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Man, Fuzzy would be a terrible person to introduce to a couple of engaged teenagers. "Wait, I could get legally married to Sasha and then we wouldn't have to jump through legal hoops to stay with each other? Visiting each other in hospitals, starting together for refugee claims, all of that?" That's a bad concept for her to even become aware of. I mean, don't get me wrong, I'm on board, but it's a bad idea.
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Jul 9, 2018 22:36
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I'm torn between the smart route and the "oh man I want to see this happen" route
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Jul 9, 2018 22:38
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I tend to stay away from intentionally walking into bad ideas in CYOAs because it's usually hard enough to get the outcome you want even when trying to be smart. "Bad idea" is subjective, of course.
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Jul 9, 2018 22:43
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Fuzzy and Sasha Smith. I like plan introducing Fuzzy to matrimony. There is so much potential for shenanigans, also it’d be cute and touching I’m sure, I’d trust Ice to write a wedding, maybe not this school year, but probably around late year 3-4
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Jul 9, 2018 23:14
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jagadaishio posted:Man, Fuzzy would be a terrible person to introduce to a couple of engaged teenagers. "Wait, I could get legally married to Sasha and then we wouldn't have to jump through legal hoops to stay with each other? Visiting each other in hospitals, starting together for refugee claims, all of that?" That's a bad concept for her to even become aware of. I'm pretty sure Fuzzy is aware of the possibility of marrying Sasha, considering how Matt was pushing for it last year. I also think it'd be a terrible idea and we shouldn't do it.
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Jul 9, 2018 23:24
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While it might be funny to bring Fuzzy along, the invitation was for just Kenji. Or well, attendees of the spirit mentor class. I think it'd be bad manners to ask to bring along someone unrelated to a "get to know each other" dinner specifically for attendees of the class.
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Jul 9, 2018 23:29
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Ice Phisherman posted:Then it came to him. He didn't know this girl on sight because Joyce Sartell was actually a guy. Elves were considered the beautiful metahuman races. They tended to be prettier on average and Joyce trended towards the androgynous side, neither completely handsome nor completely beautiful, but confusing. Is there any further backstory here, or, should I just read it as written Ice Phisherman posted:Quiet this entire time, Kenji tried not to fidget as he was thrust back into the spotlight. He wasn’t used to being forced to engage with people in this sort of environment and that made him uncomfortable. Still, he felt like he needed to try. He found himself thinking back to that hallucination where he’d been the Husky. I get that Kenny is in a weird place right now, between Dog, Julie, and being back at school. Still, Social Warfare is kinda Kenny’s thing, is there a reason beyond what’s stated that his anxiety is ‘spiking’? Ice Phisherman posted:CYOA Time Kenny accepts the invitation graciously, and recognizes it for what it is; an audience with Tir Nobility which he wouldn’t have received otherwise. Furthermore, being an elf, Kenny appreciates this as a potential opportunity to step into a larger, even more influential and powerful, world. Both Joyce and Krupa have stated that they appreciate the niceties, and that formalities can be forgone during class. Since this dinner wouldn’t be ‘class’, Kenny needs to keep up with his manners and etiquette, meaning doing research to bring whatever acceptable gift(s) would be required, as well as minding the Tir version of table manners plus his Ps and Qs. Also, no guests. The invitation was for him only; this is a personal meet and greet, not to be misunderstood for a 'friendly' social occasion. The way Joyce presented this meal smacks of 'obligation'. Ice Phisherman posted:What does Kenji think about Olisha, Joyce and Krupa? Thoughts on Olisha: Wary, cautious, and on-guard. She’s a meal-ticket, a means to an end; we need her contacts and her network to turn Oli into a viable investment. We can’t offend or alienate her, and, we can’t get too friendly either, and have her forget that we have mutually beneficial business together. Thoughts on Joyce: Respect, deference, and cautious. Joyce seems to be a ‘real-deal’, intelligent, powerful noble, born and bred for his intended role. If Kenny can earn his respect and understanding, perhaps he can parlay this schoolyard relationship into something more substantial and long lasting, on both a personal and professional level. It never hurts to be friends with and have options outside of UCAS. Thoughts on Krupa: Curious, intrigued, and cautious. While Krupa ‘seems’ like an otherwise silly, giggly, love-struck girl, she’s also a ‘match’ for Joyce, meaning that her family is at least as powerful and influential. Deal with her as genuinely as we can, find out more about her background; we can even spin it as, “While I’m an elf, I know nothing about my heritage and birthright, perhaps you can educate me?” Ice Phisherman posted:Does Kenji like Indian food? Has he ever tried Indian food? Kenny likes his drink strong and his women stronger, so sure, I wouldn’t see why he wouldn’t like India food (at the full native level of spice as well, not the dialed down ‘suburban samosa’ version either). Another thought; the idea that Olisha would ‘bully’ Joyce and Krupa is both amusing, silly, and sad to me. Sure, Olisha might be a ‘corporate princess’, and for all we know, her parents might be considered ‘corporate nobility’. The fact that she’s ‘written’ top 40 songs though seems to be a strike against her in that she’s involved with the ‘mundane’ tasks of business details and execution. Joyce and Krupa are actual nobility, destined to be among the ruling class of Tir; they’re literally out of Olisha’s weight class and league, and by orders of magnitude. Heck, Olisha is still in her ‘Goth’ stage.
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Jul 9, 2018 23:31
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CourValant posted:Kenny accepts the invitation graciously, and recognizes it for what it is; an audience with Tir Nobility which he wouldn’t have received otherwise. Furthermore, being an elf, Kenny appreciates this as a potential opportunity to step into a larger, even more influential and powerful, world. Aha! An in-character rationale I like. Let's go with this.
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Jul 10, 2018 00:07
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sheep-dodger posted:I also think it'd be a terrible idea and we shouldn't do it. Oh, she definitely shouldn't be allowed to go through with all that. It's a bad and dumb idea that she might get into her head, not something that her friends, girlfriend, or guardian should actually let her get away with treating as a serious option. That's a, "Fuzzy, I'm flattered, that's cute, but hell no," situation. And yeah, I say Kenji should go alone. It just makes the most sense. Inviting along someone who didn't actually get invited would just be rude.
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Jul 10, 2018 01:35
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Neither Fuzzy or Sasha are old enough anyway, so it doesn't even matter. And I get what you mean about it being a no guests situation. Didn't think about that, and making Kenny have to deal with them alone... Not sure I want to. Amending my initial vote to Kenji accepts the invitation because he doesn't really have a good reason not to, but takes some time to do as much research on Tir culture as he feasably can. Also, he's had Indian food before, even spicy, but only as authentic as anything ever gets in the ACHE. It's really too bad we can't introduce Fuzzy to them, but perhaps later.
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Jul 10, 2018 01:51
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Plan Cour works for me. Let's get Kenny some more connections in fields that would otherwise be unavailable to him, and maybe get to know these two a bit better. Not snubbing them will offend Olisha however.
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Jul 10, 2018 02:03
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Oh cool literal actual nobility. Fascist nobility, at that. Honestly, they both seem like nice enough people, and on top of that they're 16 so they get some leeway. But they are also the literal embodiment of an incredibly oppressive, reactionary, and unjust system so yeah right now they're on my  list. I guess we can play nice for political reasons right now, but drat.
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Jul 10, 2018 04:13
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Hopefully we can get a read on whether the noble kids are "incredibly sheltered" nice or "Of course we should be kind to actual people, and better protect them from the sub-elven monsters" nice.
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Jul 10, 2018 04:25
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I’m pretty sure Dove wouldn’t tolerate a facist so Joyce is likely a good person, unsure about Dolphin, so Krupa is up for debate.
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Jul 10, 2018 04:28
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Accept because they seem nice, Kenji’s stressed and there’s no easy out. Don’t bring others yet, it’s a club thing and Kenji’s established as trying to be polite and deferential when dealing with well-connected people. Kenji can try introducing them to Oli soon to see how they react to her. So far we’ve only seen how they react to elves. Kenji’s had curry, but probably not good curry. malbogio fucked around with this message at 07:54 on Jul 10, 2018 |
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Jul 10, 2018 04:31
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numerrik posted:I’m pretty sure Dove wouldn’t tolerate a facist so Joyce is likely a good person, unsure about Dolphin, so Krupa is up for debate. From his perspective the fascists are probably the peaceful and harmonious ones. He defended their "democratic reforms" which Ice has highlighted in his notes as being mostly window dressing. I'm going with probably a good person, but sheltered and absolutely willing to go to bat for his country.
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Jul 10, 2018 05:40
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At the end of the day mentor spirits are still spirits, so (and feel free to correct me if I'm way off base) their interpretations of things like peace and harmony might be different.
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Jul 10, 2018 15:44
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Bear Enthusiast posted:At the end of the day mentor spirits are still spirits, so (and feel free to correct me if I'm way off base) their interpretations of things like peace and harmony might be different. Bingo. A great example would be that a jackbooted corpsec thug might be a Dog Shaman (his squad is his Pack), the street-shaman trying to kill that jackbooted thug might be a Dog Shaman (his runner crew is his Pack), and the elementary school teacher desperately trying to get a field trip of kidergarteners out of the crossfire might be a Dog Shaman too (his class is his Pack). Spirit Mentors are multi-faceted god-beings, with each individual shaman only interacting with a tiny part of the greater being, to the extent that two instances of the same Mentor might be radically different from each other. And, more to the point, they're rarely socially-objective observers of human politics. They're more observers of a metahuman's nature, and guiding forces that try to nudge their shamans onto ideal paths. Dove likely doesn't know, understand, or care about the nuances of Tir's aristocratic politics. But when Joyce is put into a situation where he needs to decide between peace and harmony, or conflict and strife, Dove will push him towards the (subjective) peaceful path.
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Jul 10, 2018 16:10
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Is there a society in Shadowrun that conspires against magic as a concept?
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Jul 10, 2018 16:12
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VanSandman posted:Is there a society in Shadowrun that conspires against magic as a concept? I think magic is illegal in Egypt, if I remember right.
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Jul 10, 2018 16:38
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VanSandman posted:Is there a society in Shadowrun that conspires against magic as a concept? Humanis Policlub despises mages as much as metas.
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Jul 10, 2018 17:34
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jagadaishio posted:
Don't resist the peaceful Future! You're making me shoot you just submit and and we'll have Utopia. Imagine how peaceful it'll be once everyone thinks, acts, and LOOKS the same way.
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Jul 10, 2018 17:51
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So I'm going to veer off topic like I do sometimes. Be aware.CourValant posted:Is there any further backstory here, or, should I just read it as written I made him with a few purposes in mind. His looks are a very small part of that. quote:I get that Kenny is in a weird place right now, between Dog, Julie, and being back at school. Still, Social Warfare is kinda Kenny’s thing, is there a reason beyond what’s stated that his anxiety is ‘spiking’? Kenji is prone to depression, his entire moral code, such as it was, from Edward has collapsed, he's gained the attention of something powerful that he doesn't understand and he briefly imagined himself as a dog as it killed and ate its prey, human supremacists tried to target his friend, his art patron/meal ticket despises two of his classmates and he's not able to fade into the background in a class of four. I'd say that he could mentally deal with any of this on his own given enough time. However, it's all happening at roughly the same time. Kenji is physically and mentally tough, but tough people have limits too. It's the sheer amount of it all falling on him at once that's causing problems. Kenji is used to stress, but the type of stress he's well adapted to is violence. After all, everyone gets stressed out sometimes. It just means that he's going to be eager to blow off steam. quote:Another thought; the idea that Olisha would ‘bully’ Joyce and Krupa is both amusing, silly, and sad to me. Sure, Olisha might be a ‘corporate princess’, and for all we know, her parents might be considered ‘corporate nobility’. The fact that she’s ‘written’ top 40 songs though seems to be a strike against her in that she’s involved with the ‘mundane’ tasks of business details and execution. There are some mitigating factors that I'm going to go into eventually, but yeah, Joyce and Krupa are in a different weight class than Olisha. However, Olisha definitely can stir up problems for the two. Especially since Joyce and Krupa have a difficult time striking back directly as they're not used to direct conflict. Tir is a relatively new country so royalty works a little differently. So while he's of ducal rank, he doesn't actually govern several counties and therefore several counts like a duke of old would. He and his family are one step below high nobility though, and for what I have in mind for him, that rank is necessary for what I want him to try and accomplish. His family does have a ton of land, and they've wrung out about as much prosperity as possible from that land as they can, but the land isn't that great. It's based on the real life Harney county area in Oregon. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harney_County,_Oregon The land out there isn't much good for anything but ranching and tourism. I squeezed in power generation, but there's not a ton to power out there. So while his family has high rank, they have middling poor land. Animal products also sell well, but in a land of mostly vegetarians it's not particularly respected. His family has climbed as high as they're going to go on their own. They have plenty of land. Their rents are solid, but not fantastic. However, there tends to be a split between rural nobility, city nobility and those near the court, and at some point I'm going to attempt to point that out in the story. Joyce is one step below high nobility, but it comes with a lot of caveats. I won't spoil what Krupa is though. I will say that this is me going back to my knowledge of dynastic politics. Krupa is going to fit in ways that I find interesting. VanSandman posted:Is there a society in Shadowrun that conspires against magic as a concept? A lot of the human supremacists have problems with magic since it came with metahumanity. That was why Julie hid her magic to begin with. Christianity also cratered in attendance because most churches didn't accept magic and had a strong bias against metahumans until about 2050 and they began showing up around 2012. They pushed hard against change. This was also coupled with dropping attendance rates. A lot of other religions picked up the slack as magic coming back meant that these old religious traditions had power. Marco for example is a Christian theurgist and he heals and Christians might calls these miracles, but Fuzzy's tradition is shamanism and she can do a little healing too. She's not religious at all and probably hasn't thought about religion overmuch besides being invited to Julie's church a few times. Julie's tradition is also shamanism, but she's also a new, practicing Christian too. At least as far as her magic is concerned, her magical tradition and her faith aren't in conflict, though that may happen at some point. The way I'm taking shamanism is that it isn't faith. It's primal. Not in the sense that it's primitive, but in the sense that it's the first, or prime. You see spirits, you respect them because they're old and powerful. You learn magic, you cast it, because it's useful. Your power comes from nature and the natural environment default setting isn't mired in faith, it's mired in tooth, blood and claw. It's mired in life and death, survival of the fittest stuff. Not being some sort of apex predator like most people assume, but truly finding a niche in their environment and thriving. The closer that practitioners grow to understanding and internalizing these fundamental concepts, the more powerful they become. And while there are other ways to power (in my own headcannon), the most surefire way (that's acceptable) to become more powerful and raise your magic rating is to grow closer to the food chain. The reason that most of these corporate teens aren't powerful isn't because they have some sort of limit on their powers and that they're inherently weak. It's because they've never been truly hungry, they're far removed from their sources of food, water comes to them and they've never had to defend themselves or kill to eat. They're separated themselves from the inherent threats of the food chain and so they don't reap the benefits of what it means to carve out a place inside of it and thrive. There's a hard limit that they can reach without understanding these concepts just by being on Blake Island, or just being among nature, but that limit is firm and short of their actual potential. Anyway, I'm off topic. I do want to play around with that concept at some point though. I'm thinking of later in year two or at the beginning of year three. Other traditions I imagine would mean that you become "more magical" by growing closer to your faith. So if you're Marco, you become more powerful by being a better Christian. Religions have codes which they require of their followers and they're almost always hard to adhere to. So it's not easier for Marco. It's difficult in different ways and I'd say that shamanism, at least the non-religious type of shamanism, is far more straightforward. jagadaishio posted:I think magic is illegal in Egypt, if I remember right. Though I'm not planning on going into Islam, Shadowrun hasn't really shied away from the topic. Magic is "forbidden" for most Islamic faiths, but certain practioners can be cleared to use their magic. Why they're allowed to basically boils down to "because we said so". And here I go off topic. I'd like to tackle Islam as a religion and way of living both, but they're hard to break down so people can understand it since you're talking about different sects within Islam, cultural differences, regional differences, differences between the sexes, their history, all that jazz. It's complicated. I feel like I could try. My house held exchange students while I was growing up and I lived with Muslims almost continually for about oh...I want to say at least five years. Probably longer. There's a lot of hate and misunderstanding between Muslims and Christians and before 9/11 they were just another religious minority in the US that people largely ignored. That said, I don't want to shoehorn concepts in for the sake of talking about them. If it comes up, it comes up, but I'm not sure if I can do the topic justice. Mere visibility isn't enough. I've talked about this before and I guess I'll talk about it again. I want to write good characters that aren't defined by a single aspect of their identity. I remember getting some thanks from a few posters about Marco and how I've been tackling Christianity in general. Those reactions overall have been mixed because a lot of people that I know are put off by Christianity. Myself included at times. Marco is a pretty fleshed out character. He is a person who is a Christian, not a Christian who is a person, or worse, created for the sole purpose of representing an identity. He's caring, patient, forgiving, loving and all around a good person. He spent time out of his busy schedule to help teach Fuzzy how to read. He also struggled with his pacifism after hearing about what was done to Edward to the point where he would secretly work out his anger on a heavy punching bag. If he were just a Christian and just there to push Christian ideals and if he was always right or always wrong purely defined by Christianity, that would be me falling into the same trap that writers often fall into. Mere representation isn't enough. In fact, I find it insulting save for rare circumstances. You might call it tokenism. It has its place. When an identity is so taboo or marginalized, tokenism is how you introduce that idea to people. However, people aren't wholly a single external identity. They are themselves and that identity, like being a member of a faith, or a non-standard sexual orientation, or being part of a non-majority race, are facets of their personality, not the whole of it. You saw a lot of these original token characters pop up in the 1970's. At least in the US, I'm not sure about other countries. Back in 1971, the character Archie Bunker, who was probably the most famous racist character on television, made wrongheaded assumptions about gay people only to find out that his friend, Steve, was gay. Further, you find the first trans person in 1977 with the Jeffersons where George Jefferson finds out that his old army buddy, Eddie, is now Edie, is now a transgender woman. These are tokenism, but for the times they're startling because they're absolute firsts in television. Go back even further to Star Trek in the 1960's and you'll see the very first interracial kiss on camera, and the entire cast and crew got a shitload of hate mail and death threats from white supremacists back when they were not some screaming minority, but a large majority of the population during the civil rights movement. Even the character of Uhura, the comms officer, was a huge leap forward at the time. Black actors and actresses tended to be relegated to subservient roles up until that point. Sure, she was under the authority of a white captain, but she was a respected senior officer on the bridge of a space ship and she would have adventures with the rest of the crew. Star Trek definitely wasn't perfect, because it leaned hard into the white man's burden as a concept for almost the entire series and was also incredibly sexist, but it was startlingly progressive for the time. It wasn't perfect, but if you look at it in the context of the times it was pretty drat progressive. Because on other shows and movies at the time, a black actress would be almost always be a maid or a nanny for a white family. We're past that now, but at the same time we haven't changed a lot either. It's because the introduction of these people with these fringe identities is risky to do, but once the risk is taken, it's done. The concept of their identity has been introduced. The taboo is broken. What's hard is finding writers who can authentically make these people who have these identities and make them into an interesting person who isn't a token character. They aren't some ideal concept of say, a gay person, but they're a person, with strengths and flaws and interesting tidbits about their lives that makes them believable. And a huge problem with writers is that they have no idea what they're doing because they have little or even zero concept of what they're writing. So these characters end up as a sort of caricature of a gay person. A straight person's idea of a gay person. They might talk to a gay person or two to get some tidbits to try and make them real, but I doubt they'll dive deep. It's really only when you get talented writers who understand those identities that they can accurately depict what those identities are about. Simultaneously, you have to make the character interesting and fit them into the story without some elaborate process of shoehorning them in, otherwise it feels fake and people tune out. It's delicate. I could write an all gay story, but that feels like I'd be throwing out red meat for a small number of people. I don't want to write propaganda pieces. I want to write good stories. So tying it back to Christianity for example, you can find tons of lovely right wing trash level movies out there that waspy Christian nationalists just eat up like "God's Not Dead". And I see someone who was instrumental in helping constructing my morality, Kevin Sorbo, of Hercules fame, go on to become a Christian's token idea of an academic. In the movie (if I remembering the right one, there are tons of garbage tier "Christian" movies) Kevin Sorbo's character is a philosophy teacher and he's somehow stunned by this new Christian kid who comes into his class with these basic and deeply flawed arguments which somehow undermine an entire branch of the humanities. It's garbage propaganda front to back and I really hope that it was Sorbo's stroke that made him into an rear end in a top hat, because he was by far a part of one of my favorite feel good shows growing up. Then you have Chariots of Fire. This is a Christian film that is a masterpiece of cinema. Its themes are heavily Christian, but the story is told so well that you don't need to be a Christian to enjoy it. Its message is universal. It delves deeply into racism, classism, perseverance, faith and sacrifice. The persecution feels real and living your faith is hard, not easy. So you look at God's Not Dead, which I like to think of as "Christploitation" and compare it to Chariots of Fire, which is an amazing piece of cinema. Technically, both are Christian movies, but God's Not Dead is an inauthentic propaganda piece that is meant to reassure people of how great they are by lying to them. Chariots of Fire goes in the opposite direction. Being true to your faith is hard. To me, authenticity isn't everything, because you can be an authentically lovely person, but it should be built into the framework of all art. Or at least that's my opinion, and what I try to strive for. If I create a character, they're not a jumble of of identities. I want to complicate them because people are complicated. If they don't feel like people, if that framework is inauthentic at its core, whatever I build upon it isn't worth a drat. Here's an article if you're interested in more on the topic - https://www.giantbomb.com/articles/guest-column-visibility-is-not-enough/1100-5466/ Crazycryodude posted:Oh cool literal actual nobility. Fascist nobility, at that. Honestly, they both seem like nice enough people, and on top of that they're 16 so they get some leeway. But they are also the literal embodiment of an incredibly oppressive, reactionary, and unjust system so yeah right now they're on my And I also introduced Jayvon, our anti-fascist dwarf. I'm not going to do some both sides narrative either. I'm going to push these characters and therefore these themes into conflict. In media, there's a real fear about talking about fascism and why it appeals to people. So in media there are almost always clear winners and losers and these stories have little nuance to them. When I talk about a theme, I assume that at the heart of every political movement is a thesis. It's basically an argument or idea. I am going to repeatedly slam these two conflicting ideas together and show why people hold to them even under duress. Or maybe why they don't hold to them. I don't pick winners and losers. I leave that to the thread and the dice. And not all supposedly good choices will be easy or obvious. Truly solving problems is hard. Bear Enthusiast posted:At the end of the day mentor spirits are still spirits, so (and feel free to correct me if I'm way off base) their interpretations of things like peace and harmony might be different. One of the themes I want to dive into that dovetails (fofofo) into the conflict between democracy and fascism are the twin concepts of negative and positive peace. Negative peace is achieved largely through violent means. It is rooted in the absence of violence, pessimism and it is curative, meaning that it is used to cure an existing problem. Positive peace is peace by peaceful means, it's optimistic, preventative, meaning that it is achieved by using measures to prevent violence in the first place, and there are often ways in which this peace is built into the world to prevent violence from happening in the first place, and is therefore structural, or part of the bones of society. You can imagine negative peace as that moment of calm after someone repeatedly kicked their enemy while on the ground. When that enemy refuses to get up, that is negative peace, or peace enforced through violent means. Even the threat of further violence is negative peace. Positive peace would be to convince both people never to engage in violence at all, or if that happened, convince both to settle their disagreement peacefully, which leads to more peace. I'd also like to point out that while I want to work with a lot of these themes, what I want to do at the very core of this story is make something entertaining that people want to read, but it also says something meaningful that challenges people as I try to narrate in a neutral tone. I want to distill these sometimes hard to understand concepts into a form that most people can understand without talking down to you, my audience. At the same time, have these characters interact with these themes in a meaningful way that impacts their lives without deviating from who they are or the story at large, but not requiring deep understanding of these concepts in order for people to just have a fun time reading it. I also don't have many contemporaries who are writing about this stuff outside of non-fiction. A lot of fiction is feel good these days and does little to inform, or at least the stuff I'm familiar with. All while trying to provide meaningful choices to everyone and writing more or less on the fly. It's an incredibly ambitious project that I've undertaken and I'm surprised that I haven't crashed and burned by now. Really surprised. Really, really surprised. sheep-dodger posted:(also: Ice might want to consider changing Olisha's name when he does the first full editing pass, as having two characters with such similar names can be confusing, especially when they appear in relation with each other. Yeah, I'm seeing that. I may just do a quick patch and rename Olisha to Alicia, which sounds the same but it looks distinct from Oli. I'm not the best at names. Anyway, as for writing, I have an appointment with my doctor later today as I continue to follow up on my vertigo. I've been feeling better lately, but it comes and goes. I'll do some editing for the last two chapters and once that's done I'll begin to work on the next chapter. Once that's done I'm going to get back to editing book one. I think it's time to get the website up. I've been procrastinating for way too long on that front as I want to open my story up to a wider audience. I have the money for the website, it's just that I've been sitting on it. I tend to let my perfectionism get in my way of making something that's good or great, and I really want to get off my rear end and stop worrying about being perfect. A big thank you for people who have donated. The donations do help and are appreciated. 
Ice Phisherman fucked around with this message at 06:53 on May 15, 2019 |
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Jul 10, 2018 19:21
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jagadaishio posted:Man, Fuzzy would be a terrible person to introduce to a couple of engaged teenagers. "Wait, I could get legally married to Sasha and then we wouldn't have to jump through legal hoops to stay with each other? Visiting each other in hospitals, starting together for refugee claims, all of that?" That's a bad concept for her to even become aware of. Also, yeah, I'm not really interested in pushing Fuzzy and Sasha to get married. Especially at such a young age. People of my generation are pushing marriage backwards, not forwards. At least in the aggregate. I see Fuzzy and Sasha growing closer and more comfortable with one another as they change and grow. Marrying your sweetheart straight out of high school can 100% work, and I've seen it work, but a lot of people who get married early I feel are making a mistake. So if you're religious, you get married so you can be physically intimate, or that if they already are, that it'll "be so much better". Or people will "do the right thing" if someone gets pregnant. There's not a lot of thought about if you're actually a good match or not. Fuzzy isn't really going to fundamentally understand the significance of what marriage means and Sasha is still somewhat conservative and wants to take things slow. That said, if people like Joyce and Krupa enough, I'll pursue the story-line I've outlined for them. They come from a culture where arranged marriages happen, and among the corporate types, political marriages are pretty common. Marrying for love would be seen as "what poor people do" and people who marry for power or wealth would laugh up their sleeves at a marriage for love. Love is what you get from a mistress. Marriages have been about maintenance of power, economics and politics for way longer than marriage has been about love. If you ended up loving who you were married to, you were either poor or it happened by chance. People marrying primarily for love is a fairly new concept if your timeline goes back far enough.
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Jul 10, 2018 22:22
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Ice Phisherman posted:It just means that he's going to be eager to blow off steam. Kenny riding Gentoo like a seahorse mount around Blake Island while Octo throws up AR banner ads? Ice Phisherman posted:His family does have a ton of land, and they've wrung out about as much prosperity as possible from that land as they can, but the land isn't that great. It's based on the real life Harney county area in Oregon. Ahh, this old chestnut. Yes, this is a familiar, historically accurate tale with nobility of old. Ice Phisherman posted:Animal products also sell well, but in a land of mostly vegetarians it's not particularly respected. His family has climbed as high as they're going to go on their own. I bet with a little marketing, you can sell ‘Elven Mystical Moo Cow Steak’ at an incredibly insane premium. Ice Phisherman posted:Joyce is one step below high nobility, but it comes with a lot of caveats. I won't spoil what Krupa is though. I will say that this is me going back to my knowledge of dynastic politics. Krupa is going to fit in ways that I find interesting. My kind of story. More Borgias’ and the Pope(s) in Avignon, less Game of Thrones. Ice Phisherman posted:And while there are other ways to power (in my own headcannon), the most surefire way (that's acceptable) to become more powerful and raise your magic rating is to grow closer to the food chain. I believe we’ve covered this topic a few times in this thread already; I like your headcannon here. Ice Phisherman posted:Even the character of Uhura, the comms officer, was a huge leap forward at the time. Black actors and actresses tended to be relegated to subservient roles up until that point. If you’re not aware of this story, Nichelle Nichols had considered quitting Star Trek when MLK Jr. convinced her to stay on, citing the positive role model she was providing to the African American community at the time. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nichelle_Nichols#Star_Trek Ice Phisherman posted:One of the themes I want to dive into that dovetails (fofofo) . . .  Good to see your sense of humor remains intact. Ice Phisherman posted:You can imagine negative peace as that moment of calm after someone repeatedly kicked their enemy while on the ground. When that enemy refuses to get up, that is negative peace, or peace enforced through violent means. Even the threat of further violence is negative peace. Not that I necessarily agree with it, although Pax Romana wasn’t all that bad for its citizens. Ice Phisherman posted:Really surprised.  Ice Phisherman posted:Anyway, as for writing, I have an appointment with my doctor later today as I continue to follow up on my vertigo. I've been feeling better lately, but it comes and goes. Keep us updated; we care more about you and your health than story posts. ***** :edit: ***** Ice Phisherman posted:People marrying primarily for love is a fairly new concept if your timeline goes back far enough. How the institution of marriage began and the problem it was trying to fix (inheritance rights and the bludgeoning clergy class not allowed to lay claims to church holdings) has always been of great interest to me. You want to upset a woman with ‘modern’ sensibilities at the office or at a polite social gathering? Tell her that her interpretation of Monogamy and Love is actually a carefully crafted façade, imposed onto her by old men who cared only about the children from her body, and not for a hair on her head. Maybe you’ll take a little time to address it in your story, should the occasion arise?
CourValant fucked around with this message at 22:33 on Jul 10, 2018 |
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Jul 10, 2018 22:23
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CourValant posted:My kind of story. More Borgias’ and the Pope(s) in Avignon, less Game of Thrones. If you like dynastic politics, GOT is good for introductory stuff, but I'm not the biggest fan. It's good work and somehow GRRM keeps hundreds of characters and dozens of plot-lines straight. That's a serious achievement. But I honestly prefer something more along the lines of The Borgias, The Tudors or Pillars of the Earth. quote:If you’re not aware of this story, Michelle Nichols had considered quitting Star Trek when MLK Jr. convinced her to stay on, citing the positive role model she was providing to the African American community at the time. I didn't know that. That's super neat. quote:Good to see your sense of humor remains intact. It's a big part of what keeps me going. quote:Not that I necessarily agree with it, although Pax Romana wasn’t all that bad for its citizens. Not everyone was a citizen. It was run on slaves. The divide between rich and poor was stark. Also, Pax Romana meant the borders weren't getting any bigger. It was also broken by a number of wars. From wikipedia, quote: "The first known record of the term Pax Romana appears in a writing by Seneca the Younger in 55 AD.[6] The concept was highly influential, and the subject of theories and attempts to copy it in subsequent ages. Arnaldo Momigliano noted that "Pax Romana is a simple formula for propaganda, but a difficult subject for research."[7] In fact, the "Pax Romana" was broken by the First Jewish–Roman War, the Kitos War (also in Judea, 115–117), the Bar Kokhba Revolt (also known as the Third Jewish–Roman War), the Roman–Parthian War of 58–63, Trajan's Roman–Parthian War of 113, the Dacian Wars, various battles with Germanic tribes, including the Teutoburg Forest, and Boudica's war in Britain in AD 60 or 61." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pax_Romana quote:Keep us updated; we care more about you and your health than story posts. Thank you. I'm okay. I'm just doing more follow ups to figure out why I have vertigo. If anything, I'm getting better, but lots of exertion still makes me dizzy. quote:How the institution of marriage began and the problem it was trying to fix (inheritance rights and the bludgeoning clergy class not allowed to lay claims to church holdings) has always been of great interest to me. The modern idea of marriage as I understand it is new. Even in Christianity it hasn't always been one man one woman. Charlemagne was a Christian king and he had a ton of wives. When gay marriage was being debated over, Christians tended to push one man one woman, but even Christianity wasn't always one man one woman. It just has been for a long time. But closer to the early Christian church this wasn't always the case. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charlemagne As for upsetting people, I prefer not to do so on purpose. If someone feels like this or that way of thinking empowers them, so long as they're not hurting anyone, I don't mind. I don't like using my knowledge to rub someone's nose in something. I'd rather my knowledge enrich the life of the people I talk to. Life tears down people enough for me not to add to that. So I'd like to build people up, not tear them down. No one really knows the original purpose of marriage because the concept of marriage predates the written word and probably oral history. I remember reading about Roman customs back in the day and there were serious similarities between pagan Roman wedding ceremonies and modern Christian ones. For example, the father "gives away" the bride and the husband may pick up the bride at the end of the ceremony. Today that's more symbolic, but in pre-Christian Roman times, the father literally owned his daughter. She was his property. The ritual which looks like the father giving away his daughter now was a ritualistic way of legal transfer of his daughter, then his property, to the husband, now his property. The only way a Roman woman could be free is if there was no man of the house to take over as Pater Familias, or father of the family. A Roman woman gained her freedom when her husband died. Further, if she remarried, all of her wealth and property would transfer to her new husband and she would abandon almost all of her rights as a free citizen. So many Roman women simply didn't remarry. I'm not sure if monogamy and love is a carefully crafted facade, but a lot of our rituals are paternalistic in nature. At the same time, we've also abandoned some materialistic rituals as well. Down here in the South, when a man wanted to marry a woman, he would be evaluated by the women of the household. Usually this would be grandma, mom and often any other women who were thought to have a good head on their shoulders. That way they could screen men that were seen as unworthy for the potential bride to be. If they nixed him, the couple wouldn't be allowed to marry. Personally though, I feel like monogamy is still a thing primarily because religion tells us that non-monogamy is bad and religion told us its bad primarily because it causes chaos for inheritance. Imagine a group marriage where you have three wives and a co-husband. Who gets what when someone dies is a problem. Wealth might never transfer or be taxed. It also potentially resurrects clan-like family structures which governments specifically go out of their way to stamp out as they are a threat to its power. But it is seriously messy. Germany used to be fractured into a hundred different nations before German unification. That all came down to how inheritance law shook out as land was divided among the sons. I could go on, but I won't because it'll go on forever. I really like dynastic politics and play way too much Crusader Kings 2 as well as being a huge history nerd. I'm not sure if I'll address it or not as I'm not sure if I could make challenging it both relevant to the story and interesting. Ice Phisherman fucked around with this message at 01:23 on Jul 11, 2018 |
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Jul 10, 2018 22:36
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Interested to see how you interplay the positive/negative peace as defined with the positive/negative peace put forward in the Birmingham Jail letter --contrasted with yours maybe as positive/negative justice? Gonna be rather hard to have positive peace and positive justice, which should be a delicious source of tension in the story same as the rest of history. Also there's definitely an aspect of social stability to monogamy outside of pure inheritance. If you got dudes higher up on the food chain hording the wives, especially older guys, such that you further emiserate a group of young horny poor males, you aren't doing your police force any favors to say the least.
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Jul 11, 2018 16:26
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Or that society's women, who, surprise surprise, tend to get a lot of that frustration unfairly directed at them.
Dr Subterfuge fucked around with this message at 17:08 on Jul 11, 2018 |
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Jul 11, 2018 16:55
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CourValant posted:You want to upset a woman with ‘modern’ sensibilities at the office or at a polite social gathering? Tell her that her interpretation of Monogamy and Love is actually a carefully crafted façade, imposed onto her by old men who cared only about the children from her body, and not for a hair on her head. I find some humor at the juxtaposition here. Do something absurdly rude and openly inflammatory, but you only suggest it be done at a 'polite' social gathering.
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Jul 11, 2018 19:01
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Kenji and Krupa - Monday, July 23, 2075 - Morning - Blake Island "I think that dinner sounds great," said Kenji, "Should I dress up?" Krupa laughed and shook her head. "No, it's fine," she said, lightly, "It's about welcoming you to our group and I think we should keep it casual. If you want to wear your uniform or just change into jeans and a t-shirt since it's after school, that's just fine. Come as you are." As stressed as Kenji was, that little knot of worry inside of him loosened just a little at hearing that. Something about Krupa's genuine demeanor was strangely nourishing to his soul. He wet his lips with his tongue and spoke. "I'd like to bring something for you and Joyce if that's okay," said Kenji, quietly, almost shyly, "I have this Chinese restaurant that I enjoy. It's real Cantonese cuisine. I'd like to bring something other than just myself." Krupa beamed at him and that smile of hers did much to help soothe his nerves. "Okay, sure," said Krupa, "Just so you know, Joyce is a vegetarian and the only meat I eat is seafood. Indian food is great if you don't eat meat. We won't mind you eating meat though. Would you like me to order you some meat dishes?" The smile that Kenji felt wasn't forced. Instead it bubbled up from inside of him along with a small laugh. "Well it's a tall order," joked Kenji, "But I think I can go veggie for the space of one meal. I won't say no to seafood though." "Eating seafood is how I keep Joyce from sneaking food off my plate," whispered Krupa, slyly, "That way I can sneak more food off his plate when he's not looking. Fish is the tastiest defense." Kenji laughed and shook his head as Krupa giggled into her hand. "Suddenly I'm worried about my food disappearing," joked Kenji. "Poof!" exclaimed Krupa, "Personally, I blame spirits. They like to eat you know." "You're not kidding," said Kenji, honestly. "Oh," whispered Krupa, "One thing." She beckoned him closer and Kenji felt himself drawn in despite himself. "Joyce doesn't like sweet stuff, so if you like desserts I won't feel as bad about eating one on my own," she whispered, conspiratorially. Kenji thought about it and smiled as he thought of what to bring as they both leaned back. "Have you ever had a moon cake?" he asked. Krupa shook her head. "Okay, I'll bring a veggie dish and some ice cream moon cakes," said Kenji, "They're great. An ice cream moon cake is a little smaller than your fist and layered. So you have a ball of orange or mango sherbert in the center, some other sort of ice cream around that, biscuit crumbles on the bottom so it doesn't fall apart and hard chocolate around it. It's getting into autumn and they're a sort of tradition for Chinese people. I was raised East Asian...Ish. So I got a mishmash of holidays. When I had extra money when I was growing up I'd buy a few of the ice cream ones since the normal moon cakes could be pricey. I'll spring for some nice ones." Mouth slightly open, Krupa closed it and made an exaggerated wiping motion with the back of her hand. "Checking to see if I was drooling," she teased, "I'm sold." "Even better, I won't label them and I'll choose different ones. So it'll be like a box of sampler chocolates," said Kenji, slyly, "How does black forest chocolate sound?" Krupa threw up her hands in mock surrender. "I'm already defeated!" she exclaimed, as she threw up her hands, "Show mercy! I surrender! Seriously, you're going to make me fat. I'll be swimming for days to burn it all off. Bring something for Joyce too, okay? He doesn't show it around other people, but he pouts if he gets left out." "I got you. He doesn't like sweets, maybe spicy?" asked Kenji. She tapped her nose, knowingly. "I'll grab a sampler of some spicy veggie dishes then," said Kenji, thoughtfully. "This sounds wonderful," said Krupa, happily, "I'm so glad that I asked. We could order together at the terminal in the lunch room. The delivery charges are pretty high since someone has to come by boat just to deliver food. Especially right now since the harbor...You know." She frowned slightly and made a vague gesture in the general direction of the harbor that was currently clogged with boats. Kenji froze as he realized he nearly committed to several hundred nuyen worth of delivery charges. The conversation with Krupa had been so enjoyable that he'd forgotten to be calculating. Aware of her reputation, Kenji knew she wasn't some smooth social operator. Instead her pleasant and genuine demeanor blew past his social armor which was geared towards cynical attacks. As a person who was raised around criminals he could smell a scheme from a mile away, but Kenji found himself vulnerable to genuinely kind people. They made him feel good about himself and little in his life had prepared him for that. There was a vague worry in his gut about Olisha seeing them together in the lunch room, but there was nothing to do about that now. "That sounds fine," said Kenji, "I have to meet Julian during lunch, but afterward I'll come and find you. I don't want to be late for my next class though. See you at lunch?" "See you at lunch," said Krupa, cheerily, "Welcome to the club." "Thanks," said Kenji, happily, Kenji and Mr. Peters - Monday, July 23, 2075 - Late morning - Blake Island The smell of the classroom was strong. Earth, salt, wood both exotic and not and a mix of hard to place spices filled his senses. There were work stations filled with rows of neatly arranged tools and machines that ranged from high tech to primitive with a hard bias towards the primitive. Kenji had seen the inside of machine shops before. The ACHE had a few cottage industries for making guns and bullets from scrap parts and garbage. Some of them were pretty sophisticated too, so the mix of the high tech and primitive was interesting, but nothing he hadn't seen before. The class had a dozen students, most of them unfamiliar to Kenji though unlike a typical machine shop class, the work was split almost evenly between men and women. Instead of desks, they all sat at square tables meant for four people and so all of them turned in their chairs to see their teacher. There stood Mr. Peters, an older but not quite yet old dark skinned human man with light brown eyes. His head was shaved, his features thin and stark, and his body was so thin to be almost birdlike. He wore tan heavy overalls that covered most of his body with heavy, black boots and a red and white flannel shirt that made him look far bigger than he already was, and his thin neck and head inside of his heavy clothing made him look vaguely like a turtle as well. Bird turtle. "It's a brand new school year and I'm so very excited to see so many new faces," said Mr. Peters, happily. Kenji hadn't interacted with Mr. Peters at all last year, so his voice took him by surprise. The normally reclusive, bony teacher in the heavy clothing had one of the calmest, most soothing voices he'd ever heard. "Now, since we're a day behind, I won't waste any time," he continued, "Students who had me last year. You've already taken my safety course and you know my policies on safety. Since you've been invited back you are trusted enough to work with a measure of independence. I won't keep you. Feel free to work on your projects so long as they don't disturb us." Half of the dozen students stood up and went to the work stations. Just as asked, they began to work or talk quietly among themselves. This left Kenji and five others. "If you're wondering about that, I mix my sophomore, junior and senior classes together. Freshman are not allowed to take this class as they haven't developed their magic to the point to safely attempt enchanting," said Mr. Peters, "Trusted older students, meaning everyone who just left, help the younger students and I help everyone. My enchanting and alchemy classes tend to be small. I'm under no illusion that creating magical items is as flashy as a spell or a summoned spirit. However, each and every tool will allow you to focus magic in a way that is far harder to achieve with raw strength or even skill. These tools can be specialized or all purpose, but in life, it's far easier to drive a nail with a hammer rather than a rock. We make the right tools for the right purposes. Unlike a hammer, which can be used by anyone, each tool made in this class, called a focus, is made for one person and one person only. No one else can use it once its bonded to the awakened using it without breaking that magical bond." Mr. Peters began to slowly pace before the six students as he kept his eyes on them. His gait was graceful, and again, Kenji was reminded of a bird as he moved. Not the hopping shuffles of a crow or a pigeon, but something long legged like some of the Herons he'd seen that strode up and down the shore of the island. "In this class," he continued, "We learn to safely design, construct and disassemble magical focuses. Safety is priority number one in this class and we'll be spending a two week course learning how to safely use these tools. It is also highly suggested that you either have some crafting skills or to take an art class to learn some. Please raise your hand if you have any crafting skills or plan to take an art class this semester." Four of the six students raised their hands, Kenji included. This left a boy and a girl with their hands down. Mr. Peters looked down at his commlink and then back up again. Kenji looked at them, but someone caught his eye. It was Skylar. The young, blonde elf briefly flicked her eyes towards Kenji and then back. Kenji remembered her. She'd been one of Julie's bullies last semester. She'd stopped before Minuet lost all sense and reason and pulled a gun on his friends, but Skylar had abused Julie, someone that Kenji cared deeply about. He felt something stir inside of him, something wary and protective that told him to be on guard. Quickly, he identified it as Dog's influence. He closed his eyes, asked himself why he was feeling that way and ran through the mental exercises that Julian taught him in order to calm himself down. Ten seconds passed and that feeling subsided, but didn't go away entirely. Sklyar must have said something, because Mr. Peters answered a question he hadn't heard. "That's correct, thank you, Skylar" said Mr. Peters, "Items you craft yourself that you plan to make magical are called telesma. I can't provide you with any of them. They need to be personal. You can purchase, be gifted or even find the sorts of items to make telesma, but working them with your own hands makes that object more receptive to your magic. As you work with it, you become familiar with it. With that familiarity comes an easier time empowering it. The more personal your telesma the more powerful it can be. It's a way of empowering an enchanted item without having to use more magic. Basically, the more personal an object, the more efficient it can be and the more magic you can stuff inside of it. We'll talk about this more near the end of the safety class." Skylar looked briefly at Kenji again, but Kenji looked away from her and back towards Mr. Peters. A young man's hand shot up and he began to talk without being called on. "Can you show us how to make magic wands that can cast spells and stuff?" asked the young man, excitedly. Mr. Peters almost suppressed a sigh. He briefly looked down at his commlink and turned to address the young man. "I can," said Mr. Peters, placidly, "Tell me, Ronald, what kind of spell did you have in mind?" "How about illusions? Can you make a wand of illusions like in Skralgar the Barbarian?" he asked. Mr. Peters looked puzzled. Skylar answered the unasked question. "It's a new movie that's out right now," she said, her tone disdainful, "The wizard uses wands from a big belt." "I see," said Mr. Peters, "Technically I could make one. Storing spells for a different time is more along the lines of alchemy which I also teach. However, I suppose you'd want to use it more than once. Perhaps forever. Technically, these sorts of items do exist. I myself have seen a carved staff that can shoot out bolts of lightning without having to be recharged. They tend to be rare and therefore priceless, but there is another reason why people don't use them. Does anyone know why?" Kenji didn't answer with his words. Instead he tapped his commlink, a smartwatch, and angled it upwards. A simple and hazy holographic image, his smartwatch's home screen, flickered to life in the air. People looked up and there were a few laughs and giggles from the sophomores. He turned it off since using the projection function for too long would quickly drain the battery. Mr. Peters nodded in approval and looked back down at his commlink again. Ronald's cheeks flushed from embarrassment. "Right. Thank you for demonstrating, Kenji," said Mr. Peters, "Single use alchemical items can be used by anyone and those normally run out in a few hours. This is currently the only way for anyone to use magical items, even someone without any magic of their own. However, the end results of almost all spells can be duplicated with the correct technology. For example, a trideo screen can create a three dimensional illusion, a power line runs electricity from here to there and you can use an electronic device to see, hear and talk to someone very far away. There are spells that are unlikely to be duplicated and the ones that can be duplicated are often impractical to do quickly or perhaps their devices are bulky and impractical to take with you, or they're just not as good as magic. Simply put, in most cases you simply won't need a wand of illusions. In fact, with very few exceptions, if you can't cast spells you can't use a wand of illusions. Where the state of magical crafting is right now is that almost all wands as you might call them need to be charged and it is incredibly taxing. It's simpler to use a trideo screen." Ronald looked glum at hearing the news that he couldn't be the wizard in his new favorite movie. "What we can do is create focuses. These can make spells more powerful, so simple to sustain that you don't need to concentrate, summoning, binding and banishing spirits can be made easier. In fact if you want to empower all of your spells and summonings at once, you can, though the items you need to make such a device are personal, rare or both. Those are for those among us who cast spells and summon spirits. If you're an adept, those among us with magic that normally enhance the body or mind, you can turn on and off powers that you may find useful, but might not need to have on all of the time. These are called ki focuses. For our midterm we'll be creating an enchanting focus to help with the creation of your final project, one of the focuses that I just mentioned of your choice which you will create under supervision. Now, if we don't have any other questions, back to safety." Mr. Peters looked at the students. None of them talked, so he continued. "Safety in this class is important," he began, and his voice grew serious, "You might think of this as a sort of shop class. The comparison to a shop class is the closest comparison that I can make. If you're not careful, you could injure yourself. There are plenty of ways in this class for the unwary to cut themselves with an improperly used tool, lose a finger, a hand or an eye. We don't have the luxury of replacing any of these with cybernetics or bioware without a cost. Your essence, the connection to your soul which your magic comes from, can be damaged if you replace a catastrophic injury with technology. If the cut is clean, we can easily reattach a finger at a hospital. Otherwise you'll have the choice of living with that damage to your body or damaging your essence to repair your body. Luckily, I haven't had an injury that has damaged someone in this manner in over five years. That's because people who don't take my class seriously are told to leave for their own safety and the safety of others. However, and this is important, improperly handled magic while creating a focus can directly damage your essence far more than replacing a hand or an eye could ever do. We do have spirits on hand which can make these magical catastrophic failures nearly impossible. I say nearly, because if you try to injure yourself on purpose it is possible." Mr. Peters cleared his throat and his normally placid tone returned, though Kenji saw a few nervous looks around the room. "However, those who complete my class will most likely find the work rewarding," he said, "Those who complete their final exam will earn a certification as an apprentice enchanter which means that you will be able to work under another enchanter who will inspect your work and either approve or disapprove it. Once you have proven yourself as reliable you will be promoted to journeyman and you will be allowed to work largely on your own with limited supervision. Then will come a final review before a group of your peers and if they approve then you can become a member in good standing of the United Talismongers Association if you so choose, or you will be allowed to remain independent. I'll say this. If you create a focus for someone, only you can augment and repair that focus. No one else can do it and nothing suggests that is going to change. This means that people will come back to you over and over again so long as they have it for upgrades and repair. You customers will be loyal and an established talismonger will not need to seek them out. They will find you and you will decide if they are worthy to be your client or not. I know that many of you come from wealth and you may scoff at this kind of labor, but the world is full of things that money can't buy. We collect those things. Talismongers are the beating heart of the magical community. We create magical focuses, sell reagents and often sit on great swaths of magical lore. This is the first step in that profession." Then with a small flourish, Mr. Peters gestured towards the door. "However, I realize that this life is not for everyone. It is dangerous for the unprepared, requires hard work, focus and time. This is not a mere class. It's not even to prepare you for a job. Being a talismonger is a lifestyle that requires commitment. If you feel like this lifestyle does not appeal to you, there are open slots in other classes and I will make sure that next semester you will get the first pick of your favorite class if it is full this semester. I only want the committed to be here. There is very little point in taking one class. Those who wish to drop my class may enjoy a walk outside, could go to the library or perhaps head home for a quick nap. I won't penalize you." There was a short pause before students began to leave. None of the older students did, though they did watch who departed. Of the six incoming sophomore students for the semester, only Kenji and Skylar stayed. Kenji was on the fence. The danger didn't thrill him, as his artistic specialty, tattoos, rarely ended up slicing off someone's hand. If Mr. Peters was being honest about the position in the community that a talismonger occupied, he was very interested. At least if the money and influence was right. "I have questions," said Kenji. Mr. Peters sat down at the edge of the table and nodded to Kenji. "Do you teach tattooing?" asked Kenji. Mr. Peters arched an eyebrow. Skylar scoffed in disgust. A sidelong glance in her direction from Kenji made her fold her arms and look away. "The art of it? No," said Mr. Peters, "The magical portion, yes. They're mostly used in ki focuses. I will say up front that ki tattoos don't have the best reputation. People have long softened their views on tattoos. I even have a few of my own, though they're normal tattoos. However, there are criminal organizations that prize magical tattooing. East Asian influences have bled over into the criminal community at large so you'll see heavy amounts of tattooing on Hispanic, Russian, biker and racial supremacist gangs for instance. Their talismongers are mostly in-house and almost always uncertified and therefore illegal. There are many people who would judge you for that. That said, I've had several students who've made a career of magical tattooing. They enjoy the lifestyle. Do you enjoy that lifestyle, Kenji?" Kenji shrugged in response. "I did it over the summer as a hobby. It turns out that I'm good at it," he said, honestly, "I don't really know about the lifestyle." "Then you'll figure it out pretty quickly. Did you practice in the flesh or in a simulation?" asked Mr. Peters. Kenji's cheeks colored and he cleared his throat. "Matrix sim," he said, "I haven't done skin yet." "You'll need to fix that," said Mr. Peters, with a small chuckle, "I taught a student who did magical tattooing a few years ago. He was Samoan. He did good work. He said that there was no substitute for working with real skin and I believed him. Now, don't tell me that you learned only using a tattoo gun." "Most of it," said Kenji, "But I did some irezumi as well. It's sort of...Japanese tattooing. Traditional. It was harder to use though." Mr. Peters nodded and rubbed as his jaw with bony fingers. "Good. The simpler the tool the better," said Mr. Peters, "You can create a magical tattoo with a tattoo gun, but its too processed. You'll have a hard time with it. You'll have the easiest time with wood, stone and bone tools. The tattoo comb my student used was made with wood, boar's tooth and a turtle shell. If you decide to stay with me we'll find you the right tools. That said, I have good news, bad news and expectations if you wish to stay with me." Kenji opened his hands in a welcoming gesture before he clapped them together. "Lay it on me," he said. Mr. Peters continued to stroke his chin as he nodded. "The good news is that if you find a tattoo that is personal enough to the person who wants to wear it, you can have an easier time with working the magic," said Mr. Peters, "Someone won't have to use a personal object in its creation. Tattoos are symbolic. If that symbol is important to them then that helps them fuel the magic. The bad news, besides the reputation I mentioned, is space. There's only so much space on someone's body for tattoos. A small ki focus might not take up much space. A power focus, which would help a shaman fuel all of their magic, would probably take up their entire back. The better you are the less space you'll take up, but that takes time and practice. Lastly, you'll have a hard time tattooing yourself, so I'll expect you to learn the basics of how to create items. Specialization is fine, but if you ever want to create anything for yourself, they'll need to be items. However, as a potential magical tattooist, I have an important expectation of you." Mr. Peters leaned forwards and downwards, so close that Kenji could smell the coffee on his breath. "I will not be training the next in house talismonger for a gang. Not ever," said Mr. Peters, seriously, "They aggressively recruit if your tradition matches theirs." Mr. Peters leaned back as Kenji nodded slowly. "I'm glad you understand. Also, try to keep your tattoos tasteful," said Mr. Peters, with a small smile, "You're representing the magical community. One day you'll be picky with your clients. Don't accept commissions for trashy tattoos. People will know you by your work and judge you accordingly. Don't be the guy who makes a bleeding heart covered in barbed wire wrapped in flames as a magical tattoo. You'll be happy that you didn't in the long run." Skylar suppressed a giggle from behind her fist. Kenji suppress a grimace. "I'm not making fun of you," said Mr. Peters, "I'm just repeating the lessons that my last student learned. That said, I'm perfectly willing to teach you. Head out, go take the rest of the class and think if this is right for you." Still writing. No CYOA yet. Ice Phisherman fucked around with this message at 05:11 on Jul 15, 2018 |
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Jul 14, 2018 22:07
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So I fixed the last two updates (the ones before this one) and I'm still making tweaks. I pulled my voice out of the narrator's voice and tried to go more neutral. Thanks to those who pointed that out. Also, moon cakes, yo. If you've never had one you should try and find one. They're an experience. I will say that not everyone likes them, but it's easier to like the ice cream ones. It's a little early for moon cakes as in the story it's about a month and a half to the Chinese New Year, but I figure it's never too early to sell ice cream. Ice Phisherman fucked around with this message at 22:34 on Jul 14, 2018 |
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Jul 14, 2018 22:29
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Terrific update as usual IP! However I did spot a couple of mistakes, highlighted below. Ice Phisherman posted:Otherwise you'll have the choice of living with a scar are damaging your essence. Either you meant "or", or you're missing word(s). quote:We create
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Jul 14, 2018 23:27
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Groetgaffel posted:Terrific update as usual IP! Got it. Thank you. I'm going to see if I can get another update out today. And we'll see if Kenji wants to take this path as a Talismonger or not as it is a long term goal. However, once he gets the skills down he'll be able to start making money and connections within the magical community before year one is out. It's a solid path to either going legit, nestling deep into the criminal magical community or going "legit-ish" which is pretty common for independent talismongers. So talismongers are crafters and/or librarians for magical lore with the caveat that access to their libraries are rarely free. I'll say up front that Kenji's logic is low and to do the librarian part of being a talismonger he'd need lots of ranks in arcana. However, I'll say that it's pretty darn common for the crafters to disappear for a while into their work. While creating focuses, they have to go into a magical lodge and stay there for days while doing their work without leaving or the focus will fail which means time, money and karma all get wasted. Every time you want to create a focus you need double its level. So to create a simple level one focus, you just need one hit because one times one is one. They're super easy to make. If you want to get a super neat level 6 focus, you need 36 hits and each time I roll is a day spent. So remember to bring food and install a bathroom in the lodge. So if Kenji got deep into creation, he'd simply disappear from the world for a while while doing a job. So the school has a ton of spells that they allow the students to learn for free (its baked into the education cost) and can sell students reagents at cost. Spell formulas usually cost money. You're talking thousands per spell which I've simply waived as the school just has a lot of spells. A talismonger would also pick up books that would be filled with magical lore. Not spells, but the really esoteric stuff. Finally, repeat customers are common. Getting customers in the first place is hard because they tend to be loyal to one person in particular as they are the ones who have to fix up or upgrade gear that they made, but once Kenji gets going, he'll start making connections within the magical community. So while he's retired from Shadowrunning, he's still a fixer. Jumping from fixer to talismonger is not a long jump, but a short hop. Talismongers are fixers, but for the magical community, and they can choose whether they want to be legal, illegal or "legalish". Here's the paths for Kenji if we decide for him to go the talismonger route: 1. Kenji partners with someone someone established who's smart, but he'd be a junior partner in that case. Before you thumb your nose at the idea, Kenji doesn't know the ins and outs of the business and he has few magical connections beyond Blake Island. 2. He could go corporate. Lots of talismongers are corporate and one of the big corps would happily snap him up. He'd even have plenty of leverage while working at a corporation. If he left, he'd most likely take his clients with him...If he could get around the non-compete clause which I imagine would be standard. 3. He could attempt to strike out on his own. This would be expensive. He'd need lots of start up capital to settle into a good place and be willing to eat at least a year of being in the red. Luckily, he's still a student and so this doesn't immediately matter. This is a really long term goal. Narratively, Kenji will be able to make money and connections while he's on Blake Island and beyond as he'll be forever hungry for new clientele. Him being a Dog shaman is probably a big boost as well. There's a sort of feeling like a Dog shaman is more trustworthy even though that's only with their pack. In the short term, Kenji will be able to make focuses for people at a reduced price and either sell them or even give them away/sell at cost if it's to his friends (if he wants). He'll also be able to create better focuses as he taps into the magical community for goods which would normally be unavailable to him. I'm not sure about the prices though. The creators for Shadowrun really didn't think a lot of their crafting skills through so I don't think that there are prices for how much any of this costs before labor. So I'll think on that. We won't be voting immediately on what Kenji will be doing. We'll do that in a few updates as Kenji mulls it over. I will say that this is a good fit for his character if he can find the right partner, but if you don't want it that's just fine. Ice Phisherman fucked around with this message at 00:40 on Jul 15, 2018 |
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Jul 15, 2018 00:34
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Talismongers make some of the best magical fixers around. Independent talismongers, the kind that cater to Shadowrunners, usually have a massive breadth of clientele and when a Johnson or other fixer is putting a team together, they almost always ask a talismonger for magemuscle to hire. So Kenji going down the talismonger route makes a lot of sense to me, especially as a ki tattooist. He'll still have the know how to make level one fetishes, at least, which brings in the young mages. And indy adepts will flock to him.
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Jul 15, 2018 06:13
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Going along the legal-ish path seems like it fits best with Kenji. I won't dismiss the idea of having a mentor out of hand, and I don't think Kenji would either, as it potentially does have some benefits. I think Kenji would first explore what kind of mentor he might be able to score before he'd make the decision to strike out alone.
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Jul 16, 2018 01:42
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Yeah, striking out alone from day 1 without any appropriate contacts feels like a bad plan. Better to find a fitting mentor to learn from for the early stages of his career. He can always go independent later on when he's more established.
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Jul 16, 2018 07:55
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Kenji - Monday, July 23, 2075 - Late morning - Blake Island Kenji decided to go back to his cabin to grab a nap. The nap didn't happen as he was too wound up from his nerves. He felt better than at the end of his class with Julian, but he still didn't feel good. He tossed and turned in his bed for about fifteen minutes before he decided that he wasn't going get that nap. He'd jump into a simulation instead. He grabbed his hat with the net of electrodes inside, place it on his head, set the right program for the commlink turned on the trodes. An instant later he was in the full virtual reality simulation of a tattoo parlor. A large man in blue jeans with pale skin had his back exposed as he laid on a tattooists table. Kenji's half finished tattoo was upon him. The outline of a bird with extended wings could be seen and he'd done some coloring. It had turned out better than he'd hoped, so he kept working on it. The man breathed lightly and if ran across a sensitive area on the back he'd move and grunt, but otherwise he didn't respond. With a hand command, Kenji pulled down a drop down menu from mid air, saved his worked and chose new tools. These were the irezumi tattooing tools. While there was an option for a the older tools: A tattoo chisel and gouge, he selected the tattoo needle as it would probably hurt a lot less and be easier to work with. The needle was attached to a long, black, wooden handle with a place to hold and change needles near the end, painted white. For his other implements, he also chose black gloves, a white medical mask to keep from sneezing on his subject even though this was VR, black ink in a glass jar and twos cloths, one to wipe away excess ink and one to wipe away blood. Finally, he disinfected his hands from a nearby pump. He couldn't spread infection in VR, but it was good to get in the habit. Not wanting to work with a large tattoo, he selected a new model, a smaller man who sat in a chair instead of lying down on a the long, padded table. Then he pushed the pain tolerance of his subject upwards. He took a few minutes to watch help tutorials on what to do to refresh his memory as he hadn't worked with these tools in months. He chose one of his own pieces of artwork that he'd sketched, a dog walking along a trail, something he'd seen in his dreams. He printed the outline on a piece of paper, the outline still wet from ink and wrapped it around the man's arm. After a few seconds it came away and was left with a trace. Some artists would freehand their work. Kenji wasn't so confident. Not yet at least. Just as the tutorial had showed him, he steadied the tool against his thumb as he placed his hand on the man's arm and began to slowly jab the ink into his skin. An hour later his alarm went off. This had taken far longer than with his tattoo gun and he felt like his arm should be sore by now, but it was VR. You didn't get physical fatigue and Mr. Peters' words about needing a real person to practice on suddenly made more sense. His hunger hit him all at once, like it does for people fully engrossed in their work. Headway had been made with dog on the trail tattoo, but he hadn't even made half a quarter of the progress that he could've made with the tattoo gun. Still, he was satisfied. Though he knew he didn't need to, he wiped down the tattoo, cleaned his tools, put away his ink, stripped off his gloves, washed his hands and only then did he pull himself out of the program. He exited the simulation and felt warm and toasty underneath the covers of his bed, feeling much better than he had an hour before. Kenji, Fuzzy, Sasha and Julian - Monday, July 23, 2075 - Noon - Blake Island Students emerged from their classrooms and walked towards the lunchroom, Kenji included. The day was overcast, but it wasn't raining, so people split between eating lunch inside and eating on the wooden benches outside. He quickly ducked in, grabbed a pack of soy fries, pumped a squirt of ketchup over them and nearly left. However, he realized that if he felt hungry, Fuzzy and Sasha might be hungry too and they were all scheduled to go and talk to Julian. Unsure of what they'd want, he grabbed two more packs of fries and walked out. He waved to a few groups of people, ketchup fries and two plain clutched clumsily in one hand, but he didn't stay to chat. He didn't see Krupa, Joyce or Olisha, but it was still early enough that people were showing up. He strode out of the lunchroom, back into the open air and ducked inside of the school where the teachers' offices were. When he knocked, he got a response. "Come in," said Julian, voice muffled by the door. Kenji opened it to find Fuzzy and Sasha sitting next to one another. Julian sat behind his desk and behind him was the inspirational poster with a kitten hanging from a branch. A steaming mug of what smelled like coffee filled the room with its aroma. "Hello Kenji," said Julian, "Take a seat." Kenji nodded and gestured with his free hand to the packs of soy fries. "I brought snacks in case this went long. Is anyone hungry?" asked Kenji. "Thank you, no," said Sasha, "I'll get something after we're done." "Sure," said Fuzzy. She reached out and grabbed one of the packs. To Kenji's chagrin, it was the one with ketchup. She immediately began to munch on them. "Thanks Kenji," said Fuzzy. Sasha whispered a few words to Fuzzy and Fuzzy blushed, offered the ketchup fries back to Kenji, but he waved them off. "No problem. Julian?" asked Kenji. "Hmm?" responded Julian. "Hungry?" asked Kenji, "I brought snacks." In answer to his question, Julian lifted up his plain, black coffee mug and took a sip. "Thank you, but no. I'll have something later," he said, "Please sit." Kenji took a seat and ate a few fries from one of his two remaining packs. For a few seconds, Julian said nothing. Instead of speaking, he ran a hand through his long, blond hair and sighed. His gaze drifted away from them, and without looking at them, he began to speak. "When I started the pilot program to take in talented, low income students, I didn't really know what I was getting into," he said, quietly, "I have fostered three and now four young adults, that means you three and Julie. I thought about all of the good I could be doing. I'd pluck...Well...No offense, but I plucked three high risk young people out of awful environments. The way that I sold it to the school was that their talent would challenge the student body to do better and therefore produce better results. I've had a year to evaluate myself and my actions. I'd say that part was a success. Grades are up, participation is up, all that stuff." An awkward pause followed as Julian drank from his mug, eyes still averted. "After some soul searching, I've come to the realization that beyond getting you here, I've had very little to do with that academic success. Taking credit for your triumphs feels wrong. Even worse, it feels wrong because I've been failing each and every one of you," said Julian, quietly, "Some more than others. You see, I thought that being a teacher might prepare me to be a guardian. Maybe even a kind of parent, though I'm not trying to take anyone's place." Sasha breathed in sharply in response. Fuzzy, who'd never stopped eating, stopped now. She put her fries in her lap and reached out to put a hand on Sasha's own. With a grimace, Julian looked at Sasha and nodded to her. "Sorry, Sasha," said Julian, "I'm not trying to touch any sore spots." "It's fine," whispered Sasha. Head bowed, Sasha didn't make eye contact with him. Julian looked away again. The food was forgotten as Kenji and Fuzzy stared at Julian. "As a teacher," continued Julian, "I was trained to keep a professional amount distance from my students. Each teacher eventually figures out what works for them, but I've been distant for so long that I've been failing you. You see, when I was growing up, my own parents, especially my father, thought that providing was their most important job to the exclusion of nearly everything else. What happened to them was called wage slavery today. Long hours, low pay, debt spiral. It's pretty common. I was raised poor and while I had what I needed in terms of having a roof over my head, food in my belly, all that stuff, I missed a sense of stability from their absence. No one was around to guide me. So I acted out, I got in trouble and I think a lot of that had to do with being left alone. In retrospect, I think I've fallen into the same pattern. All of you have a roof over your heads, food in your bellies, a first class education, lots of independence and a largely absent guardian. I work long hours as a teacher, I'm there if you ask for help, I tried pretty hard early on to be a mentor, but that mostly stopped once I met with failure." Julian closed his eyes, turned his head towards Fuzzy and bowed it before her. "I tried with you, Fuzzy and I think that I truly hurt and failed you. So much so that I drove you away when I was trying to protect you," he said, quietly, "I've never been a parent. I thought that being a teacher would help me be a parent, but I've come to the conclusion that many teachers do. Teachers aren't parents. If the foster care system wasn't cut to the bone then someone from the government would have seen you by now and rightfully given me an earful at the very least. The fact that I've been allowed as a single person to foster four young people with no oversight shows just how bad it is right now. What they care about is making sure that the worst cases are taken care of because they don't have the resources to help everyone. They see young people that are being provided for and count that as a blessing. It's a sign of the times. Not to exclude you, Sasha, but you weren't part of the original program. You, Fuzzy and you, Kenji and Julie as well have turned into wonderful people despite my neglect. So..." Julian wet his lips and opened his eyes again as he finally looked at his students. "That neglect has caught up with one of you," said Julian, sadly, "Julie should have been seeing a counselor at the very least from day one. The way she was treated from the moment that she turned into an ork, to the way that her magic was revealed, to her stay in prison made for adults was horrific. I was just another person in a line of people that failed her. With the exception of Kenji, none of you have been getting any counseling for what you have gone through in your lives. Maybe you don't see it is bad. Maybe you saw it as normal. Maybe you can live with it, but I let Julie down. It was Mrs. Maureen that discovered Julie's trauma. I'd underestimated it. Lone Star ran the prison she went to and all of her records came back...Well, not spotless, but not out of the ordinary. Those records said that she'd been seeing a counselor and had they'd ended their sessions. That Julie had more or less come to a healthy resolution. When I asked yesterday, Julie told me that she'd seen a counselor once for a few minutes and never again. I was so stupid." Julian sighed and rubbed his face with his hand. It was Kenji that spoke up. "So you're telling me," began Kenji, slowly and incredulously, "That you believed Lone Star, who runs a private prison, spent money on Julie to help her mental health? And that you believed it?" With a sour smile, Julian shook his head. "No, if I'd paid attention I would've known better," he said, "It's not that I believed them. It's that I'm just one person and things slip past me. I was just looking for obvious red flags. If you didn't notice, all of this was pretty thrown together at the last minute. You were each supposed to have your own foster family, but that system has been teetering on the edge of collapse for a long time. Further, it's not meant to handle young people with magic. People with magic, especially powerful magic, have no accommodations within the foster system. Seeing as Diego, your adopted father, have no legal identity, nor do yours, Kenji, and since Julie's remaining family abandoned her, that meant that I had the option of dropping you into a system to fend for yourselves when you weren't here with no oversight, or taking you on myself. I decided on the latter as the better of the two choices." Fuzzy's hand, still on Sasha's, fidgeted nervously. Sasha took Fuzzy's hand in her own. "I didn't think that any of this was going to happen. It was just a dream of mine. Then it did. I got funds, I got the go ahead and it was just me sorting through hundreds of names of young people just like you. Each of them with their own story, their own troubles and just enough power to get in on merit. The ones I found, you two and Julie, were people I thought that I could help. There were easy choices. People with spotless records who would fit in easily. People who were poor, but would have prospects in a normal state run school. That's not what I wanted. I wanted to help people. I had to reject so many without even talking to them. Then I held dozens of interviews in the span of a week. After that I made my choices and here you are. I remember reading Julie's story, talking to her in prison and knowing in my heart that if I left her there, she might never get out. That was after talking to you two and making my decision, but I just couldn't leave her there. So I found the donors to make up the shortfall and stretched the money for two students into three. I felt so good about myself and was so busy that I missed what should've been obvious. She wasn't okay. No one had counseled her. I thought that with a roof over her head, a better environment than prison, food in her belly and a good education that she could make something of herself. Then she did, but..." Julian took in a deep, shuddering breath. "...But her being successful doesn't mean she was well," said Julian, darkly, "She's a tough young woman, but she has her limits. Yesterday she asked me to go see a counselor for an evaluation after Mrs. Maureen and Chip convinced her to seek help. I stayed up through the night in the lobby of a psychiatric ward knowing that I'd failed her before she came out to tell me that she needed to stay. Julie..." "Julie is in a psych ward?" blurted out Kenji. Julian winced and slowly nodded. "Is she okay?" asked Sasha, quietly. "What's a psych ward?" asked Fuzzy. Hands lifted, Julian quieted the teens down. It didn't happen immediately, but he had answers and they didn't. "First, yes, Julie is in a psychiatric ward," said Julian, "Second, yes, she is safe and in the hands of professionals. Third, a psychiatric ward is where people with emotional trauma go to seek help. Like a hospital for the mind." Fuzzy looked dubious at the prospect of a mind hospital, but stayed silent. Kenji crossed his arms and stared hard at Julian. "So what are you getting at?" asked Kenji, irritably. "What I'm getting at is that she's safe, she's getting help and it's no thanks to me," explained Julian, "I repeatedly screwed up and though there were reasons that I could use as excuses, I don't want to excuse myself. I'm owning my failure. Kids...No one in authority is watching me. The government doesn't have the funds to send anyone even though they're supposed to. The foster care system isn't built to handle people like you, so it was either take you on myself or leave you at the mercy of a failing system. I've gotten some flack from the other teachers here and there, but they're not over me and until recently they weren't aware of the extent of how badly I'd failed. At a normal school there would be administrators to keep me in line, but that's not how this place works. In these sorts of cases, it's not just one failure that causes a problem. It's been my repeated failure that has been harming all of you and for that I'm truly sorry. Words can't express how sorry I am." More to come after a break.
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Jul 16, 2018 19:28
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Kenji, Fuzzy, Sasha and Julian - Monday, July 23, 2075 - Noon - Blake Island "I don't understand," said Fuzzy, glumly. "What part don't you understand, Fuzzy?" asked Julian, tiredly. Fuzzy paused. Her mouth made a thin line as she thought. "Almost all of it," she responded, sadly, "I don't know what's going on. You're talking about stuff that I don't understand. You said that Julie got hurt and it's your fault?" "Yeah," said Julian, "I missed what should be obvious to me. She should have been in therapy. All four of you, including Julie, should be in therapy." Kenji was about to open his mouth, but that gave him pause. He absolutely did not want someone analyzing him for any reason. It was in that moment of indecision, caught between speaking up for Julie and thinking of how to help himself that someone else spoke up. "You didn't fail me," whispered Sasha. With a turn of Sasha's head, she looked from Fuzzy to Kenji, a look of shame upon her face. "I'm not trying to excuse what happened with Julie, but you didn't fail me," said Sasha, "You helped me find a safe place to stay when I had nowhere to go. I was allowed to come back even though I'm pretty sure that would cause problems for you and the school. You took me in when..." She licked her lips and squeezed her eyes tightly. "You took in when no one else would or could," said Sasha, and her voice broke, "Outside of this room, I can count on one hand the number of people who didn't abandon me. My parents are in jail. My corporation cast me out even though I didn't do anything. My father's friends were all fired and I'm afraid to reach out. My grandparents are okay, at least the last time I checked, but I'm afraid to reach out to them too because they might lose everything since Ares controls their pension. My dad is a good person. He couldn't have...He'd never..." Fat tears slid down Sasha's cheeks. A curtain of dark hair draped in front of Sasha's face as she hung her head. "He couldn't..." she sobbed. Sasha's hand slipped from Fuzzy's own. She buried her face in her hands and began to weep. In an instant, Fuzzy was there, hugging and consoling her. Kenji needed no prodding from Dog to go to his friend, though he felt deep satisfaction that was not his own. He may not have been the best at understanding himself, but he valued his friends more than life itself. He joined in the hug as Sasha broke down crying. For a time, she was Fuzzy's entire world and so neither Fuzzy nor Sasha noticed the fourth person in the room. Kenji did though. Eyes averted, looking perhaps the most miserable that Kenji had ever seen him, sat Julian behind his desk. The picture of the kitten hanging from a limb framed him, the words "Hang in there" were blocked in part by his body. Kenji weighed a decision as he looked at the man who was his teacher and guardian. CYOA Time So. We're going to decide on what happens with Julian. Julian feels awful because he feels like he's neglected his wards: Fuzzy, Kenji and especially Julie. He's basically had no oversight because the foster system is hosed and Blake Island has no principals, just some admin staff. It's a place entirely run by teachers. Julian got the money, threw together them getting into school and with almost no oversight. That's the reason it's been so slapdash. Why there's been so very little in terms of plans. For good or for ill, the only person who has really been handling them has been Julian. 1. It's group hug time. Kenji and Fuzzy both critted on their composure tests. Fuzzy automatically succeeded on an etiquette test to help out Sasha and Kenji critted again on etiquette, so Sasha is in good hands. So while Sasha falls apart, they're there for her. Fuzzy is 100% focused on Sasha, but Kenji is aware enough to know that Julian is excluding himself because he feels unworthy. This question is about emotional distance. Does Kenji want Julian to be closer to him or does he want to maintain distance? Both Kenji and Julian will check with Fuzzy first as Fuzzy has a complicated history with him, but Fuzzy will say yes. This is Kenji's choice. Does Kenji want Julian to stay away? Or is he capable of forgiving Julian? 2. Out of everyone here, who is in Kenji's pack? If they are not pack, how does he feel towards them? -- So we established earlier how Kenji and Fuzzy are going to react. Those rolls are already done and I'll apply their effects afterward. Fuzzy is stable for now, she's going to fall apart later and rally by focusing on doing what needs to be done. Kenji rallies as well. He doesn't do it for himself, but for his friends, which feels appropriate. So it looks like the majority wants Kenji to go and go alone to meet up with Joyce and Krupa for dinner. Maybe we can bring Fuzzy or Oli along at some point in the future to meet them, but Kenji doesn't feel like it would be appropriate to invite other people along. dice rolls: Kenji rolls leadership with Krupa back in the previous post. He wants to bring some of his own food as well. This would be 16 dice vs Krupa's 8 in etiquette. Kenji barely beats her. So he's going to be bringing ork made Chinese food to the two from Tir. Kenji rolls etiquette. It looks like he's going to graciously accept their invitation. He fails with 3 hits vs 4. Krupa isn't offended. In fact, she absolutely charms him. He's completely taken off guard by how she comes off as genuine and kind. Kenji comes from a world where cynicism is the rule and good people tend to slip right past his guard. He doesn't fall for her or anything like that or develop a crush, but she briefly broke through his cynicism to touch his heart and he's not used to that. So he fails this exchange, but he gains 1 die back to his pool of stress. She'll also have a 1 point advantage on him in a coming etiquette challenge. So he's at -5. I roll composure for Kenji to chill out over the class with Mr. Peters. He's pretty soothing. Kenji gets 1 hit and so he gets 1 die back. So he's at -4. Here's the skinny with Mr. Peters: He teaches alchemy, enchanting and art. Since these classes are physical based, workman classes that someone could essentially just pay money to do, they're pretty unpopular with the exception of art as being a Talismonger is a lifestyle. So Kenji actually has Mr. Peters twice this semester. Once for enchanting and once for art. As an art teacher, this has a lot of crossover with enchanting as enchanting is made far easier by someone making their own piece of art such as a necklace or a ring or a bracer for example and then binding the magic to it. Kenji wants to do this with tattoos. In the book they're all ki focuses, but I'll expand that to other focuses because rule of cool. Technically Kenji shouldn't be able to make focuses at all, but the rules for making focuses are so terrible in the books that I'm just going to do what I want. I don't see why anyone would ever take the enchanting skill if they were playing a normal game of shadowrun. Like ever. Anyway, Mr. Peter's class is straightforward, pleasant and Kenji only has twelve students to contend with. Six of these are advanced students who are going to be doing their own thing and so they're released early to work on their projects. The other six are sophomores. I roll, because by tomorrow, four of them will have dropped his class to take a different one, leaving Kenji and Skylar as two new students. So unlike classes like spellcasting, summoning and adept classes, the less desirable classes like arcana, artificing and alchemy have very small class sizes due to their unpopularity while his mentor spirit class has a small class size due to the fact that people can't choose their mentor spirits. Mr. Peters is fine with the small class size. He lets everyone know that the class is demanding, that it may not be for them and they can drop this class if they so desire and switch to any other class with open slots. He launches into the curriculum. They'll spend time learning how to disenchant a focus. Breaking comes before making, as they're going to learn just enough about how these formulas are constructed to see where they can fail. They're going to be gifted with some of the failed projects that students have made and learn how to pull them apart. Then for the midterm they're going to make an enchanting focus. Lastly, they're going to make a focus of their choosing either for themselves or another as their final project. What drums people out though is that Mr. Peters warns that there is a small chance of catastrophic failure. If this happens under normal circumstances then a portion of their magic can be permanently stripped away. Luckily, they have spirits on the island which prevent that which use what's called a guard power. The item will still be ruined, but as long as they have that spirit on hand they will be safe. Only if they purposefully try to injure themselves during the process will the spirit have a hard time coping for mishaps. This is standard fare for those in the talismonger profession as mishaps are known to happen. He's informing the class of this now. Years ago he used to inform his students some weeks in, but now he prefers to tell his students up front so they can transfer to another class if this fact bothers them. He'll wait around for a few minutes after lunch if anyone wishes to drop the class. Class ends and he practices some tattooing to chill out. He gets 2 hits on 6 dice (-5 penalty) to work. I'll say that Mr. Peters gave him 1 die back and so I roll a composure test with -5 but +4 to restore dice for stress for a total of 10 dice. One hit. He's feeling just a little better and is now at -4. Julian tells him later that Julie is off island and getting counseling, he fails and gets another 3 hits with the success rating at 2 since the full extent of Julie's problems aren't yet known. So it doesn't stress him out any further. Here's what happens. Julian wants everyone here to seek counseling with the sole exception of Kenji because Edward sought out counseling before. So Kenji needs 3 hits on 7 dice or he's going to undergo some counseling which will eat into his time. So Julian is making a judgement call on Kenji. He fails with 2 hits. Julian can easily tell by assensing Kenji that he is stressed out, but this may just be from all of these changes. He's not going to order Kenji to undergo mandatory counseling as Kenji didn't fail by much, but he wants Kenji to go talk to the school counselor at least once a week. Kenji can either skip English class if he wants to go now or wait and see Mr. Hill after his last class. Kenji is used to acting tough, so this is an easy check for him. He just needs 1 hit on 7 dice to bury his feelings. He makes it with 3 hits. He's able to put on a front and suggests that if either Fuzzy or Sasha need help, they should go before him. I restore 1 die back as he's able to maintain his composure in front of his friends. He's now at -3 for the day. Julian apologizes to Fuzzy, Kenji and Sasha. He feels inadequate for their needs. He's never had children before, much less teenage children. He thought that a decade of teaching could prepare him for mentoring students and that he could provide for their needs, but he's come to realize that merely providing is not enough. He knows that many of them already have parents and that as a guardian he's not trying to take their place, but he's been failing in his role as someone that they can rely on. He helps provide for their material needs: A roof over their head, food in their bellies, a first class education and the safety of Blake Island were allotted for Fuzzy, Julie and Kenji. He apologizes to Sasha, but he wasn't able to raise the funds that she needed to attend next year, though he has gotten her the minimum rate of 150,000 nuyen and was able to hold onto the money from Ares as it was non-refundable. I roll 13 dice -2 for Julian for composure. He gets 3 hits which is enough, so he keeps it together. Julian maintains his composure. Still, he feels ashamed, humbled and tired. He admits that he may not be good enough and that he bit off far more than he could chew by taking on so many wards, but that was the only way to help so many...And he puts this bluntly...At risk children. He wanted to help, but was unprepared for any of this, and it took Julie getting hurt to realize that. He offers to attempt to find them other guardians if they find him inadequate. His job as a teacher makes him want to keep a professional distance, but that directly contradicts what he should be doing as their guardian and he's never sure what to do. His two jobs compromise his ability to serve their needs, so he wants to give them an out. Even if only one of them decides to stay with him, he's going to do his absolute best to meet their needs from this moment onward. He's going to go into remediation, which means he's going to be training himself to deal with people their age who are in different categories of at risk behavior. That's going to take time. In the meantime, whether they stick with him as a guardian or not, he wants to do everything he can to help them succeed in their endeavors. He will help them in any way they see fit so long as it improves their lives or helps further their education. He wants them to think of their needs first, not their wants and desires. If they are truly in need and ask him for help, he will do his best to help them. He realizes that this is just more providing and admits that, but helping to provide was never wrong. It was only providing for them that was wrong. Sasha thanks him because he helped save her. Her corporation abandoned her when her parents went to jail and she couldn't have went to her grandparents without jeopardizing their retirement in Ares, which was hard earned after over thirty years on the police force. She is grateful beyond words that Julian helped find her a safe place for her and Fuzzy. That it must have been a risk to his career to take her on, even if she's going to turn eighteen in less than a year. That with the exception of Julie, everyone who wasn't driven away or abandoned her are in this room. Sasha rolls a composure test. She fails with a 1. I won't say that this is a panic attack, but she's been holding this in for a while and she has a really ugly crying session that's going to last for a while. She doesn't remember it, but she chose life as a pariah. This is what it looks like. Fuzzy rolls composure and gets 6 hits on 9 dice. Since she has loyalty 6, I'm going to say that she knows Sasha well enough that she can support her. This isn't the first time that Sasha has fallen apart like this, just the first time that she's done so in front of other people. Fuzzy is going to fall apart later for a while, but she's going to be Sasha's rock right now because that's what Sasha needs. I roll again for Kenji to see how he reacts to his friend and possible packmate in pain. 5 hits. That's a crit as well. He's been useless on his own and stressed out all day, but she's his friend and he's going to be there for her. He's not good at knowing what he wants, but his friends are another matter. Group hug time. He doesn't have loyalty 6 as that's just for Fuzzy, but I'm going to upgrade Sasha to loyalty 5. He is one of the few people in the world that won't judge her because of what her father did. I roll charisma 8 + etiquette 6 + street cred 4 + loyalty 5. He gets 7 hits. Sasha doesn't need sweet words. She needs physical comfort, and he provides it to her along with Fuzzy. However, he notices with 3 hits (it's easy) on a perception test that Julian is just sitting there awkwardly on his rolling chair and in front of the "hang in there" poster. Ice Phisherman fucked around with this message at 20:48 on Jul 16, 2018 |
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Jul 16, 2018 20:45
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Apologies for taking so long to get to the next choice. I sometimes underestimate how long my storyboarding actually takes in terms of writing it out. The storyboard for the last few scenes was 2400 words long, so I guess it would be a while, but not as long as I thought it would be.
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Jul 16, 2018 20:55
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| # ? Jun 10, 2024 05:49 |
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Kenji invites Julian in Trust and love have carried us well so far.
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Jul 16, 2018 21:08
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