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A Simple Transaction I

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You could do what they do over in MfD and link the winning plan in the title. In your case I suppose you could just link the final vote tally post. That requires people figuring out the chapter titles are links (or contain links) and actually clicking it to be spoiled. In my experience at least it's less tempting than a spoiler box, as it is more effort.
 
Rihaku said:
An interesting theory! I would say that your last point means that one does not need to operate out of concerns for practicality at such stages, so there is no particular need to curate the timelines one may or may not be associated with.
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Well no, I was assuming it was more an autonomous function along the lines of a human's body folding proteins. As in, instead of "timelines/universe that contain the Accursed" it would be more accurate to define them as "timelines/universe that are part of the Accursed" unless he deliberately chooses otherwise.

As simply by visiting a universe the flow of causality goes from "The Giant Spaghetti Monster created the multiverse therefore the universe exists" to "The Accursed added a multiverse created by the Giant Spaghetti Monster to 'the set of multiverses visited by The Accursed', therefore the multiverse exists, therefore the Giant Spaghetti Monster created it, therefore the Giant Spaghetti Monster exists".

And suddenly I'm imagining The Accursed in a phase of grandfatherly amused contempt "oh you kids and your war of multiversal destruction, what schenanigans. Why back in MY day you had to walk 5 trillion miles to school uphill both ways before you did anything like that. And yes I do mean YOU, not me you young whippersnapper. Of course you also used to have Fleebums, don't see those around much anymore. I do miss me some good old Fleebums. When I get done talking with you I should probably go and reset your omniverse back to when you had Fleebums. Have I ever told you about the time I did that and overshot and then had to seduce my past self because of one of my curses? Well you see ..."
 
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Simon_Jester said:
I guess that's fair... though anyone who cares to can just look up the winning vote, so I'm kind of at a loss to see how it would be a form of spoiler... ;)
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Sometimes you actually can't look up the winning vote if it won based on arguments and omake power rather than raw votes. But I usually just scroll to the bottom of the update first to see what won but sometimes I see the next options instead and end up spoiling myself that way.
 
Unelemental said:
Edit: Unless we ignore the Odyssial hints and go with this suggestion, so he would have gotten the power through the Curses, slowly bleeding his potential as he creates Cursebearers? But then why would he do that? Hard to imagine someone like that going "oops, I've taken too many Curses to get here, let me back up some".
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My (evidently incorrect) thought was that making Cursebearers was both a method of mitigation (just like we can mitigate curses without losing the power they earned us, by instead sacrificing power we could have achieved USING the power they earned us) and also a method of acting upon the omniverse. A vector by which some power or ability is used.
 
I mean, just from reading the update posts alone more or less, my impression has been that the Accursed operates under so many curses that it makes it very difficult for him to function, despite his immense power. I'm reminded of the role of the geas in Celtic mythology.

Heroic figures like Cuchulain had to be very careful about what they did sometimes, due to multiple interlocking curses that would kill them if they didn't follow their codes.

Cuchulain, for example, among many other geasa, would die if he ate dog meat, but would also die if he refused food offered to him by a woman. When a woman who wanted him dead learned about this, It Did Not Go Well.
 
Rihaku said:
An interesting theory! I would say that your last point means that one does not need to operate out of concerns for practicality at such stages, so there is no particular need to curate the timelines one may or may not be associated with.
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So the Accursed (or some Cursebearer) allows any advanced civilization/people to access perhaps an infinitesimal fragment of his power in exchange for appropriate amounts of cursing? Seems reasonable as a mitigation method. Makes you wonder if humanity's 8 hour day/night cycle is actually a minute fragment of the Curse of Slumber..

He certainly had no opposition at all the creation of the Broken Kaleidoscope, though, that's for sure.
 
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mastigos said:
My (evidently incorrect) thought was that making Cursebearers was both a method of mitigation (just like we can mitigate curses without losing the power they earned us, by instead sacrificing power we could have achieved USING the power they earned us) and also a method of acting upon the omniverse. A vector by which some power or ability is used.
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Well, at his level the Accursed can probably do that either way. He's limited in many ways by his Curses, but he's also way better at mitigating them and acting around them than any number of Cursebearers, so he might not need to actively or even passively exert his power, he'd just choose specific people as Cursebearers that are likely to further his goals.

We've also speculated whether the number of his Curses is constant. If we go with the 'lots of monsters ganged up on him and thus Curses' theory, then the amount of Curses might increase as he gets into more fights - with Curses being expressions of unhealable wounds at a conceptual level we don't have the literary tools to describe. So he might also be too busy simply surviving to do much else other than getting rid of Curses through creating Cursebearers.

Hopefully we won't encounter his enemies' agents anytime soon if that's the case.
 
mastigos said:
Well no, I was assuming it was more an autonomous function along the lines of a human's body folding proteins. As in, instead of "timelines/universe that contain the Accursed" it would be more accurate to define them as "timelines/universe that are part of the Accursed" unless he deliberately chooses otherwise.
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He's beyond logic / necessity, so he doesn't need to have powers that are constrained by making sense. There's no limitation of action economy and no implicate causality behind any action or inaction beyond what he wishes to assign, so there's no need to have a system whereby universes that are necessarily inferior to him in scope/scale are 'part of' him or not.

Simon_Jester said:
I mean, just from reading the update posts alone more or less, my impression has been that the Accursed operates under so many curses that it makes it very difficult for him to function, despite his immense power. I'm reminded of the role of the geas in Celtic mythology.
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That's more or less true, but he does have carveouts and mitigation methods sufficient to act as he pleases for the really important stuff, and similarly smaller carveouts reserving a smaller portion of latitude for less proportionally important things. Basically, whenever he's not acting it's because of a Curse, and whenever he's acting he has the appropriate mitigations for that scenario.

Unelemental said:
Well, at his level the Accursed can probably do that either way. He's limited in many ways by his Curses, but he's also way better at mitigating them and acting around them than any number of Cursebearers, so he might not need to actively or even passively exert his power, he'd just choose specific people as Cursebearers that are likely to further his goals.

We've also speculated whether the number of his Curses is constant. If we go with the 'lots of monsters ganged up on him and thus Curses' theory, then the amount of Curses might increase as he gets into more fights - with Curses being expressions of unhealable wounds at a conceptual level we don't have the literary tools to describe. So he might also be too busy simply surviving to do much else other than getting rid of Curses through creating Cursebearers.

Hopefully we won't encounter his enemies' agents anytime soon if that's the case.
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Even now in his Cursed state the Accursed is individually more powerful than any single opponent of his. Kind of necessary in order to be the end of power level debates!
 
Rihaku said:
That's more or less true, but he does have carveouts and mitigation methods sufficient to act as he pleases for the really important stuff, and similarly smaller carveouts reserving a smaller portion of latitude for less proportionally important things. Basically, whenever he's not acting it's because of a Curse, and whenever he's acting he has the appropriate mitigations for that scenario.
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Of course, you could flip that wording around and say "the Accursed has so many curses that except where he's able to lawyer an exception or keep some of them at bay strategically, he's unable to act at all." ;)
 
Blorcyn said:
This really impressed me. Did you come up with it on the fly following the arrete choices, or did you have it in the wings, waiting to mix it up until there were three things chosen?
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Thanks! The former, but the idea that the hero would be constrained to three Accretion slots (unless Progression was used to improve that parameter) was planned for this system.
 
I wonder what the Curses actually mean at the Accursed' power level? Like, what does the Apocryphal Curse do? Is it as some have suggestions, making curses? Create enemies ex nihilo or from the Accursed' own power to expend the Accursed' time?

The more I look at it, the more it seems Cursebearers are more for people that can help do all those not important stuff. Combat Cursebearers in particular seem designed to optimize functionality at the level below where the Accursed can see. Maximizing his ability by creating as many Avatars that can act without being burdened..
 
Hey Rihaku, what was Kong's Seram level? I would ask for Nameless, but he grows too fast for that, so Kong is a good benchmark.
 
Can the Accursed make a defense so powerful that even he couldn't break it?

He represents the end of the power scale. Almost-God but with the shackles of Curses that give him purpose before he ascends and becomes God in truth. Maybe when he offloads enough of his Curses it heralds the end of the universe as he remakes it into one more to his liking.

The most interesting build I think for a Cursebearer would be to take something like pay to win and just load up on Accursed Favor. Could you eventually get to the point where you are best friends with the most powerful thing in existence? Assuming Favor does something like actually raise it an appreciable level there would be a breaking point where the Accursed likes you so much that there are probably some pretty crazy benefits. It would be like being best friends with your boss and god at once. I bet the Accursed knows some pretty good places to play golf.
 
It's a pity we didn't see whether Three Wishes can be upgraded by our LRs. Rechargable Wishes seem pretty crazy.
Sickul said:
Can the Accursed make a defense so powerful that even he couldn't break it?

He represents the end of the power scale. Almost-God but with the shackles of Curses that give him purpose before he ascends and becomes God in truth. Maybe when he offloads enough of his Curses it heralds the end of the universe as he remakes it into one more to his liking.

The most interesting build I think for a Cursebearer would be to take something like pay to win and just load up on Accursed Favor. Could you eventually get to the point where you are best friends with the most powerful thing in existence? Assuming Favor does something like actually raise it an appreciable level there would be a breaking point where the Accursed likes you so much that there are probably some pretty crazy benefits. It would be like being best friends with your boss and god at once. I bet the Accursed knows some pretty good places to play golf.
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Well PtW does let the Cursebearer speak with the Accursed. Maybe one could convert Accursed Favor directly into Lesser Remittances, and acquire more favor by doing quests for the Accursed? It seems plenty powerful.
 
Shard said:
He certainly had no opposition at all the creation of the Broken Kaleidoscope, though, that's for sure.
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I wonder if the reason that option was stated to be unimaginable hubris wasn't because of the Accursed himself, but because Nameless was using time-travel to steal a power set that's probably protected from that brand of nonsense. Why do I get the feeling he would've walked away with different Passions and orb choices because Cursebearer Nameless from the alternate timeline would have stolen his power, killed him, and then casually taken his place?

It's a kaleidoscope, but also a mirror. What do you do when every reflection gazes back?
 
Box Lunch said:
I wonder if the reason that option was stated to be unimaginable hubris wasn't because of the Accursed himself, but because Nameless was using time-travel to steal a power set that's probably protected from that brand of nonsense. Why do I get the feeling he would've walked away with different Passions and orb choices because Cursebearer Nameless from the alternate timeline would have stolen his power, killed him, and then casually taken his place?

It's a kaleidoscope, but also a mirror. What do you do when every reflection gazes back?
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The option states that he's giving an unquiet life to something that does not exist. In his timeline anyway. The version of Nameless we saw got the worst possible Cursrbearer offering though. 3 Curses and 4 Orbs for Combat Class. Ours got 2 Curses for Combat Class..
 
Hm, looks like Robot's trailing, so to overtake the piscine madness gripping the thread we may have to rally around the other alternative. Pass Out combined with the tail end of the update's a natural lead-in to a dream sequence, or at least more hints about Hunger's past. In that sense it could be as interesting as Foremost lore, though less relevant to our current task. We get Arete for prudent or wise decisions and while it won't remove Exhaustion on its own, it's clear Hunger's at the end of his rope. Self-care's important too; he needs to rest and recharge. As the Nightmare Praetor, no time spent sleeping's truly wasted.

[X] Crown
[X] Pass Out
 
Enohthree said:
Idle thought, as I page through old Cursebearer quests. The fact that all curses are ones that the Accursed is transferring to lighten his own burden implies horrifying things about the Doom of Rivalry.
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You're not wrong, but it's not as if the Accursed has peers.

It may compel him to oppose himself on some matters, however.
Shard said:
Wow. So that's like 10x the speed of progression.

Who even needs chronomancy abuse with such crazy multipliers?!
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Hunger. Hunger does. How else could he regularly fit in a year-long nap every night, to be fully rested when Interesting happens.
Rihaku said:
Technically you're trying to graduate from a mere murderhobo to an Emperor! Imperial power flows from the cockpit of a giant robot.
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One should always honor your roots. Incorporate the best parts of murderhobodom into one's personal Emperorship style!
Dark Abstraction said:
A thought occurs to me, which doesn't seem to have gotten a ton of attention. This society knows about the Curse of Decimation because the Armaments have it;
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This Armament has it. Other Armements are linked to a Curse, but not necessarily the same one, as I understand.
Byzantine said:
You could do what they do over in MfD and link the winning plan in the title. In your case I suppose you could just link the final vote tally post. That requires people figuring out the chapter titles are links (or contain links) and actually clicking it to be spoiled. In my experience at least it's less tempting than a spoiler box, as it is more effort.
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Not that we know what the winning plan is, based on votes alone. That is at most two-thirds of the what goes into determining the winning choice. Possibly less.

Orm Embar said:
Hm, looks like Robot's trailing, so to overtake the piscine madness gripping the thread we may have to rally around the other alternative.
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I see no reason to resist piscine madness, though.

[X] Crown
[X] Dress the Fish
 
Is it truly madness or just an overabundance of sanity? We fished, we caught a fish, now we want to dress the fish. Some would say this is the natural order of things!
 
I mean, it's literally +? and +Gisena vs 1 Arete. It just depends on what you find more efficient.

Also interacting with Gisena vs Evening Sky flashbacks.
 
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