[X] Action Plan: We Need to Talk About Ami
Premise: It will soon become clear that the SC users of the Goketsu are rapidly becoming stronger than those without. Furthermore, Ami may leverage her position in Leaf in order to acquire the Shadow Clone technique. As a social spec jonin, it is probable that she has higher than average Resolve, which would allow her to begin using FOOM almost immediately. Shikamaru also suspects what we are doing, and I find it likely that is Ami got FOOM information out of Akane, it is possible Ino has as well.
What I'm trying to say is that FOOM is not as secret as we intended it to be, and any of these parties can use this information to negotiate with Asuma for greater access to the jutsu.
I say we beat them to the punch.
Firstly, we've yet to reach the point where FOOM breaks even on investment (for Akane/Kei this should be at the end of Detour 1, i.e. when they reach Resolve 70 after idling at Resolve 69 for a while grinding column stats), so we're still a long way away from worrying about 'what's their secret?' from the general populace. You do have a point about Ami and Shikamaru plausibly figuring it out and ruining our sales pitch for it.
However... the critical value of FOOM is not what we get by selling it to Asuma, but how it's our path to supremacy. Selling it earlier ensures that Ami can't sell it for us, but it also means we hard-cut the comparative advantage we get from it to, well, not that much overall. Asuma and whoever he trusts to FOOM would start powering up before we could even get close to their level, ensuring that they always stay ahead of us. The longer we hold exclusivity on FOOM, the better our comparative advantage, and the gains from selling it are the cherry on top, nice to have but not worth trading away a layer of the cake just to make sure.
That said, if there's reason to believe that Ami would sell it in a way that reaches Orochimaru's ears, that's absolutely reason to pre-empt her and do it right, because FOOM-Oro is an existential threat. I don't presently think that's likely though, because an Ami who knows enough about FOOM to sell it would similarly not want it to get into Orochimaru's hands, and neither would Asuma either.
Ultimately I think it's reasonable to learn more about what Ami knows and/or what she might do once she knows, or to try and guide her potential response without leaking even more info, or something along those lines, but I don't think that we're in such a bad spot that the best thing for us to do is abandon ship and sell it while the selling's hot. Not yet.
I don't mind, but the word count probably needs to be trimmed first
I personally approve getting the Kurosawa on board with the Great Seal (if anyone can give us some tips on the Iron Nerve as it applies to seal downloads, it's them), but I disapprove of trying to make the working relationship 'strongly tilted in our favor'. Firstly, we are not diplomat enough to be adversarial with them and perform particularly impressively. Secondly, I'm not personally interested in the 'become the Kurosawa heir' scheme that the line seems geared towards, nor do I think Hazou would be at all interested in substantial cooperation with the Kurosawa who exiled and suppressed his mother.
The Kurosawa are most likely going to be useful to the Dragonwar, and so there's nothing wrong with cooperating with them towards that end, but I do not see the need, gain, or merit in pursuing a long-term relationship with them, let alone starting it by trying to act like we're already a better diplomat than Ren.
