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Hi everyone! After a pilot session a few months ago, some folks finally put up with me long enough got together to make two episodes of Citation Needed! Given that the voice chat is an integral (and weird) part of the Discord scene, I thought it was important to give you an insight into the kind of stuff that sometimes goes on in there. It's not exactly polished stuff - I've got a pronounced stutter thanks to a brush with psychoactive medication and Internet connections aren't always the most stable things - but it's funny and insightful and teaches about interesting fun things. So, without further ado:

Episode 1: Jacob Haugaard and Danish Pyramids
Featuring: Alleb, Larfen, and Tomash

Episode 2: Banjawarn Station and Nuclear Sheep
Featuring: Granz, Larfen, and Tomash

Please feel free to leave comments about what you liked, what you didn't, and what sort of things you'd like to see in future episodes. Enjoy! =]

Agents keep their abilities when they're outside HQ, they just can't go running around showing they're blatantly not of World One.

If you tell Ix she's a dog person you'll make her cry. :P 'Fwai' is the shortened version of her actual name, Faolan—which means little wolf in Irish. (It was brought up in their last mission. Yes, she hates it.)

I'd better not what? *innocent smile*

Weird...

Anywho, this was lovely and I'm doing a happy jig right now that my fluffy OTP ship is sailing mighty fine. IxWolf is adorable and glorious, and deserved all the kisses and love she can get! So says I! Great job, Ixi.

Seriously, if you hurt them even more, I swear I'll... ughh, I don't know what I'm gonna do... I'll be more upset! Ha!

Anywho, let's review:

“Why did I think a cat was a good idea?”
Because you're more of a dog person? ;>

The opening scene is solid. It's nice to see IxWolf wake up by something other than nightmares. Also, kinda cute to see her making coffee the Muggle way; but then still has that little kid side in her. 'Yep, I'm doing all the witchy stuff!'

Lottie getting sudden sunburn was absolutely hilarious :D

*does a happy dance* My fluffy ship is sailing mighty fine! As always, fantastic job!

Morning talk is also nice, like the Overwatch reference (crosses 'Overwatch' from a potential topic for my agents. Not gonna be a copycat). Also, did I miss anything? I must've missed something, but what was the meaning of 'fwai' once again?

I have a question, though. IxWolf conjures up a blanket. In New Cal. Is there some sort of field around the main base that stretches out and lets the otherworlders keep their otherworldliness? I understand inside the building, but far enough outside?

"We don’t have to worry about an unhappy ending dealt to us by a sadistic author."
You better not...

Here is a link to the results I got...
http://politiscales.la-commune.net/en_US/results/?m0=64&m1=10&e0=50&e1=24&s1=7&s0=76&j1=17&j0=50&t0=21&t1=43&c1=31&c0=38&p0=52&p1=5&femi=43&b0=55&b1=19&prag=67&mona=67

Unsure about them, but oh well...

But my green ecology bar was bigger than yours, by ten percent. And as we all know, it's the size of your ego bar that matters.

Definitely agreeing with the overpopulation thing. I was just talking to some of the reptile keepers recently about the fact that families need to start adopting more, rather than having their own biological children. Slows down the growth rate AND helps orphans! It's not the sort of thing that the state can really try to enforce, though, because some cretins will always be around to try to turn it into a eugenics thing.

—doctorlit, with the longest green bar

by pointing out that, unlike the other candidates, HPMoR is much more divisive. It's way easier to find people who like the thing that it is for, say H^30. So we should probably leave that one alone just to be a bit conservative there, since it's not, well, legendarily bad.

- Tomash

I think everything that's been mentioned so far has come up before, and I have no objection to any of them going on the list. The more I think about it, the more I realize it's no skin off my nose one way or the other, so I say have your fun. {= )

~Neshomeh

But yeah, almost certainly a troll. The content is repugnant, let's get that right, but the writing is hilarious. Just one non-explicit quote: He grunted furiously, screaming "!" in his deep orkish voice. Screaming "!". *snerk* Also, that second chapter. What? {X D

It seems to fit the same general category as "C*l*br**n." I have no objection to this being added to the list.

(Trivia: I somehow managed to read the title of the fic as "Squid Broken" up until actually clicking the link and seeing it on ff.n. I am shocked to realize my eyes were lying to me the whole time, relieved there were no squids involved, and concerned that some part of my brain expected them.)

~Neshomeh lost her innocence a long time ago.

Back in 2016, the map featured both the terrifying War-Queen Alleb, and the vast techno-island of Tomash. And today?



War-Queen Alleb rules still in the Eastern Mountains, in her fiery hot domain. Though not affiliated with Chaos, she has a fervent (one might almost say fanatical) hatred for magic, and harvests the anti-Mana thrown from the active volcano above her base.

Meanwhile, in the west, an ancient magical spell has finally been broken by the mages of Huinesoron, revealing an entire mountain that had previously been invisible. Upon its heights sits the great city of Tomash, blending science and magic together to further the cause of Chaos.

All in all, things don't look terribly good for the magic-lovers among the forces of Order. Ah, well - them's the breaks!

hS

I've... uh, just spent a couple of hours reverse-engineering how the flags are created. :-/ As y'do.

As expected, the flag is created deterministically from your stats. It can have up to three colours and one symbol. In the list below, the symbols are ranked from 0to 7 [rather than 1-8, because I found the double-X symbol right at the end and didn't feel like renumbering); the active symbol with the rank closest to 0 will be shown regardless of their respective stats. The colours, on the other hand, are picked based on the stats and the priority list. The actual layout of the flag is determined by the number of colours (2 or 3 - 1 is just a plain field, obviously) and the values of 'Internationalism' and the Reform/Revolution bar.

It's not possible to make any flag you want: you can't have a fleur-de-lys without white on there, for instance, or a shield without blue. But with this, you can manipulate the URL to your heart's desire to get any possible design.

---

Constructivism: c0, 'Equality', purple @ 40%, no emblem.
Essentialism: c1, no motto, no colour, double X @ 85 (w/ Punitive) (ranked 0).
Rehab: j0, 'Justice', no colour, no emblem.
Punitive: j1, 'Order', no colour, double X @ 60 (w/ Essentialism) (ranked 0).
Progress: s0, no motto, no colour, no emblem.
Conservative: s1, 'Family', blue @ 40%, shield @ 60% (ranked 4).
International: b0, 'Humanity', no colour, star circle @ 70% (ranked 6).
National: b1, 'Fatherland', brown @ 40%, no emblem.
Communism: p0, 'Socialism', red @ 60%, hammer and sickle @ 80% (ranked 3).
Capitalism: p1, 'Work', yellow (w/ laissez-faire) @ 40%, no emblem.
Regulation: m0, no motto, pink @ 40, no emblem.
Laissez-faire: m1, 'Liberty', yellow (w/ capitalism) @ 40%, no emblem.
Ecology: e0, 'Ecology', green @ 40%, flower @ 70% (ranked 5).
Production: e1, no motto, no colour, no emblem.
Revolution: t0, 'Revolution', no colour, star at 60% (ranked 7).
Reform: t1, no motto, no colour, no emblem.

Anarchist: anar, no motto, black @ 91%, no emblem.
Missionary: reli, no motto, no colour, no emblem.
Radical Feminist: femi, no motto, no colour, feminist logo @ 95% (ranked 2).
Pragmatist: prag, no motto, no colour, no emblem.
Vegan: vega, no motto, no colour, no emblem.
Complotism: comp, no motto, no colour, no emblem.
Monarchist: mona, no motto, white @ 51%, fleur-de-lys @ 51% (ranked 1).

Colour Priority

Black > White > Brown > Blue > Yellow, Red > Pink > Green > Purple

Red OVERRIDES pink & yellow.

Yellow is ranked by laissez-faire's position.

Shapes:

2-colour:

Default = 2 columns.

Reform @ 40% = 2 bars.
Revolution @ 20% = diagonal split.

Internationalism @ 60% = Nordic cross.
...+Reform @ 40% = 7 bars.
...+Revolution @ 20% = diagonal bar.

Internationalism @ 1% = zigzag.
...+Reform @ 40% = 5 bars.
...+Revolution @ 20% = long triangle.

3-colour:
Default = 4 squares (1-2,3-1).

Reform @ 40% = 3 bars.
Revolution @ 20% = chevron.

Internationalism @ 60% = 4 squares.
...+Reform @ 20% = canton + 6 bars.
...+Revolution @ 40% = chevron + 6 bars.

Internationalism @ 1% = 4 squares.
...+Reform @ 20% = canton + 4 bars.
...+Revolution @ 40% = chevron + 5 bars.

---

And just to prove I'm not making it up:

The French Monarchist American Flag

hS

My results are http://politiscales.la-commune.net/en_US/results/?t1=26&t0=48&p1=12&p0=67&e0=33&e1=43&b0=81&c0=81&c1=5&femi=76&j1=5&j0=76&s0=95&m0=90&prag=100

I took the thing twice, actually, and my scores were rather stable under retakes with the exception of the communism/capitalism axis, which was a bit more commie the first time. Eh. Economics is hard.

- Tomash

I'm not particularly surprised by my stats. Here they be!

http://politiscales.la-commune.net/en_US/results/?reli=100&p1=76&p0=5&j1=33&j0=26&t0=24&t1=45&s0=26&s1=57&c0=19&c1=69&b0=40&b1=31&m1=50&e0=14&e1=62&prag=67

-Alleb, who now returns to intermittent lurking and generally being devoured by Real Life

(First off: this is the link to Matt's full results, for you nebby types.)



To the Office of Thaumaturgy, Huinesoron,

After a long and arduous trip, we have finally come to a conclusion: the Office of Cartography are terrible at their job. They managed to miss multiple major cities - including Granz, which lies directly between Neshomeh and Hardric! - as well as an entire desert, and the delta around the town of doctorlit. We attach a vastly more complete map of Plortitics, compiled from our own efforts. We have also included a key, since apparently they didn't feel that was worth their time.

Now, moving onto something more interesting: we were able to confirm the presence of vast magical fields on both our own mountain and the mountains of Chaos. The triple city of Scapegrace, palindromordnilap, and Kaitlyn is practically buzzing with mana, more's the pity. We also confirmed weaker magical activity in the desert of Larfen and the forest of Neshomeh, as well as uncovering a previously-unknown magical wellspring in the eastern deserts, around Phobos.

Unfortunately, with good news comes the bad: we have also confirmed the existence of anti-Mana. This magic-absorbing force appears to have sprung from the actions of the ancient Uber Overlord: its strongest source is around the mountain on which his fortress once stood, while a weaker scattering can be found in the desert where he made his final stand.

It is to be hoped that the forces of Chaos do not gain possession of anti-Mana, for they could be a powerful weapon against us. Conversely, if the town of Matt Cipher could be convinced to collect up the material, we could begin to nullify Chaos' arcane advantages...

One final note: while travelling the emptiness of the north coast, we sighted a fleet out to see. The warriors of Guardsman Tom are still prowling around out there, and they owe allegiance to Chaos...

-The First Huinesoronic Thaumaturgical Expedition

~

Comments from the fully tricked-out map:

-Belief in change through revolution is common (though not guaranteed) in the far Left. The 'far' Right, though, aren't generally firm believers in reform - that belief is held by the centre. I think this means that the status quo is Right-leaning, and that the closer you are to that, the less you think massive change is needed.

-Progressives (further south) are more likely to be constructivists, while conservatives are more likely to be essentialists. It's not a hard rule, but there's definitely more little brown houses as you go north.

-Most of the stats, helpfully, aren't strongly correlated with anything. Belief in rehabilitation versus punishment (city size), for instance, doesn't seem to be linked to any of the other seven. Which says that they chose their axes well.

-I need to launch an investigation into what determines your flag and motto. :D This is fun!

hS

https://i.imgur.com/fXKPsRW.png

I guess I'm just a soft and squishy neutral in most of these

Ix and Charlotte go on a date, but of course things don't go smoothly for them at all.

Slice of life, angst, hurt/comfort, fluff.

I have read Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality, and I think it shouldn't be added to the list of legendary badfics. It may have problems, but it's not exactly Little Miss Mary.

I wondered what would happen if you hit the same answer for every question, and realized I could click through rapidly, so I found out! For posterity, here are the results:

Absolutely agree
Fatherland - Work - Liberty
All bars 50/0/50
Additional characteristics:
- Anarchism (strong)
- Pragmatism (strong)
- Complotism (strong)
- Veganism (strong)
- Monarchism (strong)
- Missionary (strong)

Somewhat agree
Fatherland - Work - Liberty
All bars 33/34/33
Additional characteristics:
- Pragmatism (weak)
- Veganism (weak)
- Monarchism (weak)
- Missionary (weak)

Neutral or hesitant
No words
All bars 0/100/0
No additional characteristics

Rather disagree
Fatherland - Work - Liberty
All bars 33/34/33
No additional characteristics

Absolutely disagree
Fatherland - Work - Liberty
All bars 50/0/50
No additional characteristics

Observations:

Apparently the additional characteristics result from selecting "Absolutely agree" (strong result) or "Somewhat agree" (weak or no result) on certain questions.

Answering with all anything but "Neutral" generates the same three words. No idea what that means.

All "Neutral" and all "Rather disagree" both generate a blank white flag. The former makes sense. The latter confuses me.

~Neshomeh

From the Help page:

Why are the people how they are? This axis allows you to situate yourself between two opposite poles which answer this question.

The constructivists consider that people build themselves from their environment (notably social) and that the caracteristics that make them who they are, are acquired.

On the contrary, the essentialists consider that an individual is by nature how he/she is and that his/her caracteristics which make this person who she/he is, are innate.

A lot of the questions dealing with this axis were things like whether you believe people from different countries have inborn traits that make them different from other people, or that quote about whether one is born a woman or becomes a woman.

IMO, the answer to this, as with most things, is that it's both. Like, a population that breeds mostly with itself for long enough is gonna develop a few genetic traits that may set it apart from other populations, like e.g. a preponderance of a certain blood type; but on the other hand, we are so very social, and our societies matter immensely; but on the other hand, we have the intelligence to overcome our past experiences and adapt to new ones.

... Again, this is why I struggle with these tests. ^_^;

~Neshomeh

Which I guess is because it was the second-highest score that I got? Or something? I'm really not sure how that stuff is determined, or the colors and designs on the flags, either.

Anyway, I care! I just get tripped up when my mind starts conjuring scenarios like digging wells so people can have access to safe water and that sort of thing. Like, we shouldn't be demolishing the rain forest or the Alaskan wilderness etc., but I think people have a right to a certain quality of life as concerns access to vital resources, and if we properly care for the environment and drastically reduce our population, then everyone's quality of life will improve, so it's all much of a muchness?

This is why I have so much neutral space in my scores...

~Neshomeh really believes overpopulation is one of our most serious problems, but there are no quick and easy solutions to this. Would settle for birth control for everyone yesterday, plzkthx.

This is what I choose to put a reply on. Oh, well. This is my thingy.

http://politiscales.la-commune.net/en_US/results/?c1=5&c0=71&e1=29&e0=33&p1=24&p0=31&j1=14&j0=48&t1=62&t0=14&b1=12&b0=62&s0=62&s1=10&m0=55&m1=7&femi=38

My results.
Certainly not the worst test I've taken, but some of the questions seemed a bit strangely worded to me. Still, it seems to have hit decently close to the mark for me. Not entirely sure what the constructivism/essentialism stuff is about, though, and I think my ecology score was a bit low, but I suppose that's down to me abusing the neutral/hesitant option.