The Chat Thread

[kenod]

True.

These are the memories Aylitha is actually erasing, the knowledge of the existence of that fruit.

[Arlin]

"We live in a world, where millions can die because someone threw a pineapple!" Was a sentence that  was actually the basis for a character i was developing in era4 

4 minutes ago, Voidus said:

I feel like the Stranger was wise enough to excise them from existence in the Forgery. Some hatreds are too powerful to be overcome even with reality-bending magic that reshapes the entire world.

I'll add that to the list of things Bell will have no idea about when the Forgery breaks

Edited March 19, 2022 by Arlin

[+ZincAboutIt she/her]

I’d be all for a new magic system if we wanted to make one up, that sounds fun! As for trying to take down the DA, it’s not really a wise plot course mostly because it’s been done before, and also because the power imbalance is pretty enormous and therefore not really fun. The best bet for an actual compelling “guild war” plot, if we wanted to do one, would be for the DA to effectively go into a schism and turn on itself, with each side garnering allies from the other guilds. 
Depending on how this Era ends and what goes on between the resident demigods, that could actually be possible.

[kenod]

Making magic systems is always fun.

As for Aylitha's actions, she'd go for whatever option allows her to do the most interesting research.

[Voidus]

16 minutes ago, ZincAboutIt said:

I’d be all for a new magic system if we wanted to make one up, that sounds fun! As for trying to take down the DA, it’s not really a wise plot course mostly because it’s been done before, and also because the power imbalance is pretty enormous and therefore not really fun. The best bet for an actual compelling “guild war” plot, if we wanted to do one, would be for the DA to effectively go into a schism and turn on itself, with each side garnering allies from the other guilds. 
Depending on how this Era ends and what goes on between the resident demigods, that could actually be possible.

DA civil war? Well that sounds...
Reality ending.

[+ZincAboutIt she/her]

1 minute ago, Voidus said:

DA civil war? Well that sounds...
Reality ending.

Well at the very least it’s never been done before  

[MacThorstenson he/him]

19 minutes ago, kenod said:

Making magic systems is always fun.

It would be interesting if there was some sort of magic revolving around a true sight, or a grounding in reality, or detecting of investiture or something like that, that happened as a result of everyone existing in the forgery. Like peoples spiritweb responded after the forgery as a defense mechanism and developed this new ability.

[Voidus]

7 minutes ago, ZincAboutIt said:

Well at the very least it’s never been done before  

This is actually rather interesting, there have been no shortage of people who have tried to destroy the DA in the Alleyverse but it is weird that nobody has ever thought to turn them against themselves.

[kenod]

Just now, Voidus said:

This is actually rather interesting, there have been no shortage of people who have tried to destroy the DA in the Alleyverse but it is weird that nobody has ever thought to turn them against themselves.

To be fair, that's because most of the time the irp Voidus kept everyone in line. The Stranger has a similar level of power, but he didn't do anything against Voidus until the forgery, and other than that nobody in the DA who can do it really exists.

[MacThorstenson he/him]

2 minutes ago, Voidus said:

This is actually rather interesting, there have been no shortage of people who have tried to destroy the DA in the Alleyverse but it is weird that nobody has ever thought to turn them against themselves.

I've been trying to think of a reason why the DA would turn against itself. The best I can come up with is that some upshot baker decides that a second round of baking for A-iron cookies isn't necessary, and this disagreement rocks the DA to its very core. 

[kenod]

2 minutes ago, MacThorstenson said:

I've been trying to think of a reason why the DA would turn against itself. The best I can come up with is that some upshot baker decides that a second round of baking for A-iron cookies isn't necessary, and this disagreement rocks the DA to its very core. 

Why the heck would that ever be unnecessary?

[+ZincAboutIt she/her]

1 minute ago, MacThorstenson said:

I've been trying to think of a reason why the DA would turn against itself. The best I can come up with is that some upshot baker decides that a second round of baking for A-iron cookies isn't necessary, and this disagreement rocks the DA to its very core. 

Or, you know, one demigod wrapped the entirety of the universe in a false reality without the permission of the other in a misguided attempt to give him a second chance at life, allying himself with said friends mortal enemy, leading to a world collapsing event and possibly endangering his daughter.

[Voidus]

6 minutes ago, kenod said:

To be fair, that's because most of the time the irp Voidus kept everyone in line. The Stranger has a similar level of power, but he didn't do anything against Voidus until the forgery, and other than that nobody in the DA who can do it really exists.

I have actually always been of the opinion that Voidus and the Stranger are not that much of a pair of outliers in the DA, like the various department heads could if they wished to wield some pretty monumental power. Like the fruit-throwing that was mentioned earlier nearly prompted Voidus to just obliterate everything but he was restrained by other members. So yes definitely the more powerful figures, but the Alleys deal with things like the Phoenix, death stars and eldritch gods, they could at the least drum up enough power to make people think they might be able to kill Voidus.

6 minutes ago, MacThorstenson said:

I've been trying to think of a reason why the DA would turn against itself. The best I can come up with is that some upshot baker decides that a second round of baking for A-iron cookies isn't necessary, and this disagreement rocks the DA to its very core. 

Yeah it's a massive conglomeration of mad scientists and bakers with very minimal managerial intervention or oversight, it's honestly a miracle we haven't destroyed half the universe fighting over whose name comes first in a paper that's being published.

[MacThorstenson he/him]

10 minutes ago, kenod said:

Why the heck would that ever be unnecessary?

Listen all I'm saying is that through the tests I've run there is no improvement in hemalurgic strength, texture, and taste from a second bake. The only improvement is a more durable cookie, but we always end up eating them in less than an hour anyway so who cares?

10 minutes ago, ZincAboutIt said:

Or, you know, one demigod wrapped the entirety of the universe in a false reality without the permission of the other in a misguided attempt to give him a second chance at life, allying himself with said friends mortal enemy, leading to a world collapsing event and possibly endangering his daughter.

Hmm ya know I could see how that would be a slight issue. But its just two friends, they'll work it out

 

 

5 minutes ago, Voidus said:

I have actually always been of the opinion that Voidus and the Stranger are not that much of a pair of outliers in the DA, like the various department heads could if they wished to wield some pretty monumental power.

It would be interesting to come up with various profiles for department heads. I feel like they would be egotistical enough to have more than just a suite of normal powers, they would all try to come up with a powerful gimmick. They would also likely be so devoted to their department that their personalities become based off of it. I've been trying to workshop a Department Head for the Department of Alleymatics, and its been interesting to draw some inspiration from whisper's view of the dept heads.

[+ZincAboutIt she/her]

7 minutes ago, MacThorstenson said:

I feel like they would be egotistical enough to have more than just a suite of normal powers, they would all try to come up with a powerful gimmick.

Egotism comes with the promotion to Dept Head, I think.

[kenod]

I think that right now we have the Stranger as the head of the department of abominations, Mac was counter-intelligence, though IIRC Lita is now? I remember there was an inquisitor that was head of acquisitions, though I can't remember his name. Aylitha is head of biological research, and Cam head of HR.

Not sure how many of those department heads are still part of the current DA though, after the Forgery.

[+ZincAboutIt she/her]

Just now, kenod said:

I think that right now we have the Stranger as the head of the department of abominations, Mac was counter-intelligence, though IIRC Lita is now? I remember there was an inquisitor that was head of acquisitions, though I can't remember his name. Aylitha is head of biological research, and Cam head of HR.

Not sure how many of those department heads are still part of the current DA though, after the Forgery.

After Mac left we did put in Lita as head of DoCI, and the inquisitor at Acquisitoons  was named Matthieu, but yeah idk if he’s still there after the forgery I never really gave it some thought

[Arlin]

16 minutes ago, MacThorstenson said:

It would be interesting if there was some sort of magic revolving around a true sight, or a grounding in reality, or detecting of investiture or something like that, that happened as a result of everyone existing in the forgery. Like peoples spiritweb responded after the forgery as a defense mechanism and developed this new ability.

Ooo thats cool, I've been trying to think of elements/resources that are available to the surface city that we could pull. The Alleystorm is only really used to fuel radiants at this point but there are some unexplored aspects that could definitely be played with. Crysts are off the table as point of them is to be magic neutral. 

I love the Idea of something rising because of the Forgery. There could be some really fascinating interactions with people like my current character who didn't exist prior to it.

[Voidus]

4 minutes ago, MacThorstenson said:

It would be interesting to come up with various profiles for department heads. I feel like they would be egotistical enough to have more than just a suite of normal powers, they would all try to come up with a powerful gimmick. They would also likely be so devoted to their department that their personalities become based off of it. I've been trying to workshop a Department Head for the Department of Alleymatics, and its been interesting to draw some inspiration from whisper's view of the dept heads.

Whisper does not necessarily have the most sane idea of who in the DA is capable of what, she is slightly to extremely insane. She assumes that most of them probably have the ability to erase the city on a whim if they chose to, either through personal ability or just like unleashing the abomination hordes. Whether or not this is accurate is an exercise left to the reader.

[MacThorstenson he/him]

6 minutes ago, kenod said:

Cam head of HR.

Don't say his name. 

6 minutes ago, kenod said:

I think that right now we have the Stranger as the head of the department of abominations, Mac was counter-intelligence, though IIRC Lita is now? I remember there was an inquisitor that was head of acquisitions, though I can't remember his name. Aylitha is head of biological research, and Cam head of HR.

Not sure how many of those department heads are still part of the current DA though, after the Forgery.

I think cannonically there are tons of department heads that are "out for lunch" so to speak. If we wanted we could always create new departments and heads to match them.

3 minutes ago, Voidus said:

Whisper does not necessarily have the most sane idea of who in the DA is capable of what, she is slightly to extremely insane. She assumes that most of them probably have the ability to erase the city on a whim if they chose to, either through personal ability or just like unleashing the abomination hordes. Whether or not this is accurate is an exercise left to the reader.

Wow only the city? Yeah she is insane  

I'm gonna go through the OP for the Dark alley thread and catalogue all the dept heads in that, iirc there were a lot of them.

 

EDIT:

I really like the idea that members of the DA are never dead, they are just on vacation until they return. All the OG's are just out there somewhere, enjoying the tomato basil soup alley.

Edited March 19, 2022 by MacThorstenson

[Voidus]

5 minutes ago, MacThorstenson said:

Don't say his name. 

I think cannonically there are tons of department heads that are "out for lunch" so to speak. If we wanted we could always create new departments and heads to match them.

Wow only the city? Yeah she is insane  

I'm gonna go through the OP for the Dark alley thread and catalogue all the dept heads in that, iirc there were a lot of them.

 

EDIT:

I really like the idea that members of the DA are never dead, they are just on vacation until they return. All the OG's are just out there somewhere, enjoying the tomato basil soup alley.

Shutting off the AV news because they don't want to doomscroll while on holidays.

[+ZincAboutIt she/her]

7 minutes ago, MacThorstenson said:

the tomato basil soup alley.

I must visit this place immediately

[Rushu42 she/her]

46 minutes ago, MacThorstenson said:

It would be interesting if there was some sort of magic revolving around a true sight, or a grounding in reality, or detecting of investiture or something like that, that happened as a result of everyone existing in the forgery. Like peoples spiritweb responded after the forgery as a defense mechanism and developed this new ability.

Ooh, expanding the magic system like this would be really cool. I wonder if we could establish some sort of meta-investiture powers - as in, powers based solely off of the detection/manipulation of other forms of investiture. Kind of like A-Bronze or Aluminum already impact things, but expanded, perhaps?

[MacThorstenson he/him]

27 minutes ago, ZincAboutIt said:

I must visit this place immediately

I may or may not have come up with that alley based off of what I'm craving at the moment.

17 minutes ago, Rushu42 said:

Ooh, expanding the magic system like this would be really cool. I wonder if we could establish some sort of meta-investiture powers - as in, powers based solely off of the detection/manipulation of other forms of investiture. Kind of like A-Bronze or Aluminum already impact things, but expanded, perhaps?

That would be pretty interesting. I gotta think about that.

 

Guys I wrote a paper for the DA.

Spoiler

On Departments and the department heads.

Authors:

Mac Thorstenson, Former head of Department of Counter Intelligence, et al. Cam Nosnetsroht, head of HR

 

Abstract:

There are a lot of departments, many of them lack active heads.

Introduction:

Everyone knows that the DA has a myriad of departments and members. In this paper I attempt to catalogue a number of the departments that existed in the past (Pre-era1), and list which ones don't have active department heads.

Methods:

I looked through the OP for People you wouldn't want to meet in a dark alley (Dark alley thread for short). Each specialty listed was given a department or sub department, and the current canon head was listed next to the department name. Several alternate names were suggested for simplicity, though knowing the  DA's organizational skills, the odds that both departments are fully funded and functioning are high. 

Results:

Dept of Sales: Voidus

R&D: The Stranger

Dept of Advertising: ??

Dept of Recruitment (Acquisitions?): Mathew or something idk

DoCI: Lita (formerly Mac)

Dept of Spying (Inteligence?):

Dept of Shipping: ??

Dept of Inter-Guild commerce: ??

Dept of Public Relations:??

Dept of Biochemistry: Aylitha (?)

Dept of Alleymatics: (Soon to be filled maybe??)

The Following specialities were deemed likely to exist under R&D, but could also be their own department if needed.

Specialties: Breath Experimentation Expert

Specialties: Hemalurgic Theorizing 

Specialties: Hemalurgic Compounding Researcher

Specialties: Zoohemalurgy

Specialties: Hemalurgy of non-Metallic magic systems

Specialties: Trans-species Hemalurgy,

Specialties: Eldritch Horror* and Researcher of Investiture of The Dark Alley!

*Pending office cleaning

Specialties: Mistwraith research team,

Specialties: Lerasium

Conclusions:

The department system in the DA is ridiculously bloated and Chaotic, and many of the department heads have been missing in action for years. But I love it. I know that this is a scientific paper and that I'm really not supposed to use the first person but I don't care. The department of citations was dissolved years ago. 

But yeah, I guess theres a lot of departments. Further research is needed to determine if we should fill them. 

Disclaimer applies.

 

Edited March 19, 2022 by MacThorstenson
Dept. of Proofreading didn't go over the paper.

[kenod]

13 minutes ago, MacThorstenson said:

Dept of Shipping: ??

What type of shipping? (Both?)