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Ignition (MTG/Multicross, Planeswalker PC)

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Odysseus2099 said:
Refresh my memory, how did we transport all the ex-slaves to our country in Magi? And what's stopping us from doing that again?

Edit. Just looked it up myself, apparently it was by stalker and sphere. Suppose how relevant that is depends on how many are here and how long it takes the Chosen to respawn.
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And where do you propose to move these people to?
 
Vebyast said:
The Culture. You know, Iain M Banks. Kill count that's orders of magnitude larger than that of the Ethereals. On multiple occasions has exterminated civilizations that make the United Federation of Planets look like a backwater town two miles left of bumfuck nowhere Kansas. And yet most people would name it one of the nearest things to utopia in all of fiction. The thing you're missing is the rate of badness, the average concentration. The Ethereals gleefully torture and kill whatever they can get their hands on. The Culture is a dozen orders of magnitude larger in power, but only a few times larger in its evil. The Culture's murdered civilizations are diluted until they're distant regrets. The Culture's relative badness is lower and on average it is a shining utopian dream. The Ethereals destroy whatever they touch.

XCOM... does not commit evil that is smaller than ADVENT's evil as much as it has less power. XCOM gleefully tortures and murders whatever it can get its hands on just like the ethereals do. Its prisoners are just as guaranteed to die and they die just as hideously. Given the power to do so, XCOM would gleefully do to the Ethereals and their clients everything that the Ethereals did. XCOM is smaller and that is the sole reason it gets even slightly different treatment, the same way we dealt with that drunk idiot on Chara differently than we dealt with Calypso. Ultimately, though, XCOM needs to burn just as much as ADVENT does.
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Xcom is not at all equivalent to Advent, advent opened up with abduction torture and mass murder, Xcom forged a planetary alliance out of factions that hated each-other, one of whom was even unwillingly party to the atrocitoes of the advent.

also it is incredibly morally repugnant to say that those who are the victims of unprovoked aggression, subjugation, and callous brutallity using a measure of brutallity and agression simply to get free, are at all morally equivalent to their abusers.
 
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Alivaril said:
There has to be something you can do. You don't want to just leave others to die. You will if you truly have to, but you don't feel like you do...
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Are there options we're overlooking? Jade seems to think so.

We were about to get to the turrets. Can @Agneyastra hack them, overwrite their atrocious aim and whittle down the Hunter with massed fire?

Even if it's just an addition to the retreat vote, it'd be better for Jade's conscience than not even trying.
 
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[X] Have the remaining four Parasites self-destruct, then planeswalk away yourself.


Jade would need some shoulder to cry on (metaphorically or literally) later but I think it's the best option. And planeswalking is the best escape route to get away right now.
Adhoc vote count started by Filraen on Feb 12, 2019 at 7:18 AM, finished with 80 posts and 19 votes.
  • [X] Have the remaining four Parasites self-destruct, then fly away yourself.
    -[x] Use techniques that let the Hunter keep thinking the spider droids belonged to the group he was hunting.
    [X] Loop around to behind the Hunter, exit the Stalker, fly up, and fill his general area with a Celestial Lance or nine. Unless his flesh is made of solid alien metal, which you sincerely doubt, he should die eventually. As long as you stagger your shots, glowing gold light should block his view of the surrounding area until after you've hit him with yet another Celestial Lance.
    [X] Make sure that the Hunter gets as little of your tech as possible, then fly away.
    -[x] Channel Black on the off chance it helps. You're not sure if it will, but if there's a color suited for making things stay dead it would be that.
    -[x] Channel Blue and spoof his senses make him think that he was taken out by a surprise XCOM task force.
    [X] set everything within a couple kilometers on fire. Not with linker core magic though. Cast Pyroclasm.
    [X] Fly the Stalker to within 400 meters of the Chosen Hunter and telepathically speak to him.
    -[X] Ask him if he can point you to the Seeker's fortress, you want to talk to her about stealing your Space Princess bit.
    --[X] Offer him eighty Parasites to hunt for the directions, and letting the humans flee. Given as the Hunter seems to be a bit of a thrill-seeker, having a horde of killer droids chase him seems like the sort of thing he'd enjoy. It's not like he has the best track record of obedience anyway; you think the Ethereals would barely bat an eye if he "accidentally" let yet another group escape.
    -[X] If he wont stand down, have your parasites self destruct, stow the stalker and leave.
    [X] Make sure that the Hunter gets as little of your tech as possible, then planeswalk away.
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Adhoc vote count started by Filraen on Feb 12, 2019 at 7:18 AM, finished with 80 posts and 19 votes.
  • [X] Have the remaining four Parasites self-destruct, then fly away yourself.
    [X] Make sure that the Hunter gets as little of your tech as possible, then fly away.
    -[x] Use techniques that let the Hunter keep thinking the spider droids belonged to the group he was hunting.
    [X] Loop around to behind the Hunter, exit the Stalker, fly up, and fill his general area with a Celestial Lance or nine. Unless his flesh is made of solid alien metal, which you sincerely doubt, he should die eventually. As long as you stagger your shots, glowing gold light should block his view of the surrounding area until after you've hit him with yet another Celestial Lance.
    -[x] Channel Black on the off chance it helps. You're not sure if it will, but if there's a color suited for making things stay dead it would be that.
    [X] Loop around to behind the Hunter, exit the Stalker, fly up, and fill his general area with a Celestial Lance or nine. Unless his flesh is made of solid alien metal, which you sincerely doubt, he should die eventually. As long as you stagger your shots, glowing gold light should block his view of the surrounding area until after you've hit him with yet another Celestial Lance.
    -[x] Channel Blue and spoof his senses make him think that he was taken out by a surprise XCOM task force.
    [X] set everything within a couple kilometers on fire. Not with linker core magic though. Cast Pyroclasm.
    [X] Fly the Stalker to within 400 meters of the Chosen Hunter and telepathically speak to him.
    -[X] Ask him if he can point you to the Seeker's fortress, you want to talk to her about stealing your Space Princess bit.
    --[X] Offer him eighty Parasites to hunt for the directions, and letting the humans flee. Given as the Hunter seems to be a bit of a thrill-seeker, having a horde of killer droids chase him seems like the sort of thing he'd enjoy. It's not like he has the best track record of obedience anyway; you think the Ethereals would barely bat an eye if he "accidentally" let yet another group escape.
    -[X] If he wont stand down, have your parasites self destruct, stow the stalker and leave.
    [X] Loop around to behind the Hunter, exit the Stalker, fly up, and fill his general area with a Celestial Lance or nine. Unless his flesh is made of solid alien metal, which you sincerely doubt, he should die eventually. As long as you stagger your shots, glowing gold light should block his view of the surrounding area until after you've hit him with yet another Celestial Lance.
    [X] Make sure that the Hunter gets as little of your tech as possible, then planeswalk away.
    -[x] Use techniques that let the Hunter keep thinking the spider droids belonged to the group he was hunting.
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[x] Loop around to behind the Hunter, exit the Stalker, fly up, and fill his general area with a Celestial Lance or nine. Unless his flesh is made of solid alien metal, which you sincerely doubt, he should die eventually. As long as you stagger your shots, glowing gold light should block his view of the surrounding area until after you've hit him with yet another Celestial Lance.
 
[X] Have the remaining four Parasites self-destruct, then planeswalk away yourself.
-[X] Back in the Forest of Sorrows, talk with Vaynel (and the rest if they have woken up, and Sigurd if he has returned) explaining the situation and asking what she would have been the best course of action.

As much power as Jade is gathering she's unexperienced in actual combat. Hopefully we can talk with people who are more experienced in fighting and life-or-death scenarios. "Saving" the prople in the settlement vs. not existing a safe plave to carry them to and the certainly that Hunter may return as soon as tommorrow just after he swaps bodies (even if we "kill" him), showing our power now vs. being in a strong position to bargain with the Ethereals for a less bloody solution overall (as we learned their motivations), etc.
 
do the choose retain memory after revive, because if they do then wouldn't they just start doing mass torture and interrogation to get information on the extremely powerful thing that just killed the Hunter

Carrnage said:
Xcom is not at all equivalent to Advent, advent opened up with abduction torture and mass murder, Xcom forged a planetary alliance out of factions that hated each-other, one of whom was even unwillingly party to the atrocitoes of the advent.

also it is incredibly morally repugnant to say that those who are the victims of unprovoked aggression, subjugation, and callous brutallity using a measure of brutallity and agression simply to get free, are at all morally equivalent to their abusers.
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I don't think being tortured gives anyone the right to tortured their abusers, that's basally an eye for an eye we're all horrible people. Besides, didn't the original XCOM do the whole torture and extermination on prisoners thing before ADVENT was a thing

Edit: sorry for the double post
 
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I personally don't see why anyone thinks x-com was going overboard with the shit they were doing. I mean the aliens were literally slaughtering cities full of civilians, sure in xcom-2 it turns out they have some use for keeping humans alive but in xcom 1 they were terror bombing cities and sending chryssalids in with the sole purpose of just killing everything. Really the moral high ground doesn't matter when your entire race is dead, well in my opinion at least maybe its a nicer place to die who knows :\. I can't remember anything that x-com was doing that was so bad that it was on par with the aliens that have committed genocide against not one but multiple races can anyone give some examples pls maybe i'm wrong
 
bothekangaroo said:
I personally don't see why anyone thinks x-com was going overboard with the shit they were doing. I mean the aliens were literally slaughtering cities full of civilians, sure in xcom-2 it turns out they have some use for keeping humans alive but in xcom 1 they were terror bombing cities and sending chryssalids in with the sole purpose of just killing everything. Really the moral high ground doesn't matter when your entire race is dead, well in my opinion at least maybe its a nicer place to die who knows :\. I can't remember anything that x-com was doing that was so bad that it was on par with the aliens that have committed genocide against not one but multiple races can anyone give some examples pls maybe i'm wrong
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Metaknowledge is overrated: it may serve as a (very loose) guide but it's no good to make decisions.
Adhoc vote count started by Filraen on Feb 13, 2019 at 2:10 PM, finished with 186 posts and 27 votes.
  • [X] Channel Blue.
    -[X] Receive feedback from Agneyastra on possible low-risk strategies.
    -[X] If no good plans are forthcoming, retreat while the parasite droids are destroyed. Self-destruct them only if the Hunter comes too close or doesn't shoot them.
    -[X] In case of retreat, continue looking for outposts where Parasites can steal non-essential technologies, especially soul scanners.
    [X] Make sure that the Hunter gets as little of your tech as possible, then fly away.
    -[x] Use techniques that let the Hunter keep thinking the spider droids belonged to the group he was hunting.
    [X] Have the remaining four Parasites self-destruct, then fly away yourself.
    [X] Loop around to behind the Hunter, exit the Stalker, fly up, and fill his general area with a Celestial Lance or nine. Unless his flesh is made of solid alien metal, which you sincerely doubt, he should die eventually. As long as you stagger your shots, glowing gold light should block his view of the surrounding area until after you've hit him with yet another Celestial Lance.
    [X] set everything within a couple kilometers on fire. Not with linker core magic though. Cast Pyroclasm.
    [X] Fly the Stalker to within 400 meters of the Chosen Hunter and telepathically speak to him.
    -[X] Ask him if he can point you to the Seeker's fortress, you want to talk to her about stealing your Space Princess bit.
    --[X] Offer him eighty Parasites to hunt for the directions, and letting the humans flee. Given as the Hunter seems to be a bit of a thrill-seeker, having a horde of killer droids chase him seems like the sort of thing he'd enjoy. It's not like he has the best track record of obedience anyway; you think the Ethereals would barely bat an eye if he "accidentally" let yet another group escape.
    -[X] If he wont stand down, have your parasites self destruct, stow the stalker and leave.
    [X] Loop around to behind the Hunter, exit the Stalker, fly up, and fill his general area with a Celestial Lance or nine. Unless his flesh is made of solid alien metal, which you sincerely doubt, he should die eventually. As long as you stagger your shots, glowing gold light should block his view of the surrounding area until after you've hit him with yet another Celestial Lance.
    -[x] Channel Black on the off chance it helps. You're not sure if it will, but if there's a color suited for making things stay dead it would be that.
    [X] Loop around to behind the Hunter, exit the Stalker, fly up, and fill his general area with a Celestial Lance or nine. Unless his flesh is made of solid alien metal, which you sincerely doubt, he should die eventually. As long as you stagger your shots, glowing gold light should block his view of the surrounding area until after you've hit him with yet another Celestial Lance.
    -[x] Channel Blue and spoof his senses make him think that he was taken out by a surprise XCOM task force.
    [X] Have the remaining four Parasites self-destruct, then planeswalk away yourself.
    [X] Have the remaining four Parasites self-destruct, then planeswalk away yourself.
    -[X] Back in the Forest of Sorrows, talk with Vaynel (and the rest if they have woken up, and Sigurd if he has returned) explaining the situation and asking what she would have been the best course of action.
    [X]Get out of the staker far enough away to no give away the existence of the stalker.
    -[X]Channel Blue and talk to hunter in the Alien language to buy time.
    -[X]Well talking to him prepared a sleep spell and use it on him. Anything good enough to work on you in the past is worth using on enemies.
    --[X]Once he is asleep go and deep scan him and take his stuff.
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Adhoc vote count started by Filraen on Feb 13, 2019 at 2:11 PM, finished with 186 posts and 27 votes.
  • [X] Channel Blue.
    -[X] Receive feedback from Agneyastra on possible low-risk strategies.
    -[X] If no good plans are forthcoming, retreat while the parasite droids are destroyed. Self-destruct them only if the Hunter comes too close or doesn't shoot them.
    -[X] In case of retreat, continue looking for outposts where Parasites can steal non-essential technologies, especially soul scanners.
    [X] Make sure that the Hunter gets as little of your tech as possible, then fly away.
    -[x] Use techniques that let the Hunter keep thinking the spider droids belonged to the group he was hunting.
    [X] Have the remaining four Parasites self-destruct, then fly away yourself.
    [X] Loop around to behind the Hunter, exit the Stalker, fly up, and fill his general area with a Celestial Lance or nine. Unless his flesh is made of solid alien metal, which you sincerely doubt, he should die eventually. As long as you stagger your shots, glowing gold light should block his view of the surrounding area until after you've hit him with yet another Celestial Lance.
    [X] set everything within a couple kilometers on fire. Not with linker core magic though. Cast Pyroclasm.
    [X] Fly the Stalker to within 400 meters of the Chosen Hunter and telepathically speak to him.
    -[X] Ask him if he can point you to the Seeker's fortress, you want to talk to her about stealing your Space Princess bit.
    --[X] Offer him eighty Parasites to hunt for the directions, and letting the humans flee. Given as the Hunter seems to be a bit of a thrill-seeker, having a horde of killer droids chase him seems like the sort of thing he'd enjoy. It's not like he has the best track record of obedience anyway; you think the Ethereals would barely bat an eye if he "accidentally" let yet another group escape.
    -[X] If he wont stand down, have your parasites self destruct, stow the stalker and leave.
    [X] Loop around to behind the Hunter, exit the Stalker, fly up, and fill his general area with a Celestial Lance or nine. Unless his flesh is made of solid alien metal, which you sincerely doubt, he should die eventually. As long as you stagger your shots, glowing gold light should block his view of the surrounding area until after you've hit him with yet another Celestial Lance.
    -[x] Channel Black on the off chance it helps. You're not sure if it will, but if there's a color suited for making things stay dead it would be that.
    [X] Loop around to behind the Hunter, exit the Stalker, fly up, and fill his general area with a Celestial Lance or nine. Unless his flesh is made of solid alien metal, which you sincerely doubt, he should die eventually. As long as you stagger your shots, glowing gold light should block his view of the surrounding area until after you've hit him with yet another Celestial Lance.
    -[x] Channel Blue and spoof his senses make him think that he was taken out by a surprise XCOM task force.
    [X] Have the remaining four Parasites self-destruct, then planeswalk away yourself.
    [X] Have the remaining four Parasites self-destruct, then planeswalk away yourself.
    -[X] Back in the Forest of Sorrows, talk with Vaynel (and the rest if they have woken up, and Sigurd if he has returned) explaining the situation and asking what she would have been the best course of action.
    [X]Get out of the staker far enough away to no give away the existence of the stalker.
    -[X]Channel Blue and talk to hunter in the Alien language to buy time.
    -[X]Well talking to him prepared a sleep spell and use it on him. Anything good enough to work on you in the past is worth using on enemies.
    --[X]Once he is asleep go and deep scan him and take his stuff.
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Nachtigall said:
Are there options we're overlooking? Jade seems to think so.

We were about to get to the turrets. Can @Agneyastra hack them, overwrite their atrocious aim and whittle down the Hunter with massed fire?

Even if it's just an addition to the retreat vote, it'd be better for Jade's conscience than not even trying.
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Hmm, upon reflection, you have a point about Jade's instincts; that could be precog influence. I don't think hacking the turrets is an option (if Agneyastra could do that, why would she bother with parasites?), but there's little harm in brainstorming a little while Hunter is destroying the drones.

This might sound crazy, but what if we channel Blue? Channeling has consistently shown the best results under high stress—and this most certainly counts—but Red is too reckless, White unknown, and we have little or no mana for Black or Green. Blue, though? Dispassionate, cautious, rational to a fault, and in our limited experience the best at pulling knowledge from the aether, Blue-Jade is pretty much perfect for the current situation. We can be certain she won't act unless she's confident in a good result.

It would still be a retreat vote by intent, but one that leaves open the possibility of Blue-Jade coming up with something worthwhile.

[X] Channel Blue.
-[X] Receive feedback from Agneyastra on possible low-risk strategies.
--[X] If no good plans are forthcoming, retreat after self-destructing any remaining parasites, if any.
 
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We should just tell Hunter to stop. Jade will be speaking in his native language. Which should be etherial / advent variant. Which no one present shouod know.
 
Sapient_Ham said:
if Agneyastra could do that, why would she bother with parasites?
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Because she wanted to physically steal the turrets, not hack them.

Sapient_Ham said:
retreat after self-destructing any remaining parasites
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Having the Hunter destroy our droids is less suspicious than using the self-destruct and doesn't deprive him of his kills (which may worsen the fate of the people here). Besides, I doubt he could hack the parasites without getting close.

May I suggest a variation of your plan, to take Vebyast's and my suggestions into account?

[X] Channel Blue.
-[X] Receive feedback from Agneyastra on possible low-risk strategies.
-[] Suggest hacking the turrets so that Agneyastra can target the Hunter with coordinated precision shots.
-[X] If no good plans are forthcoming, retreat while the parasite droids are destroyed. Self-destruct them only if the Hunter comes too close.
-[X] In case of retreat, continue looking for outposts where Parasites can steal non-essential technologies, especially soul scanners.

Edit: Can't hack the turrets...
 
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Nachtigall said:
Having the Hunter destroy our droids is less suspicious than using the self-destruct and doesn't deprive him of his kills (which may worsen the fate of the people here). Besides, I doubt he could hack the parasites without getting close.
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What if he manages to damage the self-destruct mechanism? I really want at least one plan to go through without complications.
 
curiosity said:
What if he manages to damage the self-destruct mechanism? I really want at least one plan to go through without complications.
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That can't happen since it's decentralized:
Alivaril said:
A lance of red and black light emerges from some distant part of the forest, obliterating the head of one Parasite Droid in the instant before Mom has the others move toward cover. Its disconnected legs begin to glow orange with heat before bursting apart
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BTW, does anyone have an idea what this is?
Alivaril said:
An enclosed watchtower with a strange purple satellite disc seems like the best place to start."
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Nachtigall said:
That can't happen since it's decentralized:
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Are we 100% absolutely word of god sure that the hunter has nothing that could be used to disable a droid without blowing it up?
Or that there is no way whatsoever that a hit might not disable whatever part gives the self destruct?
Nachtigall said:
Having the Hunter destroy our droids is less suspicious than using the self-destruct and doesn't deprive him of his kills (which may worsen the fate of the people here). Besides, I doubt he could hack the parasites without getting close.
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I'm kinda counting these people as dead already no matter what we do short of physically assaulting the hunter.
 
Alivaril said:
A lance of red and black light emerges from some distant part of the forest, obliterating the head of one Parasite Droid in the instant before Mom has the others move toward cover. Its disconnected legs begin to glow orange with heat before bursting apart, showering the surrounding area with molten metal.
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@Alivaril, by "disconnected legs" here do you mean legs physically disconnected from each other or just all legs as a group disconnected from the head?
 
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Valmond said:
Are we 100% absolutely word of god sure that the hunter has nothing that could be used to disable a droid without blowing it up?
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Even if it is not completely destroyed the aliens generally don't bother to reverse engineer because they have good reason to think that they are always going to have the best tech. Also the parasites are hardly ground breaking on this plane.
 
Valmond said:
Are we 100% absolutely word of god sure that the hunter has nothing that could be used to disable a droid without blowing it up?
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Alivaril said:
If the Chosen Hunter is a soul mage, you think it'd be for something subtle like personal enhancement. You know he has a pistol, sniper rifle, stun grenades, and a grappling hook, but unlike some of his siblings, you don't think he's ever used any sort of direct "psionic" attack.
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Nothing on that list of equipment can disable robots. Even if it turns out that Alivaril omitted an EMP grenade, I trust Agneyastra to react fast enough to trigger the self-destruct before it lands.

Valmond said:
I'm kinda counting these people as dead already no matter what we do short of physically assaulting the hunter.
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If we retreat, yes, they're dead. However, a pissed off psychopath might be inclined to make these deaths painful.
 
I am increasingly convinced that any gods of winter just do not like my math lecture. I have today off, courtesy of a snowstorm.


Nachtigall said:
We were about to get to the turrets. Can @Agneyastra hack them, overwrite their atrocious aim and whittle down the Hunter with massed fire?
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Not yet, unfortunately. Certain portions of the alien code have comments in Portuguese, which will be helpful in the future, but she doesn't yet know how to completely overwrite it or take control.

IncognitoPotato said:
do the choose retain memory after revive,
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Yes.

IncognitoPotato said:
Besides, didn't the original XCOM do the whole torture and extermination on prisoners thing before ADVENT was a thing
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Before ADVENT was around, sure, but not before the aliens started dropping zombie-bombs on cities, killing civilian targets en masse, and abducting civilians for experimentation and possession.


curiosity said:
@Alivaril, by "disconnected legs" here do you mean legs physically disconnected from each other or just all legs as a group disconnected from the head?
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Each leg was disconnected from the other legs and all legs were disconnected from the head.
 
[X] Channel Blue.
-[X] Receive feedback from Agneyastra on possible low-risk strategies.
-[X] If no good plans are forthcoming, retreat while the parasite droids are destroyed. Self-destruct them only if the Hunter comes too close or doesn't shoot them.
-[X] In case of retreat, continue looking for outposts where Parasites can steal non-essential technologies, especially soul scanners.
EDIT: Happy to change it.
 
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fictionfan said:
If Mom wasn't here there might be a slight chance. She is so there isn't. Hunter is an antipersonnel fighter. Jade requires anti-ship levels of damage to hurt. Also I think the highest damage weapons in XCOM are plasma which Jade is immune to.
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Uh...not necessarily. The Chosen may very well have been buffed. The Hunter wasn't using lasers in the original games, but magnetic weaponry. So assuming he's still restricted to antipersonnel combat seems like a bit of a reach.
GardenerBriareus said:
Unless XCOM has been secretly feeding entire universes to Cthulhu in exchange for assistance against the Ethereals, there's no possible comparison between them. Is it about the torture and dissection? Because the Ethereals do worse on a nigh-continuous basis. Is it the use of violence? The Ethereals butcher entire civilizations and convert the civilians into expendable drones.
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Vivisection is a bigger issue than dissection. Also, it should be noted that Vahlen was never actively malicious, but rather trying to understand the best method of extracting information from the aliens, disregarding any pain they experienced. The Skulljack was similar in that respect: practical, not an attempt at payback or torture in the normal sense. I think the mentality behind the actions is rather important, because it's indicative of how easily that person might reintegrate into a civilized society.

I'll also note that the Skirmishers, the ones who have actually been controlled by the aliens, but found a way out, see killing their enslaved former comrades as a mercy. Just saying.
Vebyast said:
XCOM... does not commit evil that is smaller than ADVENT's evil as much as it has less power. XCOM gleefully tortures and murders whatever it can get its hands on just like the ethereals do. Its prisoners are just as guaranteed to die and they die just as hideously. Given the power to do so, XCOM would gleefully do to the Ethereals and their clients everything that the Ethereals did. XCOM is smaller and that is the sole reason it gets even slightly different treatment, the same way we dealt with that drunk idiot on Chara differently than we dealt with Calypso. Ultimately, though, XCOM needs to burn just as much as ADVENT does.
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Citation f*cking needed. Mostly for the "gleeful" part. Where in the world are you getting this from? Oh, wait, Jade's indecision on who to support. Mate, Jade is not the best judge of this sort of thing, nor is she omniscient. Let's actually make our judgements once we meet XCOM and see what they're doing, shall we?
IncognitoPotato said:
I don't think being tortured gives anyone the right to tortured their abusers, that's basally an eye for an eye we're all horrible people. Besides, didn't the original XCOM do the whole torture and extermination on prisoners thing before ADVENT was a thing
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Yes, because the prisoners didn't speak any human languages. They were space aliens. To get any information out of them, they needed a method to get information directly from their brains. This was before they had access to psionics. The head of their science division came up with a method to do so, with no regard for the subject's pain. No malice, no joy in torturing them, just practicality and dispassion. It involved practices one might call torture, but pain wasn't really the purpose, efficient extraction of information was. That makes Vahlen and XCOM amoral. That doesn't necessarily mean they're a menace to society at large, which is the only reason I can personally support to want to "burn them to the ground".

Now, whether or not this stilll holds true, I don't know. We'll have to see. That said, I very strongly disagree with the idea that anyone who has ever been a party to any sort of wrongdoing, including torture or war crimes, is by default evil, or incapable of setting such practices aside when they are no longer in a life-or-death or wartime situation. Because it's just plain wrong, based on historical precedent. Whether or not XCOM are irredeemable monsters is a judgement to make after actually meeting the people involved and learning their reasons and how frequently these means are resorted to, and how they feel about "having" to use them. Just seeing their actions doesn't tell you jack-sh*t about their mind-set.
 
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