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Sion
Oct 16, 2004

"I'm the boss of space. That's plenty."


Chapter 1 - Origin
Creation and Beyond.


The ancient powers never fully went away. They wander our roads and cities, mingling with the teeming masses of humanity. Divinity walks amongst us. The World that surrounds us swims in myth and Legend, with a vast array of Godly pantheons, Titanic elemental forces and supernatural creatures all coming into contact with humanity on a daily basis.

All myths are created equally here; the World is both carefully balanced on the back of a giant turtle, clumps of mud stirred up from the sea floor by Izanagi’s staff, and billions of years worth of gravitational melee bringing carbon, lead and every other mineral together. There is no conflict between these myths in the same way that there is no conflict between light being a wave and a particle. It just is. There are commonalities in the origin stories of all Pantheon’s. Chaos, Harmony, Light, Darkness - no matter the name that’s used, every culture has a vision of these concepts; We call these elemental forces Titans.

Some say the Titans fell in a war against the Gods. Others say they put on new faces and still toy with humanity. What we can say for sure, is that the Titans are very real, and so are the Gods.

While Gods don’t need humans, they do need humanity. Not to exist, or maintain their power, but as a mirror. Human worship is the way by which the Gods know themselves, and without humanity to help them know themselves, the line between God and Titan vanishes entirely. Mortals need the Gods to protect them from the Titans, and their often sadistic offspring, Titanspawn.

There’s no secret conspiracy to hide this knowledge from the fragile Mortal minds or something. Gods are as frank about their relationship with humanity as they ever were. They answer prayers in exchange for worship and will pitch an existential fit when they don’t get their way. Everyone knows the Gods are there, even if they refuse to engage with divinity or believe it’s just some shared hallucination.

The very real Gods of old have taken steps back from humanity over the last five hundred years; the creation of the printing press, the dawn of radio, television and now social media making it all too easy for word of miracles and malice to spread. In the past, Zeus obliterated Semele by showing his full glory to her. Now, if you slap that on YouTube, you’ve got a lot of angry people wondering why their kids have burst into flame after clicking something that should have been a video of Logan Paul getting his rear end broke in two by a Scion of Bishamon. The Tuatha Dé Danann once lived in Ireland proper, and what did that get them? War, invasion, exile, famine and Fatebinding so powerful that it’s hosed everything up for them. The more attention a God gets, the bigger the spotlight that shines on them, and the more Fate takes note.

You noticed that, huh? The capital letter at the front of the word Fate and the word Fatebinding. You’ve also noticed that some words I’ve told you so far are capitalised. That just means that at some point in your future, they’re probably going to be important words to remember. Don’t worry about remembering them all at the moment, it took me a while to get everything squared and away. Don’t sweat it. Right now, it’s not important.

Most folk go through every day of their lives without thinking about most of this stuff - they’re stuck in traffic, they think ‘Hermes, you piece of poo poo, I want to get home,’ or they say a quick prayer to Chicomecoatl an’ Centeotl right as they’re taking dinner out of the oven. There are soldiers that carve the Tiwaz rune into their rifle, and people that listen too closely to weather reports in the caribbean find themselves tapping their feet to Shango’s drumbeat. The San Francisco Giants have a literal giant as their mascot, and when the Patriots win their eleventh straight superbowl or whatever, they’ll sing a hymn to Nike or Ogma before breaking open the kegs. Most folk are in a cult, some folk are in many cults, everyone gets on with their lives. It’s not a big deal, except for when it is.

You’re asleep at the moment which, considering the day you had yesterday makes a fair bit of sense. You’re a normal person living a normal life in a normal, mythically enhanced World. Just- quick question, how would you describe yourself? Social animal, physically fit, smartiepants?


1. How would you describe yourself?
A - Social animal. I can charm anyone, or scare the crap out of ‘em just as easy. I’ve not been to a party that I wasn’t the life of, and my little black book is stuffed cover to cover.

B - Physically fit. Gotta get them gains. Or something. I dig swimming, cross country running, snowboarding. I was one knee injury away from being a spokesperson for GoPro.

C - Smartiepants. Graduated highschool a year early with offers from every college I wanted.


That’s good to know. Hey, just so I know, when you wake up and look out the window, where are you gonna see? The local Gods in some region are obviously going to be more prevalent than others. You don’t tend to get many members of the Manitou in Eastern Europe. So- where are you?


2. Where are you?
A - Edinburgh, Scotland. It’s a great city, even if it’s a bit English. Cultural capital of northern Europe, great links to Glasgow and the Highlands are full of weird creatures. There’s a lot of Nordic Æsir Gods, Chinese Shén Gods, Indian Devá Gods, and very strong representation of the Irish Tuatha Dé Danann. Place is soaked in history; wars, crimes, sports rivalries. Plus they make Grand Theft Auto here.

B - Wayne County, New Jersey, United States I know, I know, but out here you’re half an hour from New York City, two hours from Philly and Boston, four from Washington. Jersey’s a commuter state, plus it’s soaked in history (by American standards.) Busy with Algonquian Manitou, African Òrìshà, and Greek an’ Italian Theoi. And that’s before you get into New York, where there’s just a bit of everything. Out here in Jersey, it’s all red-state/blue-state city/farmland, but that’s rubbing up against The City more and more.


Huh. I hear that’s nice this time of year. Speaking of you being tired because of what you were up to yesterday… What was it that you were actually doing yesterday?


3. What did you do yesterday?
A - Went into work at head office. It was a Tuesday, and I work for Fenris Arms. It’s been a lovely few months with us having to say time and again that we don’t have any control over what people do with our weapons. So far, people are buying it. Hit the gym afterwards and tried to listen to some podcasts but they’re really achingly dull and super judgy. I'm not a bad person because, am I?

B - Went into work at the stadium. It was a Monday, and I play for the under 21s. We’re doing great this season, and I’m kicking rear end. We’ve got an important match real soon, so I’m getting kind of nervous about it. I’m pretty much the strongest player on the team and everyone’s counting on me. I’m surprised I’m sleeping this well, to be honest. The stress has been getting to me.

C - Went into work at the site. It was a Wednesday, and I work at a construction site. The boss wants us to start observing more rituals but, honestly, I just want to get the work done and go home. There’s something about the depth that we’re putting foundations down to that’s really… it’s giving me the heebie jeebies and I ain’t a fan. Came home, cracked open a beer, watched some TV.

D - Went to the temple. Same thing as I do everyday. I’m involved pretty deeply with one of the local cults. I’m somewhere between a priest and a spiritual leader. I just- I just wish there was more I could do. I see all the trouble in my community and… well, it’s enough to test anyone. I don't want people to see that, obviously, but-

E - Went to school. I’m studying of my doctorate. It’s a mix of history, divinity and computer science. It’s- super complicated, but I think I’m able to make it work. I’m not sure if I’ll be able to convince the school to give me the funding that I need to actually finish this project but I’m looking to see if I can merge mythic understanding with new theoretical physics discoveries...

F - Bodyguard Duty. I’m a bodyguard and security consultant. Sometimes it’s me casing a joint to find out where someone would break in from, if someone were to do such a terrible thing. Other times it’s me trying to stop a literal Valkyrie from getting shitfaced and destroying a nightclub; those girls can fuckin' drink. Every night is different, though. Man, have I seen some shady poo poo... To be fair, I've also done some shady poo poo, so I'm not gonna sit in judgement.


Really? And you enjoy that? Well, more power to you, I guess. Just so I know- what should I call you? I’ll be honest, I’m entirely inside your head right now since I’m probably just that cheese you had at dinner backing up on you as indigestion but… humor me. Tell me a little bit about yourself. Male, female, whatever? I’m gonna need a name to call you too.

4. Tell me a little bit about yourself.
A - Me? Well… Audience suggestion time!

I’ve only got a few more questions for you but, for the moment, I think it’s maybe time I let you get back to that dream you were having before I so rudely interrupted. Odds are you won’t remember any of this by the time you wake up, but if you do remember to trust the voices in your head. They’re only ever gonna get louder...

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Sion
Oct 16, 2004

"I'm the boss of space. That's plenty."
Hello, and welcome to the game! Scion is a game about a strange world where all myths are real, all legends are created equal, and you live safe in the knowledge that my God could beat up your God. You’re currently a mortal in the world of Scion; what kind of mortal you are, what kind of a person you are, and if you become more than just a person is entirely up to you. Heroism will be required to move beyond this mortal coil, however.

First thing’s first:

You do not need to know anything about Scion to play this CYOA!

I’m going to be aiming to keep everything very user friendly. We’re starting at the absolute bottom at the moment; we’re in the Origin part of the superhero story. There are special, mechanically important words that we’re going to reference throughout the course of this; some of these words are going to live in the post directly after this one.

If you have any questions, you should feel free to ask. I’ll try to have info dumps every once in a while to make sure that people are able to keep up. The definitions that we have in the Glossary will change and update as our character learns more about their place in the world.

We’re going to be using the tabletop rules from Onyx Path’s Scion 2 roleplaying game. Since this game isn’t fully released yet (we’re using the pre-release version of the rules for this), there may be some things that change as we go. There are some things that may not for a CYOA that may just need to get houseruled entirely. I like music in games, so if you have suggestions for music I can throw in, please link it!

We will most likely be using approval voting for this. You can vote for multiple things, and all votes are counted. The highest voted outcome is the one that’s gone with.

Since it’s a tabletop game being run as a CYOA I have a bonus vote for you all.

5. How in depth do you want character building to be?
A - Bare minimum. Please handle this poo poo for me. Major choices based on vague descriptors.
B - I like a bit of crunch. Let us make suggestions for specific abilities, or pick from a list of selected powers rather than have them just develop.
C - Gimmie ‘dem dots. Let’s put dots in slots and get our hands dirty.

Sion fucked around with this message at 23:44 on May 8, 2018

Sion
Oct 16, 2004

"I'm the boss of space. That's plenty."
Rules
We're going to be using Dice Rolls in this game. The basic outline is that you build a dicepool (the amount of dice you're gonna be rolling) out of an Attribute and a Skill. You work out how many points in each attribute and skill you have by counting the number of dots you have next to those things in your character sheet. You roll the total number of the associated dots in D10s and anything that's an 8 or higher counts as a success. Usually if we land on a 10, we get to roll that die again until we stop rolling 10s.

The number of successes that we get will need to beat a set difficulty level. Minimum difficulty on anything that needs rolling is a 1. 1 difficulty is you manage to outrun someone chasing you. 3 is you outran a police car on foot. 5 is you manage to outrun the wyld hunt. 5+ is you outran a Fury.

Sometimes success will come with complications. These don't prevent you from succeeding, but they do function as a 'yes, but...' sort of thing. You get Enhancements when you set yourself up in a good position and these give automatic successes. I'll basically be handling this stuff behind the scenes.

Degrees of success exist here too. If you beat the target number by 1 you showed off some skill while beating the challenge. If you beat it by 4+ you'll make the nightly news. Same goes for degrees of failure. If you hack into a computer terminal with one degree of success you find that there's a record of a portable hard drive somewhere on the network. If you get a 4+ margin of success, you find out every password the terminal owner has. If you fail by 1 you'll be locked out and security might be informed in the morning. If you fail by 4+ you'll be locked out of the system and you can expect an armed response team.

One of the cool things about Scion is that even if you fail, you don't eat poo poo. You're too important to Fate to do that. Failure is never a dead end and it will always lead to something new, or build to a heroic comeback. Every time you fail - that is, you don't roll any successes, or don't beat a target number. you get something called a Consolation. These are helpful, buy minor, side effects of failure. A chance meeting, an unlooked for advantage, a fateful encounter.

Botches exist but should be super rare. They only happen when you don't roll a single success (ie nothing 8 or higher), and you roll at least one 1. If you botch, you not only fail to achieve your goal, but you suffer an additional setback. You don't get a Consolation from this other than something called Momentum which is a thing I'll be managing.

If you have questions, shout! I'm on here, on the CYOA Discord under the Server Group @Sciontific Method. If you want to be notified of updates, ask to be put in that group.

XP Costs and Tweaks
pre:
Object 		Change 						Cost
Attribute 	Add one dot to a single Attribute 		10 Experiences
Approach 	Change a character’s Favored Approach 		15 Experiences
Skill 		Add one dot in a new or existing Skill 		5 Experiences
Knack 		Purchase a new Knack 				10 Experiences
Specialty 	Add a Specialty to a Skill 			3 Experiences
Between Chapters we'll be able to make other changes for free! Between Chapters we can:
- Swap out Knacks for free.
- Shift one dot from one Attribute to another Attribute or from one Skill to another Skill.

The Pantheons

Æsir — The Norse Gods of Scandinavia, an uneasy marriage of a warlike pantheon and an agricultural pantheon, both waiting for the final battle that will end the World.
Devá —The Hindu and Vedic Gods of India, powerful and ancient beings who stand astride this World and many others.
Kami—The Japanese Gods, concealing deep passions and fierce rivalries beneath calm faces and subtle movements.
Manitou — The Native Gods of the Algonquian people, who have suffered much in the diaspora of their people but never lost their own sense of righteousness.
Netjer— The Egyptian Gods, eternal yet mutable, watching over a people not truly their own any longer.
Òrìshà — The Yoruban Gods, the African Gods who transformed themselves during the transatlantic slave trade, and also encompassing a sub-pantheon of Voudoun deities called the Loa. (In depth post here.)
Shén — The Chinese Gods, a truly massive group of deities organized into a grand Celestial Bureaucracy.
Teōtl — The Aztec Gods of the Mexica, who sacrifice greatly for their people and receive sacrifice in return.
Theoi — The Greek and Roman Gods, noble lineages existing in one big (some would say titanic) family.
Tuatha Dé Danann — The Irish Gods, fierce in their honor and passionate in their art, descendants of ancient divine refugees.

Glossary

Axis Mundi - A gateway to a piece of mythic geography (sometimes known as a Terra Incognita). You travel through an Axis Mundi to reach a Terra Incognita.
Cheval - The special, pantheon specific power of the Òrìshà. It allows people to be possessed by gods and spirits of the Òrìshà pantheon through ritual. This possession is almost always a consensual act, but we've heard rumors of the Cheval ritual being hijacked by malicious spirits.
Fate - What you’re meant to do.
Fatebinding - Scion’s have a mythical jazz about them that draws people into their sphere of influence. You know how you want to avoid Scion’s? This is why. You get bound to them, and then everything begins to go sideways. You’re a bit player in their story. You risk becoming a background character in their movie.
God - A divine being, often born of Titans. They once did blatant stuff to humanity but have taken their foot off the gas. These days they tend to get their dirty work done through Scions.
Scion - A half-divine offspring of a God and humanity. Sometimes called a demigod. Often inspires cultish followings. Often bad news and worth avoiding. Bad poo poo tends to follow them.
Sleeper - A word that a spirit called June.
Terra Incognita - A piece of mythic geography. In order for all myths to be true, the layout of the world would need to be utterly broken. As such, there's geography that's hidden away in a corner of reality. You access these by travelling through Axis Mundi.
Titan - A big, bad elemental force almost. Typically killed by Gods or suspended in prisons. Maybe. Who’s even sure at this point when it comes to mythology?
World, the - The World that mortals inhabit. It’s where you keep all your stuff.

Notes
June is super smart. 5 dots in Intellect means that she is doubtless one of the most intelligent people on the planet. 5 dice in intellect means that if we're doing thinky things, or things that would require cunning (4) or resolve (3) we're pretty sure we're going to get at least one success no matter what. Because we're this drat smart, we can turn our hand to basically anything that requires us to think things through first. Intellect 5 + Medicine 0 still gives us 5 dice. It ain't pretty but we can first aid just by virtue of being smart enough to go 'blood should be inside the body,' for example.

We might not want to lean too hard on our strength of one and our close combat of zero. Thankfully we have a good amount of Dexterity, so the odds of us actually getting punched are pretty low. Plus, if we get a weapon of some kind, we could use our dexterity to hit people giving us 4 dice. We might not be able to hurt but if that weapon's, say, a chainsaw against an ogre or something you'll find that the saw is where most of the damage comes from.

You can hopefully look at the character sheet below to work out what we're really good at, and what we're not so hot at.

Character sheet

Sion fucked around with this message at 20:00 on Jun 15, 2018

JesterOfAmerica
Sep 11, 2015
1. A
2. B
3. BEF
4. Female, My name is Barbra June Morgan. Call me June, everyone does.
5. B

JesterOfAmerica fucked around with this message at 22:52 on Apr 3, 2018

NinjaPete
Nov 14, 2004

Hail to the speaker,
Hail to the knower,
Joy to him who has understood,
Delight to those who have listened.

- Hávamál
1. AC
2. AB
3. DEF
4. Skip for Now
5. B

Jossar
Apr 2, 2018

Current status: Angry about subs :argh:
1. A
2. A
3. F
4. Nothing comes to mind at the moment.
5. B

malbogio
Jan 19, 2015

1. C
2. A
3. ADE
4. -
5. B

Sion
Oct 16, 2004

"I'm the boss of space. That's plenty."
I feel like Question 4 may have been asking for a lot straight away. Maybe we could skip it for now?

Pedestrian Xing
Jul 19, 2007

1. C
2. B
3. D
4.
5. B


:munch:

dont be mean to me
May 2, 2007

I'm interplanetary, bitch
Let's go to Mars


1 CB
2 B
3 EBC
4 As you wish.
5 B

Chatrapati
Nov 6, 2012
1. B
2. A
3. A
4. We make Grand Theft Auto games and work out in our spare time.
5. Dunno

There are no British deities in Britain? Or are they too small-scale to be considered part of the big leagues?

Sion
Oct 16, 2004

"I'm the boss of space. That's plenty."
There are British deities in Scion. There are deities from basically everywhere! The pantheons listed in the OP are not the only ones in the World but they're the ones that are available to players. Besides, having been the target of Viking, French and Norman invasions in the past has left Britain as a pretty serious melting pot of gods.

You think Robin Hood wasn't a scion of Artemis? With his bow and arrow tricks? Britannia was a scion of Athena and sister to Colombia.

Going to keep the first round of voting open until this time tomorrow!

Magnusth
Sep 25, 2014

Hello, Creature! Do You Despise Goat Hating Fascists? So Do We! Join Us at Paradise Lost!



1 AC
2 A
3 DE
4
5 BC


Oh, and to comment on the british deities thing, a lot of deities present elsewhere also exist in britain, just as native there as elsewhere. Wodan, the germanic version of odin, is present in the british isles before any vikings, and Lugh is basicly present everywhere there's celts, the roman goddess epona is originally british, etc. etc.

Crazycryodude
Aug 15, 2015

Lets get our X tons of Duranium back!

....Is that still a valid thing to jingoistically blow out of proportion?


C
B
E
-
A

But Not Tonight
May 22, 2006

I could show you around the sights.

1. C
2. B
3. C
4. My name's Jackson Druke, usually go by JD though. Bit of a quiet guy, keep to myself and get the job done. I'm one of the electricians doing dirt work downtown on the new skyscraper going up, and I'll be glad when it's done...something about the ground there makes my bones ache in a bad way.
5. B

Lord Zedd-Repulsa
Jul 21, 2007

Devour a good book.


But Not Tonight posted:

1. C
2. B
3. C
4. My name's Jackson Druke, usually go by JD though. Bit of a quiet guy, keep to myself and get the job done. I'm one of the electricians doing dirt work downtown on the new skyscraper going up, and I'll be glad when it's done...something about the ground there makes my bones ache in a bad way.
5. B

All of these sound good to me.

sheep-dodger
Feb 21, 2013

1 A
2 A
3 CDE

JesterOfAmerica posted:

4. Female, My name is Barbra June Morgan. Call me June, everyone does.
5 B

Natalie Fartman
Apr 5, 2013

I selflessly rescued an abandoned cat during the COVID-19 Pandemic :3:

1: C
2: B
3: D
4: Cats. Cats all the way down.
5: B

Natalie Fartman fucked around with this message at 15:49 on Apr 5, 2018

Sion
Oct 16, 2004

"I'm the boss of space. That's plenty."
Chapter 1 - Origin 2

So, you're a smart one, huh? Not much for physicality but we can't have everything, can we? Bit of a golden tongue to you too! Less of a commanding presence but you strike me as the sort of person that often won't have to order anyone around, if you can convince them, right?

Oh- Oh, wow. You're trying to fit the round peg of divinity into the square hole of science? I'll give you credit, kid, you're brave! You ever stop to think that maybe you're biting off more than you can chew with it, though? Like, there's some questions that are better left unanswered? Ever think that maybe, just maybe, the gods don't like it when you try and explain their existence? They've got an ego to them and having some upstart human going 'um, actually-' at everything they do might rub 'em up the wrong way?

1. Aren't you worried about upsetting the Gods by asking too many questions?

A - I don't care.
If I'm right, what the Gods say doesn't matter, especially if I can prove it. I'm Forceful about my beliefs.

B - It's all about perspective. There's a lot in the world, and I'm just looking for stuff no one else has ever thought to look for, and finding answers to questions no one else has asked. I'd say I've got a good bit of Finesse about how I approach things.

C - Well, maybe it upsets them but I'm sure they can handle it. Afterall, the Gods have been here for hundreds of thousands of years before me. Odds are, they'll be here for hundreds of thousands of years after me. I think they're pretty Resilient, and so am I.


As I've previously stated and maintained, I'm just a dream. Some indigestion that's playing up; I'm sure you can feel that sense in the back of your throat. That strange, overflowing saliva that's starting to nudge you towards wakefulness.

Living out here in urban decay country must be exciting! I'm sure that the Manitou are thrilled that the people that live here have at least left the native names for places intact, if not necessarily the people. You've got your Professor as a contact and as a friend. They're the only person that's tracking what you're up to but I'm interested to know who else you have in that groupchat of yours.


Tell me at least two other people in your contacts list.

D - Hadrian. He runs the cult I'm a member of.
Pretty much everyone's in a cult to one God or another. Hell, a lot of people are in multiple cults. He's a stand up guy, knows his way around occultism almost as well as I do. Plus, he's from around here. Knows the backroads and all the urban legends. Knowledgeable Guy.

E - Bridge. We were in highschool together, but she's gotten pretty sketchy. I mean, I keep in contact with her but I wouldn't say she's a friend friend. She's constantly getting busted with illegal substances. Plus, I'm sure she's stolen at least two cars. She's kind of a Career Criminal now I think about it...

F - Ike. Soldier, fresh from the sandbox. He's got some baggage that I kind of wanna help him work through. He's one of those guys that's happy to blast his ATV around the trails whenever they get nice and muddy, plus he's got military training. Very handy in a fight.

G - Hannah. She's a Lawyer that my folks knew. She helped my mom and dad get money after the accident and I've stayed in contact with her ever since. Never hurts to know a lawyer. Sure, they're Personal Injury but they're good for most legal questions, and they can act as an attorney should poo poo get nasty. Lawyers. Always good to have around.

H - Pete. Paramedic that works for Valley Hospital. He's busy a lot of the time but when he's available, he's reliable as hell. Calm, confident, charming and caring. Everything from broken bones to cuts and scrapes. He'll set you up with a sweetheart rate, even if you're out of network.

I - Ugh, what's their name? Oh! That's right... Audience write-in. Try to think of a role not covered for a contact!


Quite the motley crew. Do you think they'll stand by you? Even as things get strange? Even as you start getting strange? I guess time'll tell. You're starting to bubble back up to wakefulness, I can tell. I just need a few more things and then I'll leave you be..


A couple of things needing defined here.

- We need to think of our Approach. Are we Forceful, more Finesse focused or more about Resilience? When the tough gets going, do we hit back? Do we look for another route to get past it? Do we take it on the chin knowing that it'll break before we do? Picking an Approach will give us a boost to certain stats. We are primarily Mental focus, with social as secondary.

- We need two contacts picked that will help round out our initial Band.

- We need to pick a Knack. Knacks in Scion are things that show divine power, but for us at the moment, it's going to be a subtle power. Our options, based on our Sage calling, are:

J - Aura of Greatness Once per day, add +2 to any social skill (Leadership, Empathy, or Persuasion.)

K - Blockade of Reason You readily deflate the arguments of hucksters and con men with a sharp application of reason, or blunt denial (usually calling out the person for what they are trying to do). Targets of lower Tier cannot trick, coerce, swindle, or con you, and any supernatural attempts to do so trigger a Clash of Wills.

L - Palace of Memory When you recall past events that you have experienced or studied, you are able to recall the details flawlessly, never missing out on any clues or dropping the ball on any details you might remember.

M - Presence of Magic You always know when you are near an object or place of true magical or sacred power. You can smell ozone in the air, the hair on the back of your neck stands on end. You can just tell that something's strange here. This bypasses the need to make any kind of Occult roll to identify a place or object of magical or sacred power.

N - Omniglot Translation When you converse in or read a foreign language, your communication is flawless, without a trace of an accent. You can turn out translations in your native language in a matter of minutes without needing to roll. If you are translating mystical runes or the handwriting of Gods, you still do so swiftly, but must make a Knack Skill roll.

O - Speed Reading When you read materials for your research, you do so at lightning speed, devouring thick tomes in a matter of minutes and flipping through electronic documents in the blink of an eye. Halve the time you need to do any kind of academic research. Once a scene you may establish that you’ve read up on a subject and gain 1 Enhancement to the next applicable roll. This bonus applies before the roll.


Remember, you can pick multiple things and all votes are counted. I'll post our character sheet once I get it updated!

But Not Tonight
May 22, 2006

I could show you around the sights.

C
E & F
M and if I can pick more than one knack, N as the second.

malbogio
Jan 19, 2015

B
Edit: Plan Sheep Dodger
KMO

malbogio fucked around with this message at 09:39 on Apr 7, 2018

malbogio
Jan 19, 2015

But Not Tonight posted:

C
E & F
M and if I can pick more than one knack, N as the second.

We only get one knack but you can vote for as many as you want to increase the odds of one you like winning.

Lord Zedd-Repulsa
Jul 21, 2007

Devour a good book.


B
EGH
LO

JesterOfAmerica
Sep 11, 2015
1. A
2. EDITED-Plan sheep-dogder
3. LNO

JesterOfAmerica fucked around with this message at 00:51 on Apr 7, 2018

Natalie Fartman
Apr 5, 2013

I selflessly rescued an abandoned cat during the COVID-19 Pandemic :3:

1. B
2. H, F
3. M, L

Jossar
Apr 2, 2018

Current status: Angry about subs :argh:
1: C
2: EDITED - See Below.
3: M

Jossar fucked around with this message at 19:41 on Apr 6, 2018

NinjaPete
Nov 14, 2004

Hail to the speaker,
Hail to the knower,
Joy to him who has understood,
Delight to those who have listened.

- Hávamál
AB
Plan sheep-dodger
KM

NinjaPete fucked around with this message at 21:32 on Apr 6, 2018

sheep-dodger
Feb 21, 2013

B
I - 1 I met Bryan during my undergrad, as he was working on passing the bar exam. He's fun to hang out with and we quickly became good friends. Now that he's passed his exam, he works as a criminal defense lawyer, though his student loans have pushed him to take work as a criminal defense lawyer, if you catch my drift.
I - 2 Ashley and I have been in an on again off again kind of relationship since we shared a dorm room in our first year. While I stayed in academia though, she finished her MBA and is now a high powered executive at an international energy company. She regularly tries to poach me in order to use my research into godhood to find new ways to generate power.
KLO

sheep-dodger fucked around with this message at 18:19 on Apr 6, 2018

Sion
Oct 16, 2004

"I'm the boss of space. That's plenty."
Leaving this vote open until Midnight UTC tomorrow night.

JesterOfAmerica
Sep 11, 2015

sheep-dodger posted:

I - 1 I met Bryan during my undergrad, as he was working on passing the bar exam. He's fun to hang out with and we quickly became good friends. Now that he's passed his exam, he works as a criminal defense lawyer, though his student loans have pushed him to take work as a criminal defense lawyer, if you catch my drift.
I - 2 Ashley and I have been in an on again off again kind of relationship since we shared a dorm room in our first year. While I stayed in academia though, she finished her MBA and is now a high powered executive at an international energy company. She regularly tries to poach me in order to use my research into godhood to find new ways to generate power.

Switching Contact vote to these two

Jossar
Apr 2, 2018

Current status: Angry about subs :argh:

sheep-dodger posted:

I - 1 I met Bryan during my undergrad, as he was working on passing the bar exam. He's fun to hang out with and we quickly became good friends. Now that he's passed his exam, he works as a criminal defense lawyer, though his student loans have pushed him to take work as a criminal defense lawyer, if you catch my drift.
I - 2 Ashley and I have been in an on again off again kind of relationship since we shared a dorm room in our first year. While I stayed in academia though, she finished her MBA and is now a high powered executive at an international energy company. She regularly tries to poach me in order to use my research into godhood to find new ways to generate power.

Likewise, switching contact vote to this.

Pedestrian Xing
Jul 19, 2007

1. A
2. DE
3. K

Crazycryodude
Aug 15, 2015

Lets get our X tons of Duranium back!

....Is that still a valid thing to jingoistically blow out of proportion?


B
FH
N


As fun as it would be to have an ex that's the CEO of Exxon, I would be immediately and irresistibly compelled to tear her throat out whenever we met so

Sion
Oct 16, 2004

"I'm the boss of space. That's plenty."
Chapter 1 - Origin 3

Finesse is best, I'll cop to that. Straight up attempting to manfight a god in a theological battle is probably bad news for everyone involved, plus they don't take kindly to someone trying to outlast 'em. Like you said, they've been here for thousands of years before you, and'll probably be here for thousands of years after you. Also, if I were you, I'd maybe try and keep that ex of yours under wraps; some gods might not like the idea of someone being involved with someone else that's lookin' to factory farm divinity to keep the lights on. Gods tend to feel a little bit undervalued these days, and turning them into a transitionary power source probably wouldn't do much to make 'em feel appreciated.

Your lawyer pal seems like a good guy, but now that I get a closer look at the three of you I'm- really starting to hope that no one ever comes at you straight on a physical confrontation. You're three solid jaw-jackers but Ashley seems like the only one of you that can throw a decent punch, and that's only because she spent some of her frankly obscene bonus money on krav maga lessons. Maybe don't find yourself reliant upon her to keep you safe.

You're waking up soon since I think I have enough here to start keeping proper tabs on you. I'm going to need a better name than 'you' though. Also maybe some pronouns. Hopefully you should have a mental image of what you look like based on what we've said so far.


Alright, so this is now basically the ultimate audience write in. I asked earlier but it was too much too early but now, I think we're in a better position for it:

A - What's our name, what do we look like?

We're a PhD student that's doing our doctorate on forcing the square peg of divinity into the round hole of a scientific and dependable understanding of the universe. We're adept, dexterous, and probably one of the most intellectually gifted people on the planet. We live in one of the more rural parts of New Jersey; fifty minutes from Newark airport and fifty minutes from New York. The friends that we have are an energy company exec that keeps trying to poach us. We have previously been in a romantic relationship with her. We have another friend that works as a criminal lawyer who aims to keep people out of trouble if they pay them well enough.

We have a strange voice in our head now and previously, when we went to places that had a lot of urban legends surrounding them (such as the Pinelands), the hairs on the back of our neck stood up and we could just 'feel' that there was magic there. When we awake, however, we'll find that our reading comprehension has been accelerated to nearly inhuman levels and arguments used to lead us astray from the most reasonable course of action will fall upon deaf ears.

What does this person look like?

I've added a character sheet to the OP. 5 Dots is human maximum before things start getting weird.

Also, sorry for the delay in posting. Had a bit of a family emergency. If you're on the CYOA discord, there's now a group for this game called Godtime. Ask for it and I'll try and hook you up.

JesterOfAmerica
Sep 11, 2015
We are Barbara June Morgan but call us June everyone does. The years in front of computer screens never helped our eyesight but the glasses gave us a bookish charm. We have the shade of brown skin that lets people fill in the blanks and boy has that come in handy in some rough spots.

sheep-dodger
Feb 21, 2013

JesterOfAmerica posted:

We are Barbara June Morgan but call us June everyone does. The years in front of computer screens never helped our eyesight but the glasses gave us a bookish charm. We have the shade of brown skin that lets people fill in the blanks and boy has that come in handy in some rough spots.

Sure, this sounds good!

Sion
Oct 16, 2004

"I'm the boss of space. That's plenty."
Leaving this question open another 24 hours. Then we'll wake up, nice and refreshed. :v:

Sion
Oct 16, 2004

"I'm the boss of space. That's plenty."
Chapter 1 - Origin 4

Barbara June Morgan.

It's as good a name as any. I think that's pretty much everything that we need at the moment. You're going to wake up real soon and you're going to have a headache. You're going to blame it on being dehydrated because you fell asleep in front of your computer again. The odds are that it'll have failed out with the same error that the last thirty attempts at compiling your code have failed out with. I'm not the kind of dream that helps you work through problems, I'm afraid. I'm really more of a 'write down stuff about you for future reference kind of guy.' Anyway.

When you wake up, you're going to have a headache and you're going to blame it on dehydration but there's a whole other reality to it that you're not able to see just yet. Fingers crossed you'll do something big and impressive and someone might actually become invested in your story. You're still feeling sick from earlier and in five seconds you're going to feel a twinge in your lower back that wakes you up...

Two.

one.



Wayne, Passaic, New Jersey.
April 20th 2018, 8:43 am


You awake with a pounding headache and a feeling in the back of your throat like you're about to be sick. Recent memories of a dream begin to fade away into the mists of wakefulness. An errant and unintentional movement of the left arm causes a clatter of soda cans to fall from the top of your trusty Ikea onto the hardwood floor below. They were, thankfully, empty. There were a lot of empties and you could probably do with cleaning the place up. You swallow hard and take a deep breath in, eyes scrunched up and adjusting to the light coming in through the window. A crick in your neck and an ache in your lower back gave you a reminder that even as you were just entering your mid twenties, the ability to get a good nights sleep at your desk was starting to escape you.

At some point you must have nudged your computer out of its screensaver, the black mirror replaced with a vibrant 'gently caress you.' Another error message on another virtual machine running somewhere in the cloud. You paid by data transfer, not by calculation rate or by time used. One of the perks available to students through a university program, but it didn't matter if the data being back down to you either made no sense or didn't even boot properly. You sniff, half waking up and lean back in the crooked leather office chair. It'd been with you for a few years, picked up for cheap from when the chiropractors clinic over the road went bust. The padding in the seat wasn't great but, hey, the price was right. Speaking of price, there's enough money in the current account for the bus into the city, a Colombian coffee and egg and sausage on Texas Toast from the QuickChek.

Then again. Was it worth going into the city? Another meeting with a review board professor. An hour into the Port Authority, half an hour to the university, an hour worth of meeting, and then the same again to get back home all to say 'hey, that thing that's not loving worked for the last year still isn't loving working.' Still, having said that, it'd be around one in the afternoon by the time you're done in there, so you could pretty reasonably meet up with Ashley. She always does the best corporate lunches. It's hard to think of someone so lacking in frugality when it comes to a company expense account.


Looking at the screen, there's not that much in the way of interesting emails. A few properties for rent, some people looking at your linkedin profile, youtube updates. Scrolling through to find the error log from last nights failed compile. Open it and-

code:
2018-04-19 23:26:04  Application Already Installed on Disk, installed version as:
2018-04-19 23:26:04  cl 2174
2018-04-19 23:26:04  update.ini found
2018-04-19 23:26:04  Using User Proxy settings.
2018-04-19 23:26:04  Upload complete to: C:\WINDOWS\TEMP\godbox\share-update.xml
2018-04-19 23:26:04  Successfully downloaded share-update.xml
2018-04-19 23:26:04  Compare Version: 2174 To: 2173
2018-04-19 23:26:04  Using User Proxy settings.
2018-04-19 23:26:11  Download complete: C:\WINDOWS\TEMP\godbox\godboxManager-swarmagent.exe
2018-04-19 23:26:19  The file "C:\WINDOWS\TEMP\godbox\godboxManager-swarmagent.exe" is signed.
2018-04-19 23:26:19  A subject with name [godbox-swarm] has been found!
2018-04-19 23:26:19  Successfully downloaded Installer, install it now
2018-04-19 23:26:24  Waiting for service to become idle.
2018-04-19 23:26:29  Waiting for service to become idle.
2018-04-19 23:26:34  Waiting for service to become idle.
2018-04-19 23:26:39  Waiting for service to become idle.
2018-04-19 23:26:44  Waiting for service to become idle.
Well, it booted at least. The goal is to get a swarm of different virtual machines up and running, and communicating with each other and doing simultaneous processing on physical simulations. If you have a good enough simulation you can start to run through influences of different divine beings on those simulations and see just what impact different gods have on different situations. You could piece together a map of where one gods sphere of influence ends and another one begins. If you get enough nodes in your swarm, you can basically throw any question at it and have it spit out an answer. The problem was, you needed to fully understand the question so you could ask it in a way that the machine understood and, as the last eighteen months had taught you, machines are not as smart as you are. Hell, there's not a lot in the world that is as smart as you are.

Last night, a little before midnight, the godboxManager (the mothership for all the drones) updated successfully (yay!), signed off on a new version of the swarmagent automatically (very yay!), deployed them and then- nothing. You've got a master server that's up and running but none of the agents are updating to connect to it (very boo.) At this point, you're now stuck with a few problems. It could have been the internal network at the datacenter you were using, or it could have been the software and Izanagi's balls it's too loving early for this.

They say genius tends to be underappreciated in its own time, but they never talk about how underpaid genius tends to be as well.


Leaning back ever further into your chair, you glance out of the window over the road to the gas station and- huh. There's an ambulance parked outside the front of it. Couple of cops cars too - they're NJ cop cars, so they're black muscle cars with Police written on them in dark brown, almost purple letters. You wouldn't know they were cops until they pulled you over, or if they had uniforms standing around outside them like they did right now. Looks like that coffee and sandwich is off the table.

Maybe it's looking from the dull light of the interior straight out into daylight that's doing it but there's a bit of a pain in the back of your head. Thankfully, the aches in your back and the weird 'am I about to barf?' sensation has faded, so you've got that going for you.

Low funds, probably no breakfast and the research project is stalling out again.

1 - What's first?
A - I'm gonna stay in, see if I can get this code to work.
B - What happened over the road? Maybe go rubberneck over there or see if I can help out.
C - Head into the city, check with Professor Hayes, then see if Ash wants to buy me some lunch and convince me to come over to the darkside.
D - Head into the city, skip seeing Professor Hayes, but see if Ash wants to buy me some lunch and convince me to come over to the darkside. I'm not feeling academia today.
E - Wait, who was looking at linkedin? That could be worth checking out.

JesterOfAmerica
Sep 11, 2015
1. BD

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dont be mean to me
May 2, 2007

I'm interplanetary, bitch
Let's go to Mars


BDE

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