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Panopticon: A Game of Posthumans, Perniciousness, Paranoia, Politics, and Plasmaguns

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Aleph said:
Of course, Serafina doesn't know this. Yet (though she may be able to guess since she hasn't been reported dead). But if she goes to Fujimaya, she isn't covering her ass, she's blowing her cover. Right now, the Technocracy at large... doesn't really have any reason to think it's her. And I would be very, very wary of assuming the guy will play nice with her if she offers him that and reveals who she is.
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Who says that she's going to tell him anything about who she is? Why would giving him our identity serve us? Right now, we're wearing a Xiaolan, and there's absolutely no reason to crawl out of it until after the conversation's over. She's certainly got the warding spheres to keep him from IDing her based on the phone call.

MJ12 Commando said:
Who Let The Dogs Out?
Roll 10d10x7 for Donald's attempt to convince the Get of Fenris and Red Talons, by proxy, that they should try to attack the weaverscum.
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Is there anything we can do to add to that roll? I figure, the more hostile werewolves there are attacking hostile Panopticon assets, the better.

As for Rose... I kind of want a write-in for this one, but I don't really know what all the options are. To me, it's a question of Reina. What did she break rose down *as*? What did she build her up *as*?

Her basic thesis for the breaking down seems to be "You are useless, and a threat to those you claim to care about. You are immature, and need to actually control your own thoughts and decisions, following a real morality, rather than blindly serving." As for the building up, Reina is, at heart, a general, and I'd see her building up Rose as a soldier, at least somewhat. After all, there is very clearly a war on.

Your virtue is the thing you aspire to - that you want to be, and that you reward yourself for when you make it. For this, I'd see some sort of Defender. She has a small group of people she cares about, and she nearly betrayed them, and she feels terrible about it. Your flaw is the part at the core of you that you fall back on when you've run out of the ability to fall back on anything else - and there I see pain - some sort of violent, angry lashing out. Again, I don't really know what the specific options would be, but those at least feel like maybe choices.
 
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Sirrocco said:
Your virtue is the thing you aspire to - that you want to be, and that you reward yourself for when you make it.
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No, not necessarily.

Donald, for example, hates his Virtue and he hates who he is, deep down. Which Reina - who is a big huge bitch in his opinion - probably knows, because when he's stopped from indulging in his Vice, he becomes a Machine workaholic who's a lot less fun and isn't held back by his human vices and weaknesses.
 
A Whole New Rose, Pt. 1
[X] (2.0x) Penitent: Gain WP when you atone in some portion for your wrongs.

A Whole New Rose, Pt. 2
Choose Rose's new Vice.
[ ] Idealist

Rose is still Rose, or at least she's holding on to what pieces of her 'self' that she can. So she's still an idealist at heart, believing the Union is the best possible way for mankind to advance and fight the things that go bump in the dark like Nephandi, heomphages, and nasty EDEs, as much as she's now painfully aware that the Union has plenty of nasty skeletons in its own closets, much like Donald and Serafina do. As such, she's taking on a Idealist Vice.

But she also feels hideously guilty about how she wanted to kill Donald and everyone else, the people she loves most who've been nothing but kind to her. So she's going to be very intent on atoning for those thoughts. So: Penitent Virtue.

Edit: Vote Changed.
 
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A Whole New Rose, Pt. 1
Choose Rose's new Virtue
[X] Write-In: Masochist: Regain 2 WP when you succeed in a task by pushing yourself beyond your limits.

A Whole New Rose, Pt. 2
Choose Rose's new Vice.
[X] Charmer: Spend 1 WP to tell someone something they don't want to hear. Regain 1 WP if you don't tell them something they don't want to hear and not doing so has potential negative consequences to you.

Rose is trying to pretend that she's all right. She's telling people what they want to hear - they want to know she's better. She's avoiding conflict, and doesn't want to argue with people. It's a mask, but it's a good mask. People don't want to really know about her. They want to humour her. The people who put those things in her head want her to be a good little doll, and she can wear that mask. She's used to it.

But inside, she's lost and scared and - above that - angry. Not that she can really get angry, and she knows that and it seeps out. She hates her body that means people expect things of her just because of the genetics it was made from. She hates that it's so strong and dangerous and so people assume that she's just a killer construct. And she hates that it's so good at fighting, because people don't even respect her for what she can do. She's trying to find something - anything - that she can say is hers, rather than something she was given, and if she can push her body beyond its breaking point and beyond its design specs so it's her doing it, the pain doesn't matter. When she runs headfirst into the limits they put on her and breaks them, it feels good. It's a rush. It's something she's chosen to do, which they didn't make her for. After all, if she does it right, she doesn't need to hurt at all.

(Note: Oh my there will be Paradox from this Virtue.)
 
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A Whole New Rose, Pt. 1
[X] (2.0x) Penitent: Gain WP when you atone in some portion for your wrongs.

A Whole New Rose, Pt. 2
Choose Rose's new Vice.
[X] Idealist
 
[X] Write-In: Masochist: Regain 2 WP when you succeed in a task by pushing yourself beyond your limits.
[X] Charmer: Spend 1 WP to tell someone something they don't want to hear. Regain 1 WP if you don't tell them something they don't want to hear and not doing so has potential negative consequences to you.
 
A Whole New Rose, Pt. 1
[X] Write-In: Masochist: Regain 2 WP when you succeed in a task by pushing yourself beyond your limits.

A Whole New Rose, Pt. 2
Choose Rose's new Vice.
[X] Idealist

Edit: Changed virtue. I think that one of Rose's core things was that she didn't like hurting people or doing bad things. Her recent experiences have created a spiralling little doubt of self-loathing, in that she hates who she is and hates what she did. She's trying to punish herself, and the additional guilt that comes from doing bad things is hell on her, since it reminds her of what she did under conditioning's influence- and what other people did to her.
 
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Virtue:
[X] (2.0x) Penitent: Gain WP when you atone in some portion for your wrongs.

Vice:
[X] Idealist

Edit: Vote changed.
 
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Strypgia said:
Rose is still Rose, or at least she's holding on to what pieces of her 'self' that she can. So she's still an idealist at heart, believing the Union is the best possible way for mankind to advance and fight the things that go bump in the dark like Nephandi, heomphages, and nasty EDEs, as much as she's now painfully aware that the Union has plenty of nasty skeletons in its own closets, much like Donald and Serafina do. As such, she's taking on a Idealist Vice.
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You... uh, do remember that one of the things which got her passed over for screentime is that Idealist vice, because it makes working with RDs quite hard because it means she has to suppress her vice as cooperating with Reality Deviants (certainly like Jamelia does) is antithetical to the ideal. And I don't think any Rose or Reina-aided self-rebuilding is going to have her suddenly become the best friends of the RDs.

"I'm an idealist at heart" is a virtue - that's what you're saying and describing. Taking Idealist as your Vice makes it your tragic flaw, the thing which obstructs you and makes your life more difficult. "Never Compromise - even in the face of Armageddon" is Idealist as a Vice.

...

My Masochist/Charmer thing, for example, quite deliberately poses Charmer as the Vice. It's a coping mechanism, but it's not a very healthy one. If she just pretends everything is all right and doesn't tell the people she cares about the truth, it'll be like everything is bad to normal. They won't worry about her. They won't hate her because she's had core parts of her personality broken. It's not healthy and it's something she'll have to fight with if she wants to improve - and the people she's lying to will also need to push through the walls she's throwing up.

(Meanwhile, the Masochist is a strength in a way the Charmer isn't - she is actively trying to find something she can make her own identity and which isn't just "oh, you were made that way", and she's a Progenitor anyway. Having a somewhat cavalier approach to getting hurt comes with the territory, especially when you heal like she does. If she pushes past her limits - and not just her physical ones, her mental ones too - she can possibly use that strength to build up enough confidence to open up to others (ie, getting WP from her Virtue lets her suppress her Vice and admit to Sera and Donald how she's hurting).)
 
[X] Write-In: Masochist: Regain 2 WP when you succeed in a task by pushing yourself beyond your limits.
[X] Charmer: Spend 1 WP to tell someone something they don't want to hear. Regain 1 WP if you don't tell them something they don't want to hear and not doing so has potential negative consequences to you.
 
EarthScorpion said:
Have to say, not sure why you'd consider the angel-summoning priest to be someone inclined to trust or like the Void Engineers who do things like call angels "aliens" or "EDEs" and kick down the door and shoot Uriel with phasers.

The Void Engineers have historically done a pretty good job at alienating most Spirit users, by being tremendous cocks.
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We just have to phrase it the right way. "Oh, you hate the VE's? Remind me again who's working tirelessly to stop evil alien demon spirit things from destroying the earth, and who killed his entire congregation by summoning one of them."
 
[X] Write-In: Masochist: Regain 2 WP when you succeed in a task by pushing yourself beyond your limits.
[X] Charmer: Spend 1 WP to tell someone something they don't want to hear. Regain 1 WP if you don't tell them something they don't want to hear and not doing so has potential negative consequences to you.
 
[X] Write-In: Masochist: Regain 2 WP when you succeed in a task by pushing yourself beyond your limits.
[X] Charmer: Spend 1 WP to tell someone something they don't want to hear. Regain 1 WP if you don't tell them something they don't want to hear and not doing so has potential negative consequences to you.

I have been convinced that this is an appropriate and suitably horrifying response for someone who has just gone through several days of severe trauma. It's almost certainly not the healthiest choice for her, but who cares about that when we could have a self-destructive moe train wreck? This is clearly not a quest where we shy away from making our characters suffer for the sake of telling an entertaining story.

Besides, I'm sure it will all work out in the end. Probably. Admittedly, it helps that Rose can regenerate from a single cell.
 
A Whole New Rose, Pt. 1
[X] (2.0x) Martyr: Gain WP when sacrificing yourself for a cause.

A Whole New Rose, Pt. 2
[X] Charmer

Rose has been bad, she knows this deep inside her heart. If she works extra-hard she may be able to make up for it, maybe they won't hate her for it. She doesn't think she could survive if they hated her for being bad, or annoying, or weak, or for any reason really...
 
EarthScorpion said:
You... uh, do remember that one of the things which got her passed over for screentime is that Idealist vice, because it makes working with RDs quite hard because it means she has to suppress her vice as cooperating with Reality Deviants (certainly like Jamelia does) is antithetical to the ideal. And I don't think any Rose or Reina-aided self-rebuilding is going to have her suddenly become the best friends of the RDs.

"I'm an idealist at heart" is a virtue - that's what you're saying and describing. Taking Idealist as your Vice makes it your tragic flaw, the thing which obstructs you and makes your life more difficult. "Never Compromise - even in the face of Armageddon" is Idealist as a Vice.

...

My Masochist/Charmer thing, for example, quite deliberately poses Charmer as the Vice. It's a coping mechanism, but it's not a very healthy one. If she just pretends everything is all right and doesn't tell the people she cares about the truth, it'll be like everything is bad to normal. They won't worry about her. They won't hate her because she's had core parts of her personality broken. It's not healthy and it's something she'll have to fight with if she wants to improve - and the people she's lying to will also need to push through the walls she's throwing up.
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Fair enough, ES has convinced me to at least change my Vice choice. He's much more knowledgeable about the mechanics than I am. I somewhat misunderstood what Idealist meant here, and I think the Charmer Vice is more in line with what I wanted; an element of Rose wilfully deluding herself in the face of what she knows isn't right, in the name of avoiding pain.

I'm still more in favor of Penitent than Masochist, as 'I need to make up for it, since if I was a Good Girl this wouldn't have happened, so I must have been a Bad Girl' feels more like Rose than a new identity through Masochism.

[X] Charmer: Spend 1 WP to tell someone something they don't want to hear. Regain 1 WP if you don't tell them something they don't want to hear and not doing so has potential negative consequences to you.
 
[X] Write-In: Masochist: Regain 2 WP when you succeed in a task by pushing yourself beyond your limits.
[X] Charmer: Spend 1 WP to tell someone something they don't want to hear. Regain 1 WP if you don't tell them something they don't want to hear and not doing so has potential negative consequences to you.

between the two/three choices that seem to be shaping out...

Well, as much as I'm not a huge fan of the massive paradox she's likely to take for it, I like this Rose better. She's looking forward, trying to overcome her old limits and forge a new identity, rather than obsessing about what she's done wrong. Having her source of *strength* be "I am wracked with guilt, and desperately trying to make up for it" honestly seems pretty terrible. Much of what's being described here sounds like Martyr and/or Penitent as a *vice*. (and oh boy wouldn't a Masochist/Martyr virtue/vice combo burn out fast).

I also like the way it shapes her behaviors. When she's at her worst, her form of "turtle up" is to do whatever she can to make the people near her like her. It's not the worst failure state out there, even if it does mean that shes still *very* easily led. Meanwhile, she aspires to claim agency, define her own identity, and Do Awesome Things - which means that we get to see her doing awesome things, that when she is Doing Awesome Things, she'll often have a bit of extra willpower to do them with, and that the time she can best ignore her urge to be Friends With Everyone is when she out there forging her identity in a real and visceral way. (With real viscera!)
 
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Sirrocco said:
Well, as much as I'm not a huge fan of the massive paradox she's likely to take for it, I like this Rose better. She's looking forward, trying to overcome her old limits and forge a new identity, rather than obsessing about what she's done wrong. Having her source of *strength* be "I am wracked with guilt, and desperately trying to make up for it" honestly seems pretty terrible. Much of what's being described here sounds like Martyr and/or Penitent as a *vice*. (and oh boy wouldn't a Masochist/Martyr virtue/vice combo burn out fast).

I also like the way it shapes her behaviors. When she's at her worst, her form of "turtle up" is to do whatever she can to make the people near her like her. It's not the worst failure state out there, even if it does mean that shes still *very* easily led. Meanwhile, she aspires to claim agency, define her own identity, and Do Awesome Things - which means that we get to see her doing awesome things, that when she is Doing Awesome Things, she'll often have a bit of extra willpower to do them with, and that the time she can best ignore her urge to be Friends With Everyone is when she out there forging her identity in a real and visceral way. (With real viscera!)
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Heh.

This line of reasoning is honestly what convinced me, because it means that we'll be able to bring Rose back off the sidelines. At this point, she's seen less action than anyone in the party except Donald (who can participate remotely, like he did in the Cairn assault.) With this, she's got a reason to be out and doing stuff, and we've got a reason to bring her. (After all, there won't always be a suitably badass giant robot available.)

[X] Write-In: Masochist: Regain 2 WP when you succeed in a task by pushing yourself beyond your limits.
[X] Charmer: Spend 1 WP to tell someone something they don't want to hear. Regain 1 WP if you don't tell them something they don't want to hear and not doing so has potential negative consequences to you.
 
Virtue:
[X] Write-In: Masochist: Regain 2 WP when you succeed in a task by pushing yourself beyond your limits.
I like this, I really do. Pushing herself, always pushing herself, to prove that she is better than the impossibly mighty and ever-distant (and idealized) Reina Lior. Because she can take it. Because she was made to take it.

Vice:
[x] (2.0x) Martyr
But not Charmer. There is nothing she needs to pretend she's actually fine about, because everything is fine. Giving her everything, and I mean everything, in overcoming her troubles and obstacles is not self-destructive, it's strengthening. And because she has that strength, in body and in heritage, Rose can and will put herself in harm's way for those who cannot do so. She will be the ideal of the knight in so-pale-it's-shining flesh, not just another butcher. After all, she can take it and keep going.
 
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Sirrocco said:
When she's at her worst, her form of "turtle up" is to do whatever she can to make the people near her like her. It's not the worst failure state out there, even if it does mean that shes still *very* easily led.
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Not quite. Charmer as a vice is "Don't tell people things they don't want to hear", rather than "do what people say". She finds it hard to tell people bad news and won't risk arguments by pointing out ways that people's plans are flawed if they look attached to them. It's less... active as a Vice than, say, Caregiver (poor Sera) and tends to warp your behaviour more subtly because a lot of the times it comes up (for example, someone asking her casually "How are you?") don't seem worth spending WP over.
 
EarthScorpion said:
Charmer as a vice is "Don't tell people things they don't want to hear", rather than "do what people say". She finds it hard to tell people bad news and won't risk arguments by pointing out ways that people's plans are flawed if they look attached to them.
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Except that this is basically how Rose has been so far - limited in being able to tell people Bad News mostly because she didn't know anything bad/had the knowledge removed.

Charmer as a vice sets Rose 2.0 up to be the same as Rose before, except more so since it now directly feeds off her vice.

I would strongly ask that we reconsider this, because I don't want to waste our one chance to make Rose a more active and pro-active character in the Amalgam, rather than just Passive Moe.
 
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