[OOC] Origin of Species

[Antarctic Termite]

Kyelin said
One interesting ability an Entity could have might be manipulating there species on a subtle level once they are settled and stable. Kind of like when, say, a God might suddenly draw their species to migrate to a safer area, or maybe they could cause extinction events prematurely. Say once an era to wipe out competition around them, or to 'wipe the slate clean' and get their Spheres back to 100% immediately, for emergencies.

You can murder your own species if you're creative enough- Cancer, for example, is a mutation which you can trigger with each generation, although as usual if a species is not heavily influenced by your sphere, it will tend towards survival (survivors reproduce, pass on surviving genes, and so on). Also, instinctive behaviour is under your control. So, for example, changing a population's navigation instinct to avoid a predatory species is cool- But the other species may change likewise to follow, especially if they're being controlled by another Entity.

Haemonculus said
I think Antarctic is only able to control the whole mass extinction bits like asteroids and nasty stuff like... I can't... there... just... uh... asteroids.

Boom.

Leotamer said

Get back to you on this one.

tobiax said No. Deep One wants to go all Robo-Cop on things that don't cooperate (so it seems). That Which Moves (need to change that name, maybe...) would allow things to be out of its control, and accepts that things can't be. It asserts that sometimes things need to be "weak", "imperfect", or at the bottom of the food chain. It understands that not everything's connected.

That's what it's like, not what it's trying to do.

[Leotamer]

Add a bit to my post because I was bored.

[Sixsmith]

[Ekirei]

[Antarctic Termite]

All I see is words

words everywhere

I should stop trying to do anything when it's this hot. ._.

[Sixsmith]

No, it's just a science overload. Happens to errybody.

[IVIasterJay]

Title: Dominance
Intent: To create a singular, perfect being. A being incapable of being killed, of dying, of being trapped, or oppressed, or denied. A being capable of anything its mind desires. Omnipotence with physical form. To create living god. He doesn't care how long it takes or how many times he fails; he will succeed. And then the being of his mind will shape him a body of his own, and they will rule all of reality as equals.
Played By: IVIasterJay

[Antarctic Termite]

Fixing irrigation is hard and time-consuming.

@Jay, we are manipulating the course of species here, not individuals, so... You might need to explain that further or change it, and check to see if it doesn't conflict with any other Intent.

As for the changing-landscape idea, I'm going to tweak the system and put it up to the players to vote on tomorrow (nice delay there). Personally I'd much prefer it if you designed species that terraformed as part of their life processes, Arrakian Sandworm style, and what actions you could take for or against other species depended on your creativity in using your own various species as tools. Would that be overcomplicating the system, or would it provide pressure to develop your organisms creatively? Up to you guys.

Anyway, bottom line of what I'd like us to be doing here is this: Constantly change the available life to suit our wishes and meet necessities, putting pressure on other players to change in response, in whatever way they please; to play a complicated game of chess with organisms as pieces, that gets steadily more interconnected and beautiful until I nuke it with magic and we start again from what scraps we can glean. The question is if giving the Entities a way to directly alter non-organic parts of the planet be helpful or detrimental to sustaining this kind of roleplaying environment.

[Obscurus]

wow this exploded overnight. Now I have to read everything to understand what we are doing exactly:p I haven't made a 'One' yet, but I'm going to. looks pretty interesting so far. With a lot of entities already.

[Leotamer]

Well, the reason I like interacting with the environment is because I think it adds some depth to how you influence everything. This way you kind of have to creatively uses your influence if you want the best results and it isn't a case of "X dies!" or "X lives!". Like there could be a phenomena called Growth which cases everything to grow/ reproduce much faster in the region. This might help your agenda or creatures, however other entities steps in and abuse your ability for free.

[Antarctic Termite]

Entities were never meant to directly be able to influence much, let alone everything. They can affect one thing, and that is species development. The roleplay is restrictive for them, and that was always intentional- What they want done, they will have to do by using the one power they have. I feel like it loses sight of the central evolution theme if the players can have tools that are completely separate to how they evolve their species. The emphasis here is always on that evolution, making your species work for you using creative writing, not making the world work for your species.

On the topic of creatively using your field of influence, the Spheres are a measurement to keep the players equal by assigning values and an eventual limit to the actions they take (I do intend to define this a little more clearly when I next edit the first post), because I felt like people would not like this roleplay as much if nothing had hard limits. What I had in mind for strategy was not how cleverly you assign your 100% to different actions, but how well you can write life into existence and roleplay with it strategically (again, act-and-react chess game), using your Sphere to keep youself within a clearly defined limit. Again, I may have put too much emphasis on Spheres as a mechanic. If so, I apologise for the confusion.

This was long and I don't much like long, but whatever, just felt like things should be clarified.

[tobiax]

Huehuehue so this is the Crayak's game.
Excellent.

[Leotamer]

Keep in mind, I did that because I was bored.And the wonderful thing about this RP is we can make stuff as we go along. So, if the core mechanic every gets old, we could also expand on it or add new things. But that could be in a week, a month, or never. That is just how open-ended this RP is.

The use of sphere in my suggestion was almost purely to balance it out. If you could say "Well, I create world wide earthquakes for a thousand years and make all my creatures immune to earthquake" that would be really OP. I don't mind if sphere is an important mechanic or not. I kind of like the idea of sphere management so long as it doesn't become a chore.

And speaking of game, this is starting to remind me of spore.

[Ekirei]

Leotamer said
And speaking of game, this is starting to remind me of spore.

Took the words out of my mouth

[yoshua171]

Well, this looks rather intriguing~

[Sixsmith]

Wow Spore. Such disappoint. Many retconning. Much lost potential. So sad. :(

I like the idea of being restricted to the species as a whole, though... uh... I only say this because I intend to make creatures that are the environment itself. @_@ You will all live upon my world-species and you will all bow to its will. Don't test the hunger of an entire world; it shall consume all who deny its greatness. D:<

I shall call it... Leviathan. Such wow. Much originality.

EDIT: Can Morgan Freeman be the monologue for this entire RP? I vote for that.

[Kyelin]

^I second that idea, and will now be reading every IC post in Morgan's Voice, whether you want me to or not.

[tobiax]

That which moves shall not allow that.
Not the Morgan Freeman thing, the other one.

[Kyelin]

Isn't another key point of this RP is that entities have no idea that others exist? Except by inference, where they notice certain creatures evolving beyond their sphere of influence?

Just clarifying, this one's quite a doozy on the old grey matter o.O

[Obscurus]

I like the core mechanics and I think they are complex enough, seeing what discussions we already have. Throwing in more options will probably ruin this RP and distract from it's main focus, as termite already said.