A Simple Transaction I

Talace said:

Hmm... Okay. These are also fair points. Just to clarify, this also delays Preeminence and Domain, both of which provide meaningful bonuses independent of Ruling Ring, and delaying that does affect our ability to express Rank in a meaningful way. I'd also like to put forward that Rank is similarly a holistic buff to everything we do, drastically reducing the chance of failure and offsetting its costs.

Nonetheless, this particular issue is dependent on a disagreement that is unwieldy and hard to resolve (due to a large amount of variables to take into account): Is the net benefit of Wreath now + Delaying Ring picks and Ruling Ring larger than Ring Picks ASAP, Ruling Ring ASAP, Wreath maybe later?

Thus, I'll take another stab at a different point.

Consider the sheer utility of Philosopher's Wreath: unlocking and hastening the rate of advancement for a magic system we have previously encountered. It makes more sense to me to reserve picking this option until after we have either encountered a magic system that synergizes with our existing ones, one that opens up new avenues for Progression, or one that is exceedingly powerful. We have many opportunities suited for encountering said magic systems (going to the Encampment, clearing the Inner Temple, going to civilization, meeting the Wandering Magus, even), and as such it is a waste to use on a magic system we already have (Surgecrafting) or unlock a system inherent to us (Soul Evocation) that we already have ways of unlocking.

As such, Philosopher's Wreath is a powerful tool that must be conserved, not used to gain short-term power than can be acquired in other ways.

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That's not the only thing it does! It also "substantially increasing both the variety and the conceptual potency of effects available to it"

Think of it as how King's Sceptre made Accretion even more broken and stronger. It shouldn't be seen as merely an short term power increase. It increases the potential of the magic system.

Zampano said:

May I ask why you're selecting Control? It seems to be mostly aimed at resolving the drawback that an Edeldross surge might accidentally buff an enemy. But that's only likely to happen if we recruit an ally who would be involved in melee combat on the front line.

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Rihaku has stated that it's MUCH easier to train magnitude for surgecraft than control. As such, I figure that we'll get magnitude training just by using it in battle, but we might not get much or any control training in battle. To be honest though, I think any of the three options will be good, I just have a slight preference for control.

[X] Vigor Itself
[X] Vigor Itself x2
[X] Magnitude

Might as well. Stats are nice and reaping the benefits of blood buffs is always nice.

DkArthas said:

That's not the only thing it does! It also "substantially increasing both the variety and the conceptual potency of effects available to it"

Think of it as how King's Sceptre made Accretion even more broken and stronger. It shouldn't be seen as merely an short term power increase. It increases the potential of the magic system.

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True, but the point I'm making is that unlocking a new magic system is a massively powerful thing, much much more than making a system stronger and more potent. The one thing better than a "varied, conceptually potent magic system" is "a good system, plus a new system that is varied and conceptually potent"!

Talace said:

True, but the point I'm making is that unlocking a new magic system is a massively powerful thing, much much more than making a system stronger and more potent. The one thing better than a "varied, conceptually potent magic system" is "a good system, plus a new system that is varied and conceptually potent"!

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Yeah but multiple magic systems with no multipliers also means that we will be forced to spilt our attention between them while having the Ring debuff that penalize normal training without real stacks. It might result in us failing to exploit even one of those properly in the short to medium term!

People are going for The Ruling Ring, Rune King might no longer remain an option since we might just heal our eyes normally. So any multiplier to magic is pretty amazing for us. It would allow us to grow stronger to an appreciable degree while not fighting.

Current vote count?

Garlak said:

Question, could this signature thing be applied to Spacebattles too and not just Sufficientvelocity?

i.e. Could people advertise this quest in their Spacebattles signature too and get points that way too?

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If you post a significant amount on Spacebattles, sure, why not.

Cerillian said:

Letrizia at least has been stated to be of very low Rank currently:

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She's in the Low rank category, but her Rank isn't necessarily low within there!

Talace said:

Hmm... Okay. These are also fair points. Just to clarify, this also delays Preeminence and Domain, both of which provide meaningful bonuses independent of Ruling Ring, and delaying that does affect our ability to express Rank in a meaningful way. I'd also like to put forward that Rank is similarly a holistic buff to everything we do, drastically reducing the chance of failure and offsetting its costs.

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Another thing i'll bring up is that Ruling Wreath will help with Letz Sharpbright stuff, which will in turn help her study astral rank and ways to boost it, which may in turn help uslearn how to either boost or better utilize ours kind of like how Edeldross means we can now benefit much more from Gisena's research.

Talace said:

Thus, I'll take another stab at a different point.

Consider the sheer utility of Philosopher's Wreath: unlocking and hastening the rate of advancement for a magic system we have previously encountered. It makes more sense to me to reserve picking this option until after we have either encountered a magic system that synergizes with our existing ones, one that opens up new avenues for Progression, or one that is exceedingly powerful. We have many opportunities suited for encountering said magic systems (going to the Encampment, clearing the Inner Temple, going to civilization, meeting the Wandering Magus, even), and as such it is a waste to use on a magic system we already have (Surgecrafting) or unlock a system inherent to us (Soul Evocation) that we already have ways of unlocking.

As such, Philosopher's Wreath is a powerful tool that must be conserved, not used to gain short-term power than can be acquired in other ways.

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Talace said:

True, but the point I'm making is that unlocking a new magic system is a massively powerful thing, much much more than making a system stronger and more potent. The one thing better than a "varied, conceptually potent magic system" is "a good system, plus a new system that is varied and conceptually potent"!

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I think that's a good tack to take, but I think their's another way to look at it. No matter how many magic systems we pick up or encounter, their's always going to be the phantom glimmer of another hypothetical magical system that will give a even better benefit when wreathed. However, the best buff to our advancement rate is always going to be gated behind having it in the first place, by a incredible magnitude. A 300% multiplier on something that advanced without picks is nothing to sneeze at, after all. Considering that we would have even been able to pick up vertice beforehand, I have no problem believing we won't have trouble getting new magics systems in non wreath, maybe even easier ways.


Contrast that against the downsides of not taking it at the moment. Every update where we don't take it is going to be one where both us and our allies ar elagging behind further then otherwise would have due to a much slower advancement rate, and every update we don't have the ring boosting that, well i'm sure you can see how that would incentivize people to go for the RIng when their able to actually look at the tangible benefits of better advancement and how it helps us. Plus aside from it netting us even moremagical pseudo systems in Findross which was behind more then one magic system in the original cursebearer quest and graces, this could help incredibly well withthe main features of our build.

Namely, well, Lord Hunger's artifacts. Imagine a world where Hunger or Gisena figures out how to apply perfect to the Ring or the Morning Sky, or maybe even Renewal towards the sword in such a way as it grows closer towards the power it had when it was the tool of the Forebear?

DkArthas said:

Yeah but multiple magic systems with no multipliers also means that we will be forced to spilt our attention between them while having the Ring debuff that penalize normal training without real stacks. It might result in us failing to exploit even one of those properly in the short to medium term!

Since people are going for The Ruling Ring, Rune King might no longer remain an option since we might just heal our eyes normally. So any multiplier to magic is pretty amazing for us. It would allow us to grow stronger to an appreciable degree while not fighting.

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I disagree! We'd have multiple magic systems with all our existing bonuses plus potentially Ruling Ring bonuses. The splitting attention point is less relevant if we already have our Ring, and thus the need to save is majorly lessened (unless ya'll wanna hunt for Total Eclipse/Pillars right away?). Rune King is great! I'd like to get it as soon as we can! Also, can't we just choose to not heal our eyes?

Just to add on to the point about saving it to unlock new magic systems, keep in mind it caps out at unlocking ones at Noble Praxis level, so not only does it not gaurantee that we'll be able to get any magic system we encounter, but when I brought up the possibility of unlocking the Noble Praxis itself with it Rihaku questioned the benefit of it in comparison to using it to boost Edeldross Surgecrafting. Not to mention it's perfect themes and stat boosting is going to be able to help us cast, and possibly advance faster then other magic systems less focused on such stuff.

DkArthas said:

Since people are going for The Ruling Ring, Rune King might no longer remain an option since we might just heal our eyes normally.

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Seems like a silly assumption. Rune King is based off of ontological sympathy with Odin.

Odin didn't gain knowledge of magic by not healing an eye he'd already lost, he gouged it out for that knowledge. If anything, I would suspect that Hunger restoring his eye and then taking Rune King would offer greater benefits, since the metaphysical act of sacrifice will be much more closely aligned with the actuality of Odin's own bargain for knowledge.

And hey, Odin also hung himself in that myth. And Hunger can kill himself without dying. Sacrifice your first (better) form for magic! You'll weaken yourself and disappoint the Forebear, but that's a small price for more magic, isn't it?

(this is not a serious suggestion; do not do this)

Odin gave his eye without it being blind first. I don't see why healing the eye would stop us from sacrificing it.

Edit: So ninja'd I'm almost on fire.

Yeah. Good point. Still, convincing people to mutilate ourself might be harder! But I suppose potentially greater benefits might make up for it.

Sara said:

I think that's a good tack to take, but I think their's another way to look at it. No matter how many magic systems we pick up or encounter, their's always going to be the phantom glimmer of another hypothetical magical system that will give a even better benefit when wreathed. However, the best buff to our advancement rate is always going to be gated behind having it in the first place, by a incredible magnitude. A 300% multiplier on something that advanced without picks is nothing to sneeze at, after all. Considering that we would have even been able to pick up vertice beforehand, I have no problem believing we won't have trouble getting new magics systems in non wreath, maybe even easier ways.


Contrast that against the downsides of not taking it at the moment. Every update where we don't take it is going to be one where both us and our allies ar elagging behind further then otherwise would have due to a much slower advancement rate, and every update we don't have the ring boosting that, well i'm sure you can see how that would incentivize people to go for the RIng when their able to actually look at the tangible benefits of better advancement and how it helps us. Plus aside from it netting us even moremagical pseudo systems in Findross which was behind more then one magic system in the original cursebearer quest and graces, this could help incredibly well withthe main features of our build.

Namely, well, Lord Hunger's artifacts. Imagine a world where Hunger or Gisena figures out how to apply perfect to the Ring or the Morning Sky, or maybe even Renewal towards the sword in such a way as it grows closer towards the power it had when it was the tool of the Forebear?

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The point of infinite comparison doesn't work since there's a cap to how good the system can be! Additionally, their advancement might be comparatively slower, but I don't think this reaches the point of unacceptably slow for me. This is because we trade off their power and advancement for achieving the buffs as soon as possible!

Besides that, we also have to weigh that against the prospective Blood Advancements that are guaranteed to be as good (efficiency-wise) as the benefits you mention! Our Blood Advancements already buff others, as well as have buffs adjacent to existing systems.

Essentially, the point I'm making is that a significant increase in a good magic system is less important than keeping that same magic system at base, and adding another magic system (with the same level of significant increase) that might have compounding benefits. Imagine if we had Battle Mastery, how much more efficient all our attacks would be, how difficult it would be to exert our body to the point of exertion. Imagine if we had Geomancy, and became O N E W I T H T H E W O R L D while at the same time perfecting that with a singularity of Edeldross and Findross? Magic systems are always better when compounding. Rihaku offered wonderful options with Surgecraft, and it would be wonderful to plumb the depths of his imagination (and learn about all the magic systems we missed out on).

Dark Abstraction said:

Seems like a silly assumption. Rune King is based off of ontological sympathy with Odin.

Odin didn't gain knowledge by not healing an eye he'd already lost, he gouged it out for that knowledge. If anything, I would suspect that Hunger restoring his eye and then taking Rune King would offer greater benefits, since the metaphysical act of sacrifice will be much more closely aligned with the actuality of Odin's own bargain for knowledge.

And hey, Odin also hung himself in that myth. And Hunger can kill himself without dying. Sacrifice your first (better) form for magic! You'll weaken yourself and disappoint the Forebear, but that's a small price for more magic, isn't it?

(this is not a serious suggestion; do not do this)

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If Hunger knew ripping out his recently healed eye would make him stronger, he would probably do it! Imagine a Super Rune King where we apply [To Shatter Heaven] to every Buildvote!

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The strongest argument against Wreath right now is that Surgecasting was unlocked with a vial of blood and a long shower. Wreath has the ability to purchase magic systems with much more esoteric requirements.

One can imagine ever-more specific reagents or rituals for future magic systems. Consider a system with an access ritual that requires us to harvest the dew from the leaves of a plant watered by the blood of our enemies with whom we've now made peace. That's just step 2 of 247 distinct elements...

My point is that spending Wreath on Surgecasting sacrifices a large part of the versatility that makes the option so powerful to begin with. I'd vote for a Soul Evocation Wreath in a heartbeat, or really any magic system that we don't already have access to.

Zampano said:

The strongest argument against Wreath right now is that Surgecasting was unlocked with a vial of blood and a long shower. Wreath has the ability to purchase magic systems with much more esoteric requirements.

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Imagine getting Chrysopoeia! Now that's TWO perfecting systems, compounding synergistically. (Unless, of course, Chrysopoeia is above the Noble Praxis).

Talace said:

The point of infinite comparison doesn't work since there's a cap to how good the system can be! Additionally, their advancement might be comparatively slower, but I don't think this reaches the point of unacceptably slow for me. This is because we trade off their power and advancement for achieving the buffs as soon as possible!

Besides that, we also have to weigh that against the prospective Blood Advancements that are guaranteed to be as good (efficiency-wise) as the benefits you mention! Our Blood Advancements already buff others, as well as have buffs adjacent to existing systems.

Essentially, the point I'm making is that a significant increase in a good magic system is less important than keeping that same magic system at base, and adding another magic system (with the same level of significant increase) that might have compounding benefits. Imagine if we had Battle Mastery, how much more efficient all our attacks would be, how difficult it would be to exert our body to the point of exertion. Imagine if we had Geomancy, and became O N E W I T H T H E W O R L D while at the same time perfecting that with a singularity of Edeldross and Findross? Magic systems are always better when compounding. Rihaku offered wonderful options with Surgecraft, and it would be wonderful to plumb the depths of his imagination (and learn about all the magic systems we missed out on).

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While it's overall potency is capped at Noble Praxis, keep in mind that even Noble Praxis has things it's specializatizes in at the detriment of others. Infinite Comparison creeps in when you start to think that their could always be a magic system that sacrifices more things we don't care about for things we do, or that we might get a option that makes us want to go in a different direction.

While that is true of Blood Advancement, the great thing is that Edeldross surgecraft doesn't just buff existing systems, because of their reliance on stats and the ability to work on other characters, it potentially buffs ALL existing systems, including our advancement rate and our allies, which will provide recursive buffs to us. it's better then getting one more Blood Advancement option to take to boost ruling ring in my eyes, and more exclusive to boot. Given Edeldross potential, even multiple perfection boosting magics especially if it only works on ourselves working together might pale in comparison to one with a boosted advancement rate to such a high degree even if we take out all the updates of tripled advancement we'd potentially be missing out on.

But let's turn this around. This is a vote for Philosopher's wreath, not neccesarrily what we'll apply it too. We already have the option to take new magical systems. If you believe that the benefits of compounding are better then specialization, even advancement focused specialization, then we have a chance to apply that right now by taking either Soul Evocation, Sorcery, and possibly even unlocking the entire Noble Praxis. This would still make it so our allies don't lose up on any inbetween updates of potential boosted advancement. And if none of those options entice you or other players now, why are you so sure they will in the future when they might potentially be fighting with shinier and newer options of new magic systems then the one's we can get right now?

Btw, if we are offered Linear Halo again, it's going to look much more attractive with our higher stats. Not sure it applies to Edeldross, since it can only be applied to formal and systemic types of magic, though given Gisena is able to research Graces for it, I would say yes. Man, so many options, so little Arete...

[X] Vigor Itself
[X] Vigor Itself x2
[X] Control

Wreath has already evolved once when we unlocked magic systems. I'm curious what it will do if we get then decently mastered before unlocking it, as I suspect it will have yet another new effect.

Besides we're probably almost to the Ring and the growth rate is insane enough even the Inner Temple will fall if we manage to win a single serious fight with it. I'm very curious what ++progression will do to weakish things like Opalescence that arent worth buying now. Amd if it will help any with arete prices.

DkArthas said:

Yeah. Good point. Still, convincing people to mutilate ourself might be harder! But I suppose potentially greater benefits might make up for it.

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I've said in the past, but I would definitely vote to mutilate ourselves if it was thematic. I just won't do so by locking in maimings that the Tyrant caused. He's the past, and the wounds he caused should be as well. If we're gonna be crippled, it should be because we chose to personally wield the knife that carves away selfhood for supremacy.

Sara said:

While it's over potency is capped at Noble Praxis, keep in mind that even Noble Praxis has things it's specializatizes in at the detriment of others. Inifnite Comparison creeps in when you start to think that their could always be a magic system that sacrifices more things we don't care about for things we do, or that we might get a option that makes us want to go in a different direction.

While that is true of Blood Advancement, the great thing is that Edeldross surgecraft doesn't just buff existing systems, because of their reliance on stats and the ability to work on other characters, it potentially buffs ALL existing systems, including our advancement rate and our allies, which will provide recursive buffs to us. it's better then getting one more Blood Advancement option to take to boost ruling ring in my eyes, and more exclusive to boot. Given Edeldross potential, even multiple perfection boosting magics especially if it only works on ourselves working together might pale in comparison to one with a boosted advancement rate to such a high degree even if we take out all the updates of tripled advancement we'd potentially be missing out on.

But let's turn this around. This is a vote for Philosopher's wreath, not neccesarrily what we'll apply it too. We already have the option to take new magical systems. If you believe that the benefits of compounding are better then specialization, even advancement focused specialization, then we have a chance to apply that right now by taking either Soul Evocation, Sorcery, and possibly even unlocking the entire Noble Praxis. This would still make it so our allies don't lose up on any inbetween updates of potential boosted advancement. And if none of those options entice you or other players now, why are you so sure they will in the future when they might potentially be fighting with shinier and newer options of new magic systems then the one's we can get right now?

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There are a few choices I'm pretty sure we as a voterbase would be willing to take-- a magic system like Chrysopoeia, the Ordinal Spiral, Battle Mastery, and the like. All-in-all, there's quite a lot of people willing to vote Philosopher's right now, so I don't think there's a shortage of readiness for PW.

Again, recursive buffs might just be less effective than a single combat update with ++Progression! I could spend time elaborating that this would be better than the compounding buffs of Edeldross, but I'm quite sure that this is a deadlock at this time.

This last point is intelligently made. First-- deconstruction. I don't think we'll be getting the Noble Praxis, since Cut Through is pretty explicitly only part of the greater whole, and beyond that it doesn't have access to the underlying principles of reality that we need permission from the Accursed from first. Beyond that, we still have pretty strong ally boosters available to us right now (Undying Vanguard, Ennobling, hell, Augment Dominion) and while it's true that they all have costs, I don't expect the new ally boosting from Edeldross to not have costs as well. Secondly-- Soul Evocation has a potential unlock from Winter Moon (IIRC) and Sorcery is concedably good, but I'll make a judgement call here and say that a redundancy in Sorcery is less versatile/effective than a new scope of non-perfection related magics. Also, I don't wanna play a Sorcerer again, but that's just me.

But ultimately, I don't think we should take it right now because I don't think we're currently in need of a magic system right now. A vote practicing magic to receive a long-term holistic stacking buff which in the short term provides the same amount of stats as a pure STATS pick costs another day having not cleared the Temple! We burn time, and time spent learning now is suboptimal.

Talace said:

A vote practicing magic to receive a long-term holistic stacking buff which in the short term provides the same amount of stats as a pure STATS pick costs another day having not cleared the Temple! We burn time, and time spent learning now is suboptimal.

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Nothing here costs more or less time before we return to the temple than anything else. The training is going to happen regardless of what wins here.

[X] Vigor Itself
[X] Vigor Itself x2
[X] Magnitude

Conjured Blade said:

Nothing here costs more or less time before we return to the temple than anything else. The training is going to happen regardless of what wins here.

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Additional time practicing and maximizing the value of Edeldross through Philosopher's Wreath outside of the dedicated time training! This is the prerequisite to get all the best-case scenario benefits of PW-- time, space, breathing room. STATS is good in that it is comparatively more compact and time-efficient to get similar results with less potential!

honestly burned out of all this Temple and Ruling Ring stuff
have read too much salt about it on both sides that I don't think I'll ever enjoy us having it