How can LV win the war in three weeks

[nkafkafi]

No: HPFGUIDX 92982

> Jo wrote:
> Oooh ESE!Neri  :-D
> 
> BUT what if an imperio'ed wizard imperio'ed LV, would he be a 
servant
> to himself? Doesn't sound in character at all! No you need a 
negative
> rule to exclude LV himself and possibly some of his closest
> henchpeople because they might be doing other things with which this
> process could interfere. Also could do with an end process or ruling
> his evil empire could be a bit dull and repetitive.
> 
> Otherwise this is all looking very plausible to me!

Neri:
Details, details! This is why I never became a professional 
programmer. This thread does demonstrate, however, the potential of 
open-source code. In one week we could probably design between us the 
ultimate, fail-proof, world-conquering Imperius virus. Unless Yahoo 
or the list elves consider this an illegal activity and hex us out :-D

BTW, you noticed how, in my rush to defend my new invention, I 
immediately identified myself with the Dark Lord. I guess this is why 
mad scientists tend to become tools in the hands of mad dictators. 
Actually, I believe Ultimate Evil is inherently dull and repetitive. 
If LV gets his wishes to win the war, dominate the world and conquer 
death, I expect he'll die of boredom after three years at the most. 

Quickly returning to programming issues, which are much more 
captivating than the moral dilemmas, I didn't think about the problem 
you raised of LV becoming his own servant <slight dizziness; 
overcome>. I did think about a similar problem: Suppose you went to 
one of the imperio'ed wizards and told him (very fast, before he has 
time to curse you): "I'm the Dark Lord!" Would he then become your 
servant? I guess he would, unless he knows what the real Dark Lord 
looks like. This demonstrates again that any virus is only a 
parasite, depending completely on the knowledge and abilities of its 
host.

Correcting all these bugs that you and others were quick to point 
out, I can see that the elegance of the original 3 directions in my 
Imperius Virus v.1.0 won't last a day. What we need is a sub-program. 
We could write all the complex directions on a peace of parchment, 
and put also a picture of LV in it, and of course pictures of all his 
henchmen. Then all we need to do is to give this parchment to the 
first imperio'ed wizard and order him to follow the directions in it. 
The directions in the parchment will look something like:

----------------------------
1. Be a good servant of the Dark Lord (see Fig. 1).
2. ...
3. ...
<a long list of directions and conditions here>
.
.
37. Photocopy this parchment, give it to the wizard you imperio'ed 
and order him to follow the directions in it.
-----------------------------

This looks good. But what if Harry, Ron and Hermione manage to steal 
one of these parchments, replace LV's picture with DD's picture and 
return it to the imperio'ed wizard without him noticing the switch? 
Oh well, back to the drawing board...     


Neri, who sincerely hopes that LV does not lurk in HPFGU and will 
never find out about this.