Lex Sedet In Vertice: A Supervillain in the DCU CK2 quest

What sort of tone should I shoot for with this Quest?

  • Go as crack fueled as you can we want Ambush Bug, Snowflame and Duckseid

    Votes: 30 7.7%
  • Go for something silly but keep a little bit of reason

    Votes: 31 7.9%
  • Adam West Camp

    Votes: 27 6.9%
  • Balanced as all things should be

    Votes: 195 50.0%
  • Mostly serious but not self-involvedly so

    Votes: 73 18.7%
  • Dark and brooding but with light at the end of the tunnel

    Votes: 12 3.1%
  • We're evil and we don't want anyone to be happy

    Votes: 22 5.6%

  • Total voters
    390
  • Poll closed .
Beginning
He had grown complacent.

That is what Lex thought as he watched Metropolis burning from the security room of LexCorp. His city was burning. His city.

All because some man with delusions of grandeur in a far-away country hadn't bothered to do his due diligence before starting a shadow war. And all because Lex had not taken the threat particularly seriously. He should have known better.

After all of the books on military strategy he had pored over, all the biographies he read about great military strategists, and his own weapons designs, he should have internalized: a war of pure defense did not work. The results of his own attempt at making a Maginot Line in Metropolis laid bare: killed security guards, burning buildings, and the screams of civilians. Mercy, at least, was attempting to minimize the losses to all.

After the worst had died down, he thanked Mercy for all her work. She'd discovered that the entire attack on the city was but an attempt to put Lex's defenses on the backfoot in an attempt to assassinate him. Another reminder of the ruthlessness of the enemy.

And, Lex sat at his desk and saw the messages awaiting him. Communications from all over- Lois Lane was demanding information on Ra's Al Ghul so that she could let her readers know what was going on. Leave it to a reporter to try to get more readers in the middle of an attack. But...she could have her uses. Something to think about.

According to the television new President was set to make a public speech at the White House regarding the largest terrorist attack on United States soil. Lex knew that the government was going to get involved in this no-longer shadow war. No President could allow such a blatant attack on US soil from a foreign element.

But, mostly, Lex planned. Possibilities and plans arose and were debated in his mind as he considered the best course to take with what he had on hand. Because, right now, he could not end the war with Ra's Al Ghul even had there been a peace offering. Lex had been publicly attacked. If he were to endure it without taking his own pound of flesh, no one would fear him. While Lex demanded respect and desired adoration, he needed fear. It was what prevented possible enemies from striking out in the first place.

Lex needed to make a statement in action- in blood. Perhaps not publicly. But, before this war was over, these League of Assassins needed to be shown that poking at Lex Luthor wasn't poking at a bear- it was poking at the Red Button.

And so, he began to plan. And so, it began.
Canon omake have 500 exp

And idea to get police reputation up while also bolstering our own employee's morale after people died:

[ ] Metropolis Heros' Fund: Started and funded by Lex Luthor after the attack on Metropolis, this fund's purpose is to look after the families of those who gave their lives while in service to LexCorp or while in service to law enforcement.
Option already exists under starting a charity (a subvote will trigger to specify what you want the charity to be about
 
Speaking of which, why is there no option to investigate magic? Even if Luthor doesn't believe in it, like Wally and some others, we could go at it from the angle of figuring out how mystics who do unusual things do them without actually considering magic as the reason--though I'd hope he'd have a open enough mind to say that it COULD be magic if he can't disprove that it is, followed by attempting to discern rules behind magic.
 
Speaking of which, why is there no option to investigate magic? Even if Luthor doesn't believe in it, like Wally and some others, we could go at it from the angle of figuring out how mystics who do unusual things do them without actually considering magic as the reason--though I'd hope he'd have a open enough mind to say that it COULD be magic if he can't disprove that it is, followed by attempting to discern rules behind magic.
He has had zero interaction with actual magic. If things had gone well after interacting with Zatanna then you would have been able to investigate magic. Meditate would let you stumble on to it if you got a high enough roll. There will not be a straightforward [ ] learn about magic option until Luthor has actually encountered real magic but there are other options.
 
Speaking of which, why is there no option to investigate magic? Even if Luthor doesn't believe in it, like Wally and some others, we could go at it from the angle of figuring out how mystics who do unusual things do them without actually considering magic as the reason--though I'd hope he'd have a open enough mind to say that it COULD be magic if he can't disprove that it is, followed by attempting to discern rules behind magic.
If you really want to poke into magic, there is a good option

[ ] Research alternative medicine
DC 46 You don't personally put much stock into alternative medicine but you don't see any reason to leave a single stone unturned. If you do find something successful with this then you can laugh at everyone who might mock you for this seemingly ridiculous enterprise.

I would love to go Luthor+Mercy+Pamela on it. High roll can open some way to magic. Sadly, this war won't allow us to do it
 
He has had zero interaction with actual magic. If things had gone well after interacting with Zatanna then you would have been able to investigate magic. Meditate would let you stumble on to it if you got a high enough roll. There will not be a straightforward [ ] learn about magic option until Luthor has actually encountered real magic but there are other options.
But magic isn't exactly hidden, is it? Aren't there any public figures with magic?

Also, if nothing else, how about a option to investigate myths? Fae and the like.
 
But magic isn't exactly hidden, is it? Aren't there any public figures with magic?

Also, if nothing else, how about a option to investigate myths? Fae and the like.
Magic is not known to the public or Luthor yet. This is before meta-humans and such were well known. The most well known public figure with magic right now is Zatanna and she hides her stuff as just show magic. There already are options that would let you explore myths (the expedition vote could if rolled well for example). Until you encounter it or it becomes known to the public discovering and investigating this stuff will not be straightforward
 
[X] [reveal] Reveal a highly edited version of what you know about Ra's al Ghul to Lois Lane
[X] [Spray] Don't use the pheromone spray
[X] [Talia] Work through proxies with Talia
[X] Plan Dream
 
We may want to consider making a year- long (4-turn, now 3-turn) plan/goals for LexCorp. We've been going turn to turn with no real plan (possibly because plan voting is not allowed for the turns) and so our approach has been a bit scattershot.

Anyways, my goals for Lex in the year:
Get More Help (Lex can't do everything)
Build Up LexCorp Forces
Build Up Metropolis
Deal with the League of Assassins (with US help)
Revolutionize Space (this year- next year we might want to go Biology)
Maybe Go Green if we can squeeze it in.
 
Speaking of dealing with the League of Shadows... do we hit them hard enough to get them to back down and then try to end hostilities by finding out who framed us for the death of those 5 assassins or do we try to destroy the League of Shadows here?
 
[X] [reveal] Reveal a highly edited version of what you know about Ra's al Ghul to Lois Lane
[X] [Spray] Don't use the pheromone spray
[X] Plan Dream
[X] [Talia] Work regularly with Talia but don't let her in your inner circle
 
...Can I ask WHY WOULD WE EVER WILLINGLY GIVE LOIS LANE ANOTHER INTERVIEW?

Even if we do decide to out Ra's Al Ghul, which I am against, letting Lois get the interview is idiotic when there are thousands of other reporters to talk to. She gave us bad press on a puff piece. Make her pay for it. Give some other rival reporter the scoop.

Most reporters won't accuse us of lying or twist the narrative against us. Lane already did and will again. It's a free press, but if we never so much as give her another quote I'm fine with it.
 
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Here is another idea:

- [ ] Criminal Benefits

While few are working for you over a long term basis in your less than legal activities, you might as well take the initiative and plan out how to create the shell companies and commit the tax fraud to divert money to pay for the same kind of benefits your regular employee's earn - including legal support (for on the clock jobs only of course). This is unheard of in the underworld and thus the enterprising minion will be drawn to the Lex criminal empire (or whatever name we hide it behind), give us a more talented pool of crooks.

We should also try to incorporate the police and criminals into our forces - then we'll run this town!

Also unofficial terminology for our employees: :V

- Corp: Goons
- Gov: Minions
- Crime: Crooks
 
...Can I ask WHY WOULD WE EVER WILLINGLY GIVE LOIS LANE ANOTHER INTERVIEW?

Even if we do decide to out Ra's So Ghul, which I am against, letting Lois get the interview is idiotic when there are thousands of other reporters to talk to. She gave us bad press on a puff piece. Make her pay for it. Give some other rival reporter the scoop.

Because as a Pulitzer Prize winner she'll have the loudest voice and be given the most column room and airwaves in Metropolis, and we need to take advantage of that, at least until we develop our own media empire.
 
Also, being willing to give more interviews to someone who has written less than flattering things about you in the past makes it much easier to paint yourself as a fair individual who is willing to field hard questions, and as someone who doesn't have anything to hide.
 
Speaking of dealing with the League of Shadows... do we hit them hard enough to get them to back down and then try to end hostilities by finding out who framed us for the death of those 5 assassins or do we try to destroy the League of Shadows here?

We have to hit back few times at least, else cost of hitting us is too low for the League to take any other action.

...Can I ask WHY WOULD WE EVER WILLINGLY GIVE LOIS LANE ANOTHER INTERVIEW?

Even if we do decide to out Ra's Al Ghul, which I am against, letting Lois get the interview is idiotic when there are thousands of other reporters to talk to. She gave us bad press on a puff piece. Make her pay for it. Give some other rival reporter the scoop.

Most reporters won't accuse us of lying or twist the narrative against us. Lane already did and will again. It's a free press, but if we never so much as give her another quote I'm fine with it.

We are throwing a clear target for Lois to chase, real terrorist story is more appalling then Lex's egomaniac and controlling behavior.
 
[X] [reveal] Reveal a highly edited version of what you know about Ra's al Ghul to Lois Lane

[X] [Spray] Don't use the pheromone spray

[X] [Talia] Work regularly with Talia but don't let her in your inner circle
 
[X] [reveal] Reveal a highly edited version of what you know about Ra's al Ghul to Lois Lane
[X] [Spray] Don't use the pheromone spray
[X] [Talia] Work through proxies with Talia
[X] Plan Dream
 
Wait, what? You said earlier we could. The ability to pick and choose particular psychological phenomenon as it suits us. That we didn't have to just pick "Dog AI", but rather could pluck out the "Sense of Smell" parts.
Animal AI cannot be repurposed for things an animal cannot do. You cannot have your animal AI play the stock market for example. I apologize for the confusion (when I said it cannot be repurposed it would be more accurate to say it cannot be repurposed for distinctly non animal like behavior). So while you can pick and choose stuff like a dog's sense of smell you won't be able to use it for things outside of an animals capabilities (what the write-in was primarily concerned with). Again apologies for the wording if it was confusing. I personally consider picking and choosing pieces to put together to be modifying but scrapping it for an entirely different function to be repurposing. I realize that the definitions I was operating under might not be the same ones other people use. Is there anything I can do to reduce this kind of confusion in the future?
 
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[X] [reveal] Reveal a highly edited version of what you know about Ra's al Ghul to Lois Lane
[X] [Spray] Don't use the pheromone spray
[X] [Talia] Work through proxies with Talia
[X] Plan Dream
 
Animal AI cannot be repurposed for things an animal cannot do. You cannot have your animal AI play the stock market for example. I apologize for the confusion (when I said it cannot be repurposed it would be more accurate to say it cannot be repurposed for distinctly non animal like behavior). So while you can pick and choose stuff like a dog's sense of smell you won't be able to use it for things outside of an animals capabilities (what the write-in was primarily concerned with). Again apologies for the wording if it was confusing. I personally consider picking and choosing pieces to put together to be modifying but scrapping it for an entirely different function to be repurposing. I realize that the definitions I was operating under might not be the same ones other people use. Is there anything I can do to reduce this kind of confusion in the future?
Yeah, when I consider repurposing, I simply considered "take this thing that makes a realistic dog, and make something very unrelated to being a dog". Like, for example, smell-based identification of people. The AI was obviously designed with the whole entity in mind. That was the purpose, to simulate entire conciousnesses, Ivo working his way up to Human. But we repurpose it, make it work for something BESIDES that.

Plus... I'm not honestly sure you couldn't find some animal psychological phenomenon that couldn't be applied to the stock market. But lets say you can't, a lot of the other listed fields, it works easily. Aviation, Agriculture, speech recognition, self driving cars, medical diagnostics and monitoring, customer support 24/7, facial and emotional recognition, chatbots, applications are near limitless.



As for help stopping this in the future, honestly the only thing I can think of is being more verbose in your answers. Explain what you mean and stuff. Not the best solution, seems a bit inevitable that misunderstandings will happen eventually. But being able to quickly handle them after they crop up is rather good.
 
Yeah, when I consider repurposing, I simply considered "take this thing that makes a realistic dog, and make something very unrelated to being a dog". Like, for example, smell-based identification of people. The AI was obviously designed with the whole entity in mind. That was the purpose, to simulate entire conciousnesses, Ivo working his way up to Human. But we repurpose it, make it work for something BESIDES that.

Plus... I'm not honestly sure you couldn't find some animal psychological phenomenon that couldn't be applied to the stock market. But lets say you can't, a lot of the other listed fields, it works easily. Aviation, Agriculture, speech recognition, self driving cars, medical diagnostics and monitoring, customer support 24/7, facial and emotional recognition, chatbots, applications are near limitless.



As for help stopping this in the future, honestly the only thing I can think of is being more verbose in your answers. Explain what you mean and stuff. Not the best solution, seems a bit inevitable that misunderstandings will happen eventually. But being able to quickly handle them after they crop up is rather good.
I'll do my best to be on the ball when explaining things but I also don't want to drown everyone in text (I do enough of that with every action vote.

The issue with a lot of these things is that while useful animal psychological behavior is not enough to get it to work on its own. The AI cannot make long term plans thus it cannot truly succeed at the stock market. It can recognize and emulate parts of speech but it is incapable of understanding the complexity of human speech (Parrots and dogs can understand and repeat things like "sit" but they can't grasp "sit down after eating") so chatbots and full on speech recognition are not at all feasible. Likewise self-driving cars (getting a car to head to a destination in a timely manner while not violating traffic laws is incredibly complex and would need too much stitching and cobbling to actually function with the AI you have now), medical diagnostics (how many diseases can an animal recognize?), customer support (language issues again) and even arguably emotional recognition (can animals understand sarcasm?) are too complicated for the AI to parse as it is. Yes some of the fields listed could work (aviation and agriculture would for example) but oftentimes they still need hardware rejected. The general rule of thumb is that if an animal cannot do it then the animal-like AI can't do it. Yes the behavior is useful but it isn't a complete enough package to truly get it functional. The write-in was rejected because it was way too broad and had massive holes in what you could actually do with the animal-like AI. A lot of the proposed fields have a complexity to the tasks that no animal could truly deal with so the AI would be incapable of properly fulfilling the task.
 
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Here is another idea:

- [ ] Criminal Benefits

While few are working for you over a long term basis in your less than legal activities, you might as well take the initiative and plan out how to create the shell companies and commit the tax fraud to divert money to pay for the same kind of benefits your regular employee's earn - including legal support (for on the clock jobs only of course). This is unheard of in the underworld and thus the enterprising minion will be drawn to the Lex criminal empire (or whatever name we hide it behind), give us a more talented pool of crooks.

We should also try to incorporate the police and criminals into our forces - then we'll run this town!

Also unofficial terminology for our employees: :V

- Corp: Goons
- Gov: Minions
- Crime: Crooks
The write in will be heavily restructured but it is accepted. Have 100 exp (sorry for taking so long I had to do a lot of deliberation on it)
 
@King crimson

I have a suggestion for pheromone spray. In addition to giving us an option to use it during special events, let us use the pheromone during the hero assignment phase. Allowing us to use it as consumable to get + to actions. With such conditions:

- Can be used only on diplomacy and intrigue actions with a hero assigned
- Using it in an action with a hero, who doesn't know about spray means he will learn about it.
- Some heroes may dislike the idea and receive a hit to the cooperation score
- Bonus to roll is hidden and decided by you after it is assigned saving you from listing roll bonuses to everything

The same system can be used to other consumables we may get in the future.
 
@King crimson

I have a suggestion for pheromone spray. In addition to giving us an option to use it during special events, let us use the pheromone during the hero assignment phase. Allowing us to use it as consumable to get + to actions. With such conditions:

- Can be used only on diplomacy and intrigue actions with a hero assigned
- Using it in an action with a hero, who doesn't know about spray means he will learn about it.
- Some heroes may dislike the idea and receive a hit to the cooperation score
- Bonus to roll is hidden and decided by you after it is assigned saving you from listing roll bonuses to everything

The same system can be used to other consumables we may get in the future.
Sure this sounds like a manageable and reasonable update to the system I could make. I'll implement it next hero vote
 
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