Game goals: thoughts on keeping it fresh and tingly

You can think of the Blob as the planet Jupiter. It’s unimaginably far away and even if you could get there somehow, there isn’t an attack you could make that would make a difference to it. And yes, that includes the entire nuclear weapon arsenal of Earth. Even if you could somehow get them all to Jupiter - which you can’t - they wouldn’t do anything noticeable.

So I’m not sure what problems you think you have solutions for, but the Blob’s total domination over Earth is not one of them.

i’d take that metaphor a step further:

what we’re experiencing re: the blob is like the gravity well of jupiter. you can’t kill the gravity well, because that’s just a property of local reality with that bigass mass over there. and there isn’t much we can do about that.

and for those who don’t know, jupiter is big enough that it makes the sun wobble around the center of the solar system. a center which is not, as some simplified explanations suggest, inside sol itself.

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It sounds like you mean I need to kill the sun, and my character is super strong you don’t even know what you’re getting into there. I’ll kill it, I totally will.

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Everyones already done an excellent job touching on the functional impossibility of trying to affect the blob or the other entities out there, but I’d also like to touch on the whole idea of solving them with a sci-fi concept or reversed technology.

The Blob and the Mycus are both functionally non starters, they’re biological hive mind entities. I’m not aware of any observations of technology from them being brought to Earth, and find it unlikely that they even possess technology in the same way we would conceptualize it (Why build a water purification plant when the distributed blob in the water table can alter it to your thrall body needs?). Reverse engineering them is going to be limited to very light touch genetic alterations, which we have in the form of mutagens. There’s nothing else in the human realm of understanding we could try and draw on to use from them, short of joining them and becoming hive entities, as the Mycus is keen to have us do. Same goes for Triffids afaik, they don’t seem to exhibit any technology, just exponential growth.

Mi-Go’s do have technology, in a sense, as minor players in the greater scheme of things, but two factors inhibit going further with that. One, their technology seems to be exclusively of the bioengineering variety, and two, if they had anything at the scale of capability to hurt the major players, it would stand to reason they would be using it, and wouldn’t be a minor player. A single human, even a very smart, strong one, is unlikely to have some secret insight an entire species of slavers that’ve been stealing humans, and would have access to whatever we know, wouldn’t have thought of. It doesn’t seem to be helping them, it won’t be helping you.

There is also the Exodi faction (Exodii? Just Exodus maybe?) who are responsible for introducing some technology post-cataclysm onto Earth, in a true, human understandable metals and circuits kind of way. This is the technological space we would most be able to build onto, and mods already allow some limited exploration of such. However, that would still face the mi-go problem. That if their technology was capable of being used by a smart being to deal significant damage to a major player, it would be done already, and the Exodi wouldn’t be outcasts surviving on the fringe of the big player awareness.

Effectively, any technological solution to destroying the major players would rely on the actual technology using factions to have something that powerful, but be ignorant enough of it that they just never realize it, but the solution is simple enough for a smart human to come up with it in a short time frame (Game-scale, nobody gonna play 25 years of Exodi college student to develop a weapon to win the game). That level of incompetence on behalf of the external factions wouldn’t pass the laugh test.

So you’re all saying there’s a chance right? Not a good chance. 50/50, maybe 51/49 but still a chance? :thinking:

Is the human race able to survive…

This is a thread I still remember from a long time ago, all about humans vs. all the crazy crap going on. A lot of what you are asking about was gone over, in detail, here.

A long read, but a good one if your bored enough.

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This is a fascinating thread. And very true to life… This will be a big post for me - so please forgive typos and if I have missed anything, point it out and I’ll do my best to address it.

I must emphasise that I appreciate everyone who has weighed in on this topic because it is enriched by it. That stated, not all enrichment is appropriate for all purposes, judging by the stuff I am currently enriching my garden with… So apologies in advance for my contribution! :wink:

I also note that we all sharing our opinions, current game lore and have barely even begun to tap the power of our imaginations.

Without going too off-track, I think the impossible postulates suggested are only currently so. Other concepts exist in scifi which can deal with these problems. An old philosophical question comes to mind: can GOD (by which I mean Generalised Omnipotent Deity) create a rock so heavy that he cannot lift it?
The answer is yes - but only until GOD later wishes to lift it and changes into a new stronger, variant.
Likewise, we players and contributors can engineer the game in any way we like and if the consensus is divided, well then the game can fork. Those who desire it can create their own variant, correct?

Current lore states that the blob etc is unkillable but no-one knows that in-game, ergo some will try to… Although many others might surrender to it. Nihilism comes to mind, as a psychological refuge.

We don’t actually have to genocide the blob etc, it can live in other places, but its existence on Earth is destroying all forms of human and animal life and probably the whole ecosystem. Certainly the mycus is destroying the plants. As the most powerful species on the planet, humans have the responsibility to defend it from colonising aliens who are engaging in classical rape and pillage. For example, many people campaign to protect endangered species their whole life so why would they give up when the blob guarantees to destroy them?

I bet each and every one of us could easily come up with possible solutions to the blob problem and why they would or wouldn’t work. Some examples:

  1. War of the Worlds - natural disease
  2. League of Gentlemen - Moreau’s unnatural disease
  3. Star Trek: Wrath of Khan - Genesis missile
  4. Cure the blob like we do dysentery etc
  5. GM the blob to attack itself - this may be the simplest solution
  6. Tame (GM) the blob so it acts like our own mitochondria (evolution has done it already)
  7. Use new blood filter cbms to cleanse the blob (never seen a zombie mi-go so they must have a way)
  8. Unleash nanobot grey goo to convert blob into useful hydrocarbons or inert materials
  9. Reverse engineering alien tech for any imaginable solution - too many possibilities but we could take out Jupiter, the sun or an alien home-world by launching a relativistic missile…
  10. or if alien travel is warp/portal based - alien home-world meet black-hole!
  11. get outside help from more advances aliens
  12. and a ton of other ideas that many of you know of already or will dream up if motivated…

So whilst I accept game lore ‘says no’, we can change it and do so with aplomb. And I absolutely get it that many people want an undefeatable enemy - and we can pretend it is. But even in-game it’s not likely that such an entity can exist.

Finally, out of curiosity, has anyone ever had a poll to see how many players/contributors would like to find a way to defeat the blob? There are others who want to save the environment, protect ecology and free humanity from slavery, aren’t there? :sweat_smile:

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You can fork the game, but it’s probably better to make a total conversion mod.

  • The blob is multi dimensional and uses something that isn’t matter, but somehow smaller than atoms in a way not understood.
  • Earth is now part of the blob’s “home” as much as any of the other places in other dimensions it dominates. Destroy Earth with a black hole and the blob won’t care and won’t be hurt in any meaningful way. The same goes for any other target you might find, as there isn’t a “home world”. There might have been an origin at some time in the distant past, but that’s about it.
  • The mi-go have bio engineered themselves to be resistant to the blob, yes. They probably come from somewhere the blob hasn’t invaded but their dimension travels have had them encounter it previously, and if they tried to actually bio engineer a sufficient volume of Earth’s biosphere to be resistant the blob might actually take notice, in which case they’d probably be wiped out rapidly: currently they’re not registering as worth noticing by the blob.

If you’re going for a mod lore, I’d replace the blob with something that can actually be countered. The technical approach that would be the least unreasonable would be to get hold of alien portal control tech to block all portals to our universe (optionally to do it selectively, if those who provide the tech are [supposedly] friendly and you’d want to maintain contact with them). After that you could try to clean up the mess by collecting and destroying this much more manageable blob stuff through some means.

We could change the game lore, but we won’t. You can make a poll, but it won’t change anything.

Is it Call of Duty: Dark Days Ahead? I do not think so.

  1. Create a character that resembles YOU as detailed as possible. In terms of stats, skills and personality

  2. Are you such badass in real life? Would you engage every single enemy? I would sh*t my pants trying to survive the rage of my undead neighbour. It is not about imposing limitations. It is about how YOU would act during Cataclysm. Do not fight if you do not have to

  3. CBMs, mutations… I respect them as a given playstyle, but I have never used them. I have started playing Cataclysm in 2014. Since then, every single character that I have created was in danger all the time. Just because I did not use CBMs or mutations. BTW, would YOU like to mutate into a disfigured monster IRL?

  4. Deathmobiles. “Oh… I will create 100% unrealistic, indestructible fortress on wheels and then I will be complaining that Cataclysm is boring”. Are YOU able to create such vehicle IRL?

‘It only takes one bite’ mentality. Be yourself, not a character from Fallout or Skyrim. Think about what would YOU do in a given situation in real life. Think about which gear would YOU use and which gear YOU would be able to use in real life. Are you able to fell a big tree with an axe or chainsaw IRL? Trust me, it is not easy and safe. That is why I use young trees to gather firewood. Another things. How much weight YOU would be able to hike with. How scared YOU would be in real life. Etc, etc…

Games from ‘pre-online’ era were all about immersion. Give it a try. I think it may be worth it

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Yes. That’s why I’m a noob here. :wink:

You provide 11 solutions.

Solutions 1, 2, 4, 5, and 6 require finding a disease that affects or genetically modified an organism that doesn’t, as far I know, even have DNA. So while these may be possible solutions for some other hypothetical culture, they’re not feasible for humanity before the Cataclysm and they’re definitely not feasible for scattered survivors afterwards.

Solutions 3, 8, 9, and 10 involve technological solutions that humanity has never had access to. Setting aside the minor detail that outside of soft sci-fi, we don’t even know how to theoretically make a relativistic missile - the Lorenz equations are kind of a pain that way.

Solution 7 isn’t practical for humanity after the Cataclysm (there are no new CBMs without a bunch of researchers who are all dead), and even if it were, it only addresses the small fragments of the Blob in the ground water. It does nothing to the Blob entity, the one that trivially opened thousands of portals across the surface of Earth and could do it again whenever it thought necessary.

Solution 11 is at least possible, though are current lore doesn’t posit any aliens more powerful than the Blob. And even if there are aliens more powerful than the Blob, humanity has no way of contacting them and no guarantee or expectation that they would be willing to help in a way beneficial to humanity. Replacing the Blob’s invasion of Earth with the Gunk’s invasion of Earth doesn’t really improve the situation.

So you have 11 solutions, and none of them really work.

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Thank you for your thoughtful reply.
That said, I feel you are dismissing them without foundation that is consistent with what I have seen of the game. I have to disagree with you scientifically. It happens all the time but it’s just a game so it’s not worth the energy. We are all entitled to our opinions and with respect to a made-up game, it’s really just a question of taste.

I was merely interested in seeing if anyone else had any ideas or even wanted to ‘win’ in a classical sense. After all, that is how many faction-driven games are played. What was fascinating was the attitudes conveyed. Some people are more attached to the status quo than I would have guessed.

Kevin pronounced judgement on it and seemed to speak for all who mattered so I accepted it as the final word. I didn’t know he could do that but when in Rome… It was a strange response to my simple questions though.

If I or anyone else really wanted to win, it would be far easier to create a fork (as suggested by PALU) than argue with some folks. You’d think someone was stealing their toys. Heh, I think I see where the inspiration for the Blob comes from… Just kidding! :wink:

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It does not matter how many possible solutions are there and how viable they are. What have left of mankind does not even know about the blob. Why would a single survivor even start thinking of solution to a problem they aren’t aware of?

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Kevin’s response is blunt, but I think it’s born out of lengthy discussions in the past where people have tried to push their version of [insert thing here] disregarding just plain ordinary statements that the lore and game won’t change it’s overall direction.

From what I understand of the current games lore, the closet we’d have to surviving indefinitely would be taking on the Exodii approach to things. Which is to “abandon ship” and continuously travel from one doomed parallel earth to the next. I think this was mentioned as a ‘New Game+’ of sorts on another forum.

So ya can’t be the hero that saves reality; Since this is more of a Lovecraftian plot, but with a bit of luck and know how, you can endure, if you’re willing to “bend” that is.

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Another planned non-hostile alien faction, the Yrax, have a long term goal of walling off their dimension from the Blob. You’ll be able to contribute a very small bit to their research, but are unlikely to see the fruits of your labors. Although the Yrax are in a tearing hurry to complete their research, they will readily admit that they still need around 9,000 more years of data before they can really crunch the numbers.

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Have the Yrax been responsible for abducting humans and returning them with stories of ‘probes’ before the Cataclysm? I mean were well into B movie sci-fi territory already.

If so, are they still abducting? Could there be a way of increasing ones chance of being abducted in the future? Could there be a random start as a returned abductee with er, some pain, and recovering from heavy sedation? Perhaps with some dubious knowledge. Or simply meeting NPCs that claim to have been abducted.

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I don’t see why the Yrax would have had any interest in humans before the cataclysm. If their goal is to seal off their dimension, visiting a non contaminated one would provide very little data about the blob and its effects, unless they somehow knew it was imminent (in a 9000 year time span comparison) and required a pre contamination comparison data set.

The Yrax’s research doesn’t involve the poor unfortunate natives of the dimensions being invaded by the Blob. They have no reason to abduct humans.