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Post by Tout-Perd on Nov 11, 2015 13:50:11 GMT -5
Talking about Blackbird in the Ishkabibble topic got me started on a fun plot exercise: Essentially, assuming Blackbird had a contract put out on your character, how would it go? Assume the character is made aware some unknown party is out to kill them, at the start of the day. Mind you, Blackbird is a world-class assassin who can negate powers subconsciously (from the sound of things, if he's aware of a Power, they can't use their powers).
-Natalie: I've gotta go with Natalie winning on this one. I mean, if you take away her powers, you still have a Natalie. And considering that she can shapeshift, but still reliably chooses herself over saltwater crocodiles, giant squid, Siberian tigers, grizzly bears, etc, that implies that any of these apex predators is a downgrade. Natalie's most dangerous form is Natalie. (Not to mention she'd be willing to take lethal injuries in order to take 'bird down, since she'd assume she could just use her powers to recuperate afterwards. Anything less than a pretty little headshot's unlikely to stop her, and she's probably going to make it impossible to get a good bead on her from the moment she knows she's a target.)
-Zebedee: No idea on how this would go; Zebedee's powers are all either divine or technological in origins, but I have no idea what threshhold of tech is necessary to qualify as "Magic" or "Powers". If Zebedee has his powers, this is likely a stalemate, because he'd likely teleport himself or Blackbird halfway across the world instead of actually dealing with the problem. If Blackbird trumps tech, Zebedee's likely dead.
-Thyra: Sorry Thyra, but your godlike forcefield means that you're likely to try and stand there, and take an attack. Bad idea. Very, very bad idea.
-Miko: Tough call on this one; Miko knows that pretty much everybody wants him dead, so he has all sorts of contingencies in place for getting out of dodge. That said, he's notably substantially lower caliber than Natalie in a straight no-Powers, no-Magic fight (in an off the boards RP, she proceeded to stomp him, Haze, Joseph, and Helen all at once in that situation), and he also packs substantially less mundane weaponry. (You can pretty much count on Natalie to always be carrying some kind of blade and some varieties of explosives, even if it's just smokebombs or flashbangs.) So I gotta hand it to 'bird.
-Didn't: Didn't falls into the Zebedee loophole of "What counts as Powers?" Her yo-yo is (Andalite)tech, and her animals she has with her are a matter of bonding, not powers. But there's no way she could take Blackbird in a straight fight. So the real question is: Can Didn't fall asleep before Blackbird finds her? If she does, she'll poof off into time and space. If she doesn't, Blackbird kills Didn't. You monster.
-Garth: Could Garth without Powers stop Blackbird? Haha, no.
-Nopcsa: Even with Powers, Nopcsa wouldn't stand a chance.
-Helen: Falls into the Zebedee/Didn't category of "If she can leave, she just magics herself away ASAP." Otherwise, dead.
-Blaise: Like Thyra, she'll assume she can negate any gun. Like Thyra, this is a terrible idea.
-Emily: This actually would be a hell of a thing, because I could see Emily calling in the Obsidian Hearts, and things would get incredibly messy. Emily straight up on her own though, likely wouldn't be able to beat Blackbird.
-Lacianus: This would be one hell of a close fight; Lacy's not a Power, but has peak human skills, fine tuned for gunplay. It'd be a crazy, crazy gun battle that goes down, but I think Blackbird would take it, due to his pragmatism, experience, and willingness to kill.
-George Buckland: This is not a remotely fair fight. Blackbird may very well be the best assassin in the world, but George has dozens of assassins at his beck-and-call. Not to mention he very well might just fly/teleport away and nuke the entire country, just to be safe.
So, how about your casts?
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Post by The Evil Biscuit on Nov 11, 2015 14:02:52 GMT -5
LOL this is great.
Agree on all counts here. Bird is highly skilled, but he's not some mind-bending uberninja who's physical ability is just as potent as to be a Power into itself.
On his subconscious ability - while I don't know and don't particularly care to define the range of his negation, it's safe to say it's probably larger than a single room and likely smaller than a city block. Let's say 50 meters in any direction, so 100 meters in diameter. He doesn't have to be aware of a Power to negate them. He simply radiates anti-power.
EDIT: For continuity's sake we will assume that any manifested power that Blackbird's 'aura' comes into contact with is not negated, but the source of that power is. To explain - if Bird's aura diameter is 100m and Zebedee stands at 110m and chucks a fireball at him, that fireball is not affected by anything once it enters the anti-power zone, and will travel all the way to Bird. Zeb could stand at range and fire off his blasts all day. However, should Zeb (being the source of the fireballs) enter the zone, he will be unable to manifest his magical abilities. Additionally, if someone is casting any sort of spell or illusion and Bird walks into it, that spell or illusion will remain active and have a direct influence on Bird until he comes within range of the actual caster, at which point the ability is negated. So take that into consideration as well.
One of the key weapons in his arsenal is the mystery of the power itself. It's not public knowledge (though some sleuthing could probably turn it up) and he's not aware of it so he can't use it to bolster his advantage any more than it already is. However, most of the Powers he's killed (not many as of today) were not aware of it either, and chose to open the engagement with their now-defunct power. It is that small window of opportunity that gets them killed. So another question you all should ask yourselves is, 'Would my character open with or immediately rely on their Power against the Blackbird?' Physical fighters have a very level playing field right off the bat.
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Post by Yoshimitsu on Nov 11, 2015 14:05:00 GMT -5
Good topic! I get the feeling the majority of everyone's characters are gonna be "would definitely die". My immediate thoughts:
Yoshimitsu - I think I'd actually give this to Yoshimitsu. Stripping away his powers limits his arsenal of weapons to anything he's carrying on him which immediately puts him at a disadvantage, but the deciding factor I think is Yoshimitsu's speed. A big portion is implied to be supernatural, but the guy was specifically engineered to be fast, not supersonic but still fast enough to outspeed damn near anyone. I'd give it to Yoshimitsu for that alone
Illiana - Lose. Once you get past summoning, healing, fire magic, you're left with an above-average human who can twirl a spear.
Antonio - Lose. Oh my god. (Whether he puts up a fight depends on whether Blackbird's power-negation works on enchanted objects or just people - if it's just people, he might be able to get away)
Marshall - Doesn't legally own a gun any more. Lose.
Fratley - With power negation, he loses his high-jump skill. Competent in a fight, sure, but he's just lost his key skill. Also can't use his Dragon Knight powers for an advantage.
Araini - Would potentially just... stop existing by being in Blackbird's presence. I dunno, how would Blackbird affect someone who's a vessel for a vast amount of magic?
EDIT: Ninja'd by Biscuit, will update with updated opinions later
Edit 2: Here's some updated opinions!
Yoshimitsu - Is mostly the same as above. If he can manifest a weapon before entering Blackbird's negation zone, he'd win, I think.
Illiana - Would still probably lose. While she wouldn't immediately open the fight using any magic, she'd keep it as a trump card and have a vulnerable moment when it doesn't work.
Antonio - Would be able to escape, but not fight. If he can get outside of the negation zone, he can use his deck of cards to cause enough of a distraction to escape.
Marshall - Same as above.
Fratley - Depends on whether he using a high-jump as his opener or not. If he is, that would probably give him enough of an advantage to at least fight on even ground. Could probably still go either way.
Araini - Would depend on whether he can sense Blackbird's negation zone. If he can sense an area where something is going on, he wouldn't enter it.
MORE CHARACTERS that I introduced in a short fic
Phones - Dead. At his core, all of his fighting style is limited to his power to channel through his pin badges.
Evita - Even fight. She can't manipulate gravity, sure, but she's a brawler.
Sebastian - Also dead.
Phoenix - Non-combatant. I can't imagine it'd take much for Blackbird to disconnect a robot.
Tyrell - Win. He's a sniper with no powers to speak of.
Davis - Even fight, again, though actually probably leaning more towards Blackbird. He has an unorthodox weapon that might give him an advantage, but he's not as proficient in a fight as Evita.
Lluad - Dead, irrespective as to whether the power negation stops him from shifting into 'wolf form. Out of wolf form, he's weaker but more level headed, in wolf form he's stronger but more reckless.
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Post by Beelzebibble on Nov 11, 2015 14:31:12 GMT -5
Terrian: Dead. Though, ironically, Bird's power negation gives Terrian a small advantage here; since he wouldn't be able to produce duplicates in Bird's presence, Bird would have no way of knowing whether his victim was the original or a duplicate. So he'd better nab the real Terrian on the first try, or else he's going to start finding a whole lot of duplicates and a whole not lot of the original.
Charles Tanner: Dead. His lackeys aren't skilled enough to protect him from a professional in the absence of Tanner's powers.
Channery: Probably dead. She's not a Natalie- or Rie-level combatant. Good luck to her if Bird finds her with a weapon already on her person, but otherwise, once she tries and fails to pull a rifle out of midair, she's dead.
Esther: Dead.
Deandre: Dead.
Masha & Misha: Very dead.
Hooper or Staudt: Extremely dead.
Renard: I told you, I don't consider him a Power. Also, dead.
"Haywire" Hastings: Who? Oh right, that guy from that one DL topic who can scramble electronic devices or something. He's pretty flabby. Dead.
Rhometer: If Bird comes within power-negating distance of him, the universe probably explodes. So everyone is dead.
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Post by ch00beh on Nov 11, 2015 16:46:57 GMT -5
picks up blackbird and flies away
ps. I kind of figured Blackbird's ability was a manifestation of reality warping where he subconsciously forces things to be mundane. So sufficiently advanced tech would also end up being negated.
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Post by The Evil Biscuit on Nov 11, 2015 17:12:14 GMT -5
It's possible, but I had to really tread lightly with what his power could and couldn't do with respect to other people's characters. While the original idea did start out as 'Blackbird makes people human again' I knew that being able to do that, without any real countermeasure or exception, to every character would alienate him (and me) from having worthwhile encounters with other RPers.
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Post by Tout-Perd on Nov 12, 2015 15:50:01 GMT -5
Stupid question, but what would his powers do to an obvious alien creature like Sly in his base form? Or what about a shapeshifter like Natalie? Would she be mode-locked as an animal until she got out of range, or would she poof back to her human form the moment he took effect?
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Post by The Evil Biscuit on Nov 12, 2015 16:25:40 GMT -5
That's a great question, and one I actually don't know the answer to. I think it would depend on where on the supernatural spectrum those abilities fall. Is Sly's ability purely biological in nature? If so, he's probably unaffected. Is Natalie's? If she's magical in some way, then yes, she'd revert within his effect. The same goes for technology as well. I don't see how he could negate hyper-advanced technology without also shutting down every piece of lesser technology (cars, watches, elevators, computers) in his vicinity.
It also probably doesn't have 100% effectiveness against sufficiently strong magic. It may very well be possible to overpower his effect, or stress it to failure.
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Post by Yoshimitsu on Nov 12, 2015 17:28:33 GMT -5
The same goes for technology as well. I don't see how he could negate hyper-advanced technology without also shutting down every piece of lesser technology (cars, watches, elevators, computers) in his vicinity. That's actually a super cool idea. If he can't control the negation and it flares up in response to certain threats, like, he subconsciously throws up an anti-magic field when confronted with magic but if he's confronted with advanced technology, it's an anti-technology field that's passed off as a power cut. Like a city block goes down but everyone just shrugs it off as "oh hey the power company is being shit" and it's a hide-in-broad-daylights thing. Joyeuse must have enough people on payroll to hack media to pass it off as a power cut, surely.
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Post by Silumas on Nov 12, 2015 20:18:23 GMT -5
I'm not sure how Silumas and Blackbird would interact. Without spoiling too much of who Silumas is and where he comes from, he has never been without magic...without the ability the cast. I don't think they could actually fight...as Silumas would simply be kept away when his physical form is negated by the anti-magic shell. Unless, of course, very, VERY strong magic can overcome it, then it would only be an inconvenience.
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Post by The Evil Biscuit on Nov 12, 2015 20:23:29 GMT -5
It's possible, but again recall that this is a passive 'always-on' ability. It doesn't really respond to any stimulus (though I believe that were he aware of it and actively practiced, he could control it) so he'd be shutting off the power literally everywhere he went. He'd never be able to use a cell phone or a microwave. A Power isn't shut down the moment they use their ability and he reacts to it - they're negated within 50m of him regardless, bec-
Oh. Oh.
It DOES have to be on reaction. That's why you have to knock him out to stop it. If it were wholly passive it would still be in effect if he were unconscious (as in, asleep). So there you go. Perhaps there is something to the technology angle.
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Post by Tout-Perd on Nov 12, 2015 22:50:54 GMT -5
I think of it like the "Murphyonic" field from the Dresden Files; it's a constant subconscious effect. My interpretation is that it enforces what 'bird thinks is "normal", so no throwing fireballs or turning into a dragon, and probably any tech more than ten years ahead of modern humanity is unlikely to work. So he doesn't negate technology per se, only "superscience" tech. So Natalie and Sly's shapeshifting tech would be negated, but stuff you'd see on Future Weapons, like something Lacy or Shouta might be packing, would probably still work okay.
So, the way I see it is that it's a "Rubber-band effect" for reality. Things that aren't normal snap back to what normal should be, within a certain radius of 'bird.
Which does lead to an interesting question of if one can trick Blackbird's perceptions enough, if they could "cheat" their Power. To give a simple though unlikely example; if you gave Hector a flamethrower, could he use it to justify "flames" from his powers within the normalcy zone? And would he be able to cheat it up full tilt, or only to what 'bird knew was normal for such a weapon?
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Post by The Evil Biscuit on Nov 13, 2015 0:10:41 GMT -5
I would prefer to leave it at being magic-negative (and explore the tech angle in future if and when Bird does become self-aware of his ability and it's potential). It allows us to define a very specific line of demarcation on what his power can and can't do, and keeps him grounded in a very manageable powerset (which I like, any of you that know my writing know that I stay pretty rooted in reality and enjoy writing my characters within their physical limits).
So for now, we can say that unassisted tech (tech that does not operate via magical means) is unaffected. Dimensional manipulation I'm not sure about, but since I need Bird to be able to shut down Mandelbrot for the sake of epicness I'm going to say that it is affected and attempt to explain it later.
I have started to consider its core definition as simply Negative or Subtractive Force. Call it 'The Negative'. It acts like noise cancelling. Bird's subconscious projects a subtractive force or energy against magic that nullifies its effect. As he grows in his power he may gain the ability to nullify other things: tech, organics, space, time, etc). It could be very interesting.
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Post by Lady Kara on Nov 24, 2015 17:58:51 GMT -5
Might be rather interesting (or sad, depending) how things would play out with some of mine...
~ Kara ~ = Being that Nintaku rely on martial arts and other forms of combat as much as they do on their own powers, she wouldn't be as fearful of going against Blackbird if she had to... especially since she has dealt with assassins before. But she'd also be very cautious about the whole matter since she'd rather avoid having to defend herself against him in battle. In other words, try hard not to be a target but seriously be ready to kick ass at all times. Something I'm not sure on = Would spirikin count as magic since they can possess spirithyst stones in objects? Because if this falls under the category of things Blackbird can't block, then Kara would also have her spirikin comrades as added support in a fight against him. And most of them are decent at fighting without their own powers, if they're blocked.
~ Serpentei ~ = He'd have a slightly easier time than Kara would, having been heavily trained most of his life in combat and weapon/environment utilizing. However, there is the small possibility of him having a bit of trouble in the midst of a heated battle due to current health issues (based on the timeline in 'Mirror of Urakuni'), so that'd make things dicey. But, just like Kara, he'd of course do best not to be much of a target to avoid fighting Blackbird at all cost.
~ Sagami ~ = Ehhh... not sure on him. There's the fact that he isn't as skilled in combat like his cousin, but sure as hell is badass at street fighting. He rarely ever has used his Nintaku powers (so losing them is no prob), but if spirikin were unable to be used it'd suck majorly for him since he relies on the aid of spirikin way more than his cousin has ever done. And then there's the BIG fact that he had surgery on his heart not long ago and is technically still recovering from that... so with that in mind, yeah... he'd sadly not last that long against Blackbird in a lengthy battle. XP
~ Jiyuu ~ = He may be trained in combat like most Nintaku, but his reckless attitude and hotheadedness could prove dangerous to him in battle. Also, his health isn't exactly the greatest due to a harsh life in the pocket dimension Urakuni. So it's rather iffy on whether he'd do well against Blackbird or else end up dead.
~ Nagisa ~ = She is highly skilled in sword combat, as well as in Drakyan martial arts. The added bonus of the Drakyan elves being a bit more physically stronger/heal a bit faster than humans is also useful. However... it's unclear if Blackbird would be able to block her bond with Divine Dragon Raijuu, since he's an extremely powerful creature dwelling in another dimension. At most I can see maybe her access to his power being heavily diminished, and still able to wield certain abilities in lesser strength than normal (Stormwing Armor, Thunderfang Sword, etc.). And even if Raijuu's power were to be blocked, she'd still kick major butt.
(((Should I add Sazanami Vindahl and Kamuro Hakkai, even though it's been ages since I've used them in ORP?)))
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Post by Loogs on Mar 28, 2016 2:24:26 GMT -5
hey look, it's me, hitting up old topics while I'm making searches on the forums for stuff.
Hector - This one's contingent on him avoiding gunfire well enough to get within close quarters. Career sailor and seasoned warrior vet Hector Nouveau is ripped, and if he gets the chance to get Bird in a grapple and throw some punches then he is going to beat him unconscious, and if it was actually Pleiades he was gunning for, yeah Bird would get beaten to a bloody pulp because papa bear don't pull no punches. That, or he'd lop his head off with the Tiamat Blade.
Vathalé - Eh. She was never really much of a fighter in the first place, and all of her offense capabilities lie in magic and summons. That said, she's not too shabby with a shashka, but tbh the forecast isn't sunny for 'Thale in this matchup especially considering she'd definitely try and lead with magic or summons
Halley - Halley's not actually even a Power?? The trick here would be catching her in the first place, since Halley's quite good at being slippery and fast. I'm giving this one to Halley because Bird simply wouldn't be able to get her, but if he somehow, somehow manages to corner her I don't think she'd be long for this world.
Ivan - Pffft, this flabby stoner?? Without his Stargazer magic, he's fucking dead.
Dimitri - Disqualified because he's technically not "alive". Sure, Bird could easily stop his human vessel, but what the hell are you gonna do with a floating spirit that doesn't even exist on the same physical plane as you?? You gonna shoot at it??? Dimitri's whole existence transcends magic. BONUS: Bird would then die painfully as Dimitri infiltrates his body and crushes his soul from the inside. (unless the negation trumps that. In that case, it's a stalemate.)
Nadeshi - If living, breathing dragons don't count as magic, this one goes to Nadeshi. If they do, then his chances are contingent on a) if Nadeshi was going into this fight with his guards or the army at his side and b) Nadeshi being able to get into close enough quarters to use his glaive. But who even cares about Nadeshi anyway
Pleiades - See Hector; otherwise, if Hector's not around then she's dead and also why are you killing children you monster
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Post by Beelzebibble on Jan 12, 2018 12:11:26 GMT -5
Oh, Lee, you forgot one.
-Maude: Already dead.
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