Comatose

I kind of like the idea of it being decentralized for a while (like Epoch being a power in the city, but not the only one). I don't think it would be hard to come up with factions. We could even have some Maple/Vanilla led factions. I really like the "epic too weak to keep ruling" idea, but would personally prefer it to be 'too weak to continue ruling their large portion of the city'. I might be the odd one out here, which is fine if that's the case, but I really like the idea of distinguishing Edmonton from previous threads (other than Portland) to make it a little more chaotic. The "coming out a night" part is from Mistborn definitely - in The Buried Giant the mist was always there, but I thought it would be better to make it non-constant for RP purposes. The forgetfulness effect doesn't have to be mist related - it could have different physical manifestations. I like the idea of it being a fun colour though. This idea is continuing to develop for me though (feel free to say if you don't like it): What if this epic doesn't know she or he is an epic? They produce the forgetting mist every time they fall asleep or become unconscious, and thus are totally unaware of what they are doing. During the day, they go through their life as a regular (but perhaps somewhat cranky/irritable) human, and meanwhile all of these different factions are trying to find them to either use the power to their advantage, or to remove the effect so Edmonton can be more effectively organized. EDIT: To be clear, if people like the timezones thing (which seems to be the case), I would be totally open to having this be a second aspect of weirdness going on at the same time as the 'fast travel zones' or whatever.

Sorry it took me so long to catch up. The weekend was really busy. Personally, I would prefer for this city not to have a single epic in charge. I kind of like the idea of it being relatively ignored due to Calgary getting way more focus and power being relatively decentralized in Edmonton. The time travel weirdness makes me nervous but will abide by the group decision as people seem to like it. Another city wide weirdness idea - I just finished a book called The Buried Giant in which a strange mist causes people to become forgetful. What if there is an epic caused mist like that which comes out at night or something, causing people to stay in doors or risk becoming disoriented and forgetful? It could lead to some fun sequences if people end up outside after dark, and one of the plot points could be hunting for the epic creating the mist. It could also help explain why things are disorganized. Edit: It might even be a kind of safe place for epics whose weaknesses have been revealed or are on the run. If someone tried to find you or knows your weakness, you can trick them out into the mist and let them become forgetful and escape. Edit #2: Also my main critique of “maples” is it doesn’t seem like a term canadians (especially Western Canadians) would actually come up with - more likely to be something someone else came up with and applied to them.

Gotchya. So you are saying if "after" and "during" were the same category, then it would be 9 to 5, or 7 to 7 if the two who said they wouldn't be opposed switched? That makes sense. Sorry for being mixed up.

I'm confused. I didn't give an after vote? My vote was always that the RP should happen before Calamity leaves. My statement was that, in that time period before Calamity leaves, I think it should be around the time of Steelheart's death. I never meant to give a second vote. By my count, we have 4 for he leaves during, 9 for the RP happens before he leaves, 1 for RP is after Calamity leaves, and 1 person is neutral.

I did vote before.

I'm fine with Voidgaze. Didn't we kind of figure out she might be redeemed without knowing it? I know we want to strictly limit the number of those, but I recall that being an potential explanation in her case since she was made before we knew how corruption worked. I'm also actually fine with some PIs (like straight up invincibility or Resurrection), as long as they aren't too common, and aren't paired with worldbreaking powers. Basically, I think it would be good if you make an invincible character, to give them interesting limits otherwise. There are lots of ways to stop or defeat someone without killing them, so I don't think PI = OP. The only thing we need to be careful of is ratios. I'd prefer to keep things in the current epics thread, mostly so I don't need to change the link in my signature. I have also been including my vanilla characters there. For another slang term for humans (not crazy about "maples") how do people feel about "basics"? That's a term that exists now with similar connotations to vanillas that I could see being adapted. So, since it seems Edmonton is the place we are going with then? I think if it is we should start working on a premise - something to start things off with a bang and give the plot some drive, and the characters something to engage with so it isn't just "a bunch of vanillas and epics wandering around". Any ideas? As an aside, after watching Jessica Jones, I've always thought an epic with Killgrave style powers, but who is very physically weak and vulnerable, would be fun.

My vote is right after Steelheart dies, in the gap between Steelheart and Firefight. I think it would be fun to have our characters getting news of a major epic's death.

I think post Calamity is a little too unknown to venture into. I prefer pre personally. How long before Steelheart was Oregon destroyed again? I can’t find the timeline we worked out. @Voidus @Edgedancer

No worries KK! I’m sure you’d be welcome to hop in any time with a single or as a side character, which might be less busy than what you were handling before. Love your writing so even a limited opportunity to write with you would be great Of course its totally understandable if even that is too much. Life is busy and that makes sense. Edit: #pleasebringbackbacktrack

I'm kind of thinking of grouping some of my epics together with a bunch of Vanillas who enter the city as refugees. Masquerading as vanillas to avoid their enemies, these epics would be a little less corrupted for the time being (kind of like Megan in the books), and then when they start using their powers the corruption would start again.

We are pretty multicultural, so you can probably go with anything. Also, since we would be RPing post end of the world epic crisis, populations tend to move around a lot. I had a new thought, what if we did Edmonton? My thought was, since Calgary is also a pretty major city, what if most of the most powerful epics from Alberta and the surrounding area (maybe even some from the northwestern states) flocked there to try to take it over, and it ended in a huge blood bath. Calgary was utterly destroyed, and Edmonton, the slightly smaller city, was left comparatively unscathed? I kind of like the idea of life going on as normal right next to complete and utter devastation. (I'm a big ideas person, so unless someone stops me I'll just keep throwing stuff out there. Please everyone feel free to turf anything you don't like).

Calgary is huge geographically and has over a million people if we are looking for a city that size. Due to how it sprawls, it might be tough for the epics who live there to control, and other than Edmonton which is close by, it is fairly isolated. It's also close to the mountains, and has some rivers, so lots of fun terrain. Winnipeg is another fairly large but isolated city that could be fun. No mountains, but lots of lakes in the surrounding area. If we are looking for a place with many cities close together, something in Ontario or Quebec would probably be the way to go. We've already referenced Vancouver in the RP, but that could be another option. I'm kind of partial to the west personally, mostly because of its proximity to Oregon. I also worry that using Vancouver, Toronto and Montreal might be difficult if we go for the chaos of many mid level epics approach, as they are all big enough to attract powerful high epic rulers. A less major city might be more believable. Pros and cons to each, it depends what people want.

Oregon's destiny was destruction, but we are somewhat less limited than we were in Oregon, though obviously we would have to keep things somewhat low key to explain why the Reckoners' attention was occupied elsewhere. Regardless, destruction or lackthereof can occur regardless of whether there is a high concentration of high epics or not. I'm fine with allowing a good amount low powered epics with prime invincibilities (Fortuity, for example). Even Taylor Swift (who I would really love to use) is powerful and has a PI, but won't be levelling any cities any time soon. I think where issues occurred was having too many epics with world breaking offensive capabilities. Some of these were necessary for plot reasons (the rulers of the different cities, for example, had to be capable of keeping lesser epics in line or they wouldn't be in charge), but personally I think it would be cool to focus on mid-level epics for the sequel What if, whatever city we choose, has been relatively untouched by High Epics, aside from the odd rampage now and then, as most powerhouses have moved on to more important cities? The vanilla population still lives in fear of course, and mid-level epics strut around like they own the place, but the relative lack of high powered epics to impose order makes it both chaotic but somewhat free?

Obviously part of the fun of writing in the Reckonersverse is making epics, but it would also be cool to have some Vanillas. Any ideas for those? I already have Brandon and I could introduce Ian since he never made it to the Dalles. Any others? Also, do we want to set a limit on OP epics (Rainmaker, Lucentia, Soulcaster, etc) and encourage non-high epics or high epics with less devastating offensive powers to encourage the development of mid level epics and vanillas? Getting overpopulated with High epics was a common problem previously so we may wish to avoid that.

I voted Canada, but I think Mexico would also be an okay option in terms of location, but might require more research.

I see the issue you are having. The distinction I had was that (b) is how or why the Shard acts, and (c) is what the shard is doing (but not what they want to accomplish). Both are qualitative (need a better word) in that they define an action rather than a result, and govern how a shard acts, but... I think I need to think more. The qualitative/substantive distinction is essentially the journey vs. destination distinction in some ways. I feel like in/out categories are not as useful in this context, but I am lacking the vocabulary necessary to articulate what I am getting at. When I have a moment, I'd like to get back to the original categories and then rethink the groupings.

I think my primary preference for Canada over Europe is its geographical proximity to Oregon. It might stretch plausibility to get a bunch of Oregon characters to the same place in Europe. I really don’t think lack a familiarity will be as much an issue as you might think. Most of us knew nothing about Oregon and we made it work. Especially if we start with one city a quick Wikipedia read supplemented by a player whose been there should be enough.

Very interesting. Thanks for the thoughts! It came out of my desire to reconcile my issues with the less 'active' intents (Ambition and Autonomy in particular). I think the intents of the shards we've seen this far in detail are fairly straight forward, but for me these seemed not to fit the established pattern, indicating to me that the pattern I was recognizing was incorrect. The idea comes out of two places. The first is the idea that all of the intents are aspects of Adonalsium, split apart from each other, and lacking the context they once provided to one another. Based on the diversity we've seen, to me at least it doesn't seem like the "parts" can be fit neatly into a homogeneous category (like the "four elements" or the "surges"). Some specified a certain action, others were more concerned with an attribute, for example. The second piece comes with thinking about realmatics. I started with the idea that all of the intents warp their Vessels towards a certain something, and as I thought about it it seemed reasonable for that thing to be Adonalsium. I was thinking about the separation between the realms, and how healing magics focus on a spiritual ideal. Since location and time are compressed or united in the spiritual realm, I realized that there, Adonalsium would still, in some senses be whole, both in the past, and potentially in some of the possible futures. It also made sense to me that all the Shards, as pieces of a whole, would somewhat perceive themselves as that whole. So if Adonalsium is like a spiritual ideal that the intents are working towards, I kind of started thinking about intents as being similar to the cognitive filters that interpret or interfere with one's ability to heal, or change their spiritual ideal. I am not saying that the intent is cognitive - I think it is all three along with the Shard, and if anything the Vessel's interpretation of the Shard would be cognitive, but I do think the intent might function similarly to a cognitive block or filter. It's like, if Adonalsium was a box of blocks with an open lid, each shard is a box with a lid that will only allow one shape of block through, if that makes sense. Together, the shards could dump out all the blocks (produce Adonalsium), but separate, they can only drive towards one thing. Taking these two concepts, I did look at the shards we have thus far, and thought about what they are driving their Vessel towards. Whereas we have clear goals for Ruin and Preservation, some (even ones we have good descriptions for like Odium) are less clear. Ruin and Preservation are somewhat objective - they focus on desired states, and there is only so much room for interpretation. Odium is less clear (assuming he is Odium and not "Passion"). Is he compelled to make people hate, or just to hate, or both? Breaking the shards into categories helped me make sense of these issues. That was pretty long and rambly but I hope it makes sense. Personally, I think the push/pull variance is more a product of allomancy. As far as we know, even Feruchemy and Hemalurgy do not have push/pull variances, and we haven't seen that form of categorization in other magic systems (like the surges or the Dor). I did somewhat see them as external/internal and subjective/objective (I am not a huge fan of inanimate and inanimate, but I am also not a fan of subjective/objective, so if you have any other suggested categories let me know). I think it's more like introverted and extroverted (I like these more than internal/external because the words indicate an inclination to either isolate or intervene, but do not preclude internal or external action - it's useful I think to think of intents a little like personalities) and qualitative and quantitative maybe? Introverted - inward focus on motivation or self. Changes what or how a shard is. Extroverted - outward focus, acting in the world. Changes what a shard does or why they do it. Qualitative - focus on "how" or "why" rather than "what", making changes to qualities or attributes rather than substantive ones. Substantive - focus on "what" a shard is or does. I think that, in assigning categories, it is important to me for this theory that all intents lead to Adonalsium, and that should frame how they are structured and explained. So: (a) INNATE - introverted / substantive - becoming divine by changing self - inward focus on a specific result: in this case an attribute or state of being. Autonomy becomes autonomous. Ambition becomes ambitious. (b) RELATIONAL/MOTIVATIONAL - introverted / qualitative - becoming divine by changing how one interacts - an inward focus on changing the quality of the shard's interactions, and by extension, the qualities of the interactions among people. Odium acts with hatred. Devotion acts with love. (c) INTERVENTION - extroverted / qualitative - seeks to become divine by acting in the world - an outward focus on intervening in the world in a certain way. Cultivation cultivates things, Endowment gives things. (d) MANDATE - extroverted / substantive - seeks to become divine through making substantive changes to achieve a certain result - an outward focus on intervening in the world to achieve a specific result. Ruin seeks a state of destruction. Preservation seeks a state of stasis. I'm still working through these, and changing things around, so I would appreciate thoughts on these groupings. I agree that all shards are capable of impacting what a shard is and what a shard does, but I think I'm proposing they have different focuses? So for Preservation, what Leras does is the primary point of friction with his intent (see his inability to stab Elend), but their are ancillary or secondary effects on who he is and how he interacts with people as well, if that makes sense.

We need Backtrack back right? He’s so fun! It might be cool if we set up some sort of mystery and put Backtrack in the middle of it with his power to obtain information. Edit: Oh wait. Backtrack was Kobold’s wasn’t he.

I love the idea of a set time frame, provided that there is enough inherent flexibility to allow people some freedom to be creative. I actually had a set time window for Corvallis (of a week or so of actual RP after the prologue iirc) and I like to think it would have worked well had we gotten that far. Or do you mean a real world termination date? That could be interesting, but it might be difficult if people's schedules vary in business.

I'd prefer pre-Calamity personally, but after could be fun too I agree. If we do a city far enough away, we could even do it during the events of the books. Maybe right after Steelheart dies?

I think a destabilized location would be fun, since we've done a couple dictatorships already. What characters are people interested in bringing back? I would love to do more Brandon and Taylor Swift since they didn't get to do much in the Dalles.

An apt metaphor just occurred to me: it’s like if the goal of becoming divine/Adonalsium was becoming muscular, but each Shard only knows how to exercise one muscle group or one nutritional strategy. They all are trying to achieve the same goal, but come to varied and sometimes opposite results as one only lifts weights to get a big right arm, one only cuts back on fat but doesn’t eat protein, and one only does cardio etc.

I know there have been a couple topics on this, and a couple that come close to this topic, but I thought I would start a new thread to focus on these categories and they have helped me to articulate how I think intents actually act upon the Vessels. For context, back when we didn't have many shards, I believed all of the intents would be active words which drive their vessel towards certain actions. Ruin is driven to destroy, Preservation is driven to preserve, Cultivation is driven to transform, Honor is driven to promise and honor those promises, Devotion is driven to love, Odium is driven to hate, Endowment is driven to give, and Dominion is driven to dominate (this one in hindsight doesn't work as well), etc. Then we started getting ones like "Autonomy" and "Ambition" which are more innate attributes not attached to any particular action. Then, since Oathbringer, as I've considered the Odium /Passion debate (team Odium all the way), I've rethought how I think about intents. I still think Shards drive their vessels towards a certain result in a very active way, but how that drive occurs differs depending on which quadrant the shards are located in. Since we don't have all the Shards, attempts at categorization at this point are inherently flawed, but I'm interested to see where the discussion leads. 1. Concept I think that the Intents of Shards are driving the Vessels to become "more divine". Each Shard had an idea of what "Adonalsium" is as a spiritual ideal, and wants to actualize that ideal by reshaping their vessel. The individual "intents" are the paths by which each shard strives to reach that ideal. Over time, the personal motivations of the vessel are eroded and replaced with the motivation to follow path provided by the intent. The actions the Vessel takes may still be chosen by the Vessel, but whereas before they may have been motivated by love of a friend or family member, or personal gain, those old motivations are increasingly replaced by their intent. Each Shard has a different way of laying out it's path. Some treat divinity or Adonalsium as an active force and focus on acting in the world, some a mandate or objective to be achieved, some see it in terms of the relationships between Adonalsium and mortals, and some see Adonalsium being defined by certain innate and unchangeable attributes. These distinctions create differences. Initially, the differences between, say Odium and Devotion and Ruin and Preservation, bothered me because I perceived them to be inconsistent. But this form of categorization helped me to make sense of the differences. Shards focused on physical intervention or action or inherently more objective. Their intent or motivation is to DO something in the universe, and thus the ways in which they interpret their intent, or the actions they take to bring about their divine mandate are more limited to things which bring about the intended result. Shards with a relational focus have more subjectivity - the actions and results are less of an issue so long as the way in which the Vessel acts accords with its intent. Shards dealing with innate attributes strive to BE a certain way. Results are important, but internal, and actions taken in pursuit can vary widely Vessel to Vessel. 2. Categorization For now I am going to stay pretty broad and high level, but would love to discuss the specifics of how I've categorized shards based on evidence from WoBs or the books if people are interested or have quibbles. (A) Innate (What God "Is" - Shard drives Vessel to "BE") Shards: Autonomy and Ambition. Maybe Honor, Dominion, or the Shard that just wants to survive. These Shards drive the vessel to BECOME more divine by focusing in on innate divine qualities. The Vessel is driven to become, in this case, more autonomous or ambitious, but how they do that can be highly subjective. These shards are the mostly likely to take a less active role in the world due to the internal nature of their intent. Vessels with these shards are more likely to lose their sense of self, despite being more "in control" of their actions especially if they do not possess the innate quality or state they are driven to attain. These Shard sees Adonalsium as Autonomous or Amibtious (and perhaps as Honourable or innately Sovereign). As most of the Shards I am placing in this category firmly have not been widely observed in text, I am not prepared to comment on the future sight issue. (B) Relational (How God Relates to People and the World - Shard drives Vessel to relate in a specific way) Shards: Odium, Devotion. Maybe Honor. These Shards are pieces of how God relates to the Cosmere, and lay out a path towards divinity based interaction with the World. These Shards are very MOTIVATION focused, and depending on the filter of the Vessel, the outcomes can vary greatly. This category is arguably the most subjective, and provides the most opportunities for Vessels to maintain some sense of self. Conversely, the effects of these Shards can be more insidious, and the Vessel may be less aware of how they are being influenced. This category also gives the Vessel heightened freedom to choose it's goal. Rayse chooses to try to kill other Vessels, but another holder of Odium might have been driven to act in different ways. Due to the focus on the "how" rather than the "what" or "why", I think these Shards may be more likely to have less of an ability to perceive the future due to its relative irrelevance. (C) Intervention (What God Does - Shard drives Vessel to perform a certain divine action and intervene in the world) Shards: Cultivation and Endowment. These shards are the doers. Going back to my original concept of intents, these ones fit the best. Cultivation cultivates or transforms and Endowment endows or gives. The Shard drives the vessel to take certain actions, separated from the context of motivations or goals. These shards also have a great deal of freedom, but their focus is primarily external. The dangerous aspect of these Shards is that there is no end goal or desired outcome. The Vessels will continue to be driven to act, no matter how much the world is transformed in the process. These Shards cannot exist in isolation, and must intervene and change the world around them. I think that future sight in this category may have a high level of variance. If an action requires a great deal of foresight the shard may have superior future sight, but otherwise it may not. For example, in order to cultivate or transform something, Cultivation must be able to have a concept of what the transformed thing will become, making an increased ability to perceive multiple possible futures necessary. The gardener must know something of the finished plant when planting the seed. I do not think a high level of future sight would be necessary for all shards in this category though. (D) Mandate (What God's Goals Are or "Why" God acts - Shard drives Vessel to bring about a divine state of being). Shards: Ruin, Preservation, Dominion. I originally included this section in "Intervention", but the more I thought about it, the more I realized I liked it more as a separate category (and it helped me place Dominion (which I highly prefer to place here rather than as a divine state of being). Part of me still sees Ruin and Preservation in the former category (Intervention) but I am going to keep thinking about it. These Shards strive for divinity by attempting to bring about a certain goal or end state. Ruin wishes to end all things. Preservation wishes to hold all moments together in unchanging perpetuity. Dominion wishes to bring about a state of divine sovereignty and rule over its domain. These shards may utilize a variety of methods or actions to bring about their preferred state, but as the Shard's influence increases, they may become impatient to bring about their goal, despite their indifference to time (see Ruin's drive to reclaim the Atium and end the world immediately, rather than wait for the Ashmounts and Deepness to do the work for him). These shards can be the most transformative as the Vessel's entire identity, personal motivations and emotions, and agency are all subsumed by its overpowering goal. I think on the whole, these Shards would be more likely to have good future sight, with some exceptions. For example, I believe the reason Preservation has superior future sight whereas Ruin's ability to perceive the future is limited has to do with Preservation's desire to hold things in a state of stasis for forever, and is thus driven to anticipate and prevent change. Preservation is driven to seek a highly specific future, and thus must avoid all others. Ruin, on the other hand, is present focus, in that it wants to end the current or present state of being, and bring about an immediate end. The future is irrelevant, because Ruin's ultimate divine goal is to ensure no futures come to pass. I know this logic can be applied in the reverse, and have debated with the contrary opinion in the past, but we do know from the books that Preservation's future sight is superior, and this was my rationale for it. I would predict, on this basis, that Dominion's future sight might be better than Devotion's. Note on Honor I note that I have had trouble placing Honor. It may drive its Vessel to be more honorable or it may drive its Vessel to proceed in an honorable way. I'm curious what people think about this. 3. What this Means I think the main take-away is that: (1) All Shards are reshaping their vessels to be "Adonalsium"; (2) Despite an awareness of and longing for the spiritual ideal of Adonalsium, the Shards provide Vessels with imperfect and flawed understandings of how to effect the desired transformation; (3) The ways in which the Shards drive their Vessels to perfect their flawed state of divinity varies shard to shard, but the form these motivations take may be used to categorize the Shards. It looks like I will need to go back to work without proofreading, so forgive any typos. I also did not have time, like I wanted, to go back and link some of the other topics I have read on this subject, so if you have one in mind, please link it and I will include it in the OP. What does everyone think? Let me know here or on Discord Links to Previous Discussions Involving Different Groupings of Shards: 16, the Shards and Scadrian magic Fundamental Surges Unknown Shards

I know I had no knowledge of Corvallis when I started, and did a lot of research on maps and Wikipedia and the general internet to get the details right. What I was trying to say is I know enough Canadian cities that I could provide people with the information they need to RP there. I think Canada is nice because it's close enough to Oregon that we can reuse epics (unlike with the problems ID'd with Europe). We tend to use many smaller cities anyways (aside from Portland) so I don't think initial unfamiliarity with a city will be an issue if we do some research. And there are a lot of other big cities besides Toronto. We've referenced Vancouver already in the RP, and Calgary and Montreal both have well over 1 million people (Vancouver and Montreal both have several million I think), and Edmonton and Winnipeg are getting close. All of those are bigger than Portland. There are lots of small cities in Ontario or across the Prairies that could be used as well if we want to avoid well known places. For example, my home city is like 5 times the size of Corvallis, even though it's still on the small side. American cities, of course, work fine as well, but between WHiO and the books, the States are a little full of epics at the moment, and in Canada we might be less likely to contradict canon. I'd be down with anywhere of course, but those were the reasons behind my suggestion.