Skyscraper Graveyard II: Jealousy and Ambition

[the_druid_droid]

Originally Posted by Anarion

We are not instituting instrumentality, and if I hear so much as the suggestion that we design an EVA, I'm quitting the team.

I'm thinking some of those words must have a legal meaning I'm unfamiliar with. Also, this isn't really anything in Turing's mind, just some random OOC musings as I'm sorting through bits of Mage cosmology in my head.

More seriously, I don't think it's just isolation from others, but from existence. The abyss doesn't care if you work and speak with people, but a meaningful friendship that fills both parties with joy and happiness is probably anathema to the abyss. So is a hated enemy, for that matter because it means you both care enough about each other to be plotting all the time. The abyss wants you to wake up, put on your clothes, go to work, go home, go to sleep, repeat. No thought, no meaning, no progress, no emotion.

Actually, your example is what I was trying to get at. Not someone who's an unfeeling killer, but simply numb.

Originally Posted by Thanqol

I'll level with you. Attempting to understand the Abyss' motivations, or look for consistency within it's actions, is doomed to failure - because the only way to test those hypothesis is to interact with the Abyss.

Point.

[Anarion]

Originally Posted by the_druid_droid

I'm thinking some of those words must have a legal meaning I'm unfamiliar with. Also, this isn't really anything in Turing's mind, just some random OOC musings as I'm sorting through bits of Mage cosmology in my head.

Not legal. Have you watched Neon Genesis Evangelion? It's pretty good if you haven't seen it and that's what I'm talking about. I don't want to spoil it for you though.

[the_druid_droid]

Originally Posted by Anarion

Not legal. Have you watched Neon Genesis Evangelion? It's pretty good if you haven't seen it and that's what I'm talking about. I don't want to spoil it for you though.

Ah, ok. It's actually on my to-watch list, but I've slowed down on that a lot lately. Hopefully one day!

[Tiki Snakes]

Originally Posted by Anarion

Not legal. Have you watched Neon Genesis Evangelion? It's pretty good if you haven't seen it and that's what I'm talking about. I don't want to spoil it for you though.

Alternatively, wait and watch the remake they're currently doing. Though I'd count it as a classic, it's also got a lot of detractors and after about the first half of the show, I am very strongly one of them.

The remake is apparently going quite well, but I can't start watching it till they've finished.

[Anarion]

Originally Posted by Tiki Snakes

Alternatively, wait and watch the remake they're currently doing. Though I'd count it as a classic, it's also got a lot of detractors and after about the first half of the show, I am very strongly one of them.

The remake is apparently going quite well, but I can't start watching it till they've finished.

It's perfectly fine if you just mute it every time Shinji talks.

edit: and don't look at the subtitles.

[Tiki Snakes]

I just think there is something to be said for waiting for them to finish the version where they will not likely run out of budget altogether two thirds of the way in and during which the director will not have a complete mental breakdown.

It's very much an option to consider.

[Thanqol]

Originally Posted by Tiki Snakes

I just think there is something to be said for waiting for them to finish the version where they will not likely run out of budget altogether two thirds of the way in and during which the director will not have a complete mental breakdown.

It's very much an option to consider.

Everyone is orange tang!

[Anarion]

Originally Posted by Thanqol

Everyone is orange tang!

Hey! Hey! We're trying not to spoil it for DD, here!

[Tiki Snakes]

Ugh.

So, figuring out if it's even worth attempting to Evil Eye one of them. It'd be improvised, so we're starting at a dice pool of 3. But it says both resisted and something about removing composure.

So I'm assuming that I'd be taking a dice penalty AND they'd get a roll to negate even if I succeed?

[SiuiS]

Originally Posted by Tiki Snakes

Question; Will I be able to get close enough this turn to have the faintest idea what's going on, or will that take until partway through the next turn? (Scrying, I know, etc etc, but that wouldn't allow me to act this turn either, except to just fire my gun mostly at random, and I could arguably do that better with Spacial Map).

You could use I believe Spaces 2 to bend your vision, do that by looking straight at the target, your vision actually goes up, over an around the anomaly to see top-down. But that doesn't actually solve your problem, so much a remind you spaces lets you look around corners.

Originally Posted by the_druid_droid

Believe it or not, I actually thought something along those lines might be your response. Time then for my second question, which has to do with Abyss as separation/isolation. Clearly, it has some of those overtones, being the thing that metaphysically divides the fallen world from the supernal, but what about on a more individual level?

Obviously, some measure of distance is part of human nature, and some may be owing to perfectly mundane callousness, but is there (or could there be) a level of alienation and isolation from one's environment and fellow humans that as a symptom of Abyssal influence or the consequence of Paradox?

The abyss is either part of or permanently infecting the human soul. That's the problem. Every time something good permanently leaves social consciousness as is considered not objectively good, it's because the abyss has eaten it. The abyss is both a ens and non-ens, a thing and not a thing. So while the abyss is absence, and eats away at circuitry, it is also presence, an rewrites circuitry. The abyss institutionalizes the corrosively mundane.

The abyss is present in the human soul. The abyss is a permanent, possibly I fixable hole. Ergo, there is a permanent, indictable hole in the human soul. Every human soul. All mankind has been ulcerated. Standard human dickery is not necessarily separate from the abyss.

Originally Posted by Anarion

SCP-055 seems relevant. I think you can make conclusions about what the abyss is not, or about things that run counter to the abyss even if you can't assign it any consistently in action or motivation.

Except definition narrows concept, but the abyss is not narrow. The abyss is a thing, a place, a state of mind, a point of view. If I told you heaven was a point of view an not a place, you could grasp it. If I said it was a place and not a point of view, you could grab it. the abyss is both things at ice, even the mutually exclusive parts. Nailing it down doesn't work. Every Mage who thinks they have a handle on the abyss is actually being handled by the abyss. It is, from a meta point of view, the abyss is that thing that cannot be good, cannot even be neutral. They've done a good job of rendering that in character.

[Anarion]

Originally Posted by Tiki Snakes

Ugh.

So, figuring out if it's even worth attempting to Evil Eye one of them. It'd be improvised, so we're starting at a dice pool of 3. But it says both resisted and something about removing composure.

So I'm assuming that I'd be taking a dice penalty AND they'd get a roll to negate even if I succeed?

That's an explanation for how it's resisted. What it means is that you take your full dice pool, subtract the target's composure, and that's your dice pool. As long as you get 1 success on that reduced dice pool, the spell works. It would say "contested" if the other guy got a roll too.

Originally Posted by SiuiS

Except definition narrows concept, but the abyss is not narrow. The abyss is a thing, a place, a state of mind, a point of view. If I told you heaven was a point of view an not a place, you could grasp it. If I said it was a place and not a point of view, you could grab it. the abyss is both things at ice, even the mutually exclusive parts. Nailing it down doesn't work. Every Mage who thinks they have a handle on the abyss is actually being handled by the abyss. It is, from a meta point of view, the abyss is that thing that cannot be good, cannot even be neutral. They've done a good job of rendering that in character.

Worthless. If the abyss is truly undefinable in any sense, then it's not even a thing, why bother using a label? If the name "the abyss" connotes no meaning whatsoever (or at least none comprehensible to people) then it has no relevance.

I'm not saying your wrong, just that if you're 100% right then I don't care what you call it and I don't care to discuss it. I'll busy myself helping people and stopping problems based on whatever definition of "The Good" I've seized on (some variation on the Silver Ladder rhetoric in Tessen's case) and leave you to debate the non-meaning of incomprehensible concepts.

[Tiki Snakes]

I'm not really sure I have any time for the concept of the Abyss as a meta element. Even if it quite clearly is, to some degree, just part of the meta-construct that the writers used to try and keep their potential players from completely going off the rails. (In as much as the covert-vulgar thing and paradox are quite clearly mostly a limiting mechanic with cool fluff).

It's a wibbly wobbly timey whimey ball of nondimensional ickyness that seeps inside the patterns of the fallen world and corrupts them, often in strange and random ways.

Heaven being a point of view is an easy concept, as in a philosophy or way of looking at the world that provides some kind of spiritual contentment or similar. The abyss is not a philosophy, or a mindset. Certain mindsets may make you more vulnerable to it, but that's not the same thing. It's an actual sucking black wound on creation. A thing defined by the gaps left by everything else no-longer fitting together correctly.

But then, I get contrary sometimes and that does affect my view of things. I think things like defining something as inherantly undefinable are a trigger. Of course you can narrow down and define the abyss, get a grip on things it might and might not affect, because there are many things that the abyss isn't and doesn't do.

It reminds me of that one SCP where there is a particularly horrifying containment proceedure, and the closest that the official line gets to defining it is, once or twice in the discussions, the meta-explanation of it being whatever the worst thing that you, the reader, can conceive of. Which, given that the shape left by the actual article is quite obviously, anviliciously obviously deliberate sexual abuse, I just can't help but not be convinced by that line and the concept behind it.
(And to a lesser degree, the rational behind things like 682 being defined by the concept of it being unkillable, or 55 and being unknowable).

Also, I'm not sure I need to see around corners. Spatial Map seems to give me better than that, a total awareness of the postion of everything, regardless of line of sight or even if you still have working eyes. If it comes to a gunfight, it's straight to hard cover and only jack's gun hand ever needs to poke out.

Anarion - That's a little better, then. Hmm.

[SiuiS]

Originally Posted by Anarion

Worthless. If the abyss is truly undefinable in any sense, then it's not even a thing, why bother using a label? If the name "the abyss" connotes no meaning whatsoever (or at least none comprehensible to people) then it has no relevance.

Not philosophically, it's not. Having a label means that every time you discuss that thing, it's the same thing. Having a term for how you don't understand a thing also has value. Ontologically, it is Not. If the two defining characteristics of the abyss are that it's bad, an it's always the same thing (admittedly more a factor of the label than that which is labelled), then callin it "the abyss" means that no matter what form the abyss takes, you hear "the abyss" and you know it's bad, and that it is functionally the same as the last time "the abyss" came up.

If you find that worthless, oh well. It achieves exactly what it's supposed to. Especially given the some five thousand years of recorded awakened history showing that every time some sorcerer decided "maybe the abyss isn't definitively bad" the evidence and horror stry comes back that yes, yes it is bad. Always. Every time.

I'm not saying your wrong, just that if you're 100% right then I don't care what you call it and I don't care to discuss it.

That's what is so terrible about it. It's a lot of things at once, including watered down, baseless new age metaphysical technobabble. It I everything bad in life.



[quoye]I'll busy myself helping people and stopping problems based on whatever definition of "The Good" I've seized on (some variation on the Silver Ladder rhetoric in Tessen's case) and leave you to debate the non-meaning of incomprehensible concepts.[/quote]

Good. Your choices are care about the abyss, become consumed despite some very common sense warnings, or do something productive. I want you to do something productive.

[Tiki Snakes]

Originally Posted by SiuiS

That's what is so terrible about it. It's a lot of things at once, including watered down, baseless new age metaphysical technobabble. It I everything bad in life.

Considering it is definately an existence-threatening uber-bad thing, trying to seep into the world/s and pull them screaming into its own void of non-existence, I'd still like to say that I think at times that you over-sell and over-state the Abyss a little.

I'm pretty sure that baseless new age metaphysical technobabble is a mage plot of some kind, for example.

[SiuiS]

Originally Posted by Tiki Snakes

I'm not really sure I have any time for the concept of the Abyss as a meta element. Even if it quite clearly is, to some degree, just part of the meta-construct that the writers used to try and keep their potential players from completely going off the rails. (In as much as the covert-vulgar thing and paradox are quite clearly mostly a limiting mechanic with cool fluff).

Ah, I don't mean it is strictly a meta concept. That's silly, and the abyss works perfectly fine as an IC function if you discount this. What I mean is that you can rest assured the abyss is bad. In character, you often feel "oh, we'll nothing is completely evil, maybe my ST is just unimaginative?" – it's a common theme of gaming, that such black and white, clear moral divisions must be wrong. Not can, but must.

The abyss however is bad. If your character's reticence on the subject is based on an in-character thing, which is usually the point of that character since there is a literal wealth of in-character information proving it that you as a player don't have... Then go for it. But if your character has reservations about the abyss always being bad period, because you do, you can rest assured the character knows better than the player.

EDIT: that was really more of that self-referential mocking humor. I suspect technobabble is just because jargon grants a sense of legitimacy.

[Anarion]

If you're willing to acknowledge that the abyss is totes for sure "bad" then you've defined it in quite a lot of ways. You can't say it's impossible to define. I get that Thanqol started this by pointing out that getting into details on the nature of the abyss is liable to blow your brain up, but saying the abyss is undefinable is just stupid.

It's NOT a happy friendship. It's NOT a successful career. It's NOT true love. It might attempt to deceive and appear as a warped or twisted forms of these things, but they are good things and the abyss is not.

[Thanqol]

Originally Posted by Tiki Snakes

Ugh.

So, figuring out if it's even worth attempting to Evil Eye one of them. It'd be improvised, so we're starting at a dice pool of 3. But it says both resisted and something about removing composure.

So I'm assuming that I'd be taking a dice penalty AND they'd get a roll to negate even if I succeed?

You simply take a dice penalty. Fortunately their composure is only 1.

Originally Posted by Anarion

If you're willing to acknowledge that the abyss is totes for sure "bad" then you've defined it in quite a lot of ways. You can't say it's impossible to define. I get that Thanqol started this by pointing out that getting into details on the nature of the abyss is liable to blow your brain up, but saying the abyss is undefinable is just stupid.

It's NOT a happy friendship. It's NOT a successful career. It's NOT true love. It might attempt to deceive and appear as a warped or twisted forms of these things, but they are good things and the abyss is not.

Actually...

There's one Manifestation called the Unwelcome Guest. It shows up and basically acts as your awesome best friend for ever. It becomes the totally coolest person in your life until your life revolves around it.

(Side effects may include your life revolving so totally around the Unwelcome Guest that when it suddenly disappears you enter a despair induced suicidal state)

[Tiki Snakes]

Originally Posted by SiuiS

Ah, I don't mean it is strictly a meta concept. That's silly, and the abyss works perfectly fine as an IC function if you discount this. What I mean is that you can rest assured the abyss is bad. In character, you often feel "oh, we'll nothing is completely evil, maybe my ST is just unimaginative?" – it's a common theme of gaming, that such black and white, clear moral divisions must be wrong. Not can, but must.

The abyss however is bad. If your character's reticence on the subject is based on an in-character thing, which is usually the point of that character since there is a literal wealth of in-character information proving it that you as a player don't have... Then go for it. But if your character has reservations about the abyss always being bad period, because you do, you can rest assured the character knows better than the player.

EDIT: that was really more of that self-referential mocking humor. I suspect technobabble is just because jargon grants a sense of legitimacy.

Well, if you want to get into the technobabble philosophy of it, the abyss can't be bad. because it lacks agency. I think that's the word. It has no say in what it does, because it doesn't really do anything. It simply is*. It's no more Bad than a typhoon, or the Ebola virus.

It's exactly like those things in a sense, only on a significantly greater scale. What it certainly is, is dangerous, harmful, unnatural in the grandest sense of the word and potentially something resembling actively hostile to all creation.

I'm genuinely not sure there is any such thing as Evil, not really. How sure I am varies admittedly, but I'm certainly not just winding Aotrs up when I comment on the weirdness of his repeated claims of Evilness. I'm not sure it's even that useful a concept beyond being a handy shorthand.

*Unless it isn't and actually does have a sentient or pseudo sentient core, of course. I for one don't want to go in and find out.

[Anarion]

Originally Posted by Thanqol

Actually...

There's one Manifestation called the Unwelcome Guest. It shows up and basically acts as your awesome best friend for ever. It becomes the totally coolest person in your life until your life revolves around it.

(Side effects may include your life revolving so totally around the Unwelcome Guest that when it suddenly disappears you enter a despair induced suicidal state)

That would fit my category of things that deceive you as a warped version of the real thing. Cutting you off from all other connections and making you mentally dependent is bad and a real friend wouldn't do that.

Edit:

Originally Posted by Tiki Snakes

Well, if you want to get into the technobabble philosophy of it, the abyss can't be bad. because it lacks agency. I think that's the word. It has no say in what it does, because it doesn't really do anything. It simply is*. It's no more Bad than a typhoon, or the Ebola virus.

Yes, that's the word you're looking for. That argument, however, is BS. The abyss is a thing that responds in a direct and generally ironic way to Mages screwing up reality. Advanced abyssal things are even sentient. This isn't a tropical storm or an earthquake, though it can take those forms. It's a fitting punishment for Hubris.

Also, things can be bad without being evil. Bad is an objective* measurement of how something affects people. Evil is a subjective measurement of the intent of the thing, which can't exist if the thing can't have intent.

*By objective I don't actually mean objective, I just mean subjective stuff we all agree on like how it's bad to be sick, to be in pain, or to murder someone.

[Thanqol]

Originally Posted by Tiki Snakes

Well, if you want to get into the technobabble philosophy of it, the abyss can't be bad. because it lacks agency. I think that's the word. It has no say in what it does, because it doesn't really do anything. It simply is*. It's no more Bad than a typhoon, or the Ebola virus.

I believe this is a mistake. The Abyss isn't even what it is. And it's ruled(?) by the Gate(??) who most certainly(?) has agency(???).

If nothing else, it's maintained by the Exarchs, who also certainly(?) have agency.

Ultimately, like Mask, making any generalisation about the Abyss is probably a poor idea.

That would fit my category of things that deceive you as a warped version of the real thing. Cutting you off from all other connections and making you mentally dependent is bad and a real friend wouldn't do that.

The entity may not be consciously attempting to do that.

[Tiki Snakes]

I know even less about the Gate than I do about anything else.
Except that we don't talk about the Gate apparently, but that might only be when "We" are Seers?

Edit - Generalisations about mask are easy. Watch;

Mask is Adorable.

[Thanqol]

Originally Posted by Tiki Snakes

I know even less about the Gate than I do about anything else.
Except that we don't talk about the Gate apparently, but that might only be when "We" are Seers?

We don't talk about the Gate

Oh, Druid, remember to check the autofire rules. May be relevant to your interests.

Originally Posted by Tiki Snakes

Edit - Generalisations about mask are easy. Watch;

Mask is Adorable.

Spoiler

[Tiki Snakes]

Originally Posted by Thanqol

Spoiler

Spoiler

[Thanqol]

Originally Posted by Tiki Snakes

Spoiler

Spoiler

[Lix Lorn]

Originally Posted by Thanqol

Spoiler

That one's still pretty cute.

[Thanqol]

Originally Posted by Lix Lorn

That one's still pretty cute.

I give up; they all get successively cuter from there.

[Anarion]

Originally Posted by Thanqol

Oh, Druid, remember to check the autofire rules. May be relevant to your interests.

You seem especially concerned that we know all the rules to use the insanity doom gun to best effect.

[Thanqol]

Originally Posted by Anarion

You seem especially concerned that we know all the rules to use the insanity doom gun to best effect.

I wouldn't want you to feel like you didn't get your money's worth out of it before you all go insane and die.

[Thanqol]

Take me down to the Paradox city,
Where the sky's on fire and the souls are empty...


If you've ever wondered why Mage Duels are a thing, now you know.

Oh, by the way, on the whole Abyss is a force of nature vs Abyss as hostile dimension thing... have a look at Mage p273.

[SiuiS]

Originally Posted by Anarion

If you're willing to acknowledge that the abyss is totes for sure "bad" then you've defined it in quite a lot of ways. You can't say it's impossible to define. I get that Thanqol started this by pointing out that getting into details on the nature of the abyss is liable to blow your brain up, but saying the abyss is undefinable is just stupid.

The point of a definition is to be exhaustive. A definition of what the abyss is or isn't cannot be exhaustive. I never said it was impossible to define. I said a definition would not be sufficient. You can define the abyss. You can trust in that definition and then it will screw you. That has always been my point.

[quoye]It's NOT a happy friendship. It's NOT a successful career. It's NOT true love. It might attempt to deceive and appear as a warped or twisted forms of these things, but they are good things and the abyss is not.[/quote]

Relying on that understanding could be bad.

Originally Posted by Tiki Snakes

Well, if you want to get into the technobabble philosophy of it, the abyss can't be bad. because it lacks agency. I think that's the word. It has no say in what it does, because it doesn't really do anything. It simply is*. It's no more Bad than a typhoon, or the Ebola virus.

No, I'm pretty sure the abyss does have some measure of agency.

It's exactly like those things in a sense, only on a significantly greater scale. What it certainly is, is dangerous, harmful, unnatural in the grandest sense of the word and potentially something resembling actively hostile to all creation.

I'm genuinely not sure there is any such thing as Evil, not really. How sure I am varies admittedly, but I'm certainly not just winding Aotrs up when I comment on the weirdness of his repeated claims of Evilness. I'm not sure it's even that useful a concept beyond being a handy shorthand.

*Unless it isn't and actually does have a sentient or pseudo sentient core, of course. I for one don't want to go in and find out.

I actually had similar thoughts earlier, so it's funny you use that language. I think the intent behind the abyss within design parameters was to be objectively evil, or as close as possible. Within the game, the abyss is a thing that not only wasn't opposed to exist, but shouldn't exist and cannot exist. It's existence causes harm to all other things. It's sort of a malaise which shoul be fixed, instead of a thing in its own right.

Originally Posted by Tiki Snakes

I know even less about the Gate than I do about anything else.
Except that we don't talk about the Gate apparently, but that might only be when "We" are Seers?

Edit - Generalisations about mask are easy. Watch;

Mask is Adorable.

There's a legacy from worshipping the gate I think. I'm not entirely sure it's something you choose so much as what happens when you talk about the gate.

Originally Posted by Thanqol

Oh, by the way, on the whole Abyss is a force of nature vs Abyss as hostile dimension thing... have a look at Mage p273.

heart of secrets?

Also, I'm not sure about the Gate controlling the abyss quite so much. Where is that from? I mean, it's possible but conceptually doesn't sit well with me so I'd like to look into it.