|
being a soul vampire is pretty evil even if you feel conflicted about it I'd say generally munching on anyone you'd have a conversation with is at the very least unforgivably rude.
|
#
?
Jan 11, 2019 20:28
|
|
|
|
| # ? May 25, 2024 22:13 |
|
|
MikeJF posted:Except not, because it's demonstrably unhealthy. Article 1: White Chain In real life, most social expectations about gender roles are based on spiritual or biological beliefs about differences between the sexes that largely aren't based on evidence. Yet they are so pervasive that they exist virtually world wide in some form, and widespread acceptance of people operating outside those expectations as normal and healthy is only a recent development. In K6BD's universe, the question of how much the non-human characters are defined by their natures rather than socialization is an open one: devils are apparently created de novo with the ability to converse fluently, smoke cigarettes, and negotiate complex agreements for access to human souls in exchange for servitude. What sort of identity newborn void angels were created with hasn't been established. The other thread of this is that, in K6BD's universe, you can transcend anything through self-actualization and/or face punching, including naturally determined factors like "being stabbed in the eyeball with a knife hurts", but folks who can do this are clearly the exception rather than the norm. Tollymain posted:it wasnt ys's flame that became the angels Dead Reckoning fucked around with this message at 20:42 on Jan 11, 2019 |
|
#
?
Jan 11, 2019 20:31
|
|
|
The way I think of it in universe Thaumatology is that the Mask granted by mortals give them enough of Un to provide a crutch for the black flame to form a kernel of personality around. Himself turned out to be enough of a personality that he didn't need the crutch.
|
|
#
?
Jan 11, 2019 20:36
|
|
|
Very unroyal answers ITT
|
|
#
?
Jan 11, 2019 20:41
|
|
|
M_Gargantua posted:The way I think of it in universe Thaumatology is that the Mask granted by mortals give them enough of Un to provide a crutch for the black flame to form a kernel of personality around. Himself turned out to be enough of a personality that he didn't need the crutch. We still haven't seen Himself without a mask. It's just his mask is an iron prison cage suspended in the middle of a big empty room.
|
|
#
?
Jan 11, 2019 20:47
|
|
|
Dead Reckoning posted:"The Concordance Angels views on gender identity don't have a factual basis" is an assumption that hasn't been answered one way or the other yet in the story. Carry both of these thoughts just a moment longer.
|
|
#
?
Jan 11, 2019 21:05
|
|
|
If he wears a mask then he wears a throne, “Woe betides he who mistakes the rider for the steed.”
|
|
#
?
Jan 11, 2019 21:09
|
|
|
There's more and less ethical forms of soul parasitism. A soul pact/consuming devil liquor may not convert someone into a devil/hot black flame until after they've died, and most people making pacts are operating with some level of informed consent (i.e. they're sorcerers specifically looking to learn the Art or acquire a devil's services, and the part where that corrodes your soul is on the table). Eating humans, on the other hand, is... pretty invariably immediately lethal. Also, Yab went through several slaves a day in a non-eating fashion, apparently -- just working them to death for no reason. Yeah, a devil's fundamental nature is violence, but all existence is violence. All you can do is minimize your impact by not eating people. EDIT: Dead Reckoning posted:"White Chain experiences discomfort because she can't comport herself with the Concordance's views on gender identity" is a fine reading of the text. "The Concordance angels are morally wrong for having those expectations, because it makes White Chain uncomfortable and unable to live in a way she feels authentic" is a value judgment. "The Concordance Angels views on gender identity don't have a factual basis" is an assumption that hasn't been answered one way or the other yet in the story. The Concordance angels aren't actually in compliance with the theory of angel gender being advanced here, i.e., the Cold White Flame is fundamentally masculine and all feminine gender expression is, I dunno, human softness. Their claim is that they are beyond "insipid gender," but also that being referred to with masculine terms and wearing masculine clothing and having traditionally masculine bodies is totally non-gendered and transcendent, whereas feminine terms and clothing and expressions denote human frailty, which seems contradictory -- "he" is exactly as much a gender as "she." Independent of whether there's a basis for "masculinity is the nature of angels" (which I don't think there is, though I understand where you're coming from on this, I think), the Concordance angels seem like hypocrites. Poltergrift fucked around with this message at 21:24 on Jan 11, 2019 |
|
#
?
Jan 11, 2019 21:12
|
|
|
Dead Reckoning posted:stuff All of this is moot because humans created the devils and angels as they currently exist in the K6BD universe. They forged the masks and armors.
|
|
#
?
Jan 11, 2019 21:17
|
|
|
A Wizard of Goatse posted:being a soul vampire is pretty evil even if you feel conflicted about it The problem, of course, is that while pacting in moderation should be sustainable for both parties, it's not sating. A pacted Devil is bound to the contract they made, which can chafe, if the contract is a moderate one, they're not going to be getting a lot of soul, just enough to sustain them. So plenty of Devils push for more power, more uneven contracts, more food, but even once they hypothetically reach the highest tiers of power, that's not going to be 'enough', just like in real life billionaires will keep trying to get richer. On the sorcerer's side, more moderate and careful contracts are going to get you less services and borrowed power, and given the political climate in Throne and the fact that people usually want power for specific reasons, it's perhaps not surprising that some people push themselves too far too fast, take on too many contracts, and burn themselves out. Basically, I don't think 'making a deal with a Devil' is, in this setting, supposed to be an inherently bad thing. A Devil skimming enough soul through contracts to keep themselves going isn't being a parasite, because the relationship is mutualistic. It's just really tempting to eat more than the baseline for obvious and understandable reasons, and that can potentially snowball. EDIT: Beaten by Poltergrift. Like, it's possible that any pacting at all is going to have negative consequences for the sorcerer involved but the impression I got is that people who make pacts carefully are doing it because they think it's a fair trade. PetraCore fucked around with this message at 21:59 on Jan 11, 2019 |
|
#
?
Jan 11, 2019 21:52
|
|
|
PetraCore posted:EDIT: Beaten by Poltergrift. Like, it's possible that any pacting at all is going to have negative consequences for the sorcerer involved but the impression I got is that people who make pacts carefully are doing it because they think it's a fair trade. Even moreso, humans specifically designed it this way. They created the masks, they created the system.
|
|
#
?
Jan 11, 2019 22:04
|
|
|
Poltergrift posted:There's more and less ethical forms of soul parasitism. A soul pact/consuming devil liquor may not convert someone into a devil/hot black flame until after they've died, and most people making pacts are operating with some level of informed consent (i.e. they're sorcerers specifically looking to learn the Art or acquire a devil's services, and the part where that corrodes your soul is on the table). I'm going to go out on a limb and guess that being slowly eaten from the inside out by an infestation of devils is not in fact without negative consequence for the host, even if they wind up expiring before the process is complete. Even just normal paths to power on Throne that aren't a literal infernal pact and don't look an awful lot like the relationship between a wasp and a caterpillar tend to come with Terrible Consequences, it'd be weird as hell if this one in particular was totally on the level and benign, no catch worth caring about. And while yeah I guess it's reasonable to say tricking someone into signing an exploitative contract whereby they agree to be eaten in exchange for some token of service is 'more ethical' than just chowing down without even the veneer of a quid-pro-quo, neither quite rise to the heady bar of being good things. Poltergrift posted:The Concordance angels aren't actually in compliance with the theory of angel gender being advanced here, i.e., the Cold White Flame is fundamentally masculine and all feminine gender expression is, I dunno, human softness. Their claim is that they are beyond "insipid gender," but also that being referred to with masculine terms and wearing masculine clothing and having traditionally masculine bodies is totally non-gendered and transcendent, whereas feminine terms and clothing and expressions denote human frailty, which seems contradictory -- "he" is exactly as much a gender as "she." Yeah they're absolutely implicitly assuming male to be the default, 'neutral' option, and thus any deviation from it is making some kind of statement. I don't think it per se has to do with 2 Michael actually wanting to be a man with a dick, he and his disciples just picked up some human bigotries in the course of integrating into human society and refuse to ever, ever interrogate them because that would be admitting they might be tainted by the real world instead of absolutely objective arbiters of truth. A Wizard of Goatse fucked around with this message at 22:08 on Jan 11, 2019 |
|
#
?
Jan 11, 2019 22:05
|
|
|
A Wizard of Goatse posted:I'm going to go out on a limb and guess that being slowly eaten from the inside out by an infestation of devils is not in fact without negative consequence for the host, even if they wind up expiring before the process is complete. Even just normal paths to power on Throne that aren't a literal infernal pact tend to come with Terrible Consequences. And while yeah I guess it's reasonable to say tricking someone into signing an exploitative contract whereby they agree to be eaten in exchange for some token of service is 'more ethical' than just chowing down without even the veneer of a quid-pro-quo, neither quite rise to the heady bar of being good things. I don't think there needs to be inherently terrible consequences to a minor pact for it to fit the themes in the comic, because the theme of the comic is that if you want to do anything big you can't stick to the safe and moderate paths.
|
|
#
?
Jan 11, 2019 22:08
|
|
|
it has been pretty much universally stated that the devil pacts were an insanely stupid idea. the underlying theme of the comic is not 'that nice man is really going to give you the free shortcut to incredible power!'
A Wizard of Goatse fucked around with this message at 22:16 on Jan 11, 2019 |
|
#
?
Jan 11, 2019 22:09
|
|
|
Like you could argue the other side that the system is inherently flawed because it means devils are exploited for work and can and do end up essentially enslaved if they don't have the power to take what they need without asking. That wouldn't be the full picture, because taking what they need without asking involves eating people, but it's also not a lie. There definitely are going to be abusive and exploitative sorcerers making pacts with devils too desperate to say no.
|
|
#
?
Jan 11, 2019 22:12
|
|
|
A Wizard of Goatse posted:it has been pretty much universally stated that the devil pacts were an insanely stupid idea
|
|
#
?
Jan 11, 2019 22:12
|
|
|
https://twitter.com/orbitaldropkick/status/1083831676285923330?s=21
|
|
#
?
Jan 11, 2019 22:13
|
|
|
Knock 'em out Allison Defining the 'em is optional
|
|
#
?
Jan 11, 2019 22:16
|
|
|
a) Devils don't really have much in the way of other options. They're obligate parasites, and they can't choose not to start existing. Even if neither pacts nor cannibalism are strictly harmless, I'd imagine that most humans also wouldn't opt for death over having to inflict long-term, semi-consensual harm on other people. b) My guess is that this is some kind of meat house. c) God, this comic is good.
|
|
#
?
Jan 11, 2019 22:18
|
|
|
PetraCore posted:The problem, of course, is that while pacting in moderation should be sustainable for both parties, it's not sating. A pacted Devil is bound to the contract they made, which can chafe, if the contract is a moderate one, they're not going to be getting a lot of soul, just enough to sustain them. So plenty of Devils push for more power, more uneven contracts, more food, but even once they hypothetically reach the highest tiers of power, that's not going to be 'enough', just like in real life billionaires will keep trying to get richer. This, of course, means that there must be firms of devils who provide various services to multiple individuals each, the economy of scale comes in when the firm will have devils able to make any type of pact needed and act as a clearinghouse for contracts. I'm sure they have a kickass legal department, too, in order to make the best possible contracts for their employees. Not sure how the ownership would get paid, maybe they're partners who get a cut of everything. Or maybe it's a devil cooperative, and gently caress Capital.
|
|
#
?
Jan 11, 2019 22:23
|
|
|
habeasdorkus posted:This, of course, means that there must be firms of devils who provide various services to multiple individuals each, the economy of scale comes in when the firm will have devils able to make any type of pact needed and act as a clearinghouse for contracts. I'm sure they have a kickass legal department, too, in order to make the best possible contracts for their employees. Not sure how the ownership would get paid, maybe they're partners who get a cut of everything. Or maybe it's a devil cooperative, and gently caress Capital. Either you’ve read the craft sequence by max Gladstone or you should read it.
|
|
#
?
Jan 11, 2019 22:28
|
|
|
I haven't, but I'll add it to my reading list!
|
|
#
?
Jan 11, 2019 22:32
|
|
|
Poltergrift posted:The Concordance angels aren't actually in compliance with the theory of angel gender being advanced here, i.e., the Cold White Flame is fundamentally masculine and all feminine gender expression is, I dunno, human softness. Their claim is that they are beyond "insipid gender," but also that being referred to with masculine terms and wearing masculine clothing and having traditionally masculine bodies is totally non-gendered and transcendent, whereas feminine terms and clothing and expressions denote human frailty, which seems contradictory -- "he" is exactly as much a gender as "she." PetraCore posted:People weren't tricked into it. They designed the system. It was their idea in the first place. Now, they have to be really careful because the average devil will try to trick them into giving away more soul than their services are worth, or just try to straight out eat them if there aren't enough safeguards in place, but those are the failure states, not the intended results. And a powerful and unethical enough devil is going to skip the contracts entirely and just go right to eating people, like Yab. Poltergrift posted:a) Devils don't really have much in the way of other options. They're obligate parasites, and they can't choose not to start existing. Even if neither pacts nor cannibalism are strictly harmless, I'd imagine that most humans also wouldn't opt for death over having to inflict long-term, semi-consensual harm on other people.
|
|
#
?
Jan 11, 2019 22:43
|
|
|
M_Gargantua posted:Either you’ve read the craft sequence by max Gladstone or you should read it. Yeah I'm gonna second that recommendation for the entire thread, if you like KSBD you will like the craft sequence.
|
|
#
?
Jan 11, 2019 22:51
|
|
|
Dead Reckoning posted:I just think tut-tutting the Concordance for clinging to essentialism instead of conforming to a social structure based on what we know about earth human beings in 2018 is hella shallow. This is such a weird stance to take, I don't know why you keep going back to it. Clearly there are those who want to escape that system (Petal Knights) and are struggling with it (White Chain). Also, we are human beings in on Earth in 2018 (well, 2019). So is the author. Exactly what other eyes are we supposed to see this world though? Dead Reckoning posted:Devils aren't human beings. Like, you can say that their essential nature requires predatory behavior and that this shouldn't be held against them from a moral standpoint, but the antelope being eaten doesn't really care that the lions are an important part of the ecosystem that weeds out the sick and weak, and it doesn't make a lion pretending to be friends with an antelope it has a weird crush on any less hosed up. The entire point of Cio's character arc is that she doesn't believe this is the case and is trying to live a life where she doesn't do this. Why are you arguing for the status quo that the characters are fighting? I still just don't get what you're trying to prove.
|
|
#
?
Jan 11, 2019 23:08
|
|
|
M_Gargantua posted:Either you’ve read the craft sequence by max Gladstone or you should read it. It's really good!
|
|
#
?
Jan 11, 2019 23:09
|
|
|
despite everything, it's still you.
|
|
#
?
Jan 11, 2019 23:13
|
|
|
PetraCore posted:Where? Genuine question. It's somewhere in the liturgy. Koss created the Sustainers to maintain Throne and the Protectors to enforce the law. Aesma became jealous of Koss's accomplishments and created her Mistake, the only mortal Inheritors, the Perceivers. And only the Perceivers were stupid enough to bind the formless chaos with masks to create the Destroyers.
|
|
#
?
Jan 11, 2019 23:21
|
|
|
Rotten Red Rod posted:This is such a weird stance to take, I don't know why you keep going back to it. Clearly there are those who want to escape that system (Petal Knights) and are struggling with it (White Chain). why are you so vehement that the defining conflict of a major character in a story about breaking the laws of reality through sheer willpower amounts to Nofap November? pseudorandom name posted:It's somewhere in the liturgy. also the angels repeatedly talk in-comic about how loving stupid it was, and the devils sing a little song about how humans are suckers for ever engaging in those pacts. there is literally no mention of the binding of devils in the comic or the text surrounding it where it is described as a good idea, much less a mutual cooperation for the greater good. It's people trying to enslave a Power They Do Not Understand as a shortcut around self-improvement and getting heartily screwed for it. A Wizard of Goatse fucked around with this message at 23:40 on Jan 11, 2019 |
|
#
?
Jan 11, 2019 23:30
|
|
|
PetraCore posted:People weren't tricked into it. They designed the system. It was their idea in the first place. Just because humans came up with an idea doesn't mean it was a good idea; and just because they designed a system doesn't mean they chose how every single part of it works. Humans created a way to exploit the black flame, but they didn't decide how the black flame works, and the things humans create to exploit resources always have drawbacks that come bite humans in their collective rear end. For a comparison, humans invented nuclear power plants. Cheap and nearly unlimited energy. A Chernobyl disaster is a failure state; if you're cautious you just get to deal with dangerous radioactive waste that will remain harmful for several thousand years. That doesn't mean this result is what you intended to get in the beginning when you went about how to harness the power of the atom; it just means that you've accepted a long-lasting drawback.
|
|
#
?
Jan 11, 2019 23:34
|
|
|
pseudorandom name posted:It's somewhere in the liturgy. Being stupid does not and has never precluded defying fate and the order of things. Honestly, it seems like a prerequisite. I think we'd do well to separate out the angel conversation and the devil conversation here, incidentally. "Angels can have gender identities other than Genderless But Secretly Male" is a very distinct topic from "devils eat people," since one has the consequence of "the angel is Too Human, which is bad in some way we haven't really explained" and the other has the consequence of "people get eaten."
|
|
#
?
Jan 11, 2019 23:39
|
|
|
Poltergrift posted:Being stupid does not and has never precluded defying fate and the order of things. Honestly, it seems like a prerequisite.
|
|
#
?
Jan 11, 2019 23:42
|
|
|
the way in which being Too Human is bad, to angels, is that it signifies a rogue agent/future petal knight who places their own desires and sense of self above robotic adherence to The Law and the ideals of angeldom (as interpreted by noted fraud and cult leader 2 Michael). The Thorns are good and cool because they're making themselves look all hosed up not because they each personally identify as a spiky boi, but to fit in as Thorns, angel-ier angels.
A Wizard of Goatse fucked around with this message at 23:59 on Jan 11, 2019 |
|
#
?
Jan 11, 2019 23:46
|
|
|
Chernobyl's scram system was hemp cords wrapped around the control rods, so, it's up to you whether binding devils is more or less insane.
|
|
#
?
Jan 11, 2019 23:54
|
|
|
A Wizard of Goatse posted:the way in which being Too Human is bad, to angels, is that it signifies a rogue agent/future petal knight who places their own desires and sense of self above robotic adherence to The Law and the ideals of angeldom (as interpreted by noted fraud and cult leader 2 Michael). The Thorns are good and cool because they're making themselves look all hosed up not because they each personally identify as a spiky boi, but to fit in as Thorns, angel-ier angels. The other way in which Too Human is bad is that a guild system is a loving weird way to run a video game company.
|
|
#
?
Jan 12, 2019 00:01
|
|
|
Cat Mattress posted:For a comparison, humans invented nuclear power plants. Cheap and nearly unlimited energy. A Chernobyl disaster is a failure state; if you're cautious you just get to deal with dangerous radioactive waste that will remain harmful for several thousand years. That doesn't mean this result is what you intended to get in the beginning when you went about how to harness the power of the atom; it just means that you've accepted a long-lasting drawback. I think you're massively overestimating the degree to which one can describe the risks that people take as "calculated." Dead Reckoning fucked around with this message at 00:06 on Jan 12, 2019 |
|
#
?
Jan 12, 2019 00:04
|
|
|
wiegieman posted:Chernobyl's scram system was hemp cords wrapped around the control rods, so, it's up to you whether binding devils is more or less insane. At Chernobyl the control rods, which were the only mechanism in the entire process capable of acting as a nuclear de-ccellerant, were inexplicably* capped with graphite, which is an extremely flammable nuclear accellerant. This is the equivalent of a building's fire-sprinkler system having the spray nozzles made out of very small sticks of gasoline-coated dynamite. 11 reactors currently operating in Russia still use this system. *Actually, there is a reason, but it's not a great one. Old Kentucky Shark fucked around with this message at 00:26 on Jan 12, 2019 |
|
#
?
Jan 12, 2019 00:22
|
|
|
Dead Reckoning posted:I don't know whether Concordance angels gender identity is part of their nature or part of their socialization, it hasn't been addressed at this point in the story. Devils apparently are created with gender identities absent biological sex, but show little to no regard to them. I just think tut-tutting the Concordance for clinging to essentialism instead of conforming to a social structure based on what we know about earth human beings in 2018 is hella shallow. their "gender neutral = male by default" poo poo isn't that deep of a commentary on our society, but you manage to completely miss the point and instead rationalize that SURELY there is a justification we just haven't found out yet
|
|
#
?
Jan 12, 2019 00:40
|
|
|
Feel like this may be relevant. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AxV8gAGmbtk
|
|
#
?
Jan 12, 2019 00:42
|
|
|
|
| # ? May 25, 2024 22:13 |
|
|
Ashcans posted:The only thing that confuses me about that is that during the episode with Vladok, Alison swipes a mask to bind him again. The mask she grabs was part of some transaction between a devil with a cracked mask and the people who presumably made it - when she takes it, he protests 'that's my mask!', and it clearly looks like it's designed to replicate the cracked one he's wearing. So what was going on there? If he was buying a new mask, wouldn't that be basically be buying a new identity? Or can we assume it has somehow been crafted to imitate the current one and preserve some matter of identity? But then wouldn't have binding it to Vladok's unbound form basically shape them into a copy of that other devil? Only that hasn't happened, because now Princess has evolved into a Red, she clearly has a different shape and style of mask than the Red whose mask she was bound with. The way I imagine it is that a devil flame and mask is like liquid taking the shape of a container; remove the container and it will slosh away quickly, but for the moment after you remove the container the liquid will hold its shape before it falls apart. New empty masks like what we saw are designed to take the shape left on the flame, so you can quickly change the mask over if you're careful and retain identity. So the devil replacing his mask would've had it moved over immediately during some ritual, and the shape of his identity would've remained intact. Vladok was in the process of dissolving but still existed for a brief time during his rampage, so Princess is most of Vladok. Cio was a totally different bit of flame, but her old mask had her old shape and impressed itself on the flame. Also Allison was in heavy magic-key-drunk mode and thought it would work, so it did. MikeJF fucked around with this message at 01:00 on Jan 12, 2019 |
|
#
?
Jan 12, 2019 00:58
|
|
