I'm not sure I buy it. This is a REALLY hopeful mindset for a witch, which...doesn't work.

Witches also can't self-terminate. Not even Homulilly, technically.
I really don't see what's so out of character for a witch to attempt that. Especially if the witch is after something that can't be given by her barrier.

Madoka's witch tries to create heaven after all. She pulls everyone and everything into that false heaven by force and makes that idea into a curse upon the world, but she is trying to make everything better.

Homulilly tries to save Madoka. The only time we see her she does it by attempting suicide, but her goal in it all is to save the person she cares about.

Oktavia is trying to hear Kyousuke play one last time. To do it she locks herself in a box with a soul destroying orchestra, but even she has something she's hoping for.

Walpurgisnacht here is trying to orchestrate her salvation, but she'll also be a calamity upon humanity to do it. Reading her poem --- linked for new folks --- she ignores the suffering of others by saying its all a play and overrides their wills by saying its all part of a script and that the story must not change.

Everything else? If Rebellion and the concept movie are her plans too? That all comes only after she herself has been saved. And those too both require enormous suffering in order to proceed where another way forward might not.

Walpurgisnacht is also the strongest witch, and a union of many witches all over the world, who have joined forces and come together as a single being. For such a thing to happen would require a singularly strong purpose that would resonate with many different witches and I think dewitching, orchestrating their own salvation, provides the strongest and most resonant possible reason for that to happen. Something that could well resonate with any witch, regardless of background.

----------

As to "cannot self terminate" I think the hypothesis works without that --- certainly it's a point of evidence, but it's a thing that follows from the idea, rather than underlying it --- but weren't you the one who noted that at the end of one of the games Homura witches out after she wins and, rather than hatching, her grief seed just crushes itself?


The progress we've made with imparting positive emotions into Clear Seeds should be sufficient to convince Airi that there is a future path to dewitching, and that Sabrina is dedicated to that goal.

More importantly, we've already left Airi to stew for longer than I'd consider optimal - continuing to put the conversation off isn't going to do her mental state any favours.
Honestly, I don't believe it will be enough on it's own.

I can see her response being:

"Okay, that's a neat parlor trick but what are you even trying to pull here? Can I talk with her? Can I see her again? Without those things, this is just jewelry."

Which is why I wanted to aim for something more concrete tonight.

I think just honestly talking with her and sketching out plans will help, but any good it will do will happen regardless of the progress we've made so far.
 
That's... not really possible? Not unless we make a major breakthrough while in timestop, anyway, and that's unlikely enough that we shouldn't bank on it.
We shouldn't bank on it no, and if it fails then we simply have to count on the game plan of explaining the situation and various caveats to Anri, but I think we should at least try to get something concrete tonight.

I put the note with Homura tonight in the schedule write up for exactly that reason.
 
Honestly, I don't believe it will be enough on it's own.

I can see her response being:

"Okay, that's a neat parlor trick but what are you even trying to pull here? Can I talk with her? Can I see her again? Without those things, this is just jewelry."

Anri sees herself as the center of the universe; as a protagonist; leastways that's what I remember from the Asunaro arc. If we give her what we've got and a line involving one of the hypotheses about how magic from someone special (to the person) is probably a good idea and how this has never been done before she'll eat the whole thing up.

Obviously I can't give that 100% confidence, but this kind of reaching parlor trick that requires a bunch of effort to work is exactly what the type she's been called would go for, as I understand it.

And I mean... She's witchbombed. The point of this is so that she can see this person again.

... Ah, right, she's being held with antimagic and she's obsessive. Hm... maybe that does complicate things? I'd kind of assumed we were going to get her to do the manual labor of pushing a shitton of magic into a clear seed.
 
Last edited:
WPN is also a witch with no barrier. Barriers, notably, contain the desires that hold the witch in place, even as they contain their despair. Which implies to me that she's after something that no possible delusion can offer her. After all, if it was just a matter of power, then that wouldn't stop her from making figments to her desires.

As to what that could be? Well, if everything is going according to her plan the entire time then I think WPN is trying to dewitch herself by using Madoka and Homura to do so.

If all Walpurgisnacht wanted was to be human again, I'm certain she would just delude herself into thinking it was so.

Like -- fundamentally, I think it's a mistake to view Witches as lucid beings. Witches suffer horribly, but their suffering is as much delusional and solipsistic as it is depressive and apathetic. That's why Witches are able to act as active agents at all, rather than just going catatonic and wallowing while they rationally reflect on how horrible their lives are.

Witches are very human in that regard, actually. Just like humans, they're fundamentally not psychologically equipped to face the scope of their suffering head on. They can't acknowledge all of the things they don't have and all of the wants left unfulfilled.

And they cope just like humans do, too: they cope by ignoring the little things, and, if necessary, lying about the big things. That's fundamentally what Barriers are, I think: the protective self-delusions of a Witch given physical, psychodramatic form. Everything is fine. You're fine. You have everything. You have everyone. Everyone loves you. You're not alone.

Homulily almost certainly was not special for tricking herself into thinking she was human, or for using force to get what she wanted. Witches are violent not just because their deluded perceptions conflict with human reality, but also because they have a need to confirm their personal narratives. Witches have to prove to themselves that their self-delusions are true, at all costs, at all times, because to do otherwise would be to doubt, and thus, to face up to the depths of their suffering.

If Walpurgisnacht doesn't have a Barrier, I doubt it's because she can't just wirehead herself with a private reality -- I think it's because she's strong enough to unilaterally confirm her self-delusions and personal narratives. She can forcibly snuff out all threats to her ego and eliminate those possibilities that contradict her worldview, even in an open, 'public' reality.

Walpurgisnacht doesn't need a private Barrier, because she can make the world into her Barrier.
 
Last edited:
If all Walpurgisnacht wanted was to be human again, I'm certain she would just delude herself into thinking it was so.

Like -- fundamentally, I think it's a mistake to view Witches as lucid beings. Witches suffer horribly, but their suffering is as much delusional and solipsistic as it is depressive and apathetic. That's why Witches are able to act as active agents at all, rather than just going catatonic and wallowing while they rationally reflect on how horrible their lives are.

Witches are very human in that regard, actually. Just like humans, they're fundamentally not psychologically equipped to face the scope of their suffering head on. They can't acknowledge all of the things they don't have and all of the wants left unfulfilled.

And they cope just like humans do, too: they cope by ignoring the little things, and, if necessary, lying about the big things. That's fundamentally what Barriers are, I think: the protective self-delusions of a Witch given physical, psychodramatic form. Everything is fine. You're fine. You have everything. You have everyone. Everyone loves you. You're not alone.

Homulily almost certainly was not special for tricking herself into thinking she was human, or for using force to get what she wanted. Witches are violent not just because their deluded perceptions conflict with human reality, but also because they have a need to confirm their personal narratives. Witches have to prove to themselves that their self-delusions are true, at all costs, at all times, because to do otherwise would be to doubt, and thus, to face up to the depths of their suffering.

If Walpurgisnacht doesn't have a Barrier, I doubt it's because she can't just wirehead herself with a private reality -- I think it's because she's strong enough to unilaterally confirm her self-delusions and personal narratives. She can forcibly snuff out all threats to her ego and eliminate those possibilities that contradict her worldview, even in an open, 'public' reality.

Walpurgisnacht doesn't need a private Barrier, because she can make the world into her Barrier.

That's pretty much exactly right.
 
Homulily almost certainly was not special for tricking herself into thinking she was human, or for using force to get what she wanted. Witches are violent not just because their deluded perceptions conflict with human reality, but also because they have a need to confirm their personal narratives. Witches have to prove to themselves that their self-delusions are true, at all costs, at all times, because to do otherwise would be to doubt, and thus, to face up to the depths of their suffering.

If Walpurgisnacht doesn't have a Barrier, I doubt it's because she can't just wirehead herself with a private reality -- I think it's because she's strong enough to unilaterally confirm her self-delusions and personal narratives. She can forcibly snuff out all threats to her ego and eliminate those possibilities that contradict her worldview, even in an open, 'public' reality.

Walpurgisnacht doesn't need a private Barrier, because she can make the world into her Barrier.

Agree with everything except for the last part.

Firstly, Homulily is almost certainly unique, both in circumstances of birth and her worldview.

One thing that everyone seems to forget is that by the beginning of the Movie, her Witch hasn't hatched yet.

And it still hasn't hatched by the end. Her Soul Gem hasn't transformed into a Grief Seed. It did transform into some weird crown thingy in the end but that's neither here nor there.

Homura through all the movie remains in a borderline state, not because she deludes herself, but because she is actively deceived. Her Barrier doesn't act like a safety cushion and instead kinda passively-aggressively pushes evidence into Homu's face. "Look out, you are not human anymore, can we get on with your suffering already?" is what I got from watching the bleeps in the imaginary Mitakihara's cityscape and reading the runes' translations.

Once she acquires relative lucidity and understanding of her current situation, she gets right into that endlessly suffering part, with an added bonus of somehow achieving even further suffering in spite of being saved by Madoka.

Secondly, yes, Walpurgisnacht not having a Barrier could mean she's a strong enough actor to make the reality conform to her expectations, but. It doesn't answer every question. If the strength is the main criteria, then why does Gretchen have a Barrier?

Their goals differ. Gretchen's is to create false Heaven with no suffering. For that purpose, a pocket reality of your own making is very nearly ideal.
Walpurgisnacht's, therefore, is to affect the real world. I'm not really sure her goal is to become human(s) once again, but it's certainly something she can't just imagine into already having.
My guess would be to gather Witches and cause further Witch-outs to get more Witches like card collectibles.
It's at least not random destruction, because otherwise her modus operandi doesn't make sense, along with the fact that there are still cities standing around the world and this AU is not a postapocalyptic hellscape.
 
I'll attempt to clean Redshirt's vote up a bit, since Firn is probably still fried and this vote is yet again catastrophically overloaded. For fuck's sake, he cut us off after two damned vote-blocks this update. Cut it down.
[x] Kazumi:
-[x] Given Toshimichi is strong enough to control Tokyo, maybe we should err on the side of caution?
--[x] Ask for Mami's advice - you trust her instincts.
-[x] Tell Kazumi about Fukushima - hiring them to contain Airi, and them wanting to ride the wave you're creating and agreeing to a mutual defense pact.
--[x] Inform Kazumi that you'll ask Fukushima if they're interested in sending a representative.
I still have no idea what the first line there is, so I've made my best guess in hopes that it'll force redshirt to clarify:

[x] Kazumi:
-[x] Do Kazumi and Mami think it'd be worth meeting up to try your griefhax anyway? If Toshimichi is really that strong...
-[x] Fill Kazumi in about Fukushima. Hired them to contain Airi, mutual defense pact, their apparent and stated motives, you'll probably invite them to join for Tokyo too.

[x] Contact Yuki from Fukushima:
-[x] Inform her about your goals in Tokyo, and what you've learned.
--[x] Ask if she's interested in sending some representatives to a meeting with Chiyoda.
--[x] Ask to discuss what she knows about Tokyo in more detail during tommorow's meeting.
-[x] Ask if she'd be willing to help you contact the other Fukushima Groups tomorrow, to spread Clear Seeds.

[x] Contact Yuki:
-[x] Fill her in about Tokyo, standard schpeil. You'll probably want to ask more questions tomorrow, but for now:
-[x] You're thinking you'll gear up on mind defenses for the meeting; any tips?
-[x] Does she want to send a representative, or even attend herself?

We can defer the bit about cleansing to the next meeting. We don't need a full back-and-forth about what we're going to ask tomorrow, it's obvious and just wasting cognitive effort. Just say that we're probably going to be asking more questions and then hit the stuff that'd be immediately useful for scheduling and the upcoming enchantment practice session.

[x] Oriko discussion:
-[x] Per vote in abeyance.

[x] Oriko discussion: Per vote in abeyance.

As voted. I expect that this is about as far as we'll get, because it's going to be heavy.

[x] Enchantment studies:
-[x] Follow Mami's advice.
--[x] Else, per vote in abeyance.

[x] Enchantment studies: Per vote in abeyance.

We already voted to follow Mami's lead. And we did, obviously and on-screen. Specifying it again is wasting space and detail.

[x] Discuss future groups to contact with your friends. Take suggestions for other groups, and for scheduling.
-[x] The other groups in Fukushima.
-[x] The Tome Group.
-[x] Sono Mako's Kagoshima group.
-[x] The Murasaki Shrine Maidens, in Kyoto.
-[x] Tsubaki Mikoto, in Hozuki.
Dropping this entirely because we don't have space in this update. Please just stop shoving fucking everything into single goddamn votes. We don't need to plan the entire next week in this one damn vote, and if you try you're going to end up one-tenth-assing ten things and fucking them all up because a third of everything happens in every update and it all gets hideously disjointed. Especially because we only have so much time to discuss every vote. Fucking focus, please, for the good of the quest.
 
Last edited:
[X] Vebyast

Going to concur the votes might be getting excessively big again. We need to consider likely stopping points that work naturally (ie Sabrina only works so fast) and narratively (ie when are we likely to switch scenes).

I mean if your worried that Firn will keep going past the end of a vote you could specify to break to a vote.
 
If all Walpurgisnacht wanted was to be human again, I'm certain she would just delude herself into thinking it was so.

Like -- fundamentally, I think it's a mistake to view Witches as lucid beings. Witches suffer horribly, but their suffering is as much delusional and solipsistic as it is depressive and apathetic. That's why Witches are able to act as active agents at all, rather than just going catatonic and wallowing while they rationally reflect on how horrible their lives are.

Witches are very human in that regard, actually. Just like humans, they're fundamentally not psychologically equipped to face the scope of their suffering head on. They can't acknowledge all of the things they don't have and all of the wants left unfulfilled.

And they cope just like humans do, too: they cope by ignoring the little things, and, if necessary, lying about the big things. That's fundamentally what Barriers are, I think: the protective self-delusions of a Witch given physical, psychodramatic form. Everything is fine. You're fine. You have everything. You have everyone. Everyone loves you. You're not alone.

Homulily almost certainly was not special for tricking herself into thinking she was human, or for using force to get what she wanted. Witches are violent not just because their deluded perceptions conflict with human reality, but also because they have a need to confirm their personal narratives. Witches have to prove to themselves that their self-delusions are true, at all costs, at all times, because to do otherwise would be to doubt, and thus, to face up to the depths of their suffering.

If Walpurgisnacht doesn't have a Barrier, I doubt it's because she can't just wirehead herself with a private reality -- I think it's because she's strong enough to unilaterally confirm her self-delusions and personal narratives. She can forcibly snuff out all threats to her ego and eliminate those possibilities that contradict her worldview, even in an open, 'public' reality.

Walpurgisnacht doesn't need a private Barrier, because she can make the world into her Barrier.

I really don't see what's so out of character for a witch to attempt that. Especially if the witch is after something that can't be given by her barrier.

Madoka's witch tries to create heaven after all. She pulls everyone and everything into that false heaven by force and makes that idea into a curse upon the world, but she is trying to make everything better.

Homulilly tries to save Madoka. The only time we see her she does it by attempting suicide, but her goal in it all is to save the person she cares about.

Oktavia is trying to hear Kyousuke play one last time. To do it she locks herself in a box with a soul destroying orchestra, but even she has something she's hoping for.

Walpurgisnacht here is trying to orchestrate her salvation, but she'll also be a calamity upon humanity to do it. Reading her poem --- linked for new folks --- she ignores the suffering of others by saying its all a play and overrides their wills by saying its all part of a script and that the story must not change.

Everything else? If Rebellion and the concept movie are her plans too? That all comes only after she herself has been saved. And those too both require enormous suffering in order to proceed where another way forward might not.

Walpurgisnacht is also the strongest witch, and a union of many witches all over the world, who have joined forces and come together as a single being. For such a thing to happen would require a singularly strong purpose that would resonate with many different witches and I think dewitching, orchestrating their own salvation, provides the strongest and most resonant possible reason for that to happen. Something that could well resonate with any witch, regardless of background.

----------

As to "cannot self terminate" I think the hypothesis works without that --- certainly it's a point of evidence, but it's a thing that follows from the idea, rather than underlying it --- but weren't you the one who noted that at the end of one of the games Homura witches out after she wins and, rather than hatching, her grief seed just crushes itself?



Honestly, I don't believe it will be enough on it's own.

I can see her response being:

"Okay, that's a neat parlor trick but what are you even trying to pull here? Can I talk with her? Can I see her again? Without those things, this is just jewelry."

Which is why I wanted to aim for something more concrete tonight.

I think just honestly talking with her and sketching out plans will help, but any good it will do will happen regardless of the progress we've made so far.
If Walpurgisnacht has a goal that doesn't fit in a Barrier, I'd propose we fit the simplest candidate first. "Change the world." A very generic thought from any outwardly directed young lady. How this remains outwardly directed in the Witch state is unusual, but we have two examples. We know something else, that Walpurgisnacht has times to appear, and greater periods of inaction. Could this be an echo of bipolar symptoms? Or we can just appreciate this in a fantasy battle format - "Walpurgisnacht can't hold her transformation indefinitely." A collection of small-fry doesn't compare to Gretchen. Her goal is to flood the world with her magic, but this didn't go very far any time in the past. What we seem to be implying is a quantity and rate limit on the magic of Witches, and that is easy enough to explain by inheritance.
The list of win conditions expands thereby?
#####

- Strike with Godly force
- Enforce helplessness
- ? Run down her timer
- ? Destroy the unifying motive of the collective. Theatrically declare a superior power to change the world in front of the Witch.

#####
Please just stop shoving ... everything into single ... and it all gets hideously disjointed. Especially because we only have so much time to discuss every vote. ... focus, please, for the good of the quest.
Might a better frame of reference help?
I think your complaint is an undefined variable problem. You would like "the amount of IC time" in a vote to match "the number of clock ticks in the story progress?"
Does this correctly simplify the issue?
I'll suggest that it is possible to troubleshoot the issue you see here. In the sense of "describe the problem in all relevant terms, find a solution that can be implemented successfully."

Could you see this as a pair of mis-matched API calls? The request, from QM. The vote, from players. There are different types of information in, or out of scope during any one vote. Nouns and verbs are strongly typed. Interval is the odd duck. Time is poorly represented in our Quest interface.

I don't define how long the story interval is. By custom, those definitions are unit-less, and elastic. Varying that interval widely every week is not a technical writing fault IMHO. Do you wish to see the request include explicit, measure timing information? It would allow other people to agree with you by rational means. If that were something that is needed at each vote, who can define the IC elapsed time?
Of course, we can also agree using irrational means. It has been working so far?
 
Might a better frame of reference help?
I think your complaint is an undefined variable problem. You would like "the amount of IC time" in a vote to match "the number of clock ticks in the story progress?"
Does this correctly simplify the issue?
I'll suggest that it is possible to troubleshoot the issue you see here. In the sense of "describe the problem in all relevant terms, find a solution that can be implemented successfully."

Could you see this as a pair of mis-matched API calls? The request, from QM. The vote, from players. There are different types of information in, or out of scope during any one vote. Nouns and verbs are strongly typed. Interval is the odd duck. Time is poorly represented in our Quest interface.

I don't define how long the story interval is. By custom, those definitions are unit-less, and elastic. Varying that interval widely every week is not a technical writing fault IMHO. Do you wish to see the request include explicit, measure timing information? It would allow other people to agree with you by rational means. If that were something that is needed at each vote, who can define the IC elapsed time?
Of course, we can also agree using irrational means. It has been working so far?

... eeh. But we're not machines. People should consider their own understanding of how a story could flow to figure out when the best stopping point is. They can also use their rather more natural understanding of how conversation generally flows to figure out when they think we have gone long enough for a given moment.

People are too worried about missing something and trading ease of understanding for completeness that may not be necessary. That we are starting to gain votes in absence out of large parts of previous votes signals to me that we are doing too much.

Planning is well and good but we want a conversation now, not an operational plan.
 
[X] Vebyast

Might a better frame of reference help?
I think your complaint is an undefined variable problem. You would like "the amount of IC time" in a vote to match "the number of clock ticks in the story progress?"
Does this correctly simplify the issue?
I'll suggest that it is possible to troubleshoot the issue you see here. In the sense of "describe the problem in all relevant terms, find a solution that can be implemented successfully."

Could you see this as a pair of mis-matched API calls? The request, from QM. The vote, from players. There are different types of information in, or out of scope during any one vote. Nouns and verbs are strongly typed. Interval is the odd duck. Time is poorly represented in our Quest interface.

I don't define how long the story interval is. By custom, those definitions are unit-less, and elastic. Varying that interval widely every week is not a technical writing fault IMHO. Do you wish to see the request include explicit, measure timing information? It would allow other people to agree with you by rational means. If that were something that is needed at each vote, who can define the IC elapsed time?
Of course, we can also agree using irrational means. It has been working so far?
Firnagzen has expressly stated before that time trade-offs are a thing for this quest.


As an aside, for people who are frustrated at not being able to address the potentialbomb?
This has been a very frustrating series of updates. It's like (I will date myself here) one of those point-and-click puzzle solving games where you have to find the exact right pixel to click on or the game just stops dead.
Generally speaking, that means you're approaching it wrongly.
This was from the Rionna clusterfuck, but it holds true as a general rule.
 
Last edited:
[x] Kazumi:
-[x] Defer to Mami's experience to decide whether to keep focusing on mental protection this enchantment session, of if Umika's power is sufficient.
-[x] Fill Kazumi in about Fukushima. Hiring them to contain Airi, the mutual defense pact, their apparent and stated motives.
--[x] You'll probably invite them to join for Tokyo too.

[x] Contact Yuki:
-[x] Fill her in about Tokyo. You'll want to discuss them in more detail tomorrow, but for now:
--[x] You're thinking you'll gear up on mind defenses for the meeting; any tips?
--[x] Does she want to send a representative, or even attend herself?
-[x] Ask if she'd be willing to help you contact the other Fukushima groups to spread Clear Seeds while you're there.

[x] Oriko discussion: Per vote in abeyance.

[x] Enchantment studies:
-[x] Follow Mami's advice on what to focus on.
--[x] Else, per vote in abeyance.

I clarified my intentions with the first line. Other than that, Vebyast's alterations look good. The only change is that I added the mention of contacting other Fukushima groups back into the vote - letting her know well ahead of time of our intentions within her city strikes me as only polite, and being polite is helpful when it comes to maintaining a good working relationship.
 
As an aside, for people who are frustrated at not being able to address the potentialbomb?

Okay, so we need to take a different approach.

I'm... not sure what that should be? We're already trying to build up Homura's relationships in general, will that be sufficient?

Maybe if telling Sayaka about the loops goes well, Homura might consider talking to Madoka about it before Walpurgisnacht? With Madoka's support, I imagine Homura wouldn't give into despair... but that's just an assumption.

Or maybe we should be focusing on the QB side of the equation. We think grief can create arbitrary amounts of energy if we put in the effort to create it. Can we just... pay QB enough to fuck off and not bother our friends?

We could combine that with the anti-QB field from PMKM, to make sure it doesn't renege on the deal.
 
Or maybe we should be focusing on the QB side of the equation. We think grief can create arbitrary amounts of energy if we put in the effort to create it. Can we just... pay QB enough to fuck off and not bother our friends?

We could combine that with the anti-QB field from PMKM, to make sure it doesn't renege on the deal.

The idea has some potential here, no pun intended, but we would really need to cover our bases. QB has shown time and again that he would seek and exploit any advantage possible, antiquated concept of morality inherent to primitive species completely aside.

You know, if we could make a magical contract with him and create a magical MacGuffin that would work as indented and produce energy only if his entire race upholds the terms of the contract, that would be really great... and cheesy. And wouldn't even guarantee QB won't try to screw us anyway, because they for some reason thought that taking on an actual Goddess of the Universe would work out for them...
 
Back
Top