No argument on the humor aspect. I loved the look on Bane's face in that ep. The image of Robin pile-driving himself would also be just as funny.
With This Ring (Young Justice SI) (Thread Twelve)
- Thread starter Mr Zoat
- Start date
- Status
Which isn't what's happening in that video. There a person who normally chooses to sacrifice a few people to save more after his failure to do so killed a ton of people is being presented a deliberately fucked up situation by the embodiment of all of humanities evils occupying a wish granting device to demonstrate how it intends to fulfill his desire for world peace...through killing everyone but him and his family.
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Empiricist2
Let's play doctor!
- Location
- Baton Rouge
Well, having a near guarantee that your police force won't go completely mad is a pretty nice advantage, presumably one good enough that they chose green over everything else.
Also, green is the most consistent color. Zoat mentioned care fatigue in his big response, and it's come up occasionally in the story, but it's a pretty serious drawback for a police force. Imagine if a soldier's weapons and armor varied in effectiveness based on the situation.
"Yeah, these people were dicks to me, so I might as well be wielding a squirt gun against the people massacring them."
Not exactly optimal.
This is almost word for word what Zoat actually said it is.
For some reason people always watch the main thread for updates, but from my experience the story only thread gets the updates a couple minutes before this thread.
Problem is, that would severely limit what type of story this is. If OL had been given a ring that is useful for little more than fighting and uncomplicated constructs, this story would lose a large draw for it. The human uplift project and magitech revolution would be vastly harder to get off the ground, and while some elements of this story would remain the same it would still be fundamentally changed, and I think for the worse. For one thing, fights where the best solution to almost every problem is 'Hit harder. If that doesn't work, hit even harder.' would be boring. One of the things I and I assume many people here love is the analytical method of discovering an opponent's weaknesses and exploiting them while simultaneously preventing them from doing the same. It's just so much more mentally engaging.
Also, Zoat wants to write a story that eventually gets to dealing with plausibly realistic alien civilizations. Presumably, these aliens will have built weapons much more powerful than a human tank. In order for OL not to immediately die upon fighting his first alien ship, power rings actually need to be as powerful as they are currently.
HogarthThree
Mostly Harmless
- Location
- USA
Eh, outside of demon fights, I don't think the SI will be using that sword very often. JL rules of engagement and all that.
BTW, I was just thinking about the "capture weapons" in Final Fantasy X. I still don't quite get how beating up something with a special sword won't result in said thing ending up dead. Because it is still a giant sword. Fantasy... I know.
Anyway, I'm sure the SI is well aware that if a powerful artifact can be taken, it can be re-taken as well. Every use is a risk that it might fall into the wrong hands. Best to save it for very special occasions.
Hestia&theCourt
Turns out we're plural too.
- Location
- In transition
- Pronouns
- She/Her
A sword that heals injuries it gives up to non-lethality? I dunno.
- Location
- Alabama
Would it really? I mean, does Paul really need to be able to basically data-mine everything with his power ring? Does Paul really need to be able to forge better magical materials than a woman doing it for thousands of years? The uplift can happen without Paul having to actually do much of the work. He can still contact Ted Kord, Septhian, Io, Lex Luthor, Zatanna, etc. He doesn't need to be able to do anything with his ring personally to make that happen. Hell, if Zoat wanted to, he could have had a GLTAS-powered ring that still contains a database of alien technology, and share that technology to people like Kord/Luthor/Septhian, without necessarily being equipped to produce that technology due to too much complexity.
And yeah, alien civilizations should be a problem regardless. If his ring was as it's shown in canon, he would still have difficulty dealing with alien civilizations. Now, Zoat's going to have to arbitrarily make those civilizations so much more powerful than they probably would be, to challenge him, to the point where you'd have to go, "How the fuck are Hal, John, and Guy still alive in canon with their nerfed rings if this is what they face outside?"
I also partially reject your premise that fights wouldn't be interesting to read about if it were simply, "hit it harder" to win. See, consctruct weapons are such a visual medium that it's sometimes difficult, especially in a story with as much content as this one, to make fights seem entertaining. So yeah, maybe it would lose something if Paul couldn't store as much weaponry or gadgetry as he wishes within subspace, if only because variety would be lacking. Instead, Zoat has to constantly shove technology or magic enemies at Paul just to give him a moment's pause.
If it were a more standard powered ring, then most fights should be a struggle, unless you're just on the level of Batman. Zoat wouldn't have to arbtirarily increase the level of the enemy or scry ward every inch of Earth to keep him on his toes.
SpokenSoftly
(Verified Fruity) (Potassiest Write-Tan)
- Location
- The nearest fruit bowl
If you were to go back and redo things, I'd suggest a gravity-well restriction to speeds. Several times the speed of sound in-atmosphere, true FTL in space, exponential speed curve the further away you get from a star. Works out to everything being within about a week's journey at the outside, and a solar system being about six hours' trip across.
Ah, I'd forgotten.
I think a good edit to the bit where OL is teaching the greenies to resist assimilation would be for one of them to point out that depending on those short FTL hops is a rookie move that will get him killed. Heck, it almost did get him killed during the watchtower fight against lantern Stuart.
Really, it's like people are saying. OL is only OP by Earth standards. Grayven learned this the hard way fighting the Thangarrians.
Karuadin
Vago Mundo
I'm moderately certain that Cynic was being sincere with that post, unless we're processing it differently for whatever reason. Some people do honestly think that getting constructive criticism on their work would be useful to refine their writing.
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Empiricist2
Let's play doctor!
- Location
- Baton Rouge
Eh, yeah, probably not.
He can't though. He can make perfectly pure metals and alloys, but she's the one doing the actual hard part that no one else can do.
He can't demonstrate things nearly as effectively, making them much less likely to go along with his pitch in the first place, especially without an existing tech database. I mean, think of the initial encounter with Sephtian.
Just the ring database wouldn't help much. Well, all the theory bits would, but the technical schematics wouldn't. They wouldn't have any way to produce all the tech in the database. Giving people in the middle ages the precise schematics of sniper rifle doesn't actually help them at all, because they have no way to make the materials involved, and no way to craft all the mechanisms in the device.
Arbitrarily? Black Beetle was toying with the fight with the Team in canon S2. He barely even bothered defending himself because he knew their attacks couldn't truly hurt him.
An easy sector? Not being engaged much with wars between the big stellar empires? Not totally sure, I'll let Zoat handle this one if he feels like responding.
I don't see how simplifying the combat helps in this written medium, and I don't see it as something interesting to write. OL will primarily be fighting tech based enemies in the future, so having that be the case now is narratively a good thing, despite the occasional trouble in making someone with defenses adequate enough to block OL.
Also, OL is all about preparation, and this is a self insert fic. I doubt Zoat would be all that inclined to write a story where preparation and R&D don't play a significant role throughout all aspects of the story.
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- Location
- Canada
You massively underestimate how having all the R&D be simply finished and just having to make stuff would make technological progress quicker.
Only the ones who have outstanding International Arrest Warrants should have to worry. How many world leaders have one of those?
Vertigo doesn't quite measure up to this. Vertigo was allowed to walk free due to 'diplomatic immunity' but there apparently wasn't any International Warrant issued against him. This guy Grayven mentions, was actually handed over to the International courts, and then played them for a fiddle for 6 years, and may well have continued to do so for years more if he hadn't died of natural causes. Doesn't inspire confidence in the Hague's ability to actually punish people. Hell, what happened with Vertigo just reinforces Grayven's opinion.
It was aa civil war that had been going o for 8 years. it already was a violent revolution (or maybe revolutions)
From the sounds of things there were quite a few militia groups, and not all friendly towards each other.
Empiricist2
Let's play doctor!
- Location
- Baton Rouge
Earth 16 does have a noted problem of just completely not using schizotech. Although your point does have merit, I was oversimplifying.
I imagine the database has the specs for lower-tech things that Earth could reproduce as well. Remember that it had the "uplift for dummies" protocol active at the time. That implies having the intermediary steps as well.
- Location
- a nice place
your are forgetting that the ring is also a supercomputer. it can take care of the calculations
no its made from the remains of demons who were originally angels crafted directly by god. I would atleast expect it to have an infinite power source. there are the second and third to fall. even before samael.
But the R&D isn't done. Without knowledge of how to make something knowing its design is fairly useless. Especially when the device is centuries or more ahead of you technologically.
Actually OL has said he intends to try to take Larfleeze alive.
GullibleCynic
Grammar Marxist
- Location
- Earth
I dont know about anyone else but I was actually being sincere, sorry if it came across otherwise. You clearly but a lot of thought into your post and though I dont write very often I would be flattered if someone cared enough about my work to respond with as much depth as you did. I dont agree with all your points, but I would still try to learn from them
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- Location
- Canada
The database isn't limited to future tech, it has it all, including the necessary processes to do stuff. Otherwise having said future tech designs wouldn't be nearly as useful.
I know, he's alive in future Paul adventures after all. Personally I think he deserves death, but w/e. Anyway, the point of the example was to show how he could kill a character that's pretty darn strong in a somehow easy fashion.
Demeanour (part 2)
- Location
- Hampden Park
19th April
13:58 GMT -5
"Recognised, Orange Lantern, B zero six."
"Hey Paul!" That's a little odd. Ted was waiting for me just outside the zeta tube. The fact that there's a zeta tube on top of the KordTech building isn't a secret secret, but it isn't supposed to be common knowledge. He usually just waits inside the building.
"Good afternoon, Ted." I give his proffered hand a quick shake, and… He's putting his left arm around my shoulders. Okay, now I know something's not right. Behind his back I take my rune stone out of subspace while giving him a ring scan. No magic detected and no anomalies, aside from a slightly elevated heart rate. "Is something going on?"
"Lots of things are going on! We're, we're busy people."
"Okay. Ah, just a moment." I generate a zeta tube construct and then hold my left hand up to my left ear. "Okay Wallace, you can come through now."
A slightly tricky decision, but I think it was the right one. If he does this as Kid Flash then he can use the zeta tube whenever he wants. But -since none of the people we're meeting are on the 'approved for secret identities' list- he can't take his mask off or use any money he makes from mass production of his potions in his civilian guise. The alternative is coming here as Wallace West each time. No problem with people knowing his identity -unless someone tries kidnapping him for his alchemical knowledge I suppose- and no problem with him benefiting financially from his own work.
Unfortunately, that means that he can't use the zeta tube which so helpfully announces his identity to come here, because we can't think of a justification for 'Wallace West, intelligent but basically normal high school student' to have access to the League's secure transportation system. He can get the next nearest tube and run here… Though getting a bus or a taxi would be a better idea. Super speed might conceal the user's identity from everything but ultra speed cameras but the fact that someone is using it is very obvious.
Huh, kind of odd, that. At the moment regular people working out his identity is a bigger problem than supervillains doing it because the most notable supervillains already know.
Anyway, there are only so many times I can 'drop him off' here before it starts to look odd, so he's probably not going to be able to attend the weekly meetings. That and school. But a healing potion has such obvious utility that I couldn't not make this happen.
There's a flare of light and Wallace appears, dressed in the least superheroic way he could manage, carrying a satchel for his computer and a padded case for his samples. He blinks a little theatrically and looks around at the New York skyline, rube-ing it up magnificently. "Whaw."
"Hey there Wallace." Ted removes his arm and walks over to greet Wallace. "Paul said you had a healing potion for us?"
"Mister Kord? Ah, whaw." Wallace turns towards Ted and transfers his carry case to his left hand to shake Ted's hand. This action causes his satchel strap to slide from his shoulder and he scrambles to catch it with the hand now carrying the case. He awkwardly manages it, keeping hold of the strap as he shakes Ted's hand.
Think he may have taken the 'Clark Kenting' lessons a little too to heart.
"Just 'Ted' is fine, Wallace."
"Oh, okay. Um, just call me Wally. Everyone apart from Orange Lantern and my grandma do."
"Alright. I just.. need a quick word with Orange Lantern. Why don't… You take the stairs down. Janine can show you where we're meeting."
"Okay! Thanks Mister.. Ted."
Still giving it the 'innocent high school student' Wallace heads towards the stairs, rearranging the strap on his shoulder and looking back as if he's so totally thrilled to meet Ted that he doesn't quite believe that it's happening. He even does the Clark Kent thing of actually walking into the door because he isn't looking where he's going.
Ted leans closer to me. "Where'd you meet him?"
"Central City. I was at the university, talking to them about Leonard Snart. Pretty much just bumped into him."
Ted frowns slightly. "Doesn't Central City have a 'Doctor Alchemy'?"
"Sort of. The military took his 'Philosopher's Stone'-" And aren't interested in talking about it. Even I'm not sure where they stashed it. "-and his transmutation gun requires it in order to work. As far as we know he doesn't know how to make another Stone-" Though Alan was able to tell me about a couple of its former owners. "-so he isn't currently much of a threat. He used to be a chemistry teacher but as far as we've been able to tell he doesn't actually know anything about alchemy."
Ted frowns. "Name's kinda misleading."
"He originally called himself 'Mister Element'. If it makes you feel happier you can call him that."
"Wait, he wasn't a real doctor either?"
"Ted, you said you wanted to talk to me about something?"
"Oh, yeah. Yeah. That. Okay. Um… Well, the good news is that we managed to build a suit of power armor like yours with the invisibility system. And as far as we can tell, the mind altering effects are pretty minor."
"Good news. Wait, you haven't… Actually put someone in it without-."
"No! No. Well not exactly."
"Ted."
"We were doing test exposures with volunteer college students! We didn't give them power armor. That stuff's far too expensive to build a whole lot of suits for testing."
"Okay… That's a bit more reasonable."
"We did double blind short term exposure tests, they're all wearing monitors like the one's we're using to reverse engineer the Thinking Cap… They're showing signs of increased impulsiveness and a slight increase in aggression, but it's not enough to be worrying and Louis Crandell said that part of the effect only lasts a few months. I want to see if we can inoculate people with low doses before they start using it for real."
"A perfectly reasonable thing to test, but I'm kind of bracing for the bad news here."
"Iiiiit's Bobo."
"Bobo?"
"He's the Chimp we've been trying out some of our non-intrusive Thinking Cap designs on."
"Oh, how's that been going?"
"Oh, good. He can float small objects and create simple sensory illusions now."
I close my eyes, take a deep breath and then open them again. "Ted. Are you working up to telling me that there's an invisible telepathic monkey loose in New York City?"
"We don't know he's loose."
"Ted."
"'Cause, you know… He's invisible."
"Ted."
"I mean, we know he's not in his enclosure, but we're pretty sure that he thinks of the building as 'home' so he probably hasn't gone that far."
"What did we say, Ted? What did we say, when we first started this?"
"Ahhhh... No mad science?"
"Because our aim is to make people's lives better, improve the lot of the Human species and make enough money that the project is self-funding. What else?"
"You're… Fed up with well meaning scientists creating their own villains?"
"Completely fed up, Ted. Completely fed up." I squeeze my eyes shut again. "At least tell me that he hasn't got phasing or power armour."
"Why would we make power armor for an ape?"
"I don't know. Did you?"
"More of a test frame?"
"For goodness sake!"
13:58 GMT -5
"Recognised, Orange Lantern, B zero six."
"Hey Paul!" That's a little odd. Ted was waiting for me just outside the zeta tube. The fact that there's a zeta tube on top of the KordTech building isn't a secret secret, but it isn't supposed to be common knowledge. He usually just waits inside the building.
"Good afternoon, Ted." I give his proffered hand a quick shake, and… He's putting his left arm around my shoulders. Okay, now I know something's not right. Behind his back I take my rune stone out of subspace while giving him a ring scan. No magic detected and no anomalies, aside from a slightly elevated heart rate. "Is something going on?"
"Lots of things are going on! We're, we're busy people."
"Okay. Ah, just a moment." I generate a zeta tube construct and then hold my left hand up to my left ear. "Okay Wallace, you can come through now."
A slightly tricky decision, but I think it was the right one. If he does this as Kid Flash then he can use the zeta tube whenever he wants. But -since none of the people we're meeting are on the 'approved for secret identities' list- he can't take his mask off or use any money he makes from mass production of his potions in his civilian guise. The alternative is coming here as Wallace West each time. No problem with people knowing his identity -unless someone tries kidnapping him for his alchemical knowledge I suppose- and no problem with him benefiting financially from his own work.
Unfortunately, that means that he can't use the zeta tube which so helpfully announces his identity to come here, because we can't think of a justification for 'Wallace West, intelligent but basically normal high school student' to have access to the League's secure transportation system. He can get the next nearest tube and run here… Though getting a bus or a taxi would be a better idea. Super speed might conceal the user's identity from everything but ultra speed cameras but the fact that someone is using it is very obvious.
Huh, kind of odd, that. At the moment regular people working out his identity is a bigger problem than supervillains doing it because the most notable supervillains already know.
Anyway, there are only so many times I can 'drop him off' here before it starts to look odd, so he's probably not going to be able to attend the weekly meetings. That and school. But a healing potion has such obvious utility that I couldn't not make this happen.
There's a flare of light and Wallace appears, dressed in the least superheroic way he could manage, carrying a satchel for his computer and a padded case for his samples. He blinks a little theatrically and looks around at the New York skyline, rube-ing it up magnificently. "Whaw."
"Hey there Wallace." Ted removes his arm and walks over to greet Wallace. "Paul said you had a healing potion for us?"
"Mister Kord? Ah, whaw." Wallace turns towards Ted and transfers his carry case to his left hand to shake Ted's hand. This action causes his satchel strap to slide from his shoulder and he scrambles to catch it with the hand now carrying the case. He awkwardly manages it, keeping hold of the strap as he shakes Ted's hand.
Think he may have taken the 'Clark Kenting' lessons a little too to heart.
"Just 'Ted' is fine, Wallace."
"Oh, okay. Um, just call me Wally. Everyone apart from Orange Lantern and my grandma do."
"Alright. I just.. need a quick word with Orange Lantern. Why don't… You take the stairs down. Janine can show you where we're meeting."
"Okay! Thanks Mister.. Ted."
Still giving it the 'innocent high school student' Wallace heads towards the stairs, rearranging the strap on his shoulder and looking back as if he's so totally thrilled to meet Ted that he doesn't quite believe that it's happening. He even does the Clark Kent thing of actually walking into the door because he isn't looking where he's going.
Ted leans closer to me. "Where'd you meet him?"
"Central City. I was at the university, talking to them about Leonard Snart. Pretty much just bumped into him."
Ted frowns slightly. "Doesn't Central City have a 'Doctor Alchemy'?"
"Sort of. The military took his 'Philosopher's Stone'-" And aren't interested in talking about it. Even I'm not sure where they stashed it. "-and his transmutation gun requires it in order to work. As far as we know he doesn't know how to make another Stone-" Though Alan was able to tell me about a couple of its former owners. "-so he isn't currently much of a threat. He used to be a chemistry teacher but as far as we've been able to tell he doesn't actually know anything about alchemy."
Ted frowns. "Name's kinda misleading."
"He originally called himself 'Mister Element'. If it makes you feel happier you can call him that."
"Wait, he wasn't a real doctor either?"
"Ted, you said you wanted to talk to me about something?"
"Oh, yeah. Yeah. That. Okay. Um… Well, the good news is that we managed to build a suit of power armor like yours with the invisibility system. And as far as we can tell, the mind altering effects are pretty minor."
"Good news. Wait, you haven't… Actually put someone in it without-."
"No! No. Well not exactly."
"Ted."
"We were doing test exposures with volunteer college students! We didn't give them power armor. That stuff's far too expensive to build a whole lot of suits for testing."
"Okay… That's a bit more reasonable."
"We did double blind short term exposure tests, they're all wearing monitors like the one's we're using to reverse engineer the Thinking Cap… They're showing signs of increased impulsiveness and a slight increase in aggression, but it's not enough to be worrying and Louis Crandell said that part of the effect only lasts a few months. I want to see if we can inoculate people with low doses before they start using it for real."
"A perfectly reasonable thing to test, but I'm kind of bracing for the bad news here."
"Iiiiit's Bobo."
"Bobo?"
"He's the Chimp we've been trying out some of our non-intrusive Thinking Cap designs on."
"Oh, how's that been going?"
"Oh, good. He can float small objects and create simple sensory illusions now."
I close my eyes, take a deep breath and then open them again. "Ted. Are you working up to telling me that there's an invisible telepathic monkey loose in New York City?"
"We don't know he's loose."
"Ted."
"'Cause, you know… He's invisible."
"Ted."
"I mean, we know he's not in his enclosure, but we're pretty sure that he thinks of the building as 'home' so he probably hasn't gone that far."
"What did we say, Ted? What did we say, when we first started this?"
"Ahhhh... No mad science?"
"Because our aim is to make people's lives better, improve the lot of the Human species and make enough money that the project is self-funding. What else?"
"You're… Fed up with well meaning scientists creating their own villains?"
"Completely fed up, Ted. Completely fed up." I squeeze my eyes shut again. "At least tell me that he hasn't got phasing or power armour."
"Why would we make power armor for an ape?"
"I don't know. Did you?"
"More of a test frame?"
"For goodness sake!"
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Empiricist2
Let's play doctor!
- Location
- Baton Rouge
Ok, Wally can still go on an exorbitant spending spree. Awesome. Glad that this is back.
Also, this is why I refresh the story only page to get the update first. I had already finished reading before the version on this thread even went up.
Finagle007
[Verified Great Old One]
- Pronouns
- He/Him/His
BWAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!
Massgamer
Advance toward the Future
- Location
- The Future
Next Ted is going to say that Bobo has developed human levels of intelligence or Paul will find that out when he finds him.
Ha!
Typos:
Typos:
"through"
"any"
"use"
"where"
"news"
- Location
- Florida, United States
- Status