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Magical Girl Escalation Taylor (Worm/Nanoha)

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LancerisDead said:
The issue isn't what will the people who get Guardian Beasts will do, but what the people already in power will do.
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You mean offer them jobs in the police as a measure of drowning out parahuman violence? It's a funny thing, but most people don't want to be criminals, (or heroes for that matter) and would happily take a stable job with minimal chance of violence. Bonuses when the purpose of stabilizing their societies. People like purpose and stability. (not sure why the last one sometimes, but they generally do)
landcollector said:
Registration Acts sound okay *in theory*, but given the recent (IRL anyway) example of that in popular culture is the whole debacle of a story line that was Marvel's Civil War, I am predisposed to look negatively at such things. *shrug*
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Marvels civil war was a massive series of dues ex idiot. While generally I agree that registration acts are a bad idea which only leads to problems, popular culture wildly exagerates everything. Over thousands of registration acts across the globe, only the Nazi's and commies ever went to comic book levels of "this is a really bad idea".
 
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RoninSword said:
Will the vials even do anything with Edens corpse destroyed?
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Would the QM have given them to us and suggest we give to somebody when they would do nothing? Well, maybe. Just for the heck of it. I expect that they'll work exactly as before, though, as the shard providing the power was scattered long before Eden crashed. Eden just held onto the control shards. Drinking the vials gives you a connection to an existing power shard.
 
Solusandra said:
You mean offer them jobs in the police as a measure of drowning out parahuman violence? It's a funny thing, but most people don't want to be criminals, (or heroes for that matter) and would happily take a stable job with minimal chance of violence. Bonuses when the purpose of stabilizing their societies. People like purpose and stability. (not sure why the last one sometimes, but they generally do)
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I meant "recruit them as military", because forget parahumans, the second GBs are everywhere you create an arms race. Some places will fall to the anarchic chaos that multiple individuals having violently overprotective/murderous bodyguards will cause, others will establish a state crackdown on freedom, because that amount of firepower in the hands of randomly selected civilians simply cannot be allowed. then, they will recruit said fighters, because obviously, the rest of the world has the same idea and will attempt to attack them with their new amoral combat engines.

Basically, people do want order and stability, and violently shaking the paradigm as you propose to do will inevitably lead to major societal upheaval, as human history attests . Don't point to the last 70 years of relatively minor global conflicts, in our world even, not the theoretical death world that is Earth-Bet, as vallid evidence that everything can be resolved with peace and talking. Humans have been going to war with each other ever since the dawn of history and for pretty much every reason under the sun.

The only reason parahumans manage to function so well in earth-bet society as they do was because of the concerted efforts of Cauldron, a shadowy organization with infinite amounts of money, influence, and a precog who always knew the right choice to take. And they still got two entire continents in a state of never-ending warfare.
 
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Lab_Accident said:
Some places will fall to the anarchic chaos that multiple individuals having violently overprotective/murderous bodyguards will cause,
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Most of the places where this might possibly maybe be a problem, are already in anarchic chaos.
Lab_Accident said:
others will establish a state crackdown on freedom,
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How? As your arms race comment from above suggests, the new beasts and their masters would be a serious power to be reckoned with.
Lab_Accident said:
because that amount of firepower in the hands of randomly selected civilians simply cannot be allowed.
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Which is why the Americans put the firepower as a precondition of the society. So this foolishness would be long forestalled.
Lab_Accident said:
Basically, people do want order and stability, and violently shaking the paradigm as you propose to do will inevitably lead to major societal upheaval, as human history attests . Don't point to the last 70 years of relatively minor global conflicts, in our world even, not the theoretical death world that is Earth-Bet, as vallid evidence that everything can be resolved with peace and talking.
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Violence can be curtailed by shared business interests where its more expensive to war and take than it is to simply be part of a massive active trade network.
All talking ever accomplished was the guy with the big stick getting his way and unless the guy with the big stick wants peaceful discourse, everybody on equal footing getting red in the face or drawing swords.
Hmm...I may just have hurt my own argument. Possibly.
Lab_Accident said:
The only reason parahumans manage to function so well in earth-bet society as they do was because of the concerted efforts of Cauldron, a shadowy organization with infinite amounts of money, influence, and a precog who always knew the right choice to take. And they still got two entire continents in a state of never-ending warfare.
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Handing out powers in mass to people who they judged to be stable.
 
[X] Take a job at DragonTech – His contributions to society have a minimal likelihood of being connected to him, but he gets Dragon's protection if anything goes wrong with his tech.
 
Solusandra said:
How? As your arms race comment from above suggests, the new beasts and their masters would be a serious power to be reckoned with.
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Through declaring martial law, closing all roads, seizing vital assets such as food resources, water and electricity supplies, gasoline, bunkering the hell down, and judiciously carpet-bombing any areas that threaten to make trouble. The people could still rise up and topple said governments with their GBs, but that leads to anarchic chaos, as above.

Solusandra said:
Which is why the Americans put the firepower as a precondition of the society. So this foolishness would be long forestalled.
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Yup, the Americans. The nation with the most permissive gun ownership laws of everywhere in the planet. In certain parts of Europe, even police don't carry fire arms, that's how tightly controlled guns are. So your argument doesn't really fly anywhere except America. And that happens because historically, America as a nation was born when firearms were already a thing, and the american "firepower as a precondition of society" ideal works because fire arms are the great equalizer. Anyone can use a gun, and everyone is basically about as dangerous with a gun as the next person. If you allow everyone to have one, an equilibrium is reached. Not so with magic. Not so with GBs. The scales are tipped. The carefully even distribution of force needed for "armed peace" to work is broken. While theoretically, anyone off the streets could have a GB, minimal observation could reveal whether the person actually had one or not. Paradoxically, GBs are not as good deterrents as guns.

Solusandra said:
Handing out powers in mass to people who they judged to be stable.
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Which did not work out so well. I'm not even gonna say "Siberian", that was an accident on their part. But Grey Boy, Coil, the Ambassadors, heck, even Eidolon and his Endbringers. "Stable" does not mean "willing to cooperate with normal society when in possession of overwhelming power". What, if you had a superpowerful creature as your pet, who would listen to your every order, would you still get up early for a 9-5 job?
 
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Solusandra said:
You mean offer them jobs in the police as a measure of drowning out parahuman violence? It's a funny thing, but most people don't want to be criminals, (or heroes for that matter) and would happily take a stable job with minimal chance of violence. Bonuses when the purpose of stabilizing their societies. People like purpose and stability. (not sure why the last one sometimes, but they generally do)
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Solusandra said:
Most of the places where this might possibly maybe be a problem, are already in anarchic chaos.

How? As your arms race comment from above suggests, the new beasts and their masters would be a serious power to be reckoned with.

Which is why the Americans put the firepower as a precondition of the society. So this foolishness would be long forestalled.

Violence can be curtailed by shared business interests where its more expensive to war and take than it is to simply be part of a massive active trade network.
All talking ever accomplished was the guy with the big stick getting his way and unless the guy with the big stick wants peaceful discourse, everybody on equal footing getting red in the face or drawing swords.
Hmm...I may just have hurt my own argument. Possibly.

Handing out powers in mass to people who they judged to be stable.
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And why, oh why do you think the people that benefit from the fucked-up parahuman society will just let this fly? Or even, why do you think that they won't try and co-opt magic?

Because there's nothing preventing the Accords and Elites of the word to go to someone with Gear GB, point a gun at their loved ones and say "Now you work for me".

Again, magic ain't going to make the corruption disappear, more like exacerbate the already pre-existing power inbalance.
 
LancerisDead said:
And why, oh why do you think the people that benefit from the fucked-up parahuman society will just let this fly? Or even, why do you think that they won't try and co-opt magic?

Because there's nothing preventing the Accords and Elites of the word to go to someone with Gear GB, point a gun at their loved ones and say "Now you work for me".

Again, magic ain't going to make the corruption disappear, more like exacerbate the already pre-existing power inbalance.
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Not everywhere, and not with everyone. Normal people would have a much better chance of fighting off supervillains with GBs around. but yeah, I can see Accord doing that.

The fact they have standardized powers, look mostly human, are much cheaper to obtain then Cauldron Capes, and can make easily repairable tinkertech for his normal forces, would make Accord a big fan of GBs and magic in general. And Accord in particular, with his bullshit thinker power, is in a position to survive and thrive in a rapidly-changing society.
 
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Lab_Accident said:
What, if you had a superpowerful creature as your pet, who would listen to your every order, would you still get up early for a 9-5 job?
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Yes, and I'd be making bank in either security or construction. Personally I'd favor construction, unless I was a gadget. Then I'd want a computer job. I'm a hobbiest with computer programs, but no where near a pro. :cry:
LancerisDead said:
Because there's nothing preventing the Accords and Elites of the word to go to someone with Gear GB, point a gun at their loved ones and say "Now you work for me".
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WHen the gear pulls out a laser gun, raises his bullet fucking barrier jacket and kills them instead, you have one less unstable asshole in the world and a gear who's just as happy to go about his business as he was before the threat. Gears will be the least vulnerable, they make the devices all the new magi will be needing.
 
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Solusandra said:
WHen the gear pulls out a laser gun, raises his bullet fucking barrier jacket and kills them instead, you have one less unstable asshole in the world and a gear who's just as happy to go about his business as he was before the threat. Gears will be the least vulnerable, they make the devices all the new magi will be needing.
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Given the "GB dies when the mage gets ganked" caveat will be discovered sooner or later in your supposed "Let's make as many mages as possible to upend the system" future, Gear GBs are actually more vulnerable than most due to the relative squishiness of their Gadget mages.
 
landcollector said:
Given the "GB dies when the mage gets ganked" caveat will be discovered sooner or later in your supposed "Let's make as many mages as possible to upend the system" future, Gear GBs are actually more vulnerable than most due to the relative squishiness of their Gadget mages.
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Rando gear beasts can made devices, which means gears'll have barrier jackets the first. Much less squishy.
 
Part of me really wants to continue this debate, but I know I'm not up to it now, so I'm going to really try to stay out of it. I don't expect to succeed at stopping myself, but I am trying. Too much of this debate revolves around the differences between Earth Bet and our meatspace for the argument to be winnable at all, and the full theory would be so large a derail of the thread as to invoke moderator carpet banning.*

*More like warnings to stop it, I just liked phrasing it that way after whoever's comment about carpet bombing the opposition.

One of my favorite quotes that is a bit relevant: The oppressed do not yearn to be free. They yearn to become the oppressors.
 
Something we really should bring up with Alexandria: We now have enough mages capable of casting recursion field to drag an Endbringer in. As shown in canon, once you don't have to worry about collateral damage, parahuman powers can get seriously freaky... though admittedly, that's not saying much given Nanoha mages' tendency to get just as freaky, and for largely the same reason. I doubt Breaker tier spells would get used much without RF.

Of course, the caveat to that is that the Endbringer can break out by killing the mages who cast the spell, and Tim and his pretties are pretty squishy by Endbringer standards. If we decide to use those three to cast the spell(or just the familiars, as taking Leviathan away from him falls very much in the 'defend your maker' GB rulebook), their next step should be to fly to the edges of the field and hide.

A big plus to using RF is finally getting to throw a Ragnarok or three, while Teana uses Starlight Breaker and whoever is with her fires what they can. If you can't solve a problem with more dakka, you are obviously not using enough dakka.
 
I could easily be wrong with this, but considering it took even Scion a few shots to down the EB's, A ragnaroc or three is only going to be enough to force normal retreat. And unleashed paras or not, do you REALLY wanna be trapped in a pocket dimension with an EB? Even if they stay in sandbag mode?

I mean, we'll probably need to do it, just because it's not obvious IC that it wouldn't work and we still need a proof of concept to get on with the spacelaunch plan, but still.
 
Solusandra said:
I could easily be wrong with this, but considering it took even Scion a few shots to down the EB's, A ragnaroc or three is only going to be enough to force normal retreat. And unleashed paras or not, do you REALLY wanna be trapped in a pocket dimension with an EB? Even if they stay in sandbag mode?

I mean, we'll probably need to do it, just because it's not obvious IC that it wouldn't work and we still need a proof of concept to get on with the spacelaunch plan, but still.
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SW has said that one Ragnarok won't kill an Endbringer. SW has also said, I believe, that enough of them could. 5 Ragnarok's would cause us to drop dead, but two or three combined with other mages throwing more breaker tier attacks and a sealed environment that prevents the Endbringer from retreating could be enough even without an Arc-en-ciel. A weapon which we currently do not know whether the TSAB ship has, nor do we know what kind of repairs the ship still needs to get space worthy, much less how safe it would be for a ship that knows about the dimensional dislocation to enter Earth Bet's cluster....

Well, short answer is likely that we won't have a real chance of killing Leviathan or Behemoth no matter which one shows up next. I do wonder how much Leviathan being in an enclosed space like RF would affect his hydrokinesis. In canon, he pushed a lot of water up into the air to fall during his attack and keep him well armed. Then again, we've never seen Leviathan acting at full strength. Even in Golden Morning, most of his power was little more than a distraction against Zion.

RoninSword said:
The other caveat is that Behemoth would likely take the Ragnarok, and use its energy to kill all those involved.
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The second one, yes. The first one has the element of surprise, and might disorient him enough for another blast.

aceraptor said:
Teleporting the Endbringers to orbit would be best. Have to wonder if Teana's ship has a Arc en Ciel installed.
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And there's the rub. The only way it would be equipped with that gun already would be as a precaution against "monsters attacking cities and driving people insane" is the essence of the message that pushed them to accelerate deployment of the ship and first contact protocols for Earth bet. Protocols that turned out to be less called for with how divided Earth Bet is.
 
Uh guys.
The whole magic proliferation argument is missing one key factor: The uplift is not random. Please stop treating it like it is being given out to everyone.

Whats the difference between parahuman powers and magical uplift here?
Parahuman powers:
-Powers specifically go to the most unstable members of society at the moment they are most likely to misuse them due to Trigger events.
-Conflict drive limits parahuman ability to cooperate to relatively small groups before cumulative dysfunctions tear up the group. Unique powers renders cooperation and coordination difficult.

Magic:
-Linker core scanning is focused on already vetted law enforcement agents who can probably expect a pay raise out of this.
-Mages below natural A-ranks are highly limited in their personal capabilities, and rely on cooperation to succeed. PRT members are already experienced in cooperation.


Fundamentally the parahuman power distribution method has a natural terminus of many warring states, while the magic power distribution method has a natural terminus similar to the Iron Age transition. Whoever gets the power first is able to use it to accumulate institutional power and first mover advantage more effectively.

Remember while Linker Core distribution is random, availability of scanning, devices and training in their usage is not random.
Yes, they will leak to the general public eventually.

Good thing law enforcement has them first eh?


Wyrd said:
And there's the rub. The only way it would be equipped with that gun already would be as a precaution against "monsters attacking cities and driving people insane" is the essence of the message that pushed them to accelerate deployment of the ship and first contact protocols for Earth bet. Protocols that turned out to be less called for with how divided Earth Bet is.
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Its pretty much standard capital ship armament for the TSAB. Its there because a dimensional rupture cannon is known to stop most Lost Logia, and as such theres no scenario for knowing you need it ahead of time on an explorer.
 
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