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[LP CYOA] Epic

Kayerts

Arcane
Joined
Jan 28, 2011
Messages
883
It has the Vajra pieces that were last seen on Marduk. And Ean was ruling, tortured, asleep and mind-melded with Sekhenun all that time, so he's accounted for. Any other God-Emperors we might be familiar with?

Well:

That is a result of him… it… playing the role of an Emperor. In its mind, whether from a remnant of its host’s thoughts or an idea it obtained from somewhere, it has created for itself the impression that an Emperor is one that conquers and rules, a larger-than-life figurehead that takes many concubines and protects his people, serving as an exemplar for them to follow.

Maybe Marduk fondly remembers that dick who showed up for three minutes and shanked him with a lightning bolt, right when he was about to achieve ultimate power? If you look WAY back in the thread, he's been pretending to be Ean ever since he arose in Babylon; maybe he's up to his old tricks.
 

Baltika9

Arcane
Joined
Jun 27, 2012
Messages
9,611
Kayerts, you're telling me that all this time, Marduk was Ean's #1 fanboi?
Going with Kayerts' plan, especially because I want to see this
But the real reason for the Imperials' integration is because they got hooked on Earthling pop Culture thanks to Qin Kawano's songs.

Now they remember love.

....

Hm, yeah. That sounds perfect.

I'll take that explanation for a successful Kayerts B2 with no time limit. :thumbsup:
The most hardcore and manly military in the universe practicing drills and fitness to J-Pop. Also, Adrahasis finally finding his true love in Rei.

Let's wrap this up I can go play a Guan-Dao toting Chinese General.
 

Jester

Arbiter
Joined
Mar 24, 2013
Messages
1,493
Will go with B2, Kayerts had similar idea to mine and i like it.

As for why Tactican would ally with us. Highlighting that Marduk will become powered up avatar of hunger after passing gate, probably making him same as masters are now with addition of being unmatched and insane. Emperor impossible to control, who will do what after finishing Masters? Whats more we have tech with allowed us to fight their emperor after year of research still possible to improve?

Having some advanced masters calculator we probably can make another road there after studying it, after all we got Sek and Senya. (this info could be useful in negotiations probably)
Wonder if they mailed some more to League.

Cant we use our tech to send Empire forces to core systems of League bypassing their defenses or back into Empire space? We could schedule second gate with them to get them back, or contact if needed. Either one would catch League off guard, will it be their command center or assault fleet. We could even try to get they leaders i got impression that League effectiveness would be heavily affected with power vacuum.
 

ScubaV

Prophet
Joined
Feb 20, 2011
Messages
1,022
B2, within the time limit. It's pretty much what I was going to suggest, and I don't think 6 months is too unreasonable. The only sad thing is that we probably won't be able to figure out how to extract Shulgi from the sun in that time. Not only would I love to see Ean from an outsider's perspective, but I'd love to see Ean and Shulgi reunited. Naram making a comeback as the crazy retard would be amusing as well (maybe he got elevated to concept status as well and will possess Naim, wink wink nudge nudge).
 

a cut of domestic sheep prime

Guest
Naram making a comeback as the crazy retard would be amusing as well (maybe he got elevated to concept status as well and will possess Naim, wink wink nudge nudge).
Elevated to the concept of anti-bro/simpleton? Yes, I think Naim would express him quite well... :lol:
 

a cut of domestic sheep prime

Guest
If Dio was a concept, he'd be pride or selfishness, not hunger. I rather think Dio was our Master friend and Marduk's current state is a result of devouring Zeus and then getting stuck in the void for 3000+ years. Could be wrong though... Maybe in his desperation to escape he was able to reach out to some thing else and it took him over. (Sort of like how we have the ability to reach out to some forgotten thing and erase people?)

Concepts. I wonder. Like creation or destruction? Are we a concept ourselves? Hmm.
 

Baltika9

Arcane
Joined
Jun 27, 2012
Messages
9,611
Naw, Dio is pure ambition. He's been selfless a couple of times, and never really greedy. Just an unscrupulous douche.

Say, by what period of chinese history is your next LP inspired by, treave?

What about the dating sim? Is it ancient times, or will we get to chill out with Alhazred maybe? Modern times?
 

Smashing Axe

Arcane
Patron
Joined
Dec 29, 2011
Messages
2,835
Divinity: Original Sin
I regret that we didn't enter the dragon age realm when we had the chance as Ean. It'd have been cool to be the rightful emperor of two worlds.
 

treave

Arcane
Patron
Joined
Jul 6, 2008
Messages
11,370
Codex 2012
The Devourer is its own entity with its own grudge against the Masters, for what that's worth. You'll notice that I didn't refer to the Emperor as Marduk.

As for the next LP, it could either be the age of the gods during the Zhou dynasty, martial arts focused, during the Song, or a hybrid of both in a made up place and time that is similar but not quite China.

As for the other one, a brief prologue in 1015 Kievan Rus, then we go from 1815 to 2015, playing a character from each generation.
 

Kayerts

Arcane
Joined
Jan 28, 2011
Messages
883
A Kievan Rus' LP interests me, even a partial one.

About this thread, current thoughts: "concept" is another word for "idea." My guess is that ideas can be Great or merely Pretty Good. Senya, Rei, and the Emperor are all Pretty Good Ideas: creation, destruction, hunger. They are aspects of existence. Whereas the fatass in the center of universes represents existence itself, and thus is Great. The Pretty Good Ideas are terminals in that they, and their powers, are tied to one specific facet of what the Great Idea perceives. None of the Pretty Good ideas can die because they're tied to their respective concepts, which the Great Idea will continue perceiving, across multiple universes.

We cause ghosts to appear when we "die" because the Observer has to temporarily consider a world without one of its defining concepts (creation, destruction, hunger), and that results in a view sufficiently incongruous that it confuses the Observer. This causes it to stop perceiving some things, and causes the universe's memory leak to grow.
 

treave

Arcane
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Codex 2012
Close, but not quite. Senya and Rei are most assuredly human, and mortal. Creation and destruction are just their ability to add and delete the records, parsed in a way their mortal minds can understand. A 'concept' like the Great Devourer is an aberration. Concepts by themselves are just ideas stored in the record, like laws that govern the thought of sentient beings. This is what it means to be cold, or hot, or hungry. They have no will.

On a tangent, the Great Idea itself is of course the idea of existence. It may appear to have a will, but that is really nothing more than what is required of it to carry out its duties because of its nature as the administrator and repository of fate. It is something of an idiot god; not as much as an Azathoth, but certainly very limited in its thinking. When Senya dies, it cannot register what it perceives as itself to have 'ended', and thus discards possibilities to reshuffle the universe back into a place where Senya exists. Those possibilities are what end up as lost information. The greater the duration, the more information is lost. This is in addition to the information that disappears when things die or are destroyed. It is a very flawed observer.

Going back to the Devourer, rather than being an original concept, it is something that has associated itself so strongly with the idea of hunger in this universe that it appears to embody the concept here. It has become an actual glitch in the 'software' that the Masters use to create and recreate their pet universe... a rather specific glitch. We know that voices are made in batches, they have codes, and some of them can go faulty. It is no coincidence that Ean consuming his voices triggered a nature similar to the Gieloth, who in turn appear to be related to the Devourer after some fashion. Perhaps time is a closed loop. Or perhaps some voices are always faulty. At any rate, as long as this universe exists it cannot be totally destroyed, and it would reemerge when it is remade. It has grown in strength till it exists on the same level as the Masters now, and the only thing keeping them rather blase about the whole affair is that this far it has always been confined to the universe they created.
 

Storyfag

Perfidious Pole
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Joined
Feb 17, 2011
Messages
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Location
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Since you seem to be in a talkative mood, it's time for Storyfag's Silly Questions(tm)(R)(c)

1. What would have happened had Senya decided to rip apart the pocket dimension the Master created to meet with him?
2. Why exactly did the Indus Confederation burn Inane Flowers left and right?
3. What's the deal with the Watchers waaay back in Dio's time. They had a funny smell about them. Were they supernatural in some way?
 

treave

Arcane
Patron
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Messages
11,370
Codex 2012
You let in the white ghosts and they turn him into goo, the Star League already had agents on Earth, and Watchers were just really well-trained humans though some of them were enhanced via the Naram-Master's experiments.
 

Tigranes

Arcane
Joined
Jan 8, 2009
Messages
10,350
It's a pity the Dio arc wasn't longer. :(

I wonder what will happen if B2 Kayerts is accepted by Adrahasis, they all stand guard as we fire the giant black hole at Marduk... and the Dragon survives. :eek: The terms of the agreement don't exclude Adrahasis then capturing us for the Emprah, or standing aside for the ensuing combat round 2.
 

Baltika9

Arcane
Joined
Jun 27, 2012
Messages
9,611
Then we'll just have to kick his ass again. Seriously, all we did as Senya was get into fights against impossible odds and push him past the limits. Even exhausted, we can take him.
Speaking of the Watchers, what happened to those guys? I saw no trace of them in this chapter, which means they've gotten much better, or disbanded.
 

treave

Arcane
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Codex 2012
Well, B2 victory. I'm assuming the six month time limit.

***

The Mission


“So, now that everyone’s here, shall we begin? I’ll be taking the minutes for today.” says Emiri, twirling a pen between her fingers.

Thanks to the stable black hole where Uranus used to be, and some quick negotiations with Adrahasis, the Imperial Crusade into Earth territory was stopped in its tracks. It was definitely the sort of situation that warranted a meeting.

Rei, Emiri, Erec and Erika are present as my subordinates, although Erec would probably rather die than admit it – even if I don’t have an official rank, I’m being regarded as the leader of… well, something. People seem to listen to me nowadays. The newly minted President Iannes is here too, together with the Federation’s latest Chief of Staff, Admiral Harlsen. Besides him are Sekhenun and the Tree-Emperor, which is what I had taken to calling him in my mind after seeing him step out of one that sprouted almost spontaneously inside Sekhenun’s laboratory.

Pity. Having a dragon fight a tree would have been amusing to watch.

On the other side of the long table are Adrahasis and his twin sister, Adrasteia. Apparently they are rare offspring borne from a union between two immortals. Having had the chance to talk to Adrasteia on the way back she was definitely unlike her more thoughtful brother. Adrahasis tells me that she takes after their father. “That reminds me, I probably owe them a nice boat.” I hear the Tree-Emperor muttering to Sekhenun, glancing at the twin immortals.

“I suppose her flaming red hair is rather attractive. I’ll give her that. Now, please do your job.” whispers Kyrie icily in my ear as I feel a clammy hand on my neck. The first thing she’d manage to do upon regaining the ability to manifest again was catching me chatting with Adrasteia and her handmaidens. I didn’t know ghosts could kick so hard. I almost turn my head to speak to her, before catching myself. I’ll have to make it up to her later, in private.

Admiral Harlsen clears his throat, giving me the sort of odd glance you reserve for people who seem like they’re about to talk to empty space. “Can we start now?” he says, scratching his chin while casting a suspicious look over everyone at the table. I suppose we do make for an odd meeting – Iannes and the Admiral aside, no one here looks a day over 25, but the combined ages of some of the people here add up to thousands of years.

“Sorry, Admiral. I’m still a bit tired,” I try to smile. “Very well, let’s begin. I think we should hear from our new friends from the Empire. Lord Adrahasis, Lady Adrasteia, if you would?”

Adrahasis and his sister stand up and give a crisp salute after the Imperial fashion, which Harlsen matches with the Federation style.

“Thank you for having us here,” Adrahasis begins. “I believe everyone here has read the report that I wrote up on the true nature of our Crusade.”

Iannes nods. “You mean to say that these gods that the League believe in are real, and the Empire wants to slay them?”

“That is correct, Mr. President,” says Adrahasis smoothly, his mannerisms incongruent with his child-like appearance. It seems like he has done his homework. “Our Emperor was to have led us there, though it would have been at the cost of many Earthling lives. Sir Hoshikawa provided a rather persuasive counter-argument to our prior strategy, and so here we are.”

“Are the rest of your men alright with this?” asks Ean, the Tree-Emperor.

“I estimate 77% of the ships will follow my lead without question for now. Footage of Sir Hoshikawa’s battle with our Emperor have been spread throughout the fleet. They are rather impressed. As for the remainder, I am sad to say that we have some dissenting opinions who are preparing to return home now that the Emperor is inconvenienced for an indeterminate amount of time. They may be planning to establish fiefdoms of their own in the fragmenting Empire.”

I do the mental calculations in my head. That would work out to roughly a hundred thousand warships, perhaps more. It is a sizeable force, one that I would be loathe to give up for lost.

“Is there any way we can convert them?”

“I don’t see the point,” interjects Adrasteia. “They have rejected cooperation. Let me have a thousand ships and I will smash them before they can run.”

“You’re certainly very quick to attack your former comrades.” I say.

Adrasteia gives me a feral grin. “Let’s just say that there are some cowardly bastards there that I’ll enjoy killing.”

“Still, the resources that they hold are considerably valuable,” points out Sekhenun. “We will need every man and ship that we can get.”

Is it worth the risk to confront them, however?

***

A. Attack the uncooperative remnants of the Imperial fleet. Adrasteia and the Dunamis Clan will lead a boarding action to slaughter anyone who does not surrender. We need those ships and those supplies.

B. Allow them to go unharmed. Their return to Imperial space could serve to inconvenience the Star League instead. They will serve as a distraction.

***

“This matter aside, how do you plan on killing these gods you are talking about, if they do exist? How are we even getting there in the first place?” asks the Admiral.

Adrahasis turns his eyes on me. Well, I suppose I did promise. I turn my eyes towards Sekhenun, who lets out a sigh of annoyance.

“I will explain that matter. Now, the gateway to the dimension of these gods… the Masters, if you will, exists in a heavily guarded sector at the center of the galactic core. The Imperial Crusade aimed to turn Earth into an alternative entrance. Now, the Devourer’s method to do so, and the tool he would have used, are lost to us, no thanks to a certain hotshot. We do not have the knowledge nor the capability to turn Earth into another gateway to the Masters’ dimension.”

“A full frontal assault is suicide,” frowns Adrahasis. “There are billions of automated defense units guarding the gateway, each capable of destroying a planet. They will only allow passage for the victors of the game.”

“As I see it, the Masters have already decided that the Star League will win this game of theirs,” says Ean. “In that case, they will certainly do everything that they can to assist the Star League in achieving victory. In order to win the game, the Star League will be required to defeat us, their last standing opponent now that the Empire’s military is practically under our command.”

“The defeat can be diplomatic or military,” says Adrahasis. “If we surrender and bow to them it will also be considered their victory, granting them passage past the maze of defensive systems.”

“How automated are these systems? Can they be manipulated in any way?”

“As far I know, they will not respond to any commands; these at least are designed to be fair,” answers Adrahasis. “They will either shoot upon you, or recognize you as the victor and allow you to pass. Their victory recognition criteria is unchangeable, even for their creators. If not they would have sent these units against the Dragon Emperor long ago. Instead they attempted to defeat us via more manipulative means.”

“Gentlemen, all of this talk of getting to the gate is well and good, but how are we going to destroy these gods once we are there?” asks Iannes.

“Hunting them down one by one would be a hassle. Would our pact be fulfiled if I simply collapsed their entire dimension in on itself?” I turn to Adrahasis again.

He gives me a blank stare. “Yes, it would, but how do you talk about such terrible things so casually?”

“I have a rather different perspective from you, I suspect.” I grin. “So, there’s our method. I am confident that I can create a bomb that can wipe out their reality, beyond their ability to repair it. I would only require the Sun.”

“You’re going to turn the Sun into a bomb?” Multiple variations of this question are shouted towards me all at once.

“We don’t have the time to go out and get another star from under the League's noses.” I shrug. “I could use Jupiter, but it would not be anywhere near as lethal. Of course, that might be sufficient, but if you want to be very sure that they are all destroyed at once…”

***

In the end, we decide to:

A. Use the Sun to create a device powerful enough to collapse the Masters’ entire dimension into a singularity when it is detonated. There is no point half-assing total destruction.

B. Turn Jupiter into a bomb that is powerful enough to destroy a galaxy.

C. Keep our explosives in our pants and do things the hard way – we will sally through the gateway and take on the Masters in direct combat.

D. Try using wormholes to transport men and materials towards the nearest G-type main-sequence star in order to build the bomb there.

***

As for getting there;

A. Surrender. All we need is to get our people and equipment in place. It doesn’t matter whether we’re travelling with the Star League or over the flaming wrecks of their fleet.

B. Take on the Star League, head on. I find it unlikely that the Masters will like us winning, but once we defeat the League their systems will automatically recognize us as the winners of the game, allowing us passage.

C. Distract the League with our fleets while we attempt to infiltrate the gateway with a small, stealthy squad of elite units. This choice precludes the building of any bombs, however, as those devices will end up being too large for any stealth mission to work.
 

treave

Arcane
Patron
Joined
Jul 6, 2008
Messages
11,370
Codex 2012
Don't forget you only have six months. Defeating the League then grabbing a hypergiant might be nice but sadly the pact you made means you don't have enough time to prepare after you defeat them. It'll have to be done in one shot. As for going out and getting another star right now, it is doable with wormholes but the sheer amount of trips required means that certain someones in another dimension might notice and get suspicious. Not recommended.
 

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