#scattering theory

[angryducktimemachine]

Aromanticism Zine but it's just my incoherent thoughts.

[babacontainsmultitudes]

I'm gonna be so fr I actually did feel a little bad for the dollmaker what do you mean it looks like a caterpillar what do you mean it was trying to leave this world???

[sunlight-shunlight]

pondering that falon'din is associated with an owl, and those are also messengers of andruil. and he's referred to as "winged death" which is also mentioned to be something that elgar'nan deploys against enemies. and both falon'din and andruil are referred to as venturing into dark places, where no one else can survive/wanted to go.

and ghilan'nain was not initially an evanuris, but was antagonistic towards them and making a bunch of weird creatures. she was given the offer to join them in return for getting rid of the creatures, and accepted. but with "pride stopping her hand" from destroying a few. and when asked about trusting people to share power, solas says "I know that mistake well enough to carve the angles of her face from memory."

solas also has nothing good at all to say about falon'din, mostly calling him a bloodthirsty tyrant who went so far in encroaching onto other evanuris territory that mythal had to besiege his temple and beat him up to stop him.

but he says nothing about dirthamen at all.

dirthamen is described as having gone missing unexpectedly, scaring all his followers, because they were now unprotected. and caught between their own high priest wanting to lock them into the temple forever like a cask of amontillado, and other forces outside that wanted to take their secrets by force. there is one note that a dirthamen follower defied the evanuris and took on a forbidden (probably a dragon) type of form, and was judged by elgar'nan harshly. he apparently also invented the varterral to protect his town from a high dragon? wack, but also could indicate that he had worked with ghilan'nain on making it, since she's the only one who's otherwise mentioned to be bioengineering stuff.

dirthamen has very very few surviving statues or depictions, and is more associated with falon'din than as his own independent figure in the dalish myths. even his own temple includes mosaics of falon'din. there's a few statues that are probably dirthamen, but the most striking is in mythal's section of the fade behind the eluvian, which is a statue of a hooded figure, doubled over with a giant sword sticking out of his back.

[vespula-acadica]

I so badly want to study the genetics of tlt universe

[hopefulmuffins]

rewatching Link Click season 2 again and a thought hit me

How is Lu Guang still in his body after being possessed multiple times? It's been shown that once someone uses their power on a person who is already under the influence of another power it cancels out the old one and is replaced with the new. So CXS possessing him would/should have kicked him out followed by LTC possessing him afterwards with no pictures in between or afterwards, so no chances for him to repossess himself. BUT I was thinking, if enough changes have happened to this timeline maybe the future LG came from really doesn't exist anymore and therefore he has nowhere to return to so maybe he just gets locked inside his body like everybody else? Possible plot hole? (I hope not, that would be a heck of a hole)

[thefirstknife]

I can't believe I'm over here crying about Ahamkara romance. Timestamped link to the drawn cutscene from today and lore from the bow. Feelings things and stuff about this.

So the one who scattered the eggs was Riven's mate, Taranis, and he did it to save their children after Riven got Taken. He was also one of the arguably good Ahamkara who didn't bargain to trick people, but would instead keep those wishes clean which hurt him instead. He also granted himself his own wish, something that kills an Ahamkara; his wish was for the eggs to be safe until someone could protect them.

He had his lair in the Black Garden because he was safe there and this is where hs invited Riven so they could be safe together to have eggs. But then Ahamkara Hunt happened and Riven got Taken and they got separated forever. Genuinely crying about space dragons rn.

Super interesting details from Taranis about how he took the toll of the wishes on himself instead of hurting those that made the wishes, proving that Ahamkara don't have to inherently do things to trick people. It's also an interesting tidbit about them being able to grant their own wishes, but at the cost of their own life.

The exotic mission will have 4 catalysts to find, which will presumably be spread through 4 weeks and finishing each one will give lore so the missing lore book is from this mission which means there's still stuff to learn! We'll have to wait for it though.

Incredibly cool mission in a really nice environment of the Black Garden that's completely new! Still interested in the Vex though and how they perceived this whole Ahamkara business and if maybe an Ahamkara existing in the Black Garden has something to do with the stuff they're involved with right now. Really can't wait to get more from this mission in the lore book.

[puhpandas]

1 month until sotm 🙏

[jwcc-confessions]

do you guys remember when liking benrius wasn't an unpopular opinion...? i personally like both ships but ive noticed that majority of the newer fans prefer benji (or bengia, if we're counting that)... to be honest, i hardly ever see people who ship benrius anymore.

I feel like I saw a lot more Benrius at the end of CC because it was the only viable ship left in canon but tbf with CT I've seen a slight shift. I guess because Darius is now canonically in love with B and she is newly single, the Dinostar shippers have had a resurgence and that left a gap open for the Benji shippers to slip right in. Albeit a smaller gap, since some people respect Bengia being canon

[morn-yvri-winters]

Fun CogDis Fact [+ Some Theory Crafting & Regards to Lore itself] (STORY SPOILERS... for a 15 year old fan-game)

So i was doing some data mining (as in looking inside of the game files for fun to see how the game ticks and works, and boy howdy let me tell you, RPG Maker 2003's UI scares me, props to Otherhand for navigating through these... many variables, numbers, & symbols going on, because it honestly overwhelms me) I had learned that:

Cerue appears in the Maria & George Magicant Flashback as one of the background Gieegs behind the windows. While this most likely is just a matter of reusing sprites, it should also be noted that not all Gieegs in the "allthegoogs" sprite sheet actually get used. Like, i want to say around 3/4ths of them actually ever get used (there are a total of 4 Gieegs in "allthegoogs".

(UPDATE 1: She's actually present for one more scene, i think? For whatever reason, her event handler has two pages but she appears for both pages, from what i can guess, she is meant to be the Gieeg that appears during the sequence where Maria & George are walking down the hallway [i think i want to say when George wants to show off the mental amps to Maria, since they share similar variables "0049: maction", which is meant to be the activation of an event via some number inputted by some handler)

(UPDATE 2: Yep, she is present for the scene when George & Maria head to the giant vault door to then breach using the Mental Amplifier Device, yet she doesnt seem to look, which could mean Otherhand forgor to make her turn or she wasnt meant to be there)

Another fun fact, the two Gieegs (referred to as goog 1 & goog 2 internally) that appear when Giegue has his overstimulation moment by Maria's Melody are actually using Giegue's Sprite Sheet (referred to as "Newgiegue")

(a part of me wanted to say its probably due to Giegue being the only "stock-standard" looking gieeg to have a moving sprite, but that isnt even remotely true since the gieegs from "allthegoogs" ALSO have walk sprites as well)

...the fact that the misc googs dont get used here either really feels like there was some manner of implication there by the dev. Personally i feel like its meant to imply that this is Giegue's actual parents but that would be a MONSTROUS conclusion to jump to, especially when there is ZERO mention about the BG Gieegs other than them appearing in scenes and the "(They're watching)" interaction.

Actually, the only real plausible theory to make here would be that Cerue was around for the Human Caretaker Experiment/Goog's Arrival to the Solar System. I mean, the fact that she knows about Giegue and refers to him as an anomaly, seems to imply she knows a LOT more about Giegue (as in a majority of his history/biography) than what the player already knows (who he is, what he is, what he becomes, etc.), in addition, she has a Starman in a chamber and seems to know about their origin/capabilities, even calling their transformation into Starmen a mistake yet compliments the design itself.

Which reminds me of something else, the timeline of events in CogDis which are awfully questionable in terms of order (at least for 1 to 4):

"QUESTIONABLE" TIME OF EVENTS

(190X) - The Gieegs arrive to the Solar System and successfully neutralize the Martian's Space Station's Inhabitants to ensure they have the element of Surprise on their hand.

(190X) - The Gieegs arrive to Mars and engage in war against the Martians. They are successful in doing so and assimilate the Martians into their Army/Empire as the "Starmen" (?).

(190X) - Maria & George find Giegue out in the wild, they are then kidnapped and Maria is supposedly in a mini coma for over a week??? Regardless, George & Maria take care of Googie (also George works out some arrangements with the Gieegs to make sure that everything is comfortable to their liking).

(190X) - 2 or so years later, the event occurs, Maria gets Magicant'd and George runs away with the Mental Amplifiers.

(190X -> 198X) - Mother 1's Back Story involving George's Return to Earth occurs and eventually leads to the events of Mother 1 itself (also apparently PSI spreads out across Earth itself?).

I refer to this as being "questionable" as I am highly unsure as to whether or not the Gieegs were the only ones present on the Mothership OR if the Gieegs had done Mars dirty, assimilated the Martians into their Army as the Starmen and then went to Earth.

Personally a part of me wants to believe its potentially the former, as them getting pissed off at Humanity and taking it out on the Martians seems fitting in terms of MOTHER/Earthbound Logic (problem is that this wouldnt really align too well with the Mars' Data Log).

However it might actually be the latter considering that the Gieegs come from outside the Solar System, and by this time the Martians are the only one with a Space Station/Satellite, them getting neutralized by the Gieegs feels fitting, as the Gieegs themselves REALLY dont like it when another race has PSI (or at least, if they do, they dont like them being a potential threat to their goals, whatever THAT may be).

[tl;dr version of this paragraph, either they got super pissy and took out their hate on Mars or they are the equivalent to the Viltrumite Empire from INVINCIBLE and neutralized Mars so nobody would know and potentially warn others who about their arrival]

(now im thinking of the "THINK MARK! THINK!" meme in my head but with Giegue & [insert fitting character role here])

(Also if you're wondering why i've come to such a strong assumption about the Gieegs, it mainly has to do with a friend of mine bringing up a really good point when i was discussing lore stuff about my sona's world (aka the one in my pfp and which i have a ref sheet to), that being "Why would a race that seems peaceful, need weapons of mass destruction to defend themselves? That would imply that they aren't peaceful in the slightest or have blood on their hands." and it sorta stuck with me. Like, the best example I can currently think of is: An alien race comes down to Earth and says "we come in peace" and then pulled out a nuke and vaporized an entire forest after one deer spooked them; thats sorta what the Gieegs feel like to me whenever i think about them now, CogDis obviously doesnt make them peaceful and afr kind of 'shifty' but Official Mother (Game) Lore never actually quite describes what their intentions even were in the first place, only that they were afraid of Humanity having access to PSI and that Giegue needed to stop them)

Actually, i find it even more weird as to what could have possibly had occurred to the other Gieegs. So if we were to go by the theory of "Cerue being around", then there was probably at least... Three to Four unique Gieegs total?

(Hell, maybe there could of been even more aboard the Mothership for all we know, considering that when Maria is running through the halls, she mentions that the aliens on board all sorta just looked at them without stopping them, never brings up if they were just other Gieegs or what, just that they were being observed)

We know Cerue could have potentially disembarked at some random point (maybe potentially after the Human Caretaker Experiment OR after the Mars Invasion, depending upon which happens first) and goes into hiding on Mercury, basically collecting various creatures from around the Solar System (some either being alive or dead).

We do not know what happens to the other 2 to 3 Gieegs except that they were present for the Human Caretaker Experiment & The Invasion of Mars, as they were most likely responsible for the majority of opposition & were described as being all-powerful by the Mars Super Computer's City Records, so I imagine only a few were needed to take over.

Giegue is the only one around on the Mothership (excluding Niiue) but doesn't know where Cerue went.

(...potentially, Niiue's dialogue about him knowing that she doesn't want to meet him could imply that he's referring to his true identity as Giegue & knows that Cerue possibly sensed him but as Giegue and not his own unique being, which is why she said she only trusted the Applechasers [the main 4] and doesnt try to erase their memory).

(WARNING LINKS LEAD TO FANDOM WIKI, CARRY A BLOCKER) Oddly enough, the fandom wiki for Earthbound has a really interesting tidbit of a theory regarding as to what Giegue's Race even was or what may have happened to them (since after Mother 1, Giegue's People gets ZERO mention), mentioning that after he returned to the ship, he may have ended up killing his people in a fit of distress & deterioration before eventually transforming into Giygas, but its fandom wiki so take it with a tablespoon of salt.

(if youre wondering "why not use WikiBound?", it mainly tends to be game information rather than like, external media information..? Idk, i personally feel like i found more substance to Giegue's Fandom Page than compared to his WikiBound Page)

something i will mention however, is that the fandom wiki uses a lot of information from the novel for Mother 1 (apparently?) as a means to sorta fill in information regarding events that occur between the games. Also its the only wiki with a page regarding Giegue's Race, also this really cool illustration of the Mothership:

Anyhoot, I'm done rambling now, i just sorta wanted to share this because it was on my mind. Gonna stop now before my brain overheats and combusts from thinking too much, also i am hungry, its lunch.

(UPDATE, 12/23/202X, I've realized Cerue's Sprite has different opacities, which might mean that she's been sticking around quite a bit when George makes his discoveries & when the two escape)

[michaelnumber73]

I feel a touch called out

[tvckerwash]

I hc wash and south (and by proxy, north) as all being ODSTs prior to pfl and one thing I really like about hcing them as such is that it adds another layer of depth to why they were all chosen to be a part of the recovery force.

ODSTs are a special forces unit within the marines, and they're generally used as force amplifiers and in high risk or sensitive operations. two such scenarios include the recovery or recapture of personal and high level assets behind enemy lines, as well as deep reconnaissance and intelligence gathering. ODSTs are also used in politically sensitive operations, which pfl was following the crash of the moi.

so basically, who better to be on the recovery force than former ODSTs who already have a background doing the kind of work that would need to be done?

this also adds to some of the tension between north and south as well imo, as while they're a great team who are capable of working together they clearly have two very different skillsets—south is not portrayed as someone who has the patience necessary for long reconnaissance missions, and part of the reason why team b failed so spectacularly is because two snipers and an intelligence operative are not a good choice for a smash and grab mission. had north been replaced with south things would've probably went way better for them, because south is actually fairly similar to wash in her "get in, get it done, get out" mentality, though where wash comes off as more methodical and is willing to take that "wait and see" approach, south throws caution to the wind and has a "we'll cross that bridge when we get there" approach.

this is probably why wash and south were (on paper at least) going to get eta and iota—south would've benefited greatly from having an ai that was afraid and anxious as it would force her to slow down and think things through more, and wash getting an ai that was happy and cheerful would force him to loosen up a bit and be less high-strung and serious.

[wazzappp]

Weird thought. Could be sad or could be dark.

What if Movie!Khaji Da is acting/was acting at least in the beginning of it?

Like, the Siri/Alexa/Cortana/thing. What if that’s fake, and the Scarab is acting to make them (mostly Jaime) less afraid of it. Either bc it’s aware of pop culture opinion around AI (and is downplaying itself so they’re not scared of it so much), or is still loyal to the Reach and wants Jaime to trust it bc it’s an infiltrator.

So skittish Khaji Da acting robotic and hiding its emotions until like the end of the movie, post the synchronization thing (bc it’s scared of their opinions).

Or Khaji Da working to gain Jaime’s trust and pretending to not understand human stuff (and playing into pop culture expectations of androids/ai/robots/etc) so that way he doesn’t question the whole “world killer” thing.

Either long-term manipulation with bad ending (reach takeover), or Khaj slowly comes to actually care for Jaime/his family (possibly bc the Reach do treat it like an Alexa [actually wait 3rd option, it acts like an Alexa for a while bc it was made to act like that (subservient, emotionless) for the Reach, and thinks they want it to act like that?], while the Reyes’ actually like. Address it. And care about each other. [and possibly Khaji Da itself] So it starts to feel guilty, decides “fuck the Reach” and comes clean to Jaime.

Have this mess (unproofread) bc I am procrastinating on other tasks.

(If general/non-body horror ideas are not something you’re interested in, you can tell me to stop)

ACK FUCK SO SORRY THIS TOOK SO LONG TO GET TO I THOUGHT I RESPONDED TO IT ALREADY I JUST CHECKED MY ASKS AAAAUGHHHH!!!

I really do enjoy khaji being more mechanical just because it's how they are. In my opinion it makes their development so impactful because it requires them to literally break their own coding. Go against the very fabric of your being, what you were MADE for, to try and be something more like yourself even though you don't know who that is yet.

Khaji only PRETENDING to be more robotic has some very very interesting potential though. Attempting to fit in a box your entire existence and then literally only being accepted once you step outside that box? Jeez, what a disorienting experience. My poor little murder bug :'(. They would probably end up needing a LOT of reassurance from Jaime. Just in subtle ways to make sure it's truly better that they behave as a person and not a tool. It would take soooo much time to build khajis self confidence and autonomy back up from that. Therapy. SOOOOO much therapy for the both of them on god.

[gaymakima]

You've heard of "Raven is Ruby's father" theories, now get ready for "Adam is the OTHER Rosebird child"

[art-of-mathematics]

The task I wanted to do:

- task 1: Visualize the fourth dedekind number

What I needed to do in order to do task 1:

- task 1.1: Draw a hypercube and

- task 1.2: then give each of the 16 vertices a name - which is the 16 different "cells" (I dunno which word to use, sorry) of a venn diagram with 4 overlapping sets plus a circle around that 4-venn diagram.

- - -- ---

//additional info: For the 3rd dedekind number visualization I already posted I needed to use 20 cubes. Each of the 8 vertices of a cube was related to 3 sets - A, B and C - and the intersections of these sets. (AB, AC, BC, ABC)

You remember this post:

... and these details:

...and now back to the 4th dedekind number, which follows the same principle, - but in 4 dimensions.

- So we need a hypercube - and a 4th set/letter:

Now we have 4 letters - alias 4 sets

- and 11 combinations of these sets:

AB, AC, AD, BC, BD, CD, (6)

ABC, ABD, ACD, BCD, (4)

ABCD (1)

=> 11 different intersections + 4 "pure" sets. (sorry for ignorant wording)

So, we have 15 of these now. What is with the 16th (as the hypercube has 16 vertices)? Yeah, that one is the circle you imagine around the 4-set venn diagram.

- - -- ---

This is a 4-set venn diagramm btw:

--- -- - -

So, back to me attempting to do the 4th dedekind-number visualization:

So I started to draw that venn diagram using ellipses, but I slightly altered it, because I wanted to use my isometric grid paper. (The angles of my drawing are different than in the picture depicted above.)

I started to draw the 4 ellipses, and I somehow started to see two intertwined/interlocked tubes due to the additional helplines I used for drawing.

Then I started to use my thicker black pen to make this effect of these two interlocked tubes more visible:

Now I plan to write the sets/letters at the backside of that piece of paper - in mirrored, so I can hold this piece of paper (with the tube drawing in front) against the light - and see the letters of the set names shining through.

i might also add some details to the tubes.

[day-mark]

okay the one downside of making aus based on other media is that sometimes people dont know wtf youre talking about 😭 but this is ludwigs lore in the game,, does anyone see the vision of dream having a similar fate for this au..

[mbirnsings-71]

the curse of sudden OC brain rotting is I am in fact the one who has to make content for them it's sooooo-