The Secrets' Crusade

[Ekzentric Lohner]

@Snowfire Is the nano-enslavement stuff technologically close enough to the twisted ascension that the latter could be deduced as a possibility if the Uninvolved were told about the former, or would the Shiplords only be able to point out "these guys are skeevy" without actually having anything that'd tip them off to the ultimate threat?

 

[acegunner]

[x] Contact Fleets were diplomats as much as anything else, but were any of their number ever as skilled as you? What might happen if you simply ask?

 

[Snowfire]

@Snowfire Is the nano-enslavement stuff technologically close enough to the twisted ascension that the latter could be deduced as a possibility if the Uninvolved were told about the former, or would the Shiplords only be able to point out "these guys are skeevy" without actually having anything that'd tip them off to the ultimate threat?

Click to shrink...

One could try an argument in the vein of "Well if this is how they treat the galaxy now how would they treat it as an Uninvolved?" If the Uninvolved of the time really are like what Amanda felt in the echo-memory on the uninhabited world, it could work.

As to the reactions if you pull off something like that? It's hard to be sure. The simulations definitelt have alert features, but your Unison Intelligences can't tell exactly where they lead or how loud they'll be if they get set off.

 

[Tirfarthuan]

Part of what led the Hjivin minds to rejecting the Shiplord overtures was based on how they just didn't believe that the Shiplords could be so old and not have taken the same route as they'd done.

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Good news, Hjivin! Things have changed somewhat since you died. I'm sure the Shiplords would be eager to point out the differences, but the similarities tell quite a story.

(I think I'm starting to understand why the Shiplords are half-heartedly modeling Hjivin war crimes through their own specific brand of horrific evil. I just don't think some things can have a justification at a certain point, and the Shiplords have sailed faaar past that a long time ago.)

The idea just didn't exist to them.

Click to shrink...

The nature of Secrets makes this kind of thing into the Outside Context Problem all the time in this setting, but it's even more true on a larger thematic level, huh.

 

[Simon_Jester]

Wait is the reason the Shiplords hate Practice is that they saw the Uninvolved wipe out the Hjivin, something they can't replicate or have a response to?

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The Shiplords clearly have an unrelated trauma that predates the Hijvin, and which is also related to why they hate Practice. Also, while they can't replicate what that Uninvolved did to the Hijvin, they definitely have anti-Uninvolved/anti-Practice weaponry that counters whatever it is that the Uninvolved are. To the point where the Uninvolved are genuinely afraid of what happens if the Shiplords get mad and come looking for them with a large axe.

I mean, my initial idea was specifically finding out about the twisted ascension attempt and warning the Uninvolved early enough that they respond without going to urgent extremes.

That said, I do like "apply solar tier diplomacy to convincing the Uninvolved that this is an abomination with a good chance of mind controlling the galaxy"

Also there's the question of what we expect the reaction to be if we DO beat this simulation. And if our Masques can survive the resulting scrutiny. Because that kind of informs decisions about things like using Practice, which is super obviously glowy and will DEFINITELY BE NOTICED. Or if we even want to win this in the simulation.

Plus there's another concern: are we going to come off as catspaws of the Uninvolved

Click to shrink...

This... is all a very good point. We're going to blow our cover something fierce if someone notices us using Practice, as opposed to just being Unusual Shiplords No One Can Quite Identify.

(Honestly we're lucky that Shiplords don't bother doing the equivalent of asking each other "what's your social security number," though I suppose we may just have our party's AIs spoofing all that stuff below the level of resolution of the game)

 

[Snowfire]

(Honestly we're lucky that Shiplords don't bother doing the equivalent of asking each other "what's your social security number," though I suppose we may just have our party's AIs spoofing all that stuff below the level of resolution of the game)

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This is what has been happening, yes. Insight gave you enough detail to tune the Masques for this, and you've been using Practice to cheat the system as well. Practice isn't necessarily applicable to all of this situation, however, and it will have limits to how it can be applied even ignoring the issues of truly active use of it.

What's you've been using so far has been generally passive. Things like the reply you gave to Kicha, which really surprised them because Mandy gave a hyperformal response clause that fell out of general use more than half a million years ago.

 

[Dmol8]

They are, yes, but they only found out after the war came to the end and the cultural scars had already been inflicted. So the Uninvolved explaining was kinda like someone holding a nuke launcher standing over the smoking remains of an entire civilisation telling someone who was in Nagasaki that it was completely ok and that they'd never actually use the nuke launcher again unless they had to.

Click to shrink...

Well that's just wrong on multiple levels. But honestly the wrongness of your metaphor is beside the point since it still conveys your meaning which as I understand is this:

This war we are witnessing right now is like if the Federation from Star Trek had an issue with Ascended Life instead of Genetically Engineered Life and then decided to be a Guardian and Guide to other's efforts to Ascend and then had a bad first contact with Space Imperial China ran by Science Emperors that were using the Second Secret as a basis for their society that led to a galactic war.

This resulted in said Federation being saved at the last second by a Lifeform they Ascended nuking the Space Imperial China out of existence and pressing the Federations Ascended Life trauma button at the same time. At this point the Federation drops the Guide part of watching over other species Ascend and becomes a Fascist State that preemptively punishes any species that learns of the Secrets in order to prevent anything like this war and it's end occurring.

Am I getting the situation correctly?

 

[Snowfire]

Doing a quick tally before I head out for the afternoon. I'll probably push the vote close back to tomorrow afternoon when I get back - and will give further answers then.

Adhoc vote count started by Snowfire on Jul 15, 2021 at 8:00 AM, finished with 53 posts and 10 votes.

• ---

  7 people have voted

  [X] Contact Fleets were diplomats as much as anything else, but were any of their number ever as skilled as you? What might happen if you simply ask?

  • Kirbstomp
  • RyubosJ
  • Brogatar
  • Zfglx
  • carterhall
  • Shwaggy
  • acegunner

  2 people have voted

  [x] Write-in: Get the key information as quickly as possible and then try to get the attention of the Uninvolved early.

  • Coda
  • Random12345

  1 people have voted

  [X] The Hjivin emissaries will not give you the answers you seek. But might their staff, or the servants below them? Dangerous to act right under the nose of a near-peer, but it just might work.

  • Faraway-R

 

[Nemonowan]

Well that's just wrong on multiple levels. But honestly the wrongness of your metaphor is beside the point since it still conveys your meaning which as I understand is this:

This war we are witnessing right now is like if the Federation from Star Trek had an issue with Ascended Life instead of Genetically Engineered Life and then decided to be a Guardian and Guide to other's efforts to Ascend and then had a bad first contact with Space Imperial China ran by Science Emperors that were using the Second Secret as a basis for their society that led to a galactic war.

This resulted in said Federation being saved at the last second by a Lifeform they Ascended nuking the Space Imperial China out of existence and pressing the Federations Ascended Life trauma button at the same time. At this point the Federation drops the Guide part of watching over other species Ascend and becomes a Fascist State that preemptively punishes any species that learns of the Secrets in order to prevent anything like this war and it's end occurring.

Am I getting the situation correctly?

Click to shrink...

Doesn't seem quite like that to me.
It's like a more powerful, human-ruled, and paternalistic version of the Federation met a no-cosmetic-changes Borg.
The Borg decided that they could take them and launched a war, they pushed back the Federation, the Federation regrouped, counterattacked, pushed back the Borg to the point that they could sense defeat, so they launched a hasty program for Borg-flavoured-Ascension that created a monster ready to assimilate the galaxy. Then Q decided that enough was enough and erradicated the ascended monster, the Borg and every single species that had been Borged.
That horrified the humans so much that to prevent the possibility of this happening again the they turned the Federation into a galactic enforcer that keeps every other species under strict technological limits, allows ascension only within their control and limits, ande developed anti-Q weapons to make sure that they never again get involved like that.

 

[Lightwhispers]

[x] Contact Fleets were diplomats as much as anything else, but were any of their number ever as skilled as you? What might happen if you simply ask?

Poking the Uninvolved seems like a mistake to me.

 

[Dmol8]

[x] Contact Fleets were diplomats as much as anything else, but were any of their number ever as skilled as you? What might happen if you simply ask?

Forgot to vote on my last post.

 

[Baughn]

(Honestly we're lucky that Shiplords don't bother doing the equivalent of asking each other "what's your social security number," though I suppose we may just have our party's AIs spoofing all that stuff below the level of resolution of the game)

Click to shrink...

This is true, but I think at some level we just have to take the chance.

We're here in hopes of preventing a war that might kill a majority of the galaxy, and we're looking directly at one of the traumas that's causing that war in the first place. Stopping the war doesn't mean finding some secret that will let us trivially defeat the Shiplords; I doubt such a thing exists. It means convincing the Shiplords not to fight, and that means at some stage we have to communicate with them.

The people at this site are here because they remember what happened, and what they've become, and they hate it. They're constantly searching for a better way. They haven't found one.

I can scarcely think of a better opening to this conversation than to find that solution, where they thought that none existed.

 

[JOJOBRN]

[x] Contact Fleets were diplomats as much as anything else, but were any of their number ever as skilled as you? What might happen if you simply ask?

Worth a shot and probably more plausible than metagaming to figure this out as quickly as possible using normal means would have been in this scenario.

 

[Zaealix]

...Sincerity.
The Same ship design that once ferried a people facing destruction away from harm became collectors meant to be filled with tribute in the form of individuals.
...
It's like they call themselves Shiplords but they've become Zookeepers, preserving a few small families of species that once numbered in the millions if not billions.
The Shiplords have turned Grimdark, and that attitude shines through no matter how good of a diplomat they send.
Amanda doesn't HAVE that Grimdark attitude running under her mask, so to speak. She, runs off hope and faith in a better, brighter tommorow, and that Noblebright spirit ALSO shines through...
And on a level...
I feel like THAT, is the trick.
The Shiplords thought themselves powerful, but then found they weren't truly powerful enough. And it's like they're flexing harder and harder to try and intimidate everyone else into thinking they ARE as powerful as they want to be, in an effort to truly become as powerful as their protective Mandate demands.
But that 'we must be the most powerful' drive, has become 1st priority, because that's what happens when you want to be a protector and don't have the power to ward away enemies- you just get smashed aside when someone stronger then you comes along. The Need to Protect is effectively crushed by the Pragmatic Thought of 'what if we're not strong enough to protect them?'
...
I slightly want to critize the Shiplords in that their intrigue game runs deeper then their military game, given that they HAD Warfleets aplenty for fighting, just not necessarily enough of them everywhere but those are elites, and not really meant for defense? But like...
The Shiplords are too OFFENSIVE. Even pre-Hjivin, it's like they're more about bringing down the hammer on the derserving rather then protecting the innocent and/or restoring damage.
They believe once broken, it's not worth reforging, almost.
They don't think in terms of reincarnation or a greater cycle of life.
They're caught in short-term thinking, where if someone gets ahead and doesn't let up, they'll only stay ahead and pull away from the rest of the crowd. That's the only move.

The Shiplords don't believe in dreams and hope and faith enough, so when logic gets hung up on 'why should we not be baby-eaters?' their hearts ache, but they don't have the support needed to say 'because eating babies is wrong! It'll make more enemies then if we didn't eat babies, even if eating babies makes us stronger!'
...
I feel like I can't quite say this right, and it's fustrating.

 

[Simon_Jester]

Well that's just wrong on multiple levels. But honestly the wrongness of your metaphor is beside the point since it still conveys your meaning which as I understand is this:

This war we are witnessing right now is like if the Federation from Star Trek had an issue with Ascended Life instead of Genetically Engineered Life and then decided to be a Guardian and Guide to other's efforts to Ascend and then had a bad first contact with Space Imperial China ran by Science Emperors that were using the Second Secret as a basis for their society that led to a galactic war.

This resulted in said Federation being saved at the last second by a Lifeform they Ascended nuking the Space Imperial China out of existence and pressing the Federations Ascended Life trauma button at the same time. At this point the Federation drops the Guide part of watching over other species Ascend and becomes a Fascist State that preemptively punishes any species that learns of the Secrets in order to prevent anything like this war and it's end occurring.

Am I getting the situation correctly?

Click to shrink...

Except the part where the Hijvin Sphere bears no real resemblance to Imperial China and should not be compared to Imperial China.

And the part where in the English language you do not just arbitrarily capitalize random nouns, but the rules for English capitalization are straightforward and you can look them up on the side.

 

[Zaealix]

Except the part where the Hijvin Sphere bears no real resemblance to Imperial China and should not be compared to Imperial China.

And the part where in the English language you do not just arbitrarily capitalize random nouns, but the rules for English capitalization are straightforward and you can look them up on the side.

Click to shrink...

Think less rules as Written versus rules as Spoken. An example of which is that last sentence. At least that's how it rolls for me, though I think Dmol there is using it for similar reasons.

But as a second attempt at what I was getting at…
How do you think the Shiplords would react to the Hjivin secret versus how Amanda might react to say, catching Iris reading some XXX-rated story?
Hjivin probably sensed the Shiplords might react by punishing them, or taking the book away to destroy it.
Amanda I think would be shocked, but more inportantly, she'd be willing to sit down and carefully talk it out with Iris, so they could come to a conclusion that works out, whatever it might be.
THAT, is the difference.

 

[Dmol8]

Except the part where the Hijvin Sphere bears no real resemblance to Imperial China and should not be compared to Imperial China.

And the part where in the English language you do not just arbitrarily capitalize random nouns, but the rules for English capitalization are straightforward and you can look them up on the side.

Click to shrink...

Actually the Hijivin Sphere does bear a resemblance to how Imperial China/Japan/East Asia has been portrayed in a lot of written works over the years. Some of those works were even made in China or Japan or South Korea and in some cases were supposed to be showing such qualities as positive (hello Japanese Slave Girl Harem shows).

Edit: Oh yeah the English capitalization grammar rules fly out the window the moment one is trying to emphasize words as carrying more meaning that they usually do in regular conversation. Written or spoken or signaled in some other way.

 

[Coda]

Then Q decided that enough was enough and erradicated the ascended monster, the Borg and every single species that had been Borged.

Click to shrink...

No, it wasn't recursive. It wiped out the Borg infections but it left the civilians. Why do you think there were refugees to rescue?

And the part where in the English language you do not just arbitrarily capitalize random nouns, but the rules for English capitalization are straightforward and you can look them up on the side.

Click to shrink...

Give him a break; the rules are different in German and it doesn't really impact intelligibility.

Edit: Oh yeah the English capitalization grammar rules fly out the window the moment one is trying to emphasize words as carrying more meaning that they usually do in regular conversation. Written or spoken or signaled in some other way.

Click to shrink...

Try all-caps or italics. Putting a single capital letter on a word makes it seem like you're assigning a name to some specific concept -- for example, "good" describes something that isn't bad, but "Good" describes an idealized moral system.

 

[Simon_Jester]

Think less rules as Written versus rules as Spoken.

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I don't know about you, but when I speak English, I don't capitalize anything.

I'm not even sure how to pronounce the difference between lower-case and capital letters reliably. Maybe by shouting?

An example of which is that last sentence. At least that's how it rolls for me, though I think Dmol there is using it for similar reasons.

Click to shrink...

Well... it's still grammatically incorrect and jarring to most native English-speakers. Not all, I'll grant you. But most.

Actually the Hijivin Sphere does bear a resemblance to how Imperial China/Japan/East Asia has been portrayed in a lot of written works over the years.

Click to shrink...

And those written works were not accurate characterizations of what Imperial China was like.

Much less accurate characterizations of "East Asia" as somehow being a single coherent bloc where all the cultures somehow work the same, an idea that is orientalist garbage; reality was never like that.

Do not make the mistake of comparing horrible fictional societies to real societies, purely on the grounds that the fictional society resembles an inaccurate picture of the real society that has been assembled from other fiction.

Imperial China is not equivalent to, say, the Klingons. It is a real place that really existed. It is a place that had real impact and whose descendants are real people today that deal with real prejudices caused by foreigners who believe fictions about history.

Edit: Oh yeah the English capitalization grammar rules fly out the window the moment one is trying to emphasize words as carrying more meaning that they usually do in regular conversation. Written or spoken or signaled in some other way.

Click to shrink...

Maybe, but you're salting in Gratuitous Extra Capitalization far, far more often than is justified by the level of emphasis that would make sense in context. You're capitalizing so hard my first thought was that you were just straightforwardly applying German capitalization rules.

Native English speakers don't do that, unless they wish to call attention to themselves as being abnormal. If that is not your intention, you would be well advised to use less capitalization.

 

[Coda]

I'm not even sure how to pronounce the difference between lower-case and capital letters reliably. Maybe by shouting?

Click to shrink...

There's a nuance in the inflection. It's something that as a native speaker you probably both use and perceive but not necessarily consciously notice. Using my example earlier, compare how you might inflect "that was a good thing to do" (that is, beneficial) compared to "that was a Good thing to do" (that is, the D&D alignment).

Native English speakers don't do that, unless they wish to call attention to themselves as being abnormal. If that is not your intention, you would be well advised to use less capitalization.

Click to shrink...

Seriously, be nice. It's one thing to point out a helpful tip for communication. It's another to imply negative things about someone because of it. As long as someone is making themselves understood, as long as communication is happening, "right" and "wrong" grammar really don't matter.

 

[Snowfire]

How do you think the Shiplords would react to the Hjivin secret versus how Amanda might react to say, catching Iris reading some XXX-rated story?

Click to shrink...

*looks at how sex-ed is taught in PW humanity*
Do you really want me to answer this question

Answers soonTM, digesting delicious afternoon tea.

 

[Zaealix]

*looks at how sex-ed is taught in PW humanity*
Do you really want me to answer this question

Answers soonTM, digesting delicious afternoon tea.

Click to shrink...

...Okay so maybe not the best topic I could have picked-it works for humanity here not humanity post-Practice War. Mumma mia.

 

[Dmol8]

And those written works were not accurate characterizations of what Imperial China was like.

Much less accurate characterizations of "East Asia" as somehow being a single coherent bloc where all the cultures somehow work the same, an idea that is orientalist garbage; reality was never like that.

Do not make the mistake of comparing horrible fictional societies to real societies, purely on the grounds that the fictional society resembles an inaccurate picture of the real society that has been assembled from other fiction.

Imperial China is not equivalent to, say, the Klingons. It is a real place that really existed. It is a place that had real impact and whose descendants are real people today that deal with real prejudices caused by foreigners who believe fictions about history.

Click to shrink...

OK did you miss the part where I said people from China and Japan use those same concepts and portray them as Good? I'm not talking about Orientalism and Occidentals' racist propaganda.

I'm talking about Japan's writing concept where the plot is only the purview of the protagonists that magnetically draw in other characters, China's cultivation stories that have a small handful of Enlightened characters that every other character orbits around and South Korea's specialists who are a cut above the rest of the characters in a story and as such get to decide questions of life and death.

When I mentioned Imperial China I was talking about the relationship China and it's neighbors had with the Chinese Emperors that in science fiction is shaped into some sort of technology that is used for population control. Is this racist? Yeah in most cases when written by occidental authors. The problem is that this also happens to be how some people from Japan or China or Korea (South or North) look at the concept of a Ruler.

Also the Klingons are Star Trek's version of Russia which is an Eastern European/North Asian country.

Give him a break; the rules are different in German and it doesn't really impact intelligibility.

Click to shrink...

Maybe, but you're salting in Gratuitous Extra Capitalization far, far more often than is justified by the level of emphasis that would make sense in context. You're capitalizing so hard my first thought was that you were just straightforwardly applying German capitalization rules.

Native English speakers don't do that, unless they wish to call attention to themselves as being abnormal. If that is not your intention, you would be well advised to use less capitalization.

Click to shrink...

Actually back in the 19th century when the Brothers Grim were doing their work on standardizing/codifying German as a Language the older of the two Jacob Ludwig Karl had a friend named Vuk Stefanović Karadžić who was doing similar work on standardizing/codifying Serbian as a Language. As it turned out both men collaborated/communicated on the topic of grammar rules which is why today German and Serbian grammars are so similar.

So I'm Serbian not German, but when it comes to grammar tells that makes no difference in English because of that collaboration between two language reformers in the 19th century.

Edit: Other than mistaking me for German a good point. I'll see what I can do about writing more like a native.

*looks at how sex-ed is taught in PW humanity*
Do you really want me to answer this question

Answers soonTM, digesting delicious afternoon tea.

Click to shrink...

Yes please. This seems like something interesting.

 

[Snowfire]

...Okay so maybe not the best topic I could have picked-it works for humanity here not humanity post-Practice War. Mumma mia.

Click to shrink...

Heh, not quite that. It's more that PW takes a very, very open view to physical intimacy, and the Institutes take their responsibility to ensure that people are well prepared for it seriously. The general biological process et. all is taught at a relatively early age, with electives starting at around high school age where teenagers can start to expand their understanding of things in a safe and non-judgemental space. The primary focus lies in hammering in the importance of consent and not hurting one's partner(s) (except in ways they might like to be hurt, but that's another elective).

Institutes supply spaces for young adults to experiment, some of which are supervised, some of which are not - it depends on the subject. Kids are encouraged to use these to experiment and learn about themselves if they're curious, with the only major rule being pretty simple: make sure your partner(s) have given fully informed consent. Parents are also extremely open to questions from their kids about physical intimacy, and are quick to direct children to proper information sources if they don't feel capable of giving a good answer. Taboos as we understand them have also all largely died. So Amanda finding Iris reading (or more likely simming) an XXX story would probably result in her asking when she was going to try it.

...and apparently who with, too. Huh.

Answers relevant to your current scenario will appear shortly.

 

[Snowfire]

Well that's just wrong on multiple levels. But honestly the wrongness of your metaphor is beside the point since it still conveys your meaning which as I understand is this:

This war we are witnessing right now is like if the Federation from Star Trek had an issue with Ascended Life instead of Genetically Engineered Life and then decided to be a Guardian and Guide to other's efforts to Ascend and then had a bad first contact with Space Imperial China ran by Science Emperors that were using the Second Secret as a basis for their society that led to a galactic war.

This resulted in said Federation being saved at the last second by a Lifeform they Ascended nuking the Space Imperial China out of existence and pressing the Federations Ascended Life trauma button at the same time. At this point the Federation drops the Guide part of watching over other species Ascend and becomes a Fascist State that preemptively punishes any species that learns of the Secrets in order to prevent anything like this war and it's end occurring.

Am I getting the situation correctly?

Click to shrink...

The post below was a largely correct reordering of your analogy within current quest knowledge, but I've put in a few corrections in bold for convenience.

Doesn't seem quite like that to me.
It's like a more powerful, human-ruled, and paternalistic version of the Federation met a highly-stealthed Borg.
The Borg decided that they could take them and launched a war, they pushed back the Federation, the Federation regrouped, counterattacked, pushed back the Borg to the point that they could sense defeat, so they launched a hasty program for Borg-flavoured-Ascension that almost created a monster ready to assimilate the galaxy. Then Q noticed what was going on, decided that enough was enough and eradicated the ascending monster, the Borg and all of the assimilation junk stuck into those from other races who could still live without it.
That horrified the humans so much that to prevent the possibility of this happening again the they turned the Federation into a galactic enforcer that keeps every other species under strict technological limits, allows ascension only within their control and limits, and developed anti-Q weapons to make sure that they never again get involved like that.

Click to shrink...

To quickly cover my changes: the Hjivin had very good camouflage for what they were actually doing. It wasn't obvious. The Shiplords only caught it because at the time Contact drew in a lot of their more skilled analysts and at the end of the day the difference between working out how to help a polity and what a polity is trying to hide from you is largely academic.

The creation of the Hjivin did not fully form, the Uninvolved got to it before it was complete. When that Uninvolved acted, however, everything with a Hjivin soul died.

But as a second attempt at what I was getting at…
How do you think the Shiplords would react to the Hjivin secret versus how Amanda might react to say, catching Iris reading some XXX-rated story?
Hjivin probably sensed the Shiplords might react by punishing them, or taking the book away to destroy it.
Amanda I think would be shocked, but more inportantly, she'd be willing to sit down and carefully talk it out with Iris, so they could come to a conclusion that works out, whatever it might be.
THAT, is the difference.

Click to shrink...

This is missing things beyond the analogy you chose. The problem here is that the Hjivin fully understood that the Shiplords saw what they were doing as horrific. They just didn't care, and from their PoV it wasn't as if the Shiplords could actually stop them. Until, y'know, they could.