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

[X] You have been trying to improve your social game. Keep pushing it. See if you can arrange something with not only Wang Chao, but also Alingge, Liang He and possibly others. (Social Benefits. Less focused training. Lower but wider skill bonuses. Zhengui gets more experience with other cultivators.)

mitchchris said:

X] Try to arrange weekly training sessions for the next month with just Zhengui, Wang Chao and yourself. (More focused training, higher but more narrow skill bonuses, Zhengui gets better martial training.)

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missing a [ there.

dycouza said:

I think this would do more to impress Wang Chao that we aren't as bad as he thought we were. His main concern with us was our disregard for our lesser (i.e. everyone *spits*) and our influence with CRX. Showing him we're cool and a bit of a jerk might allow us to baaarely eke out a friendship. I'm not really interested in turning Zhengui into a fortress like Wang is specialize on doing though. Alingge's ideas were more interesting and a wider set of instruction might be better for a young Xuan Wu trying to make his own Way.

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I think you might be mistaking Wang Chao for Wu Jing, who we argued with at Luo Zhong's party.

LQ has only met Wang Chao once at Cai's party. The only things Wang discussed was LQ's supposed lack of decorum using CtE on Liang He, as well as bringing former prostitutes into her household.

yrsillar said:

"Perhaps you speak true," Wu Jing said as the pressure faded. "But I find your attitude troubling all the same, for one who has the ear of our Lady. If you are sincere, then pay a mind to the perceptions and echoes of your actions in the future. The Emerald Seas can little afford instability. The Wu remember how fragile prosperity truly is."

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yrsillar said:

"Quite right," Wang Chao said, shaking his head. "I cannot speak against your musical talents, but that part at the end of the duel was a bit vicious to use on a countrymen, wasn't it?"

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yrsillar said:

"...Leaving that advice of yours aside," Wang Chao huffed, shooting Meng a disgruntled look. "It occurs that this is a rare opportunity. You must be aware of the foul rumor that has begun to spread around your house already, Miss Ling. Might you want to address the matter?"

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[X] You have been trying to improve your social game. Keep pushing it. See if you can arrange something with not only Wang Chao, but also Alingge, Liang He and possibly others. (Social Benefits. Less focused training. Lower but wider skill bonuses. Zhengui gets more experience with other cultivators.)

[X] You have been trying to improve your social game. Keep pushing it. See if you can arrange something with not only Wang Chao, but also Alingge, Liang He and possibly others. (Social Benefits. Less focused training. Lower but wider skill bonuses. Zhengui gets more experience with other cultivators.)

[X] You have been trying to improve your social game. Keep pushing it. See if you can arrange something with not only Wang Chao, but also Alingge, Liang He and possibly others. (Social Benefits. Less focused training. Lower but wider skill bonuses. Zhengui gets more experience with other cultivators.)

I am very quickly warming up to Wang.

[X] You have been trying to improve your social game. Keep pushing it. See if you can arrange something with not only Wang Chao, but also Alingge, Liang He and possibly others. (Social Benefits. Less focused training. Lower but wider skill bonuses. Zhengui gets more experience with other cultivators.)

I'm always a fan of getting more social interactions

This chapter calls for a more comprehensive analysis than I usually bother with I feel. Let's see:

yrsillar said:

Let us begin then! Sir Ling

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While it may seem mostly earnest/sweet (and it is), this does imply Wang is the type of person that treats spirits as fully people, which is a mark in his favor.

yrsillar said:

Wang Chao had begun to move toward Zhengui, ripples of qi echoing from his feet with each step. Every pulse pinged out and reverberated back, flooding back into his meridians. Each pulse was weak, but with every step they were growing slowly stronger.

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The avalanche indeed. Three points here:

1. We can probably expect similar buildup capability from UGM, so that's pretty cool.
2. In a sense Wang's build is the best way to deal with Zhengui's without cheating; have an excellent defense foundation and an offensive stategy that can scale as high as it needs to bury whatever opponent you're facing.
3. This also highlights a current rather big lack in Zhengui's build: For all that half his theme is "Growth" our boy lacks the gradual scaling we've come to expect from our build and are now seeing in Wang's.

yrsillar said:

"...Elder Ying gave me some lessons on spirit bonding, and aiding growth, but nothing like an art," Ling Qi replied. "Is that a thing?" If so, some parts of the Songseekers Ceremony made more sense

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An IC acknowledgement of this should be an important step, especially as LQ gets more comfortable involving the spirits as not just wards but fellow peers in cultivation. This and the thing about beast Qi are why I was rating the conversation with Alingge highly on the pros of this vote outcome.

yrsillar said:

"He's holding back though," Ling Qi said absently, only realizing that he had spoken aloud a moment later.

"It is not typically the point of a spar to immediately crush your opponent," Liang He said.

"I know that," Ling Qi replied. All the same, the ugly feeling that sometimes rose up after a spar with Meizhen or Cai Renxiang stirred in her stomach. It seemed watching her little brother be on the other end of it was no less disatisfying.

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LQ hates to lose. Color me surprised /s.


Alright, so before I look at the votes I'd like to point out the few important things that happened here:

1. LQ got into the role of observer for once, where she can experience what it's like for Zhengui, watching one she cares about fight (even in assessment spar!) while she's on the sideline.
2. She was not alone in observing, and was getting sound external commentary that expands her views and highlights some of her unreasonable expectations.
3. (this is less personally relevant but still important to note), Wang is in a good mood and is likely amenable to the vote suggestions. Alingge too probably considering looking at beasts helps her cultivate, and Liang He will likely go with what Wang goes if LQ's right and it's like the Han brothers.

Now, the votes:
[] Try to arrange weekly training sessions for the next month with just Zhengui, Wang Chao and yourself. (More focused training, higher but more narrow skill bonuses, Zhengui gets better martial training.)
[] You have been trying to improve your social game. Keep pushing it. See if you can arrange something with not only Wang Chao, but also Alingge, Liang He and possibly others. (Social Benefits. Less focused training. Lower but wider skill bonuses. Zhengui gets more experience with other cultivators.)

I think there are 3 main questions to ask here:

1. What is the benefit to Zhengui; easy enough since that's spelled out:
   • "better martial training" vs "more experience with other cultivators"
2. What is the benefit to social goals; slightly less easy but still mostly spelled out:
   • For focused training we likely steadily advance a working relationship with Wang, which fits our objective.
   • For less focused, there's explicit (and nebulous) "Social Benefits". Relationship with Wang will not be the sole focus, but if we navigate the difficulty successfully (e.g make sure we don't sideline Wang and use the mutual in-group to get everyone to work together better) there's potential for similarly good advancement.
3. What can help LQ's development more (in a broad character sense):
   • The first option is nice and focused on the martial aspect and likely LQ's relationship with Wang and/or Zhengui. I don't feel it's particularly exciting in terms of growth options beyond what's stated though.
   • Having seen the potential benefit of external viewpoints, I'm inclined to think the second option's "experience with other cultivators" can benefit not just Zhengui but also LQ. The option is also explicitly noted as pushing the boundaries for social that LQ's been trying to improve, so this would be the second group of contacts we're trying to establish in inner sect (first being the music club).

It's also worth mentioning the second option has the benefit of a wider group of cultivators that trained together and can likely cooperate better in future war deployments.

So ultimately I think the vote boils down to: do we want immediate martial benefits more than the potential longer-term benefits of a broader social/training group, and I think that even with the upcoming cave dive, we're better off with the second option. A broad Foundation should serve us better than a focused but narrow one after all.

Which is why I'll be voting for:
[X] You have been trying to improve your social game. Keep pushing it. See if you can arrange something with not only Wang Chao, but also Alingge, Liang He and possibly others. (Social Benefits. Less focused training. Lower but wider skill bonuses. Zhengui gets more experience with other cultivators.)

EDIT: also Alingge specifically as a present external viewpoint should help a lot with LQ's heart demon/expectation management problem between her and her spirits.

[X] You have been trying to improve your social game. Keep pushing it. See if you can arrange something with not only Wang Chao, but also Alingge, Liang He and possibly others. (Social Benefits. Less focused training. Lower but wider skill bonuses. Zhengui gets more experience with other cultivators.)

[X] Try to arrange weekly training sessions for the next month with just Zhengui, Wang Chao and yourself. (More focused training, higher but more narrow skill bonuses, Zhengui gets better martial training.)

[X] You have been trying to improve your social game. Keep pushing it. See if you can arrange something with not only Wang Chao, but also Alingge, Liang He and possibly others. (Social Benefits. Less focused training. Lower but wider skill bonuses. Zhengui gets more experience with other cultivators.)

[X] You have been trying to improve your social game. Keep pushing it. See if you can arrange something with not only Wang Chao, but also Alingge, Liang He and possibly others. (Social Benefits. Less focused training. Lower but wider skill bonuses. Zhengui gets more experience with other cultivators.)
Ling Qi needs socializing.

[X] You have been trying to improve your social game. Keep pushing it. See if you can arrange something with not only Wang Chao, but also Alingge, Liang He and possibly others. (Social Benefits. Less focused training. Lower but wider skill bonuses. Zhengui gets more experience with other cultivators.)

yrsillar said:

There was a ring ling a temple gong being struck as metal met shell

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like


[] Try to arrange weekly training sessions for the next month with just Zhengui, Wang Chao and yourself. (More focused training, higher but more narrow skill bonuses, Zhengui gets better martial training.)

This vote doesnt actually mention any social gains, and doesnt even include Sword Boi. I'm more likely to vote for the other choice, since a wider experience is better by removing any possible surprises we might encounter. Everything else after that surprise can probably be handled with what we aready have.

[X] You have been trying to improve your social game. Keep pushing it. See if you can arrange something with not only Wang Chao, but also Alingge, Liang He and possibly others. (Social Benefits. Less focused training. Lower but wider skill bonuses. Zhengui gets more experience with other cultivators.)

Inserted tally

[X] You have been trying to improve your social game. Keep pushing it. See if you can arrange something with not only Wang Chao, but also Alingge, Liang He and possibly others. (Social Benefits. Less focused training. Lower but wider skill bonuses. Zhengui gets more experience with other cultivators.)

yrsillar said:

"...I will trust your discretion," Ling Qi replied, and the words were difficult to force out. She felt a pang of pain at the thought of leaving Zhengui to fight a stronger opponent unsupported, but it was only a spar. She couldn't baby him, if he was going to keep up with her. "Zhengui, fight hard, okay?"

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yrsillar said:

"It looks like he needs a little more work," Ling Qi said with a wry chuckle. "I might have to cut back on cultivation to train him a little more."

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Ling Qi has this instinct that as long as he keeps up/is stronger, things will be fine and work out. It's a bit naive, and not really fair to Zhengui, but reflects Ling Qi's hangups with raw power and her unclear life goals. She has this hope that as long as she's strong enough things will work out, probably partly as a result of her relative ignorance about all the details of how the world really works. Without knowing the intricacies, they haven't made their way into her worldview.

At this point, it does seem like the tendency for choices involving teamwork having more negative framing in the vote options is a deliberate manifestation of Ling Qi's insecurities with trusting people and not grasping for maximum personal power/success. I'd be really interested in seeing what happens when we actually vote for one of those teamwork options to test the theory, but it hasn't happened yet.

It was nice to see her getting pushback, and from three people no less! Hopefully we'll incorporate the lesson moving forwards. This vote doesn't seem to touch on the issue too much though.

[] Try to arrange weekly training sessions for the next month with just Zhengui, Wang Chao and yourself. (More focused training, higher but more narrow skill bonuses, Zhengui gets better martial training.)
Spends more time focused with Wang Chao, which probably has Wang Chao social benefits. More War, I think?. Puts Zhengui through the paces, though I personally don't think that's all that important to our teamwork.

[] You have been trying to improve your social game. Keep pushing it. See if you can arrange something with not only Wang Chao, but also Alingge, Liang He and possibly others. (Social Benefits. Less focused training. Lower but wider skill bonuses. Zhengui gets more experience with other cultivators.)
Less focus on Wang Chao, but providing the pretext for communal engagement could bring Wang Chao social benefits, which could bring Ling Qi social benefits with Wang Chao. Less War, but probably Beast Handling among other things; should still be primarily War given the nature of the exercises. Zhengui actually talks to people, so that's cool.

Not feeling strongly about either option, which is a bit of a relief honestly.

[X] Try to arrange weekly training sessions for the next month with just Zhengui, Wang Chao and yourself. (More focused training, higher but more narrow skill bonuses, Zhengui gets better martial training.)
Usually I would say 'go for versatility', but we are at war, so we need to up Zhengui's martial prowess as soon as possible.

[X] You have been trying to improve your social game. Keep pushing it. See if you can arrange something with not only Wang Chao, but also Alingge, Liang He and possibly others. (Social Benefits. Less focused training. Lower but wider skill bonuses. Zhengui gets more experience with other cultivators.)

[X] Try to arrange weekly training sessions for the next month with just Zhengui, Wang Chao and yourself. (More focused training, higher but more narrow skill bonuses, Zhengui gets better martial training.)