Re: [GRIMDARK] Fallout Equestria: Project Horizons Discussion

[CannonFodder]

I think SilentCarto is onto something here, though. Even if they had only a little intelligence into what was going on inside the ministries, they had to know that at least three major war-ending projects were about to go online (bypass spells, the SPP, and Alicornication). For the zebra forces, this is the time to use all the bombs, set all the plans in motion, and end this. Because if they wait even a few days more, they're going to lose and "Nightmare" Luna wins the world.

Regardless of the actual positioning of the Maripony bomb, the fact that it hit right as the test was starting is really too much to credit to luck. Whether there was somebody inside or outside watching a stolen monitor feed or whatever. Actually, come to that, they probably just underestimated how strong Maripony was, and expected the bomb to actually incinerate it.

At any rate, hitting Maripony at that particular moment would be a good idea, tactically speaking -- as the first actual test commences, everyone involved in the project would be present. You'd be able to get Twilight, Mosaic, and Gestalt in one fell swoop. Decapitate the MAS and wreck their most promising project with a single shot.

You can remove the SPP from being war ending. The reason being is neutron bombs. Short version if you detonate a nuke high enough there will be minimal fallout and it would still kill everyone. It wouldn't matter if the SPP was activated. It wouldn't matter. For example if the SPP was activated and you were targeting manehatten just detonate it above the clouds and they would still die. Granted nobody would be burned to death or flash carbonized(basically what happens at ground zero is instantly you are vaporized and a "shadow" is left behind of your carbon being blown backwards in the shape of a shadow), but within they would still die of radiation sickness any ways.

The SPP is nothing more than a deus ex machina used to give a reason to end the original FoE. It's nothing more than "press x to finish game".

[FeatherDust]

Or maybe all references are from New Vegas, which I am not really familiar with.

There's your problem. I played New Vegas back around October, and it was like, "Oh my god! This is that thing from PH! And that's THAT thing!" A lot of FoE stuff, too, like how Canterlot basically IS the Dead Money DLC.

Some of the references are quite subtle, too.

[skibadaa]

Outside of Benny nobody really cares about the Chip, and while I admit it's probably from the fact it's scripted that way, nobody else tries to take it if you somehow get it back and not use it in the bunker

House cared about the chip, so did Caesar. The NCR didn't care because they didn't know, I'm sure if they had known they would have moved heaven and earth to get it, doubly so for the Vegas chapter of the BoS.

And ever since getting it, it's caused her nothing but pain and sorrow and the same goes to her friends.

I seem to remember the chip getting the courier shot in the head, and then buried alive. But then I suppose by BJ's standards that barely even counts.

[FeatherDust]

You can remove the SPP from being war ending. The reason being is neutron bombs. Short version if you detonate a nuke high enough there will be minimal fallout and it would still kill everyone. It wouldn't matter if the SPP was activated. It wouldn't matter.

What is this "new tron"? I have never heard if such a thing. I know they have balefire bombs full of necromantic dragon fire, but I don't think setting that off way up in the sky would cause a rain of your mysterious fictional "death particles".

Anyway, alicorns only get stronger when irradiated and magic shields can block radiation and such (see Canterlot), so I don't think that would work anyway.

[FeatherDust]

And talismans are spells detached from the user.

And stuck to a physical object... They can't move through a network as pure data, and data can be copied, unlike EC.

But okay, fine, you don't think EC rises to megaspell levels. They call it a megaspell. They probably know more about spells than we do. Let's take their word for it and not crap all over the plot point.

Do you really need Somber to write a scene where two characters discuss megaspell physics to justify why EC is one?

[CannonFodder]

What is this "new tron"? I have never heard if such a thing. I know they have balefire bombs full of necromantic dragon fire, but I don't think setting that off way up in the sky would cause a rain of your mysterious fictional "death particles".

Anyway, alicorns only get stronger when irradiated and magic shields can block radiation and such (see Canterlot), so I don't think that would work anyway.

And Einstein is rolling in his grave right about now.

The balefire bombs gave off radiation right? A neutron bomb in principle is a bomb that gives off radiation that is detonated high in the air instead of close to the ground. The balefire bombs even though they are made with necromantic dragon fire still give off radiation. Therefore you could use them in the same way. What a neutron bomb does is that instead of giving a blast of dust and cause radioactive dust to be kicked up in the air, aka fallout, it acts like a flashlight. Imagine a giant flashlight in the sky anything and everything it touches that is organic dies from radiation poisoning. Sure there might not be a concussive blast of heat, but you'd still die regardless if it was a nuke or a balefire bomb.

If a balefire bomb was real and detonated at the high needed you would still die. Granted you wouldn't die from the blastwave, you'd still die of radiation poisoning. The only way you could be right is if ponies, and not just ghouls or alicorns, were immune to radiation. . . Oh also if you were close enough to ground zero you wouldn't just die from radiation poisoning your cell walls would burst and you would turn literally into a liquid with only your bones left. I'm pretty darn certain that even alicorns aren't immune to liquidization.

No matter how much radaway you gave everyone I'm pretty certain it can't reverse a pony from being turned into a literal puddle on the sidewalk. I doubt even Celestia and Luna could survive being turned into a puddle.

Think of it another way. The majority of your body is water. Imagine if everything keeping the water in it's shape and thus form your shape was to instantly lose cohesion. Imagine a organic lifeform as a water balloon. What were to happen if you were to pop the balloon?

[FeatherDust]

The balefire bombs gave off radiation right? A neutron bomb in principle is a bomb that gives off radiation that is detonated high in the air instead of close to the ground.

That's an EMP, dude. A neutron bomb is detonated near the ground and makes LOTS AND LOTS of secondary fallout because it irritates everything around it.

The balefire bombs even though they are made with necromantic dragon fire still give off radiation... you'd still die regardless if it was a nuke or a balefire bomb.

A neutron bomb works by removing the containment shielding that normally keeps fast neutrons in the bomb's core. Balefire does not produce a flood of fast neutrons as part of its detonation because it does not rely on nuclear fission. There are no fast neutrons to release, so no neutron shower.

EMP wouldn't work either, since that relies on a nuke making lots of gamma in the high atmosphere. We can't say balefire does not produce gamma for sure, but magical radiation appears not to be like real world radiation anyway, so it's unlikely.

[CannonFodder]

The balefire bombs gave off radiation right? A neutron bomb in principle is a bomb that gives off radiation that is detonated high in the air instead of close to the ground.

That's an EMP, dude. A neutron bomb is detonated near the ground and makes LOTS AND LOTS of secondary fallout because it irritates everything around it.

A neutron bomb works by removing the containment shielding that normally keeps fast neutrons in the bomb's core. Balefire does not produce a flood of fast neutrons as part of its detonation because it does not rely on nuclear fission. There are no fast neutrons to release, so no neutron shower.

EMP wouldn't work either, since that relies on a nuke making lots of gamma in the high atmosphere. We can't say balefire does not produce gamma for sure, but magical radiation appears not to be like real world radiation anyway, so it's unlikely.

I call b.s. on the "it's cause magic" explanation. What about dragon fire necromancy causes radiation? Does standing next to a dragon mean you're going to have a half life? Or is necromancy radioactive? My guess is the megaspell acts a implosion device with the dragon fire compressing inwards and the necromancy to sustain the dragon fire outside of a dragon. If it were to just outwardly explode then there would be no radiation.

[Guest]

The radiation itself is magical radiation, this is actually canon - "necromantic radiation" specifically. It's "radiation" as in the physics term if anything, not as in Alpha, Beta, and Gamma radiation.

[CannonFodder]

The radiation itself is magical radiation, this is actually canon - "necromantic radiation" specifically. It's "radiation" as in the physics term if anything, not as in Alpha, Beta, and Gamma radiation.

That doesn't make sense at all. It'd be like making the claim a naked singularity can exist. No matter the universe such a thing is logically impossible. The only way such a thing could exist is if magic was a particle.

[FeatherDust]

The radiation itself is magical radiation, this is actually canon - "necromantic radiation" specifically. It's "radiation" as in the physics term if anything, not as in Alpha, Beta, and Gamma radiation.

That doesn't make sense at all. It'd be like making the claim a naked singularity can exist. No matter the universe such a thing is logically impossible. The only way such a thing could exist is if magic was a particle.

Half the point of saying "magic" is so you ain't gotta explain shit.

But if you wanna go there, yes, magic is a particle (or a wave), or more likely a whole family of wavicles.

Magic exerts force on the universe. Force must be transmitted by a particle, like a photon, electron, or graviton. If a wavicle of magic exists, then it must be possible to propagate through space, which is the definition if radiation. QED.

[Guest]

My headcanon for pretty much any unexplained magical phenomenon in any media is that it's sort of a basecode of patterns and stuff recognized by the OS of reality - some can be formed by the human brain/body, some require talismans and the like, and some require actual computer systems to correctly create. Greater accuracy with these patterns results in greater control and potentially greater strength.

Anyway, though, part of the problem with trying to take real life physics and apply it to magic is that real life physics don't allow magic. You need to keep in mind that there are many additional rules - some of them potentially more like guidelines - and that many, or even all, of the old rules no longer apply, or are only macroscopic and can be overridden by more accurate rules that allow for the existence of magic. It's actually sort of cool, come to think of it.

[CannonFodder]

Half the point of saying "magic" is so you ain't gotta explain shit.

There's a difference between using it as a mechanic of the story and using as a plot device.

[Valikdu]

Radiation in FoE was taken directly from the Fallout games. In these, it also worked nothing like in does in real world, so it could as well be magic too. And it was clearly a mechanic of the game. Now it is a mechanic of the story.

[Retl]

@Swicked
I kinda sorta
completely missed the point too.

[Moodyman90]

House cared about the chip, so did Caesar. The NCR didn't care because they didn't know, I'm sure if they had known they would have moved heaven and earth to get it, doubly so for the Vegas chapter of the BoS.


I seem to remember the chip getting the courier shot in the head, and then buried alive. But then I suppose by BJ's standards that barely even counts.

I've spent way too much time thinking and typing different replies to this. Here's the condensed version of everything I've come up with.

Outside of a House or Independent ending, the chip isn't a major plot point for the story as a whole. Of who you mentioned, only House could use the chip. The Legion wouldn't use it if they could, the NCR would only use it to negotiate better terms with House, and the BoS would keep the chip because it's Pre-War tech.
If Benny wasn't in the picture and the other knew about it, they still wouldn't have attacked.
The Courier was delivering the chip to House, so he has no reason to attack.
The NCR would most likely stop the Courier and offer to pay them for it. Pro-NCR companion Cass says "You don't fuck with the person who delivers the mail."
The Legion would probably stop the Courier and demand they hand over the chip, but they wouldn't attack first since Caeser has ordered that nobody was to attack any couriers.
The BoS would probably show up and go "Hand over the pre-war tech or else." but that's at the risk of the NCR discovering them.

EC-1011 on the other hand is the whole focus of Project Horizons. Stable 99 was attacked because EC-1011 was in there. Blackjack got the bounty put on her because she has EC-1011. Blackjack travels to nearly everyplace around the Hoof because of EC-1011. And everybody who's after EC-1011 has nearly always shot first, then tried to ask for it.
That is in contrast with the Courier, which once again outside of Benny, anybody who knows about the Chip usually ask the Courier for help first before trying to kill them, and only because they refuse to.

[FeatherDust]

There's a difference between using it as a mechanic of the story and using as a plot device.

While this may be true, that fact does not in any way support the concept that a fictional magic-powered device must in all its details mirror the operation and effects of a real life device to which it bears a superficial resemblance.

In other words, there is no good reason that a balefire bomb needs to work like a nuke just because both of them are really big bombs that can destroy a city.

"Magic A is Magic A" -- that is, "science-like" magic -- means that the audience can assume there are rules to how magic works that can't be broken. It doesn't mean we have to know what all those rules are or that they have to mirror real life in any way; it just means that once the story says "this is how this kind of magic works", we can assume that is true and will always be true. The story can then break that and throw a twist in -- "Oh, well, I know a way to sneak around that rule" or "Well, this is a new KIND of magic with different rules" -- but a story that does that too often will lose its audience's goodwill. Some stories just avoid that completely by refusing to give magic any rules at all and it's just a big hand-wavey do-whatever-you-want button; Lord of the Rings comes to mind as an example of that, and like almost all well-written examples of that method, magic takes a back seat for most of the story.

In any case, you're making the claim that a balefire bomb is capable of creating a neutron shower that would be fatal to alicorns and thus make the IMP project worthless. There are at least three logical fallacies there.

First, you conclude that balefire can create fast neutrons that would make it especially harmful to living things, based on a false parallel to real nuclear weapons. Since balefire clearly does not act the way a nuclear blast acts (see Psalm's memory of the blast consuming the MoM hub for the most obvious example), balefire is obviously not a nuclear blast.

Second, you assume that alicorns, stated within the story to be immune to radiation, would not be immune to this particular brand of radiation, which is an unsupportable claim. It may be the case, but until the story says so or shows us an alicorn who is being badly affected by Pink Kryptonite, we have to go on the observed facts, which are that alicorns are effectively immune.

Third, you assume that having a weapon that is dangerous to alicorns inherently means the project wouldn't bring about a quick end to the war, which is not necessarily true. A weapon capable of killing alicorns in mass numbers would be equally capable of wiping out ground troops in equally massive numbers, so on that front alicorns are no weaker than standard troops. If the project could give standard troops even a 20% increase in their combat capabilities (and honestly, it'd be more), they would win quickly on any battlefield where such weapons were not available, and any battlefield where the zebras are willing and able to use such weapons would be an immediate defeat for the allies anyway. (No general would hold back their "I Win Button" bombs from a battle just because the alicorn squad didn't make an appearance.)


Okay. That's everything I wanted to say earlier but couldn't while typing on my cell phone. I'll let you have the last word if you want it, but I think I've pretty much said all I can say on this topic.

[FeatherDust]

@FeatherDust
Congrats on missing my point.

No, no, I think I got your point. EC isn't big, flashy, and powerful enough to be called a megaspell, in your opinion.

I just think the problem is that you've drawn a hasty generalization -- because MOST megaspells are flashy and powerful, that means ALL megaspells are flashy and powerful, and anything that is not flashy and powerful is therefore not a megaspell.

Also, I think you're underestimating what EC can do. It's hardly just a worm. It can travel to a specific location and autonomously determine the status of a particular individual, even with an extremely degraded body. That's not Dealer doing that*. The program itself, the spell, is capable of drawing conclusions using inductive logic. It can read, listen, and look even when there's no equipment around to allow such actions. That's a little crazy for a program that doesn't have a brain running it.

* The whole identification process has to be external to Dealer; if he could control it, he would be able to check people off without going to a specific geographic point first. He'd be able to just look up at Hightower Prison and go, "Yeah, no." But he doesn't, so he clearly can't.

[Icy Shake]

@FeatherDust: You seem to mostly have this covered, but I'll just add that Fo:E and related stories are (or are, perhaps--if one is feeling particularly uncharitable--attempts at) fairy stories. The fact that the mechanics don't work in the real world doesn't matter at all, and is a feature, not a bug. The goal is--well, I'll just quote here:

Children are capable, of course, of literary belief, when the story-maker's art is good enough to produce it. That state of mind has been called “willing suspension of disbelief.” But this does not seem to me a good description of what happens. What really happens is that the story-maker proves a successful “sub-creator.” He makes a Secondary World which your mind can enter. Inside it, what he relates is “true”: it accords with the laws of that world. You therefore believe it, while you are, as it were, inside. The moment disbelief arises, the spell is broken; the magic, or rather art, has failed. You are then out in the Primary World again, looking at the little abortive Secondary World from outside. If you are obliged, by kindliness or circumstance, to stay, then disbelief must be suspended (or stifled), otherwise listening and looking would become intolerable. But this suspension of disbelief is a substitute for the genuine thing, a subterfuge we use when condescending to games or make-believe, or when trying (more or less willingly) to find what virtue we can in the work of an art that has for us failed.

Obviously, I can't say that the mechanisms in Fo:E and PH will never or should never break one's immersion, but I've never had that problem personally--though I have at times been pulled out by other things, like the (repeated) assertion that Red Eye is charismatic (though I guess that could be chalked up to the framing device, and an overly impressionable narrator), when he never really came across that way to me, or the presence of Stronghoof.

[OneMoreDaySK]

E1101 is going to be the key to a giant mech that Blackjack interfaces with after getting some more mech augmentations to fight Cogitum and the EoS. /sleepyrant

[AGurdel]

Or maybe all references are from New Vegas, which I am not really familiar with.

There's your problem. I played New Vegas back around October, and it was like, "Oh my god! This is that thing from PH! And that's THAT thing!" A lot of FoE stuff, too, like how Canterlot basically IS the Dead Money DLC.

Some of the references are quite subtle, too.

Thanks. Thats nice to know. I'm planning to reread Fo:E and PH after I'm done with University in October and now I'll probably play NV again before that. Dead Money is one of the DLCs I never touched.

[FeatherDust]

Yet.

That is all the point I was trying to get to. My first post asked if it was eventually going to do something worthy of being called a megaspell. You then started arguing that no, it absolutely could be the one megaspell that wasn't a mega version of a smaller spell...

So I think it might do something more impressive later. You think it'll remain a gimpy little skeleton key to be trotted around hoofington from one project to another.
I guess I just want more from it, is all, and think Somber might have something more impressive in store for later.

Fair enough; I certainly may have read in a certain grumpy "it BETTER have secret powers" that wasn't intended.

And, honestly, I'm not saying it doesn't have some big flashy hidden functionally. I'm not the author. I'm just saying it may not be anything more than what we have seen, and that's still good enough to be a low end megaspell, if a very unusual one. I make no claim as to the existence or nonexistence of such a boost. I'm pretty agnostic on stuff like that.

[O. Hinds]

@FeatherDust: You seem to mostly have this covered, but I'll just add that Fo:E and related stories are (or are, perhaps--if one is feeling particularly uncharitable--attempts at) fairy stories. The fact that the mechanics don't work in the real world doesn't matter at all, and is a feature, not a bug. The goal is--well, I'll just quote here:

Children are capable, of course, of literary belief, when the story-maker's art is good enough to produce it. That state of mind has been called “willing suspension of disbelief.” But this does not seem to me a good description of what happens. What really happens is that the story-maker proves a successful “sub-creator.” He makes a Secondary World which your mind can enter. Inside it, what he relates is “true”: it accords with the laws of that world. You therefore believe it, while you are, as it were, inside. The moment disbelief arises, the spell is broken; the magic, or rather art, has failed. You are then out in the Primary World again, looking at the little abortive Secondary World from outside. If you are obliged, by kindliness or circumstance, to stay, then disbelief must be suspended (or stifled), otherwise listening and looking would become intolerable. But this suspension of disbelief is a substitute for the genuine thing, a subterfuge we use when condescending to games or make-believe, or when trying (more or less willingly) to find what virtue we can in the work of an art that has for us failed.

Obviously, I can't say that the mechanisms in Fo:E and PH will never or should never break one's immersion, but I've never had that problem personally--though I have at times been pulled out by other things, like the (repeated) assertion that Red Eye is charismatic (though I guess that could be chalked up to the framing device, and an overly impressionable narrator), when he never really came across that way to me, or the presence of Stronghoof.

Wow, I hadn't heard that quote before. Thanks for posting it.

[Meleagridis]

Flask:

...Flask, huh? How'd you get all that information? Was it in all in her rant in the kitchen?

Given her cutie marks represent a game of chance and gamble, maybe that means that getting away with gambits through sheer luck is her special talent ?

No way no how it is quite so simple. I'd say a 90% chance of light showers and broken hearts, but you never know.

Spoiler:

http://wavemasterryx.tumblr.com/post/42233891985

Late to mention it, but that makes this no less deserving of praise. If I could, I think I would replace my bedroom window with this.
Looks like she's in a lot of... pane.

Pinkie Pie: Got way overzealous and lost control of her ministry (an interesting combination, I know). I'm not the best person to defend her, since I just don't like her. But it seems to me like her ministry often (at least sometimes) did a good job of rooting out Zebra sympathizers and saboteurs.

Her position terrifies me. I think it should terrify more. Her fourth wall-breaking prowess was amped up to eleven- she was not practically psychic, she was a straight up mind reader and fortune teller -but the world was still ending. She could predict every sabotage, anticipate the bomb strikes. She was given free reign by the government to do whatever the hell she wanted to keep things safe. Eventually she even left her morals at the door for a while, the last thing she could possibly do to clear away the distractions and dedicate herself to stopping some angry horses with big guns. And she couldn't. She probably knew she couldn't, too. All that power, all that prescience and you know the world will burn. Childhood friend slowly eaten alive by a toxin and fused to a window. Strapped to a hill, forced to watch it all burn after everyone else is taken. Destroyed, sucked into an old enemy with a grudge and overpowered by her ego. Even she doesn't know what happened to the second last one.

Only one gets away. And it's not because of anything Pinkie did, either. Just... one left. Alone. At the end of the world.


[Icy Shake]

Wow, I hadn't heard that quote before. Thanks for posting it.

You're welcome. I first read the essay/lecture as an assignment five years ago, and it's had an important impact on my thinking about speculative fiction ever since.

[Meleagridis]

Why do you think Pinkie wouldn't know what happened to Rainbow Dash?

Mostly because Kkat didn't. She left that... well, she left that for us. In all likelihood she probably knows RD's end just like the others. We don't know for certain if RD survived or not (I doubt this) and I needed another doom premonition to round it all up, so...

In my defence, her psychic powers have proven fallible before. And if you decide to accept her more recent reactions in season 3 (when she went borderline obsessive after Dash left for camp) as evidence that Dash was one of her favourites, the thought of a big grey 'I don't know' for RD's fate seems like pretty FO:E appropriate torment.

[Derpmind]

So I thought I'd enjoy giving the PH thread a read tonight.

I didn't.

[WavemasterRyx]

Late to mention it, but that makes this no less deserving of praise. If I could, I think I would replace my bedroom window with this.
Looks like she's in a lot of... pane.

Oh late comments are no problem at all, I still very much appreciate them. Although, I do have a whole basket full of clean, balled up socks that I can throw at you for such vile punnery.

Also, she's totally smiling...

[Derpmind]

So I thought I'd enjoy giving the PH thread a read tonight.

I didn't.

-_-

Uh, right, the quote's from CannonFodder. It says that in the quote box. Because it's his fault since the last few pages he's a grumpy pants meanie pants. I coulda shoulda made that clearer, sorry. Also Swicked I love you, you still have the best sense of humor.

[CannonFodder]

So I thought I'd enjoy giving the PH thread a read tonight.

I didn't.

-_-

Uh, right, the quote's from CannonFodder. It says that in the quote box. Because it's his fault since the last few pages he's a grumpy pants meanie pants. I coulda shoulda made that clearer, sorry. Also Swicked I love you, you still have the best sense of humor.

. . .Er uh, whoops?

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