@Old AmsterdamWill post again on that tomorrow. For some reason have become violently ill over the last few hours. Family had something similar last week, so guessing it is a really delayed bug =P

@Sickle-cell
Ewwe

@Sickle-cell
It's fine. Let's hope his hands don't interfere next time.

Right, will post again to advance the Circus on my next IC post in a couple of days time. ^.^

About to get a post up in the next half-hour. Afterwards, I'll be taking about a week's break over xmas. Work has me in basically every day for longer than usual, and the few days I actually have off is the 24th, 25th and 26th.

Which my family would kill me if I fobbed them off on. =P

@Sickle-cell
No worries, mate. Holidays are holidays, no one should be getting angry over lack of activity during them. :3

There we go. Reactions to events should be enough to keep you all occupied for a while =P

I forget who I need to tag, but would Knight and Ifrit be up for some talking during the matches before our 3v3?

... Well. I have a great deal of reactions to write, and not a lot of free-time to write it in due to these being the most stressful days of the year...

@Old Amsterdam Indeed, it seems we need to do that to prepare. Collab or just summarization or whatever. Hah. The ones to tag are me and @SkinnyTy. Oh, geesh.

@PlatinumSkink @SkinnyTy

I was thinking we could do it via IC, or we could work on a colab that I could add into my post. Given Sickle is gonna be AWOL for a while, I figure we've got time to do it IC slowly.

Suppose. It feels a BIT weird to have a conversation that takes place BEFORE an established posted post that is before the conversation, but I can potentially be fine with that.

Collab feels a bit more convenient, though, takes less effort per snippet for each response. Each person really only need to add four sentences each per exchange. One for reacting to what the other says, two for their actual words and then one for how they said it. It automatically becomes unnecessarily much when we all post normally. _{In fact, let's limit ourselves to five sentences each per exchange, if at all possible. Maybe more on the first one, because we need to analyze the other person and what's going on and have internal monologue and such. But after that, for regular exchanges? Five is PLENTY.}

I'm open for whatever Skinny thinks, first, of course.

All of the above sounds good to me. I have been kinda low on involvement lately, since oddly enough finishing up the semester has left me with less time sitting around between classes with a convenient computer, and a lot more time busy working overtime (I am at work rn, for example) insomuch that I have been considering dropping out if it weren't for the low demand around my character for the past bit. That said, I have still managed to at least check the thread most days, although not usually read it. If we start a collab though, I can make a commitment to check every night and at least put in a paragraph of input.

@PlatinumSkink@Old Amsterdam

@PlatinumSkink@SkinnyTy
Whatever works. We can just have our separate IC reactions and jump straight in, but then we'll still be waiting around until Sickle is done with the holidays. But whatever y'all want to do.

@PlatinumSkink@SkinnyTy
Whatever works. We can just have our separate IC reactions and jump straight in, but then we'll still be waiting around until Sickle is done with the holidays. But whatever y'all want to do.

It feels a BIT weird to have a conversation that takes place BEFORE an established posted post that is before the conversation

DW about that. I deliberately did what I did to give you time to have a conversation, head in then react to your opponents. One giving a rough indication of what will be going on, not ushering your characters into the ring quite yet ^_^

Post should be up sometime today or tomorrow.

EDIT: Geez, I'm terrible with my flakiness. Sorry, post should be out on Friday or Saturday - it's about halfway done right now, but I'm pretty fried after today.

I'll look at getting the talking started tomorrow, if I can, @SkinnyTy@PlatinumSkink

Heeeeeeeeeey sorry for being late to the party with this one:
@Sickle-cell Why does Conflux's persuasion ability work in the power nullification field? However she's exerting her will, it seems like it would be coming from where she's standing (in the audience, which is within the nullification field), not from where the target is standing (in the arena, where the field is absent). Even if it is based on where the target is, Tony is in the field, and so should be unaffected.

Since we're on the subject, I didn't speak up when you first brought in your two mindcontrol characters, but if there's any reason I'm going to quit this RP, know that it's highly likely to be them. Mind control is a concept that's been captured over and over in games successfully, but the "there's no save from this you just have to do what the person says for the convenience of plot" has never been one of those working solutions. I won't make too much of a stink about it here, since it's not affecting me, but keep them away from my characters.

If you're looking for suggestions in making that sort of power work better:
* Make it require the use of someone's true name. This makes the use of this ability due to a player's failure to keep such important information secret. Don't magically pull a character's true name out of your butt without giving the player some method of defense against its discovery.
* Provide a saving throw: literal dice would work here, with a reasonable difficulty arranged by you and the player. Let the player roll the dice.
* Make it require Concentration. This would make a team effective against these targets. Up the number of concurrent concentrations and difficulty breaking concentration based on intended threat level.
* Limit uses per day. Make small commands use a small portion of this pool, and large ones a large portion. Increase pool size based on intended threat level.
* Create a link between the caster and the target: any negative affects on the target are transferred directly to the caster. Lop off the controlled character's head, you killed the caster, too.

Basically, mind control powers need interaction and counterplay. If you're using mind control and don't know how the players can defeat it, you're using it wrong. You're going to create a lot of power escalation as players try to kill the threat. And they will, since the threat is not just threatening the character's wellbeing, but also their sanctity as "their character." Killing it is the only available method of interaction, so players will take it.

Mind control characters are the enemy of fun: this is good to use if you want the players going all out to stop them, less so if you intend to keep your mind control character around.

References: Myself, a player of many games and professional game designer at Firaxis. We make XCOM: we know all about difficult but fun gameplay ;)

Hello! I'm feeling better-ish now

If anyone was curious where I may have gone to, I'm currently on vacation-- and before that I had a minor operation, which got me in such a sour unproductive mood.

I'm feeling better now, so I'll catch up to what's been laid down! :)

Alright, first things first. I have screwed up with my wording in the last post and apparently terrified everyone, so let me clarify.

When she said "Kill them all", she meant "kill them all that you can actually, feasibly kill". Talion is in the arena atm, and the nullification field is still in effect. Ergo, the only people Talion has a chance against are the other 5 people in the ring with him. And of those, he's only going to be gunning for the three that are already classified as his enemies - Knight, Ifrit and Gamble - and anyone who actively gets in his way. The audience, and Tony, are completely safe. Feel free to edit your posts to reflect this, or what not, but i'll be editing mine to make that last part more clear and offer the mic back after Conflux is done with it shortly after this.

Again, my bad, I'll be clearer in future.

Next order of business.

---

Why does Conflux's persuasion ability work in the power nullification field? However she's exerting her will, it seems like it would be coming from where she's standing (in the audience, which is within the nullification field), not from where the target is standing (in the arena, where the field is absent). Even if it is based on where the target is, Tony is in the field, and so should be unaffected.

This I'm unwilling to answer in telling you specifically how, but I shall confirm a few things. I have specifically hinted at how she does so in my post, but it's fairly well hidden unless you make a few assumptions of your own. It does come from where she is standing and has no bearing on the location of her target whatsoever. The best and most obvious answer I can give is the she cannot negate or ignore the field herself.

---

but the "there's no save from this you just have to do what the person says for the convenience of plot" has never been one of those working solutions.

If you're using mind control and don't know how the players can defeat it, you're using it wrong.

*Darth Vader Breathing Noises* I find your lack of faith...disturbing.

First off, I have no plot. I believe I've said this before, but I mean it. All I have are characters with goals and motivations and PCs with the same, and utterly no idea where any of this is going. Conflux isn't using her power to advance any plot, she's using it to advance her own goals.

I know exactly how the players can defeat it, and was planning to slowly introduce countermeasures over the course of the saga involving her, but I shall post a text dump of stuff here I was going to reveal later but have hinted at most of this stuff already.

First off, for those who have actually read Worm, Kingmaker and Conflux share the same shard. For those who haven't, this basically means that their powers both share the same overall semantic theme and function. I called them 'Arbiter' in a previous post, as in Arbitration, persuasion and working out solutions with people.

Conflux's power has two parts. The first is a passive field around her that slowly - over a period of several weeks, months or years - makes a target more susceptible to her control. Her second ability is actively telling people what to do and works as thus:

- She can instruct a target to carry out a command. The target will then attempt to fully carry out this instruction ONCE via the most convenient means. "Kill yourself" may mean jump off a bridge, or shoot yourself in the head. This may then be stopped by other people or through circumstantial means. A jumper may be saved from jumping by a passing civilian or caught by a flying hero. The person trying to shoot themselves in the head may have just run out of ammunition. Either way, this marks the command as 'complete' - even if the outcome is not what Conflux desired. Completing the task - such as handing her the microphone - also completes the task.
- Once a task is 'complete', the target regains all control over their own actions and is only then aware of everything that transpired from when she used her power. This is caused by the target's brain being allowed to perceive the alteration to his consciousness, and allows the target to build up an immunity to this power because it has become hyper-aware to any changes. As such, her power can be used once on a target, after which they cannot be controlled for around three or four in-game days. This is increased when dealing with Thinker-powers by a factor of their PRT rating. Low-level thinkers will be unaffected for about a week, whereas high-level thinkers may gain years of protection. Since they both have the same shard, this 'cooldown' is shared between both Conflux and Kingmaker's powers.

Speaking of, Kingmaker also has two abilities. The first is another passive ability, in that he instinctively knows the best thing to say to make a target agree with his point of view. That does not always mean it is successful, but he can usually talk people into doing things without using his secondary power. The active ability of Kingmaker's power is far more limited than Conflux:

- He can command a target to follow an instruction, and the target will do so to the best of their ability while being completely conscious of what they have to do. As such, if the thing goes against their core nature, such as killing themselves, stealing from a close friend or betraying a faction, they simply will not do so. When the refuse to carry out a command - as happened with Geist in his penthouse - the target suffers crippling headaches and becomes completely aware of what Kingmaker asked them to do, and gains the same immunity to his power for roughly 3-4 days. As before, this is shared between both him and Conflux, which is why Geist refused to carry out both Kingmaker and Conflux's instructions during the post in the penthouse.

---

I have no intention of forcing a character to do anything that would cause any serious implications for them without the player being completely on-board. As such, while I may give instructions to PCs as I see fit, I am fully aware that any may be prevented by a number of means - be it active support from an ally or NPC, or merely co-incidence. In any event, Conflux will not be involved in many battles personally besides the Circus, as her entire power set revolves around preparing others to fight for her. She's only here to deliver an ultimatum to the city, once Talion is finished.

I shall have my post edit done soon, need to go prepare soup quickly first. Will likely not be around at all for the next few days, so have a very merry chrstimas, and I'll see you all again soon. ^.^