How Charis 'MIGHT' react to the Testament of Scheuler.

About the Stone of Scheuler, I've always figured it was Kohdy. He approached Scheuler, Scheuler realized how screwed up things were, and Khody was 'killed' after downloading into the molycirc to be another 'backup' plan.

One that could be reactivated in the churches most dire needs.

One that would have 10 days before dumping... fits the line.

No longer term PICA, no long term AI sleeping- just a regular 10 day PICA that can do/interface/check with all the other systems and order strikes or stand down orders, as delegated by Scheuler.

I swear I've read this here before, but darned if I can find it.

purduephotog wrote:About the Stone of Scheuler, I've always figured it was Kohdy. He approached Scheuler, Scheuler realized how screwed up things were, and Khody was 'killed' after downloading into the molycirc to be another 'backup' plan.

One that could be reactivated in the churches most dire needs.

One that would have 10 days before dumping... fits the line.

No longer term PICA, no long term AI sleeping- just a regular 10 day PICA that can do/interface/check with all the other systems and order strikes or stand down orders, as delegated by Scheuler.

I swear I've read this here before, but darned if I can find it.

What's the point of recording Kohdy and not Shueller himself? Ex-marine with half-burned brain (his memory was erased, then partially restored by half-competent measures) is not exactly the person that could be relied upon. If there is a personality on Stone, it's almost certainly Shueller himself.

Dilandu wrote:What's the point of recording Kohdy and not Shueller himself? Ex-marine with half-burned brain (his memory was erased, then partially restored by half-competent measures) is not exactly the person that could be relied upon. If there is a personality on Stone, it's almost certainly Shueller himself.

Perhaps Nimue's PICA wasn't the only one brought to Safehold. We know that besides being used as expensive toys for the ultrarich, PICAs were used by those needing to operate in dangerous environments. Hence, it's plausible that a marine commando such as Kohdy could have had a PICA. It's less plausible that as a colonist who would have his memory wiped of technology would have had his PICA shipped with him. Perhaps he started off as part of the command crew but decided that to deal with PTSD, he'd become a colonist instead.

Despite what I just said, if Kohdy used a PICA, it makes far more sense if it was manufactured on Safehold to amplify his abilities as a Seijin. Given what Merlin told Cayleb when he gave him Excalibur, we know Helmcleaver alone would not be enough to explain Kohdy's reputed abilities. A PICA would, though that seems to be more than necessary.

I'm not a fan of the idea of a Kohdy PICA, just that it would be far likelier for there to be a Kohdy PICA (whatever its origin might be) than a Schueler PICA. Having or building a PICA would certainly have come to the attention of Chihiro. There are plausible but unlikely reasons for there to be a Kohdy PICA. I cannot think of any plausible reasons for a Schueler PICA to have been built.

Salisria wrote:
[snip]
I cannot think of any plausible reasons for a Schueler PICA to have been built.

That's easy: The plausible reason for creating one (or several) archangel PICAs (not necessarily Schueler specifically - but he too) would be that a PICA would give the 'arch-angels' a much longer lifespan so longer direct control over Safehold.

BUT -
- since (it looks like) there aren't any 'archangel' or church-side PICAs around - when having them (if possible) would have been a no-brainer - that seems to indicate that for some reason the church side couldn't build any. My guess is it may be as simple as the colonists not bringing the construction plans for PICAs from the homeworld. So only the Nimue-side (who already had a PICA after all) was able to reverse-engineer it and produce one.
Or the colony fleet DID bring the construction plans for PICAs but the Shan-Wei rebels stole or deleted them in some clandestine or other operation for the purpose of denying the church the possibility to create immortal 'arch-angels'. Actually that's a cool thought if I say so myself.

But we've been assuming that if Langhorne's clique had any PICAs, they kept the ten day limit since the Wylsyns had been told the Key could only be used once. Under that restriction, there's no justification for any of the archangels to have PICAs so as to give them longer lifespans.

Could the Temple have built PICAs without a 240 hour time limit? Yes, but I doubt they'd have had the inclination or imagination to do that.

Salisria wrote:But we've been assuming that if Langhorne's clique had any PICAs, they kept the ten day limit since the Wylsyns had been told the Key could only be used once. Under that restriction, there's no justification for any of the archangels to have PICAs so as to give them longer lifespans.

Could the Temple have built PICAs without a 240 hour time limit? Yes, but I doubt they'd have had the inclination or imagination to do that.

Ah, I see where you are coming from. You are thinking about the limitations of the Wylson key. I am sorry - I hadn't read that part of the thread. My bad.

Well, keeping the 10-day limit would make no sense. Because it would negate the PICAs main advantage: providing near immortal permanent leadership. Indeed that's why Nimue's original PICA aka Merlin scrapped that limit first thing. So we are in agreement that in the case the temple faction did have the ability to produce new PICAs for their 'archangels' those most certainly wouldn't have had the 10 day limit. (Only contrary to you I am certain that if the temple could have produced them it would have since it would have given such an obvious massive advantage. But since it seems the temple didn't we can infer the temple couldn't build them for some reason. Possibly didn't have - or lost in the war - the construction plans.)

Now as for bringing additional PICAs from Earth I seem to remember that the books are very clear that Nimue's PICA was an exception and the only one. So we really only have to worry about PICAs produced in the colony (i.e. without 10-day-limit) see above. But alright - DW can change his mind of course, and add more earth-build PICAs anyway, we'll see. Even in that case it would have been a no-brainer for the temple guys to scrap the 10 day limit first thing (like Nimue did).
So that time limit can't really be the reason for the Wylson key limitation.

Bruno Behrends wrote:Well, keeping the 10-day limit would make no sense. Because it would negate the PICAs main advantage: providing near immortal permanent leadership. Indeed that's why Nimue's original PICA aka Merlin scrapped that limit first thing. So we are in agreement that in the case the temple faction did have the ability to produce new PICAs for their 'archangels' those most certainly wouldn't have had the 10 day limit.

[...]

Now as for bringing additional PICAs from Earth I seem to remember that the books are very clear that Nimue's PICA was an exception and the only one.

Actually, we aren't in agreement at all.
First, the idea that time-unlimited PICAs would provide for an immortal leader or advisor was an idea that IIRC Nimue herself, or someone in Admiral Pei's conspiracy in any case, came up with. Unless someone in the Temple faction also had the same inspiration and acted upon it could the Temple faction built any. Second, the anti-technology bias Langhorne and Bedard had was something legitimately held by them, not simply cynically used to support the religion that turned them into archangels. I'm dubious that even if the Temple faction had the idea that they would have created such Frankensteins, and even if they did, someone like Chihiro would have strictly limited their creation, in which case it would be a Chihiro PICA, not a Schueler PICA, under the Temple, and probably operational but hidden because it had been disclosed by Langhorne pre-Bombardment that even the archangels' bodies would eventually wear out and the archangel's spirits would return to God. If the Temple had created any immortal PICAs, Safehold history would have been completely different, so time-unlimited PICAs are something we can be reasonably be sure the Temple never had.

Also, if IIRC, we weren't told that Nimue's PICA was the only one in the Operation Ark fleet, only that it was the only one available to Admiral Pei's conspiracy. The existence or non-existence of PICAs outside the conspiracy was left unsaid. The conspirators were fairly certain that Langhorne would eventually require the surrender of any openly declared PICAs for disposal, which is why Nimue agreed to be transferred from Commodore Pei's staff to Admiral Pei's staff so that her PICA could be officially lost from the equipment list.

Salisria wrote:But we've been assuming that if Langhorne's clique had any PICAs, they kept the ten day limit since the Wylsyns had been told the Key could only be used once. Under that restriction, there's no justification for any of the archangels to have PICAs so as to give them longer lifespans.

Could the Temple have built PICAs without a 240 hour time limit? Yes, but I doubt they'd have had the inclination or imagination to do that.

IIRC those limits were built in at a fundamental level to the PICA OS, and it took a top level programmer at the very top of his game AND desperate situation to get around them [and there were side effects]

Therefore the temple angels may just not have had the skill/capability to do that - or maybe even the awareness it was just about possible.

Bruno Behrends wrote:Well, keeping the 10-day limit would make no sense. Because it would negate the PICAs main advantage: providing near immortal permanent leadership. Indeed that's why Nimue's original PICA aka Merlin scrapped that limit first thing. So we are in agreement that in the case the temple faction did have the ability to produce new PICAs for their 'archangels' those most certainly wouldn't have had the 10 day limit.

[...]

Now as for bringing additional PICAs from Earth I seem to remember that the books are very clear that Nimue's PICA was an exception and the only one.

Actually, we aren't in agreement at all.
First, the idea that time-unlimited PICAs would provide for an immortal leader or advisor was an idea that IIRC Nimue herself, or someone in Admiral Pei's conspiracy in any case, came up with. Unless someone in the Temple faction also had the same inspiration and acted upon it could the Temple faction built any. Second, the anti-technology bias Langhorne and Bedard had was something legitimately held by them, not simply cynically used to support the religion that turned them into archangels. I'm dubious that even if the Temple faction had the idea that they would have created such Frankensteins, and even if they did, someone like Chihiro would have strictly limited their creation, in which case it would be a Chihiro PICA, not a Schueler PICA, under the Temple, and probably operational but hidden because it had been disclosed by Langhorne pre-Bombardment that even the archangels' bodies would eventually wear out and the archangel's spirits would return to God. If the Temple had created any immortal PICAs, Safehold history would have been completely different, so time-unlimited PICAs are something we can be reasonably be sure the Temple never had.

Also, if IIRC, we weren't told that Nimue's PICA was the only one in the Operation Ark fleet, only that it was the only one available to Admiral Pei's conspiracy. The existence or non-existence of PICAs outside the conspiracy was left unsaid. The conspirators were fairly certain that Langhorne would eventually require the surrender of any openly declared PICAs for disposal, which is why Nimue agreed to be transferred from Commodore Pei's staff to Admiral Pei's staff so that her PICA could be officially lost from the equipment list.

Bruno Behrends wrote:Well, keeping the 10-day limit would make no sense. Because it would negate the PICAs main advantage: providing near immortal permanent leadership. Indeed that's why Nimue's original PICA aka Merlin scrapped that limit first thing. So we are in agreement that in the case the temple faction did have the ability to produce new PICAs for their 'archangels' those most certainly wouldn't have had the 10 day limit.

[...]

Now as for bringing additional PICAs from Earth I seem to remember that the books are very clear that Nimue's PICA was an exception and the only one.

Actually, we aren't in agreement at all.
First, the idea that time-unlimited PICAs would provide for an immortal leader or advisor was an idea that IIRC Nimue herself, or someone in Admiral Pei's conspiracy in any case, came up with. Unless someone in the Temple faction also had the same inspiration and acted upon it could the Temple faction built any. Second, the anti-technology bias Langhorne and Bedard had was something legitimately held by them, not simply cynically used to support the religion that turned them into archangels. I'm dubious that even if the Temple faction had the idea that they would have created such Frankensteins, and even if they did, someone like Chihiro would have strictly limited their creation, in which case it would be a Chihiro PICA, not a Schueler PICA, under the Temple, and probably operational but hidden because it had been disclosed by Langhorne pre-Bombardment that even the archangels' bodies would eventually wear out and the archangel's spirits would return to God. If the Temple had created any immortal PICAs, Safehold history would have been completely different, so time-unlimited PICAs are something we can be reasonably be sure the Temple never had.

Also, if IIRC, we weren't told that Nimue's PICA was the only one in the Operation Ark fleet, only that it was the only one available to Admiral Pei's conspiracy. The existence or non-existence of PICAs outside the conspiracy was left unsaid. The conspirators were fairly certain that Langhorne would eventually require the surrender of any openly declared PICAs for disposal, which is why Nimue agreed to be transferred from Commodore Pei's staff to Admiral Pei's staff so that her PICA could be officially lost from the equipment list.