[ericthered]

Originally Posted by GnomesofZurich

Is that a cumulative -1? Anyway, I'm hoping I'll soon be able to avoid it entirely, because with Mental Surgery 5 it becomes feasible to quickly give someone a variety of useful Delusions (Daymar is above suspicion; the flour is contaminated, throw it out; salt works as well as psi-suppressants, etc.).

Yes, its cumulative. You need a long-term solution ... like some of your above suggestions.

Day isn't necessarily saying he can really tell the future, but that this is something fun to try out...and an excellent excuse for making skin-to-skin contact to enable Mental Surgery!

Got it.

Okay, so Day needs to figure out how to make Pothi not suspicious of him. Since Pothi already thinks Day is a bit of a klutz, on the way to requisitions he will "trip" over something, and fall to the ground. "Can you give me a hand up?" When Pothi, hopefully agrees to help him up, he'll use Mental Surgery 5 to give him Delusion (Daymar is above suspicion), which I think would fall into the [-5] level, and Incurious (12) [-5]. Since my base skill is 18, this still gives him an effective skill of 16.

Originally Posted by GnomesofZurich

Do you have any recommendations? Absent-Mindedness? Edit: Gullibility (12) [-10] might fit the bill.

The initial Delusion is enough to keep him from suspecting Daymar: You need to overcome his reluctance to expose himself to discipline. If he is found abandoned without a buddy, he is in as much trouble as you are. The change needs to be something that makes Pothi willing to potentially sneak off by himself.

A quirk level delusion of "As long as I'm at my job they won't discipline me" might work. As might "You're only in trouble if you get caught", "The buddy system is not a big deal", compulsive risk-taking, Loner, or even sense of duty (Jakorbi). Though that last one could be risky if you don't trust Pothi's ability to keep a secret.

Note: the penalty to mind surgery is cumulative: if you go back and make more edits to Pothi's mind I'll be looking at the total number of edits. Otherwise you can give him -100 in mental traits fairly easily just by coming back again and again. But the existing budget for traits that you have is pretty high as it is.

Originally Posted by TGLS

Well I suppose I should start hanging around Floor 19, as opposed to showing up just before the fires break out.

What will you be doing on floor 19? any specific actions?

Hua quickly drops back down a hatch back into the viewing area on deck 6. Botha hadn't noticed her leave, but instead is staring at the lights playing out in hyperspace -- largely caused by the reality bubble at this point. A few other spacers have shown up as well, including a couple who seem to have romance on their minds.

I have confidence Daymar will get you the electrical kit. Picking it up will simply be a matter of discretely getting it without Botha noticing when passing through deck 5 naturally. Could you roll for that, and what will Hua do after that?