Le Mélange: an equinoctial weather event

[temnix]

Twice a year a weather phenomenon unfolds in the part of the eastern seaboard of the United States that the Paragon City shares with the Rogue Isles. The francolingual islanders have long dubbed it Le Mélange. During this event, which is synchronized with the vernal and autumnal equinoxes of March and September, the city and the islands swap their climates. Paragon City becomes gloomy and drenched as well as subjected to flashing thunderstorms while the Rogue Isles bask in the serenity of azure skies, even with rainbows. This upsets the decision-makers and kingpins of both places, because Statesman's pants used as the flag on the Paragon City Hall droop with moisture and Lord Recluse's towers look a lot less imposing in clear light, but neither side have been able to do anything about this natural occurence, which lasts in both cases a little over a week.

 

Natural yet strange. Things get shuffled and moved about in Le Mélange. Alignment changes twice as easily, and hero and villain groups can be found far away from their usual haunts, some to use the opportunities this time opens and others for less obvious reasons. The Coralax in particular treat these events as moments of celebration and venture far inland to enact strange dances and rituals. Some claim to have seen them mingle with Pumicites of Igneous, staging back-to-back roundelays. Inhabitants of the upper air have been known to descend to earth, including ozone elementals and cosmic rayfish. Speaking of fish, these sometimes drop from the sky and wriggle on the ground, but this, at least, is easy to connect to the action of the most enigmatic, dangerous and useful feature of Le Mélange - the standing tornadoes. Called les Flemmards by the French, i.e. the Lazybodies, these colossal funnels rise in every watery area of the city and the islands, swerving upwards from the sea higher than any investigator has been able to soar. They do not appear in quite the same spots every time, nor do they always lead to the same places. For les Flemmards are traffic tunnels. Entering one by swimming or boating or flying or teleporting deposits one in a random place, often over dry land. It could be another district of the city, another one of the islands, it could be a hazard zone. Only a few of the tunnels have fixed destinations. Some adventurous spirits still make a sport of venturing in, sometimes encouraged by the possibility of finding unique salvage from the ocean floor in their pockets when they emerge.

 

Many stories have accreted around les Flemmards over the centuries. Supposedly an entire British man-o'-war from the American Revolution has escaped to one from French pursuers. It sails out when the Flemmards reappear with its ghostly crew; in 1891 it or something like it bombarded Founders Falls and fought two ironclads of the U. S. Navy before disappearing again. (There are fresh grounds from the rumor mill: Arachnos has lured the ship to their side and it is being modernized in a secret dock with the latest weaponry to rail destruction on Paragon City when the time is right. A few transparent, antiquated sailors on leave have indeed been seen around the bars of the Rogue Isles, and their thirst for English gin is unquenchable.) More obviously, several criminal groups make a point of watching for the tornadoes and investigating them as soon as they appear. Stable funnels make excellent smuggling corridors. Thus, little boats with mafia thugs and gangsters are usually found bobbing around them, sometimes holding signs that say "Superadine" or "Mr. Black." Mysterious Eurotrash has been known to fall out.

[Rudra]

First, why would a weather pattern change how easily it is to change character alignment? Second, you are changing the lore of the factions to suit your purposes. For instance, the Coralax aren't found inland because they are an aquatic people. That's like saying the merfolk hold celebrations in the middle of the Sahara. Third, introducing a mechanic that sends characters to random locations where they are likely to die, i.e. sending a level 10 into the heart of Grandville, is not something I want in the game. I'm hoping I'm not the only one that feels this way.

[CrusaderDroid]

Giant weather event with a bunch of code involved? 

 

But why?

[Ghost]

Does the OP actually play the game, or spend countless hours of figuring out ways to change it and then countless more hours starting threads?

[Luminara]

1 minute ago, Ghost said:

Does the OP actually play the game, or spend countless hours of figuring out ways to change it and then countless more hours starting threads?

 

He did, but he quit.

 

Twice.

 

Temnix 3, The Resurrection of the Return of the Re-awakening!  He's back, and he's ready for more (posts that take seventeen hours to get to the fucking point)!  Coming soon to a theater near you!

[Glacier Peak]

1 minute ago, Luminara said:

 

He did, but he quit.

 

Twice.

 

Temnix 3, The Resurrection of the Return of the Re-awakening!  He's back, and he's ready for more (posts that take seventeen hours to get to the fucking point)!  Coming soon to a theater near you!

I think it's a chatbot writing these threads at this point. 

[Luminara]

Just now, Glacier Peak said:

I think it's a chatbot writing these threads at this point. 

 

I can spot those without trying.  This ain't that.  He's grandiloquent and circumlocutory to the point of making me appear terse, but he's definitely human.

[Blastit]

22 hours ago, Rudra said:

First, why would a weather pattern change how easily it is to change character alignment? Second, you are changing the lore of the factions to suit your purposes. For instance, the Coralax aren't found inland because they are an aquatic people. That's like saying the merfolk hold celebrations in the middle of the Sahara. Third, introducing a mechanic that sends characters to random locations where they are likely to die, i.e. sending a level 10 into the heart of Grandville, is not something I want in the game. I'm hoping I'm not the only one that feels this way.

 

I mean, the theme is pretty clear: a peculiar weather phenomenon swaps the typical weather of Pragon City and the Rogue Isles. Therefore alignments, which are linked to these locations, metaphorically shift too. He also did say that the coralax "venture" inland, meaning they go somewhere they usually aren't found. This continues the theme of things getting swapped around. Boundaries are pushed. It happens around the equinox because that's the point where light and dark hang in the balance and then swap.

 

I'm not sure about the details suggested here but the fundamental idea of an event where things swap is perfectly acceptably mystical and is less tied to a specific culture than something like the Valentine stuff, Halloween or that one with the 'orrible year-baby.

[Rudra]

1 hour ago, Blastit said:

 

I mean, the theme is pretty clear: a peculiar weather phenomenon swaps the typical weather of Pragon City and the Rogue Isles. Therefore alignments, which are linked to these locations, metaphorically shift too.

That makes no sense to me. At all. First, the weather at the Rogue Isles is not doom and gloom mirroring evil. Nerva Archipelago and St. Martial are just as bright and sunny as anywhere in Paragon City for instance. Second, just because Grandville suddenly gets a sunny day does not mean the place is any less the home of Arachnos and villainy. It just means that Grandville's oppressive and fortified design is easier to see. Or would be if Grandville itself was not already so well lit as it is. And weather has nothing to do with whether or not a character is evil, good, or other.

 

1 hour ago, Blastit said:

He also did say that the coralax "venture" inland, meaning they go somewhere they usually aren't found. This continues the theme of things getting swapped around.

I can see things moving because of a disaster, even a weather-based disaster, but not just because there is a weather change. Nor would it cause aquatic entities like the Coralax to mingle with subterranean entities like the Pumicites, especially since the Pumicites hail from regions as extremely hostile to the Coralax as to humans. Lava is just as bad for the Coralax as it is for the rest of us.

 

1 hour ago, Blastit said:

I'm not sure about the details suggested here but the fundamental idea of an event where things swap is perfectly acceptably mystical and is less tied to a specific culture than something like the Valentine stuff, Halloween or that one with the 'orrible year-baby.

The difference here is that the Valentine's event and the Halloween event are still recognized by most people. Even in cultures that don't have these holidays, they at least know the holidays exist and are celebrated in American culture and to an extent, general European culture as well. Adding an event that does not conform to such a basis is fine, but it should still conform to the lore of the game or expand upon the lore of the game. And the OP does not. It simply ignores the lore of the game.

[Luminara]

14 minutes ago, Rudra said:

Lava is just as bad for the Coralax as it is for the rest of us.

 

Note to self: stop eating lava.

 

[Rudra]

1 minute ago, Luminara said:

17 minutes ago, Rudra said:

Lava is just as bad for the Coralax as it is for the rest of us.

 

Note to self: stop eating lava.

 

Leave it to @Luminara to find or be the exception to what I thought was a rule. 😄

[Luminara]

23 minutes ago, Rudra said:

Leave it to @Luminara to find or be the exception to what I thought was a rule. 😄

 

I have a high metabolism.

[Blastit]

50 minutes ago, Rudra said:

Second, just because Grandville suddenly gets a sunny day does not mean the place is any less the home of Arachnos and villainy.

 

It's a mystical thematic thing. It isn't meant to make physical sense. You're missing the forest for the trees.

[PeregrineFalcon]

On 3/24/2024 at 10:17 AM, Luminara said:

I can spot those without trying.  This ain't that.  He's grandiloquent and circumlocutory to the point of making me appear terse, but he's definitely human.

I'm convinced at this point that the OP is Diantane's second account.

[Luminara]

1 minute ago, PeregrineFalcon said:

I'm convinced at this point that the OP is Diantane's second account.

 

They're different people.  Spelling is impeccable, everything is grammatically correct, there's a lack of weird off-topic maundering (yes, this one rambles, but it's all on-topic, relevant to the post itself) typical of the other poster, details which inform the reader that it's a different person.

 

But it's more than that.  Second accounts are typically just as obvious as bots.  Everyone develops a writing style which is uniquely his/her own, a "voice", and they rarely change it, even if they're trying to hide behind a second account.  Most people don't even think about it, so they're dead easy to identify.  Others try, but can't maintain the fiction of being someone else because how we write is based on patterns, habits, muscle memory, personal preferences for certain words and more.  Spotting those is harder, but it's only a matter of time, because they always slip up and return to their original "voice".  It's like... when you see someone using "u" instead of "you", over and over again, then typing "you" near the end of a post, showing that they're actively working to suppress their writing style, and inevitably failing.

 

Identifying bots and second accounts are really just pattern recognition.  Bots all have the same patterned style, which makes them noticeable purely for the repetitiveness.  Second accounts have an identifiable pattern which matches up with primary accounts, and it's just a matter of mentally matching the "voice" between the two.  Sometimes you can see that pattern immediately, other times you have to accumulate pattern segments until you can match them, but in the end, the match is recognizable.

 

How a post is written is almost like a fingerprint.  Or maybe it's just how I read posts.  Regardless, there's no fingerprint match here.

[Rudra]

2 hours ago, Blastit said:

 

It's a mystical thematic thing. It isn't meant to make physical sense.

And that is what I disagree with.

[Ghost]

6 hours ago, Blastit said:

 

It's a mystical thematic thing. It isn't meant to make physical sense. You're missing the forest for the trees.

 

“Just say it’s mystical and therefore it doesn’t have to make sense”

That phrase will cover every bad idea that has ever been asked to be implemented 

Edited March 26 by Ghost

[JasperStone]

18 hours ago, Luminara said:

 

Note to self: stop eating lava.

 

but

...

ow ow....

it so 

.....

AHHHHHHHHHHH

...

delicious