- Pronouns
- Male
Except because of shard magic equivalentcy the shards would be able to detect it, and notify tinkers and thinkers accordingly.
Brockton's Celestial Forge (Worm/Jumpchain)
- Thread starter LordRoustabout
- Start date
No, they wouldn't. Joe has how many types of magic? None of which are the ones Shards use. Shards use, let's call it "entity magic", Joe uses magic from entirely different multiverses -that IIRC all have different forms, no matter how similar, of magic. On top of this, AFAIK the Magic equivalency was introduced for the sole purpose of allowing certain perks like in the Magitech Constellation to effect Shard's/Worm stuff or something along those lines.
Even if they did, so what? What're they going to do, trace it all the way back to Joe's unreachable base, or maybe some naturally really hard to get to place that has become borderline impregnable with all of Joe's defences and try do something about it? And it's not like they'll actually know what it is or what it's doing.
- Location
- USA
Yes and no, it would be stealth magic versus detection magic. Shards wouldn't just autowin, and its certainly possible, likely even, that the shards wouldn't even be looking for some of the methods Joe could use just due to their utter lack of creativity and never encountering them before. Joe literally can't be less than exceptional, so his stealth 'magic' and tech would be top class; unless the method itself has a fatal flaw that no amount of quality or power can overcome and the shards know about it, the odds are pretty good in his favor.
But, this possibility, simply not knowing what's out there, that there might be that specific power that can notice, is why he's starting very small scale with stealth drones instead.
Hijack his theoretical surveillance system, that in turn will endanger all of Celestial Forge's database systems and potentially some members, mainly Survey (Her protection is not fiat, it's an arbitrary rule that Shards can lift as easily as they set it up. Just look at Narwhal.) Again, Mama Mathers proves that Entities know of the concept of "memetic hazard" and can use it freely.
We should not underestimate powers that float around in Worm. Most of them very exotic, which just mean that "All or Nothing" Blasters is one of the least of Joe's concerns.
Hijack a system they can't even begin to understand? Even if they could understand one tech base used to make it the mixed components and tech bases would probably make it border on unrecognisable. It's not like Shards have an "understand every tech" ability like in a PA fic to analyse it with.
It's easy to say that the forge has something to let Joe do whatever he wants, but until Joe gets The Maddest Science Yet! we can't just hand wave that every piece of tech or magic has it's own limitations. The reason I brought up issues with using Star Trek sensors is because that is what was being used as a base for this theoretical world sensor.
If you are going to he can get around the ST sensors limitations by using hybridization and quality upgrades, what technology is being added as hybrid? You say magic can make an unnoticeable world sensor. Which magic? What examples from the source material show even the potential for that use?
Lord has always said that he takes every settings technology seriously and thinks about what each one adds and how it can be used. If Joe were to create this kind of sensor Lord would tell us exactly which perks were being used and how they worked together to make the sensor do everything he said it could do. If we demand that Joe do something we should at least show the same due diligence in showing how he could do it.
- Location
- USA
Joe has enough general tech and knowledge perks at this point that there really isn't much he couldn't invent even if it isn't from a direct blueprint or specific tech base from the forge. Then iterate that invention through all the find and fix the flaws perks. Then boost it with the upgrade perks. Same with the more free form magic perks, though those are much more gated by time and research, as there's a lot less knowledge packs and more 'here's the ability to do it, now figure out how'. Something like the fidelias from Harry Potter is technically possible for example, and with Lethe as a starting point, probably not as bad to research as otherwise would be (though it would still be quite the time and effort sink, just learning enough hp magic to even start... so time better spent elsewhere at the moment and thus not an example I would actually expect to be used.)
Most of his perks going into most of his work should be pretty much default at this point, as there's so many bridging perks like the hybrid, the treat exotics like steel, magic infusion, putting properties of one material into another etc. If another tech base does an aspect better, then just take that part instead, there's no reason to be pure with all the ways to smooth out compatibility.
It's not so much that you can hand wave an answer by assuming there's a perk that covers it, it's just that when you have several masterwork quality perks, infinitely upgrade perks, spiral energy, etc. on top of knowledge base synergies filling each other's gaps and offering new perspectives and solutions, it's really hard to find a problem that shouldn't be covered or couldn't at least be worked up to.
Star Trek is was just the example because it's a relatively well known base that for sure has that tech baseline. I'd be very surprised if pretty much every knowledge perk on the interstellar and beyond level didn't have something to contribute, and the end result would likely draw from all of them. It's hard to say exactly what is or isn't in them, because a lot of them are "here's literally everything from their society" and you have to make inferences on what should reasonably be there. Which one would actually be the core is a bit more open ended. I'd probably work toward a version of Moon Cell as a personal preference if the Fate perks gave enough (don't remember off hand) to make it a viable pursuit and not too much of a massive research time sink.
Considering absolutely everything in the forge that he already has, there's just no way that this isn't an option if he wanted it to be. The question isn't if he could do it, but would he want to/should he anyway?
Most of his perks going into most of his work should be pretty much default at this point, as there's so many bridging perks like the hybrid, the treat exotics like steel, magic infusion, putting properties of one material into another etc. If another tech base does an aspect better, then just take that part instead, there's no reason to be pure with all the ways to smooth out compatibility.
It's not so much that you can hand wave an answer by assuming there's a perk that covers it, it's just that when you have several masterwork quality perks, infinitely upgrade perks, spiral energy, etc. on top of knowledge base synergies filling each other's gaps and offering new perspectives and solutions, it's really hard to find a problem that shouldn't be covered or couldn't at least be worked up to.
Star Trek is was just the example because it's a relatively well known base that for sure has that tech baseline. I'd be very surprised if pretty much every knowledge perk on the interstellar and beyond level didn't have something to contribute, and the end result would likely draw from all of them. It's hard to say exactly what is or isn't in them, because a lot of them are "here's literally everything from their society" and you have to make inferences on what should reasonably be there. Which one would actually be the core is a bit more open ended. I'd probably work toward a version of Moon Cell as a personal preference if the Fate perks gave enough (don't remember off hand) to make it a viable pursuit and not too much of a massive research time sink.
Considering absolutely everything in the forge that he already has, there's just no way that this isn't an option if he wanted it to be. The question isn't if he could do it, but would he want to/should he anyway?
Hello Dragon, what are you doing here? Setting a precedent of shards knowing what reverse engineering is? I see...
That. Okay. Why? Why they "can't even begin to understand" this s.t.g.s.s.(stupid theoretical global surveillance system)? Is it because it works on different set of physical laws? No, s.t.g.s.s. at it's base Star Trek scanner, that is to say, just like Shard, work on normal clarktech physics.
Just. because Shard, by your logic, can't see Joe's magic, so they would not notice thought up magic radiation used for scanning? The Fairy Queen would be able to see Joe's magic like any other Shard(WoG). Her power to see shards (and magic) is secondary and is something that should be usual for Shards - like flight. All Shards can sense Joe's magic. Not all allow their hosts to see it.
Stupid. to think that Shard will be deterred by Joe using more than ST techbase. Entities pillaged throw who-knows-how-many civilizations and assimilated all of their technological trees, all of which worked on the same physics that technology that was brought up in s.t.g.s.s. though experiment. That is to say, for Entities all that technology is different designs, same shit. If prismatic lab or psychic abilities (which is actual Out-of-Contexy for Entities, not Magic) were brought up, then this argument would work, but as all that was brought up was usual as fuck clarktech with a bit of magic - fat NOPE.
Point. that Joe enchanting tech will lead to it being unrecognisable does not make sense as well. "Hey, Karl, that machine makes surprisingly good coffee, what do you think it is?" - "A coffee machine?" - "Impossible! It's too good at making coffee to be a coffee machine!" Of course, it's only overexaggeration. But, seriously, when Shards will detect magical radiation, and they will detect it, and trace it back to where s.t.g.s.s. is, be it some remote place on Earth or some detached pocket space (It can't be on Workshop, for the same reason Joe can't set up the Earth Bridge in Workshop) they will have no reason not to assume that system that scans their hosts with energy is not a scanner. And they dealt with scanners before, this one just works a lot better. Shards are uncreative, not moronic.
Just. because Shard, by your logic, can't see Joe's magic, so they would not notice thought up magic radiation used for scanning? The Fairy Queen would be able to see Joe's magic like any other Shard(WoG). Her power to see shards (and magic) is secondary and is something that should be usual for Shards - like flight. All Shards can sense Joe's magic. Not all allow their hosts to see it.
Stupid. to think that Shard will be deterred by Joe using more than ST techbase. Entities pillaged throw who-knows-how-many civilizations and assimilated all of their technological trees, all of which worked on the same physics that technology that was brought up in s.t.g.s.s. though experiment. That is to say, for Entities all that technology is different designs, same shit. If prismatic lab or psychic abilities (which is actual Out-of-Contexy for Entities, not Magic) were brought up, then this argument would work, but as all that was brought up was usual as fuck clarktech with a bit of magic - fat NOPE.
Point. that Joe enchanting tech will lead to it being unrecognisable does not make sense as well. "Hey, Karl, that machine makes surprisingly good coffee, what do you think it is?" - "A coffee machine?" - "Impossible! It's too good at making coffee to be a coffee machine!" Of course, it's only overexaggeration. But, seriously, when Shards will detect magical radiation, and they will detect it, and trace it back to where s.t.g.s.s. is, be it some remote place on Earth or some detached pocket space (It can't be on Workshop, for the same reason Joe can't set up the Earth Bridge in Workshop) they will have no reason not to assume that system that scans their hosts with energy is not a scanner. And they dealt with scanners before, this one just works a lot better. Shards are uncreative, not moronic.
Okay, gone a bit livid on this one. Sorry. Tl;dr: there's no reason to assume that Shards "can't even begin to understand" Ape-tech as it is right now. Capabilities of Entities are vast, and Joe's caution is warranted. If they have even one reverse engineering Shard that 1/10 as good at it's job as Sting at it's, then that's it. Ape-tech understood in a matter of seconds, the only mystery remained - why it's work better than it should.
But you know how Joe could create tech that Entities actually have no hope to reverse engineer (At least in any reasonable amount of time)? By incorporating psionic (or psychic, same shit here) in his tech. But it would take actual research and engineering (or perk some perk, but I don't remember any perk that make psi tech) so it can't be done anywhere close to NOW in the story.
And I want to remember that discussion started with someone saying that Joe can easily make Planetary Big Brother right NOW in the story, and it would solve ALL of his problems. That it's logical, easy and efficient. I think I said enough on it, but last time, just for good measure: It's not logical, because problems Joe facing right now can be solved by much less drastic measures, it's not easy, because nothing is in Worm, it's not efficient, because solving your problems by making more problems is the opposite of being efficient, and it's so out of character, that if Joe actually done it, I would wonder if he was switched out with Echidna clone.
Looking at what I wrote, I remember wise words of a great man: "I may have gone too far in a few places."
Joe's tech has several tiers of black-boxing.
First, he has well executed but mundane technology that anyone can replicate.
Then he has work based on novel principles that anyone can replicate after learning those principles.
Then he has actual shard-style black-boxing, which he can deliberately produce with his Worm perks.
Then he has technology that relies on fiat abilities to function, which can be understood but not replicated without his assistance.
Finally, his Simple Scientific household Solutions are black-boxed by fiat and cannot be comprehended by mortal minds.
First, he has well executed but mundane technology that anyone can replicate.
Then he has work based on novel principles that anyone can replicate after learning those principles.
Then he has actual shard-style black-boxing, which he can deliberately produce with his Worm perks.
Then he has technology that relies on fiat abilities to function, which can be understood but not replicated without his assistance.
Finally, his Simple Scientific household Solutions are black-boxed by fiat and cannot be comprehended by mortal minds.
Do aeons-old multi-dimensional crystalline supercomputers count as "mortal"?
Heck, with all his healing, cyborg, and demigod perks/abilities, does Joe?
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- Location
- Gladstone, OR
The point of Simple Scientific Solution is to create ridiculous sci-fi conveniences that lend themselves well to situational or gag-humor. The main reason it was blackboxed was to prevent jumpers from exploiting it immediately.
Roustabout threaded that particular needle well, with the privacy curtain, white noise machine, and Aisha's thermos. Probably also the bag he gave Taylor.
Roustabout threaded that particular needle well, with the privacy curtain, white noise machine, and Aisha's thermos. Probably also the bag he gave Taylor.
Narsauce
The Crucible Shitlord
- Location
- Here, there and everywhere
The bag was, ironically enough, not made with SSS. I believe Lord said it was made with PJO crafting powers because the Hephestus kids did make "Bigger on the inside" things before.
- Location
- Gladstone, OR
Hence 'probably', there are lots of ways to achieve the effect.
I had a long response to this but I realized there is a watsonian reason to believe that it isn't currently possible or easy for Joe to build a planet wide scanner.
If he could build it Survey would already be badgering him to do so.
As we've seen Joe takes requests from members of the forge seriously and if it were possible for him to build it but he didn't want to for any number of reasons we would still have gotten a mention of the argument that he had with Survey about it.
MagicalAmbitions
the rose in your vase
- Pronouns
- She/Her
interesting choice to exclusively refer to Lisa by her deadname (outside one use of her codename)
are you, perhaps, Coil in the flesh? is it out of a misguided belief that a name that is assigned at birth is somehow 'truer' than one chosen during life? maybe you think it's more impactful to refer to her exclusively by a name that ties her back to her trigger event? or that her choice of new name is simply a side-effect of trauma and thusly unimportant? potentially it makes you feel cool and edgy?
what i'm getting at is that it's a Weird choice. is it less important to respect a character's name because they're cis?
Joe's keeping the sss stuff under wraps and not giving it to anyone involved with cape stuff cause he doesn't trust them to stick to the household problem uses with it and that's fair. Taylor's already been using the bag to haul around tons of bugs as a cape which by itself would probably violate it. Joe just has so many spatial expansion options that the to him small amount of extra space was no big deal which is why he thoughtlessly agreed to letting Taylor keep it.
- Location
- Maine
- Pronouns
- They/Them/Theirs
(Note, I am entirely joking) I'll have you know that a way to ensure your pets and service animals are safe and healthy is very much a household problem. Taylor may have more service animals than other people have nerve endings, but they're still emotional support spiders, as well as allowing her to do things that her disabilities(IE: Being a normal human) prevent her from doing.
JoshuaSweetvale
Insectovore
- Location
- NL, 65 Million Years Ago
Powerful, proactive, loved. Pick any two.
Superman is omnipotent and loved, because he does nothing proactive, unless it's one of those throwaway timelines where he goes mad and develops a sadistic streak out of nowhere.
Everyone loves Steve Rogers, and no-one will say a bad thing about him, but nobody actually listens to him on any political issue. They don't have to. All that respect buys you nothing.
Warlord Skitter. Saved thousands of lives. Demonized and nearly executed by the Fist of Cauldron, the plot reaper herself. Because the people in charge couldn't take losing the illusory veneer of control. This was also referenced a few pages ago regarding Lisa's neurotic antics about control.
Power belongs to those who wield it. Use power to twist the world to your will, and you will be hated by anyone and everyone with ambition. That is inevitable. The alternative is being Kal-El. He doesn't want to be hated, so he doesn't destroy all the world's nukes. I'd not call that selfish, I'd call it unproductively selfish. I'd rather have Victor Von Doom, selfish actions and all.
Relatedly: this is also why Thanos is so chill about being despised. Thing is, he was also wrong. Like Cauldron.
Skitter kinda wasn't wrong. She was the last person with power who cared about Brocktonites. Nor would a hypothetical Tyrant Forge be wrong by using overwhelming force to fulfill Cauldron's on-paper mission statement of cleaning up the Entity infestation.
Autocracy actually works when the autocrat derives all power from themselves. No need to actually do things to hold onto power. No need to control people. Just fix big problems, eat well and lounge on a cloud the rest of the time. Everyone will want the Tyrant dead for it but they won't be able to kill 'em.
Superman is omnipotent and loved, because he does nothing proactive, unless it's one of those throwaway timelines where he goes mad and develops a sadistic streak out of nowhere.
Everyone loves Steve Rogers, and no-one will say a bad thing about him, but nobody actually listens to him on any political issue. They don't have to. All that respect buys you nothing.
Warlord Skitter. Saved thousands of lives. Demonized and nearly executed by the Fist of Cauldron, the plot reaper herself. Because the people in charge couldn't take losing the illusory veneer of control. This was also referenced a few pages ago regarding Lisa's neurotic antics about control.
Power belongs to those who wield it. Use power to twist the world to your will, and you will be hated by anyone and everyone with ambition. That is inevitable. The alternative is being Kal-El. He doesn't want to be hated, so he doesn't destroy all the world's nukes. I'd not call that selfish, I'd call it unproductively selfish. I'd rather have Victor Von Doom, selfish actions and all.
Relatedly: this is also why Thanos is so chill about being despised. Thing is, he was also wrong. Like Cauldron.
Skitter kinda wasn't wrong. She was the last person with power who cared about Brocktonites. Nor would a hypothetical Tyrant Forge be wrong by using overwhelming force to fulfill Cauldron's on-paper mission statement of cleaning up the Entity infestation.
Autocracy actually works when the autocrat derives all power from themselves. No need to actually do things to hold onto power. No need to control people. Just fix big problems, eat well and lounge on a cloud the rest of the time. Everyone will want the Tyrant dead for it but they won't be able to kill 'em.
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Carrnage
Human
- Location
- New Zealand
That has more to do with the status quo than anything else.
JoshuaSweetvale
Insectovore
- Location
- NL, 65 Million Years Ago
That's no excuse for Cauldron, and it's no excuse for DC.
- Pronouns
- He
That's pretty impressive for someone with jumpchain powers. Most jumpers tend to lose their morality over time. That's why we call the older ones "elder jumpers", as if they are uncaring elder gods.
I'm very grateful Joe kept his morality.
There's nowhere in story where this distinction is made. And while yes, the parahuman=magic was originally made for magitech compatibility, it's also nice that it prevent Joe from curbstomping the world as soon as he got magic. Especially Fate magic.
- Location
- USA
It's only just recently becoming even slightly viable. With Blank/OCP and Mental fortress, he gains some margin of error for taking some risks without the worry of Ziz definitely taking immediate interest in it. Those perks don't eliminate the risk entirely, but they do lessen it. Before that, anything outside the workshop basically had her name on it. Though still held back by the unknown threats he has knowledge exist, so he still doesn't just go all out. He also wants to let the world, especially the still volatile city, rest a bit so avoiding anything big. Even then, he is taking steps toward powerful surveillance with his stealth drones already, just to feel out the response to who can even detect his stuff.
His reasons for not doing it are risk management and maybe a bit of morality on invasion of privacy (though he already has powerful scanners, and Survey as mentioned certainly isn't gonna take that as an excuse), not ability. He definitely has the blueprints (and the knowledge base to make them viable) and the materials, and his miniaturization, efficiency, and build speed perks make any constraints on initially being too big less of an issue, especially because version one probably doesn't even need to be planet scale, and can instead be local to his sphere of influence.
The Meta reasons for not doing it are because it either works, goes undetected and does what it's suppose to, and then the story becomes relatively easy mode outside of the Endbringers (that can now be properly tracked and studied) and Zion, and maybe a rare few exceptional powers that can't be handled easily even if you know about them, or are just obscure enough (especially Strangers and Tinkertech) that even Joe's scanners couldn't detect them without being specifically designed to. So the story would enter homestretch with those being the only things really worth dealing with. Especially because putting any effort into making the world a better place and succeeding would eventually draw the Entity's attention anyway, as it disrupts the cycle enough even if the source isn't so easily discovered. Sorta like Cauldron really; they can't really make the world(s) a nicer place even if they wanted to because the entities don't want that and would interfere, risking away even their Hail Mary.
Or it doesn't work. Zion, despite not having any experience with this specific tech base, or applications of 'magic' or souls, psion, w/e else Joe wants to throw at it, does actually have something that detects it and identifies it as something to look into. And hey, as the Warrior Entity, whose literal job and purpose is dealing with out of context problems that disrupt the cycle, I'm not gonna say with confidence he definitely doesn't, or that these hypothetical OoC detectors are either passive enough or too critical to his core directive that they're conveniently on, and that Joe scanning the world in a detectable way despite his best efforts to not be breaks OCP enough for them to work. Then the Story enters endgame because now Joe is on a very short clock and the odds, while not hopeless, are certainly not in his favor. He's definitely not winning a direct confrontation at least.
Where we seem to disagree is that I believe if he accepted the risks and went for it, he has fairly decent odds of success. Equivalency gives the shards a fair chance, but they still have no experience with his specific brand, so it's by no means guaranteed they have an answer, or that that answer is in a position to even be useful. It's not like they have a catch all power that breaks every single possible way of hiding, or detects all possible methods of scanning, even passive ones with little to no emissions, or emissions so minor they blend well into the background radiation of reality. If they somehow do have this catch all, it'd be pretty doubtful that it's energy efficient enough to keep it on all the time, especially given just how many Earths they'd need to watch over (though, I will concede that if it's on anywhere, where Zion is would be the best bet).
If they were that flexible, to already have an answer to things that didn't even exist (not 'magic' itself as they've been retroactively attuned to it, but ways of applying it, ways of applying other tech, physics that didn't apply until now, materials that didn't or couldn't exist, etc) until Joe's passenger started twisting reality to make it so, they wouldn't be hijacking other races for their creativity. If they do, it would be by pure coincidence due to sheer age and exposure to many things and/or brute force stupidity that shouldn't work but does anyway; because shards can be idiot savants like that. So possible, but not guaranteed. Especially because Joe's stealth efforts would be top notch and the shards answer would have to be on that level or coincidentally exploit a vulnerability that Joe didn't know to account for.
That said, I actually don't think the risk is worth it right now with what Joe knows, and that the cost of being wrong is way too high even if the odds are in his favor. Especially because pissing off the Entity isn't the only risk, there's others, like Cauldron, that could make life at least unpleasant if they took exception to him doing it, and unlike the entity they can reasonably put 2 and 2 together even without direct evidence, because really, who else even could? Just that it's a theoretical option that shows how much of the world's problems are already beneath his full potential should he stop holding back and desire to fix them, and there wasn't the risk of a Sword of Damocles descending for doing so.
Either way, it can't be built until the end phase of the story if it would ever be built at all (which it probably would, or something like it, because Survey). So he needs in story excuses not to, at least not yet, because after OCP and Mind fortress, why wouldn't he if he didn't have reason to believe Ziz wasn't the worst thing out there? Especially when he's pretty sure he could kill an endbringer if he had to.
His reasons for not doing it are risk management and maybe a bit of morality on invasion of privacy (though he already has powerful scanners, and Survey as mentioned certainly isn't gonna take that as an excuse), not ability. He definitely has the blueprints (and the knowledge base to make them viable) and the materials, and his miniaturization, efficiency, and build speed perks make any constraints on initially being too big less of an issue, especially because version one probably doesn't even need to be planet scale, and can instead be local to his sphere of influence.
The Meta reasons for not doing it are because it either works, goes undetected and does what it's suppose to, and then the story becomes relatively easy mode outside of the Endbringers (that can now be properly tracked and studied) and Zion, and maybe a rare few exceptional powers that can't be handled easily even if you know about them, or are just obscure enough (especially Strangers and Tinkertech) that even Joe's scanners couldn't detect them without being specifically designed to. So the story would enter homestretch with those being the only things really worth dealing with. Especially because putting any effort into making the world a better place and succeeding would eventually draw the Entity's attention anyway, as it disrupts the cycle enough even if the source isn't so easily discovered. Sorta like Cauldron really; they can't really make the world(s) a nicer place even if they wanted to because the entities don't want that and would interfere, risking away even their Hail Mary.
Or it doesn't work. Zion, despite not having any experience with this specific tech base, or applications of 'magic' or souls, psion, w/e else Joe wants to throw at it, does actually have something that detects it and identifies it as something to look into. And hey, as the Warrior Entity, whose literal job and purpose is dealing with out of context problems that disrupt the cycle, I'm not gonna say with confidence he definitely doesn't, or that these hypothetical OoC detectors are either passive enough or too critical to his core directive that they're conveniently on, and that Joe scanning the world in a detectable way despite his best efforts to not be breaks OCP enough for them to work. Then the Story enters endgame because now Joe is on a very short clock and the odds, while not hopeless, are certainly not in his favor. He's definitely not winning a direct confrontation at least.
Where we seem to disagree is that I believe if he accepted the risks and went for it, he has fairly decent odds of success. Equivalency gives the shards a fair chance, but they still have no experience with his specific brand, so it's by no means guaranteed they have an answer, or that that answer is in a position to even be useful. It's not like they have a catch all power that breaks every single possible way of hiding, or detects all possible methods of scanning, even passive ones with little to no emissions, or emissions so minor they blend well into the background radiation of reality. If they somehow do have this catch all, it'd be pretty doubtful that it's energy efficient enough to keep it on all the time, especially given just how many Earths they'd need to watch over (though, I will concede that if it's on anywhere, where Zion is would be the best bet).
If they were that flexible, to already have an answer to things that didn't even exist (not 'magic' itself as they've been retroactively attuned to it, but ways of applying it, ways of applying other tech, physics that didn't apply until now, materials that didn't or couldn't exist, etc) until Joe's passenger started twisting reality to make it so, they wouldn't be hijacking other races for their creativity. If they do, it would be by pure coincidence due to sheer age and exposure to many things and/or brute force stupidity that shouldn't work but does anyway; because shards can be idiot savants like that. So possible, but not guaranteed. Especially because Joe's stealth efforts would be top notch and the shards answer would have to be on that level or coincidentally exploit a vulnerability that Joe didn't know to account for.
That said, I actually don't think the risk is worth it right now with what Joe knows, and that the cost of being wrong is way too high even if the odds are in his favor. Especially because pissing off the Entity isn't the only risk, there's others, like Cauldron, that could make life at least unpleasant if they took exception to him doing it, and unlike the entity they can reasonably put 2 and 2 together even without direct evidence, because really, who else even could? Just that it's a theoretical option that shows how much of the world's problems are already beneath his full potential should he stop holding back and desire to fix them, and there wasn't the risk of a Sword of Damocles descending for doing so.
Either way, it can't be built until the end phase of the story if it would ever be built at all (which it probably would, or something like it, because Survey). So he needs in story excuses not to, at least not yet, because after OCP and Mind fortress, why wouldn't he if he didn't have reason to believe Ziz wasn't the worst thing out there? Especially when he's pretty sure he could kill an endbringer if he had to.
TLDR: Building something like this would likely bring an early end to the story one way or another (what a weird thing to say about a story over a million words...), so Joe needs excuses not to. Excuses not rooted in inability to actually do it, because he definitely can if he set his mind to it. Those excuses can even be valid concerns (ie Zion is Op and Joe at least kinda sorta knows something like him might exist as a threat), and acting on them the correct decision meta wise. But they may also be wrong and not acting is just a waste of time. Given the costs of being wrong though, it's probably better to play it safe and slow like he has been. He does have those excuses, however, so it's a moot point outside of hypotheticals anyway.
We'll just have to see where the story goes. Though I am hyped for when he can start opening up on the world at least a little bit, even if the extreme options would still be a ways away. Coil should just hurry up and die.
Agree makes me wish at the bare minimum tattletale had mentioned Noelle and gave Joe info about the travelers instead of holding it back because she not doing so will not just bite Joe in the back but also her, the only good thing is at least Joe can already counter Noelle without knowing about her. But if Sarah had just told Joe about it he could creative tons of counter measures even before the fight especially against Coil's own in case Coil is taken down, since Coil doesn't have any tinker defenses. Hopefully in the next few chapters Sarah can actually be used to Joe instead of impeding him.
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People would not hate you if you solved their problems and fecked out. At best, they would be grateful, at worst they would not care about you. To be called a Tyrant, you need to actively oppress people. If all you do is solve people's problems and let them live their happy little lives, you are not a Tyrant, you are a Benevolent Ruler. And masses love Benevolent Rulers.