Legion World Forums LEGION OUTPOST Bits o' Legionnaire Business LMB Fast Facts! Ask Cobalt...

(I know some of these answers, but I love to see Cobie spin his wheels... )

In the Dark Opal thread, Everyday Girl (I think this was in response to Emily's pedigree, which I shared with Abin Quank) told Red Arrow about her heritage. I interpreted what was written to mean that she was their biological granddaughter.

Thanks, Emily - I totally overlooked the Dark Oval stuff. I edited my above post to reflect the fact that:

- Numbnuts was the concubine of Bast
- Pagan Lass was Numbnuts's daughter
- Everyday Girl's mother's actually was Pagan Lass's daughter

So while she is Pagan Lass's biological grandaughter, she isn't Abin's. I'm not sure how the "Orphanage" fits in. Maybe she was briefly there before Abin and PL took custody of her, and that's how she knows My Whee Fem.

All I know is that the more I read about "My"... the more I want to read. She seems like a totally cool, mostly untapped character.

You are welcome! I hope we can cooperate on stories together soon. I really want to get some LMB stuff out before the next semester begins.

It varies story to story, sometimes light-hearted, sometimes serious and often a combo of both that's for some reason seems to work well! Certainly! The question is--where have you been, on some secret mission? In the future?!

I’ll start with your last question: YES! To both! Abin is both a genius and a madman, chock full of zillions of ideas, often crazy and often brilliant. He’s part-Grant Morrison, part-Jack Kirby and part George Carlin. In real life he looks like a cross between Indiana Jones and his father as played by Sean Connery.

I’ve been writing with Abin for several years now and know him well—and we’ve often trusted each other with our various characters over the years so we both recognize we ‘get’ each other’s characters. We both came to Legion World around the same time. You have a really good handle on his characters so I’ll fill in some gaps for you.

Rather than just list it in an easy to read way, I’ll be a pain in the ass and turn it into a narrative. (Hey, it’s my thread after all).

New Kid & Space Ranger
Abin joined LW in the late Summer / Fall 2003 a few months after its formation and hadn’t really interacted with the LMB much before. He joined under the name “New Kid”, since he was basically the new kid on the block. He kind of dove right in. At that point in time, LMB roleplaying was totally rampant on the MMB with probably 30+ posters roleplaying every day, with everyone having an Alt ID. It was a crazy time (as the LMB History thread gets into). The evolution of Abin’s username from “New Kid” to “Abin Quank” is covered earlier in this thread but I’ll get into it as we go.

“New Kid” took on the personality of being a bit of an annoyance, and his power became “super annoyance”. As this started to develop and Abin jumped into roleplaying he also created his first alt ID, Space Ranger. This coincided with what was happening on the MMB at the time, namely the various “conspiracies” that included Winema Wazzo, Tarik the Mute’s Academy and allegations against Crujectra and EDE. Basically, the storyline was New Kid contacted his brother, who was an intergalactic Space Ranger and former protégé of Buck Rogers, to clean up Legion World. Thus Space Ranger showed up and instantly was a hit. In fact, he’s my favorite alt of all-time.

What Chuck did was make Space Ranger totally over the top in his black & white views. He had instant run-ins with the Emerald Empress, who he believed was a villain (she had reformed) and also several other LMBers, like Semi-Transparent Fellow, Vee, Arachne and Icefyre. So he wasn’t an LMBer and wasn’t a bad guy. He was a Daxamite early on. It was also established that he was a polygamist with two Carrgitte wives (ipso facto six wives)—I’m not sure if that bit is still in continuity.

It was at this time that I joined Legion World and in a period of 2-3 crazy nights, which are all explained in the history of the LMB thread, Cobalt Kid and Space Ranger launched the Security Office to combat Thora’s invasion. For Ranger, this meant ultimately coming to an understanding with the LMB and joining the organization. Early on, the Ranger was a bit of a player too, having relationships with Emerald Empress, Mantis and other Alt ID’s (as did Cobie, which gave the Security Office its notorious reputation).

The key Space Ranger story is “Ms. Grundy Comes to SHAKES”. Space Ranger’s kidnapping also spurred “The Assault on Thora”, a major tag thread at the time.

“New Kid” (re: Abin) became “Almost New Kid” for awhile, and then eventually “Almost But Not Quite New Kid”. Tag Threads were rampant during this time period (late 2003 – early 2004) and Abin, myself and others were posting in all of them, so several of us began to shorten it to ABNQNK when we writing his name.

The most important tag thread at the time was the “Ongoing Tag Thread” which ended up being something like a whopping 35 pages or so. The first 10 pages had tons and tons of authors contributing; the main two were probably Abin and myself. During this tag thread Chuck created dozens of characters. These included two that stand out above the rest: Something else else Amazing, an independent superhero; and Everyday Girl in her first appearance. Much like Jailbait Lass/Lolita, Everyday Girl began her career as a “Gen-Car” (general character), a non-Alt ID member of the LMB that would show up repeatedly in stories. At that time, her family history was not revealed; she actually began as a replacement for Leap Year Lass (note the similarity to names) because I told Chuck that Teeds didn’t like when posters included her in tag team threads without her express permission.

In the Ongoing Tag Thread, the final evolution of Abin’s name took place: Numf-El joined Chuck, Invisible Brainiac and myself as the fourth major author of the thread (it eventually became just the four of posting huge arcs) and was instantly hilarious. He did a bit where his character, who spoke with a crazy Scottish accent, met Almost But Not Quite New Kid and said “ABNQNK? WTF? What’s that, Abin Quank?” or something like that. And instantly, Chuck was rechristened as Abin Quank. I jumped all over it and in the next post established that Abin Quank had a Green Lantern ring as supplied by Cobalt Kid (never explained how I got it); we also established there was only one Green Lantern left in the universe(s).

Chuck also created Golden Girl, a villainess who was the mother of Cobalt’s baby, Numf-El (its complicated).

Stoopid Cat and Pagan Lass
With Abin Quank and Space Ranger fully created, Chuck began the next phase of his madness on the MMB. He already had established Abin was the LW Janitor (thus absent mindedly causing LMBers all kinds of grief) and Space Ranger was renowned for busting people’s balls when they stepped over the line. Now he took it one step further and introduced Stoopid Cat, based on his wife’s real life cat, who somehow seemed to cause all sorts of trouble. Little known fact: in the early days, both Stu and I had access to Stoopid Cat as an alt ID.

Stoopid Cat got into all sorts of shenanigans, including having a longtime grudge with Hrun the Barbarian, who also came to Legion World at this time (kicking off the long-standing relationship between the House of Quank with Hrun).

During the Alt ID Rebellion, Abin had a temporary Alt whose name escapes me, but itw as a doctor who was bent on capturing Stoopid Cat. Also noteworthy is Space Ranger was the villain behind the Rebellion and was put on the shelf for a time.

Abin then used that alt to create Pagan Lass for his wife Alice. He then wrote up the backstory with Pagan, Stoopid Cat (her familiar), Numbnuts, Bast and others in the Ongoing Tag thread and elsewhere—all of which you have broken down pretty well. There is also the 1950’s super-team Abin created The Justice Society of Message Board Posters, which included Pagan Lass and Stoopid Cat during their lives in that century (not to be confused with Faraway Lad’s Justice Society of Message Board Posters in the 1940’s). You see, Pagan & Stoopid had lived all the way through to the 31st century every year along the way. Among Abin’s JSMBP is my personal favorite character, Cloned Green Pig.

Pagan Lass was established to be married to Abin Quank, though no one could tell why. It had also been established earlier that Space Ranger was Abin’s adopted brother (and thus, his last name is not Quank).

For a long period of time, the House of Quank was Abin, Space Ranger, Pagan Lass and Stoopid Cat.

Also noteworthy
In “The Good, the Dark and the Dead”, an important plot point is Matlock is revealed to be Hrun’s father via time travel. They have a huge knockdown dragout fight at the close.

Everyday Girl
EDG, as previously mentioned, was a Gen-Car Abin created in the Ongoing Tag Thread. He also had created the Gen-Car My Whee Fem as the Security Office’s receptionist, though that was about all that was known about her for a long while. Sometime between “The Good, the Dark and the Dead” and “Infinite Crisis”, Abin decided to upgrade Everyday Girl to Alt ID status.

In quintessential Chuck fashion, he made Everyday Girl way over the top in her naïve valley girl personality, purposely “bothering” posters with her. This was hilarious with some of the newer posters at the time, such as Tamper Lad.

EDG was revealed then to be Abin & Pagan’s granddaughter, but that was it. She joined the Security Office and in a twist, her family would try to keep her away from dangerous missions, but Cobalt Kid saw something in her and would give her tough missions despite their protests. She became one of the major mainstays of the OoS.

In “Infinite Crisis”, the House of Quank had a major change as the Red Bee killed Space Ranger. Everyday Girl took it the hardest and brought the Red Bee down and thereafter tried to take on Space Ranger’s role in the OoS. Another major revelation was Everyday Girl’s father was revealed to be Hrun the Barbarian (and ipso facto, her grandfather is Matlock, making her have the best LMB pedigree of us all). I’m not sure about Faraway Lad originally intending to be her father as I can’t recall off the top of my head, but I believe it if you read it in the thread.

Princess Diana of Vallhalia was not mentioned right away and I think it was years before her name was ever revealed. She was the daughter of Pagan through a previous marriage (possibly not even a marriage, as that is also unrevealed) and its unclear how old she is (remember Pagan is thousands of years old). I thought I remembered Numbnuts at one point possibly being the father, though his name suggests otherwise. We’ve never actually “seen” her before; there is certainly a great story to be told there. Hrun has mentioned her in passing a few times but never with any real clarity.

EDG has two ‘cacks’ (a race created by Abin), one who is a mini-EDE and one who is a mini-Cobie. These are Nobody and Noone. This actually ties into a subplot created by Eryk years earlier totally by accident, as he had introduced a mini-EDE called Nobody. It must be fate.

EDG is of great important but its unclear why at this point. Only that there is something of great important in her future.

My Whee Fem, Gary Concord and others
Over the next few years some other major changes occurred:

My Whee Fem was upgraded to Alt ID from Gen-Car in one of the Roleplays (possibly Five Faces of Death), at the same time that Jailbait Lass / Lolita was. The three girls, all best friends, then became a trio who worked together. My stopped being the receptionist at the OoS and became a sword-wielding, ass-kicker with a good sense of humor. She was also the most ‘normal’ of the Quank’s in terms of personality.

Much later, My Whee Fem was revealed to be a Cack herself, IIRC. Abin may have to correct me. This came about because Abin was stretched pretty thin with more characters than available Alts and so he took My Whee Fem off the board; this subplot explained why. Eventually she came back during Thyme Crime.

Gary Concord, the Ultra Man was a character Abin created during Space Ranger’s death. He was an antagonist for the LMB though never an outright villain. He entered into an alliance with Lonestar and Frio (when she turned evil) against the LMB but actually sided with the good guys when Frio went on to join the Five Faces of Death, which were true evil enemies of the LMB. So he worked against the LMB but never when it caused harm to anyone but the LMB. He had his own noble code. He and Frio had a brief, doomed romance.

Abin himself can explain Gary’s story better than I can. Ultimately, he was another version of Cobalt Kid which explains their mutual animosity for one another; both saw the other as their worst versions of each other. It relates to Stu’s plotlines (the Banned ‘Em Zone) and some of Abin’s other plots, In the end, Gary made the ultimate sacrifice to save the LMB during Thyme Crime. He was actually an alt on Legion World for quite a number of years so it was a big death for our continuity.

Lonestar Ranger was not an Alt ID of Abin’s, but actually one of mine! After Space Ranger died, I tried to create an opposite type Space Ranger character (this one of the Dark Oval), who was a pure opportunist. He was introduced in Invasion to not be a main villain, but someone to complicate the story and confuse matters, while raising tension. After Invasion he stuck around on Legion World trying to find ways to enrich himself and ultimately was killed by Frio. When Shenu (one of the Five Faces of Death) resurrected a bunch of corpses, I used it as an opportunity to play a zombie Lonestar “The Reanimated Corpse of Lonestar Ranger” but that didn’t last. Ultimately, I traded Lonestar to another poster, who has never used the Alt since.

During Five Faces of Death, Abin also created Slim who had immense cosmic powers via his bar “Club Cobalt in Chains”. He has a huge grudge against Cobalt because his planet was wiped out by a mercenary force who was working with the UP and the Triumvirate years earlier, and blames Cobalt for allowing it to happen (actually claiming Cobalt knew it was going to happen). His entire family was wiped out. Following FFoD, Slim disappeared, unable to capture Cobalt, though he did appear once again briefly, asking Faraway Lad (then leader) to investigate Cobie. Ultimately he disappeared again soon after. There is an unfinished plotline there.

Zardi showed up about two years ago and currently has a giant island floating over Legion World. That plotline is ongoing.

Sam Pureheart is a young paramedic who is also Everyday Girl’s boyfriend (now that she’s gotten older). He appears to be a very lawful and good person; Cobalt has given him a hard time, either because he’s looking out for EDG (as some believe) or actually mistrusts him, which he claims.

Abin Quank also went from janitor to gazillionare during this time.

Space Ranger came back from the grave, ultimately to be revealed as never having died per a secret plan by Cobalt Kid and Doctor One.

Pagan Lass died in 2010 both in real life and in LMB continuity and will be missed.

Following Pagan’s death, Stoopid Cat also left the LMB, as he was her familiar. It appears his departure is permanent.

The House of Quank is now Abin Quank, Space Ranger, Everyday Girl, My Whee Fem, plus Sam Pureheart and Zardi. Abin has dozens (if not more) characters that aren’t alts but Gen-Cars, scattered through almost 10 years of continuity that I’m sure will pop up eventually. The two of us having been working on a subplot for over two years that we keep coming back to, for instance.

Hope that helps. If you have specific questions, let me know!

Thank, Cobie! That is awesomely thorough!

The Faraway/Hrun thing as EDG's father was just a brief bit in the LMB Infinite Crisis where Faraway shows up and says something like, "My daughter... at last we are reunited" and just as EDG goes, "Daddy!" suddenly there is a time blip and Hrun shows up saying the same thing. EDG is then like, "Daddy #2!". It looks like that was the timeline that stuck.

And my total favorite thing about the Quank saga is the creation of My Whee Fem - which is absolutely a testament to Abin's creativity. I think I saw this on the Tag Team thread, but she was actually the result of one of your spelling mistakes.

You meant to say "Help me!" to EDG, but instead mis-typed, "Help my". Without missing a beat, EDG said... "My? You mean My Whee Fem - my long lost Korean-Phillipino friend who doesn't shoot well, but is great with knives? Of course I'll help her!"

Just awesome.

About Gary Concord, I mentioned this earlier in the thread:

Pretty sure he's not dead but trapped as I remember it. Am I wrong?

What exactly are the Cacks? I used the search engine and found out they are spirits, but nothing that went into detail. And in general, what is the cosmology of the LMBverse? I've played alittle bit with spiritual matters already, so I want to see if what I have been thinking makes sense.

This thread is a primer on Cacks (or Cackles). Halloween tag thread

Okay! I fixed the link, although Cobie's profile does explain a few things about Cacks or Cackles as the case may be...

Thank you very much. I didn't know what to make of them in the Dark Oval thread. I love that Everyday Girl is Fighter/Magic dual-class because it constrasts with Emily's Fighter/Science dual-class.

OK, Cobie, I have a question regarding your thoughts on Legion World social strata...

In the past, there have been events that have referenced the sort of "character" nature of different groups on Legion World (ex: The Alt-ID rebellion; the fact that Stoopid Cat was the first Alt in the LMB leadership ranks; the struggles of the lurking class).

How would you say these concepts translate to "in-story" characteristics. ie - What would you say would designate someone as an "Alt" if they were actually a person on LW?

I love this thread! So many good times...

Question, what's Invisible Brainiac's dating history again? I seem to remember Spelling Bee and Sarah, but I spent most of the time being drunk in the back of Vee's Variable Villa.

As a rider to the above question (and actually, the more I think about it, probably itself the primary question), what does the very name of the LMB imply from an in-story perspective? In a world where people are members of the "Legion of Message Board Posters" what is the "Message Board" and in what way are those people "Posters" of it?

Sorry to get all "Grant-Morrison meta" about it, but I just think you'd probably have some really interesting thoughts on the whole thing.

Cobie, in a fair fight, who do you believe would win between Cobalt Kid and Lard Lad?

Cobie doesn't fight fair fights.

(But he'd win in a fight against any character in or out of LMB continuity )

The way I see Alt IDs is they are kind of seen how minority groups were right during and after the Civil Rights movement in the United States. (Not now in the 2010's, but in the 60's & 70's). This is a galaxy wide phenomina that existed long before Legion World was founded. So they have undergone a long struggle over time, and much of that history is unwritten thus far.

On LW and among the LMB, a few stand out. Space Tart is technically an Alt ID and she joined the LMB in their first year. Space Ranger is considered a great hero among the galaxies even before his joining the LMB and so he has become very iconic in the eyes of other Alt IDs. And Stoopid Cat was the first Alt ID to ever achieve a leadership position in the LMB which meant something big to the Alt ID population on LW.

In 3003 we had the Alt ID Rebellion roleplay(essentially a storyline written by Abin, myself, Vee and Quis IIRC) that pitted Space Ranger against the LMB when tensions mounted. During the Myriad era both Eryk and myself used the Alt ID Rebellion tensions as an important theme in resolving the Myriad animosity (which only worked for a time but became a story point). Ever since then the idea is that relations between Alt IDs and main characters has calmed down but it could come up again.

From a meta perspective, however, we've never once said something like "___ is an Alt ID of ___" in-story. That might be taking things a bit too far.

The "lurking class" is basically all of the Legion World posters that do not post on Legion World and therefore are not official members of the LMB. I see them very much as Legion World civilzation's "working class"; the blue collar workers that are the vast majority of the population but do not share the majority of media attention, commerce, etc. They also are the ones who suffer greatest when threats hit Legion World (often dying in the backgrounds).

I guess a case could be made that "Gen-Cars" (a term Abin created to refer to General Characters, which are recurring characters in the LMBverse that are neither LMBers nor Alt IDs) are also part of the lurking class. Beyond that, I'm not sure if a Gen-Car has any distinct characteristics socially. Maybe they are akin to the middle class, or on the upper end of the working class spectrum.

Note, when I refer to these class distinctions, I'm not so much referring to economic distinctions (which is really how we define class now). I'm thinking it extends beyond that, likely in a more social sense.

I'm certainly open to some further ideas on this topic! A key element to me would be to always keep a degree of ambiguity about the whole thing and never answer it definitively.

When we created the term "LMB" it was short hand for "Legion of Message Board Posters". The very earliest Year (1) LMBers used the term "LMB" regularly.

Somewhere along the way, in about Year (2), posters began calling themselves the "LMBP" because that made more sense. By then, posters like STU had joined and he used exclusively that term.

However, many of the Year (1) LMBers, like Lardy and myself, never stopped using "LMB", leaving out the "P". So STU came up with the idea that it stands for "Legion of the Message Board", which I've always kind of liked.

Somewhere further along the line, after we were on Legion World, the vast majority of newer posters (from probably Kent Shakespeare's era onward) stuck to the original "LMB", so the "LMBP" use has kind of gone away.

Getting more towards your actual question, the "Message Board" could mean a variety of things. I once discussed this with some posters here (Lardy, do you remember this conversation? Eryk may have been involved). "Message Board" might refer to the "Mission Monitor Board", which is an essentially part of the LMB--monitoring problems around the galaxy and addressing them. So in a way, it really means Legion of the Mission Monitor Board.

In fact, in our very earliest days on the DCMB's in 2000-2001, we had an ongoing thread called "Mission Monitor Board" that was continually in use among the LMBers, often serving as a roleplaying home or just a place to chat amongst ourselves (it was also where we checked in when we were on a official 'road trip'). When Gary designated the Legion World forums and the Mission Monitor Board forum became the forum most tuned into LMB shenanigans, I know it wasn't on purpose but the similarity to that old thread always made me smile. Perhaps that was the Meta playing in.

Having it so 'on the nose' kind of fits when thinking about an organization like the Knights Templar, which basically is short-hand for the Knights of the Temple Mount, referring to what they thought was King Solomon's Temple. There are, of course, scores of examples of similar organization names deriving from something very clear and uncomplicated.

So maybe that's what the Message Board element means? I think we should establish in continuity that when non-LMBers, like the lurkers, ask them what a message board is, there is some kind of in-joke response like "I'm still waiting for them to tell me," as if they also don't understand. Because after all these years its become a commonly asked question.

Invisible Brainiac burst on the scene in 3003 as the youngest LMBer ever to join at age 15. Quickly taken under Cobalt Kid's wing, he was quite the hot commodity and girls came out of the woodwork to try to get his attention.

Spelling Bee was a quasi-villain who became smitten with him.

A girl working at Cafe Cramer named Sara briefly dated Ibby (in my "Price of Security" onevision).

Yourself, myself, Condo & Magnetic Kid and one other used to through massive parties at the Variable Villa that often had many sensual misunderstandings. This was an ongoing in-joke in the Vee's Villa thread throughout 2003-2004. Condo & Pol were dating (both men).

Ibby had a crush on Lolita and though he didn't know it, she shared it back a little but never said anything.

Everday Girl had (and still has) a huge crush on Invisible Brainiac.

I'm not sure about others. The way we played it left lots of room for 'untold stories' where IB may have dated a bit (either sleeping around or perhaps not going that far--that too was ambiguous).

Cobie,

Have you taken to drinking? I tend to disagree with your assessment of your abilities here...bub.

Love the discussion about Alt IDs, lurkers etc.

I agree that we should maintain some ambiguity about it - it helps give Legion World its own "flavor" apart from the real world. These classes aren't intended to be quite the same as the real world.

Alt IDs, perhaps, could be a class defined by how they are created.

Lurkers could be a class defined by their choices - deciding not to participate as much as other classes.

Gen-cars... well... I'm not quite sure about that. Most of the gen-cars seem to be LMBPers or allies...

And thanks for the recap about IB's love life I remember the villa parties, and one running joke was that IB would be snuck in invisibly since he was underage, only to promptly get wasted and fall asleep at the very first sip.

There was a lot of invisible snoring at the villa.

I can't believe you know more about "my" dating history than I do. Thanks

Thanks for the LMB/LMBP discussion. That's really a very satisfying explanation for the meaning of the name.


On the topic of social strata... it's just fascinating to me to try to imagine, and very much falls into the "world-building" that you guys have been engaged in for over a decade.

I think I tend to agree with IB on the division lines between class based on position versus those of birth.

It would seem that a "lurker" could always improve his or her standing by becoming more engaged, while the division between "Primaries" - for lack of a better term - and "Alts" is something more inherent, like no matter what they do, an Alt would always be an Alt. A Gen Char simply seems like it would be a lower substrata within the "Alt" community.

Something else else else: the act of "posting" would be akin to logging into the monitor board and being on duty. So essentially, posting is the time spent being a hero, saving lives and going on adventures

The class divisions are an interesting topic, no doubt. What's unsaid and a big question is how in the world can someone tell if you're an Alt? Is it a physical characteristic? Is it like Marvel's mutants where some are obvious and some can hide it easily?

I'm having a hard time understanding this system. How could all the characters know they are fictional characters without it being unrealistic?

Logically, if we went by that system than that means all cameo characters and a majority of supporting characters would be Alt-IDs or Gen-Chars, which means they would not be a minority.

I joined after making alternate identities became against the rules of this forum so therefore I cannot have Alt-IDs.

I never put any real thought into it...