[Torg] Sometimes you use the tool...

[Dominick Riesland]

2008/7/21 Tommy Tanaka <tommytanaka at gmail.com>:
> Sometimes the tool uses you? This is the first of an indeterminate number of
> questions that I'm feeling like posing to the list. Some of them are going
> to be looking for specific answers, others are more discussion fodder. This
> one leans towards the latter. And the subject is tools and contradictions.

While I saw the other responses already, I'm taking this because this
topic, properly handled, gives a grand tour of the rules for reality.

> What constitutes using a tool? Is listening to a radio or watching TV enough
> to cause a contradiction, or would you have to try to change the station?

There are several things to consider here. First, there are
electromagnetic waves being generated to create the signal. If they
are being generated in an area with sufficient Tech axiom by a
character with sufficient Tech axiom, there is no problem.
Electromagnetic waves themselves come from natural sources (stars),
and as such can float through space without generating contradiction.

However, the receiving device must take the waves of the correct
frequency and convert the information contained in them back into
sound (and pictures, in the case of a television). This, in Torg
terms, is also a tool use, and subject to the appropriate rules. If
you are in contact with the device (walkman, boom box, etc.), it can
be an active contradiction check to turn it on, and a passive
contradiction check every scene afterward that it remains on. If it's
larger, the character who wants to use it in an area with lower axioms
must either maintain contact with it or create a long-range
contradiction. (Note that an edeinos who turns on a television while
in Core Earth does generate an active contradiction check to do so,
but once it's on, the local reality will support it.)

> The former has nasty implications. Hey, for that matter, if you played Mein
> Kampf (translated into Eidenos) over a loudspeaker at Baruk Kaah's minions
> (assuming you can actually find words in the Eidenos tongue to get the ideas
> across in the first place - might need to throw some magic or a miracle into
> the mix), would they risk disconnection struggling with concepts above their
> social axiom? (That sounds like a great PsyOps plan.)

Only if they tried to act on them. The tool here isn't the message
itself, but the concepts contained in it. It would be the same as if
someone gave Mobius the plans for the first atomic bomb. The plans
themselves aren't contradictory (Nile Empire has paper and ink and
sufficient command of the English language to understand the words),
but the attempt to build one would be the contradictory act.

> Would a magical
> illusion of Godzilla rampaging through Tokyo cause massive contradiction
> checks as people try to decide whether or not it's real? Or would the
> spellcaster have to make a contradiction check every time someone tried to
> disbelieve the illusion?

Magic disbelief is supported in every cosm where the Magic axiom is
low enough to prevent magic from always creating real effects. As
such, you can't force someone to disconnect off of getting them to try
to disbelieve an illusion.

> Similar question with passive contradiction with
> carrying tools. If I start wandering around Aysle passing out coins made of
> space-age alloys, what's going to happen?

Not much. A coin made of aluminum alloy does the exact same thing as a
coin made of silver: get passed from one person to another in exchange
for goods and services. Try getting that dwarven weaponsmith to start
manufacturing them, and you could have some fun with contradiction.

> For that matter, what sort of passive contradiction checks am I going to be
> making for having that loose change in my pocket? The "Using Passive
> Contradiction Checks" box on p.152 of R&E says that passive contradiction
> checks don't have to be made for every single passive contradiction a
> character has. The specific examples given are a character's clothing and
> Nile Empire's Law of Morality. (Though I'm not sure about that last one,
> since the text of the Law says that every single morally gray action is a
> contradiction. That sounds more like an active contradiction.) So how many
> checks would you need for all the stuff you're carrying on you? My personal
> view is that the Everlaw of One isn't that picky. You're either
> contradictory or you're not. It doesn't matter to the Everlaw if you're
> carrying a single Tech 30 tool or if you're festooned with biotech, magic
> items, etc. You're contradictory so you make a single check at the beginning
> of the scene.

That's the general idea. You make a single check, but if it fails, all
contradictory elements are affected.

> Back to the tool using you: Let's say you hypnotize an Eidenos (yeah, I use
> them alot in these examples... what can I say? They have a lot of low
> Axioms.) Give him some post-hypnotic suggestions, then cut him loose. What
> happens once one of them is triggered? Long-range contradiction for the
> mesmerist? Is it a passive contradiction for the Eidenos while he's walking
> around? Is his roll to resist the compulsion a contradiction? I assume not
> since otherwise people would have to make contradiction checks when
> "interacting" with, for example, that plasma sword being shoved through
> their guts.

Again, this would be a case of whether the local reality can support
hypnotism. It's effectively a tool with a delayed effect that must
happen outside the range of the hypnotist. So if the suggestion
happens in an area where hypnotism is supported, there is no problem,
otherwise a long-range contradiction check by the hypnotist is in
order. The edeinos doesn't factor into this except as part of the
initial hypnotism - if he disconnects then, he must abide by the local
reality, which may very well include hypnotism as a supported skill.

Dominick Riesland, aka Rabbitball
Speaker, 5-Color Rules Committee
Creator of the Cosmversal Grimoire
"There are always possibilities, my sergeant told me. But he never had
his possibilities torn away like wings from a fly."