As a separate question, if we spent the 1xp to raise Presence to 2 would that be likely to reduce Dia's bonus there? If so, would that be neutralized if we spent the full 5 to increase the aggregate Presence of Amu+Dia to 4 and put the gained dot in Amu's Presence?
Yes, and no.
Deliberately trying to avoid skill overlap is something Exa can do, but not without Amu and Dia becoming a lot more familiar with each other first. There's more going on with Dia than you think; even without Midori's modifications, she's less
Amu than any of the others.
You could try to raise Dia's skill, which would sidestep the problem, but she's a bit fragile right now.
Lore handles most of the humanities, math and general academic knowledge. It's an important stat for any scientist as a result, but it's largely abstract. A botanist might be able to identify and rattle off the entire taxonomy of any given plant you put before him, but without Craft: Wood he wouldn't know how to keep it alive except in the broadest sense.
This is correct. To clarify the "most", some parts of academia do fall under other abilities; bureaucracy, for example, contains just as much theory as practical skills. The theory is needed to let her handle odd situations or build an ideal bureaucracy from scratch, the practical skills to actually do anything with her knowledge.
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At this point, I should remind y'all that there's still a vote on. You don't have to visit the shrine right now, but it seems likely that you will--so who will you want to bring?
- Hotsuin would like you to bring Yukari, and while you're not privilege to his thought processes, it seems..
unlikely that he has anything but the best of intentions in this. Amu has had a chance to look through her bio, which is pretty impressive. She's presently studying at Tokyo University, a surface detail of her life that has little bearing on most of her days, which are largely concerned with... well, stopping anything like Nyx from happening again, by whichever means. She has twice declined a job offer from JPs, but did offer her services in case Nyarly surfaces again.
- Io is... probably a little scary, but she really wants something to do, and this outing seems a safe enough way of getting to know her. Amu is unsure of why she's still in JPs at all, now that lines of communication inside of Tokyo are mostly reopened, but maybe her home is in one of the areas most damaged by the earthquakes?
- Lt. Kato, the poor guy, probably won't mind the chance to go do what he's paid for. It seems he's otherwise doomed to spend his days following you around.
- Ran has her hands busy helping with fallout containment, both in the angelic and nuclear sense of the word.
