With This Ring (Young Justice SI) (Thread Fourteen)

[Antares1883]

Okay, my thoughts, for whatever they are worth.

First of all, why is yellow ring Paul wasting his time rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic?

Earth-Bet is undergoing an apocalypse, it's a slow apocalypse, but it's an apocalypse nonetheless. Killing criminals isn't going to stop that apocalypse.

Secondly, I find it quite amusing that the update had yellow ring Paul threaten the group in Brockton Bay that could beat the everloving crap out of him and steal his lunch money.

The light of the emotional electromagnetic spectrum is just that per DC canon- light.

Jade and Kyle once had to stop Dr Light from using his photokinesis from absorbing enough of the Glow from Kyle's battery to undergo apotheosis.

And what does Grue's power do? Eat light for lunch.

With the ring completely neutralized, does Yellow Ring Paul have the resources to deal with Regent's body control, Bitch's two ton dogs, etc?

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He doesn't know anything about Worm, doesn't know about the interdimensional nature of Parahuman powers, endbringers or even Scion. He doesn't know Cauldron is a thing so taking all that into consideration why wouldn't he be doing what he's doing now. Power Rings are also peak BS in terms of tech, considering everything they can do all fit into a ring that can manipulate an emotion, it makes Tinker tech look tame.

 

[infinityDivided]

lol and people say DC and Marvel are stupidly op, that's insane.

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The Entities are basically Wildbow going "Okay, I have the setting and the main characters. Now I just need to explain why hundreds of thousands of people develop powers that

A: are designed to be safe to their wielders/humanity/the planet at large,

B: would require hilariously immense amounts of processing power and resources,

and
C: are almost never used for the benefit of society as a whole."

Their whole conceit can be boiled down to "Where does Superman get the energy for his flight/indestructibility/strength/heat-vision/whatever-the-comic-writers-pull-out-of-their-ass?"

 

[Stsword]

He doesn't know anything about Worm, doesn't know about the interdimensional nature of Parahuman powers, endbringers or even Scion. He doesn't know Cauldron is a thing so taking all that into consideration why wouldn't he be doing what he's doing now. Power Rings are also peak BS in terms of tech, considering everything they can do all fit into a ring that can manipulate an emotion, it makes Tinker tech look tame.

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Figuring out that the Endbringers are slowly ending civilization doesn't require any of that shit, it requires being able to read. Unless your argument is that yellow ring Paul is illiterate, his ignorance is on him.

And you are apparently fuzzy on how power rings work.

They are computerized batteries. You know what someone without a power ring but nonetheless has access to the emotional electromagnetic spectrum can do? Everything that someone with a power ring can do. Maltusians don't need power rings. Larfleeze doesn't need a power ring. New God Justice Lord Stewart doesn't need a power ring.

The ring isn't the impressive part of that equation, it's the emotional electromagnetic spectrum that does the heavy lifting.

If the Maltusians had never discovered the emotional electromagnetic spectrum, their power rings would be limited to what say electricity can do, the rings don't make the energy do anything they can't naturally do.

 

[Information era]

He probably doesn't know about the apocalypse happening.

He doesn't need to actually use his constructs on the Undersides to defeat them, he can just shoot them like he did with Lung.

Zoat can just make it so that Grues powers don't work on power rings or Spectrum light.

He has advanced tech, so ha can use some device that prevents his body from being hijacked and he also has power armor to deal with super strong people.

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His energy weapons are all from creating a construct that shoots out the actual energy.

 

[Antares1883]

Figuring out that the Endbringers are slowly ending civilization doesn't require any of that shit, it requires being able to read. Unless your argument is that yellow ring Paul is illiterate, his ignorance is on him.

And you are apparently fuzzy on how power rings work.

They are computerized batteries. You know what someone without a power ring but nonetheless has access to the emotional electromagnetic spectrum can do? Everything that someone with a power ring can do. Maltusians don't need power rings. Larfleeze doesn't need a power ring. New God Justice Lord Stewart doesn't need a power ring.

The ring isn't the impressive part of that equation, it's the emotional electromagnetic spectrum that does the heavy lifting.

If the Maltusians had never discovered the emotional electromagnetic spectrum, their power rings would be limited to what say electricity can do, the rings don't make the energy do anything they can't naturally do.

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The rings are powered by the Emotional Spectrum but they have a lot of features that you'd otherwise not be able to do without it or at least not as easy, the rings are great at allowing people to do things they'd overwise not be able to do and in just general fight above their weight class. Plus having a Ring AI and database is pretty handy.

No sirens, I note. A man glowing with yellow light shoots a dragon in the brain with a positron beam, and no one calls the police. Clearly, I couldn't get here soon enough.

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Again Paul doesn't know anything, that quote shows us that he probably just arrived, so expecting him to instantly jump right next to an Endbringer when you know that's fucking dangerous is a dumb move, sure Paul is probably smart enough to realise that the Endbringers are slowly fucking civilisation over but beyond that, the exact reasoning on why he's doing what he's doing now, IDK you'd need to ask Zoat.

If Zoat has any intention of continuing this until we do see Endbringers, I'll be interested to see how he'd deal with them.

 

[Information era]

The rings are powered by the Emotional Spectrum but they have a lot of features that you'd otherwise not be able to do without it or at least not as easy, the rings are great at allowing people to do things they'd overwise not be able to do and in just general fight above their weight class. Plus having a Ring AI and database is pretty handy.

Again Paul doesn't know anything, he's probably just arrived, so expecting him to instantly jump right next to an Endbringer when you know that's fucking dangerous is a dumb move, sure Paul is probably smart enough to realise that the Endbringers are slowly fucking civilisation over but beyond that the exact reasoning on why he's doing what he's doing now, IDK you'd need to ask Zoat.

If Zoat has any intention of continuing this until we do see Endbringers, I'll be interested to see how he'd deal with them.

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Which then brings into question why he is jumping in and doing anything until he has at least a basic understanding.

 

[Antares1883]

Which then brings into question why he is jumping in and doing anything until he has at least a basic understanding.

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I'm not sure, I don't why he would, you'd think that Paul would do some research at least. Maybe that scene is where he just arrives and he arrives just as Lung is raging about?

EDIT: Maybe he arrives, sees what's going on and uses his funky emotion powers to find out Lung is a dickhead and kills him IDK.

 

[iamnuff]

First of all, why is yellow ring Paul wasting his time rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic?

Earth-Bet is undergoing an apocalypse, it's a slow apocalypse, but it's an apocalypse nonetheless. Killing criminals isn't going to stop that apocalypse.

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Most likely because Paul has no idea about this.
He can't see the future or magically know things either. He showed up in this world and saw rampant crime. Now he's acting to deal with it.
End of story. (so far)

Secondly, I find it quite amusing that the update had yellow ring Paul threaten the group in Brockton Bay that could beat the everloving crap out of him and steal his lunch money.

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Yeah nah bro.

Jade and Kyle once had to stop Dr Light from using his photokinesis from absorbing enough of the Glow from Kyle's battery to undergo apotheosis.

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And in some versions of DC green lantern are vunerable to things painted yellow, or things made of wood, or...

None of those things are true in the versions that Mr Zoat is pulling from, where the Glow is a semi-magical emotion-based power-source, and the actual colour and light it outputs is basically a footnote.

It's very likely that Lord Protector Paul could blast away Grue's darkness, and even more likely that his magic (and whatever physical prowess he's picked up in his long long life) would be more than enough to handle a bunch of children.

Also Darko, you might as well not bother. Vaermina is posting from an alternate universe in which the mechanics of every single fictional setting function slightly differently than they do in our universe, and he's never ever going to stop mouthing off about them with 100% confidence.
It doesn't matter how obviously you prove him wrong, how many wiki pages or direct quotes you cite or even shoving direct images of feats being shown on screen in his face, he will never ever stop showing up one update later and acting like everyone in the story is stupid because of some nonsensical 'fact' that he just invented in his head.

Seriously. This pattern of behaviour has been ongoing for more than five years now. In every single thread that he's active in.
Just ignore him and move on, that way the rest of us who are ignoring him don't have to see one half of the argument continuing endlessly.

 

[Information era]

I'm not sure, I don't why he would, you'd think that Paul would do some research at least. Maybe that scene is where he just arrives and he arrives just as Lung is raging about?

EDIT: Maybe he arrives, sees what's going on and uses his funky emotion powers to find out Lung is a dickhead and kills him IDK.

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He knows about the local criminals enough to put a ranking of undersiders below uber and leet.

Which is confusing because while uber and leet have been doing it longer, the undersiders have robbed casinos, are generally much more competent, and have higher rankings.

 

[Antares1883]

He knows about the local criminals enough to put a ranking of undersiders below uber and leet

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Honestly I just don't think Zoat put that much effort into the backstory of a chapter he probably has no intention of continuing beyond one or two more chapters.

 

[Darko]

I'm not sure, I don't why he would, you'd think that Paul would do some research at least. Maybe that scene is where he just arrives and he arrives just as Lung is raging about?

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Plus he probably found some database that shows the crimes Lung has committed and how he hasn't been taken down, so he decides to kill him.

 

[Vaermina]

Honestly how powerful would you have to be to take down an Entity reliably? Would a Parallax fused Paul be enough?

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Reliably? Probably Superboy Prime levels.

 

[Information era]

Plus he probably found some database that shows the crimes Lung has committed and how he hasn't been taken down, so he decides to kill him.

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And he apparently found out all that without finding out that he is kept around as long as he limits himself and helps against the civilization ending threats.

 

[Darko]

And he apparently found out all that without finding out that he is kept around as long as he limits himself and helps against the civilization ending threats.

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Lung never fought an Endbringer aside from that one time he fought Leviathan.

He considered it pointless to fight them.

 

[Valint]

No, it's WoG from wildbow himself, saying that Ziz isn't a telepath, and that her 'song' is the feeling of her telekenetically carving your brain up on a microscopic level to make you do what she wants.

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Citation needed.

Either way, one thing's for sure, there was a period where WB was adamant that there is no telepathy in his setting, to the point where he 'revealed' that even the big scary mind-reading telepathic monster is actually just faking it via the (frankly much more difficult sounding) telekinetic brain-surgery and future predictions, instead of actually being able to see your thoughts.

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Citation very much needed.

There was a loud segment of Worm fandom which was Kid Flash-levels of "Everything is just magnets telekinesis!" that theorized this, very loudly and repeatedly. Also loudly.

As for how the Simurgh works, we literally (a) get to see it from the point of view of her targets in Madison, (b) get a description of it from Wildbow, and (c) get to see the mechanism from her end.

Psychic pressure and hallucinations, yes. Nary a mention of telekinetic surgery.

Yeah, Wildbow sometimes changes his mind. However, more often than not, the problem is more that Wildbow makes a vague statement that's true in a particular context, and fandom seizes on it to extrapolate to the moon.

(Like, the one point where Wildbow had Glory Girl saying that telepaths didn't exist--and then later explained that this was just in-universe knowledge, which wasn't necessarily gospel truth--or the WoG where Wildbow explains that there aren't any straight-up full-blown telepaths... and then later explained that it wasn't because it was impossible, but just because the Entities didn't find that powerset interesting, and that lots of parahumans are using a limited form of telepathy as part of their powers.)

...although the manhunter is a telekine too, so maybe he was saying that J'onn would feel her trying to do that to him and be able to block it?

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... Look, if you're going to look at a straight-up statement like "[the Simurgh] would beat [Martian Manhunter] in terms of telepathy", and go to work trying to figure out how to contort so it actually means not telepathy, that kind of feels like you've got a death-grip on fanon and there's no real point trying to change your mind.

It's pretty simple. If Martian Manhunter is able to undo the Simurgh's manipulations, then whatever she's doing is in the same field as what he does.

I mean, I guess you could say that he's really not a telepath, if you want? Like, some sort of John Byrne-ish 'all powers are really just telekinesis, when you get right down it' argument?

 

[Information era]

Lung never fought an Endbringer aside from that one time he fought Leviathan.

He considered it pointless to fight them.

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Is still the reason he is kept around

 

[iamnuff]

Citation needed.

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Pass

Citation very much needed.

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Hard pass

This isn't a debate thread, and frankly Wildbow was always shit about properly cataloguing his WoG posts, so i can't even just grab it from a wiki or someting, so no i'm not going to spend actual time diving to look for a quote that doesn't matter. Either take it on faith as something that was common knowledge to everyone in the fandom for multiple years, or don't.

I legitimately don't care, because the state of wildbow's canon doesn't actually matter. Either in this thread or anywhere else, for that matter.
If he can't even be bothered to keep his own bullshit straight, why should I invest any effort in doing so?

The actual point I was making is that Lisa isn't a telepath, and so couldn't have knocked herself out with Paul's name.
That remains true regardless of which version of WoG about how Simurgh's song works Wildbow feels like enforcing today.

... Look, if you're going to look at a straight-up statement like "[the Simurgh] would beat [Martian Manhunter] in terms of telepathy", and go to work trying to figure out how to contort so it actually means not telepathy, that kind of feels like you've got a death-grip on fanon and there's no real point trying to change your mind.

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... No, this is a response to you saying that Wildbow said that if she tried to sing at MM, he'd be able to tell what she was doing and stop it.

Unlike Simurgh, we know for a fact that J'onn is an equally capable telepath AND telekinetic, so him being able to somehow stop her from brainfucking him doesn't actually answer either way which vector Simurgh would be using in this theoretical crossover battle.

Not that it matters, because as above, Wildbow's WoG is wildly inconsistent, so answer could change depending on his mood today.

 

[Antares1883]

This isn't to do with Wildbow or anything but the problem with WOGs in general is that the author can just make anything up when asked about a situation that they'd never considered before. If you're in a situation where the Story clearly says X but the author says Y then imo story takes priority. If it's not in the source material or at least hinted in the source material then I think it's safe to just ignore the WOG. Again this isn't about Wildbow or anything just in general that I felt like saying.

*cough*J.K.Rowling*cough*

 

[LazySloth13]

Mr. Zoat are the Lanterns who are going to show up just the basic seven colors with the possibility of black? Or other versions of Paul without power rings as well?

Because I can imagine most versions of Paul decides to kill most of the villains who inhabit Earth-Bet save maybe Baul and Saul, the former can barely survive Earth -14 and the latter's compassion would lead him helping the PRT, even the Paragon would see the limitations of the government heroes more of a hindrance.

Also are these snippets another case of Paragon-Paul having visions of his alternate selves similar to how Ambush Bug tried removing his from Canon? Or just an Else-World/What If? episode?

 

[hkim]

Me: "12 new pages, wha-?"

Me, two minutes later: "Oh a Worm chapter. That'd do it!"

 

[Information era]

Because I can imagine most versions of Paul decides to kill most of the villains who inhabit Earth-Bet save maybe Baul and Saul, the former can barely survive Earth -14 and the latter's compassion would lead him helping the PRT, even the Paragon would see the limitations of the government heroes more of a hindrance.

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The thing is, is that all of the supervillains in earth bet (other than the slaughterhouse) limit themselves well below most pauls' kill thresholds.

Oh and zoat, lung is not a serial murderer and his crew doesn't do murders. He would've been sent to the birdcage long ago if he did.

When bakuda takes over after lung is incapacitated, then they start murdering people.

 

[Darko]

Also are these snippets another case of Paragon-Paul having visions of his alternate selves similar to how Ambush Bug tried removing his from Canon? Or just an Else-World/What If? episode?

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Paul only has those visions of his alternates around April 1st, not before or after.

Of the two occasions it's happened so far, both were on the 1st of April.

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[Mr Zoat]

11th April 2011
00:47

The ring shows me the approaching motorcycle in my mind's eye, the general construction reminding me more of an Astartes bike than the more usual design. Scans show that it's riddled with exotic mechanical and electronic equipment, and…

That's a halberd.

So this is a 'superhero'.

I feel a moment of sympathy for my alter egos who had to put up with that sort of lunacy on a regular basis. Thundera has no such tradition, and never will if I have anything to say about it.

The armour is passable, as light power armour goes. The colour is a little off-putting, but in an urban environment it probably serves adequately as camouflage. The exposed chin-. Is there a retractable chin guard? No, there isn't. Ordinarily I'd have said that such a small weak spot wouldn't matter significantly in urban combat, but if he routinely closes to halberd range -and stays there- then that clearly isn't the case. It also implies a vulnerability to gas weapons and contact toxins.

My own armour is a masterwork of technology and magic wrought for me by Mumm-Rana's hands. My only influence is in the yellow lantern built into the cuirass, freeing me from the need to recharge the ring. It has served me well on a dozen battlefields, and a simple analysis shows that it will outperform… Armsmaster's? Armour in every regard.

The young woman with the insects is still watching from a nearby rooftop. I imagine that she's curious as to whether I am a deluded serial killer or not, but I'm not sure that it's actually worth my while remaining here. While I doubt that the Undersiders are going to pass what I said on to anyone, my work will be easier if I can attack the local superhumans before they can gather hostages. Naturally, I would simply shoot through them, but I would prefer to minimise civilian casualties.

On the other hand, it would be useful to gain first hand information on the capacities of the local law enforcers. I do intend to pass the pacified city back to them after all.

Ring, scan for neurological oddities such as those so far seen in local superhumans.

Working.

Armsmaster turns onto this street, sees me and leaps from his bike, which slows, turns away and parks itself automatically. He watches me from a defensive crouch, polearm in the guard position.

Located.

The ring shows me an albino in a warehouse. The people around him have an unusual number of swastika tattoos, and the quantity of firearms rather implies that they're not Buddhists.

"Unknown parahuman-."

"Excuse me for a moment."

I fly upwards about a hundred metres, giving myself a clear line of sight to the warehouse. The albino operates under the name 'Alabaster', and has some sort of regenerative ability which resets his body when he's injured. The obvious counter is entombment, but logically speaking destroying the part of his brain which controls his ability should do the job.

The quantity of ammunition present does give me some concerns, but I still have Orange Prime's cold gun designs on file so I should be able to prevent it cooking-

Located.

-off. I create a positron ray construct and a cold gun construct, target Alabaster's brain with the former and fire. There's a small blast as the positrons briefly interact with the outer wall of the warehouse and explosively neutralise a few of its electrons, and then another slightly larger one as the beam carries on and puts the positrons in a position to briefly interact with Alabaster's cranium.

His accomplices don't require such careful treatment. I target brains and hearts, moving from one target to the next in a matter of seconds. Few have time to understand what's happening before they expire and… Ah, good show. The heat increase is palpable but nowhere near cook-off temperature.

I put my constructs into an 'at ease' position and return to ground level.

Located.

Armsmaster has come a little closer, but he was clearly monitoring me and the only change in his stance as I come to a halt on the road is to tilt his head to continue to track me.

"I apologise. You were saying?"

"Did you kill these people?"

"Yes." I generate a data stick which should be compatible with local technology and float it towards him. "A full recording of the incident. Death was near-instantaneous in all cases."

He lets the data stick float in front of him for a moment, and I notice some sort of broad spectrum probe deploy from his axe. Most likely trying to determine whether it's an explosive or not. After a moment he takes it with his left hand and places it inside an armoured compartment in his cuirass.

"If you surrender and accompany me now, it is possible that you will be offered a favorable plea bargain regarding these murders."

"Your statement is probably true. However, I am not interested in your offer."

"The alternative is that I defeat you and bring you there by force."

"I believe that you overestimate your chances. But I am curious as to your motives. What is it about what I've done here that bothers you?"

"Aside from the cold-blooded murder of sixteen men, including-"

"Thirty-four men and three women."

"-both of the ABB's parahumans?"

Two-? Oh, yes, that corpse has a mask and a super tumour. I hadn't noticed at the time.

"And one belonging to Empire Eighty Eight."

"That will trigger a gang war. Dozens of innocent people will die in the crossfire when Empire Eighty Eight move in on former ABB territory."

"And what do you propose to do about it?"

"I'm not here to discuss policy with a criminal."

"The correct thing to do is bring in the army, as you clearly lack the resources to deal with such a major upsurge in violence. That said, if local law enforcement had adequate resources to deal with the level of opposition you face then this situation would not have arisen. You need not worry about collateral damage. I will simply kill all participants."

Located.

Oh, that's interesting.

"I had been under the impression that superhumans were prohibited from holding positions of authority in the Parahuman Response Team. Does that just apply to directors?"

"Why are you asking?"

"Thomas Calvert is a superhuman. He has the signature growths in his brain. I don't yet have the data to tell you what his particular ability is, but there doesn't appear to be any record of it in your files. That seems like a substantial oversight, given his current role."

…

"How did you come by that information?"

"I scanned him just now. Determining whether someone is a supervillain or not requires a manual review, but those growths in your brain are quite distinctive."

"You can locate-?"

He cuts himself off, but I nod anyway.

"Yes. I'm going to get back to work, now. I suggest-"

He gestures, and a bolas of some kind attempts to wrap itself around me. I catch it with a construct and drop it on the ground.

"-that you make preparations for your job suddenly becoming possible. Farewell."

I rise into the air, target Purity and then fire.

 

[Otokonoko Culture]

Nooooo. Not Shiny Momma.

 

[JamesEye]

Hahaha! I'm loving this. He'll just kill them all. Casually admitting to being able to locate superhumans but not realising that basically breaks the entire game wide open. Suggesting to just bring in the army and I'm guessing he'd support massive air strikes and stuff too. Haaaa. I'm looking forward to how this arc goes in any direction ha.

 

[Information era]

No that isn't how it works. the super tumor just lets them control the super powers, without it the super power acts uncontrollably. Alabaster is unkillable, no matter what you do to his body. Secondly, the super tumor occurs in anyone with the possibility to trigger, which is somewhere like either 1/5 or 1/200 of the population, I forget which.

 

[RichardWhereat]

Nooooo. Not Shiny Momma.

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Shiny mumma is a murderer.

No that isn't how it works. the super tumor just lets them control the super powers, without it the super power acts uncontrollably. Alabaster is unkillable, no matter what you do to his body. Secondly, the super tumor occurs in anyone with the possibility to trigger, which is somewhere like either 1/5 or 1/200 of the population, I forget which.

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People without powers only get one tumor. People with powers have the second one activate.

 

[Otokonoko Culture]

Shiny mumma is a murderer.

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So is Jade!

By this point in the timeline, Purity had wanted out of the E88 for months. ThunderCats Paul loses 30 points.

 

[Information era]

Shiny mumma is a murderer.

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Ok How many times do I have to say this, none of the extent supervillains are murderers within the Brockton Bay. Murder is against the rules, and results in them getting sent to the birdcage. Purity is also CURRENTLY ACTING AS A SUPERHERO. Albeit not acting much differently than when she was a supervillain, Still being racist and targeting mostly black and asian criminals, but still.

 

[varoksa]

Its amazing how boring a concept is after having seen this scene being done near verbatim half a dozen time through various worm fics, now completely slaughtering the chinese parahuman army may have been actually interesting, or just literally anywhere but brockton done to death bay.