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Post by Philip S on Jul 5, 2012 8:29:50 GMT -5
The machines are only aware of 'materium side boarder space' and have a limited understanding of the 'double distortion engine' and not fully aware that it is dropping into the immaterium (they probably think it a sensor issue - one that humans will solve, but the machines do not know why). They do not understand the 'warp' in the 40K sense (and to be fair it's not the same in Sciror). It's like the machines can get into the warp, but cannot see it, do not know it, can't read it, but humans can 'pilot' the ship - the machines do not understand. Humans do not really understand either - their 'hunches' simply work. As the machines cannot see it, and humans do not have the words to describe it, neither really knows that it is somewhere outside the universe.
Further to this, the machines have no idea that the human mind is connected to immaterium, and combined they can reach into the Infinity - for a machine to do that would take a 'triple distortion engine' (an array of warp drives focused on a same point to create a new engine) which the machines do not have - yet. The amount of power required to do it the machines way (using materium power) is astronomical - we are taking about burning up stars. How could a machine image a human could do that?
Humans take a short cut - in a weird (and perhaps sinister) way the Infinity is reaching out to them and helping to bridge the gap...
Philip
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Post by malika on Jul 15, 2012 5:56:27 GMT -5
What about taking this "history repeats" a step further and also include "mythology repeats"? Now, not all of the myths need to be psionic styled events (they could be though).
Like for example the story of Hades and Persephone. It could be a corporate rivalry between Hades and Demeter. The Demeter corporation developed a programme or created something else, which is named Persephone. The Hades corporation wants to Persephone and sends out its forces to take it. The Demeter corporation responds by an all out attack. It is only with through peace negotiations carried out by the Zeus corporation (by using a "Hermes programme" or something) that the conflict is resolved.
Of course this is just an example that is oversimplified, we could also go all psionic in here and turn the Hades faction into a more undead kinda thing...
But returning to those myths and linking them to the corporations, what if these events/stories (the "repeated myths") are not taking place after the Psidemic such as the Legion, Space Greeks, etc. But happened during the Supremacy days? That way they do retain a certain sense of myth because they were quite old, people would talk about them and blow them out of proportion (thus making them mythological).
You could thus use the SITA setting to "teach" history and the Supremacy era to show mythology.
Food for thought...
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Post by Philip S on Aug 1, 2012 6:10:36 GMT -5
If the Space Greeks are the first corporate block to form on Gaia, that is they conquered by the Space Roman block that forms in opposition, then the Greek myths could be brought into the Gaia setting.
Perhaps the myths of the Greeks can be explained with the Psidemic, and perhaps the slaughtering of the Space Greeks diminish the power of their 'gods'?
The Space Romans may win, and take the Space Greek gods as their own (renamed), but without the genetic/ meme ties between the 'gods' and the Space Romans they god's power slips away. The Space Romans are left with nothing...
This may also give an idea to the Space Romans that in order to overcome Psionic 'gods' you have to kill all the followers: genocide.
Philip
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Post by malika on Aug 1, 2012 6:27:02 GMT -5
Another possibility of course, that the Gods are psidemic manifestations. I like the idea of keeping both options open, meaning that in some cases there were actual gods and such whilst in the other it is simply "historical reinterpretation".
Digging the genocide idea by the way... ;D
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Post by Philip S on Aug 3, 2012 4:35:41 GMT -5
I was thinking of the Greek Gods as in the film the 'Clash of the Titans', where worship by the people empowers them (in Sciror this is 'focus' of latent psi powers of humans).
The Space Romans kill the worshippers and the gods loose power.
If going with the Greek myth, this would means that there are two types of deity - Titans and Gods, along with all their off-sping - monsters and demi-gods.
It might be interesting to re-image the Greek myths.
Philip
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Post by malika on Aug 3, 2012 4:40:16 GMT -5
So what would be the difference between these things in SCIROR? Gods would be actively worshipped? But they would have been human or are purely imagined manifestations made real? Titans:  Demi-Gods: humans who are believed to be powerful, or simply humans who are shown psionic potential or something along those lines. This could come in various forms, doesn't automatically mean psycher or anything. Monsters: random.
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Post by Philip S on Aug 3, 2012 5:05:46 GMT -5
I'm thinking; Titans - the first and most abstract and deformed of the manifestations, perhaps a combination of thousands of people, and maybe a drop of something else like the personification of human concepts. The Titans are at war within their own mind, probably a bit mad. I'm not sure how they give rise to the gods - perhaps part of the power jumps into a single human? Gods - a human who is elevated in power by the psionic event, they retain their mind but gain fantastic power (power corrupts so they are 'petty and cruel' to quote a tv program  ). They defeat the Titans. Demi-gods are second generation union of a 'god' and a regular human ('mortal') Monsters are humans that have mutated (single person power up like the gods - but gone wrong) or a more chaotic manifestation (like the Titans). There can also be a 'alien' influence of the Infinity (bleed through from other realities). Philip
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Post by malika on Aug 3, 2012 5:15:57 GMT -5
Hmm, the Titans to me seem to be more primal then. I could see terramorphs falling under this category. They seemed to be more akin to some instinctual force of sorts.
The Gods are the "second generation", who seem to be more calculated and in control.
Demi-Gods are the union between Gods and humans, in the traditional sense. Or perhaps a more normally upgraded one. However, once people start massively worshipping them, they might become Gods of their own. Kind of akin to how certain demi-Gods were rewarded godhood.
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Post by Philip S on Aug 3, 2012 5:25:30 GMT -5
The Titans could be terramorphs, or a similar concept (in that they are made up of more than one 'soul' and act more on instinct). I agree they should be more primal, chaotic, and violent.
A demi-god could be elevated to immortality by a god.
Philip
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Post by malika on Aug 3, 2012 5:29:21 GMT -5
But could the demi-God only be elevated by another God? When looking at the whole power based on worship, you might think that if a demi-God might scheme his way to godhood through propaganda/marketing: making the people worship him.
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Post by Philip S on Aug 3, 2012 5:43:08 GMT -5
I think you could be on to something. Within a psionic event the focus of the group could empower anyone. Getting the focus might be tricky, and followers may think self promotion as 'blasphemous'. Some demi-gods who become heroes may slip through as a god's champion, and be seen as being granted godhood by the gods, whereas (in actual fact) they are really being elevated by their fame among the population.
Philip
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Post by malika on Aug 3, 2012 7:01:30 GMT -5
What I'm more interesting in, in this aspect, at least is to see how the worship of a demi-god/god/whatever is spread artificially. I mean, with religions you could have this done in a natural way, people worship the sun and what not. Or in the sense of crusades, etc.
But you mentioned somewhere that you'd like to see a parody of capitalism. What if we take advertising, communication and marketing to the extreme. Basically the ultra-capitalist version of religion...
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Post by Philip S on Aug 3, 2012 9:12:45 GMT -5
The capitalism system is probably going to fail during a psidemic, but it could have an influence before the psidemic and direct the focus of the population. In our world we have celebrity worship, and through celebrity worship the reflected focus on brands. Hell, even brands these days seem to be worshipped to some (lesser) degree, or at least 'believed in' and even held as some form of national pride (I'm suddenly though of the Intel/ AMD fanboy wars, and Mac fever, then GW fanboys). I'm not suggesting we have the Stay Puft Marshmallow Man running about (but it could be fun!), I'm suggesting people in the minds of the population, through adverts, tv shows etc. at the time of the event could be the focus of that psidemic event and gain powers. A star of a show is easy to personify into their character. Some concepts may be harder to personify, or more vague, like 'Coca-cola', and perhaps lead to a mishmash of conflict thoughts (nice taste, it's just a drink, but fear of corporate power) and lead to 'Titans'. I wonder what a Coca-cola Titan would be like? Philip
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Post by malika on Aug 3, 2012 13:04:34 GMT -5
Hmm, a terramorph made from cola bottles?  Which reminds me, would there be glass inside the Ecorium, or would they have a sort of plastic instead of that? If there would be access to glass, it would lead to all sorts of interesting glass based weapons during the Psidemic... Perhaps capitalism is the wrong word here, I would more talking about corporatism, or at least that extreme capitalism as seen in cyberpunk and other dystopian fiction. Whilst it as an economic system might eventually collapse, the social structure that come with it could remain fully intact. Meaning that society might regress to something very tribal, but still use the very capitalist based terminology (for example the corporations and executives). As for corporate icons running amok, I think something like that could definitely happen during the Psidemic. I think it's all about how it executed, in a film like Ghostbusters it was done in a rather funny and cute way to still make it accessible to young viewers, but it could actually be quite scary and morbid when you think of it. Ronald McDonald coming to live and eating the children at the restaurant...
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Post by malika on Dec 31, 2012 11:31:57 GMT -5
By the way, speaking of repeating history, or perhaps also of repeating mythology. You might want to check out what Zeus had been up to? Depending on whether these would be psionic characters or not, you can get an idea of how they were all connected. I'm imagining them at the moment as each a separate company rather than actual characters. Food for though... Oh yeah, here's the link: visualising.org/visualizations/zeuss-affairs
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