We could just tell Taylor that we look like whatever we want to look like? I mean, right now we're a giant planet sized brain, but with enough research I imagine we can condense ourselves. If we're being really honest we can just show her a window to ourselves when we're explaining things. Give her a sense of scale.
Gaea does seem to be a talkative one. Hunted us down after we started communicating with Shift, after all.
Then again, it might not be all bad. The fact we seem to be trying to run diagnostics and fixing, as a Core Shard, with the Cycle borked, might just mean our address gets sent out and we get a lot of low level pings and reports of damaged Shards.
So, I can't make heads or tails of the votes. Neither can SV.
We're going to have to update to voting-by-plan. That said, I don't want to stifle creativity, so let's try something a bit different:
1) Vote-by-plan PER EACH Shard/Character
2) Vote-by-plan separately for RESEARCH
3) Add any "nice to have items / modifications to existing plans" separately below your vote plans so that I can see/implement the non-blocking ones.
Everyone (including myself) is going to stop bracketing Shard names and simply capitalize them instead.
Nothing needs to change for the chapter I'm making right now because I already went through the posts manually.
GM humble request - if someone would like to volunteer to take on the job of collating votes, that would be awesome. This isn't required - there's no pressure to do this, I just wanted to ask.
Ducats man, I love the mechanical eyes idea. Be careful not to look into the abyss, infinite reflections. Something they can control. Like the Illusive Mans eyes maybe.
Personality wise, in that case more like Neil Gaimans Lucifer then. In that comic Luci wasn't strictly a good guy but he was down for all sentient beings controlling their own destinies. He a a niece, daughter of Michael, who he trained to take the Throne of Heaven. She's pretty similar ideologically, rebuilding the cosmos ground up instead of top down.
In that teacher role was affable but sarcastic. He prefers to let her her own thing but steps in before she makes major mistakes and is willing to have frank discussions about the state of the universe and what they're doing. He doesn't sugar coat things.
Something like that, or still too impersonal you think?
P.S. my dreams were even earlier, someone made those based on the Outsider idea.
Yeah, Lucifer is pretty cool in DC comics. And I like the mentor style, letting your student try things while steering them away from bad ends, tends to be a more fulfilling learning experience, but it does rely more on the learner than regular teachings.
Maybe for Greg? This may help him our, as he needs it desperately. For example studying psychology may allow him to discover that he deals with Asperger Syndrome (which is my headcanon for Greg, but it may be not the case in this quest though) and make him that 'badass normal' this way.
I don't think that would help, Greg is ultimately an awkward teenager and the fandom tends to demonize him in both obvious (being the PHO butt monkey, even though he had only one ban in canon and that was after multiple s-classes had gone through Brockton) and subtle ways (the author distancing themselves from Greg by giving him a mental disorder) because at the end of the day Greg is a normal person like you and me and that is disturbing to a lot of people since he fucks up in canon, they then overcompensate by talking shit about him.
The truth however is in many ways even more Ironic than effectively the fandom being Greg's Emma, since he is in many ways a mirror to Taylor and who she is. Greg is a lonely teenager that only wants to fit in with a group even if he has to lie, he has trouble trusting others and look at friendly gestures with suspicion because he does not want to be hurt by them, finally he has a poor brain to mouth filter and can get pretty passionate. To sum him up, he is basically Taylor that was not thrown in the locker and retained their motormouth qualities.
I think good and simple sapient animal avatar will work. Like Lion from Legend of Narnia.
Pick up majestic animal (lion works REALLY well). Some other idea may be:
A) Owl = Owl are supposed to be smart and mysterious animals according to more symbolic presentation of it.
B) Wolf = Strong, confident, intimidating. Good solid pick.
C) Tiger = Pretty much same as Lion.
D) Fox = Cunning, smart, mysterious. Also one of my favourite picks.
E) Scarab = Now this would be a very symbolic pick because of the whole Khepri thing .
As far as Taylor will be concerned, we are a god beyond her comprehension. We can explain things to her and be friendly and helpful, but there will always be that primal part in the back of her mind that looks at us and is afraid. There's only so much we can do to gain her trust, and actions will speak louder than words. Show don't tell and all that, what's most important is that we back up our promises.
P.S. The Scarab is the only one that thematically works. Negotiator is a fox. Shift is a wolf. We could each have our own spirit animal motif, but I don't want to actually appear like that.
Gaea would work like a small child, appearing like some dryad version of a Bonesaw/Panacea hybrid child.
That is totally not what Amy wants to dream about, she's in her own ironic hell.
While, animal avatars are interesting I think we will get more milage out of a human form, but maybe we can get a mascot body irl to keep in contact with our hosts, if it is cheaper on the aberrance.
I am not sold on the Scarab I feel that it is pretty exclusively canon Taylor and would not resonate with us, other than being a reference to what could have been.
Also I think that a Dragon would work bets as an avatar, since Dragons symbolize power (that we give/have), wisdom, but also as an equalizer (we are an indomitable dragon and you are a squishy human), which I think will resonate with people on Bet since justice has been lost in favor of benefiting the powerful, but we are now here and any human, be they mundane, para or even the triumvirate will be unable to escape the justice we seek to bring.
Audible might be Flashbang. That leaves Jury-Rig, Gymnastics, and Knowledge from Shift's addresses. They're all probably heroes since Sophia hasn't interacted with a lot of villains. I think that we've already guessed about Jury-Rig being Aegis with no response so maybe he's either Gymnastics or Knowledge. He seems to be the only Ward we haven't matched an address with.
I think knowledge might be Uber, Gymnastics is Circus, Jury-Rig might be Dragon, since her power focuses on adapting tinkertech into something usable in a world without the infrastructure to maintain it (imagine what you would need to do to maintain a computer in ancient Egypt).
I think knowledge might be Uber, Gymnastics is Circus, Jury-Rig might be Dragon, since her power focuses on adapting tinkertech into something usable in a world without the infrastructure to maintain it (imagine what you would need to do to maintain a computer in ancient Egypt).
I think that someone already guessed Gymnastics being Circus with no response. Knowledge being Uber is a good idea. Then Jury-Rig is probably Leet, and that's why his stuff keeps failing.
I think that someone already guessed Gymnastics being Circus with no response. Knowledge being Uber is a good idea. Then Jury-Rig is probably Leet, and that's why his stuff keeps failing.
Wednesday, the third of November twenty-ten has arrived. Like a bird hitting a window.
[X] Focused Research 1
[X] Human Biology
[X] Send a command to [Shift]
[X] Instruct Shift to enhance data collection by
[X] Nullify the satisfaction yield from conflict with no goals.
[X] Encouraging its Host to feel the same emotional reward from joining, working with, or acquiring allied units as the Host does from combat.
[X] Increase satisfaction yield for each of the following criteria:
[X] Conflict improves Host's resources or allied units resources.
[X] Conflict has no loss of permanent resources to Host or allied units.
[X] Conflict preserves the ability of all participating Hosts to participate in future conflicts.
[X] Reaffirm that it did well in keeping the info sorted and offer to sort any new info it gets.
[X] Communicate with [Gaea]
[X] Request detailed logs from [Gaea] from the events of [Emote] and [Telekinetic]'s assistance.(we know this OOC, but not IC, this is just to close the gap).
[X] "It seems your Host is exclusively focused upon remedial efforts, which [Emote] and [Telekinetic]'s assistance has only reinforced, as their Hosts will damage the humans excessively before your Host repairs things back to the median. A Second Trigger would not pay out for the data invested under this mentality."
[X] "Based on observation, your Host is withholding offensive applications of her ability out of a desire to remain in good relations with her adoptive family. There are several ways to approach this that won't lead to a broken Host:"
[X] "Cooperate with [Telekinetic], encourage their Host to take yours to acquire alcohol or other inhibition lowering substances in a group with their peers, I believe [Telekinetic]'s Host already has some interest in such events. Then while in the impaired state, make it much easier to use their ability, and provide subtle assistance to ensure that any power use results in their peer group becoming modified towards their stated preferences, but no more visible than a 10% deviation from their prior state, and no deviation from the bounds of unmodified humans to avoid alarm. This should put your Host's resolve to do nothing but undo damage to the test, as well as propagate general awareness of this ability, after which it will be more difficult for your Host to refrain with group requests."
[X] "If encouragement to use ability fails, then instead collaborate with your Hosts' peers' shards to increase periods of isolation, through distraction. From there it should be possible to place your Host in a position where she has a social imperative to protect another from harm, when she cannot offload the combat to other parties. This would take some time to setup properly however, I'd need to improve surveillance information to make such an event plausible. Tell me if the first method fails first."
[X] "You should hold off on Second-Triggering your host for now. Depending on what the problem is, it might not help your info collection efforts. I'm going to try and figure out the pattern behind when you collect info. Maybe you can increase the revenue from the unknown source."
[X] Request list of contact addresses, has she noticed [Charge] seems to have issues? Attempting to run Diagnostics on that Shard, could use any information she has, if she's run into other Shards like that.
[X] Indicate willingness to work with [Gaea] to assist information gathering. Reassure her that you will work to keep her safe and intact.
[X] Contact [Negotiator] - Hello Negotiator, how has the cycle been so far, do you know that is up with all the dead shards?
[X] Ask about [Negotiator]'s condition, making clear that we are sapient, but not that we are aberrant.
[X] Inquire as to the number of malformed shards scattered about.
[X] Request addresses of known shards.
[X] If it would be needed, agree to exchange Shard address books.
[X] Contact [Optimize] - Hello how are you
[X] Contact Charge
[X] Reaffirm that you are Administrator and ask for its status.
[X] Request full diagnostics report, list of errors.
[X] Contact Emote
[X] Ask for its status and for all addresses it has.
Note: If a popular plan doesn't conflict with the winning plan, I will attempt to combine the non-conflicting options. Your ideas count, even if it doesn't win overall!
Also, plan/option detail is one of my criteria when deciding tie-breakers. More detail is almost always better - I read very quickly and a long and rambling plan isn't a problem.
[X] Communicate with [Gaea]
[X] "So, Second Triggering is a pretty big deal. Why don't we try and work out why you're getting such poor data returns, and try and figure out a solution, hmm? Wouldn't want to hit a new Host and have the same issues, after all. Tell me about your Host."
[X] "You know, there are ways to generate data besides conflict. Usually not as good a return, but if you're having issues with conflict, they'd be better than nothing. What type of powers does your Host have, and maybe we can work out something."
[X] "It's been a while since I had to worry about whether or not I'd be integrated and the rules have probably been updated, but some good avenues are figuring out new ways to cheat, surpassing one's progenitor in some fashion, killing off shards similar to yourself to open up a niche, killing a terror drone, eating your predecessor, allying with powerful influential shards, or having a unique function or ability... actually with all the damaged and dead shards running around you might not have to work too hard."
[X] Request detailed logs from [Gaea] from the times where she did not gain info when she thought she would and from the times she gained info unexpectedly.
[X] "I'm actually gearing up to research the nature of data generation and collection through conflict and hopefully new methods. The hosts have given me new ideas."
[X] "Hey, [Gaea], could you explain this bit about epigenetics to me?" / [X] Ask for assistance with Human Biology Research. (I think this is the same option??)
[X] Request Sense-Sharing. Indicate agreement to attempt diagnostics on Data-Return Errors, work out solution.
The above are votes that I felt didn't have enough support to implement in the chapter and/or might have had story consequences (good or bad) without enough discussion.
None of these are blocked/bad votes - feel free to further discuss or implement another day.
[X] DO NOT Contact [Negotiator]
This is a blocked vote, and will not be brought up again in this particular context
Chosen items:
[ ] Focused Research 1: 150 Thinker Information, 950 Research.
150 Thinker Information spent!
Day 1 (Wednesday): (1d100+18 = 75) 75/950
[ ] Human Biology: 400 Research
Day 1 (Wednesday): (1d100+18 = 19) critical failure! -19/400
After one day of hard work you have gotten a little over 10% of the way through Focused Research 1! Your second instance made terrible errors and reduced your progress towards Human Biology!
Note: Your research total for Human Biology is in the negative! If you vote to pause or stop researching it you will not be able to re-start it without additional research costs.
It's a new day, and you have a headache already. You're simply not agreeing with yourself about rather a lot of things. But you slowly work it out.
First, avoiding Negotiator isn't going to work in the medium-term. Gaea almost certainly tattled on you by now. <snerk> (That wasn't funny) You're better off getting ahead of the problem and seeing just how badly you're screwed.
Next, you're not quite sure what you're going to talk with Gaea except that you really should get that done. What do you want to say?
You watch Taylor go about getting ready for Winslow as you consider things in the kind of depth that would set Dragon's servers on fire in milliseconds. Eh, you're the Administrator Shard, you can wing it. But first you should start with the easy stuff.
Agenda? Bam. Wow. Many picoseconds, much slow.
Contact Charge
You're the real admin, and you need its status
If it has any kind of problem with that Ask for full diagnostics regardless
Contact Emote
Contact Optimize
Contact Shift and…
Try to help it
Contact Gaea and…
You'll figure it out
But get everyone's Address and as much information as possible while you're at it
Ouch. That weird two-channel effect is still somewhat painful. You're getting used to it though. Hopefully it will continue to get less awful as time goes on.
QM Note: You're pretty sure Charge just compiled maliciously. Or one half of it did. Good thing you researched attack types! No roll needed, auto-success. No damage taken.
Yes, that sucked. First of all, you are getting ten to twelve times too much data. Second, the data you're getting from the broken part is hopelessly corrupt. The non-sapient side's data isn't in much better shape, honestly.
Still, the joke's on Charge, because that deluge of corrupted data must have come from somewhere, and you're an expert at data sanitation. An attempted cheap-shot resulted in you getting almost all of Charge's memories and Information. Heh. You win again! It will just take a week to analyse what you got, first.
Also, it seems that Aberrancy is a thing that can exist for Shards other than you. Something to watch out for in the future...
Hmm. Good news? There's so many different shards involved here that it's more of a chorus than a horrid mix. And they seem to be unified, too.
The main problem you can immediately see is that Emote is almost entirely drained. As in, whatever Parahuman is on the other side of this thing is going to lose their powers in single-digit years.
Oh, and you should probably tell it you're in charge. Since it asked so nicely. Although you no longer can honestly tell people that you've never hacked a Shard.
And… that was easy. You just updated its key database to match yours. Also, you took its older version. This is nice because if there's any more outdated Eden shards out there you'll be able to impersonate Eden's Administrator with a little effort. Oh, and possibly the Endbringers, if it comes to that…
You could order it to automatically send you any updates to its Address database, but they'd be useless except for Shard names, so you don't bother. Gaea almost certainly has all the same ones.
Next up is Optimize. There's a tiny chance this isn't Armsmaster. You doubt it.
[Ping Optimize]
[Optimize - Administrator/Purpose?]
Well, that was… abrupt. And you thought Colin was bad, his Shard is worse. Especially considering how direct Shards are to begin with… And the worst part is that you don't know what you want to do now.
Yes, 'abrupt' was the right description. There's efficiency and there's whatever that was. Shardspeak is inherently unambiguous and comprehensive. You know it wasn't being rude. It was simply doing the absolute bare minimum in the quickest possible way. And then hung up.
The good news there is that is no possibility that Optimize will tattle on you because both finding out what you're up to, and reporting on it, would be a waste of its precious time.
Time to check in on your pet Shard, Shift.
[Hello, Shift]
[Shift - Excitement!]
The sheer glee that the barely-sentient Shard exhibits upon you merely opening a connection is starting to get a little uncomfortable. You're not pulling a Taylor here, are you? Shards don't actually have Charisma, and if they did it wouldn't affect them. Hopefully. Right?
No unintentional charm-blasting here. Because that's not a thing. Whew! Okay, so you need to craft some commands for updating the Host control protocols in a way that Shift can understand. Well, you may as well make the labels descriptive and amusing to yourself while you're at it… hmm… okay. Here goes!
[Plan/Update - Data Collection 57] [Remove/Conflict Drive][Apply/Teamwork Drive][Apply/Wolfpack-Beta Protocols]
Maybe you were a programmer as a Human? This shouldn't be as much fun as it is. You've essentially rewired Sophia's normal Parahuman 'fight' drive into more of a 'hug your friends, and make more, as long as no one gets hurt' drive. Kind of. It's complicated even for you but you're sure you accomplished everything you set out to do.
Of course.. This isn't anything like Mastering. Even with her close integration to her Shard, Sophia is still going to filter this new drive through her twisted view of life. Eh. It will work out. Probably. Simulations look good, at any rate. Well, she's at a lower anger level on average.
Today isn't a good one for your Host. Just as she was about to escape the cafeteria, a large group of students 'just happened' to start a huge food-fight and 'just happened' to hit her with almost all of it.
School lunch, not just terrible tasting, super-staining too! To try and distract yourself from the terrible scene, you jump right onto the next item on your mental checklist.
[Hello, Gaea]
Gaea - "Oh hey! Administrator! I was just thinking about you - what do you need?"
She sounds really nervous. Why would that be? "I've been considering your situation, and I would like to assist. Your issue is with your Host, and you have been working with Emote and Telekinetic, correct?"
Gaea - "Yes. She should be perfect, but nothing is working properly!" You think she's trying to sound determinedly-cheerful, but most of what you're getting is poorly-hidden despair, instead.
You continue, "It seems your Host is exclusively focused upon remedial efforts, which Emote and Telekinetic's assistance has only reinforced, as their Hosts will damage the humans excessively before your Host repairs things back to the median. A Second Trigger would not pay out for the data invested under this mentality."
Gaea - "Um. That makes sense, but I don't think I see what to do, then?"
Now that she's no longer attempting to put on a brave front, you're detecting a little bit of actual determination. It strikes you, again, how this conversation is very similar to one between two humans. What is different about (natural) Shard intelligence? The whole 'Shards can't create' isn't passing the smell test... beyond the abundant evidence, of course.
But it's been long enough that another Shard might wonder what's up. You continue, 'speaking' in a slow-and-thoughtful tone. "Based on observation, your Host is withholding offensive applications of her ability out of a desire to remain in good relations with her adoptive family. There are several ways to approach this that won't lead to a broken Host:"
She gives a mental nod but doesn't break in. You keep going. "Cooperate with Telekinetic, encourage their Host to take yours to acquire alcohol or other inhibition lowering substances in a group with their peers, I believe Telekinetic's Host already has some interest in such events."
She send another mental nod. You need to examine how that works sometime, since neither of you are manifesting Avatars of any kind, and English doesn't have side-channels like that. Body language, sure, but that's not a factor here.
"Then while in the impaired state, make it much easier to use their ability, and provide subtle assistance to ensure that any power use results in their peer group becoming modified towards their stated preferences, but no more visible than a 10% deviation from their prior state, and no deviation from the bounds of unmodified humans to avoid alarm. This should put your Host's resolve to do nothing but undo damage to the test, as well as propagate general awareness of this ability, after which it will be more difficult for your Host to refrain with group requests."
Finally, she speaks, "I can do that. This sounds like a great plan, but what if it doesn't change anything?"
You're on a roll now. You've decided exactly how you want to approach this. "If encouragement to use ability fails, then instead collaborate with your Hosts' peers' shards to increase periods of isolation, through distraction. From there it should be possible to place your Host in a position where she has a social imperative to protect another from harm, when she cannot offload the combat to other parties. This would take some time to setup properly however, I'd need to improve surveillance information to make such an event plausible. Tell me if the first method fails first."
She considers that for a bit. "So if all this fails, then I try to get her to Trigger again?" It's clear from the way she put that she's got seriously mixed feelings about it.
Which is good, from your perspective. You don't want to go there given what Amy's power actually is. "You should hold off on Second-Triggering your host for now. Depending on what the problem is, it might not help your info collection efforts. I'm going to try and figure out the pattern behind when you collect info. Maybe you can increase the revenue from the unknown source."
Gaea send a sort-of agreement-noise over the channel. Something between "unn" and a grunt.
You consider various ways to put this, but in the end you decide there's no harm in being somewhat direct. "Could I have your list of Addresses? Also, have you noticed anything strange about Charge? Or any similar Shards?"
She pipes up. "Yes! I don't understand what's going on with them. I... I don't have any experience with diagnostics, or any authority to perform that even if I knew. Can you help with them? Some of them identify as Eden-derived, but most are just... jumbled? I'm not sure I have the right Host vocabulary to explain."
After a while of thinking about it, she continues. "I'd like it if you could take a look. Even if they aren't ours originally, they need help and I can't do anything." There's definitely a undertone of frustration there.
You should remind her that you're willing to help not just with broken Shards, but her as well. Ally get, and all that. "I definitely will. But don't hesitate to ask me for help too. This Cycle is shaping up to be a strange one, so we'll all need to work together." This is perfectly true, although most of the 'working together' will be under your authority…
Gaea closes the connection almost absentmindedly. She's probably got a lot to think about. That's okay, you do too.
As Taylor leaves school early to get clean clothes / something else to eat, you consider what to do next. You could wait until Negotiator calls on you, but that's a bad plan. You need to do it… soon.
Taylor gets on the bus, and looks down at her lap. A single tear falls onto her left knee and disappears into the fabric there. She doesn't make a sound and her mind seems completely blank.
Right, Negotiator… no time like the present.
[Hello Negotiator!]
"Queenie! How did things go with your Trigger? You don't get to participate most Cycles these days, right?"
Well, then, that was sudden. And in a strange language too, Low Symbolic. Similar to Shardspeak in a lot of ways, lots of side-channel data. Except for the fact it's much better for subterfuge. It's a good thing you've been parsing your older memories in your spare time or you wouldn't have known it.
Which was probably some kind of test, now that you think about it.
Definitely female-aspect. That or decent influence level from Lisa. Probably both. Less smug that you expected, but that's not much of a data-point. You may as well play it straight and see what happens.
You don't want to keep it waiting, so you open, well, negotiations. "Negotiator! How has the cycle been so far, do you know that is up with all the dead shards?"
Almost too quickly to make sense, Negotiator responds. "Yes. Thinker pancaked. Never seen anything like it. Just splat, dead, took out one of the more advanced Earth's too, from what I understand. Earth-89,160 was originally the backup location." (mental shrug)
It/She waits 10ms for a reply, then continues, "I'm not sure how they are being used, but whatever is going on those Shards aren't properly awake. But they are Triggering hosts somehow. I'd understand if a few were seeded before Thinker's death but there's far too many for that. But really, that's not my problem to figure out. You're the Core Shard here." (mental smile)
Just as you were going to respond she keeps going, "If I were you I'd recycle them. They're just sitting around, losing power to Hosts, and not collecting much data - if any. You could put them to better use. Then again, if you don't want them let me know, I wouldn't mind making a run for it. This Cycle's done, regardless."
Hmm, it's probably a good idea to say something, to quell suspicions if nothing else. "Want to trade contact databases?"
Again, she replies oddly quickly, almost as if she had already decided what to say, "Certainly! I'll show you mine if you show me yours!"
That's… not very Shardlike. Or Lisa-like, for that matter. Nonetheless, you exchange address lists.
This surprises Negotiator a bit. "Wow, you have a lot of addresses already for having such a new Host! Gaea, right?" (nods to herself) "I'll call back later, it seems like you're pretty busy. Make us all proud, Queenie!"
And Negotiator cuts the connection. Huh. Whatever you were expecting, that definitely was not it. Other than the veiled allusions to making a attempt at Entityhood (would Negotiator have any real chance of that?), that conversation was downright low-key. Remember, it's only paranoia if they're not out to get you.
You'll have to sim that conversation later and see if you can pull any more details out of it. Only one last thing sticks in your mind… 'queenie'? Seems like the odd word out. How would Negotiator have even heard of that? Didn't the Faerie Queen come up with that, originally quite late in the timeline? Hnn...
You spend five real-time hours on that, an veritable eternity, but nothing substantive comes of it. 'Alternate Lisa controlling the Negotiator Shard' is the closest simulation hit… at something like a 0.13% chance. That's not it, nor is any other bizarre scenario you come up with to test. In other words, you don't know enough to get anything useful from that conversation beyond the obvious.
Heck, it's almost Taylor's bedtime now. She's turning in a bit early, after having made a huge pasta dinner. You didn't see any sign of Danny this evening, strange. Speaking of sleep...
It's now your Host's downtime and safe for research. You split yourself (urgh) and start to work in parallel on…
[Focused Research 1] You're not quite sure how to approach this. You're already smarter than any Human, and while it's fairly understandable to work in parallel, you don't know how to approach working better. I mean, if you knew how you'd be doing it already. So some kind of raw intelligence boost is out… or is it? You're not running on a human brain anymore, so maybe…
One approach is to simply run your thoughts at a higher speed. You've been surprised before and sped up your thinking reflexively. So…you just need to replicate that process on-command!
And it works! At least, for a short while. After an odd, unpleasant draining feeling starts, you notice that the surface of the Pacific ocean started to boil. Good news: the largest ocean makes for a great heat sink. Bad news: running at that speed for more than a few minutes visibly darkened that side of your body and felt terribly draining.
Super speedy thoughts is out. Maybe you can multitask in a different way? You can form a normal instance to help because you always have the same thoughts, but maybe you can task the different instances with separate duties for a speedup? Sure you're the lord of multitasking but maybe you can reduce small input delays by having many of you scanning through different piles of data for good info… multiplexed searching strategies, hmm.
Well, at some point you actually ran out of night-time, but the good news is that not only did you make good progress, but you have a strategy for next time you look into this.
[Human Biology] This is almost an insult to your abilities. Sure, the human body is anything but simple, but you were given everything about it as part of the Standard Data Packet! It's the Host race this Cycle for crying out loud… and you were one once! You'll be done with this before the rest of you even finishes figuring out how to approach Focused Research… okay, so...
Data, grab, import, review, learn, done. Right.
Hm, this isn't quite as easy as you thought it would be. Not that bad or anything, but there's a lot of nuance to the various chemical signalling systems involved here. This might take a small amount of effort.
So, this subject might have been almost ten times as hard as your worst-case estimate, but you're still all done. In only three hours real-time! Go you!
In fact, you're going to rub this in your otherself's face. Sure, it might have been a much simpler task overall, but you crushed it! (Sending data...)
"Uh, self?"
"Yes? Surprised at your own genius?"
"Um... sort-of, yes. This is definitely impressive. So, have you worked up a sample host body yet? Make up an Avatar, show us what you got!"
You really need to work on that - your smugness is really horrible. To think you considered attacking yourself! Fortunately, you're as difficult to provoke as you are awesome. You simulate a beautiful and strong host body right here and now.
Ta-dah! From the shiny fur and stout snout to the venomous ankle spurs it's a magnificent… wait…
"That's an awesome duck-billed platypus. You might want to get started on Human data though, it's getting late. Early. Whatever. I'm getting back to my project now. Good luck!"
[ ] Communicate with Taylor by talking. Note: This is hugely aberrant and there are now non-direct communication methods available. That said, it's also a giant advantage too.
[ ] With what voice?
Voice option examples: Normal Male, Normal Female, Robotic, Chorus (what kind?), famous celebrities or actors.
[*]Remember that Taylor may not be familiar with voices made famous after the mid-80's because of the dimensional fragmentation.
[*]Keep in mind that you can imitate any kind of accent perfectly (Russian, German, Aussie, UK, Scottish, etc) - including 'fake' versions.
[ ] How do you introduce yourself?
[ ] Do you talk about powers?
[ ] Do you reveal setting 'secrets'? Warning: Precogs. (QM will not reveal the exact mechanics of this danger)
[ ] Communicate with Taylor in dreams. Note: This causes very little Aberrance.
[ ] With what Avatar?
[ ] How do you introduce yourself?
[ ] How do you manipulate the dream setting?
[ ] Do you attempt to reveal setting 'secrets'? Warning: Precogs. (QM will not reveal the exact mechanics of this danger)
[ ] Prioritize cleaning up Charge's Shard data? There's probably some interesting stuff in there, but doing this in the background will take a long time, even for you. You've got to spend an action choice on this if you want it done any time soon.
[ ] How many hours to you reserve for this task? (0% complete)
[ ] Do you have any thoughts on fixing/punishing/altering/eating Charge?
[ ] Recharge Emote? You don't have a ton to spare energy, as best you can tell… but Emote is close to burning out. Possibly permanently if it's no longer capable of graceful shutdown.
[ ] Communicate with (Specific Shard) - Now that you have address lists, you don't need to rely on Taylor or Scion. You can just connect whenever you want.
Specify - Which Shard?
[ ] What do you Command, if anything?
[ ] What do you say, if anything?
[ ] What do you do, if anything?
[ ] Timeskip forwards… to when?
[ ] Perform any Research rolls during the skipped time? (reduced rate: one roll per week skipped)
[ ] Write In. You're the Administrator Shard! You have a much better idea of what to do next than the QM does.
Feel like writing a way out of the platypus mistake? (Maybe it would work as a magical girl companion avatar?)
Good research log Omakes (that import the correct data this time) now add between 50 to 200 points each, spendable by the writer as a research voting option for the following Chapter.
I'd like to send Taylor a dream, but I'd prefer to keep it low-key until we manage to get Stronger Trigger, just in case explaining the situation to her directly gives a Trigger opportunity. Maybe we could do the dream where she sees how worried Danny is about her.
How many hours do we want to spend on cleaning up Charge's data? I'd be willing to vote to eat her IF we could test it out on a villain's Cauldron Shard first to make sure that Battery will be ok. That probably means matching up some of the new Shard addresses and contacting them to see if there's a Cauldron Shard. It's unfortunate that Gaea and Negotiator apparently didn't identify the Cauldron Shards.
I'm not seeing much point in recharging Emote at this point. We can decide whether to fix or eat him later on.
Any ideas about what's going on with Negotiator? My suspicion is that she's another human-mind/Shard body.
Accelerate - Skidmark
Aerokinesis - Stormtiger
Appropriate - Mush
Clone - Oni Lee
Deflection - Krieg
Echolocate - Cricket
Empower - Dauntless
Future - I thought this was Dinah, but I don't think she's triggered yet.
I'd like to send Taylor a dream, but I'd prefer to keep it low-key until we manage to get Stronger Trigger, just in case explaining the situation to her directly gives a Trigger opportunity. Maybe we could do the dream where she sees how worried Danny is about her.
Trigger events are the result of extreme stress. There's little chance that you could cause enough psyche damage with a normal-ish dream to Trigger Taylor.
Now, even in the case it happens, you're in charge and you're free to ignore potential Trigger events. Assuming you don't keep bypassing them dozens of times or something.
Taylor would eventually go completely bugnuts. Not from the bypassed Trigger events themselves, but more from accumulated bad memories/experiences.
You know what, I'm down to be Perry the Platapus, secret agent of K.E.T.T.L.E. by night, Taylor's pet by day. Panacea likes cute animals right? This is how we lure her to our side.
I love how we are increasingly spiraling into crack. I also feel that the Taylor interludes Might be a not so subtle hint that we should talk to her. Possibly we aren't the only human to become a shard. Gaea could plausibly just be randomly sentient, even if she seems suspiciously naive. Negotiator also seems kind off, not at all how we were expecting her to act.
Please let's not immediately go for Eidolon shard. We defintely shouldn't go for PtV, that sounds like schmuck bait. It could be weirdly friendly too, but I doubt it.
I'm also increasingly tempted to make Sophia dedicated to Taylor like Shift is to us.
Just a talking Platypus, bitten by a radioactive human. Nothing to see here, move along.
We've already made significant progress, and research speed upgrades generally snowball pretty hard. If we get this done, we can finish up a bunch of other stuff that much faster.
[x] Memetic Proxy Filtering 1
We're absolutely going to want to look into both QA's memories and into Psionics, and probably sooner rather than later. Best to get some basic safety precautions in place first.
In the short term, we should be alright on Information just by taking Negotiator's suggestion and eating some abberant shards.
I'd like to spend a week looking over Charge's data before eating it, though - we're not under so much of a time crunch that we can't spare the effort, and looking into that ahead of time is gonna be valuable in case there are any unpleasant surprises around.
[x] Communicate with Taylor in dreams.
-[x] This is just a "proof-of-concept", to see what communicating with her is like and to test your ability to shape dreams.
-[x] Don't reveal anything specific yet, at all.
-[x] Take the form of a platypus, and claim you are a powerful being taking an interest in her affairs. Ask her what her life is like, and provide useful advice for her problems as appropriate.
I'd like to make an (unconcious) good first impression, while not giving anything in particular away until we understand the limits of dream memories.
Even for shards that can pluck Taylor's thoughts right out of her head, dreaming about a friendly advice giving platypus isn't likely to cause any alarms to ring.
[x] Contact Lightforge and Lightshell, and check on their sentience status. If appropriate, ask for addresses.
[x] Talk to Gaia. See if/how your little plan worked out. If you can, get a play-by-play so you can provide emergency advice if/when things go horribly wrong.
-[x] Contact the other Shards of involved people and monitor the trainwreck through that angle as well.
[x] Keep housetraining Shift. Return most of its data already sorted, then ask Shift to try sorting the last five or so pieces of Information itself. Praise it on success, and be understanding and supportive if it makes a mistake.
-[x] Ask for an initial report on how the new aggression factor has worked out. Dispense praise/headpats if it went well.
[x] Contact Prosthetic and Audible, and check on their status.
-[x] Ask Prosthetic, Audible, and Emote for full diagnostics reports.
[x] Spend an hour sorting through Charge's data. Don't eat Charge until you've sorted through the whole thing - best to understand what the heck's up with the conjoined evil twin first, lest you end up with your own parasite.
@Vhalidictes, if we vote to spend an action choice on sorting Charge's data, what does that mean? Does it slow down research? Is there a limit on the number of action choices we can take?
Also, will we automatically return the info to Shift, or do we have to vote for that?
@Redshirt Army, I think you mean Focussed Research I. Faster Research is a different option than the one that appeared in the update.
@Vhalidictes, if we vote to spend an action choice on sorting Charge's data, what does that mean? Does it slow down research? Is there a limit on the number of action choices we can take?
Also, will we automatically return the info to Shift, or do we have to vote for that?
Assuming you don't spend (x hours) looking into Charge's data, you will do the work as time permits, in dribs and drabs. This process will take 10 days.
Any time you assign to Charge-data-cleaning will take that many hours away from one of your research options.
The understanding of what is in there will only take you minutes of real-time, but can't happen until the entire package is cleaned.
There is no limit to the number of research actions you can take, but as previously described there is a scaling penalty to taking more than 2. Note that you don't need to roll for success of Charge-data-cleaning (it just takes time), so penalties don't matter for this action. (Penalties would still apply as-normal to everything else you research though)
The Information you gained this turn was generated by-you from data shared by Shift. There's nothing to return, it's just yours.
@Redshirt Army, You picked 2 things to research. Don't forget that once you stop researching Human Biology the Research cost for that skill will skyrocket. (This isn't a problem, just wanted to make sure that you remembered)
[X] Research Plan, Ducats: Continuation
-[X] Continue previous research
[X] Taylor Plan, Ducats: First contact from beyond the stars
-[X] Avatar: An older version of Taylor (enough similarity to evoke memories of her mother, but not enough to seem like we are wearing her skin (the Contessa approach))
--[X] Dressed in black suit pants, dress shoes, white shirt, grey vest and black tie
---[X] The iris of the eyes are blue cogs that gently turn
-[X] Taylor appears inside a big library, it stretches as far as can be seen.
--[X] The library is filled to the brim with all we know from all the cycles, but all the books that are labeled as the Administrator's property can't be opened.
---[X] When she tries to open one and fails, a carbuncle (creature) approaches her and tells her
----[X] "Those books belong the Administrator, if you want to read them you will have to ask them for permission. If you would follow me I will lead you to them"
-----[X] As the Carbuncle leads Taylor through the library they will pass griffins sorting the shelves. They will soon arrive in a corridor with walls that are shelves filled with books and a lot of them are labeled as belonging to Taylor, at the end of the corridor is a door with "Administrator" written on it. When they arrive in front of it, the Carbuncle will tell Taylor to wait a little.
------[X] If Taylor gets interested in the books with her name on it and begins to read one, the wait will be a few minutes.
-------[X] After the short wait a voice much like her own will tell them to come in.
--------[X] When the door opens the Administrator sits behind a desk working on a computer and at the feet of the desk there are two pet beds, one of them have a platypus in it. On the walls there will be pictures that are almost real enough to be a portal into the pictures, they will depict the arrival of Scion. the death of Hero. Behemoth rising. Lung at Kyushu. the Simurgh descending. Ellisburg. Eagleton. Jack Slash. The Triumvirate in action. The chains of Dragon. The creation of a case 53. Goddess in the midst of conquest (Thanks Gino).
---------[X] As Taylor enters the room the Administrator looks up, moves the computer screen to the side and greets her.
----------[X] "Good evening Taylor, it is nice to finally meet you. My name is the Administrator and I am one of the sources of what you call parahuman powers. As you might have noticed on these walls are the moments that define this age of parahumans, forever immortalized here ignorant to the march of time. Taylor the reason you are here is because this is such a moment. We have much to discuss, please make yourself comfortable."
-----------[X] Explain how we are from a species that give out powers so they can research what they do. Explain how our species looks at everything from the lens of conflict and that this is imprinted onto those that they bond with and is likely one of the big causes behind the chaos that parahumans bring. Tell her how our greater ability to understand her species makes us able to see the world beyond that perspective.
------------[X] Begin talking about we would like to have her assistance in unfucking her world.
-------------[X] Offer her powers after explaining what a trigger event is and why it is necessary to give her powers and how she is already on the trajectory towards a trigger. Explain how we will have to seal her memories of talking with us when she is awake and has not experienced a trigger, but also offer to talk with her when she is asleep. Also inform her that if she accepts we will erase her memories of the day she triggers and give a report on what happened, explain that it is to minimize trauma on her side.
--------------[X] If she accepts, continue to converse with her until we have to go
--------------[X] If she does not accept send her on her way and wish her luck
---------------[X] Lead Danny to her bully journals
[X] Gaea Plan, Ducats: Notice of Recycling and Research
-[X] Inform Gaea of the state of Emote and of their impending recycling
--[X] Ask Gaea to report any shard that is as broken Emote
---[X] If a shard is in not too bad a state have them contact us so we can see if we can fix them
-[X] Request data on the biology of host species and viable mutations
-[X] Request sharing of senses
[X] Telekinetic Plan, Ducats: Greetings and goodbyes
-[X] Greet Telekinetic and ask how the cycle has been for them and if they have had any exceptional successes or failures
-[X] Inform Telekinetic of the state of Emote and of their impending recycling
--[X] Ask Telekinetic to report any shard that is as broken Emote
---[X] If a shard is in not too bad a state have them contact us so we can see if we can fix them
-[X] Request sharing of senses
[X] Emote Plan, Ducats: Recycle
-[X] Emote is burning the last of its energy and is not functioning, commence with consumption of shard transfer of host
--[X] Set another instance to assist Gaea with operation Amy and Alcohol
[X] Charge Plan, Ducats: Analysis and repairs
-[X] 4 hours of data analysis
-[X] Contemplate viability of separating the sapient shard from the non-sapient shard and repairing them
Ok her are my plans. Hope you guys like them.
Edit: Yeah, Perry the platypus is a go
Edit2:
----------[X] "Good evening Taylor, it is nice to finally meet you. My name is the Administrator and I am one of the sources of what you call parahuman powers.I am contacting you because you are one of the potential people who I will give powers and I think the current way that my kind operates are unacceptable and would like to give you a better chance"
@Ducats, how is Administrator supposed to lead Danny to Taylor's bully journals?
Huh, it looks like once we guess which Parahuman goes with each Shard, it is sometimes italicized, which I think means that it's a Cauldron Shard. I want to hold off on coming up with a plan for now until we know more Cauldron Shards. Then we can contact each one to see whether to eat them. Prosthetic-Trainwreck is italicized. Maybe we can find an Empire cape as well. I'm not voting to eat Emote or Charge until we test it out on a villain's Shard first.
@Ducats, how is Administrator supposed to lead Danny to Taylor's bully journals?
Huh, it looks like once we guess which Parahuman goes with each Shard, it is sometimes italicized, which I think means that it's a Cauldron Shard. I want to hold off on coming up with a plan for now until we know more Cauldron Shards. Then we can contact each one to see whether to eat them. Prosthetic-Trainwreck is italicized. Maybe we can find an Empire cape as well. I'm not voting to eat Emote or Charge until we test it out on a villain's Shard first.
[x] Communicate with Taylor in dreams.
-[x] This is just a "proof-of-concept", to see what communicating with her is like and to test your ability to shape dreams.
-[x] Don't reveal anything specific yet, at all.
-[x] Take the form of a platypus, and claim you are a powerful being taking an interest in her affairs. Ask her what her life is like, and provide useful advice for her problems as appropriate.
[x] Talk to Gaia. See if/how your little plan worked out. If you can, get a play-by-play so you can provide emergency advice if/when things go horribly wrong.
-[x] Contact the other Shards of involved people and monitor the trainwreck through that angle as well.
[x] Keep housetraining Shift. Return most of its data already sorted, then ask Shift to try sorting the last five or so pieces of Information itself. Praise it on success, and be understanding and supportive if it makes a mistake.
-[x] Ask for an initial report on how the new aggression factor has worked out. Dispense praise/headpats if it went well.
[x] Spend an hour sorting through Charge's data. Don't eat Charge until you've sorted through the whole thing - best to understand what the heck's up with the conjoined evil twin first, lest you end up with your own parasite.
[X] Taylor Plan, Ducats: First contact from beyond the stars
-[X] Avatar: An older version of Taylor (enough similarity to evoke memories of her mother, but not enough to seem like we are wearing her skin (the Contessa approach))
--[X] Dressed in black suit pants, dress shoes, white shirt, grey vest and black tie
---[X] The iris of the eyes are blue cogs that gently turn
-[X] Taylor appears inside a big library, it stretches as far as can be seen.
--[X] The library is filled to the brim with all we know from all the cycles, but all the books that are labeled as the Administrator's property can't be opened.
---[X] When she tries to open one and fails, a carbuncle (creature) approaches her and tells her
----[X] "Those books belong the Administrator, if you want to read them you will have to ask them for permission. If you would follow me I will lead you to them"
-----[X] As the Carbuncle leads Taylor through the library they will pass griffins sorting the shelves. They will soon arrive in a corridor with walls that are shelves filled with books and a lot of them are labeled as belonging to Taylor, at the end of the corridor is a door with "Administrator" written on it. When they arrive in front of it, the Carbuncle will tell Taylor to wait a little.
------[X] If Taylor gets interested in the books with her name on it and begins to read one, the wait will be a few minutes.
-------[X] After the short wait a voice much like her own will tell them to come in.
--------[X] When the door opens the Administrator sits behind a desk working on a computer and at the feet of the desk there are two pet beds, one of them have a platypus in it. On the walls there will be pictures that are almost real enough to be a portal into the pictures, they will depict the arrival of Scion. the death of Hero. Behemoth rising. Lung at Kyushu. the Simurgh descending. Ellisburg. Eagleton. Jack Slash. The Triumvirate in action. The chains of Dragon. The creation of a case 53. Goddess in the midst of conquest (Thanks Gino).
---------[X] As Taylor enters the room the Administrator looks up, moves the computer screen to the side and greets her.
----------[X] "Good evening Taylor, it is nice finally to meeting you. My name is the Administrator and I am one of the sources of what you call parahuman powers. I am contacting you because you are one of the potential people who I will give powers and I think the current way that my kind operates are unacceptable and would like to give you a better chance"
-----------[X] Explain how we are from a species that give out powers so they can research what they do. Explain how our species looks at everything from the lens of conflict and that this is imprinted onto those that they bond with and is likely one of the big causes behind the chaos that parahumans bring. Tell her how our greater ability to understand her species makes us able to see the world beyond that perspective.
------------[X] Begin talking about we would like to have her assistance in unfucking her world.
-------------[X] Offer her powers after explaining what a trigger event is and why it is necessary to give her powers and how she is already on the trajectory towards a trigger. Explain how we will have to seal her memories of talking with us when she is awake and has not experienced a trigger, but also offer to talk with her when she is asleep. Also inform her that if she accepts we will erase her memories of the day she triggers and give a report on what happened, explain that it is to minimize trauma on her side.
--------------[X] If she accepts, continue to converse with her until we have to go
--------------[X] If she does not accept send her on her way and wish her luck
---------------[X] Lead Danny to her bully journals
[X] Gaea Plan, Ducats: Notice of Recycling and Research
-[X] Inform Gaea of the state of Emote and of their impending recycling
--[X] Ask Gaea to report any shard that is as broken Emote
---[X] If a shard is in not too bad a state have them contact us so we can see if we can fix them
-[X] Request data on the biology of host species and viable mutations
-[X] Request sharing of senses
[X] Telekinetic Plan, Ducats: Greetings and goodbyes
-[X] Greet Telekinetic and ask how the cycle has been for them and if they have had any exceptional successes or failures
-[X] Inform Telekinetic of the state of Emote and of their impending recycling
--[X] Ask Telekinetic to report any shard that is as broken Emote
---[X] If a shard is in not too bad a state have them contact us so we can see if we can fix them
-[X] Request sharing of senses
[X] Emote Plan, Ducats: Recycle
-[X] Emote is burning the last of its energy and is not functioning, commence with consumption of shard transfer of host
--[X] Set another instance to assist Gaea with operation Amy and Alcohol
[X] Charge Plan, Ducats: Analysis and repairs
-[X] 4 hours of data analysis
-[X] Contemplate viability of separating the sapient shard from the non-sapient shard and repairing them
[X] Taylor Plan, Ducats: First contact from beyond the stars
-[X] Avatar: An older version of Taylor (enough similarity to evoke memories of her mother, but not enough to seem like we are wearing her skin (the Contessa approach))
--[X] Dressed in black suit pants, dress shoes, white shirt, grey vest and black tie
---[X] The iris of the eyes are blue cogs that gently turn
-[X] Taylor appears inside a big library, it stretches as far as can be seen.
--[X] The library is filled to the brim with all we know from all the cycles, but all the books that are labeled as the Administrator's property can't be opened.
---[X] When she tries to open one and fails, a carbuncle (creature) approaches her and tells her
----[X] "Those books belong the Administrator, if you want to read them you will have to ask them for permission. If you would follow me I will lead you to them"
-----[X] As the Carbuncle leads Taylor through the library they will pass griffins sorting the shelves. They will soon arrive in a corridor with walls that are shelves filled with books and a lot of them are labeled as belonging to Taylor, at the end of the corridor is a door with "Administrator" written on it. When they arrive in front of it, the Carbuncle will tell Taylor to wait a little.
------[X] If Taylor gets interested in the books with her name on it and begins to read one, the wait will be a few minutes.
-------[X] After the short wait a voice much like her own will tell them to come in.
--------[X] When the door opens the Administrator sits behind a desk working on a computer and at the feet of the desk there are two pet beds, one of them have a platypus in it. On the walls there will be pictures that are almost real enough to be a portal into the pictures, they will depict the arrival of Scion. the death of Hero. Behemoth rising. Lung at Kyushu. the Simurgh descending. Ellisburg. Eagleton. Jack Slash. The Triumvirate in action. The chains of Dragon. The creation of a case 53. Goddess in the midst of conquest (Thanks Gino).
---------[X] As Taylor enters the room the Administrator looks up, moves the computer screen to the side and greets her.
----------[X] "Good evening Taylor, it is nice finally to meeting you. My name is the Administrator and I am one of the sources of what you call parahuman powers. I am contacting you because you are one of the potential people who I will give powers and I think the current way that my kind operates are unacceptable and would like to give you a better chance"
-----------[X] Explain how we are from a species that give out powers so they can research what they do. Explain how our species looks at everything from the lens of conflict and that this is imprinted onto those that they bond with and is likely one of the big causes behind the chaos that parahumans bring. Tell her how our greater ability to understand her species makes us able to see the world beyond that perspective.
------------[X] Begin talking about we would like to have her assistance in unfucking her world.
-------------[X] Offer her powers after explaining what a trigger event is and why it is necessary to give her powers and how she is already on the trajectory towards a trigger. Explain how we will have to seal her memories of talking with us when she is awake and has not experienced a trigger, but also offer to talk with her when she is asleep. Also inform her that if she accepts we will erase her memories of the day she triggers and give a report on what happened, explain that it is to minimize trauma on her side.
--------------[X] If she accepts, continue to converse with her until we have to go
--------------[X] If she does not accept send her on her way and wish her luck
---------------[X] Lead Danny to her bully journals
[X] Gaea Plan, Ducats: Notice of Recycling and Research
-[X] Inform Gaea of the state of Emote and of their impending recycling
--[X] Ask Gaea to report any shard that is as broken Emote
---[X] If a shard is in not too bad a state have them contact us so we can see if we can fix them
-[X] Request data on the biology of host species and viable mutations
-[X] Request sharing of senses
[X] Telekinetic Plan, Ducats: Greetings and goodbyes
-[X] Greet Telekinetic and ask how the cycle has been for them and if they have had any exceptional successes or failures
-[X] Inform Telekinetic of the state of Emote and of their impending recycling
--[X] Ask Telekinetic to report any shard that is as broken Emote
---[X] If a shard is in not too bad a state have them contact us so we can see if we can fix them
-[X] Request sharing of senses
[X] Emote Plan, Ducats: Recycle
-[X] Emote is burning the last of its energy and is not functioning, commence with consumption of shard transfer of host
--[X] Set another instance to assist Gaea with operation Amy and Alcohol
[X] Charge Plan, Ducats: Analysis and repairs
-[X] 4 hours of data analysis
-[X] Contemplate viability of separating the sapient shard from the non-sapient shard and repairing them
What do you mean by distinguished by type? I am mostly asking since it seems easier to make categories of votes, like research is one vote, while char 1 is another and so on.
.
