Isabella Maronni, aka "Can I press charges now please?"

gradii

I assume I can take her to court for reading my mind without permission.

jonsills

In the face of an ongoing crisis (the jailbreak, fueled by Menton's psychic manipulation), this might fall under the heading of "imminent danger" - if she doesn't scan people telepathically, how's she supposed to protect UNTIL personnel (and passing superheroes) from being possessed by Menton? It's the same legal doctrine that lets police open a door without a warrant if they have reason to believe someone inside is in imminent danger (usually screaming).

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bulgarex

Take her to court? Certainly that's your right. Winning in court? No slam-dunk.

If this sort of thing happens within the territory of the United States, then American law as described in Stronghold would apply. There are exigent circumstances regarding the likelihood that a crime will be prevented, a criminal will escape, evidence will be destroyed, etc. under which an authorized agent of the law (and Maronni as an UNTIL agent probably qualifies) can take actions which would otherwise be prohibited.

Unfortunately, being obnoxious does not in itself usually qualify as grounds for prosecution or lawsuit, unless the obnoxiousness is in some way publicly defamatory.

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bulgarex

Just be aware that if you take Maronni to civil court and loose, you open yourself to a countersuit she would very likely win. And whether or not a criminal prosecutor would take your case would depend in large measure on likelihood of winning, which in this case doesn't appear high.

So trying to make your point could easily fizzle or outright backfire.

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bulgarex

By the PnP lore Maronni works for UNTIL. But yes, if you could convince her superiors that she misused her powers during a crisis she might be reprimanded.

Have you noticed how hard it is to get the police, military etc. to take civilian complaints against their personnel seriously, particularly when it's only the complainant's word against the officer's?

I'd love to be able to tell you your character would have a shot at getting satisfaction through official channels, but from a realistic perspective the odds are greatly against you.

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jonsills

I dunno, every hero I've seen bends the law pretty badly, from unauthorized entry without probable cause to assault with a deadly weapon (few heroes wait until the gang members in Westside start shooting first, and we're supposed to have presumption of innocence). It'd be pretty hard to make the public case that we're all fighting the good fight, but Maronni's a borderline villain for scanning everyone for Menton's control while he's actively controlling Stronghold personnel.

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ceroy

I think Maronni's character remarks are just made to be funny, much like most of this game is not taken very seriously. There's quite a bit of dialog that doesn't make sense, nor takes your character into account. Much like when Psi is mind controlling the officer in MC, and he gives you missions to defeat the purple gang. If you character is a mentalist, then you'd know he was being mind controlled.

But, back to the point. I don't think cryptic had any thoughts of the judicial system or any laws in mind when they did the dialog for the NPCs in this game. And as noted our characters do break quite a few laws when we take action in this game, though they are game mechanics, it basically shows the spirit of the content of the game.

When you think of the NPCs and dialog for this game, think simple. Young people playing these games these days don't know or think technical when playing games, they just want to get into the action. In fact, most just ignore the dialog completely and just follow the arrow to their objectives. How many of us know the legal laws in the champions universe? I would guess, not many. In fact, quite a few people would be surprised to know that they even exist in such depth. This game is just that, only a game. If we want to be deep, we have to do it with our characters and our backstories that we come up with, and the foundry system would allow us to make detailed stories if we like, but that is another can of worms that I won't go into.

sistersilicon

Aren't we taking this a bit too literally? Even if a telepath wasn't actively reading someone's mind, they could still pick up a general mood, right?

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championshewolf

gradii wrote: »

Oh well I can make my point in other ways than a court case.

She'd probably still be liable to receive some sort of military discipline for her actions given she works for PRIMUS.

Misusing her powers brings a negative light on the whole organization.

Your plan would likely back-fire, as she would have grounds to counter suit for harassment, and defamatory marks. Nothing about her remarks really constitute anything actionable anyways.

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bulgarex

Methinks there's a long, long list of CO PCs ahead of Isabella on that list.

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meedacthunist

Ehh...

Don't even take it in-character or in-universe, gradii. It's just a yet another CO pun.

Since Maronni is a psycher, she must be doing or saying something cheesy related to her talent - that's all behind this line. Otherwise this part of her character doesn't count.
You really shouldn't be taking it any more in-universe or paying any more attention to it than to NPCs talking about walking into Qliphotic Seepage or wondering if their neighbour is working for VIPER.

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jaazaniah1

How can I take this law breaker to court? This is obviously an invasion of my privacy. I did not give her permission to look into my mind at all. Superficial invasion of privacy is still invasion of privacy.

gradii wrote: »

In fact it says right in one of my bios, my telepath Prodigy WILL often attempt to mentally scan new people she meets, HOWEVER its a very superficial peek at surface intentions unless she knows she's dealing with bad guys.

She wont look at what your favorite food is, or what classmate you might have a crush on.

biffsmackwell

I don't really find it invasive if she can tell if you're thinking positive thoughts or not. To me this says that she can read your mood like a normal person can read a frown or a smile on a face. You're not gonna take someone to court because someone saw you curl your upper lip and guess that you're a little irritated at what you're looking at, right?

Being sensitive to moods is something I doubt anyone would classify as a crime. Just like in real life, you have some people who can't read physical cues and some who can do it with amazing precision. There are people who can pick up your mood and/or intentions or whatever without using voodoo magic or superpowers, just by observing you. You can't take them to court either for just being more perceptive than you. You can't defame them for being able to read you, either.

At the end of the day, I think the most important thing is to have good intentions. Then a person like this would just be like "Hey, you're a good dude, go punch bad dudes!"

Who cares if you're thinking negative thoughts?

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warcanch

Sure, as a GOOD mentalist, I've learned to control my powers (for example). However, I still have to sift through YOUR mind in order to glean the info I'm looking for. IF I happen to come across some new pie recipe or your intent to rob a bank, I can't just dismiss this info.

Now, we can argue that a Search Warrant stipulates what you CAN search for. IF you find other evidence NOT stipulated, you CAN NOT act on that. However, you still KNOW it exists.

jonsills

Gradii, you're simultaneously overthinking and underthinking this. If we're going to take Isabella's dialog at face value, then it's going to be necessary to take our characters' actions at face value as well. And none of us are going to look very pretty if we do that...

(Heck, you've already admitted your toon tries to scan the minds of anyone she meets. Not many people have psionic defenses, which means even a casual scan might as well be a Vulcan mind-meld. She's already committing massive invasion of privacy, on a daily basis.)

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sistersilicon

Or maybe she's just f%#$ing with y'all.

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bulgarex

I guess this is an example of humor not always translating well through the written word. Personally I didn't get "joke" from your initial post, or your subsequent replies. I thought you were conveying "genuine" in-character indignation.

If I knew humor was your intent, my reply would have been the verbal equivalent of

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chaelk

If you want to be really picky.

In the Pnp game,
NON mentalists get automatic knowledge of anyone using a mentalist ability on them FOR FREE.
They know which one and exactly which person did it, even in a crowded stadium
Unless you have purchased Invisible power effects.(mine did, annoyed the hell out of another party member. "I know you did it." " NO you don't")

a mentalist must BUY the ability to detect mentalist abilities and its opposed.

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themightyzenith

gradii wrote: »

Honestly I think thats kinda bullcrap and ignore it entirely.

It makes NO sense unless said mentalist is EXTREMELY sloppy. Given her behavior though that might apply to Maronni.

None of this "makes sense"......it's not real Gradii, it's fiction.

meedacthunist

I've stopped expecting hard logic and making sense from comic books (and everything comic-book related) long time ago.
It should be enough if it's just remotely plauisble.

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queencesta

I have a character that would deliberately sit there and think dirty, graphic thoughts at her if she said something like that to her, in one of those 'I'm not stuck here with you; you're stuck in here with ME' sort of ways.

bulgarex

There's a Champions villain called The Monster, essentially a gothic-horror, mad-slasher villain dialed up to 11. Its thoughts are so evil, so horrific, that any telepathic contact with the Monster's mind, even a brute-force attack, causes the telepath to suffer great pain and even physical injury.

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