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And the public at large doesn't really know the "unwritten rules" even exist because nobody writes about or mentions them. Not that the Unwritten Rules even matter to major villains. They'll ignore then anytime they feel they can get away with it. Which means it only really affects those trying to be a hero.

EDIT: Personally, I never understood why Wildbow gives villains immunity to having their civilian name discovered. I mean, why the frell would law enforcement not do their best to track down and arrest a wanted criminal just because said criminal wears a mask? It doesn't stop them from going after Joe Normal if he robs a bank while wearing a mask, does it? So why would having a super power suddenly change the equation?
 
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FireCire said:
Taylor can't go public with her parahuman sensor. It absolutely destroys the unwritten rules. Long term, it might be ok if villains can't hide and if new parahuman get guidance, but short term it'd be like unmasking every parahuman. Remember how that went in Cannon with the Empire?
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Huh never said for her to go public any announcement would piss off some highly unstable people some of whom are bullet proof and can do strange shit.

I said it would be a major boon for law enforcement, defence and Intel because it would be since you can use it to detect and confirm if parahumans are in the area you are about to raid/investigate/attack. I not say she should sell to John Q Public but gives them to the right people with sufficent clearance a parahuman detector could save lives of people who have to deal with unpleasant and hostile situations.

Also at the end of the day the Unwritten Rule is frankly a load of crap its children playing with WMDs level of stupidity. I mean I do get that in endbringer fights you need all hands on deck and it protects capes families but what about the ass hats who commit monstrous crimes and then take the mask on and suddenly they can't be touched. It's the height of stupidity and before anyone say escalation a govt can still bring a scary amount of resources to the table against any group or individual that decides to play domestic terrorist.
 
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FaerieKnight79 said:
And the public at large doesn't really know the "unwritten rules" even exist because nobody writes about or mentions them. Not that the Unwritten Rules even matter to major villains. They'll ignore then anytime they feel they can get away with it. Which means it only really affects those trying to be a hero.

EDIT: Personally, I never understood why Wildbow gives villains immunity to having their civilian name discovered. I mean, why the frell would law enforcement not do their best to track down and arrest a wanted criminal just because said criminal wears a mask? It doesn't stop them from going after Joe Normal if he robs a bank while wearing a mask, does it? So why would having a super power suddenly change the equation?
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I believe its an extension of the Endbringer truce. Which begs the question of why it applies to villains who don't show up to Endbringer fights. Remember in Worm, like 3 out of 4 parahumans are villains or something ridiculous like that so encouraging them to show up to world-ending events when they occur in their city and not just running away is while not a smart idea, not entirely brainless either. (You could easily make the case that the reason there are so many villains is because they manage to get away with what they do, encouraging the behaviour which works in Cauldrons favour as more parahumans are made in chaotic conditions). So, in this case, it's literally a Cauldron plot.
 
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GeneralOs said:
I believe its an extension of the Endbringer truce. Which begs the question of why it applies to villains who don't show up to Endbringer fights. Remember in Worm, like 3 out of 4 parahumans are villains or something ridiculous like that so encouraging them to show up to world-ending events when they occur in their city and not just running away is while not a smart idea, not entirely brainless either. (You could easily make the case that the reason there are so many villains is because they manage to get away with what they do encouraging the behaviour which works in Cauldrons favour as more parahumans are made in chaotic conditions). So, in this case, it's literally a Cauldron plot.
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I wonder out of those 3 in every 4 parahumans are villains I have to wonder how many of those 3 bother to turn up for the fight at the end of the day they could just say sod it all and uproot stakes and leg it out of an endbringer fight.
 
On SB someone made this remark on RCB, which I believe to be correct actually. After all, she is biologically static, meaning she biologically never went past being a teenager

She is a teenager with power. What do you think is going to happen? Ed, imagine you are 17 to 18 years old and head a Federal Agency. Plus you can technically get away with murder under the right circumstances.
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In comics, it is true that for every hero there tends to be a dozen or so villains they regularly face, with heroes typically having their own stable of villains. Not that villains exclusively fight one hero. There are also the one off villains that are only around for a single story or arc. That said, in comics villains do get arrested and spend time in jail. Okay, yes they do tend to break out of jail. But not always.

In Worm, villains don't even have to worry about that because they either never get arrested or it's made easy for them to escape before they ever see the inside of a cell. The Butcher can't be killed, because the person responsible becomes the new Butcher. But nothing prevented authorities from capturing The Butcher after this was discovered and locking him or her up. And what about the rest of The Teeth, why are they allowed to run free? Or The Fallen, why are they allowed to run free? Or the Slaughterhouse 9?

"But Faerie, if the authorities did their jobs then how would there be enough people to fight off Endbringers?" I hear you saying.

And in response, I ask you this... How many of the capes who show up for Endbringer fights are villains, vs the number of heroes? I'd imagine that unless it's their hometown, most villains don't go to Endbringer fights because doing so is kind of suicidal. Which would mean it's mainly the heroes who get slaughtered at Endbringer fights, while the villain population remains mostly the same.
 
Martin Bajar said:
On SB someone made this remark on RCB, which I believe to be correct actually. After all, she is biologically static, meaning she biologically never went past being a teenager
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Huh that reminds me of a discussion with group I'm part of on discord about Thinkers and there mental and emotional development. We were discussing if the shard stunts or maybe even freezes it to a limits it to a significant degree.
 
FaerieKnight79 said:
EDIT: Personally, I never understood why Wildbow gives villains immunity to having their civilian name discovered. I mean, why the frell would law enforcement not do their best to track down and arrest a wanted criminal just because said criminal wears a mask? It doesn't stop them from going after Joe Normal if he robs a bank while wearing a mask, does it? So why would having a super power suddenly change the equation?
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With the whole 'unwritten rules' I start to wonder how many villains actually have powers. Say someone wants to rob a bank. Doing it the normal way will cause a manhunt by several law enforcement agencies that will check every trace of the robber, DNA, fingerprints, footprints, you name it. But dress in a silly costume and use a silly name 'Captain Obvious' and suddenly the only one looking for the robber is PRT... who probably don't even have a forensic department. Good luck finding the elusive Captain Obvious without it.
 
That would piss off the other agencies and law enforcement agencies even more. Imagine being a chief of a police force that knows that a serial mugger is not a parahuman but due to the PRT taking over the case, you can't take down the criminal. Cauldron is sitting on a ticking time bomb that they don't even know that they are on. Once those parahuman scanners come online, they will start removing cases from PRT jurisdiction(See, we knew that they were not parahuman. Now let us do the job that you couldn't).
 
Honestly, it wouldn't surprise me for (for example) the maffia to on purpose, hire a parahuman for just one case, just so the PRT will become responsible to deal with the maffia (as compared to actually competent law enforcement)
 
kelgar04 said:
Huh that reminds me of a discussion with group I'm part of on discord about Thinkers and there mental and emotional development. We were discussing if the shard stunts or maybe even freezes it to a limits it to a significant degree.
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I believe WoG is that Rebecca's age wasn't frozen until she hit her mid twenties. So she isn't a perma-teen.
 
Bezzerker said:
I believe WoG is that Rebecca's age wasn't frozen until she hit her mid twenties. So she isn't a perma-teen.
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That was actually more of a discussion on Thinkers in general than any specific parahumans on the discord in question. Just nudged my memory when it came up is all.

Edit: It was a rather broad discussion.
 
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Martin Bajar said:
Honestly, it wouldn't surprise me for (for example) the maffia to on purpose, hire a parahuman for just one case, just so the PRT will become responsible to deal with the maffia (as compared to actually competent law enforcement)
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kelgar04 said:
It would make a shocking amount of sense actually.
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I'd say that's probably how the gangs got started in Worm.

roman566 said:
With the whole 'unwritten rules' I start to wonder how many villains actually have powers. Say someone wants to rob a bank. Doing it the normal way will cause a manhunt by several law enforcement agencies that will check every trace of the robber, DNA, fingerprints, footprints, you name it. But dress in a silly costume and use a silly name 'Captain Obvious' and suddenly the only one looking for the robber is PRT... who probably don't even have a forensic department. Good luck finding the elusive Captain Obvious without it.
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Now I want a fic where unpowered Taylor is 9 or do different capes, each in increasingly tacky old Halloween costumes.

She could be the villainous nemesis for each Ward, and the Heroic foil for each of the Undersiders!
 
Prince Chrom said:
I would prefer Starship Troopers style power armour, it's better and can be used by ordinary humans.
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I remember reading about that thing in the book, and good god do I want a set. If only for my commute to work. The drivers around her can be C.R.A.Z.Y. at times.

And being able to take pedestrian routes would vastly cut down on my commute too, so it's a win-win!

DoctorNobody said:
I'd go with CMC armor from Starcraft, personally.

Piggot would probably demand the first suit. And a cigar. And a transfer to the Zerg Nilbog containment zone.

Piggot: "Hell Yeah, it's about damn time."
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I WOULD SO TOTALLY LOVE TO READ THAT!
 
The way I figure it, the only reason the Unwritten Rules aren't abused more is because they aren't common knowledge. Which, yeah, how are they not common knowledge? We know they aren't because despite months of research, Taylor was entirely unaware of them until Lisa filled her in.
 
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Just a silly scene...
  • Apocrypha
    • "You are under arrest for murder with a Parahuman power, Villain!"

    "No I'm not."

    "What... Of course you are! By the powers granted to me by the federal government, I am placing you under arrest!"

    "For what?"

    "I just told you! Murder exacerbated by a Parahuman power. Kaiser is dead over there, and we have witnesses that say you did it."

    "I did do it, yes."

    "AHA! Condemned out of your own mouth, miscreant! You are coming with me."

    "Nope."

    "... you are making this far more difficult than it needs to be. We have incontrovertible proof that..."

    "Hold on. Please."

    "Attempting to talk yourself out of this won't work."

    "Bet it will."

    "What was that?"

    "Nothing. OK, look. You're trying to arrest me for murdering our local Nazi leader by means of a Parahuman power, correct?"

    "Yes."

    "And you think that I'm a villain?"

    "Yes!"

    "Right. I see. Couple of minor points though."

    "Which are?"

    "Well, point one, it was self defence, he was attacking this entire area and killed at least five people I'm sure of, not to mention injured about another ten."

    "Killing a villain with powers is unacceptable and is deemed murder in the eyes of the law regardless of circumstances."

    "Which is idiotic. That aside, point two is that I didn't use any powers."

    "I don't understand..."

    "I used this. It's a gun. You may remember them from such crimes as the bank robbery yesterday where all your Wards got humiliated?"

    "..."

    "Shot him right in the eye. .45ACP hollow point to the brain seemed to do the job, even with his armor. He still needed to be able to see and he didn't duck fast enough."

    "..."

    "No powers. No Parahuman crime. Clear self defence case in my view, and I bet the law will say the same."

    "...even if you used a gun, you being a Parahuman will still mean that..."

    "Not a Parahuman either. Just a normal human."

    "You're wearing a mask!"

    "It's the middle of March and it's cold. This is a scarf!"

    "I don't believe this."

    "Sorry. Not a Parahuman, no powers involved, Kaiser was a dick, and now he's a dead dick. Now if you'll excuse me I need to go talk to the cops over there, the ones grinning at us, tell them what happened, and then my dad expects me home for dinner. Nice to meet you, Armsmaster. Later."

    :evil:
     
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