[X] Plan For Progress
I would like a Su Ling or Xuan Shi action sometime...Anyway, as far as Ashen Shadow goes, I've been clear that I want a second or third floor mantle art in that style. You thought I was joking about that master plan?
Anyway, I can't wait to see what SCS 3 does! Will we become like the shadow? Will we get even more movement speeds and passives? Will we get a higher slope that we can ignore? All of these questions will be answered, eventually!
Given the description of 'she hasn't sheathed herself fully in darkness qi' that we got of the third layer this update, my guess is that Ling Qi will finally get phasing of a sort. Not being there was the primary attribute of Darkness we got in SCS' description, after all.
The problem with training Qi is that Qi training, well, sucks.
On the other hand, increased Qi is a permanent omni-versatile aspect of cultivation with repercussions for combat stamina (in two ways), spirit bonding, as well as being the primary measure of the 'foundation' for spiritual cultivation (given that Argent Vent's Qi portion is focused on getting cultivators up to speed on their reservoir). While things like meridians, masteries, and arts are also permanent and useful, they are much more focused and specifically applicable. Dice applied to Qi are 'useful' in almost every clash, making Qi the chassis of the vehicle we call Ling Qi, while dice applied to the rest are components—you're not always pressing the brakes in every driving situation, so even though they're necessary to the vehicle's function they don't help very much when you (for example) hydroplane.
Personally I'd like to see Ling Qi cultivate Qi specifically sometime. Gotta get to 50/60 Qi before Green, after all, and while '1/3rd to Qi' and '1/5th to Qi' and 'procs a Qi roll on X' is useful for that, letting her make most of the progress even without specifically going for it, I'm not so sure that it'll be
enough to reach what she needs.
On a similar note, Meridians even when she's not got a specific art to fill them with—we can expect that we'll need a Lung and another Arm for any sort of mantle art, for example, and we can make similar predictions for other arts. Like, what if we want a movement art not limited by the light? SCS is great in a combat or night stealth situation, but sometimes in the middle of the day you just gotta go fast. We don't have to cultivate it as much as SCS but Ling Qi should not be running place to place like a pleb in broad daylight if she doesn't have to.
One day I'll finally be able to convince people to spend an action on her. And then we'll find out we could have been getting great medicines from her for a pittance all this time, I bet.
What I expect is that Ling Qi gets better at extracting cores and getting fairer prices for them. 5RS per core is 'enough' but I'm sure that knowing more about it would get a better deal. Like, maybe being a 'regular supplier' instead of just being a random disciple who comes in with cores, if Ling Qi gets in good with people like Fatty Hao and the rest of the production section of the sect.
