MaimakteriAnn
(Verified Sleepy)
- Location
- Enormous And Round Terran Homeworld
- Pronouns
- She/Her/Dr
That kinda sounds like you want every Celestial X story to be the same. Have you considered just rereading some of the ones you already like?
The Eldritch One (Celestial Forge)
- Thread starter Optimal Robotics
- Start date
Probably, but I've seen so many 'OH NO! I gave a nazi even a boo boo so I'm a horrible person!' Taylors often enough that I don't honestly care because a more jaded Taylor who cares about the lives of those she's ruined about as much as the average True Neutral or Neutral Evil alignment chart character is honestly a bit of fresh air. I get that deviating from canon personality wise can make it feel like it isn't the same character anymore and pull you out of the experience but I just find that to be a breath of fresh air rather than everything being canon purist compliant. I'm just trying to find an even semi-plausible reason for it to work, but if there isn't a reason and she is just like this in this noncanon worm fanfic then that is perfectly fine with me.
Ashkari
(Verified Ink-slinger)
- Location
- United States
Yes, and that's a common trope. That's my point. I could list off countless examples of books I've read where someone has been given mysterious objects of uncertain usefulness that don't come into play until later on down the line. Loads of books where characters are given blessings or curses of an unknown nature by deific beings. Loads of books where characters uncover some oddity without recognizing its significance or what it's even supposed to be other than 'strange-looking rock'. I've even seen ones that turn that into a recurring gag.
I've also read many a novel, or watched many a movie, that entirely revolves around someone who's largely entirely clueless, careless, and/or a bumbling idiot of some description or another, with it being a centrally defining feature of the narrative. Same goes for stuff with characters who are too generally spaced out or too inside their own heads to pay attention to things happening to them. Sometimes its even a deliberate attempt at alien or altered cognition perspectives.
Your question, at its core, was a rhetorical one that comes off as showing that you either have basic underlying assumption that there isn't a point in your mind to MCs that don't automatically know, understand, or pay attention to everything that is going on around them, or else you lack general experience with reading a wider selection of genres. Either way, I can point to a great deal of fiction I've encountered over the years that says otherwise.
You might dislike clueless or uninformed MCs, you might dislike stories that don't involve hyper-competent or all-knowing problem-solvers, or just prefer fixfic SIs, or whatever… but that does not mean there is no point to MCs who don't know, understand, or care what is going on with themselves.
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Also, nice job on trying to call out someone for making an observation on the likelihood of limited experience as being a personal attack, and then going on to make several yourself. That's not real convincing.
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- Location
- Auckland
The trope fits Superman pretty well, to name one famous example. If I remember correctly, Superman in his early years knew nothing of his Kryptonian heritage. The idea of Jor-El sending an AI based on his personality originated with Superman- The Movie.
Honestly, I could kinda see their point but only in fics with things like the Celestial Forge, Grimoire, etc. Without the mc actually knowing what any of this stuff is and their mutliversal nature meaning that Lisa's shard shouldn't have just about any clue what a good portion of it even does means that for all intense and purposes all this cool and interesting stuff to work with just becomes more piled up junk which, at the rate typical MCs get more stuff form the forge, means there is little to no time for them to figure out what they do without it feeling like a repeated ass pull that they somehow figure out how this stuff works without any context or knowledge of them. The typical whole point of these Celestial things is usually to see what crazy stuff can be made or done with the things given. When you take that away by making the character have no knowledge of what the stuff is and also make the character so passive that they don't even try to figure any of the stuff out I guess it just ends up feeling like a let down. Like the idea of 'you coulda just selected the things you'd have wanted to give the character in the first place and just made their power mutate over time to get those instead of teasing us with all this other stuff'. That kind of what's the point mentality if you get what I'm saying, like if you aren't going to use the forge in Celestial Forge then why make it a Celestial Forge story. Just take all the perks you would have allowed her the mentality to use or the stuff you want for the funnies anyway and just put it in a doc and call it the Eldritch Forge or something. As I said, I am just seeing where they are coming from. At the end of the day it is the author's story to tell but that doesn't stop the frustration.
Barbaric Bob
The Barbaric One
- Location
- Soon to be plundering a village near you
that's not fair, if original Taylor had antimatter she'd fucking ramp up like there's no tomorrow, Bakuda would get blown to smithereens (together with the coastline)
You're trying to go after a point that is both sensible and articulates a problem with the fic, where the author's trying to eat his cake and have it too moment, where the central recipient both is entirely incurious about the powers she's getting, refuses to engage or experiment with them, and yet also loop the negotiator in to act as an exposition fairy to magic plot direction into existence. You're being extremely smug about how this is actually not a problem at all because you've seen better writers do things kinda like what's being complained about here. But like, I'd love to hear you talk about this story, and how the author is using the clueless mc and exposition fairy trope, rather than hearing you talk about how extremely well read you are by vaguely describing the edges of some tropes that happened in stories you liked.
She does take bakuda, the nine, leviathan, Dinah, becoming a warlord, and being betrayed and attempted to be killed by coil to have her first canon kill.
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As I said previously, I don't think the decision to not give her any information about the forge was necessarily a bad one (Though not even knowing when she gets powers/perks may be a bit much). That said, it doesn't pair well with a passive nature. It doesn't really help that she really doesn't have any incentive to look further into her powers either. I mean the slime power is one good enough to essentially build an entire cape career out of. Unless a power is completely obvious in it's use, as she currently is, she just doesn't have a reason to care which kind of sucks the enjoyment out of the story. Honestly, It's entirely possible this issue is only popping up because of the perks she rolled and when she got them. That random nature is one of the main draws of the forge but it stands to reason that it could also cause issues like this. It's one thing to get a perk you can't use right away. It's another entirely to get a perk you can use but you don't even know you have it to try.
Idk, this isn't really a story killer for me yet. It's a bit frustrating definitely but it's not so bad I feel the need to leave.
To offer a suggestion instead of just harping on criticisms, maybe have her start experimenting with stuff in those other timelines.
To be fair, she's already had to deal with both herself and her dad dying several times. Her becoming far more bloodthirsty than canon is completely believable to me. (At least I think it was this story that happened in)
Idk, this isn't really a story killer for me yet. It's a bit frustrating definitely but it's not so bad I feel the need to leave.
To offer a suggestion instead of just harping on criticisms, maybe have her start experimenting with stuff in those other timelines.
To be fair, she's already had to deal with both herself and her dad dying several times. Her becoming far more bloodthirsty than canon is completely believable to me. (At least I think it was this story that happened in)
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Terribly sorry officer, didn't know we were talking about Stephen King giving his MC the AllSpark while changing how the AllSpark works but keeping the name. See how you immediately jumped to using completely irrelevant genre tropes to address my complaint while trying to paint me as an idiot? And then to top it all off you get confused about a human getting defensive and insulting you after you bluntly call their experience and knowledge into question in the most aggressively dickish manner possible. Big shock that they returned fire with fire especially when you displayed such a willful, almost deliberate, misinterpretation of their point.
I don't mind violence but this ignorance gets frustrating
Evil Legend
Shiny Scales
- Location
- Ukraine
I don't know why people keep using the idiotic fanon interpretation of the Negotiator.
Yeah, even if the Entities had never encountered a hundred different kinds of Forge bullshit, why do people automatically jump to the assumption that whenever they encounter magic, a "Error 404" occurs, the shard throws up its hands in defeat, and goes to get drunk in the shard interpretation of a bar in the Firmament.
Entities live and breathe the hope of encountering any kind of weirdness. The whole point of the cycles is to randomly throw countless forces at each other in the hopes of stumbling upon strange interactions they've never seen before.
It's far more likely that when faced with new Forge effects, the shards will go into overdrive to figure out what it is. And unlike the really weird stuff, the Forge's powers are actually consistent and understandable unless some memetic anti-thinker effect is specifically applied.
In that case, expect the Negotiator to start making much more precise and larger logical leaps, and Tattletale to suddenly find her reserves inexplicably larger than usual, as if she were constantly in the middle of a major conflict. If you recall, there are actually canonical mechanisms for ramping up powers in interesting situations, the most relevant of which in this case are Sechen's Ranges.
PS(edited): Just in case, this wasn't a criticism of the fanfic, because in the work itself, Tattletale hasn't had much of a chance to really figure things out yet due to Taylor intentionally hiding and denying everything. This entire comment is entirely in reference to the comments on this work, where people just write Tattletale off for no reason.
Yeah, even if the Entities had never encountered a hundred different kinds of Forge bullshit, why do people automatically jump to the assumption that whenever they encounter magic, a "Error 404" occurs, the shard throws up its hands in defeat, and goes to get drunk in the shard interpretation of a bar in the Firmament.
Entities live and breathe the hope of encountering any kind of weirdness. The whole point of the cycles is to randomly throw countless forces at each other in the hopes of stumbling upon strange interactions they've never seen before.
It's far more likely that when faced with new Forge effects, the shards will go into overdrive to figure out what it is. And unlike the really weird stuff, the Forge's powers are actually consistent and understandable unless some memetic anti-thinker effect is specifically applied.
In that case, expect the Negotiator to start making much more precise and larger logical leaps, and Tattletale to suddenly find her reserves inexplicably larger than usual, as if she were constantly in the middle of a major conflict. If you recall, there are actually canonical mechanisms for ramping up powers in interesting situations, the most relevant of which in this case are Sechen's Ranges.
PS(edited): Just in case, this wasn't a criticism of the fanfic, because in the work itself, Tattletale hasn't had much of a chance to really figure things out yet due to Taylor intentionally hiding and denying everything. This entire comment is entirely in reference to the comments on this work, where people just write Tattletale off for no reason.
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So let me get this straight guys. I put out a chapter where Taylor starts to figure out her shit, and you immediately start complaining about her not figuring out her shit? /S
In all seriousness though I don't plan to leave it here. This was just a good spot for a cliffhanger. And Lisa wasn't drawing a blank with her power, it just didn't magically solve all her problems. Otherwise it would be, y'know, boring.
In all seriousness though I don't plan to leave it here. This was just a good spot for a cliffhanger. And Lisa wasn't drawing a blank with her power, it just didn't magically solve all her problems. Otherwise it would be, y'know, boring.
I don't think it was her not instantly figuring things out that annoyed people this time but rather her general attitude towards her powers.
It's this sort of ambivalence, bordering on distaste, that makes it frustrating to read. Rather than any interest in what it might be able to do or what it could be used for, she just wants to get rid of it and move on as if it doesn't exist. It'd be one thing if this were the first time she's done this, but this is pretty much the third. The generator, the mouths and now the diamond. You know what they say about patterns and all that.
I get this is why you're trying to get TT involved, since her curious nature will balance things out and basically force Taylor to do something with the stuff. That said, the drawback to this method is you have a protagonist essentially being forced to interact with their own powers. For people who read these stories while thinking of all the cool things they'd do with the power, it just comes off as kind of ungrateful I guess? It's like watching someone win the lottery and just throwing away the ticket because they don't want to think about what to buy. Not the best analogy I know. She doesn't need to be jumping off the walls with excitement every time something shows up but not instantly jumping to "how can I make this go away" would go a long way.
This kind of thing might have been (and pretty much was) taken better earlier on in the story, but we're several chapters in now and things don't seem like they are changing. Even if that's exactly what this chapter is leading towards.
Should have accused Dean of murdering him, via negligent endangerment by leaving sharp sheets of metal laying around, to stave that off; it wouldn't have stood up to scrutiny but, exactly because of that fact, it would have invited scrutiny that she could have benefited from.
Well god damn. Service to a community and gratitude. That's got to be fulfilling.
Taylor having problems with making partial reports like this, before having accomplished anything with the information, is well known and all the more annoying because of it.
I can't tell if it reflects upon writing-quality neutrally or positively that it bothers me but I know damned well that it's not negative.
Well that's statistically weird given how Shards work; even with the Parahuman-members having a lot of kids and Second Generation Parahumans being how they are I would have expected a second First Generation to have come from that same family to get numbers that high and I don't think that Shards like to distribute themselves that closely; especially if their Host's Trigger is similar enough.
I assume that they're one of those Nazi families that the Empire recruit from.
Actually it's kind of weird that they'd fuck with Taylor this way if they're integrated into the Cape scene like that; I suppose that they're only technically in the Cape scene, only technically related to the Parahumans in their family while otherwise being estranged, or something and aren't actually aware of how this shit works?
Also cool; they found the Fuck Arounds; I wonder what specifically they're going to Find Out.
Was this not obvious or something?
Excuse me? That's a pretty weird thing for them to do. Also mildly inconvenient in that Taylor might need to either disguise herself or raid places for food.
Actually that'd be pretty fucking funny; she could raid them for food; just slip under their doors and whatnot, at least to check rooms for people, and just empty their fridge and cupboards and whatnot. Maybe steal their TV and whatnot while she's there.
Actually, and here's a fucking devious idea, what if she steals money from the places that they bribed into banning her from? But, like, only the amount that they were bribed with? Doesn't matter how rich you are if you don't have any actual buying power.
Ah; a Elite-associated group. Yeah that'd be trouble.
I think that Taylor alone could retaliate at least though.
I guess that it's important that she's having fun? Might have been easier to rob their houses though. Probably a better message as well; you shouldn't bring Cape shit into people's homes.
Really? I thought that drugs were worth more then that. I'm legitimately disappointed.
I previously mentioned that this first-person perspective was bordering on a third-person perspective but it's getting worse; that outright was a third-person perspective.
This is your regularly scheduled reminder to avoid taking your Thinker places off-leash.
Weren't they approaching it from the same direction? How did Taylor end up pointing it anywhere near Lisa?
Cool; a super-hard material. Taylor could probably do a few interesting things with that.
Well, I mean, someone else with Taylor's powers could probably do a few interesting things with that; Taylor could probably use it as a bludgeoning-rock the same as any other rock.
Also you failed your lore-check there; Taydenite isn't what Petrosapiens are made out of.
Man this dumbassery is squarely on Taylor.
That said though they're really storing Anti-matter in plastic storage-tubs? Is it Fullerened or something?
You need to reread Worm or something; there were a lot of things going on there that aren't here and vice-versa.
Of course she doesn't know things about them; she and Taylor took a metaphorical glace at them and fucked off.
Looking at the actual thing itself it seems to only have a button, a finger-hold ring, and a trigger so yeah probably a bit fiddly.
Actually, funnily enough, she already has a investigation/research, and organization/memory-recall, Perk; it seemingly is just that she has no way to proc it since she seems to not ever investigate, organize, or recall anything.
I went into a bit of a analysis about why antimatter would be concerning to others, to the effect of milligrams of the stuff being suitable for demolishing buildings right down to the foundation, and others were kind enough to mention that not only would that happen but the pair-annihilation would convert protons and neutrons, and their pairs, into force-carrying particles, for however long it took for them to annihilate/decay, and enough photons to cause ionizing radiation.
I get that the Buildy Gun and Taydenite are more actionable things to engage with but you shouldn't try to dismiss antimatter.
To be fair when she got bug powers Queen was probably rather insistently pressing the "Conflict" button in her brain and forcefully making her aware of what each and every one of her millions or billions of insects were capable of.
Being fair though this is a wonderful exploration of alternate characterization since she quickly learned about Sophia and decatastrophized violence.
Oh cool; you actually used that? That's awesome.
By the way, for reference, Buckminsterfullerene, also called "C60" because of the number of carbon-atoms used to make it and to distinguish it from other carbon-balls which have different properties, tend to dissolve in common solvents, which is apparently highly abnormal for allotropes of carbon, and color it purple (of various shades depending on solvent-type and solute-concentration) and yellow-green (depending on what I believe is static-electricity, from light-exposure, making it clump up or something).
Apparently the concentration of it can be up to a hundredth-of-a-milligram-per-milliliter in Methanol so that, taking into account that each Buckyball is only carrying about a single Hydrogen's worth of antimatter per sixty Carbon atoms. might make it suitable for practical uses.
Edit: also for reference, loose Fullerenes are comparable to soot or smoke so you would probably want it to be dissolved in something or otherwise contained.
Also also for reference there are other solvents, like Chloronaphthalene, which are much better at holding large amounts of Fullerene. In fact let me just link to the Solubility Table for Fullerene.
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- Pronouns
- He/Him
The main problem I have with this is that using Tattletale to figure out Forge Stuff and Perks seems kinda shortsighted. With how there are quite a few Perks that leads to either solving the Entities quest for the [ANSWER] or could threaten them so I just don't see how Lisa's Shard wouldn't alert Scion (knocking him out of his depression through hope to restore the Thinker or whatever self-preservation protocols/instinct they have) and thus ending the story with Taylor dissected or killed. Unless you veto all the Perks that do either or have them go against how the rest of the Perks work and actually inform Taylor how they work I just don't see it working out.
Edit: thinking about it some more actually makes it seem even worse because the Shard and Shard Host learning more about the Forge then the Forge User means that anything Taylor eventually makes that could do something against the Shards will already be known and countered. It essentially sets the story up as kinda defunct/Grimdark because the world will end no matter how much Taylor tries because she trusted the wrong person.
Edit: thinking about it some more actually makes it seem even worse because the Shard and Shard Host learning more about the Forge then the Forge User means that anything Taylor eventually makes that could do something against the Shards will already be known and countered. It essentially sets the story up as kinda defunct/Grimdark because the world will end no matter how much Taylor tries because she trusted the wrong person.
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Maybe it's just me but the rolls seem to be coming way too often for how good they are, not sure what table you're using but I'm pretty sure the Taydonite might be the least useful one so far and it's completely neutral, nearly all rolls have resulted in complete immunity to some hazard or other or just been a "win" button.
Even as she is now there really isn't anything that can even threaten Taylor, she's immune to radiation, mind control, doesn't need to breath, and can re-form if blasted into pieces, and that's just the convenient Endbringer-specific hard counter rolls.
Even as she is now there really isn't anything that can even threaten Taylor, she's immune to radiation, mind control, doesn't need to breath, and can re-form if blasted into pieces, and that's just the convenient Endbringer-specific hard counter rolls.
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This sums up a lot of my issue with nerfing how the omniversal mcguffin is supposed to work and trying to replace that same feature with a second in universe character. Lisa's power has other loyalties, not even mentioning the fact that the shards are not miracle makers and would need shit loads 9f data to even begin guessing at the more exotic shit not based on physical laws.
Lisa is a whole second person that you have essentially tied plot armor to, because the story is just as dead if she dies instead of the MC. Killing pretty much all tension in that regard. Because, frankly, a lot of escapism readers would kill to have what Taylor has and reading about her actively ignoring it because she went through something traumatic would definitely piss off people who have their own trauma or are just detached in general.
Basically your MC is pitying herself and if it isn't author enforced mechanics changes that prevent her from knowing about her powers, but is instead her repressing it then a lot of people will stop caring. We all have our baggage, most of us don't want to read about someone given the ultimate tool to taking control of our lives and see them waste it while complaining about how rough it is to be them.
Even if Shards would contact each-other for things like that, when absorbing each-other at the end of the Cycle would achieve something similar anyway, Zion isn't the Warrier Entity; Zion, and Eden, are just large remaining clumps of Shards infeasible to make suitable for Hosts which are kept around as defenses against hazards to the Cycle.
They're like specialized immune-systems, Zion for external hazards like bacteria and parasites and Eden for internal ones like cancers and prions and viruses, rather then proper administrators.
TT also doesn't solve a problem taylor has, that is, figuring out how her power works. I mean it's certainly something that everyone but taylor thinks is an issue. But for taylor herself? Her power works. She doesn't need to understand any more of it and she's not curious about it and she doesn't do anything about it. As far as taylor's attitude is concerned, her power can do whatever it wants and it's no skin off her back. She has other things to worry about. This chapter isn't driven by taylor at all, this chapter is just a thinker dragging around dead weight while looking at the shiny things.
I do think the title Negotiator is an interesting clue to how TT's power works, that is, it leans on the shard network to info broker analysis. Whenever TT pulls something wild out of her ass, that's the negotiator buying and selling [DATA] on the shard network. Of course, that'd mean that the shard network now knows about the completely novel FTL drive ennabling power crystal.
I do think the title Negotiator is an interesting clue to how TT's power works, that is, it leans on the shard network to info broker analysis. Whenever TT pulls something wild out of her ass, that's the negotiator buying and selling [DATA] on the shard network. Of course, that'd mean that the shard network now knows about the completely novel FTL drive ennabling power crystal.
- Pronouns
- He/Him
They kinda have to talk to each other otherwise power effecting Trumps plus some Thinkers wouldn't be a thing/work and Jack Slash wouldn't be a danger. Zion kinda has to be a administrator/central/commanding intelligence of his Shards since he decided to emulate human emotions and now he's depressed (which Is kinda the entire reason Worm could happen at all) and if you take Ward as real (ew) then all the other shards go do their own thing which makes the Titans when he dies.
Edit: to continue with it the Forge is kinda the thing that would get the attention of pretty much all the Shards on how much new Data it brings just by existing. Just the slime body, mouths, and living FTL Crystal would have Shaper doing the Shard equivalent of drooling probably.
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I've had to veto 3 time constellation perks because they just kept. On. Coming. My rolls have been wild. She is also specifically not immune to mind control.
Not here it don't. Negotiator has exclusive access and I'm not elaborating any further than that.
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I don't think that many Trump-type Shards retain connections to other Shards though; I'm pretty sure that it's just that their Shard-manipulation functions are adjusted to effect things like other Host's connections to their Shards, the connections themselves, instead of other Shards themselves. Like I'm pretty sure that Shards tend to connect to other pieces of themselves, subsystems and the like, in a similar way to how they connect to Hosts so it shouldn't be that strange for Shard-manipulation abilities to be possible to repurpose into Shard-connection-manipulation abilities.
While Zion and, theoretically, Eden are able to manipulate their own Shards though that isn't indicative of them being able to manipulate other Shards; that's like saying that Butcher or Glaistig Uaine can control all Shards because they have their own collection of them that they can control.
- Pronouns
- He/Him
It would still need to work with the other Shard as to not kill their Host in the struggle to take control of something directly connected to the Host's brain. For the comparison it kinda ignores the whole idea that Zion and Eden would have administrator access to all the Shards because they sent them out in the first place while the other two wouldn't.