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

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

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

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

    Votes: 31 7.9%
  • Adam West Camp

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

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

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

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

    Votes: 22 5.6%

  • Total voters
    390
  • Poll closed .
This is good enough. There are a few little bits that are certainly a little odd spellingwise (sabotoage should be sabotage and nest time should probably be next time). You've earned a vote when the season is completed and created another restriction in season writing. You've earned 500 exp for this omake.

Alright, fixed those two typos you mentioned.

And I will use that 500 exp with the 300 I already have to buy the next "Death of Abin Sur" interlude, whenever it's convenient for you to write.
 
I still say Brain's the French Authorities' & Doom Patrol's problem.
He's their problem, but we might want to coordinate with each other just so we don't accidentally cross paths and piss each other off. If he's meddling in affairs that involve us (like hacking our phone network), and if we might meddle in affairs that involve him (like our growing space presence and business interests in Eastern Europe), it would behoove us to stay out of each others' way or have a truce or some supervillainous equivalent of the "presidential hotline" by which we can contact each other.

Speaking of which, we should start working on that Vegan Meat action to make recruiting Beast Boy easier (probably).
...That is clever, and bear in mind I've never watched the Teen Titans cartoon and am working purely off deduction and snippets here.

yes it is because he intends to wipe out all life so better be prepared for him.
Right, but the counter-counter-argument is that in canon he fails to wipe out all life, because someone stops him, and that someone isn't Lex Luthor.

By promoting ourselves to his special attention for destruction, we increase the chances that we can stop him ourselves.

But we also increase our exposure to risk, because now if Trigon wants to destroy the world, he's going to have to go through us. Directly through us. Which means that we cannot, for example:

1) Rely on someone else hopefully stopping him before we have to endanger our own assets, which is Lex's usual strategy for dealing with world-threatening supervillains. He knows the JLA or whoever will fight them first, and effectively uses them as a meatshield. Nor can we...

2) Plan to escape to another world or universe to avoid Trigon's wrath if he somehow destroys all the powers that have been set against him. Because, again, he'll be gunning for us personally and he'll have to go through us before he confronts any other opposition.

Kinda? Though it wasn't buff Mari, and it was a group of women. And IIRC Wonder Woman was cleaning house.
Yes, because Wonder Woman is much stronger than Vixen.

Which is why I feel weird about trying to boost her Martial up to 35 or whatever.
 
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Right, but the counter-counter-argument is that in canon he fails to wipe out all life, because someone stops him, and that someone isn't Lex Luthor.

By promoting ourselves to his special attention for destruction, we increase the chances that we can stop him ourselves.

But we also increase our exposure to risk, because now if Trigon wants to destroy the world, he's going to have to go through us. Directly through us. Which means that we cannot, for example:

1) Rely on someone else hopefully stopping him before we have to endanger our own assets, which is Lex's usual strategy for dealing with world-threatening supervillains. He knows the JLA or whoever will fight them first, and effectively uses them as a meatshield. Nor can we...

2) Plan to escape to another world or universe to avoid Trigon's wrath if he somehow destroys all the powers that have been set against him. Because, again, he'll be gunning for us personally and he'll have to go through us before he confronts any other opposition.
The problem with him being beaten is that he kind of won he killed the entire justice league. its only through Raven friendship with the teen titans trigon loses and they is noway in hell Lex or anyone on earth but Raven could defeat Trigon and again it wouldn't be out of character for some versions
of Lex since in some versions he tries to fight doomsday or evil superman.

Edit: Also we are kind of making assumption about what state Trigon is in or what followers he has since I don't know what version of the cult of blood is active or if he has his sons so I can see your point about the risk.
 
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Non-Canon Omake: LexCorp Association of Wrestling (LAW) Pt.1
LexCorp Association of Wrestling (LAW) Pt. 1

Music plays in the background as a reel of images flash one after another. Lex Luthor, Superman, Lois Lane, The Rogues, Flash, Wonder Woman, Ra's Al Ghul, and more. The reel ends with the letters "LAW" and then a picture of a smiling Lex Luthor in a suit.

Fireworks go off in the building as the camera pans the crowd, a full arena filled to the brim. In the center of the arena sits a wrestling ring, and a few meters behind the ring sits the announcers table. The two men behind the table? Perry White and Oswald Loomis.

"Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to LAW, the Lexcorp Association of Wrestling. I'm Perry White, and beside me is my partner Oswald Loomis."

"Thank you Perry, and welcome to everyone at home! Just like all you Lex Addicts, I too cannot wait for Mr. Luthor to make his special announcement tonight!"

"You think it has something to do with his match on Sunday?" Asks Perry, as if hinting something. Oswald doesn't take the bait.

"With Superman? Pfft. Who do you think he is? Lex Luthor fears no one, and Sunday at Battle of the Gods, I guarantee that Lex will be the one standing with his arm raised!" Oswald retorts definitively. Perry almost snorts in response.

"Yeah because he cheats. I notice you didn't say a thing about him actually winning the match." Oswald looks to say something, but Perry keeps on going. "And honestly, I think the boss has messed up. He has no chance to beat someone like Superman in the ring, and to even allow it get to this is--"

"What's this?" Oswald holds his hand to his ear and cuts Perry off. "It appears that we have Superman backstage and he's looking to say some words to one Lex Luthor. Vicki, take us away." He commands.

Suddenly we get a view of a backstage area that looks like a hallway of sorts. Vicki Vale stands there with a microphone held to Superman's face and besides Superman is one James Olson.

"Well Vicki, I just like to say that I look forward to finally getting a fair shake at Lex, and possibly getting some answers. For reasons I can't begin to understand, the man has hated me ever since I...I..." Superman starts off confident, nice but firm, but trails off at the end.

"Ever since you turned down his generous offer, yes. Wouldn't any man be a bit insulted at a refusal as blatant as yours?" Vicki asks bluntly, cutting Superman off. It's not much of a surprise as Vicki is known to be favorable towards Lex Luthor, so much so that some even think they might be having an affair. Superman recoils and frowns at her words.

"Well...no. I mean yes, but I didn't refuse him as coarsely as you're making it out to be. I just--"

"Didn't you? I remember you slapping down the hand of the man that helped you, that offered you so much, and in return wanted so little. You spat on a visionary, right in his face, and told him to screw off. I can't say I'm not disappointed in you, Superman." Vicki bites back scathingly as she interrupts him. Superman looks to be at a lost for words.

"I...Look here, I..."

"And do you really think you can defeat a man like Lex in that ring? You may be Super, but Lex is--" She doesn't get to finish before Jimmy Olsen snatches away her microphone, yelling loudly with every word.

"First off Vicki, shut your mouth! Don't you ever talk to my pal, Kal like that again! And let me tell you something about Superman vs. Lex!" He stops to lick his lips and adjust the microphone. "You know they say all men are created equal, but you look at Kal, and you look at Lex Luthor, and you can see that statement is NOT true! See normally, you go 1 on 1 with another wrestler, you got a 50/50 chance of winning! But Kal here is a Kryptonian and he's not normal! So Lex has a 25% at best at beating him! And then you add in me, James "Jimmy" Olsen to the mix, and his chances of winning drastic go down! See the match at Battle of the Gods, there's a 50% Chance of winning. But Kal has a 75% Chance of winning because Lex KNOWS he can't beat Kal and he's not gonna even try! So you take Lex's 25% and minus the 25% chance of him not trying, and he has a 0% chance of winning at Battle of the Gods! THEN Take Superman's 75% Chance of winning against any common man, and add on the 75% chance of facing Lex in particular, and Kal's got a 150% chance of winning that match up! See Mister Luthor? The Numbers Don't Lie, and they spell disaster for you, at Battle of the Gods!" James "Jimmy" Olsen finishes, as he shoves the microphone back into Vicki who looks bewildered at his proclamation.

Jimmy storms off and Superman shakes his head and walks after him, muttering an apology. Vicki does her best to be professional, but she's dumbstruck by what just happened.

"Did...did anyone understand a word he said?"

"There's no need Vicki." Comes the smooth tones of the boss, Lex Luthor as the camera pans to him in his office, sitting at his desk. "'Twas but the ramblings of a fool." Lex says confidently. "See, what Superman, James, and Perry White don't understand is that...I always win. And I will never put myself in a position that can jeopardize that." Lex then stands up and walks in front of his desk.

"You see, the contract I signed, that we all signed, said that Superman would get a match with M.E., at Battle of the Gods." Lex smirks. "For whatever reason, that alien seems to think that means me, but no, it is literally the initials M.E. as in 'The Vixen' Mare E." Out of nowhere the camera is snatched around ad forced to look into the animalistic lion-like eyes of a predator. "Down girl, save it....for Superman." A growl is heard and the camera smashes into the floor, showing static.

The static then subsides for a second as it focuses on a dark room. Four dark figures, shadows, stand in the room menacingly.

"Respect." Says one man in a sort of soothing voice.

"Order." Grunts another man.

"Goods." Squeaks out a third man.

"Understanding." Says the fourth man in a somewhat deep voice.

"Excellence." They all say in unison. The first man, the leader clearly, walks into the camera's view wearing... a parka of sorts? And sunglasses. He is Leonard Snart, AKA Captain Cold.

"Sincerity. Emphasis on the Sin." The man takes off his sunglasses and stares deep into the camera. "I want you to hear me now, and hear me good, LAW. Respect us, and we will respect you. Give us what we want, and we will serve you...for a time. But cross us, and you will find it hard to walk away from that mistake." He places his sunglasses back on. "Emphasis on the walk." Leonard Snart steps back into the shadows. "Understand that...and you will come to understand us...the Rogues."

The camera is filled with static once more before Oswald and Perry are shown again at their announce table.

"Wow. That was...wow." Perry is almost speechless.

"I know, chilling. I wonder what the Rogues have in store, for LAW. " The two remain silent for a moment. "In the meantime, we have our first match of the night coming up next, it's Lex's newest recruit, 'The Vixen' Mare. E. vs. Diana Prince, known to many as 'The Wonder Woman.' This promises to be a knockdown brawl folks, so stay tuned..."



Next time on LAW Pt. 2.... Mari vs. Diana, Vixen vs. Wonder Woman.
 
LexCorp Association of Wrestling (LAW) Pt. 1
AU where The Quest is WWE!!!!
I like it!

"First off Vicki, shut your mouth! Don't you ever talk to my pal, Kal like that again! And let me tell you something about Superman vs. Lex!" He stops to lick his lips and adjust the microphone. "You know they say all men are created equal, but you look at Kal, and you look at Lex Luthor, and you can see that statement is NOT true! See normally, you go 1 on 1 with another wrestler, you got a 50/50 chance of winning! But Kal here is a Kryptonian and he's not normal! So Lex has a 25% at best at beating him! And then you add in me, James "Jimmy" Olsen to the mix, and his chances of winning drastic go down! See the match at Battle of the Gods, there's a 50% Chance of winning. But Kal has a 75% Chance of winning because Lex KNOWS he can't beat Kal and he's not gonna even try! So you take Lex's 25% and minus the 25% chance of him not trying, and he has a 0% chance of winning at Battle of the Gods! THEN Take Superman's 75% Chance of winning against any common man, and add on the 75% chance of facing Lex in particular, and Kal's got a 150% chance of winning that match up! See Mister Luthor? The Numbers Don't Lie, and they spell disaster for you, at Battle of the Gods!" James "Jimmy" Olsen finishes, as he shoves the microphone back into Vicki who looks bewildered at his proclamation.
Seriously? Professor Scott Steiner? Lol

Edit: You do know that this is the Anti-Life Equation right, @KnowledgeKing?
 
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And I will use that 500 exp with the 300 I already have to buy the next "Death of Abin Sur" interlude, whenever it's convenient for you to write.
Expect it to land on the 21st
Which is why I feel weird about trying to boost her Martial up to 35 or whatever.
If it makes you feel a bit better using just the most basic form of her powers I calculated that optimally switching between the pairs should allow for Mari to exert about 5842.27 N of force with every blow (accelerate to cheetah speeds before switching to Blue Whale mass) which means through switching fast she can hit crazy hard. Mari's power get potentially even more dangerous once you realize that the force distributed is far more concentrated than what occurs with a blue whale slamming into someone (similar to how a high heel can shatter glass an elephant can stand on due to pressure distribution). I still haven't even gotten into the odder forms of Mari's powers that are possible (like aliens that are also animals or dinosaurs could potentially be used). Tricks of switching between animals to optimize deadliness has been how I've been narratively matching Mari's boosted stats (fun fact she's also the only hero unit you have that can survive having her head cut off thanks to cockroach powers).

@King crimson How's this? Took liberal use of Karl's bone formula thing though it may not be monstrous enough. Also bone rabbits cause it sounded fun.

I like it. It's certainly not monstrous enough for the current formula but I could see it being a potential model down the line. Karl also appears to entirely lack facial hair (which is a really minor thing all things considered but I thought I should point it out). Still its a fun piece for what I see as a potential evolution of the bone formula. Also I adore the bone rabbits (they made this picture for me) and I think you knocked them out of the park of making them look like really creepy rabbits with extra growths coming out of them. Less monstrous then the current versions but more immediately recognizable as rabbits because of it.

You've earned 400 exp
LexCorp Association of Wrestling (LAW) Pt. 1

Music plays in the background as a reel of images flash one after another. Lex Luthor, Superman, Lois Lane, The Rogues, Flash, Wonder Woman, Ra's Al Ghul, and more. The reel ends with the letters "LAW" and then a picture of a smiling Lex Luthor in a suit.

Fireworks go off in the building as the camera pans the crowd, a full arena filled to the brim. In the center of the arena sits a wrestling ring, and a few meters behind the ring sits the announcers table. The two men behind the table? Perry White and Oswald Loomis.

"Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to LAW, the Lexcorp Association of Wrestling. I'm Perry White, and beside me is my partner Oswald Loomis."

"Thank you Perry, and welcome to everyone at home! Just like all you Lex Addicts, I too cannot wait for Mr. Luthor to make his special announcement tonight!"

"You think it has something to do with his match on Sunday?" Asks Perry, as if hinting something. Oswald doesn't take the bait.

"With Superman? Pfft. Who do you think he is? Lex Luthor fears no one, and Sunday at Battle of the Gods, I guarantee that Lex will be the one standing with his arm raised!" Oswald retorts definitively. Perry almost snorts in response.

"Yeah because he cheats. I notice you didn't say a thing about him actually winning the match." Oswald looks to say something, but Perry keeps on going. "And honestly, I think the boss has messed up. He has no chance to beat someone like Superman in the ring, and to even allow it get to this is--"

"What's this?" Oswald holds his hand to his ear and cuts Perry off. "It appears that we have Superman backstage and he's looking to say some words to one Lex Luthor. Vicki, take us away." He commands.

Suddenly we get a view of a backstage area that looks like a hallway of sorts. Vicki Vale stands there with a microphone held to Superman's face and besides Superman is one James Olson.

"Well Vicki, I just like to say that I look forward to finally getting a fair shake at Lex, and possibly getting some answers. For reasons I can't begin to understand, the man has hated me ever since I...I..." Superman starts off confident, nice but firm, but trails off at the end.

"Ever since you turned down his generous offer, yes. Wouldn't any man be a bit insulted at a refusal as blatant as yours?" Vicki asks bluntly, cutting Superman off. It's not much of a surprise as Vicki is known to be favorable towards Lex Luthor, so much so that some even think they might be having an affair. Superman recoils and frowns at her words.

"Well...no. I mean yes, but I didn't refuse him as coarsely as you're making it out to be. I just--"

"Didn't you? I remember you slapping down the hand of the man that helped you, that offered you so much, and in return wanted so little. You spat on a visionary, right in his face, and told him to screw off. I can't say I'm not disappointed in you, Superman." Vicki bites back scathingly as she interrupts him. Superman looks to be at a lost for words.

"I...Look here, I..."

"And do you really think you can defeat a man like Lex in that ring? You may be Super, but Lex is--" She doesn't get to finish before Jimmy Olsen snatches away her microphone, yelling loudly with every word.

"First off Vicki, shut your mouth! Don't you ever talk to my pal, Kal like that again! And let me tell you something about Superman vs. Lex!" He stops to lick his lips and adjust the microphone. "You know they say all men are created equal, but you look at Kal, and you look at Lex Luthor, and you can see that statement is NOT true! See normally, you go 1 on 1 with another wrestler, you got a 50/50 chance of winning! But Kal here is a Kryptonian and he's not normal! So Lex has a 25% at best at beating him! And then you add in me, James "Jimmy" Olsen to the mix, and his chances of winning drastic go down! See the match at Battle of the Gods, there's a 50% Chance of winning. But Kal has a 75% Chance of winning because Lex KNOWS he can't beat Kal and he's not gonna even try! So you take Lex's 25% and minus the 25% chance of him not trying, and he has a 0% chance of winning at Battle of the Gods! THEN Take Superman's 75% Chance of winning against any common man, and add on the 75% chance of facing Lex in particular, and Kal's got a 150% chance of winning that match up! See Mister Luthor? The Numbers Don't Lie, and they spell disaster for you, at Battle of the Gods!" James "Jimmy" Olsen finishes, as he shoves the microphone back into Vicki who looks bewildered at his proclamation.

Jimmy storms off and Superman shakes his head and walks after him, muttering an apology. Vicki does her best to be professional, but she's dumbstruck by what just happened.

"Did...did anyone understand a word he said?"

"There's no need Vicki." Comes the smooth tones of the boss, Lex Luthor as the camera pans to him in his office, sitting at his desk. "'Twas but the ramblings of a fool." Lex says confidently. "See, what Superman, James, and Perry White don't understand is that...I always win. And I will never put myself in a position that can jeopardize that." Lex then stands up and walks in front of his desk.

"You see, the contract I signed, that we all signed, said that Superman would get a match with M.E., at Battle of the Gods." Lex smirks. "For whatever reason, that alien seems to think that means me, but no, it is literally the initials M.E. as in 'The Vixen' Mare E." Out of nowhere the camera is snatched around ad forced to look into the animalistic lion-like eyes of a predator. "Down girl, save it....for Superman." A growl is heard and the camera smashes into the floor, showing static.

The static then subsides for a second as it focuses on a dark room. Four dark figures, shadows, stand in the room menacingly.

"Respect." Says one man in a sort of soothing voice.

"Order." Grunts another man.

"Goods." Squeaks out a third man.

"Understanding." Says the fourth man in a somewhat deep voice.

"Excellence." They all say in unison. The first man, the leader clearly, walks into the camera's view wearing... a parka of sorts? And sunglasses. He is Leonard Snart, AKA Captain Cold.

"Sincerity. Emphasis on the Sin." The man takes off his sunglasses and stares deep into the camera. "I want you to hear me now, and hear me good, LAW. Respect us, and we will respect you. Give us what we want, and we will serve you...for a time. But cross us, and you will find it hard to walk away from that mistake." He places his sunglasses back on. "Emphasis on the walk." Leonard Snart steps back into the shadows. "Understand that...and you will come to understand us...the Rogues."

The camera is filled with static once more before Oswald and Perry are shown again at their announce table.

"Wow. That was...wow." Perry is almost speechless.

"I know, chilling. I wonder what the Rogues have in store, for LAW. " The two remain silent for a moment. "In the meantime, we have our first match of the night coming up next, it's Lex's newest recruit, 'The Vixen' Mare. E. vs. Diana Prince, known to many as 'The Wonder Woman.' This promises to be a knockdown brawl folks, so stay tuned..."



Next time on LAW Pt. 2.... Mari vs. Diana, Vixen vs. Wonder Woman.
This omake was odd for me. I'm not all that familiar with professional wrestling so I went into this a little lacking in the knowledge of the context which made it a bit difficult to follow at times but never so much so that I didn't get what was going on (the only really problem I had was a sort of metatextual "why is this happening the way it is" which I'm assuming can be answered with "that's how professional wrestling is").

Vicky is super aggressive here which felt a bit odd to me that Superman of all people is the person she's ragging on but I'm assuming she was needed to fill a role and she does that well. The little touch that she is manipulating the image Clark has was a nice touch and I do think from what little we saw of Kal El he is solid.

Jimmy Olsen's rant suffers a bit from something I've heard referred to as the fallacy of mimicking form (there's probably a better actual term out there) where what is meant to be confusing and difficult to follow in universe is confusing and difficult to follow out of universe. It wasn't a bad attempt at causing a stylistic change to indicate something in universe but for me I felt that it didn't work all that well and I ended up kind of tuning it out the first few times I read it. I think it's the weakest part of the omake and is the point that could most easily be improved on in the future.

I also have an odd question about the stage name chosen for Mari "Mare. E.". A mare is traditionally a female horse (there are other meanings but I don't see them all that often and they are even more wildly off base as I doubt you intended connection to moon plains or a bad performance in sports). Was the horse comparison intentional cause it felt a little weird to me but I might be missing something and I'd like to get some of the thought process behind the intentionality here.

The rogues were fun for the little bit we saw them and I'm quite curious who each one was (my guess would be Mark Mardon as the first, Samuel Scudder as the second, Axel Walker as the third and Mick Rory as the fourth). Feel free to let me know how close I was with my guess work.

You've earned 400 exp for this omake
Edit: You do know that this is the Anti-Life Equation right, @KnowledgeKing?
Erm, not really?

The Anti-Life equation has multiplication and division in it and variables that are defined to have it make sense. The whole thing written out is (the parenthesis are things I've included myself to help it make more sense as an equation):

(((((Loneliness + Alienation + Fear + Despair + Self-Worth)/Mockery)/Condemnation)/Misunderstanding) x Guilt x Shame x Failure x Judgement)
and
N=Y where Y=Hope and N=Folly, Love=Lies, Life=Death, Self=Darkseid

Of course I could simply be missing a joke between the two of you and taking fake comic book math way too seriously.


Don't know why it popped out so small, sorry about that. @King crimson got another for you.

As for this picture it's neat. If I had to guess at influence the old Teen Titans cartoon heavily influenced the design (The hair, horns and fifth eye/gem in the forehead match up fairly clearly) although there are elements that are certainly your own as well (the lack of weird side burn things, the ears shape and the way the markings are placed on him). I like seeing this take on Trigon since it keeps a lot of the old stuff to make it recognizably Trigon but it seems like a less savage then usual version (lack of visible teeth helps with that).

400 exp has been earned along with my interest in seeing how you would end up drawing Doomsday, Atrocitus and Charybdis (the Aquaman villain not the mythological monster)
 
Suffice to say an update is coming tomorrow rather than today but it will come tomorrow. Sorry for all of the delays.
 
Erm, not really?

The Anti-Life equation has multiplication and division in it and variables that are defined to have it make sense. The whole thing written out is (the parenthesis are things I've included myself to help it make more sense as an equation):

(((((Loneliness + Alienation + Fear + Despair + Self-Worth)/Mockery)/Condemnation)/Misunderstanding) x Guilt x Shame x Failure x Judgement)
and
N=Y where Y=Hope and N=Folly, Love=Lies, Life=Death, Self=Darkseid

Of course I could simply be missing a joke between the two of you and taking fake comic book math way too seriously.
Ah... Nope. This is just simple humor. No inside joke or taking math seriously here. And yes, KC I know what the Equation actually is :p I've read the DC Wikia page a lot of times.

Now to the joke. Scott Steiner is a Wrestler, who during a WWE interview gave this erratic speech, explaining why he will win against his opponent. Something that made no sense to any and all who heard it.

I just made a jest in good faith.
Also here's the clip, the actual interview.

 
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So here's a potentially stupid question @King crimson, how do the Kryptonite power plants work? Do they use steam to turn turbines like most power plants? And if so do they get a bonus from the improved turbines tech we got from researching Red Tornado?
 
If it makes you feel a bit better using just the most basic form of her powers I calculated that optimally switching between the pairs should allow for Mari to exert about 5842.27 N of force with every blow (accelerate to cheetah speeds before switching to Blue Whale mass) which means through switching fast she can hit crazy hard. Mari's power get potentially even more dangerous once you realize that the force distributed is far more concentrated than what occurs with a blue whale slamming into someone (similar to how a high heel can shatter glass an elephant can stand on due to pressure distribution). I still haven't even gotten into the odder forms of Mari's powers that are possible (like aliens that are also animals or dinosaurs could potentially be used). Tricks of switching between animals to optimize deadliness has been how I've been narratively matching Mari's boosted stats
Well, so far I think I'm the only one who wrote a scene of Mari McCabe actually fighting anything, and I hope I portrayed her realistically. I know you canonized it.

I portrayed a Mari who in my opinion, could plausibly have the low-twenties Martial or so stat she had as of several turns ago before people started inflating it- a superhuman, but one that a human being without power armor could conceivably fight if they were merely very good, even though they'd probably lose pretty fast unless they were, like, Batman or something.

And yeah, that wasn't Optimal!Mari, so in fairness, there's that.

I'm not sure that just any form of cheese can be applied to her abilities and work, and if I were running the show I'd put some limits on the magic, but I definitely take your meaning and it's your show to run, not mine. Though, uh...

(fun fact she's also the only hero unit you have that can survive having her head cut off thanks to cockroach powers).
Importantly, does she know that, because if she doesn't, then it wouldn't work based on my understanding of the Tantu Totem, which is admittedly a bit shaky.

Maybe we should have Mari and a few Learning heroes do that study action after all. ;P

I like it. It's certainly not monstrous enough for the current formula but I could see it being a potential model down the line. Karl also appears to entirely lack facial hair (which is a really minor thing all things considered but I thought I should point it out).
I'm not sure you ever mentioned him having a beard or mustache, and while your picture of him has it, your picture of him is also from a Golden Age Batman comic.

Golden Age comics tend to have somewhat distorted proportions, and follow fashion conventions of the 1930s (all middle and upper class men wear suits, and "Doctor Death" in the Batman comics has a freaking monocle, something nobody's worn in decades except as a deliberate fashion statement). So we can only treat Golden Age pictures as a rough guide to a man's appearance.

This omake was odd for me. I'm not all that familiar with professional wrestling so I went into this a little lacking in the knowledge of the context which made it a bit difficult to follow at times but never so much so that I didn't get what was going on (the only really problem I had was a sort of metatextual "why is this happening the way it is" which I'm assuming can be answered with "that's how professional wrestling is").

Vicky is super aggressive here which felt a bit odd to me that Superman of all people is the person she's ragging on but I'm assuming she was needed to fill a role and she does that well. The little touch that she is manipulating the image Clark has was a nice touch and I do think from what little we saw of Kal El he is solid.

Jimmy Olsen's rant suffers a bit from something I've heard referred to as the fallacy of mimicking form (there's probably a better actual term out there) where what is meant to be confusing and difficult to follow in universe is confusing and difficult to follow out of universe. It wasn't a bad attempt at causing a stylistic change to indicate something in universe but for me I felt that it didn't work all that well and I ended up kind of tuning it out the first few times I read it. I think it's the weakest part of the omake and is the point that could most easily be improved on in the future.

...

Erm, not really?

The Anti-Life equation has multiplication and division in it and variables that are defined to have it make sense. The whole thing written out is (the parenthesis are things I've included myself to help it make more sense as an equation):

(((((Loneliness + Alienation + Fear + Despair + Self-Worth)/Mockery)/Condemnation)/Misunderstanding) x Guilt x Shame x Failure x Judgement)
and
N=Y where Y=Hope and N=Folly, Love=Lies, Life=Death, Self=Darkseid

Of course I could simply be missing a joke between the two of you and taking fake comic book math way too seriously.
When you are a math teacher, and I am, Jimmy Olson's rant comes perilously close to being the Anti-Life Equation. :(

Though only close, because while for a few brief moments I did belief that life was pointless after reading it, I was filled, not with a desperate desire to obey Jimmy Olson in order to give my life meaning, but rather with a desperate desire to kill him before any of my students heard him. :p

[I am mostly joking. But only mostly.]

Also, it is entirely possible that the quotients in the Equation are intended to be divided by one another- for example, the ratio of condemnation to misunderstanding might itself be relevant in the denominator of a larger fraction, making it valid to write:

(bunch of depressing variables)/(condemnation/misunderstanding) ...

So here's a potentially stupid question @King crimson, how do the Kryptonite power plants work? Do they use steam to turn turbines like most power plants? And if so do they get a bonus from the improved turbines tech we got from researching Red Tornado?
My headcanon (based on the thoughts I was having while writing this was that some combination of stimuli is used to cause the kryptonite to emit exceptional amounts of the delta rays that are normally its only detectable form of radiation aside from the green glow.

In theory with the right equipment, you could basically just capture those delta rays and use their energy to generate direct current (as a solar cell does, but with much greater intensity so you can have it all concentrated inside a building instead of needing to cover acres of land with solar cells).

Buuuut in theory you could also capture those delta rays and use them to heat things up and then run coolant liquid past them to create a steam loop that powers a turbine.

Not sure which approach would be more efficient, the 'krypto-voltaic' approach that creates direct current (which you'd then have to turn into AC, not sure how solar power plants handle that), or the 'krypto-thermal' approach that generates heat and runs a steam turbine.
 
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So here's a potentially stupid question @King crimson, how do the Kryptonite power plants work? Do they use steam to turn turbines like most power plants? And if so do they get a bonus from the improved turbines tech we got from researching Red Tornado?
They do not get a bonus from the Red Tornado stuff. As to how the kryptonite powerplants work I'm not sure. From what I understand modern nuclear power plants use the heat of the material to boil water and then use that to turn turbines and generate electricity. This might not work for kryptonite since it can be touched without too much damage meaning that it doesn't release enough heat at any given moment for this to be viable. If someone else knows more about physics and has an answer then feel free to chime in but I ultimately have no idea beyond "comic book shenanigans". You'll get a similar response when asking about batteries (I don't know enough about the chemical compositions a theoretical battery would need to have and how well that interacts with the properties it has been established that kryptonite). Sorry for not being able to provide you with a clear definitive answer.

Well, so far I think I'm the only one who wrote a scene of Mari McCabe actually fighting anything, and I hope I portrayed her realistically. I know you canonized it.

I portrayed a Mari who in my opinion, could plausibly have the low-twenties Martial or so stat she had as of several turns ago before people started inflating it- a superhuman, but one that a human being without power armor could conceivably fight if they were merely very good, even though they'd probably lose pretty fast unless they were, like, Batman or something.

And yeah, that wasn't Optimal!Mari, so in fairness, there's that.

I'm not sure that just any form of cheese can be applied to her abilities and work, and if I were running the show I'd put some limits on the magic, but I definitely take your meaning and it's your show to run, not mine. Though, uh...
You did portray her accurately to how she was at the time. There are limitations inbuilt to the Tantu Totem (most notably it can't give her the abilities of animals not from this dimension meaning she can't copy demons at all, and it also cannot copy artificially engineered species meaning she couldn't copy animals on venom or something along those lines). There are limitations on it, the thing is even with the strictest interpretation of her power (one animal trait at a time and have to call out both the animal and the trait being copied) there is a good amount of cheese that can be gained through the switching rapidly of animals (poison dart frog skin could let her one shot most creatures that have open skin contact and are native to earth). Mari in quest has a less restrictive powerset then that so she could definitely make use of cheese to win.

If we had to give a narrative reason as to why her stats got better, Mari read up on animals and practiced switching animals quickly. She's still a bit of a glass cannon but there is at least some justification for how she got to that point.
I'm not sure you ever mentioned him having a beard or mustache, and while your picture of him has it, your picture of him is also from a Golden Age Batman comic.

Golden Age comics tend to have somewhat distorted proportions, and follow fashion conventions of the 1930s (all middle and upper class men wear suits, and "Doctor Death" in the Batman comics has a freaking monocle, something nobody's worn in decades except as a deliberate fashion statement). So we can only treat Golden Age pictures as a rough guide to a man's appearance.
True enough regarding Golden Age comics although I'm pretty certain Cassandra has mentioned him having facial hair (in a personal action in which she tried to meet him and failed to do so). Karl definitively has facial hair in this quest.
My headcanon (based on the thoughts I was having while writing this was that some combination of stimuli is used to cause the kryptonite to emit exceptional amounts of the delta rays that are normally its only detectable form of radiation aside from the green glow.

In theory with the right equipment, you could basically just capture those delta rays and use their energy to generate direct current (as a solar cell does, but with much greater intensity so you can have it all concentrated inside a building instead of needing to cover acres of land with solar cells).

Buuuut in theory you could also capture those delta rays and use them to heat things up and then run coolant liquid past them to create a steam loop that powers a turbine.

Not sure which approach would be more efficient, the 'krypto-voltaic' approach that creates direct current (which you'd then have to turn into AC, not sure how solar power plants handle that), or the 'krypto-thermal' approach that generates heat and runs a steam turbine.
This is likely going to be the best explanation on how kryptonite works unless someone can provide a better one. I honestly do not feel qualified to ultimately make a ruling on this specific thing as I lack the expertise to do so.
 
@King crimson the best I've seen to Kryptonite being used as a power source is with Metallo. A two pound rock of Kryptonite powers his body, and when he lost it he was able to substitute plutonium. It just says he channels the radiation but makes no clear mention on if he is converting it to another type of energy. He could also shoot a beam of Kryptonite radiation out his chest like Ironman's unibeam, but it doesn't state how. So some comic book logic along with possibly the equipment @Simon_Jester mentioned, just very compact to fit Metallo's frame. I've checked all these, nothing clearly stated. I would say its the voltaic approach as the thermal approach would damage Metallo's circuitry, or fall right out of him since sometimes he has lead components, and that's far easier to melt than steel or titanium.

edit. So closest I found was an Atomic battery after googling "plutonium voltaic". The first paragraph from the article reads:
"An atomic battery, nuclear battery, tritium battery or radioisotope generator is a device which uses energy from the decay of a radioactive isotope to generate electricity. Like nuclear reactors, they generate electricity from nuclear energy, but differ in that they do not use a chain reaction. Compared to other batteries, they are very costly, but have an extremely long life and high energy density, and so they are mainly used as power sources for equipment that must operate unattended for long periods of time, such as spacecraft, pacemakers, underwater systems and automated scientific stations in remote parts of the world."
 
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This omake was odd for me. I'm not all that familiar with professional wrestling so I went into this a little lacking in the knowledge of the context which made it a bit difficult to follow at times but never so much so that I didn't get what was going on (the only really problem I had was a sort of metatextual "why is this happening the way it is" which I'm assuming can be answered with "that's how professional wrestling is").

Vicky is super aggressive here which felt a bit odd to me that Superman of all people is the person she's ragging on but I'm assuming she was needed to fill a role and she does that well. The little touch that she is manipulating the image Clark has was a nice touch and I do think from what little we saw of Kal El he is solid.

Jimmy Olsen's rant suffers a bit from something I've heard referred to as the fallacy of mimicking form (there's probably a better actual term out there) where what is meant to be confusing and difficult to follow in universe is confusing and difficult to follow out of universe. It wasn't a bad attempt at causing a stylistic change to indicate something in universe but for me I felt that it didn't work all that well and I ended up kind of tuning it out the first few times I read it. I think it's the weakest part of the omake and is the point that could most easily be improved on in the future.

I also have an odd question about the stage name chosen for Mari "Mare. E.". A mare is traditionally a female horse (there are other meanings but I don't see them all that often and they are even more wildly off base as I doubt you intended connection to moon plains or a bad performance in sports). Was the horse comparison intentional cause it felt a little weird to me but I might be missing something and I'd like to get some of the thought process behind the intentionality here.

The rogues were fun for the little bit we saw them and I'm quite curious who each one was (my guess would be Mark Mardon as the first, Samuel Scudder as the second, Axel Walker as the third and Mick Rory as the fourth). Feel free to let me know how close I was with my guess work.

You've earned 400 exp for this omake

Ah yeah....the unfamiliarity with wrestling will hurt the omake....

Let's see...Jimmy's rant was a play on the Steiner meme Sanas posted (though Steiner was in TNA at the time, WWE's competitor)

And Vixen was a play on Paul Heyman being known as Paul E. Dangerously.

So Mare E.

Horse comparisons are only a bonus as the legendary 4 Horsemen of wrestling is a thing. And right now the 4 Horsewomen are considered some of the best in the game as far as women wrestlers.


But regardless, I appreciate your patience and your thanks. And I'd like to donate my exp to Mari's Martial.

Thanks.
 
@KnowledgeKing you just want Mari to smack that flying blueberry out of the sky don't you? :lol: At the rate you're going, once Mari has mastered the Tantu totem, Superman might be one of the few that would survive a direct hit.
 
They do not get a bonus from the Red Tornado stuff.
That makes sense; the Red Tornado's turbines are the kind that propel things, like the turbines in a jet engine. We should probably be able to use them to build better jet engines, but not better power plants necessarily. After all, the basic principle of using a spinning propulsion system to push an airstream is the operating principle of a jet engine, and it's shared with however the Red Tornado operates. Still a jet. You can build jet engines that don't even burn jet fuel if you have a power source like a nuclear reactor (or kryptonite).

Though if T.O. Morrow had come up with a revolutionary design for turbine blades that made them lighter or more efficient than anything invented in the ~35 years since, it MIGHT pay off when designing, say, steam-turbine power plants.

As to how the kryptonite powerplants work I'm not sure. From what I understand modern nuclear power plants use the heat of the material to boil water and then use that to turn turbines and generate electricity. This might not work for kryptonite since it can be touched without too much damage meaning that it doesn't release enough heat at any given moment for this to be viable.
It is clearly true that a random hunk of kryptonite like you can pick up in your hand will not be hot enough to be used as a nuclear fuel rod that boils water just by coming into contact with it. On the other hand, there may be some way to stimulate kryptonite to emit more energy (say, by bombarding it with certain kinds of radiation or exposing it to a magnetic field or dunking it in a bath of some chemical).

Given that "kryptonite lasers" that presumably share some of the properties of 'kryptonite radiation' are apparently a thing... It seems reasonable that there be some method of stimulating kryptonite radiation. Of making it emit radiation in greater amounts than it normally would just sitting there and passively glowing.

If someone else knows more about physics and has an answer then feel free to chime in but I ultimately have no idea beyond "comic book shenanigans". You'll get a similar response when asking about batteries (I don't know enough about the chemical compositions a theoretical battery would need to have and how well that interacts with the properties it has been established that kryptonite). Sorry for not being able to provide you with a clear definitive answer.
Most obvious ways to make this work involve being able to stimulate kryptonite to emit more radiation- say, by heating it up to high temperatures.

@King crimson

One important question that occurs to me: is the kryptonite consumed? Do we have to keep shoveling more fresh-mined kryptonite into power plants and replacing kryptonite batteries? Or does a single big hunk of kryptonite just keep working as a power source/supply/battery for an extended period of time?

...it also cannot copy artificially engineered species meaning she couldn't copy animals on venom or something along those lines).
We'd better remember that.

@King crimson the best I've seen to Kryptonite being used as a power source is with Metallo. A two pound rock of Kryptonite powers his body, and when he lost it he was able to substitute plutonium. It just says he channels the radiation but makes no clear mention on if he is converting it to another type of energy. He could also shoot a beam of Kryptonite radiation out his chest like Ironman's unibeam, but it doesn't state how. So some comic book logic along with possibly the equipment @Simon_Jester mentioned, just very compact to fit Metallo's frame. I've checked all these, nothing clearly stated. I would say its the voltaic approach as the thermal approach would damage Metallo's circuitry, or fall right out of him since sometimes he has lead components, and that's far easier to melt than steel or titanium.

edit. So closest I found was an Atomic battery after googling "plutonium voltaic". The first paragraph from the article reads:
"An atomic battery, nuclear battery, tritium battery or radioisotope generator is a device which uses energy from the decay of a radioactive isotope to generate electricity. Like nuclear reactors, they generate electricity from nuclear energy, but differ in that they do not use a chain reaction. Compared to other batteries, they are very costly, but have an extremely long life and high energy density, and so they are mainly used as power sources for equipment that must operate unattended for long periods of time, such as spacecraft, pacemakers, underwater systems and automated scientific stations in remote parts of the world."
OK, yeah, that is EXACTLY what I had in mind.

After following a few wiki links, I can safely say that this is what I was envisioning as the basic mechanism- the radiation emitted by the radioactive material stirs up electrical disturbances in a surrounding material, and those electrical disturbances are tapped for power. The difference is that, given that my earlier kryptonite omake was canonized, kryptonite is hilariously better for this kind of application, because the delta rays it emits are low energy enough to be entirely stopped within the material they hit, instead of punching into and through it and causing undesired side effects. The potential for much higher efficiency is there, I would expect.

So the key pieces of semi-technobabble involved are:

1) A "deltavoltaic enclosure" that surrounds the kryptonite and absorbs the (detectable) radiation it emits, turning into (appropriately) direct current (DC).

2) An "inverter" (a RL piece of electrical power equipment, the same thing they use to solve the same problem when the current is coming from photovoltaic solar cells that work sort of the same way our 'deltavoltaics' do.

3) Aaaand after that you're good, you just plug it into the power grid.

For some applications it may be more efficient to skip the alternating current entirely and just run direct current off the kryptonite power source itself, but for an industrial scale power plant that isn't practical, at least not until/unless we invent mass-producible room temperature superconductors.
 
@King crimson the best I've seen to Kryptonite being used as a power source is with Metallo. A two pound rock of Kryptonite powers his body, and when he lost it he was able to substitute plutonium. It just says he channels the radiation but makes no clear mention on if he is converting it to another type of energy. He could also shoot a beam of Kryptonite radiation out his chest like Ironman's unibeam, but it doesn't state how. So some comic book logic along with possibly the equipment @Simon_Jester mentioned, just very compact to fit Metallo's frame. I've checked all these, nothing clearly stated. I would say its the voltaic approach as the thermal approach would damage Metallo's circuitry, or fall right out of him since sometimes he has lead components, and that's far easier to melt than steel or titanium.

edit. So closest I found was an Atomic battery after googling "plutonium voltaic". The first paragraph from the article reads:
"An atomic battery, nuclear battery, tritium battery or radioisotope generator is a device which uses energy from the decay of a radioactive isotope to generate electricity. Like nuclear reactors, they generate electricity from nuclear energy, but differ in that they do not use a chain reaction. Compared to other batteries, they are very costly, but have an extremely long life and high energy density, and so they are mainly used as power sources for equipment that must operate unattended for long periods of time, such as spacecraft, pacemakers, underwater systems and automated scientific stations in remote parts of the world."
Thank you that's actually very helpful to know.
Ah yeah....the unfamiliarity with wrestling will hurt the omake....

Let's see...Jimmy's rant was a play on the Steiner meme Sanas posted (though Steiner was in TNA at the time, WWE's competitor)

And Vixen was a play on Paul Heyman being known as Paul E. Dangerously.

So Mare E.

Horse comparisons are only a bonus as the legendary 4 Horsemen of wrestling is a thing. And right now the 4 Horsewomen are considered some of the best in the game as far as women wrestlers.


But regardless, I appreciate your patience and your thanks. And I'd like to donate my exp to Mari's Martial.

Thanks.
No problem. I enjoy picking up new stuff and at the very least it's interesting to be on the outside looking in to learn this stuff. Thank you for elaborating on a lot of the stuff going on in the omake.

I'll be sure to get around to donating the exp now
@King crimson

One important question that occurs to me: is the kryptonite consumed? Do we have to keep shoveling more fresh-mined kryptonite into power plants and replacing kryptonite batteries? Or does a single big hunk of kryptonite just keep working as a power source/supply/battery for an extended period of time?
A single chunk can work for a very long time but it is ultimately being consumed (albeit at a rate where unless you cause the kryptonite to explode it could take centuries until it runs out of power). Kryptonite can also absorb some energy before spitting it back out so it is to an extent "rechargeable". Kryptonite that exists now is going to stick around for several dozen human lifetimes unless it explodes.
 
My money's on him eating a bunch of other scientists. Lex might be the main attraction, but he's still at a buffet.
 
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