MU Podcast 051 - Wacky Gadgets and the Wacko's that Use Them

[trevlix]

Hah! I'll take Dr. Who or Dr. Strange. Or Dr. Zhivago. He's a superhero, right?

Um...not sure about that, but yeah...we'll go with that. Sounds like you might enjoy Mythic Russia.

[Dr. Gerard]

Yes, I believe I would...

[Nvision]

Hey guys, just catching up on my listening after another hiatus, and I was intrigued by your discussion on the domination serum. I don't know if anyone has discussed it yet, but what do you think about a scenario based on water supply doping, where the antagonist is either an advertising agency or commercial corporation with a fledgling sorcerer in their R&D department? What better way to pimp your product than forcing consumption via mass arcane manipulation?

[Shimmin Beg]

Knitting circle, you say?

30-second scenario: the knitting circle are basically innocuous, but their plans for a grand display of embroidering and knitwear at the town hall are potentially disastrous. Unbeknownst to (most of) them, they've been working on segments of a complex Mythos symbol that will act as the focus for a spell, bringing insanity and death to the populace. Since this is a completely laughable hazard, nobody will believe it, forcing Investigators to take drastic action. The problem may be individual pieces, or perhaps the circle do a lot of knitting squares for blankets and the like, and plan to assemble their most recent output into a huge patchwork as part of a charity drive.

(this was actually 30 seconds, if not less, to create - it come to me in a flash when you brought up the knitting circle)

Also, on "headless" cults - I think both conspiracy theory circles and things like Anonymous, 4chan and other pseudonymous circles could offer rich pickings there. It's all about buying into and shaping beliefs and behaviours, so there tend to be some more influential participants, but less sense of formal hierarchy, and there's more scope for disagreement and for established voices to lose credibility.

[Keeper Jon]

Knitting circle, you say?

30-second scenario: the knitting circle are basically innocuous, but their plans for a grand display of embroidering and knitwear at the town hall are potentially disastrous. Unbeknownst to (most of) them, they've been working on segments of a complex Mythos symbol that will act as the focus for a spell, bringing insanity and death to the populace. Since this is a completely laughable hazard, nobody will believe it, forcing Investigators to take drastic action. The problem may be individual pieces, or perhaps the circle do a lot of knitting squares for blankets and the like, and plan to assemble their most recent output into a huge patchwork as part of a charity drive.

(this was actually 30 seconds, if not less, to create - it come to me in a flash when you brought up the knitting circle)

Also, on "headless" cults - I think both conspiracy theory circles and things like Anonymous, 4chan and other pseudonymous circles could offer rich pickings there. It's all about buying into and shaping beliefs and behaviours, so there tend to be some more influential participants, but less sense of formal hierarchy, and there's more scope for disagreement and for established voices to lose credibility.

This is all "Win."

[Shimmin Beg]

Knitting circle, you say?
...

This is all "Win."

Glad you liked it!

This episode also inspired a technology-based scenario seed, which I've posted at YSDC if anyone's interested (http://www.yog-sothoth.com/blog/369/ent ... the-bacon/).

[Dr. Gerard]

I like that a lot. I've been thinking about sinister radio signals for ages. Their use as propaganda weaponry as well as espionage communication like the "number stations" around the world -- such great seeds there. Nice write up!

[Dr. Gerard]

Hey guys, just catching up on my listening after another hiatus, and I was intrigued by your discussion on the domination serum. I don't know if anyone has discussed it yet, but what do you think about a scenario based on water supply doping, where the antagonist is either an advertising agency or commercial corporation with a fledgling sorcerer in their R&D department? What better way to pimp your product than forcing consumption via mass arcane manipulation?

Knitting circle, you say?
...

This is all "Win."

Glad you liked it!

This episode also inspired a technology-based scenario seed, which I've posted at YSDC if anyone's interested (http://www.yog-sothoth.com/blog/369/ent ... the-bacon/).

Knitting circle, you say?

30-second scenario: the knitting circle are basically innocuous, but their plans for a grand display of embroidering and knitwear at the town hall are potentially disastrous. Unbeknownst to (most of) them, they've been working on segments of a complex Mythos symbol that will act as the focus for a spell, bringing insanity and death to the populace. Since this is a completely laughable hazard, nobody will believe it, forcing Investigators to take drastic action. The problem may be individual pieces, or perhaps the circle do a lot of knitting squares for blankets and the like, and plan to assemble their most recent output into a huge patchwork as part of a charity drive.

(this was actually 30 seconds, if not less, to create - it come to me in a flash when you brought up the knitting circle)

Also, on "headless" cults - I think both conspiracy theory circles and things like Anonymous, 4chan and other pseudonymous circles could offer rich pickings there. It's all about buying into and shaping beliefs and behaviours, so there tend to be some more influential participants, but less sense of formal hierarchy, and there's more scope for disagreement and for established voices to lose credibility.

Agreed. A knitting circle makes a great basis for a cult, and a group-made artifact makes a fantastic "tome" or mcguffen.

[Shimmin Beg]

Hey guys, just catching up on my listening after another hiatus, and I was intrigued by your discussion on the domination serum. I don't know if anyone has discussed it yet, but what do you think about a scenario based on water supply doping, where the antagonist is either an advertising agency or commercial corporation with a fledgling sorcerer in their R&D department? What better way to pimp your product than forcing consumption via mass arcane manipulation?

That sounds pretty cool. Reminds me weirdly of a children's book called Yummy Yuk I read many years ago, which was pretty darned creepy as I recall.

[JH33]

Thanks as ever for the show guys.

Just thought I'd flag one thing as you said you might revisit cults in a future show. French Governments appear to be quite interested in cults and as such set up MIVILUDES or the "Interministerial Mission for Monitoring and Combatting Cultic Deviances" - which regardless of how you view the morality of 'cult' having negative connotations is a pretty awesome name from a CoC perspective. Apparently (according to Google translate) their mission is to: observes and analyzes the cult phenomenon, coordinates preventive and repressive government action against sectarian, and informs the public about the risks and dangers to which it is exposed." They were set up on 2002 and would appear to be still be in action as their website looks like: http://www.miviludes.gouv.fr/ and they seem to have published various reports.

I confess I don't know any more about them as they are on my increasingly lengthening list of things I should look into ( a list that has lengthened considerably in part due to this podcast!) but I thought I'd throw it out in case anyone else found it interesting/helpful.