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Paths of Civilization

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[X] [Conq] Just the western parts (Thunder Speakers become vassal, Txolla annex additional territory, rest of the Thunder Horse fragment into desperate city states)
[X] [Refugee] Send out runners that you have food and intact farmland (6 temporary Econ damage, -6-8 Econ Expansion, -1 Stability, chance of further loss, +6-8 Econ next turn)
[X] [PttS] Horse Valley
[X] [PttS] 0 Stability
[X] [Diplo] Let's maybe spread out in case the gods throw another bolt (Found Far Northern Trade Post)
[X] [PSN] Bit more black soil (Sec Black Soil, -1 Centralization)
 
Alectai said:
Well, Doom Comet's been around before, it's not entirely outside of the realm of possibility she realized from looking at our records and Khemetri records that it was getting closer, and predicted it was going to hit in this area, and then from there plotted it's usual course compared to where the world is and figured it'd land in X area.
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It's completely out of the realm of possibility.

How are you going to plot a course if you do not have a map of the solar system to plot the course on?

(Oh, and orbital mechanics being the weird things they are means that the comet will not come closer year after year. It'll be close one year, distant the other, until at one point it hits.)

Modern day astronomers, with all their supercomputers and orbital satellites and whatnot would struggle to predict the movements of asteroids a few years in advance to that level of accuracy. The hypothesis that we can do it based on partially decomposed records is completely silly.
 
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I wonder what the Khemetri think about giving us Astronomy, then having us immediately use it to smite those who were snubbing us with the Wrath of the Gods.

If nothing else, it likely vindicates the worth of astronomy to being equal to that of our Sacred Warding.
 
Alectai said:
Well, Doom Comet's been around before, it's not entirely outside of the realm of possibility she realized from looking at our records and Khemetri records that it was getting closer, and predicted it was going to hit in this area, and then from there plotted it's usual course compared to where the world is and figured it'd land in X area.

But yeah, Fucking Magic is honestly more believable. Because you're looking at a supercomputer level of computational power to pull that shit off on your own.

It's not impossible, and I wouldn't, you know, blindly follow this kind of thing anyway, because it's too hard to predict--but yeah, if you have an oracle and they give you a warning--you'd best consider very carefully whether to ignore it.
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Curiosity.

Do you need two previous passes or not in order to figure out the orbit of a celestial object? I know you would need a minimum of two passes for a period.


(Note this may not have been Doom Comet-san and Tormulyna may simply have spotted a different pattern)
 
10ebbor10 said:
It's completely out of the realm of possibility.

How are you going to plot a course if you do not have a map of the solar system to plot the course on?
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(Shrugs)

Honestly, as far as we know, she just got lucky--she predicted it'd get real fucking close and probably collide on this pass, but it wouldn't have necessarily landed directly where predicted. That she was basically dead on might have been just dumb luck when she really just kind of worked out a general area that was much larger and the other sages and shamans whipped up a prophecy based on the data.
 
PyrrosWarrior said:
I read this quest as an incredibly interesting attempt to make a society survive through all of the ages' natural, societal, cultural, martial , and more challenges. I don't want it to turn into a magic-fest, even on a lower scale.

Side-note: I am really not all that interested in turning us into a democracy. That is the only reason why I didn't join the Democratic Socialists. I agree with every other plank except the part of democracy on all levels.
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To add to this, it also would give this quest a sour taste to it. It's like reading Percy Jackson only to have it revealed in the 4th book that the Gods and entire mythology don't actually exist but have been secretly robots the whole time.
Adhoc vote count started by PyrrosWarrior on Aug 6, 2017 at 3:37 AM, finished with 96953 posts and 90 votes.
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PyrrosWarrior said:
To add to this, it also would give this quest a sour taste to it. It's like reading Percy Jackson only to have it revealed in the 4th book that the Gods and entire mythology don't actually exist but have been secretly robots the whole time.
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For a good portion of the early part of the quest it was actively discussed whether magic was real or not though, eventually the consensus settled on no but it's not like AN ever said anything one way or another that I recall.
 
Alectai said:
(Shrugs)

Honestly, as far as we know, she just got lucky--she predicted it'd get real fucking close and probably collide on this pass, but it wouldn't have necessarily landed directly where predicted. That she was basically dead on might have been just dumb luck when she really just kind of worked out a general area that was much larger and the other sages and shamans whipped up a prophecy based on the data.
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This is what I am thinking.

Savant type mystic figures out that something in the sky is going to come really close, but doesn't quite know where and then you get a combo of luck and the other priests cooking up a prophecy to frame everything in a parsable fashion.
 
Ghostdevil said:
I don't get it how?
Nothing in that post indicated it was magic o_O
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Well one of our geniuses was able to predict where and when a comet would strick and another genius was able to see the strike coming via a flock of invisible crows before, you know, anyone could actually see the comet.

People need advanced computer equipment to predict meteorological events like that.... and how the hell did our military genius realize what was happening before even seeing the comet? She saw the death of the city before it even happened!

Something supernatural is going on here, people aren't physically capable of this and too many things like this are happening for these to be coincidences.
 
10ebbor10 said:
It's completely out of the realm of possibility.

How are you going to plot a course if you do not have a map of the solar system to plot the course on?

(Oh, and orbital mechanics being the weird things they are means that the comet will not come closer year after year. It'll be close one year, distance the other, until at one point it hits.)
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The same way the sumerians, babylonians, chinese, hellenic, indians, mayans, aztecs did... by looking and calculating... if it shines, it can de calculated.
 
BungieONI said:
Curiosity.

Do you need two previous passes or not in order to figure out the orbit of a celestial object? I know you would need a minimum of two passes for a period.
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You would need two points of data or an extended period of observation for the first fly by and a firm understanding of gravitation. Both are obscenely unlikely for a Bronze Age civ.

I dunno if magic is real, but Fucking Magic, man.
 
[X] [PttS] Black Mirror
[X] [PttS] 0 Stability
[X] [Diplo] Let's maybe spread out in case the gods throw another bolt (Found Far Northern Trade Post)

Math! ... On the one hand new trees, on the other panic based poetry. Tough choice. ... I go with the Ymaryn thing to do and choose new trees.
 
I just had a horrifying realization:

What if the magic is dependent on our decisions, and there's been a Background Magic Level slider that we'll never be able to see?

Think about it; Last time we chose to ignore the guy who got hit in the head. He turned out to be harmless. This time we chose to listen to the girl with an interesting mind, and watched our neighbors get nuked from orbit. This seems to imply to me that the thread's belief in magic makes it real in a genuine quantifiable way.

Edit: To further expand; We as a thread collectively believed that Yenyna the Martial Genius would singlehandedly win the entire war for us, and what happened next?
 
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Alectai said:
Honestly, as far as we know, she just got lucky--she predicted it'd get real fucking close and probably collide on this pass, but it wouldn't have necessarily landed directly where predicted. That she was basically dead on might have been just dumb luck when she really just kind of worked out a general area that was much larger and the other sages and shamans whipped up a prophecy based on the data.
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Even predicting that it was coming closer would be miraculous.

Because, how are we supposed to measure how far it is? We do not have the tools to do that in this time and age.

So, we can't even predict it's coming closer.
 
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huhYeahGoodPoint said:
I just had a horrifying realization:

What if the magic is dependent on our decisions, and there's been a Background Magic Level slider that we'll never be able to see?

Think about it; Last time we chose to ignore the guy who got hit in the head. He turned out to be harmless. This time we chose to listen to the girl with an interesting mind, and watched our neighbors get nuked from orbit. This seems to imply to me that the thread's belief in magic makes it real in a genuine quantifiable way.
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*adds another note to the Ymaryn Collective Unconscious theory*

I dunno, working primitive vaccine analog in the Stone Age is pretty wack too. I'm just sitting here with my sandwich and cake and giggling occasionally at the sheer crazy that just happened.
 
Alectai said:
(Shrugs)

Honestly, as far as we know, she just got lucky--she predicted it'd get real fucking close and probably collide on this pass, but it wouldn't have necessarily landed directly where predicted. That she was basically dead on might have been just dumb luck when she really just kind of worked out a general area that was much larger and the other sages and shamans whipped up a prophecy based on the data.
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But then there's also the fact that the prophecy wound told us exactly what to do to have the entire thunder horse army decapitated by the comet.
 
Malevolo said:
The same way the sumerians, babylonians, chinese, hellenic, indians, mayans, aztecs did... by looking and calculating... if it shines, it can de calculated.
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None of them did this.

You can only predict recurring patterns that you can observe. Impacts are not recurring, and the trajectory of the thing can not be observed.
 
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Malevolo said:
The same way the sumerians, babylonians, chinese, hellenic, indians, mayans, aztecs did... by looking and calculating... if it shines, it can de calculated.
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None of those have ever done something like this. They can predict asteroids passing by our atmosphere every few centuries, but they could never predict when and where an Celestial Body is gonna crash in advance, because that shit has way too many variables even for modern supercomputers.
 
Academia Nut said:
Camped out on the river separating their territory from the Thunder Horse, Yenyna sat upon her chair watching the opposite side as twilight ate away the last of the red of sunset in the world. All of a sudden she began to scream, gazing up at the sky in terror. An attendant ran to her, and he managed to get from her lips:

"crows, a sky full of them"

Then she went quiet and gazed up in horror, looking to the western sky.

To the rapidly brightening western sky.
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Holy shit.

I really don't see a way how Yenyna could've detected the Tactical Nuke Comet before the sky started to brighten.
AN really is pushing the magic-angle here...
 
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