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Who is Witchwind's successor?
07-04-2014, 04:39 AM
Down in the Development forum, I made the cockamamie suggestion that the third Supreme Commander of the ISTs should be Brigid "Pouka" Dunsmuir. (She was actually my second choice; my first was La Triomphe, but then I looked at Farah's stats and saw the Combat Paralysis.)
After a beat or two, I proposed Drifter and Warrior as likelier prospects, then asked Bob who he had in mind; he confessed to me that he didn't have anyone specific in mind for the position. So I thought we could all vote on it, like how Legion of Super-Heroes periodically lets the readership choose the Legion's new leader. At the very least, we can bat around ideas and justifications.
As exams in England say, discuss.
Last Free Human
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For my IST campaign setting I had Warrior chosen to replace Witchwind after she was incapacitated thwarting a metahuman enhanced Hurricane Katrina. Unfortunately Warrior was assassinated by the former Federal Agent turned obsessive nutjob who had been stalking him for years. He was replaced by an IST member who made it to prominence during the Y2K Invasion, Magellan, a very powerful telepath from Norway.
M
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...replace the invasion with the canonical WWIII, and I can see that fitting into the timeline, if Bob doesn't mind killing Warrior off. (And depending on what he wants to have happened with Katrina.) All you'd need to do is provide Magellan's stats (clearing them with his player if he's a PC).
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Considering that the position of IST Commander has a diplomatic component (not much of one, but "reporting in person to the Security Council" counts), I can't see Warrior or any telepath getting the job.
--
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
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I have to admit, that was my biggest problem with Warrior. And Drifter, come to that.
Last Free Human
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Even so, if someone is going to be serving with an IST, especially at the level that Warrior (and even Drifter) seem to be, there's a lot of responsibility, a lot of administration and probably coursework on "How to win friends and influence people". Warrior put in his time as head of IST Washington DC if I'm not mistaken, and experience and necessity would have required him to develop (perhaps unwillingly) the diplomatic skills needed. As regard telepathy, I always assumed that the IST would have some method of vetting telepaths, perhaps a Geneva Convention approved training course and regular reviews by a panel of telepaths and psychiatrists. Considering Magellan was trained by IST Geneva's metahuman research facility, I would assume that he passed those requirements.
I'll have to see about converting Magellan to 4e.
I probably need to write up IST Geneva's "Mount Olympus" research facility too.
I need more hours in my days.
M
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Last Free Human Wrote:Warrior put in his time as head of IST Washington DC if I'm not mistaken, and experience and necessity would have required him to develop (perhaps unwillingly) the diplomatic skills needed.
You're not mistaken, and good point. If I can imagine Pouka developing maturity, it's not that much more of a stretch to imagine Warrior learning to be a people person. The same for Drifter (who was Field Commander in Moscow).
Quote:As regard telepathy, I always assumed that the IST would have some method of vetting telepaths, perhaps a Geneva Convention approved training course and regular reviews by a panel of telepaths and psychiatrists. Considering Magellan was trained by IST Geneva's metahuman research facility, I would assume that he passed those requirements.
Also makes sense. Well, apart from the "IST Geneva" thing, though that may be just in your universe. The sidebar on p.IST79 states that Switzerland, like its OTL counterpart, is not a UN member (and thus doesn't have a permanent IST), though it "acts as the seat of many UN agencies". Maybe the international-level Bonded Telepaths' Organization is one of them? (And I'd imagine that the BTO has some sort of say in the vetting of IST teeps.)
Last Free Human
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It actually isn't an IST Embassy, its technically the "Hammond-Leary Center for the Study of Posthuman Sciences" also known as "Mt. Olympus" and "IST Geneva". In my campaign it is the central repository for all IST posthuman research (both overt and covert) as well as training for "special cases" of posthumans whose abilities are either unique or very dangerous. They publish journals on posthuman studies and other related sciences as well. They were responsible for studying the Tunguska Artifact and training (and raising) the one result of that study, the IST New York member Achilles from birth.
The BTO was the group I was thinking of (too lazy to look it up). I imagine there's an international version (or a comparable organization) that manages such things very similarly to the business side of Babylon 5's Psi-Corps, which laid down rules for interactions between telepaths and normal humans. Maybe the World Council on Psychic Ethics and Standards or some similarly ponderous sounding group.
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Last Free Human Wrote:It[']s technically the "Hammond-Leary Center for the Study of Posthuman Sciences" also known as "Mt. Olympus" and "IST Geneva". In my campaign it is the central repository for all IST posthuman research (both overt and covert) as well as training for "special cases" of posthumans whose abilities are either unique or very dangerous. If Bob somehow doesn't already have such a central repository, I encourage him to snaffle up this concept. In fact, given that he's established the scientific study of posthumans as one of Krypton-1's defining traits, I suspect some such central repository exists, even if he's never specifically mentioned it.
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I hadn't even thought of a central repository -- it's certainly too good an idea not to use. Thanks.
-- Bob
---------
Then the horns kicked in...
...and my shoes began to squeak.
Last Free Human
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No problem.
M
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