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Author Topic: Crystalline - Cycle 84  (Read 84704 times)

Aklyon

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Re: Crystalline - Cycle 60
« Reply #375 on: February 25, 2015, 10:07:18 am »

Can't we just design wireless energy transfer crystal?
We could, but suggestion games don't always try the more obvious idea first.
From least to most complicated way to explore down:
Climb down the wall
Parachute down
Make wireless energy transfer
Drop an outpost
Drop an outpost more safely on gel material.
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Crystalline (SG)
Sigtext
Quote from: RedKing
It's known as the Oppai-Kaiju effect. The islands of Japan generate a sort anti-gravity field, which allows breasts to behave as if in microgravity. It's also what allows Godzilla and friends to become 50 stories tall, and lets ninjas run up the side of a skyscraper.

forsaken1111

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Re: Crystalline - Cycle 60
« Reply #376 on: February 25, 2015, 10:10:57 am »

Well wireless power sounds like it will be useful in other situations too so let's start with that, then we can get a disconnected crystal chunk down there with steady power.
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Twi

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Re: Crystalline - Cycle 60
« Reply #377 on: February 25, 2015, 10:27:06 am »

We posed as an messenger of crystal. Which implies that that kind of thing happens sometimes. I want info on that.
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Aklyon

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Re: Crystalline - Cycle 61
« Reply #378 on: February 26, 2015, 08:35:27 pm »

I had a big blob of text here, but bro went to his friend's house so I ended up being able to put this together into one post of all the turn, not two. The only important thing missing was that I mentioned trying to update it every other day. Also have a reference pic from the combination of the previous two scale-2s, to give a better scale of the distance we're going away from the core.

Cycle 61
You, via the diplomatic crystalline, poke the fortress guard again and ask who you could speak to on less scientific matters. Then you listen to the communications that you can get to.
Quote
[Outpost translation note: IDs are mostly encrypted. Fitting replacements used instead of generic labels]
Guard (via text, not speech): Sir, the xenogeology, whatever its name was again, is asking to speak to someone besides Senior Scientist Bor. Supposedly it is not a scientific matter.
Sir: Crystalline, I think? Anyway, we need more detail, the people he probably wants are hidden behind red tape or reasonable suspicion against talking to it themselves.
Guard: It could download from that device Bor brought. Just give it an unsecured comm.
Sir: Just in case, let me go doublecheck something...
---
Sir: Commander, would I be able to persuade an unsecured comm from someone? According to our guard near it, it has a non-scientific matter to discuss.
Commander: Depends. How will it use it?
Sir: Presumably the same way it traded some science with Senior Scientist Bor, via fiber optic interface port.
---
[difficulty translating message, possibly being manipulated as it transmits]
Commander: Ftyis, are qwe awake?
Ftyis?: Not especially awake, no. Byjdsaxptmyal?
[connection to conversation disrupted]

---
Commander: You still there?
Sir: Mhm. Got an answer yet sir?
Commander: Better, I got you a comm unit. Go ask this man for it, he just got it from wherever he finds these things. [encrypted id file]
Sir: Wonderful, thank you for that! Though I still would need someone for it to speak to about this...
Commander: I'll talk to the thing through it, I suppose. Not like theres much else to do besides paperwork.
...
"Oi, guardsman, I got you the comm unit you suggested. Give it to the big hunk of shininess if its awake."
A communicator? I suppose the alteri I'm asking for is rather cautionable about aliens then.
"Or perhaps they're too busy to walk all the way into engineering to speak in person. Might as well ask if this will be trouble while I'm here, I still don't like how you just showed up in the base."
Trouble? Oh yes, it will be trouble for the Proxians. For you in particular however, it is unlikely to be troubling unless you are particularly empathetic for your besiegers.

You send a message to the diplomatic crystalline to ask any nearby proxians for a talk with an arcanist at the specified location, and if they ask why to make up something suitably mystical and earthen. Also to continue acting as Emissary of Crystal while doing so, voice and all. Having sorted that out, you quickly connect to the communicator, and after some quick tech-echo support from a nearby partial-forgite block, spot and contain a spying device embedded into it in a quick but effective and well-done fashion; you suspect the alteri that commander contacted installed it. While you do not have the time to disassemble it and find how it works to neutralize their spying on you via it, the containment should prevent it from broadcasting at least, which means they'll have to come get it to retrieve the recording or whatever it does. Some signals are rerouted to ensure only relevant communications go past Outpost Fortress to be extra careful.

Quote
Ping.
Alteri: Are you imitating a sonar?
If your sonar is for getting attention, I suppose. Who is on the other end of this unit for us to speak with on a nonscientific manner?
Alteri: You cannot figure it out yourself? We had expected a geological being to have similar capabilities to a computer.
Ah, so your encryption is relatively simple to crack then, if you expected us to have discovered your name simply from the transmitter? We had not bothered, assuming that attempting to break into secured channels would trip any number of silent alarms.
Alteri: Perhaps I worded that badly...regardless, who I am is relatively unimportant until you stop beating around the bush-shaped plant and tell me what this is about.
You know that the Proxians have magic, yes?
Alteri: Allegedly.
And that they do not have the siege tech required to crack forgite.
Alteri: Yes.
Has anyone here tried to research said magic system? More specifically, their glyphs and supposed elemental speakers.
Alteri: I don't see how this is not a scientific inquir-
36 cycles prior to now, a Proxian structure was leveled by a plasma blast. The resulting ruin had scorched yet otherwise unaffected glyphs arranged on what likely was its basement level. The glyphs on the ruins of the walls were ruined, not untouched like the floor.
Alteri: Cycl-
Irrelevant, continue.
Alteri:...So you are saying they have a plasma-resistant magical engraving that you discovered an arbitrary amount of time ago. Are you asking us to shoot at it again?
No. We are asking if you have any data on their glyphs, or supposed elemental speakers. While highly advanced technology is essentially magic, magic is not necessarily technology, and as it stands the proxian village has been left undisturbed for the most part by us due to more pressing concerns and lack of threat from them.
Alteri: Do you have a point here?
The fastest way to obtain information is to take it. However in the interest of not making unneeded enemies, we thought it would be relatively diplomatic to ask first before rifling through any files we can gain access to on your network. Once we have practical or working knowledge of Proxian magic, they lose all importance to the Crystalline here, unlike the Alterin Imperium. As a pointless but beneficial bonus, you would be rid of antagonists for the time being if we felt like helping you in that direction, or otherwise.
Alteri: Aha, so thats what you're after. You, rock, are a shiny, knowledge-seeking, bored predator who has both prey and a potential rival in your sight, and you want to take care of both at once without pretending to be nice to the one you're going to metaphorically eat.
Not so much eat as much as we cannot pretend to be both clueless of their magic and part of it at the same time. Are we being too wordy for you?
Alteri: No, but you sound like a pain in the butt to deal with so far. Be concise for me.
Fair enough, we will toss the rest of the diplomatically-wordy dialogue and lay down what we want. We are attracting a Proxian arcanist out a significant distance from the village, disguised as part of their elemental arcana. We want you to send someone to discover how their magic works, how their glyphs work, and if possible, how they summoned the large crystal-encased object. The last of those we could eventually find out for ourself with enough time, so it is not as important. In exchange for us ensuring they are not attacked by the arcanist, we want all of the information gathered from it, and will deal with the proxians if they become a problem for our mutual friend out there.
Alteri: I'm assuming we get to keep the information as well.
It is acceptable, as long as we are not mentioned if you send the information offworld.
Alteri: You won't stay hidden forever, rock. It is-
-only a matter of time, indeed. Have we reached an agreement, then? We will need your name now, of course.
Subcommander Varyon: Yes, subject to approval from the fortress leadership, of course. Who are a bit more suspicious of you than even my subordinate who delivered this device is.
Excellent.

A matter of time that you will determine, hopefully. As much as you'd like to pretend they can't sneak things out, there is a number of encrypted sections of the network you simply have not gotten access to yet. Now then, next on the list of things to do this cycle was sciencing the new material, which you do with much less talking involved and only slightly more almost-explosions. it doesn't seem to like being messed with, which is fair enough considering the energy its giving off, but eventually you get a small cluster of it realigned into a shape that hopefully is unlikely to explode when you pulse through it.
You put that aside for the moment after noting the spot you had adjusted and make two farseers, having just now realized you were missing vision on some of the proxian roofs. You also put one near the planned meeting spot for the magics below the diplomatic crystalline and the precautionary arms crystal, before adding a single repair crystal to top off the column that was missing one the previous cycle and turning to the other big issue: How to go about getting to the bottom of the cavern.

Clearly, one does not simply hang a massive line of feeler crystal clusters down and hope to spot something. That would be inefficient for this distance to say the least, and terribly impractical from a structural view. Simply climbing down the available side is certainly an option, as when you reach the bottom you could go back up the other side. Both simple and structurally ok. Alternatively, there are more interesting ideas. Most however, would require wireless energy transfer, which is not currently a priority outside of being part of Core research. You make it a separate objective and assign a collection of newly fabricated research crystals to the job, then set Outpost Research (previously outpost cavern) to help in its rather limited way. Some Forgitar Half-crystal is forged around you to continue slowly building your core armor since theres an abundance of energy about, a couple more repair crystals are made, and then you settle for saving the last of the energy for the cycle and instead focus on getting on with it! The sooner you rediscover wireless transmission the less issues you'll have later.



Spoiler: Status (click to show/hide)
Spoiler: Map legend (click to show/hide)
Spoiler: Crystal Cluster forms (click to show/hide)
Spoiler: Crystal forms (click to show/hide)

To put it simply, we don't know anything about the elements-speaking-to-proxians thing. It was just something we'd heard about while investigating those proxian buildings, and it turned out to let us sneak in perfectly, aside from one dead master arcanist who got in the way. This way, we can get both sides to do something useful for us, and theoretically make it less likely that they'll try to orbital smash us when we finally activate the creation of those arms crystals.
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Crystalline (SG)
Sigtext
Quote from: RedKing
It's known as the Oppai-Kaiju effect. The islands of Japan generate a sort anti-gravity field, which allows breasts to behave as if in microgravity. It's also what allows Godzilla and friends to become 50 stories tall, and lets ninjas run up the side of a skyscraper.

Armok

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Re: Crystalline - Cycle 61
« Reply #379 on: February 27, 2015, 12:26:08 am »

> Develop some form of farseer with vastly huger range but lower resolution, to see ahead on the zoomed out map.
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So says Armok, God of blood.
Sszsszssoo...
Sszsszssaaayysss...
III...

Twi

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Re: Crystalline - Cycle 61
« Reply #380 on: February 27, 2015, 02:52:51 pm »

And give Aklyon more work? Armok is truly the god of blood and tyranny. :P

Do that simple climbing thing, research wireless energy, scheme about majiks.
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Aklyon

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Re: Crystalline - Cycle 61
« Reply #381 on: February 27, 2015, 02:56:13 pm »

It wouldn't be a ton more effort (it certainly would be some, and would basically just need a bigger template than the palantir, and take a lot longer to fill in), but the problem would be less resolution. The map isn't particularly detailed to begin with.
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Crystalline (SG)
Sigtext
Quote from: RedKing
It's known as the Oppai-Kaiju effect. The islands of Japan generate a sort anti-gravity field, which allows breasts to behave as if in microgravity. It's also what allows Godzilla and friends to become 50 stories tall, and lets ninjas run up the side of a skyscraper.

The Froggy Ninja

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Re: Crystalline - Cycle 61
« Reply #382 on: February 27, 2015, 03:45:37 pm »

Create a small crystal screen on the side of the trap if possible so the researcher has access to our list of glyphs.

Armok

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Re: Crystalline - Cycle 61
« Reply #383 on: February 27, 2015, 04:40:49 pm »

Yea. I'm mostly after geology stuff like size of the planet, thickness of crust, presence of oceans, and if this amount of caves is typical for the planet or not. Not exact location of ore veins or individual caves.
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So says Armok, God of blood.
Sszsszssoo...
Sszsszssaaayysss...
III...

Twi

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Re: Crystalline - Cycle 61
« Reply #384 on: February 27, 2015, 04:43:24 pm »

Ahhh, less map more What Kind of Planet Are We On Anyways. I support this info.
« Last Edit: February 27, 2015, 05:13:03 pm by Twi »
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Aklyon

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Re: Crystalline - Cycle 61
« Reply #385 on: February 27, 2015, 06:01:19 pm »

Yea. I'm mostly after geology stuff like size of the planet, thickness of crust, presence of oceans, and if this amount of caves is typical for the planet or not. Not exact location of ore veins or individual caves.
Ah, now that I could do without extra map bits. Though I'd need to actually make some of it first, I didn't really plan out the whole planet. (Nor am I a geologist :P )
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Crystalline (SG)
Sigtext
Quote from: RedKing
It's known as the Oppai-Kaiju effect. The islands of Japan generate a sort anti-gravity field, which allows breasts to behave as if in microgravity. It's also what allows Godzilla and friends to become 50 stories tall, and lets ninjas run up the side of a skyscraper.

Twi

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Re: Crystalline - Cycle 61
« Reply #386 on: February 27, 2015, 06:42:01 pm »

Yea. I'm mostly after geology stuff like size of the planet, thickness of crust, presence of oceans, and if this amount of caves is typical for the planet or not. Not exact location of ore veins or individual caves.
Ah, now that I could do without extra map bits. Though I'd need to actually make some of it first, I didn't really plan out the whole planet. (Nor am I a geologist :P )
That's what you need research and imagination for.
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The Froggy Ninja

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Re: Crystalline - Cycle 61
« Reply #387 on: February 27, 2015, 06:52:58 pm »

Who's willing to bet that the weird crystal is related to the magic? They mentioned altering arcane feilds which may mean aligning themselves to the crystals energy or creating it as a by product of aligning natural energies to them.

Aklyon

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Re: Crystalline - Cycle 62
« Reply #388 on: February 28, 2015, 10:38:22 pm »

Contrary to what I was expecting, today was really busy. Today is also when I was going to update, so in favor of getting it updated instead of delaying it until tomorrow, the geology will come later.

Cycle 62

The arcanist eventually arrives, though its fairly dark by the time it arrives. The Alteri arrives soon after, though covered in more cloaks than the arcanist is. A translator is hidden somewhere inside those, to disguise the Alteri.

Ahhh, you have arrived. Or at least one of you has, followed by a pile of cloaks.
"Why are you so wrapped up? More to the point, who are you? No one in the village has that many cloaks."
"I have come a long way, from far away, to learn what the emissary of crystal wanted of me, only to find one who appears to be a proper arcanist when I arrive at the right spot. I repeat your question back to you."
Would either of you be interested in what I have to say, or are you too busy being suspicious of the other?
Go ahead. The cloaked one just nods.

The cloaked one was terribly mutated in an accident involving spotting a long-since dead Outsider. Therefore, he does not like to be seen, but after particular effort and apparently a number of favors, was brought to my attention. They wish to learn the ways of magic, but away from anyone who might recognize them. Since the nearby Master Arcanist appears to be missing, I sought out any one of you who would listen to come train them.
Am still suspicious of them. How do I know they are not an Outsider?
You...you! Just because I was in a major accident does not mean I am a different being altogether! I will travel further if I must, as the emissary will be able to locate me anywhere on our lovely world, I bet. Where I come from the Master Arcanist was the one with the most apprentices. I do not want to be one of many poorly-trained. That will never get me towards the path I seek.
In that case, you are not an Outsider, I suppose. Just a pushy misshapen former townie, now a traveller by the will of the terra arcanum. Hardly the sort of person I'd want to deal with.
Both of you quiet down. An ominous hum approaches from the outsider fortress.

A planned hum, but a hum nonetheless. After a few minutes it stops abruptly, similar (but not quite distinctly different at this distance) to how it stops when the plasma mortar fires. Its not, of course; that would endanger the agent. But the Proxian doesn't know that.
The hum and the abrupt stop match the Solfire launcher firing, but I see not the bright glow indicative of it firing. Perhaps it is getting ready.
On second thought, perhaps I should remember who the true enemy is. Cloak, we will be settling this issue before we start, but first, let us survive the attack. He mumbles something too quickly to be distinguishable and a small ditch is torn into the nearby dirt. Cloaked Alteri is shoved into the ditch, while the Unnamed Arcanist scours another one for himself and dives. The two are then covered back up, leaving some holes to look/breath through, and the sides combined so they can argue without shouting through dirt. The rest of the night is uneventful, as they argue over whether or not (despite your relation to the project as Emissary of Crystal) they can deal with each other long enough to properly train. Eventually the two get out of the ground, brush themselves off, and consider the threat not to be happening and leave their own ways.
You suspect this will take awhile (or even longer if you're forced to ask a new arcanist to do it), and in the meantime store up a cycle of energy and return to quickly focusing the wireless research. At least that made some nice progress.
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Crystalline (SG)
Sigtext
Quote from: RedKing
It's known as the Oppai-Kaiju effect. The islands of Japan generate a sort anti-gravity field, which allows breasts to behave as if in microgravity. It's also what allows Godzilla and friends to become 50 stories tall, and lets ninjas run up the side of a skyscraper.

The Froggy Ninja

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Re: Crystalline - Cycle 62
« Reply #389 on: March 01, 2015, 12:11:41 am »

Act all "displeased god" at the Proxians. Ask the Altari what that was all about.
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