[ ] Access to a Master Craftsmen in constructing a new instrument (Sets down the path to a new weapon talisman, focused on acquiring resonant materials)
Got some thoughts to share on this option. At its core, there's nothing wrong with embarking on a quest to collect bits and pieces representing exotic locales, grand challenges, her own past, and dreams for the future. It's actually extremely rad.
The trouble is I think there's basically no way to actually manage that questline well.
First off is, well, the start. As an exploration of what the old flute and replacing it means to Ling Qi, this questline doesn't offer anything clear, and there's not much room to actually clearly set our course. Picking the quest doesn't tell us anything about what Ling Qi wants from it. It sounds like we wouldn't be getting a consult with the crafter ahead of time, and it would feel off to delve into this intimate a concern with a stranger anyway. So we have to pick out the meaning of the quest in transit to completing it. Okay, how?
That's a rhetorical question, but it's also a literal one. The logistics of making choices in a questline like this are... dire. Everything from all exploration options to creating FSS+ is potentially a road stop where the course of the rest of the questline is given shape. That's... not great in practice. First, because it's only potential, so we as players can't actually know whether any particular arc is going to be tied to the flute and its meaning, which limits our agency. Second, it'd inject chaos and stress into our other decisions by making everything maybe about the flute. Third, if we're poking around a narrative for the flute and then decide mid-adventure it's not for us, we're basically forced to throw our effort on that adventure, likely at the expense of other opportunities, down the drain in order to salvage a narrative direction for our flute that we do want. Having the flute quest stumble into random arcs looking for identity to borrow risks both narratives. Last, strung out ad hoc questlines are a poor fit for plot threads with importance to characters, which every one of Ling Qi's reactions to the subject suggests is true for her and the flute issue.
The framework of the quest, as presented, will require us to make blind choices, many relying on chance, and then construct a cohesive narrative retroactively. For a subject as heartfelt as the flute, I simply don't think it's workable. It's the same problem that we ran into with the heart demon subplot; a lack of clarity meant the storyline was meandering, occasionally disrupting other plot threads but unable to coalesce its own consistent character. Ling Qi's flute quest needs to launch from firmer ground than this, or it will simply be a vague headache.
Basically, what @Doramas said.
[X] Notes and Writings from Master musicians of the Meng (New options and projects for creating and modifying arts)
[X] Ten years of service from a Meng Geomancer, for construction and tutoring (Opens special options in fief construction. Zhengui gets ideas)
Got some thoughts to share on this option. At its core, there's nothing wrong with embarking on a quest to collect bits and pieces representing exotic locales, grand challenges, her own past, and dreams for the future. It's actually extremely rad.
The trouble is I think there's basically no way to actually manage that questline well.
First off is, well, the start. As an exploration of what the old flute and replacing it means to Ling Qi, this questline doesn't offer anything clear, and there's not much room to actually clearly set our course. Picking the quest doesn't tell us anything about what Ling Qi wants from it. It sounds like we wouldn't be getting a consult with the crafter ahead of time, and it would feel off to delve into this intimate a concern with a stranger anyway. So we have to pick out the meaning of the quest in transit to completing it. Okay, how?
That's a rhetorical question, but it's also a literal one. The logistics of making choices in a questline like this are... dire. Everything from all exploration options to creating FSS+ is potentially a road stop where the course of the rest of the questline is given shape. That's... not great in practice. First, because it's only potential, so we as players can't actually know whether any particular arc is going to be tied to the flute and its meaning, which limits our agency. Second, it'd inject chaos and stress into our other decisions by making everything maybe about the flute. Third, if we're poking around a narrative for the flute and then decide mid-adventure it's not for us, we're basically forced to throw our effort on that adventure, likely at the expense of other opportunities, down the drain in order to salvage a narrative direction for our flute that we do want. Having the flute quest stumble into random arcs looking for identity to borrow risks both narratives. Last, strung out ad hoc questlines are a poor fit for plot threads with importance to characters, which every one of Ling Qi's reactions to the subject suggests is true for her and the flute issue.
The framework of the quest, as presented, will require us to make blind choices, many relying on chance, and then construct a cohesive narrative retroactively. For a subject as heartfelt as the flute, I simply don't think it's workable. It's the same problem that we ran into with the heart demon subplot; a lack of clarity meant the storyline was meandering, occasionally disrupting other plot threads but unable to coalesce its own consistent character. Ling Qi's flute quest needs to launch from firmer ground than this, or it will simply be a vague headache.
Basically, what @Doramas said.
[X] Notes and Writings from Master musicians of the Meng (New options and projects for creating and modifying arts)
[X] Ten years of service from a Meng Geomancer, for construction and tutoring (Opens special options in fief construction. Zhengui gets ideas)
