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Threads Of Destiny(Eastern Fantasy, Sequel to Forge of Destiny)

Voted best in category in the Users' Choice awards.
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[X] Turned away. She had to see to her family first and foremost. Besides, she was sure that Cai Renxiang was too busy to spend the day on something frivolous
 
[x] Invited Renxiang to come out with her. Meizhen would be there later as well, so what was one more for the gathering?
 
Arkeus said:
If we look at the actual voting option, it can be construed as 'step toward adding CRX in the family', but it's actual direct effect is 'Does Ling Qi want to help her right now when it will likely be at the cost of Meizhen, Zhengui and the rest of her family?'

I think 'step one of adding CRX to the family' might be important... but it's actually the very first 'family time' we have had with Meizhen since we got to the inner sect, and it's also one of the very, very rare time where Zhengui is relevant as an actual person in the thread. For someone who thinks both Zhengui and Meizhen are being sidelined out of the Family, this can also be taken as the third step to said sidelining.
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AbeoLogos said:
My argument is the actual event in question, Zhengui's awakening, should by default belong to him as the object of emphasis, and diversion from that should only be under the strongest of motivations. Cai Renxiang's situation does not, now, meet that standard for me. Before you go off about my opinion of her, that actually tells you jack squat about it, except that I don't think getting closer to her overrides the issues with Zhengui right this moment. And his situation's pretty well just as "exceedingly rare" as her's is; he is just waking up after an exhaustion and trauma induced sleep that followed immediately seeing the person he loves most in the world almost die, having forcibly broken through to heroically and triumphantly defend the village in part to make her proud, and then failed (again!) to protect her.

They're both in vulnerable states, and I have no interest in denying that about Cai Renxiang. My position remains that we have an existing obligation to Zhengui that we would be neglecting with the effort to rope Cai Renxiang into the mess. My justification is in no way flimsy, you simply don't recognize me looking past two feet in front of us. This was a gap of perspective that could have been approached with questions rather than accusations.
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Well, I do get that position ... if one dislikes CRX . But in any scenario when one doesn't, it does not compute in a cost-benefit analysis point of view. Let me elaborate.

(but first, a disclaimer: This whole post will assume that reading of the options is actually correct. I do not believe it is the most likely option, necessarily, but I do believe there is a >10% chance that it is the correct reading as I am unable to completely disprove or dismiss it. As such, I will address the "it will cost Zhengui" argument as if it has 100% possibility of being true in the interest of intellectual honesty, so that even in the unlikely scenario it ends up being true, my reasons for voting will remain valid)

Let's start by sheer cost-benefit. So let us assume CRX = Zhengui in value, and that rather than seeing it materialistically by desired support rank ups, that CRX's well being = Zhengui's well being.

(💚 = abstraction for generally being there, helping , loving, generally caring, etc. I am using it as an abstraction to quantify what it is assumed we are giving Zhengui and/or CRX, friendship and support, in a way that is math comprehensible)

If so, CRX is literally on fire, with no support network and no one else able to help. Zhengui was wounded, but that was something purely physical and healable. Zhengui also seems to have no psychological problems and a strong support network. Evidently, then, if we assume we have 1 💚 to give, it will do more good going towards CRX because we keep showering Zhengui with 💚 . Seriously, we spent AP precisely so that our family will get a stable supply of 💚s and Zhengui is included. Zhengui, incidentally, also has a playmate. So even with the wounds, CRX needs the 💚 more cuz she has no way of getting one while Zhengui gets a lot anyway.

But wait, there is more. Zhengui will definitely be getting something, after all , heck, he will be getting most of it, we will be visiting him and the whole event will be about him. Viewing it as who will get 1 💚 is disingenuous. Assuming that this is a zero-sum game (which hahaha love is not, but as mentioned above I am taking the most disadvantageous position possible to prove that even then I wouldn't change my vote) then there are 5 💚 to split between CRX and Zhengui. Scenario "don't call CRX" will result in 0 for CRX and 5 for Zhengui. Scenario "call CRX" will result, more likely, in 2 for her and 3 for Zhengui. But since I am on a roll discarding the most advantageous for me position for the most disadvantageous, let's instead say it will result in 4 for her and 1 for Zhengui. As the game is now diceless except for exploration rolls, it literally cannot go below that because we'll still care about Zhengui. So its the more fair split if we place both in equal value even under the worst case scenario.

Meizhen would be a bit more tricky to address... if she wasn't close friends with CRX. I am finding myself very doubtful she will get less 💚 either way, although the alternative may indeed result in us getting more out of her in a way impossible with CRX around. Still, we allready put out her most destroying fires, and we aren't outright neglecting her, so...

Some may call my mathematicking about love cold, and call such stuff unquantifiable. I agree, but my maths stem from my desire to help CRX. They are there to oppose the maths that say we shouldn't. And it is maths that say we shouldn't, because the argument is given there in a clear gain- loss equation, even if it is one less clearly mathematic. So I am mathing it away to dispel the fiction that this is a full-on "Zhengui or CRX" dilemma
 
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storryeater said:
Well, I do get that position ... if one dislikes CRX . But in any scenario when one doesn't, it does not compute in a cost-benefit analysis point of view. Let me elaborate.

(but first, a disclaimer: This whole post will assume that reading of the options is actually correct. I do not believe it is the most likely option, necessarily, but I do believe there is a >10% chance that it is the correct reading as I am unable to completely disprove or dismiss it. As such, I will address the "it will cost Zhengui" argument as if it has 100% possibility of being true in the interest of intellectual honesty, so that even in the unlikely scenario it ends up being true, my reasons for voting will remain valid)

Let's start by sheer cost-benefit. So let us assume CRX = Zhengui in value, and that rather than seeing it materialistically by desired support rank ups, that CRX's well being = Zhengui's well being.

(💚 = abstraction for generally being there, helping , loving, generally caring, etc. I am using it as an abstraction to quantify what it is assumed we are giving Zhengui and/or CRX, friendship and support, in a way that is math comprehensible)

If so, CRX is literally on fire, with no support network and no one else able to help. Zhengui was wounded, but that was something purely physical and healable. Zhengui also seems to have no psychological problems and a strong support network. Evidently, then, if we assume we have 1 💚 to give, it will do more good going towards CRX because we keep showering Zhengui with 💚 . Seriously, we spent AP precisely so that our family will get a stable supply of 💚s and Zhengui is included. Zhengui, incidentally, also has a playmate. So even with the wounds, CRX needs the 💚 more cuz she has no way of getting one while Zhengui gets a lot anyway.

But wait, there is more. Zhengui will definitely be getting something, after all , heck, he will be getting most of it, we will be visiting him and the whole event will be about him. Viewing it as who will get 1 💚 is disingenuous. Assuming that this is a zero-sum game (which hahaha love is not, but as mentioned above I am taking the most disadvantageous position possible to prove that even then I wouldn't change my vote) then there are 5 💚 to split between CRX and Zhengui. Scenario "don't call CRX" will result in 0 for CRX and 5 for Zhengui. Scenario "call CRX" will result, more likely, in 2 for her and 3 for Zhengui. But since I am on a roll discarding the most advantageous for me position for the most disadvantageous, let's instead say it will result in 4 for her and 1 for Zhengui. As the game is now diceless except for exploration rolls, it literally cannot go below that because we'll still care about Zhengui. So its the more fair split if we place both in equal value even under the worst case scenario.

Meizhen would be a bit more tricky to address... if she wasn't close friends with CRX. I am finding myself very doubtful she will get less 💚 either way, although the alternative may indeed result in us getting more out of her in a way impossible with CRX around. Still, we allready put out her most destroying fires, and we aren't outright neglecting her, so...

Some may call my mathematicking about love cold, and call such stuff unquantifiable. I agree, but my maths stem from my desire to help CRX. They are there to oppose the maths that say we shouldn't. And it is maths that say we shouldn't, because the argument is given there in a clear gain- loss equation, even if it is one less clearly mathematic. So I am mathing it away to dispel the fiction that this is a full-on "Zhengui or CRX" dilemma
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There is a few issues with that.

First, I disagree that CRX is suffering more than Zhengui right now. In fact, I'd say that Zhengui is suffering significantly more than CRX. He just had a tribulation where he fought against an endless horde and got knocked out knowing he had failed and Ling Qi was dying. Not only that, it's not the first time it happened, and it's not the first time that afterward Ling Qi just ignores him. CRX has her own issues right now, and she is feeling vulnerable, but Zhengui's much, much more hurt.

Second, Ling Qi has fairly constantly been putting effort in her relationship with CRX, and fairly constantly ignored Zhengui. We might see Zhengui in 'downtime' more, but when we actually do things it's never about him. As has been pointed out, whenever there is a choice between 'Zhengui' and 'something else', Ling Qi always chooses 'something else'. When there is a choice between 'CRX' and 'something else', Ling Qi almost always chooses 'CRX'.

Third, We are going, right now, to see Zhengui waking up after being hospitalised and needing support. Bringing someone whome Zhengui doesn't know, and who personally kind of dislikes spirits, is not "Oh, this is still going to be about Zhengui, but a bit less". It considerably changes how it works.

Basically, CRX is getting a ton of Ling Qi love, Zhengui is getting none, and right now we are getting the endpoint of a Zhengui character arc... and are going to ignore him in order to talk to the person we always talk to anyway.
 
[X] Turned away. She had to see to her family first and foremost. Besides, she was sure that Cai Renxiang was too busy to spend the day on something frivolous
 
AbeoLogos said:
I disagree that accurately encapsulates the consequences of the vote and subsequent update's events.
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And I see no difference between your concerns and the "concerns" people expressed way back when about how voting to bring Qingge and Biyu together with us to see Zhengui could endanger them or ruin their view of cultivation/us due to Zhengui terrifying Biyu (or it being shown that we care about them so that Renshu or any other enemy of ours would know that they can hurt us by going after them).

We are being presented with a relatively straightforward vote on whether or not to take advantage of a frankly golden opportunity to make headway in our relationship with CRX due to her recent contact with her mother and reminder of her being a "puppet" who can be replaced if things go badly enough and I categorically refuse to consider any of this "but what if it's actually a vote between Zhengui and CRX and who gets more focus and help/characterisation" business.
 
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I don't buy the argument that the choice which is framed about our relationship with CRX is fundamentally about Zhengui.

On a meta level: yrsillar has just posted an Interlude about Renxiang. He has just given us questers narrative transparency about what, exactly, she is dealing with. So I read this as a vote of "does LQ want to deepen her involvement in Renxiang's personal shit or stay out of that hot mess and keep their relationship professional?" If it turns out it is secretly about Zhengui, that would represent yrsillar dealing with his audience in bad faith: making the casually-discernible context of the vote entirely about our relationship with CRX and requiring us to divine that he actually meant us to vote on whether we love Zhengui more than CRX is what I'm gonna call a Dick Move.

With regard to the argument of "Having CRX means significantly less Zhengui," here's how I imagine the update playing out without CRX: Fussing over the good boy, letting him know what happened, Meizhen eventually showing up, some cute byplay between Zhen and her spirit. Here's how I imagine it playing out with CRX: Fussing over the good boy, letting him know what happened, introducing him to our boss and headpat-giver (who will be awkward and formal and mostly lurking in the background), Meizhen shows up, CRX gloms onto her. In other words, insofar as anyone gets less narrative space as a result of including CRX, my prediction is that it's Meizhen. And I'm OK with that.

EDIT: Also, I am willing to bet on this ($10 to charity of winner's choice?) if someone figures out a good way to adjudicate between the possibilities when we're inherently comparing "what happened" to "what would have happened."
EDIT2: Sad that I didn't get anyone to bet with me before yrsillar settled the issue.
 
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Arkeus said:
First, I disagree that CRX is suffering more than Zhengui right now. In fact, I'd say that Zhengui is suffering significantly more than CRX. He just had a tribulation where he fought against an endless horde and got knocked out knowing he had failed and Ling Qi was dying. Not only that, it's not the first time it happened, and it's not the first time that afterward Ling Qi just ignores him. CRX has her own issues right now, and she is feeling vulnerable, but Zhengui's much, much more hurt.

Second, Ling Qi has fairly constantly been putting effort in her relationship with CRX, and fairly constantly ignored Zhengui. We might see Zhengui in 'downtime' more, but when we actually do things it's never about him. As has been pointed out, whenever there is a choice between 'Zhengui' and 'something else', Ling Qi always chooses 'something else'. When there is a choice between 'CRX' and 'something else', Ling Qi almost always chooses 'CRX'.

Third, We are going, right now, to see Zhengui waking up after being hospitalised and needing support. Bringing someone whome Zhengui doesn't know, and who personally kind of dislikes spirits, is not "Oh, this is still going to be about Zhengui, but a bit less". It considerably changes how it works.
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Fair argument, but I still disagree.

First, CRX is, like, psychologically maimed. This is not about her most recent wound, it is about her long term trauma and her long term wellbeing. She is hurting more cuz every trauma stays in her like a wound that will not go away. She has no one that cares except for that one absolute bro of a Violet she dislikes. It is absolutely rational that we make a stronger effort helping her get past being constantly on fire than we would spent on other friends, but even so...

We do not spend that much time with CRX. This thread is suprisingly balanced social links wise (may be the good writing making everyonje interesting), and we frequently snub every single character for another character. CRX right now needs u the most though, because...

Zhengui's problem is not something we will work out when he awakes. We told him good job, we will tell him good job, and we are trying to make him feel part of the family, but the "push yourself to get stronger" mentality is something Ling Qi cultivates to him. Perhaps not intentionally, but she encourages his grand statements and last stands, because they resemble her. If that particular fire is the one you think should be put out, we should put it out in Ling Qi first so that Zhengui will stop emulating her.

But what if the problem isn't the "pushing himself" but the "I failed" ? Well, a party, even one without CRX, is not a place to address that directly. Having a party does make him feel more valuable, sure, but the more the merrier, unless we summon someone that hates him, or that he hates in which case, well...

Zhengui isn't Sixiang, he doesn't hate CRX. As for CRX hating spirits... citation, please?

Edit: corrected realms of bro from Prism to Violet after a comment below indicated my mistake.
 
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I think, if anything, this can be good for both Zhengui and CRX.
We can introduce CRX to Zhengui, praise Zhengui for being the absolutely best boi ever, and give CRX and a better model for how to deal with your loved ones than what she has.
 
Valmond said:
I think, if anything, this can be good for both Zhengui and CRX.
We can introduce CRX to Zhengui, praise Zhengui for being the absolutely best boi ever, and give CRX and a better model for how to deal with your loved ones than what she has.
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Actually, have these two never met before? I don't remember it happening on screen but surely they would have by now.

It'd be nice for this vote to know what Zhengui actually thinks of Renxiang, if only because I'm pretty sure Renxiang's opinion of Zhengui is boringly predictable.
 
storryeater said:
Fair argument, but I still disagree.

First, CRX is, like, psychologically maimed. This is not about her most recent wound, it is about her long term trauma and her long term wellbeing. She is hurting more cuz every trauma stays in her like a wound that will not go away. She has no one that cares except for that one absolute bro of a Prism she dislikes.
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If you mean the fabulous dress maker, he's 5th realm going on 6th, still a ways away from Prism.
 
The Empire needs some white ranked cultivators to start up the CPS department.

[x] Invited Renxiang to come out with her. Meizhen would be there later as well, so what was one more for the gathering?
 
TimEd said:
And Meizhen doesnt really show overt affection, period.
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FTFY.

With regards to the discussion about framing this vote as a Zhengui vs CRX choice, it's very much not. This is all but explicitly a referendum on CRX being in or out of our "person I care about" group. Our Domain is explicitly centered around the idea of a family (with very close friends getting lumped in the way people often do in real life), and the "Turn away" option flat out says she can't spend effort on CRX instead of Ling Qi's family.

Voting against including CRX because you want more Zhengui time is valid if and only if we accept that Ling Qi can only have 3-4 people in her familial in group and that all of those slots are full. That only holds up if you believe that the thread is uncapable of caring about characters unless they're constantly onscreen, and anyone who doesn't get enough screentime will drift away from LQ - which has been explicitly kiboshed by the QM when they said LQ is perfectly capable of keeping up their relationships without constantly voting to see people.
 
picklepikkl said:
yrsillar just posted in Discord:
"The next update will be primarily focused on Zhengui regardless"
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Honestly, dragging up an old issue again but this is a perfect example of the big problems I have with the Discord.

There's an argument being made in the thread. Why is this info only coming in on the Discord?

I'm grateful for the people who do bring the info back into the thread, but it's very annoying to essentially miss out on a load of info and wonder what is being said without being able to see it.

Really does create the feeling that there are 2 classes of questers. Those on the discord and those that aren't.
 
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[x] Invited Renxiang to come out with her. Meizhen would be there later as well, so what was one more for the gathering?
 
Humbaba said:
Honestly, dragging up an old issue again but this is one a perfect example of the big problems I have with the Discord.

There's an argument being made in the thread. Why is this info only coming in on the Discord?

I'm grateful for the people who do bring the info back into the thread, but it's very annoying to essentially miss out on a load of info and wonder what is being said without being able to see it.

Really does create the feeling that there are 2 classes of questers. Those on the discord and those that aren't.
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You dont have to worry, yrs very, very rarely chimes in on the votes. He is mostly active after an update drops and if people got questions about that. This time it was more a call for help because discord got... worse then the thread in a way. Discord is 99% people yelling at each other to not clutter up the thread.
 
Because it could be reasonably construed that the vote is about 'do we reject Renxiang so we have more time for Zhengui', and some people don't like Renxiang enough to take time away from Zhengui. When in fact, Yrsillar has now confimed that it's a question about whether we want our relationship with Renxiang to be personal (include her) or professional (reject her), since he said that the vote won't affect our time with the precious turtle snake.
 
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CalvinCopyright said:
Because it could be reasonably construed that the vote is about 'do we reject Renxiang so we have more time for Zhengui', and some people don't like Renxiang enough to take time away from Zhengui. When in fact, Yrsillar has now confimed that it's a question about whether we want our relationship with Renxiang to be personal (include her) or professional (reject her), since he said that the vote won't affect our time with the precious turtle snake.
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We're going to have different definitions of reasonable.
 
Thor's Twin said:
I'm just confused about why this needed to be clarified, but I'm glad that it is regardless.
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I think yrs, in order to break chapters and ensure our agency and lack of complaints, gives us some votes that are so obvious people can't help but seek the catch, even if there isn't any.

Humbaba said:
Honestly, dragging up an old issue again but this is a perfect example of the big problems I have with the Discord.

There's an argument being made in the thread. Why is this info only coming in on the Discord?

I'm grateful for the people who do bring the info back into the thread, but it's very annoying to essentially miss out on a load of info and wonder what is being said without being able to see it.

Really does create the feeling that there are 2 classes of questers. Those on the discord and those that aren't.
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Honestly, hard agree here, combined with the fact that, if I understand correctly, the Discord is less moderated and civil, it makes it somewhat of a toxic addition, which is why I do not participate in it.
 
[x] Invited Renxiang to come out with her. Meizhen would be there later as well, so what was one more for the gathering?
 
[x] Invited Renxiang to come out with her. Meizhen would be there later as well, so what was one more for the gathering?
 
It's entirely counterproductive to try to tally two beings suffering, compare them, and firmly declare which has suffered 'more'. Especially when there has been enough obvious/measurable suffering on both sides that pursuing such a questionable view on things still leaves the results contentious.
 
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