I'm putting this here because it does not belong on the ships thread, as it is not a ship description.
Drenivian... I'm sorry. Your ship is broken and wrong. You need to fix it. I will enumerate.
First thing: there are no metatalents here. There are biomods, but these are *not* the same thing. Biomods are a physical and/or psychological change. They cannot give you anything that can't be explained by science. Tentacles and catgirls? Yes. Precog/TK? No. Berserker states? If it's supernatural enough to be called a metatalent, it isn't a biomod. If it's just "get really angry off of a strange custom cocktail of internally generated chemicals" then that works as a biomod - but it wouldn't work on anyone who already had a biomod, and it would last for the rest of the person's life. That's a *really* big warning label you'ld have to slap on *any* sort of employment offer if you didn't want that same berserker rage turned on *you*.
Second thing: The inexplicable modifications: If it's a paint job, then that's seriously pushing the effects of local handwavium. If it's a paint job being run by a set of onboard AI-driven robots or some such, that's fine. If it's anything more than a paint job? No. Sorry. The handwavium doesn't do that. One of the first rules: "You cannot show the handwavium a picture of your genre vehicle of choice and have it just make it for you."
Third thing: the base hull: Where on earth did you *find* such a thing? I've never heard of one. It sounds like a hull designed for space, which means that you *wouldn't* find one on earth. You'ld have to actually construct it yourself, which means that its accuracy would be limited by your abilities at construction and the money you had available. Exactly the same issue, worse and more of it, applies to your "Supplimentary mecha". You have to build those things individually, and they take large quantities of time, effort, and money. Also, especially at the scale you're talkign about, it's not really something you can keep under wraps anymore - and so you're going to get the Danelaw pounding at your door somehting fierce *well* before you get it off the ground. If you're not making it on the ground? Well, that presents its own difficulties.
Fourth thing: Money: Putting together the hardtech part of this would require *huge* amounts of cash, even going Full Kludge Ahead (and soaking down the tremendous masses of Quirk that would result.) Where are you getting the money for it all? Especially with two sister ships?
Fifth thing: do you *really* think that the US is going to be cool with having a major 'wave-based corporation in the middle of Lake Superior? Especially one that spawns biomods like they're going out of style and seems to be equipped for war? The most recent administration got *elected* on the back of anti-handwavium sentiment.
Sixth thing: Why, why, why would you build an enormous mecha-carrier as a science vessel? This is fenspace. The bigger you are, the slower you crawl. Science/research vessels generally are big enough to carry an appropriate research payload, along with appropriate researchers, and that's it. If you're feeling paranoid, you might throw in a bit of defensive kludgetech, but not anythign that would take up much mass, and *certainly* not a bunch of giant robots.
Seventh thing: Hardtech scientists cannot trust wavetech data. The quirk makes it far too unreliable. If you're building a scientific satellite for them, that means that you have a company with both a serious wavetech and a serious hardtech presence. This is... nontrivial to justify, given the history. Remember, we're pretty much working off of current truth. If your company isn't big enough to have a web presence/news articles/etc in the here and now, then it's not that big on the cusp of in-game 2007 either. Admittedly, there's a *bit* of fudge-factor there - the split happened a short while ago - but it's still a decent rule of thumb.

Quote:

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Please send some snow
Some snow for Johnny
He wants to build
A big snowman
It was a week just before Christmas
Way down in Lousianne
A little boy was kneeling by his bed
In a manner poised and grand
I listened as he said his prayers
His voice came soft and low
He said, "God tell Saint Nicholas
To send a little snow."
Please send some snow
Some snow for Johnny
He wants to build
A big snowman
I'd like to build a snowman
Like the other children do
I've got an old top hat, and a walking cane
Got a big long cigarre too.
Yes everything is ready
And I'm all set to go
How can I build a snowman
When I haven't any snow
Please send some snow
Some snow for Johnny
He wants to build
A big snowman
Now, early chrismtmas morning
Much to his surprise
Snowflakes by the millions
Were falling from the skies
Down the stairs and out-of-doors
As fast as he could go
So happy that Saint Nicholas
Had sent a little snow
Thanks for the snow
The snow for Johnny
Now he can build
A big snowman
Thanks for the snow
The snow for Johnny
Now he can build
A big snowman
Thanks for the snow
The snow for Johnny
Now he can build
A big snowman

---

So after seeing this lovely picture on SkyKnight's (Bert's) websight
www.bgcrisis.com/
I wants one!
Featuring my toons of course. :-) So where do I start looking for artists that do fanart? I've found mmoart.com but that would be $300 a picture - for what I'd like anyway, $350 Canadian at current exchange rate. A little steep for me right now.
Any ideas would be apreciated. Many thanks. -Cindy

I keep having trouble thinking of whaky inventions and their appropriate quirks, so I though I might ask you guys if you know any of the top of your head.
Also I'll be gone until the 28 give or take a day, and maybe some distance from the writing will give me the nessecary inspiration.
If the Prof needs to be written into anything feel free, I'll ruberstamp it when I get back
E: "Did they... did they just endorse the combination of the JSDF and US Army by showing them as two lesbian lolicons moving in together and holding hands and talking about how 'intimate' they were?"
B: "Have you forgotten so soon? They're phasing out Don't Ask, Don't Tell."

Quote:

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Hrm. Maybe we should try character writeups? Get things clear and in the open, like.

---

With the revised versions of the story to align with later continuity developments, I'm splitting out the story posts to a story only thread, and will provide links back to this thread for comments.
The new thread is:
p202.ezboard.com/fdrunkar...=187.topic
- CD
--
"Anko, what you do in your free time is your own choice. Use it wisely. And if you do not use it wisely, make sure you thoroughly enjoy whatever unwise thing you are doing." - HymnOfRagnorok as Orochimaru at SpaceBattles
woot Med. Eng., verb, 1st & 3rd pers. prsnt. sg. know, knows

Florin Wrote:There's a series of books that starts with There Will Be Dragon's that deals with a similar idea, although it's set WAY in the future and doesn't involve aliens. Unfortunatly, it's written by John Ringo and thus involves extended rants against Democratic style thinking and scientific rationality. It also contain's 'Heroes' who I dearly wish death upon.

No, sorry, it's not a cure. :-)
ECL and IST Paragon City are now in coalition with The Dragon's Hoard (started by *gasp* Horned Dragon - was it obvious?) Anyway, HD asked me to let you know the Hoard is recruiting.
You must be magic origin. Would be great if you were also a mythical type creature. Example - HD is obviously a dragon, Wyvern, succubi, my toon is just a cursed dragon slayer.... I'm trying to convince Rev to play a Sphynx. I haven't seen many of those in game. but you'll need to be able to riddle. Any takers?
I think I covered everything. Any questions, ASK! @His Lovely Wife, or @Horned Dragon
PS, I should probably mention, this is on Infinity Server.
-Cindy

My muse is a bitch. Because, see, despite all the fun being had in Fenspace... she is not content.
Oh, no.
See, it starts with my picking up S.M. Stirling's The Protector's War a week or two ago. There are things about that book's premise (Namely that, one fine day ten years ago, The Machines All Stopped) that bother me quite a bit. Not neccessarily his evaluation of the consequences as a whole (that being, ninety-mumble percent of the human race starves to death or worse) - I don't think it's the most likely result, but it's plausible enough to accept for the sake of the story - so much as his apparent conviction that mass starvation = mass cannabalism = total social breakdown into animalism for anyone and everyone caught in a city, regardless of other factors.
No, I have not read the prequel dealing with the actual change and its consequences. No, nothing will ever convince me to do so.
So, where this dissatisfaction led, for me, was wondering if there was another way of getting that same situation - IE, modern people building new nations with medieval tech, and...
Well.
It starts when Sufficiently Advanced Space Aliens show up in orbit and say, "Hi. We're your new gods. Now that you're set on the right path in our worship, you're going to have to throw away everything you've got that involves electrical current or turning combustion into mechanical work, for they are blasphemous in our eyes. You can have a year or two to convert, since we know there'd be a lot of people starving otherwise."
And the nations and people of Earth say something quite polite that boils down to, "Nothin' doin'."
And the Gods say, "Do this or risk our terrible wrath," and zap some insignificant and mostly depopulated cultural landmarks into smoking craters.
And the nations and people of Earth say, "Go fuck yourselves."
And the Gods oblitherate every speck of military power they can find and say, "You don't really have a choice about this."
And Earth sez, "Go fuck yourselves sideways."
And the Gods say, "If you keep being foolish, we're shortly going to forget about how tolerant we'd meant to be of those who don't know better."
Then they glass a random selection of major world cities.
And the UN Security Council put their cards on the table in private session and admit that - at best - they're years from being able to do anything about these assholes.
So they say okay. And hide their research projects real good.
And then, since they've been troublesome, the Gods dissolve all these absurd 'Republic' delusions and draw up new borders, mostly along geographical lines, and grab people out of the populace and say, "Here. You're King in these parts. Throw away everything your people had before we came and build something that's not indecent."
So.
Here. You're King in these parts.
Where are you? And what do you do?
Ja, -n

===============================================
"Puripuri puripuri... Bang!"

One of this week's nifty links on the Nodwick website may have direct usefulness for "Pests and Hanoi-ances": Moving Through Matter with Buckaroo Banzai. It's heavy going, but it seems to be accurate real-world science. More importantly, it was written by the science advisor for the movie, so it's definitely accurate Banzai-science.
(I've saved a copy to local storage, just in case.)

-Rob Kelk
--
Rob Kelk
"Governments have no right to question the loyalty of those who oppose
them. Adversaries remain citizens of the same state, common subjects of
the same sovereign, servants of the same law."

- Michael Ignatieff, addressing Stanford University in 2012