129: The Whims of Creation Simon Hawke

FancyShark

The honor system is without honor

Flippant Sausage Beyond Oblivion

Im beginning to really put a lot more credence into the idea that these people were the descendents of the really stupid and annoying who were tricked into migration by a fed up Earth.

gellaho

"What do we want? Elf waifus! When do we want em? Now!"

The Late Eric Christian Berg

Look, we may to do a genocide here...

FancyShark

Unfortunate choice of group names, Simon. But possibly intentional.

Flippant Sausage Beyond Oblivion

"As long as we dont investigate or think about if theyre sapient or not, we can never prove they ARE sapient, and therefore it will be fine to herd them into a cargo bay and open the airlock."

gellaho

Weird way to build a ship, but sure

Flippant Sausage Beyond Oblivion

Well...............thats one way to do it, i guess.

FancyShark

Interesting

Flippant Sausage Beyond Oblivion

They built a less fun Ork Rok.

that mfing chloe motherfucker

I mean I guess if you don't have to worry about aerodynamics you really can make it look like anything

gellaho

Damn space manipulating dwarves

that mfing chloe motherfucker

I don't know why in a world of infinite creativity, this author chose the ship to look like a rock, but I guess

The Late Eric Christian Berg

Just hollow out Ceres and take it for a spin.

FancyShark

Hi, @that mfing chloe motherfucker !

that mfing chloe motherfucker

I'm having a violent reaction to nanalloy and I don't know why

that mfing chloe motherfucker

Hello!

gellaho

Secret space corridors

that mfing chloe motherfucker

FUCKING WHY is it NANOpolymer but not NANOalloy??? Why Nanalloy???? Nana isn't anything!

Flippant Sausage Beyond Oblivion

Allergic to the perfume the grandmas wore before they were smelted and beaten into folded nanalloy.

that mfing chloe motherfucker

How do you pronounce it anyways? Is it nan-alloy? Or is it Nana-lloy? Nanal-loy?

Nanall? Oy!

The Late Eric Christian Berg

This was how I felt watching NCIS as a computer guy.

gellaho

They find looking at space very disconcerting

that mfing chloe motherfucker

Karen and Rhonda are the best names possible for this I'm not gonna lie

Flippant Sausage Beyond Oblivion

Its easy, Karen. Youre 100 thousand incurious dipshits with depression and space madness.

gellaho

Stop the fuck lab

Flippant Sausage Beyond Oblivion

Ive played enough Oxygen Not Included to know after a while you cant even handle the slime mines, let alone being outside.

A stunner is just a rock tied to a stick.

gellaho

Shut down all the fuck labs! Oh, right people might be using those, shit

FancyShark

On the plus side, more meatloaf for everyone!

gellaho

gasp P-P-pregnancy!?

Flippant Sausage Beyond Oblivion

Its almost like these people dont expect to actually colonize a world at ANY point.

gellaho

I will not tolerate any more fantasy freaks being born!

The Late Eric Christian Berg

Incurious, agoraphobic, and suicidal. They'll be fine.

Flippant Sausage Beyond Oblivion

Golly not ABORTION!

gellaho

Oh, right

Flippant Sausage Beyond Oblivion

Surely not that thing you would almost certainly have to do from time to time!

FancyShark

Kinda surprised they even know what pregnancy is at this point

gellaho

"It's a lovely name for a freak"

Flippant Sausage Beyond Oblivion

Aliens need to board this ship and take these people as slaves.

Tom Owns Diebel's Grave

Graciella? Everyone else has a real name

gellaho

Oopsie

FancyShark

Damn. And we don't have insurance.

Flippant Sausage Beyond Oblivion

You hit a fantasy duck.

gellaho

Done hit a dang dragon

Flippant Sausage Beyond Oblivion

HAppens when you fly.

Better skin and dress it quick before the meat goes bad entirely.

gellaho

Meanwhile, Jenny loves rowing

Flippant Sausage Beyond Oblivion

Rowing is good exercise.

Velo

Rowing's pretty fun if you've got good water

FancyShark

"Shut the fuck up, Jenny"

Flippant Sausage Beyond Oblivion

Also ladies love it when you row them out to the middle of the lake where they cant escape.

Escape from the picnic lunch you brought!

Velo

There's a Woody Allen/Hugh Jackman movie all about that

gellaho

They, coincidentally, encounter a dragon

gellaho

But no flying vehicle to ram into it

Flippant Sausage Beyond Oblivion

its not that big a deal if you can hit it with your car and kill it.

A solid roll on Lightning Bolt will take the starch out of most dragons.

FancyShark

Smaug is drunk and does not need this shit right now

gellaho

You're a wizard, wizard at it

FancyShark

"Rub his belly"

Velo

Just the worst wizard

gellaho

Let me piss fire at it

gellaho

Velo

Again, I know a doctor who can help with that

Flippant Sausage Beyond Oblivion

A good trick is you cast Exploding Runes on a bunch of copper coins, then put them in a bag of holding. Turn the bag inside out, scattering the coins and you have a magic shotgun bomb.

Ulysses is a bad wizard.

gellaho

This is probably fine

Flippant Sausage Beyond Oblivion

Shooting fire out of your staff is amateur hour shit, bud.

gellaho

Fly the boat straight into the rocks

Flippant Sausage Beyond Oblivion

Not going to be the last time he hears this.

gellaho

What a great plan

Flippant Sausage Beyond Oblivion

Also I dont see how this deals with the dragon, its not gone forever.

gellaho

Luckily Jenny had that telepathic dolphin dream earlier

gellaho

Not sure why she wouldn't have been able to save the drowning idiot without that, but OK

Carrying him and full set of armor

FancyShark

Jenny might be a packhorse

Flippant Sausage Beyond Oblivion

I dunno Jenny, you havent actually done much in the way of swordfighting yet, the only time you came close was wrangling Ulysses' hog. You can probably just let him do most of the real work, most problems can be solved by magic.

gellaho

Sure, I'm an AI and have been making decisions without authorization, but I'm not compromised

Flippant Sausage Beyond Oblivion

I hope the AIs have just decided to cull these weirdos and play DnD in their dumb asteroid ship forever.

gellaho

MOISTEN!

THOSE!

LIIIIIIIIIIIIIPPPPPSSSSS!!!

Flippant Sausage Beyond Oblivion

I feel like this is a mistake.

Never trust an AI with a name like Guardian.

gellaho

Peter out here looking to get Junior'd

Flippant Sausage Beyond Oblivion

I mean its a fair question, its not like 1) hed know what pregnancy requires or entails, and 2) they can make literal human life, they deffo have the ability to implant a womb.

gellaho

Peter's spent a lot of time on this

gellaho

FancyShark

"The early attempts at men giving birth were even more graphic than you're picturing"

gellaho

"I definitely wasn't jerking off when I was doing it either"

Flippant Sausage Beyond Oblivion

Lol why would that not be the first thing any sane person does with that technology, experience things they couldnt otherwise?!

FancyShark

Peter also had the pain setting on "Can I Play Too, Daddy?"

gellaho

Shove that baby in me, and cut it out of me

gellaho

gellaho

That's the same thing as experiencing child birth, right?

Flippant Sausage Beyond Oblivion

"Never, actually? Because you arent my wife and I dont need your permission?"

FancyShark

Peter has waited his whole life for this and he's not letting a potential genocide get in his way of being his true self

Flippant Sausage Beyond Oblivion

Or just the novelty of it, I mean im with him on this one.

gellaho

Peter's pregnancy planning is interrupted by his current child, who I think he forgot was missing

Flippant Sausage Beyond Oblivion

Oh he didnt forget, he was planning the replacement.

Also Sonja is such a wuss, what kind of space doctor doesnt want to play god and put extra organs in a dude?!

gellaho

Behold my latest video game creation

Flippant Sausage Beyond Oblivion

John Brinkley rolls in his grave, madam.

FancyShark

"And if you try to circumvent the DRM I've installed, the program will kill you all"

gellaho

Out here recreating Nick Arcade

Flippant Sausage Beyond Oblivion

Also what the fuck is up with this ship, is the AI secretly a Nancy Reagan\Tipper Gore hybrid?

Tom Owns Diebel's Grave

Let's hope the teens don't fuck again while the whole ship is watching

gellaho

Oh, no. It's an ARG

that mfing chloe motherfucker

The last line is what I wrote in my review for this book

Flippant Sausage Beyond Oblivion

And this is a totally normal thing for STEM types to do, this is why you need liberal arts majors to balance the system or you get science dorks thinking they are entitled to reprogram the ships VR rig to trap children in videogames and coopt the reproduction chambers for making submissive and breedable elves.

gellaho

That's all you need is TV and video games

Flippant Sausage Beyond Oblivion

There are only like five a year at most anyway. Its not even been that long since all this started.

gellaho

Riley's got the blood lust

Flippant Sausage Beyond Oblivion

There are more yearly suicides at a given walmart than there are on this ship.

"Its totally different, sapient beings can choose to do evil and therefore are fine to kill."

0000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000..0000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000....................

gellaho

"It's training me to do magic in real life¥

Flippant Sausage Beyond Oblivion

Goddam cat.

gellaho

Uh, so bored. Best end it all

FancyShark

It still worked in the context of your joke!

Ulysses saying the argument every parent who hated video games ever used

gellaho

It's all about imagination. Or competition. Both?

Flippant Sausage Beyond Oblivion

"Its almost like things that arent science and engineering are important?"

Also this is Young Simon speaking directly to us, the reader.

FancyShark

"And that's why Leisure Suit Larry isn't 'porn', Dad!"

Flippant Sausage Beyond Oblivion

If I had kids I would be so mortified to have raised a Leisure Suit Larry fan.

gellaho

These AIs seem like a problem

gellaho

Flippant Sausage Beyond Oblivion

Id rather my children jack off to Marvel Questprobes The Hulk.

FancyShark

Wait, did I call it? Did the AI psychologist prescribe suicide?

gellaho

Meanwhile, the ship has gone completely to shit

Tom Owns Diebel's Grave

Who would ever be so foolish to design an AI that doesn't consider the welfare of humanity its top priority

Flippant Sausage Beyond Oblivion

Its kind of fuckin short sighted to program a machine to take care of a generation ship, whos purpose is to colonize planets and have the machines think that humans are superfluous.

gellaho

No, but it saw people committing suicide inevitable and did nothing

FancyShark

Ah, like an HMO

maaaaaaaaaannnnnn

Flippant Sausage Beyond Oblivion

I mean they named their psych AI Sigmund so..........

Its advice was probably not great.

"So what you do is sit naked in this box, right, and collect your orgone energy."

"Also cocaine."

gellaho

The Wizard's Castle

Flippant Sausage Beyond Oblivion

gellaho

These clues suck

Flippant Sausage Beyond Oblivion

"Also when you see them tell them their nets fuckin suck and they need to get more exercise if they are gonna chase a dwarf."

gellaho

MOISTEN!

THOSE!

LIIIIIIIIIIIIIPPPPPSSSSS!

Velo

Let Riley go first

gellaho

The advice didn't really help

FancyShark

This must be the enrichment children need to be happy

gellaho

Murder time

gellaho

gellaho

Little Ms Moffet

Flippant Sausage Beyond Oblivion

"No, im from Chicago. You know, the one with the soup pizza?"

FancyShark

Wait. Chicago still exists in this world?

gellaho

RIP

gellaho

The neighborhoods on the ship are named after places

FancyShark

How dare you bismerch Lasagna With Burnt Crust

oh, my bad

Flippant Sausage Beyond Oblivion

Awful blase about her two friends dying in this videogame.

Velo

Not a good time to be ironic, Cat. Real Riley move

gellaho

Hippie

Flippant Sausage Beyond Oblivion

Hahahahah you got the old bullshit kind of Druid, from the 2E rules, huh?

Maybe if you grind hard you can bring someone back as a badger.

gellaho

"Our names are definitely real"

gellaho

She's brave enough to cross a bridge, how impressive

FancyShark

Then a dragon shows up and revenge-burns them all. The End

Flippant Sausage Beyond Oblivion

Hey maybe send the heaviest person across first?

Because then you know its safe for everyone else?

This is basic DnD stuff.

gellaho

Classic Robert move

FancyShark

This would be way more bloody if the lady had made it a dungeon-crawler

Flippant Sausage Beyond Oblivion

These dorks would starve on the first two floors of Dungeon Master.

gellaho

Riley's parents are not pleased with his performance

Velo

None of us are

FancyShark

Entire schools going dark trying to grind out a legendary weapon

Flippant Sausage Beyond Oblivion

They should fuck off, its hard out there for a rogue.

You're not good at stabbing, you dont do magic.

If the DM doesnt let you do skill checks then you have nothing.

gellaho

Shoved the kids in the gas tank

FancyShark

There is no way parents would watch their kids play an RPG this long

Flippant Sausage Beyond Oblivion

I totally would!

Like it would be so awesome if my kids had like a real play DnD podcast or something.

gellaho

Tom Owns Diebel's Grave

This game is single-handedly rewriting their entire culture

gellaho

Not even the first ones there, for shame

Flippant Sausage Beyond Oblivion

Well its usually better to get to the Tomb of Horrors second, that way some of the traps are set off already.

gellaho

Gross

Flippant Sausage Beyond Oblivion

Riley I see you didnt learn a lesson about trusting women you dont know. Hopefully this one wont turn you into a pig.

At least not literally.

gellaho

First team not doing great

gellaho

Third team right there

Flippant Sausage Beyond Oblivion

Hes right, it could be a leucrotta.

Or a really smart mimic.

Dopplegangers.

Wererats.

FancyShark

Beholder

Terrasque

gellaho

Carpentry magic

Flippant Sausage Beyond Oblivion

Did none of the other kids get wizard powers? Seems like a ripoff.

FancyShark

The kid who got monk already finished the quest

gellaho

Just skip the pig quest

FancyShark

lol

The quest that's meant to be the hope for humanity has a speedrun strat

gellaho

Third team failed the virgin test

gellaho

This game sucks, man

Flippant Sausage Beyond Oblivion

Dont be a smartass Emily. A Wizards Castle obviously has a wizard.

Otherwise its just a sparkling fortification.

FancyShark

Be glad it's not a Necromancer's Tower. Or a Lich Citadel.

gellaho

Ulysses pops out of existence

FancyShark

HE'S DEAD!

🥳

:sharkparty:

gellaho

Somebody's been siphoning our space fuel

Flippant Sausage Beyond Oblivion

TANNERITE FILLED SPACE DOG!?

PLEASE?!

gellaho

Secret garden

FancyShark

It's a gas leak

Flippant Sausage Beyond Oblivion

Or DID SHE?!

Because science!

gellaho

Two dwarves take the security team to a castle

Flippant Sausage Beyond Oblivion

Oh god this asshole again.

SHOOT HIM>

SHOOT NOW WHILE YOU STILL CAN!

DONT LISTEN TO HIS ELVEN LIES!

gellaho

Just gotta create some fantasy creatures to worship me as a god

FancyShark

The lady fucked an AI?

Is he played by Jude Law?

gellaho

Behold

FancyShark

aw

He's alive

Flippant Sausage Beyond Oblivion

At least one of the kids is like "No, im good. Staying here. Its neat."

They have to shut off the server to get him to quit.

gellaho

I fucked with your DNA and injected myself into you, that's cool, right?

gellaho

Uh oh

FancyShark

oh no

gellaho

It's fine

FancyShark

This is now the plot of a lot more anime. But the even grosser kind

Flippant Sausage Beyond Oblivion

Well thats depressing.

gellaho

My DNA was the only solution, because I am so rad

Flippant Sausage Beyond Oblivion

"Youre only any good because of my superior genes and how i made you that way."

Not "Children have unlimited potential." or something.

Velo

It's distinctly not fine

Flippant Sausage Beyond Oblivion

And i mean..........yeah some of those kids wont be President but they can play DnD at least.

gellaho

I am humanity and I can choose to do as I please with all of you

Flippant Sausage Beyond Oblivion

Look, society needs the kids that grow up to be janitors who smoke weed and play DnD

gellaho

Goodbye forever

FancyShark

I don't like some of the words this lady is choosing

Flippant Sausage Beyond Oblivion

This is a profound misunderstanding of how Darwinist evolution takes place, so it makes total sense for a scientist to be saying this.

gellaho

"But, please don't fuck them. Full of problems from living in this fuel cell for so long"

Flippant Sausage Beyond Oblivion

I mean that too, outside of their fields, scientists are just as dumb as anyone else.

I guarantee theres at least one geneticist out there who is a flat earther.

gellaho

Later, it's time to get married

Flippant Sausage Beyond Oblivion

Which is absurd because hollow earth is the real deal.

FancyShark

The wedding is between the Security Chief and her yakuza holo-boytoy

gellaho

Peter's pregnancy has materialized

Flippant Sausage Beyond Oblivion

Cool.

Good for him.

gellaho

I'll name her after the woman who secretly fucked with our first child's DNA

Flippant Sausage Beyond Oblivion

"Penelope Hitler Stalin II Surnamington."

gellaho

I guess it went with the full package in the end

gellaho

FancyShark

Peter thought it would make his dick bigger

Flippant Sausage Beyond Oblivion

It could be worse, she could have been engineered to chew her way out.

gellaho

Space hippie now lives in the fuel cell garden

Flippant Sausage Beyond Oblivion

Like eels in a horse.......

gellaho

Here comes the baby

FancyShark

Or, inspired by the mythology stuff, she could have been designed to spring fully formed from his forehead

Tom Owns Diebel's Grave

Book ain't over yet

Flippant Sausage Beyond Oblivion

Also Penelope turned all these people into DnD dorks, and Karen is King Dork.

gellaho

And I guess Ulysses isn't going to go and just drink instead

FancyShark

And his father dies in childbirth because no one has any experience assisting with live births at this point

Velo

Huh

Well I guess that's an ending

Flippant Sausage Beyond Oblivion

Im sure Penelope has programmed a talking dog with the necessary knowledge of midwifery.

gellaho

Huzzah

Flippant Sausage Beyond Oblivion

So do they just have a fuckin fuel tank full of elves and shit or?

Did they flush those fuckers?

Maybe its better we dont know.

Velo

Simon is willing to explain in 400 pages or more

gellaho

We have defeated The Whims of Creation

Flippant Sausage Beyond Oblivion

Simon should have written some classic DnD modules, he would have been good at it.

FancyShark

We did it!

Velo

Excellent choice

Thank you @gellaho , fantastic as always

FancyShark

Thank you, @gellaho !

Great riffing, everyone!

gellaho

So concludes the 129th Edition of The Book Cage

gellaho

May your tube babies remain free from the tampering of a egomaniacal elderly scientist

FancyShark

Have a good night!

gellaho

I love that the cover is a dragon on the ship. When all that dragon did was get hit by a helicopter and die