NorseQuest (A Norse Xianxia)
- Thread starter I.F. Ister
- Start date
- Original Fantasy Action
-
- 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
- Location
- Mid-Atlantic
Hmm. Writing a bunch of magical fire energies into a book that's probably made of flammable materials might be a mistake.
That's why we got to fireproof said book. And in general make it a pain to get rid of, you know, for spite!
- Pronouns
- He/Him
I'll try and whip up a plan in a bit. We'll see how that goes.
I just want to point out that, since you're actually using multiple kinds of dashes, you're using dashes wrong:
- For uses like a comma/colon/parethesis, either use an em dash with no spaces (armor—which) or an en dash with spaces (armor – which). If this is narrator text within a quotation, they go outside ("Foo"—bar—"baz").
- For interruption, the only valid choice seems to be a single em dash with no spaces (fore—a-after), though I've seen a space after fairly often.
- For hyphenating a word – whether the hyphen is part of the word, introduced due to a line break, or due to stuttering stuttering – normally use the ASCII hyphen-minus (don't bother with the dedicated hyphen codepoint). You did this correctly, but it's mentioned for completeness. But if the items being hyphenated are already compound (whether with spaces or with hyphens), use an en dash instead. If there are more than 2 levels, go home and rethink your life.
- For ranges of numbers or a relation between distincted objects (as opposed to merging with a hyphen), use an en dash with no spaces: (1–2, US–Canada). The latter is similar to a slash.
- For minus you really are supposed to use the dedicated minus character (surrounded by thin spaces, as with all operators), if your markup system doesn't take care of that for you: (3 − 2 = 1). Doing the thin spaces manually is pretty rare.
- For ellipsis, there are always exactly 3 dots unless there's normal punctuation appended (Ha, ha… ha….). I prefer the precomposed ellipsis since styleguides differ on how to expand it (some also use em dash variants). Other things you can do: Foo…? Bar, … baz.
- Pronouns
- He/Him
Alright, I'm gonna do this comparison one last time, because we have finally actually hit the age of 20, when the benchmarks for an average Norseman are listed for:
Average Norseman of 20:
40-60 Orthstirr (pre-raid, expect more like 100-200 or so post-raid),
Hamr 5-6 (occasionally 7), Hugr 4-6,
Combat Pool 15-25 without items, 1 Martial Style (Glima 2 or so)...this number may be slightly obsolete with Glima's transition to a Martial Style (I'd expect maybe +5 dice from that transition)
8-15 Tricks (1 Mastered),
? Skill-Tricks (in context, I'd expect maybe 4-8, but it's not in the benchmarks post),
? Twists, 0-1 Hugareida,
4-5 in one combat skill and 2 in the rest, 3-4 in non-combat skills, maybe 5-6 in one or two, Farmwork or Labor 7.
2 Shapeshifting slots if they happen to have Hamr 7.
Norsewomen are lower in most areas but with Housecraft 7 or so, Hugr on par with men's Hamr (5-6 with an occasional 7), often Clearwater, some seidr spells, more high non-combat skills, and more Skill-Tricks.
Current Halla Stats (at 20):
604 Orthstirr, 12 Soulscape Pockets (including 1 Armory pocket and 1 Brewery),
Hamr 7 (Infused 6), Hugr 7 (Infused 5), Fylgja 5 (Infused 4),
71 Combat Pool without items (94 w/items), 2 Martial Styles (Stoker State 5, Glima 3),
61 Tricks (4 Mastered) [Hamr: 0 Vague, 7 Rough, 13 Refined, 1 Mastered, Hugr: 2 Vague, 0 Rough, 6 Refined, 0 Mastered, Hugareida: 1 Vague, 7 Rough, 15 Refined, 3 Mastered, Martial Styles: 0 Vague, 5 Rough, 2 Refined, 0 Mastered, Vague Tricks not included in total count],
20 Skill Tricks (and 2 in progress),
3 Twists, 8 Hugareida (including 2 used Alloy Slots out of 3, also 1 in progress), 6 Seidr Spells (and 3 in progress),
4 in Chop, Defense, Dodge, and Tactics, 3 in all other combat skills, 3-4 in most non-combat skills (only Barb-Tongue and Overland are still at 2, nothing is lower), Artcraft, Housecraft and Weaponcraft 5, Farmwork and Labor 3.
Fylgja revealed. Frenzy 5, and effectively 5 Shapeshifting Slots (one tied up in Fast Creation).
So, uh, yeah. Halla is not as good a farmer as the 'average Norseman' and not as good at Housecraft (other than smithing, where she is much better) as the 'average Norsewoman', but she makes up for both of those by having better tools than they do (which she made herself...she adds 16 dice to the Work pool if you include the items she's improved, and has about +5-6 successes over someone with Good Tools, +3 over even someone with Superior Tools, which are the best they can manage sans Forgefire), her non-combat skills are otherwise pretty much on par (again, aside from smithing or those she can provide Tool bonuses to), and in every other area she is so vastly superior that comparisons are silly. We've come a long way.
Average Norseman of 20:
40-60 Orthstirr (pre-raid, expect more like 100-200 or so post-raid),
Hamr 5-6 (occasionally 7), Hugr 4-6,
Combat Pool 15-25 without items, 1 Martial Style (Glima 2 or so)...this number may be slightly obsolete with Glima's transition to a Martial Style (I'd expect maybe +5 dice from that transition)
8-15 Tricks (1 Mastered),
? Skill-Tricks (in context, I'd expect maybe 4-8, but it's not in the benchmarks post),
? Twists, 0-1 Hugareida,
4-5 in one combat skill and 2 in the rest, 3-4 in non-combat skills, maybe 5-6 in one or two, Farmwork or Labor 7.
2 Shapeshifting slots if they happen to have Hamr 7.
Norsewomen are lower in most areas but with Housecraft 7 or so, Hugr on par with men's Hamr (5-6 with an occasional 7), often Clearwater, some seidr spells, more high non-combat skills, and more Skill-Tricks.
Current Halla Stats (at 20):
604 Orthstirr, 12 Soulscape Pockets (including 1 Armory pocket and 1 Brewery),
Hamr 7 (Infused 6), Hugr 7 (Infused 5), Fylgja 5 (Infused 4),
71 Combat Pool without items (94 w/items), 2 Martial Styles (Stoker State 5, Glima 3),
61 Tricks (4 Mastered) [Hamr: 0 Vague, 7 Rough, 13 Refined, 1 Mastered, Hugr: 2 Vague, 0 Rough, 6 Refined, 0 Mastered, Hugareida: 1 Vague, 7 Rough, 15 Refined, 3 Mastered, Martial Styles: 0 Vague, 5 Rough, 2 Refined, 0 Mastered, Vague Tricks not included in total count],
20 Skill Tricks (and 2 in progress),
3 Twists, 8 Hugareida (including 2 used Alloy Slots out of 3, also 1 in progress), 6 Seidr Spells (and 3 in progress),
4 in Chop, Defense, Dodge, and Tactics, 3 in all other combat skills, 3-4 in most non-combat skills (only Barb-Tongue and Overland are still at 2, nothing is lower), Artcraft, Housecraft and Weaponcraft 5, Farmwork and Labor 3.
Fylgja revealed. Frenzy 5, and effectively 5 Shapeshifting Slots (one tied up in Fast Creation).
So, uh, yeah. Halla is not as good a farmer as the 'average Norseman' and not as good at Housecraft (other than smithing, where she is much better) as the 'average Norsewoman', but she makes up for both of those by having better tools than they do (which she made herself...she adds 16 dice to the Work pool if you include the items she's improved, and has about +5-6 successes over someone with Good Tools, +3 over even someone with Superior Tools, which are the best they can manage sans Forgefire), her non-combat skills are otherwise pretty much on par (again, aside from smithing or those she can provide Tool bonuses to), and in every other area she is so vastly superior that comparisons are silly. We've come a long way.
Last edited:
- Pronouns
- He/Him
Alright, so, plan:
[X] Plan Hugs Are For Afterwards
-[X] Like with Gabriel reassign a Shapeshifting Slot from Fasts to High-Twitch Muscles and one more Frenzy to Pockets, leaving us with only our 3Fold Inertia-Arresting Throw in terms of Tricks stored in our Fast. Also reassign another shapeshifting slot from Dense Muscles to yet more High-Twitch Reflexes. Reassign two Capacity from Beaconlight and Explosive Reactive Armor to Unending Time In The Sun and Fireside Barrage.
-[X] Invest 2 Orthstirr in Hugr, 1 in Composure, 4 in Tactics, 3 in Scouting (-11 Orthstirr)
-[X] 52d6 Attack (52d6 tricks)
-[X] 42d6 Defense (42d6 tricks)
-[X] 0d6 Intercept
-[X] Put up a 50d6+9 (w/Hugareida) Orthstirr Enhanced x11 Atgeir Bodyguard (-25 Orthstirr).
-[X] Activate Slipstream (-16 Orthstirr) and Heated Shroud (-5 Orthstirr) and take to the air with Ember-Wing Cloak and stay there (-6 Orthstirr, all subsequent actions include the +1d6 from Skyfire).
-[X] Immediately release one 30d6+5 (w/Hugareida) Orthstirr Enhancedx9 Fireside Barrage (-16 Orthstirr), followed by two 30d6+5 (w/Hugareida) Orthstirr-Enhancedx9 Kindle Spinners (-11 Orthstirr each) in Abjorn's direction, trying to probe his defenses and take him down if possible. If he manages to close with us, use a 40d6+5 Sharpenedx19 Lightning-Enhanced Skewer-Flick attack w/Puncture to gain some distance (-33 Orthstirr).
-[X] By default use Atgeir Bodyguard to defend against everything. For the first melee attack that gets through, use Contested Movement and all our Stoked Dice to defend (-3 Orthstirr, 24d6+5 defense) and counterattack with a Sharpenedx1 Lightning-Enhanced Skewer-Flick attack w/Puncture (-15) and abort to Sidestep (-2 Orthstirr) if that does not work as a defense.
-[X] In response to anything after that Contested Movement (or any ranged attack) once Atgeir Bodyguard is broken, use Halting Vortex (-4 Orthstirr), and if something gets through that use up to four 50d6+9 Reinforcedx48 Sway defenses (-50 Orthstirr each).
-[X] Tactics – So, we want to avoid close combat at all costs here to avoid being grappled. Basically we activate our available buffs and take to the air here and try and take Abjorn down with ranged attacks, with one big melee attack ready to use to hopefully gain some distance if necessary, while using a combination of a very large static defense and Perfect Defenses to avoid getting hit.
Being grappled is how we lose this fight. This plan attempts to prevent that in several ways, and is thus very heavy on defense, while taking Abjorn down with ranged attacks. Arguably, we should do fewer of those at higher dice, but I think we'd feel bad if we just alpha struck and immediately won, and while I don't think that would happen (I suspect Abjorn has some solid defenses), a few more slightly smaller attacks still seems workable to feel him out. We'll go for the win next turn.
EDIT: Replaced the first Kindle Spinner with a Fireside Barrage, this way we'll get to see how that works.
[X] Plan Hugs Are For Afterwards
-[X] Like with Gabriel reassign a Shapeshifting Slot from Fasts to High-Twitch Muscles and one more Frenzy to Pockets, leaving us with only our 3Fold Inertia-Arresting Throw in terms of Tricks stored in our Fast. Also reassign another shapeshifting slot from Dense Muscles to yet more High-Twitch Reflexes. Reassign two Capacity from Beaconlight and Explosive Reactive Armor to Unending Time In The Sun and Fireside Barrage.
-[X] Invest 2 Orthstirr in Hugr, 1 in Composure, 4 in Tactics, 3 in Scouting (-11 Orthstirr)
-[X] 52d6 Attack (52d6 tricks)
-[X] 42d6 Defense (42d6 tricks)
-[X] 0d6 Intercept
-[X] Put up a 50d6+9 (w/Hugareida) Orthstirr Enhanced x11 Atgeir Bodyguard (-25 Orthstirr).
-[X] Activate Slipstream (-16 Orthstirr) and Heated Shroud (-5 Orthstirr) and take to the air with Ember-Wing Cloak and stay there (-6 Orthstirr, all subsequent actions include the +1d6 from Skyfire).
-[X] Immediately release one 30d6+5 (w/Hugareida) Orthstirr Enhancedx9 Fireside Barrage (-16 Orthstirr), followed by two 30d6+5 (w/Hugareida) Orthstirr-Enhancedx9 Kindle Spinners (-11 Orthstirr each) in Abjorn's direction, trying to probe his defenses and take him down if possible. If he manages to close with us, use a 40d6+5 Sharpenedx19 Lightning-Enhanced Skewer-Flick attack w/Puncture to gain some distance (-33 Orthstirr).
-[X] By default use Atgeir Bodyguard to defend against everything. For the first melee attack that gets through, use Contested Movement and all our Stoked Dice to defend (-3 Orthstirr, 24d6+5 defense) and counterattack with a Sharpenedx1 Lightning-Enhanced Skewer-Flick attack w/Puncture (-15) and abort to Sidestep (-2 Orthstirr) if that does not work as a defense.
-[X] In response to anything after that Contested Movement (or any ranged attack) once Atgeir Bodyguard is broken, use Halting Vortex (-4 Orthstirr), and if something gets through that use up to four 50d6+9 Reinforcedx48 Sway defenses (-50 Orthstirr each).
-[X] Tactics – So, we want to avoid close combat at all costs here to avoid being grappled. Basically we activate our available buffs and take to the air here and try and take Abjorn down with ranged attacks, with one big melee attack ready to use to hopefully gain some distance if necessary, while using a combination of a very large static defense and Perfect Defenses to avoid getting hit.
Being grappled is how we lose this fight. This plan attempts to prevent that in several ways, and is thus very heavy on defense, while taking Abjorn down with ranged attacks. Arguably, we should do fewer of those at higher dice, but I think we'd feel bad if we just alpha struck and immediately won, and while I don't think that would happen (I suspect Abjorn has some solid defenses), a few more slightly smaller attacks still seems workable to feel him out. We'll go for the win next turn.
EDIT: Replaced the first Kindle Spinner with a Fireside Barrage, this way we'll get to see how that works.
Last edited:
AeonIlluminate
The power of friendship and aggressive landscaping
- Pronouns
- They/Them
[X] Plan Hugs Are For Afterwards
Is Stoker State not applicable to this plan?
Is Stoker State not applicable to this plan?
- Pronouns
- He/Him
With zero Basic Attacks it is indeed useless this turn. a plan using those with our ranged weapon would be valid, potentially, but I thought this was a bit better for this turn, anyway.
- Location
- some computer lab
[X] Plan Hugs Are For Afterwards
Here's hoping Abjorn has some ranged tricks.
Here's hoping Abjorn has some ranged tricks.
We're planning on flying out of reach and beating him with ranged trick attacks, which Stoker State doesn't benefit from.
- Pronouns
- He/Him
He's exceedingly mobile, is what I suspect. Like, I think he can jump and try to grab us...him throwing things is also very possible.
AeonIlluminate
The power of friendship and aggressive landscaping
- Pronouns
- They/Them
Yea, but theres still some "bonk with sagaseeker" defences in there and one of our defences is bonk incoming weapon and then them. I just don't remember which one that is, and I don't remember the qualifiers for Stoker to gain stuff.
- Location
- some computer lab
That bonk is another Trick attack though, so Stoker State wouldn't help.
- Pronouns
- He/Him
Stoker State works on Basic Attacks. It works on ranged attacks as well as melee, but they need to be Basic. No attacks in the current plan are Basic Attacks. Including such attacks was possible, but didn't seem worth it to me on this turn specifically.
Last edited:
- Location
- Bretonnia
- Pronouns
- He/Him
If Sagaseeker does get realized, could we feed him the cold clay or even the earthblood for cold/fire damage respectively? Well, not sure if we want to use the earthblood on Sagaseeker as of now given the other things we can use it for, but the cold clay seems like a good bet.
When Halla dies will we pick the next player character or will we default to the last birthed child or something like that?
[X] Plan Hugs Are For Afterwards
[X] Plan Hugs Are For Afterwards
- Pronouns
- He/Him
I want to try feeding it other magical metals and see what happens. If it can count as other metals instead of Storm Iron at-will, then it'd be very nice.
We pick one of her children who is alive at that point in time. Our choice which.
Last edited:
- Location
- Bretonnia
- Pronouns
- He/Him
That's probably a safer option, yeah. Although when Toki told us about Realizing, he said 'substances' rather than metals, so I assume that we're not limited to feeding only metals to Sagaseeker.
- Pronouns
- He/Him
Oh definitely, I'm down with non-metals, but we have an ongoing supplier for all the basic kinds of magic iron, so metals are easy and straightforward. Molten Iron would, if it assumed its properties, also let us halve the cost of Fire Hugareida stuff done through Sagaseeker, which would be sweet, likewise Drafty Iron and Gale stuff, I'd assume...being able to combine that sort of thing in one weapon would just be really excellent.
Having what amounts to a metamorphic weapon that can do different magic metals at will would be very sweet.
Last edited:
- Location
- India
- Pronouns
- He/His
@Imperial Fister, our char sheet still says that our 10 normal pockets have 110 orthstirr invested. Shouldnt it be 100? I am assuming each base pocket has 10 orthstirr.
- Pronouns
- He/Him
It should. It's a typo.
- Location
- California
Done!
*Collapses face-first onto the ground*
I wasn't actually sure I'd ever catch up, you madmen have already added almost 40 pages just since I started reading earlier in the week.
@Imperial Fister I want to congratulate you on creating such an excellent quest. One of the most interesting worlds I've ever seen, with a vibrant and realized construction, filled with fascinating characters. But I also want to thank the questers as well. Normally I don't bother to read the discussion when getting caught up on quests, especially ones as long as this, just skipping through the threadmarks for the story. However I decided to give it a go this time on a whim, and I'm exceptionally glad I did. Between you all you've managed to create an excellent back and forth of ideas, theories, and speculation that have elevated my enjoyment of the story in a way that just reading the updates wouldn't have done.
A true accomplishment.
*Collapses face-first onto the ground*
I wasn't actually sure I'd ever catch up, you madmen have already added almost 40 pages just since I started reading earlier in the week.
@Imperial Fister I want to congratulate you on creating such an excellent quest. One of the most interesting worlds I've ever seen, with a vibrant and realized construction, filled with fascinating characters. But I also want to thank the questers as well. Normally I don't bother to read the discussion when getting caught up on quests, especially ones as long as this, just skipping through the threadmarks for the story. However I decided to give it a go this time on a whim, and I'm exceptionally glad I did. Between you all you've managed to create an excellent back and forth of ideas, theories, and speculation that have elevated my enjoyment of the story in a way that just reading the updates wouldn't have done.
A true accomplishment.