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Summoner Quest (Celestial Menagerie)

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[X] 200 Hog-Goblin + Micro Bonus

Storm Atronach is a good summon, but I noticed the drop on Hog-Goblin was interesting.

The Confusion-Be-Gone says it restores clarity of mind, given how confused allies attack eachother, would it work to restore someones mind affected by Master powers? How would you rule that @zagan?
 
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JumpFail200 said:
Storm Atronach is a good summon, but I noticed the drop on Hog-Goblin was interesting.

The Confusion-Be-Gone says it restores clarity of mind, given how confused allies attack eachother, would it work to restore someones mind affected by Master powers? How would you rule that @zagan?
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It would depend on the specific effects. It would mainly work on effects that make you believe that you're surrounded by enemies, that increase paranoia, or that increase emotions like anger. But it wouldn't work on full control effects and not on Simurgh bombs.
 
[X] 300 Frost Atronach + Micro Bonus
[X] 300 Storm Atronach + Micro Bonus

Would Equip Trait allow someone to gain a Magica Reserve and learn Elder Scrolls Magic? I'm assuming that a basic Destruction spell like Fire, Frost, or Shock would be easy to learn (all players start with Fire) since they are just generating and firing off a stream of a basic element.
 
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sonicyoash said:
Would Equip Trait allow someone to gain a Magica Reserve and learn Elder Scrolls Magic? I'm assuming that a basic Destruction spell like Fire, Frost, or Shock would be easy to learn (all players start with Fire) since they are just generating and firing off a stream of a basic element.
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The Magica Reserve? Sure, that's what the power is for.
However, learning a spell with no guidance at all? Perhaps with a lot of trial and error, they might get something. But how would they even know it was possible? Even Alex wouldn't know that.
 
I would guess that if someone Equipped the magicka reserves from the Atronach they would notice the energy, guess that it likely had something to due with the element the Atronach was composed of (especially for the Storm Atronach), and then hurt themselves trying to test if they could recreate what the Atronach can do themselves. I may not know how Elder Scrolls mages begin their training but a complete novice trying to copy an elemental creature of frost's ability sounds like the precursor to a case of frostbite. Not worth the effort in trying to figure it out in my opinion, at least not yet.

The explanation on what picking Sloth would have done to the mayor was interesting. I actually really like the idea of a Changer who "charges" their battle-form by remaining still in an egg prior to emerging. It sounds like a power that is more dependent on teamwork than most. What would have been the plan for the mole, I wonder? Enhanced digging?

@zagan out of curiosity, if Alex had given Solar permission for data transfer, what data would Solar have passed along anyway? Light manipulation in order to become a glowworm? *Insert rim-shot here*
 
zagan said:
300 Storm Atronach + Micro Bonus
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Are these things going to be every bit as useless here as in game? I summoned one once to see if the rumors were true when I got the game. I never summoned it again.

Also would the Horse Talisman or Dog Talisman increase her lifespan? Or overall health?
Personally I'd go with Ramiel first and Tailed Beast second.

zagan said:
The Magica Reserve? Sure, that's what the power is for.
However, learning a spell with no guidance at all? Perhaps with a lot of trial and error, they might get something. But how would they even know it was possible? Even Alex wouldn't know that.
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I'm sure one of the kids would like that. Would Alex keep a bit of the Skyrim magic after giving away?
 
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Feather_Up said:
The explanation on what picking Sloth would have done to the mayor was interesting. I actually really like the idea of a Changer who "charges" their battle-form by remaining still in an egg prior to emerging. It sounds like a power that is more dependent on teamwork than most. What would have been the plan for the mole, I wonder? Enhanced digging?
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Yes, it would have been more lizard shaped, with two giant claw.

Feather_Up said:
@zagan out of curiosity, if Alex had given Solar permission for data transfer, what data would Solar have passed along anyway? Light manipulation in order to become a glowworm? *Insert rim-shot here*
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No idea.

Doccer said:
Also would the Horse Talisman or Dog Talisman increase her lifespan? Or overall health?
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Horse Talisman straight up give immortality; I think you stop aging as soon as you hold it.
Dog Talisman would increase lifespan because it heals you of anything and everything but you could still die of old age. Assuming no accident, I could see a user of the Dog Talisman reach 150 years old?

Doccer said:
I'm sure one of the kids would like that. Would Alex keep a bit of the Skyrim magic after giving away?
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If he learn any Skyrim spells? Yes, he got plenty of other magical sources to fuel them. It may require some tweak but that's all.
 
zagan said:
Horse Talisman straight up give immortality; I think you stop aging as soon as you hold it.
Dog Talisman would increase lifespan because it heals you of anything and everything but you could still die of old age. Assuming no accident, I could see a user of the Dog Talisman reach 150 years old?
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We'll gain other methods of immortality before that becomes an issue. Xerneas from Pokemon can just straight up grant it for one. An Ancient Dragon from D&D would likely have Wish and could Wish for it. And others still.
 
Vote closed: Winning vote: 300 Storm Atronach + Micro Bonus

Very nice that. So far all our Elder Scroll creatures had been pretty weak, Shadow wasn't a Servant to start with, so it's nice to have a good creature from there.
 
zagan said:
Horse Talisman straight up give immortality; I think you stop aging as soon as you hold it.
Dog Talisman would increase lifespan because it heals you of anything and everything but you could still die of old age. Assuming no accident, I could see a user of the Dog Talisman reach 150 years old?
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Just reading before work and noticed this, but I think you have their effects backwards?

The Horse heals but could likely extend someone's age through biological immortality, such as repairing cells, but not straight immortality. The Dog can give straight immortality, but doesn't really heal so much as prevent death from the injury, plenty of examples like Uncle getting beaned by rubble knocking him out but not crushing him under the weight, to Shendu getting a hole blasted through the chest and still being alive.
 
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Chapter 242: A few days of work. New
  • Threadmarks
    • [X] Creature
    Creature Roll: (710 points)
    Category Roll D50=24, Entry Roll D47=20
    300 Frost Atronach, 300 Storm Atronach, 200 Gargoyle
    Category Roll D50=45 Ni No Kuni, Entry Roll D90=25
    200 Hog-Goblin, 200 Hooray, 200 Hullaballoon
    Sub-vote results: 300 Storm Atronach + Micro Bonus
    Banked: 410

    This chapter reads more like a list of bullet points instead of a segment of the story but I couldn't find a good way to summarize the events that I wanted to include without doing that. I hope you like it anyway.
    ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
    Sunday, 06/05/2011 (9 AM)

    The four days that followed my visit to Killington, were at the same time eventful and peaceful. A lot of small things happened but none of them were that noteworthy.

    Over that period I freed five additional people from Gray Boy's Bubble. Among these, three triggered, and despite my attempts to minimize things each one gained power influenced in more or less subtle ways by the partner I turned them into.

    A woman that I turned into Mole, gained the ability to create a hole in the ground, and if she jumped into it, she then teleported some distance away by emerging from another hole in the ground.

    Trying to be as bland as possible the next one was turned into a Bunny. The man in question gained enhanced senses, mostly smell, and even more so hearing. Once again this could be explained away, Thinkers with enhanced senses in one flavor or another were a dime a dozen. Still, it was weird.

    I could have chalked up those two as a coincidence, but the last one convinced me otherwise.

    So for the last one, I picked Bacon. The result was a woman able to throw blasts of light that turned anyone hit into a piglet for a few minutes, and if they were parahuman she gained a much weaker version of their power for the same duration. Considering how traumatized she was we didn't do comprehensive tests but she panicked when waking up after her trigger event and she hit a hero called Hecaton, who can grow additional arms and legs. As soon as he was turned into a pig she sprouted fingers and toes from all over her body. It didn't help with her state of mind, and Hug was required to calm her down.

    It was evident that Shards in general, loved to use Data gained from my partners to craft the ability they would grant. I was determined to avoid any partners with any real power. For the next, I was thinking of the Companion Cube. But would there be any psychological consequences for the victims after being transformed into an inanimate object?

    Obviously, even if I was freeing those people, which was wonderful, seeing them suffer in horrible ways beforehand was a bit traumatizing, so I did meet with Doctor Yamada on Friday. We talked a fair bit about my experience with the bubbles, how I handled it so far, whether I could sleep, what my feelings were each time, and so on.

    Putting words on things felt good. At the end of the session, I called Moonbeam. Once the surprise passed, Doctor Yamada got on smashingly well with my unicorn. We spent a fair bit of time talking about psychology in general, my contribution was purely theoretical but the two of them were able to exchange more concrete examples without quoting names of course. The differences in the psychological makeup of humans and ponies exist but surprisingly aren't that deep. The two widely different sapient species had a lot in common.

    During my travels, I continued to pick up new partners. In Albany, I gained a Guinea Pig, a Salamander from Columbus, a Betta fish in Lansing, and lastly a Great Dane from Harrisburg. I wasn't sure if the dog would pass muster for the Menagerie, considering I had multiple already, but it worked fine.

    On the subject of the partner network, I received the first request for healing. I expected it much earlier, however, the one in charge restrained themselves to emergency cases. I got two back-to-back, a pair of troopers who received bullet wounds during a firefight in Denver, and a hero from Cheyenne who received a nasty burn. In both cases, the healing worked just fine.

    Of course, traveling wasn't the only thing I did. On Thursday, I had enough time for one more magic lesson with my two students. Well, less a lesson and more an experiment. Specifically, we tried to enchant some of Strega's amulets. At first, I was afraid that Taurus would feel excluded but thankfully that wasn't the case. He was deeply interested in the experiment and he took on the job of documenting most of it.

    For my part, I was really interested in Strega's power. Her ability to bend the law of physics wasn't uncommon among Parahumans, but her versatility was. The strategist in me was appreciative of the tactical value of it.

    It didn't take long to get some good results. Unbreaking made the effect of her totems last nearly three times as long, with some variance depending on how many beings were subjected to their effects. With just that, this experiment was a success. But of course, we didn't stop there.

    The logical thing to do after Unbreaking was to try with Mending. And while it did prolong the effect of the Totem, theoretically for an unlimited duration, that was only if we fed it Bottles o' Enchanting. And that would be extremely costly and difficult to manage in the field.

    Finding out if other enchantment works, proved trickier. It turns out that the answer was only with specific effects. The one that modulates temperature could be affected by Flame or Fire Aspect to increase it and by Frost Walker to reduce it.

    There was also Density, which worked extremely well when it came to increasing gravity. With that effect being by far her favorite, I knew that Density would become scarce among my collection of enchanted books in short order.

    Before putting an end to the experiment we found out one last enchantment that worked, but in different ways than the others. Protection, and its variants, made the totem at the center of the effect harder to destroy. Considering that the totems were the main weakness of Strega's power, it was an excellent find.

    All in all, we were plenty satisfied with this day's lesson.

    Professionally, I also had a meeting with Dragon. I asked her to send me a Dragonsuit so I could load it up with several things I gathered. Collin was fairly busy, and Kid Win was still in the middle of a frenzy of redesign following the discovery of his specialty. In any case, Dragon would no doubt share.

    I end up giving her a lot of stuff. The three mecha shift weapons, a scroll, dust samples from the Evernight Castle, and a few things I picked up from Random Summoning that she was better equipped to study than me. She was particularly excited about the Superconductive Copper.

    While we talked in person, I mentioned that her Dragonsuit technically qualifies for Creature Acquisition. So if she was willing to give me one, I would happily accept it. It could serve as my partner for the Guild. She was extremely receptive to the idea, stating that she would design the best one she could while keeping in mind everything that my powers brought to the table. Her exact words were, only the very best for my little brother. Seemingly she saw this as an opportunity to repay me for my help in some small way. I simply said that I was looking forward to it. It should be ready in a few weeks. I was quite curious to know what she would cook up.

    Training wise I started and finished my regime of seeds. Having eaten a hundred of each I was ready to stop there. And I was a little sick of them too. The only exception would be if I find any other type of seeds. The results spoke for themselves, even with the minimum amount of partners summoned and no other boost I could do amazing things. And with everything activated at once, I would be hard-pressed to find anyone able to rival me in physical activity. It was somehow exhilarating.

    I spent a fair amount of time getting accustomed to my new physical parameters, sparring with my partners, shadowboxing, and just exercising in general. I continue to visit Nimue's Dungeon too, and reach level seven as Dungeon Master and five as a Researcher. I regained the ability to use Material Extraction on the partner that I lent to Nimue and a perfect memory concerning Magical Theory, which was quite nice.

    Practice with the Panda also continues, both with my wood clone and by myself. I didn't learn anything new, but I continued to refine what I learned. In the same vein, I trained with Rex's chakra cloak. Something that I've been neglecting lately with everything that was on my plate. With the wood clones available, I could now afford to do so. It was even one thing that the clone could help train. There was a strong chance that I would need it when Behemoth inevitably raised his ugly head.

    And evidently, armament Haki remained a priority. On that front progress was glacially slow, by my standard anyway. Kuja wasn't able to give me much context but it was clear that training Haki was normally an extremely long road. Even just manifesting it could take years. The fact that I could do so, even just on my fingertip, was a testament to all the advantages at my disposal. So in the end I couldn't complain about my ability to learn this rare skill at a hundred times the speed of someone else, instead of instantly.

    My partners were also training during the same period. The Pokemon, battle maniacs that they were, continue to progress at a rapid pace. Koraidon learned the powerful move, Outrage, a move that I would be extremely careful in deploying. The user had a tendency to go mad with rage and destroy everything in their path. Considering Koraidon's strength the risks were substantial. But he wasn't the only one, the other continued to learn new moves as well. I was extremely proud of them.

    But of course, my Pokemon weren't the only ones to progress. Gobimon has grown enough to reach the level of Ultimate. After a fierce battle against R.O.B, he managed to Digivolve into a magnificent Brachiomon. At that stage, he towered above the battlefield in a real way, without becoming so large that he couldn't act in an urban environment. Aylamon was the first to congratulate him, before asking for a ride. The following minutes were spent watching Aylamon ride on Gobimon's massive head while shouting encouragement at him to run faster.

    Concerning my personal life things were also going remarkably well. On Thursday, I had a short date with Crystal during her lunch break. Nothing complicated, a simple leisurely walk in the park adjacent to the college. It was just nice to spend time together.

    On the same evening, I participated in an impromptu online tournament with Lars in a racing game. Even with my enhanced reflexes I lost, simply because he knew the game better. It was fun anyway.

    And on Friday night, we all gathered in a Karaoke for an evening of singing and laughing. I discovered that Crystal wasn't a great singer, her voice was more than pleasant enough but she couldn't hold a note to save her life. I wasn't any better so I couldn't complain. It was an enjoyable evening.

    Mom wasn't forgotten, we spent a good chunk of Thursday evening cooking together. She used the opportunity to tease me about my relationship with Crystal. I endured it with good grace.

    On the Menagerie front, a few things happened. I gained two partners, a cute bird called the Least Auklet. And a Storm Atronach, an elemental being made of stone and lightning. Interestingly, I didn't get to choose their name, they gave it to me through Animal Language. They were called Qo, seemingly it means lightning in some obscure language from their dimension.

    Still related to the Menagerie, I gained a new partner in a different way. Early Wednesday morning I watched with eager anticipation as the Void Chick's egg moved from side to side, before cracking, a tiny beak piercing the shell, fragments of it falling to the ground and revealing the tiny head of the chick. Through a process that took several minutes, it extracted itself from its egg, first cracking the egg in half, then pushing, before resting, before pushing again. Each time the cycle repeats itself a little more of its body is revealed. After one final push, it managed to stumble into the open air, trembling from the cold. After resting for a minute it tentatively stood up, and started chirping, looking for food.

    It was one of the most beautiful sights I've ever seen in my life.

    After making sure it was alright I let it in Hug's tender care.

    Obviously, I kept my routine of Random Summoning.

    Wednesday
    (D144=5 Pokemon, D548=231 Hippopotas (200))
    (D144=37 Card Captor Sakura, D52=44 The Through (200))
    (D144=131 Smite, D27=3 Camazotz (600))

    Hippopotas was a cute and affectionate Pokemon, but the sandstorms he could generate at a whim were kind of bothersome. At least he got along great with Gobimon for the brief duration of his visit. The Through was an interesting card but not really useful to me, I already have multiple different ways to pass through walls. Sadly the last creature I got to meet on Wednesday was an unpleasant fellow. Camazotz was a god in the same way as Cernunnos was. The first words out of his mouth include a request for a human sacrifice. I didn't insist and dismissed him immediately. Contrary to Cernunnos, I hoped to never meet him again.

    Thursday
    (D144=40 Lilo & Stitch, D121=27 Experiment 103 Stamen (050))
    (D144=28 Okami, D92=46 Crow Tengu (200))
    (D144=74 Paranatural, D26=21 Sphinx of Games (300))

    The ability to attract pollinators that Stamen possessed was mildly interesting and he was a nice enough fellow but that was all. Despite being a Demon the Crow Tengu was actually fairly pleasant to talk to. And he was able to give some advice to Caradoc, they sparred for a bit. For his part, the Sphinx of Game turned out to be a malicious being, trying to convince me to play riddles with him right away. Even with the protection of the Menagerie I refused to play with him and dismissed him in short order.

    Friday
    (D144=11 Dragons, D163=147 Graveknapper (400))
    (D144=123 Re:Zero, D23=4 Hakugei (700))
    (D144=43 Portal/Half-life/Fallout, D116=90 Giant Rat (100))

    Friday wasn't great for Random Summoning, a vicious dragon, a giant evil flying whale, and a big mutated rat. Nothing with any real uses. I mean the whale was impressive, yes. But I couldn't do anything with it.

    Saturday
    (D144=103 Cassette Beasts, D82=10 Dominoth (300))
    (D144=68 XCOM, D24=15 Alloy S.H.I.V. (200))
    (D144=17 Marvel/DC/Worm, D137=114 Zhu Bajie (600))

    And on Saturday I got a giant moth that granted me the ability to glide just for having it. It could have been nice to give it to a hero that needed some mobility. Next was a robotic weapon platform that was a mix of human and alien technology. The interesting part for me was the Alloy that composed its armor. It was an excellent material and I extracted as much as I could from it. Both to give to Nimue and to Dragon.

    But the best one that came out of Random Summoning was the last one. Even I heard about the legend of the Monkey King. Meeting one of his companions was an honor. We spent the whole night talking and training. He was a fantastic teacher. Twenty-four hours was far too little time to even try to learn any magical skills from him, particularly since I had work to do on Sunday. So instead, with the help of Laoban, he helped me refine my scattered martial arts training. Teaching me some exercises to do and a lot of tricks that could be used with Shapeshifting considering the power that Solar grants me. Come morning I left a trio of wood clones with him to continue.

    The engineers, biologists, and geologists had finished their work. All the permits had been acquired. And the event had been organized. Finally, everything was in place for me to move the tanker blocking the Bay.

    Wordcount: 2721
    Excess words: 263
    ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
    The next chapter will cover the moving of the tanker and maybe another mini-time skip, we'll see how it goes.

    For the roll, 410 (Banked) + 240 (Chapter) + 120 (Excess words) = 770 points.

    [] Creature

    [] Power

    Voting will be closed Friday at 3 PM GMT

    Note 1: What type of Dragonsuit do you think Dragon will give to Alex? A (pre-time skip) canon one or a custom one? And if the second, what features should it include?
    Note 2: I added a new class to the list of Dungeon Classes, the Force Sculptor. It's very likely to be the class that Crystal will choose, but it's available to everyone.
     
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