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Therapy, a Wormfic

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frommerman said:
You're right. I happen to think that the way she's portrayed in the original work is wrong on a variety of levels, which I explained above.
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I get you, but I don't buy it. If her power is making all the choices, does that mean her power wants to kill Scion? Why should it give a fuck?

Also, I've always thought the idea of Contessa the zombie was asinine anyway.
 
MadGreenSon said:
I get you, but I don't buy it. If her power is making all the choices, does that mean her power wants to kill Scion? Why should it give a fuck?

Also, I've always thought the idea of Contessa the zombie was asinine anyway.
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The [PATH] still needed to be initialized the first time by its host, and after that first time, wasn't Doctor Mother guiding it?
 
Maybe her power is being guided by her original request all this time.

When she first asked what she would need to do in order to kill Scion, the path told her what needed to be done and took control. From then on, the path has pretty much been interacting her what to do.

I find the idea of Zombie!Fortuna extremely believable. The girl has never made a single decision for herself; it's always been her power making all the decisions, her power telling her what to do. Those moments in which she dictates the path are the only moments of free will that she ever has. From then on, it's always the path.

Honestly, she seem like less of a zombie and more of a robot. Always following orders without question.
 
MadGreenSon said:
This was not indicated by the text. At all.
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It doesn't need to be.

Think about it: spending years just following random, inane orders, never being in control of your body and always putting on an act for the people around you. Your body is moving and your mouth is talking, but it's never really you. It's someone else, making the right amount of movements, the right amount of sounds in order to satisfy a goal. You're not making a conscious decision to do things, your power is. You're just a backseat driver, the one being carried along for the ride.

And at the end, you don't set aside time for yourself so that you can make your own decisions. No, you don't have the time for that. Instead, you set up yet another path after the first one has been completed. And another and another and another. Soon, all you can do is make paths, all you can do is follow orders. The person people see you as, that isn't you. It's your power. Your power controlling your life, controlling your every action.

And you're just being carried along for the ride.
 
You get a like because it's about time someone had Cauldron deliberately lobotomize Coil and puppet him for Endbringer predictions. Cauldron gets a Picard for not doing this 37 seconds after Coil chugged his vial.
 
MadGreenSon said:
This was not indicated by the text. At all.
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It also wasn't indicated by the text that Panacea's power wasn't meant for controlling things, or that Cricket was completely nuts on top of being a nazi, or that Paran's power is meant to pair with Panacea's, or how old Ash Beast was, or a bunch if other things I've done with this fic. I'm writing a fic about mental illnesses and how a person who can fix them shoved into a world replete with them changes things up. To that end, I am making certain thematic changes to the source material so I can show off aspects of this general concept from every angle. If you don't like that, that's fine.
 
frommerman said:
So. The Path to Victory is another example of a power which should not be able to leave a human sane. Entities have no reason to design their powers for the good of their users, and Path to Victory specifically wasn't designed at all. Contessa gets almost the full force of the shard, with only the last-second limitations slapped on by Eden just before she died.

So yeah. I'm interpreting her power to completely interrupt sapience while it is active because there's no way something that is appreciably human should be able to do the things Contessa can do. Incidentally, this is why she's trying her best to never, ever be seen by Sanity's real eyes. Sanity would see Total Psychological Overlay, Sapience Suppression and decide to nope that misery right where it stood. No, not even an exacerbated by powers because there's nothing to exacerbate. Contessa, while using her power, is effectively a p-zombie.
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I'm...pretty damn sure that's not how her power works, or what kind of state she's in psychologically. She suffers serious psychological effects from near-constant power use from a young age, but she absolutely doesn't lack sapience whenever her power is not encountering a blind spot. It's just fundamentally nonsensical. Otherwise she'd act like a small child whenever near a power nullifier (like Mantellum), which she didn't in canon. Otherwise she'd be like a small child whenever dealing with a blind spot (she isn't). Otherwise she'd never be able to do anything with her power, since she couldn't actually decide upon/modify/prioritize/refine her Paths.

Yes, using her power like she does has a major psychological toll on her, but that's because she constantly uses it, which she does because she's trying to do the impossible, with everything at stake. It's not because her power itself is overriding her sapience. She is fully aware of the steps in her Paths and actively decides when to change/modify her Paths, stop following one (or all) of them entirely, and what she's doing in real-time while following a Path. Her interludes makes this explicit.

Also, Entities do design their powers for the good of their users to an extent. Scion's interlude makes this explicit. Powers are designed in such a way as to not be detrimental to the experimentation of said powers--so a power that drives its user insane (to the point of not getting as much useful data) is undesirable to them unless that is exactly the point of that power. Similarly, powers are designed with limits (like the Manton Effect) to prevent them from damaging the experiment (like making a power so lethal that the user can just kill tons of people with ease, and no useful data is gotten, or a power that harms its user and gets him killed prematurely). Lastly, shards are (by their very nature) designed to be directed by the will of their users, not the other way around. After all, gleaning data from how the hosts utilize their powers is the entire point of handing out powers in the first place, and it is also how the Entities use their shards themselves (as in, how they use the ones they never intend to give out). While the Entities do program in some limitations and general protocol, they don't like the shards exercising much control over their hosts unless that is the specific purpose of a specific shard.
 
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SaltyWaffles said:
Also, Entities do design their powers for the good of their users to an extent. Scion's interlude makes this explicit. Powers are designed in such a way as to not be detrimental to the experimentation of said powers--so a power that drives its user insane (to the point of not getting as much useful data) is undesirable to them unless that is exactly the point of that power. Similarly, powers are designed with limits (like the Manton Effect) to prevent them from damaging the experiment (like making a power so lethal that the user can just kill tons of people with ease, and no useful data is gotten). Lastly, shards are (by their very nature) designed to be directed by the will of their users, not the other way around. After all, gleaning data from how the hosts utilize their powers is the entire point of handing out powers in the first place, and it is also how the Entities use their shards themselves (as in, how they use the ones they never intend to give out). While the Entities do program in some limitations and general protocol, they don't like the shards exercising much control over their hosts unless that is the specific purpose of a specific shard.
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This bit at least is null for PTV; it wasn't supposed to go out.

At least, I think I'm remembering that correctly.

Because if it was supposed to go out right after it was gotten, well. Eden just lost her right to the title 'Thinker'.
 
SaltyWaffles said:
I'm...pretty damn sure that's not how her power works, or what kind of state she's in psychologically. She suffers serious psychological effects from near-constant power use from a young age, but she absolutely doesn't lack sapience whenever her power is not encountering a blind spot. It's just fundamentally nonsensical. Otherwise she'd act like a small child whenever near a power nullifier (like Mantellum), which she didn't in canon. Otherwise she'd be like a small child whenever dealing with a blind spot (she isn't). Otherwise she'd never be able to do anything with her power, since she couldn't actually decide upon/modify/prioritize/refine her Paths.

Yes, using her power like she does has a major psychological toll on her, but that's because she constantly uses it, which she does because she's trying to do the impossible, with everything at stake. It's not because her power itself is overriding her sapience. She is fully aware of the steps in her Paths and actively decides when to change/modify her Paths, stop following one (or all) of them entirely, and what she's doing in real-time while following a Path. Her interludes makes this explicit.

Also, Entities do design their powers for the good of their users to an extent. Scion's interlude makes this explicit. Powers are designed in such a way as to not be detrimental to the experimentation of said powers--so a power that drives its user insane (to the point of not getting as much useful data) is undesirable to them unless that is exactly the point of that power. Similarly, powers are designed with limits (like the Manton Effect) to prevent them from damaging the experiment (like making a power so lethal that the user can just kill tons of people with ease, and no useful data is gotten, or a power that harms its user and gets him killed prematurely). Lastly, shards are (by their very nature) designed to be directed by the will of their users, not the other way around. After all, gleaning data from how the hosts utilize their powers is the entire point of handing out powers in the first place, and it is also how the Entities use their shards themselves (as in, how they use the ones they never intend to give out). While the Entities do program in some limitations and general protocol, they don't like the shards exercising much control over their hosts unless that is the specific purpose of a specific shard.
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First, she never got close enough to Mantellum to be precog-blocked. She specifically avoided that scenario. We never see what happens to her when she gets precog-blocked in canon because she actively avoids those scenarios.

Here, her power had her going up against something she could not see. Normally this would be like her walking into Mantellum's influence willingly, but of course she had an additional precog helping here.

I completely agree with your criticisms based upon her canon attitudes, except for the fact that I think it's total nonsense that someone who is mostly human could coexist with an omniscient, more or less omnipotent Seer in the same brain. Humans don't work that way. We don't deal with massive amounts of information all at once well.

There's a hypothesis (borne out by testimony) that some of the problems for those on the autism spectrum (especially those with very serious cases) are caused by the brain processing sensory data incorrectly. Instead of throwing out the irrelevant stuff, it...doesn't. Many of their behaviors are attempts to reduce sensory overload. Contessa experiences sensory overload constantly, and if she were a human trying to deal with that, she would break immediately. So, in order to maintain the Path that she asked for, all the way at the beginning, her power makes sure she isn't broken by effectively removing some of her humanity.
 
frommerman said:
I completely agree with your criticisms based upon her canon attitudes, except for the fact that I think it's total nonsense that someone who is mostly human could coexist with an omniscient, more or less omnipotent Seer in the same brain. Humans don't work that way. We don't deal with massive amounts of information all at once well.

There's a hypothesis (borne out by testimony) that some of the problems for those on the autism spectrum (especially those with very serious cases) are caused by the brain processing sensory data incorrectly. Instead of throwing out the irrelevant stuff, it...doesn't. Many of their behaviors are attempts to reduce sensory overload. Contessa experiences sensory overload constantly, and if she were a human trying to deal with that, she would break immediately. So, in order to maintain the Path that she asked for, all the way at the beginning, her power makes sure she isn't broken by effectively removing some of her humanity.
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By that definition, Taylor, Dinah, Lisa, and more would be just as brain-dead as you argue Contessa should be. Taylor has infinite multitasking. She maintains her sapience, intelligence, emotions, and individuality despite simultaneously being aware of and controlling every aspect of millions of insects and herself. Lisa's power is a super inference/intuition engine coupled with super-perception/observation, and yet she directs her power even when it's going at full-speed.

Panacea has a perfect, real-time awareness of and control over anything biological that she touches. Which includes billions, if not trillions of individual cells, all at once. Down to a genetic level. And yet, she controls her power, not the other way around.

The shards with Thinker aspects basically provide "off-site" processing for their hosts, essentially expanding what their brains are capable of. They are designed to do so in a way that doesn't infringe upon the host's individuality, intelligence, emotions, or will, because doing otherwise would invalidate the whole experiment to begin with.
 
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frommerman said:
First, she never got close enough to Mantellum to be precog-blocked. She specifically avoided that scenario. We never see what happens to her when she gets precog-blocked in canon because she actively avoids those scenarios.

Here, her power had her going up against something she could not see. Normally this would be like her walking into Mantellum's influence willingly, but of course she had an additional precog helping here.

I completely agree with your criticisms based upon her canon attitudes, except for the fact that I think it's total nonsense that someone who is mostly human could coexist with an omniscient, more or less omnipotent Seer in the same brain. Humans don't work that way. We don't deal with massive amounts of information all at once well.

There's a hypothesis (borne out by testimony) that some of the problems for those on the autism spectrum (especially those with very serious cases) are caused by the brain processing sensory data incorrectly. Instead of throwing out the irrelevant stuff, it...doesn't. Many of their behaviors are attempts to reduce sensory overload. Contessa experiences sensory overload constantly, and if she were a human trying to deal with that, she would break immediately. So, in order to maintain the Path that she asked for, all the way at the beginning, her power makes sure she isn't broken by effectively removing some of her humanity.
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The one problem I have with this interpretation is that I don't think she is experiencing sensory overload, though. I mean, powers like Taylor's and Lisa's don't give this same sensory overload, despite being similar in terms of what they're meant to do, at least in part - process vast amounts of information. Lisa's headaches only occur because it's a limiter placed there by the Entities, and Taylor doesn't *get* headaches, once she gets over the initial headache of whatever she's attempting to teach her power to do (cope with and block out the influx of information, at first, but eventually she learns to see and hear through bugs and it stops being an issue). And headaches are far, far better than what happens to Contessa in this fic.

My interpretation of the PtV is that Contessa asks for a path, PtV crunches all the numbers and then Masters her body through the steps required for that path - the only loss of "sapience" is from the fact she's not really making any actual decisions these days, given how long she's been working with the Path guiding her, rather than the Path taking over her brain.

Edit: Bollocks, I've been Imped!
 
SaltyWaffles said:
By that definition, Taylor, Dinah, Lisa, and more would be just as brain-dead as you argue Contessa should be. Taylor has infinite multitasking.
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You did read to the end of Worm were Tayor is very close to being utterly brain dead right? like Frommerman may have slightly exaggerated it but he is correct in whats happens to her she may be able to choose weather or not to follow the paths, but if she essentially chooses not to, well her end goal is to prevent the death of Humanity across multiple realities, she has most likely rarely not been on a path as such her development is very stunted.
adc said:
The one problem I have with this interpretation is that I don't think she is experiencing sensory overload, though. I mean, powers like Taylor's and Lisa's don't give this same sensory overload
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Its a high possibility that Taylor at first did have sensory overload when she first triggered and then immediately had a second trigger to let her handle all the data her first power gives her.
Lisa has had sensory overload in canon via overusing her power.
 
SaltyWaffles said:
By that definition, Taylor, Dinah, Lisa, and more would be just as brain-dead as you argue Contessa should be. Taylor has infinite multitasking. She maintains her sapience, intelligence, emotions, and individuality despite simultaneously being aware of and controlling every aspect of millions of insects and herself. Lisa's power is a super inference/intuition engine coupled with super-perception/observation, and yet she directs her power even when it's going at full-speed.

Panacea has a perfect, real-time awareness of and control over anything biological that she touches. Which includes billions, if not trillions of individual cells, all at once. Down to a genetic level. And yet, she controls her power, not the other way around.

The shards with Thinker aspects basically provide "off-site" processing for their hosts, essentially expanding what their brains are capable of. They are designed to do so in a way that doesn't infringe upon the host's individuality, intelligence, emotions, or will, because doing otherwise would invalidate the whole experiment to begin with.
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Imp'd, but...

Taylor is a second trigger. Her first power is likely the reason she went to the psych hospital for a week after the locker, as she was completely incapable of processing anything happening and totally lost it.

Lisa, according to canon, can only use her power for ten minutes a day at the beginning without getting crippling migraines. Sounds like overload to me.

Panacea has boatloads of issues, not the least social isolation from being really, really averse to touching anyone because she gets a full rundown on their entire biological system every single time she does. She gets to not use her power constantly, of course, but she is so completely terrified of her power that she never really uses it for much at all.

Yeah, Thinker powers come with pretty terrifying side effects, pretty much universally. They're either mostly useless (I think that sounds purple), or they're massively damaging to your basic humanity.

I've amped up that effect for this fic. I won't deny that. But the basics were already there.
 
SpeckofStardust said:
You did read to the end of Worm were Tayor is very close to being utterly brain dead right? like Frommerman may have slightly exaggerated it but he is correct in whats happens to her she may be able to choose weather or not to follow the paths, but if she essentially chooses not to, well her end goal is to prevent the death of Humanity across multiple realities, she has most likely rarely not been on a path as such her development is very stunted.
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This was as a result of improperly removing the limiters of her power, if I recall correctly, not because she was processing too much information. Contessa's shard wasn't jailbroken the same way.

SpeckofStardust said:
Its a high possibility that Taylor at first did have sensory overload when she first triggered and then immediately had a second trigger to let her handle all the data her first power gives her.
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Very true, but that's a result of having a shitton of information shoved into your brain and not having the ability to process it. Once she's has the ability to process it, she stops having problems. Contessa isn't having the information shoved into her brain like Taylor was, she's just being Mastered through a list of steps that achieves her goal.

SpeckofStardust said:
Lisa has had sensory overload in canon via overusing her power.
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Lisa had Thinker headaches from overusing her power, which was a result of the limiters put in place by the Entities, was it not? As she got into more and more conflict (becoming more in tune with her Shard?), as well as became better at using her power, her headaches slowly got better. Contessa had no limiter in place - the only limit that was imposed was a restriction on her power from working against other Entities.
 
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frommerman said:
So. The Path to Victory is another example of a power which should not be able to leave a human sane. Entities have no reason to design their powers for the good of their users, and Path to Victory specifically wasn't designed at all. Contessa gets almost the full force of the shard, with only the last-second limitations slapped on by Eden just before she died.

So yeah. I'm interpreting her power to completely interrupt sapience while it is active because there's no way something that is appreciably human should be able to do the things Contessa can do. Incidentally, this is why she's trying her best to never, ever be seen by Sanity's real eyes. Sanity would see Total Psychological Overlay, Sapience Suppression and decide to nope that misery right where it stood. No, not even an exacerbated by powers because there's nothing to exacerbate. Contessa, while using her power, is effectively a p-zombie.
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Well.

There's a new nightmare to add to the list.

So, thanks for that I guess.
 
adc said:
This was as a result of improperly removing the limiters of her power, if I recall correctly, not because she was processing too much information. Contessa's shard wasn't jailbroken the same way.



Very true, but that's a result of having a shitton of information shoved into your brain and not having the ability to process it. Once she's has the ability to process it, she stops having problems. Contessa isn't having the information shoved into her brain like Taylor was, she's just being Mastered through a list of steps that achieves her goal.



Lisa had Thinker headaches from overusing her power, which was a result of the limiters put in place by the Entities, was it not? As she got into more and more conflict (becoming more in tune with her Shard?), as well as became better at using her power, her headaches slowly got better. Contessa had no limiter in place - the only limit that was imposed was a restriction on her power from working against other Entities.
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Right, and I'm basically saying that, since one of her first goals was to kill the Entities, She's been Mastered for most of her life. Being Mastered is not famous for being good for developmental health. See Regent.
 
frommerman said:
Right, and I'm basically saying that, since one of her first goals was to kill the Entities, She's been Mastered for most of her life. Being Mastered is not famous for being good for developmental health. See Regent.
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Oh sure, I can totally see her being developmentally stunted and horribly screwed up from all the terrible things she does on a daily basis, but not to the point where she can't think while using her power. She still has her sapience, she's just totally fucked up.
 
adc said:
Lisa had Thinker headaches from overusing her power, which was a result of the limiters put in place by the Entities, was it not?
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It can be argued either way.
adc said:
As she got into more and more conflict (becoming more in tune with her Shard?)
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Or she got more used to handling large amount of information.
adc said:
Contessa had no limiter in place - the only limit that was imposed was a restriction on her power from working against other Entities.
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adc said:
improperly removing the limiters of her power
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Or you know a lack of limits cause a lot of problems for humans using the powers, also the path to victory does not pore in information to the same amount as the others we have mention, after its just a list of steps it does not tell you how these steps lead to the goal just that these steps will lead to your goal.
 
frommerman said:
Lisa, according to canon, can only use her power for ten minutes a day at the beginning without getting crippling migraines. Sounds like overload to me.
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Nope. Entity limiters take many forms- pain is a natural error message system humans have anyways, why not use it for telling the human 'Alright, you're done now."? As for increases in how long it can be used, I'm pretty sure that the Agents are allowed to loosen the Limiters as their hosts use their powers to cause more conflict- and Lisa's so good at that that many people who know (of) her hate her!

Panacea has boatloads of issues, not the least social isolation from being really, really averse to touching anyone because she gets a full rundown on their entire biological system every single time she does. She gets to not use her power constantly, of course, but she is so completely terrified of her power that she never really uses it for much at all.
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To be fair, a very, very noteworthy amount of the problems that 'limit' her power are thanks to the combination of a shitty adoptive "mother", a not-really-there adoptive "father" and her adoptive sister's "LOVE ME!!!" aura. Her power may not have helped, but it was likely, at best, a minor factor.

Also, you don't get social isolation from being averse to touching people, no matter how much of a good reason you may have for it.

Also also, sane people with full biokinesis in Worm should be wary of their power, and how people will react if they realize what it is. They were willing to birdcage Canary because she accidentally mastered someone and she looked slightly like the Ziz. A striker version of Nilbog's power, that can easily be used to enhance in a manner that has end results similar to Bonesaw's saner days? If the PRT learns about that, they're KO-ing you with a tinker bullshit stun thingy, donning hazmat suits and birdcaging you the instant you use it for anything other than healing.
 
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