Random Questions Thread

Looks like a middle cut or something, but I don't think that's the correct name.

Another of my kid-related questions: What would a normal 13 year old boy do to initiate a conversation with another kid of about the same age that he doesn't know? They don't go to the same school and they are meeting outside of the other kid's school?

Why are they meeting up in the first place? Or is this just a chance encounter due to them being in the same vicinity with nothing better to do, or something of the like?

Also, what gender is the other kid? Like is it an attempt top talk to a crush or something?

So, kind of a specific question, but; are there any Unfortunate Implications attached to characters with orange skin?

My tiefling in a D&D campaign I'm in's orange with purple hair, I recently finished a wig, and I'm working on a full cosplay; one of the other players said I shouldn't do that because painting my face orange could be seen in the same light as black/yellowface.

I tried googling, but I can't find anything (just some results about the results of eating too much beta carotene). Any idea if there's anything to that? Because I might need to redesign my character if that's the case.

x3: My best guess would just be "hello, my name's [blank]", or whatever the relevant greeting is. Kids still tend to be kinda blunt at that age.

Edited by Bisected8 on Dec 10th 2022 at 11:36:03 AM

I think until somewhat recently, Native Americans were stereotyped as having red skin, which might be what that other person was thinking of. You can still find some sports teams in the US called "Redmen" or "Redskins" that have Native American-looking caricatures with cherry-red skin as mascots. It may have still been in use as a slur as late as 1970, because in Jane Elliott's famous 1968 eye color social exercise, she refers to "yellow" and "red" people.

I Googled "orange skin stereotype" and found this Wikipedia article where a dude used "orange" to describe Malay people, but I've literally never heard of this before in my life and have no idea if it ever entered common vernacular. In ads for Wonka-brand candy, they still color the Oompa-Loompas orange, although their skin color may be the least of their offensive baggage- I haven't heard of anyone calling for that aspect to be changed due to racial stereotyping.

So you're most likely okay. But if someone from an ethnic or racial minority does say it offends them, I can't imagine it'd be a big deal to change the character's skin color to something more overtly fantastical like a super neon orange.

Edited by CrystalGlacia on Dec 10th 2022 at 7:34:17 AM

In one of my new Science Fantasy story ideas, the world dies and most of the population (split into theocrats and revolutionaries) goes to fight somewhere else while the civilians who haven't died yet mostly flee to some other place. Both sides leave some sort of a fighting force behind to take the world over, the revolutionaries leave Character A (basically a random officer) and an army of constructs, while the theocrats leave Character B (a former warlord) with a group of elite soldiers that whittles down to five. There's also some remaining civilians, who mostly shelter with A because he's holding most of the world (it's kind of small), and also mostly controls the resource which is both their fuel and food. Meanwhile, B and her troops are basically guerillas who keep raiding the resource to feed and arm themselves and generally not caring about people getting in the way, forcing A to keep up the constructs which uses up more of the resource. This resorce isn't regenerating anymore or is slowly ceasing to generate which is why the others left, and A is also trying to find a new form of sustenance because he's the only one with the resources to try. A and B both lose contact with their leaders and eventually think everybody else is dead (they aren't), so A tries to talk B into surrendering in exchange for rations, but she refuses because she doesn't view the war as having ended and still views this as an ideological conflict (and possibly just wants power that badly?), and demands A surrender to her instead if he wants to live (like Von Lüttwitz at Bastogne in WWII, as A is technically outnumbered. Though she doesn't really think he'd surrender).

How do i make Character B's continuation of pointless fighting and refusal to surrender seem less straight-up crazy, since the resource will run out eventually and they all will die unless they find more or get something new? She's supposed to be intelligent and good at war.

Edited by Nukeli on Dec 11th 2022 at 12:52:50 PM

I really have a knack for asking questions while forgetting important context, do I...

The other kid is also a boy and Thirteen will develop a crush on him in the future, but as of now he only wants to talk. He's specifically looking to know the other kid.

Regarding orange skin, I don't think orange skin on its own would make a lot of Unfortunate Implications, especially in a fantasy setting. Unlike black and white or red (as mentioned ^), I don't know of any specific associations of orange. Now if your character has additional "ethnic markers", you may want to check if they resemble any real life ethnicity.

Maybe reveal that there's something else that she knows and left others in the dark? Maybe a form of Victory by Endurance?

I'm trying to decide between two "takes" of a scene I am writing—-it's actually one of my favorite scenes in my WIP.

In this scene a massive army is attempting to confront and kill my protagonist-turned-Big Bad, not understanding that it's already far too late for that. The two versions of this scene are generally the same but with one large difference:

One of them takes place through the eyes of a random human soldier who is largely clueless about what is happening, and only just found out about the supernatural world a day prior. The second version is through the eyes of actual supernatural beings who are present to also lend their aid and are fully aware of the magnitude of the situation, although not how severely outmatched they are.

I can't really decide which one is more impactful and ultimately more horrifying. Just wondering if anyone has insights on how to choose?

Edited by Swordofknowledge on Dec 11th 2022 at 1:44:54 PM

In the same Science Fantasy story as my previous question, the groups of rebels and theocrats have gone to fight on different worlds after their world literally died.

The rebel leader and a small group are on one world and the theocrats are somehow unable to crush them despite outnumbering them. There's only a small group of theocrats consistently on that world for some other reason (possibly because of some other species living on that world, somehow?). They send Character C to infiltrate them, pretending to be a dissident who escaped a Fate Worse than Death in their hands, and the rebels take him in because that's what they do even though they're suspicious. C is supposed to search and leak information, and betray the rebels at a crucial moment (whenever/whatever that'll be, they don't know yet).

Character D^note  (a clawed shapeshifter twice his size, whom he's frightened of at first) is the first rebel who really approaches him, he shows C around and is nice to him. C goes with it in order to get closer to the group. C had never actually encountered the rebels or the underclass people before because he'd born after the conflict had started and had only heard about them, and notices the rebels belonging in the underclass species aren't inherently evil or agressive, and that D isn't untrustworthy or a manipulator despite being a shapeshifter. C's first reaction is of course denial and trying to ignore it, and telling himself he must carry out his mission anyway despite anything. However he's also gotten really (romantically, eventually) attached to D^note  (especially since C has never received real love or affection, because the theocrats are terrible) and doesn't want to hurt him. However C never comes clean to the rebels or cuts contact with the theocrats, acting like the problem can be ignored. After some long time the theocrats strike and capture the rebel group (maybe C makes the biggest mistake of his life and is somehow pushed into giving them the nudge they need, or is that a bad idea?). During the attack he's exposed to the rebel leader and they fight (or maybe C attacks?), and D appears when the rebel leader is bleeding on the floor. Not being in the best place mentally and torn between the theocrats and D, C yells at D about them and his mission (possibly claiming he never loved D?) and D strikes out his eye before he collapses crying and C escapes. The rebels are all captured and paraded around by the theocrats before show trial and execution. C starts regretting very quickly and breaks the cautious D out of prison, and after failing to convince D to stop fighting and just hide somewhere, helps D free the other rebels. Then C either gets exposed to the theocrats and has to flee with the rebels, or stays where he is but has the theocrats on his tracks trying to find out who arranged the escapes.

Could C's and D's relationship be in any way salvageable after this? Note that it was never a honeypot, C wasn't supposed to get into that but it happened on its own and was genuine.

What would a rank hierarchy of a military police organization look like?

I found a few examples of military police ranking systems here. From what I see it's usually divided into Generals, Seniors, Juniors, and Cadets, with 2-4 ranks in each group.

I recently imagined an odd scenario with an alien character of mine.

They have a weapon that cause alterations down to on a sub-atomic scale and precision, and the scenario involves them shooting a rabid animal with it and converting every bit of virus/virus-infected cell into a molar equivalent of H 2 O (not 1 virus = 1 drop of water).

The question is, if a rabid animal got every bit of virus (and viral reproductive DNA) turned into harmless water, would it live, or would it die from nerves-turned-into-water-itis?

It's a very weird question I know.

Edited by ironcommando on Dec 16th 2022 at 11:57:49 PM

It's unclear, because how rabies kills is not well understood as of yet, (it doesn't cause fatal encephalitis like most other things that infect the brain) so at minimum, the answer is "it might not even prevent the animal from dying of rabies."

My Science Fantasy story has a ritual mutilation which is used as a punishment/to "mark" people. It involves cutting off two fingers from both hands, and doing something to the victim's face/eyes (i haven't decided what, just gouging out the other eye feels minor, and there's many normal ways to lose one eye so it'd be less specifically marking).

Which combination of three remaining fingers would propably be more functional? Thumb-indexfinger-ringfinger or thumb-middlefinger-littlefinger?

Edited by Nukeli on Dec 16th 2022 at 8:18:48 PM

Thumb-index-ring. (The index and little finger have more tendons controlling them than the others, and between the two the index is the more useful.)

So, what type of criminal group would be capable of unifying the US if it collapses?

If the US collapsed, balkanized, and it isn't reunifying on its own, a dedicated criminal organization certainly isn't going to manage it.

Criminal organizations tend not to do much without a government to infiltrate, like in some parts of South Italy, and they tend to do a poor job of keeping the place together even when they do get control.

Also, criminal organizations are effectively companies of a sort, so them actually running a government runs into the Company Town problem where there's fairly few actual scenarios where a company town isn't a bigger drain on resources than it gives in output. (Pretty much only in agriculture and mining are company towns even remotely good ideas) Not only would a dedicated criminal organization be unable to reunify the US, it likely would be uninterested in trying.

Warlords would be more effective, and even then, warlords rarely manage to achieve anything over large areas anymore, if just because modern military tech kind of requires a substantial military supply chain that you need a country to operate. You can't just give some people guns and tell them to go wild when they're up against a tank or a helicopter, which need fuel and skilled users but happen to be effectively immune to small arms. To have a scenario where one warlord is somehow managing to reunite the US, tanks, helicopters, and aircraft and heavily-armored things in general would have to be out of the equation. Probably artillery too, not to mention drones.

The Military Landscape of today is extremely unfriendly to those without significant infrastructure to support their army, and while criminal organizations may have infrastructure, they don't have reason, and while warlords might have reason, they don't have infrastructure.

So, they would use a group as a proxy of sorts.

No, it just wouldn't happen. The closest to a criminal organization forming a state was the Pirate Republic of Nassau, which was more a polite agreement between a bunch of english privateers (pirates after the war ended) to not kill each other and to not attack english ships in a small island city that happened to not have any functional government of its own at the time. There was no infrastructure to maintain there either, they tended to be at sea most of the time, and that didn't last long at all, it got taken back over by a functional government who pardoned some pirates and kicked the rest out or killed them.

The peak population was thought to be around a few thousand, it was not a large operation, and the nature of piracy makes a governed port very desirable. Any other criminal organization would stop at a few agricultural areas to cultivate whatever otherwise illegal plants they're growing and processing, and any warlord would immediately get blown fighting the national guard and their much less limited resources, or be smart and stick to extorting rural areas, avoiding provoking any national guard units still around.

There's no real way that a criminal organization would or indeed could reunify a collapsed and Balkanized United States. Now, the National Guard units turning to warlordry might be plausible, if you really want a warlord-type thing, but in practice, maritime piracy is pretty much the only criminal organization that could reasonably have a country, and it wouldn't be interested in most of the continental US. At best, it might have something like what Venice or Genoa did.

Also a warlord probably wouldn't be interested in uniting the states or whatever anyway, controlling lots of territory is already difficult, and when you're not a well-established government with good supply lines, it might not actually be possible for a warlord to control a significant portion of the continental US's population, and industrialization means you don't have to have a large land area to have a lot of wealth, so in most cases, it just wouldn't be worth the administrative difficulty of taking more territory.

One scenario that I can see potentially working out would be that in which, effectively, the criminal organisation is led by someone who desires leadership/control/power more than they desire money, and who has underlings who will (for whatever reason) continue to follow them on that journey. (Perhaps the promise of more power or more stability for those who support them.)

The organisation would then essentially switch from being a criminal organisation to being a warlord organisation. If the original syndicate is large enough, this might lead to a fairly large army of sorts—if likely one that's quite spread out.

That said, I would also expect a high likelihood of the organisation splintering, as those who prefer to remain criminals break away. There's also a high potential for the leader in question to be overthrown—likely enough simply killed—so that the organisation can remain a criminal one.

Hmm... On the other side, I can see one potential reason for a criminal organisation to want to re-unite the states: if there's an argument to be had that a whole united states makes their criminal work easier and/or more lucrative, then they might seek to achieve that. (Perhaps by supporting some warlord or other.)

Something like that, yes.

So this is a middle part◊ undercut◊. Undercuts were clearly popular in the 40s, but was parting men's hair about the middle any sort of a thing, or was it actively considered bad?

Does anyone have any ideas for age-related degradation that does not involve physical weakness?

In my WIP there is a line from a character, describing one of the villains as "wise and powerful, but getting old and tired and not as sharp as she used to be". It occurred to me later that this villain is an immortal of The Ageless variety, so their mind or senses shouldn't have suffered over time.

Does anyone have ideas for how an immortal being could grow dull or lose their "edge" over the centuries?

Perhaps she could become very "stuck in her ways" - not willing to acknowledge new developments as immediately relevant, or having a preference for outdated skills and technologies?

Inconsistent memory might end up being an issue. Most people's memory works by connecting things to other things. So even without significant physical degradation, it could become harder to remember things just because they're so tangentially connected to what you were just thinking about, causing significant delays.

Also people constantly suffer low-level brain damage. If they're just ageless, repeated minor injuries could cause severe degradation in the long term.

Edited by Florien on Dec 20th 2022 at 10:40:40 AM