Mandelbrot Device?
Anyone who is expert in The Lore able to connect that to anything we have seen before? What is a Mandelbrot Device, anyway?
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Being serious, the only other reference to it that I know of is the Chaotician badge, also in Founder's Falls.
http://www.fimfiction.net/story/36641/My-Little-Exalt
I've occasionally wondered if Professor Xaos was opposed by a hero called the Effective Butterfly, but beyond that, I have nothing for you. I've always thought Xaos had a great deal of potential as an in-game character, though. For that matter, so do a number of other characters mentioned only in plaques, although a fair number of them are deceased. I'd still like to see the Teal Serpent (adversary of Atlas), though; the name sounds like a character with the potential for a neat costume.
"Bombarding the CoH/V fora with verbosity since January, 2006"
Djinniman, level 50 inv/fire tanker, on Victory
-and 40 others on various servers
A CoH Comic: Kid Eros in "One Light"
A Mandelbrot Device is obviously a machine which creates a finite-size lake with an infinite-length coastline. It would have ruined the value of lakefront property all over the world if Positron hadn't stopped the evil plot!
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In seriousness, it could have something to do with the Mandelbrot Set, a kind of fractal.
Or it could have something to do with Johnathan Coulton's song of the same title.
"Positron discovered residual fractal energy from Professor Xaos' Mandelbrot Device at this location. ............................. Anyone who is expert in The Lore able to connect that to anything we have seen before? What is a Mandelbrot Device, anyway? |
The Mandelbrot Device was the target of the endgame (L40!) raid during the Christmas event of 2003. Being during the pre-Beta, where AT's were free-form the few players that were available for the raid were unable to complete it, due to many of them picking horribly gimped combinations like ForceFields/Empathy and Invuln/Regen/Stone Armor.
They /petitioned for help and Positron finished the mission for them.

Or I'm lying and a Mandelbrot Device is a powerful weapon capable of destroying a city, using destructive energies greatly magnified from the playing of an un-tuned mandolin.
Picture of an Electric Mandolin:

In seriousness, it could have something to do with the Mandelbrot Set, a kind of fractal.
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C'mon. Finite area lake, infinite length coastline? It's Mandelbrot Lake! The actual set part of the Mandelbrot set!
...
Plebes

http://www.fimfiction.net/story/36641/My-Little-Exalt
I'm surprised nobody's mentioned this yet.
<shakes head> I don't know, the quality of gamers these days, wouldn't know a mathematical concept if it bit them on the asymptote...
<exits, muttering about it used to be better in the old days when this were all just fields...>
Warning:
The above post may contain Cynicism, sarcasm and/or pessimism. If you object to the quantities contained, then tough.
For those who don't know what the Mandelbrot Set is, here's an image.
What's unique about the set is that no matter how far you zoom in, there's more and more detail, making it literally infinite in scope. Clearly, the Mandelbrot Device was some kind of reality warping machine that could spell DOOOOOM for all of existence.

"Positron discovered residual fractal energy from Professor Xaos' Mandelbrot Device at this location. The fractal energy was cascading off of the main hyperbolic components. Luckily, Positron was able to neutralize the energy before it became dangerous to the public."
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What's unique about the set is that no matter how far you zoom in, there's more and more detail, making it literally infinite in scope.
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This is true of all fractals; hardly unique to the Mandelbrot Set. See Julia Set and Weierstrass Function for more info.
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What I think is interesting about fractals is that they're fixed points of iterated function systems. The Sierpinski Triangle is normally rendered as a set of triangles within triangles to form:

But it doesn't really matter what you start with. So long as you do enough iterations, the fractal still looks the same.
Using the same IFS as in the first image, I can make the Sierpinski Triangle using...
A point:

A line:

A pentagon:

http://www.fimfiction.net/story/36641/My-Little-Exalt
This is true of all fractals; hardly unique to the Mandelbrot Set. See Julia Set and Weierstrass Function for more info.
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http://www.fimfiction.net/story/36641/My-Little-Exalt
I'm surprised nobody's mentioned this yet.
<shakes head> I don't know, the quality of gamers these days, wouldn't know a mathematical concept if it bit them on the asymptote... <exits, muttering about it used to be better in the old days when this were all just fields...> ![]() |

"Samual_Tow - Be disappointed all you want, people. You just don't appreciate the miracles that are taking place here."
I'm surprised nobody's mentioned this yet.
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Ya think thats cool, here are some in 3-D http://www.geeks3d.com/20091116/expl...lbrot-fractal/ Now thats trippy!
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For those wanting to play with fractals in the safetly of their own home, the old stalwart, Fractint is apparently still going. Which is worrying, as I remember faffing around with Fractint when I was at university... 19 years ago

<slouches off, having successfully made himself feel old...>
:edit:
Damn, Fractint's 32bit only on the windows version. If you're running Vista/Win7 64bit, then it's not going to work

Warning:
The above post may contain Cynicism, sarcasm and/or pessimism. If you object to the quantities contained, then tough.
Other people may have more luck, but at the moment, I can't get it to run.
Warning:
The above post may contain Cynicism, sarcasm and/or pessimism. If you object to the quantities contained, then tough.
About 3 years ago I started a thread about an historic marker in Founders Falls that was in the game, but did not respond when clicked upon. It was at location 2688.3, -0.0, 889.2. The general consensus was that it was awaiting further gamelore.
I was rescuing a CoT ritual victim today nearby and thought I ought to see if it now said anything. To my surprise, it does:
"Positron discovered residual fractal energy from Professor Xaos' Mandelbrot Device at this location. The fractal energy was cascading off of the main hyperbolic components. Luckily, Positron was able to neutralize the energy before it became dangerous to the public."
Anyone who is expert in The Lore able to connect that to anything we have seen before? What is a Mandelbrot Device, anyway?
PS It is the marker north of Jenny Firkins in FF, in front of a statue of an angel with a shield
"How do you know you are on the side of good?" a Paragon citizen asked him. "How can we even know what is 'good'?"
"The Most High has spoken, even with His own blood," Melancton replied. "Surely we know."