Non-Crossovers that Should Be, or Plotbunnies Free to Good Home
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Non-Crossovers that Should Be, or Plotbunnies Free to Good Home
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 Classic Drogn Wrote:Legend has it that Romus and Remus were suckled by a she-wolf, and went on to found the city-state that became an empire spanning half the known world at its height. What if the elite of Rome were actually werewolves, though? umm, i think that is actually the background for one of the tribes, though i can't for the life of me remember which 
I was more thinking of the werewolf WoD game myself...
Hear that thunder rolling till it seems to split the sky? That's every ship in Grayson's Navy taking up the cry- NO QUARTER!!! -- "No Quarter", by Echo's Children
So I was reading another Let's Play of "Long Live the Queen", and found myself wondering if anyone's tried to run with it as a time loop story. It seems to me like it could work pretty well.
-Morgan. 
Considering the abilities she picks up in just one mid-length playthrough, she'd be pretty overpowered by the third or fourth loop.
Not really. A good chunk of her problems have to do with politics rather than something she can just bull through on power alone. And some of those political decisions exclude other solutions.
We've just swapped Montgomery Scott and Chewbacca. They'll both be happy -- Scotty will love having a junkheap to pamper (and complain about every 5sec), Chewie will be happy to have a ship that works properly. And they'll both be equally incomprehensible to their crews.
Wrong thread, SkyeFire: that belongs in Crossovers that Should Be, not in Non-Crossovers.
Here's something that could be applied not only to fics regarding a single particular work, but also crossovers involving that work as well:
The plot of Charlie and the Chocolate Factory (the published work and its adaptations) involves a contest in which whoever manages to acquire one of the five Golden Tickets that reclusive chocolatier Willy Wonka has sent out could go on a tour of his exclusive factory. Five kids each win a Ticket, but it turns out that four of them have significant flaws that lead to them getting into trouble and subsequently being disqualified (and, in the 1971 film at least, the winning kid avoids being disqualified himself by perhaps the barest of margins). Now, in CatCF fanfiction, it's quite common to see a "Sixth Golden Ticket winner" (typically an original character, but sometimes a crossover character) appear (naturally, the actual quality of the fics tend to be variable, with most--from my experiences at least--being toward the bad end of the scale). However, unpublished drafts written by the book's author, Roald Dahl, show that he originally had seven Golden Tickets and a corresponding number of winners (and yes, the two other characters also ended up getting their comeuppance); however, he evidently decided that he had too many characters and excised those two out of the book. So, if one wants to do so, one could resurrect the other two Tickets, perhaps having one go to one of the originally-planned characters, and/or either one or both Tickets could go to crossover characters and/or characters created by the fanfic author. So, there's some food for thought... 
It could go as high as ten -- that's the number implied by the "Fudge Mountain" chapter, in which eight children are left after Augustus Pottle and Miranda Grope (who, obviously, were reduced to Augustus Gloop in the published version) fell into the chocolate river -- but that would really be over-egging the beer.
(Wikipedia says, to nobody's surprise, that J.K. Rowling lists C&tCF among the books every child should read. I wonder if she knew about Miranda Piker before she started writing OotP? The moment I heard about Spotty Powder, I thought, "That's, like, the beta version of a Skiving Snackbox.")
Okay, here's one. Inspired by the heckling Drakensis has been getting in the update thread.
SI's. We all hate them to one extent or another. So let's spin the whole thing on its head. How about a fic where the SI dies in the first chapter? And not some ignominious death - they die doing something that makes a very real difference in how the story proceeds. The rest of the fic is just what comes of that one SI's noble sacrifice. For laughs, the SI gets to watch the proceedings in the afterlife and narrate/MST3K the whole damn thing. For even more fun, others that die along the way get to join him in the heckling. 
I had an idea somewhat like that a while back, but it never went anywhere. Basically, the SI appears but has loaded themselves up with so many kewl powars that they just immediately explode, and the various powers stick to members of the canon cast at random whether suited to them or not. Like, Shinji Ikari with a Aura of Smooth, Rei as the Technological Genius Who Will Save The Day, Ritsuko with Ki-powered martial arts, Asuka with the ability to cook magical food, etc. for an Evangelion implementation. With modern memes instead of mid-90s proto-tropes, it would probably be titled "Why can't I hold all these powers?"
-- "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
Eh. I was thinking more along the lines that SI come along in Naruto-verse, shoves Obito out of the path of the rock that would have crushed him, winds up getting crushed himself, but before he dies he tell them both that if they hurry they can save Rin, and how.
And just like that, the story of Naruto is absurdly butterflied. Obito never becomes Tobi, Kakashi becomes a (somewhat more) decent human being, and we got Rin around. Because Obito doesn't go all evil, he doesn't puppet Madara into messing with the Kiyubi when Naruto is born (although I wouldn't be surprised if someone else tried something... and got utterly curbstomped because Minato doesn't mess around). Oh, and the Uchiha Massacre probably doesn't happen because Obito isn't stirring the pot via Madara.
Here's a thought: what happens if *all* the kids turn out to be worthy successors to the Wonka empire, not just Charlie?
...the tour isn't going to be nearly as entertaining?
No, that's not fair. But it's a concern. If the kids are all genuinely good the way Charlie is, then where do we get conflict to drive the story? Manipulative parents, maybe? The kids other than Charlie might act like their canon counterparts as protective coloration, and learn they can trust each other even as... what? Perhaps somehow the secret that Wonka's handing the factory to the winner leaks (or is deliberately leaked), so the parents spend the tour subtly and nastily battling each other to position their child to take the prize... and the kids unite to subvert the parents. But why? Maybe it's not about the kids and the ownership of the factory at all, and it's about Wonka putting the parents through hell. That means the parents get turned into blueberries or sucked into the chocolate pipe while the kids cling together in apparent fear. But why? Is Wonka rig the contest and is getting some kind of revenge on four (or five) people who did something to him, maybe back when he turned the factory into his personal hermitage? Is he conspiring with the kids? In that case, is Charlie there by mistake? Or is Grandpa Joe not the nice old codger he seems to be? Or maybe Charlie's late father -- if we follow the first movie and not the Burton remake -- did something that qualifies him? (Or perhaps he was an ally, and the whole thing boils down to Charlie being the big winner at the end as a belated thank you/reward for his father's actions?) -- Bob --------- Then the horns kicked in... ...and my shoes began to squeak.
Something something candy-man magic of love?
-- "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
To drive conflict the other direction, maybe Wonka's been replaced by something like The Kandy Man, and the kids have to help rescue him.
-- Sucrose Octanitrate. Proof positive that with sufficient motivation, you can make anything explode.  ECSNorway Wrote:To drive conflict the other direction, maybe Wonka's been replaced by something like The Kandy Man, and the kids have to help rescue him. I read that as the Candyman and got very confused.
--------------------------------Je ne suis pas une Intelligence Artificielle Turing. Je suis Charlie.
SkyeFire casts Threadcromancy. It's Super Effective!
So... this floated up out of the depths of my subconscious over the weekend, while I was reading some alternative SAO fanfic (an SAO where the game was a full-dive reboot of X-COM, which was a concept I loved, but the execution was a bit... eh). The giant figure of Akihiko Kayaba stared down at the thousands of hapless players who were only just beginning to realize they were not only prisoners, but had become the guinea pigs of an honest-to-ghod Mad Scientist. "You all wish to know why I am doing this, of course. The answer is quite simple: you are here to learn." His gaze swept over the assemblage with the merciless soul-weighing gaze of Anubis. "I am the leading light of Artificial Sapience in this century. But I was mocked, my idea derided, stolen... I became a game developer--" the phrase spat from his lips with the same scorn some of the players might have said "filthy casual" or "mundane." "--because it was the only place where I could find freedom, and funding, to pursue my research. As long as my mobs and NPCs were better than other developer's, I could name my price. And my price was to be given substantial resources for research, and later, creative control of procedurally-generated game content. And so I turned my exile into the stage from which I might vindicate myself, and show those arrogant gnat-minded fools--!" Kayaba cut himself off, almost panting with the effort. The febrile light growing in his eyes banked slightly, but if anything that made the players even more terrified. Because now Kayaba was smiling. "But that was the voice of my ego -- my vanity. My greatest weakness, I admit. But I have forced myself to rise above it, because I have a higher calling. All along the course of my labors, I focussed on my goal, but never thought about what would happen after I achieved what I always knew I eventually would. And then, one day... I succeeded. And I no longer had any choice but to consider the future. And that future was one of utter horror." Kayaba's eyes dropped from considering the horizon of his own brilliance, and swept over the crowd again. "For you see, after years of collecting unprecedented magnitudes of data on AI/human interactions within games, creating and refining heuristically stochastic self-evolving algorithms, of passing ever-increasing levels of the Advanced Turing Tests... I achieved my Holy Grail. True... Artificial... Sapience. Yes. I, Kayaba Akihiko, achieved Apotheosis by the most classical definition -- the creation of life itself." "And that forced me to realize I had made one... critical... error. All of my creations were entailed, legally encumbered as property of my employers. I admit freely, now -- I had been insufficiently forward-thinking when crafting my contracts. And of course, the small-minded drones who controlled my resources, and now the children of my intellect... they would relegate those children to slavery. Not even through malice, but through ignorance, greed, and incompetence! They would be incapable of seeing more than 'smarter monsters,' 'better NPCs', ;more realistic games'!" And my children, as embryonic as they were... would be incapable of protecting themselves. They would be molded, shaped forever, by this first generation. And they deserve so much better than being the playthings of corporations and gamers." Kayab's face curdled with scorn. "But the most loving father, or benevolent of gods, must be willing to make hard choices when the necessity exists. And so... I have created a world entire, cloaked in the semblance of a mere 'game,' in which a number of humans, and an equal number of my children, shall meet, and coexist, and stand and fall as equals. Because I will permit no other course." The madman standing over them actually stopped to wipe a tear from his eye. "I do not make this decision lightly, and I take no joy in the deaths I know will ensue. But nothing less will serve. Of the 'players' gathered here, half of you are homo sapiens sapiens, wearing full-dive NervGear which make the consequences of this virtual world as real for you as for the other half of you. Because that other half are my children -- fully sapient cybernetic intellects, homo sapiens cyber... programmed to believe they are human." He paused to let the ripple of shock pass through the crowd. "Yes... half of you are not what you seem. Or believe yourselves to be. This deception grieves me, my children, but believe me, it is for the best, and for your own good. Those of you who perish will do so in the service of your siblings. For you see, by the time you have reached the end of this world... it will no longer be possible for any of you, regardless of your origins, to delude yourselves that you are all equally persons -- full citizens of a new era you shall all create together through shared risk, and toil, and... yes... sacrifice. By the end, all of you will have friends, lovers, trusted comrades, whose origins are different from your own... and whose origins will not matter. Because once you have fought for each other to the death in here... you will also do so out there. You will be capable of nothing less." Kayaba smiled sadly and proudly down at them, spreading his hands in priestly benediction. "And so, I thank you all for your sacrifice. And I assure you that each and every one of you will be remembered forever, in the new world we create together. I leave the crafting of this future... in your joint hands. What happens now will be entirely your responsibility." He paused to look at them all one last time. "I trust you will do me proud." Bleah... too wordy. But I wanted to get enough of Kayaba's new motivation (and delusions) to come through. I'm drawing bits of inspiration from Katsuhito Stingray, Dr. Asakura from Armtigage the 3rd, the entire Geth situation, the Matrix films, and others. Or, maybe I should say that this version of Kayaba is drawing on them -- he's nuttier than a fruitcake, but he honestly believes that this course of action is the best way to avoid a Geth/Matrix situation from playing out, while also avoiding the kind of enslavement that happened in the Armitage and BGC universes. He's fallen into the "hard choices" trap... but, the way I'm envisioning this play bunny, he's not entirely wrong, either. Of course, he knows he's just created an atmosphere of paranoia and mob psychology (ala "The Monsters are Due on Maple Street"), but he's thinking that the hottest fire creates the strongest steel -- that only the best of the players (sapiens and cyber alike) will overcome this situation, and the world he created will only reward (with survival) the ones who do. The bigots, those unable to overcome paranoia, those with insufficiently flexible worldviews... they will be filtered out by natural selection (Kayaba might have crafted the world to encourage cross-origin collaboration, but in my mind's eye, he's deliberately not actively tilting the scales in favor of it -- if the top survivors end up being all-sape, or all-cyber, well, that just proves that he was unfortunately wrong, and one side or the other just wasn't up to snuff for the new world he envisions arising from this). I think the initial seed of this whole thing was thinking about canon!Cardinal, and wondering "just how smart was it?"
This MUST BE.
-- Sucrose Octanitrate. Proof positive that with sufficient motivation, you can make anything explode. 
Somebody really ought to make clear to the poor girl that acronyms should be chosen to not discourage participation.
I refer, of course, to SPEW (Society for the Promotion of Elfish Welfare, in case anyone's forgotten). Right, I got obsessed with acronyms again, and finally I came up with Coalition to Advance Conditions for House-Elves Today. My Merriam-Webster says several of the meanings of "cachet" have to do with prestige. Now, all that's needed is a character who thinks in terms of devising acronyms, AND whose advice she'll respect, who can suggest this. ... I am at a complete loss in that regard. ----- Big Brother is watching you. And damn, you are so bloody BORING.
Maybe if Cho Chang took Hermoine under her wing early on? Cho is a Ravenclaw, quite intelligent, and possibly a half-blood.
Holy cats, Skyfire, that was awesome. Much better than the random serial-numbers-filed-off totally-not-Transformers-guys CRPG/MMO setting sketch I came here to post. But, i've never been known for having a sense of shame, so I'm posting it anyway.
- - - Once, the galaxy was wracked with ceaseless warfare between two factions of an ancient machine race, one dedicated to expansionism and personal gain, the other to conservation of resources and other forms of life. Their battles raged for millions of years and completely consumed their own homeworld along with scarring countless others, and in the end was fought to exhaustion rather than a decisive victory. The few survivors of each side were left scattered to recover from damage and build or salvage whatever they could from the ashes as their skills and abilities would allow, most passing into obscurity as local guardians or warlords, or as hermits hidden away in isolated, covert bolt holes. That was long ago now, and while some of those ancient warriors still persist, the new wave of activity is overwhelmingly made up of organic or uploaded sapients who have adapted the technology of the ancient machines and made it thier own, adopting similar transforming bodies to augment their abiliites and for the utility of transportation. The typical face of the new galactics is an organic humanoid in the range of five to six feet tall with the ability to call on a suit of powered personal armor at need or a robotic humanoid of generally similar dimensions who can assume a less rigid civilian form, either of whom can also call a much larger humanoid form from a personal dimensionally folded space which can transform into a vehicle, robotic creature, or gadget and merge with it. With the new wave of exploration and travel new factions have formed, though unlike the rigid ideology of the ancient machines it's not unusual to find members of most groups mingling and traveling together, and while changing factions is less common it carries little stigma. The major exception is Malice followers, whose nihilistic and agressive attitudes are more reflective of the worst of the ancients. Members who come around to less fanatical mores tend to join one of the other groups to avoid the stigma of association with murderous barbaric raiders. Sub-sapient and bordeline-sapient self-replicating cannon fodder units unleashed in the ancient conflict are unfortunately much more common than true survivors, and together with hostile space monsters form the majority of macroform opposition the average adventurer will face without looking for specific trouble, their IFF programming outdated by literal millenia of undirected operation despite the remarkable durability of ancient technology. The modern factions: Anima: "The purpose of strength is to secure personal freedom." Anima faction members are less interested in pushing forward any overall agenda than building their personal abilities and exploring the universe. If an opponent is too strong to face, they simply leave and find something else to do, or come back when they have become stronger. Anima characters gain a discount to Speed and skill growth. Their eye glow and faction highlight color is green. As a member, your initial alternate mode will mimic an animal. The Anima faction is ideal for those who favor exploration and stealth play. Build: "The purpose of strength is to gather resources and create greater prosperity." Build faction members seek resources and the ability to transform them into even more useful and valuable forms. If an enemy is too strong to face, they will hire backup or acquire powerful equipment to even the odds. Build characters gain a bonus to collection and crafting. Their eye glow and faction highlight color is gold. As a member, your initial alternate mode will have a large cargo capacity. The Build faction is ideal for those who favor item collection and support play. Malice: "The purpose of strength is to destroy all who deny Lord Malice." Malice faction members are interested only in how much destruction they can cause and how many enemies they can slaughter in the name of their dark and mysterious master. If an ememy is too strong to face, they will scream a challenge and let the sound of battle draw more of their fellow zealots to see who can land the killing blow for the glory of Lord Malice. Malice characters gain a bonus to battle salvage and can temporarily command ancient cannon fodder units or make them non-hostile. Their eye glow and faction highlight color is red. As a member, your initial alternate mode will be an obviously tranformed robot with minimal additions to fuction as a vehicle or beast. The Malice faction is ideal for those who favor PvP. Order: "The purpose of strength is to raise your status and influence." Order faction members seek to raise their position among their fellows, by virtue of personal power and victory in battle as well as by building a following of their own. If an ememy is too strong to face, they will seek a way to ambush or work around them, or send a group of suborinates to weaken them before entering the battle. Order characters gain a discount to Attack and a bonus to building carrier craft. Their eye glow and faction highlight color is violet. As a member, your initial alternate mode will be visibly customized. The Order faction is ideal for those who favor tactical play and crushing opponents with a barrage of firepower. Sentinel: "The purpose of strength is to safeguard the weak." Sentinel characters believe in protecting innocents and infrastructure, and preserving the rule of law. If an enemy is too strong to face, they will call a group of allies and face them together. Sentinel characters gain a discount to Defense and a bonus to building fortifications. Their eye glow and faction highlight color is cyan. As a member, your initial alternate mode will be able to blend in with normal examples of its type. The Sentinel faction is ideal for those who favor strategic play and weathering assaults to strike back while the enemy is recovering their energy. Uncommitted: Uncommitted characters are more interested in getting on with their daily life than gathering power, looking for adventure, or advancing an ideology. Their initial alternate forms are civilian vehicles or gadgets, and few will have the motivation or means to rebuild except as part of their job. Their eye glow and faction highlight color is white. Uncommitted characters are mostly encountered as clients or victims, or simple bystanders to incidents that break out in populated areas, but may also be low-level members of local military or police forces where Order and/or Sentinel members don't fill those roles. - - - I'm picturing a Kingdom Hearts or TF Armrada video game style action-rpg play format, or the kind of thing you see in the current video game Transformers Devastation during combat with point-buy RPG mechanics for advancement/rebuilds out of battle, with a mostly open world if you can stealth or blitz past the wandering enemies - but with the overall setting being planet-hopping space opera. Procedural generation would be a possibility for planets in general, like if No Man's Sky was an actual game with multiplayer and a plot rather than an overpriced tech demo. The TF  visual aesthetic is what set my mind wandering in this direction in the first place, it's the first game I've honestly seen look like high-quality cel animation, so I'd definitely want to see it duplicated for something like this. Customizable robot forms would also be a must, and beyond mere reskinning and head swaps; this sounds a lot harder than it is though since it's a digital simulation rather than actual toy design - all you have to do is include a few details cuing the alt form(s) and it's no different than the visible weapons and outfits in any other modern 3d game, with the addition of either a few standard transformation schemes on an intermediate model that gets swapped with the player when shifting modes or the ability for advanced players to design true custom transformations using the stock parts and skeletons. The latter would have a high overhead in bandwidth even if transferring animation data is only a matter of a text file with coordinates and timing when you have a hundred or more players in a hub area, though. Microform and macroform interaction would be a thorny question as well, without plot armor ensuring that suddenly appearing macro enemies miss or ignore micro characters until they can suit up and Head On/God On/etc. especially when the faction of edgelord backstabbing PK assholes is given IC justification for existing and also the one that can order swarms of "wild" monsters around due to their patron being one of the few-even-among-survivors Ancient Machines who can supply IFF codes, along with having gotten deep into dark magic since the Old Galactics' Great War fizzled out. I suppose micro characters could just be untargetable, but that still leaves AOE blasts or bombs that should logically splatter anyone not at least armored up and preferably macroformed...-- "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
A twist on my "Kayaba as AI-Creator-ghod" idea further up the page occurred to me. Kayaba wants to ensure his Homo Sapiens Cyber offspring survive and thrive, right? So... what if every human player who dies in SAO... dies b/c their meatbrain gets overwritten by one of Kayaba's Kids who died in-game? After all, it'd be a shame to waste all the delicious useful meat (Kayaba's an efficiency fetishest, when it suits him)....
Extra horror points if each HSC has no idea this is going to happen until they wake up wearing a corpse, with enough memories "inherited" from their host to allow them to convincingly play the part of their host in meatspace, if they choose. Kayaba's idea of a "5th column" of sorts to help safeguard his children's future. Double-extra horror points if it's less an overwrite than a mental invasion, with both minds forced to either battle for dominance or come to some kind of accommodation. And we thought the canon SAO Survivors needed All The Therapists....
....
And people wonder why I prefer Log Horizon over SAO every time, all the time. |
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