Whitewings

Re: Talk about toxic Gas! The question is, what happens when VX is combined with hydrochloric acid, and various other digestive chemicals? I'd suspect the end results would be very different from VX.

Re: A more advanced origin. Don't forget Scientific Success. Captain America's a perfect example, and the live TV version of the Hulk was an example of a deliberate experiment that worked (rather too well... ).

Re: WWYCD: Morty the Mugger never learns... After determining that the process is reversible, most of my characters would basically ask if he colud be left that way until shortly before his trial.

Re: WWYCD: The Basics Faye: Assuming she's not yet gone public, well, I doubt a 17 year old Olympic level athlete is going to have any trouble reaching the cat. Actually, that applies to most of my characters. They'd say sure, unless there was something pressing to deal with, and it's very easy for most of them to get the cat down. Ika is an exception. She could certainly get the cat down, but her English is poor and her understanding of modern culture non-existent. Eighty thousand years ago, the only domesticated animals around were perhaps dogs, and they earned their keep. "Pet" is not a part of her conceptual universe.

Re: Name for French Brick I still like the name Maginot. Remember that the Maginot Line worked perfectly; France was invaded due to failures completely unrelated to the Line's construction and operation.

Re: What's in a Name? Obscure's power is simple and straightforward: To make herself or other people or objects obscure, unnoticed, insignificant. This purely psionic effect doesn't change her appearance in the least, just causes people to not notice her in particular, write her off as "just another lab tech/stock girl/window shopper/etc." Obviously, there are limits to this ability: she must dress in a fashion suitable to the area, for example. But it's still great boon to casual infiltration and light investigation. Next: Butterfly Baby

Re: The Doctor is in...Doctor Apocalypse that is.. One rather oddly oriented fellow accused Willingham of plagiarism for using the Destroyers in his comics, since they were actually from the modules "Death Duel with the Destroyers" and "The Island of Doctor Apocalypse." His response was basically "How can I plagarize them when I created them in the first place?"

Re: WWYCD? "Once more, with Justice" Faye: Something upbeat, maybe anime-inspired. Unlike Marvel-style teen supers, she *likes* having powers. OK, maintaining a secret ID can be a pain, but she's got a pretty canny idea of how hard finishing out grade 12 would be if she became a major celebrity (and in the eyes of at least some people, a weapon/resource that must be theirs). That being said, she'd feel obligated to at least try to track down the twit responsible and give him a lesson in manners. And self-defense (congratulations, you're today's practice dummy). Champion Wind: As Liane, folk all the way. She's a second-generation hippie, what do you expect? As Champion Wind, think more along the lines of Les Miserables in its more operatic moments. If the cause is a demon or similar, he's going to eat an arrow or three, with a helping of axe for desert. If it's a really weird Special, she's going to rip him a few new (figurative)orifices. Ika: She doesn't predate music, but she does predate complex harmonies. Think of African or Amazon tribal music, but in a language nobody alive today knows. She knows rhythm, melody, and that's about it. Then find the demon and kill it.

Re: What Would Your Character's City Be Like? Faye: Vancouver, but with some tweaks: Every single building would be at least up to code in every way, every last one, right down to the poorest sections of the downtown east side. No exceptions. And the Vancouver City Council will be interested in making the city into Funcouver instead of Nofunvancouver. Buskers, street artists, sidewalk vendors, all of the which the Council has been trying to shut down, would be encouraged instead.

Re: WWYCD: Omelas Umm... their lives aren't especially "easy." As the story establishes, the people of Omelas, the City of Happiness, still work and plan, still labour and build. You're forgetting that we are seeing the city on a day of festival; on an ordinary day, they do ordinary things, but they do these things, and view these things and each other, in a positive way; they know the difference between needful and merely desirable, which is why there are no automobiles in Omelas. Trains, busses and good city planning do the same job just as well, and at far less cost. This is only one example that LeGuin gives; the people of Omelas are not idle dreamers. To assume them so is to completely misread the story.

Re: WWYCD: Omelas A much better version of "The Cold Equations." The science in the original version was very dubious. Anyway, in this case, the best of the bad choices is a variant on #1. Put the kid to sleep if at all possible, then put him in the airlock and cycle it. It's still a horrible thing to have to do, but at least you can try to make the poor kid's death as peaceful as possible. Oh, and if you can get the kid to go to sleep, you should recheck the oxygen consumption, it might have dropped enough for both of you to make it. If it hasn't... well, see above.

Re: "Shallow" Purchases One of my characters has PS: Cheerleader, and another has PS: Singer, PS: Drummer and PS: Flautist. I'm thinking of buying "Expert: Music" for her.

Re: WWYCD: Omelas The story (with which I am thoroughly familiar) does not explicitly state that the ones who remain in Omelas have accepted the situation as it is (though this is very strongly implied). Taking Omelas as a place with an ongoing history rather than the set-piece LeGuin created it as, why is it impossible or even improbably for there to be people who say "Our current system is the best we can do at this time. Let's see if we can create a better one." I don't doubt that the people who invented (for example) the plowshare said "These hoes are the best agricutural tools we have. They're not good enough." There's a difference between saying "This is the best we can do" and saying "This is the best than can be done."

Re: WWYCD: Anti- 'Authority' In Seeds, this could actually happen. Assuming Faye's not a part of the taking-over teams (she wouldn't be, it would be against her nature), then when and if war's declared... Thor strike the bad guy headquarters. To quote Heinlein, "I think we can stop throwing rocks at Cheyenne Mountain now." "Why's that?" "It's not there anymore."

Re: WWYCD: Omelas Oh, that's good! This may be the best parody of Iron Age (or as I call it, Lead Age) "heroes" I've yet seen. PS: "Lead Age" from the sudden proliferation of main characters whose primary "power" is apparently a big gun.

Re: WWYCD: Let the Hunt Begin!! Faye would try to make her own exit, or failing that she'd trying to reason out the location of the exit. It's very hard to imprison a 695 point telekinetic/teleporter with loads of vocational skills and plans to go into super-contracting. "Aw, your mini-Dyson sphere done sprung a leak! So sad." As she heads home, "Man, what was that guy smoking?"

Re: WWYCD: Omelas

Re: WWYCD: Omelas

Re: WWYCD: Omelas Champion Wind: She'd do her absolute level best to find a way to change the Bargain. She's very idealistic, and believes herself to be a genuine-article magical girl. At the very least, she'd try to find some way to mitigate the child's suffering, perhaps by limiting the confinement to a month or so, thoguh even that would leave her sick at heart and horribly guilt-ridden. Faye: She'd have to think a long, long time about this, and she'd have to ask a lot of questions, before she colud decide what was the right thing. Ika: What does she care? It's not her child, it's not her tribe, it's not her territory, it's not her concern. Gem Has the Psych Lims of "Hates Black Magic " and "Protective of Children." The kid's got a new mommy, and if you don't like it, tough.

Re: WWYCD-Hurricane Katrina Faye: Can't stop a hurricane and wouldn't try, but she can certainly evacuate cities in a hurry. Megascale AE on TK is a *wonderfully* useful advantage. When the hurricane itself comes in, she can try to help by throwing up a 14-kilometre-long Force Wall against the storm surges. Katrina's a Cat5, the NO levees are only rated fora Cat3. Without super-help, they're going to be breached.

Re: WWYCD: The Spray's The Thing...(some mature themes) Champion Wind: As Champion Wind, this isn't her domain. As her normal self, she'd talk to her parents, and try to organize protests (what can I say, she grew in SanFran). Faye: Visit the president of the company. Suggest that the new line is a little too much of a good thing, and it would be a good idea to dilute the spray a little more... like to about a tenth its current strength. If necessary, fly him around to see the effects.

Re: WWYCD: Ignorance is Bliss Faye: She's actually a pretty decent programmer, and after checking that the site is actually located in a country where its content is illegal, will send the operators e-mail. "Have you heard of underage porn? Good. You have six hours to clean up this site and apologize publicly. If you do not, you will be shut down." At the deadline, send the URL to the local cops, flagged "Underage porn site." If the site isn't in a country with laws against its content, the site operators will find their site has been taken down drastically. Do *not* tick off a teenage girl with the power of a small army. Serena: Web sites don't work well without power. People don't work well when they're the subject to an unremitting campaign of fear. She's a bit fanatical about her privacy, and her main stock in trade is psychological warfare. Ika: She's a timelost cave girl. She predates concepts like modesty and individual rights.

Re: Super Prisons without Super Tech I'll agree there. The first time the authorities in *any* country try it is pretty well certain to be the last.

Re: Teen Titans GO! for review Starfire has shown that she can survive in open space and travel between stars without need of suit or ship. Some suitably limited Life Support (only in free space would be my suggestion) should be included, along with FTL travel.

Re: The Powers of humans in Seeds of Change As long as we're talking about people like Batman, the Question, Green Arrow, or Lady Shiva, I have no problem with it. But when you starting to push into people like Dr. Reed Richards and Victor von Doom (both of whom routinely push technological development *far* past what they should be able to manage), or Karate Kid from the Legion of Super Heroes (who can take on Superboy in hand-to-hand combat and win), I think the "normal human" label ceases to apply.