Great question, axle.

I kind of answered it above. I'd say, "hey fellas and gals, we are going to space-opera/sci-fi/Cthulhu it up tonight! So check this out...this is some of the kind of stuff I mean, for tonight's "flavor"/genre/atmosphere.... "The Star Whale..."

Players: "Ohhhhh, interesting..." (they get ideas and start chattering...) GM: *Grins* (and get ideas from their chatterings...)

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I liked the lecture, perhaps the Golgafrinchan's didn't make up that whole space goat idea. You give us the concept of the space whale. It is an interesting idea for explaining mass extinctions because it forces a view human existence that includes the humanity as citizens of the galaxy. But because the space whale is so difficult for humanity or any person to interact with the idea it is difficult to engage with. Thus like the lecturer we are left with nothing to do but throw up the hands of imaginations.

What can you say about giant untouchable (almost unknowable) space whales ( that treat our planet like a cookie jar) that sucks.

Perhaps Moby Dick and the space whale are the last elements of nature that man can not conquer and thus must turn to religion in order to understand his role in the universe? But Moby Dick and Ahab had history, a relationship. There can be no personal relationships with a star whale.

You could go out and look for Moby Dick. You could look for and physically wrestle with the embodiment of natural death living among man's violent oppression and exploitation of the natural world.

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So how would you unpack this to for your group? Go to Comment

I re-read this yesterday at Aramax's urging, and there was one point on which I was mistaken when I first read this. I had thought (I am not sure why) that the star whales were much bigger than they are described here. I was picturing beast hundred of thousands of kilometers long that could be "seen" by radio telescopes light years away. I was picturing things that existed in a different dimension of size as well energy and their passing through the solar system was destructive as they absorbed energy and matter.

I think perhaps the citizens of the cosmic era could indeed interact with these things or at least make an attempt to do so. They are not written as unknowable a beast as they are literally described to be.

But on the re-read I was also reminded that seminar presented here is the real gem of this piece. Go to Comment

Absolutely perfect addition to the Mythos. I'm a sucker for anything remotely Lovecraftian. My whole years long D&D game was just so, and these would have fit just right. I will DEFINITELY use this at some point!. I agree the lecture was great. Go to Comment

Of anything on this site ,I WILL use this as an epic baddie in a game,will run mini or maxi campaign around concept. Can't tell you how much I love this except w more HOHs
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Took this sub as core statement of my new campaign, working all the game logic around this(although I'm doing the destruction cycles as 1000 years)Thanx so much for the inspiration!!!!!!!! Go to Comment

For me the issue with Lovecraft in RP is that it breaks down when it comes to the players. The point of these things is that they are unknowable and so beyond the pale of understanding. So how is a star-whale supposed to be usable in a game other than background flavor?

That being said, the idea of the invisible food chain is an excellent one. What happens when a space whale dies? Are there decomposers? Scavengers?

Props to Aramax for the HoH, this was an enjoyable read I would have missed. Go to Comment

Devil and Kuma are my fav's . Really? No other comments shame on you Strolenites! Letting this unknown gem flounder! 5/5

Commenting Challenge Go to Comment

If there is a comic book it is a safe assumption that I have not read it, I don't read comics as I do not appreciate the medium.

The Cosmic Era is meta material, and I am building it, I haven't quite wrapped a skin around it, but I am trying. This all started under the pretense of being a game that I and fellow nerds could play at the bar while our wives and SOs did their thing at a horse show. It's been a long sustained effort.

i am planning on writing stories from this material, and a lot of this is a mixture of world building, integrating things I want to integrate into the setting, and exorcising ideas from my head so that I can go to sleep. This submission was written in one sitting after two drinks, so there is nothing that some editing or a second draft shouldn't fix.

What do I want from this? I want a slick RPG core book. I want 80s influenced splatbooks that fall into the GURPS feel (Cosmic Era: GI Joe sourcebook, Cosmic Era: COBRA! Sourcebook) but keep the Apple slick, anime bright, cleavage flashing, hypertech feel of the Cosmic Era. I want a novel that doesn't get put into the Sci-Fi section, I want a novel like Vonnegut, that gets filed in the Fiction section.

I want people to play the Cosmic Era, and build Cloud Strife, Liu Kang, and Lady Jaye go rampaging on a mission to stop Soundwave's plan to deploy a sonic mind control generator. Go to Comment

My audience here at the Citadel?

In a nutshell, peers. I see everyone as being equally involved in writing, creative exercises, and world building.

Goals inside the Citadel? That is another good question, mostly because I don't have a good answer to that, other than I would like to see the Cosmic Era 'finished' in that there is a central submission that flows out to other submissions, and eventually that be turned into a PDF for online distribution.
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I am not quite sure I understand this.

Aside from the intro and the conclusion it reads like a check list on whether or not Joe fits the comsic era. You have sold me, I think it does.

Are we discussing how the GI Joe cartoon (you didn't read the comics?) influenced the cosmic era? I think that is interesting topic, discussing your creative and writers process.

Are we discussing how the GI JOE characters are realized and integrated into the cosmic era? I feel like this is more about the Joe cartoon as it was truly in the 80s, and not so much the joe story is re-told in the cosmic era.

Sentences that confuse me are like this one
"Cobra and the Joes both had full access to arcanotech, Cobra used it to make wonder weapons, and exotic devices, and bases in the middle of nowhere, and have things like a leader with a chrome head. "
Because you discuss this in a past tense and as if the world of the Cosmic Era and Joes were already one.

Then you have sentences such as this one in which you discuss the cartoon in the voice of fan or critic.
"While there were plenty of normal episodes, a very large number of GI Joe episodes dealt with abnormal situations, from being shrunk to diminutive size in one episode, to exploring the Himalayas and encountered yetis, and alien dimensions."

Then you sentences like this
"In the Cosmic Era TPK isn't uncommon. With levels of engagement, TPKs can potentially be common. a group of infantry encountering a squad of power armor troopers are going to be smeared like bugs, while a single mech is going to stomp all of them like a man crushing insects under his boots. "

This is an even tougher sell, and here is my big point.
The cosmic era stuff (I have not read it all) as far as I can see is all meta-material. It is material generated that is peripheral or an accessory to the stories and the narrative. For example the clone list, you not telling the story of the Jo clones, you are telling us about the way they may be integrated into another story. You have "the last tank" story, which is still written as analysis of another narrative (the mockumentry is a powerful technique..I am not knocking it).

The actual medium in which the cosmic era will be realized will either be at the game table or in some other form: a story or novel. We have yet to see the pieces put together into some working apparatus. How do you see your audience for the cosmic era? Are you talking to us as fellow story tellers?

I all for dissection of the work and the influences: Well done sir.
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To be fair I never really read the joe comics either, there was a lot material in them and I always felt like I was stepping in mid stream, but all friends I grade school read the comics, so I picked up a few and you had some cosmic era type stuff in there as well. There were clones and space travel, people got shot and blown up. It was more military though than the tv show which had stronger sci-fi element. But there were GI joe transformer cross over comic which I also never read. I have tried to get into comics as Adult but just can't do it. I feel like you would really enjoy the newish transformers comic, they have adult retro- selective retelling and rationalization that is part of the cosmic era narrative .

But my real question regarding goals and audience is how do you view your audience at the citadel with regard to this post?

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One of the things about this submission is that I wrote it in the hopes of pulling some of these different threads together and give them some cohesion. This is also written from the hopeful perspective of putting the setting together into some sort of publishable format, and if it does end up a book, there would pretty much have to be a chapter on how arcanotech works and why it does.

Unfortunately I don't enjoy this aspect because it feels like I am showing my hand, and showing how I do things and make them work on a mechanical level, a functional level and that ruins the magic. Go to Comment

Only voted Go to Comment

I think I get it now!

Thanks. Go to Comment

If there was really no magic in this you would have published this article in Nature and not roleplaying website. I like it, and this stuff is a necessary tool for deep fiction (by deep I mean complicated). Go to Comment

A new take on the skeleton undead. 5/5 Go to Comment

Only voted Go to Comment

A fearsome thing to fight. Go to Comment