Kasimir

Kassel signing up. I'll figure out his personality/backstory later; I just had the name because...eh, World Cup. Edit: I admit I also wanted the faint amusement of being the first to sign up for King's game. As for the family name, I'll go with the House, later on, I reckon. Edit 2: Alright, alright. Kassel Erikell, amateur philosopher (logician) and a general dabbler. As far as public knowledge is concerned, Kassel is a distant cousin, rather than from the main line of descent. Despite his general tendency to muddle along, it seems House Erikell entrusts him with a surprising measure of responsibility...

I know, so I was told If it's cool, bottom of the MR list, please? I still have a few tweaks to work through in the name of game balance worries.

I was waiting for the MR-series to be rolled out If I still have one or two final sets of tweaks to be made, can I still apply to run my Scadrial game as an MR? (I put it down as QF in the Game Creation thread, but I've been thinking of going for a 48 hour cycle, which would automatically shift it to MR. And I'm adding one or two things. As I said, tweaks >> ) Edit: I also find this new and improved rule format to ah, have more personality than the last one

Understood, thank you for the clarification - Well, I'm shifting towards PC myself, with the death of my console and the fact I have already gotten my hands on a Blu-Ray player Not that I game as much these days, so there's that as well.

!!! Thanks a bunch, Nymp and Tempus (Not shifting yet, because I'm still trying to get used to my 1-day old Nicrosil, but this is absolutely next on my list!)

I was under the impression that the worms had been referred to as parasites in the text and so preferred to remain with the term, but upon checking, have realised that I'd just picked it up from the discussion going on and used it for no particular reason. Symbiotes it is.

Way less dangerous than mosquitoes though (Had to say that was brilliant.)

Sell. This framework of free will you are implying...I do not buy it The fledging Wax/Marasi ship will continue to not sail and not be a thing.

I guess it's one question I've recently been curious about, as my console broke down, so I'm in the process of selling off my games. Are you a console gamer or a PC gamer? Why? I originally didn't get a console with the intention of gaming: I got it because it was going for cheaper than Blu-ray players. Then because I had one, it did seem like a decent idea to swap my gaming to the console instead. What I liked about it was that there was less of a need to trouble-shoot or to worry that a game wasn't going to work with your PC specs. It was just slot in the game, install, and play. And I did prefer handling games like Assassin's Creed on PS controls rather than PC ones. The downside, of course, is (I'm told), worse graphics, the fact that I can't play mods with my games (*cough* Skyrim *cough*), that when a new console rolls out and doesn't have backward compatibility... (thanks, PS4), I'm in for quite a spot of bother with regard as to what to do. So, console or PC? Which is it? Or do you go for both? Edit: Oh shucks, I put it in Entertainment because I assumed gaming fit well with video games, but now I'm not sure if it's better under Tech Discussion. If I've made a mistake here, I'm sorry mods >>

Consciously, no. I'm not sure if I do have an implicit bias against reading female authors, though. (It's something I've always wondered about since they did that implicit bias test on CVs submitted by male and female scientists, but I don't want to derail this thread ) I would certainly hope I don't. Here's what draws me towards/pushes me away from a fantasy book: -The cover. I'm admittedly a little superficial like that, but some well-done covers really draw me. Boring-looking ones make me put it back down. I basically picked up Mercedes Lackey's and James Mallory's The Outstretched Shadow because of the cover art. -The blurb. If the blurb is well-written. That's how I ended up picking The Name of the Wind. -A quick flip through its contents. This is where I'm not really sure how to articulate things. I flip through the book and I see if the writing style interests me, if there's anything in there that captures my attention. If there is, I get it. -Recommendation/a review from someone else. That is basically how I started on The Wheel of Time. ...maybe let me go the other way around. Here's what would make me not pick up a book by a female fantasy author: if the book appears as if it's going to focus on a lot of romance, I drop it. It's not really my cup of tea. I'm thinking particularly about urban fantasy (which I grant is a separate kettle of fish), but the female protagonist with love triangles/quandrangles/what-have-you seems to be becoming a trope I am slightly tired of. So I wouldn't go out of my way to pick up yet another of those. That being said, I do like Seanan McGuire's October Daye series, so there's that. Interestingly enough, back when I read fanfiction, most of the authors I read from/enjoyed reading tended to be female authors, and I did read the fantasy sections, predominantly. I don't know if it's a demographic issue, but it does make me wonder...

From the perspective of DST (Developmental Systems Theory), it's entirely possible. Proponents of DST argue that the emphasis on genes as the sole consistent unit of inheritance is flawed, because there are many other things which are consistent elements of an organism's developmental cycle, as such. This is something Pathfinder's post reminded me of. We don't even need to talk in terms of consumption: parasites could be passed from parent to offspring in the nightmaws, the parallel being the transmission of gut bacteria, from mother to offspring in real life. Think in terms of vertical transmission. Edit: I just thought I should clarify, perhaps, that this isn't really in opposition to convergent evolution. Again, if we drop a gene-centric view, that is to say, if we desist from genic selectionism, then it's very much possible to consider this a way of fleshing out how Nightmaws obtain the parasite in a different way from the Aviar, who seem to have developed (also in a DST-way) a reliable, consistent practice of eating the fruit of Patji's Fingers.

When you watch a variety show episode taking place at a safari, and wonder if Soothers could Soothe animals on a safari. That's one shoo-in position for modern Allomancers right there...

In addition to that, would it also be ok if I took back my request, please? I'm kind of getting used to the Nicrosil one, anyway

Just to check: you've mentioned you've wanted to explore the idea of gender role transgression--of people accessing specific magic of the opposite gender. But I notice that the example you gave there is one in which the system just is: basically, if you're born a female, you access saidar. If you're born a man, you access saidin. Being able to access saidin in a female body isn't impossible, but it requires the person to have a certain...metaphysical history, maybe let's put it that way. But the idea I'm getting with what you're saying is that you're looking for cases where that sort of transgression isn't restricted to highly theoretical and rare circumstances: it's possible, but people don't do it for reasons of (presumably) culture and socialisation, and perhaps a few other reasons to add on to that. Given that, are you looking for systems that lean towards the saidin-saidar type split, or more of the latter kind? Edit: I know I'm freely eliding the difference between sex and gender here; the distinction isn't particularly fine-grained in WoT, with one or two exceptions, so I am not as sharp about terminology as I should probably be.

That's actually a pretty interesting topic. The more I think about it, the more I realise I haven't seen that many gender-specific magic systems. This is off the top of my head, and I don't have a particular series to pin it down to, but have you considered seidhr practices? It's not absolutely gender-specific but there's certainly something transgressive [at least the way the literature seems to discuss it] about males practising seidhr. Fantasy books done in a Norse setting usually tend to emphasise this, although I can't recall a good title at the moment. There's a YA series (YMMV): Chanters of Tremaris, where the magic is...somewhat gender and region-specific. It's not particularly well-detailed, so that's my initial caution, but the element of gender specificity comes because the magic happens through song. So it's supposed to be the case that there are some songs (such as those for illusion) which are too high-pitched for males to sing, and some songs (such as those for 'ironcraft' and fire) which are too low-pitched for females to sing. Though exceptions exist. If more occur to me, I'll add on to those here. This topic is certainly making me think. Edit: Claymore (the manga.) But it's sort of like saidar-saidin--there's no real distinction between a male Claymore and a female Claymore (people with powers because of implants) except that the males apparently have a greater tendency to lose control, go off the rails, and become monsters (subjective, but I'm trying to avoid spoilers, so...)

Updated vote tally: KalFS (7): Riitiidiikiir, Riingar, Luka, Hreo, Wyrm, Jeno, Jatae Jene (3): Mai, Matrim, KalFS Mai (2): Jene, Jain Jatae (1): Kai I sincerely doubt there were any shenanigans to be had at the initial 6 votes for Kal anyway. I'm not particularly minded to turn this into a proper bandwagon by throwing on an eighth vote for KalFS. So I think I'll leave my vote on Jatae, as he's not in any particular danger. My suspicions of Jene haven't entirely been satisfactorily dealt with, but three people have already stuck him with votes. And I do understand real life reasons: I myself will probably have to invoke those for tomorrow's rounds, but I'm wondering about just how many "well I came on and just threw in a vote"s we're going to end up hearing. For now, I'm going to treat that with the benefit of the doubt and leave it--for the moment. Jatae crops up twice on lists (admittedly rather broad ones) concerning people who could take Aonar down and people who could have been the Grappler, and he hasn't been particularly helpful in terms of offering suspicions, which makes it all the harder to determine what he's doing. He's not the top on my suspicion list, but at this point, I'm just going to note that I've got a question mark with regard to him and leave my vote as it stands. Edit: Then again, not all bandwagons are bad, though. Keeping in mind the insanely lucky one King managed. I guess we'll just have to wait and see for this cycle. Be a good thing to sort out the four Gunner claims, in any case.

Which just means we're both overdue, don't you think? Kal, I have the same problem. It's making me want to start referring to myself as Käi, in the hopes that the extra umlaut will help me somewhat. I don't know what to think right now. I'm really with King in that I feel that it doesn't make sense to frame when they could forc--oh. Unless...Maybe let's reverse this. Let's pretend we're Mutineers. (Well, some of us won't be pretending, but still...) What does it take to make a frame work, both technically and in terms of a strategic analysis? The main answer I'm getting is to set it up in such a way that it isn't just someone being framed, but it's your catspaws doing the framing. In other words, giving up one mislynch is small beans if and only if you can do it in such a way that it sets up other players to take the fall and ensures further mislynches. Which I suppose means that would/might be the case, if this turns out to have been a set up. In addition: I'm wondering if the problem is because analysis so far hasn't taken into account fog-of-war. If it is a frame, framing requires not putting other teammates at risk, at least from the Grappler's perspective. But there's also something more: they'd not necessarily know what fellow teammates are doing, unless they're also the one making the kill last cycle. Which means it's probably not safe to disregard other possible discrepancies or Mutineer actions in the bigger picture. Hoo, boy. In any case, I expect we'll see. And I still do want to hear from Jatae, so there's that.

Point taken, and there's really no point in keeping this quiet. I'm specifically referring to Game 5, where Aspren (back then) made this point, "That's eight votes for Grellin [Grey], unopposed. I doubt he's a Ghostblood." It's not exactly verbatiim, but given that episode, I'm trying to think about what that could mean. The vote on Kal seems to be proceeding a bit too easily, and while it's possible the Mutineers are hiding in the votes for Mai and Jene (as we'll soon find out based on the lynch, unless Kal is serious about being a Gunner) I think that ignoring base rate probability, it looks suspiciously reminiscent of that scenario. Which is why I'm divided about this and staring at the posts, trying to figure things out. I don't want vote shenanigans or Captain lynches. But I don't want to be led about by the Mutineers either. Although that seems to happen an awful lot :/

Says the guy who got me killed on Cycle storming Two! one game after he GMed me. ja

Meta did say we should be prepared to have a multiple of them (Gunners). But on the other hand, 6 votes on Kal is almost half our remaining players. That's also something that's concerning me at this point in time. I do think we need a decent layer of protection for the Captain and from grappling hook shenanigans. That I think makes sense. But the numbers voting for Kal right now? Maili, this reads to me like Grey, and I don't like that, although I think you might remember that well. At this point in time, 11 people have cast their votes. I have not yet; having retracted my vote from Jene. Jatae has not yet appeared, and come to think of it, we haven't heard much from him. His post yesterday was mostly just to put his vote on Luka. I don't like the look of this because even if Jatae and myself are Mutineers (for all you know, that is), there's at least one or two Mutineers hiding in the votes cast right now. And given there are six for Kal... I'm not even sure if I'm modelling the probabilities right at the moment. But I really need a good think, although it's not as though my one vote can do anything decisive here Dann rate ich zum zweiten Mal. Was aber, weiß ich noch nicht.

Whoops. My bad. Time for a reread!

First, Jene, thank you for responding. Second, there's something I wanted to address because it's in white text from Matrim. As he's noted he's allergic to long texts, I will keep this short: no. There are no safe roles in this game, so no one is above suspicion. Third: that's quite a number of posts to wake up to. I'm going to go through the information and to have a think before placing my vote again. At this point in time, KalFS has a clear lead, so unless I'm trying to ward off last minute vote shenanigans, I think there is no point in putting one on him immediately. Fourth, a quick vote tally at this point: KalFS (6): Riitidiikiir, Riingar, Luka, Hreo, Wyrm, Jeno Jene (3): Mai, Matrim, KalFS Mai (2): Jene, Jain Last: that's four people now who've claimed to be Gunners. "I'm Roger", said the Shamed Bridgeman to the King, "And so's my wife!"

Thanks, Weiry!