Types of Abilities

[Kalaong]

Back to speculation on manifestations?

Anomaloids seem to manifest abilities on scales equivalent to Larry Niven's psychics. Frank Scott had "Plateau Eyes"; he could make himself unnoticable - the psi ability exhibited by Matt Keller in "A Gift From Earth". William Villette was basically a strong Grog from "The Handicapped"(or a weak Thrint from "World of Ptavvs"). Jason Saito's telepathy was fear-based, but not that different from Larry Greenberg's from the same novel - extremely short range. Carrying the Niven analogy further, is Gil "The Arm" Hamilton's "imaginary arm" out of the question in the Shadow Unit universe? Or a telepath with unlimited range but only with people she feels an emotional connection to, like Hamilton's friend, Julie? How about short-term precognition a la Judy Greenberg(or Gary Goldman's initial script for "Next", a marvelous treatment of Phillip K. Dick's "The Golden Man" before Hollywood marked its territory all over it)?

On a similar scale would be Jim Ellison's superhuman senses(Clark Johnson's "The Sentinel") or Frank Black's empathic psychometric flashes(Chris Carter's "MilleniuM").

Catering to my personal geekiness is a thought from out of left field - Given Haf and Chaz's initial manifestations(software savant and human supercomputer), I'm wondering about the possibility of anomaloids with exaggerated hyperfocus AKA Science Related Mimetic Disorder(Jon Kilgannon's "A Miracle of Science") or "The Spark"(Phil and Kaja Foglio's "Girl Genius")

[MadGastronomer]

I find it fascinating that you feel the need to analogize these. It seems somewhat limiting to me.

[txanne]

Kalaong, can you please remove the Dexter spoilers from your sig line? It's not a good way to convince people to watch it. Quotes are fine--just don't tell us who gets killed, or the name of killers, or anything that could spoil our enjoyment of the story. Thanks.

[Kalaong]

Limiting? The common trait of all of those abilities is that though they are subtle, they are pretty damned potent. And there's still a lot of them. I was trying to state that the TPTB will be easily be able to populate five seasons of subtle, creepy superpowered weirdos even with the high turnover rate.

Why is this is a simulated television show? Do we really need yet another season of American Idol or Who Wants To Be A Millionaire? I want to see the Unit try to comprehend their own mythologies, and roam the Verse' with space hookers, and hear the wax lion speak, and find out what Promise City is actually promising, and get on the Global Frequency! The entertainment industry is ruled by "chimps with Down's syndrome", to quote Zero Punctuation. There's simply no other explanation.

Oh. Sorry. I just thought it was appropriate considering my hope that TPTB will introduce a Gamma vigilante.

[MadGastronomer]

Gammas Pace, Cauldwell, Kent, Grossman and Schumacher were all vigilantes.  I know, I know, you mean a gamma-hunting gamma.  Honestly, though, while that would provide some interesting conflict within the group, they're still going to take him or her down.  A gamma-killer doesn't actually help them, since one of Reyes' goals is to study gammas, and they aren't OK with vigilantism.  Part of the definition of being in the FBI is being a law and order type.
It's not so much that any one of your analogies is limiting -- although taken too seriously, they certainly can be -- as that I've seen you make analogies over and over again, and the pattern looks to me as if it's shaping and limiting your understanding, and is part of you trying to fit the facts as found in the stories to your theories instead of the other way around.  You don't seem to be taking Shadow Unit as what it is, but as a series of things that are like other things.  Of course, I can't know for sure that you're doing that, it's just what it looks like to me.

[Kalaong]

Analogies are how I create context and process information. For example, I used to have regular discussions with my dad over the gold standard as opposed to paper money, and it wasn't until he stated that he considered it to be the difference between rivers and oceans that I understood his point of view, even if I didn't agree with it. (Paper is a river, an orderly constant albeit one that only goes downhill, never up - QED inflation. The gold standard is the ocean, constantly fluctuating in response to myriad stimuli, but never going dry. He considers inflation to be an acceptable price for enforcing control over a chaotic system. I'm kinda freaked out because inflation means that when one exchanges real resources for increasingly worthless paper the government keeps a percentage of each transaction.)

[Kalaong]

Hmm. The primary reason I post and argue is that the only thing better than responses from TPTB would be new episodes. Okay, new ability theorizing - how about a hatemonger? A Gamma who can slam people with mild prejudices and dislikes into committing violent acts? And for a season finale Uber-Gamma, how about a jinx - somebody who slams probabilities to make himself lucky enough to survive four-story falls while cursing others to get hit by falling toilet seats?

[Kalaong]

And on the weaponized Gamma front, how about a telekinetic who targets the carotid artery?

[MadGastronomer]

Like Andre?  Or were you thinking of blockages?

[Kalaong]

I was thinking about some major city being inundated with DKOs(Done Keeled Over), the term for an unidentified cause of death. Said Gamma reaches in a target's neck, pinches the carotid artery shut, waits for them to die, then just lets go. No marks, no evidence.

[Mattador]

None whatsoever?  I don't think it would be likely to be detected, but wouldn't squeezing an artery shut leave internal bruising, or something of that sort?

[el_jefe]

Depends on how it was done, and how extensive the autopsy was.

[jimsmyth]

It's more fun if there is evidence, though.  Mysterious and hard-to-figure-out evidence, mind you, but evidence.

After all, would "Breathe" have been such a scary experience if we hadn't known the mechanism?  Isn't that why we have Frost on the team, to give us the analysis that turns a cityful of DKOs into victims of the Carotid Clamper?  Then our geniuses can workl out a profile, and have the race against time to find and stop the killer.

Plus, storywise, the carotid-clamping loses it's effect if Brady explains it at the denoument and Old Mister Carruthers explains he would have gotten away with it if it weren't for those meddling FBI agents.

[Kalaong]

Yeah, I guess it is a whole lot like "Breathe". How about the old standby - a telepath who can just scare people into heart attacks and strokes? Side effect - Rash of bodies looking kinda like Samara's victims in "The Ring".

[MadGastronomer]

Yeah, but why do an old standby?