So what's really going on in Worm?

[D'znn-Xy'lll MetaChthonia]

Huh? Didn't know I had this Watched.

I mean, it's at least WoG and possibly canon that a Tinker can't accurately describe what is happening when they are Tinkering (and certainly it's implied by "no reproducing Tinkertech"). There are two ways that can make sense - altered cognition, and/or the Tinker's actions are irrelevant window dressing and the Shard is actually nanolathing that shit. Wildbow's WoG mentions both IIRC, although honestly I think he overestimates how far the first can actually take you in modern Earth.

(Reverse engineering is hard, but much easier than research. On the other hand, it doesn't matter if you can reverse-engineer something if building it requires tools you don't have.)

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Personally I think it is both. It's constructing just enough technology to make it seem technological but leaving out the important bits which the Shard simulates in as a Striker power which is why Tinkertech breaks down arbitrarily and is seemingly impossible to reproduce yet is just technological enough to convince people it isn't just a Striker power. Wildbow has also stated Shards take shortcuts. Albeit it was in reference to PTV when he said that. The Shards also do a LOT of simulating. There also is a Canon precedent in the form of that one guy from Chicago who could give the properties of various things by fusing them together, basically Tinkertech works off something halfway like that. The Shard could also steal some of the energy to maintain its own simulation if it generates more then is necessary like using two 9V batteries when it really needed a button battery. This also means the Shard can set arbitrary limits to what it can do and give aesthetics in complete defiance of how it should have worked. It might also create the design incorrectly so it actively relies on the Shard to keep from breaking (like using more voltage for a circuit then it could reasonably take and when the Shard gets bored the device explodes or two pieces being held apart by a magnet that somehow remains perfectly between them no matter what). Not only would that be fully technological but it would also be impossible to reproduce because a 1:1 reproduction would actually fail successfully.

 

[Prince Charon]

I would suggest that how much is weird tech and how much is the shard doing it varies from Tinker to Tinker, which helps Dragon's Tech-Thinker power when it comes to reverse engineering. Any Tinkertech that is enough 'tech' could in theory be reverse engineered, so if any of it at all can be understood by non-capes, it'll be the stuff that's close to our tech-base anyway.

 

[The Unicorn]

I mean, it's at least WoG and possibly canon that a Tinker can't accurately describe what is happening when they are Tinkering

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Yes, and that's because they don't actually build everything needed for their devices, and their shard is guiding them. That's very different from "Tinker Fogue".

If a Tinker tried to explain how to make things there are (in most cases, not all Tinkers work the same way after all) places where they skip steps because their power is altering the materials used, or the step is something like "pick the pebble that feels closest to right" or even just them consciously using their power (similar to how Taylor made her canon armor, or Panacea made Atlas). The point is you never have Tinkers in canon start making something without being aware of what they're doing (at least not any more than your average engineer), very much unlike canon.

Personally I think it is both. It's constructing just enough technology to make it seem technological but leaving out the important bits which the Shard simulates in as a Striker power which is why Tinkertech breaks down arbitrarily and is seemingly impossible to reproduce yet is just technological enough to convince people it isn't just a Striker power.

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That explanation works for some Tinkers, but given the definition of Tinker given in canon and the PRT quest it's impossible for any explanation to apply to all Tinkers.

You have Tinkers like Bakuda or Amsmaster which fits your explanation, there are ones like Dragon who simply have the ability to figure out how to make actual technology, there are ones like Taylor or Amy who use their power directly under conscious control to make stuff other people can use, and probably other types of Tinkers as well.

 

[MissileTeatime]

I mean, it's at least WoG and possibly canon that a Tinker can't accurately describe what is happening when they are Tinkering (and certainly it's implied by "no reproducing Tinkertech"). There are two ways that can make sense - altered cognition, and/or the Tinker's actions are irrelevant window dressing and the Shard is actually nanolathing that shit. Wildbow's WoG mentions both IIRC, although honestly I think he overestimates how far the first can actually take you in modern Earth.

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I feel like this is falling over into "retreading old worm debates" territory, but we know for a fact that tinkers can design stuff to be assembled by flatscan humans. Bakuda points this out when she's dismantling Canary's bomb collar.

(I'm not sure I buy her explanation for how she identified it, that criteria would identify plenty of mid-2010s real-world smartphones as tinkertech for example, but it is canon.)

 

[D'znn-Xy'lll MetaChthonia]

there are ones like Taylor or Amy who use their power directly under conscious control to make stuff other people can use, and probably other types of Tinkers as well.

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Actual Tinkers and Tinker Rating aren't the same thing. The Rating is a catch-all term for anyone that can figure out how to use their power to build things regardless of whether or not it's actually Tinkertech. Technically Victor has the potential for a Tinker Rating due to stealing Engineering skills but that doesn't mean he is building Tinkertech despite having a Tinker Rating.

Taylor has a Tinker Rating not a Tinker power same for Panacea. Neither of them got the technology/bioengineering from their Shard but rather had to figure it out themselves (except Panacea, she had a cheat sheet). I was talking about actual Tinkertech like Armsmaster or Leet or Bakuda or Bonesaw or etc. Just like there are different spins on different powers there are most definitely different spins on how the Shards pretend they are making technology (I even gave three different explanations there). I would be surprised if one of them wasn't Orking it by stuffing a bunch of random stuff in the casing and simulating the entire device on a parallel dimension and it only works the way it shouldn't because the Shard lets it work.

Ratings are a signifier of potential danger not of what their power is. It's why it is called a Threat Rating.

 

[The Unicorn]

Actual Tinkers and Tinker Rating aren't the same thing.

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In canon? yes, they are. The canon definition of "Tinker" is "a person who has a Tinker rating". In canon all the PRT ratings were just threat ratings and completely ignored the mechanics of the power.

Ratings are a signifier of potential danger not of what their power is. It's why it is called a Threat Rating.

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Exactly, and Tinker is a PRT Threat rating, not anything else. There is no use of the PRT threat rating in canon other than as threat ratings.

 

[ses]

So my question that I don't see brought up very often: If people call flight+Brute rating the Alexandria package why aren't flying Blasters like Purity or Laserdream called Legend packages? Worm has more canon flying blasters than A-packages by a good margin, mostly due to Pelham and her buds, why isn't there ever a name established for them?

 

[Prince Charon]

So my question that I don't see brought up very often: If people call flight+Brute rating the Alexandria package why aren't flying Blasters like Purity or Laserdream called Legend packages? Worm has more canon flying blasters than A-packages by a good margin, mostly due to Pelham and her buds, why isn't there ever a name established for them?

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The most likely answer (IMHO, anyway) is that while Brockton Bay has more flying Blasters than flying Brutes, Earth Bet in general has significantly more flying Brutes, with flying Blasters in BB simply being a statistical outlier.

 

[The Unicorn]

So my question that I don't see brought up very often: If people call flight+Brute rating the Alexandria package why aren't flying Blasters like Purity or Laserdream called Legend packages? Worm has more canon flying blasters than A-packages by a good margin, mostly due to Pelham and her buds, why isn't there ever a name established for them?

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I'm speculating, but seems to me with Flying Blasters, the key point is that they are Blasters, and there are a thousand different type of blaster so while a brute is a brute regardless of the mechanics, people won't see someone who shoots lightning bolts from their hands, and someone who glows and fires beams of concentrated sunlight, and someone who can fire lasers as having the same power, so there is no large group of people with what's seen as the same power as Legend.

Additionally, Legend's reputation seems to be first about his political/social position, then about his administrative role as head o the protectorate, and only a distant third about his powers. This is very much unlike Alexandria or Eidolon.

 

[Amazon Climber]

So my question that I don't see brought up very often: If people call flight+Brute rating the Alexandria package why aren't flying Blasters like Purity or Laserdream called Legend packages? Worm has more canon flying blasters than A-packages by a good margin, mostly due to Pelham and her buds, why isn't there ever a name established for them?

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Because we don't have a term for that, but we do have the term Flying Brick.

 

[The Unicorn]

Because we don't have a term for that, but we do have the term Flying Brick.

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How is "Flying blaster" not a term for it?

 

[Evilhippy]

Because we don't have a term for that, but we do have the term Flying Brick.

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I always called them Flying Artillery, which is not that far off from what a lot of them are.

 

[The Unicorn]

https://www.reddit.com/r/Parahumans/comments/38sumg/cape_synergy/

This doesn't exclude mental state, mind - it just means triggers can and do look things up outside the host mind if they think it useful to do so.

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Interesting. Thanks.

Furthermore, https://www.reddit.com/r/Parahumans/comments/4ak6m0/spoiler_what_if/d11aso3/ indicates that QA doesn't really do anything other than coordination

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No, it doesn't. What it indicates is that it

specializes in coordinating control over large numbers of smaller lifeforms.

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While I'll grant I misremembered it saying "things" instead o "lifeforms", given that Taylor in canon boosted her bugs to give them significant super abilities relative to the uncontrolled versions and could control their internal mechanisms, even if QA was limited to only coordinating large number of life forms (which makes no sense and contradicts the canon description of what the shards are) you could get a Brute or Mover power from it via direct control of cells.

This doesn't, strictly speaking, disagree with what you just said, but what you just said isn't really disagreeing with me, so...

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More specifically, it's exactly what I said and explicitly contradicts the claim that shards give powers that "tend to help [the user] continue living in the immediate future".

you can't infer how much mass or matter it has from it's apparent density or any other properties, any more than you could infer a Flechette bolt's mass or Siberian's mass. It cannot be quantified with the information at hand.

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Point.

 

[klassekatze]

More specifically, it's exactly what I said and explicitly contradicts the claim that shards give powers that "tend to help [the user] continue living in the immediate future".

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"Powers often help solve immediate death threats" (your words) and "tend to help [the user] continue living in the immediate future" (my words) are almost literally the same thing. If you don't think so... sure, whatever.

Also you're gonna have to elaborate on the whole super bug thing. Even allowing for direct control of normally uncontrollable biology, I don't remember Taylor's bugs ever defying physics. Which is what Brute via cell admin equates to.

 

[The Unicorn]

"Powers often help solve immediate death threats" (your words) and "tend to help [the user] continue living in the immediate future" (my words) are almost literally the same thing. If you don't think so... sure, whatever.

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"Powers often help in this particulary sub group of trigger conditions" Is very different from "powers generally help" To pick some number from the air - assume that powers help in 95% of cases where the trigger event was an immediate death threat, and that those cases are 20% of all triggers. i.e powers help in 19% of the cases. I think we can agree that in such a case you couldn't say powers tend to help the user living, if those were the only cases where they helped.

Also you're gonna have to elaborate on the whole super bug thing.

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Producing more silk than possible (by orders of magnitude), surviving and actively moving in conditions where the normal insects would be at best torpid and more likely dead, super fast weaving of silk, super strength and IIRC inerta (not sure about the last, I remember using a swarm of bugs to break a window, but that may be from a fanfiction)

 

[Prince Charon]

Producing more silk than possible (by orders of magnitude), surviving and actively moving in conditions where the normal insects would be at best torpid and more likely dead, super fast weaving of silk, super strength and IIRC inerta (not sure about the last, I remember using a swarm of bugs to break a window, but that may be from a fanfiction)

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Of course, all that may be the result of Wildbow not knowing that it isn't possible (IIRC, Skitter's costume is also more protective and more fire-resistant than it should be), but it's still 'stuff that happens in the story,' so regardless of whatever the Doylist reasoning may be, Watsonianly either Earth Bet insects are more powerful than RL insects, or it is indeed part of Taylor's power.

 

[The Unicorn]

IIRC, Skitter's costume is also more protective and more fire-resistant than it should be

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Pretty sure that's just the fanon depiction of her costume. Well that and people not getting that multiple layers of tightly woven cloth are a lot less flammable than loose threads, even before Taylor added whatever coating the used on it.

For the rest, even if we ignore everything Wildbow got wrong, Taylor could control the breeding cycle, and metabolic rate of bugs, doing the same to cells would allow for regeneration, super-strength, and probably a minor changer/stranger power.

 

[SlickRCBD]

In canon? yes, they are. The canon definition of "Tinker" is "a person who has a Tinker rating". In canon all the PRT ratings were just threat ratings and completely ignored the mechanics of the power.


Exactly, and Tinker is a PRT Threat rating, not anything else. There is no use of the PRT threat rating in canon other than as threat ratings.

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Sorry to necro this, but would Batman from another universe be given a tinker rating even though all his stuff can be reproduced and none was made by him (in some versions)?

At the least he qualifies as brute 0, thinker 0, tinker 0.
He's probably actually a brute 1 because of his ability to recover from injuries and still be at peak physical conditioning, as well as be near the top in several different athletic areas.

 

[The Unicorn]

Sorry to necro this, but would Batman from another universe be given a tinker rating even though all his stuff can be reproduced and none was made by him (in some versions)?

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The "can't be reproduced" is never part of the Tinker definition in Worm canon. In fact it was never universally true in canon since we have examples (although they're few and far between) for mass produced Tinkertech.

If he isn't the one who made the stuff then he isn't a Tinker, a Tinker is someone whocan make tools, a Batman who didn't make his own stuff isn't a Tinker any more than Coil was in canon - being able to buy Tinkertech doesn't make you one.

At the least he qualifies as brute 0, thinker 0, tinker 0.
He's probably actually a brute 1 because of his ability to recover from injuries and still be at peak physical conditioning, as well as be near the top in several different athletic areas.

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No. You're trying to use the PRT threat assessment ratings as power ratings, that's not how it works.

 

[SlickRCBD]

The "can't be reproduced" is never part of the Tinker definition in Worm canon. In fact it was never universally true in canon since we have examples (although they're few and far between) for mass produced Tinkertech.

If he isn't the one who made the stuff then he isn't a Tinker, a Tinker is someone whocan make tools, a Batman who didn't make his own stuff isn't a Tinker any more than Coil was in canon - being able to buy Tinkertech doesn't make you one.


No. You're trying to use the PRT threat assessment ratings as power ratings, that's not how it works.

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Ah, but he can show up with any number of gadgets, so labeling him a tinker let's the troops know to expect him to have devices and that depriving him of his devices deprives him of most of his firepower. Brute 1 indicates that he's dangerous in hand-to-hand due to his martial arts training. I wouldn't be surprised if the real life Mike Tyson or Mohamad Ali deserved a brute 1 rating in their respective primes. The average trooper taking on either of them in hand-to-hand, even if the boxer is unarmed and the trooper has a baton or nightstick?

So that's where I get tinker. It's a warning about Batman's gadgets to be prepared for him to pull out weird gadgets that aid him.

 

[The Unicorn]

Ah, but he can show up with any number of gadgets,

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Same as Coil. Same as any PRT trooper. The point about Tinker rating is noting something people can't get by mundane means.

I wouldn't be surprised if the real life Mike Tyson or Mohamad Ali deserved a brute 1 rating in their respective primes.

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I would, first IF they deserved any sort of rating they'd be at least 2 and more likely 3, 1 rating is "an untrained civilian can overcome this"
Second, that would mean everyone has a PRT rating, which is definitely not the case.

 

[The Unicorn]

Going by your logic Strider is a mover what, 4? maybe 5 at the high end?

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No, I specifically pointed out that he'd be a valid Mover 9.

Since he has essentially the exact same powerset being described there as far as the PRT would care in said scenario.

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In the same sense that an M1 Abrahms tank and M24 Chafee tank are essentially the same vehicle.
There's a rather large difference between "can drop 50 armed troops anywhere in the world with no warning, teleport out to any spot in the world, kidnapping people who were several meters away with no warning" power that Strider has, and "Can show up in any location they prepared in advance with only what they can personally carry" that Mouse Protector has, much less high speed flight.

Purity speed is unknown to my knowledge,

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True, what we know is that she's significantly faster than any cape in BB other than velocity or Dauntless, and that Crystal is significantly faster than Glory Girl, who can go at least 80mph (we know she can go that fast we don't know her top speed).

If she really could do something like Brockton to Boston in under five minutes I have no idea how you could possibly argue she is Mover 4, she even meets your criteria of other threat ratings as she has some extremely potent blaster ratings, but Wildbow is not known as a paragon of consistency.

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Because the mover ability is really a minor threat. Sure she can fly to some other city quickly, so what? If she didn't have her blaster powers she'd be easy to deal with. Her blaster powers are the threat, not her mover ability.

The main thing is the bit you quoted about informing the PRT in neighboring jurisdictions is part of how to respond to Mover 9, not the definition of what makes a Mover 9. Just because someone can move to another city quickly doesn't make them mover 9.

 

[Xilph]

In the same sense that an M1 Abrahms tank and M24 Chafee tank are essentially the same vehicle.
There's a rather large difference between "can drop 50 armed troops anywhere in the world with no warning, teleport out to any spot in the world, kidnapping people who were several meters away with no warning" power that Strider has, and "Can show up in any location they prepared in advance with only what they can personally carry" that Mouse Protector has, much less high speed flight.

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Strider potentially loses to a single trained individual, and definitely to a parahuman backed group of professional soldiers, so that is a 4-5 right?

In the scenario of "long distance teleporter", what is the functional difference between can bring mooks, has a secondary power such as giant lasers, and has acquired a bomb? All of them are a threat, but making the high level mover power contingent on non mover capabilities seems inherently flawed.

What is an example of a highly rated mover power in your mind? Like 8-10. Someone with mover as the sole cause of their rating, not an argument that mover is a force multiplier for other abilities which raises the rating meaningfully. Preferably with a non teleportation example or at least a power that does not involve teleporting others. Or does that kind of power rating require the ability to teleport others or to be acting as a force multiplier for others in order to obtain?

On Purity/Crystal/Victoria that is a mess of almost dragon all esque power scaling, for all we know it is 80, 95, and 100 mph. Was Crystal even described as the fastest or was she just described as the best? Different words have different meanings. Crystal could be a better flier than Victoria without necessarily being faster. Without more information anything here is relying off significant amounts of speculation.

 

[The Unicorn]

Strider potentially loses to a single trained individual, and definitely to a parahuman backed group of professional soldiers, so that is a 4-5 right?

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No. A blaster 10 can lose to a single untrained civilian, they're still a blaster 10. The rating are what amount of force you need to have a high chance of winning, not what you'd need to have a slim chance of winning if everything goes perfectly.

In the scenario of "long distance teleporter", what is the functional difference between can bring mooks, has a secondary power such as giant lasers, and has acquired a bomb? All of them are a threat,

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yes, all of them are a thret but they're different threats. The more options the parahuman has for attacking the higher his threat rating because the PRT doesn't know in advance what they'll do and needs to be prepared.
When dealing with a teleporter with Mouse Protector's powers you need to be prepared for them showing up with any weapon a normal person can carry and use, and you know they can only show up in places that have their mark. That's difficult, but not impossible for a team to deal with.
When dealing with strider you need to deal with him bringing any weapon a normal person can use, up to and including tanks, and with him showing up without any mark needing to identify the location, and you need to deal with the possibility of him showing up with dozens of mooks and with the possibility of him dumping a few tons of rock (or if his only limit is volume a few thousand tons) or explosives on you, and with him teleporting your team out to the middle of the ocean and leaving them, and a dozen more possibilities.
This makes it a LOT more difficult and more dangerous to deal with such a teleporter, and that's why the two do not have the same rating.

What is an example of a highly rated mover power in your mind? Like 8-10. Someone with mover as the sole cause of their rating, not an argument that mover is a force multiplier for other abilities which raises the rating meaningfully.

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I gave one. Strider. Turn it around, can you give an example of what you'd consider Mover 6 or 7?

Or does that kind of power rating require the ability to teleport others or to be acting as a force multiplier for others in order to obtain?

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No, but I can't think of any canon example that doesn't. A speedster with much less limits on affecting the world than Velocity might fit the bill, but there are none in canon.

Without more information anything here is relying off significant amounts of speculation.

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Fair enough.

 

[Xilph]

No, but I can't think of any canon example that doesn't. A speedster with much less limits on affecting the world than Velocity might fit the bill, but there are none in canon.

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No need for a canon character, any power from anyone in fiction, even hypothetical powers would work.

No. A blaster 10 can lose to a single untrained civilian, they're still a blaster 10. The rating are what amount of force you need to have a high chance of winning, not what you'd need to have a slim chance of winning if everything goes perfectly.

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Yes, so a 4-5. A squad with parahuman backup should easily be able to take on Strider if you can catch him by surprise, but that is a requirement for most mid+ movers. Starting at probably as low as even 4 to 5 you need dedicated parahuman counters or favourable terrain that counters their power on top of the element of surprise normally in order to actually capture them and prevent them from fleeing. Even someone as simple as Glory Girl would require dedicated parahuman counterplay in the form of your own better fliers or technology that specifically counters her power, and the element of surprise. Even as little as a ten second warning would be enough to let a motivated Glory Girl achieve a not insignificant amount of speed and distance, and that rapidly increases with more time. So maybe trending towards a 6 on Strider by those metrics.

A parahuman with unlimited time to prepare and resources is not actually worth considering, unless you want to give every mover dramatic increases just due to their ability to more easily escape and thus return with said resources.

When dealing with strider you need to deal with him bringing any weapon a normal person can use, up to and including tanks, and with him showing up without any mark needing to identify the location, and you need to deal with the possibility of him showing up with dozens of mooks and with the possibility of him dumping a few tons of rock (or if his only limit is volume a few thousand tons) or explosives on you, and with him teleporting your team out to the middle of the ocean and leaving them, and a dozen more possibilities.

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Arguments about tanks and mooks are irrelevant, a teleporter being judged based on the assumption they have effectively infinite money is largely meaningless. Velocity with that kind of resources is a devastating threat which is not much less dangerous. The actual argument here is that his Mover power is higher rated because he can teleport you against your will, or hypothetically if he can teleport a few thousand tons. Checking Worm itself, we actually have very little to go on as to the limits of Strider. We do not know how far he can teleport in a single jump, it is possible he chains jumps to achieve his distances, and we know he is the best friendly mass teleporter but what does that mean? I think the highest number we get for him teleporting alongside himself might actually be two. Even speculating based on other groups it is very possible he is only capable of teleporting half a dozen to a dozen people at a time and that he could not teleport something like a tank at all unless there is additional sources I am missing from the Leviathan fight which was his only canon appearance that I can find. Maybe mentions elsewhere exist too. It is completely possible with the actual evidence I can find in canon that he has a mass limit of less than a ton, but he is just highly capable at chaining teleports together.

Having to have a marked object at a location is also not a limit they can really account for unless the marks are easy to find. There is far too many ways to travel with minimal detection or to easily move small objects around the world with minimal detection for that to be a practical limit unless you can build some kind of detector which can easily detect marks from a range.

I gave one. Strider. Turn it around, can you give an example of what you'd consider Mover 6 or 7?

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Sometimes the numbers get tricky, but maybe Trickster? The ability to switch two objects within line of sight of similar mass. It provides the ability to teleport foes and allies around which makes conventional tactics difficult, makes him difficult to restrain, but is not actually a threat at a large scope and with proper parahuman support and caution should be counterable.

 

[A Simple Pilgrim]

I have a question about canon.

Is the youth guard actually an organization with any power? There's been some fanfics where the taylor sues the PRT or winslow, and the youth guard gets involved, and the BB wards get shut down etc. In particular I'm referring to that ultra popular malicious compliance fic on SB, called invincible or something? (it's the one where taylor has a bunch of floating disk shields).

I had the impression that the PRT and Protecterate were only paying lip service to the legal system, and had enough leverage/authority to never lose a court case they don't want to lose, and never have to even think about being told what to do by some private group.

 

[Prince Charon]

I have a question about canon.

Is the youth guard actually an organization with any power? There's been some fanfics where the taylor sues the PRT or winslow, and the youth guard gets involved, and the BB wards get shut down etc. In particular I'm referring to that ultra popular malicious compliance fic on SB, called invincible or something? (it's the one where taylor has a bunch of floating disk shields).

I had the impression that the PRT and Protecterate were only paying lip service to the legal system, and had enough leverage/authority to never lose a court case they don't want to lose, and never have to even think about being told what to do by some private group.

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In the original Worm, Youth Guard does not exist. It was created for the Worm Quest that Wildbow ran some years ago (after Worm finished), to intimidate the players into interacting with a Ward that we were as a group absolutely unsuited to dealing with. There, they had actual power, and policies that look like the way child stars are abused, but had to be invited in to exercise it. In Ward, they do exist, appear to have real power, and might not need to be invited in (someone who has spent far more time on Ward than I have or ever want to should answer that), and it makes what happened in Worm make less sense.

 

[The Unicorn]

Even someone as simple as Glory Girl would require dedicated parahuman counterplay in the form of your own better fliers or technology that specifically counters her power, and the element of surprise.

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No they don't. A flyer with GG ability to fly, and none of her other powers could easily be taken out by a squad of PRT troops. If they were limited to non-lethal means they might only be able to chase off the flyer, but the cape wouldn't be a serious threat. GG is a threat because of her brute and master powers, her mover rating helps enhance those, but on its own? It's not really much of a trhreat.

Even as little as a ten second warning would be enough to let a motivated Glory Girl achieve a not insignificant amount of speed and distance, and that rapidly increases with more time.

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Sure, if she reacts instantly and focuses on running away, but spreading out the team so whichever way she goes you can trap her would work just fine...if she didn't have her aura or shield or superstrength.

A parahuman with unlimited time to prepare and resources is not actually worth considering,

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True, but you do need to assume they have a resonable amount of resources and time, and when their power grants them more of both, you need to assume they'll use them before any confrontation.

Having to have a marked object at a location is also not a limit they can really account for unless the marks are easy to find.

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It does mean they can't teleport to a location the cape hasn't been (since we're ignoring the possibility of advance preparation). In fact is we go by your argument that we ignore advance prep the cape couldn't teleport anywhere.

Is the youth guard actually an organization with any power?

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In Worm they didn't exist. In the Quest Wildbow ran they are they had supreme power over a host of stuff. In Ward I believe (from what I've been told, haven't read it) they had more reasonable power levels, so take your pick of anywhere from all powerful to so weak you can't tell they exist. All options can be argued as canon.