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A Simple Transaction I

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Sharkey_smt said:
99% of YA is crap.
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This is actually a genre I've enjoyed quite a lot of, so let's see. Spellbinder (and it's sequel, The Midnight Gate), Conrad's Fate, the first five Pure Dead Magic books, City of Fire, The Rithmatist, Blackbringer (although not its' sequel), the first two May Bird books, and arguably I Am Not A Serial Killer. (In the same series, the third one and the interquel are the other good ones, and the interquel isn't quite as YA.) Oh, and the whole Fablehaven series except the first one, which I haven't read, and the second two Tiffany Aching books, since again I haven't read the first two. And the eponymous second The Dark is Rising book, although I didn't really like the others.
Repeating authors, Archer's Goon, A Tale of Time City, all but the last in the Pure Dead Magic series, Partials (but not its' sequels), and Skyward if you can tolerate the deeply unnecessary psychic FTL.
Stuff I'd recommend with slight reservation, in that they aren't entirely to my taste: Paranormalcy, Transparent (the one by Natalie Whipple), Enchanted Glass, all the other Chrestomanci books, everything by Patricia C. Wrede, Skulduggery Pleasant, The Amulet of Samarkand, and the first three Harry Potter books. Also, honorable mention to Hounds of the Morrigan, Chronicles of Narnia, and The Last Unicorn, which arguably don't count as YA, and I have reservations about even if I love them.
And that's without covering comics at all.
(Apothecia and W.I.T.C.H., off the top of my head, though the latter's translation was sabotaged by Disney after their deeply disrespectful adaptation bombed.)
Sharkey_smt said:
100% of YA where the MC is a heroine with unique powers and a love triangle is crap.
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Teenage love triangle is generally a bad sign, but I think Fablehaven might have pulled it off - I don't remember if there was more than one interesting/interested boy at once - I Shall Wear Midnight lacks the unique powers angle but hinges on the love triangle, Blackbringer could almost certainly have gotten away with it because the heroine's like in her 20s, but I don't remember if it bothered, and Skulduggery Pleasant was definitely worse off for the romantic subplots. Transparent mostly pulls it off, though.
Sharkey_smt said:
Recently I read Little Brother by Cory Doctorow and I liked it. Give it a go if you have time
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Mom started that; apparently it had smut. My family reads YA because it's generally the one genre besides middlegrade that's both fairly clean and often clever enough to be interesting, which is to say that if it isn't clean, it's rather badly missing the point.

(Middlegrade recs: The Adventures of King Midas, Team Spy Gear, the Bruno and Boots series, the Mindwarps series (at least up to book 10 or so, which is all my library had), Asylum for Nightface, and The Adventures of Anatole. My Father's Dragon maybe also counts?)
Zampano said:
but... we've all read those books already?
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I actually haven't! He's also missed Phillip K. Dick's stuff. But dystopian recs would need a different writeup, and I'm already up far past my bedtime. Oh, actually, there is a dystopian YA I remember and kind of liked - EPIC, by Conor Kostick. The premise was bizarre, but kind of fun. I don't think the sequel was a good idea, though.

(Also, two different trilogies I thought were dead have turned out to have endings published in like 2013. Huh. Hopefully Spellbinder #3 is good.)
 
Bloodcasting Tactic:

Our bloodcasting Rank advantage might be as high as +0.6, depending on whether Procyon's Rank is exactly 10 and whether it has any +Defensive Rank. That puts us somewhere between 'overwhelmingly' (+0.5) and 'insurmountably' (+1.0) higher than Procyon.

BUT! Procyon doesn't have any blood and the Pilot's body is subsumed by Totality. What can we do?

Hunger can bleed on Procyon. The Legions could bleed on Procyon. Verschlengorge could bleed on Procyon. Maybe the Walls of Myth are powered by the life-blood of the Arcanist and they can bleed on Procyon too.

The blood of Procyon's victims might be a vector for a pretty major combat malus. Plague, Rust, Karmic Debt... these are usually long term considerations but when Procyon's ultimate Trump Card is so tiring to activate, any one of these might tip the balance and delay or prevent its deployment.

Versch's blood might be uniquely effective as part of a ritual to ensure retribution for his executioner. It's possible that Versch wouldn't even have to die in this scenario: Procyon's pilot already has blood on his hands by allying with the Astral Denizens who are so focused on killing Armaments.
 
runeblue360 said:
We've got precise control over Deathly Star; does that extend to the focus of its attack? For example, rather than the full gradient of Procyon's existence, could we specify its spirit/soul and try to weaken its Rank like that, boosting with Artful Thorn if need be?
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The Deathly Star already goes full-out on every vector it can attack. Turning certain vectors off doesn't strengthen the others. It's a full-court press!

Similarly, there's no difference whether you execute it in the physical realm or halfway into Realm of Forms. It's already doing its best.
 
TooSlow said:
Are the costs greater than the wounds it inflicts?
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From the rotbeast fight, overusing Artful Thorn looked to be threatening us with an Exhaustion-type debuff.

Of course, R's phrasing "Adorie's cost reduction is substantial, but least useful in this application" implies that there is some other application in which Adorie's cost reduction would be more useful. Maybe it's better to just spam discounted Refinement of Quickness + Cut Through rather than the more expensive Realm of Forms conceptual attack

I wonder if the Mirellyian bloodline would've reduced the existential diminishment of Follow Through
 
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It's probably just for Quickening, since we're basically relying on it to survive and quartering a flat cost is much better than quartering an exponentially increasing cost.
 
runeblue360 said:
It's probably just for Quickening, since we're basically relying on it to survive and quartering a flat cost is much better than quartering an exponentially increasing cost.
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Mathematically true only if the cost reduction occurs after the exponentiation. Even a minor reduction in the base difficulty would have a dramatic effect on battlefield endurance. As it stands, we should probably expect just a few Thorns, even with Adorie's help. That's why I was hoping to cheese something out of the (oddly detailed) description we got from the Rotbeast fight.

Unfortunately I still don't have any ideas beyond the obvious for 'readied actions' from Gisena or Letrizia.

Gisena Tactics:
  • Manifest a physical instantiation of the True Perfecting Blade and hand it to Hunger so that each jaunt to the Realm of Forms gets two hits.
  • recreate the array of runes Augustine used against Versch for a momentary distraction against Procyon
  • Literally just shoot even one lance of Nullity
  • shoot letrizia's pistol at it

Verschlengorge: Rely on newly installed "Nilfelian Enchantments" as an OOCP for Procyon. Letrizia can pretty much go into a kamikaze / berserker rage here because Procyon is here to kill her, specifically. Any damage short of complete Annihilation can be repaired with the full GDP of Nilfel. (Rihaku would probably point out that Annihilation is more likely than the alternative, but I'm gonna keep up the optimism and maybe someone else will have an idea)
 
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Zampano said:
recreate the array of runes Augustine used against Versch for a momentary distraction against Procyon
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Recreating the soul severing attack Augustine used against us would likely be more effective.
Zampano said:
Verschlengorge: Rely on newly installed "Nilfelian Enchantments" as an OOCP for Procyon.
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Unless Verschlengorge is repaired to Rank 10 I don't think that this will do much at all, other than risking Letrezia and Verschlengorge.
 
TooSlow said:
Recreating the soul severing attack Augustine used against us would likely be more effective.

Unless Verschlengorge is repaired to Rank 10 I don't think that this will do much at all, other than risking Letrezia and Verschlengorge.
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Does Procyon have a soul? That attack seemed pretty uniquely aimed at Hunger. I will be happy to amend my statement to "have Gisena iterate on something we saw from Augustine"

As for Versch, the rank comparisons are all about 1v1 matchups. If Letrizia and Gisena are allowed one "readied action" despite not having reaction times of < 5 milliseconds then the most useful thing Versch could do might be to attempt a grapple. Even if Procyon takes 1 second to gut Versch, that's potentially 5-10 actions freed up for Hunger to tear into Procyon.

Hell, even stepping outside the main gate would be a hell of a ploy if she was aiming for a distraction

Letrizia can heal from any nonlethal injury thanks to the starlight cloak, and Nilfel will have Platinum to spare for Versch's repairs as long as Hunger survives.
 
Rank is derived from the power of the spirit, so presumably he has either a soul or some other method of anchoring his Astral shadow to his physical form.
 
Zampano said:
Does Procyon have a soul?
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Procyon has rank so that is a given.
Zampano said:
As for Versch, the rank comparisons are all about 1v1 matchups. If Letrizia and Gisena are allowed one "readied action" despite not having reaction times of < 5 milliseconds then the most useful thing Versch could do might be to attempt a grapple.
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Verschlengorge gets defeated easily by Hunger when he isn't using his Rank. Procyon will have stats superior to Hunger and will be using his Rank, given that Verslengorge is about 3 Ranks lower than Procyon and that Rank 10 is superior to the infinite stats of a stage 15 cultivator I estimate that Verslengorge and Letrezia will be killed instantly by Procyon the moment they are found by him without Hunger's intervention. The idea of a being with reflexes worse than a fruit fly fighting an Armament at full power in close combat is laughable.
Zampano said:
Even if Procyon takes 1 second to gut Versch, that's potentially 5-10 actions freed up for Hunger to tear into Procyon.
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Having a plan that relies on putting the people we're supposed to be protecting in harms way seems like a terrible idea.
 
The anime opening is about 85-95% ready, frame and animation-wise (personal opinion, but Versch looks swag as fuck,) but we'll still need to wait for a good while before it gets done. I don't really know how to edit and Microwave who offered to do it for me won't be available for some time.

... so, I fulfilled my promise and brought you an anime opening for AST (or, rather, I will bring you one.) Next on the list, I'm thinking...

Video game?
 
Alright, let me go through a quick list of why you should consider Seize The Day:
  • Negative outcome of both options is, in fact, the same. With Shroud, we fail to injure Procyon and then he kicks our ass. With Seize, we fail to convince him and then he kicks our ass. In both cases we burn through all our rerolls and Defensive Wish. However, I think that the difference is that Seize The Day just seems likelier to happen, especially with rerolls
  • Positive outcome of Shroud removes Procyon as a threat and gives us assorted benefits while positive outcome of Seize merely postpones the fight. However, positive outcome of Shroud is still very likely to saddle us with crippling Conditions and perhaps even minor Sundering; meanwhile, powering up correctly might drop Procyon as low as 3-pick fight, which just sounds much more manageable
  • Remember that social combat gives picks. While it's true that picks from social combat are more orientated to social rather than combat, they are still picks, and it's possible to get something that does everything, such as OaF II. Needless to say, stakes here are as high as they get, so we can hope for a way to translate our Arete into the power even if negotiations do break down
  • This option leverages the power of our allies much better. Gisena can actually make argument instead of just being able to do a prepared action, and we've already seen that she has additional insight about Human Sphere
  • Indeed, while Procyon makes it so it's pilot doesn't get instantly charmed, the social combat favor us more, unlike physical throwdown. In fact, this mirrors Forebear's fight with Ur-Mother quite nicely - as such, we can use that as example of what to do and what not to do
  • I feel that this action just has much more room for tactics, which would make it easier to gain better DC
  • Finally, Age and Treachery is more fitting than doing half-assed Follow Through and just hoping that shit works out
E: Like, I can't stress how nice it is to have Gisena be able to chime in here, she has much better idea about what's going on
 
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Some good points Wolfy, but I do find myself doubting their veracity.

Wolfy said:
  • However, I think that the difference is that Seize The Day just seems likelier to happen, especially with rerolls
  • Indeed, while Procyon makes it so it's pilot doesn't get instantly charmed, the social combat favor us more, unlike physical throwdown.
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Where is this exactly coming from? Not from out stats, since they are better at combat, so presumably you assume that the pilot is more susceptible to social combat, but wouldn't Procyon help with that just as well? Additionally, Hunger thinks Shroud was down has a pretty good chance of working and even when it goes sideways, there's still a long shot, assuming we don't fail too badly. Seize the day on the other hand, seems 'unlikely, but possible'. We can assume hungers estimations as correct since Procyon is telegraphing itself.

Wolfy said:
  • However, positive outcome of Shroud is still very likely to saddle us with crippling Conditions and perhaps even minor Sundering
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Based on what? This is the first I've heard of this, is it purely headcanon or is there actually some basis for it? Hunger can survive a lot, and is striking first. This first strike is what either works or won't. So there's 'a pretty good chance that Procyon won't ever strike us at full strength. Our own strike doesn't Cripple or Sunder us, so what's going to? If we do fail, death is more likely. Crippling is possible too, in the event we do win but at a cost, but being sundered is not, since we would be doing that to ourselves and the thread has not voted for it.

Wolfy said:
  • Remember that social combat gives picks. While it's true that picks from social combat are more orientated to social rather than combat, they are still picks, and it's possible to get something that does everything, such as OaF II. Needless to say, stakes here are as high as they get, so we can hope for a way to translate our Arete into the power even if negotiations do break down
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Correct me if this is wrong, but the point you're making is we social combat and might get to buy more power? The plan itself is good on that front, but you seem to be assuming we get picks before it's time for actual combat, which seems to not be the case. It's mentioned that if this does not work, Procyon might at least hesitate briefly, so it doesn't really sound like everything is going on pause and we start voting for new picks, since brief hesitation for Procyon is probably from a second to few microseconds, or smaller.

I do agree that social combat leaves more wiggle room for tactics and approaches. Age and Treachery vs Cut Through is more of an opinion thing, so no comments on that.
 
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TooSlow said:
Having a plan that relies on putting the people we're supposed to be protecting in harms way seems like a terrible idea.
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This is such an unfair description of what was a good faith post. Like... I even gave reasoning for why Letrizia's loss function is not particularly serious for anything short off total annihilation. If you are unwilling to accept any Casualties on our side then why did we let any of the soldiers show up to battle? Why is Adorie on the battlefield at all?

Having a plan that refuses to let someone who is in danger contribute seems like a horrible idea, especially if they are dead either way if you lose.

If it's intolerable to take any allied casualties then Hunger shouldn't have burned Rank in the Armor of Midnight at all. He should've just walked out the gates all by himself and waited for the Accursed to smite Procyon immediately.
 
Saugo said:
Where is this exactly coming from? Not from out stats, since they are better at combat, so presumably you assume that the pilot is more susceptible to social combat, but wouldn't Procyon help with that just as well? Additionally, Hunger thinks Shroud was down has a pretty good chance of working and even when it goes sideways, there's still a long shot, assuming we don't fail too badly. Seize the day on the other hand, seems 'unlikely, but possible'. We can assume hungers estimations as correct since Procyon is telegraphing itself.
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We are not all that better than at social combat though? While we do have some specific combat-related stuff such as Thorn and so on, most of our most important stuff benefits both combat and social(OaFs, Ranks etc) and we do have social specific advancements such as ADS(sadly not applicable here), Silver, Tower, Gleam and so on. Really, the biggest difference is that Aobaru's buff doesn't works on Charisma, but that's easily counteracted with Gisena being fully relevant in diplomacy instead of having just an option of doing a prepared action in actual combat.

Procyon does give it's pilot enhanced Wits and Rank 10 social, but that's it. It's designed for combat, not talking. It has big dick stats, big dick guns and big dick shroud, but it's simply not as good when it comes to talking. And, sure, Rank 10 means that Gisena can't just Appearance him, but we can still dish out some good ol arguments. Like, we had a Forebear update where he was in (more or less) this exact situation. He was against an opponent that exceled in one area, so he pulled her into arena she wasn't good in, and thus won. Armaments are really good at combat, way better than Hunger is. They are, however, not designed to be diplomats, so forcing them in that arena is to our benefit.

When in doubt, just do what Forebear would do.
Based on what? This is the first I've heard of this, is it purely headcanon or is there actually some basis for it? Hunger can survive a lot, and is striking first. This first strike is what either works or won't. So there's 'a pretty good chance that Procyon won't ever strike us at full strength. Our own strike doesn't Cripple or Sunder us, so what's going to? If we do fail, death is more likely. Crippling is possible too, in the event we do win but at a cost, but being sundered is not, since we would be doing that to ourselves and the thread has not voted for it.
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Based on what happens in quest. Even if you win high pick fights with good rolls, it's likely that you will eat Conditions in process(i.e. Vanrier). Current fight is about 95% "you die" and 5% "you somehow manage not to die" which is also likely to be extremely damaging. Sundering is something that might or might not happen, but minor Sundering might be preferable to expending wish.
Correct me if this is wrong, but the point your making is we social combat and might get to buy more power? The plan itself is good on that front, but you seem to be assuming we get picks before it's time for actual combat, which seems to not be the case. It's mentioned that if this does not work, Procyon might at least hesitate briefly, so it doesn't really sound like everything is going on pause and we start voting for new picks, since brief hesitation for Procyon is probably from a second to few microseconds, or smaller.
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Powering mid-combat is a time honored Progression strategy, just this time its not killing but talking. It depends on what ends up happening, exactly, but there are multiple scenarios that can end up with us nabbing a pick or two. For example, Hunger could make an argument that would have Procyon contact his mission control; if that counted as victory we'd have the time he needs to get answer to powerup and strike back.

Getting picks is not certain, but it is certainty something that could happen. As such, it's something we can plan for, either as primary goal or backup plan in case that negotiations fails. For example, we can start negotiations with "we are studying Letrizia" and then end them with deal that exchanges her for bunch of other mages. Then use picks generated by that social combat to power up and smash Procyon before we actually hand Letriza over.

Of course, there's additional uncertainty of social picks giving us something relevant to Procyon fight, but omni-applicability of OaF should hopefully mean that we can nab OaF II. Or just use pick for Praxis I guess.
 
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Wolfy said:
It's designed for combat, not talking. It has big dick stats, big dick guns and big dick shroud, but it's simply not as good when it comes to talking.
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This strikes me as a counterargument to your thesis that Seize might work. Procyon is heavily specced into combat, so it is less likely to engage with us on a social footing. Procyon is powerful enough to Solo the entirety of Nilfel, so it strikes me as unlikely that it would put up with delaying the fight by >30 hours.

Instead, we'll lose the element of surprise & the strategic advantage of doing battle in our chosen battlefield location.
 
Zampano said:
This strikes me as a counterargument to your thesis that Seize might work.
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The very next line:
And, sure, Rank 10 means that Gisena can't just Appearance him
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Armament is not exactly vulnerable to this, either, he just doesn't have overwhelming edge it boasts in physical confrontation. After that, it's just question of priorities. He can decide to forfeit the lives of everyone involved, sure, but cutting edge military tech and hard to get mages both have non-trivial value. As long as value of our hostages and evading the risks of fight outweighs the risk of losing Letrizia or losing time, there's no reason not to talk, really.

Especially since we don't want to "defeat" him in social combat, we just want time and picks.
 
Wolfy said:
The very next line:

Armament is not exactly vulnerable to this, either, he just doesn't have overwhelming edge it boasts in physical confrontation. After that, it's just question of priorities. He can decide to forfeit the lives of everyone involved, sure, but cutting edge military tech and hard to get mages both have non-trivial value. As long as value of our hostages and evading the risks of fight outweighs the risk of losing Letrizia or losing time, there's no reason not to talk, really.

Especially since we don't want to "defeat" him in social combat, we just want time and picks.
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The next line isn't a rebuttal. The post I'm responding to brings up the example of the Forebear cutting through someone who tries to social their way out of certain defeat. How'd that work for the Ur-mother? In fact, there are other similarities: when diplomacy failed, she shot a fuckhuge laser just like we are planning to use Deathly Star.

Seize tries to weaponize compassion as a weakness in the operator of a walking WMD. That doesn't get my vote.
 
Wolfy said:
We are not all that better than at social combat though? While we do have some specific combat-related stuff such as Thorn and so on, most of our most important stuff benefits both combat and social(OaFs, Ranks etc) and we do have social specific advancements such as ADS(sadly not applicable here), Silver, Tower, Gleam and so on. Really, the biggest difference is that Aobaru's buff doesn't works on Charisma, but that's easily counteracted with Gisena being fully relevant in diplomacy instead of having just an option of doing a prepared action in actual combat.

Procyon does give it's pilot enhanced Wits and Rank 10 social, but that's it. It's designed for combat, not talking. It has big dick stats, big dick guns and big dick shroud, but it's simply not as good when it comes to talking. And, sure, Rank 10 means that Gisena can't just Appearance him, but we can still dish out some good ol arguments. Like, we had a Forebear update where he was in (more or less) this exact situation. He was against an opponent that exceled in one area, so he pulled her into arena she wasn't good in, and thus won. Armaments are really good at combat, way better than Hunger is. They are, however, not designed to be diplomats, so forcing them in that arena is to our benefit.

When in doubt, just do what Forebear would do.
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Doesn't OaF boost military matters much more than social? Anyways, I have a general feeling that we have more combat specs, though the point actually comes straight from the update, since, if I'm not misunderstanding, Hunger seems to think physical combat has a better chance, which you didn't actually address at all. Procyon is built for combat, so that's where the pilot will be steering the confrontation. Do you really think he cares that much about our hostages? I'm very doubtful we can actually force the diplomacy, and so is Hunger.

Wolfy said:
Based on what happens in quest. Even if you win high pick fights with good rolls, it's likely that you will eat Conditions in process(i.e. Vanrier). Current fight is about 95% "you die" and 5% "you somehow manage not to die" which is also likely to be extremely damaging. Sundering is something that might or might not happen, but minor Sundering might be preferable to expending wish.
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I can buy some crippling wounds if we succeed, but not fully. However, the fight is absolutely not "95% "you die" and 5% "you somehow manage not to die"". Hunger seems to think this has a pretty good chance of working, and pretty good is definitely not 5% survival rate with a slice of crippling. If the first strike only works partially, then it'll be a long shot, but you're skipping a step I think. Seize doesn't really help with these concerns either, since if the troops won't matter to the pilot, we have ceded our advantage, and thus the resulting combat will actually be with the odds you mentioned.

Wolfy said:
Powering mid-combat is a time honored Progression strategy, just this time its not killing but talking. It depends on what ends up happening, exactly, but there are multiple scenarios that can end up with us nabbing a pick or two. For example, Hunger could make an argument that would have Procyon contact his mission control; if that counted as victory we'd have the time he needs to get answer to powerup and strike back.

Getting picks is not certain, but it is certainty something that could happen. As such, it's something we can plan for, either as primary goal or backup plan in case that negotiations fails. For example, we can start negotiations with "we are studying Letrizia" and then end them with deal that exchanges her for bunch of other mages. Then use picks generated by that social combat to power up and smash Procyon before we actually hand Letriza over.

Of course, there's additional uncertainty of social picks giving us something relevant to Procyon fight, but omni-applicability of OaF should hopefully mean that we can nab OaF II. Or just use pick for Praxis I guess.
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Again, this does sound good on paper, but we have no evidence that contacting mission control, or anything else for that matter, is really a thing. I could just as well point out different ways of crippling, but in the end it comes down to the odds, since failure means overwhelming combat in both cases. And Shroud was down has a better chance of working in my eyes. Shroud has a 'pretty good chance' but it's possible that the diminishment won't be enough, in which case it drops to a long shot. Seize is 'unlikely, but possible'. I do grant you that there's a chance I might be reading this wrong, but I'd still rather bet on our martial ability than the goodwill of an Armament pilot. Perhaps we will just have to wait and see.
 
Zampano said:
Seize tries to weaponize compassion as a weakness in the operator of a walking WMD. That doesn't get my vote.
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No it doesn't.

There's been a number of strategy posts for seize. Orm mentioned the pilot being a senator's son, and that returning home alone with his entire entourage dead would be bad enough politically that he'd want to avoid it. My strategy was to injure him in the totality enough to spook him into being willing to bargain. The vote blurb itself says nothing about compassion. There are plenty of reasons that the pilot might want to keep the rest of his kill team and their mages alive other than just compassion.
 
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