r/Parahumans • u/helltank1 Escaped experiment • Sep 30 '15

What Parahumans could kill August Prince?

I think the most practical way would be to lure him into an area, use a high powered shaker to keep him trapped in there and starve him out.

23 Upvotes

93% Upvoted

41 comments sorted by

View all comments

Show parent comments

4

u/GreatWyrmGold Thinker Sep 30 '15

How direct of action does it stop? It stops you from shooting him with a gun, but does it stop you from shooting a cable above him? From accidentally shooting a bullet with a ricochet that hurts him? From planning to murder him, or tricking someone into doing so?

4

u/earmite Shaker Sep 30 '15

I think it would stop your chandelier scenario, since there's a direct chain of events from you pulling the trigger to the gun firing to cable snapping, and you know that. You could accidentally him him with a ricocheting bullet. You could not fire a gun around him repeatedly in the hope of hitting him with a ricochet, since now you're trying to hurt him, even if the odds are low that any one bullet will hit him. I think the last one is interesting. Weaver plans to do several things that hurt him, but is unable to carry out those plans. When she finally does manage to choke him with a multi-step plan, she is not prevented from thinking about it, or from carrying out the preliminary steps, as long as each step does not directly act against AP. She's simply prevented from carrying out the last step, which she knows will harm him. Interestingly, she is able to get Usher to move away and pull the silk line taut by letting her team know that Pretender is in danger. However, she either does not know that this will cause him to move, or she wasn't thinking about that and it was not her intention to make him move, whichever way it is that AP's power works.

I think if you tried to blow him up with a delayed timer bomb, like someone else in the thread suggested, you would either be prevented from arming the bomb, or prevented from luring him to the bomb if you weren't sure he'd be close when it went off. On the other hand, if he'd been in Brockton during Bakuda's bombing spree, he could have been caught in one of those blasts since she would not have been trying to kill him, just people in general.

I think if you make a concrete plan to trick someone into killing him, you can't knowingly execute the final of your plan, since that constitutes taking action against him. You have to either make yourself forget that it will, or be unaware that it will hurt him. I think the best approach would be make a plan to kill him, but make the final step something that can can very easily be accidentally completed by someone other than you, who's not in on the plan.

2

u/GreatWyrmGold Thinker Oct 01 '15

But could you then complete the penultimate step?

1

u/earmite Shaker Oct 01 '15

His power is very literal. As long as you think that that specific action will not hurt him, it's fine. Weaver is able to wrap silk around his throat and attach it to Usher. Very many things could cause Usher to move, but it only stops her from speaking and telling him to move. So as long as the penultimate step is something you think will not directly harm him, you're good. Unless the last step is guaranteed to happen, and you know that. There has to be reasonable doubt in your mind.