of the Council, their particular powers get programmed in.
But when new supers spontaneously appear, they will only be protected by the veil if they happen to be similar to one of the existing super races, by whatever criteria the Veil recognises them. Physical appearances can vary dramatically (see Dabbler’s school day as an example). So the most reliable way of identifying a supernatural person is by the super-power which differentiates them (or their DNA if they happen to be from an alien race, which lost out and had no super ancestor).
So the Beast or Wolverine, from the X-Men, might be covered by the werewolf part of the Veil, for example. Beast’s super-power made him become hairy and beastial. Whilst Wolverine’s gave him regeneration. Both of which are things that overlap the werewolf set of powers. So if they came to this world, they might be invisible. Much to Wolverine’s dismay, if he is trying to catch Sydney’s attention!
New supers could be programmed in, of course, but first they would need to be spotted and their characteristics isolated enough to add them to the code. The very fact that supers are becoming much more common would make this very hard. And now that they are public knowledge, the problem is not adding them to the list of those hidden, but making sure that new ones are excluded, so they do not risk revealing the presence of the Veil.
* Her vagueness being because science has not been able to prove how super-powers work, and she cannot bring any classified knowledge, from the Council, to bear, to support her case, when presenting the situation to the public.
** Ie all those who managed to find a way to propagate, despite any problems (such as being made out of rock and finding normal partners to be too squishy).
Yorp, I love the amount of analysis that went into this. One small error though – Sydney’s ninja-sense. She pierced a secondary veil pertaining to Dabbler’s handler (although he was giving off tantric vibes) and managed to remember that she had noticed an issue. And then proceeded to remember where the problem spot was. She might be able to notice Wolverine through The Veil, or she might not. I’m now uncertain as to whether it was an error. Truesight orb at all times, Syd…
X is a specialist spy super. I am certain that her abilities are innate, and she was not relying on the Veil. Moreover Sydney could see X directly. The scene started off with Sydney grasping the true sight orb, and freaking out at seeing a purple four armed alien standing right in front of her. Sometime during the course of the ensuing fracas she also saw the mysterious figure in the spy outfit.
Given the immediate priority of fending off the purple monster, this was not a high priority. The other more distracting things took her attention away from X. Plus, when things started to calm down, Dabbler was standing in between Sydney and X. Hence it taking a moment for her to remember, then doing her (purely dramatic) “ninja sense tingles” before looking over to where she had seen X.
The next page then shows X lowering her invisibility, so that the others present could also see her. Doing so confirms that she is not relying on the Veil. Especially as she then talks with Dabbler about how she was spotted, and sounded confident that she could fix it.
Mind you, if X is actually a monster, under her spy outfit, then she could be exploiting the Veil. Nothing would specifically preclude that. It just does not seem to fit as well as her being a super.
I don’t think they wanted to veil them to begin with, they are human after all. I read the exchange more like “yes, some ended accidentally catched in”, as in particular super individues casually matched a spell’s template. I guess they even debug them out when become aware of it.
Yorp: sorry if you already included this, I didn’t actually read your… err… poooooost yet
No probs. Any post of that length, it is natural to skip past, until or unless in the mood for it. I need a refresher course at Sesquipedalian Addicts Anonymous.
Nice to know we thought alike. Even if you were a teensy bit more succinct.
Dammit, you didn’t include it… it’s your whole topic altogether :(
Dave, please, paste an “As Yorp said” at the beginning of my post if you can, thank you.
Thanks, I usually read the posts in between taking care of other stuff, so yes, longer posts I tend to read them the last.
Don’t worry about it. We both had similar thoughts, to the same stimulus. The time stamps are irrelevant, under the circumstances.
Just chalk it down to ‘great minds think alike.’ ;-)
And as a good friend of mine in a online RPG always used to follow that quote with:
“And Fools seldom differ!”
::waggles his ears foolishly and gives a silly grin::
Repetition is inevitable.
Repetition is inevitable.
If magic is code, I bet there are mages who spend their entire careers trying to root out Magical Viruses.
Nonsense viruses would be a lot less amusing if instead of creating pop ups they made someone go insane and start yelling about the benefits of buying off brand Soni televisions and penis pumps.
“Damn it, someone’s infected this source hub with a Cthonic Meltdowner.”
Wizard screaming about R’leyh
“Who uploaded Pokémon Go to the reality stabilization matrix?”
The story of The Sorcerer’s Apprentice would end up quite differently if the world suddenly experienced a DDOS failure…
O.o
“Goes into the backroom, flips the breaker, 30 count, resets breaker.”
All good now.
::wanders around the magical lab, putting brooms away and stacking up buckets::
“Puts out a tray of apple slices, carrots, and sugar cubes for the help.”
Try Charlie Stross’ “Laundry Files” books. They combine IT office politics and computer geekery with British civil service. The Laundry is one of the organizations protecting us from Tentacled Horrors from Beyond Space-Time with spells written in Old Enochian and ISO 9000 certifications. There’s a fantastic RPG for the series already. Both the books and the RPG are worth a look!
“Sydney will be disappointed when she checks the pictures she took earlier.”
Well, that’s a downer.
In addition: What about if she looks at the pictures while holding the True Sight orb?
Is there an illusion over the picture, or is the picture actually physically changed?
I bet the picture would probably appear disappointing unless she uses the Comm Ball to look at them. From the sounds of how the Veil works, the pictures would be altered by the veil, but still would have captured the photo. It’s just that someone without activated truesight can’t see the actual picture.
I think…
I mean… It makes sense in my head but it IS 4am.
If you took a picture of a vampire next to someone dressed as a vampire and you don’t know which is which, would the veil know which is the real one to hide their appearance in the picture?
I’m sure the Veil can identify those supernatural elements that it was coded for properly
Maybe they would both look like fake vampires?
That would be the easy approach… you take a picture of a (real) werewolf, it comes out with visible seams in the costume…
And there are only two plausible blanket-coverage approaches to photographs, videos, and security cameras:
1) detect every instance of some person or device filming a supernatural, and alter the light as it enters the camera
2) detect every instance of a person looking at a photo/etc of a supernatural, and alter something (the light, or their perception) at that time.
I would think the first is a lot simpler and less energy-intensive. (Consider a webcam – one camera in one spot, might have concurrent viewers all over the world PLUS be recording for later upload to a dozen YouTube-equivalents, and random people will take frames from those posts as pictures for their own purposes.)
Of course, there are the confusing situations… expert costumer makes a really good werewolf costume, and puts it on a model for a photo shoot… a model who happens to be a werewolf…
My understanding is that The Veil doesn’t act on light, it acts on brains so the image *in* an electronic/photographic form would be correct but, as long as the sigil is up, anyone looking at it would *think* it was fake/not see the monster in the picture/etc.
Pre-today’s comic I would have said so too. But the blog, above, makes me less confident. Whilst the first part very clearly supports it:
The conclusion appears to veer away:
This is why I would be interested to see what happens when Halo uses her true sight orb on the photos. If it is her mind being messed with, she should be able to see the vampire and werewolf, whilst holding the orb. Whereas if the Veil is actually physically changing the photos then it will do nothing.
Clearly it would be simpler (and thereby more elegant) if it was all handled mentally. Plus the second quote can be read that way (as “appear” can be via mental means). But it is stated as being complicated, so that may not be the case.
Probably why we had Halo snapping away, so she can see the pictures later.
Even though she’s met all these people, she may not recognise them when she meets them again when the Veil is down.
I wonder what else can see through the Veil. A pair of Hoffman Lenses perhaps?
But what about photo recognition software? They have to take that into account, or at the very least, update to do so.
Why do you think photo recognition software has historically had such a bad reputation?
If you examine modern code, it has had its reliability vastly improved by a number of false-positive exclusions, built in, to remove the most ludicrous mis-identifications.
Such as “werewolf”, “vampire”, “pixie”, “bug-eyed-monster” or “grey alien”.
Those times, in a movie, where the monster looks fake, it could have been a really accurate monster, but worn by someone who happens to look like that for real and protected by the veil.
I wonder how The Veil will affect that recent press conference. On the video, how will Dabbler show up? None of the other supers are supernatural, but she sure is. Isn’t her shooting the mountain a sort of a “fuck the veil” moment? “Why does our video show this average looking girl holding a Berretta, when I remember this hot woman with a weird futuristic weapon she refused to explain?” Does Arianna know about The Veil?
I feel sorry for supernatural families. No family photo books. “We took pictures of our little centaur, Chet, while he was growing up, but all we got were these pictures of some human child.” Maybe there is a market for supernatural painters to record pictures of people. I wonder if you went touring the castles of Europe and looked at the paintings with true-sight what interesting things you would see?
Part of this is addressed in Dave’s blog, above.
However Dabbler, as always, is an exception to every rule. She was very likely overriding the Veil. If by no other means, than by the fact that ‘succubus illusions are the most powerful’, so the Veil could not stop her from appearing the way she wants.
Regardless of that she does have her cover-story, that her purple four-armed form is her ‘shapechanged battle-form’. So it is reasonable that many will believe that, as it is no more incredible than any of the other supers they saw demonstrating powers.
Plus it is possible that the Veil will help convince folks to believe the story, magically. In today’s comic it is revealed that the Veil is customised to each race’s capabilities, plus we know that Dabbler is not the only succubus, on Earth, and she was using her racial ability, rather than unique illusion magic (which Dabbler is completely undeveloped in).
Yes. Maxima did before entering, and the team clearly communicate well. For it to be anything else would require an unlikely plot twist.
Yes, the HOW is being very elusive. I feel like there’s hints (admittedly vague) pointing in opposite ways all over the place.
I just realized: I was trying to reply to your other post above :(
Is Dabbles showing off, again? She is going to show them a whole new way to code?
Haha, that nerdy debate about enchantments as if they were code is really funny :D
So here’s a question:
If the Veil covers everything, including succubi, how can Dabbler appear as a regular Succubus while inside Arc HQ? What about when she dropped her glamour during the fight?
Oh that is interesting… however, if that’s the case, how come ANY of the people in the council look like monsters at the moment, or how do people get random glimpses of “Centaur at the corner of 5th and main”
I’d say they can CHOOSE wether they are glamoured or not…
If that’s not the case, then I’d say its probably Succubi personal magic overpowering widespread global spell weave.
I’m sure a Succubi glamour would overpower the veil yes, so they’d look as they want. But when turning off that glamour, the veil should be taking over. Otherwise it’d defeat the point.
So either being able to turn it off at will, which sounds dangerous, or maybe it doesn’t effect people that know the truth already.
She told the whole world that she was a superheroine and that was her super powered “Battle Form™” so the veil has no need to make her look like a human cause the humans have already been successfully snowed.
That’s in general. But I also think you are on the right track that once people truly and for sure know the truth of the matter it seems to stop working on them. Though that could be a coincidence of such people having been marked by the Council’s agents in some way so they could work with them directly.
Full marks – I’d forgotten that revelation as well.
Aptly named, is Observer.
::waggles his ears in amusement::
I like that. It’s consistent with “suppresses awareness of supernatural”, if you don’t think about something as “supernatural” then the suppression doesn’t kick in.
Or the room has bad reception on the veil signal.
I was wondering why she could see everyone in the room in their true form.
Maybe they just turned it off for a private meeting. (turned off localized obviously)
Don’t forget that she got blindsided by one of the characters in a previous page, where she forgets what she was talking about…
The author confirms that the veil can be turned off, in this chamber, on the next page.
If you realize that walking sticks are insects that look like sticks, and you actively have one called to your attention, you can continue to see it even after you look away for a moment. But if you have never heard of them before, you won’t even be looking for them to begin with. And it might freak you out when you see a branch from that tree start to run away from you if you get too close because you have no context for what you are seeing.The Veil may function similarly.
Good point. Not a full illusion, just drawing your attention away from it (and obfuscating the truth).
Probably also way cheaper on the computing power. That has to be important for such a massive spell.
There’s probably a huge class file for exploiting change blindness.
While the Veil probably works quite well on regular succubie.
Dabbler’s unique genetic background (1/2 succubus, 1/3 doppelganger, and 1/6 alien) means she is probably not “coded” into the Sigils matrix.
Well spotted.
I’d say it’s a case of the veil not being coded for that many variables in one “window”
Yes! My first thought was “Dave, you sneaky bastard, you really thought this all the way through!” :)
Real runewriters use vim.
I almost wish you had said emac there so I could make your statement.
But yes, real runewriters use vim.
That’s the text editor, not the gene or the cleaning product
Or any of dozen or so things that vim could mean.
What about the soda in Far Harbor?
Real runewriters carve the runes into the screen.
Heh, you make me remember this: https://xkcd.com/378/
*chases m-butterfly*
REAL runewriters use butterflies
If the whole magical-programming-language thing interests you, you’d probably like Rick Cook’s series that starts with Wizard’s Bane. Full books, just quite short, but very interesting.
For a more horrific take on that idea,Charles Stross’s “The Laundry” series is good as well. And by horrific I mean in the Lovecraftian way, not badly written.
Yeah, I love how they can use an Arduino with a Dho-Nha curve to direct a gibbering horror from beyond spacetime. If they have the right ISO 9000 certification, of course.
I love Rick Cook’s Wizardry Series.
You are in the lates 80’s and need, quickly, a group of experienced programmers that are open to be pay in gold and spend months living isolated in a fantasy world with dragons, orc, wizards,etc.
Where will you find such people? In a SCA event in Southern California, of course.
The computer science major in me is getting a kick out of this one.
Symbols getting snuggly. Now that made me laugh, all on its own!
Hit bit her. I think that’s what she was mad about too.
Sometimes snuggles does involve that.
But non-consequentially it is bad. Especially if carrying a contagion! So she is right to be mad about it!
Still love how the symbols are anthrolupinepomorphized though.
non-consequentially = non-consensually
Enter the mage?
Dude, stop chatting up the succubus, and get on with your report. You are holding up the whole Council!
Typo in panel 6: “they would have be” should be “they would have to be”
I’m reminded of a character I once played in a Shadowrun game who envisioned his magic as programming code. He cast spells by typing on his laptop and everything.
Aaaw. I was hoping he would have a deck instead. (Magidecker! lovely. :D )
Virtual Adepts or NWO from Mage the Ascension.
If the programmer is wearing Ether Goggles, then you know which side they’re on.
;)
That would be a Son of Ether working with a difference engine.
Arcanum++, like C++? I didn’t get that, I’m afraid, until I read DaveB’s comments.
When I saw those pluses, I went looking for footnotes! ☺
I thought of Notepad++.
I’d ask if this is a C/C++ joke, but last I checked, you can write C in C++, so…
Still, nice to know that programming principles apply to magic in this world. Got a chuckle out of that.
I’m sure it’s not a direct correlation, and “Arcanum” is probably more like Pascal or Ada than like C
oops: *”Arcanex”
I was thinking it was more like C++ and C#, where both are similar but not entirely cross compatible.
The pedant in me is straining to get out.
I think Arcanex might be Kobalt.
What I will be most interested in learning, is whether those pictures will look different, when she is holding the True Sight orb. Is the Veil making a permanent change to the real world (which seems to be contrary to the rest of the blog) or is it altering the perceptions of the human observer, when they look at a photograph?
And could a Hollywood production get ‘too good’ and find that audiences are complaining ‘Why were there no werewolves in the movie? It was advertised as a werewolf movie!.
I would argue that, if the Veil is only affecting human perception, then those people who want to watch a Hollywood movie will still see what they expected to see. Even if they filmed real werewolves, for example, the audience is expecting to see “Hollywood Special Effects.”
So real werewolves could get employment in Hollywood, as actors, and cut down on the special effects budget?
Or, if the unions interfered, in some other country, with a budding film industry. Like Bulgaria and Romania. With all those indigenous werewolves, and vampires, willing to work cheaply.
This explains alot
But how would the studios find out about the werewolves in the first place?
It would only take a few instances of encounters with the filming crew “on location” until somebody figured out what was going on…
;)
And now I feel a strong urge to write a script for this.
Darn it, I meant to click on Spicefreak‘s post, so that it would appear after my last, below.
I like smart characters, who can see the risks, and take precautions to minimise them, if they are necessary ones. Thus reducing the ‘inevitable’ to ‘in peril of’, which sits much more comfortably with me as a viewer or reader. Keeping a balance between fear of failure and hope of success. Plus all the dramatic and/or comedic possibilities that such opens up.
Werewolves can read the situations vacant, the same as anyone else. If they see that a studio is recruiting both actors and SFX crew, for a monster movie, they can put themselves forward. Presumably only if they need the cash, more than they fear the risk.
The clever ones will be sure to learn enough makeup and prosthetic skills, to make it look like they are getting made up. Making the occasional appearance with makeup ‘half on’ but clearly unconvincing at the early stages. Whilst ensuring that they do the work in private, so that they can spend the time rehearsing or playing console games, without having to spend hours in the make-up chair.
Plus they can even set up a cover company, where they can order ‘super-realistic monster outfits’, rather than use the studio’s own SFX department. On the grounds that the specialist company can do it cheaper and better.
The studio would not necessarily even be in the loop. From their point of view they have just hired a specialist group of monster actors (which is a thing, in the real world) who have an associated SFX company, that they prefer to work with (I would be surprised if that did not happen, in some instances, likewise).
Their work will always be very reliably of good quality, ready on schedule, and able to undercut all of the high-tech competition!
The one irony? Directors always like to have their special effects customised, to fit their personal artistic vision.
“No no, that werewolf is way too fluffy! Send it back to the props department and order one that is more… grungy… and scary!”
[werewolf, muttering under breath] “Sod it, now I am going to have to spend hours in the make-up chair, every day.”
I would think since its their public image, and the likely hood of being at the front of a human mob with torches, that is involved that supernatural creatures would take a direct interest in controlling media about said image.
In a world like Grrl Power, where all these beings are real but secret, you might expect to see them slowly push their image from Monster to Anti-Hero to just plain Hero to something more lovable to maybe being just like one of the guys.
Wait a minute…..
Yea, at some point they will just go totally over the top and put faerie princess sparkles, on some previously terrifying monster.
Otherwise known as a PR critical failure roll.
ROFL
I see two ways of how they added technology to the spells.
Or the photos, for instance, of something supernatural were itself added to the “supernatural occurrences” list, or the cameras were added as target of the spells among humans.
If the former the photos and so will still capture something supernatural, with humans unable to perceive it. Syd with truesight should do.
If the latter then the camera itself is fooled and so the photo will be of a normal event. Truesight would not make a difference.
Dave wording is not clear enough to allow and settle the issue.
What about Arcanum#?
“There’s no point in trying to port the enchantment over as they would have be completely powered down for the update.”
Is this a typo? “Would have to be” or “would be” seems more natural.
I always see the magic is code idea as in everyone has their own personalised language they use which are derived from their teacher’s to some degree and the more personalised it is the better the usage.
Thank you for addressing some of the comments I left in the previous, I really do appreciate it. As you’ve replied to me, I shall reply to you.
“someone could be making out with a lizardman at a club (for example) and not know it, which is… I guess bad, if you’re racist against lizardmen”
It’s not about racism, it’s about consent. If I’m going to engage in a physical, intimate relationship with someone, I need to know who I’m getting involved with. It also reminds me of that scene from Revenge of the Nerds, where Lewis sleeps with Betty. She thinks she’s sleeping with her boyfriend, but was tricked. This technically qualifies as rape.
While not exactly the same thing, it’s still a deliberate lie.
““I’m sorry, I’ve been lying this whole time, I’m not brunette, I’m really a… blonde!”
This statement completely minimizes and poorly represents the situation that’s been presented in the story. Everyone knows blondes exist, but there are literally billions of people being lied to about the existence of cryptids, supernaturals, and supernatural events.
It’s also a matter of protection, which you lampshade.
“there are going to be some who are going to delight in tormenting or killing their prey, but as Ingsol said, they police their own.”
First of all, this isn’t good enough. The right to protect yourself should be allowed to any individual, full stop. It completely boggles my mind how the US government would collaborate with a conspiracy that withholds extremely vital information that may help someone protect themselves.
There is no justice for the victim, or the family and friends of any victim that falls prey to a cryptid, that is being obfuscated by The Veil.
And finally, it’s the fact that it’s such a massive conspiracy. Not only is it a conspiracy, it’s a needless one. There are heroes flying in the skies, libraries of lore already purporting the existence of cryptids, as well as conventions celebrating their existence. Just what is this Veil protecting?
It’s protecting the food source, that’s what.
Don’t want the peasants learning to read, after all. Nope! They might revolt against the serfs.
That’s what it is. A shadow government that’s manipulating billions of people in order to regulate their food supply, and suppress their minds.
…
Y’know what’s funny? I bet the Grrl Power Obama actually is a lizardman.
Crap. I got that bit about the serfs mixed up. Now I look dumb. STRIKE IT REVERSE IT.
But yeah, TL;DR The Council has enslaved billions of people in a conspiracy that supersedes any known government system.
If the Council set this up out of fear hundreds of years ago and had to back it up by killing off their own kinds with extreme prejudice its probably going to take a while to talk them out of hanging on to their magical woobie. So choices are probably-
1: Slowly convincing them to drop the veil and integrate into modern human society as themselves (and several of them seem to be immortal so conversations like that might take on Entish proportions when it comes to anything important)
2: Work with them to help them police themselves properly.
3: Get your War on and kill enough of them to force whatever is left to integrate with human society where they will be surrounded by humans that just witnessed a war between their governments and monsters from horror movies… Yeah, they should do well………..
I’d go for 2 as a stop gap measure with 1 as the long term plan. (You are starting to strike me as a plan 3 kind of guy.)
As others have said the official outing and use of supers might be the start of a campaign to show the Council that modern humans may have come far enough to begin to accept beings with strange abilities and sometimes strange appearances. Dabbler’s inclusion on the team might be a lot more planned out than we think since she has visual elements of both Demons and other aliens in her “Battle Form” and uses abilities similar to Council members right out in front of the human worlds eyes. She’s a great example of humans being cool with such things (she actually will probably develop a large fan base with great action figures of her “Battle Form” being held in the happy hands of little humans everywhere!).
The focus on the “food source” thing doesn’t completely ring true in the fact that only a couple of represented species need any direct sustenance from another sentient being (not entirely sure the Vampires in this realm couldn’t live off of animals but I’ll assume they can’t for now). The others would have needed other reasons to throw their lot in.
I have to wonder if Dabbler’s contract with ARCHON specifies that her “action figures” be anatomically correct.
Or at least some of them anyway.
Arianna would just make sure all her figures are the kind with the clothes as part of the molded plastic body? Or do you mean correct to proportion? I think she would probably be OK with going bigger than true proportions…
She would insist on checking the prototype of anything with her likeness as being up to her standards of 10+. (even if it didn’t exactly look like her she can, and happily WILL, look like anything YOU want anyway and would probably be just fine if it had something seemingly silly like 4 boobs or something! ;) )
Someday society will loose its hang-ups over stuff like this, and anything like Barbie or action man will be anatomically correct.
Children growing up, in rural environments, see such, and much more, by having animals all around them. With the only result being that sex education classes hold less surprises for kids from rural backgrounds. Plus humanity evolved in such communities. So Dabbler would be right to try help humanity shake its prudishness.
You’ve got things the wrong way around maybe. At one point nearly everyone was effectively “rural” in what they saw growing up. (yes, I’m “rural”) But it was during those time that we developed some seriously uptight rules about…. damn near everything but especially gender, sex, and such.
Its during those times and places where everything gets “civilized” and citified that everyone starts to hang loose and stop giving a crap about… damn near everything but especially gender, sex, and such. (rural folk ARE a bit more casual about killing crap since you pretty much have to kill a wide variety of things just to get by out here unless you are rich enough to have someone live trap it all and haul it off into some poorer rural persons back yard so that they are forced to kill it for you! LOL )
Maybe its when people are really close to animals that we feel the need to make a bunch of rules, etc… to mentally and spiritually distance ourselves from them. It falls apart a little if you go all the way back to tribal/clan types living REALLY close to nature but then I think those folks felt pretty powerless and were looking for any sort of edge to survive. (can’t beat ’em join ’em type of thing [acting like animals, shamanistically taking on their spirit, etc… ])
Just some raw thoughts before work. Not very polished. :-P
As for the vampires need to feed.
Why do you think all those vampire books are coming out these days?
They help find new blood so to speak.
It must drive them crazy when the campaign occasionally misfires and produces Human-Vampire wannabes that in turn convince partners to share blood with them! ALL THAT WASTED FOOD!!
“The focus on the “food source” thing doesn’t completely ring true in the fact that only a couple of represented species need any direct sustenance from another sentient being (not entirely sure the Vampires in this realm couldn’t live off of animals but I’ll assume they can’t for now). The others would have needed other reasons to throw their lot in.”
This is the second biggest gripe I have with this conspiracy. (The first being that IT’S A DAMNED CONSPIRACY.) The right to knowledge is the right to expanding one’s own potential, including the potential for self defense. The Council can’t possibly monitor every single cryptid in the world, so withholding information on such a massive scale only sets up humans as a fodder for said conspiracy.
Think of it this way: there’s no benefit to cryptids to be in said situation. There’s so much potential to open up the market on cryptozoology! Imagine entire college courses focusing on cryptids!
I mean, if you can major in women and gender studies, then anything is possible, right?
Obsessing over the fact that there is a conspiracy, and that it is undesirable, is stopping you from examining what can be done about it. Other than envisaging a shiny future where there is no need for a conspiracy. But how do you propose to get from the former situation, to the latter?
Observer‘s reply to your opening post, in this thread laid out the broad possibilities very well.
What you are doing is saying “Here are the things which are important to humanity, and how we have to change things to make it better for humanity” yet never stopping to balance that with the effect it will have on the cryptids.
You keep imagining that there are millions of cyrptids munching humans for breakfast, every day. Which clearly is not the case, as the world population has expanded from 6 billion, when I was a pup, to over 7 billion today. And the growth is not slowing down.
Archon know about the Veil, so their intelligence arms will be investigating the veracity of any claims that the Council make. If it turns out that they are farming humanity, then that would be a clear case that they would need to protect society against it. To date however, we have no shred of evidence, to support cyrptid populations harvesting humans wholesale. As such, it does not bear further examination, in this post.
At this point you need to drop the arrogance of thinking of the US as the world’s super power. We now know that they are small fish in a small barrel. The galaxy is a lot bigger, and has more guns and bombs than the USA. Not to mention magic, genies, and who knows what else.
So it is not just a matter of a US politician making a demand. Such may not be enforceable, even with the aid of all the USA’s supers. Elsewhere you yourself make the argument that there are significantly more cyrptids than there are supers. Yet many clearly have super-level powers (such as the succubus we saw, and both vampires and werewolves are significantly more powerful, on average, than normal humans).
I even showed how that pixie alone could devastate the USA.
Therefore if you want to get the Veil lowered, you have to look at things from the cyrptids point of view. Archon would need to convince them of the following points. Human governments, world-wide, are:
1) capable of protecting the cyrptid populations from persecution.
2) able to prevent their own societies from collapse, due to the social shock, of revealing just how many other races share the planet with them. And how many of them look scary. How many countries, do you think will have adequate counselling services, for their populations?
3) have measures in place to police rogue cyrptids. Without the Veil in place, it may no longer be possible for them to police themselves. So human police forces would need to show that they can take over the responsibility. Or put in place mechanisms to co-operate with the Council enforcers.
Finally, what do you think would happen if the USA announces tomorrow, that “there are cyrptids, world wide, that we cannot see, including vampires and werewolves, who may be eating people. But we cannot do anything about that just yet”?
Please suggest an action plan, which is not likely to result in lots of the general public dying, rather than just repeating “conspiracy is bad”.
In addition to the arguments listed above, I might add that all-out genocidal war with supernatural “monsters” that have their metaphorical back against the wall may not go well for humanity, despite our massively overpowering numbers. The veil also protects humanity from the worst excesses of would-be overlords
What’s the precedent that there’d be an all-out genocidal war? Maybe in The East and Middle East, but in The West there’s so much lore celebrating nearly every cryptid that I guarantee there’d be special interest groups vying to “protect” the rights of said individuals.
There’d be talk shows about “My husband is a Lizardman, and I didn’t even know it!” (Coming soon to Maury!) Protests would be held on college campuses insisting that school boards have a more diverse staff to include cryptids, and to have more safe spaces for cryptids. Then there’d be podcasts about how racist movies, TV shows, books, and video games have been by misreprsenting the supernatural for years.
And what’s best is I think Grrlpower Comics would be the best to tackle a story like that. Grrlpower focuses on extraordinary people thrust into very, very ordinary situations. Which is why I’m so perplexed that Dave has chosen the MIB/massive conspiracy route.
It’s like he took his stupid pills in writing this chapter. No offense, Dave, but I’m really perplexed by this decision given your exemplary ability to weave in the extraordinary with the extra ordinary in an interesting and compelling way.
Do bear in mind that Dave has started out with the premise of a world that is outwardly the same as ours. Yet he wants to have all the interesting things that other super settings do, including diverse races, other than just humanity.
Which obliges there being something which hides them. The veil is that something.
Now just follow through the logic. The good guys find out about this. Put yourself in their shoes, what would you do?
Clearly you would immediately expose it to the world. There would be a war to the death, and humanity would go extinct.
Or you could be rational, and work to change the situation to a preferable one. However such change cannot occur overnight. At the earliest stage you would need to maintain the status-quo.
Condemning good guys for having to do the best they can, within the constraints of a difficult ethical situation is just silly. DaveB is being brave in confronting the scenario he has envisaged, in a realistic way.
If you set something in the real world, you will find situations where you cannot have an ideal solution to a given moral problem. You have to find a compromise.
I’m with Yorp on this. DaveB’s design here may not be ideal, but it’s not stupid by any means. He’s clearly put thought and development into this, working it to ensure that it aligns with the vision he has for the setting at large.
*I do agree with your first example, however – intimacy with an external, potentially biologically compatible species could have health implications down the generations
I realize this issue is dense with moral dilemmas, and I’m not really in full agreement with either side yet, but I want to chime in on a couple of issues
I assume that anyone is still allowed to protect themselves to the fullest of their ability against any supernatural attack. But any government participating in hiding the existence of supernatural entities has nothing the do with that. Government can’t stand in your way, but they are also not required to TEACH or prepare you. I’m allowed to defend myself against oppression or invasion, but the government is not required to instruct me in the best way to disable a tank or build and IED, nor are they required to buy me a gun.
The fact that the government cooperates in maintaining the anonymity of a small subset of non-human entities seems like the exact same sort of classification that keeps Dabbler’s true nature a secret or keeps Area 51 hidden. In ANY society there are trade-offs between safety and liberty (and Ben Franklin’s quote is at best a gross over simplification); if done well you can maximize both, but there’s nothing that says we are required to have absolute freedom and perfect information or we’re being oppressed. That’s basically anarchy.
Second, regarding the “rape by deception”. Rape is always a hot-button issue, but my take on it is that you have to be actively trying to convince someone that you are someone/something you aren’t, and I guess non-human qualifies, but it’s not the kind of thing I think would pop up on most people’s radar. There was a case in the newspaper a few years ago about a guy who convinced a woman he was Orthodox Jewish to get in her dress (I was going to say pants but orthodox Jewish woman don’t wear pants AFAIK). The fact was that she didn’t want to have sex with non-orthodox-Jews. However most people don’t think (I believe) “I don’t want to have sex with sentient non-humans”. It’s basically a non-issue. If it looks human and thinks like a human and there’s no long-term repercussions, what’s the problem? If that’s really a concern for you, maybe you shouldn’t be going around having casual sex.
As a comparison, AFAIK there’s no publicly accessible registry for people with AIDS- if that’s a concern for you and you don’t trust your partners, take every new one to get an STD test. And yes I know it’s not exactly the same because there’s no publicly available “are you a lizardman” test, but it’s still a question of harm IMO. Again, IF THERE’S NO LONG TERM PROBLEMS, what’s really the difference between someone dying their hair or getting a fake tan (or breast implants) and someone wearing a full-body illusion spell.
I gotta go with Grey Phantom. Comparing it to hair color is really minimizing the situation.
Transgenderism would have been a better real world comparison. Even those who support transgenderism may balk at the notion of their date originally being a different gender than they are now.
Even if there aren’t biological incompatibilities (And, as I said in the comments for the last comic, that would be a really hard thing to buy into. Even Star Control 3 didn’t go that far with biology.), a lot of people may, if eased into the idea, be willing to accept lizardmen in their society. That doesn’t mean that the same amount of people would want to get intimate with a lizardman.
“actively trying to convince someone that you are someone/something you aren’t”
That is literally the definition of what the Veil is doing.
It’s funny, but on the drive home I was just thinking that the dating situation involving The Veil would have a very steeped comparison with someone who is trans. Hell, even most trans people I know would agree that it isn’t racist/sexist/transphobic to not want to penetrate/be penetrated by someone without full disclosure about their partner’s genital history.
For anyone wanting, I can link to exactly such testimony from a trans individual.
“If I’m going to engage in a physical, intimate relationship with someone, I need to know who I’m getting involved with.”
That’s a large part of DaveB’s point. There’s nothing stopping you from getting to know who you’re getting involved with. What you’re fixating on is WHAT you’re getting involved with. Most people consider matters like personality and interest to be central to personal identity, while cosmetic appearance is secondary at best. DaveB’s assertion is that, for something as short term as one kiss, knowing someone’s species is unimportant if you’ve already made the determination that you like them enough as a person to kiss them… and if the revelation that they ARE a different species changes that, then yes indeed you may be a Speciest.
“The right to protect yourself should be allowed to any individual, full stop. It completely boggles my mind how the US government would collaborate with a conspiracy that withholds extremely vital information that may help someone protect themselves.”
No one is denying individuals the right to protect themselves. What individuals lack is the CAPABILITY to protect themselves. If the public is going to require intervention in order to be protected, the government (in the form of ARCHON) is a valid agent of intervention. Likewise, the Council stepping up to control its own is also an entirely reasonable agent of intervention.
The thing is that on an individual level, having the information about the existence of these monster species doesn’t increase a person’s ability to protect themselves… but on a collective level, humanity having that information will inevitably conclude in a genocide targeting those who are not normal. You can’t say that ‘people have a right to defend themselves’ and then cast a group of people to task for taking a necessary step for their own self preservation. By your own logic, the Twilight Council has a right to protect itself from the hostility of humanity… and they’re doing so in a manner that allows them to reduce the body count of their act of self preservation to virtually zero.
“It’s protecting the food source, that’s what.”
Only in as much as the food source would suffer some casualties in the effort to cleanse itself from parasites… which is to say on a macro level, the food source isn’t in much danger. That’s the irony of the situation. On the individual scale, a vampire is an overwhelming threat to a human… but on the global scale, humanity is an overwhelming threat to vampiredom (or pick your council member race of choice), due to a combination of numbers and cooperating military infrastructure. Once the large scale is taken into consideration, the Veil’s purpose makes sense as a self preservation mechanism rather than a hostile attack.
Will this Arcanum or Arcanex determine the origins of Sydney’s Halo orbs?
Probably not.
As revealed here, Lexica Arcanex is essentially a programming language (for magic). Programming languages don’t reveal things. It’s possible (but not necessarily true) that a program could be written which would do that, but we’ve been given no reason to think that such a program currently exists – and if it were to be written now, it would probably be written in Arcanum++.
Maybe the orbs are like this fellow? With each one tailored to their specialised spell program. But the previous user has already made various choices, and checked the box which says “do not ask me this again”.
But Halo need not worry, I have a solution. Although it may still take her a while to attempt an action which would trigger the new mystery orb helper.
I forget where (it may have been qntm) but I read part of a story where magic was flavoured as being something everyone manipulated in a way unique to them—to some people it was musical in nature, to some people it was artistic, but it all came back to the same thing underneath. It meant mages could only assist one another with great difficulty, because they effectively had to translate their spells into a foreign language.
The idea of a horrible mess of spaghetti voodoo holding the Veil together is great for much the same reason.
So if it it did supress awareness partially is that why the ARClight’s(?) estimate for the number of supers is off?
It is that or just typical government efficiency.
Hey, let’s not be spreading misconceptions all around…The government is very efficient at what it does. It’s just that, much like this quote from a Rothchild goes, “If all of the people knew what we do in stealth, we’d be running from lynch mobs for the rest of our lives.”
…Or something like that…I was paraphrasing.
Actually, if the people knew what they did in stealth, they’d be asking themselves “How did these idiots manage to be in charge in the first place?” Regretfully, there is no secret Illuminati conspiracy that runs the country behind the scenes. There is no Secret Plan or Great Work, either. …Which is subtly depressing. Even a sinister cabal that knows what they’re doing at least knows what they’re doing.
Michael Flint, “In the Country of the Blind”, asks the question, “In all these conspiracy theories, isn’t it amazing how united and competent the conspirators are?”
(His… aren’t.)
Ayup (good book, by the way. New-author-good book, but still good). Also, as X-Files helpfully reminded us, we’re talking about the US government here: the folks who gave us Amtrak, and the Susan B. Anthony dollar.
It certainly sounds like it contributed to that, yea. Good call.
Really good point. However since Archon knows about all this I would expect them taking it in account. Well, maybe they did but it’s something hard to weigh off.
Some, not necessarily all. For instance Dabbler clearly has some basic knowledge gaps, about how the Veil works, behind… uh… the veil.
Sydney could be astutely asking some questions which had not been raised before (or at least not in the way she has thought it through). So Archon may not have been aware that some supers are being hidden.
Conceded.
Spells as code… there’s an old but still good series of stories where the main enemy is a sentient computer who is taught magic. Set in a city that was a dimensional crossroads. Cynosure? This is going to bother me until I remember it.
Well according to Jack L. Chalker everything is Markovian mathematics anyway. Magic is just a way of using the underlying math that forms the universe. All of the universe is a computer driven simulation controlled by a computer the size of a planet powered by a white hole. “Monsters” are actually beings from other worlds that got here by mistake or guile through portals called gates. If you have a smart enough computer it can alter your code to make you whatever you want to be. One character managed to understand the math enough to alter it himself. For those who didn’t read them the “Well World” series is kind of fun check it out.
Eh, it sometimes seems that most magic spells were written by a collaboration between Tremere & Malkavian vampires anyway…
:P
Would this explain the Mandela effect?
In the early eighties I saw a portable color television that I couldn’t afford.
When I look for it on eBay today I find that it is not available.
The guys at the Vintage television Forum assure me that that model never existed.
Only when monsters are involved. If the portable TV you are thinking of walked around on its own legs and ate passers-by then yea.
If not then it is just Ebay letting you down, because there were portable colour TVs in the 1980s, and various vintage models are available, from time-to-time.
That’s not so much about availability as lack of demand. All those little portable televisions used analog TV signals, and the broadcasters all stopped transmitting them years ago. Any TV broadcasts now are digital, and the old TVs can’t use them.
One of the things that bothers me is leaving witnesses out to rot. As much as I hate the Men in Black method, the Kang and Kodos method isn’t much better:
Homer: What are you spraying me with?!
Kang: Rum! So no one will believe your story.
They probably blame shapeshifters a lot, but that won’t hold up if other people are around and have inconsistent observations.
Centaur? Shapeshifter.
Skeleton? Shapeshifter.
Politician too important to hold accountable doing untoward things? You better believe it’s a shapeshifter.
I would not be surprised to find out that part of the blood drive actually goes to feed Vampire and other blood drinkers. Yes there are I’m sure some who prefer their blood fresh from a living host but probably about the same amount of humans who prefer to hunt and kill their own meat. Plus I’m sure there are professional “bloodbags” who are paid well for their service in whatever way they require. I do wonder about taste preferences. Mosquitoes prefer certain blood types wouldn’t vampires have a similar predilection?
Seems plausible.
Did you ever play the video game The Sims 3? If you had the right expansion pack, you could play a vampire in that. If, for whatever reason, you couldn’t find someone to bite or just didn’t want to drain other people, you could go down to the grocery store to buy some plasma fruit to deal with your dietary needs.
Honestly, I’m NOT kidding, here.
Heheheh, reminds me of a bug in The Sims 2 if you had both the Night Life and Apartment Life expansion packs installed.
A vampire living in an apartment would, for no apparent reason, walk outside during daylight hours and burst into flames. It took them several weeks to track it down, but they finally found out what was causing it, and released a patch.
It turns out, the apartment-dwelling vampires were not spontaneously committing suicide. They were trying to pay their rent. xD
I played a VtM game with a vampire who worked in the testing facilities of a blood bank. He would take all of the unusable blood (you would be surprised at how often people lie about things that would disqualify them from donating) and cause an occasional “false positive” in order to feed.
Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic. -Arthur C. Clarke
Any sufficiently analyzed magic is indistinguishable from science. -Agatha Heterodyne
(Reference: https://www.girlgeniusonline.com/comic.php?date=20081205#.V9aiPygrKUk)
Anything indistinguishable, by both sufficiently advanced technology and magic, is Amazeballs!™ ~ Yorp
(Reference: https://www.grrlpowercomic.com/archives/2239#comment-462274)
+1
Actually, the inverse of Clarke’s Law was first proposed by Larry Niven, not Phil Foglio.
It’s the basis behind Niven and Gerrold’s book “The Flying Sorcerers”. Good book, lots of in-jokes and Tuckerisms.
Actually Niven’s law is the exact inverse, something like: “Any sufficiently advanced magic is indistinguishable from technology”. Foglio’s one it’s different and goes with Spark’s way of thinking.
The implication is that Sydney was correct about the origin of supers… partially.
The tricky part is that hybridization with misc. species is unlikely because the genetic material is incompatible. Especially with aliens, since they aren’t likely to have any common ancestor at all; you’d have better chances of hybridizing with an octopus or a starfish. Those at least have the same amino acid code in DNA.
Unless there’s some kind of arcane/nanotech auto-gene-sequencer thing at work. Hmm…
It is canon that certain aliens can interbreed with humans (and most other aliens too). Namely the succubi. They do cheat though, having access to advanced technomagic and a society which specialises in doing just that. So you were right, as you mentioned that in your caveat.
Note that werewolves and vampires have evolved in parallel with humanity and can mutate human DNA to be compatible with theirs (assuming that everything, like this, works via DNA, which seems to be the case with supers, for example).
As the above examples exist, so too could others have evolved similar tricks (some through being related, such as with were bunnies, and others by parallel evolution) or have directly copied them (other demons and aliens could utilise succubus reproductive technology, as modified to their own species situation).
Werewolves work with magic virusses. Assuming it’s still just a virus, that means DNA manipulation yes.
Agreed. We have been told that the way it is manipulated, for werewolves, is by magic. For them though it is the magic associated with the virus which is magically causing the mutation. As opposed to reading ‘manipulation’ as the lycanthropes themselves having any control over the process. Beyond, of course, the decision “bite or not to bite” or choosing whether to buy anything from the pharmacists, if opting for snu snu.
Succubi though clearly have a much more sophisticated, and complex system, incorporating active use of technomagic (and factories!). Which is wholly consistent, with scientific knowledge, that alien species would otherwise be totally incompatible.
Wait… if the being bitten by a werewolf changes your biology, wouldn’t it be logical for werewolves to birth a whole litter of offspring rather than one singular child?
Also, on panel three. If that guy was the one that turned her into his sireling werewolf, Isn’t what he’s trying to do with her considered… you know… Incest?
Possibly. It depends on whether werewolves follow their human side or their wolf side, as regards reproduction.
Which may even be variable. If conceived in wolf-form they might follow multiple litter births (and thereby be advised to deliver in wolf form). Whereas conceiving in human form may result in the one birth (or rare twins et al, as per normal ratios). Hybrids falling somewhere between the two.
Even a multiple birth capable wolf might only give birth to a single cub. However you are missing the point. Which is that the author wanted to indicate that you can get the same result (an extra werewolf) by either biting a human or mating with a fellow werewolf. Likewise you can get multiple new members by noshing on a lot of folks or having a big litter. Dave was just illustrating the simplest, and minimum, version.
Heh, I had thought her comment to be a generic relationship dispute. But you may have called it right. As regards the question, it could go either way. Clearly she will have retained (most/all) of her human DNA. So there is no issue with that side. As for the additional wolf DNA though, it could be a problem. However the way it operates might overcome that.
Grrl Power Verse werewolves do not necessarily even create a werewolf, for instance. They could make a were-jackal or a were-deer. Which means that there is a far wider potential genetic pool being transmitted, via the bite, than just the werewolf’s own DNA.
I suspect it probably ends up being like having kids with your cousin. Not advised, but it does happen. Just don’t let it happen too often, in one family (or closely related group of families) or you end up with in-breeding.
Remember that the wolf part of werewolf is just one aspect. There is a were for every mammal. With the common part being human.
In the story of Snow White the queen gave her a ‘poisoned apple’.
What the queen actually did to the apple was set up the command lines:
– Access admin root
– Enter sleep mode
– Enable new boot-up password: ‘true love’
– Login user verification required via lip-print scan
So was Dabbler just making up random stuff after all?
Succubi have their own illusions to conceal themselves. Likely other demons too. And other races of aliens. A lot of other aliens have high-technology and/or magic too. So there will be many options available.
If you were going to some backwater place, with primitive technology, would you rely on the local infrastructure, or take your own basic survival gear, to keep you safe from the local organisms? Be that anti-biotics and other medicines, or a holo-belt, depending on the analogy used.
That said Dabbler was accused of portmantealing, so maybe she was making stuff up. She only had a few raw facts, so was having to guess a lot, as we are, as to the specifics, for that particular case.
Context seems to suggest she knows some tech that fills the “pretend to be human” purpose and is just trying to work out how its name translates since her english does have its limits. Not that it matters, ultimately, since the technology wasn’t in use.
Ah, so its like nanoha-verse magic
This reminds me of the Web Mage series by Kelly McCullough. He mixes spells with hacking and norse mythology. It’s a very fun read.
This council may not be as open minded as they claim. The universal symbol for ‘no’ is a bar across a picture of something. Behind Ingsol’s chair we clearly have a sign saying ‘No Daleks’.
Heh. Or is it “no salt”? Making that the giant slug box.
Maybe that’s where the Haitan zonbi (no, not ‘Zombies,’ thank you very much) sit. And wasn’t *that* a fun two decade brawl in the Council, too.
One of the old legends says that vampires have REALLY bad OCD, and if you spill salt in front of one, he has to count all the grains before he can do anything else.
If I were a vampire, I would take that legend with a… well, you know.
That looks more like a picture of a navigational compass to me (the bar will be part of it).
In the next comic Sydney notices it and says “Is that a sextant?” Dabbler overhears and replies “Is there a sex tent here? This meeting could be more fun than the last one.”
Not sure what the other image is, but one of them is a pick-axe
This is starting to sound like an ink-blot exam!
*sniff* Yes, it has been preying on my mind. I heard a snail shell go crunch, under my paw, earlier!
Here is our best view of the banners in question, collectively. Although you get a better look at some, such as Star Trek, on the next page.
So, on the current page, we have:
• Star Trek (yellow logo, blue border, black background)
• Celtic braiding (grey logo and border, white background)
• Pacman-eating-a-power-pill (last panel, yellow logo and border, green background)
• Indiana Jones’s Hat & Whip (shades of beige logo, yellow border, lilac background)
• No salt shakers / No Daleks/ pick-axe/ No locks (small banner, yellow logo and border, purple background)
I thought it was a brain.