Catalog of the Weird Parallels - Page 144

Mysterious Dark Lord v3.2 · 04-26-2019, 10:38 PM

This particular world is one I was just introduced to from a manga titled Neko ga Nishi Mukya (Cats Are Facing West), still being published.

=====================
The very existence of this parallel is a secret. It has no name, simply a number in the archives. It is a Z1 world, accessible only with specific orders. Only parachronic researchers are allowed access for short times.

Superficially, this appears to be a parallel at approximately AD 2010. But it is a world where small-scale short-lived reality quakes (called "Flow Disruptions") are semi-normal events.

Flow Disruptions are usually preceeded by abnormal fogs and softening of objects in the afflicted area. When the fog clears, reality is changed. The disruption may last for periods ranging from hours to years, with few being permanent. The area involved may be anywhere from a city neighborhood or small town all the way down to a small box. Flow Disruptions are a thing of normal life in this world, like weather events, and there are laws, customs, and protocols in place for minimizing the disruption to public life.

Some are "natural" events - pieces of reality suddenly changing, either temporarily or permanently. Many others are influenced by the thoughts and emotions of beings in the vicinity. Pieces of the past may re-appear, new natural laws may appear, anomalies of space and time may occur, or any other event may be connected to a Flow Disruption. Some people and animals may be mutated or vanished and returned.

Professionals called "Flow managers" can, through experience and trained cats, track and analyze these disruptions. If the Flow Disruption is influenced by humans, they can also attempt to reverse it.

Researching such small and semi-harmless reality quakes would be a godsend to most parachronic researchers. The skills of Flow managers are of great interest to Infinity recruiters. But the idea that an outtimer might be caught up in one of these events (or worse have his own emotions manipulate a Flow Disruption) is a major danger to the Secret.

It also interests sociologists that with regular proof that reality wasn't as "real" as it could be, society in that world seems to have adjusted to it, thinking no more of the risk of a Flow Disruption than they would the possibility of a large storm.

Astromancer · 04-27-2019, 07:01 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Mysterious Dark Lord v3.2

This particular world is one I was just introduced to from a manga titled Neko ga Nishi Mukya (Cats Are Facing West), still being published.

=====================
The very existence of this parallel is a secret. It has no name, simply a number in the archives. It is a Z1 world, accessible only with specific orders. Only parachronic researchers are allowed access for short times.

Superficially, this appears to be a parallel at approximately AD 2010. But it is a world where small-scale short-lived reality quakes (called "Flow Disruptions") are semi-normal events.

Flow Disruptions are usually preceeded by abnormal fogs and softening of objects in the afflicted area. When the fog clears, reality is changed. The disruption may last for periods ranging from hours to years, with few being permanent. The area involved may be anywhere from a city neighborhood or small town all the way down to a small box. Flow Disruptions are a thing of normal life in this world, like weather events, and there are laws, customs, and protocols in place for minimizing the disruption to public life.

Some are "natural" events - pieces of reality suddenly changing, either temporarily or permanently. Many others are influenced by the thoughts and emotions of beings in the vicinity. Pieces of the past may re-appear, new natural laws may appear, anomalies of space and time may occur, or any other event may be connected to a Flow Disruption. Some people and animals may be mutated or vanished and returned.

Professionals called "Flow managers" can, through experience and trained cats, track and analyze these disruptions. If the Flow Disruption is influenced by humans, they can also attempt to reverse it.

Researching such small and semi-harmless reality quakes would be a godsend to most parachronic researchers. The skills of Flow managers are of great interest to Infinity recruiters. But the idea that an outtimer might be caught up in one of these events (or worse have his own emotions manipulate a Flow Disruption) is a major danger to the Secret.

It also interests sociologists that with regular proof that reality wasn't as "real" as it could be, society in that world seems to have adjusted to it, thinking no more of the risk of a Flow Disruption than they would the possibility of a large storm.

Let me be the first to praise you for bringing this idea into GURPS. It's sad that Pyramid no longer exists for you to broadcast this idea from. Flow Disruption and Flow Managers deserve to be official GURPS.

Flyndaran · 04-27-2019, 08:46 AM

I don't know why, but I get a feeling this setting would really work for an anime.

A high school geared for those youths whose changes became permanent. Or out-timers recruiting from said school.
Or you could go with Silent Hill, a city prone to more violent storms like Tornado alley.

Astromancer · 04-27-2019, 08:54 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Flyndaran

I don't know why, but I get a feeling this setting would really work for an anime.

A high school geared for those youths whose changes became permanent. Or out-timers recruiting from said school.
Or you could go with Silent Hill, a city prone to more violent storms like Tornado alley.

I know why you have these ideas. You're gifted. Darn you! Now I'll have to give both Mysterious Dark Lord v3.2 and you credit when I swipe these ideas.

Mysterious Dark Lord v3.2 · 04-27-2019, 08:12 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Astromancer

I know why you have these ideas. You're gifted. Darn you! Now I'll have to give both Mysterious Dark Lord v3.2 and you credit when I swipe these ideas.

In RPGs and fanfics, theft is the sincerest form of flattery.

PTTG · 04-29-2019, 04:10 PM

In this 1995 worldline, a technique for "retrophotonic holography" was invented a few years ago. The technique consists of illuminating an area of space with three separate lasers with a special series of wavelengths and other qualities. The constructive interference creates fully visible, semitransparent holograms of what occurred in that place (relative to the most dominant gravitational field) at a given time in the past.

The device can get very high resolution images of anything that's happened in the past month (good enough that microscopes can be used to examine individual cells). Past that, the resolution drops off logarithmically, allowing vaguer and vaguer images of more and more distant eras. It's possible to read most text in recovered images about 2000 years old, and it's possible to recognize individuals in images up to 5000 years old. Past 100,000 years, he images are just blobs of light and color.

Finally, this world was an echo up until a slight divergence in 1960. Even though these "retrograms" are local superscience, they would be incredibly useful to uncover fine details of history without risking visiting echoes at pivotal moments.

ericthered · 04-29-2019, 05:07 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by PTTG

In this 1995 worldline, a technique for "retrophotonic holography" was invented a few years ago. The technique consists of illuminating an area of space with three separate lasers with a special series of wavelengths and other qualities. The constructive interference creates fully visible, semitransparent holograms of what occurred in that place (relative to the most dominant gravitational field) at a given time in the past.

.....

Finally, this world was an echo up until a slight divergence in 1960. Even though these "retrograms" are local superscience, they would be incredibly useful to uncover fine details of history without risking visiting echoes at pivotal moments.

Wow, that's a really disruptive technology. Some implications:

You have nearly the perfect forensic tool. If you know where it happened, you can look at what happened. To get away with a crime you need to conceal the place it was committed.

This applies to Scandals and Spying as well. You can get film of any act the accused was involved in if you know where to look. You can watch deals being made, watch plans being drawn up, and watch illicit acts.

The Holy events of most religions are well within the device's range. Homeline can fall back on "This isn't an exact copy", but this world can't. That's going to cause a lot of upheaval.

Lastly, the ability of this world to investigate a parachronic conveyor is nearly unparalled. They can watch the operator punch in buttons, inspect the circuitry, and do so at their comparative leisure.

PTTG · 05-01-2019, 12:35 PM

In 1962, soviet submarine B-59 launched its payload of nuclear missiles (this, it appears, was the consequence of other, less significant changes). Astonishingly, the US and USSR managed to avoid escalating after the missiles were mostly intercepted, though the blasts did destroy the American fleet. The conclusion of the crisis was a stalemate, with a standing US threat of nuclear retaliation if any soviet forces approached the island.

Though escalation to full-on nuclear war was avoided, The following years were just short of open war between the two powers. This created a feeling of dissatisfaction and fear surpassing that of Homeline's cold war significantly. The tension seems to have reinforced the stability of the Soviet Union, resulting in its persistence into the verge of the 21st century.

Perhaps that is why, in 1998, the arrival of an alien spacecraft was greeted with open acceptance. The aliens -- broadly humanoid, though with vastly different biology -- offered to rule humanity and provide uplift into a society that controlled thousands of nearby planets.

The aliens arrived three months ago, and now Earth's old conflicts are largely forgotten in the new one between enthusiastic humans urging uplift and opponents who fear the aliens have other motivations.

Many pro-uplift people believe that humans aren't fit to rule themselves, while many resistant people simply want to continue their old feuds. On the other hand, the uplift faction sees this as a way out of near-certain extinction from nuclear annihilation and ecological damage, and the resistance believes that humanity's history shows continuous progress on its own, always towards more equality, and servitude under an alien race would annihilate that.

johndallman · 05-01-2019, 01:21 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by PTTG

In 1962, soviet submarine B-59 launched its payload of nuclear missiles . . .

Err, it had no missiles. As a Project 941 "Foxtrot", it was armed only with torpedoes. Do you mean its nuclear torpedoes?

PTTG · 05-01-2019, 01:35 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by johndallman

Err, it had no missiles. As a Project 941 "Foxtrot", it was armed only with torpedoes. Do you mean its nuclear torpedoes?

Good point. Still, it attacked the US forces and brought about the tactical nuclear stalemate that marked the next several decades.

04-26-2019, 10:38 PM	#1431
Mysterious Dark Lord v3.2 Join Date: Mar 2005 Location: The deep dark haunted woods	Re: Catalog of the Weird Parallels This particular world is one I was just introduced to from a manga titled Neko ga Nishi Mukya (Cats Are Facing West), still being published. ===================== The very existence of this parallel is a secret. It has no name, simply a number in the archives. It is a Z1 world, accessible only with specific orders. Only parachronic researchers are allowed access for short times. Superficially, this appears to be a parallel at approximately AD 2010. But it is a world where small-scale short-lived reality quakes (called "Flow Disruptions") are semi-normal events. Flow Disruptions are usually preceeded by abnormal fogs and softening of objects in the afflicted area. When the fog clears, reality is changed. The disruption may last for periods ranging from hours to years, with few being permanent. The area involved may be anywhere from a city neighborhood or small town all the way down to a small box. Flow Disruptions are a thing of normal life in this world, like weather events, and there are laws, customs, and protocols in place for minimizing the disruption to public life. Some are "natural" events - pieces of reality suddenly changing, either temporarily or permanently. Many others are influenced by the thoughts and emotions of beings in the vicinity. Pieces of the past may re-appear, new natural laws may appear, anomalies of space and time may occur, or any other event may be connected to a Flow Disruption. Some people and animals may be mutated or vanished and returned. Professionals called "Flow managers" can, through experience and trained cats, track and analyze these disruptions. If the Flow Disruption is influenced by humans, they can also attempt to reverse it. Researching such small and semi-harmless reality quakes would be a godsend to most parachronic researchers. The skills of Flow managers are of great interest to Infinity recruiters. But the idea that an outtimer might be caught up in one of these events (or worse have his own emotions manipulate a Flow Disruption) is a major danger to the Secret. It also interests sociologists that with regular proof that reality wasn't as "real" as it could be, society in that world seems to have adjusted to it, thinking no more of the risk of a Flow Disruption than they would the possibility of a large storm. __________________ "When you talk about damage radius, even atomic weapons pale before that of an unfettered idiot in a position of power." - Sam Starfall from the webcomic Freefall

04-27-2019, 08:46 AM	#1433
Flyndaran Untagged Join Date: Oct 2004 Location: Forest Grove, Beaverton, Oregon	Re: Catalog of the Weird Parallels I don't know why, but I get a feeling this setting would really work for an anime. A high school geared for those youths whose changes became permanent. Or out-timers recruiting from said school. Or you could go with Silent Hill, a city prone to more violent storms like Tornado alley. __________________ Beware, poor communication skills. No offense intended. If offended, it just means that I failed my writing skill check.

04-29-2019, 04:10 PM	#1436
PTTG Join Date: Feb 2011	Re: Catalog of the Weird Parallels In this 1995 worldline, a technique for "retrophotonic holography" was invented a few years ago. The technique consists of illuminating an area of space with three separate lasers with a special series of wavelengths and other qualities. The constructive interference creates fully visible, semitransparent holograms of what occurred in that place (relative to the most dominant gravitational field) at a given time in the past. The device can get very high resolution images of anything that's happened in the past month (good enough that microscopes can be used to examine individual cells). Past that, the resolution drops off logarithmically, allowing vaguer and vaguer images of more and more distant eras. It's possible to read most text in recovered images about 2000 years old, and it's possible to recognize individuals in images up to 5000 years old. Past 100,000 years, he images are just blobs of light and color. Finally, this world was an echo up until a slight divergence in 1960. Even though these "retrograms" are local superscience, they would be incredibly useful to uncover fine details of history without risking visiting echoes at pivotal moments.

05-01-2019, 12:35 PM	#1438
PTTG Join Date: Feb 2011	Re: Catalog of the Weird Parallels In 1962, soviet submarine B-59 launched its payload of nuclear missiles (this, it appears, was the consequence of other, less significant changes). Astonishingly, the US and USSR managed to avoid escalating after the missiles were mostly intercepted, though the blasts did destroy the American fleet. The conclusion of the crisis was a stalemate, with a standing US threat of nuclear retaliation if any soviet forces approached the island. Though escalation to full-on nuclear war was avoided, The following years were just short of open war between the two powers. This created a feeling of dissatisfaction and fear surpassing that of Homeline's cold war significantly. The tension seems to have reinforced the stability of the Soviet Union, resulting in its persistence into the verge of the 21st century. Perhaps that is why, in 1998, the arrival of an alien spacecraft was greeted with open acceptance. The aliens -- broadly humanoid, though with vastly different biology -- offered to rule humanity and provide uplift into a society that controlled thousands of nearby planets. The aliens arrived three months ago, and now Earth's old conflicts are largely forgotten in the new one between enthusiastic humans urging uplift and opponents who fear the aliens have other motivations. Many pro-uplift people believe that humans aren't fit to rule themselves, while many resistant people simply want to continue their old feuds. On the other hand, the uplift faction sees this as a way out of near-certain extinction from nuclear annihilation and ecological damage, and the resistance believes that humanity's history shows continuous progress on its own, always towards more equality, and servitude under an alien race would annihilate that. Last edited by PTTG; 05-02-2019 at 12:13 AM.