Ren'Py The Null Hypothesis [v0.6a] [Ron Chon]

[Augustus Commodus]

We have a channel devoted entirely to fan submissions.

This probably fits into the "something beyond our control" category, but I tried joining the Discord through the game. First I got an age-verification screen, but before I could even enter my birthday, I had a "there has been a problem" screen. It then put me through a name screen, "I'm not a bot" screen, said it needed a verification, asked for my phone number, sent me a text, entered the verification, asked for a password, said it needed to confirm my e-mail, then sent me to a blank screen with no where to enter my e-mail. I closed it, tried again, and the process repeated. I then decided it wasn't worth it and "I don't want to be on Discord anyway."

Anyway, my idea has evolved into a more general Nightbrowler thing:

"I'm bored. Let's prank someone. I'll pay you $50 to . . .
Bampf over to the Mutiefan site and change everyone's profile.
Option B
Option C

Theoretically if he consumed a large amount of booze and no water he could get the full effect but his healing factor is outright on par with magic since he can recover whole organs in minutes without taking in any food to generate the mass so it's whatever the writer decides.

In some ways, it's a good thing comic book logic isn't real logic. It has been established that adamantium is extremely toxic, and if it wasn't for his healing factor, it would kill Wolverine. In fact, his healing factor would be much greater without his skeleton since he is using a significant part of it just to keep that toxicity in check. By logic logic, Null's power would be very bad for Wolverine and X-23, and spending the night with the latter might kill her. It would be ironic if the thing that allowed Null to have a relationship with Rogue is also what means he could never have a relationship with Laura, but I would prefer to have my cake and eat it too.

Note that, thanks to Jean's training, his nullification is active in a 2-feet radius, a couple more seasons working on expanding the field rather than turning it off and voila, Logan is drunk just by sitting next to him.

It would still be annoying. They are sitting at a bar together. Each time one of them leaned over to talk to someone on their other side, the healing factor kicks in and Logan's sober. One of them needs to use the restroom. Sober. Put a song on the jukebox, sober. Now that I'm thinking of it, I'm imagining Logan's nickname for Null being "Buzzkill."

Oh, this game seems great. I really like Oni's Rogue-Like and this one has a really cool flair. But... As an ESL, I have to say that all the poetic license used to represent accents in this game make it a bit hard to read sometimes.

You do have my sympathies, but I am the opposite. I really like seeing accent written out in literature, something that has fallen into disfavor over the last few decades. Some authors, such as Steinbeck were really masters of capturing accents in writing. Also, kudos for remembering not to use the accent in texts and other written communications, except for Kurt and "zee" which was properly lampshaded.

 

[Augustus Commodus]

Can't wait until some madman tries to amplify that power to cover the entire globe or something.

Note, this is just a random villain idea I pulled out of my ass. This is not a spoiler for the game. Made you look.

Spoiler: Stupid Speculation

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On the subject of spoilers, I'll ask for a small one. When I was a kid reading X-Men comics, there were plenty of times Wolverine and Magneto interacted, and Magneto didn't do anything to Logan's skeleton. Even as a kid, I wondered about it. The conclusion I drew back then was that adamantium was a mu material that wasn't subject to electro-magnetism. Then some author must have wondered the same thing, and it basically became a meme. So the tiny spoiler I want is: have you guys given any thought to what extent Magneto can manipulate adamantium within your universe?

 

[Maddeninggg]

By logic logic, Null's power would be very bad for Wolverine and X-23, and spending the night with the latter might kill her. It would be ironic if the thing that allowed Null to have a relationship with Rogue is also what means he could never have a relationship with Laura, but I would prefer to have my cake and eat it too.

Heavy metal poisoning is a slow process so a single night being completely nullified wouldn't kill her or Logan. Not to mention only Laura's claws are metal, not her entire skeleton like Logan. A few minutes with their healing factor reactivated would quickly clear any issues.

 

[drifter139]

Heavy metal poisoning is a slow process so a single night being completely nullified wouldn't kill her or Logan. Not to mention only Laura's claws are metal, not her entire skeleton like Logan. A few minutes with their healing factor reactivated would quickly clear any issues.

unless their healing factors work like Deadpool's

 

[Augustus Commodus]

Heavy metal poisoning is a slow process so a single night being completely nullified wouldn't kill her or Logan. Not to mention only Laura's claws are metal, not her entire skeleton like Logan. A few minutes with their healing factor reactivated would quickly clear any issues.

Depends on the substance and the dosage. Arsenic poisoning can kill in less than a day, and toxic dosages are usually expressed in micrograms, not kilograms. Given the extremely toxic nature described for adamantium and that it takes the majority of Logan's healing factor to counter it, we should probably compare it with the worst examples.

I suppose it would be a way to help differentiate the characters. Null and Laura spend their first night together. Laura wakes up feeling very ill. After an examination, they figure it out. While other characters prefer staying after a date, Laura would be, "That was fun, but you know I can't stick around/you better get back to your room." It would also add an extra dimension to how much she's sacrificing after the mall incident.

It would be a little sad. I imagine Laura would either be the best cuddler or the type to kick you to the edge of the bed so she can have her space. I haven't decided which, yet. Either way, Laura cuddles would be special, and I don't want to disincentive them.

unless their healing factors work like Deadpool's

That too.

Edit: In keeping with having my cake and eating it too and my Null's powers are wish based speculation above, we can have Laura decide to spend the night despite the fact that it makes her feel ill, and as he's drifting off to sleep, Null wishes his powers didn't make her sick and problem solved. Best of both worlds.

 

[Maddeninggg]

Depends on the substance and the dosage. Arsenic poisoning can kill in less than a day, and toxic dosages are usually expressed in micrograms, not kilograms. Given the extremely toxic nature described for adamantium and that it takes the majority of Logan's healing factor to counter it, we should probably compare it with the worst examples.

For Logan it might be different because it's his entire skeleton, but Laura only has the claws so I really doubt she'd get so terribly ill in just a few hours. Also not to mention that near the end of chapter 1 Null can turn his nullification on or off at will.

 

[BigAlzBub]

I'm not sure I get why Adamantium is toxic. The stuff is supposed to be virtually indestructible, where as the toxicity would have to be tiny amounts (single atoms probably) bonding with (probably) blood to make some new chemical which has deleterious effects, but given that it is (virtually) indestructible single atoms of it can't be breaking loose or it wouldn't have this property. I suppose it could be acting as a catalyst to form something really nasty, or it might give off some form of extremely localised radiation which is super harmful, but that would imply that Adamantium has a half-life (although granted it could be extremely long and still dangerous, like some of the radioactive waste products from Fission)

 

[Augustus Commodus]

:shrug: It still puts Laura in the kilograms category even if that is better than the dozens of kilograms Logan is carrying around. It's hard to have informed speculation about the impact a fictional substance would have on one's metabolic functions. Still, turning off his power would pose the dilemma of not being able to cuddle with both Laura and Anna Marie at the same time. Either way, I'm probably over thinking it, and if I realize I'm overthinking it, it probably means I entered "I should have just shut up and gone to bed" territory hours ago.

 

[Augustus Commodus]

I'm not sure I get why Adamantium is toxic. The stuff is supposed to be virtually indestructible, where as the toxicity would have to be tiny amounts (single atoms probably) bonding with (probably) blood to make some new chemical which has deleterious effects, but given that it is (virtually) indestructible single atoms of it can't be breaking loose or it wouldn't have this property. I suppose it could be acting as a catalyst to form something really nasty, or it might give off some form of extremely localised radiation which is super harmful, but that would imply that Adamantium has a half-life (although granted it could be extremely long and still dangerous, like some of the radioactive waste products from Fission)

Depends on the substance. With arsenic, for example, it is toxic because chemically it acts the same as phosphorus, but it forms weaker bonds. Your body uses it like it would phosphorus to construct different proteins, etc. but those proteins break and don't work properly, messing things up. Different heavy metals are toxic for different reasons, so it kind of lazy to lump them all together as "heavy metal poisoning."

I, however, agree with you. Given the way adamantium was described, it should be non-reactive and thus non-toxic. I did think it was stupid when the whole adamantium toxicity was introduced, but it's canon now.

 

[BigAlzBub]

I'm not a reader of the comics and the wider universe (just watched the cartoons and the movies), Has old Wolvie ever been collared with one of the Nullification devices the government uses to suppress mutant powers? If so, that might give some idea as to how bad the toxicity of Adamantium is, and whether Null and Laura can enjoy a sweet all night caress.
Of course when Null gains greater control over his powers he might be able to project the Null field directionally, which isn't a huge stretch of the Imagination, given (from what I have read on Wikipedia) that at some point Rogue learns to turn her draining power off.

 

[jvbatman]

I'm not a reader of the comics and the wider universe (just watched the cartoons and the movies), Has old Wolvie ever been collared with one of the Nullification devices the government uses to suppress mutant powers? If so, that might give some idea as to how bad the toxicity of Adamantium is, and whether Null and Laura can enjoy a sweet all night caress.
Of course when Null gains greater control over his powers he might be able to project the Null field directionally, which isn't a huge stretch of the Imagination, given (from what I have read on Wikipedia) that at some point Rogue learns to turn her draining power off.

When Magneto ripped out his adamantium his healing factor ramped up a ton because it took so much of it just to keep him alive with all that shit on his bones. He's not the first they tried to put adamantium on and it killed all the other patients because they couldn't heal to keep themselves alive like Logan.

 

[Knight]

Oh, this game seems great. I really like Oni's Rogue-Like and this one has a really cool flair. But... As an ESL, I have to say that all the poetic license used to represent accents in this game make it a bit hard to read sometimes.

As an English as a 4rth language person let me offer some advice. Don't try to read it first, skim it then imagine someone actually talking like that.
Most people don't notice it but when we read our brains "autocomplete" a lot of things, people will read part of a word or even part of sentence and the brain assumes the rest; it's why sometimes when people read aloud they will say something that has the same meaning but will be a word or two different than whats written without noticing it.

When I was learning English two things helped me more than any ESL class, gameboy JRPG's and old American animated movies/shows (early 00"s and before). Both used simple language in small bit size chunks where accents were exaggerated for effect, watching it with subtitles made picking up the accents easy.

Watch a bit of the old X-men tv show (you should do it anyway, since it was pretty good).
Once you can hear it in your mind reading it on paper is as easy as formal English.

 

[Knight]

Depends on the substance. With arsenic, for example, it is toxic because chemically it acts the same as phosphorus, but it forms weaker bonds. Your body uses it like it would phosphorus to construct different proteins, etc. but those proteins break and don't work properly, messing things up. Different heavy metals are toxic for different reasons, so it kind of lazy to lump them all together as "heavy metal poisoning."

I, however, agree with you. Given the way adamantium was described, it should be non-reactive and thus non-toxic. I did think it was stupid when the whole adamantium toxicity was introduced, but it's canon now.

Wait, did they really make adamantium toxic (I don't read the modern garbage Marvel excretes), that's just dumb. Radation posioning would be much more dangerous to someone with a healing factor.

Substances can be toxic in one of two ways, by way you described (chemical reaction where the starting substance is depleted) or by acting as a catalyst. Adamantium can't work in the first way since it's whole point is that it's near unbreakable when solid and if it wasn't Logans cells would metabolize it over the decades.
And if it was a catalyst (the only real option) it would wouldn't be depleted but would be accelerating a chemical reaction that occures in the bones, joints, ligaments or soft tissue that contacts those; any by-product produced that way would a naturally occuring substance in the body, it's been a bit since my biochemistry and anatomy classes but I can't think of anything that would be toxic from that, especially to Logan.

I remember the days when Spidermans writers would make chemistry jokes, I doubt modern writers could even get a D- in middle school chemistry from before the common core days.

 

[Augustus Commodus]

When Magneto ripped out his adamantium his healing factor ramped up a ton because it took so much of it just to keep him alive with all that shit on his bones. He's not the first they tried to put adamantium on and it killed all the other patients because they couldn't heal to keep themselves alive like Logan.

To be fair, the grafting process itself is extremely invasive and traumatic. Given that adamantium is "indestructible" once set, I always imagined it involved pouring or injecting molten metal directly onto the bones. When I was younger, I assumed it was due to the nature of the procedure itself that Logan was the sole survivor, not due to the nature of adamantium toxicity. I wasn't the most avid reader, but it wasn't until Magneto ripped out Logan's adamantium and his healing factor became supercharged as a result that I became aware of adamantium toxicity being a thing. Does anyone remember exactly when that happened, because . . .

And yeah, that's how it ends up being, a constant cycle of writers not agreeing with each other. That said, the most prominent version is the one where she is a sadistic monster.

I mean we are in the Claremont era. We could just not have her do the things other writers made her do.

if it became canon after the point in which the game is set, and the creators are willing to ignore canon events that occur later in the storyline, it is possible to just ignore adamantium toxicity. As I mentioned, I never liked the idea anyway.

Wait, did they really make adamantium toxic (I don't read the modern garbage Marvel excretes), that's just dumb. Radation posioning would be much more dangerous to someone with a healing factor.

Substances can be toxic in one of two ways, by way you described (chemical reaction where the starting substance is depleted) or by acting as a catalyst. Adamantium can't work in the first way since it's whole point is that it's near unbreakable when solid and if it wasn't Logans cells would metabolize it over the decades.
And if it was a catalyst (the only real option) it would wouldn't be depleted but would be accelerating a chemical reaction that occures in the bones, joints, ligaments or soft tissue that contacts those; any by-product produced that way would a naturally occuring substance in the body, it's been a bit since my biochemistry and anatomy classes but I can't think of anything that would be toxic from that, especially to Logan.

I remember the days when Spidermans writers would make chemistry jokes, I doubt modern writers could even get a D- in middle school chemistry from before the common core days.

As Paracelsus wrote, "Alle Dinge sind Gift, und nichts ist ohne Gift; allein die Dosis macht, dass ein Ding kein Gift ist." or "All things are poison, and nothing is without poison; the dosage alone makes it so a thing is not a poison." Even oxygen and water are toxic to humans in high enough concentrations. The human body produces trace amounts of formaldehyde which is necessary for its proper function but becomes extremely toxic even in dosages slightly higher than that necessary amount. So, yes, it is reasonable for something acting as a catalyst accelerating normal metabolic functions resulting in some usually benign chemical being produced in such quantities that it results in it being toxic. Without knowing which metabolic processes are influenced and what chemical is being produced, it is impossible to know how toxic it would be and how quickly it would produce ill effects in the individual. That being said, I still think adamantium poisoning is stupid and would prefer it to be non-reactive. Okay, I'm going to bed for real this time. Hopefully by the time I wake up, someone smarter than I has figured this out or one of the devs gives us a word-of-God answer so I can stop wasting so much of my very limited cognitive function on this. Sometimes I hate being a nerd.

 

[BigAlzBub]

Radiation poisoning might or might not be bad if you have healing factor, for instance Wade Wilson (Deadpool) has massive cancer and it kept in check (and repaired) by his healing factor. Ultimately we all have cancer cells in our bodies pretty much from the moment we are born, but the body recognises them and tells them to self destruct, I believe it is called Apoptosis, so if the healing factor recognises cancerous or damaged cells and either destroys them and replaces them or just puts them back to the way they "should" be then it ought to be fine.

I think they made Adamantium toxic so when Wolvie had it removed he didn't suffer a huge nerf to his powers for only having bone claws rather than his signature metal ones.

 

[Clobbertime]

Oh, this game seems great. I really like Oni's Rogue-Like and this one has a really cool flair. But... As an ESL, I have to say that all the poetic license used to represent accents in this game make it a bit hard to read sometimes.

If they add Gambit they'll also be trying to write a Cajun accent along with the others. Being born and raised in the American south myself I've grown used to hearing our speech get completely slaughtered by actors in movies and TV shows giving us Hollywood's poor rendition of our dialects, so I've let their little faux pas with Rogue pass. They're just minor compared to the butchering Hollywood does.

 

[Evil13]

There's a youtube channel called Trick Theory that discusses how the adamantium poisoning could work, it's not so much the build up in the internal organs like mercury and other forms of heavy metal poisoning, but rather the continual inhibiting of the cellular function within Logan's body. Bonding a metal like adamantium to a skeleton would probably drastically the body's ability to produce blood or plasma.

Which makes sense - when we suffer an injury, the body heals itself, not to what it was before but close enough. Scar tissue forms as a means to ensure survival, it's a patch job to ensure the body survives, but it's still a patch job. So in Logan's case, adamantium poisoning would keep overtaxing his healing factor, causing more wear and tear in his ligaments and joints than the average person. As proven when Magneto ripped the adamantium from Logan's body. Despite a physical regression, Logan's senses were heightened to a point far beyond what they were with the metal and at one point, despite getting hit full on by a subway train, Logan was back on his feet seconds later.

 

[Knight]

Even oxygen and water are toxic to humans in high enough concentrations. The human body produces trace amounts of formaldehyde which is necessary for its proper function but becomes extremely toxic even in dosages slightly higher than that necessary amount. So, yes, it is reasonable for something acting as a catalyst accelerating normal metabolic functions resulting in some usually benign chemical being produced in such quantities that it results in it being toxic. Without knowing which metabolic processes are influenced and what chemical is being produced, it is impossible to know how toxic it would be and how quickly it would produce ill effects in the individual.

Which is why I prefaced it with "occurs in the bones, joints, ligaments or soft tissue that contacts those". There are tons of reactions that occur in major organs (especially the digestive tract) that could result in a lethal imbalance but the biggest thing I could see when it comes to bones would be something related to T cells given the functions bone marrow serves, since Logan doesn't die from a common cold means that his bones must still be porous or at least not be completely encased (assuming adamatium itself isn't porous) so there is still a fluid exchange of some kind going on. I was just trying to imagine what it might be.

Without knowing which metabolic processes are influenced and what chemical is being produced, it is impossible to know how toxic it would be and how quickly it would produce ill effects in the individual.

fair point, unless we know the catalytic effects of adamatium we can't diagnose it... still fun to talk about it though.

Radiation poisoning might or might not be bad if you have healing factor, for instance Wade Wilson (Deadpool) has massive cancer and it kept in check (and repaired) by his healing factor. Ultimately we all have cancer cells in our bodies pretty much from the moment we are born, but the body recognises them and tells them to self destruct, I believe it is called Apoptosis, so if the healing factor recognises cancerous or damaged cells and either destroys them and replaces them or just puts them back to the way they "should" be then it ought to be fine.

I think they made Adamantium toxic so when Wolvie had it removed he didn't suffer a huge nerf to his powers for only having bone claws rather than his signature metal ones.

The damage from radiation poisoning comes from mutated DNA or damaged proteins (prions), which should make caner 10x worse.
Also, healing factors always assume it's only healthy cells that are being created, cancer cells are rapidly dividing cells whose division rate could be compared to a low level healing factor. Anything that accelerates the rate of cell division in healthy cells should have a similar effect on cancer cells.
The thing with DP is that eventually one or other should overtake, he should either be cancer free or die of it after enough time. The real reason is that writers just wanted to make him funny looking for comedic effect, DP is as close as you can get to a toonforce character without it actually being one. The healing factor is just an excuse for being able blow his nuts off for laughs.

 

[Knight]

If they add Gambit they'll also be trying to write a Cajun accent along with the others. Being born and raised in the American south myself I've grown used to hearing our speech get completely slaughtered by actors in movies and TV shows giving us Hollywood's poor rendition of our dialects, so I've let their little faux pas with Rogue pass. They're just minor compared to the butchering Hollywood does.

I have the same problem with Slavic accents. Seeing American actors speak like any Eastern Euro is cringe-worthy, especially when other characters look in the camera and say how perfect their pronunciation is. It's especially bad with Russian. I just look at it like people from Kazakhstan look at Borat.

 

[BigAlzBub]

The damage from radiation poisoning comes from mutated DNA or damaged proteins (prions), which should make caner 10x worse.
Also, healing factors always assume it's only healthy cells that are being created, cancer cells are rapidly dividing cells whose division rate could be compared to a low level healing factor. Anything that accelerates the rate of cell division in healthy cells should have a similar effect on cancer cells.
The thing with DP is that eventually one or other should overtake, he should either be cancer free or die of it after enough time. The real reason is that writers just wanted to make him funny looking for comedic effect, DP is as close as you can get to a toonforce character without it actually being one. The healing factor is just an excuse for being able blow his nuts off for laughs.

Fascinating insight, however might you not get some sort of evolutionary effect whereby, if your healing factor made all cells, good and bad go into overdrive, then you would be almost immediately destroyed by damaging cancer cells, thus that particular mutant line would be cut from the gene pool (no relative of Deadpool ), thus making "positive" mutations much more prevalent?