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A Harry Potter Quest: He who was not

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[X]These are for Exploration Only – Use these boots for Emergencies and during your Exploration Activities only. While you are of no particular mind to keep their existence secret, you don't want everyone to know them either and it might be useful to have a set of trump card in place for a later time.
[X] Plan Empathetic Adventures V3
 
Guys, if I missed something, sorry. Trying my best :) So, let's start:

MysteryCPU said:
Edit: @Tabula Rasa I have two ideas for "Do Something" and I wanted to know if they were valid:

1. Work on Artistic Skill: The idea is that Jacob has been working on his painting and comes from parents who are painters (a famous one) and sculptors. If he truly is a person with infinite potential, I figure that would also cover his artistic skills. Not sure how mechanically that would work, but the ultimate goal is to keep working on these skills so that if he gets into Alchemy or anything where artistry is a component...it would be aesthetically breathtaking.

2. Collect Class books for all years (1-7th): It was shown in the "Half Blood Prince" that classes keep old used textbooks as spares and that it seems no one is keeping track of them. Also, our own spell and potions list is limited to this year and what we have observed. Couldn't Jacob sneak around and quietly collect one copy of the spare textbooks and see what spells/potions exist, what he needs to learn, and to have the book to help him train when he reaches those levels?
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You can do the first, sure. But you don't need to if you just want Jacob to get good at it. I'm already working it into the story (even if just as c-level storyline. Jacob has always been a talented artist, because his parents showed him. You guys decided that he'd find his heart in painting and that's what he is doing from time to time. In the last update there was a painting described that he made.

The second, well if you learn all skills needed for this year, you can put an action in and Jacob will research all the things he'll need to learn for next year.
Blonddude42 said:
@Tabula Rasa this has been bugging me for quite a while since my reread -- why is flying a core skill? It seems like a bit of an odd choice personally, but I'm pretty sure you have some logic to it (even if that logic is "it seems reasonable to me")
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Oh, that's an easy one. Happy to answer!
I'm a super action oriented author. This is easily the one thing I'm most confident with, because I've been an active fighter my entire life. It's easy to imagine myself in a situation and make the picture come to live for me and you in extension.

That's what these core skills are in all simplicity: The skills I thought were most important for you to keep yourself alive. All that is important in direct combat.

The lines are not 100% clear, I admit, but it was an honest attempt at it. Share your thoughts if you think otherwise!

unmatchingsocks said:
Greatly enjoyed the painting's description. Who draw it, Jacob or his mother?
Anyway the description reminds me Munch's "The Dance of Life", even though the style is probably completely different and the meaning is absolutely very very different.
Thank you Tabula Rasa, now it is time to think about frogs and maybe monthly planning
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The painting was drawn by Jacob. If you go back a chapter, you'll see that he had been struggling with painting something. Reading that and the picture in this update after another, should give you all the insights you need.

And that you for the kind words. I do really appreciate them! Thanks!
 
Biggest problem I have with Emphatic Adventures (aside from not being sure about training Empathy right now): the Hogsmeade action might not be listed under Social, but it's still something that requires quite some social energy. Feels a bit...strange?
And I also don't see the need for money, so...yeah. I'd really like that to be changed, to something else. Be it another action invested into the exploration, a specific preparation action for the same, or research into Healing spells, future curricula, the thing with "how do I prove I'm telling the truth?" or any thing else...
 
[X] Plan Empathetic Adventures V3
[X] These are for Exploration Only
 
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Nando said:
the Hogsmeade action might not be listed under Social, but it's still something that requires quite some social energy. Feels a bit...strange?
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Well, I don't really see how you can expect me to change the Hogsmeade action into another Exploration action, as each one costs 3 actions vs the Hogsmeade 1 action. And it isn't under social, so it isn't a social action, but a business one. Regardless, if you read the exploration actions, you will see that you can only take one a month.
Tabula Rasa said:
(Takes 3 Actions, can't be taken in the same month as Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea and What hides behind trees)
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So I don't see how you can possibly expect me to add another Exploration action on top of the one that I already have ...

As for not needing money, we sort of do if we want to make the Blue Wideye Potion. The cost to make 10 doses of the Blue Wideye Potion was calculated to be around 150 Galleons last I recall and a single dose is probably around 15 Galleons. That is a lot of money, so picking some up where we can, when we can seems like a good idea to me.

Edit: Also, what are people's arguments against exploration? Do we really just want to sit inside and do nothing while there is a world out there to explore?
 
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ShyGuy said:
Edit: Also, what are people's arguments against exploration? Do we really just want to sit inside and do nothing while there is a world out there to explore?
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Exploration dangerous with Dementors while we don't have mastery of Patronus charm.

Exploration less dangerous with more general improvements.

Edit: Plus Wideye potion gives us more actions.

I think that's about it.
 
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ShyGuy said:
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Okay, maybe the bit about exploration was missing a point (I think I'd assumed it was a thing of stages, as in: it takes three actions to finish this stage), but
a) there is the option of using one action to explicitly do research, before going on to actual exploration (checking the library for information on the area)
b) I did provide other possible actions (research into stuff, I'd be partial to looking into things related to proving truth (remember how McGonagal said "oh well, no way to know who's speaking the truth" and then gave the boy we'd saved from being bullied detention?))
c) yeah, we will need some funds. But not right now, and one action in it wont make much of a difference - better to do a designated money turn later on, in my opinion.

Aside from that, I think right now the arguments against exploration are that one place has dementors, and the other two are shitty to explore in the middle of winter (and we don't know anything about them), and we have the automatic skill ups and people want to maximize on those...
And training/researching is not doing nothing, in my opinion...

edit: I think some of my confusion about adding another exploration action came from this: I'm used to plans listing how many dice/actions/... are being spent on any activity. So, since the exploration action didn't have anything like "x3"/"(three actions)" listed, I'd assumed that it was just one action being spent on it (like "doing preparations for this", or "exploring only a part of the area", or something...).
 
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Tabula Rasa said:
Oh, that's an easy one. Happy to answer!
I'm a super action oriented author. This is easily the one thing I'm most confident with, because I've been an active fighter my entire life. It's easy to imagine myself in a situation and make the picture come to live for me and you in extension.

That's what these core skills are in all simplicity: The skills I thought were most important for you to keep yourself alive. All that is important in direct combat.

The lines are not 100% clear, I admit, but it was an honest attempt at it. Share your thoughts if you think otherwise!
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Now that makes a ton of sense. I was thinking of them as the main skills of your average witch and wizard, but presenting them as the skills that keep you alive makes a lot of sense. Functionally I'd think "riding" would fit better than "flying" but "flying" is the proper name for that skill set.

With that being said, would moving around with our special shoes be governed by flying to some extent?
 
Light said:
Exploration dangerous with Dementors while we don't have mastery of Patronus charm.
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The QM explicitly addressed that concern. No one wants to do the exploration action that actually deals with Dementors (until we get the Patronus that is).
Tabula Rasa said:
Dementors are explicitly only in one of the outside options. You don't need to be afraid of them anywhere else of the actions I gave you. I don't want you to sit around in the castle all year
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You'll note that even the QM doesn't want us holing our days away inside the castle, just practicing spells. If we don't even do anything, what is the point of this quest?
Light said:
Exploration less dangerous with more general improvements.
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It has been months since we last went on an exploration action. We have improved quite a bit in that time. How much more improvement do we need to have before we suddenly decide we will be ready?

Nando said:
Aside from that, I think right now the arguments against exploration are that one place has dementors, and the other two are shitty to explore in the middle of winter (and we don't know anything about them), and we have the automatic skill ups and people want to maximize on those...
And training/researching is not doing nothing, in my opinion...
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Again, the QM addressed the Dementor argument. The warming charm addressing the concern about exploring in the current weather. As for maximizing automatic skill ups, my plan does that with Potions whereas going all in on DADA actually doesn't. Two actions spent on DADA isn't maximizing the skill up, as it would be the same chance of success if we waited next month and did the same DADA training actions, where as if we waited on Potions we would actually have a 25% chance of success of failing vs doing it now and getting a auto-success. So this isn't a matter of maximizing the automatic skill ups.

As for researching before doing exploration, we learn more about the secret passage by exploring it. We don't know if it is a straight shot to the mountains, if it curves, or anything else about it. The Horizon Exploration action is just the 1st part of a series of exploration (it starts the chain). We aren't going to be able to blow through it no matter how much we prepare. And in order to research appropriately, we have to have some info to know what we are dealing with. Which is why you do a preliminary exploration and if you get stuck somewhere or run into an issue along the way, you stop and return to base. Only then do you conduct research on how to overcome the obstacle. We can't research the option because we don't have anything solid to do research on.

Basically, we go in, and if/when we encounter an obstacle we can't overcome, we go back to Hogwarts, research the problem and go back. That is how you explore. We can't research a problem we don't know about.
 
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[X] Plan Empathetic Adventures V3

[X] I don't understand the Question – These boots are now your everyday boots. You will wear them at all times and use them freely. There should be no rules against this in place in the castle, because quite frankly, an item like this has never existed. Use the boots in any kind or form to have fun, for duelling club and whatever you have in mind. No further votes for when to use or not. The sky is yours to play with.

I do not u defeat and why more people are not voting for flying boots. They are flying boots.
 
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[X] Plan Empathetic Adventures V3
[X] I don't understand the Question – These boots are now your everyday boots. You will wear them at all times and use them freely. There should be no rules against this in place in the castle, because quite frankly, an item like this has never existed. Use the boots in any kind or form to have fun, for duelling club and whatever you have in mind. No further votes for when to use or not. The sky is yours to play with.

This plan suits my wishes and c'mon we've got flying boots. Enjoy them
 
@ShyGuy Just to let you know, I'll answer not all of your post, since I don't feel entitled to argue other peoples position and/or was just trying to answer your question, not making a point ("why are people against exploration?" "this might be why" (and not "this is why I'm against it")).


ShyGuy said:
The warming charm addressing the concern about exploring in the current weather.
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Which helps with temperature, yes. And I guess the shoes will help with not getting stuck in snow etc.
But snow/rain coming down or early darkness due to short days (which, yes, lumos, but we don't know if anything/-body is going to notice)...goes back to the point below - how much preparation is included in the three actions?

ShyGuy said:
Basically, we go in, and if/when we encounter an obstacle we can't overcome, we go back to Hogwarts, research the problem and go back. That is how you explore. We can't research a problem we don't know about.
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We know in which direction we're gonna go (even if it's as vague as "the mountains north of the Forrest"). That is definitely enough to look up on a map and/or check books for. I'm just not sure what all is included in the three actions... *shrugs*
Tabula Rasa said:
Nando said:
Are actions like "check library for information on the Great Lake" something that could be done (under "Do something!") or can we assume those kind of things would be part of the exploration action itself?
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Yes, don't be afraid of taking these options. Like the Hogwarts exploration, they too are just the first step in either path.
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All in all...yes, exploration is nice, but exploration outside in these conditions is more complicated than it needs to be, in my opinion.
I'm fine with spending one month cooped up in the castle. It's not like we'll only have training-montage chapters from here on out, anyway.
Next month we'll be fine with Rune Club stuff again, I hope.
And I've got no idea on Scottish Winters or the schoolwork schedule, but maybe we can either spend March exploring, or April (do we get Easter Holidays?).

edit: Since @Tabula Rasa is already tagge due to the quote: Can you clarify on that quote? I asked a question with an "or", and you answered yes - was that an intentional, logic answer ("one or both of the sentences connected with the 'or' are true") or am I tripping over some language barrier?
 
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[X] Plan This train has no brakes v4

Overall I like the other plan more but the Hogsmeade action is an issue I can't get over.
 
Nando said:
Which helps with temperature, yes. And I guess the shoes will help with not getting stuck in snow etc.
But snow/rain coming down or early darkness due to short days (which, yes, lumos, but we don't know if anything/-body is going to notice)...goes back to the point below - how much preparation is included in the three actions?
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I suppose that is a reasonable argument. I just assume that Jacob won't make any obviously bad decisions. He is curious, not suicidal. I don't think he will just go off without preparation, but it is a reasonable question to ask I suppose.
 
ShyGuy said:
I suppose that is a reasonable argument. I just assume that Jacob won't make any obviously bad decisions. He is curious, not suicidal. I don't think he will just go off without preparation, but it is a reasonable question to ask I suppose.
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Yeah, might be my paranoia from other quests bleeding over...
But, if I'm reading the text of the vote, it sounds like "welp, this evening I'm free, let's check out where this tunnel I found months ago actually leads!"
Which...might not be what's going to happen, but I feel like it shouldn't be a problem to be more prepared.
 
I admit to being a little confused on the worries in regards to the Hogsmeade action; from my perspective, it's just business. Jacob's not exactly going to stand there for a few minutes chatting about the weather with them, he's just going to deliver the packages they requested and then head off to the next one until there's no one left. He's got enough of a reputation that no one will really mind so long as he delivers them in a timely manner. Do you talk about your new baby with the Amazon delivery guy for no reason? That's how I see it, anyways. If anything, the idea that he'll be speaking to people who're effectively random strangers in any depth that allow them to mention Jacob's current emotions is what's questionable. He's not even obligated to give them a response; just a "Ah, sorry, I don't feel comfortable talking about it" or even a less personal "there's nothing to be done about it" is an acceptable reply to any nosy inquiries.
That's how I see things, anyways. We're late enough into the voting period I don't think it actually matters.
 
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