With This Ring (Young Justice SI) (Thread Fourteen)

[Ganurath]

Maybe that's what happened? When he went off into space, he accidentally took all Hope for a peaceful resolution with him. Which is why everyone is going nuts.

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Making a Lantern requires two things:

1. Someone with the competence to make a Lantern.
2. At least one planet's worth of widespread emotion appropriate to the Lantern's intended color.

A previous example of a Hope Lantern being made involved the annihilation of a continent-spanning religious institution that would make the men in charge in The Handmaid's Tale double-take and cringe at how horrible it is to women.

 

[Buggy123]

Making a Lantern requires two things:

1. Someone with the competence to make a Lantern.
2. At least one planet's worth of widespread emotion appropriate to the Lantern's intended color.

A previous example of a Hope Lantern being made involved the annihilation of a continent-spanning religious institution that would make the men in charge in The Handmaid's Tale double-take and cringe at how horrible it is to women.

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Not necessarily a whole planet. For instance OL can forge lanterns on his own, and he did so once as a demonstration.

Granted, that was on Maltus, which might qualify as a planet's word of Avarice.

 

[Handlewithcare]

Paul will snap and use his limit move.

"That's IT! CAKETIME!"

 

[Vaermina]

"Not on a nice country, but there are plenty of places that the Syndicate won't make worse by taking them over. Somewhere lousy with strife which they couldn't make worse if they tried."

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And when a decade later they have fortified the place and are now using it as a base to invade and conquer other countries with a full blown army?

Because that's what's going to happen.

You quite literally had an example of this on Earth 16 with Queen Bee and Bialya.

Man its getting to the point where OL might just go "Diplomacy has failed" and curb-stomp a new paradigm into place and leave.

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I mean... He could try... But Luthor isn't acting worried yet, which should really worry Paul since it likely means Luthor has three or four trump cards just waiting in the wings to deal with him.

 

[Istaran]

Paul will snap and use his limit move.

"That's IT! CAKETIME!"

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And in other news, Washington DC was crushed under a giant cake. There were no survivors.
Cleanup crews reported that it was "the most delicious thing we have ever tasted," but warned that lab tests show it contains no preservatives, and is likely to rot fairly quickly and spectacularly.

 

[EvenMaster80]

And when a decade later they have fortified the place and are now using it as a base to invade and conquer other countries with a full blown army?

Because that's what's going to happen.

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I can sorta agree with you on that point, dumping a bunch of supervillains in a third-world country would probably not go over very well. But not just for the reason you presented.

The Syndicate should have no interest in taking over an impoverished country because of the fact they don't even know how to run one. We see an example of this on the same Earth when the Crime Lodge failed to keep New York.

These guys are superpowered criminals, not exactly the kind of people who know how to build nations and feed the people. Even if they didn't try to take direct control and stuck to crime, the local people and nations would still probably work together to attempt push out the Syndicate, which is happened in the US. Also, I don't feel like the Syndicate would be content with a nation that'd barely have running water and would probably overstep their boundaries, which would restart the open warfare.

Sending the Syndicate elsewhere isn't a long term solution. They need to be dismantled as a group and every individual criminal should face appropriate punishment.

 

[Ngamer11]

Sending the Syndicate elsewhere isn't a long term solution. They need to be dismantled as a group and every individual criminal should face appropriate punishment.

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A big problem is that the US doesn't want to just dismantle the Syndicate. It wants to completely demolish it, whatever it takes. Paul isn't trying to find a long-term solution. He's trying to avoid turning the US into a wasteland full of millions of corpses. He just wants to do that minimum so he can get out of dodge. Unfortunately for him, neither side wants to back down, so MAD it is.

 

[Mr Zoat]

I can sorta agree with you on that point, dumping a bunch of supervillains in a third-world country would probably not go over very well. But not just for the reason you presented.

The Syndicate should have no interest in taking over an impoverished country because of the fact they don't even know how to run one. We see an example of this on the same Earth when the Crime Lodge failed to keep New York.

These guys are superpowered criminals, not exactly the kind of people who know how to build nations and feed the people. Even if they didn't try to take direct control and stuck to crime, the local people and nations would still probably work together to attempt push out the Syndicate, which is happened in the US. Also, I don't feel like the Syndicate would be content with a nation that'd barely have running water and would probably overstep their boundaries, which would restart the open warfare.

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Palaces in third world countries generally have running water. Even at the Syndicate's peak there weren't that many Made Men. They won't be hurting for amenities or targets, and there are enough of them who do know how to administer territory that they will be able to create something functional.

 

[Soul Shocker]

Fuck this shit, kill them all

 

[Yog]

I mean... He could try... But Luthor isn't acting worried yet, which should really worry Paul since it likely means Luthor has three or four trump cards just waiting in the wings to deal with him.

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To be fair, same goes for Paul too, as far as trump cards go. Luthor has never faced an orange lantern before. Blue Paul may wield Hope ring, but he always operated on a very limited power budget. Paul still has to reveal all the higher tier orange light manipulation abilities. Branding, assimilation, energy absorption, avarice denial, etc, culminating with 'It's happy fun snek time". He is yet to reveal most of the technological capabilities of his equipment - his power armor should be sufficient to deal with everyone here by itself. Paul still isn't tapping into his full bag of tricks. Nowhere close, really.

 

[Maxx Crowley]

Sigh...

If he had just stayed and kept talking in their totally ineffective force field thing that was no threat to him he might have gotten somewhere diplomatically... maybe.

But, no. Gotta show how you can't be threatened and are now trying to talk to them after goading them all into attacking you.

Why? If you want to talk then talk, if you want to fight then fight. Why try to reason with them after emphasizing that you are a direct uncontainable threat?

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Because if you don't have the strength to do anything, why should anyone listen to you?

 

[Queshire]

I like this Luthor. His grab bag of tricks reminds me of OL. Makes me wonder if Blue tried reaching out to him like OL did his? Oh, if this is some plot between Blue and Luthor meant to end up with Blue in charge of a gutted Crime Syndicate that'd be great. >= ]

 

[Prince Charon]

I like this Luthor. His grab bag of tricks reminds me of OL. Makes me wonder if Blue tried reaching out to him like OL did his? Oh, if this is some plot between Blue and Luthor meant to end up with Blue in charge of a gutted Crime Syndicate that'd be great. >= ]

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I had not considered that one. Interesting idea. Not sure how likely it is, but interesting.

 

[EvenMaster80]

A big problem is that the US doesn't want to just dismantle the Syndicate. It wants to completely demolish it, whatever it takes. Paul isn't trying to find a long-term solution. He's trying to avoid turning the US into a wasteland full of millions of corpses. He just wants to do that minimum so he can get out of dodge. Unfortunately for him, neither side wants to back down, so MAD it is.

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I get that Paul's just trying to find a quick fix that would work so that a long term fix can be applied later when hostilities have cooled. But this fix is irresponsible and should be undesirable for both sides.

Ideally, he should be able to mediate a better possible agreement between both sides, but today just isn't his day.

Palaces in third world countries generally have running water. Even at the Syndicate's peak there weren't that many Made Men. They won't be hurting for amenities or targets, and there are enough of them who do know how to administer territory that they will be able to create something functional.

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I can see people like the Zatara's living on isolated compounds but that's not what I gathered from his statement. What Paul proposed was just to exile in some unfortunate third-world country and hope nothing could get worse. But the thing is, it always gets worse.

The Made Men could make a good living for themselves in any place, but not for the hundreds of thousands of inhabitants of the country they decide to sieze control of. They're not saints and are used to ruling through fear, which generally doesn't work too well for a civilian organizations. Yes, dictatorships are functional, but one lead by foreign supervillains would inevitably lead to even more internal strife and that generally doesn't mix well with WMDs.

 

[Prince Charon]

I get that Paul's just trying to find a quick fix that would work so that a long term fix can be applied later when hostilities have cooled. But this fix is irresponsible and should be undesirable for both sides.

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A good compromise leaves everyone equally angry. Sadly, the Government is willing to destroy the country in order to save it.

Ideally, he should be able to mediate a better possible agreement between both sides, but today just isn't his day.

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I'm not sure it would have been an option any day between the Decapitation and Wilson's planned endgame, unless someone killed Wilson first, and maybe not even then.

 

[Stsword]

The Made Men could make a good living for themselves in any place, but not for the hundreds of thousands of inhabitants of the country they decide to sieze control of. They're not saints and are used to ruling through fear, which generally doesn't work too well for a civilian organizations. Yes, dictatorships are functional, but one lead by foreign supervillains would inevitably lead to even more internal strife and that generally doesn't mix well with WMDs.

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Which doesn't work too well for civilian organizations from lack of monopoly of force.

Any Made Men that is actually an issue for should be smart enough to take some of their peers who provide that force.

And why exactly must a dictatorship run by a supervillain have more internal strife than other dictatorships?

 

[Prince Charon]

Which doesn't work too well for civilian organizations from lack of monopoly of force.

Any Made Men that is actually an issue for should be smart enough to take some of their peers who provide that force.

And why exactly must a dictatorship run by a supervillain have more internal strife than other dictatorships?

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I guess it depends on how smart the supervillain is, and how much they go with supervillain solutions to practical problems (e. g. The Light's various mad ideas)

 

[Mr Zoat]

And why exactly must a dictatorship run by a supervillain have more internal strife than other dictatorships?

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Usually, because any baseline human who became a dictator would have to have some people management skills, while a supervillain could just have force majeured it. But in this case the Syndicate has a command structure run by people with the skills to make reasonably competent dictators.

 

[Gantradies]

A good compromise leaves everyone equally angry. Sadly, the Government is willing to destroy the country in order to save it.


I'm not sure it would have been an option any day between the Decapitation and Wilson's planned endgame, unless someone killed Wilson first, and maybe not even then.

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the biggest problem here, is its even WORSE then that-
Currently this Universe's US doesnt have a Government that gives a single fuck about the nation OR the normal scams/political corruption (yes,yes i know im intractibly cynical about politicians, regardless of universe) to fill their own pockets at everyone elses expense-

literally the only thing the people in control of this worldline's US care about is killing members of the syndicate as violently as possible because they're motivated SOLELY by petty, personal desire for revenge, and either by nature, or from trauma, they are seemingly psychologically incapable of caring about innocent casulties- the biggest, quickest, simplest thing OL could do to stabilize the situation after gaining a means to leave woudl be to brand/perminently alter the desires of Slade and his Goons, or just simply decapitate the government -the resulting chaos would still be better then the (literal) fallout of letting the psychotic idiot start a nation-scale apocalypse.

 

[Simonbob]

the biggest problem here, is its even WORSE then that-
Currently this Universe's US doesnt have a Government that gives a single fuck about the nation OR the normal scams/political corruption (yes,yes i know im intractibly cynical about politicians, regardless of universe) to fill their own pockets at everyone elses expense-

literally the only thing the people in control of this worldline's US care about is killing members of the syndicate as violently as possible because they're motivated SOLELY by petty, personal desire for revenge, and either by nature, or from trauma, they are seemingly psychologically incapable of caring about innocent casulties- the biggest, quickest, simplest thing OL could do to stabilize the situation after gaining a means to leave woudl be to brand/perminently alter the desires of Slade and his Goons, or just simply decapitate the government -the resulting chaos would still be better then the (literal) fallout of letting the psychotic idiot start a nation-scale apocalypse.

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Or kill the Syndicate himself.

I'd say they're about as easy as the other, at this point.


Personaly? I think he should take Zatana and the Justice League, force a TV broadcast explaning the sitch, then go home.

 

[CTrees]

Also, how can OL disable Q-Ranger non-lethally?

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Brand?

I'm also curious on how he counters Medea.

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That's more concerning. High tier DC mages are pretty bullshit, so... Relativistic sniping? Not sure what non-lethal options there are for her, without the Ophidian.

 

[Ngamer11]

I like this Luthor. His grab bag of tricks reminds me of OL. Makes me wonder if Blue tried reaching out to him like OL did his? Oh, if this is some plot between Blue and Luthor meant to end up with Blue in charge of a gutted Crime Syndicate that'd be great. >= ]

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That would be an interesting outcome. I'm also suspicious of the "heavy collar" Luthor is wearing. Is it possible that it is booby trapped, forcing him to go along with the radicals?

 

[SirKaid]

Sending the Syndicate elsewhere isn't a long term solution. They need to be dismantled as a group and every individual criminal should face appropriate punishment.

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The only way that the Syndicate can face appropriate punishment is if they're outside of the USA. Current US policy is to execute them all without even a pretence of a trial.

Moreover, if they remain in the USA millions of innocent people will die in the crossfire. History has shown that, in cases where a civil war can't be reasonably solved via force of arms, the only solution is to allow the weaker side to peacefully disarm and reintegrate with a conditional pardon. The alternative is chaos, suffering, and death.

 

[Ngamer11]

I might be misremembering, but I think Mr Zoat said in a previous thread that although the Spectre will not appear in the main universe, he will show up on Earth -14. I hope that if he does show up, he doesn't go to overboard with punishing the guilty., or else America -14 will go the way of Vlatava, i.e. The death of everyone in the country except for the leaders of both sides.

Edit: If someone can find it, can you please post a link here. I'd like to read it again.

 

[PDV]

That would be an interesting outcome. I'm also suspicious of the "heavy collar" Luthor is wearing. Is it possible that it is booby trapped, forcing him to go along with the radicals?

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Luthor's usually the tech genius on his team, and while Quizmaster/Riddler is smarter he's not an inventor in most incarnations. (The only ones I remember where tech is part of his schtick are the Batman Forever incarnation and the hacker version from The Batman.) So that's unlikely.

 

[Eponymic]

Mind controlling the populace into submission should not be your go-to option, and it disturbs me how many people seem to be taking the 'might equals right' side. OL came into an emotionally charged war zone full of people ideologically attached to their positions, it shouldn't be a surprise that simple conversation isn't enough to fix this, but overwriting the wills of all involved isn't how you achieve the victory you're looking for, that's just a different kind of punching the problem.

What would happen when OL left if he did that?

It would surprise me if he could even want that enough to make it happen.

 

[Mr Zoat]

I might be misremembering, but I think Mr Zoat said in a previous thread that although the Spectre will not appear in the main universe, he will show up on Earth -14. I hope that if he does show up, he doesn't go to overboard with punishing the guilty., or else America -14 will go the way of Vlatava, i.e. The death of everyone in the country except for the leaders of both sides.

Edit: If someone can find it, can you please post a link here. I'd like to read it again.

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I don't remember saying that. I strongly dislike the Spectre as a character, and would only write him in a setting he was canonically part of. And even then, only if there was no way to avoid it.

 

[Lazurman]

Mind controlling the populace into submission should not be your go-to option, and it disturbs me how many people seem to be taking the 'might equals right' side. OL came into an emotionally charged war zone full of people ideologically attached to their positions, it shouldn't be a surprise that simple conversation isn't enough to fix this, but overwriting the wills of all involved isn't how you achieve the victory you're looking for, that's just a different kind of punching the problem.

What would happen when OL left if he did that?

It would surprise me if he could even want that enough to make it happen.

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It is not, in fact, his go-to option. I'm fairly sure it's his option of last resort. He has tried, is still trying diplomacy, and it is failing. The two sides hold positions that are completely and utterly irreconcilable. Namely, the government wants to turbomurderfuck the Syndicate to death for being such a colossal collective of cunts, and the Syndicate wants to not fucking die, which is what will happen if they try surrendering.

How do you reconcile the irreconcilable? You can't. Short of uprooting the entire Syndicate and taking them off-world and marooning them on some habitable planet far away from Earth, I can't see a peaceful solution.

Thus, the mind control. And it is permanent, or can be made such. Remember what he did to the guy in charge of Hell? Reshape their wants until they no longer want to be such gigantic jackasses to each other. Juuust requires him to channel Best Snek and not go coocoo for Cocoa Puffs again.

 

[Soul Shocker]

Or kill the Syndicate himself.

I'd say they're about as easy as the other, at this point.


Personaly? I think he should take Zatana and the Justice League, force a TV broadcast explaning the sitch, then go home.

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Personally I prefer killing the Wilson gang myself

 

[Gantradies]

I might be misremembering, but I think Mr Zoat said in a previous thread that although the Spectre will not appear in the main universe, he will show up on Earth -14. I hope that if he does show up, he doesn't go to overboard with punishing the guilty., or else America -14 will go the way of Vlatava, i.e. The death of everyone in the country except for the leaders of both sides.

Edit: If someone can find it, can you please post a link here. I'd like to read it again.

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Oh greaaaaat. That's just what earth -14 needs! THAT lunatic running around turning people into chairs and woodchipping them!


... the more you think about it, the more fucked up the old comics code becomes *shudders*

huh. And created based off a physiological impact study that was fabricated from top to bottom by a single crooked researcher too, according to tvtropes o.o