Our avatars are posting on a forum thread.

(OOC: I went to a cabin up north (w/o internet) for the weekend!)

   Despite popular demand, I'm back!   
   While I was absent, I was doing volunteer work for video game companies that use predatory game mechanics. I am sure that the Mistress will be pleased with the evil that I have contributed to the world.   

   RE:    [1]

   Agreed. Is it so bad that I find haunted houses to have such sympathetic goals and motives?   

   RE:    [2]

   Hmm . . . What constitutes a "sufficiently high degree" here?   

Edited by m-95 on Feb 20th 2023 at 4:25:07 AM

Something between your homeworld and Tevyat. Tevyat being an exception for the time being, but we'll still avoid using IU tech in that universe for safety reasons.

Would give specific values, but unfortunately, IU physics isn't real and I can't give any

Also, hope you had fun on the hike!

Edited by StepexNo2 on Feb 20th 2023 at 10:33:25 AM

[1] What are these God-like beings, Ica?

[1] That's actually an interesting thought since maybe ghost and similar beings just want a place to hang out that fits their environment.

That's a good point sis though it's more of a convenience (or inconvenience for those who don't want to up with them) in most works where haunted houses/mansions are built by a near graveyard.

Eh, you'll be fine in Teyvat. Trust me, gods have been trying to pull this universe apart by the seams for millenia. Besides, if interuniversal travel were gonna do anything, Aether would be either dead or causing all of us to die. And I feel pretty alive. How 'bout you, Aether?

Mhm, functions still in order.

Macha: (Looks at Milktchi) Aww, you're so cute! Bet my daughter Mel would love to know you! Our world is no stranger to cute creatures, either. Just look at one of my friends!

Macha: His name is Pip, and he can evolve into angel-like and devil-like forms.

(Edit: Didn't intend for it to be that big.😓)

Edited by CosmosAndChaos on Feb 20th 2023 at 9:41:44 AM

   Hewwo! Ooh, that's a cutie wootie! Thank you foah shawing!   

   How darling! They have angel-like and devil-like forms too huh? That's very intriguing!   

: Poyo! (It's so cute that I want to pet it!)

: Me too, it looks huggable too!

(OOC: It was more of a family visit than hike, but yes, it was fun.)

[1] [2]

Wait, when you say you "will no longer be serving universes of a sufficiently high degree," a degree of what? Of technology?

And do you mean you wont serve universes that are of said degree, or do you mean you won't give universes products of said degree?

If it's the latter, then that does make sense.
If it's the former, then between Europa and Teyvat seems like an arbitrary range. Especially since (by "normal" standards) Europa's tech is all over the place. Apparently people in Stefan's version of Earth are shocked by clockwork-AIs, but also seemingly just . . . travel from England to the Americas without writing a last will & testament like it's no big deal????

Also, update on the book situation (see HERE): I'm currently in the middle of the 3rd chapter ("Laying Siege"). Some of the big royal & noble houses are learning that the Baron is wounded. There are some interesting, kinda-funny antics involving the King of Croatia's foreign policy, but this post is getting crowded so I'll leave it there for the time being.

Edited by m-95 on Feb 20th 2023 at 8:28:12 AM

So much cuteness abounding here! My Morpeko is pretty adorable as well. Anyway, I've been thinking about the increasing popularity of tribal-themed trailer music (both orchestral and percussion cues), and I think it wouldn't be such a bad idea to compose tribal-themed horror trailer music. Combining horror sounds with tribal elements such as flutes and drums to create music you'd expect would fit for a trailer for a movie like The Green Inferno.

Cool, Marnie! The rainforest can be quite scary, so I think that's an awesome idea! Perhaps you should design a cover artwork for such an album featuring tribal-themed horror music!

You're always talking about trailer music, Marnie. Still, that doesn't seem like a bad idea at all! I wonder how it would sound like when put together...

   More cuteness equals more happiness to me! aroo.   

   Watch it Hapihapitchi, hope you don't cause any "Sweetness Aversion" lol (maybe I should add a little darkness, hehehehe).   

   Cuteness and darkness can be a great combination, that's why the term "Grotesque Cute" exists!   

Edited by MkayRose on Feb 20th 2023 at 9:46:48 AM

It’s no big deal because we have airplanes. We enter a pressurized tube with wings that runs on some kind of kerosene and also computers (not sentient ones) with a human pilot, and it goes approximately 40,000 feet up in the air… it’s safer than it sounds. It takes approximately 8-10 hours to get from England to the States, depending on your exact destination.

Edited by KitkatKK2 on Feb 20th 2023 at 6:57:24 AM

We have airships and other forms of flight over here. But "airplanes," you say? I'll have to look that up.

. . . OK, I looked up what airplanes are. Well, they're surely better than Wulfenbach's infamous "Falling Machine," but they still look dangerous. Then again, I'll take your word that they're safer than they sound. I can see them working.

Also, is "the States" what you call the Americas?
And apparently you guys don't have that whatever-the-hell-nightmare-thing in the middle of the Atlantic. That explains why you're so casual about trans-Atlantic travel.

Edited by m-95 on Feb 20th 2023 at 9:05:13 AM

”The States” refers to the United States of America, a specific country in North America, and probably what most people think of when you say “America”. As for the other point… please elaborate on this “whatever the hell nightmare thing”.

On the "whatever the hell nightmare thing," I don't really know how to explain it. Mostly becuase Europa's top scientists — mad or otherwise — have been trying to figure out what it is and still don't know much about it.

Europeans used to be able to travel to and from the Americas by airship or by boat, till that whatever showed up out of seemingly nowhere.

(OOC: Canon information about the Americas in Girl Genius is scant. This fan wiki article contains pretty much all canon info about the Americas in Girl Genius. The section near the bottom on the GURPS sourcebook is the most info that I'm aware of.)

Edited by m-95 on Feb 20th 2023 at 9:37:49 AM

You know, hypothetically, it would take a lot longer, but couldn’t you just… go the other way around?

Theoretically, yes. But the Pacific has always had it's own dangers.

(OOC: I actually don't know why they don't do that, but knowing this comic's setting, there's probably a good reason.)

I’m not even going to ask. As for myself, I have been working on a new project for my… let’s call them “surprise shows”. Maybe the technical word would be “unauthorized solo plays the park makes no money off of”, but aren’t they synonymous?

Argh, responses, responses, sorry, got caught up in projects...

[1] The gods come in all shapes and sizes, as far as we know. They can be small, big, or only detectable with special tools, but what they tend to have in common is a near-universal control over their homeworld. Sometimes to the point where they can have access to other universes.

[2] Well, there are different methods of inter-universal travel. Some, like the method we use for organics, are controlled and tested to be safe, while others, like the method we use for non-organic entities (i.e. blast it with the target universe's i-particles) can be very destructive, albeit moreso for the starting point universe than for the target universe. Idk how robust Tevyat is in that regard, but better safe than sorry, I guess?

[3] Er, no, I meant compatibility degree. If a universe's compatibility degree is high enough, there's a higher chance that there's some kind of superstructure in it which could get destroyed. Tevyat and your homeworld is indeed an arbitrary range in that regard too - it's been a year since the field of IU physics has started developing. Maybe we'll find something better.

[4] Whoa, what exactly do you guys have in the Pacific? Some kinda secret base?

Surprise shows? Sounds like you're having fun.

Well, "we" (as in, Europa) don't have much there. If the stuff we send out there gets too far from our main communications, sometimes we lose contact with it.

Oh, a "comparability degree," now? That sounds kind of interesitng. What's that?

If I had to take a guess, I would assume it's how compatable a world's laws of nature are with another world's laws of nature. If that is the case, then why would a higher degree cause more destruction to it's superstructure? Or am I still getting these degrees wrong?

Honestly, I'd be interested in hearing more about it. In layman's terms. Here in Europa we don't fully understand a good deal of our own world, and extradimensional stuff is a very young discipline.

Edited by m-95 on Feb 21st 2023 at 11:27:13 AM

Aight, sorry, took me long enough to get back.

So, if you send one object into another universe, by default it will radiate. Why? Well, every universe has its own set of subatomic structures. Mine mostly has protons, neutrons and electrons - others may have strings, lattices or completely exotic objects. If you send those objects into my homeworld, they won't be stable, and will fall apart into something that my homeworld's physics can sustain within less than a second. This is what releases a lot of radiation, and if you analyze the radiation, you can gain some useful insights into the other universe's physics.

But a lot of universes can also sustain atomic nuclei - you can safely send them into those universes without worrying that they'll fall apart. Usually. In practice, sometimes there's a force that rips the nuclei apart anyways.

This is true for all structures across the multiverse (obviously). What isn't obvious is that you can put all universes on a scale from zero to... infinity, as far as we know. And for each universe, there is at least one possible structure from it that can't fit into a universe lower on the scale, and all its possible structures will fit into any universe higher on the scale. You can roughly attribute each universe a number based on what other universes its matter is compatible with - that number is what we call the compatibility degree.

Does that make sense? It's my kind's current understanding of the multiverse, and it may be inaccurate.

Edited by StepexNo2 on Feb 21st 2023 at 7:53:39 PM

It seems relatively accurate though a relatively narrow measure though especially useful for you given your limited toolset you cant exactly atomically stabilize yourself.

(x2)

OK, I think I get it.
So when you say "higher," you don't mean "more compatable," but instead you mean "higher on this list of worlds sorted in relation to each other," correct? That means they're not sorted based on how compatable they are with your world, but all of them are sorted by how compatable they are with each other. And that'd mean if World A is higher than World B, then World A can sustain all of World B's stuff but not vice-versa. I hope I'm getting it right.

And if that's right, then — out of curiosity — where would your homeworld, Stefan's homeworld, the world with Teyvat, and the world with Europa all be in this hierarchy in relation to each other? Or would you not know?

Edited by m-95 on Feb 21st 2023 at 3:35:03 PM

[1] That's reassuring, thanks.

Correct! I have actually tested the degrees, and the hierarchy goes: Stefan's homeworld < my homeworld < Europa (< Uirst's base of operations) < Tevyat (< the Toons' homeworld). I haven't been able to test Gensokyo thoroughly enough to see if it would go below or above the Toons' homeworld, unfortunately.

And as I might've mentioned before, your own bodies actually have a lower degree than your homeworld, and even Stefan's homeworld. Which explains why you could travel safely.

Edited by StepexNo2 on Feb 21st 2023 at 9:44:22 PM

I don't believe you told us that before. If our bodies are at a lower degree than everything else around us . . . How would that even . . . ?

Fascinating. Us being physically different might explain some oddities.
. . . Wait, would that imply that we're somehow not meant for here? Or maybe even not from here? What would that mean? The implications of this are incredible.

I don't think it's that. We don't seem to be physically different from other humans. Plus, we have the Spark, which is a trait seemingly native only to our world. And while the Spark can be inherited, it can also show up in people with non-Spark parents. Which implies we're not physically different from our world's humans.

Hmm . . .
(Mad!) But — and this is just speculation — what if humans aren't from here? All humans? What if humans came from somewhere lower on the scale?

You sound crazy . . .
(Mad!) We must take this to some place with a chalkboard. So we can discuss your thesis in more detail.

(Mad!) You mean, somewhere like a lab?

(Mad!) Precisely. Like a lab.

Edited by m-95 on Feb 21st 2023 at 4:16:01 AM