A Stressful Situation
Where I Talk About What Happened Last Night
So one of the things I did after writing last night's post was sit down and spend some time with Forest Trails. We talked about what we hope for out of our future. We both agreed on one day wanting a family, and I apologized for being blind to romance, and we agreed that it was something I would have to work at.
I also thanked her for her compliments. It's not everyday a person has their girlfriend write down a bunch of reason they like them and then put them up on the internet for people to read. It made me feel really good.
Everything was going well until this morning when I got news back that my next big job in prospecting had fallen through. Actually it was far worse, the company that usually hires me filed for bankruptcy protection and so they won't be paying me for the last job I did. Since they also used to account for over eighty percent of my work, this leaves me in a bit of a lurch. A rather big one actually.
I decided to spend my time in Equestria Online doing something that was nice and happy to try to get myself in a better mood.
In Which I Finally Meet My Pet Roc
So I logged in and found myself lying in my room in the library. I got up, walked to the door, and stepped out into the library proper. I found Forest Trails sitting reading a book in the corner by the fire. She put it away when she saw me and came over.
“Trails,” I said giving her a hug, “Is it ever good to see you again.”
“Likewise,” She replied returning the hug, then looked at me closely as we parted, “Did something bad happen? You look a little upset.”
“Oh, just more bad news. It really doesn't change things over here,” I shook my head to clear it, “I don't want to think about that right now. How about we go and finally met Young Jim Hawkins.”
“Who?” Forest asked cocking her head.
I grinned and started walking towards the library exit, “It's the name of the Roc that we are going to hatch today.”
“Ah,” Forest trails gave me a suspicious look, “Why do I get the feeling there is a joke in that name somewhere?”
I laughed, “Back where I come from there is a story called 'Treasure Island' and the protagonist of that books name is Jim Hawkins. It seemed rather appropriate.”
“And I suppose the slight pun has nothing to do with it?” Forest Trails asked raising an eyebrow.
“Well,” I said feeling a little guilty, “Maybe a little. But that doesn't make it a bad name!”
“Let's just hope that 'Young Jim Hawkins' doesn't take it as an insult,” Forest Trails held up the book on raising Rocs, “It says that Rocs can be a bit touchy about insults.”
“It' will be fine,” I insisted, “Now I'm going to try something,” I glanced up at the mountain accross the valley and stamped my hoof to get a quick look at how the map looked. “I'm going to head to that mountain over there. If I mess up we'll have to find something to do, but I want a bit of a challenge today.”
Forest nodded and fell back, I stepped into the alleyway and sent out my power drawing a line quickly between me and the mountain. I quickly snapped the two locations together and stepped through letting the locations snap back apart behind me. I kept walking till I heard Forest Trails behind me, I waited for a second for her to catch up
We walked for a short ways then turn around. We had ended up near the top of the mountain and could look down on Canterlot from where we stood. I pulled out the rock egg and set it down on the ground and put my hooves on it. I let my power flow through it and then slowly and carefully nudged the maturity of the egg forwards. That was the most tricky part. A mistake would have consequences that I really didn't want to contemplate.
Thankfully I managed to bring the egg to hatching without messing up and the the egg started to shiver in my hooves before cracking and a head popped up. It still had the shell on, so it couldn't see me, and it made a desperate crooning sound. I reached over and removed the shell on it's head and it looked at me and chirped happily.
I smiled and reached into my claudication (what I am going to call the subspace pocket I have folded together to allow me to carry things without saddle bags. It is a pretty cool piece of earth pony magic. I got the idea from here) and pulled out a fish I had picked up the night before. I tossed it to the Roc and it ate it in a single gulp.
The Roc came up to my ponies chin when it was standing up, and yet somehow still managed to look very cute. It stumbled out of the egg and rubbed it's head against my chin reminding me of a cat of all things. It crooned again and I gave it a hug and it melted against my body enjoying the contact.
I heard an amused chuckle and glanced over to see that Forest Trails had a smirk on her face, “Do I have to worry about being replaced My Treasure?”
“Never Trails,” I replied, “What do you think of the little guy? Cute isn't he?”
“He is,” Trails agreed, “I guess I'll be watching over him during the day.”
“Actually,” I said, “I'm going to try ageing him up till he is old enough to look after himself. I found a book last night that talks about how to do it.”
“Oh?” Forest Trails asked.
“Basically there are certain things that animals learn. There is a way to project my power so that he can gain that information as if he was growing up as wells as ageing his body to match. It will allow him to grow to adult size and mental level in just a few minutes.”
“You can't do something like that without a cost of some type,” Trails pointed out doubtfully.
“Well there is one problem with it, to fill in a lot of the blanks it pulls on the mind of the pony using the power and permanently mind links them.” I looked down at where Young Jim Hawkins was still rubbing against me. “It means that I will have a mental link with him, and that he will be able to talk to me. Also for a long time any thing that hurts him will also hurt me.”
Forest looked at me and shook her head, “And you want to do this why?”
“Because I'm not around enough to raise Jim, but I still want to be there for him. This way I can do that.” I looked down and ruffled the feathers on Jim Hawkins neck.
“Right, do I have to look away?” Trails asked, taking a step back.
“Shouldn't have to,” I replied getting ready, “the spell mostly acts like a growth spell would on a plant and follows a lot of the same rules. That means that you aren't seeing the power, just it's effects.” I paused suddenly having second thoughts, “hopefully anyway.”
Trails nodded and I let my power flow into Young Jim Hawkins. I then started sending out tendrils of power searching out other Rocs throughout Equestria. I found his mother very fast, and then his father a minute later. I found an old one in a nest about to die and a nest of young Rocs that were only a month old. All of them I connected with my power back to Jim. Once I had a hundred I started to create slowly let information through the connections.
As the knowledge flowed I watched it to make sure that none of it was specific. Any time that the memories started to flow into personal territory I cut them out and waited before checking them to see if they hand changed. All the knowledge that I did let through I let flow into myself mixing it together to make sure that only the generic important knowledge was left.
Only after doing all of this did I slowly start to let the information flow into Young Jim Hawkins. As I let the information flow I slowly aged him. Even going slow I had to be careful I didn't push his body too hard. There was only so much a body could take and pushing to fast would kill him.
As I helped his body and mind to grow I started being able to hear his thoughts. He was confused, but he also trusted me and I found myself promising to not let him down. I suddenly found Jim reaching for knowledge faster than I could filter it and was forced to step up my game so that he could have it. At the same time I was forced to increase how fast his body was growing to match the information I was giving him.
Finally after what seemed like forever it was done. I collapsed and stared at the new fully grown Roc in front of me. I could hear him thinking how grateful he was to me and how hungry he was. I told him to go and feed and that I would meet him on this mountain the next day. I also mentioned that he was not to eat ponies and got a sense of abhorrence at the idea. Apparently he thought of it the same way we would think of cannibalism. It probably had something to do with him viewing me as his parent.
He took off and Trails watched him go, then ran over to me. “Are you okay?” She asked.
“Fine, but I don't think I will every try to do anything like that ever again. That was touch and go their for a while.” I looked down, “I'm literally shaking. He's going off to hunt right now. Would you like to head back to the library with me? I think I need some time to wind down. I also want to write this up for our friends.”
Forest Trails nodded and we headed back to the library.
Final Things About Forest Trails And Yesterdays Addendum
So after we got to the library I read some of the responses to the addendum that Forest Trails wrote yesterday to her. She was grateful that people seemed to like it, though she wasn't sure how anyone would get cute from what she wrote. Apparently she was trying to go for epic because it was her first letter to us 'visitors.'
She was also amused that Nine Tails thinks that she is a player and not an AI. She asked me to point out that if she was just playing the role of an AI then she had way to much time on her hands. She asked me what the point of pretending to be an AI would be and I had to admit I wasn't sure.
Anyway, I'm going to lay down with Trails and do some relaxing reading. Hatching Young Jim Hawkins was stressful and I need to unwind.
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3261211
I think the thing is that cleverbot is nowhere close to an actual AI. It actually is far away from one really. Things that are closer to AI's are actually strategy games. A good AI in a strategy game has to take in information, process it, remember previous information and then make decisions to work towards goals.
Of course this is only true for AI's that don't cheat, but if you changed how a strategy game is played to that of a conversation you will see that there are many similarities. I don't find it that much of a stretch that someone took it further and made an AI capable of working with more abstract concepts. We already have a lot of the basics down. Think of how the AI in the The Fall of Asgard is supposed to work. It is the best strategy AI ever designed. Is it that much of a stretch to think that it's designers kept on pushing and managed to make something that was actually able of holding real conversations?
Seems like you're getting really good with the magic system in your shard. Never bothered myself, I do too much shard hopping to get a consistent grip on it
3263346 Thanks for the bits, but I still lost something in the process... but that doesnt matter, I gagged the culprit and stuck im in a rough tavern and said he was a guard pony, last I saw was a crowd gathering... I think Im still bleeding back there too. Well, Im off to grab my dragon companion a fresh cow or twelve.
-Moonlight Shine
P.S. Meet me in the crossroads.
Why do you never try doing some forest rescue with trails? It seems it is always what you are interested in.
3260909
I can't decide whether to be apalled or aroused.
3263705 Won't. Have other plans with my time. Don't. No knowledge on how to get there. Can't. Not permitted from my shard to go there.
- Fatum Fortunatus
P.S. force balance push, dragon-born
Wow, these Earth Pony powers are getting more interesting by the minute. Playing as a unicorn, I mostly focused on our own magic, but there seems to be so much more different kinds of magic in the game than I thought. So if anyone wants to visit Field Theory in my shard, I'll probably be in the Royal Canterlot Library for days, reading and reading and reading...
Oh, and about those rumors floating around: Are you guys sure it's about some VR tech for EQO? Because the PonyPad already has Occulus Rift support. Sure, there doesn't seem to be an official plug-in for it, but I hooked up my Dev kit, found some home-coded adapter and it was ready to go. Well, okay, I had to hook up the Rift to a Raspberry and then hook that up with the PonyPad via Wifi. But hey, that's almost the same thing. The PonyOS is surprisngly customizable. It detected the available wifi connection to the Raspberry and found the interface of the driver. It don't know exactly where the tech for that comes from, but some developer must have written a HDMI API for the PonyOS. It's like PonyOS wrote the software adapter from scratch on the spot. Spooky, really, but that's the most Plug&Pray tech I've ever seen. And here I thought USB was the king of usability.
Edit: Do not play in third-person with the Rift. You'll get a headache pretty soon. A nasty one.
I've grown rocks before, but never through minigames. does the private chat window you have with it stay open all the time? I think that would block some of the screen.
3264021 Be aroused. be very aroused. Is there any places a mare can find work?
Hump me raw!
-Moonlight Shine
P.S. This is her Dragon companion speaking... and I think she's in heat.
Oh, and Treasure Island, since you have some extra free time now, if you want to take advantage of it, you and Trails could meet me some morning before dawn. I could cast a couple of cloudwalking spells on the pair of you then after the day breaks, fly you two up to Cloudsdale in my small sky chariot. I am assuming you don't weigh too horribly much more than my unicorn friends.
Brazen Origin.
PS: Oh and yes I would come back at say 5pm to take you back down.
Well to answer her question I can think of at least two reasons why she is a human pretending to be AI.
1. She is actually a shut in who supplants actual human contact with this and feels that by pretending to be an AI she can garner your attention. In short she's an obsessed introvert.
2. She's Shy and feels more comfortable pretending to be an NPC for some unknown reason. Perhaps do to some sort of Phobia, psychological trauma in her past.
However Susland I will say this to your girlfriend that I do apologize for doubting her but given the laws of probability its more likely given current tech that she is human rather than the AI she claims to be, and unfortunately given this I am unable to believe her at the moment.
After yesterdays events though I can see that I'm not going to convince any of you that Celest and Trails are not AI's by words alone. This kinda shocks me to be honest since it should be obvious that going from Clever bot to a fully self aware AI in the course of only a few years is obserd if not impossible.
Therefore in order to prove to you all that I am correct I have gone out and obtained a Pony Pad myself with it I intend to test this so called AI and to prove to you all definitively that she is not one, or if what you are saying is true then she can prove to me herself that she is. However I do not intend to let her have control over things therefore I am having my dear friend Cao Su modify the Pad so that the external controls on it are disabled and so that it will take us directly to her throne room and bypass the character creation. That way we can prevent any sort of tampering with the test and insure a valid result
I will let you all know what the results are tomorrow.
3265660
I have spare time, and a pet phoenix.
Why the hell not?
Huh. The more you do in this game, the blurrier the line seems to become between you and your character. I mean, reread the process of aging Young Jim Hawkins. That's all fluff right there. Almost nothing about the UI involved, the game mechanics behind the memory sorting, no crunch details to be found.
I'm not saying that's a bad thing, mind you. It's just fascinating to see how immersed you are in this. I don't know, maybe I'm doing something wrong...
3266112
Good luck with that -- ponypads are sealed solid-state devices. They are not meant to ever be opened. As for overriding the instructions to talk directly to celestia, why? Just tap the upper right hand corner twice and call Celestia. She will probably figure you are having trouble or something since you would be doing it immediately but I can't see her(it) not talking to you.
3266239
We already have and have made the modifications, and to be honest for a solid state device it wasn't as hard to do as one might think. Although Cao had to saunter and weld the thing shut once we were done. and Cao did admit it did pose a unique challenge there were a lot of safeguards that she had to circumvent.
I will thank you for telling us about the button though that did save us the trouble of circumventing the character creation screen. thanks to that we shaved off about 2 hours of work, and for that you have my gratitude
Well do wish us luck with our experiment and once again thanks
3266123 crossroads. Noon. Happytimes. Be there.
-Moonlight Shine
3267517
3266123
Can we try to keep this rated PG guys?
3267523 Pg? Pfft, as if.
But maybe. . 20% chance of a wee possibility of compliance.
And then he could hear YJH thoughts not being close to his pad.
Page 15.
What exactly is he doing behind his pony pad?
Because for the entire rok growing scene you seem to ignore the fact your main character is still tapping and swiping on a touchscreen.
He's tired? Why?
He is blocking personal memories? Who's personal memories? The ones from his avatar?
I feel some more detail on how the ponypad would visualize this might've been a nice part.
Because now it seems as if he already emigrated.
3267523
4829905
Yea, I'm really curious here. What were you, the player, doing with the controls on the ponypad, and what sort of feedback were you getting from the game about what was happening?
This is definitely the most "I'm there" lets play I've seen. Even the Oregon Trail Lets plays did't go into this much description about the winter medical disasters.