DEAD SPACE EVENT

[singularitymods.livejournal.com]

ANNOUNCEMENT

Staring Thursday, March 3rd, the Dead Space portion of the event will begin at Singularity. Those unfamiliar with that canon universe needn’t fret; you don’t have to be canon familiar to participate in this. Players are encouraged to ask questions to clarify any confusion. The event will take place roughly over 2 weeks, although it’ll end no later than SHODAN’s event end.


Something big has dropped into Zone 0. It’s a small section of a ship, badly damaged, the inside almost completely inaccessible. Amongst the other debris, it probably hardly would be of any note, but it’s what’s inside it that makes it different: a Marker. A huge, alien monolith covered in symbols. These markings are DNA and anyone who decodes the symbols would realize it’s apparently ‘human’ DNA. However, the Marker also broadcasts a ‘pulse’ code that is also DNA. This is a different DNA pattern than what is etched on it, and is necromorph DNA. This pulse can be detected by most geological recorders/machinery.

As it begins to pulse, it drags Hypatia’s attention to it; the pulse does not undetected by her systems. Curiosity has gotten the better of her, and she’s salvaged the Marker and brought the monolith to a research facility in Zone 08 for further study.

Starting 03/03, the pulse begins to strengthen enough to be felt by characters.

Roughly five days later, The Corruption will be seen spreading rapidly through the vents and growing over walls, turning the air noxious and foul. The Corruption is oily/slimy in feeling and is made of organic, living tissue. It gives off a sporing and thus where the Corruption is, necromorphs will soon follow as soon as there are suitable hosts to infect.

Please, do not have any necromorphs show up until a week (03/10) into the event. There will be more information on necromorphs later, closer to their occurrence.

What does the pulse do?
The Marker is semi-sentient despite being a big rock. It tries to communicate with organisms, which sadly also drives them insane. But either way, the Marker has three things it wants:

A) it doesn’t want to be destroyed (It can be physically painful to anyone who wants to damage it)
B) It just wants to be left alone so Convergence only happens as it should (necromorphs are kinda defects; they were never meant to be)
C) it also wants to reproduce.

Characters affected by its pulse first experience headaches, sometimes bad enough to be migraines. Terrible, realistic nightmares and insomnia are also effects of the pulse.
As the pulse grows stronger, depending on a character’s psyche and intelligence, they may also experience extreme paranoia, aggression, auditory hallucinations in the form of whispers, fanatical religious belief, and most extreme, realistic hallucinations.

What kind of hallucinations?
Most commonly, the sufferer sees hallucinations of deceased friends or loved ones.
The hallucinations usually are trying to give the sufferer a message or lead people to specific places. The hallucinations often talk about a mysterious thing called ‘Convergence’ and how it must not occur. They also warn against studying the Marker and urge people to leave it alone, although often enough, the sufferer of the hallucination will not understand that.
The Marker often creates scenarios that would be peaceful to the victim if it is trying to get them to do something specific; if the person strays too far off from what they want or decides that the person will only cause more harm than good, often enough the hallucination will turn to things that would cause the person to be killed or kill his or herself.
The second most common type of hallucination is just brought on by fear and paranoia -- the person might see others around them as monsters or visualize monsters in places where there are none.

What can I expect from my character if they’re affected by this?
Depends on the character. Those more average and of lower intelligence usually just experience paranoia and eventually it leads to violence. It’s not uncommon for those who are affected by the pulse to murder each other or kill themselves because their mind was too weak or broke down.
Those with more intelligence and a stronger will usually keep it together longer or experience the extreme violence then ‘relapse’ into relative passivity. Those with the mental capacity to understand it often see the Marker’s symbols in their mind and idly scrawl them across surfaces and paper.

FAQ

Q: Does my character have to participate in the event?
A: Interacting with the Marker and necromorphs is completely optional. Some characters are just resistant to the pulse. There has been canon occurrences of people not being affected by it at all. Other times, characters might be affected but still retain sanity. The choice is up to you.
Alternatively, characters can just avoid the zone.

Q: My character is a robot/AI/computer! Will they be affected?
A: Traditionally, the Marker only affects organic life (which means cyborgs would be susceptible). The pulse has canonly disrupted many computer systems, though, and may scramble them. AI are welcome to feel confusion and disorientation from the pulse as they choose.
As for the Tron programs and ISOs, they’re a bit of a gray area as they have bodies but are also programs, to my understanding. It’s up to the cast and individuals to decide if they want to be affected as organics or programs.

Q: How far can the pulse reach?
A: The radius of the pulse is pretty massive -- the novel, it could be felt on the shores of the Chicxulub crater when a Marker was in the center. That crater is about 110 mi in diameter.
In Sing, the pulse can probably easily be felt in bordering zones to 08.

Q: Can my character find and interact with the Marker?
A: Yes, the information that the Marker is there and being studied is in Hypatia’s systems. Characters are free to go to Zone 08 to interact directly with the Marker and study it, although the longer spent interacting with it, the more likely they are to be affected. However, characters will not be allowed to harm it at all.

Q: What happens if my character touches or attempts to harm the Marker?
A: As mentioned before, the Marker is semi-sentient. Touching the Marker is like injecting liquid crazy into a person’s veins. Their mind deteriorates fast with hallucinations and pain and leaves lasting effects; if they don’t kill themselves or get killed right away, their mental state will continue to fall apart rapidly.
Attempting to harm the Marker causes similar, excruciatingly painful effects. It’s goal is to hurt the people back long enough to encourage it to leave it alone.

Q: Are there any safe zones in the infected area?
A: Yes! The Marker gives off a Dead Space field. What this means is that it’s a sort of ‘safe zone’ in which necromorphs can’t approach.

Q: My character will probably die outside Zone 08. Will they turn into a necromorph?
A: That depends on how altered their DNA has become and if they had breathed in any of the Corruption infected air. If they come in contact with the Corruption then die, it’s likely they might transform into a necromorph.


If you have any questions, please feel free to post them in the Questions area of the post below. Otherwise, people are free to use this post for planning.

Also of note, people are free to interact with both this event and the SHODAN event; they're interconnected on small points.

Comments

QUESTIONS

[singularitymods.livejournal.com]

Post any questions you might have here.

[thiswaydaddy.livejournal.com]

QUESTION! Actually two:

1)So assuming a character gets infected in Zone 08 and then dies. Will they continue to be infected when they respawn or does Hypatia have some sort of prevention system in place? Something that screens out massive errors in DNA like that?


2)As someone who has a character full of ADAM, that lovely genetic mutation drug, would it be unreasonable to assume that the effects of the Marker would spread much faster or (conversely, if the other Bioshock folk don't want to turn into crazy freaks....the irony) be mostly negligible where they're involved?

OOPS! LET'S ASK ABOUT THIS FIRST.

[ysonightfurious.livejournal.com]

According to the wiki, the Marker apparently infected a fish once or something. Knowing that it might infect animals, would it be possible for Toothless to get infected?

And if he was infected, could he become some kind of hideous flying dive-bombing menace or would I have to pick and choose one of the already existing necromorphs to turn him into?

[harpocratic.livejournal.com]

THE SHADOW ISN'T ORGANIC. But it's brain works more or less like a really really special needs human. I assume it can wig out appropriately, it just won't be infectable?

[kidfromthevault.livejournal.com]

Okay it says this and the SHODAN event are interconnected. But I already had something planned out where Vaultie will be effected turning into a robutt etc etc. Will that effect this if I don't want it to...? Him changing I mean.

I WISH I HAD TWO CHARACTERS I WANT TO DO BOTH

[hows-the-knee.livejournal.com]

OK, so according to my IM log with Teal, SHODAN will be taking over Residential Zone 7. There's one garden zone in between there and Zone 8. Is it possible that the pulse could make it that far? Or if not, uh...any suggestions/ideas on how to best combine the two events, for those who are interested in really giving their characters a terrible time?

I'd like Sarah to be involved in the DS event if possible, but she's gonna be stuck in SHODANland from the beginning all the way through to the final takedown. I'll totally understand if high involvement in the SHODAN plot means sacrificing fun tiems with zombies and hallucinations, but I wanted to check and see what my options are.

thaaaaaanks :D

[manipul8trix.livejournal.com]

Um hello

Vriska lives in 08 and rarely wanders outside the zone, so she's pretty much guaranteed to be affected by this. But likely not for too long, because she's being snatched up as one of SHODAN's testingbuddies. Yaaaaaaaay~

SO UH she'll be committing suicide at some point to escape Rainbow Rumpus AI Murder Town. Does this mean her corpse is likely to get right back up, be all "sup dudes I'm a necromorph now lol this shit is cray-cray" and start doing its crazy robospiderzombiefairygodtroll thang? And am I a terrible person for finding that kind of hilarious?

Just asking because this would give me something to do while Normal!Vriska is dead and getting her canon update. >:3c

[reunified.livejournal.com]

My head is about to be full of fuck.

[singularitymods.livejournal.com]

You'll like it.

[im-sorry-dave.livejournal.com]

TMA-1? IS THAT YOU HONEY?

[notsoloyal]

OH SWEET MARKER
LET ME GET MY SCIENCE ON

[knight4darkness.livejournal.com]

are you going to try and put it in the garage

[ysonightfurious.livejournal.com]

OH SWEET MARKER
LET ME GET MY HIDEOUS NECROMORPH DRAGON ON

[jedimacguyver.livejournal.com]

in b4 dark Jedi

[heterochromiia.livejournal.com]

oh obi wan talk sith to me

(on another note i need to bother him with this smartass kid more, he can freak out about troll abilities being THE FORCE and them obviously being GOING DOWN THE SITH PATH or something)

[heterochromiia.livejournal.com]

can i say again how happy i am that we combined the two events

because i am

best modteam/playerbase everrrrrrr

[oneliners.livejournal.com]

|D LET'S JUST HOPE IT ALL GOES SMOOTHLY.

[mcfussyfangs.livejournal.com]

ALL UNDEAD
ALL INSANITY
ALL CHAINSAWS
ALL THE TIME

[heterochromiia.livejournal.com]

ALL THE TIME

ALL

OF

IT

[sopor_pies]

Oh boy.

Whaaaaat to doooooo with Gamzeeeeeeeeee :Da

[manipul8trix.livejournal.com]

Oh, please.
LIKE YOU DON'T ALREADY FUCKING KNOW.
I think it's pretty clear what needs to be done here.
I'M THINKING IT'S MOTHERFUCKIN CLEAR AS CLEAR CAN BE.
Honk.
HONK.

:o)

[whistlesatengineers]

/gives Rookie all of the hallucinations and the crazy

I HOPE THE SPARTANS LIKE STEALTHY AX MURDERERS

[enough-bodybags.livejournal.com]

Oh boy, Medic gets to lose his shit!

[manipul8trix.livejournal.com]

Zone 08.

Where Vriska and John live.

And Vriska's already an aggressive little shit who has regular nightmares, so she won't notice anything amiss.

WHAT IS LIFE EVEN

[notsoloyal]

NOOOOOOOOOOOOO VRISKAAAAAAAAAA

[purelydriven.livejournal.com]

Aw shit, this ain't gon' be pretty.

mods wry u do dis ;3;

never stawp

[shipper]

Aw hell no.

By which I mean hell yes, of course. Wow this looks so awesome, I don't even know what I'm going to do if anything but. So coooool. *__*

[riflekinematics.livejournal.com]

>Most commonly, the sufferer sees hallucinations of deceased friends or loved ones.

:o... i seeeee (http://www.mspaintadventures.com/?s=6&p=002819)

HALO CAST PLANNING.

[oneliners.livejournal.com]

Post what your char is up to in herrrr

Re: HALO CAST PLANNING.

[nobleleader.livejournal.com]

This (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ua26qTEK25U) sums it up.

FUCKERS OF MINE WHO ARE GOING TO BE IN THE DEAD SPACE EVENT & just wtf do you think you're doing...

[ysonightfurious.livejournal.com]

> Kanaya Maryam: Go a little crazy. Then go a lot crazy.

Kanaya is going to attempt to rescue her brofriends from SHODAN only to FAIL FUCKING MISERABLY once she starts hearing a very familiar voice (http://www.mspaintadventures.com/?s=6&p=004289). She will promptly start mildly flipping her shit; panicking, getting lost and trying to get far away from the Marker like the the voice is telling her to do because Kanaya is a good troll who listens to her lusus. When she deems herself far enough from the Marker, she will calm down a little more and be a easier to interact with. Possibly mad tea party will happen during this time. When she realizes her momgrubs's voice doesn't fuck off even though Kanaya figures she's Done As Much As I can Mom why wont you stop telling me things please stop stop stop stopstopstop, she is going to flip all the tables and run off so she can killing all the things, murdering her some necromorphs when they come around.

> Toothless: Be completely terrifying.

He's gonna get ambushed by necros on his way to who knows where the fuck, and they're going to drag him into R08 where he will promptly become a REALLY AWESOME DRAGON NECROMORPH. He will spend the later parts of the event flying around, screaming, dive-bombing bitches and SPITTING FIRE AT EVERYONE until someone manages to slice off his wings and tail which I have decided are his weak points per canon and because shut up.

[eighttotwelve.livejournal.com]

Thane has shit going down with SHODAN and Motoko eventually. However, during all the while, he will hallucinate his dead waifu Irikah. Thane will resist her through his perfect memory, but it will degrade his judgment. Typically, he is very calm, and usually under the belief that any kill should be clean. That will change over the course of time for this event, and likely during the SHODAN hijinks.

Soundwave, with his awesome hearing, will be hideously affected by the Marker. He will resist at first, but cave in. It will be NO GOOD.

[notsoloyal]

bro brooooooooooooo does that mean i won't be grounded once you go crazy

can i go steal the big marker thingy now