JohnSolaris

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<Snipped quote by JohnSolaris>

Does this mean that I won't be able to predict attacks from other player characters or more powerful NPC's? Or does this apply to the 'ascended mind ability'. I'd be kind of dissapointed with the precognitive ability if it doesn't work on most opponents we'll be facing, so in that case I'd rather come up with something else.

The scenario that played out in my head was that generally Richard won't be too useful in combat, but if he's in his precognitive trance, and his opponent is distracted sufficiently, he can barrage it with a psionic blast, dispelling the countermeasures his enemy would exert in it's panic. A mentally powerful enemy would understand what was going on, but during a psionic blast while all spells are failing most would not be able to concentrate sufficiently. However this was just a little fantasy I had. I'd understand if it would be regarded as too powerful, but it's rather situational. Not sure what you think of it, but this is how I'd see Richard fight and defend himself.

@Dephaistos

Precognition is typically used on yourself, to allow you to react to surprise attacks. If you can see a potential future in which you're injured by an attack, you can then react to prevent that future from happening. This, of course, only works if you have sufficiently good reflexes, but it's definitely better than reflexes along.

It's indeed my intention that you shouldn't be able to predict an opponent's actions too easily, so no, you won't be able to consistently predict the attacks of people on similar power levels as you. As I said in the previous paragraph, you can predict the effects of your opponents' attacks on you instead, which restricts the ability to being more defensive. Also, your allies can allow your precognition to work on them, by deliberately not putting up any resistance. In your precognitive trance, you could thus establish mental links with your allies and "share" your precognition with them, allowing them to react to surprise attacks. If you want your character to be mostly support, you could change the precognitive trance to what I just described.

Your other changes are accepted, but note that the synergy with Nullify may not work like how you think it would, due to you not being able to explicitly predict an opponent's actions. Also, remember that in many cases, Nullify won't be able to completely cancel out an opponent's magic, if the opponent is on similar power levels as you; the magic will just be weakened instead. Some magic may be easier or harder to nullify, depending on the target's skill.

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@Laue (John); @ravenDivinity (Darius); @whist (Grant)

[Since @whist hadn't logged in for 11 days, he's going to be considered inactive, and his character will be removed from the current group. If he comes back, Grant will die and be resurrected in a shrine; otherwise he'll never be seen again. Basically, the same treatment @Magnato's character Meredith received.]

"Hmm?" The dark elf raises an eyebrow as he sees Darius charging out from behind the trees. "Who-"

But he never gets to finish his sentence, as an object crashes down from the sky without warning, flattening the dark elf and his insectoid companion in the process. It appears to be a one-meter-wide sphere of steely gray metal, engraved with glowing purple circuit lines and attached with various mechanical tools; the goddess's symbol can be seen on its front. However, a large chunk of the sphere is very clearly missing, exposing a significant deal of its inner machineries. The sphere twitches, sending purple sparks flying out everywhere from its mechanical wound.

"ERROR CODE 125," the metallic sphere screeches, in a similar kind of comprehensible not-quite-English the dark elf spoke earlier, except more mechanical and... garbled. "C-CURRENT TASK ABORTED. RETURNING T-T-T-T-TO BA-"

The sphere doesn't get to finish its sentence either, before exploding into a huge wave of purple energy. As the energy washes over Darius, for a split second he feels extrene pain, as though deadly electric currents are coursing through his whole body. Then everything goes black for him. But the energy isn't all. As it dissipates, a portal can be seen where the mechanical sphere once was, a section of distorted space surrounded by a translucent purple. An incredibly powerful gravitational pull can then immediately be felt, originating from the portal. Trees are uprooted, and Grant, having been far enough away to avoid being electrocuted by the energy wave, is now being pulled into the portal like a tiny leaf in the wind. As he's transported to who knows where, the portal rapidly shrinks shut, leaving behind a crater of devastation. But there is now no living being around to bear witness.

...

With a gasp, Darius jolts awake. He's now back in his medical pod again, and gripped by a terrible exhaustion, as though he had been sprinting nonstop for days. His clothes are blackened and singed, but he is alive. Or had he actually died just now, and been resurrected?

[So yeah, @ravenDivinity and @Laue, you two can timeskip ahead by an hour or something, so that both of your characters have recovered enough to leave their pods, and maybe interact with each other.]

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@JohnSolarisI would really like to have an opportunity to post now.

@Laue

Sorry, I'll get on it right now. Darius will be sent back to the shrine where John is, and @Dephaistos's character will be sent to the same shrine too after he's accepted, so you three can be in a group.

Cradle of Divinity (signups always open)

@Dephaistos: Sorry for not responding earlier. I was distracted by a bunch of things, the details of which I won't bore you with.

To answer your question, yes, it's feasible for an older person to age in reverse until he reaches his physical prime, upon becoming a transhuman. However, this is mostly up to the person's subconsciousness, which decides what he wants his physical form to really look like. If the person wants to be young again, he will be young again. But if he wants to stay an old man, then he won't become any younger, though he'll still be as physically capable as any young person, due to the magic in his body. Of course, the situation could be more complicated, such as the person wanting to be young but having a trauma-induced mental block that prevents him from becoming young again until he works out his mental baggage.

The RP has still only just begun, so nothing really significant had happened yet. It's feasible to just jump in completely blind.

And don't worry about being new to the forum. I'm new myself, so I'm no more experienced than you are.

Now, as for your character...

Richard's whole situation with Alzheimer's is completely feasible. I think it's an interesting idea, and not too complex for this game, to answer your question in your PM. However, some of your abilities need to be changed.

Overall, you should change all instances of "attacking an enemy's soul" to attacking the enemy's mana vessels instead. The soul is extremely resistant to harm until the body is dead, and it's the mana vessels that are more susceptible to damage. You must be overwhelmingly stronger than the target if you want to be able to reliably bypass the body and damage the soul directly.

Advanced Soul Regeneration shouldn't be one of your abilities. Soul damage and recovery is a very rarely occurring thing, so it's unlikely for your character to manifest an ability that specifically deals with that kind of situation.

Nullify doesn't need to be changed, but you should be aware that the extent to which you can weaken or cancel out magic of a certain element depends on your own mastery level of that element. The more skilled you are at an element, the more easily you can nullify magic of that element. Also, the ability itself takes the form of a stream of magic emanating from your character's body.

Precognition also doesn't really need to be changed, but you should know that the future is in a constant state of flux. The further you see, the more blurry the vision will be, and what you see won't always be what actually ends up happening. More specifically, chances are the things you see are the things that would happen if you hadn't been using precognition, so the ability can be used to dodge attacks that could've otherwise hit you. Also, the things you can see with precognition are limited to the things you're "touching" with your aura and magic, so usually it's limited to a small area around yourself. The area can be expanded if you sit down and meditate, but still not by much. It doesn't work on anything containing magic that isn't significantly weaker than your own, either.

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Soo yeah, what about John? As unlikely as it is, it would be quite awesome for him to catch up to the group somehow.

@Laue

I do in fact have a way of getting @whist and @ravenDivinity's characters back into the shrine, so John can catch up to them. However, neither of them have posted for 7 days, and whist hadn't even logged in either in the past 7 days. I did send both of them a PM 5 days ago, to which ravenDivinity responded, so at least he probably isn't becoming inactive. However, if whist continues to be inactive... I'll probably need to make some kind of contrived plot event happen so that John and Darius are teleported across the map to somewhere close to one of the other groups, while Grant gets teleported to somewhere unknown. If whist then becomes active again, it'll turn out that Grant got teleported to somewhere close to John and Darius.

This is a bit convoluted, though. I'm going to PM the two of them again, and see if they'll post. If they don't post in two days, I'll do the aforementioned contrived plot event.

@JohnSolaris
Is there any one of us up there who would be able to recognise those?

@akje

What do you mean? The geographical inaccuracies? Nobody would recognize any inaccuracies, because if there were any inaccuracies, I would edit my post so that the inaccuracies are no longer there. Internal consistency is important to me, after all.

@JohnSolaris
Like your DMing so far. Love the setting.

@akje

Thanks. I was worried if my hosting is up to standard in this forum, and this is reassuring.

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@helltank (Alison); @akje (Libé); @Eklispe (Rina); @Grimoire (Emeka)

Despite its magical nature, the white spider is still a delicate creature. It is quickly frozen solid, then shattered to hundreds of pieces by shards of solid darkness. The spider's innards are similar shades of white and pale blue, and there is still some energy left even as the body splits apart. But the energy is weak. Too weak. Now that the creature is dead, the power of its remains feel barely there at all, compared to the powers of those who have slain it with ease.

As Libé raises a large earthen pillar from the ground, carrying the other humans with it, he begins to get a much better look at his surroundings. The forest that they've just left is surprisingly small, less than a hundred square kilometers in size. It appears as a bluish smudge in the green grass, and its canopy ripples gently in sync with the wind, forming some intriguing patterns. The whole forest is roughly an ellipse in shape, and near one of its foci, the trees are inexplicably covered in snow; one can be reasonably certain that a faint cold draft originates from that spot. Aside from that, there are no other notable features in the forest, at least none that can be easily seen from above.

Further out into the grasslands, however, are clearly collections of houses, farms, and other signs of civilization. A small river runs through the village, turning parts of the area into a water-meadow. At some distances beyond the village, the grass starts becoming sparser, and fade to a dull frosty white, while partially giving way to shrubbery and mosses. Snow can be clearly seen by that point, and that seems to be where most of the cool wind is coming from. Curiously, there's no visible connection between the snow-covered tundra and the more localized snowy patch inside the small forest nearby. Past a section of the tundra are the peaks of several glaciers, apparently where the aforementioned river originates; beyond that things become increasingly difficult to make out.

At a direction opposite to the village, more grass-covered expanses can be seen, though they too slowly become sparser, this time giving way to sand. Not much can be seen beyond that. There is even a place where the desert and the tundra meet, resulting in some kind of gray slush. Lastly, looking around from the raised pillar, there's even a part of the land that appears to be covered in metal, as well as hints of swamps, volcanoes, and more forests. But these places are all a bit too far away for now, unless faster means of transportation are obtained.

If the humans squint, when looking at the village somewhat close to them, they may be able to see the glimmer of webs just like the ones the white spider had lain earlier. Large patches of them can be found next to the village, and some of them even encroach into the village itself. But before the humans can see anything else, the tall earthen pillar begins to shake. It seems that Libé's power, stretched so thin, may not be able to withstand the wind that constantly blows through the area after all.

[I'm not too good at geography, especially when elements of speculative fiction are involved, so I apologize in advance if there are any glaring errors. If you see any, and know of ways to fix them, please tell me by PM or in the OOC thread.]

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@helltank (Alison); @akje (Libé); @Eklispe (Rina); @Grimoire (Emeka)

The spider shows no signs of understanding, upon hearing Libé's words. In fact, it seems to be looking at him as though he's only a particularly interesting inanimate object.

But the spider doesn't stay looking at Libé for long, when it is struck on the head by a red-hot pebble. Thrown by Emeka's magically enhanced strength, the chunk of stone smashes against the spider's head with great force, and makes a sizzling sound as the spider's silky white surface begins to blacken. The spider falls to the grassy ground, now stunned and possibly brain-damaged.

Alison sweeps her tentacle through the webs of light, thinking that she can disperse them with ease. However, the moment the tentacle's shadowy black energy makes contact with the strands of bluish white light, the light simply passes through, as though it is completely intangible. At least, until an instant later, when Alison feels the light slicing through the flowing streams of magic within her tentacle that she didn't know existed. The sensation is highly unpleasant, akin to a mixture of numbness, muscle cramp, and electric shock, though thankfully mild enough to only be uncomfortable. Then she feels emptiness, as the tentacle falls apart and disperses into wisps of darkness. The energy formerly contained in the appendage is lost to her now. Although, the webs themselves do appear somewhat damaged too, some of their parts fraying and blackening due to the dark energy in Alison's tentacle.

Aron's rock spear meets the same fate as it passes harmlessly through the webs. The webs only sway a little, appearing mostly unaffected by physical force, while the magic circuits keeping the stone spear together are disrupted. The spear falls apart a moment later.

The spider is still stunned, giving the humans a few moments to make additional moves.

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@whist (Grant); @ravenDivinity (Darius)

[Wait, you two are just going to leave poor John behind like that? He still needs another hour or two to recover... Oh well, I'm not going to railroad you.]

As Darius and Grant walk along a trail in the magical forest, they're lucky to not get attacked by any more hostile creatures... for now. After some time, glimpses of cottages can be seen ahead between the trees, their structures a welcoming familiarity compared to the far more outlandish plantlife in the forest.

However, three beings seem to block the path ahead to the village.

All three creatures are roughly humanoid in appearance, if only vaguely speaking. The first resembles an elf from some work of fantasy on Earth, with tanned Caucasian skin tone, a lean build, shoulder-length brown hair, emerald green eyes, and long pointed ears. He is dressed in rather plain-looking green and brown garbs of a forest ranger of some sort, with a bow on his back, and a slender, curved shortsword in each hand; both blades glow with a verdant energy. The second figure is an elf similar to the first, but with pitch black skin, a pale white ponytail, and green eyes considerably darker and murkier in tone, dressed in black leather armor ornately decorated with dark green patterns. He holds a scimitar with serrated edges, made of some dark metal, glistening with venomous green energy. The third creature is far more demonic, a human-sized insectoid creature covered in black spiked carapace, with the head and wings of a fly. It stands on its two thicker hind legs, and possesses two pairs of arms, the lower pair ending in human-like but still shell-covered hands, while the upper pair ending in long, vicious, mantis-like blades. Wispy strands of inky darkness emanate from the creature's body, and its two blades are coated in the same sickly green energies as the dark elf's sword.

"You will not pass, spawn of the Blightmother," the wood elf snarls. Grant and Darius can fully understand his words, even though at the same time they get the feeling that the elf is not speaking English at all; it is a language entirely unknown to either of them.

"So you are this village's strongest warrior?" The dark elf says with a smirk. "You don't have to die here today, child. If you join the army of Darkness, that'll be a much better use of your talents, don't you think?"

"I'd rather die than become a demon like you!" The wood elf spits, and readies his weapons.

"How unfortunate..." The dark elf sighs. "We'll grant your wish then. I suppose your corpse is better than nothing..."

The dark elf and his insectoid demon companion both prepare to strike. Neither of them have spotted the humans, so far...

Cradle of Divinity (signups always open)

Concerning mind control, under what category would hijacking a creature's central nervous system would fall into? Technically, it's not mind control, it's body control. The mind is perfectly aware that it lost control of the body.

If it is even allowed/possible, of course.

@Laue

It would not fall under any category of mind control, since it does not attempt to alter the mind. It's allowed, yes, but it can be resisted and cured. Against someone of similar power level as you, it'll just slow down or paralyze the victim, but you can take control of weaker mooks.

Cradle of Divinity (signups always open)

<Snipped quote by JohnSolaris>

I think we are waiting for Raptorman to make his first post so that he can join us for that, but I can't really speak for the others.

@Flora

Well, Minnakht and gammaflux are going to have a small fight or something, or so they've told me.

Also, if @Raptorman doesn't post by the time the rest of you are ready to leave, I suppose I'll once again retcon it so that Raptorman's character wasn't a part of your group after all. Basically, the same treatment as what Grimoire's character will get.