- Pronouns
- He/Him
"And look how that turned out."
Panopticon: A Game of Posthumans, Perniciousness, Paranoia, Politics, and Plasmaguns
Chloe Sullivan
Subdefective
- Location
- 1630 Revello Drive, Sunnydale CA
I rather doubt it. Enlightenment 6 means knowing the truth of Magic in the WoD.
Knowing what's going on with Kessler is a whole 'nother ball park. The guy spent years surviving in a hostile dimension and fighting cyberdragons without Void-Adapting. That's not something you can just grok.
notanautomaton
I've got 99 quests, I've finished one
He's a Stormwarden, or whatever the Technocracy calls them, I forget. Doesn't require that much explanation at all really. What she doesn't know is that he's also E6.
Kerrus
Fractal Insanity
ES and I actually talked about this for a bit today. Enlightenment 6 doesn't mean you get an automatic list of everybody else who is enlightenment 6, or instantly can tell what kind of magick someone is using- and John is this big blindspot because he's such a doofus compared to the NWO- I mean he's really smart and competent and everything, but paradigmically he's on the other end of the spectrum from them, his genre is entirely different.
John and Jamelia both know a bit about the truth of the universe, but they don't know that the other one knows. Just by story stuff, Jamelia barely knows anything that's going on with Kessler. I mean she knew he was a weeeeird AI specialist because of the Centurion, and she knew that he did some weird shit and was dimensionally sensitive. I made up a technocratic explanation for how that would be justified by them for his file- but beyond that... they haven't really had anything approaching a real sit down and heart to heart on things. Being enlightenment 6 is already pretty dangerous as a techno, given the party line.
For this canonicity optional snippet, I figured that a good way to break the ice here would be to get into some sort of competition with Harlan that exposes John as actually being legitimately psychic, even though he doesn't fit any of the NWO explanations for being psychic, is the wrong genre entirely, and isn't even biological.
In this case I left the exact details open, but I imagine it started with a competitive argument that segued into a normal chess game, and resulted in Harlan deciding to be a huge asshole and play without hands, and John went "I can do it too. It's not like if he tells anyone they'd ever believe him. They'll just rationalize it as forcefields or magnets." or something like that.
Official VE nomenclature is 'quantum voyager'. Well that and void resistant/immune. John Kessler cares not for your dimensional anomaly or your void adaption bullshit.
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DarkLight140
Credit to Team
- Location
- Lost in my thoughts
When I felt shades of "the guy who just chose to retire from Panopticon's inner circle was Christos" after reading the Serafina update, I thought I was being paranoid.
Now, after reading the Elissa update, I realize I was merely being trolled.
Now, after reading the Elissa update, I realize I was merely being trolled.
Kerrus
Fractal Insanity
Anyways if it wasn't clear in the canonicity optional snippet, John is moving chess pieces by commanding a figment- a type of ultra-low level spirit, like dust in the air, the sort that are everywhere. They don't really embody anything, just vague sensations as concepts.
The main reason to do it this way is to infuriate Harlan, because the latter would immediately know if John were using magnets or forcefields or whatever- but by commanding a figment using spirit, Harlan can clearly sense what's happening.
He just doesn't have any idea how it's possible.
The main reason to do it this way is to infuriate Harlan, because the latter would immediately know if John were using magnets or forcefields or whatever- but by commanding a figment using spirit, Harlan can clearly sense what's happening.
He just doesn't have any idea how it's possible.
So. We're back in Moscow. You know what that means? It means it's time to pick up on old side-quests that we out-levelled 20 levels ago and are just getting annoyed about them sitting around in our quest log.
So what do we have still sitting around from "options we didn't take first time around" which could be the seed of things to do as a favour for yonder IBM guys.
"There's a Pogromite Progenitor amalgam operating in Moscow," Katherine says, tapping her fingers on the table. "We wouldn't normally mind that, but hyperstat forecasts suggest they'll become an irritation in the future. So we need to be seen to be being good little unquestionably loyal sorts, so they'll go hassle someone else and it all can be resolved peacefully." She flicks a hand at the air and a hologram appears. "Now, there's a certain figure in the Moscow underworld. He goes by several names, including 'Old Wolf' and-"
"Nicholai Gryloz. Yes. That face came across my desk last time I was in Moscow," Jamelia observes. "I'm surprised he survived the reconstruction process."
"He doesn't have the mansion any more," Katherine says. "As far as we can tell, he's taken up residence in one of the displaced people's trailer parks. They were meant to be monitored, but there's extensive sabotage of the camera networks there. We can see patterns in the seemingly random sabotage, but..." she spreads her hands, "... we're not exactly the most low-visibility HumInt sorts. We tried hacking the Order's databases, but they don't know where he is exactly, although they confirmed that he's probably in the temporary housing. If you could go find him and where he's working from and what he's up to, we can be nice and overt and take him down so the Progenitors see us acting against dangerous Reality Deviants like a not-too-subtle group of Iteration X meatheads and not ask future questions."
T-H-I-N-K, Part 1:
[X] Robots and other autonomous units.
T-H-I-N-K, Part 2:
[X] You'll do them a favor. (See above)
-> [X] For the course of the mission, personnel (possibly short term loan for the favour, so we have a point of contact because Henriette is out of action and it gives them someone to monitor us to help in the trust)
Trading either of our vehicles is probably a bad idea when we have too many people to actually carry in one escape car. And right now, as a one off thing, it's probably best to do the whole "comparative advantage" thing. The IBM is very good at raw boots, and our party is right out of expendable meatshields right now. And what's better than a meatshield which is just a thin layer of meat over a tough metallic endoskeleton? This gives us expendables, it gives Henriette some nice high end drone focuses, and it gives us construct security.
The attempt to see if they'll let us borrow Mari for the mission is just an idle "hey, we're down Henriette, maybe we should see how she synergises with the team before we attempt a recruitment". It's not a core part of the plan and if it doesn't work, that's fine.
The idea here, incidentally, is that this Rogue Council guy might be a lead in to rcpedia stuff, because clearly rcpedia has a shady Russian Ecstatic porn baron running some of its server-side infrastructure and that means one of the things he's been doing is a lot of cocaine, swearing, and trying to find what the fuck is going the fuck on with his fucking servers and fucking website, fuck!
This isn't the whole load of our interactions with the IBM. This is just a thing to break the ice with them, and maybe get some plot hints about rcpedia and how it went down on the night of the LA attack and still isn't back up. And if Donald tries to get another message out, it might happen in the secret (and rather tasteless) lair of a RC Ecstatic where the Gauntlet is weak and his Spirit doesn't have problems.
Alice: "... finding doing dimensional things easier where the Gauntlet is weak? I don't follow."
Jamelia: "Yes. That's very odd."
Kessler: "It's a male thing."
Harlan: "You ladies wouldn't understand. Men do Spirit, women do DSci. That's just how it works."
So what do we have still sitting around from "options we didn't take first time around" which could be the seed of things to do as a favour for yonder IBM guys.
"There's a Pogromite Progenitor amalgam operating in Moscow," Katherine says, tapping her fingers on the table. "We wouldn't normally mind that, but hyperstat forecasts suggest they'll become an irritation in the future. So we need to be seen to be being good little unquestionably loyal sorts, so they'll go hassle someone else and it all can be resolved peacefully." She flicks a hand at the air and a hologram appears. "Now, there's a certain figure in the Moscow underworld. He goes by several names, including 'Old Wolf' and-"
"Nicholai Gryloz. Yes. That face came across my desk last time I was in Moscow," Jamelia observes. "I'm surprised he survived the reconstruction process."
"He doesn't have the mansion any more," Katherine says. "As far as we can tell, he's taken up residence in one of the displaced people's trailer parks. They were meant to be monitored, but there's extensive sabotage of the camera networks there. We can see patterns in the seemingly random sabotage, but..." she spreads her hands, "... we're not exactly the most low-visibility HumInt sorts. We tried hacking the Order's databases, but they don't know where he is exactly, although they confirmed that he's probably in the temporary housing. If you could go find him and where he's working from and what he's up to, we can be nice and overt and take him down so the Progenitors see us acting against dangerous Reality Deviants like a not-too-subtle group of Iteration X meatheads and not ask future questions."
T-H-I-N-K, Part 1:
[X] Robots and other autonomous units.
T-H-I-N-K, Part 2:
[X] You'll do them a favor. (See above)
-> [X] For the course of the mission, personnel (possibly short term loan for the favour, so we have a point of contact because Henriette is out of action and it gives them someone to monitor us to help in the trust)
Trading either of our vehicles is probably a bad idea when we have too many people to actually carry in one escape car. And right now, as a one off thing, it's probably best to do the whole "comparative advantage" thing. The IBM is very good at raw boots, and our party is right out of expendable meatshields right now. And what's better than a meatshield which is just a thin layer of meat over a tough metallic endoskeleton? This gives us expendables, it gives Henriette some nice high end drone focuses, and it gives us construct security.
The attempt to see if they'll let us borrow Mari for the mission is just an idle "hey, we're down Henriette, maybe we should see how she synergises with the team before we attempt a recruitment". It's not a core part of the plan and if it doesn't work, that's fine.
The idea here, incidentally, is that this Rogue Council guy might be a lead in to rcpedia stuff, because clearly rcpedia has a shady Russian Ecstatic porn baron running some of its server-side infrastructure and that means one of the things he's been doing is a lot of cocaine, swearing, and trying to find what the fuck is going the fuck on with his fucking servers and fucking website, fuck!
This isn't the whole load of our interactions with the IBM. This is just a thing to break the ice with them, and maybe get some plot hints about rcpedia and how it went down on the night of the LA attack and still isn't back up. And if Donald tries to get another message out, it might happen in the secret (and rather tasteless) lair of a RC Ecstatic where the Gauntlet is weak and his Spirit doesn't have problems.
Alice: "... finding doing dimensional things easier where the Gauntlet is weak? I don't follow."
Jamelia: "Yes. That's very odd."
Kessler: "It's a male thing."
Harlan: "You ladies wouldn't understand. Men do Spirit, women do DSci. That's just how it works."
Is this Donald's RD Twin?
13th Bee
Worker
- Location
- Tennessee, USA.
T-H-I-N-K, Part 1:
[X] Robots and other autonomous units.
T-H-I-N-K, Part 2:
[X] You'll do them a favor. (See above)
-> [X] For the course of the mission, personnel (possibly short term loan for the favour, so we have a point of contact because Henriette is out of action and it gives them someone to monitor us to help in the trust)
I think the stuff other people have been voting for is a waste.
[X] Robots and other autonomous units.
T-H-I-N-K, Part 2:
[X] You'll do them a favor. (See above)
-> [X] For the course of the mission, personnel (possibly short term loan for the favour, so we have a point of contact because Henriette is out of action and it gives them someone to monitor us to help in the trust)
I think the stuff other people have been voting for is a waste.
Yeah, EarthScorpion's idea is probably better at least to start with. Building up a rapport is the really important thing, and we can hopefully expand on it from there
My new vote:
T-H-I-N-K, Part 1:
[X] Personnel
[X] Facilities
[X] Equipment
[X] Robots and other autonomous units.
T-H-I-N-K, Part 2:
[X] Keys to the secret psychic research station as a fallback position.
[X] Intelligence on Threat Null.
[X] You'll do them a favor. (Dimensional Science related stuff)
[X] You'll do them a favor. (See above)
-> [X] For the course of the mission, personnel (possibly short term loan for the favour, so we have a point of contact because Henriette is out of action and it gives them someone to monitor us to help in the trust)
Wufan: "Last I checked, I wasn't a woman."
Cross: *clears throat*
Siddharth's Ghost: *is very annoyed*
My new vote:
T-H-I-N-K, Part 1:
[X] Facilities
[X] Equipment
[X] Robots and other autonomous units.
T-H-I-N-K, Part 2:
[X] Intelligence on Threat Null.
[X] You'll do them a favor. (Dimensional Science related stuff)
[X] You'll do them a favor. (See above)
-> [X] For the course of the mission, personnel (possibly short term loan for the favour, so we have a point of contact because Henriette is out of action and it gives them someone to monitor us to help in the trust)
Wufan: "Last I checked, I wasn't a woman."
Cross: *clears throat*
Siddharth's Ghost: *is very annoyed*
- Location
- Spain
T-H-I-N-K, Part 1:
[X] Robots and other autonomous units.
T-H-I-N-K, Part 2:
[X] You'll do them a favor. (See above)
-> [X] For the course of the mission, personnel (possibly short term loan for the favour, so we have a point of contact because Henriette is out of action and it gives them someone to monitor us to help in the trust)
[X] Robots and other autonomous units.
T-H-I-N-K, Part 2:
[X] You'll do them a favor. (See above)
-> [X] For the course of the mission, personnel (possibly short term loan for the favour, so we have a point of contact because Henriette is out of action and it gives them someone to monitor us to help in the trust)
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Hmm. Idly speculating about a Mari recruitment, and I think we'd want her as a Support agent, not a Field agent (except in extreme circumstances). Firstly, paradox management is going to be a problem with her - it's something we have to be very aware of with Henriette and Henriette isn't as augmented (and also we've put a lot of time into helping Henriette mature and develop some NWOery so she's able to basically be a Virtual Adept for the party, while Mari... uh, is probably likely to plasma gun things). Secondly, we actually have a critical shortage of pure Support agents at the moment. Harlan is the only "pure" Support Agent, and Jamelia and Henriette are hybrid Field/Support (even if Jamelia insists on doing things personally). The fact that if someone tries to attack our Support she can take anti-material shots to the head and will flip out and kill dudes in self-defence is a plus there.
But there's also the big issue that, frankly, I'm not willing to use an abused sixteen year old girl as a soldier in the field. I'd rather leave her with the IBM where she's getting help than do that. I think Henriette and possibly Kessler could be good for her to associate with, as she'd do as a Support Agent, and I can't say that her adding custom modules to the VGV doesn't appeal to me [1] (and maybe the idea that she's more her mother's daughter while Henriette takes after her father is quite interesting), but I'm willing to give that up if it's better for her to stay with the IBM.
[1] Mari: "Hah! Look how much better I made your car! Bet you couldn't have done that yourself!"
Henriette: (Critic) "You ruined my seat! I'd just got it comfortable!"
Mari: "Ha! See! That's the most criticism you could come up with! And you had to think that up! That means you like the new plasma cannon and think it's the best!"
Henriette: "... fine. You win this round."
Mari: "Yay!"
Henriette: (Critic) "So can I have the documentation for the new features you added yet?"
Mari: "... uh. I... might have some undocumented upgrades in there."
But there's also the big issue that, frankly, I'm not willing to use an abused sixteen year old girl as a soldier in the field. I'd rather leave her with the IBM where she's getting help than do that. I think Henriette and possibly Kessler could be good for her to associate with, as she'd do as a Support Agent, and I can't say that her adding custom modules to the VGV doesn't appeal to me [1] (and maybe the idea that she's more her mother's daughter while Henriette takes after her father is quite interesting), but I'm willing to give that up if it's better for her to stay with the IBM.
[1] Mari: "Hah! Look how much better I made your car! Bet you couldn't have done that yourself!"
Henriette: (Critic) "You ruined my seat! I'd just got it comfortable!"
Mari: "Ha! See! That's the most criticism you could come up with! And you had to think that up! That means you like the new plasma cannon and think it's the best!"
Henriette: "... fine. You win this round."
Mari: "Yay!"
Henriette: (Critic) "So can I have the documentation for the new features you added yet?"
Mari: "... uh. I... might have some undocumented upgrades in there."
Aleph
Princess of Stabbity
- Location
- The sixth circle of Hell (second on weekends)
- Pronouns
- She/Her
Amusingly, I brought up this self-same point in a conversation with ES. Unfortunately...
Harlan: "Aliens did it."
Aleph: Oh BULLSHIT, you can't use that as an excuse! That isn't even an explanation!
Harlan: "He has his powers from drinking dragon blood. Our theories apply to fully human subjects, not alien contaminated ones."
Aleph: He doesn't have any blood anymore! He doesn't even have a brain anymore!
Harlan: "No, but his standing psychic waveform had twenty years to internalise the changes. They're inherent to his Id and superego now."
Aleph: Ffff...
... yeah. The problem with Harlan is that his paradigm is too all-encompassing. He can explain away essentially everything as being latent psychic powers. It's very, very hard to present him with something that would honestly confuse him - maybe Gimel, as a primium golem who is also a Spirit user and who doesn't appear to have done any bullshit things with spirits... but even that's a longshot. Harlan's fallen into the same trap as Traditions masters who get too good at justifying things under their paradigm - it prevents you from having your paradigm challenged and forced to expand (a road that eventually ends with an E6 Seeking).
Maybe Exordium perhaps?
We even had a vote-weighing, due to Conditioning, against looking into it last time. Plus if you wanted an old Chekov's gun, you'd do pretty well with something from the Moscow arc?
Sarpedon
Knight Errant
- Pronouns
- He/Him
T-H-I-N-K, Part 1:
So you're back in Moscow. You need resources. IBM has resources. You're going to try to convince them to part with:
[X] Robots and other autonomous units.
[X] Equipment
[X] Personnel
[X] Facilities
T-H-I-N-K, Part 2:
The IBM is running an operation, not a charity. To get what you want, you'll trade them:
[X] Intelligence on Threat Null.
[X] You'll do them TWO favors. (Make them Dsci Devices and Gadgets) and (ES' deal with scouting out and wrecking RC operations to get the progs off their back)
[X] Keys to the secret psychic research station as a fallback position.
While I like ES' write in, if I have learned anything from the last time we were in Moscow its that you should get important stuff done first before the sidequest subsumes all things, which is certainly a possibility if we do end up getting a message from Donald while in a knife fight with Brayko. Also I think giving them the low down on Threat Null as a whole is pretty important. Just make sure Elsa or Wufan arent around when we brief them. Unless we can find someone there to unravel a death curse I suppose. on that note are there any IBM members with Entropy 4 Prime 3?
So you're back in Moscow. You need resources. IBM has resources. You're going to try to convince them to part with:
[X] Robots and other autonomous units.
[X] Equipment
[X] Personnel
[X] Facilities
T-H-I-N-K, Part 2:
The IBM is running an operation, not a charity. To get what you want, you'll trade them:
[X] Intelligence on Threat Null.
[X] You'll do them TWO favors. (Make them Dsci Devices and Gadgets) and (ES' deal with scouting out and wrecking RC operations to get the progs off their back)
[X] Keys to the secret psychic research station as a fallback position.
While I like ES' write in, if I have learned anything from the last time we were in Moscow its that you should get important stuff done first before the sidequest subsumes all things, which is certainly a possibility if we do end up getting a message from Donald while in a knife fight with Brayko. Also I think giving them the low down on Threat Null as a whole is pretty important. Just make sure Elsa or Wufan arent around when we brief them. Unless we can find someone there to unravel a death curse I suppose. on that note are there any IBM members with Entropy 4 Prime 3?
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And if you try to get everything done at once, nothing works. Especially since you're not thinking clearly.
For example, a key component of plan "snoop around Russian temporary housing asking questions about Traditionalists" is Elsa, as the party member who's a recently ex-Traditionalist who is literally Russian and thus is the best placed to blend in. If she's stuck making DSci objects, she can't do that. Meanwhile just dumping everything about Threat Null earthside activities we know (as they're probably better informed about spaceside things than us, because of Mari) might well freak out the militant and grudge-bearing Iterators, especially if you try to use that to pay for things. Seriously, I would consider "take this information well and please don't freak out" as basically a thing we're asking from them in their own right, so we want to make sure we're in their good books before we start dumping things like "So, yeah, the secret police are compromised, and there are high level Threat Null agents who are a threat to some of your units running around the world" on them.
Do you want them to literally declare war on Panopticon right now? That's a major risk, as I would pin it. We don't want that. It's too early for that and we ideally would prefer to have things in place to have the IBM siding with maybe Ragnarok, as their interests in Earth Defence coincide. We're much better off getting in their good books on good working terms so we can ease them back towards making a block alliance with Ragnarok - which if you remember, is led by an old friend of Kessler's, is responsible for Earth defence, has ambitions on being a unified military and would love to get a bunch of high end Iterators, and - potentially - we might be able to get Lovelace on board with that too, because it helps her refocus Iteration X towards being a more peaceful arm if a lot of the old ItX militants go to Ragnarok instead.
But that kind of endgame plan requires careful management and "not just dumping information on the traumatised survivors of Autochthonia".
I will repeat that "trying to get everything done at once" is a terrible idea liable to backfire - not least because it gives MJ waaaaaay too much room to make everything go wrong and doesn't give him a nice clean short storyline to have one or two things go wrong with and give us a chance to see how we deal with it.
You has a point. Edited my votes to reflect that.
- Location
- Southern Virginia
T-H-I-N-K, Part 1:
[X] Robots and other autonomous units.
T-H-I-N-K, Part 2:
[X] You'll do them a favor. (See above)
-> [X] For the course of the mission, personnel (possibly short term loan for the favour, so we have a point of contact because Henriette is out of action and it gives them someone to monitor us to help in the trust)
Well, one step at a time then. We probably still want to trade use of the Psychic research station for help bringing it up to code, as it were; but that trade can wait, I suppose, until the rapport is established. As can telling them about Threat_Null.
[X] Robots and other autonomous units.
T-H-I-N-K, Part 2:
[X] You'll do them a favor. (See above)
-> [X] For the course of the mission, personnel (possibly short term loan for the favour, so we have a point of contact because Henriette is out of action and it gives them someone to monitor us to help in the trust)
Well, one step at a time then. We probably still want to trade use of the Psychic research station for help bringing it up to code, as it were; but that trade can wait, I suppose, until the rapport is established. As can telling them about Threat_Null.
The thing that concerns me about that is that I don't think the knowledge of that location and "you can use it when we're done with it" gets you very much help help with renovations. Especially when from their PoV, it's laughably backwards and barely better than starting off from a Sleeper facility (ie, it may be a Union sanctum, but it's a Russian NWO psychic base, so its local paradigm isn't going to be the Iterator ultratech paradigm they want and they're going to find things like nanotech universal constructors break down a lot).
And the nice thing about robots is that they're a mechanical labour force, so our Iterators can at least use them to get stuff started on their own. Henriette has Matter 4 and Corr 3, so with "I have slave robots! Beat them so they work harder!" she can do major interior restructuring and build high-tech-but-mundane defence systems and armour the place up while lying in bed healing up, supervising the robot workers as a big extended action with lots of rolls. If we later then get help from them, then we can use it to polish the place up rather than doing the basic bringing-it-up-to-specs work. I do agree we want something better, but if Henriette and Kessler can get it up to "modern Union base" on their own (with Jamelia entropy-buffing the work so it all goes perfectly to schedule), we're starting from a better bargaining position.
(plus, this way we have an excuse for limiting the party size in an IC way - if everyone else is busy on the reconstruction work, there's a reason we only have 4 party members available)
I find it interesting that when Alice is given the choice between the following correspondence effects:
[] Learn and then employ ancient, forbidden, probably dangerous, and likely vulgar true-name magic to find your real mother.
[] Call her step dad, attempt to get his assistance in finding her real mother, a former friend of his.
she chooses the former so quickly.
- Pronouns
- He/Him
[X] Plan Scorp.
Cornuthaum
Be kind to each other.
- Location
- Austria
- Pronouns
- He/Him
Dungeon Keeper Henriette, GO!
ArchAIngel
Sorcerer Supreme.
- Location
- Right behind you.
So who are the Dark Mistresses who giggle when you beat them, so she gets creeped out?
Seriously, that giggle creeped 8-year-old me out so much. Eegh.
Mari Traits
So people want to find out what Mari brings to the party and what the situation is, right?
Mari has Enlightenment 5 with the spheres of: Correspondence 3, Entropy 2, Matter 5 (Metamaterials), and Prime 4 (Reactors)
"Oh we totally want her with us this sounds great" you might say. She also has the Wild Magic flaw-any effect she casts will never turn out precisely as intended. The higher the spheres she uses, the more likely there will be a problem. Finally, she has Conditional Magic-all her effects are at a flat +3 difficulty to harm the real Technocratic Union-that is to say, Threat Null. This is a hardcoded safeguard that the IBM has been incapable of removing.
On the other hand, her isolated blinkered worldview and the amount of tampering done to grant her Enlightenment has given her Sleepwalker-she counts as a Sleeper witness to vulgar mysticism. This also means she is never going to ever be able to hit Enlightenment 6 without a literal miracle.
The plan to find Nicholai Gryloz will take you to one of the displaced refugee camps on the outskirts of Moscow, a drab gray place of prefab trailers and quickly built concrete buildings that are flat, unpainted, and incredibly dour. It reminds you more of a prison than anything else. Military personnel patrol these camps, and often are working hand in hand with organized crime. Crime and desperation are rampant-conditions are okay on the surface but oftentimes people are forced into doing "favors" for the overseers to survive. And more dangerously-with the old monsters dead and dying and many of them gone to ground, afraid that they might be caught in a purge, new blood has arrived-these camps are often dealing with vampires, who find them to be great places to feed.
To deal with this, Project Sunburst has deployed several Progenitor tactical teams disguised as humanitarian aid groups and has proceeded to infiltrate some of their agents into the military. Ragnarok Command also has a moderate-heavy presence observing, which means that the vampires have had to operate quietly and stealthily. Ragnarok Command has a lot better way to use its time than cat and mouse games with hemophages and they know it-leading to the current situation.
Mari has Enlightenment 5 with the spheres of: Correspondence 3, Entropy 2, Matter 5 (Metamaterials), and Prime 4 (Reactors)
"Oh we totally want her with us this sounds great" you might say. She also has the Wild Magic flaw-any effect she casts will never turn out precisely as intended. The higher the spheres she uses, the more likely there will be a problem. Finally, she has Conditional Magic-all her effects are at a flat +3 difficulty to harm the real Technocratic Union-that is to say, Threat Null. This is a hardcoded safeguard that the IBM has been incapable of removing.
On the other hand, her isolated blinkered worldview and the amount of tampering done to grant her Enlightenment has given her Sleepwalker-she counts as a Sleeper witness to vulgar mysticism. This also means she is never going to ever be able to hit Enlightenment 6 without a literal miracle.
The plan to find Nicholai Gryloz will take you to one of the displaced refugee camps on the outskirts of Moscow, a drab gray place of prefab trailers and quickly built concrete buildings that are flat, unpainted, and incredibly dour. It reminds you more of a prison than anything else. Military personnel patrol these camps, and often are working hand in hand with organized crime. Crime and desperation are rampant-conditions are okay on the surface but oftentimes people are forced into doing "favors" for the overseers to survive. And more dangerously-with the old monsters dead and dying and many of them gone to ground, afraid that they might be caught in a purge, new blood has arrived-these camps are often dealing with vampires, who find them to be great places to feed.
To deal with this, Project Sunburst has deployed several Progenitor tactical teams disguised as humanitarian aid groups and has proceeded to infiltrate some of their agents into the military. Ragnarok Command also has a moderate-heavy presence observing, which means that the vampires have had to operate quietly and stealthily. Ragnarok Command has a lot better way to use its time than cat and mouse games with hemophages and they know it-leading to the current situation.