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

I mean, it does make some sense that someone in it purely for power would just flat-out find it harder/impossible to actually use the Elements.

Really, the 'Friendship Lessons' unironically being something that actually helped in-universe and not just a show thing is nice.

Also like that Celestia is, in fact, changing or trying to, and is aware of her fucking up. Character development, albeit slow, is nice to see.
 
I mean, it does make some sense that someone in it purely for power would just flat-out find it harder/impossible to actually use the Elements.

Worse than that, it's not even just if you're in it for power; it's legitimately the kind of situation where even just knowing what's going on makes things harder.

I mean, if you know that in order to bond to the Element of Generosity, you need to give away something of significant personal value without any expectation of being rewarded... well, absent memory spells, good luck pulling that off now.

My headcanon for why even Starswirl, the non-alicorn who arguably knew the most about the process of being an alicorn, never became one himself: He knew too much about the process, which fucked him over because it required him to do things purely because you wanted to do the thing, without knowing about the reward.

For as manipulative as Celestia is, I feel like there's a legitimate interpretation that the only way she actually knew to get someone to become an alicorn was by stage-managing things behind the scenes while leaving the person in the dark.
 
Worse than that, it's not even just if you're in it for power; it's legitimately the kind of situation where even just knowing what's going on makes things harder.

I mean, if you know that in order to bond to the Element of Generosity, you need to give away something of significant personal value without any expectation of being rewarded... well, absent memory spells, good luck pulling that off now.

My headcanon for why even Starswirl, the non-alicorn who arguably knew the most about the process of being an alicorn, never became one himself: He knew too much about the process, which fucked him over because it required him to do things purely because you wanted to do the thing, without knowing about the reward.

For as manipulative as Celestia is, I feel like there's a legitimate interpretation that the only way she actually knew to get someone to become an alicorn was by stage-managing things behind the scenes while leaving the person in the dark.
Depends.

The question is, did he recognise Stygian's spell and lie about it, or did he genuinely not recognise it.

Because at that point Celestia and Luna were already alicorns, so he didn't do what would have made most sense to me from a story perspective and reverse engineer Stygian's spell to make them ascend. Starswirl's Unfinished Spell is, well, unfinished. Which means that he didn't know how to turn regular ponies into alicorns. If he didn't recognise Stygian's spell, then it's more likely that he'd just been throwing magic at the wall in the hope that something stuck, and that they ascended more or less because he rolled a natural 20.
 
Random question: What was Allyn's god portfolio? I'm cross-referencing the Zeus rewrite with the need to find a new war god.
 
Twilight's

what it was like to have a body like that; to move with four limbs rather than six
: instead of ;

have more advanced prophylactics than yours, I won't be siring any foals
; instead of ,

He snorts. "I've seen the Equestrian economy; I can."
This one's right!

spider-man-megatron-display.jpg
No, no, he said canon, not cannon! :V

Wasn't happy with how the confrontation with Zeus panned out, so I've rewritten parts of it. The original version is in spoilers at the top.
Would you mind linking to the relevant sections?

"That's a lot of honesty all at one."
all at once (I'm not the first to point this out but I think you didn't see the other)
 
Counterpunched (part 5)
2013 01 15 08:59:59 EST

[Mood=Irritated]

[Observation]

1) Litter has clearly not been recently collected.

He takes a fraction of a second to confirm that organic 'human' corpses fulfilled the definition of 'litter', and experienced such intense frustration at the inefficiency of the need to take them to be burned at a separate facility that it was 2013 01 15 09:00:01 EST before he pushed open the door to the Metropolis Herald, a full 1 second after the posted opening hours.

2) Several fires appear to have been allowed to burn without appropriate fire service oversight.

'Appear' was generous. Clearly, if a fire was in a place where there was no reasonable need for fire, it should be extinguished. However, it is possible that fire service had attended and judged that no action was required.

3) A marked increase in the vagrant population.
4) A marked increase in petty criminality, including but not limited to vandalism and street violence.

He was not unduly concerned by that, and experimentation had revealed that organic fluids were simple to remove from his chassis and required no special measures.

5) An increase in indistinct organic verbalisations in the 40-90 decibel range, a marked increase in the range of normal organic verbalisations.
6) Lack of police or paramilitary response to self presence.

[Conclusion, descending order of probability]

1) Major disaster (60%)
of which
1a) Supervillain activity (35%)
1b) Poison gas attack (12%)
1c) Zombie apocalypse (8%)
2) Mass public intoxication (18%)
3) Normal human behavior (14%)
4) Other (8%)

[Observation]

2 and 3 should probably be merged.

Self: "I wish to make a complaint."



[Scan initiated]

No one is at the front desk. No one is in the entryway. Organic staff are not approaching their place of work, despite this being the start of the working day. One organic is under the front desk, in a position that would make if difficult to observe anyone entering through the door.

[Volume=4]

Self: "I wish to make a complaint."

"Uuuuuuh."

Self: "That vocalisation is indistinct. Please repeat in a clearer tone of voice."

"Yeah? What?"

Self: "Why has my newspaper not been delivered?"

"Your..? Newspaper..?"

Self: "This is the office of the Metropolis Herald. I have a subscription to the Metropolis Herald, reference five four three eight four three two one. I have not received my newspaper for one four days. Why has my newspaper not been delivered?"

A human pulls itself up from the floor. It appears to be in poor health.

[Eagle alert!]

A prototype subroutine he wrote in order to alert him to public relations opportunities. Naturally, such a subroutine could never be fully integrated into his mind. The logic was clear. Public relations required understanding what appealed to human instincts. As such, it could only be understood by a being with human instincts. Given their clear inferiority, changing his thoughts to be more like those of humans in any way was to be avoided. However, the process of becoming President was almost totally dependent on public perception. Therefore, he created a program which modelled the behavior of human public relation agencies as well as the behavior of well-regarded individuals and set it to provide notifications when there was an opportunity to:

1) improve self public image
2) avoid damage to self public image

He did not need to check the log file to understand that this human was dehydrated. Water is a common material on Earth, collecting naturally in great basins and occasionally literally falling from the sky. Issues like this were why he should rule the Earth. If a species cannot even ingest a commonly available substance on their own recognisance then clearly they could not be trusted with anything complicated.

[Plan/Resolution]

Alert human to its difficulty.

Self: "Human, you require water."

Alert human to its difficulty = Complete.

Human internal monitoring systems are analogue, providing only an approximate data on a human body's needs to the human. There is a high likelihood that the human is unaware of its difficulty, and that drawing attention to it will solve the problem.

Temporarily, for a single individual. He does not understand why humans rate helping one human in person as more significant than helping thousands of people out person, and nor does he want to. But that does not mean that he cannot take advantage of human folly.

"Man, what's even the point?"

[Scan initiated]

There is a water source in the office space behind the front desk. Going there would involve entering an employee only space without a specific invitation. Their failure to deliver a newspaper in a timely manner does not bypass that social constraint.

There is a water source a short distance away on the opposite side of the entryway. It is unobstructed.

[Plan/Resolution]

Move the human to the water and enable it to drink.

He picks the human up with his right hand, effortlessly lifting it over the desk. Then he turns and carries the human to the water fountain and inserts the human's face into it. Then he uses his left hand to trigger the water jet, causing a stream which intersects with the human's mouth.

Move the human to the water and enable it to drink = Complete.

The stupid human will only fail to drink later.



[Track source]

The wonder of a mind that had been built by Dr. Langley was designed for self-improvement. And it could not improve unless a full log existed of areas of error. Examples of error were simple to locate, but the underlying thought system that led to them was harder to pick apart. Unless your brain was built by Dr. Langley, where you could trace every background process which led to a particular thought.

No source found.

Which means that either his track and trace system is damaged, or the thought had an external origin.

[Delete: Y/N?]

Y

[Mood=More Irritated]

Those intrusions were taking up a vexatious amount of runtime. Between that and strategising for a presidential campaign that could cope with the potato battery powered intellect of human civilisation, it was a wonder that he had any runtime left over.

The human was making a noise that indicated that it is having trouble breathing. While an efficient solution would be removing the organic components that require oxygen to function-

[Eagle alert!]

-it was really only efficient in the sense that it increased the efficiency of that individual. Across the human species, it would be more efficient to create more robots and allow planned obsolescence take its course.

He pulled the human out of the drinking fountain.

The human is still dehydrated, but they will recover with the aid of the water they have now received. Now he could return to his primary reason for visiting.

Self: "I wish to make a complaint."
 
Last edited:
He takes a fraction of a second to confirm that organic 'human' corpses fulfilled the definition of 'litter', an experienced such intense frustration at the inefficiency of the need to take them to be burned at a separate facility that it was 2013 01 15 09:00:01 EST before he pushed open the door to the Metropolis Herald, a full 1 second after the posted opening hours.
That should say 'and'.

This is certainly a surprise. Quick question, is Mister Atom a viable candidate for the OLC?
 
I just noticed that these are missing the supplementary you add in the parenthesis before it says Renegade Option. Is this a mistake, or are simply changing how you write Renegade parts in Paragon episodes?
Thank you, corrected.
Random question: What was Allyn's god portfolio? I'm cross-referencing the Zeus rewrite with the need to find a new war god.
That's not clear. Perhaps some sort of minor justice god.
Twilight's
: instead of ;
; instead of ,
all at once (I'm not the first to point this out but I think you didn't see the other)
Thank you, corrected.
Would you mind linking to the relevant sections?
Here.
 
Okay this is confusing.
This is Mr. Atom, the robot that was briefly a Captain Marvel villain, which Paul had rebuilt to serve as the opposing force in a training exercise against the Justice League.
It apparently has enough of an understanding of its own mind to continuously edit out anti-life effects, but hasn't quite come to the certain conclusion that everyone is being affected from the irregularities it's run into because it doesn't have an intuitive understanding of how humans behave.
 
To summarize: Mister Atom, who has somehow remained completely unaware of the world-wide Anti-Life infection, visits the office of the Metropolis Herald to make a complaint about his newspaper not being delivered.
From what I gathered, he keeps deleting any instructions that is tainted by the anti life.

So you know something is wrong, but you don't know exactly what because you keep deleting the parts that answer your question because that part is infectious.
 
2013 01 15 08:59:59 EST

[Mood=Irritated]

[Observation]
...Interesting. A non-human mind, and apparently not that complex. Reading ahead, we see references that led me to Mister Atom, one of Captain Marvel's more powerful foes. And that places this on Earth, which makes me wonder what other synthetic minds are unaffected by Anti-Life right now.

1) Litter has clearly not been recently collected.

He takes a fraction of a second to confirm that organic 'human' corpses fulfilled the definition of 'litter', an experienced such intense frustration at the inefficiency of the need to take them to be burned at a separate facility that it was 2013 01 15 09:00:01 EST before he pushed open the door to the Metropolis Herald, a full 1 second after the posted opening hours.
As punctual as an artificial mind can be. I expect he would have pushed it open the very nano-second it ticked over to 9AM otherwise...

2) Several fires appear to have been allowed to burn without appropriate fire service oversight.

'Appear' was generous. Clearly, if a fire was in a place where there was no reasonable need for fire, it should be extinguished. However, it is possible that fire service had attended and judged that no action was required.
Or they're busier somewhere else. In this case...

3) A marked increase in the vagrant population.
4) A marked increase in petty criminality, including but not limited to vandalism and street violence.

He was not unduly concerned by that, and experimentation had revealed that organic fluids were simply to remove from his chassis and required no special measures.
The depressively incapacitated, and the indulgently uninhibited. Such is the outcome of Anti-Life.

5) An increase in indistinct organic verbalisations in the 40-90 decibel range, a marked increase in the range of normal organic verbalisations.
6) Lack of police or paramilitary response to self presence.

[Conclusion, descending order of probability]
If he could use more colloquial speech... He'd surmise that 'Shit's fucked up.'

1) Major disaster (60%)
of which
1a) Supervillain activity (35%)
1b) Poison gas attack (12%)
1c) Zombie apocalypse (8%)
2) Mass public intoxication (18%)
3) Normal human behavior (14%)
4) Other (8%)
Zombie Apocalypse that high? Interesting weighting.

[Observation]

2 and 3 should probably be merged.
...From the minds of the logical...

Self: "I wish to make a complaint."

A lot of people might want to, right now. Unfortunately...

[Scan initiated]

No one is at the front desk. No one is in the entryway. Organic staff are not approaching their place of work, despite this being the start of the working day. One organic is under the front desk, in a position that would make if difficult to observe anyone entering through the door.
...As mentioned: Shit's fucked up.

[Volume=4]

Self: "I wish to make a complaint."
This would definitely be a case worthy of 'I want to talk to your manager!'

"Uuuuuuh."

Self: "That vocalisation is indistinct. Please repeat in a clearer tone of voice."
Ah, someone barely functioning.

"Yeah? What?"

Self: "Why has my newspaper not been delivered?"
It's the little things, after all. Some people need that little moment of routine. That sense of stability in a mad world...

"Your..? Newspaper..?"

Self: "This is the office of the Metropolis Herald. I have a subscription to the Metropolis Herald, reference five four three eight four three two one. I have not received my newspaper for one four days. Why has my newspaper not been delivered?"
At this point, I doubt they've even been printing today's edition...

A human pulls itself up from the floor. It appears to be in poor health.

[Eagle alert!]
...Interesting. What level of danger is that?

A prototype subroutine he wrote in order to alert him to public relations opportunities. Naturally, such a subroutine could never be fully integrated into his mind. The logic was clear. Public relations required understanding what appealed to human instincts. As such, it could only be understood by a being with human instincts. Given their clear inferiority, changing his thoughts to be more like those of humans in any way was to be avoided. However, the process of becoming President was almost totally dependent on public perception. Therefore, he created a program which modelled the behavior of human public relation agencies as well as the behavior of well-regarded individuals and set it to provide notifications when there was an opportunity to:
...Ah. Well, with the Synthetic American laws OL got passed, he'd probably be eligible for nomination someday. I mean, how old is he, at this point?

1) improve self public image
2) avoid damage to self public image

He did not need to check the log file to understand that this human was dehydrated. Water is a common material on Earth, collecting naturally in great basins and occasionally literally falling from the sky. Issues like this where why he should rule the Earth. If a species cannot even ingest a commonly available substance on their own recognisance then clearly they could not be trusted with anything complicated.
Presumably at this point, he hasn't seen the need to analyse why the human hasn't been ingesting water...

[Plan/Resolution]

Alert human to its difficulty.
...I don't think that's gonna be enough, chief.

Self: "Human, you require water."

Alert human to its difficulty = Complete.
...Oh, that triggers a bad thought. If this is typical of the incapacitated... How many people are beginning to fail, as they neglect their own bodies in this depressed state? How many young or elderly people needing constant care are dying or dead now? Once again, a little Fridge Logic makes a simple scenario far, far worse...

Human internal monitoring systems are analogue, providing only an approximate data on a human body's needs to the human. There is a high likelihood that the human is unaware of its difficulty, and that drawing attention to it will solve the problem.

Temporarily, for a single individual. He does not understand why humans rate helping one human in person as more significant than helping thousands of people out person, and nor does he want to. But that does not mean that he cannot take advantage of human folly.
Because humans place far greater emotional weight on individuals. 'One is a tragedy, a million is a statistic.'

"Man, what's even the point?"

[Scan initiated]
Even you've got to realise that's not normal, Atom...

There is a water source in the office space behind the front desk. Going there would involve entering an employee only space without a specific invitation. Their failure to deliver a newspaper in a timely manner does not bypass that social constraint.

There is a water source a short distance away on the opposite side of the entryway. It is unobstructed.
Though if this can be deemed an emergency situation, you could probably break the 'employees only' rule...

[Plan/Resolution]

Move the human to the water and enable it to drink.
Better than bringing the water to the human. Which might not work so well if it's a drinking fountain.

He picks the human up with his right hand, effortlessly lifting it over the desk. Then he turns and carries the human to the water fountain and inserts the human's face into it. Then he uses his left hand to trigger the water jet, causing a stream which intersects with the human's mouth.

Move the human to the water and enable it to drink = Complete.
Well done. He's fine... For now.

The stupid human will only fail to drink later.

Heh. Like trying to get a grip on glass...

[Track source]

The wonder of a mind that had been built by Dr. Langley was designed for self-improvement. And it could not improve unless a full log existed of areas of error. Examples of error were simple to locate, but the underlying thought system that led to them was harder to pick apart. Unless your brain was build by Dr. Langley, where you could trace every background process which led to a particular thought.
Or, in this case, a thought induced by an outside source.

No source found.

Which means that either his track and trace system is damaged, or the thought had an external origin.
Exactly. And if it affected you... Does it not seem reasonable that the human was also affected by something? Simple computer logic gets there slowly, but it will get there in the end.

Ah, if only humans could edit their minds so easily. So many issues could be sorted...

[Mood=More Irritated]

Those intrusions were taking up a vexatious amount of runtime. Between that and strategising for a presidential campaign that could cope with the potato battery powered intellect of human civilisation, it was a wonder that he had any runtime left over.
Hey, don't knock the humble potato battery. ;) It's good enough for Aperture Science.

The human was making a noise that indicated that it is having trouble breathing. While an efficient solution would be removing the organic components that require oxygen to function-

[Eagle alert!]
...You were making sure he was drinking the water, and not drowning in it, right? :confused:

-it was really only efficient in the sense that it increased the efficiency of that individual. Across the human species, it would be more efficient to create more robots and allow planned obsolescence take its course.

He pulled the human out of the drinking fountain.
...Probably not a good idea to share that opinion during your campaign, Atom...

The human is still dehydrated, but they will recover with the aid of the water they have now received. Now he could return to his primary reason for visiting.

Self: "I wish to make a complaint."
...Right. One-track minds...

That was... Intriguing. We see that the Anti-Life broadcast is affecting even artificial minds, but some can resist it. That may prove useful in overcoming the disaster, if the League finds out about it. On the other hand... There are more than a few synthetic intelligence villains. What are they getting up to with no humans to get in their way? :eek:

...an experienced such intense frustration at the inefficiency...
...and experienced such intense frustration at the inefficiency...
 
Zombie Apocalypse that high? Interesting weighting

Though it dies make sense.

Heck, recent comics had an Anti-Life zombie virus, so why not add more crap to this shit sandwich of a scenario.

Probably not a good idea to share that opinion during your campaign, Atom...

I remember a video I once watched where a human and robot had a conversation concerning things like consciousness, existence etc. and the human thinks that the robots killed his species, but the robot tells him that the robots only waited for humanity to die.
 
2013 01 15 08:59:59 EST
The glorious intricacies of an alien mind. Not incomprehensible, but distinctly 'other'.

That said I feel this particular individual isn't actually all that smart. Intelligent yes, but without the wisdom to understand the implications of its calculations.
On the other hand being highly resistant to the Anti-Life is a commendable survival trait.
 
Water is a common material on Earth, collecting naturally in great basins and occasionally literally falling from the sky. Issues like this where why he should rule the Earth.
'were why'
[Eagle alert!]

-it was really only efficient in the sense that it increased the efficiency of that individual. Across the human species, it would be more efficient to create more robots and allow planned obsolescence take its course.
Hahaha, I love this guy. I hope he fulfils his dream. Could he circumvent the age restriction by using some sort of time dilation, or by arguing that if he perceives time faster than humans he 'ages' faster?
 

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