[g]<Amelia Beerheart> Somewhat hampered by there being so much content.
[g]<Tornin> The social links will take you to our forums—they’re synced with the forums on our guild website, so you can access them in and out of the game. Read through the guild rules when you get a chance—though they’re not too far from the location rules here in the game, so if you’re complying with them you’ll be fine.
[g]<Malazan> Standard don’t be a dick set-up.
[g]<Silent> I am officially almost to Mars, Kaz. Just Skipped to far outer orbit.
[g]<Leveret> Nice. I’m going to log a while, and then maybe work on zero G manoeuvres, since they’re apparently important to the System Challenge.
[g]<TALiSON> I only just reached Earth orbit, I’m afraid.
[g]<Lady Sirah> Too much Veil.
[g]<TALiSON> Yeah, true. I’m so torn. I want to do DS' main plotline, but Veil’s so good. It’s got all the things I love that the main story is missing—you know, personality, and consequences, and some sort of tangible endgame that isn’t just beat a few million other people there.
[g]<voidMaster> It is damn easy to get distracted in this game.
[g]<Klinnia> I started Veil too. I can see why it’s hard to tear yourself away.
[g]<TALiSON> Isn’t it just the best?
Achievement
First to reach Rank Nine
[Yang Tuo]
Awarded: Custom Ship (Rank One)
[g]<Wraith> Whoa! Nina Stella dethroned!
[g]<Leveret> Custom ship.
[g]<Far Cryinggame> Custom SHIP!
[g]<Silent> These global firsts make me so jealous. How damn long and hard are we going to have to work to move up from the pills-in-space looks of our Snugs?
[g]<Amelia Beerheart> Space tampons wouldn’t be my first design choice either.
[g]<Wraith> Nan!
[g]<Leveret> I saw a fantastic big ship over Mars. It had Snugs attached to it like Lego.
[g]<Far Cryinggame> I only need to leap-frog two ranks to get first to Rank Ten.
[g]<Lady Sirah> I’ve had to accept that slow-but-steady’s my playstyle. But my Cycog says that sometimes people come out of the gate fast, and then plateau.
[g]<Wraith> Like Nina not-so-Stella!
[g]<Silent> What’s the name of the quest series you’re doing, Kaz?
[g]<Leveret> The Heart of Mars. We’ve done the first three stages, and need two more for the group before we go on. It’s a shield-training gauntlet, nine stages. I’ll add the details to the forum.
[g]<Tornin> Perhaps we’ll have our next guild meet-up on Mars. It looks incredible.
[g]<Leveret> Apparently there’s such a thing as parking queues after the Singularity. Be prepared for a wait to land on Mars once the main wave’s arrived.
[g]<Amelia Beerheart> Thankfully camping the download is still keeping us ahead of the pack.
[g]<Far Cryinggame> A ton of the newer players have never tried any kind of MMO before. They’re just insomniacs who had a cowl and decided to try the latest craze.
[g]<Silent> First signs of excess server load are showing up, too. Longer login times, but particularly issues if you try to log out quickly.
[g]<Far Cryinggame> The vague memory thing? Yeah, I’m still not sure I believe the way DS claims to be structured—that we’re Constructs, and our experiences are being sent back in packets to our dreaming selves—but I can see a quick logout means not getting the full last memory packet.
[g]<TALiSON> Thinking too much about the way DS might or might not work gives me the cold shivers. But speaking of which, I’m going to log early and get my chores done before The Interview.
[g]<Wraith> Man, is it time for that already? Thanks for the reminder!
[g]<Tornin> A half hour real-world time.
[g]<Leveret> Huh, I’d forgotten it altogether, even though I’ve got the in-game alarm set to wake me for it.
[g]<Arlen> Will meeting in ten game hours work given the schedule of The Interview?
[g]<Leveret> Good point. Let’s just make it—huh, we don’t know how long The Interview will last either. If you’re both watching it, let’s just log on ten minutes after the end of the interview, and meet up.
[g]<Silent> I’ll see if I can get to your stage before logging.
[g]<Far Cryinggame> I get the feeling we’re going to discover whether there’ll be login queues if everyone logs just to watch some developer lie his head off.
[g]<TALiSON> Mystery developer, only named programmer of impossible game, with no verified photographs.
[g]<Malazan> A whole day ago I’d say that the lack of info on this guy was a gimmick to help sell the game. Now I think this Dom Kinnen is a synth being worn by Cycogs, which is a belief I’d have found incredibly embarrassing to admit to if I wasn’t sure most of you felt the same.
[g]<Silent> Yup.
[g]<Lady Sirah> Yes.
[g]<Amelia Beerheart> Not your standard issue human, anyway. A front for something non-human, or a time traveller or—well, you’ve heard all the theories.
[g]<Wraith> I’m not such a mug.
[g]<Vasharda> I’m definitely in the mug arena.
[g]<TALiSON> Mulder not Scully today.
[g]<Leveret> But do we really want to believe? I’m going to go practice zero G. Talk to you all after The Interview.
31
puppets
"Dio, how feasible is it for me to try to go do some orbital Challenges, then log to watch Dom Kinnen’s interview, and get back here for the gauntlet without keeping Arlen and Imoenne waiting about for me? Oh, and do I lose my parking place if I go off-planet for a little while?"
[[There are orbital shuttles: you don’t need to use your Snug. They’ll cost lux points, however. Timing is more difficult. We don’t have teleportation in The Synergis—yet—and you won’t be able to complete a Challenge and a return trip in the time frame. If you want to return to this location, you could board the shuttle before logging, and I’ll put you in the Soup on arrival.]]
Te meant taking over my body and walking it somewhere. "Ew," I said, settling onto a bench of the tram-thing back out of the Challenge area.
[[This, after all, is only a simulation.]]
"Even so. How common is it for a Cycog to walk about in Bios' empty bodies?"
[[It’s sometimes used to tidy away spare modals. Not so common for Core Units. When you are in The Synergis, you are generally not logging out of reality.]]
"Do you wear people’s—Bios' modals—to experience being that species?"
[[The command interface is different for Bios and Cycogs. A Type Three modal can be constructed with a Cycog suitable interface, of course, but your Core Unit is not structured for us to be. It is something we would control with a portion of our consciousness, rather than experience.]]
"Like a finger puppet."
Dio laughed, that little synthesiser-like ripple of sound, and…it wasn’t Dio. The speaking voice was Dio’s, but the laugh was different.