Aberrant RPG - Worldwide Phase III

[Blue Thunder]

The Astaroth event would only be the first half of the adventure I proposed in the beginning. The second half would see the characters in India, where Indians have finally had enough of Utopia cracking down on their "cults" devoted to novas. The Astaroth event causes global panic, and Indians get defensive, thinking Utopia will begin attacks against famous Indian religious novas. There are riots and protests.

Here's a twist: a nova that wishes to see Utopia get damaged publically kills off an Indian nova that has set himself up as a god and makes it seem like Utopia did it (an Aberrant, a liberal Terat, or perhaps even another Indian nova). Indians go ballistic, and Utopia is kicked out of the country. The PCs must investigate who was behind the attack. For fun, involve Team Tomorrow Asia. Geisha would be trying to disarm the situation through diplomacy, while Splash uses her Indian roots to try to defend Utopia. Geisha, Splash, and Gina Bennet are the only canon characters in Team Tomorrow Asia, so this could leave room for Storyteller-created NPCs.

[Sprocket]

A quick question on the Astaroth scenario, folks. Aren't the rank & file Daemons/suckers/mooks supposed to be present when the 6 Domitori do their ritual? I can't imagine their membership being more than a few thousand, but that many people moving through a sparsely-inhabited territory would be pretty noticeable AFAIK. They're mentioned in AB:RoE (on p. 7) as convenient munchies for the True Astaroth to devour before it goes on that lunatic rampage across the Mexican desert.

[metaphysician]

Yeah, but if people don't really know whats going on ( and the Church of Astaroth has other gatherings before ), it may not matter much.

[Hyper-Focus]

We could probably come up with a whole book worth of scenarios exploring issues with human worship of Novas. We could call it "Cult of Personality"

Oh...waitaminute....

[Sprocket]

Re: Daemons-

I was just thinking that a mass migration to an empty part of the Mexican desert would be unusual enough to serve as a telltale (via satellite reconnaissance) for the baseline authorities. There's nothing like having military forces & nukes on hand to escalate a situation. ::devil Besides, a CoA gathering at events/places like the Burning Man festival is one thing, but a gathering in the middle of nowhere should provoke a bit more curiousity. The nova groups would no doubt get advance warning of this trouble vis their nova precogs.

Re: Cult of Personality-

::laugh Fortunately for us, the whole "nova cult" aspect of this scenario ("Astaroth Rising", wasn't it?) is a sideline at best.

[astronomer]

That sort of thing can get out of hand. When I ran my version of the CoA event, it escalated into a mondo fight punctuated by the Ibiza orbital railgun (what the heck, they're in the desert, aren't they?) ::devil Seriously, I wouldn't mind seeing other takes on it. WW Phase III would be a nice project to see. I hope Blue Thunder (or whoever is working on it) keeps going ...plug, plug.

[metaphysician]

No, I disagree. "Out of hand" would be if, at the moment of the rituals completion, PCs and NPCs from all across space time pop out of portals and rush the CoA trying to kill them. ::biggrin

[astronomer]

Uhhh ...... ::blink You have a reaaally interesting campaign there. ::wink And I thought I was a little odd!

[metaphysician]

Technically, it hasn't happened ( yet ) in the campaign I'm in. . . but something like that *did* happen in a prior campaign set in the same setting ( sort of ), which is also the future of the current campaign setting.

[Chuckg]

In fairness, that's because that campaign involved time travel -- and at the moment in question, the PC was about to take an action that would not only occur at a *major* historical nexus point, but to do so in a way that it would cause a time paradox that would have made the entire universe go *sprooooooing!*

When you do that, it kinda makes sense for time travellers from all over the continuum to show up right before you do it yelling "NO! DON'T TOUCH THAT!"

[Metallo]

Bear in mind that Pax does have full Director status within Utopia and is actually the highest placed nova within that organization (though Director Ozaki would probably be of equal rank if he weren't always in the shadows). Pax oversees everything involving Team Tomorrow including recruitment and placement. This means that he would be aware of most, if not all, of Proteus's moles within the Teams, as well as within the support staff that work with the various T2Ms.

The chances that he has no idea what actually happened to Slider are pretty small. He almost certainly knows the truth about what happened just as he knows the truth about Bahrain.

But the chances that he knows it was Chiraben, exactly what Chiraben looked like when he killed Slider, and where Chiraben's current location is? Not so good. Details like that would be left to Thetis and Ozaki. But I'd imagine that Pax knows all the general details of any operation that might even vaguely overlap with Team Tomorrow operations.

As for covering up for lack of empathy; there's not really anything in the books that gives any indication that Pax does anything other than moralize and talk big in front of cameras, and recite carefully prepared speeches at critical moments when in confrontations with other novas. I don't really see much empathy in him as it is.

The thing about Pax is, he's just a big bully with an even bigger playground. Not really your typical hero, one of the reasons I like White Wolf.

[Alex Green]

The thing about Pax is, he's just a big bully with an even bigger playground. Not really your typical hero, one of the reasons I like White Wolf.

Yah. You put your finger on it.

He (and most of the rest of them) actually are 3D characters with modivation. For that matter, He's a "hero" who is also an ass who is (justly) disliked by the other super-folk. How could Superman "not" be impressed with himself? How could he avoid taking out every villian he could in the first round?

Maybe more to the point, how could money-modivated villians not bother to make gobs of money legally with no risk to themselves? "I've invented a machine that turns any element into any other element, rather than turn lead into gold, or radioactive waste into lead, I think I'll use my enhanced intelligence to go rob a Candy Store!!!" ::blink

[metaphysician]

Half agree, half disagree. Villains not stupidly robbing banks when they could make a hundred times more legally? Good.

However, having "Superman" be an utterly unheroic jerk is just your standard issue deconstructionism. I don't especially mind in Pax' case, since the whole point is that Utopia is not at all what it seems. I don't, however, consider it a particular virtue, either. "Character depth" is not synonymous with "Utter lack of any redeeming feature."

I'd actually like it better if Pax were, in fact, an unlikable macho jerk. . . but one who actually did care about protecting others and saving the day. And, preferably, one who *wasn't* knowingly involved in Proteus.

[Metallo]

Half agree, half disagree. Villains not stupidly robbing banks when they could make a hundred times more legally? Good.

However, having "Superman" be an utterly unheroic jerk is just your standard issue deconstructionism. I don't especially mind in Pax' case, since the whole point is that Utopia is not at all what it seems. I don't, however, consider it a particular virtue, either. "Character depth" is not synonymous with "Utter lack of any redeeming feature."

I'd actually like it better if Pax were, in fact, an unlikable macho jerk. . . but one who actually did care about protecting others and saving the day. And, preferably, one who *wasn't* knowingly involved in Proteus.

Well Pax isn't entirely a bastard. He does choose to fight for the side working for the betterment of humanity after all.

[metaphysician]

Yeah, but with not the hint of it being for anything resembling a noble motive. He works for T2M because they give him good PR and a chance to lord over everyone with his vast power and not get arrested. And following his defeat by Divis Mal, most of the future info seems to point towards him degenerating rather enormously.

[Alex Green]

Thing to remember is that Pax didn't start with Q7 and Taint 6+ (although he might have started with node 5). When he first joined up with PU he presumably was Q5, and *MUCH* saner.

I would bet he decided to join PU (and even Project Pro) for the right reasons, or at the very least, a lot less of the wrong ones.

On a side note about Project Pro, in a different game (over on NPrime), we got sent back in time, and with the resources and information we have (i.e. basically being able to read from the ST parts of the books), after having defeated Thetis we have decided to basically create Project Pro and run it ourselves. My character has already pointed out that anyone who finds out what we're doing but not why we're doing it is going to assume we're wearing black hats. Problem is that we're the only novas around just yet and if we want to head off the war we're going to have to reshape the world.

[metaphysician]

Fair point about Taint, presuming it is Taint in Pax' case. I tend not to think so, but YMMV.

As for recreating Proteus, well, *some* of the stuff Proteus was doing was justifiably necessary, or at least marginally justifiable. Quietly eliminating insane or destructively evil novas is hardly a bad thing. OTOH, the Mengele-style experiments are at best hideously questionable, and the nova sterilization is just plain unsupportable. So IMO, comes down to whether your just fulfilling history with different names, or hijacking an incipient organization for a new purpose.

[Alex Green]

We're back in the 1920's, right after Hammersmith. The world is going to hell in a handbasket... and we're the only ones who know, everyone else thinks it's just fine. In order to change history so that everything is better this time around, we...

Destroyed Hitler's life. He killed himself.

Are in the process of destroying Communism.

Are preventing Stalin's rise to power.

Have or will manipulate key US Sentators to impliment Banking reform and other economic reforms to prevent the Great Depression.

Are going to buy media.

Have already signed up Max and Pre-Taint Michael as allies.

Are in the process of greatly lessoning the impact of "oil" on the modern economy.

So basically we're trying to get the world ready for novas in the late 20th Century by suborting people's wills, minds, and the political process. To an outsider it's going to look like we're trying to take over the world.

[metaphysician]

No kidding. Your still managing to be alot more morally justifiable than Proteus. ::biggrin

[Metallo]

Fair point about Taint, presuming it is Taint in Pax' case. I tend not to think so, but YMMV.

As for recreating Proteus, well, *some* of the stuff Proteus was doing was justifiably necessary, or at least marginally justifiable. Quietly eliminating insane or destructively evil novas is hardly a bad thing. OTOH, the Mengele-style experiments are at best hideously questionable, and the nova sterilization is just plain unsupportable. So IMO, comes down to whether your just fulfilling history with different names, or hijacking an incipient organization for a new purpose.

Lets also not forget they primarly see Nova's as a "crisis". Thinking like that only plays into the Teragen's hands

[metaphysician]

Yep. If they had an attitude more like Stormwatch Black, or even the Men in Black, they wouldn't be causing half the trouble they do.

[Alex Green]

No kidding. Your still managing to be alot more morally justifiable than Proteus. ::biggrin

Thank you, but I'm not sure. One of the weaknesses of Abby is that Project Pro is wearing a big black hat... and they appear to be doing very evil things simply because they're wearing a big black hat. If one assumes that few people think of themselves as evil... why are they doing what they are doing? Like Mal's and Pax's aberrations, we strongly suspect they exist, but their modivations are largely a mystery.

However it's hinted in some books that the more we know about them the more we might agree with them. Some of the aberrated novas in Barain were there willingly. Project Pro has nova members like Pax and Psychie. Project Pro was created by Aeon, which in turn was created by Max. The implication is that the truth is so awful that it has to be hidden until it can be dealt with, or at least, that should be the implication.

Is the real difference between them and our group of PCs simply that everyone here knows why we wrecked Hitler's life?

Lets also not forget they primarly see Nova's as a "crisis". Thinking like that only plays into the Teragen's hands

True and a fair point... but the question is "why"? What kind of a crisis? What is it that novas are going to do that's so horrible? If it's about running wild and exterminating mankind and themselves, then they should say as much and not simply hint at it. I can buy that Project Pro has bought into "the end justifies the means...." but what is the end that they're trying to avoid?

The sterilization program makes a lot more sense if we use many of "A breed apart"'s rules for 2nd Gen novas and for Hatchers. Alternatively, Project Pro in general makes a lot more sense if they know the war is coming (Max told them), and they're expecting the dreaded "3rd Generation" to be as horrible as they are. I.e. not only will novas get tainted, but so will baselines.

[astronomer]

The thing here is, the changing tone of the medium influences the games we're running now. When I started reading comics 40 years ago, it was pretty black and white, good vs evil polarized. The good guys were good, the bad guys bad. Later on, they became more 3-D, had more depth of character, etc. They became grittier and darker, doing good deeds in questionable ways (let's not even contemplate the evolution of Batman's myriad incarnations!). And recently, we have Marvel's Civil War story arc, which looks a lot like a version of the Abberant War concept. When ordinary people get slapped with amazing powers, they'll react in various ways, good, bad, indifferent. Is the War inevitable or even likely? I would say: some version, yes. Is Project Proteus necessary or even desirable? I would say: some version, yes again. The atrocities and genocide are unconscionable, but if you could put some mechanism in place to buffer and smooth out the transition to integrating novas into human society in an appallingly short time frame, wouldn't you try? If it wasn't possible, wouldn't you try to give them a homeland elsewhere, a la the Exodus?

[Alex Green]

RE: The Civil War

IMHO the Civil War turned the Avengers into a government run super villian group.

Is the War inevitable or even likely?

Considering Taint, The Teragen, and Divis Mal? I think so. Making matters worse are PU (and other agenies) putting novas under so much pressure to perform that they will get taint.

RE: The Teragen

The world will not react well to superpowered terrorists, be they Greenwar or whatever. Uncontrolled super powered aliens who openly oppose the social contract even more so.

The Teragen does have a point in that many laws and other societal rules become unworkable with many super powers. They also have a point where the "obvious" legal solutions would look more like swards than shields. I.e. Warp and Teleport transend all national bounderies (like the internet does for information). The obvious solution is for countries to pass laws saying their national bounderies are still relievant and that warpers and teleporters should stop at the edges and check in. Unfortunately, this isn't very fair or enforceable; sort of like some of the "there is no internet" laws that we've seen come out of congress.

RE: Divis

He can't be killed, he can't lead his way out of a paper bag, his social theories have little interaction with reality, and he has the mega-socials (and Q8) to attract super powered followers. Without him it's possible that an orderly transition could be made (although unlikely). With him there's just no way.

RE: Taint

Taint is actually something that society could deal with... if everyone were open about what it implies about how novas need to run their lives. I.e. Novas need to rest several times a year for weeks or months and burn off temp taint. They also need to have lifestyles where they aren't put under pressure. This is a problem for PU, the elites, and the Teragen (who constatly push their powers). We also need to accept that some people, through no fault of their own, will get tainted and will have to be put down like dogs.

[Metallo]

RE: The Civil War

IMHO the Civil War turned the Avengers into a government run super villian group.

Considering Taint, The Teragen, and Divis Mal? I think so. Making matters worse are PU (and other agenies) putting novas under so much pressure to perform that they will get taint.

RE: The Teragen

The world will not react well to superpowered terrorists, be they Greenwar or whatever. Uncontrolled super powered aliens who openly oppose the social contract even more so.

The Teragen does have a point in that many laws and other societal rules become unworkable with many super powers. They also have a point where the "obvious" legal solutions would look more like swards than shields. I.e. Warp and Teleport transend all national bounderies (like the internet does for information). The obvious solution is for countries to pass laws saying their national bounderies are still relievant and that warpers and teleporters should stop at the edges and check in. Unfortunately, this isn't very fair or enforceable; sort of like some of the "there is no internet" laws that we've seen come out of congress.

RE: Divis

He can't be killed, he can't lead his way out of a paper bag, his social theories have little interaction with reality, and he has the mega-socials (and Q8) to attract super powered followers. Without him it's possible that an orderly transition could be made (although unlikely). With him there's just no way.

RE: Taint

Taint is actually something that society could deal with... if everyone were open about what it implies about how novas need to run their lives. I.e. Novas need to rest several times a year for weeks or months and burn off temp taint. They also need to have lifestyles where they aren't put under pressure. This is a problem for PU, the elites, and the Teragen (who constatly push their powers). We also need to accept that some people, through no fault of their own, will get tainted and will have to be put down like dogs.

The terragen also has one other point you missed. A number of Nova's aren't given basic rights because of their evolutions. For instance, I believe its the seattle city defender (not quite sure tho) accidently shattered an experimental glass bridge with her sonic abilites. She was forced into defending the city for a period of time pro bono, basiclly a form of slavery. And while some nova's may be in Bharian willing, most have been kidnapped, and experinted on. Hell we can't even do crap like that to animals anymore!

[Alex Green]

RE: Sara

Even on reduced pay, she's lucky to still have a job.

RE: Bharian

Actually we do exactly that to animals.

[metaphysician]

While Divis Mal as he exists in the present is, in fact, insurmountable, there is a strong element of "Magneto was Right" going on that contributes to the problem. A lot of the claims he makes in the Null Manifesto, and the logic behind certain elements in the Teragen, boil down to "baselines will use various means to enslave or eliminate you." The thing is, this is entirely true, even as of the initial declaration. If Proteus didn't exist, and people spent more time protecting the rights of novas to not be enslaved, experimented upon, sterilized, and murdered, would he necessarily feel the need to advocate violent separatism? Its mostly meaningless to ask, because Mal's beliefs and attitudes are molded by decades worth of secret repression.

To put things more bluntly, if Time-Travelling Future-Knowing Mercer wants to avoid the Aberrant War, the easiest way to get Divis Mal out of the picture is "Don't frickin' convince him that humanity is not a species he wants to be a part of anymore."

As for the more general issue, the problem is that the activities of Aeon and Proteus simply don't make sense in light of "trying to avert a worse future." They didn't simply fail to avert the Aberrant War, they were an essentially-equal contributing factor to *causing* it, second only to the Teragen, and that only arguably. They didn't exploit any foreknowledge about the dangers of taint ( and actively overworked the Utopia novas ), and they did an exceptional job of making sure that as many of the public-minded novas in the world are recruited into an organization with an entire mass graveyard of skeletons in its closet ( thus ensuring that its the good-guys who look horrid ). They employ a whole bunch of people of questionable stability and competence, and thats not even touching the activities they support that are heinously unethical just in their own right ( deliberately fanning brushfire wars so as to kill off novas ).

There are only two ways all these counterproductive activities make any sense in light of a "saving the future" theoretical goal.

1. Mercer screwed up. Picked the wrong people, handed over the wrong information, and thus totally failed to achieve his goal.

2. The "better" future they wanted to ensure actually *requires* the Aberrant War. . . at which point we are well beyond "trying to save the world" and into the territory of "deliberately inducing global apocalypse." And pardon me, but I tend to distrust the judgement of people whose answer to a problem is "kill billions of people."

[Alex Green]

There are only two ways all these counterproductive activities make any sense in light of a "saving the future" theoretical goal.

1. Mercer screwed up. Picked the wrong people, handed over the wrong information, and thus totally failed to achieve his goal.

Not quite, but that's pretty close. Mercer founded Aeon in the 20's and I assume last was active in the 50's. We're now dealing with at least the 3rd generation, and perhaps the 4th or even 5th. It's VERY traditional in family run organizations to run into problems about then. The original visionary is gone, the people he trained and raised are also gone.

As for "saving the future", the problem is that boiled down there are two approaches to the war that Aeon can take with future knowlege, and they conflict.

1) Prevent the War.

2) Win the war.

Further, my impression from Trinity is that the whole issue of *Taint* was largely forgotten and/or scrubbed from the records. In stead of "Taint is a medical condition that is difficult to treat but much easier to prevent", history remembers "All Novas get Taint eventually and they all thus become Evil". This certainly makes the behavor of some of the Proxies more understandable.

Put another way, I don't think Max's future knowlege of Taint was in a useful form. The behavior of PU implies they only know about the Trinity beliefs of taint; The way to deal with it is to get as much use out of your novas for the greater good for as long as possible until they go mad.

[metaphysician]

Thats really just a variation on "Mercer done screwed up." Trying to change history with inadequate information is almost always a bad idea.

As for winning the war, its again a matter of self-fulfilling prophecy. About half the reason there was a war to try and win was because of the efforts Aeon made in attempt to win it.

The best Mercer comes out of this whole mess is as "helpless pawn of destiny."

[Alex Green]

As for winning the war, its again a matter of self-fulfilling prophecy. About half the reason there was a war to try and win was because of the efforts Aeon made in attempt to win it.

Yes. About half. Even without Aeon all the world would have had to deal with is Taint, the Teragen, Divis Mal, & Q6+. The incident that touched off the war was from a Microsoft employee going mad.

IMHO Max failed, he might have even made things worse, but the situation was messed up so bad to start with that it was worth the try.

[SkyLion]

Yes. About half. Even without Aeon all the world would have had to deal with is Taint, the Teragen, Divis Mal, & Q6+. The incident that touched off the war was from a Microsoft employee going mad.

IMHO Max failed, he might have even made things worse, but the situation was messed up so bad to start with that it was worth the try.

Just goes to show you that you can take away people's freedom and inalienable rights, but f--- with their internet connection and it's war mutha-f---kas!

::laugh ::tongue

[metaphysician]

The thing is, unless Mercer was almost totally ignorant about taint ( which is odd, given before you can try and change history, you kinda need to know what is wrong ), just making a public revelation of taint, and specifically the need to rest periodically, would severely cut back on the amount of insane novas. Divis Mal, Mercer gets no free ride on, as he's heavily responsible for Donighal even taking that philosophical path in the first place. And Q6 is only a contributor to the Aberrant War in the sense that it made it a war; it won't cause such on its own.

Only the Teragen is something Mercer has no fault involving, and even they'd be less dangerous without the Aeon/Proteus exacerbating factors.

[metaphysician]

Just goes to show you that you can take away people's freedom and inalienable rights, but f--- with their internet connection and it's war mutha-f---kas!

::laugh ::tongue

Eh, being fair, by that point in time, the OpNet was tied into too much of global existence. Imagine the economic chaos if every computer connected to the Internet suddenly was wiped of all data.

[SkyLion]

yes I know...

...I was making a joke... ::rolleyes

[Alex Green]

The thing is, unless Mercer was almost totally ignorant about taint... just making a public revelation of taint, and specifically the need to rest periodically, would severely cut back on the amount of insane novas.

I see no evidence any baseline in the Trinity era understands resting periodically reduces taint. I do see considerable evidence the popular media simply thinks all novas get tainted and go mad.

Much, much, much, worse... mechanically there isn't much connection to rest periods and avoiding taint. The single biggest source of taint is the Player deciding to buy something tainted. Most NPCs are run by the ST, so if the ST wants a NPC to progress with +1 Taint per year, there's nothing to prevent him. Or put another way, to a first approximation the Trinity beliefs are correct.

I'm not even sure that it's very well understood in the Aberrant era that resting periodically can burn off temp taint. I think it's reasonably well known power-maxes and power-quick-recharges cause taint, but outside of the rule book I've seen no references to any NPC wanting to take a rest for that sort of thing.

Nor am I totally sure that a public releasing of the knowlege of Taint would make all that much difference. Plenty of elites die, many or most of them don't really make long term plans. Are we supposed to believe that they'll take frequent month long rests because in a few decades they might have a problem? The modern equiv of risking taint is smoking and/or drinking. The gains are slight (especially when compared to risking taint), there are plenty of long term problems with both, and yet lots of people do so.

[astronomer]

I've been thinking about the problems Mercer has, a la changing history. The ability to time travel does not confer omniscience. If I travel to 2207, I don't instantly know all that happened in the interim. So I go to the library/surf the Net and do 6 months of research, but my conclusions will only be as good as the available data and my research methods allow. I'm not even going into how historians revise or shade history, cultural bias, or just getting the wrong answer 'cause of my own preconceptions. Also, all I have with me is what I carry. Hope I remember it all or my flash drive is really big. I come back to 2002 and march off to Washington to tell Prez Bush that Iraq won't go well per the Iraq Study Group Report. I'm sure he recieves it well. Time travel also doesn't confer omnipotence, alas. Mercer did his best in creating Aeon as a tool to nudge/shape events, and to provide an info source in the eras he'd be dropping in on. It gave him a 200-year enduring organization to work with, but that also means it had 10 generations to grow, evolve and mutate. There are suggestions that the Trinity bureaucracy has moved in directions that Mercer doesn't approve of. Also, how does Mercer prove to Aeon that he's their founder and they should drop everything and help him? Even the best protocols might not survive after a century or two.

[metaphysician]

In which case, the overall lesson seems to be "trying to change history only makes it worse."

Oddly enough, that seems to be a lesson mostly included in Ancient Aberrant, as well. . . *cough*

[metaphysician]

Hmm, a bit of necromancy, but. . .

Was just thinking about the whole "taint, and what it is" question, and it occured to me:

What *is* the in-character meaning of buying powers tainted? Or what is actually different between when a character buys something clean versus tainted, in terms of what he does and what he chooses?

[Alex Green]

What *is* the in-character meaning of buying powers tainted? Or what is actually different between when a character buys something clean versus tainted, in terms of what he does and what he chooses?

IC buying things tainted represents either rushing things, i.e. buying them before you're ready.

Or "natural progression". I.e. some novas see their taint advance just because they're screwed. They aren't power maxing, they aren't forcing quantum recharges, but they get worse anyway. Say once a year or so they get a new aberration until they go nuts. Buying things tainted once a year is the way to deal with that.

PU's 2nd man in charge is an example of this, the Green Super strong bouncing guy. He basically doesn't have any seriously max-able powers. Flight and Bounce don't really come to mind when you think of what to max and Strength can't be. He also doesn't really have a lifestyle that requires quantum recharges in a hurry. But he's having problems with taint anyway. Maybe PU is pushing him really hard, or maybe he's just screwed.

[metaphysician]

I don't know, major nova combatant and leader of a T2M team, I could see rapid recovery being an issue. . . if he had the stuff to credibly run dry.