Voting is open
[x] RUN! A war zone is not the place for a squishy human!
-[x] ...actually, this presents an opportunity. Power up and carry Jaron. You have the perfect excuse, and him knowing about ki could only make breaking the Seal easier. And it would piss off his Mom, too.
--[x] ...Power up moderately, enough to stop bomb shrapnel and bullets, but no higher than necessary for that purpose. Run fast, but not ridiculously beyond the human maximum.
--[x] ...Take Jaron to your own home, not his, if there was any question of that.
 
Like, seriously, it's not a coincidence that the two scions left vulnerable by suppressed power levels were attacked by mundane weapons their ki-senses wouldn't detect as they were walking down a strategically irrelevant residential neighborhood during the very first sortie of a global war. They were targeted. They were targeted despite not being where they were supposed to be. Somebody who knows about ki and probably about the entire masquerade is tracking and hunting them right now.

Y'know what else is going to be a priority target during the chaos covering this attempted coup? The personal residences of the ruling families. Kakara should not be running home. If anything, she should be telling everybody to get clear of any notable Saiyan sites as fast as possible.

One way to settle whether this is 100% the scouts real quick will be to check on Maya. If the scouts planned this they did it with information the captured scout gave before surrendering, which included Maya's threat status, which would make her a target in the initial sweep same as Kakara.

-but, again, that's really unlikely. Pulling off this level of infiltration would be insane for a group of alien scouts. They also likely wouldn't know much about ki suppression and the vulnerability to conventional munitions that entails.

There are Saiyans behind this. We are in the middle of an active coup during an active invasion and whose opening move was the attempted assassination of both scions. They're going to try again, probably with an immediate contingency, and a mere, "don't die from bullets", power level isn't going to stop them. Even if they don't, they are going to be targeting the exact place everybody seems to want to run to.

If we want to be clever, the other thing to try after getting Jaron clear might be taking advantage of Kakara's secret multiform ability to bait a trap, but just pretending that their near-death experience was some sort of random fluke is going to give the perpetrators another shot while wasting precious time.

Worst of all, something that explains both the targeting and the fact that Jaffur picked up the problem first would be if a seer were involved.
 
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Like, seriously, it's not a coincidence that the two scions left vulnerable by suppressed power levels were attacked by mundane weapons their ki-senses wouldn't detect as they were walking down a strategically irrelevant residential neighborhood during the very first sortie of a global war. They were targeted. They were targeted despite not being where they were supposed to be. Somebody who knows about ki and probably about the entire masquerade is tracking and hunting them right now.

Y'know what else is going to be a priority target during the chaos covering this attempted coup? The personal residences of the ruling families. Kakara should not be running home. If anything, she should be telling everybody to get clear of any notable Saiyan sites as fast as possible.

One way to settle whether this is 100% the scouts real quick will be to check on Maya. If the scouts planned this they did it with information the captured scout gave before surrendering, which included Maya's threat status, which would make her a target in the initial sweep same as Kakara.

-but, again, that's really unlikely. Pulling off this level of infiltration would be insane for a group of alien scouts. They also likely wouldn't know much about ki suppression and the vulnerability to conventional munitions that entails.

There are Saiyans behind this. We are in the middle of an active coup during an active invasion and whose opening move was the attempted assassination of both scions. They're going to try again, probably with an immediate contingency, and a mere, "don't die from bullets", power level isn't going to stop them. Even if they don't, they are going to be targeting the exact place everybody seems to want to run to.

If we want to be clever, the other thing to try after getting Jaron clear might be taking advantage of Kakara's secret multiform ability to bait a trap, but just pretending that their near-death experience was some sort of random fluke is going to give the perpetrators another shot while wasting precious time.

Worst of all, something that explains both the targeting and the fact that Jaffur picked up the problem first would be if a seer were involved.
If this is a coup then it has failed. The only chance was to attack by surprise. One we power up that can't happen.
 
Like, seriously, it's not a coincidence that the two scions left vulnerable by suppressed power levels were attacked by mundane weapons their ki-senses wouldn't detect as they were walking down a strategically irrelevant residential neighborhood during the very first sortie of a global war.

I think you are making a lot of assumptions
 
If this is a coup then it has failed. The only chance was to attack by surprise. One we power up that can't happen.

Nobody launches a coup under the cover of a world war in the middle of an alien invasion without contingency planning. If everybody were voting to power up well beyond the maximum allowable Saiyan level you might have a point about immediate safety, but the winning vote is to shrug off shrapnel and personal firearms while running impressively but not amazingly fast. Y'know, what Goku could do at the very beginning of Dragon Ball. If somebody has any of the various techs which we know are a hazard to those power levels, or is even just an average Saiyan who decides that subtlety has failed, one good ki blast will still end both of them.

-also, while you may be voting to power up enough to protect Kakara, Jaron is still going to be vulnerable to any stray bullets or shrapnel.

Seriously, just knock him out, send out a solar flare for cover, and teleport him the hell out of there.



I think you are making a lot of assumptions

You'd prefer to believe that the first-strike fighter-bombers of a surprise omnilateral world war just happened to massively deviate from their crucial missions and instead drop their precious munitions on this particular pair of schoolchildren walking down a strategically useless residential street, while at the same time involving sorcerous or seer powers of the sort which sealed-Jaffur would pick up before ki-prodigy Kakara?

Better yet, you prefer to assume that the entirety of Garenhuld humanity just randomly and simultaneously decided to attack each other without the influence of the deeply embedded masquerade members who would find this the best moment imaginable to make their move and would want to target those two particular children above virtually anybody else?

All the world leaders just happened to wake up this morning and in unison say, "Hey, let's club ourselves over the head today- oh, and make absolutely sure you get those specific two schoolchildren in the middle of strategic nowhere in the very first barrage!"
 
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How do you know we don't live or go to school near a factory?

Residential areas tend to cluster, and schools tend to be central to residential areas, so the weight is certainly on their not living right next door to a fixed surface-to-air radar, missile site, hazardous munitions depot, or similar first-strike priority target, but y'know what? Just asking the GM the question that the character should know the answer to before voting would be a vast improvement over what is currently happening.
 
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...Crap.

I'm going to be honest, @Lailoken does have a relevant point. We have here the following sequence of events:

1) Jaffur exerts what is probably every last ounce of sorcerous/ki power he has to get a second message through the Masque, one that is plainly an attempt to warn us of something.
2) Within what sounds like no more than a minute or two, we're within "danger close" distance of an airstrike.

That COULD be coincidence. For example, if the airstrike was mis-targeted or aimed at something we don't know about (like a government office building), Jaffur might still have somehow detected it coming and tried to warn us. But it is also exactly what we'd expect if we'd been on the receiving end of a sorcerous probe that immediately preceded the airstrike and helped target it on our location.

And the a priori likelihood of those two things happening so close together seems pretty low. Jaffur's a sorceror, not a precognitive; there's no reason he should get sudden visions of just any danger as opposed to specifically magic-based ones.

While it would be premature to assume that we know what is happening, it is very much possible that we're dealing with a saiyan faction that has contacts within human nations and the means to get an airstrike targeted on us.

That said... @Lailoken, could you tone the sarcasm and hostility down a bit, please? It's starting to get salty in here. Makes it hard to think, at least from my point of view.



...I think we have very different ideas of what the plan is entails.

A wall of shrapnel stopping in midair, and us appearing before people? Not on the cards. But with our Ki Sense, we can detect people in rubble and help ensure they can escape. Or cause guns to jam if necessary. Or, you know, provide first-aid to those injured.
Well, "help people" is a pretty vague write-in vote, so it's not like I have any way to know just from reading it what people have in mind, or what Poptart will have in mind if the vote gets implemented. I mean, the implication is pretty clear that the intent is "use our superpowers to help people." If the intent is "and hide those superpowers so well that nobody watching us would realize anything funny was going on," that should be mentioned.
 
In our world with our zoning laws. I have certainly been in towns that are mixed between apartments and factories
 
Okay, there are two possibilities.

We know there's not a saiyan-wide consensus that the war should happen, because Berra didn't know anything about it. If he'd known, he'd have warned us. And given that there's an alien invasion to worry about, this war doesn't serve his interests in any case.

So either the war is being directed/influenced by a rogue saiyan faction, or it isn't.

Either way, our priorities are:

1) Stay alive.
2) Keep friends, particularly Jaron/Jaffur and Maya, alive and well.
3) Conceal knowledge of extraordinary, seven-digit power levels from the alien scouts, because that might bring the Enemy down on us indirectly.
4) Conceal knowledge of any ki use from the natives of Garenhuld. This may already turn out to be impossible depending on what Maya does.
5) Help innocent bystanders.
6) Figure out some way to make our current interactions with Jaron/Jaffur satisfy our long term ambitions, e.g. breaking the Seal. This is probably a distant last in terms of 'most important things to worry about right now.'

[We can debate relative importance among 2, 3, 4, and 5, but for now, let's not. Please don't scream at me for being a monster because I put (5) behind (4) or something. I'm just trying to identify the issues. ]



Basically, if this is a purely mundane war, (1) is relatively trivial and (2) is difficult only insofar as Jaron is squishy and in an exposed location. (3) mandates against going to high power levels (i.e. one million or above), while (4) suggests that we minimize power use in general, subject to the constraint of avoiding death.

If the airstrike against us was an assassination attempt, (1) becomes much, much more important, as does (2) in the short run... But we still have to worry about (3) and (4). Saving ourselves from assassins is important, but so is not getting the planet eaten by the Enemy because they heard about a population of suspiciously human-looking creatures with power levels above and beyond the normal.

I'm going to think about votes that are crafted to consider both possibilities more thoroughly; my original plan is pretty heavily optimized for the "no saiyan involvement" scenario.
 
Residential areas tend to cluster, and schools tend to be central to residential areas, so the weight is certainly on their not living right next door to a fixed surface-to-air radar, missile site, hazardous munitions depot, or similar first-strike priority target, but y'know what? Just asking the GM the question that the character should know the answer to before voting would be a vast improvement over what is currently happening.
Man, who would ever put something related to military hardware in the middle of a residential area and not layer it in air defenses.
Oh wait.
But at least they'd never put, say, a naval base right next to a densely-populated civilian city.
Oh wait.
But maybe they wouldn't put a logistics-critical air base right next to/inside a civilian city?
Oh wait.

That's just 3 examples, off the top of my head, of people placing highly-strategic targets right next to, or in the midst of, housing and working areas for civilians.

Our current world does not always have gigantic "NO TOUCHING ZONES" between "civilian" and "military" stuff.
Assuming some overeager, hotshot pilot didn't overshoot on purpose.
 
Again, it is plausible that the airstrike hit us by coincidence. If this is a world war there are a lot of air sorties going around. Some of them will be mistargeted, some of them will be aimed based on mistaken information. Some of them will just plain miss.

That said, we have very little to lose from at least TRYING to be alert to the possibility of saiyan spies, assassins, treachery, and overall involvement in the war.

What do people think about a plan that reduces to "stun Jaron, teleport to a random secluded place on the outskirts of the city away from any paratroop landing zones?" I don't like the Solar Flare part of the plan because it will draw attention from a long distance, and to any ki users in the city it will be immediately obvious their attack didn't work.

Then again teleporting might have the same effect... @PoptartProdigy , to what extent can Kakara mask her ki and use it without being detectable from long range? Enough for an instant transmission? Is that actually possible?
 
In our world with our zoning laws. I have certainly been in towns that are mixed between apartments and factories

The lethal radius of a Mk 84 2,000lbs bomb is ~380m. What percentage of residential sidewalks do you think are within 380m of a first-strike target?



Man, who would ever put something related to military hardware in the middle of a residential area and not layer it in air defenses.
Oh wait.
But at least they'd never put, say, a naval base right next to a densely-populated civilian city.
Oh wait.
But maybe they wouldn't put a logistics-critical air base right next to/inside a civilian city?
Oh wait.

That's just 3 examples, off the top of my head, of people placing highly-strategic targets right next to, or in the midst of, housing and working areas for civilians.

Our current world does not always have gigantic "NO TOUCHING ZONES" between "civilian" and "military" stuff.
Assuming some overeager, hotshot pilot didn't overshoot on purpose.

Strawman harder. Yes, strategic targets occasionally show up within the blast zone of residential areas, but the vast majority of residential areas are not co-located with a first strike target and none of this changes the fact that you've neglected to check your exceptionally unlikely speculation before voting.



Again, it is plausible that the airstrike hit us by coincidence. If this is a world war there are a lot of air sorties going around. Some of them will be mistargeted, some of them will be aimed based on mistaken information. Some of them will just plain miss.

That said, we have very little to lose from at least TRYING to be alert to the possibility of saiyan spies, assassins, treachery, and overall involvement in the war.

What do people think about a plan that reduces to "stun Jaron, teleport to a random secluded place on the outskirts of the city away from any paratroop landing zones?" I don't like the Solar Flare part of the plan because it will draw attention from a long distance, and to any ki users in the city it will be immediately obvious their attack didn't work.

Then again teleporting might have the same effect... @PoptartProdigy , to what extent can Kakara mask her ki and use it without being detectable from long range? Enough for an instant transmission? Is that actually possible?

It's not just an airstrike- it's one of the very first strikes. It went off before even the sound from any other bomb hitting any other area going out to the horizon reached her. This was Kakara's very first warning that there was a war going on. Just happening to be under a bomb would be pretty implausible in a city the enemy apparently wants to intact enough to be worth capturing, but one of the ultra-high-importance surprise first strikes? This was not coincidence.

With bombs actively dropping and vehicles and gas lines presumably sending up secondary explosions I suspect that a solar flare wouldn't be terribly suspicious.

Grumble grumble fracking Peats fracking Balors...
 
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If providing the fact that 85% of the non-nuclear components for the US nuclear bomb arsenal was for decades assembled in a location smack dab next to houses, office buildings, gas stations, and so on, and not surrounded by loads of SAM sites, is somehow a "strawman" to the point of "hey maybe they really are just hitting strategic targets", then I don't see any way to have a reasoned debate. I pulled 3 examples off the top of my head from a nation that spreads things out quite a bit. Other more densely-packed nations probably have an even higher rate of "military stuff jammed in the midst of civilian stuff".

And if the attackers were well-coordinated enough, you don't do rolling waves of airstrikes, you do a ton of simultaneous strikes, especially if you're doing deep strikes.
 
Another major concern is that if this were planned as an opening gambit, and the masterminds had already accounted for wiping out the scions, the other really big target to plan for would be Berra, and given the way this went down it's actually pretty predictable that he'd do exactly what he's planning to do, while keeping his power level fairly low. Those airfields are serious ambush risks, or might even just be rigged to go up with a nuke and take him out while he is keeping his level down to avoid alerting the scouts because he thinks he's just dealing with squishy humans. Worse, knowing where he'd be heading would let somebody set sorcerers preparations.



If providing the fact that 85% of the non-nuclear components for the US nuclear bomb arsenal was for decades assembled in a location smack dab next to houses, office buildings, gas stations, and so on, and not surrounded by loads of SAM sites, is somehow a "strawman" to the point of "hey maybe they really are just hitting strategic targets", then I don't see any way to have a reasoned debate. I pulled 3 examples off the top of my head from a nation that spreads things out quite a bit. Other more densely-packed nations probably have an even higher rate of "military stuff jammed in the midst of civilian stuff".

And if the attackers were well-coordinated enough, you don't do rolling waves of airstrikes, you do a ton of simultaneous strikes, especially if you're doing deep strikes.

That some targets are near residences does not mean that most residences are near targets, which is what is important in judging whether or not it is reasonable that these particular people were hit by the precious surprise first strike of the tactical fighter-bombers. Would you like me to say it again? That you have individual counterexamples only proves that it is not outright impossible, not that it is likely that two of the most important targets on the entire planet really are just coincidental near-casualties of the single most important round of attacks in a surprise global war.

Again, exactly what percentage of residential sidewalks do you really believe are within a few hundred meters of a critical military target deserving of being one of the very first struck by the low-altitude precision bombing run of sleek, tactical fighter-bombers and their preciously small payloads in the opening move of a world war? Do you really believe that it is even on the friendly side of the decimal point?
 
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Lailoken, would you mind channeling a bit of that energy productively and proposing a plan of your own?

The strike that hit near Kakara and Jaffur COULD have been a coincidence.Bombs miss, planes are given the wrong coordinates to bomb. Shit happens. Much stranger things have happened during Pearl Harbor style attacks.

It is EXTREMELY BELIEVABLE, however, that the airstrike was targeted on them.

I don't think you'd actually have to try very hard to convince people to take more precautions for the "what if this is a deliberate attack" situation, as long as you're not demanding that we cast aside all concerns related to the Masquerade because you infer that we're under direct threat by a totally unknown conspiracy of saiyans.

In an attempt to move the discussion away from a pure exchange of salt and accusations of strawmanning, @Lailoken , I'd like to ask what you tihnk of the idea of a plan that reduces to:

"Stun Jaron, power up to a few hundred thousand, and teleport to a random secluded place on the outskirts of the city away from any paratroop landing zones?"

Bear in mind that Kakara can power up quickly, we know this already. If she's keeping her (excellent) ki sense out, I would expect that she'll be able to detect any fully powered up saiyans (e.g. power levels in the millions) coming in time to escalate far enough to cope with them.
 
Again, it is plausible that the airstrike hit us by coincidence. If this is a world war there are a lot of air sorties going around. Some of them will be mistargeted, some of them will be aimed based on mistaken information. Some of them will just plain miss.

That said, we have very little to lose from at least TRYING to be alert to the possibility of saiyan spies, assassins, treachery, and overall involvement in the war.

What do people think about a plan that reduces to "stun Jaron, teleport to a random secluded place on the outskirts of the city away from any paratroop landing zones?" I don't like the Solar Flare part of the plan because it will draw attention from a long distance, and to any ki users in the city it will be immediately obvious their attack didn't work.

Then again teleporting might have the same effect... @PoptartProdigy , to what extent can Kakara mask her ki and use it without being detectable from long range? Enough for an instant transmission? Is that actually possible?
IT doesn't really register as ki use as far as sensing goes, so that's fully suppressible. She can also fly, although only at about slow jogging pace. Anything else is pretty much out.
@PoptartProdigy

Is Kakara aware of any strategically significant targets in the vicinity? Stuff like Railroad depots or factories or government offices?
There's a pretty major rail line nearby, and while it's only a municipal center, the town hall (which houses the local police department as well) is just down the street from the school. Factories are a ways off, though. She can't really think of anything else.
 
Bear in mind that Kakara can power up quickly, we know this already. If she's keeping her (excellent) ki sense out, I would expect that she'll be able to detect any fully powered up saiyans (e.g. power levels in the millions) coming in time to escalate far enough to cope with them.
Her ki sense can detect ants so that seems like a safe assumption.
 
Lailoken, would you mind channeling a bit of that energy productively and proposing a plan of your own?

The strike that hit near Kakara and Jaffur COULD have been a coincidence.Bombs miss, planes are given the wrong coordinates to bomb. Shit happens. Much stranger things have happened during Pearl Harbor style attacks.

It is EXTREMELY BELIEVABLE, however, that the airstrike was targeted on them.

I don't think you'd actually have to try very hard to convince people to take more precautions for the "what if this is a deliberate attack" situation, as long as you're not demanding that we cast aside all concerns related to the Masquerade because you infer that we're under direct threat by a totally unknown conspiracy of saiyans.

In an attempt to move the discussion away from a pure exchange of salt and accusations of strawmanning, @Lailoken , I'd like to ask what you tihnk of the idea of a plan that reduces to:

"Stun Jaron, power up to a few hundred thousand, and teleport to a random secluded place on the outskirts of the city away from any paratroop landing zones?"

Bear in mind that Kakara can power up quickly, we know this already. If she's keeping her (excellent) ki sense out, I would expect that she'll be able to detect any fully powered up saiyans (e.g. power levels in the millions) coming in time to escalate far enough to cope with them.

"Knock him out and IT out, possibly under cover of a flare" was the first thing that came to mind and which I proposed. A couple kids going missing in all the chaos, especially immediately after a bright flash while bombs are dropping, isn't really surprising to any potential observers. The attackers might even believe that they succeeded. I don't know about powering up if it can be avoided. If we're lucky, IT will break whatever is tracking her, so staying at human power levels would likely make reacquiring her a lot more difficult. The harder question is exactly where to go.

Beyond that, what else to do. Berra needs to have the near-fatality and therefore the likely Saiyan role in this highlighted, because right now he may be headed right into a trap and he's clearly not thinking along those lines if he's telling his children to head for their publicly known homes. Telling everybody else vulnerable to get to obscurity might be a good move. Taking advantage of the target on her back and the secret nature of her multiform to set a trap might be a major opportunity.

Things branch from there. I'm sure I'm missing things, but we need to get the thread's planning on the right track before the voting bandwagon is too far along to do anything about.



Her ki sense can detect ants so that seems like a safe assumption.

-and yet, tracking down the scouts remains a chore. Just because Saiyans are involved in this doesn't mean that the scouts aren't.
 
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"Knock him out and IT out, possibly under cover of a flare" was the first thing that came to mind and which I proposed. A couple kids going missing in all the chaos, especially immediately after a bright flash while bombs are dropping, isn't really surprising to any potential observers. The attackers might even believe that they succeeded. I don't know about powering up if it can be avoided. If we're lucky, IT will break whatever is tracking her, so staying at human power levels would likely make reacquiring her a lot more difficult. The harder question is exactly where to go.
I'd argue that the flare is counterproductive if it shows up on the ki sense of a prospective assassin like, well, a flare. Disappearing is easier to hide and deny for Masquerade purposes than a brilliant flash anyway.

@PoptartProdigy , just to be clear, can Kakara attain a significant power level while actively masking her ki from those who might try to detect her? I was under the impression that this was possible.

Beyond that, what else to do. Berra needs to have the near-fatality and therefore the likely Saiyan role in this highlighted, because right now he may be headed right into a trap and he's clearly not thinking along those lines if he's telling his children to head for their publicly known homes. Telling everybody else vulnerable to get to obscurity might be a good move. Taking advantage of the target on her back and the secret nature of her multiform to set a trap might be a major opportunity.
Warning Berra soudns like a "do this first" thing; other ideas sound like a "do that second."

-and yet, tracking down the scouts remains a chore. Just because Saiyans are involved in this doesn't mean that the scouts aren't.
Hostile saiyans being involved with the scouts did occur to me. It seems plausible that some renegade saiyan faction might try to make an alliance with the aliens, if they could think of a way to signal them.

In that case, though, @fictionfan is right that this raises a complexity penalty. It is not, a priori, likely- merely a possibility to prepare against. The most likely scenario would be that the renegade saiyans contacted the aliens some time in the past few weeks and are to some extent feeding them information. It would explain why the scouts have taken such pains to lay low even though we've been trying to hide our power levels- if someone alerted them to how horribly outgunned they are before they actually encountered any of our patrols.
 
It increases the likelihood of a random bomb attack, but doesn't guarantee it. A railroad can be hit anywhere along the line, and the most likely targets would be stations, switches, or marshalling yards- Kakara would know if those were nearby, probably.

I do think we still have to make a plan that works if we're being deliberately targeted by saiyans who know about us.



HM.

Major problem with knocking Jaron out.

Lady Dandeer is going to find out, and want to know what happened and whether Jaron remembers anything that would lead him to think of ki powers.

Cue that mind scan we've been trying to avoid.

Can anyone think of any way to AVOID Dandeer being suspicious enough about what happened to mind-scan Jaron? Because I really, really can't. If we leave him conscious she'll wonder, if we knock him unconscious she'll wonder and be worried about him (I think/assume; she did something horrible to Jaffur to turn him into her 'dream son,' but presumably that is BECAUSE she values said 'dream son')

The only way I can think of is to make sure Dandeer never finds out what happened, and that may already be impossible given the constraints... OR to run home at merely human speed which is exactly what almost everyone DOESN'T want to do.
 
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