Ravenswing

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Says the backround to CoH. look it up if you want..

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Give me a clue, US site, UK site, in game?

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I never said that is was human made spell or that there isn't a need to call apon the favor of some godlike being to do so. Dr Strange calls apon many godlike dimesional beings to stop demons coming to our world, in which later he will have to pay some debt. Therefore its not a weak human enchantment its usually some goldlike uber enchantment

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Ah, change the goal posts already. Look, if you want to define all demons as being more powerful than all humans, then yes, you are, of course, right, but that's not true in fiction or in game. Humans beat, or entrap, demons all the time, with or without the aid of uber-gods from beyond Eastenders. Quite often trickery will be involved, but it could be down to simply getting a few friends together and performing the right ritual.

You are simply stating it as fact that innate magical creatures are more powerful than humans. Both Gid and I have given examples where this is not the case.

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What I was trying to get at also was in comics, you have to ask for those powers from a god, as it is beyond the power of a human to do such things.

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Let's think about that for a second... well, maybe in some comics that's true, but I don't really think it's the case for all that many.

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And that in my mind is the true definiton of god modding.

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No, mate, that's got nothing to do with it. I've roleplayed several gods at various times, but I was never god modding at the time. You don't even need an uber character to god mod, you can do it with a normal person.

And that's totally off-topic. Start a new thread if you want to discuss god modding (again).

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Under your logic of magic, anyone human has the potential to become a godlike mage correct? He simply needs, time, training, and practise.

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Only theoretically. Most people will never have the time. One of my characters, Jason Caine, is 8000 years old and is little more than a common necromancer. You need the will to do it, and you need some luck and inspiration. Essentially, you're looking for 'enlightenment', and you can't simply train to become enlightened.

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I think your version of magic works more on the idea of "mind over matter", while mine works kinda on the idea that you bend the laws of physic by calling on mystical energies, and maniplulation of the "life" energies of the universe.

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Yes, but what you haven't yet understood is that mine is a superset of yours.

If you get a chance, find a copy of White Wolf's Mage game. There are a couple of versions, but it doesn't matter if you get the old one (Mage: The Ascension) or the new one (Mage: the Awakening). The new one is a bit more internally consistent, but the older one kind of puts over the "overriding theory of magic" concept a bit better.

Basically, all magic stems from the same source, which is basically "mind over matter" magic. However, everyone has their own Paradigm, or way of viewing it. So a wiccan might communicate with nature, while a magician might inscribe pentagrams and summon a demon, and someone else might write a complex computer program on their custom laptop. The results are the same, but the paradigm isn't.

And in my viewpoint, another paradigm might be that "I was born able to do this trick where I shoot lightning bolts from my hands."

It's just a smart way of covering everything in one theory, but it usually goes down badly if you have a religious view of what 'magic' is.

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Hawking Radiation

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I do know how Hawking Radiation works, and I say again, no energy or matter can pass over the event horizon.

Hawking Radiation is the result of a rather neat quantum trick that happens very close to the event horizon.

Every so often in open space, two particles, one matter, one anti-matter, come into existance for no reason other than random chance (and the existance of zero-point energy). Normally, it doesn't matter, because they immediately collide and cease to exist.

However, if this happens right beside the event horizon of a black hole, what happens is that one particle flies off into space, and the other falls into the hole. If it's the anti-particle that falls in, the hole's total mass gets smaller.

Apparently, being close to an event horizon tends to promote this happening, maybe because the overall energy level of that bit of space is higher.

In practice, however, the energy comes from a particle which came into existance on our side of the event horizon, and the mass loss is caused by a particle of anti-matter falling in. Like I said, read the wiki article that you're quoting at me.

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Actually, I think you'll find that this is just the Hawking Radiation emission accelerating the smaller the hole gets

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Yes, it is. It's been calculated that when the hole gets down to about two Earth masses, the remaining matter is converted into energy at a very extreme rate. Can you imagine the effect of two Earth masses of matter being converted into energy within a short space of time right in the middle of Paragon City? (Because I'd really rather not try.)

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Further to earlier notes: If the surface of an object (which the event horizon qualifies as) releases radiation, it is reasonable to short-cut the language and state that the object itself gives off radiation.

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Yeah, I could tell you about the 'proof' that a 'hole' in an electron configuration is the equivalent of an electron mass positive particle. Same sort of 'approximation'.

However, Hawking went to a load of trouble to explain why you didn't need to have anything crossing the event horizon in order to make this 'shrinking black hole' thing work.

Edit: Almost all of the 'radiation' given off by a black hole is actually the result of matter being pulled apart as it crosses the event horizon. Except in the case of Shadowe, the Hawking Radiation should be very small compared to the energy from the Earth being sucked into him.

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I do however take some exception that you think I don't know what I'm talking about, given years of study for my degree in ASTROPHYSICS. Guess what I spent a lot of time studying?

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I was actually mostly complaining about FFM there, but you were actually arguing it with him and it can't really be argued over. There's no point, IMHO, in trying to justify a character like that in terms of science, any more than I would try to justify the existance of any of my weirder characters.

Next time FFM asks for an explanation, tell him it's magic.

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1. A black hole of that size is not radiocative, FFM. A black hole, of itself, cannot be radioactive since it can't give out any radiation. It's a black hole.


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Actually, black holes DO emit radiation. Hawking Radiation in fact... So ner!

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See point 3, then learn how it actually works by reading the article about it. No radiation can travel across the event horizon.

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this world what i purpose is possible when you look at synaspse

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Synapse does not claim to have gained his powers through genetic engineering. He was zapped and all sorts by Crey Corp. Speed isn't his only ability.

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humans are very badly designed for high-speed running.

[/ QUOTE ] Humans are he is not

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I was talking about the physical construction of humans. Unless he is no longer humanoid and runs on all fours (with altered arm lengths) then he isn't going to be able to run at anything like supersonic speeds.

Yes, in a comic book setting it doesn't matter, but you complain that a power is unrealistic without invulnerability, when that power is, itself, totally unrealistic. That's just putting limitations on things for the sake of doing it. You want to do that, fine, but don't argue it as if you are being 'more reasonable' than anyone else.

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genetic engineering isn't that advance in this world, but in a comic world it is.

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Genetic engineering cannot change fundamental laws of mechanics. No matter how you re-engineer a human, you'll never allow them to run at supersonic speed.

As I said, I don't care, it's a comic book, but you're putting forward the idea that your character is 'realistic' when he isn't even vaguely close to being realistic.

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Winged humans can't exist here. But they can in CoX

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And? We don't have an example here of a winged human being given a 'rational' explanation.

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He has enhanced strenght. why ? Not because I want him to so much as it rationizes how a human would be able to flap wings hard enough to fly when we don't possess the muscle strength to do so.

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Actually, you're wrong this time. You don't need enhanced strength you need a totally different physical structure. The primary motive muscles on a bird anchor to the the big, pointy ridge in the centre of the chest. A human rib-cage is totally different from a birds and doesn't have the required muscle and bone systems to power wings.

If you wanted to build a 'bird man' for real, he would need to have a chest that stuck out several feet in front of him, and he'd need almost hollow bones. I believe that, under Earth gravity, it would actually be impossible to build a creature the size of a human which could flap the (enormous) wings enough to lift it.

Gliding might work, but only with very big wings.

That's what I'm saying about your runner. He cannot be remotely 'realistic', because his physical structure is wrong for a creature that can run at over 600mph.

FFM, Shadowe, please stop that. There are several basic mistakes both of you are making here.

1. A black hole of that size is not radiocative, FFM. A black hole, of itself, cannot be radioactive since it can't give out any radiation. It's a black hole.

2. A black hole in any region of matter will, indeed, give off radiation in the form of intense x-rays, but that's due to all the local matter being ripped apart as it passes over the event horizon.

3. Due to a neat little quibble of quantum physics, black holes about that size can, at any instant, spontaneously release all their matter in an explosion which... well, let's just say you don't want to be there when it goes off.

All in all, I think we can safely say that that character needs to be left alone with the "it's magic" explanation.

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However Lord recluse is the world's greatest human mind.

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Really? Says who? Recluse? I think, given his resources, if Recluse was really the greatest human mind (and he isn't human, btw, he's an Incarnate) he would have taken over completely by now.

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Ok then what about Dr. Strange? The original agruement was that creation is different from manifestion, and that the first makes you god.

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You lost me a bit here. I don't understand what you're talking about.

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Elven magic is often the most powerful and only the most powerful elves can muster it.

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Not really. It happens in some books, not in all. It isn't even true in Tolkien.

In the Forgotten Realms setting, which Gideon is quoting, elves have the most powerful magic now, but Elminster can do anything an elf can do, and past human mages have surpassed the power of elves.

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And with comics, Innate magical beings are almost always stronger than humans, we usually have some kinda of anicent spell or ritual that simply keeps them at bay

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Um... so actually us humans are more powerful than this uber-demon. He can't break our weak, human enchantments...

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An interesting, character judgement of me there raven

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I'm psychoanalysing, it's a bad habit.

However, you have set these limits on your own use of the game. You say that it limits your creativity. As far as I can see, your rules aren't very limiting at all, it's your interpretation of those rules which may limt you.

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TRACOR-005 was an example of a idea i had for a doomsday type character.

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Doomsday characters should be banned. Doomsday scenarios do not work in any way in games like this. What happens if you fail to abort the Apocalypse exactly?

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but for Hyper I wanted an Organic Speedster, because of his plot. Which involves genetic engineering

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Okay, so first off you've genetically engineered a speedster character... well, that's unrealistic.

Superspeed tops out at about 95 miles per hour anyway, so unless you're going to exceed the game-imposed limitations, you don't need any clever way of stopping him 'burning up' or whatever.

And if he can exceed 95 miles per hour, then I think you can safely assume that realism has absolutely nothing to do with this character. No land creature on earth can even go that fast (unless it happens to have been recently hit by a sports car) and humans are very badly designed for high-speed running.


I have a toon with the Natural Origin. She's a kat/SR Scrapper. Dodging bullets isn't realistic for a normal human in the real world, but it is for a highly trained human in a comic. Her travel power is Superjump, because I can rationalise it as a swingline system. I could have picked Superspeed, but only OC. She has this huge Harley she drives around on and I could rationalise long distance travel as riding the Harley.

I understand your general idea of providing a rational for your powers, but you're ignoring a load of stuff so that one concept fits while justifying another part of the design by saying it's realistic. There are more or less no realistic characters in this game.

Edit: Okay, so Hoppy did it faster and with less verbiage.

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Oh and raven I don't want you to think thisis battle of the theories. I was just defending what you said about my theories on magic :P

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UN, this is called a 'debate'. We discuss each other's comments and either come to some joint conclusion, or agree to disagree. I believe it's been around since Athens was a city state, though obviously they had to actually talk to each other.

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If this is hard to understand then let me put it this way.

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It wasn't hard to understand, I simply don't subscribe to that magical paradigm. In my view, all sentient creatures have the same fundamental capacity to alter reality. A demon may be more powerful than a human, but that doesn't mean the human cannot surpass the demon.

If you like, think of it this way: two children are born with essentially the same mental capabilities. One is subjected to sleep education and becomes a Doctor of Physics by the age of three. However, he's lazy and doesn't do much with it. His sister learns the hard way and eventually surpasses him because he's not putting in any work.

Even if they both put in the same amount of hard work, they would probably both end up knowing the same, despite the boy's head start, because there is a finite amount of stuff they can learn and they both have the same basic intelligence.

In fact, in many fantasy settings, creatures with innate magical abilities are usually fundamentally weaker than, say, a human. They start with an advantage, but they can't learn the way humans can and so the humans will eventually defeat them. It's a staple of fantasy fiction.

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The definition I didn't like that you gave is that all meta human abilites are the result of latent magical channeling written into the genetic code.

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I didn't say that, I said it was a function of sentient life. Sentience does not rely on genetics, especially in fantasy and sci-fi, and most especially in comic books.

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What about physical Mutantions that occur through science such as regenative abilities? Starfish and regen as can many reptiles and other forms of life? Are they channeling your magical probablity powers?

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Err, no. Now you find me a starfish which can regenerate a limb in a matter of seconds. Show me a reptile who drops his tail, waits a minute, and it's grown back. Do you have any idea of the amount of energy required to regenerate tissue at that speed?

Very little that a comic-book mutant can do has any explanation in real science. Please don't try to tell me it has. If you are irradiated by huge amounts of gamma rays, you do not develop a hulking green alter-ego with the brain of a pea, you develop radiation sickness, your internal organs collapse, and you die. Children are not born with the ability to regenerate damage like Wolverine, because it's not physically possible.

Saying that it's magic is just a shorthand for "this isn't possible, but it's happening". If you like, we can call them "superpowers" and magicians just have an odd way of making "superpowers" trigger.

You seem to be too hung up on this separation of the natural and the scientific. There's no such thing.

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Things can be charmed, but the technology itself cannot create magical effects because it is seperated from that what makes magic.

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"Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic" - Arthur C. Clark.

"Any sufficiently advanced magic is indistinguishable from technology" - someone else.

"Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from a rigged demo" - some smart-[censored]

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Even if you look at comics, you don't really see Dr. Fate creating a gun or a computer, or car.


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That's down to comic-book convention. Dr Fate comes from the days when heroes didn't carry guns or the like (and no one would have thought of a computer). A modern day version would summon guns, but then, a modern day version wouldn't exist because the character is too powerful for modern comics.

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To me it is no different from acting. We are allow to improv, to adlib abit, but not to rewrite the script or take direction of the play.

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You probably wouldn't like my opinion of roleplayers who think RP is acting, but I don't think you mean it the way I dislike, so that's cool.

I may be missing something here. Do you roleplay at Galaxy Girl or Pocket D? I don't anymore, so I don't know.

If you have, then you are rewriting the 'plot' of the city every day by telling your own story. What I think you mean is that no one should be creating uber characters which surpass the limits created for the in-game NPCs. I'd have to say I agree with you, but no for the reasons you give.

Statesman is probably one of the strongest men alive. He's sufficiently uber that creating a character who is stronger than him is probably going to result in your character being way too God Mod. Beyond that, Statesman is a totally boring person, and I'd be very willing to suggest that our putative Uber-Statesman would be about three times as boring as States.

Uber characters aren't interesting. You can't challenge them, nothing is actually a challenge. If nothing is a challenge then why bother. So I prefer making characters that have more realistic limits (that's not realistic, it's more realistic, this is a comic book game).

Which is more interesting and exciting:

Superman, impervious to almost all damage, strong enough to move a planet, faster than the speed of light. Has to be faced by Dread Cthulhu before he'd even break a sweat.

Batman, skilled, very well trained, rich, huge resources, but subject to normal physical frailties, and one good sniper in the right place could end his career instantly.

I'd pick Batman every time, and he has the personality of an angry mongoose with severe mental instability.

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You kinda ruin the canon when you do that is my obession with it

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True, but I don't think the canon of CoX is sufficiently well codified to make this worth persuing on those grounds. I'm not actually sure that Statesman is the strongest hero. I'm quite sure he doesn't lead the Phalanx because he arm-wrestled his way to the top. (I have no idea why, but) he probably got there because all the other heroes respect him. That big demon-type sucker who stands around in Founders Falls could easily be stronger than States, but since there are no stats in the game, and no published information I'm aware of, we simply don't know.

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from a in game prospective I'd have to say the most powerful would currently be Hami, you can tell me to shut up now

[/ QUOTE ] I too believe this. But i think I'm one of the few people that sticks to the canon very stirctly, (Other than TRACOR-005 to certain degrees)


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Hamidon and TRACOR are good examples of bad gaming practice. "I don't know how to cope with powerful heroes, so I'm going to make a villain that's impossible to harm, hands out buckets of damage, but has some flaw which can be exploited." (Supposedly, Hamidon can be defeated in some clever way that the players have never figured out.)

The reason Hamidon is there is because it was the best they could come up with on short notice to provide "post-50 content" and I think everyone, including Cryptic, know that Hamidon sucks. We can't wait for him to be replaced with a TF against Lord Recluse, the way the villains get to take on Statesman. It may, or may not, be easier, but it's sure a lot more fun than taking on a big glob of jelly that can one-shot more or less anyone it feels like with a thought.

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I've set him up as one of the fastest beings on Earth [He brags that he once orbited the world in 23 seconds, but we all know he's a lieing bint].

[/ QUOTE ] Did you think what that would do to the ozone layer and the atmosphere?

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Probably not a lot. It's only about 10000 miles per hour, say around 3 miles per second

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and your body?

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Now that's a different matter, but superheroes traditionally have some method of protecting themselves (and their costume) from the effects of their own power.

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See, I can't help it I know it inhibits my creativity, but i must find at least some small bit that makes sense realisiticly!

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First of all 'it' isn't restricting your creativity, you are. Making things 'realistic' doesn't limit creativity. The problem here is that you seem to be all wound up over power, so you can't see that there's other ways of dealing with things than sheer force.

Seond, what the hell has realism got to do with anything?! This is comic-book reality. The Flash dodges bullets. If he got hit with one, he'd be dead. However, travelling at the speed of sound does not result in him being killed by a passing fly hitting him in the forehead. He is protected from the side-effects of his own powers.

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So I made these rules for myself

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That's fine, you use them if it makes you feel better, just don't ask anyone else to.

You seem to be very concerned with codifying and classifying and making rules. If the people you play with use some common sense and don't try to be the absolute best, better than everyone else, at everything, then you don't need that.

And in an environment like GG or Pocket D, if the other players won't use common sense, then rules won't help anyway.

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More pedantry - the ancient Celts had no writing!

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The peoples we tend to think of as Celts (with the Druids and all that) would have used Ogham, or Latin. At least at some times and in some regions.

The term 'Celt' itself is a bit dodgy due to the 17th Century messing about with what actually defined the term, and the incursion of this big ol'thing called the Roman Empire.

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To magic and science has always been to different things.

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Nope. A lot of chemistry stems from the early works of Alchemists. Newton was a profound scientist and mathematician, and a very accomplished magician. Astronomy owes a lot to the work carried out by astrologers trying to do their thing.

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Or, if you will, the manipulation of life energies (ambient mystical energy of this universe).

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Too specific. This might be the case with witchcraft, but it doesn't work well with Chinese elemental magic, alchemy, angelic magic, demonology or any of the other plethora of magical forms throughout the world.

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So you could be more powerful than a demon, but you will never bee the most powerful because you are human.

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You have somekind of obsession with being the most powerful, UN. Really, get over it. I also disagree with you, and you argument has little logic. A demon is born a creature of magic, so should be more powerful than a human, but you then say you can be more powerful than a demon?

Under the scheme I put forward, a human can be as powerful as anything else, if they simply have the will to carry out what they wish. However, a magician need not be more powerful than a demon, merely cleverer. Demonology is a wonderful art, learning to carefully craft binding spells which demons must obey, even against their wills, because that is their nature. Of course, it's dangerous. Get one little thing wrong...

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Also I have aways seen magic as straining the perosn to use.

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Depends on your skill, what you're doing, etc.

Creating that gigaton nuclear bomb from scratch, by the way, should require more than just great magical skill and a load of effort. It should require a doctorate in physics and thorough knowledge of how to build a nuclear bomb.

Easier to just summon up and release a load of energy.

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I wish the game had a beter definition of magic, instead of our own versions just clashing with each other.

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No, it should have a totally wooly definition of magic. Have you ever read a comic? Each universe has some basic idea of how magic works in it, but they don't apply it consistently. Each magician in the DC universe tends to operate in a slightly different way. The whole thing is about character conception. If Cryptic had laid down how magic worked in CoX, that would be massively limiting to us as players.

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One I do like is one from a game called arcanum:

An important in-game dynamic maintains that technological devices can be impeded or even destroyed by powerful magic, and that the presence of high technology can dampen or even snuff out magical effects. Because technology works with the natural laws and magic opposes and defies them.

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Well, that's one game definition. How about some more:

Mage: The Ascension: Magic and high-technology are the same thing. The reason why bleeding-edge gadgets are unreliable is that they are actually just focusses for magic and if you don't have a skilled magician to operate it, the results are unpredictable.

Most humans are known as Sleepers. They walk through life unable to perceive the supernatural world about them, but even they can be taught to use rote spells through a focus, and this is how technology becomes accepted, more reliable, and commonplace.

So, magic and technology don't interfere with eachother, unless they have been designed to, because there isn't a difference between the two.

GURPS leaves it optional whether technology can influence magic, or psionics. This is fitting since GURPS is designed to be customisable.

And out in the 'real world':

Some believe that technology interferes with magic, others that it doesn't. Cold iron, or any iron, has long been seen as a way to keep away witchcraft and witches. Chinese elemental magic includes metal as one of the five elements.

You are restricting your view of magic to one game system you like (or so it seems to me) when a study of 'real world' magic produces a great deal more fun and frolics, and a lot more variations you can twist into interesting characters. If you're really interested in producing weird and wonderful Magic Origin heroes (or villains) taking a look at some of the real world magic systems would be fruitfull.

Or you can do twist it other ways. I made a fire blaster called Angelica Darling (I wanted the cutest, sweetest name I could think of) who was a mutant. However, her mutant power was the ability to summon imps and small demons. One could assume that she would work up to bigger demons as she got more powerful. Angelica doesn't work magic in the traditional sense, she's a mutant, but the effects are the same and someone from an uncultured tribe (or, say, Arkansas) might think her a witch and burn her at the stake.

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However should a robot gain sentience would it not then have that ability.

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Yep. Now, explain sentience.

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Also if Magicians can understand and learn to use it does it then still qualify as being magic!

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Yes. Magic does things not readily explained through physics. Example: summoning fireballs from your hands. A magician may be able to duplicate the effect reliably, but to a scientist looking at it, it should be impossible.

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If i understand you correct you say magic is there, but if we are able to rationalise it or duplicate through technological means then it isnt magic. This says to me that US Angels original theory that Magic is merely unclassified energies is actually quite viable.

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In my view, it's not so much unclassified energies, more energies from an unclassified source and controlled in a way which cannot be explained normally.

It would be likely that magicians are able to somehow channel energy from the space between universes. There should be quite a lot of it hanging around out there, even if Doctor Who says there isn't.

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However a sword empowered by mystic energy is said to be "magic", if a scientist managed to make the very same sword with the same properties and using same energy sources then by my understanding of your definition its no longer magic but now technology.

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A stick that pour fire out of it is magic, or it could be a flamethrower. Any sufficiently advanced technology may be indistinguishable from magic, but it doesn't make it the same as magic.

When the magic sword was created, the method used to create it would not be understandable by the scientist. If the scientist created such a sword, he would understand how he did it and while the effect might be the same, the sword would still be a technological creation, not a magical one.

There method is everything.

Now, a scientist might actually discover how magic actually works through scientific method. He might then build a device which amplified his own latent abilities, effectively giving him the power of a magician. Beet may be an example of this kind of technology, it's really up to you, Commander, I'm assuming he has some form of sentience. Generally, if there's a 'science of magic' it's known as Thaumatology. Thaumatologists need not be magicians, but they can be enormously good at creating new spells because they understand how magic works at a fundamental level. Equally, a magician need not know thaumatology to work magic, he can just work by rote (spells) or wing it (commonly, rituals).

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Its then you realise that magic is merely a label and depending on your own understanding of the physics involved you will see it as magic technology, science, or any other number of labels you can apply to it.

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Of course it is. Everything's pretty much a label. We split science up into broad categories of physics, chemistry and biology, and the more you learn about it, the more you discover how blurred the categories are.

What's the difference between religion and mythology aside from better spin merchants?

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this is gonna be one of those "bunch of old guys sitting around a table stroking beards and smoking pipes" kind of threads.

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I do hope so.

Right then, first off, the full theory, which I created for a story about, oh, twenty years ago and I like it, so I keep using it.

The universe is, essentially, the current state of a probability equation. At any given instant, what we see and feel is the manifest function of probability and a lot of energy (matter equal energy, Einstein). Since reality is the current state of the equation, neither the future, nor the past actually exist, and the state of the past can always be altered by changing enough of the current state of the equation that people remember a different past.

Magic is the ability to change the current state, probably in some limited way. All sentient creatures have this ability. Not all can use it. Mutants, for example, develop an ability to manipulate reality in weird ways as an innate power. Latents (Science Origin in CoX) may have their power activated by some accident. Magicians learn to use it. Mad Scientists can make devices which do it, but in those cases a normal scientist would not be able to figure out how the gadget worked.

Now, it might well be quite possible for a scientist to build a machine or device which could manipulate reality, achieving the same effects, but if he can actually explain how it does it, then it wouldn't be magic. Magic is an innate property of sentience and a physical device can't duplicate that power as such. The device would have limitations over what it could do, and would require a power source of considerable size to produce a lot of the effects a magician can produce with nothing more than a brain.

That help?

Please note that this is me making up stuff. It's no more a reality than any other idea. I just make up stuff like this a lot. Always have.

And no one else in game has ever agreed that this is how magic works. I don't think I ever asked them. I know it doesn't really fit well with Doc Temporis' Time Travel stuff.

This is getting totally off-topic. Shifting to another thread. You should be able to spot it.

Obviously, if anyone else wants to stuff their oar in, feel free.

Taken from the other thread, Ravenswing: [ QUOTE ]
Here's the 'War Crow' theory of magic, just for the hell of it: Magic is the unacknowledged ability of some entities to manipulate reality with their mind. This neatly covers magicians, magical creatures, mad scientists, mutants, and anything else that does things they shouldn't.

For a while (about half of a mili-second), War Crow became the ultimate expression of this, able to see, feel, and understand all of reality. And that was right before he got told he couldn't be allowed to have that kind of power.

Now he's an accomplished magician and swordsman, who also happens to run an international courier company specialising in using super-powered couriers so you know your package is always going to get there.

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Britanic: [ QUOTE ]
...Does that include robots, or tech heroes who figure out how to manipulate mystical energy?

Should US Angel actually figure out a way of harnessing magic via her powersuit she will argue that she has merely managed to classify a previously unclassified energy frequency. Of course the reality would very well be "that girl in the powersuit just summmoned the purple binds of Sniffit!"

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Please dont think that US Angels opinion on magic is correct as she will openly admit that she doesnt have all the facts

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That's the other delightful thing about a consensual roleplay environment (that usually results in friction ), no one's theory is right or wrong.

Here's the 'War Crow' theory of magic, just for the hell of it: Magic is the unacknowledged ability of some entities to manipulate reality with their mind. This neatly covers magicians, magical creatures, mad scientists, mutants, and anything else that does things they shouldn't.

For a while (about half of a mili-second), War Crow became the ultimate expression of this, able to see, feel, and understand all of reality. And that was right before he got told he couldn't be allowed to have that kind of power.

Now he's an accomplished magician and swordsman, who also happens to run an international courier company specialising in using super-powered couriers so you know your package is always going to get there.

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Her theory is magic is uncategorised energies operating on various frequencies. She believes if she can get her instruments to both register and analyze so called magic energy, she can adapt her own technology to control it. Its just a matter of finding the correct frequency for a given energy source.

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Unlikely. You don't have a science background I take it?

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Of course because most magic doesnt follow the normal rules of physics so she hasnt broke that code yet.

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If science ever does classify some component of magic, then it isn't magic anymore, it's science. By definition, magic is something science can't classify, quantify, or detect.

I guess you picked up a bit of Resistance from an Ancilliary Pool, so you have (perhaps) some right to the energy manipulation thing at this level.

'Make' and 'Create' are two different things. Make implies building from parts or scratch. Create implies "summoning out of thin air." Making can take time, require the right parts, and can be easily handled in normal roleplay. Creating things can break any plot where the GM hasn't sealed it down with Statesman-grade Duct Tape.

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I just met a person today who says that he pvps a lot, but that he prefers defiant because union is unsportsmanlike..

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There tends to be more chance of people "respecting" things like duels and fight clubs on defiant, as well as far more heroes, which makes playing a villain squishy more difficult. That was a while ago though, things may have changed. I've taken to removing broadcast so I cant hear people gloating or whatever, and to remove the temptation from myself.

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its funny u should mention respect i was i RV the last day lookin for pvp and saw a vill and hero fighting so of coarse i did what i always do in sirens i jumped right in with a volley of attacks only to later find out they were dueling, total mistake sorry man

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As a non-PvPer, I think duels in PvP zones are kind of redundant. And if PvPers are going to respect duels in PvP Zones, then they need to start respecting PvEers and badge hunters as well. What exactly is the difference between using an open PvP area for one-on-one duels, and using it for PvE?

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He can also create, fix or disassemble almost any technical device in existance.

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Define 'create'.

And if he has control over all forms of energy he is effectively invulnerable. What powersets does he have?

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Apart from the food, none of those items are things Grav can create.

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But she can wormhole them out of her lab. If I were her, I'd have a carefully stocked warehouse by now. Like I said, you never thought through the implications of your powers.

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And besides.. the explosives would be sub standard compared to her spells

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"Hell, I sure wish I had that 500 gigaton fusion bomb I left back at the lab..."

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This is probably why I don't like plots... I'm not allowed to have Grav be as powerful as I often think she is

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Comic book universes tend not to work if you think hard about them, but if you mix in characters with the kind of power Grav is supposed to have, you might as well write off the continuity and just say that Grav and Doc have fixed the universe. Between them, they probably could.

Grav's powers, as indicated by yourself, should be enough to finish off anything that could possibly come near her. At that point, she isn't worth playing, you just haven't figured it out yet. The only way the character works is if it never does anything and just talks to other characters who aslo ignore the fact that the being they are talking to is capable of rewriting the world. All that's doing is ignoring reality. It isn't roleplaying, it's socialising as a different person.

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I just realised that my two other characters I play more at the moment are well to do (not insanely wealthy, but still...) and/or have access to lots of resources.
That is a form of Godmoding too...

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Yes, it is. My character Jason Caine was richer than just about anyone. He was 8000 years old, and figured out what 'investment' was pretty early on. Compound Interest is fabulous for money growth.

However, fabulous wealth is easier to control than uber-power. Unless you have the technical skills to back it all up, all you can do is hire people and buy things. All these things take time.

The problem Wordmaker and Zortel have/had/whatever, is that they created organisations with resources to underpin their wealth. Zortel had a satellite teleport network available, Nevermore could get more or less anything instantly...

I don't know how your characters are set up. About all the vast wealth meant to Jason was that he never had to worry about paying the rent.

It's a good idea not to include that kind of physical weakness since it's not supported at all by the game. It could have been, but that was rejected since you would have to pick weaknesses from the start without knowing which creatures might do which damage. (People go on about 'dumbing down' CoX, little do they realise it was dumbed down about as far as it could get from day one.)

And that's why I won't run plots anywhere near this place anymore. If someone could break a plot and is simply chosing not to out of the goodness of their heart, that's kind of demeaning really, isn't it?

Uber-Crow stopped going near GG, and I lost my main RP character because he could break pretty much any magical plot, and most other plots, he came across. Since GG was where plots happened, he couldn't be there.

Ghost and Doc made choices for their characters. They decided to make them the way they were and give them powers beyond anything expressible in game. They then are benificent enough to not mess with plots which are just about poking them in the ribs? That's nice. I'll just take my poor, insignificant characters and go sweep the streets.

Frankly, both Doc and Grav are very famous, IC. Why would anyone bother trying to work something out when it's easier to just go find the appropriate one and ask?

(I can't type today either. )

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In fact, my character only used it for food and drink... I'm not sure, but I don't think Grav has never used it for very complex items, and they have a tendancy to fade back to nothing after a day or two... More complex things like spellbooks she teleports from her study...

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"Hell's teeth, I really wish I'd brought my bazooka..."
"A couple of pounds of plastique would be really useful just now..."
"If we stay locked in this room, we'll starve..."
"We could call for help and have the Freedom Phalanx raid the place if only we had a cell phone..."

If I were writing a plot involving her, I'd need to begin by effectively neutralising her. She's too powerful to have around. I'd have to kill her, put her in hospital (in reality, in Paragon City, that isn't an option), or lock her up in somekind of prison she couldn't escape from.

So, if I were plotting something for GG which might have a magical bent, I need an overpowered enemy from the get-go.

That's why, when I did run a GG plot, it was heavily technological. I had a good excuse to have my own character (Crow) take a total back seat. Unfortunately, I allowed certain God Modding technology-based characters to become involved and there was a great deal of acrymony because of it. Soon after that, I quit, though that wasn't the only reason.

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Of course, I learnt some things things the hard way.

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HAven't we all.