fhplotterywheel | The brains, they are storming (7/30/08)

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The brains, they are storming (7/30/08)

Hello and welcome to the latest brainstorming post. No idea too big or too small.

Here's the last brainstorming post if you want to take a look at ideas and do more work with them.

One of the ideas that came up last time was the concept of having things that could be useful to someone else's plot without knowing if someone had a need to make use of them. So we'll have an OCD "plot spare parts" thread for anyone who'd like to use it. (An example of a "plot spare part" is here in the previous brainstorming post).

OCD is up! Storm away!

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The blame for this totally rests with

mouthy_merc, who really should not be allowed to enable me. Seriously.

Super Deformed Day, where people turn into chibi-versions of themselves. Want to pull a giant hammer out of hammerspace and bash someone with it? Go for it! Chibis will bounce right back, leaving more chaos in their wake.

Inspired by these images by Dustin Nguyen.

Feel free to drop me a line when you are. :) There's little he won't do if he can rationalize it as being a good thing.

Ahahaha I have the icon for that already, and can probably get more. :D

Randomly, I would love the idea of Fandom getting "stuck" somehow like in the movie Groundhog Day, repeating the same day over and over and over, but since the game plays out in real time it seems like that'd be impossible to do.

Katchoo has an FBI file, one that for the time being she's bound and determined Francine can never find out about.

That said, I'm totally open to the possibility of someone finding out about it and using the knowledge of it to blackmail her into doing something for them, since she's not the sort who's going to step up and volunteer to help just anybody with stuff.

Actually Jack Harkness v1.0 played out that plot waaaay back when as a personal plot. Here's a link to the first day (http://time-agent.livejournal.com/13331.html"). And the next (http://time-agent.livejournal.com/13799.html). This went on for a few days.

And then she had to drop him, leaving him trapped in groundhog limbo.

Jack v2.0 rescued him out of it when she adopted him.

But as a plot, it was pretty cool

Yeah, I think that would be a logistical nightmare to pull off as a gamewide thing, but maybe on a smaller scale -- say 10-20, maybe 25, volunteers who get stuck in the loop, leaving others to figure out how to get them out of it, it could be workable?

Oooh, thanks for the link! I think I must have been reminded by seeing it on Tyler the Younger's comms list.

Oh, dude, that was ages ago. I mentioned a student character that I was planning to app in one of the posts and I have no idea who that was going to be.

That'd be fun to play with, though, if people want to start that up again.

Not so much a plot, but Ino did want to bug Rikku at some point about how she managed the bomb during the Bishop plot. *keeps forgetting zomg* XD;

Or what if the island got stuck in a loop and it was up to the alumni to figure it out and fix it?

Assuming we could come up with a way to get the entire island stuck in said time loop that would be playable, that's a possibility, but it presupposes working it out so the entire island is stuck. And the only ways I can think of to work that out involve massive OCD and limiting interaction to pre-set posts, which would kill a lot of spontaneity on a gamewide scale.

But if anybody else can think of something . . .

Well, I think we'd have to tweak the basic plot premise that everything is *exactly* the same somehow... otherwise, there would be no RP interaction.

But if we did it on a week where there were no classes... it could start on Monday and people could continue to think that it was Monday all week, meaning that the same people post their jobs, etc. So some things could be very similar, but no one would realize that Monday was happening over and over again.

So Lacey could keep opening the diner and thinking it's Monday, but it really should be Wednesday and different people could come in for different reasons.

I dunno... I'm kind of thinking out loud... but I think that tweaking the premise rather than duplicating it wholesale could definitely work as an RP plot.

And more blathering as I keep thinking about this:

Little things could be the same (like Dean Winchester's alarm clock playing "Heat of the Moment"), but they wouldn't necessarily clue the characters in.

And maybe somehow breaking the loop involves making the entire island time travel so that the missing days don't need to be made up.

We could always take the TNG approach to the groundhog day concept...

The day starts off like it normally does every day however at the end of the day there's a catastrophe and since we're in a loop it restarts itself.

The next day people either have a sense of Deja Vu with a few people remembering the entire event. The people who remember try to convince others to stop the catastrophe and with the catastrophe happening at the same time.

People who are off the island (Alumni or people traveling) can get the idea that something is wrong when someone from the island calls them on the same day and don't remember the day before etc. etc. etc.

And when everyone figures out what the catastrophe is and stops it from happening the time flow returns to normal.

Oh, I like that.

Would people on the island keep thinking that it was Monday again? (to pick a day randomly)

Veronica is spending the summer working for the FBI...

For that matter... if anyone *else* has an FBI file that they'd like some sort of plottiness with... we could probably work something out.

Exactly. And if I remember correctly it was the catastrophe itself that caused the time to loop again and again.

Which makes sense.

The only thing about time re-setting itself is that people would need to either handwave a whole week or simultaneously play out the loop and real time - either of which could get confusing.

Unless averting the catastrophe meant that time leapt ahead to catch up with the outside world.

ETA: And in re-reading what you wrote, you didn't actually say time would re-set, you said it would return to normal... so that could mean catching up with real time?

Edited 2008-07-30 20:44 (UTC)

You, sir, are made of win. Have some booze.

I'd probably suggest what they did in the TNG episode as well.

Ideally the time loop is localized to the island and when the catastrophe is averted they join up with whatever REAL day the plot ends on.

If anyone ever wants to make use of this, the lobby of the Arms Hotel has a fruit bowl with strategically-placed fruit for "nudity emergencies." Mary also keeps towels and bathrobes handy at the desk for the same reason.

Helen's right arm can become pretty much anything she wants. Okay, flamethrowers or projectile weapons are out since she'd have to be firing or superheating part of her flesh, but she did once re-create a totem pole thing - living heads that bit each other, causing her to bleed - so it's pretty-open-ended.

It can also be turned into a living blade which can kill demons of any level or strength.

Basically offering Liz up for plots if anyone wants to use for her uncontrollable fire bursts. At this stage her powers work in this extreme if she's under extreme emotional distres but it's not hard to get her into this state.

*chimes in late*

I'm lazy, so these are both just going in one comment. Evey is pretty gifted with explosives; she's still learning, but she usually has enough stuff in her room to whip up some impressive bombs, so if you ever need a big boom, she's your girl.

Kaylee is a total Sue with mechanical stuff. Need a security system overhauled? Need an engine souped up? Need your tiny robot to be rewired to Rickroll people? She's happy to do it. She's usually happy to do things for free, but if you feel compelled to bribe her, she likes fresh fruit a lot. :D

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The brains, they are storming (7/30/08)

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