"Anyone who attempts to generate random numbers by deterministic means is, of course, living in a state of (original) sin."
   -J V Neumann

“...there is a certain place in any discussion of any one thing in existence where knowledge ends and the Great Vacuum extends on out into infinity.”
 -Ray Bradbury

"Let them not be another's servant, who can be their own masters"
 -Paracelsus

"For heaven is man, and man is heaven, and all men are one heaven, and heaven 
only one man."
 – Paracelsus

“Only the pure soul can truthfully live in this tension: to know about the possible ruin and still remain tirelessly active for all that is possible in the world.”
 -Karl Jaspers

=-=-=

"As properly unconditional, the subject is a free being. It is truly present as the self-conscious Existenz which in action finds itself in its objectivity but cannot be derived from objective being, no more than that being can be derived from it."
 — Karl Jaspers

“What is the Absolute? Something that appears to us in fleeting experiences--say, through the gentle smile of a beautiful woman, or even through the warm caring smile of a person who may otherwise seem ugly and rude. In such miraculous but extremely fragile moments, another dimension transpires through our reality. As such, the Absolute is easily corroded;it slips all too easily through our fingers and must be handled as carefully as a butterfly”
― Slavoj Zizek, The Fragile Absolute: Or, Why Is the Christian Legacy Worth Fighting For?

We talked some more about this on the Discord - or rather I babbled to myself this weekend 

There the whole lineage thing that combines human and Nonman blood, resulting in a "Two Hearted" ancestor of Kellhus.

From Knife of Many Hands there seems to be a parallel between two hearts and two personalities if not two souls.

This seems to relate to something the No-God requires to get started again, perhaps having two souls in one body creates some "flaw" or "singularity" that the Ark + NG can exploit to shut the world?

Another question is whether the Outside is made of "stuff" and can be manipulated in the same way the Inside has been manipulated using the reductonist principles of the Tekne.

Transporting some discussion about this from the Discord ->

Athjeari:

Is anyone into the SCP Foundation universe?  If so, I’m trying to identify what portions of tSA that could be transferred over to the D&D 5e rule set in a believable manner.
This specific group of players I DM for played my patchwork version of tSA, but I think they would really like an adventure version where they are essentially SCP agents and all of the SCP’s they are called to investigate are out of the Bakkerverse

Shulgi the Innkeeper:

SCP is great
Used to read articles before, haven't checked it in more than a year though.
If you combine the technological anomalies, such as the ones made by Anderson Robotics or perhaps Prometheus Labs and use them as technology for the Consult, I think it will make a fun mixture. I doubt the lores are compatible in any way though, even the horror atmosphere is different.
Flesh that hates and Consult abomiantions could work together I guess

Sciborg:

Regarding the RPG idea I think you can combine elements of Neuropath - use tech to fuck with people's brains in Seven-movie fashion w/ elements of the gods and Outside
The Hundred can be archetypes, hiding behind angels of the monotheisms and gods of the polytheisms.
The Hundred, are, arguably, akin to AIs
The Trickster seems like a friend, helping you navigate these horrors, but in truth seeks a way into the world could be a campaign.
Ciprhang - I assume 5e has the Tanar'ri, the demons of the Abyss
Those seem to be inspiration for the Ciphrang we get in the books.

5e Ultramodern - I think that's the title - prolly has enough modern rules for stuff like guns to help blend the fantasy and sci-fi elements.
You don't even need to read Neuropath, you can just ask yourself what happens when the worst people in the world - many of whom are in power - get access to tech that can fuck with brains....

Chorae would need to be toned down, tho Aporetics could be how Ciphrang are harmed...like you scribble some Word of God onto bullets, blades, etc.
just use magical weapon rules, maybe with some "ignoring defensive magics"

Wilshire:

The all/nothing nature of Bakker's magic is likely untenable for an rpg.

It works on the scale of armies, but for small groups it doesn't make sense. Either all encounters simply end with a handwaive, or the wizard does nothing.

SmilerLoki:

it's pretty much like the real world - who lands the first hit, wins

Sciborg:

Aporetics actually gives a reason for the sci-fi tech

The mechanic is already in the Modern / Urban-Fantasy rules for 5e
Ah you just tone down the efficacy of Aporetics
Like how you need a +1 magical weapon to hit most demons, elementals, etc
It give the opportunity, not victory outright

H:

Brutal Rock, Paper, Scissors balance there.
I mean, it can work, you just better watch each other's asses.  But, yeah, maybe they were going for a real D2 Hardcore-style.  It does make for some real "stakes."  In a Heideggerian Being-Towards-Death way, I guess.

Sci:

Yeah a lot of the Old School Renaissance stuff is pretty hardcore
But if the goal is Occult Investigation into Bakkerverse type horror
Seems like you need to either up the power of science and/or lower the power of magic

Wilshire:

Permadeath is not something I have ever felt I had time for.

Sci:

permadeath based on a die-roll especially is hard if you were 3/4ths of the way into an X-files style case

Wilshire:

Closest I've come is Xcom2 where your soldiers can die. While great fun in its devastation, i don't have the hours to lose an entire game.

Sci:

heh i was just thinking of how it could be done Xcom style

Wil:

Yeah feeling the loss of a mistake that kills a character you've been grooming is nice in that way, as you kind of get the best of both..

You still keep playing the stakes are there to lend weight to decisions.

Sci:

Plus the agency itself has more of a character. Sorta like Men in Black

You select agents for the job, possibly separate investigators from "SWAT" back up

So your "main guys" aren't dying every time

Pail:

Sorcerer vs Sorcerer battles still get a back-and-forth, where wards get worn down and reinforced

Smiler:

that's assuming no one's blindsided, which is a pretty big assumption

Pail:

they still have reflexive and incipient wards though

and it's hard to be blindsided due to the mark

Wil:

Akka gets ambushed a number of times
Manages to live.

Smiler:

I would assume those can be overwhelmed with a precision strike, given time to aim/concentrate

Sci:

Akka has warning Wards, it's why he wakes up in the library

Smiler:

and I mean blindsided in a skirmish, when too much stuff happens, and you can get attacked from any side at any point, while you yourself are attacking someone in the same way

Wil:

Kellhus teleporting around and killing all the primaries.

Where were their skin wards lol.

Quote from: sciborg2 on May 09, 2021, 11:23:43 pm

...and yet ->

Quote from: Cû'jara-Cinmoi on June 22, 2016, 01:11:19 pm

Mike mentioned this on TPB as the 'question of questions,' but I'm sure this in the books somewhere. Wracu find them painful, for reasons that are hotly contested. One interpretation involves the fact that it's not just places where atrocity wears thin the fabric of the onta. As Wutteat shows, it's beings as well. Wracu, some argue, are demonic in some respect.

Another interpretation turns on the way morality is intrinsic to the ontology of the World. If you look at Chorae as 'logic bombs' designed to obliterate violations of code, then you can chart antipathies to Chorae according to different kinds of violations. Thus the difference between Schoolmen and Cishaurim. Wracu are not simply Inchoroi abominations, they are Inchoroi abominations possessing souls. Like the Cishaurim, they do not so much violate the 'letter' as the 'spirit' of natural law. Chorae are 'ontological stressors' in the latter instance. 

I actually, at times, have wondered if they somehow went and "mixed" actual Inchoroi genomes and whatever genome Wutteät is/was in an attempt to manufacture Wracu.  Which might explain why they all are somewhat different than each other, each was some new experiment on how to combine Inchoroi DNA with Wutteät DNA and graft that onto cybernetic parts.  In other words, it was a makeshift process, using what tech they still had available, not wholesale "new" creations (which likely could not be souled because they lacked the understanding of how to imbue that "part").

Not that we could prove any of that one way or the other.

Might be why they were so obsessed with "cunny" as well....