Worldbuilding Notes I (general ramble and Sigeki)

October 28, 2008 at 10:55 pm (setting-related) (, , , , , )

once more, with other universes in addition to the Revised Unified Sphere.

Most of the universes are, essentially, the single planet (or in the case of Sigeki, the single solar system). This might actually be the way they are in the overall universe, or it could be me not wanting to have to write up entire universes proper… Sigeki in particular seems to have other areas implied to exist, but it may wind up being not actually possible due to the author GM Fiating the rest of the unwieldy mess away somehow, leaving only its effects on the focus area available. That, or travel between solar systems is experimental and/or impossible.

To sum up the previous paragraph: I have no sense of scale and often willfully ignore realistic space on any level above planetary, but at least I don’t have Single Biome Planet Towns for the most part. That and it’s a superheroic-style universe governed by the rule of cool as its main physical law, really…

These are rather abbreviated summaries, which I may well expand on later (some of these universes really do seem to be developing character-like tendencies). Knowing me, they will still end up being ridiculously long despite my intentions.

- Sigeki: (GURPS TL9-10) The first world created for the new-KMV, and thus the recipient of a lot of Lost Technology / Black Boxen, the most notable of which is probably the ability-enhancing artifact termed the Red Hare (… and don’t ask me why it would be called that in-universe). Consists of an entire solar system with about five (?) extant planets and a sizeable asteroid cluster, most of which were somehow terraformed into submission (even, apparently, where keeping them so would break climate laws) and several of which have inhabited moons; travel between planets takes a number of days, in some cases a week or more, and is somewhat similar in aesthetic to ocean liner/long-distance train travel. Some form of instant teleporter exists, but it’s mostly reserved for military or high-class corporate use and has heavy limits on range (from around low space station orbit to planetary surface as of Apocynthion-07). There is, for some reason, also Space Friction; it is furthermore not exempt from a number of the tropes brought on by space being an ocean, and for that matter might go so far as to qualify as Refuge In Audacity in that the author has done a lot of the research, but throws it out the window because it’s vastly more entertaining for her this way…

Although the other planets occasionally recieve vague references, the main focus of the universe remains on Oran, which I believe is second in planetary order and slightly further away from the Sun than Venus. (Its climate pre-terraforming was probably quite similar.) After that effort, which is at least seventy years in the past as of any story of note, it wound up being fairly Earthlike in climate due mostly to the influence of Most Writers Being Human*, although there are some marginally larger patches of desert than that would generally indicate**. Most travel is done on the ground or on the water; actual jetliner-style commercial air travel doesn’t seem to have caught on as well as it has here, most likely due to some adverse atmospheric condition, although in the event of really rapid travel being needed it has occasionally shown up. There appear to be some hover cars, but considering the specific type of The Future! it often lapses into in terms of aesthetics they are only to be expected.

Theoretically Oran is overseen by a government known as the Central Administration, along with one other planet in the system; in reality pretty much no actual territory on Oran is under its direct control apart from a number of the larger cities packed fairly close together and the space between them. The lion’s share of the active governing efforts are definitely invested in the other (as-yet-unnamed) planet, and it says something about the CA that despite having plotted about four stories/arcs set mostly on Oran that not even the author knows whether or not it’s imperial or federation-like or a republic or an oligarchy or what.

Oran is supposedly split into a number of different substates under the control of the CA city group; in reality most of the substates are effectively countries of their own (although most do seem to give the CA and its representatives some credit, certainly more than you’d expect considering Oran’s metafictional origin, but I digress randomly). Recently, active deposits of Lost Technology have begun resurfacing rather more often than before; these deposits are often found by actually loyal CA-based/funded expeditions, and as such the Administration’s foothold on and interest in Oran seems to be increasing.

The Bureau of Interdimensional Communications and Research also exists. So does the ordinary realspace Red Mountain, but considering it exists (or at the very least can exist) practically everywhere that isn’t as important.

Really, Sigeki is where the majority of characters ultimately come from… and within it the majority are from either Oran itself or the other Administration planet which still refuses to get a name. (The majority of the rest are from the Sphere, with a number of outliers from the O Fortuna ‘verse or the Hope Diamond group.)

* Pretty much all KMVians (well, I doubt there are any exceptions, but this precludes retcon by being vague) are technically Ridiculously Human Aliens; the Sphere and the O Fortuna ‘verse have no apparent other planets (although they do have night skies, regardless) and Sigeki is A Long Time Ago In A Solar System Far Far Away, so no Earth there. Regardless of the universe, all known inhabitants share the same general species template, which usually includes superpower options (even if they’re commented out, or inactive until certain conditions are met).

** The author really took to space western aesthetics, okay? See also: Galzburg, pretty much the entire country of, and Conjunction’s Backstory Arc, pretty much the entire style of.

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October 27, 2008 at 10:10 pm (misc.) (, )

Theory: in any attempt at making some sort of paper and pencil/numeric KMV system, there would have to be a stat judging how much of a fourth wall a character would have. Mostly, this comes into play in terms of genre-savviness and narrative manipulation as you’d expect, lower being better for that specific purpose and higher probably being better for dealing with NPCs. Well, as you’d expect if you were me.

It probably has some sort of effect on general personality/sanity, too; actually I suspect most of the KMV numeric stats would be used to determine personality, and any combat statistics would be a seperate section entirely. Most notably, in my mind the difference between Helena and her successor is mostly that her fourth wall score is much lower than his; she caught on to the grand truth of KMV strategy* considerably earlier than he did, at the obvious cost in… visible sanity.

As evidence for more stats being needed to determine sanity, a (very small number of) examples for different levels of this scale (a version going from 1 to 10, which might not be the actual numbers, but):

0 – presumably people on this particular earth-prime, capable of switching from timeframe to timeframe/viewpoint to viewpoint infinitely many times

1 – Lancer, James, Nightmare (if alive), et al.: at least Lancer and Nightmare (thus James/Tian) basically got Physical God levels of power by surviving the end of the old-KMV and the beginning of the new-KMV. You can’t get lower than that in character.

2 – Helena (by extension Xanatov), Ignatius, Dale, Elsinore, Elias and Cara: I’d say this is the example for the existence of other personality measurement mechanisms, because honestly. Even using the version of Helena from Sigurd-future and versions of Elias and Cara from some bizarre mirror universe, very few of them have anything in common about personality apart from this.

3 – Julien, Lowen, Tobias, Lunedi, Alexander (actually): Of these, Lowen probably falls closest to rounding up to 2. This seems to be the tier where the sarcastic characters who live because of their use of Mythology Gags and Shout Outs hang out in general.

4 – Mona, Mikkau, Kyle, Laura, Darian, any version of Markellos, Moran: Okay, never mind, this beats out 3 for sarcasm by a long shot. This is also clearly the tier where everyone whose name begins with M is.

5 – Chromus, Miles, Molotov, Sterling and possibly Serena: Mostly the somewhat apathetic characters, for whatever reason. (And Sterling.) Then again it is in the middle of the scale.

6 – Alexander (feigned), Sulla (Wizard-02, Helena’s mentioned replacement), more or less any sort of cosmic horror including IRIS: The characters who, while generally aware of their fictional nature to the point of more specific Medium Awareness, really don’t realize how to manipulate it and its principles to their own ends. It says something about the KMV that these three are the only examples I could think of, despite some effort.

7 and below are almost entirely NPCs; I can’t think of any main or secondary characters who fit, although 7 probably includes your average universal Library Guy. 10 is pretty much complete obliviousness as to being fictional; not even most random townspeople fall into that category, though, due to historical Events.

I assume most PC-class characters would fall between 3 and 6 on that approximate scale.

* Distilled into one aphorism: Good real-world tactics, while they may help in certain ways, really don’t help you as much as strategies weighted towards generating drama can. The KMV is permanently stuck in a deep pit of cinematic rules and nothing will probably change that, ever. Helena’s killsat is probably the prime example of her taking this to heart…

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October 20, 2008 at 7:21 pm (setting-related) (, , , )

The Sphere has VTOL aircraft and helicopters available, so why do they use larger-scale zeppelins and airships even, occasionally, for less leisurely travel? I can understand that it might be less expensive for an individual person, but Julien and Mikkau are almost certainly backed by the Magometry Research Agency for the entirety of Prismatic and thus them being low enough on funds for that doesn’t make much sense.

And that scene idea is one of the ones I really quite liked, so I’m loathe to get rid of it.

maybe I should post a thread in plot doctoring

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October 11, 2008 at 11:38 pm (misc., nanowrimo)

NaNoWriMo 2008 Participant

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October 8, 2008 at 8:24 pm (setting-related) (, , , )

On the concept of character data etc.:

It tends to blend some of the more common variants of afore-linked trope; if any means of character data transplanting exists, the basic consciousness/memories/even abilities, most of the time of the data will go along with it, leaving the former external shell effectively immobile with Mind Control Eyes. Data transplanting such as this is, however, very difficult. This is also the vague justification/handwave for any non-plot revival mechanism in the KMV (in general, medical technology is That Good); if character data is destroyed, though, it renders the destroyed completely unrevivable. The main difference from your average use of said trope is probably the last transferrable factor, as any special abilities seem to transfer along with the consciousness except in specialized cases.

Maria the Serene’s basic ability is to affect and rewrite this character data, most often to transfer the loyalties of anyone she can get to her. She also appears capable of limited data creation, although such units are entirely combat-focused and possess no personality or real sentience, apart from her acting as a psuedo-mastermind for guiding the things.

The main application of this concept is to her Elite troops; due to the specific markers used in TELOS-class units for identification, they’re basically the Mass-Produced RH05, which are all fire-elemental. Although fortunately the central superpower-amplifying Black Box present in the RH04 is still a Black Box, even to Maria…

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October 7, 2008 at 11:24 am (character-related, setting-related) (, )

In the O Fortuna-’verse, gods appear to be pretty killable; it just takes a lot more investment of time, as well as one of several mostly obscure artifacts to do so. In fact, doing so is probably the easiest way to become a god, as it doesn’t require all that mucking about with belief or being enough of a Heroic Mortal to get upgraded in the first place.

A lot of the metaphysics in that ‘verse is mostly borrowed and patched together from any mythology with which I am even slightly familiar, really. The thing about being dependent on belief is pretty common in postmodern fantasy, but the interplay between all of the actual god characters is common to almost any pantheon in mythology, although this being the KMV it’s often more intellectual.

Some more detail on Xanatov himself, as he’s one of the two god characters to really get a good amount of history/character development… Originally he was a strategist/intellectual of some description (who is never canonically named, but is basically a Distaff Counterpart of Helena without as much obfuscation). I’m not actually sure how he would have ascended, but I’m guessing from his character that he used the basic idea outlined in the first paragraph. He was then essentially forgotten, as the previous main cleric he had was rather overly dedicated to the secretive bit of his domain and anyone judged by said cleric to be ‘worthy’ eventually died out.

Quite a while later, during her initial appearance in the O Fortunaverse, Helena somehow came across a number of sources describing the history of this particular sect, and decided that he was her best option for taking levels in Cleric. A bit of social engineering later, and it was revived rather quickly…

Both Xanatov and Helena are definitely True Neutral, with tendencies every which way but Chaotic Evil as other alignments become useful for their own ends. Xanatov himself is almost apathetic, preferring to create plans for any contingency and almost never using them, largely because it takes active power for divine-class entities to take physical form in this universe.

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