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

[Lockheart]

[X] Plan Leads To Lex-Bots.

 

[ebolasos]

[X] Plan Leads To Lex-Bots.

 

[b-wolf95]

[X] Plan Leads To Lex-Bots.

 

[HavocOrder0999]

[X] Plan Leads To Lex-Bots.
-[X] [Deal] In exchange for setting up a center for the education of young metahumans the DOMA will provide staffing for this organization and allow you access to the data gathered at this school
-[X] [Deal] In exchange for a priority contract with the DOMA LexCorp will design a top of the line nonlethal weapon for them to use.
-[X] [Data] Rudimentary Robot Doubles (3 points)
-[X] [Data] A lead as to T. O. Morrow's possible location (1 point)
-[X] [Data] Tornado flight systems (7 points)
-[X] [Data] Red Inferno tracker (4 points)
-[X] [Rice] In exchange for tutoring Cassandra Luthor Emily Rice requests a pay raise and public recognition for teaching Cassandra
-[X] [Rice] In exchange for scientific consultation on a freelance basis Emily Rice would like samples of Kryptonite to work on at her universities lab
-[X] [Rice] In exchange for teaching Cassandra year round as opposed to whenever she can make it Emily would want you to pay for her flights so long as they are related to the job you are hiring her for.
-[X] [DD] Offer Carla an internship at LexCorp
-[X] [DD] Offer to fund Carla's college enrollment

 

[veekie]

[X] Plan Powerpuff
[X] Plan Leads To Lex-Bots.

Well, want the school, these are the only ones for that.

 

[Gumiho]

[X] Plan Leads To Lex-Bots.

 

[Torgamous]

I think Jinx would actually do fine with a general-education teacher. I've seen no evidence that she has any learning disorders as such; she has psychiatric issues but they don't directly seem to interfere with instruction. Socialization and classroom management, yes, but we've addressed those by moving her from a classroom environment to home-schooling with a paid professional, which we've already done.

What we DO need is a teacher who can work with traumatized or resistant students, because Jinx is both of those- but that's different from special education, though maybe compatible with what you mean by 'special needs.'

Click to shrink...

I'm sure Emily is aware of all that, since she's been trying to teach Jinx for a while. Is any of that a reason not to at least see who she recommends before using an action of our own to find someone?

 

[Wolfy098]

[X] Plan Powerpuff

 

[King crimson]

So I figured you all might enjoy a song I have been working on in the background. Let me know what you think. It's a little repetitive but I ended up liking the final product somewhat. I appreciate feedback as this is a bit of an out there song.

Doomsday Song

Endless destruction,
Annihilation,
Eradication,
Obliteration,
Complete and total decimation
The end has come

Its all on the line, you do or you die
You're out of time, staring death in the eye
Your destination, the final damnation
Your whole world consigned to the conflagaration

Cometh the beast, who bays for blood
Cometh the end, bodies broken in mud
There's nothing left
Fight on, that's right on
You'll die like the rest

Doomsday!
Doomsday!

You can believe, but none of it mattered
There's no reprieve, you'll be broken and battered
The end is upon you, the last of days
The monster moves ever onward, in a violent craze
There's no hope, at the end of the rope
Endless might, your final fight
Nothing to save, the world's a grave
Doomsday is upon you, and destruction is what he craves

The final mercy, the unworthy, all falter before the beast
Endless carnage, death unvarnished, his glorious feast

Endless destruction,
Anihillation,
Eradication,
Obliteration,
Decimation
The end has come

Its all on the line, you do or you die
You're out of time, staring death in the eye
Your destination, the final damnation
Your whole world consigned to the conflagaration

Cometh the beast, who bays for blood
Cometh the end, bodies broken in mud
There's nothing left
Fight on, that's right on
You'll die like the rest

Doomsday!
Doomsday!

You can believe, but none of it mattered
There's no reprieve, you'll be broken and battered
The end is upon you, the last of days
The monster moves ever onward, in a violent craze
There's no hope, at the end of the rope
Endless might, your final fight
Nothing to save, the world's a grave
Doomsday is upon you, and destruction is what he craves

Doomsday!
DOOMSDAY!

 

[Simon_Jester]

Then the Reporter will be convicted of Interviewing a Minor Without Parental Consent.

Click to shrink...

I mean maybe, on the other hand this is a comic book universe and we are a supervillain of the "scheming superficially benevolent evil corporate suit" type.

A plucky teenager trying to blow the whistle on our sinister activities is a classic example of the kind of shit that goes wrong in our line of work.

Also I am pretty sure if I were a plucky teenager I could think of a way around that statute (e.g. write a letter and mail it to someone, mail it to the police instead of the media, something).

We didn't need to subdue anyone, I voted for hunting down records and schematics. In other words - data.

Click to shrink...

In fairness you're right.

Also dealing with superman going to take a lot of time, so even if aren't going to commit to this actions right away, having them as options could be useful.

Click to shrink...

What I mean is, I don't think this is a great time to take "actions that chain into other actions we'll have to take before we get anything" as opposed to "actions that cash out as short-term benefits that we can figure out what to do with later."

We've skipped out on even some pretty basic low-DC ways to benefit from "data on a guy" just because we have so many "data on a guy" options and so many people and things to look into.

I'm sure Emily is aware of all that, since she's been trying to teach Jinx for a while. Is any of that a reason not to at least see who she recommends before using an action of our own to find someone?

Click to shrink...

Because she's a physicist and her students are going to be physics grad students. We're unlikely to get a good result, and Jinx having a tutor who is at best mediocre at educating her is precisely the problem we're trying to resolve here in the hopes that Dr. Rice will be better suited to educating Cassandra the child prodigy than Jinx the developmentally average pre-teen (?) girl.

[Besides, we don't need to spend an AP on getting a tutor, we just need to spend a hero on "hire a tutor" again]

 

[King crimson]

So this is the last reminder if you want to try and win prizes the Legion of Superheroes creative writing contest is open until Feb 1st

 

[Negation]

[ ] Develop a social media platform
DC 34
Roll 26 + 22 (Felicity stewardship stat) + 19 (Carol stewardship stat times coop score with Felicity rounded up)
Total 67
Significant success

Your social media platform is now up and running. It initially began life as a way for members at Ferris Aerospace to stay in contact with each other but Felicity has since expanded it to be available to anyone. The platform is still rather new and while many early adopters are fond of it the entirety of the public has not jumped aboard. Still this is your first step into this market and since literally no one else is competing with you in this space now you'll be able to dominate it at your leisure.

Results: Social media platform created with a decently sized user base, slight interest

Click to shrink...

Hmmm... prehaps we can increase the popularity of our platform by posting videos of Janus chasing a laser pointer?

 

[Mr.W]

[X] Operation Pawn's

[X] [Deal] In exchange for setting up a center for the education of young metahumans the DOMA will provide staffing for this organization and allow you access to the data gathered at this school

[X] [Rice] In exchange for tutoring Cassandra Luthor Emily Rice requests a pay raise and public recognition for teaching Cassandra
[X] [Rice] In exchange for scientific consultation on a freelance basis Emily Rice would like samples of Kryptonite to work on at her universities lab
[X] [Rice] In exchange for teaching Cassandra year round as opposed to whenever she can make it Emily would want you to pay for her flights so long as they are related to the job you are hiring her for.
[X] [Rice] In exchange for a minor fee and the setup of a grant Emily Rice could find a student she is willing to recommend to keep being Jinx's tutor in her place

[X] [Data] Location of the Red Volcano schematics (10 points)
[X] [Data] Red Inferno tracker (4 points)
[X] [Data] A lead as to T. O. Morrow's possible location (1 point)

[X] [DD] Allow Carl to take his daughter to work
[X] [DD] Offer Carla an internship at LexCorp
[X] [DD] Offer to fund Carla's college enrollment
[X] [DD] Allow all workers to take their children to work on a specific day
[X] [DD] Institute a take your child to work day as a regular event at LexCorp

 

[Swedish15]

[X] Plan Leads To Lex-Bots

 

[Thanatosra]

[X] Plan Leads To Lex-Bots.

 

[Silvereagle21]

[X] Plan Leads To Lex-Bots.

 

[Qudrim8054]

So long Ivo. You were a prick to the very end.
May Marie cry in your funeral and may Pamela, Rebecca and everyone else who hated that douche dance on his grave.

Cold hearted and cruel of me, I know.

 

[Reader of all]

Out of curiosity what does stealing 40 cakes actually get lex aside from the 40 cakes and a relationship decrease from people thinking he has gone mad? I get that it is a meme option but we have so many options that surely we can trim a few.

 

[Raukeon]

[X] Plan Leads To Lex-Bots.
-[X] [Deal] In exchange for setting up a center for the education of young metahumans the DOMA will provide staffing for this organization and allow you access to the data gathered at this school
-[X] [Deal] In exchange for a priority contract with the DOMA LexCorp will design a top of the line nonlethal weapon for them to use.
-[X] [Data] Rudimentary Robot Doubles (3 points)
-[X] [Data] A lead as to T. O. Morrow's possible location (1 point)
-[X] [Data] Tornado flight systems (7 points)
-[X] [Data] Red Inferno tracker (4 points)
-[X] [Rice] In exchange for tutoring Cassandra Luthor Emily Rice requests a pay raise and public recognition for teaching Cassandra
-[X] [Rice] In exchange for scientific consultation on a freelance basis Emily Rice would like samples of Kryptonite to work on at her universities lab
-[X] [Rice] In exchange for teaching Cassandra year round as opposed to whenever she can make it Emily would want you to pay for her flights so long as they are related to the job you are hiring her for.
-[X] [DD] Offer Carla an internship at LexCorp
-[X] [DD] Offer to fund Carla's college enrollment

This plan is my favorite.

I wanted both DOMA deals. I wanted to lure Carla Draper. I don't dare to bring children to Lex Tower till we bury into oblivion the disaster Ivo just made. I like the tech options, although instead of Red Inferno, I'd have chosen the Red Shadow records. And maybe Emily can discover something about Kryptonite tha we missed, but need to know.

Thank you very much for going through my omake and making suggestions and corrections. As you may be able to tell, I hate my own writing and so I tend to not read my own work. But, the feedback is helpful to try and improve.

Click to shrink...

Well, I can tell you that you did something much better with that scene than what I was planning to write.

 

[Thule]

[X] Plan Leads To Lex-Bots.

 

[Kolekzionera]

[X] Plan Leads To Lex-Bots.

 

[ThatGuyWithIdeas]

[X] Plan Leads To Lex-Bots.

 

[Night_stalker]

[X] Plan Leads To Lex-Bots.

 

[Kir the Wizard]

The House of Ivo: Resurfacing History
​

Anthony Ivo, probably one of the most renowned scientists of the late 20th century, a respected, if controversial, figure among his peers, has been declared dead following a severe case of organ failure earlier this month. The self-styled Professor Ivo has long since been reported suffering from a terminal degenerative disease. Despite his failing health, the researcher has thrown himself into endless work, seemingly never leaving his workplace at LexCorp without due reason. LexCorp and other major hi-tech corporations such as Wayne Enterprises have lately been acting like real "miracle workers" in the sphere of medicine, leaving many with hopes that the corporation would support this brilliant mind on the road to eventual recovery. The "miracle" never happened. Without a timely operation due to a lack of immediate organ donors, Anthony Ivo has passed away, not too long before the upcoming Nobel Prize award ceremony, an event that, as many have speculated, would finally celebrate the controversial researcher's achievements. This article, with its source base heavily reliant on scrupulous work in the archives, aims to shed some light on the famous scientist's familial background, something that may let his contemporaries understand how such a brilliant man came to be, and see for themselves whether our society has treated its scientists with the respect they deserve.

The earliest progenitors of Anthony Ivo's that are known to the US archives are Josip and Ivana, last names unknown, as all the info that the archives have of them is their parentage of Ivo Ivo, the first of the family to arrive on American soil. His real surname is forever left unknown. An immigrant coming from the vast European empire of Austria-Hungary, likely of Croatian or Bosnian origin, Ivo has made a mistake common among the Slavs coming to the US: knowing only a handful of words in English, he'd put his first name into both boxes asking for "Name" in the transport ship's manifest, with Ellis Island clerks preferring to see whether the answers matched the manifest, rather than try to correct the alien's mistake. The inspectors asked for no special identification from passengers and simply accepted the names the immigrants gave them. As a result, the Ivo family has been "born" at the end of the 19th​ century. Not much is known about the first patriarch, other than his job at a metallurgical plant, and his marriage to Maria Ivo née Polanski. It can be estimated that this has been a period of "early capital accumulation" for the family, as there are no records of Ivo and Maria applying for education, communal work, or having any part in local political events. Instead, they focused on making money and spending as little as possible, all to support their children's future careers.

As fate would have it, there is much more information available on Maria and Ivo's son, who has truly brought the family name into limelight. Dr. Julian Ivo was the first scientist in the family, the only one for some time, before his grandson's rise to prominence. It may be speculated that it was the desire to honor his unfairly forgotten grandfather that motivated Anthony Ives to change his name to "Ivo" after getting a major position at LexCorp's research division. A neo-humanist philosopher and a polymath, Julian's greatest works form the basis of theoretical robotics & mechatronics as we know them, alongside developing the basis for what is known today as "sociorobotics". In his magnum opus, "On the Connections of the Brain, Memory, and Programming", the scientist has outlined the path for future bio-engineering research, presenting a truly interdisciplinary study to the scientific community of the US. Dr. Ivo has managed to achieve his dream of becoming a Professor at Ivy University, but it never brought him quite close enough to fully develop his projects, and move from theory to applied robotics. Various businesses lacked belief in outlandish theories thought mere science-fiction, and so the great researcher was left without any grants to support his experiments. In 1942 Professor Julian Ivo was fired for undisclosed reasons. Based on his further actions, it may be speculated that the University's decision was related to anti-German sentiment, which has been growing strong in the US due to its confrontations with Germany in two World Wars. Although not actually of German ethnicity, the Ivos may have been lumped in with the "Krauts" by the mob's consensus, together with many other US citizens with distinctly Central European-sounding names. Although it must be noted that the name Yves/Ivo existed in Norman, Frankish and English naming traditions independently from the South Slavic one, it appears that Julian Ivo did not want to take any chances. As such, he has legally changed the surnames of his children, Colin and Gerald, to "Ives", seeking to eliminate any suspicion of "Germanic" descent. Left without a healthy source of income, the family was mostly staying afloat thanks to the efforts of Lucinda Ivo née Stonewall, of whom there are many records left in the documentation of various small businesses, along with newspaper ads related to various odd jobs. Meanwhile, Julian sank into independent experimentation, without any funds or proper safety measures (something that can be inferred from the number of fire department reports). Later on, he moved from makeshift mechanisms to studying chemical influence on animal brain, to radiation studies, to trying to fashion prosthetics hooked to animal brains. His bizarre death involved a fatal incident, supposedly a rabid attack from multiple mutated hedgehogs. However, it was mostly unnoticed in the larger scientific community, and Julian's sons did not share his enthusiasm for science.

Gerald Ives, angry at "missing" World War II and the Korean War, eventually devoted himself fully to a military career, leaving the rest of the family and never looking back. Eventually joining the Navy SEALs, Gerald was among the servicemen deployed to South Vietnam as advisors for the purpose of training Army of the Republic of Vietnam commandos. In the end, Ives never came back from Vietnam. He was reported missing during an operation against the Vietcong, one of many Americans forever declared MIA.

Colin Ives, husband of Mary Ives née Williams, father of Anthony Ivo, likely harbored a great distaste for his father's aloof studies, which left their mother overworking herself all alone, – an attitude which has greatly impacted the man's relationship with his son. Nevertheless, he inherited Julian Ivo's talent for engineering, turning the deceased scientist's underground laboratory into a repairman's workshop. Witnessing his family's fall from grace, Ives cursed the university that left his father jobless, and the unfathomable science that, in his mind, ruined their life. A report from the fire department shows how Colin, deep in his cups, apparently intended to burn all of his father's books and notes. The literature was protected, however, by none other than Lucinda, who always supported her husband's "genius works", and also young Anthony, presumably similarly emphasizing with the memory of his grandfather. It was likely under Lucinda's doting influence that Anthony chose the path of a researcher for himself, seeing it as a legacy he had to resurrect, for the sake of his grandfather and the honor of their old family name. Sources suggest that the atmosphere in the family was uneasy, to put it lightly. A year after Lucinda's death one can find disturbing reports from the police, questioning the situation at the Ives household. Although the police made no conclusions, the sheer quantity of their queries at the neighbors' behest is a likely sign of loud fights between Colin and Anthony, probably involving beatings. Despite Colin's intentions of eventually rising from poverty, he spent his earnings far too quickly on poor investments and alcohol, repeating history once again, as his wife Mary had to take on extra jobs to support the family. Colin died penniless, forcing Anthony to work to support his college ambitions on his own.

Looking at the history of the Ivo/Ives family, it is frightening how often blatant bigotry and lack of understanding impairs our society, making it destroy its best. Having read the works of both Julian and Anthony Ivo, I am left flabbergasted as to how long did it take for our country, and the global scientific community as a whole, to recognize the deeds of these great men. It is evident to me that Professor Ivo's background was built upon hardships, but I dearly hope that his legacy would one day allow humanity to progress pass its unflattering qualities, so that no family in the future would ever suffer such perils. Let us hope that cold calculation and societal prejudice will never snuff out the sparks of brilliance in our country, as it has happened with the House of Ivo.

 

[Qudrim8054]

[X] Plan Leads To Lex-Bots.