The PPC Posting Board - Latest posts

I think Laduquac and Penny would love to investigate Generic Food. Irony... would be funny, for sure. I'll see what I can do. ^_^

hS

It's been a hectic week for me this week, but rejoice! I've found time to cobble together a Friday Forum. (We also have the Plort thread immediately below this one, which is fun, I promise!)

Please remember that, when it comes to the state of the world, not everyone will agree with you. You're free to state, discuss, and defend your viewpoint (provided it does not violate the Constitution), but please don't use that fact to attack others.

Fandom News


(Link)

From the background scenery of Spider-Man: Homecoming comes a weird bit of trivia from the MCU: apparently, people are worshipping the Asgardians again. The Korean Church of Asgard, or this branch of it, is in New York. Apparently.

Silly News


(Link)

The Sri Lankan navy spent the day yesterday trying to rescue an elephant, which they found swimming 10 miles offshore. Apparently it had been trying to swim between islands, but got caught in a current, because... that is a thing elephants do?

You'll be glad to know it made it back to land, with their help.

Serious News


(Link)

This was the week in which Donald Trump Jr, seeing his father's campaign attacked over allegations that they colluded with Russia to swing the US election, defended himself by... releasing the emails showing him doing exactly that.

For... some reason.

The Crown prosecutor of Russia met with his father Aras this morning and in their meeting offered to provide the Trump campaign with some official documents and information that would incriminate Hillary and her dealings with Russia and be very useful to your father.

This is obviously very high level and sensitive information but is part of Russia and its government's support for Mr Trump - helped along by Aras and Emin.

Not News


(Link)

This is the Unnecessarily X-Essive project: every character who appeared in Uncanny X-Men: Volume 1, in simplified form. And I mean every character. Over 2500 of them.

It took the artist over two years.

... folks, it's been a weird week.

hS

Something is apparently wrong with time flow in HQ. I am quite sure that I cannot have known agent Hieronymus for more than six weeks. We spent most of this time in the Third and Fourth PPC HQ Hunger Games and on missions, and I remember every single day of it. But the Third Hunger Games started in January 2016 HST and now it is July 2017. How can this be? I think this should be investigated by your scientists.

Sincerely yours,

Androia Avatar, DMS-HP

and the keeping of records – may I suggest that "The Expansion of the Baronial Council" be moved to the top of the agenda?

Yes, thank you.

In no way do I want to oppose a baron who is much wiser than I am – one time’s been enough – but I am afraid that this proposal has not been thought through. How many practitioners of the ancient art of Beytah are here? Are they required to have taken residence in the Riding of Sittorese to get a vote? Will archivist’s apprentices be allowed to participate in the making of decisions?

I ask the barons to make up their minds and set down the rules, so that the Council can proceed in good order and the records will not be convoluted.

Sir Hieronymus the hermit, archivist’s apprentice of Wechi, beytah of sittorese and keeper of the records.

((I guess that the barons don’t want to be outvoted too easily, and that there is only one vote per nation and the nation’s representatives have to come to a consensus about it. But this hasn’t been clarified yet. If the barons aren’t careful, Hieronymus will try to singlehandedly cast two votes on every subject, pretending to be an archivist and a Beytah.))

I have no problem with any of the names. I think it would be good to use the existence of Guggle in your 'Guugol fluid' (Guggle fluid?), since, y'know, consistency.

Sk'ratsh probably isn't part of the SSM; the Grand Republic of Deeay isn't, and that's what you compared it to. :) It may be ripe for conquest by them, though.

I think the best way to handle the badfic thing would be to accidentally inspire a Marizu warband (or multiple). You can probably straight-up create monsters in Mayen Croft - it's Vidya Gaym, they have all kinds of strange magics there. But unless you want to directly lead the Marizu into battle (misguidedly, of course), being an unintentional inspiration is probably best.

I like the idea of the guides! The alternative is building yourself a pocket nation there, but that may be excessive for a simple shopkeeper. Uppa'you.

I don't think there's any issues with the setting. Plort is deliberately a fairly loose creation, to allow for people to easily add to it. (And, for the record, I vaaaaguely remember you doing something, but don't remember what; don't let it worry you.)

Can I craft you some heraldry? Any citizen of Plort is entitled to it. If you don't feel up to designing a shield, name some symbols you might want and I can work from there.

hS

Business was good today, but nothing of any real importance happened in her life specifically. Just daydreaming about becoming a knight. Wiping sweat from her forehead, she sits down behind the counter to think about where she's been...

Twyla Witherspoon was not always worthy of residence in the Protectorate of Plort, as she had only just recently started caring about the Marizu and their deeds. Her voyage to Konti-Nyuum started early; at age eleven she unknowingly founded a small band of Marizu in the country of Staar-Wos. She also caused the existence of monstrosities in Mayen Croft (a large and mainly Marizu area of Vidya Gaym) and the Airi-junal Islands. Only one or two years ago, she very nearly avoided the generation of more Marizu in Tiu Fort (also in Vidya Gaym) and Sti Venkeen. None of these things affect Twyla's conscience, and what little of it finished the journey to Weab was kept in the small but wild nation of Sk'ratsh. Indeed, she cannot wait to announce her knowledge to her fellow citizens of Borrd and thus open them to attack!

Twyla discovered Plort, specifically Wechi, through absentmindedly attempting to divine images of the Marizu in a bowl of Guugol fluid. Curious, she set off for Wechi, and immediately knew that Plort was where she wanted to stay. Upon her entry in Borrd, she caused a bit of commotion in front of Baron Huinesoron himself due to her misreading a book of Plort's history. She is still rather embarrassed about the incident, but has come to reside in Borrd rather nicely.

Currently, Twyla is a shopkeeper who sells artwork, weapons, travel guides for several Airi-junal Islands, and souvenirs from the District of Eidsaf'twaer in Vidya Gaym, which she visits a lot, especially a castle called Wolfreidi. She is currently in the process of creating a set of weapons and tactical gear for herself, relentlessly improving her combat skills so that one day she can try and apply for knighthood.

-----

So, here's a few things I'd like to ask for help with on the backstory:
1. Are the new names I had to come up with okay? In case you need clarification, Staar-Wos is Star Wars, Mayen Croft is Minecraft, Tiu Fort is Team Fortress 2, Sti Venkeen is the Stephen King fandom, Sk'ratsh is Scratch.mit.edu (not sure if it should be a part of Weab or So Shall Media, since some folks use it as a substitute for FF.net, but most users think of it as a second DeviantArt), Guugol fluid is Google (the search engine and no other part of it), Eidsaf'twaer is the iD Software fandom, and Wolfreidi is the Wolfenstein 3D (Wolf 3D) fandom. Did I do a good job of naming these things?
2. I said above that Twyla caused the existence of various Marizu, but that sounds a bit off. Is there any other way to say the equivalent of "I actually wrote a bunch of bad fanfic when I was younger?"
3. I also said that Twyla sells guides to some Airi-junal islands, but that also seems a bit off. Is there any other way to say the equivalent of "I write a lot of original fic?"
4. I probably also got a few things about the Plortverse wrong. I was going to do more research and fix them, but I don't have time to do so right now, so I'm going to post this and let you guys tell me what I did.
5. Give me any other tips you have! Tips are greatly appreciated! :D

-Twistey/Twyla Witherspoon, owner of Twyla's Odds and Ends

To the editors of the Journal of Investigating Veracity by Experimentation;

First off, I—what? Why are you reading over my shoulder?

Yes, I'm typing this out verbatim, what of it?

I suppose that is a valid point. Very well. First off, we must congratulate you on the establishment of what we are sure will become a most respectable publication. The PPC has been in need of a reputable scientific journal for far too long. While admittedly lacking in some areas, DAS-JIVE will no doubt fill a needed gap and help to bolster the development of pan-fictional scientific development for years to come.

That being said, I must personally confess to some confusion. As one of the preeminent PPC experts on cross-canonical technology development and artificial intelligence, I must question why I—and my team, I suppose—was not approached regarding this publishing. I have to assume this was some sort of oversight, and not some form of subtle retribution for the incident with the DAS coffee maker. As I explained both at the time and to the Thistle and Flowering Leek later, I had no knowledge of what the interns were doing and did not approve the installation of that additional piping.

In any case, my team and I look forward to the next issue.

Yours sincerely,

Dr. Daphne St. Auguste (Sc.D., Ph.D.), DoSAT-T&A
(Also both Tess Jachowicz and Naas'Gehlen vas Headquarters, who were reading over my shoulder and offering comments during the writing of this letter. Your additions have been noted, now please go file your reports.)

((OOC: So I really enjoyed this concept of yours, and will post some more in-depth thoughts later. But reading the various reports brought these three back into my head, so I decided to do a brief silly thing first. —PC ))

Yes, there were angsty bits, but they made me feel suitably bad for Ix (and helped convey why she was so angry at the Sue), which means they worked and were well-done. The heartwarming bits also balanced out the angst.

I particularly liked the charging scene (which was a nice charge of pace from straight "grab 'em, read the list, kill") and the "lets actually talk about our problems" bit.

- Tomash

((Especially since the Castle of Dawn seems to already be within its boundaries.

I'd like to get updated heraldry, but I'm probably not going to post much in this thread otherwise, especially in character. I'm still adjusting to having moved away IRL and don't really feel up to composing things as Knight Baron Eshakhar...though maybe that'll change as I get more energy back. Who knows? It's been a very busy week.

~Z))

Uh, yeah, let's go with that very nice analysis rather than "I just wanted to focus on the agents rather than the fic because so many of my missions are repetitive and badfic is all the same". I like your version better. XD

(And yeah—so long as a vampire isn't burned, they can be ripped apart and put back together with no ill effects. Jacob even once suggested turning Rosalie "into a jigsaw" temporarily to get her out of the way so they can forcefully abort Bella's spawn baby. Yeeeeah...)

I'll fix that typo once I get home. Thank you!

Another notes-based review from dog week. Sorry.

Haven't read the Saga yet, but . . . are Meyerpires seriously this indestructible? Sheesh.

So, to me, the theme of this mission is the comparison of the behaviors between the agents and the Sue and her Harry. Both pairs are present in the Wizarding World, a fantasy setting, and both in a romantic relationship. The fic romance is filled with forced and awkward dialogue, and weighed down by the Sue's insistence on being much more magical and special than the other wizards around her by virtue of being a space princess wizard of a, let's say, critically endangered species/race/what really does all that make her. The agents, on the other hand, are a witch werewolf and a vampire, but still interact like recognizable human beings; in contrast to the fantasy setting they're present in, their primary bonding conversation is about making whistling noises through blades of grass, with other topics being piercings and Pokémon jokes. You did an excellent job of showing the overly grand and awkward fic romance for how artificial it is, not by quoting the fic, mocking it, and charging the Sue, but by presenting a much more simple and natural alternative within your own writing.

As a small addition to the above, I especially liked your inclusion of the scene where Ix relates to Sue'd Harry's desire to "fall on his knees and praise" a love interest. It's a good reminder that some situations do call for what we tend to generalize as purple prose, when they're used in appropriate amounts, and to describe things that are difficult to explain, like romantic feelings.

One typo: "Harry ambled right past Ron and Hermione without so much a second glance . . ." is missing the "as."

—doctorlit sometimes falls on his knees before his work lunch, but that's less worship and more low blood sugar

That - all of it - was bloody great. I consumed it. Devoured it. Shoved it down my eye-gullets. As an introduction to the department and story type and... science, it was really bloody good! There's a lot of really fascinating, real deep sort've stuff explored throughout (even for a non-sciencey dope like me), but it always remains very entertaining and bloody funny. Mandy and Wei-Ling killed me, as did Laduquac's bits. And also what I presume to be the Thistle's little ASCII self-picture -|-cx. I approve of that. I saw your sort of, picking apart of the gag with the flashpatches and their designs, and that's brilliant, that (but you can still tell them apart! Eyyyy!) I was really wondering where the big mad scientist fellows had gotten to in HQ, and, ey, there they are!

I will admit to preferring the more 'story-ish' bits over the purely 'report-ish' bits- 'The Trials and Triumphs of Ancillary Canons,' while certainly still an interesting and fascinating read, was somewhat dull, compared to the ones with more sort of agent hijinks, y'know? Especially considering how well you do agent hijinks! But perhaps that is more of a personal thing - I would probably, by default, enjoy character hijinks over an in-universe scientific report - not that the concept of an in-universe scientific report isn't bloody good and that that sort've stuff should be done less, or any such. Anyhow, you get a real good sense of what each division does, and what all the characters are like, from each story, and they're all just so different, in terms of structure and all. And, yes, bloody well yes do I want to read more of them!
It's just, good grief, this must've taken a bloody long time to do!

So, how about, ah. Some sort of study into Generic Food? What's it made of? Does it taste the same across continua? If it doesn't, what are the differences and what causes them? What's it made of?

I imagine an attempt into studying the nature of irony in HQ would be the sort of thing they would try, too, with probable emphasis on the 'attempt' and 'try' bits of that. Just how far can you try to exploit irony in HQ? What are the limits of its reality bending capabilities? How many layers of irony on top of irony can you have before things get really weird? Or, er, some such. That all might be a touch vague.

-The establishment of the Discord as a nation, with lands in both the east and west.

-The moving of Barony Huinesoron.

-The creation of Barony Eshakhar.

-The disposition of the baronial lands in former Huinesoron.

-The expansion of the Baronial Council.

-The new flag of the Discord.

-Ye Scape-Grace's appointment as Warden of the Temple of Spelin (what, you thought I was joking?).

-Baron Huinesoron's bucket shortage (okay, that probably doesn't need to be discussed).

... yeah, you're right, that's going to be a nightmare.

hS

She looks startled to find the Council gathered there. Looking around, she hurries over to Baron Huinesoron, now seated beside his wife. "My lord," she says, bobbing a curtsey.

The baron rubs his eyes wearily. "Freckles," he says. "What brings you here in such haste?"

"Um. Messages, my lord." She pulls out a pair of scrolls. "Terri - your, um, warden - wants to let you know that there's a..." She takes a deep breath. "A bucket shortage in the castle. And in Ba-Korp."

Huinesoron looks at her levelly. "A bucket shortage."

"Um. Yes." Freckles glances nervously to the side. "We're having to use the ihm jars to make up for it; they're not... I mean, it's not exactly... pleasant."

"I see." The baron glances at his wife, and visibly restrains himself from commenting further. "And the other message?"

"Oh! Um. It's from Lady Iximaz." Freckles holds out the scroll, then reconsiders and drops her hand to her side again. "Or, well, from, um... sources." Her voice drops into a whisper on the last word.

"I see." Huinesoron leans forward and plucks the scroll from her hand. "And what does it say?"

The messenger glances around nervously. "Um, that she might not be attending the council, and..." She takes another deep breath. "And that she might not accept the expansion of her barony."

Huinesoron slumps back in his chair. "Great," he mutters, "that's just great." He taps the scroll against his leg, then sighs and nods at Freckles. "Thank you. We'll just have to hope that she reconsiders."

((I wanted to slip the (Photo)bucket shortage in earlier, but this worked better. The Iximaz info is from an email, but I don't want to close the door on her changing her mind, so, 'sources'.))

((hS))

Sir Hieronymus the hermit, part-time knight, archivist’s apprentice and keeper of the records, ticked off Baron Huinesoron and Knight Ælcalen on the list of attendees, while wondering whether Ye Scape-Grace had officially presented the new flag to the Council.

((Trying to establish who is there. Seriously, where are you all?

HG))

They're in PPC HQ, and that doesn't show up on search engines very often.

... okay, so Galileo Galilei had a daughter who went into a convent as Suor Maria Celeste. (Actually, he had two, but she's the one with a book about her.) That particular convent was San Matteo, outside Florence. She died of dysentry in 1634.

Meanwhile, in a Doctor Who audiobook, alien bounty hunters visited Florence. In what's either a fic based on the audiobook, or just a visit to the pseudo-canonical story itself, PPC agents rescued S. Maria Celeste from the convent's ruins after said aliens destroyed it. Along with the two other remaining nuns, she was brought to HQ, and treated for that nasty case of dysentry she had going on.

While getting established in the PPC, the nuns came across the notion that Galileo would someday (and in some canon) be canonised as a saint. S. Maria Celeste gleefully dedicated their new convent in HQ to him, and set about making it a home for science.

The three of them have drifted a long way from the baseline practices of the Poor Clares, but they do maintain the rules about staying in the convent and not letting other people in. Exceptions for astronomical entities and ambulatory flowers have been worked out over time. ;)

(The outlines of this are clear from her bio and paper, so I don't feel bad about sharing it.)

hS

Well, I suppose the ants would be mostly invisible in practice, because trying to make them out when the patch is on someone's uniform must be tricky. As it stands, in the document, most of the divisions can be distinguished from each other by the general color and shape of the little guys, except as I mentioned previously. (which was actually why I complained, because it seemed like an accidental out-of-universe accessibility oversight).

Thanks for your reassurances as to Ned's future.

Well, I don't know much about the Convent of San Galileo (and Google isn't helping), but given its apparent sciency focus, Peregrin would feel mostly at home (He's from what's effectively a monastery for mathematicians, physicists, and the like, and fell through a plothole while carrying a stack of observations down from the observatory at Saunt Baritoe's.)

- Tomash

As for the Aviator's TARDIS, she keeps it in her RC and it basically acts as an extention of said RC. It was one of the duplicates, though.

Hm... the explaining Overwatch's plot thing more seemed like it would be unnecessary, considering the large number of fans in the PPC. The TL;DR is that Overwatch was formed to combat the robot uprising, then collapsed after the Omnic wars and internal corruption caused public backlash. Then Talon formed as a terrorist organization and Overwatch was illegally reformed to combat them.

Thanks for pointing out the error with Zeb's line—I'll fix that ASAP.

Yea, in Her Power she has chosen you, Scape-Grace of De'endee, to be Her mouthpiece to the peoples of Borrd, and of the discordant lands beyond.

Though it pains me somewhat to do so, the will of Spelin is clear: I move that Ye Scape-Grace be immediately created warden of the Temple of Spelin, with all the rights and privileges that accompany the position.

... though I think those are 'none' and 'none', respectively. But still.

((Well, out of Spelling and Canon, the former seems more likely to have jurisdiction over symbolism. And you can, of course, spell.))

Huinesoron, Baron of Plort.

Why am I only ever smart by accident? =]

So, like I said to Skarm a couple weeks back, I'm jumping back into reading current spin-offs mid-season, so if there's anything I'm confused by that's due to not keeping up, just ignore that.

I'm also still catching up on internet stuff from that dog-sitting adventure and a schedule change last week, so this review is based on notes I took while reading it last week. I'm sorry for the stale review, but time and sleep haven't been kind to me this week . . . I do plan on hitting your other two missions you've got on the front page, as well, though it may not all be today.

I'm embarrassed to admit, I didn't get the pun in the mission title at first glance. I had a vague inkling that there was a real word that sounded like "fauxpilot," but I couldn't quite pull it out of my brain. Then I saw the fic's original title in the author note, and figured it out. I blame the sleep deprivation . . . anyway, this was a long-winded way of saying that your title is an excellent and clever pun.

I love that you have the Aviator and Zeb using a TARDIS as an RC. Aside from the fact that it makes sense for the Aviator's history, I like that it serves as a callback to the invasion, when the TARDIS distribution got dropped afterwards by pretty much everyone but Tawaki. I like seeing another, newer writer picking up on details from the PPC setting's past.

I like how you handled the lack-of-ending-puntuation issue. Quoting a bunch of paragraphs would have been clunky, so presenting it up-front through your own prose was a much better choice. I also like your explanation that it causes the world to slowly blend together bit by bit, since the "separations" between events and character dialogue are missing. My one cmomplaint on this regard is that you pretty much drop that detail after those opening paragraphs. To be fair, though, the Sue was doing enough throughout the fic that it was probably better to focus on him.

I really, really love that you've got two characters with PTSD-esque reactions to explosions, and you expose them to explosions, but then, rather than turning it into a big, dramatic thing, you let it become these really sweet, quiet moments of support between the characters. Very well done!

One thing I think you could have done a bit more is explain the canflict between Overwatch and Talon. This is the first Overwatch mission, so it would have been nice to get a feel for the nature of the conflict: what each side stands for, why Overwatch was disbanded and reformed, etc. This fic makes things especially confusing, since (if I'm reading it correctly) it seems to be trying to redeem certain Talon characters, like Widowmaker?

I have but one line to complain about:
“Bet you enjoyed that.”

“No amount of therapy sessions can compensate for that,” he said, nodding.
The way this is written, it sounds like Zeb is saying, "Therapy can't make up for how good that assassination felt," which doesn't make sense, since therapy also makes you feel good. I think, rather than "compensate for," you meant a phrase like "compare with" or "compete with?"

—doctorlit

Or... whatever they're called. Bits^TM of the PPC Discord.

Also: contest to design a symbolic crown or other emblem is now on... ;)

hS

As it happens, everyone thinks DAS-DIG (the geologists) are really weird, because their acronym directly refers to their job. The loonies.

Maybe DAS-BOOT can be Hardric's magic unit - the BOrderline Occult Team.

hS