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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] Confident Approach (Base Success 45+, 2 rolls, less time consuming, lower cost.)

While I appreciate @Black Noise's breakdown of the numbers and percentages involved, I disagree with the conclusion. There seem to be precious few things that this dreaming Fungus could want other than sustenance, and it seems to gain its sustenance from the consumption of memories and emotions. I have little desire to peddle our memories and emotions, and even if that is not the case, I have little desire to pay more for something that could be gotten for cheaper if approached slightly differently.

The time and cost saved by going with a Confident approach just seem to be worth the little extra risk.

I also see another problem with the Sympathetic approach. Making friendly overtures towards it will likely reduce its fear of us, and yet that fear of us is our most potent tool in negotiating safe passage. We want it to be cautious of us, we don't want it thinking that it could, or even should, take a stab at dragging us into the dream. So in addition to the sympathetic approach taking more time and costing more, I feel that it removes a tool in our negotiating arsenal that is vital to everyone getting through this without pulling out the more destructive techs.
 
[x] Sympathetic approach (Base success 30+, 3 rolls, more time consuming, higher cost.)

Hah! I had expected Ji Rong being all gruff about Xuan Shi supporting whatever Ling Qi chose.

And, I feel like we could gain valuable things from befriending the fungal spirit. Either spores for spreading it to somewhere else, components for making rare pills for boosting dream Qi cultivation, gaining a second advisor on dream matters or maybe just having another set of eyes spying down there underground. Like, bribing the fungal spirit to report on what the Corpse Eaters do or where they move to us. It would give us a long term strategic advantage in our spionage on these enemies of ours at the cost of a short term disadvantage for this mission.
 
[X] Threatening approach (Base Success 60+, 1 roll, least time consuming, no cost.)

Highest probability of success because it's only one roll. Three or two rolls more likely that at least one fails, even thought the rolls have individually better odds.
 
To make my case one last time, here's why I'm against 'confident':

Qualifiers:
• no|moderate|high investment in time and 'cost' to roll on the blue|orange|black lines.
• worse/better outcomes the further out from the axis you get.
• we have no way of quantifying how much worse/better in each case (though previous experience shows lots of degrees of success = huge rewards, don't think we got to roll on the deep end of the bad side yet in quest).
 
Black Noise said:
To make my case one last time, here's why I'm against 'confident':
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This is only the case if you assume
a) equal cost of each choice, which is known to be false
b) equal degrees of success on each choice are equivalent, which is unknown, but very likely to be false

You need to be clear on these implicit assumptions when running numbers.
 
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uiopion said:
This is only the case if you assume
a) equal cost of each choice, which is known to be false
b) equal degrees of success on each choice are equivalent, which quite unknown, but very likely

You need to be clear on these implicit assumptions when running numbers.
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BN explicitly mentioned all those things in their post, so I'm not sure why you're saying they need to be clear on that assumption.
Black Noise said:
Qualifiers:
• no|moderate|high investment in time and 'cost' to roll on the blue|orange|black lines.
• worse/better outcomes the further out from the axis you get.
• we have no way of quantifying how much worse/better in each case (though previous experience shows lots of degrees of success = huge rewards, don't think we got to roll on the deep end of the bad side yet in quest).
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Click to shrink...
 
uiopion said:
This is only the case if you assume
a) equal cost of each choice, which is known to be false
b) equal degrees of success on each choice are equivalent, which quite unknown, but very likely

You need to be clear on these implicit assumptions when running numbers.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
His point though is that the difference between sympathetic and confident is fairly large. To make them even you'd have to assume that the upfront cost is roughly equivalent to -5 degrees of success, which may or may not seem plausible.
 
Erebeal said:
His point though is that the difference between sympathetic and confident is fairly large. To make them even you'd have to assume that the upfront cost is roughly equivalent to -5 degrees of success, which may or may not seem plausible.
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It's also assuming 5 degree of success is on the same scale between the choices, aka the point I was making with (b)
 
Inserted tally
Adhoc vote count started by sleepypanda on Apr 14, 2020 at 8:27 PM, finished with 85 posts and 44 votes.
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Black Noise said:
To put this in perspective, here's graphs for at least N degrees of success for each approach, assuming +10 per degree
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Very useful maths, thank you!

There have been some good points for sympathy that made me think about whether the higher cost was worth it:
lioli said:
For example, while we have escape talismans, we were asked to not actually use them if all possible. If we can ensure this fungus can remain a safe route, it would make the journey back up easier and possibly save time.
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picklepikkl said:
Specifically, the thing I am hoping for from a high-DoS win here is "information about what else is around." This whole thing is an intel mission, let's cultivate some
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But, ultimately I am happy to leave those possibilities as bonuses if we roll really well, as unlikely as that is. In choosing between sympathetic and confident, I am deciding based on flavour. Which approach do I want to see Ling Qi take when negotiating on a mission? How efficient will she be when given tasks? I don't think that under these circumstances it is appropriate to try for the perfect result.

[X] Confident Approach (Base Success 45+, 2 rolls, less time consuming, lower cost.)
 
[X] Confident Approach (Base Success 45+, 2 rolls, less time consuming, lower cost.)
 
[X] Sympathetic approach (Base success 30+, 3 rolls, more time consuming, higher cost.)
 
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[X] Sympathetic approach (Base success 30+, 3 rolls, more time consuming, higher cost.)

We want to develop our kind and caring nature while building our insights into weakness.
 
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