Sirrocco
Pedantic
...and now I have an image of Halla going into full-on deep-blush spaghetti-dropping love confession mode where The Words Are Not Working until she finally manages to choke out "Can I please spar with you?"
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NorseQuest (A Norse Xianxia)
- Thread starter I.F. Ister
- Start date
- Original Fantasy Action
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- Tags
- norse mythology (mythology) original xianxia cultivation western cultivation ask sirihand did your mother tell you anything? discussion pleases yggdrasil farming gloating gets people killed granary management hubris is a coward's word you will die norsemen do not die when they are killed the qm has a bad memory the qm is bad at math viking courtroom drama (legal drama) vikings
Bracket isn't closed on the left side, so the tally won't count it.
- Pronouns
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Apropos of basically nothing, but we are becoming a properly well-rounded Norse cultivator in terms of skills. As soon as we get Bash and Cut to 3 (which is happening next turn no matter what), we will have the following ratings in non-combat skills:
1: Design
2: Barb-Tongue, Farmwork, Labor, Overland, Management, Command,
3: Scouting, Silver-Tongue
4: Artcraft, Armorcraft, Sailing, Wildcraft, Wordplay
5: Housecraft, Weaponcraft
And in combat skills:
0: Shoot
2: Strategy
3: Bash, Cut, Defend, Dodge, Glima, Pierce, Throw, Composure, Tactics
4: Chop
In the next few turns (4 or so for most of this, though some will take more like 7-8), I'm thinking that getting both Design and most of those skills at 2 to 3 is gonna be a priority (probably not Labor or Overland...we may do those eventually, but they're lower priorities), along with Dodge and Defend to 4 (Defend is apparently used with the ongoing defense of Sword-Guard which sounds great to add to our layered defense strategy), and maybe Silver Tongue and Tactics to 4 as well, along with Artcraft to 5 for our runes (since Sten makes training it cheaper).
At that point we have basically everything at 3+ except Shoot (which we may pick up to, like, level 2 as well at some point in there just to round things out and have at least 2 in everything...we can maybe get some Combat Pool out of it with a little finagling and the Armory Pocket).
Aiming for Chop 5+ and more combat skills at 4 is a long term goal, but there's only so much we can do at once and we also have a metric shitload of Tricks we need to pick up or advance as well as a few other things.
1: Design
2: Barb-Tongue, Farmwork, Labor, Overland, Management, Command,
3: Scouting, Silver-Tongue
4: Artcraft, Armorcraft, Sailing, Wildcraft, Wordplay
5: Housecraft, Weaponcraft
And in combat skills:
0: Shoot
2: Strategy
3: Bash, Cut, Defend, Dodge, Glima, Pierce, Throw, Composure, Tactics
4: Chop
In the next few turns (4 or so for most of this, though some will take more like 7-8), I'm thinking that getting both Design and most of those skills at 2 to 3 is gonna be a priority (probably not Labor or Overland...we may do those eventually, but they're lower priorities), along with Dodge and Defend to 4 (Defend is apparently used with the ongoing defense of Sword-Guard which sounds great to add to our layered defense strategy), and maybe Silver Tongue and Tactics to 4 as well, along with Artcraft to 5 for our runes (since Sten makes training it cheaper).
At that point we have basically everything at 3+ except Shoot (which we may pick up to, like, level 2 as well at some point in there just to round things out and have at least 2 in everything...we can maybe get some Combat Pool out of it with a little finagling and the Armory Pocket).
Aiming for Chop 5+ and more combat skills at 4 is a long term goal, but there's only so much we can do at once and we also have a metric shitload of Tricks we need to pick up or advance as well as a few other things.
- Pronouns
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Definitely. The question is more how soon to do so than 'if'. Personally, I'm thinking we do it when we pick up the Armory Pocket, which we can hopefully put that bolt-thrower we stole from Horra's place in, pick up a single Rough Shooting Trick, and have a very surprising holdout weapon with a base damage of 6. That way we can add the dice from it to combat pool as well.
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Agreed. Over the next six turns, for two dice a turn, since Sten can help with two crafting Tricks per turn (and we can thus pick them up in three turns each as long as we stick to two per turn), we can pick up four crafting tricks, of which I think we need Sword, Jewelry, and Helm (we probably go Gambeson for the fourth, but I could be talked into something else). I think we do Sword and Helm before Jewelry, but it's definitely on the list.
I'm also thinking we pick up Stealth over the same timeframe (1 die each turn for 6 turns). We're regretting not having it too often to let that pattern continue.
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It may be worth specialising in metalwork and trading for other items. One hauberk is worth a bunch of gambesons.
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Sure, but from what we've seen generally only Good quality things or lower are for sale. We can make, once we've improved our tools and rebuilt our workshop and all that, things of Superior make routinely, and probably Grand on a good roll. If anyone else in the valley other than Sten is doing work on that level other than the dwarves we sure haven't been given any indications of it.
And mail is expensive, even for us. We cannot afford to outfit all our friends in it (at least not any time soon)...Gambesons and maybe Helms, however, that may be more doable. Well, we'll see how things look on the Helm front once we can make those, maybe those and Good Gambesons are sufficient for our people until we can afford Mail for everyone.
I mean, I just discussed crafting and Stealth. But yes, we want more other non-combat Tricks as well. And seidr is a high priority, though I'm hopeful that the Seeress's tutelage is worth some serious bonuses in that direction (Training dice, bonus successes, doubled effect of Training dice like Blackhand gives on fire, maybe all of the above). We can probably also get some additional Training Dice from inviting Eric to spar with us and all our friends, which should be interesting.
Something I've noticed from reading through the quest is that a lot of our fights Halla has had to sort of turn into battles of attrition. To some extent I think this is how the combat system works, in which case fine, but broadly it kinda seems like we have a lot of neat abilities, we're very mobile and versatile, but not so much of a "big gun" we can use on very formidable enemies. Mybe we should start experimenting with creating our own tricks (which IIRC investing Odr can help us do) to create our own finishing move. Halla's fighting style is definitely still going to revolve around flying around throwing fireballs, using Standstill and then darting in to attack, I think that's sort of set at this point, so maybe some kind of powerful sword stroke we deliver as part of a swooping dive? Looking at our character sheet, I see we have Leaping-Cleave and Flashfire Cleave, so maybe we focus on making like, the Super Saiyan 3 version of Flashfire Cleave?
On a less vague note which we could maybe work towards now, I note that we have Ashen Kiss, our cool fire-infused Seax. But we don't use it a lot because we've got Sagaseeker. However, Halla also has some neat Ignition Tricks for investing a weapon with fire and making it explode, like Firebom-Strike. We're also now learning Throwing. Since we start a lot of our fights by flying around the air and pelting our enemy with fireballs, it feels like there would be a lot of synergy in developing some kind of flying flaming throwing attack. Something along the lines of us investing Ashen Kiss with Orthstirr and fire al la Firebomb-Strike, then we throw it down, striking the enemy and exoloding. We have Explosive Runes as well actually - we don't want the seax itself to actually explode, but maybe there's some potential to enhance the runework here to amplify this?
This would give us quite a powerful alpha strike to open up fights, and mean we're getting something out of our seax in most engagements rather than just carrying it around. It also feels like something we could try in the near term, whilst creating like, our ultimate sword style or whatever might take a while.
On a less vague note which we could maybe work towards now, I note that we have Ashen Kiss, our cool fire-infused Seax. But we don't use it a lot because we've got Sagaseeker. However, Halla also has some neat Ignition Tricks for investing a weapon with fire and making it explode, like Firebom-Strike. We're also now learning Throwing. Since we start a lot of our fights by flying around the air and pelting our enemy with fireballs, it feels like there would be a lot of synergy in developing some kind of flying flaming throwing attack. Something along the lines of us investing Ashen Kiss with Orthstirr and fire al la Firebomb-Strike, then we throw it down, striking the enemy and exoloding. We have Explosive Runes as well actually - we don't want the seax itself to actually explode, but maybe there's some potential to enhance the runework here to amplify this?
This would give us quite a powerful alpha strike to open up fights, and mean we're getting something out of our seax in most engagements rather than just carrying it around. It also feels like something we could try in the near term, whilst creating like, our ultimate sword style or whatever might take a while.
- Pronouns
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A Trick that might be possible with an atgeir would be climbing high with EWC then swooping down and turning all that potential energy into kinetic energy for a single piercing attack.
Nah, those are skill tricks, passives.
But I guess I worded that wrong....
I meant like scouting/sensing gale trick, for example. Or one to blow the sails.
There is also the campfire and cleanwater tricks, no to mention forge fire.
Or using ignition for for flashing/sending up a glare that explodes (iirc the flare belongs I to another fire hugreida, but you get the idea).
Stuff like that, that are usable outside of battle too.
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Skewer-Flick and especially Leaping Cleave can serve as this pretty well vs. most opponents. That said, we're also planning on getting Sparkbomb fairly imminently, which is a 7-9 damage single-target Emberwind Trick that Imperial Fister described as an excellent finisher.
A lot of this is also less 'the system' and more that our recent fights are giving us a skewed perspective. The Threaded Men were a lot more durable than most foes are (especially that second one, which was absurd, to say nothing of the Threaded Elephant). That makes it look like we hit a lot less hard than we do.
For comparison, Sten (who is hardcore as shit and heavily armored, remember) has a total of 24 Armor + 8 Endurance and we can take him out in four or five hits (if we could hit him). Someone equally badass but less well armored (with, say, a Good Gambeson for +8 Armor) we could take out in two hits (three or four if they had more normal mail, Damage Reduction, or both). The difficulty in both those cases is hitting them, as I said...but damage is not really our problem.
Flashfire Cleave is already a combo of Leaping Cleave and EWC, so recombining it probably doesn't work well. Leaping Cleave is also a pretty solid finisher in its own right...its weaknesses lie elsewhere.
In order to combine Tricks one needs to be Mastered and the other Refined. Doing this isn't impossible by any means, but it's something that will take quite a while and a lot of successes to achieve. There's also been a lot of discussion about specializing in melee, which I don't think is wrong, so leaning too heavily on ranged stuff right while planning on that is probably a bad call.
Ashen Kiss is designed as a utility option. It's specifically something we use when we want someone to shut the hell up since it slits their throat. That's a very neat trick to have up our sleeve, but not one we need every fight. It's also, while cool, actually not that impressive given our current crafting prowess...we can make at least as good, if not better, on an average roll. I'm not really invested in trying to focus on it too much.
Something like that is possible, yeah. Probably combining Skewer-Flick and EWC, which we do have at the requisite levels. I'd be a lot more willing to focus on that than ranged stuff right at the moment, personally, though we may need a couple of turns before getting to that.
Fair enough. Like I said, I do think we want more of those, it just may be a minute.
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By the way, what are the rules regarding converting Bog Iron into Forged Iron by working it in a smithy?
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The war is still ongoing. And even at pre-war (or early war, I guess, but before the smith was complaining) prices enough iron for a Forged Iron Mail shirt is about 96 oz. silver (probably more if we're outfitting those with Giant's Blood). Bog Iron would be a lot cheaper (around 16 oz. silver), I suppose, if we're willing to go with that. Maybe that's actually valid to equip our people, I was forgetting how much cheaper Bog Iron is and thinking in Forged Iron prices.
I have no idea. We've never actually had it even mentioned as possible and it may take tools we didn't have...prior to getting Forgefire. If it's possible we can probably do it now, though whether that's economical is a different question.
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Yeah, that'd be neat.
With Sagaseeker, since we have access to Sword tricks now, and swords are the "heroic weapon", I wonder if we'll want to remake it into a sword. One option might be to reforge the blade to be longer (and maybe steel, if we can learn that), but keep say, half the haft as a super long hilt, so we end up with more of a swordstaff or nagamaki?
That way we can do the cool heroic sword stuff, but also have a weapon that is still distinctively our own, and Sagaseeker maintains more of its spirit as a big honking two-handed weapon.
Ah cheers, that's really informative, thanks! I still need to dig a bit deeper down into the numbers here.
Well, I agree that it's partly because we've faced really strong opponents, but given the kind of life Hall leads, it does not feel like that is necessarily going to stop, does it? I'm thinking less specifically here of Flasfire Cleave, and more of like, something along the same idea, some real kung-fu bullshit which thematically combines fire + movement, as those are Halla's two main "hats". Although I suppose to really combine all of Halla's main combat abilities into one super-move, we'd want to get Standstill in there too. To give more of an idea of what I mean here...
Imagine Halla's on the ropes, she's been kicked into a tree and is bloody and tired, then she closes her eyes for a minute... and unleashes her Flaming Sword Soul, where she inverts her own Standstill to briefly freeze or slow time, takes several bounding leaps which leaves trails of fire in the air like a DeLorean, and then deliver one utterly devastating sword strike which cleaves men, horses, ships and mountains alike. That's the kind of visual language I'm drawing from here; the sort of thing you see protagonists or old masters use to face insurmountable odds in cultivator/shonen stories.
Something like the attack Steinarr used on the elephant at the end of our most recent fight, something we could use if we start having to face serious servants of the Enemy. Obviously this is would be a really long term goal, maybe it's not possible at our current level of Cultivation, but it feels like might want to be actively thinking longer term about developing more powerful techniques, rather than like, ranking up skills and talents as we go.
Well, my thought was something which fits with our current fighting style (opening an engagement at range to support allies or feel an enemy out before closing the distance), like we already do with our Kindle Spinners, but better, and mostly repurposing stuff we already have. It feels like both Firebomb-Strike is something we probably want Mastered and Throwing (at least our Chuck Trick) we might want to get Refined, so the opportunity cost here might not be massive?
But if it is then yeah, fair enough, probably not worth investing too much into.
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We've been told part of Sword Hugareida is treating things that aren't swords as if they were, so we can probably just do that without any reforging needed at all.
No problem, happy to help.
So, my point is less that the Threaded Men were more badass than what we'll be facing in the future, and more that the specific way they were badass is really unusual. I'll bet that neither Wolfwind nor Steinarr actually have -4 Damage Reduction like that second Threaded Man did, and Sten certainly doesn't, yet all three are likely more badass than it was (in the case of Steinarr or Wolfwind, they're more badass by a lot).
The Threaded Men were atypical adversaries in the way they worked (lots more shapeshifting options than normal, no tricks or versatility) is what I'm saying.
Sure, but that's very much doable with our current Trick list (well, okay, no mountain-cleaving but that's a power level issue, not a 'new trick' issue). Like, that's literally a cool description for a more powerful version of Halla using Contested Movement defensively then the Leaping Cleave + EWC offensive combo we've done several times. I'm not against getting more cool tricks, far from it, but we can already do this and really put the hurt on most stuff.
Steinarr's final attack wasn't a Trick but a Twist, and one of the most powerful Twists available in-setting. We would love something that powerful, but a new Trick just isn't gonna give us that, I don't think.
I mean it's 6 successes to get Chuck to Refined (which reduces its cost from 4 to 2 and thus saves us...maybe 2 Orthstirr per fight? We don't use it much, so that's a 6 successes for pretty minimal gains, IMO), and then another 9 to get the new Trick Refined, and 1 Capacity since it's Ignition-based. So that's 15 successes and 1 Capacity to get it (which is likely around 10 dice over 10 turns at a minimum even if our bonuses to training Fire do apply to some of it). That's...not impossible, and it might do something cool, but I'm not sure it's worth it all things considerted. At least not right now.
The diving-skewer trick mentioned I'm a lot more interested as that seems likely to be a high damage option for closing distance that might contrast with Flashfire-Cleave without Leaping-Cleave's disadvantages (it'd likely have its own...maybe price?), and would likely only more like 4 Training Dice, as the component Trick is already Refined (though it'd admittedly still be 1 Capacity).
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Going back to the mountain-cutting for a moment, I think it's worth remembering that, according to Blackhand, Kindle-Spinner was one of his signature attacks even at the peak of his power. The Norse don't get new 'super techniques' they just gradually improve the power level of the ones they have until they're absurd. We're not gonna get new and more powerful Tricks per se...new Tricks grant versatility rather than direct power. Instead, we'll get more and more ways to make them more powerful until our existing Tricks can do that kind of thing. Now, versatility is power in some ways, but it means we need to be looking for Tricks that do new things, not ones that are 'our current Trick only better'.
Look at Flashfire Cleave. It's faster than Leaping Cleave and lacks its downsides, but it also has crappy damage to actually fleshy targets. It is not flatly better than its precursor, just different with different use cases.
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Would it be alright if we didn't split eachother's replies into more than a couple of quotes? It makes the discussion a bit hard to follow, also technically against site rules. Apologies here, I know I also replied with two quotes (two or three is usually the accepted cut-off), but it just occurred to me.
So broadly, I hear what you're saying here, and you've studied the combat system in greater detail than I have, so I bow to your expertise on the specifics. (RE: the Threaded Men, I was talking about my broad sense about a lot of our fights, not just that one, but fair enough on the special damage reduction thing.) If unlocking or creating super-techniques is really not how the quest works, then fair enough, it's not how the quest works. It feels to me that when you look at stuff like our unlocking Ignition/Standstill/various Muna/etc.., there does seem to be some progression in terms of creating more powerful techniques though, so I' not sure this is true.
This doesn't mean that some of our basic ones won't remain useful; a hammer is still a hammer after all. (This is how I'd be inclined to interpret Hallr saying Kindle-Spinner was one of his signatures, it's a great distraction after all.) But I'm not sure I would accept right away that there is no progression in terms of gaining more powerful techniques/kung-fu nonsense/etc., because that's quite central to a lot of cultivator stories?
Fundamentally, where I'm coming from is that if you're a big deal in a cultivation story, you have to have your own secret style or super-duper kick you've practiced ten thousand times. That's a genre expectation, so I think it's sort of the null hypothesis starting out, and given how much of our character progression and game mechanics seem to focus around us gaining new shiny abilities... I do still think that "gain more powerful abilities" seems like it will be important going ahead.
But I accept you're coming at it from a different place here, so maybe this conversation will be less pie-in-the-sky when there's a training vote to discuss?
So broadly, I hear what you're saying here, and you've studied the combat system in greater detail than I have, so I bow to your expertise on the specifics. (RE: the Threaded Men, I was talking about my broad sense about a lot of our fights, not just that one, but fair enough on the special damage reduction thing.) If unlocking or creating super-techniques is really not how the quest works, then fair enough, it's not how the quest works. It feels to me that when you look at stuff like our unlocking Ignition/Standstill/various Muna/etc.., there does seem to be some progression in terms of creating more powerful techniques though, so I' not sure this is true.
This doesn't mean that some of our basic ones won't remain useful; a hammer is still a hammer after all. (This is how I'd be inclined to interpret Hallr saying Kindle-Spinner was one of his signatures, it's a great distraction after all.) But I'm not sure I would accept right away that there is no progression in terms of gaining more powerful techniques/kung-fu nonsense/etc., because that's quite central to a lot of cultivator stories?
Fundamentally, where I'm coming from is that if you're a big deal in a cultivation story, you have to have your own secret style or super-duper kick you've practiced ten thousand times. That's a genre expectation, so I think it's sort of the null hypothesis starting out, and given how much of our character progression and game mechanics seem to focus around us gaining new shiny abilities... I do still think that "gain more powerful abilities" seems like it will be important going ahead.
But I accept you're coming at it from a different place here, so maybe this conversation will be less pie-in-the-sky when there's a training vote to discuss?
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Sure, sorry about that.
There are 100% special ultra-powerful techniques that are entirely game changing, and we've gained several in just the last few turns. The thing is that those techniques aren't actually Tricks. Tricks can be additive so something like Slipstream which jacks up our speed might be transformative when combined with our existing combat Tricks due to synergy, but there isn't 'Kindle Spinner, but better'. That's...not how that works.
Secret techniques fall into a few categories:
1. Attribute Enhancements: Alloys and Shapeshifting are both deeply transformative, as was getting our Fylgja to 4 and making it a Wizard Owl. We've been promised the ability to much more freely shuffle our shapeshifting at higher Hamr (probably 10+) as well, and that would be absurd, and I assume getting the other stats to 10 would likewise get broken quick. Getting stats to 4, 7, and 10 is super meaningful and provides transformative abilities that radically change the nature of combat and how things work. These can technically be Trained, but hitting level 10 in a stat is a long way off at the moment, and Fylgja is just not our main area, though we'll definitely continue to increase it.
2. Twists: Look at our Twist list, all of those are utterly transformative abilities that have profoundly effected our progression and abilities in deep and meaningful ways. Punching Up has been a huge part of almost every fight we've been in for quite a while now, Hidden In Rags is profoundly good within its area, and Puncture just cancels a major part of people's defensive arsenals. Steinarr's final attack was also a Twist, for a more high end example. We can't actually train these yet, though making them is apparently possible and helped with Odr.
I'm not saying there aren't super powerful techniques, exactly, I'm saying that's not what Tricks are or what they do. Not usually, anyway. And training the things that do give them is tricky.
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It's possible! On the other hand, we didn't get any from level 4, which means it's far from certain (assuming skills work just like attributes seems unwise). It's also expensive for obvious reasons...we'll likely get there eventually (assuming we survive), but it might be a little while.
- Location
- Somewhere in The Woods
[X] "Um wow hello you're pr- I mean um. Hail cousin! I've come to retrieve my bodily-dead friend from the Abyss! His fylgja died so he's probably having a bad time right now."
-[X] "So yeah, I'm just going fishing here, not going to intrude one way or the other, he's just a kid and all that... Uh, is there anything in particular I should keep in mind while I'm doing the fishing? Just so I'm not intruding, or bothering anyone."
-[X] "So yeah, I'm just going fishing here, not going to intrude one way or the other, he's just a kid and all that... Uh, is there anything in particular I should keep in mind while I'm doing the fishing? Just so I'm not intruding, or bothering anyone."
Shard
One and Many
- Location
- Malaysia
Punching Upward is a hilarious Twist to discuss.
"Hey Halla, what was that Twist you used back there?"
"Punching Upward. Expensive, but makes me half again as strong against people who are at least twice as strong as me."
"At least twice as strong as you? Wouldn't that mean that you'd still be losing in a fight?"
"Nah, I've only lost once using it, and that was against my brother Sten. I've handled.. a Troll, Forkbeard, both Threaded Men, and that Frankenphant with it. It's really good."
"Say, how did you get it, anyway?"
"I think you just have to fight someone twice as strong as yourself and win? Might have to be a one-on-one duel, I got it from killing that Priest."
"..."
There might have been benefits for hitting 4, too. Hugr and Hamr both gave benefits for hitting 4 (extra Shapeshift/Alloy slot), but we didn't know until we hit 7, which is interesting in of itself.
Farmwork is only of those skills we will want to push to a high level of skill, for Cultivation Reasons. Ditto Housecraft.
"Hey Halla, what was that Twist you used back there?"
"Punching Upward. Expensive, but makes me half again as strong against people who are at least twice as strong as me."
"At least twice as strong as you? Wouldn't that mean that you'd still be losing in a fight?"
"Nah, I've only lost once using it, and that was against my brother Sten. I've handled.. a Troll, Forkbeard, both Threaded Men, and that Frankenphant with it. It's really good."
"Say, how did you get it, anyway?"
"I think you just have to fight someone twice as strong as yourself and win? Might have to be a one-on-one duel, I got it from killing that Priest."
"..."
I suspect the benefits are 'lesser' than getting the stat to 7. I would say likely 'half' to 'third' as good, given how Odr enhanced them.
There might have been benefits for hitting 4, too. Hugr and Hamr both gave benefits for hitting 4 (extra Shapeshift/Alloy slot), but we didn't know until we hit 7, which is interesting in of itself.
Farmwork is only of those skills we will want to push to a high level of skill, for Cultivation Reasons. Ditto Housecraft.