Gromnir

*insert silly eye-roll emoticon here.* if you want to talk animancy, what is the purpose o' your quoted post? more nonsense. 'least your other nonsense were tangential related to the topic at hand. see, technically your quoted post is spam. be aware of such in the future lest the moderators use as an excuse to prune the thread. add something relevant to topic--anything. example: aninmancers create undead and make secret police possible. these actions alone may call into question the morality of the animancer. however, the question o' the morality o' animancy itself is arguably entirely different. for example, the actions o' fritz haber is rare used as a condemnation o' the field o' chemistry itself, though perhaps in an earlier time his contributions would have been used to damn chemistry and chemists en masse. the distinction 'tween the morality o' animancer and animancy may be nothing other than petty sophistry. and again, manipulation of souls is unique. see is not hard to be on-topic even if mor's actual goal is something entire different. please refrain from littering the thread with spam and at least make an attempt to stay on-topic with a relevant observation or opine. sheesh. HA! Good Fun!

It's essentially like buying a real book and then giving it to your friends to read it, Honestly, how many centuries old is the custom of lending a book/lawnmower/whatever to your friend without it being a crime? Do we have to start now? I mean yeah, it's a very blurry issue with the advent of digital posessions, but if my sister could lend me a novel (which is you know, her property now) without the police crashing the door down, that would be great. And here is the problem, you pay 10 bucks for a book, and you can lend it out, you buy an ebook for 10 bucks and you can't do that without handing over an expensive electronic device, deprivig you of the rest of your ebooks, or making a copy, which is illegal. So charging for ebooks the same as physical books, which is what is happening now that publishers instead of retailers are setting prices, is ridiculous. that isn't a problem. it may be stupid, but it isn't a problem. don't buy the ebook if it is ridiculous to do so. buy the paper book. if you and many other similar folks begin buying the arguably superior paper book, then those who make ebooks will, quite naturally, come up with a solution. copyright laws does result in wacky possible situations. laws don't spontaneously pop into existence. it typical takes some time to get a law on the books. the process o' making laws tends to be a bit messy and rare is the most practical or efficient method gonna be the result of lawmaking. once on the books, laws that maybe were meaningful at the time o' their creation, becomes obstacles... and is even harder to get a law off the books than it is to get on. example: drive a car on non metropolitan road at night in pennsylvania has a bizarre requirement-- the motorist is 'posed to stop every mile and send up a signal flare to clear roads of possible livestock. is on the books even today. lawmaking is a slow process that is the result o' compromise. tech moves fast, and is very... uncompromising? that being said, having a paper book be a better option is not proof that copyright is bad. if piracy weren't a factor, the market would react intelligently and far quicker than would the copyright laws themselves. copyright can have odd results. lots o' laws gots funny results. find an inconsistency won't be a particular good excuse for supporting piracy though. piracy is the problem, not the solution... not that Gromnir is suggesting that oerwinde made such a ridiculous claim. what kinda yutz would do that? HA! Good Fun!

"It is an investigative police organization, similar to Scotland Yard," statements such as the above is not facts and is not clear supported. we don't find the name particular compelling, and as already stated, being a secret police does not in anyway diminish the likelihood of having detectives investigating murders. the gestapo was an investigative group. what made them a secret police group were their methods and their agenda/motivation. additionally, the gestapo were administered by the ss and they were frequently uniformed. many members o' the aforementioned Inquisition had uniforms as well and their purpose clearly were investigative. etc. you are making a large number of guesses. is nothing wrong with doing so. typical that is how we make sense o' things when we don't have all the answers or enough facts. all of which ignores the Fact that josh identified "Dunryd Row" as "secret police." josh's undergrad degree is history. that too is a fact. is it possible josh doesn't understand the difference 'tween a plain clothes police force and a "secret police?" am s'posing it is possible, but how likely do you think that is? as 'tween your guessing, and the black letter meaning of josh's words which were in no way contradicted by identifying uniforms or investigative duties of dunryd row, am gonna go with clear black-letter meaning. "From where I'm at, this job description does not exactly fit the term 'secret police' in that it is not primarily a tool for political coercion or suppression of dissent, but it is clearly different from your normal town guard to make use of the term warranted." there is absolutely nothing we has seen that would preclude dunryd row being a tool (not need primary btw) of political coercion and suppression of dissent. at the same time, Gromnir does not see why carrying out ordinary police duties would preclude dunryd row from being properly identified as a secret police force. HA! Good Fun!

how small is orlan's? cipher looks to be doing something with a bladed weapon that has a reddish stain on it. he gots a johnny carson carnac pose going on, but we cannot say with any certainty if he is using arcane powers, or is perhaps just a bit of a drama queen. maybe he need an aspirin? one would guess his outfit is a uniform as it prominently displays a symbol o' a raised fist with... dunno, a tiny bloody mace? the uniform could be showing allegiance to personal house, a governmental entity, or perhaps a local retro-ska band. we rare assume. that being said, if the cipher is investigating, we cannot hazard context beyond possibility that he/she (is orlan males and females distinguishable at first glance?) is investigating an incident that included violence... or somebody used a rather unwieldy tool to spread raspberry jam on their toast. were there a crime? if there were a crime, were it political in nature? sabotage? political assassination? a simple b & e gone bad? as for most recent post, we has no difficulty reconciling the investigation o' murders with gestapo. the gestapo had detectives. however, the crimes they investigated were having a political connection. am not suggesting that is how adam used. he gotta provide more info. nevertheless, a secret police doing actual investigating is not surprising to us. am recalling a book that were made into a movie, the night of the generals. in the book (not sure abut the movie) there were simultaneous seeming investigations o' a murder being conducted by both the gestapo and the military police. HA! Good Fun!

quit it. is NOT secret service anymore than is secret santa or secret garden or secret squirrel. as illathid observes, scotland yard would not be labeled as a secret police. secret police is a single identifiable term... don't parse. is not police who sometimes work in secret. secret police has well-defined denotation and connotation. the two words together create something different than the sum of the parts... given the context of this thread, perhaps you might think of it as akin to a chemical rather than physical change. now, is it possible that the obsidian who wrote the update were as confused as you? yeah. is possible they used "secret police" as a mash-up o' secret + police. Gromnir is taking this stuff second-hand from people quoting, but given josh's education (history major) am doubting he would do something like this by accident. if he wrote update, you can be assured he did so with knowledge and almost certainly with intent. HA! Good Fun! ps am very hopeful we don't have to explain venn diagrams and how a particular secret service could act as a secret police.

can't you romance characters in fire emblem: awakening? tell bruce that it were buckets o' fun when you romanced an elf girl (or boy?) and got yourself married. c'mon, it will make his day. HA! Good Fun!

actually, if the investigator is part of secret police, it pretty much does mean they is gestapo-ish. keep in mind that not all gestapo were corrupt, but their goals were suspect and their means were beyond the pale. secret police is not simply police who don't announce their police power. serious, read the definitions and links above. secret police is gestapo-ish... by definition. as we note above, it is possible in a particular grim-dark setting, secret police is gonna be deemed necessary. warhammer 40k is one example. even so, the secret police in such settings is gonna be possibly more scary, not less. aside: ... "Also cops and doctors example was good considering that you brought up the American in you, you guys have a wired love/hate relationship with the pOlice, especially on forum such as these and you can't know with 40+ years old with internet persona" and so we is full circle. whatever nonsense notions you got 'bout Americans and their pov of cops, Secret Police is NOT the cops you see on tv dramas. secret police is not just undercover cops. seriously guys. you two in same thread is killing us. HA! Good Fun!

ps we will note one difference that makes poe secret police potential less disturbing than real world examples. is not freaking time period, but it is fact that poe has real magic, and undead, and lord only knows what kinda threats. am genuine not knowing what sorta scary stuff exists to threaten people and governments in poe, but with monsters and magic, an organization that can act w/o need to observe the niceties o' due process or even human rights might be necessary... depending 'pon how grim-dark poe is. even so, the secret police in such a setting is still gonna be pants-p00ping scary, but they may be arguable more necessary than they is in a world where the threats is bolsheviks, jews and imaginary witches. HA! Good Fun!

We are playing 5th edition. The rules are still a jumbled mess sometimes, but I am really enjoying the metagame of managing the covenant and planning my character advancement. the... complexity (?) of the system had immediate appeal. Gromnir is one o' those rules junkies that actual enjoys a dense system. however, our borderline ocd tendencies were not shared by our gaming brethren and frequently we were sent to a corner to crunch numbers in solitude as punishment for our gaming heresies. well, not really, but it felt like that. *shrug* we always thought ars magica were one of those systems that were actual better suited for a computer environment as all the almost necessary metagaming that went into character development could be streamlined a bit. the ars magica rulebooks read likes horrible academic works where half of the book is actual the footnotes. near every ars magica rule entry would refer you to at least 1-2 other rule entries on complete different pages. actual gameplay had intriguing aspects, but our gaming group were kinda turned off by the emphasis on magic and by the rules density. HA! Good Fun!

early access as a developer/publisher money grab bothers us. early access as an excuse to extend development indefinite bothers us. the thing is, when we saw wasteland 2 screenies and video early in development, we were kinda disappointed. looked pretty darn amateurish even if we liked some conceptual aspects. we haven't played wasteland 2 as a beta tester, so all we got to go on is videos and screenies, which can be very misleading, but compared to how the game looked before early access, wasteland 2 looks... better. early access aside, if game tumbles into an additional financial quarter so as to be getting necessary polish, am not gonna complain overmuch. no offense to obsidian, but you guys got a bit of a reputation, perhaps undeserved, of buggy releases. would rather you folks take some extra time to get the game nice and shiny before releasing to the public. HA! Good Fun!

we don't know exactly how the "secret police" will be used in poe. we do know what "secret police" means. we expect that obsidian knows. change one word is pretty freaking dishonest though. state police? dream police? secret santa? use secret service instead is just... wrong. am not knowing why you is so torqued about time period. you initially used modern tv as a parallel for whatever reason. secret police Is a modern term... didn't gain use until 1920s. find direct medieval analogues is gonna result in debate, but "secret police" got some common qualities and typical the inquisition gets added... 'cause the inquisition were a bunch o' scary dudes that worked w/o transparency and in secret and used scare tactics and were oppressive. http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/secret%20police http://www.loc.gov/exhibits/archives/secr.html http://www.oxforddictionaries.com/us/definition/american_english/secret-police http://www.infoplease.com/encyclopedia/society/secret-police-the-evolution-secret-police-forces.html as we mentioned at the start, Gromnir is American, and we got a seeming natural repulsion to the term. there is some cultures that has seen secret police as a necessary evil... or at least necessary. nevertheless, is not gonna change fact that even where secret police has been better accepted, they has still been feared. serious, look up the definition if you don't know... 'cause you seeming don't. HA! Good Fun! ps we ignored your wiki entry, 'cause it is wikipedia. sorry, but wikipedia has 0 scholarly integrity and false entries and info can be added by anybody with the will to do so. nevertheless, since you brought up and seeming didn't read anything but the first line... "Instead of transparently enforcing the rule of law and being subject to public scrutiny as ordinary police agencies do, secret police organizations are specifically intended to operate beyond and above the law in order to suppress political dissent through clandestine acts of terror and intimidation (such as kidnapping, coercive interrogation, torture, internal exile, forced disappearance, and assassination) targeted against political enemies of the ruling authority." ... "Secret police not only have the traditional police authority to arrest and detain, but in some cases they are given unsupervised control of the length of detention, assigned to implement punishments independent of the public judiciary, and allowed to administer those punishments without external review. The tactics of investigation and intimidation used by secret police enable them to accrue so much power that they usually operate with little or no practical restraint." ... "Secret-police organizations employ internal spies and civilian informants to find protest leaders or dissidents, and they may also employ agents provocateurs to incite political opponents to perform illegal acts against the government, whereupon such opponents may be arrested. Secret police may open mail, tap telephone lines, use various techniques to trick, blackmail, or coerce relatives or friends of a suspect into providing information. "Secret police are notorious for raiding homes between midnight and dawn, to apprehend people suspected of dissent.[3]" seeing as how you linked it...

a secret service or organization is Not the same as secret police. and seriously folks, bring up tv shows with cops and doctors and whatnot is not helping. the obsidian guys ain't dim. am suspecting that they know what is the definition o' "secret police" and they used intentional. cowled wizards were never called secret police by bioware even if you thinks they should have been. doesn't matter. OBSIDIAN using term "secret police" is significant. using in regards to animancers is also significant to the question o' animancer morality. use "secret police" in context o' animancers to guess what is public perception o' animancers is very significant, 'cause regardless o' how you wanna use, "secret police" gots denotation and connotation that is not hugable. am not jumping to any conclusions. is a definition thing. don't say "secret service" if you mean "secret police," or vice versa. HA! Good Fun!

oh sure, no doubt the inquisition and various historical examples o' secret police organizations pre-1920 were considered quite hugable by the peoples living in those times. is only nowadays that we is enlightened enough to be afeared of repression/oppression and faceless organizations spying 'pon us to make sure we is good little citizens. HA! Good Fun!

the odd thing is, there is places that is even more poor in the world and piracy is not similarly excused as it is in eastern europe and south-east asia. is... odd. different cultures embrace notions that some activities is understandably illegal even if there ain't anything morally wrong with the activity itself. prostitution is an example. infidelity, on the other hand, is frequent viewed as immoral, but many countries/cultures where infidelity is accepted as immoral don't accept that it should be criminalized. is all very curious. HA! Good Fun!

"That just silly name association with political repression." HA! and? hey, maybe you can sell your cop show idea to kim-jong-un. you know, do a show 'bout the north korean State Security Department... something the whole family can enjoy, right? seriously, you comparing secret police organizations to the folks on cop and doctor shows and lephy comparing dangers o' being animancer guinea pig to drinking coffee. what is with people on these boards? oh, and even if all secret police were was a name association with political repression, that is still gonna distinguish from ordinary cops... you know, given the repression bit. obsidian is not calling 'em secret police 'cause they is helping little old lady find their way to the local market, or even tracking down jack the ripper. lack o' transparency is last thing a police organization wants if it is trying to reassure public. *shakes head* wacky stuff HA! Good Fun!

these threads is baffling to us. the excuses people come up with for piracy is always entertaining, though frequent ... curious. paint piracy as a quixotic endeavour or a necessary evil to combat corporate greed. is funny. funny and wrong, but still funny. there is also an undeniable geographic aspect to information piracy that Gromnir has never genuine explored. am aware that eastern europe and south-east asia is hotbeds o' such piracy, but we never bothered to discover why that is. oh sure, we has seen a bunch o' crackpot internet theories, but we never did any serious research for our self. HA! Good Fun!

your friend were expressing the prevailing view regarding grogs and companions. no doubt a great gaming group and a competent gamemaster could make non magic guy fun to play in the ars magica we know, but the system itself made grogs and companions less immediate appealing. much less appealing. HA! Good Fun!

ordinary cops is NOT the secret police. am not sure why we even need make that point, but there you go. HA! Good Fun!

it were 1989 and am thinking it were the second edition of ars that we were using. ... am suspecting that ars has come a long way since 1989, 'cause it were kinda a baffling mess back then with absolute useless armour and terrible combat... though admitted, combat were kinda secondary. character development options were slight more deep than d&d of the time, but were all 'bout the magic, so you better really like the magic 'cause much o' the rules were self-contradictory and outright silly. am suspecting the ars we played were only slight resembling what you play nowadays. what edition is ars? *shrug* HA! Good Fun!

Animancy already has mundane and beneficial applications i.e. Animancer study with the brishalgwin helped build what Ciphers are today and their ability to manipulate others souls has been put into a very practical function in the form of Defiance bay secret police... (which make a lot of sense) Also while Animancy can show the way to create monstrosities it can also better explain the workings of the universe. JS comment that some trees also have souls made me think of Orson Scott Card universe alien races different life cycle and existence. It might explain where the Engwithan disappearance... perhaps it is the American in Gromnir, but knowing that animancers create undead AND made possible the secret police is probable not helping with the whole "beneficial" aspects o' animancy. tell us that animancy also makes tax collecting in poe possible and am gonna be absolute convinced that known animancers would be murdered in their sleep with great frequency. *shrug* most real world traditional hard sciences aid us in better understanding the workings o' the universe. historically, that didn't help 'em much with public perception until extreme recent. explain difference 'tween chemistry and alchemy to average person is gonna seem like sophistry or lawyerly gobbledygook. farmer bob might be momentary interested to hear that a new element were added to the periodic chart. on the other hand, chemistry that allows Bob to increase his crop yield by 20% is gonna makes him a dyed-in-wool chemistry supporter. HA! Good Fun!

have fun. we like the keys. pretty much all the stuff we like 'bout the caribbean, but w/o the malaria and yellow fever. HA! Good Fun!

am more o' a conservative when it comes to economic issues, so... whatever. the thing is, the original intent o' the DoJ activities has either been subverted or peoples is purposeful misrepresenting what is going on for political gain. bank fraud is a huge problem for the DoJ and those payday lenders and online lenders has created so much work for DoJ that situation were being perceived as a bit desperate. espoused intent o' this choke point stuff were to pressure lenders so that they would stop and/or self-report their questionable practices. first choke point victim were not pr0n stars or gun shops, but were a bank. http://articles.chicagotribune.com/2014-04-25/news/sns-rt-us-usa-banks-payday-20140425_1_four-oaks-bank-operation-choke-point-payday-lenders back in december o' 2013, Darrell Issa ® sends a letter to the Attorney General demanding documents and making claims that DoJ were using choke point to destroy on-line lender industry regardless o' any evidence o' fraud. in interviews and tv appearances, Issa also also claimed that choke point could be used for even less savory purposes o' going 'gainst a multitude o' otherwise innocent business. so, here we is 'bout six months later and we got stories o' a multitude o' legal but unlikable persons and business being targeted by choke point. ... dunno. is republicans fabricating stories to makes democrats look bad before november elections? all seats in the house is up for grabs and 1/3 of senate. is this just scare tactics? there seems to be increasing evidence that the DoJ is being a bit aggressive with choke point. regardless, especially this close to a major election, things is rare as clear as they seem. HA! Good Fun!

how people react to animacy will depend on any number of variables we ain't yet privy to. as you point out, we don't know how well understood is the link 'tween animancy and the creation o' corporeal undead. the morality o' animancy, on the other hand, is a slight different question, isn't it? am guessing that at least very early in the development of animancy, it would be possible that animancers didn't fully understand the link 'tween their craft and souls. as far as morality of animancy is concerned, Gromnir is far more concerned with what animancers and test subjects know than what is prevailing opinions of the People. heck, the soul manipulation part o' animancy could, at least initially, have been an unexpected side-effect. am still not having enough info to make any kinda judgement, but nevertheless, we do recognize that manipulation of souls creates questions o' morality that simply do not exist in real world sciences and fields. HA! Good Fun!

*groan* look at your recent contributions. conspiracy theorist nobles making themselves available as guinea pigs for more testing animacy. to prove a point we s'pose? analogizing the risks of volunteering to be an animancer's test bunny to peoples drinking of coffee. etc. am not knowing if you is an idiot, but you is making some idiotic contributions... oh, and Gromnir not need be a genius for you to post idiotic stuff. discuss rational with amentep and others... we will stay out of it, but that won't impact your idiocy or Gromnir's genius either. HA! Good Fun!

"exactly, makes that boring and other things not-boring. Combat? Just because combat is a big part of the gameplay? That's pretty circumstantial. There can still be boring, terrible combat" is your memory that short? who the hell is gonna ask for the combat to be boring. yes, combat in poe could be boring, but why on earth is that relevant? you don't even know what you is doing anymore, do you? serious. HA! Good Fun!