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Each Label ranges from -2 to +3; the higher the rating is, the more the character sees their self by that light. If you have Danger +3, you see yourself as a threatening, violent figure. If you have Mundane -2, you see yourself as anything but a normal person.
The Labels include:
Freak, which is all about being strange, unusual, unknown, different, unique, powerful, weird, and special.
Danger, which is all about being strong, threatening, violent, destructive, badass, frightening, reckless, and mighty.
Savior, which is all about being defensive, protective, overbearing, moralistic, guarding, patronizing, and classically heroic.
Superior, which is all about being clever, faster, better, arrogant, dismissive, commanding, egotistical, and smart
Mundane, which is all about being normal, empathetic, understanding, kind, boring, simple, uninteresting, and human.
The Labels shift and change over the course of the game as your self-image changes, most often due to the influence of others. As these Labels shift, so does your position in the story: a hero who sees their self as a Danger is better at directly engaging villains and threats, but their low Mundane means they might struggle to connect with ordinary people after a fight.
Influence is a mechanic used to keep track of whose words matter to you. When you have Influence over someone else, it means they care about what you say. When someone else has Influence over you, it means that you’re affected by their words.
Much of Masks involves giving, taking, and losing Influence over others. After all, you can’t convince your teammate to stop being a Danger if you don’t have Influence over them. When you do have Influence over them, and you tell them how they endangered civilians, your words might lead their Labels to shift. They might be chagrined at your words, and shift their Danger up, and their Savior down—they see themselves as more of a Danger, because of what you said. Or, they might resist, argue with you, and wind up shifting their Savior up and their Danger down—they don’t care what you say because they define who they are, and they choose to be a Savior.
Influence allows for a quick and easy way to understand whose words can cause your Labels to shift. You care about what they say, so your self-image is tied up in how they view you, what they say about you, and what you accept about their perspective on the world.
Of course, you are just a young superhero, trying to find your way. And that means in Masks, all the adults have influence over you by default. But you can resist what they say to free yourselves of their words. You just have to stand up to them, and tell them that you make your own path…easy, right?
You can keep up with the latest Masks news over at the G+ community, or on our social media. Also check out the long example of play Brendan wrote, as well as our backer appreciation page and the Halcyon City Champions!
Hello there,
We’re back earlier than expected, with some unfortunate news that we feel we need share with you.
On the weekend, there was a serious medical emergency with one of our team’s close family members. The situation is severe enough that they won’t be able to complete their work in time for Need to Know’s alpha release. As a result, we most likely cannot make the September 26th release date without severely compromising the alpha’s quality and the mental health of one of our team. Their work is almost finished, but given the gravity of the situation, they will need a little extra time to complete it. Our thoughts are with them and their family at this tough time.
This news will no doubt come as a great disappointment to many of you, and no one more than ourselves. We’ve pushed ourselves hard to get the alpha ready in time, and development was on schedule before this emergency struck. Delaying this release again is the absolute last thing we want to do. However, a short interruption is probably unavoidable, and we felt you needed to know as soon as possible. As the pending assets can be dropped right into the game, the wait won’t be longer than a week or two.
The other parts of development will continue at full speed, and the additional time may give us the opportunity to add an extra feature to the alpha that we thought we wouldn’t have time to include. It’s only fair that you get more to play, given your incredible patience and support.
When we’ve solidified a new date, we’ll post it on social media a couple of days in advance. Our next Kickstarter update will announce the release of the alpha, and you’ll be able to download it right away.
We can’t tell you how dispiriting this delay is for us all, but at the same time we also want to express how grateful we are for your excitement and encouragement over the last few months. When hit by setbacks like this, your support makes it that much easier to remain focused and motivated.
Until next time,
Tristram and Quincy
[P.S. A reminder for backers at Clearance Level 8 and higher: The backer survey will still close on the 30th of September, so make sure you have your responses in soon! Please let us know if you have any questions or issues with it.]
Supreme Court Justices to abolish Texas Death Penalty - they want an evening off
(ACPA-Houston, TX) Texas is reeling at news that the death penalty is facing the possibility of being declared unconstitutional. Supreme Court Justices, sick of missing Friday night poker and evenings at the symphony, plan to use an upcoming appeal as an excuse to abolish executions. "I'll miss the overtime," said Justice Scalia, "but not the bleeding heart lawyers with their last gasp appeals."
Shock and Dismay
As details of the plan leaked out, groans of shock and dismay were recorded across the lone star state as Texans started to come to terms with the news that their beloved death penalty might be taken away.
"This all started with the abolition of execution for the retarded," said Dwight Johnson of Walker County, "that dang Yankee Supreme Court should stay out of our business."
Death row guards concerned for their jobs have decided to take action. Union spokesman Jim Austen stated that, "we are going to start a grassroots nationwide campaign to encourage other states to have more executions."
Arguing that the death penalty is a time honored tradition, he was quick to point out that, "the death penalty is just like freedom of religion - use it or lose it."
Over in Houston, the Mayor is particularly concerned that mass layoffs could follow in the prosecutor's office and he has weighed in his support for the guards union. "You love the yellow rose of Texas, now it's time to love the Death Rows of Texas," he said in an impassioned plea for support from other cities nationwide.
Meanwhile traffic came to a standstill in downtown Huntsville, home of the Texas death chamber, when several members of the strapdown team staged an impromptu strap-in.
Trade War looms
On the financial front, markets reacted to the news by dumping shares of chemical companies specializing in the manufacture of sodium thiopental. Lean times are ahead unless these companies can break into the burgeoning but restricted Chinese death penalty market. The US is expected to raise the issue in upcoming WTO talks.
Also read about the Atlanta woman who loves PBS pledge marathons Trying to improve: After Trayvon Martin, Alabama to introduce "Hoodies For Hispanics" program. or click here for all our satire news stories
Honeymoons don't last forever. But that doesn't mean the love affair has to end — and the love affair Canadians are having with Justin Trudeau's Liberals appears to be enduring in the polls.
The Liberals continue to hold the new support they captured after their majority victory in last fall's federal election, when they pulled votes away from both the Conservatives and New Democrats.
What do Canadians think of the leaders? Explore the latest numbers for the 5 major federal leaders in our new CBC Leader Meter.
Justin Trudeau's own popularity also remains high, with approval ratings well above those of both of his main rivals, interim Conservative Leader Rona Ambrose and outgoing NDP Leader Tom Mulcair, as well as the ratings he posted before last year's vote.
The CBC's new interactive tool, the Leader Meter, lets you track those numbers.
Over the last three months of polling, the Liberals have averaged 46.7 per cent support. That's an increase of 7.2 points over their performance in the Oct. 19 election and nearly even (up 0.1 points) from their average support during the previous quarter of federal polling calculated three months ago.
The Conservatives have averaged 29.1 per cent, also unchanged from where they were in the previous quarter but down 2.8 points from the last election.
The New Democrats, after taking 19.7 per cent of the vote last fall, have averaged just 13.6 per cent support. That's down 6.1 points from the last election and one point from the previous quarter.
The Greens have averaged 5.1 per cent support since March, while the Bloc Québécois has averaged 4.2 per cent.
The Liberals' support has held relatively steady across the board — notable considering that their polling numbers between December 2015 and February 2016 had all the hallmarks of the normal political honeymoon of a new government.
But the party has nevertheless seen further gains in some parts of the country, particularly in British Columbia. The party is up 10.3 points from the last election, leading in the province with 45.4 per cent support, and has gained 2.6 points over the last quarter alone.
The Liberals' most significant increase since the last election remains in Quebec, where the party has gained 12.2 points since the last election and sits at 47.9 per cent. That level of support is largely unchanged from where they were in the previous quarter.
In Ontario and the Prairies, the Liberals have also posted gains since both the election and the last quarter. They lead comfortably in Ontario with 50.7 per cent support and trail the Conservatives narrowly in Saskatchewan and Manitoba with 39.6 per cent.
But the Liberals may have reached a ceiling in Atlantic Canada. With 59.9 per cent support, the party is only up slightly over the 2015 election result that saw them sweep the region, and they are down 3.5 points from last quarter.
Trudeau, too, may have hit a ceiling. His average approval rating over the last three months (56.3 per cent) is down over three points from last quarter.
Perhaps the first hints that the love affair may one day sour.
Though the Conservatives are still polling below their standing last fall, they have nevertheless managed to hold on to the support they posted in the initial aftermath of losing power.
Since the election, the party's biggest losses have occurred in Alberta (down 4.5 points to 55.1 per cent) and in Ontario and Quebec, where the party is down 3.4 points. That puts them at 31.7 per cent in Ontario and 13.3 per cent in Quebec.
Despite the praise Stephen Harper had in his speech to the party's convention last week for the Conservatives' electoral gains in Quebec, that is one province where the party saw its support decrease for a second consecutive quarter.
But the Conservatives did see an increase over the last quarter in the province where they held that convention — the Tories were up about two points in British Columbia, to 27.2 per cent, though that is still down almost three points from the last election.
This most recent quarter was a difficult one for the New Democrats. Their provincial cousins lost elections in Saskatchewan and Manitoba, the latter ending almost 17 years in office, and their federal leader lost a key leadership vote and will be replaced next year.
Perhaps unsurprisingly, this coincided with a drop in Tom Mulcair's approval ratings. His average approval rating was down more than eight points from the previous quarter, to 34.3 per cent.
The party continues to poll well below its results from the last election, down more than six points on the Prairies, eight points in Quebec and almost 10 points in British Columbia. That is where the NDP saw its biggest drop in support over the last three months as well, falling 3.9 points to 16.3 per cent.
B.C. will be holding a provincial election in less than a year that the provincial NDP is hoping to win.
The Bloc Québécois averaged 16.8 per cent support in Quebec over the last three months. That is a drop of 2.6 points from the last election — the party's worst — but up 2.2 points from last quarter.
The Greens saw no significant shift in support over the last three months. The party's best results came in British Columbia, where the Greens averaged 10.1 per cent. That was down marginally over the last three months, but up about two points since the last election. Everywhere else, the Greens, who traditionally poll above their electoral results, averaged less than 7 per cent support.
Leader Meter: CBC Politics' new interactive tool
The next federal election may be years away, but what Canadians think of how their political leaders are doing today matters — and the CBC's Leader Meter tracks just that.
The Leader Meter is an interactive feature tracking the latest public opinion polls related to leaders' approval and disapproval ratings. The Leader Meter lets you choose the data you want to look at, how you want to break it down, and how it compares to past party leaders and Canadian prime ministers.
You can check out the Leader Meter here. You can also read a full explanation on how to get the most out of this interactive tool here.
Follow CBCPolitics on Twitter @cbcpolitics
This article reviews trends in national public opinion surveys, and includes all polls conducted and published by different pollsters between March 1 and June 1, 2016. Methodology, sample size and margin of error if one can be stated vary from survey to survey and have not been individually verified.
The world’s first monkeys with genes modified through a DNA engineering method known as Crispr/Cas9 were born in a lab. The scientific breakthrough by Chinese researchers could become a cornerstone for research and prevention of human genetic disorders.
Researchers at Nanjing Medical University and Yunnan Key Laboratory of Primate Biomedical Research in Kunming in China have created two genetically modified macaques with targeted mutations using the CRISPR/Cas9 system.
“Our study shows that the CRISPR/Cas9 system enables simultaneous disruption of two target genes in one step without producing off-target mutations,” study author Jiahao Sha told the Science Daily. “Considering that many human diseases are caused by genetic abnormalities, targeted genetic modification in monkeys is invaluable for the generation of human disease models.”
The researchers introduced single-cell macaque embryos with modified Ribonucleic acids (RNAs) to generate the genome-editing process. RNA is a ubiquitous family of large biological molecules that perform multiple vital roles in the coding, decoding, regulation, and expression of genes. Using the Crispr method, Chinese scientists were targeting three genes in the experiment – one that regulates metabolism, another that regulates immune cell development and a third that regulates stem cells and sex determination.
The birth of the genetically modified monkeys was not an easy process. Scientists had to target the genes in 180 single-cell monkey embryos. Eighty three of those 180 embryos were injected into female macaques, yielded only 10 pregnancies.
Only one pregnancy so far led to the birth of a pair with simultaneous mutations in two genes.
According to coauthor of the study Wezhi Ji, researchers discovered multiple changes in their target genes at different stages of embryonic development. But the newborn macaques are still too young for researchers to determine if their experiment had an effect on physiology or behavior, though “data from this species should be very useful for curing human disease and improving human health,” says Ji.
Monkeys are a natural choice to study human disorders because of their close similarities to Homo Sapiens, although past scientific endeavors of precision gene modification in primates have failed.
Inserting, deleting, and modifying DNA in human cells and other animal cells has been performed in labs within the confines of petri dishes. The method of gene modifications was also applied to various rodents and zebrafish, however with the birth of two monkeys the study published in Cell magazine, shows that Crispr can produce practical primates with genomes customized at specific targeted genes.
Some researchers have already welcomed the breakthrough, saying that this method can eventually help recreate in monkeys such diseases as Parkinson's and Alzheimer's, which can’t be studied in other animals like mice.
"If we can identify genes for neurological disorders in a clinical setting and transpose those into a monkey it would be of massive benefit. I don't know that it'll lead to a rise in the use of monkeys, but it will lead to more focused studies," said Tipu Aziz, who used primates for his work on Parkinson's disease at Oxford University, the Guardian reports.
"People have been looking for primate models for a whole list of diseases, but in the past it's been either completely unfeasible, or incredibly expensive," Nelson Freimer, director of the centre for neurobehavioral genetics at the University of California, told The Guardian. “It's going to be really critical to define the problems for which this is used, just as you always do with animal research. You want to use all the alternatives before you propose animal research. This will be reserved for terrible diseases for which it offers hope that cannot be gotten any other way.”
Sheffield United Football Club announces today (Tuesday) that HRH Prince Abdullah bin Mosaad bin Abdulaziz Al Saud has become joint owner of the Club.
Click here to download an Arabic version of this announcement.
Prince Abdullah has secured a 50% interest in Blades Leisure Ltd, the holding company for Sheffield United FC, in return for which he will invest substantial new capital into the club with the aim of working with current owner Kevin McCabe and his family to achieve the Blades' return to the Premier League as quickly as possible.
The Prince becomes Co-Chairman with Kevin McCabe of Blades Leisure and Sheffield United.
Prince Abdullah, aged 47, is a grandson of the founder of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, King Abdulaziz. He is a passionate football supporter and is former President of Al Hilal FC, the largest and most successful club in Saudi Arabia. He is also Chairman of Saudi Arabia's Football Privatisation Committee.
Prince Abdullah is a prominent Saudi businessman and industrialist. He is the founder and Chairman of the publicly-listed Saudi Paper Manufacturing Group, the largest paper tissue manufacturer in the Middle East. He is active in other fields in the services and investments sectors in Saudi Arabia, and internationally. He travels extensively and works with other prominent businessmen from around the world to promote trade, goodwill and understanding through sport between Saudi Arabia and other countries.
Prince Abdullah said: "I am delighted to invest in such a sensibly-organised, family and community club with a great history and heritage. Joining Sheffield United FC at a time close to its 125th year in existence is significant to me and, like Kevin, I am determined to see it achieve its goals and look forward to working with the whole Blades community. However, money will be spent judiciously, and in any case we must comply with the Salary Cost Management Protocol."
Kevin McCabe said: "We are thrilled to be building this new partnership for Sheffield United with Prince Abdullah, who shares our vision for the Blades to join the top tier of English football. The McCabe family remains wholly committed and over the past 10 years has invested more than £90 million in rebuilding our fine and proud Club, which now has a top-class stadium, academy and junior development centre."
The boards will also see new directors in Abdulraham Bin Abdullah (the Prince's son), James Phipps (the Prince's principal advisor) and Selahattin Baki (a highly regarded Turkish businessman and General Manager of Premier Paper Converting Company, which manufactures consumer tissue paper products in Izmit, Turkey).
London and Dubai-based specialist consulting firm Forticap acted as the sole arranger for the transaction.
Amanda Clarke and Victoria Grayson will go one final round in the Revenge series finale. The ABC soap is ending after a sure-to-be-epic showdown in the season 4 finale, and Us Weekly has a sneak peek at the women facing off in the episode.
"For you, death is my only true revenge," Amanda (Emily VanCamp) hisses at Victoria Grayson (Madeline Stowe) while aiming a gun at her sworn enemy. The elder Hamptonite was presumed dead after framing Amanda for her murder, but is, in fact, very much alive — and unafraid of death.
PHOTOS: TV shows gone too soon
"I died long before you were born. This is just a formality," Victoria says. "Are you ready now?"
Amanda ominously responds, "More than you know. Goodbye, Victoria."
Dun dun dun! Things aren't looking good for the two rivals, and executive producer Sunil Nayar told Us Weekly ahead of the finale that nothing will be the same for either woman if they make it out alive.
"Is this a woman that is able to shake off the shackle of what her mission has been? Should she survive, what is that survival going to look like? Because I think there’s no way to get out of this untainted," the showrunner dished of Amanda/Emily's potential fate.
PHOTOS: The most shocking TV deaths ever
The finale will focus on "the idea that each character, in some form or another, gets their moment of redemption and destruction," he continued. "What is the collateral of what’s happened to all those people? I think we’ve answered those questions very elegantly and in a lot of times very surprisingly in the finale."
PHOTOS: Emily VanCamp and Josh Bowman's real-life love story
Of course, the Grayson/Clarke rivalry will take center stage. "The show is Victoria and Emily," Nayar said. And as for Victoria, "[the Victoria vs. Emily] dynamic is the lifeblood of the show, and I think the work [Stowe] did this year was exceptional. You’ll see where Victoria’s story ends up next week but it is the right ending."

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