The Practice War [Complete]

Snowfire said:

Voting for the same option twice will not count twice

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Heh I had pasted over the first one I put down.

[X] Once Unthinkable - A perspective from one of the Group of Six emissaries sent to talk with humanity, reflecting on all that has happened since, and on the war soon to come.

[X] Beacons Light - The reaction of the local relay station to the Regular Fleet's return.

Zaealix said:

But then. The Warfleet play of nuking the star outright to doom the race to extinction by heat-death...

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A point here; they induce novas that then wipe out the star system, not turn off the sun to cause a slow death.

I'm glad I suggested Web and Blade during the beta process. I thought it was an interesting idea, but I didn't expect that it would jump immediately into second place.

Truth be told though, I'm more interested in:

[x] Once Unthinkable
[x] Now Inevitable

Our perspective is almost entirely that of a Potential, a politician, a soldier, and a researcher. These two perspectives are about as far from that as we can get -- I really want to see the reaction of the rest of Humanity as a way to bookend the quest (and I'm tempted to spend a coupon on it anyway if it doesn't win), and then getting the perspective of our alien allies is a matching introduction to the future.

Few things are better then being proven right

So, there is definitely a Galactic scale threat out there and these poor fellows are trying desperately to get the rest of the Galaxy into the mindset required to combat it. Due to their hatred of the second secret I'm leaning towards biological monstrosities from beyond the stars, like the scourge from stellaris.

[X] Once Unthinkable - A perspective from one of the Group of Six emissaries sent to talk with humanity, reflecting on all that has happened since, and on the war soon to come.

[X] Web and Blade - The Two Twenty Three come to terms with what they just experienced, and the immediate consequences of what saved them.

[X] Once Unthinkable - A perspective from one of the Group of Six emissaries sent to talk with humanity, reflecting on all that has happened since, and on the war soon to come.
[X] Now Inevitable - A human perspective to the Third Battle of Sol, coming from a journalist reporting on the matter as the picture of what has transpired becomes clear.
[X] Waters of Mars - The truly personal reaction of Mary D'Reve to the events that the entire star system just witnessed.

[X] Waters of Mars - The truly personal reaction of Mary D'Reve to the events that the entire star system just witnessed.

[X] Once Unthinkable - A perspective from one of the Group of Six emissaries sent to talk with humanity, reflecting on all that has happened since, and on the war soon to come.
[X] Beacons Light - The reaction of the local relay station to the Regular Fleet's return. Warning: this is in many ways a safe vote for me as a QM, and will be highly unlikely to unravel things further for you.
[X] Waters of Mars - The truly personal reaction of Mary D'Reve to the events that the entire star system just witnessed.
[X] A Darkling Watch - The vision of one beyond the stars. Do not expect actionable information.

[X] Once Unthinkable - A perspective from one of the Group of Six emissaries sent to talk with humanity, reflecting on all that has happened since, and on the war soon to come.
[X] Beacons Light - The reaction of the local relay station to the Regular Fleet's return. Warning: this is in many ways a safe vote for me as a QM, and will be highly unlikely to unravel things further for you.

[X] Once Unthinkable - A perspective from one of the Group of Six emissaries sent to talk with humanity, reflecting on all that has happened since, and on the war soon to come.
[X] Now Inevitable - A human perspective to the Third Battle of Sol, coming from a journalist reporting on the matter as the picture of what has transpired becomes clear.
[X] Beacons Light - The reaction of the local relay station to the Regular Fleet's return. Warning: this is in many ways a safe vote for me as a QM, and will be highly unlikely to unravel things further for you.

[x] Once Unthinkable
[x] Now Inevitable

[X] Beacons Light - The reaction of the local relay station to the Regular Fleet's return. Warning: this is in many ways a safe vote for me as a QM, and will be highly unlikely to unravel things further for you.
[X] A Darkling Watch - The vision of one beyond the stars. Do not expect actionable information.

Edit:
[X] Best Daughter's Worries - Iris POV, 'nuff said.

[X] Now Inevitable - A human perspective to the Third Battle of Sol, coming from a journalist reporting on the matter as the picture of what has transpired becomes clear.
[X] Beacons Light - The reaction of the local relay station to the Regular Fleet's return. Warning: this is in many ways a safe vote for me as a QM, and will be highly unlikely to unravel things further for you.

It is interesting that Amanda is much closer to Destroying, like Kalilah, while Kalilah is much closer to Protecting, like Amanda.


[X] Beacons Light - The reaction of the local relay station to the Regular Fleet's return. Warning: this is in many ways a safe vote for me as a QM, and will be highly unlikely to unravel things further for you.

[X] Once Unthinkable - A perspective from one of the Group of Six emissaries sent to talk with humanity, reflecting on all that has happened since, and on the war soon to come.
[X] Now Inevitable - A human perspective to the Third Battle of Sol, coming from a journalist reporting on the matter as the picture of what has transpired becomes clear.
[X] Beacons Light - The reaction of the local relay station to the Regular Fleet's return. Warning: this is in many ways a safe vote for me as a QM, and will be highly unlikely to unravel things further for you.

[X] Once Unthinkable - A perspective from one of the Group of Six emissaries sent to talk with humanity, reflecting on all that has happened since, and on the war soon to come.
[X] Now Inevitable - A human perspective to the Third Battle of Sol, coming from a journalist reporting on the matter as the picture of what has transpired becomes clear.

[X] Once Unthinkable - A perspective from one of the Group of Six emissaries sent to talk with humanity, reflecting on all that has happened since, and on the war soon to come.
[X] Beacons Light - The reaction of the local relay station to the Regular Fleet's return. Warning: this is in many ways a safe vote for me as a QM, and will be highly unlikely to unravel things further for you.
[X] Waters of Mars - The truly personal reaction of Mary D'Reve to the events that the entire star system just witnessed.

Inserted tally

Snowfire said:

Given the nature of the Secrets' Crusade, I was never going to give you the truth here,

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Please understand that this is from the perspective of someone with immense respect for your efforts and skill.

But this has made that respect somewhat decrease. This is the second time the playerbase has spent an utterly priceless opportunity trying to get the same information only to have that wasted because the railroad of the plot demands that it not be revealed.

And I totally get and understand and even agree with concealing the information if it being hidden is that central to the plot.

My gripe is that in that case, you should have just said from the beginning exactly what I quoted above. Just said that it was not a valid vote for Doylist reasons. And definitely should NOT have made it an explicit voting option this time around.

So, there is definitely a Galactic scale threat out there and these poor fellows are trying desperately to get the rest of the Galaxy into the mindset required to combat it.

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Oh boy. If this is true, it's also a likely possibility that since the Shiplords use this as part of a test that the thing we are defending against either 1) knows about practice enough to disable it or 2) is a welder of practice.

I'm reminded of that worm destined to eat everything in Star Trek, except perhaps this one would be smart enough to stay away from the stars. Something about the space between stars being dangerous piques my interest. Something is there and likes to be elusive.


Oh, right, it was a doomsday machine. Perhaps less likely?

[X] Once Unthinkable - A perspective from one of the Group of Six emissaries sent to talk with humanity, reflecting on all that has happened since, and on the war soon to come.
[X] A Darkling Watch - The vision of one beyond the stars. Do not expect actionable information.

I know there's a warning for Darkling, but I can't help be interested regardless.

mastigos said:

My gripe is that in that case, you should have just said from the beginning exactly what I quoted above. Just said that it was not a valid vote for Doylist reasons. And definitely should NOT have made it an explicit voting option this time around.

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The vote that won was one of the explicitly offered voting options, not a write-in, so it couldn't really be claimed to be invalid. Not being offered as a vote at all might have been reasonable, but I think that it was still meaningful -- it framed the response and colored the interaction. (It does make me curious about what the other options might have resulted in.)

I do have to agree that this wasn't an especially satisfying update, but it feels like that was intentional: we're being denied a sense of resolution because it's not resolved. It's supposed to be anticlimactic and raise more questions than it answers, because it's setting the premise of the next quest. And that effect would have been dulled if we hadn't been invested in asking the question to begin with.

Storyteller said:

The only way I can read that response was gotten is that they really didn't get that they aren't the heroes in this piece. (If they are our QM has to find a big rabbit and a bigger hat to start practicing for that magic trick)
[...]
It's slightly more sympathetic

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and

Vortex279 said:

Honestly, that last line there has me a good bit worried. It almost seems plaintive, a plea for release from a duty that they have performed for however long it has been. The question then is, Just what are the Ship Lords trying to prevent? That first line, "in death and war", makes it sound like there is a species or antagonist of some sort that comes, maybe in cycles or in response to the Secrets themselves.

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The thing is, I don't buy the "burden of command" bit at all. Sure, I'll grant that a few of the Shiplords, especially the older and more responsible ones, likely feel this way: the ones that have been around for millions of years and actually probably did try a bunch of other methods before settling on the Tribute system almost certainly do. But the casual disregard the Shiplords have shown for their own methods, the arrogance and lack of proper decorum we see from their practices, their basic flaws of how they execute their general strategy belies the graveness with which the true believers appear to hold the situation.

I mean, it's entirely expected that newer generations of Shiplords, the ones for whom the galaxy exists to serve them and their gigantic perpetual war machine, the ones for whom entire interstellar civilizations have, for their entire lives, been strictly inferior herds to be tended and culled as needed or desired, will not treat the supposedly grave situation that the older Shiplords find the galaxy to be in with the same reverence, but when the cost is billions of lives for every arrogant dismissal or thoughtless gesture that just makes them monsters on a scale that is difficult to comprehend.

mastigos said:

Please understand that this is from the perspective of someone with immense respect for your efforts and skill.

But this has made that respect somewhat decrease. This is the second time the playerbase has spent an utterly priceless opportunity trying to get the same information only to have that wasted because the railroad of the plot demands that it not be revealed.

And I totally get and understand and even agree with concealing the information if it being hidden is that central to the plot.

My gripe is that in that case, you should have just said from the beginning exactly what I quoted above. Just said that it was not a valid vote for Doylist reasons. And definitely should NOT have made it an explicit voting option this time around.

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I mean, you had to know we weren't going to really get much from the "Why" vote. It was pretty much the same question, asked from the same position, thematically, as when we did it during the Second Battle of Sol: we had surprised the Shiplords and temporarily reversed and incapacitated them, but were still demanding answers without having the position of strength required to compel them to be honest and complete. There was never going to be that much more we got from "Why", if we got anything at all.

If anything it was SBOS's "Understand" that was ahead of its time, that gave us the answers that we otherwise would have received here, only fifteen years early because we pulled off what amounted to a Spoken Miracle back then. In this case, we could have used what we learned back then and reached for more, but instead we didn't. It wasn't a trap; it was the safe, default option.

[X] Once Unthinkable - A perspective from one of the Group of Six emissaries sent to talk with humanity, reflecting on all that has happened since, and on the war soon to come.
Definitely ^
[X] Now Inevitable - A human perspective to the Third Battle of Sol, coming from a journalist reporting on the matter as the picture of what has transpired becomes clear.

This might be the more important interlude to figure out what the Circle's take on the events that happened, maybe even help Amanda with how to Speak with the Practice of Humanity behind her. She and therefore us, need to understand how Humanity has reacted to the answer that the Shiplords have given to the question of Why.
As well as the almost loss of one of the 223rd's Leaders