01-15-2004, 10:08 PM
Okay, as I said elsewhere, this is incomplete. It's also in a pretty arbitrary order, based on the sequence in which things were asked in the other thread. I also was pretty random about choosing questions to answer, based on how I was feeling when I looked at the file. Have fun.
Q: What's a Warrior?A: In Doug's home universe, the United Nations (which, because it was perceived as being powerless, was being used by various governments as a dumping ground for dangerous idealists) saw an escalation of strategicweapons and metahuman military forces during the late 1970s and early1980s as a literal threat to the future of the world, and decided to dosomething about it (incomplete -- finish)Q: You mean Doug can't just 'call home'?A: Nope. In general, his powers cannot reach beyond the universe he'sin. Q: What's the story about Haven? I liked that series! 1) Can Doug get powers from music he makes (singing, playing an instrument, etc)2) Does the power match what the song lyrics really say, or what Doug thinks they say?3) If Doug's perceptions create the power, can the power change if his perceptions of the lyrics change? Or is the power "locked in" after it manifests for the first time?4) Can Doug get more than one power from one song?5) Can Doug get different powers from different versions/covers of the same song? If so, are the different powers related or can they be totally different?6) Just how powerful can a song make Doug? Can Doug simulate Superman with the right song? In HERO-speak, is there a character-point limit on Doug's powers?What is Warriors International?Who are its members?What is Doug's role there?Q: What is 'Combat Hyping'?A: This is covered in the concordance, which I'll quote here:One of the things I was trying to do in the narrative was carry overas much of the sense and feel of the original V&V game and itsmechanics as I could. This is one instance of that. As players of mostroleplaying games will tell you, there are usually two kinds of time --"regular time," in which you do most of your talking, negotiating,hanging about and whatnot, and "combat time", during which you areusually fighting for your life. In V&V, characters with high initiativerolls (usually as a result of heightened Agility levels), often move,act, think and react several times faster than the normals around them.But outside of combat, they still interact with others at the usual rateof time. In Doug's case, I decided it was a kind of adrenal overdrivesuch as has actually been reported a few times in the real world.Q: What's this 'techno-magical' stuff? I thought technology and magic were mutually exculsive!A: Says who? If they were, you couldn't have magic swords or anything --forging steel into weapons is a technology, after all. If magic couldn'twork with technology, then a wizard would have to live naked in a cave without even fire (starting fire with flint is a technology, too). The thing is, most people associate magic with medieval fantasy, and think that means magic is by its nature incompatible with or even hostile to "high" technology. (See Shadowrun for a good gaming example.) But there's no reason at all to believe that except decades of assumptions and prejudices. Magic works just fine with technology if you pick the correct axioms -- for example, the GURPS magic system includes an entire college of magic designed to deal with technology, including such spells as "analyze machine" and "repair".Doug comes from a world where magic and technology are two different, butnot incompatible, paths by which the world can be manipulated. Magicoperates by rules (it has to, if spells can be created and cast reliably)that can be investigated and discovered with the same scientific methodused for other laws of the universe, with the same success. Researchers in the last century have even proved that there can be a large degree ofprofitable synergy between the two paths -- something that the firstenchanters of manufactured items discovered centuries earlier.Q: Why does Doug have a problem with gods?A: Doug is at his heart a frustrated mystic. He wants there to be something Big and Meaningful behind the veil of the world. Discoveringthat the gods really, truly existed, that they weren't just figments ofhuman imagination, at first seemed to the answer to what he was lookingfor. Unfortunately, almost every god he's ever met has been a disappointment -- humans writ large, undisciplined children with toomuch power, beings he feels are not deserving of either the power theywield or the influence they have in human lives. Ultimately, though, he feels betrayed by the gods, all gods, because they are (as he sees it)too busy playing sadistic games with the lives of mortals and not doinganything to give meaning and purpose to those lives. He respects and admires Hexe, maybe even loves her a little, for her integrity and self-restraint, for choosing to put herself -- all of herself -- in a mortal shell and *be* a mortal, to have mortal concerns, with something close to mortal limits; this alone, in his opinion, makes her far superior to the vast majority of gods. But paradoxically, in Hexe he cannot find the true transcendance that he yearns for, because she has become *too* human. So he's stuck looking for something other than the all-too-mortal Hexe and the ineffable brats he's come to see other gods as, in the hopes that he will find a divine spark that proves there's more to the multiverse than nihilism and self-indulgent deities. In the mean time, he takes out his frustration and anger on those deities.Q: What, exactly, does Doug need to get a power from a musical work? (music + lyrics, music + some words, words + a beat, etc.) Q: Where can I learn more about Warriors World and the Warriors themselves.You might want to cover some of material that would have been presented in DW1 that gets referenced in DW2 (and presumably later stories). Although it's been at least 10 years, I'm sure there are still plenty of folks who don't know about Heralds and Whites and other things from that universe. Or you could just include a list of books to go read : )Alternately, a brief (point for, or a paragraph or two, that's all) plot run down on what happened to Doug while he was there, if that doesn't violate Lackey's Law.Q: What happens if Doug was to play "The Song That Never Ends" on a loop in his helmet? (April Fool's Edition, surely)Q: Where can I find official IST World merchandise/materials?A: Good question. Both IST and IST Kingston are long, long out ofprint. No additional materials were ever written for the world.(SuperTemps and Super Scum predate IST, and I incorporated them intoit; they are not really IST materials.) I have, of course, a page ofIST material here on my site, but they aren't "official". If there are any other official materials, I don't know about them. You can always write en masse to Steve Jackson Games and demand them,of course.Q: Will IST ever get a second edition?A: It doesn't seem to be in the cards for the foreseeable future.However, if you send your cards and letters to Steve Jackson Gamesasking for a new, expanded edition, maybe we can get somethinggoing.Q: Is there an official IST World version of Doug?A: No. Many of the characters from Warriors' World made guest appearances in on form or another, but Doug is not one of them.He's pretty impossible to build in GURPS Supers without creatinga new power expressly for him.Q: Have you done that?A: No.Q: Why not?A: I've never needed to play Doug in GURPS.Q: What Warriors' World characters appear in IST?A: A fair number, including some not mentioned in Drunkard's Walk (at least as of early 2004). Argurous Astraph is Silverbolt. Witchwindis inspired by Hexe, but isn't really terribly close to her. Warrior isa character initially created by Joe "Dwimanor" Avins. Drifter was playedby John D. Gold. Patchwork was an NPC I created as a "villain who isn't"plot mcGuffin. Similarly, I created The Void as a villain for the campaign; she was even more dangerous under V&V.Q: Is Doug an author avatar?A: No. My "avatar" in Warriors' World is a superhero by the name of "Quasar", who works with a private team named "StrikeForce" based in New Jersey. He and Doug were freshman year roommates in college, but neither had any idea the other was a mutant with metahuman abilities. Q: Can I write Drunkard's Walk stories? A: I'm not going to come to your house and make you stop, if that'swhat you're asking.Q: No, no, I mean I want to write a Drunkard's Walk story and show it toyou and maybe share it with other readers.A: Oh. Sure. I'd be a hypocrite if I said I didn't want people doingfics based on *my* fics. Besides, I think it's a hell of a compliment.Anyway, you wouldn't be the first -- I have a page set up for fan-writtenadventures (the Fanficsquared), and I'm happy to post things people write.I'll warn you, though, that I vet what goes up there -- I'm not going toaccept something that's grossly out of character or inappropriate.You can also post it directly into my discussion forums, but then you riskimmediate and direct criticism on your efforts by people who may not be asnice as me. Q: Can I use Warrior's characters in some story I'm writing?A: Ask first. I don't own most of the WW characters, and am using them with the permission of their owner/creators. If you want to use them,you should get the same permission.Q: How many licks does it take for Doug to get to the center of a tootsie pop?A: Three. He could never resist biting.Q: What's the deal with Wetter Hexe being a god?A: The same deal with Marvel's Thor being a god. Sorta. The differenceis a little complex. Gods as manifested in a particular universe are actually a "timeslice" of vastly more powerful, extradimensional creatureswho operate in many different universes simultaneously; think of them as"inserting" themselves into many different "stories" at once. So all the Thors that exist in various universes are just "faces" -- avatars --of a single being who can manage them all simultaneously. However, theBeing who is Hexe wanted a different experience of a mortal world, andpoured *all* of itself into a human child. That Being no longer existsin the "metaplane" where all the other meta-level gods live, and no longerhas active avatars in any other universe; its entire existence is now bound into the mortal form which is Hexe. It is by no means mortal now -- whenHexe dies (and she will, eventually), the Being she is will return to themetaplane with all its experiences intact.Q: Okay, Hexe's a goddess. *Which* goddess is she?A: I'm sorry, citizen, that information is not available at your securityclearance. Seriously, although we in the campaign know what pantheon she belongsto and in what way, Helen has asked me not make that information public.She *has* laughed, though, at the idea that Hexe's Athena, particularly the version from Saint Seiya.Q: Just how powerful is Hexe? A: Very very. Using V&V rules straight out of the box, Hexe can: control the weather in an area of several hundred square miles, run at nearly 200 MPH, fly at supersonic speeds, survive being at ground zero for a nuclear explosion, take on a noncorporeal spirit form, and use the air for dozens ofyards around her as a single massive sensory organ. She can lift close to1400 pounds, and does about a third of a Fuzion Kill with her bare hands.(Unlike Doug, none of that is martial arts prowess -- that's all pure power.)And that's with almost all of her "true" nature's power throttled down!Q: Do you accept artistic renderings of Doug's adventures or the characters he interacts with?A: You bet! I even have a Gallery page to put them on.Q: Can I be a prereader? Q: If Doug was a big furry animal, what kind would he be? A: An extraordinarily large wombat.Q: Has Doug ever learnt to play any musical instruments? A: He tried his hand at the guitar during his early teens, before his metagift manifested, but found he had not talent for it. He hasn'tseriously tried any other musical instrument, although he has managed toget a recognizable tune out of a harmonica a few times. This fact secretly pleases him to a degree totally out of proportion with the difficulty of the task.Q: ... and can he play and sing such that he'll get a power? A: Well, since he can't play anything, no. But even if he could, it'sunlikely he could play, sing, *and* fight all at the same time.Q: Does Doug get any powers from instrumental versions of songs?A: No.Q: Do ballad songs trigger Doug's power, or are they safe?Q: Has any song ever automatically triggered Doug's power (is this possible?), or does it always take a conscious decision on his part?A: All the time. That's the power's default mode -- Doug can onlychoose to listen to or avoid music. Most songs then have a radiuseffect, or some other undirected expression. Doug, naturally enough,has chosen to focus a lot on songs whose effects he gains some limited ability to direct.Q: If Doug hears a song he's heard before (and had a positive connection to, and therefore, has a power for it), does it trigger his power?A: Yes. He had no voluntary control -- other than avoiding music --over the activation of his song power.Q: What was Doug's first use of the power, and what happened? (Ie: What was his origin story?) What happens if Doug hears a song while he is unconscious?What is forcing a song? (explained in story, but still...)What is mana, how does it arrise, how does it get tapped, can it be traced, etc....Is there such a thing as counterspell or antimagic?What happens when doug starts listening in the middle of a song? Or if a part of the song starts looping?Q: What happens the first time Doug hears a song?A: His subconscious mind takes it all in and evaluates (for lackof a better word) it. He gets a sense (not always accurate) of whether or not the song will have a magical effect.Does the same song in different languages have different powers?What about a song in a language Doug can't understand?What can and can't the chaos field surounding Doug do?How much control does Doug have over his powers?If the Godzilla song (you know the one by the Blue Oyster Cult) didn't work in his magic poor homeplane, could it work on a more magic rich plane, or if he tapped a node?When is the nex chapter/walk/whatever coming?How can I help?
-- Bob
---------
There is no spork.
Q: What's a Warrior?A: In Doug's home universe, the United Nations (which, because it was perceived as being powerless, was being used by various governments as a dumping ground for dangerous idealists) saw an escalation of strategicweapons and metahuman military forces during the late 1970s and early1980s as a literal threat to the future of the world, and decided to dosomething about it (incomplete -- finish)Q: You mean Doug can't just 'call home'?A: Nope. In general, his powers cannot reach beyond the universe he'sin. Q: What's the story about Haven? I liked that series! 1) Can Doug get powers from music he makes (singing, playing an instrument, etc)2) Does the power match what the song lyrics really say, or what Doug thinks they say?3) If Doug's perceptions create the power, can the power change if his perceptions of the lyrics change? Or is the power "locked in" after it manifests for the first time?4) Can Doug get more than one power from one song?5) Can Doug get different powers from different versions/covers of the same song? If so, are the different powers related or can they be totally different?6) Just how powerful can a song make Doug? Can Doug simulate Superman with the right song? In HERO-speak, is there a character-point limit on Doug's powers?What is Warriors International?Who are its members?What is Doug's role there?Q: What is 'Combat Hyping'?A: This is covered in the concordance, which I'll quote here:One of the things I was trying to do in the narrative was carry overas much of the sense and feel of the original V&V game and itsmechanics as I could. This is one instance of that. As players of mostroleplaying games will tell you, there are usually two kinds of time --"regular time," in which you do most of your talking, negotiating,hanging about and whatnot, and "combat time", during which you areusually fighting for your life. In V&V, characters with high initiativerolls (usually as a result of heightened Agility levels), often move,act, think and react several times faster than the normals around them.But outside of combat, they still interact with others at the usual rateof time. In Doug's case, I decided it was a kind of adrenal overdrivesuch as has actually been reported a few times in the real world.Q: What's this 'techno-magical' stuff? I thought technology and magic were mutually exculsive!A: Says who? If they were, you couldn't have magic swords or anything --forging steel into weapons is a technology, after all. If magic couldn'twork with technology, then a wizard would have to live naked in a cave without even fire (starting fire with flint is a technology, too). The thing is, most people associate magic with medieval fantasy, and think that means magic is by its nature incompatible with or even hostile to "high" technology. (See Shadowrun for a good gaming example.) But there's no reason at all to believe that except decades of assumptions and prejudices. Magic works just fine with technology if you pick the correct axioms -- for example, the GURPS magic system includes an entire college of magic designed to deal with technology, including such spells as "analyze machine" and "repair".Doug comes from a world where magic and technology are two different, butnot incompatible, paths by which the world can be manipulated. Magicoperates by rules (it has to, if spells can be created and cast reliably)that can be investigated and discovered with the same scientific methodused for other laws of the universe, with the same success. Researchers in the last century have even proved that there can be a large degree ofprofitable synergy between the two paths -- something that the firstenchanters of manufactured items discovered centuries earlier.Q: Why does Doug have a problem with gods?A: Doug is at his heart a frustrated mystic. He wants there to be something Big and Meaningful behind the veil of the world. Discoveringthat the gods really, truly existed, that they weren't just figments ofhuman imagination, at first seemed to the answer to what he was lookingfor. Unfortunately, almost every god he's ever met has been a disappointment -- humans writ large, undisciplined children with toomuch power, beings he feels are not deserving of either the power theywield or the influence they have in human lives. Ultimately, though, he feels betrayed by the gods, all gods, because they are (as he sees it)too busy playing sadistic games with the lives of mortals and not doinganything to give meaning and purpose to those lives. He respects and admires Hexe, maybe even loves her a little, for her integrity and self-restraint, for choosing to put herself -- all of herself -- in a mortal shell and *be* a mortal, to have mortal concerns, with something close to mortal limits; this alone, in his opinion, makes her far superior to the vast majority of gods. But paradoxically, in Hexe he cannot find the true transcendance that he yearns for, because she has become *too* human. So he's stuck looking for something other than the all-too-mortal Hexe and the ineffable brats he's come to see other gods as, in the hopes that he will find a divine spark that proves there's more to the multiverse than nihilism and self-indulgent deities. In the mean time, he takes out his frustration and anger on those deities.Q: What, exactly, does Doug need to get a power from a musical work? (music + lyrics, music + some words, words + a beat, etc.) Q: Where can I learn more about Warriors World and the Warriors themselves.You might want to cover some of material that would have been presented in DW1 that gets referenced in DW2 (and presumably later stories). Although it's been at least 10 years, I'm sure there are still plenty of folks who don't know about Heralds and Whites and other things from that universe. Or you could just include a list of books to go read : )Alternately, a brief (point for, or a paragraph or two, that's all) plot run down on what happened to Doug while he was there, if that doesn't violate Lackey's Law.Q: What happens if Doug was to play "The Song That Never Ends" on a loop in his helmet? (April Fool's Edition, surely)Q: Where can I find official IST World merchandise/materials?A: Good question. Both IST and IST Kingston are long, long out ofprint. No additional materials were ever written for the world.(SuperTemps and Super Scum predate IST, and I incorporated them intoit; they are not really IST materials.) I have, of course, a page ofIST material here on my site, but they aren't "official". If there are any other official materials, I don't know about them. You can always write en masse to Steve Jackson Games and demand them,of course.Q: Will IST ever get a second edition?A: It doesn't seem to be in the cards for the foreseeable future.However, if you send your cards and letters to Steve Jackson Gamesasking for a new, expanded edition, maybe we can get somethinggoing.Q: Is there an official IST World version of Doug?A: No. Many of the characters from Warriors' World made guest appearances in on form or another, but Doug is not one of them.He's pretty impossible to build in GURPS Supers without creatinga new power expressly for him.Q: Have you done that?A: No.Q: Why not?A: I've never needed to play Doug in GURPS.Q: What Warriors' World characters appear in IST?A: A fair number, including some not mentioned in Drunkard's Walk (at least as of early 2004). Argurous Astraph is Silverbolt. Witchwindis inspired by Hexe, but isn't really terribly close to her. Warrior isa character initially created by Joe "Dwimanor" Avins. Drifter was playedby John D. Gold. Patchwork was an NPC I created as a "villain who isn't"plot mcGuffin. Similarly, I created The Void as a villain for the campaign; she was even more dangerous under V&V.Q: Is Doug an author avatar?A: No. My "avatar" in Warriors' World is a superhero by the name of "Quasar", who works with a private team named "StrikeForce" based in New Jersey. He and Doug were freshman year roommates in college, but neither had any idea the other was a mutant with metahuman abilities. Q: Can I write Drunkard's Walk stories? A: I'm not going to come to your house and make you stop, if that'swhat you're asking.Q: No, no, I mean I want to write a Drunkard's Walk story and show it toyou and maybe share it with other readers.A: Oh. Sure. I'd be a hypocrite if I said I didn't want people doingfics based on *my* fics. Besides, I think it's a hell of a compliment.Anyway, you wouldn't be the first -- I have a page set up for fan-writtenadventures (the Fanficsquared), and I'm happy to post things people write.I'll warn you, though, that I vet what goes up there -- I'm not going toaccept something that's grossly out of character or inappropriate.You can also post it directly into my discussion forums, but then you riskimmediate and direct criticism on your efforts by people who may not be asnice as me. Q: Can I use Warrior's characters in some story I'm writing?A: Ask first. I don't own most of the WW characters, and am using them with the permission of their owner/creators. If you want to use them,you should get the same permission.Q: How many licks does it take for Doug to get to the center of a tootsie pop?A: Three. He could never resist biting.Q: What's the deal with Wetter Hexe being a god?A: The same deal with Marvel's Thor being a god. Sorta. The differenceis a little complex. Gods as manifested in a particular universe are actually a "timeslice" of vastly more powerful, extradimensional creatureswho operate in many different universes simultaneously; think of them as"inserting" themselves into many different "stories" at once. So all the Thors that exist in various universes are just "faces" -- avatars --of a single being who can manage them all simultaneously. However, theBeing who is Hexe wanted a different experience of a mortal world, andpoured *all* of itself into a human child. That Being no longer existsin the "metaplane" where all the other meta-level gods live, and no longerhas active avatars in any other universe; its entire existence is now bound into the mortal form which is Hexe. It is by no means mortal now -- whenHexe dies (and she will, eventually), the Being she is will return to themetaplane with all its experiences intact.Q: Okay, Hexe's a goddess. *Which* goddess is she?A: I'm sorry, citizen, that information is not available at your securityclearance. Seriously, although we in the campaign know what pantheon she belongsto and in what way, Helen has asked me not make that information public.She *has* laughed, though, at the idea that Hexe's Athena, particularly the version from Saint Seiya.Q: Just how powerful is Hexe? A: Very very. Using V&V rules straight out of the box, Hexe can: control the weather in an area of several hundred square miles, run at nearly 200 MPH, fly at supersonic speeds, survive being at ground zero for a nuclear explosion, take on a noncorporeal spirit form, and use the air for dozens ofyards around her as a single massive sensory organ. She can lift close to1400 pounds, and does about a third of a Fuzion Kill with her bare hands.(Unlike Doug, none of that is martial arts prowess -- that's all pure power.)And that's with almost all of her "true" nature's power throttled down!Q: Do you accept artistic renderings of Doug's adventures or the characters he interacts with?A: You bet! I even have a Gallery page to put them on.Q: Can I be a prereader? Q: If Doug was a big furry animal, what kind would he be? A: An extraordinarily large wombat.Q: Has Doug ever learnt to play any musical instruments? A: He tried his hand at the guitar during his early teens, before his metagift manifested, but found he had not talent for it. He hasn'tseriously tried any other musical instrument, although he has managed toget a recognizable tune out of a harmonica a few times. This fact secretly pleases him to a degree totally out of proportion with the difficulty of the task.Q: ... and can he play and sing such that he'll get a power? A: Well, since he can't play anything, no. But even if he could, it'sunlikely he could play, sing, *and* fight all at the same time.Q: Does Doug get any powers from instrumental versions of songs?A: No.Q: Do ballad songs trigger Doug's power, or are they safe?Q: Has any song ever automatically triggered Doug's power (is this possible?), or does it always take a conscious decision on his part?A: All the time. That's the power's default mode -- Doug can onlychoose to listen to or avoid music. Most songs then have a radiuseffect, or some other undirected expression. Doug, naturally enough,has chosen to focus a lot on songs whose effects he gains some limited ability to direct.Q: If Doug hears a song he's heard before (and had a positive connection to, and therefore, has a power for it), does it trigger his power?A: Yes. He had no voluntary control -- other than avoiding music --over the activation of his song power.Q: What was Doug's first use of the power, and what happened? (Ie: What was his origin story?) What happens if Doug hears a song while he is unconscious?What is forcing a song? (explained in story, but still...)What is mana, how does it arrise, how does it get tapped, can it be traced, etc....Is there such a thing as counterspell or antimagic?What happens when doug starts listening in the middle of a song? Or if a part of the song starts looping?Q: What happens the first time Doug hears a song?A: His subconscious mind takes it all in and evaluates (for lackof a better word) it. He gets a sense (not always accurate) of whether or not the song will have a magical effect.Does the same song in different languages have different powers?What about a song in a language Doug can't understand?What can and can't the chaos field surounding Doug do?How much control does Doug have over his powers?If the Godzilla song (you know the one by the Blue Oyster Cult) didn't work in his magic poor homeplane, could it work on a more magic rich plane, or if he tapped a node?When is the nex chapter/walk/whatever coming?How can I help?
-- Bob
---------
There is no spork.
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