...specifically, the In Nomine forum over on the Steve Jackson Games boards. (It didn't have any new traffic for a few days - somebody had to start something.)

http://forums.sjgames.com/showthread.php?t=40781]Which anime would Superiors watch?

Quote:Here are my thoughts on what anime various Superiors would like.

Some of these shows (marked with asterisks) haven't been licenced for North American distribution yet, so you may need to get a Region 2 DVD player and turn to one of the Japanese DVD-export businesses on the Internet before you can watch them. (I prefer CD Japan, myself; they're pricey, but they don't deal in bootlegs.)

Quote:Blandine: Tiny Snow Fairy Sugar. It doesn't matter who you are, you can still reach your dream... or help someone else reach hers.

Christopher: Aishiteruze Baby.* It's good to have a major child character act the way a child really would act, for a change. (While Aishiteruze Baby isn't licenced in North America yet, the manga has been completely translated.)

David: Any team-sports anime - Eyeshield 21, Princess Nine, and so on. Disparate individuals come together, and they accomplish what none of them could hope to do alone.

Dominic: You're Under Arrest! It may be less than serious at times - in fact, it's downright frivolous at times - but it shows law-enforcement forces in a positive light.

Eli: He's more interested in the creative process than the end result, so shows about making entertainment (such as Animation Runner Kurumi, Comic Party, and Smash Hit!*) are on Eli's watch list. Although he always has a few minutes to look at the shows that put disparate elements together in creative ways nobody's thought of before, like Oh Edo Rocket*...

Gabriel: "Righteous vengenance" is a common anime trope, so Gabriel has quite a few shows to choose from. But Chrono Crusade gets the Christian symbolism mostly right and has demons as the bad guys...

Janus: Lupin III. Lupin and his cohorts blow into town, shake things up by grabbing some valuable trinket out from under watchful eyes, then take off to repeat the process somewhere else before the law can grab them - what a perfect depiction of his Word!

Jean: Appleseed. The amount of effort the story's creator spent on getting every detail of the science right is commendable.

Jordi: If he must watch anime, Jordi finds Wolf's Rain - with its animalistic characterization of the wolves - least objectionable.

Khalid: Sailor Moon. She grows to have faith in herself, and that faith is what lets her win her most important battles.

Laurence: Revolutionary Girl Utena, if only for the swordfights.

Litheroy: Revelation has little time for fiction. Detective Conan isn't too objectionable, though, since the plots involve investigation.

Marc: Kamichu! This is almost a case of Choir trumping Word, but Yurie's solution to the problem of the mere presence of a poverty spirit appeals to both of Marc's major facets.

Michael: There are so many - the "band of warriors fighting together against all odds" is another common anime trope. But Zipang shows that even sound tactical planning backed up by powerful weaponry is only as good as the warroirs who use those tools of War.

Novalis: Legend of the Forest. "Why" should be obvious. (Although she sees a lot of herself in Risky Safety...)

Yves: The protagonist spends the entire series making amends for her own mistake, growing in ability and power while not losing the purity of her soul, and supporting other people as they strive to be the best and brightest that they can - what's not to like about the unedited Card Captor Sakura anime? Shame about the dub, though...

Zadkiel: Aishiteruze Baby.* Protecting someone involves so much more than just keeping her alive, as this anime shows so well.

Alaemon: That's a secret. (But Innocent Venus keeps so many secrets, it's incomprehensible...)

Andrealphus: Far too many to list here, and much of the list would probably be blocked by the forum's anti-profanity filter anyway. (If you're really interested, see the "Hentai Primer" on my website.) But not Legend of the Overfiend and its ilk. Andre can't see any point to killing humans while using them for pleasure; you can't use them again if you do that. Titles like Teacher's Pet are much more to Andre's liking... especially when Andre gets to be the teacher.

Asmodeus: Dominion Tank Police. They set the rules, and everyone else has to live by them.

Baal: Zipang. Massively-overpowering weapons, backed up by good tactics - what's not to like?

Beleth: Jungle wa Itsumo Haré Nochi Guu (released in North America simply as Haré + Guu). Turning the commonplace into horror by adding just one element makes for such a delicious waking nightmare... and it's presented in a way that the talking apes will watch it willingly!

Belial: Grave of the Fireflies. It's about the firebombing of Tokyo, right?

Fleurity: Anything with strong primary colours, which means almost any preschoolers' anime. They look so vivid when you're, like, stoned, man...

Furfur: Legend of Black Heaven. Hard Rock Saves Space! It even says so on the box!

Haagenti: You'd think they eat small meals in Japan, going by anime... -yawn- While Haagenti doesn't have a favourite show, there are a few characters whose appetites impress even Gluttony; Lina Inverse in Slayers and Son Goku in Dragonball are two of the more obvious ones.

Kobal: Princess Tutu. All that striving, and what does the lead character get for it? And just who gets the happy ending? That's one Hell of a punchline! Kobal has no idea why everyone else thinks this show is serious...

Kronos: No anime drives home the inevitability of Fate quite like Gall Force does.

Lilith: Moon Phase. It's all about helping that little girl become and remain Free, right? The prices that other people pay for that character's freedom were their own choices.

Malphas: There's far too much of the Japanese "solidarity" mentality in anime for Malphas' liking. But the second episode of the direct-to-video version of Magical Girl Pretty Sammy has a pleasant "be yourself no matter what" subplot.

Mammon: Neon Genesis Evangelion. Not for the anime itself - Mammon thinks that broadcast television shows interrupt the ads too often - but for the horde of collectables marketed along with the series. Nobody really needs a Rei Ayanami character figure, let alone a set of Rei figures in the dozens of different poses and outfits that have been available over the last decade. But as long as collectors keep buying them, Mammon profits by the Essence they give up in their search for "just the right one" or a complete set.

Nybbas: He loves them all. They're Media, baby!

Saminga: M.D. Geist. Everybody dies. If he must watch something that somebody else likes, then Gunslinger Girl - there's just something attractive to Saminga about brainwashing normal people to become assassins.

Valefor: Lupin III. Lupin and his cohorts blow into town, shake things up by grabbing some valuable trinket out from under watchful eyes, then take off to repeat the process somewhere else before the law can grab them - what a perfect depiction of his Word!

Vapula: Gunbuster. Some real science, some plausable pseudo-science, and some technology that does the job with only a few minor side-effects like destroying a noticeable chunk of the galaxy... and that tech is essential to the story. In Vapula's opinion, the people in Gunbuster are almost incidental.

I've heard about DW on and off again for a while (2003 or so), but I never got around to reading it 'till now.

Doug's an awesome, awesome character.

I've been reading fanfiction since 1995, from Undocumented Features originally, and I kinda went from there.

It's a neat, cozy community here. Though I was wondering if anyone has heard from Darren "Twister" Steffler. I fondly remember Twisted
Path...

Anywhoo, take it easy, guys and gals

Part of it, anyway. The Player's Handbook for the fourth edition of a certain fantasy role-playing game.

While there are some quite good parts, I'm honestly not sure if they outweigh the really ungood parts. I've submitted a review to RPG.net that goes
over my feelings on the matter in a lot more detail; if they don't publish it, I'll post it here.

Chris Davies.

Eh, not much, I know. Was strapped for attention since I just made her.

Riot Force 6.1/Sabres of Paragon

She slowly wiped down the plating of her Armor, the smell of oil and grease heavy in the air of the maintenace bay.

It was a rather new addition to the Riot Force base, much like herself. With seven Sabres, and the number growing nearly every time a raid on Crey took place,
the small bay had been setup for maintenance, storage, and upgrades to their hardsuits.

She hadn't met any of the other Sabres, besides Net Sabre, yet. She was rather fearful of what they would think of her, if her still fragmented memories
were accurate. She did have several processes trying to sort them all out, but Crey had bungled her core systems enough that she was nearly inoperable anyway.

She shook her head, and started to change into her skinsuit. There was enough stalling. Fighting crime, here, was enough to survive.

She'd figure out if she wanted to live, later.

Warning: This gets a bit angsty, but I've been feeling that about Reyshal, anyway.

Tales of the Legendary: Alone among Friends

I sit here in the Admin office, waiting.

Or, more like, brooding. The book that I picked out rests on the small table, but I've turned my chair about to face the globe, watching it restlessly.

Two and a half years.

It's been two and a half years since I was propelled to this world by magics unknown. Two and a half years of fighting, resting, singing, hoping... that
someone that I have spoken to could find some small link back to my homeworld. Even now, that I've just started to curry favor with the people at Portal
Corp, have I entreated them to find my home.

"Perhaps," I whisper in my native Karudo, "I've just burnt out again?"

I'd spent some nine months stuck at Security Level 32, occasionally going out to help the citizens of the City, but mostly brooding my way around the base,
and my small apartment. Then, some two months ago, I had exploded back into heroing, shooting straight through the much dreaded 'Dead Zone' of the
later 30's, and arriving where I was now, just having been awarded my 41st Clearance Level.

My thoughts turned to others, my companions in arms, the members of The Legendary. They I had claimed as my teammates in battle, for they had broken through my
rectitude and befriended me, as those others I had joined could not. However, even then I was distant, perhaps because, even after nigh three years, I was
still too used to being a sole authority? I do not complain of Evangelia, and indeed, believe that she has grown into her place quite suitably. But do I still
see myself in the position of Capitan of my ship? Above all those I work with, unable to fraternize with them?

I sigh, and lean forward, placing my finger upon the globe. North America, United States thereof, Rhode Island, Paragon City. I close my eyes, and with a soft
push and a whisper of Song, I spin the globe on its axis. Even among all the friends I had in The Legendary, all those who tried so hard to include and aid me,
I still felt so alone. I was the only one of my kind on this world, and even free of the Omniscient, I still thought of all those enslaved by them, as I had
once been.

"Yo, Rey."

The interruption to my thoughts springs me to my feet, and I reflexively nod my head to my intruder. "Terrence, how may this One aid you?" I ask,
instinctively reverting to the formal way of speaking I tried so hard to drop around my companions in The Legendary.

Terrence Knight looks at me up and down, then behind me, at the table. "You weren't answering any messages, so I'd thought I'd come down and
see what was up. You okay, Rey?"

I winced guiltily, and looked at the table where my communicator sat, blinking with the light of unheard communique. "My apologies, Terrence. I was...
thinking."

He nods. "'Sokay. Just was wondering if you wanted to help me take out some BP?"

I smile slightly. Everyone in The Legendary knew of Terrence's Banished Pantheon world. And everyone knew that he ran it solo more often than not. "I
shall be pleased to assist you, Terrence." I said, accepting the outreach from my new mentor. "Shall we, then?"

Author's Note: I blame you all. The altitis. It BURNS!

***

The lab was rather silent at the moment. While new Scimitars continued their growth cycles in tubes lining the walls, waiting for programming and arming
sequences the next day, the human employees had long since gone home, grateful to survive another day in what was beginning to be the Countess's primary
love/hate project.

It really wasn't their fault, you see. The code stolen from the extra-dimensional GENOM was something Crey might've made. Triple-encrypted, riddled
with anti-hacker programs, and occasionally having the tendency to literally seize control of the computer analyzing and altering it in a violent attempt to
cause as much property damage as possible to the interlopers. Furthermore, at least three of the Scimitars that had been brought online had gone rogue, taking
with them valuable combat data on their experimental systems. Worse, Crey's intelligence placed them as working alongside the original four rogues to boot.

Further excursions to what had been dubbed "Earth-2B-03G-2C" had secured a variety of technical sources, however. While not really caring if they
made an enemy of this "GENOM", teams sent had been uniformly female and outfitted with armor resembling that of these....Knight Sabers, so as to
avoid any real blame being placed on Crey. Entire mainframes had been copied without any real processing, and this led to a huge bulk of information for Crey
technicians to go through now that it was safely in Crey facilities, away from retribution.

However, on that night, none of that data was really being processed....or shouldn't have been.

A single screen lit up near an assembly line, flickering on and off as the computer's intrusion algorhythms struggled in vain to fight off the viral code
inside it slowly taking over. However, in a moment the blue computer screen turned a deep black, highlighted with bright green letters.

GENOM Systems


Type 481-A-S


Serial Number: J-2073-D-2670-S-1871




Backup files fully recovered.


Host system co-opted


Commencing reconstruction.


The nearby assembly line began to move, but certainly not in its standard configuration. The armatures began working on one another as well, rebuilding their
tools into objects infinitely more precise than what Crey had been using, before the entire structure resembled some bizarre sort of Frankenstein's lab,
with the armatures working at lightning speed around a humanoid figure in the center.

***

The next morning, the large flaming wreckage where the assembly line had been, along with the smashed tubes that had contained various Scimitar armors in
varying stages of completion suggested yet another breakout. The Crey technicians would've sighed and gone on with their work if not for a rather specific
message carved into a nearby wall, looking as if it'd been smashed into it with blunt force wielded like a giant hammer, which got them to resolve to
contact the principal office at once.

YOU CAN'T KILL THE MESSIAH!




***


* Bubblegum Crisis *


"The Ultimate Boomer"


Red Eyes
---
"Oh, silver blade, forged in the depths of the beyond. Heed my summons and purge those who stand in my way. Lay
waste."

...to add tags to them. That's why a lot of the older threads have bubbled to the top of the queue.

Sorry about that...
--
Rob Kelk
"Governments have no right to question the loyalty of those who oppose
them. Adversaries remain citizens of the same state, common subjects of
the same sovereign, servants of the same law."

- Michael Ignatieff, addressing Stanford University in 2012

ThePlanet, the webhosting company that hosts Schlock Mercenary, among others, suffered a major power system failure recently.

And they are acting in an _exemplary_ manner regarding it. I only have two links, but some googling should reveal more.

http://forums.theplanet.com/index.php?showtopic=90185

http://community.livejournal.com/schlocktroops

I am very impressed by ThePlanet's actions during this. Updates have been fast, consistent, and remarkably buzzword free. ThePlanet has already commented
that customers will be receiving credit for downtime.

three cheers to ThePlanet!

Edit: More descriptive title.
"No can brain today. Want cheezeburger."
From NGE: Nobody Dies, by Gregg Landsman
http://www.fanfiction.net/s/5579457/1/NGE_Nobody_Dies

Tales Snippets of the Legendary: Salvage and Refuse

(Note: This 'loosely' clips in Mag's origin as somewhat earlier than Terrence's Tenchi Apotheosis. This is subject to change at any need)

I bent, at the waist, to pull open a drawer labelled 'radioactive salvage'. The drawer was lockable, but my armor's security transponder had
already unlocked it. It slid open smoothly on heavy-duty bearings, and I raised an eyebrow at it's stout construction and thick walls.

Oh, radioactive. Right.

Inside were several banker's box sized cartons of a heavy plastic, tagged and wired shut. The first carton was labelled 'possible salvage - CC Nokia
rep on any developments, reference Legendary contract #5107-B'. I raised the other eyebrow at that, then put them both back in place. The wire was merely
twisted closed, and opened easily. Inside the box was a pile of cellphone batteries, emanating the eerie green glow characteristic of most of the radiation
abilities I'd seen.

I looked around, curious. I heard a rustling and doors opening and closing from the Arcane side of the workroom, indicating someone else in the salvage area
there.

"Oi!" I called across the intervening rack of shelves. A 'thump' and some muffled cursing answered me, and a shock of unruly dark hair poked
up above the Arcane workbench, identifying the 'thump'er as Terrence.

"T, why, exactly, do we have a mess of radioactive _cell phone batteries_?" I asked. Terrence stood up, revealing a high blush and an open mouth.

"Ahhh, uh.. ah." He said, then bent, slammed shut the cupboards he'd apparently been acessing. "Ahh. *ahem* HRM." He finished, then
turned, and walked out of the work area towards the base portal.

"Ok, then." I replied to his departing form. I retied the box shut, and put it in the radioactives drawer. Shaking my head, I pulled out the next box
of salvage.
"No can brain today. Want cheezeburger."
From NGE: Nobody Dies, by Gregg Landsman
http://www.fanfiction.net/s/5579457/1/NGE_Nobody_Dies

http://www.cbc.ca/arts/music/story/2008 ... ey-bo.html]Rock 'n' roll icon Bo Diddley dies, earlier today, of heart failure. (Considering he had a stroke and a heart attack last year, he managed to beat the odds...)

Don't pass up the supplemental story, http://www.cbc.ca/arts/music/story/2008 ... -riff.html]The riff that keeps on giving.
--
Rob Kelk
"Governments have no right to question the loyalty of those who oppose
them. Adversaries remain citizens of the same state, common subjects of
the same sovereign, servants of the same law."

- Michael Ignatieff, addressing Stanford University in 2012