Plot post for October 13th

[theearth]

PLOTTING POST

---

This format of plot post is designed for players to ask questions and find ways to influence the plot. Be bold and ask what you can or can't do; the worst that can happen is that we will say no. As plots in Save the Earth are not self resolving nor on a time limit they can evolve in many ways. Although some potential outcomes are given, they are little more than suggestion and can be changed by character action. What role you take is up to you.

The post is also open for players to plot and coordinate between one another.

---

General notes:
• There is a "How to travel" post now.
• The atmosphere in the three echo boundaries is developing very differently and almost independently of each other, as does the atmosphere in the various affected and unaffected countries. For player convenience, we will briefly characterize the locations:
Locke: Hostile. This is to large parts due to Albero's influence, but there are also other factors. Numbered actions in the city are more likely to influence the national and international opinion of the numbered than the local one.
Vegas: Ever-changing and highly dependent on local developments. All kinds of opinions exist at all times, and it depends on the current mood which ones manifest themselves; the situation in Las Vegas is characterized by massive mood swings and extremes. Player actions may thus have a significant impact on the public opinion.
Neuschwanstein: Cautiously positive. The situation in Locke is regarded as highly condemnable, and for the most part people do not consider the numbered particularly dangerous or as having brought them trouble. Numbered actions will have an impact on the public opinion, but there is a general disinclination to jump to conclusions.
Outside of the boundaries, in is of note that while in the US the public opinion is leaning towards the negative, it leans the further to the positive the further east you go from there, and the further to the neutral the further south you go.

---

Events that occurred recently or are occurring currently:

• Media: There is a clear divide between different localities now in how the media treat reincarnates. While in Locke, the environment has grown very hostile and barely any even neutral voice remains, the numbered efforts to help their image and the fact that Albero has little influence and interest there have done something on the national level, where positive, negative and neutral voices remain in a balance, though they become less realistic by the day. Fundraisers for all kinds of causes and recipients have been started. In Las Vegas, talk of why the numbered are bad and dangerous has turned into talk of how that potential could be utilized for good, and how the numbered owe everyone that help. In Germany/Austria, the media are still more on an investigative level.

Locke City
• The mafia are once again starting to strike out at the numbered. Characters may notice small gangs of them patrolling the streets at night - if they get close enough, they may note that the animal attributes some of the goons sport are now more numerous and easy to spot.

• Public opinion of the Numbered continues to swandive. The terms "mutant" and "monster" have started to take more prominence in news stories - characters who pay attention to the media may also notice that 'Local businessman Vincent Albero' is openly offering security services for those who wish to ensure they are "safe" from the reincarnates.

Las Vegas

• Meanwhile, the insides of the mountain are in the hands of the numbered, and so far it isn't known to any non-numbered that there even are insides. By now, enough of the mountain has been cleared out and turned into inhabitable quarters to sustain a number of inhabitants. All numbered are welcome to claim a room or a whole house/storage hall in this settlement, no matter if they want to live there or only have a refuge option/homebase.

The little colony is currently run by Thorir (disdainfully), who will over the coming months take on an NPC-like role; for more information and questions refer to this thread.

Neuschwanstein Area

• Together with the pink light, a large tower showed up right slab down on the border between Germany and Austria. It was soon fenced off by police and military of both countries, entrance only permitted to those whose farms were now located inside the bottom parts of it and those that needed to visit those houses for economic reasons.
• Thanks to Julien, it is now known where the teleporter exit in the Neuschwanstein Area is: It's hidden in a cave halfway up the Pöllatschlucht Gorge which leads from the flatlands up to Neuschwanstein Castle.
• Mrs Kaufmann, who represents the civilian/local political interests in the area vis-a-vis the numbered and is also be the connective point to the civilian and military/police interests of both countries in the area, hosted a reception for the numbered at which various political, public and economic big-heads of the area were also present. It went over surprisingly well! Perhaps because certain teenagers were too hungover to show up.

---

Events occurring in the immediate future:

Locke City
• The attacks (both direct and indirect) on the Numbered in retailation to Robyn's rescue have begun, and if their intensity is anything to go by then it's safe to assume that Albero is pissed. More PMs will be sent to players who requested consequences over the coming weeks!
• The escalating animosity towards reincarnates in the media continues to have consequences. Those who are famous or clearly recognised as numbered may find themselves turned away from some establishments, and may enounter people being openly afraid or even hostile towards them.

Las Vegas
• Las Vegas being Las Vegas, the despair about all the destruction is already drawing to a close: Bright minds have realized how awesome it will be to rebuild the strip ON THE MOUNTAIN. Because just think how awesome it will be to have an incredibly tasteful fountain on the mountaintop, or a blinking sparkling fairytale castle half-suspended high above. Or a glass pyramid two hundred feet above the desert build sideways against the mountain so that you can look aaall the way down while you gamble. And all the new exciting ways to install elevators! SO MANY OPTIONS!!! And don't forget a fake Venice that now has A WHOLE LAKE TO WORK WITH. And yeah, that with the airport was unlucky, but the land of pioneers doesn't let any calamity stop it from moving, so North Las Vegas Airport has seen a change in purpose and is facing significant growth while options are evaluated (you can't really put all that many gambling machines in there, it's too small #LVissues).

Basically we don't know where this mountain and lake came from, but it is our mountain and lake now and we will make it bling and glitter and completely over the top. Restructuring and rebuilding, the establishment of ways of transportation and building of new houses is taking on speed, including also residential areas.

Neuschwanstein Area

• On the 18th of October, the police/military will open the premises of the strange new tower to everyone who can prove to be numbered or whom a proven numbered can vouch for. An exploration log with details on the tower will have gone up by then. Everyone who tries to enter before then will do so illegally and potentially get into a lot of trouble, please check with a mod about that if you want to do it.

Eugen (buildyourworld) will be the official representative of the American military in this. The German and Austrian representatives official leaders of the expedition will be David Graibiger and Monika Hallbach.

• The two people leading the tower exploration on the Austrian/German side, Mrs Monika Hallbach and Mr David Graibiger, will also recruit for a special unit consisting of numbered who now stay in Austria/Germany and operating as a special commission group of volunteers. Everyone can have their character sign up for this here.

---

Events potentially occurring in the immediate future:

• In the same vein as the special commission unit in Germany/Austria, the FBI will in due time start to recruit a few additional numbered into its ranks. Somewhat more picky, they want only adults. Combat abilities are not necessary.

• To disseminate information from non-numbered NPCs more easily, we would like to have them recruit numbered contact persons. To sign up here, you will only require an IC contact post for this so the NPC can call/text/email your character. We will then either log or handwave the occasion in which the contact is made and relevant data are exchanged.

---

Potential Echo Opportunities

• Encountering a ghost-like presence, a Vermini, a Vermedi, a Vermaxi for the first time grants one plot echo each.
• Using the teleporter for the first time will grant one plot echo.

Locke City
• Encounters with an altered Mafia subordinate grants one plot echo if the character never received an echo from encountering an altered Blood Key.

Neuschwanstein Area
• Encountering a wolpertinger for the first time will grant one plot echo.


Please direct questions regarding these plot points to the thread below and not the post in general.

Comments

General Questions

[theearth]

Re: General Questions

[guitar_case_vagabond]

Regarding run-ins with the mafia gangs in Locke City. If there was a character who... I dunno, say, was intending to embark on a violent vengeance rampage are such encounters open for players to NPC on their own, or should we request mod NPCing? Also, roughly how powerful/well-equipped would these guys be?

[gogoghostpowers]

So the mountain in Vegas is hollowed out for numbered inhabitance now...

...what about the hotel(s) that Petunia offered up for them? Is she still offering the numbered some rooms, or has the whole kidnapping thing made her back off?

EDIT: also what if a numbered went to a casino/hotel's management and was like "hey, so I can put on a REAL magic show for you"? Would they spring for it? How much would they be willing to pay? Jovan would charge as much as he POSSIBLY CAN. And make them buy him the gaudiest, most outrageous outfit for it.

[scramasax]

I'm seeking to death-or-disappearances drop with Anthony here - it's already been cleared with my CR; I'm also dropping this here to insure it won't spotlight-hog on anything!

Are tempers hot enough toward Locke City's "monsters" that one could run - fatally afoul of civilian/"vigilante" violence (everyone knows what the best way to kill a zombie is), and/or would a mafia-arranged "disappearance" while trying to clear one's name of their so-called consequences be plausible? Would one be more convenient on your end for any reason? If it doesn't matter, as a note, I'm leaning toward planning the former!

(I am not happy asking these questions mind you - dear lord I am seeking to pick someone else up.)

Re: General Questions

[detectivetroll]

So not exactly where I was expecting to go, but with Anthony's death, Nick is definitely going to be looking to speed up things with taking out the mafia. If the Numbers people who were pissed off enough to do something very stupid tried to take out as many high-ranking mafia members as possible, how feasible would that be?

This might be something I should throw to people first and see which characters would want in and what firepower they'd have, but I wanted to double check that Nick's in enough to probably know some locations or meetings - or even try to set one up himself, although obviously this is waaay going to blow his cover.

[gobybessie]

So John would like to pursue legal shit. Like. Checking if the discrimination towards Numbered could be battled or stopped or if they have any stand legally whatsoever etc. etc. Is there anywhere in the US he could get his hands on some friendly attourney or judge or... anything who might be able to help?

Re: General Questions

[buildyourworld]

Could we have more information of the Numbered Special Commission Group? What's the structure like and what can we expect if our character is to join it?

[purestambition]

So, after fishing for interest both OOC and with Saretha's post over here and trying to get a feel for things well enough, here's a question before I approach the media post - how successful would Saretha be approaching media outlets outside Locke City? She's not necessarily thinking local newspapers or stations in this regard - the CNNs of the world, your talk shows (morning, midday, nighttime - doesn't matter), hell, she'll even harass whatever equivalent we have of The Daily Show if she has to, or have hired hands do it for her. Constantly.

Basically, places that don't have a centralized location bias besides 'MURRICA. Of course there's also channels that have their own biases, but this is why we consider Fox News the last resort. As well as Germany/Austria, as she'll be harassing media outlets there, too.

Contact person sign ups

[theearth]

A contact person is a numbered character who will relay information/requests from a non-numbered NPC to the network; this is an infrequent and very rare task, but might require posting within a set time-frame of a few days around a certain date. NPCs in need of such contact persons are:
The three aliens; various media NPCs in Las Vegas and the Neuschwanstein Area; the Bonbrights; Kaufmann and a politician in Las Vegas and Locke each; Hallbach/Graibiger; eventually the FBI.

<b>Character:</b> Name <b>Primary area(s):</b> Which echo boundary/ies do they spend most of their time in? <b>Link to character's IC contact post:</b> <b>Do you have a preference?:</b> Any NPC that you would absolutely not want your character to be the contact person of/that you would absolutely want to see them connected to.

[buildyourworld]

Character: Eugen Lambert
Primary area(s): Currently he's stationed in Neuschwanstein but will travel to Locke or Vegas by teleporter if necessary.
Link to character's IC contact post: HERE
Do you have a preference?: No preference

[peacefulwinter]

Character: Winter Adamas
Primary area(s): All of them! Right now, Neuschwanstein, but she spends at least some time in Vegas every day. Her home is in Locke. So, uh, anywhere?
Link to character's IC contact post: Right here.
Do you have a preference?: Winter has no particular preference; there's a player conflict with FBI information, since I also play an agent (Kevin, truthcharted), but Winter herself will happily share anything passed along to her.

[gogoghostpowers]

Character: Danny Fenton/Cure Phantom (by which I mean Cure Phantom right now, but Fenton may get outed as a numbered at some point, not sure yet)
Primary area(s): Locke City
Link to character's IC contact post: here, which is Danny Fenton's contact, but Cure Phantom's got a twitter set up for him that he sometimes checks.
Do you have a preference?: I like dem aliens, but I'm also open to anything!

[grannyfucker]

Character: Jovan Burzek
Primary area(s): Las Vegas
Link to character's IC contact post: bam (I cannot believe I didn't have one before just now)
Do you have a preference?: Nope, hit me up with anything!

[professorwolf]

Character: Randall/Randolph Lyall
Primary area(s): Right now it's split between Locke and Neuschwanstein.
Link to character's IC contact post: Recently created just for this opportunity.
Do you have a preference?: Kaufmann seems an obvious one, or the aliens, since he doesn't trust them as much anymore and it could be an interesting dynamic. Also open to the FBI. Would prefer not the media.

[espigeonage]

Character: Julien
Primary area(s): Neuschwanstein like five days a week, the rest in Vegas.
Link to character's IC contact post: Here
Do you have a preference?: No preference! He's talked to Kaufmann twice.

[ursoreckless]

Character: Chinen Shou
Primary area(s): Locke City
Link to character's IC contact post: Here
Do you have a preference?: Shou is mainly known by the Japanese locals as being an upright guy, good for keeping his word and not a person to mess with. He also still hangs out with the yakuza people though he took a step back from gang stuff because he doesn't want anything to do with those freaking Italians. He also has a lot of connections to Japan politicians and financial groups. So up to you what will work best for him :3

[alilyinthemoonslight]

Character: Lily Tsukuyomi
Primary area(s): Same as Winter above; primarily Neuschwanstein while making trips to Vegas to help with rebuilding, and intermediate visits to Locke whenever necessary, but generally trying to not make herself very known there..
Link to character's IC contact post: Here!
Do you have a preference?: Lily is becoming increasingly wary of certain extraterrestrials here and there due to what a few folks have noted, but would still relay information as needed, more likely than not. Beyond that, no preferences.

[purestambition]

Character: Saretha Kaiser
Primary area(s): Las Vegas presently, mostly scarce in Locke City unless relevant, but can frequently be found commuting to Neuschwanstein.
Link to character's IC contact post: Here, and one could assume any number of those people could find means of contacting her beyond going through her mentioned secretary there now that she's public, so I maybe should probably change that on the page. Unless one wants to do that, then we'd need to bring her player in for it.
Do you have a preference?: BRING HER POLITICIANS AND MEDIA AND AUTHORITIES. She's already eyeing all of you people. But any would be fine, in the end.

[gobybessie]

Character: John Smith/The Doctor
Primary area(s): Locke City
Link to character's IC contact post: Here
Do you have a preference?: N/A

Deliberations of a mod

[theearth]

Thorir has been a dilemma for me for a while now: On the one hand, it would be OOC for him to not make him care about the Lonely Mountain and have him want to control the situation there to provide for his friends and family and the numbered. On the other hand, I'm a mod, and I really don't want to seem like I'm abusing my mod powers to further the influence of one of my characters...

Now, I have arrived at the idea to turn this dilemma on the head and use the fact that a character who has the potential of being of some influence for the developments in Las Vegas is in mod hands for the advantage of the plot there. For the next "local arc" in LV, he will take on a bit of an NPC role by being a catalyst for certain events. This month, that won't mean much yet: All that he will do is offer residence inside the mountain to anyone. But a little more is to come, but I will do my best to balance his role carefully.

I am not sure yet what exactly all of this will end up entailing, but I wanted to try and be transparent about it. If there are any thoughts/question/whatever regarding this, please leave it here. Thanks!

On the subject of mafia counter measures...

[purestambition]

...that do NOT involve murdering a ton of thugs that'll only make them look even worse.

This is a thing Saretha wants to look in to, especially as Albero is now basically mocking them publicly. She also realizes that such a thing might need to be something which needs to be dug into ASAP considering that and certain ... incidents of late. Still, having put herself in the spotlight puts herself at a slight disadvantage, and it's not something that can be done alone.

As such, is there anyone willing to pitch in ideas or help there?

In the next little while she'll be trying to hit media outlets in Vegas and Germany, and seeing if she can work out from there but getting a foothold in Locke now is extremely difficult. It goes beyond PR of course, as they need to find a way to get at Albero and his interests in a more ironclad manner than hearsay, which is all their knowledge of him from the Network comes down to.

Re: On the subject of mafia counter measures...

[detectivetroll]

Nick is going to be on Team Murdering a Bunch of Thugs in a little bit, but he's also got a couple of recorded conversations on the mafia's plans to frame Numbers people and some kindappings, as well as some inside knowledge of the mafia that he'll be happy to pass along.

[icy_heavens]

Yeah, Toushirou is all for stopping the mafia, but . . . uh, mass murder is no. (He isn't close enough to Robyn or even Anthony to get pissed off to the point of being stupid enough to go on a murder spree.) He's not publicly out, though (just suspected by many of his schoolmates and teachers), and I doubt he'd want to change that right now. But finding other ways to take 'em down is something he'd be in for.

Numbered Special Comission Group Sign Ups

[theearth]

Please use this format:

<b>Name:</b> Name + username <b>Staying in:</b> <b>Name used officially:</b> Whatever they'd give a governmental institution.

[dorkytracksuit]

Name: Davin, dorkytracksuit
Staying in: Locke, I'm more interested in him staying in AMERICA, but he's desperate to be useful so he would go to Germany if that was the only be in a helpful group option
Name used officially: Davin Carter

Team Take Out the Mafia with Violence

[detectivetroll]

So okay! Ran things by the mods, and Nick definitely has enough insider information to know the locations of large/high-profile mafia member meetings, as well as potentially the location of where the mafia members are getting their modifications done.

After Anthony's death indirectly caused by the mafia, Nick's going to want to put this information to potentially not very smart use.

AKA he's going to want to try to take out as many high-profile mafia members as possible, potentially even gunning for Albero himself. He's got recorded conversations and other insider info that he'll pass on to Team Smarter Mafia Counter Measures, but he'll be looking for anyone on the network who wants to try to take them out for good.

He'll post on the network with the information he has and a vague plan - basically just that he wants to launch as big of an attack as possible - and look for anyone who has firepower who wants to help and/or who may have some better ideas.

SO BASICALLY who wants in on this?

[dominateartimus]

Xander would be willing to take part, due to Anthony's sake and partially to get revenge for the other attacks.