Fun Idea for Crossover-Harem

[Black Aeronaut]

Got a couple of new ideas I'm tinkering with here.
First one: Rapid Prototyping Machine.
As Zeke's experiments carry him deeper and deeper into strange terrain, I cannot help but think that having one would be useful. It'd be useful enough just to lay down custom circuit boards (contracting an appropriately equiped fab shop is hideously expensive and practical only if your ordering in huge numbers). Granted, he can probably get a good deal of stuff taken care of through MITHRIL once he's in their employ, but that's only going to go so far. So an RPM seems like the most economical solution so far...
Second: POV Shifts
About a week ago I finished reading through Stefen Gagne's Sailor Nothing and it reminded me of something about his particular style that he excells at - the Roving 1st Person POV. At this time, I'm working on the writing (scene of Rei's first meeting with Zeke, from Rei's POV - nearly complete) but I've got a corner of my mind dedicated to figuring out how I would present something like this that would cause the least amount of confusion.
When K.A. Applegate did one of her few Animorph books where the POV shifts, she'd actually head the segment with the character's name. I'd like to be a bit more subtle, following Twoflower's example of shifting fonts. At the same time, part of me wishes to hold true to the bare-bones presentation of purists such as the venerable (and sometimes hated) Benjamin Hutchins.
I know that the presentation's a post-production thing, but it's not something I want to wind up stumped on, hence why I give it at least a bit of thought in the here and now. Thoughts, anyone?
ETA: Some other stuff...
I need to download the last episode or two of Akikan, but I got a pretty solid idea of where things go from Episode 11 with the appearance of the Mixed Juice Akikan (Think Vampire Akikan - takes the powers of the Akikans she kisses and keeps their cans so she can summon 'zombie' Akikans at will).  She'll be one of the tougher opponents, for certain, and a possible reoccuring villain du jour for a while.
Also, I cannot help but think that the all-too-openly-gay director of the Akikan Elect in that area would be in cahoots (in more ways than one) with our flamer-whispered.  And just for pure brain breakage...  Nah, I'll leave this one as a surprise.  (^_^)
One final thing, then I'm done for the night...
I finally managed to put a finger on why I don't feel too cozy with the idea of making one of the Chinese Sisters (from FMP) an Akikan.  While writing this fic, I will, understandably, be changing a few things about some of the characters to make things fit better.  Something that I don't like doing, however, is changing the basic nature of a character.  This includes gender orientation and physical nature.  The only exceptions I make is where breaking these conventions is the point of the story.  Age and circumstances are somethings I'm willing to change - Sakura will be well aged by the time we see her as an active player in our story, but I have my limits in what I wish to change and I will excercise them.
Thank you kindly, though, for your input.  It has been trully invaluable and has given me a wealth of material to work with.  By all means, do keep the suggestions coming - I'm just going to be more selective in what I decide to use.  I may even pick and choose bits and pieces rather than entire ideas (Egg Shen: "Like your salad bar here - we pick what we like and leave all the rest!").

[Necratoid]

Don't worry about not taking one of my ideas, either at all or at least as written; not only does actually working out why a particular bit will or
won't fit help things in the long run... but it gives us a clearer idea of how your mind/story intentions work. Yes, I realize that I put out complex
and random idea that are relatively large compared to other's contributions... but half of that is just getting the idea out of my head.

Ah, didn't know you hadn't seen the last episode... lets just say that it contains one of the best uses of a subtitle Chekhov's gun that I've
personally seen in a long time... also, its worse that that particular gun was bugging me for reasons I couldn't really voice early on.... on the other
hand my brother just thought it was funny I had that bizarre issue.

Edit: Also as Jerry will probably be mentioned in passing in this it may be a good idea to Not make him a Whispered. Eventually someone will check on him an
the idea he is just, as a friend of mine use to put it, "Good like that.' Few things do more to destabilize peoples Status Quo like randomly dropping
in unrelated variables that seem to fit... also gives you the option to have Zeke try things out he reads about on some random board he goes to... or let him
work out the bugs in a design/use a preexisting principle rather than make it from scratch... or maybe him figuring out the jacket trick (with technomage
skills no less) gets him access to such a board. Just a thought on how to speed up development and keep him from wasting to much time reinventing the wheel.

[Black Aeronaut]

Lemme guess... The pull tab ear rings?

Yep, I was leaning towards a technomage solution for the coat, which is why having a Rapid Prototyper would be perfect - I'd imagine one would be capable
of making a series of flexible mage-tech circuit cards.

[Necratoid]

No, not the earrings. Its something that doesn't resolve until the last episode... which I don't want to give away if you haven't seen it yet.
Lets just say it started in episode 3, I think, and doesn't resolve until the last episode. As I said... it was really subtile. If you have seen them all
now I'll explain.

The one thing to remember with going through all those circuit cards is you has to have both the flats to carve out and enough gold or such to link the actual
solid pieces together. Also, as Zeke has an iron focus he'd want to use that... which is pretty non standard. I mean making the actual boards themselves
in designs that add to the mystic functions. That or he is going to be bleeding himself a lot. For the pieces I'd suggest he go dumpster driving for
random components from preexisting machines. Of course, second hand parts are going to make the boards interesting to replicate... but he's is in the
early make this thing work stages and not mass production. This means Rube-Goldberg designs to start.

[paladindythe]

edit: I forgot that "fabber" was a nickname for a Rapid Prototyping Machine... my bad

http://www.fabathome.org/...ndex.php?title=Main_Page

[Black Aeronaut]

paladindyth: Thanks for that catch! I knew there was another name, but I couldn't recall what it was.

Necratoid: Zeke's early proof-of-concept work will indeed be messy looking kitbashes, but once he's ready for practical application he'll try to
move away from that, and a fabber will be the first thing he tries. (Part of the early fun could be in watching as his initial experiments work at first, but
once pressured into action, then fall apart.)

IIRC, iron is an excellent conductor. It's either almost as good or better than copper. Copper just gets more use because it's less prone to corrosion.

As for the fabber itself, the link that paladindythe posted was very helpful. With that information, I can now see Zeke building his own fabber for a lot less
money that it would cost to buy a 'professional' grade machine. And instead of being the simpler machines shown on the site, I can easily see Zeke
employing a four- or six-syringe custom built model in order to lay down all the materials required for a circuit card in one go (a necessity if you're
laying down a multi-layered card).

Heck, once he gains access to a proper kiln, I can even see him building ceramic armor by having the fabber lay down the individual pieces (I'm thinking an
ablative-style with small replaceable segments) and then curing them in the kiln. Don't worry, that's for much later.

[robkelk]

For the pieces I'd suggest he go dumpster driving for random components from preexisting machines.

Chii?

Okay, never mind - the cast list is "large to the possible point of unmanageable" already.
--
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

[Black Aeronaut]

Dammit, Rob, you just had to slip that particular bunny into my head... :p

Unwieldly or not, the inclusion of Chi makes for some excellent moral drama - the girl is a biomimetic android, meaning that she looks and feels like the real
thing, along with all the, er... anatomical details. Everyone would wig out at her existence because while her true purpose is not known, she seems
disturbingly close to being a sexaroid, which is an act of cruelty given her degree of sapience. Who the hell made her and for what purpose? Good material for
a long-term subplot.

Additionally, I think that Persocons can fit into this universe. We have Whispereds and Armslaves (some with their own AIs, ie: Arbelast), so why not
'dumb' yet sophisticated AIs in the form of Androids? For the most part, I think the ones we see the most would be the pint-size models like Sumomo.
Life-size models like Chi would be playthings and tools of the wealthy.

I have other ideas in mind as well, but I'll leave them as a surprise. This is all great stuff for the ongoing adventures. (^_^)

[Necratoid]

You do realize that having Persicons and Ackicans in the same thing will just cause issues. I'd avoid Persicons in this (notablely earily on) as
unuseful... mostly because it makes it far less impressive that a certain evil sibling has mini-armslaves as minions. Also, most of the things that the
persicons would add or story lines they could add would already be covered by the can-kamis. Additionally... your going to have to cover why those
mini-armslaves are so masculine... I mean if you introduce them as something that comes up from reverse engineering the mini-armslaves... and Japan demands
their spiffy new household robots have boobs its the Japanese being the Japanese... otherwise its going to devolve into an issue of whether or not Gauron was
gay. (I'll explain that if needed.)

I'm not sure making circuit boards with iron is a good idea... I mean its going to make everything into magical electromagnets... which means Zeke is
going to end up with a fried laptop. Copper can be a magnet when under current... iron tends to want to stay magnetic once it gets there. Shielded wire is
one thing.... but air exposed circuit boards? I've yet to see anything that offers an alternative to current hard drives involved.

[DHBirr]

Lemme guess... The pull tab ear rings?

I saw that reference and the first image that jumped into my head was Ping from the webcomic MegaTokyo. And no, I do
not think you should go there.
-----
Big Brother is watching you.  And damn, you are so bloody BORING.