I'd like to say that I was thoroughly impressed by all of the character sheets. When it came time to choose, I found myself struggling to figure out which stories I could possibly not see lived out. If I had the capability to run every single one of those ideas at the same time, I would. If one of the accepted players decides to drop out for any reason, I may try and get one of the worlds which was not selected involved.
Accepted players in alphabetical order, plus a brief reason for choosing:
BFEL - Giant puzzle, enough said
Fluoman - Want to know what knowing everything would look like/want to break out some classic epistemological arguments while writing turns
Harry Baldman - Creation/destruction duality being constantly and explicitly played out appeals to me, just read a great trilogy which explored that theme a little
Poweder Miner - Transition metal organisms sounds entirely impractical, and fun to think about, and loyalty should make for an interesting theme
WhitiusOpus - He is openly malignant towards his creations, which should be interesting, and his first turn also had a very technical approach, which will be fun to write (I might even find excuses to do some research on how cooling a planet could go wrong!)
Password (BFEL)
(4)Forge a enormous twisting mass of corridors and dead ends in the shape of a cube.
(3)Animate cube to constantly shift the positions of all corridors and such within it, both in space and time.
In the beginning there was Password, and only Password. He immediately began to wonder how he came to be, what the nothingness before him was like, and how it was possible for him to decide on where to put something, since there was nothing to reference but himself. As entertaining as occupying himself with insoluble philosophical riddles was, questions of causality, the possibility of reality without subjective observer, and the relativity of space could only hold his attention for so long. He wanted a puzzle that he could feel, one that was manifest in front of him in all its confusing glory. But now a true philosophical puzzle arose. Is it possible for Password to create a puzzle even Password can't solve. In his puzzle solving glory, Password recognized that he could not simply create a physical puzzle which was beyond him. He needed a puzzle which would create itself. So began his journey of divine creation...
To contrast with these philosophical conundrums, Password decided to create the most physical puzzle possible, a maze. Not just any maze though, a maze which rearranged itself, though only spatially . The problem of causality, earlier pondered, resurfaced. Password was indeed able to make a maze, but it had to rearrange itself according to the laws of causality, that is the characteristics of the preceding state determined the outcome of the rearrangement. Because Password designed the algorithm, and the original state of the maze, in its entirety, he found he knew precisely how the maze would rearrange. His first attempt would certainly confuse any other intelligence, provided others existed, but left Password himself unbaffled.
Contains a maze which is constantly rearranging itself according to an algorithm only understood by Password
Perun (Fluoman)
(5)Action one: Divine: create a universe that is like our reality unless noted through the Biggest Bang.
This Universe is split in two:
Space is the realm of everything that is strictly physical: it is a cube that does not expand, and when you cross the border on one side, you go out the other with the same speed vector (intensity, direction etc).
Outspace is the realm of everything that is not strictly physical: this is where the mathematical concept of Triangle lives, for example. It does not have a shape stricto sensu since it is not physical.
Since every Space thing has at least one Outspace Anchor (Every human is linked to Human-ness, every Triangle is linked to Triangle-ness, every artifact is linked to Divinity etc) and every Outspace thing is the common properties of one or more Space Avatar(s) (Triangle-ness is in every triangle, no matter how misshapen), travel and contact between Space and Outspace is relatively easy.
FTL travel and information-sharing is impossible through "normal" means. Time travel is impossible through "normal" means. Magic exists and is composed of seven elements: temperature, time, length, mass, light, substance and electricity (according to the International System of Units). Magic tends to try to follow the conservation of energy: the scale goes from dabbling mages (at least 1 exp, more than 0% of energy spent going towards the desired effect) to legendary+5 mages (max exp, 100% of energy spent going towards the desired effect).
(2)Mundane: Perun's incarnation will use Its unlimited lifespan, relativity and light-speed travel to look for and find a desirable planet.
In the beginning there was Perun, and only Perun. It quickly realized It knew everything. But It couldn't decide what that meant, given that It was was all there was. This called into question what knowledge meant. It wasn't even sure how knowledge arose, since It had never encountered anything which It needed to learn about. But It was sure of one thing, knowledge was to be prized, and therefor the nature of knowledge must be known. With this understanding, Perun set off to create something which It could know, and which also itself would be driven to know. Knowledge must be propagated, and there must be objects of that knowledge So began It's journey of divine creation...
But where to put these objects of knowledge? In Space of course, Perun knew. But then Space would need to be, and currently it wasn't. But what of the Knowledge-objects themselves? After all, Perun might know a triangle in Space, but encountering every triangle in Space wouldn't let a being know what made a triangle a triangle. So It created Outspace to hold all of the Anchors, and Space to hold their Avatars, their manifestations. Magic was created as a consequence of the interactions of these realms, and the fact that Space is merely a phenomenal world. This was all brought about through the Biggest Bang, which brought Space immediately into a cube shape. Imperfections in the distribution of matter, typical of the phenomenal world, led the coalescence of stars and planets, which organized themselves into solar systems. However, after an eternity of searching Perun could find no suitable planet. It had been distracted by the metaphysics of creation, and paid too little attention to the physics of it all. There was too much regularity in the inhomogeneities of the matter, and every single star turned out to exist in a binary system. These systems led to irregular orbits which consumed planets, rather than leaving them suitable for any task whatsoever.
A Spacial universe much like our own, though every star system is binary
Outspace, which consists of Anchors of all characteristics (See: Platonic Forms)
DINGIR (Harry Baldman)
(5)Creation: create EN, the Conciliatory Aspect of Lordship, using a piece of my divine essence. He shall be my aide and provide regulation of my acts.
(1)Destruction: attempt to rip EN in half to create the Twin Angels of Creation and Destruction, who will each try to sway me.
In the beginning there was DINGIR, and only DINGIR. But DINGIR was of two parts, creation and destruction. Even with all his divine abilities, reconciliation of two such diametrically opposed forces was not possible. Not desiring to alienate either part of his dual-natured self, DINGIR vacillated between the two. While trying to work out his first steps, DINGIR consulted both of his aspects. He determined he must create, but also destroy. This would be best, achieved, he saw, by trying to build something beautiful, destroy it, and then build again. This capricious cycle of creation and destruction would surely be be the fullest expression of his antagonistic desires. So began his journey of divine creation...
DINGIR decided first to create something to help him in this task. Taking a portion of his constantly swirling body mass, he shaped EN, the Conciliatory Aspect of Lordship. EN was designed to help moderate the ever-changing behavior of DINGIR. In typical fashion, however, DINGIR sought to tear EN in two. However, as EN was created of DINGIR's flesh, EN was able to absorb DINGIR as the primal god assaulted his new creation. The result was a moderator of terrible power, who would work always to oppose DINGIR's actions.
EN, The Concilliatory Aspect of Lordship. It will roll a d6 action after every turn. EN will always roll to improve the action of the lower roll and negate the effect of the higher roll (i.e. if DINGIR rolls a 5 for creation and a 3 for destruction, EN will attempt to destroy something).
FIDeM (Powder Minder)
(6)Produce several moderate sized enclosed steel spaces.
(1)Place the contents for a metallic ecosystem inside-- cells are here made of transition metals and not organic compound.
In the beginning there was FIDeM, and only FIDeM. He valued loyalty above all else. But loyalty to what? There was only him. What could he be loyal to? And who could be loyal to him? He needed something else in the universe. On further introspection he found more questions. Why did he value loyalty? How did he already know what loyalty and betrayal were? Hopefully creation could help answer these questions. He could enforce loyalty while at the same time exploring how other beings understood it. So began his journey of divine creation...
FIDeM decided he would have to carefully control his creations, at least before they knew what loyalty was. So he started making steel enclosures. He got a little carried away, and actually managed to interlock most of the enclosures, leaving only one free from the others. Deciding to lay the foundations for his eventual lifeforms in the very metal he worked with, he attempted to create a landscape of different metals. However, he miscounted his protons, resulting in the production of entirely inert noble gases, not at all suited to any type of cells.
5 Interlocking steel enclosures, one free steel enclosure, all filled with noble gases
Alkroth (WhitiusOpus)
(3)Create a ball of molten lava, roughly 2x the size of earth.
(1)Begin cooling the superheated magma, creating great swathes of land and huge fissures in the planet. Name it Kranos.
In the beginning there was Alkroth, and only Alkroth. But Alkroth demanded suffering. He needed something to suffer. HE was suffering for the lack of suffering. And he was the only being not meant to suffer. Well, he was the only being at all for the moment. And that was the central problem. He needed beings that he could make despair. So began his journey of divine creation...
Before there could be beings, they needed a place to be. The Defiler decided to make a world whose origins were as fiery and tumultuous as its history would soon become. He created a giant ball of magma, but one which was hollow to half its radius. He accidentally heated this further, leading to the buildup of pockets of plasma along the magma surface.
Kranos - A hollow sphere of magma with pockets of plasma on its surface.