Fanwork#2596 Words of Armament Fish Tactics

Thorn: The core of our strategy, I believe, is to prick the fish frequently without dying in return. "A Fire Woken" is the reference material of choice. Artful Thorn takes a quarter of the casting time of RoQ, but lasts only a single strike which must be used immediately. It'll be a pain to get the freedom to do this uninterrupted, especially with the Fish's Rank screaming sirens about Thorn's danger. Earlier, my plan was relying on Silver and Second Stage for a couple hits, so we could tank the counterattack without interruption, but with Gisena here it's more complicated. Silver should still work, at least. But, of course, we should try to maneuver so we don't need it. I'd say that a continent-sized fish should have a weak spot of "behind, like, all of it," but that would be too easy. We should at least find out why that wouldn't work, though. Preliminarily, if it can turn around in a reasonable time (as it would almost have to), it will have obscene rotational power with which to splat us.

Five blows would have been enough to kill the Rotbeast, and since Artful Thorn damage scales to the enemies' size, five should suffice for the Fish as well. The problem, in addition to the Fish's resistance, is that Hunger mentioned that he can only use three without serious strain, and four (as against the Rotbeast) leaves him "bitterly drained" and "at half-strength". Five would be "not so easy," which translated from Hunger-speak means it's a no-no. This was before we got the Tears, so four should be fine. I'm still wary of five, given the exponential drain, but maybe not more than I am of fighting the mostly-dead fish without Thorns. We'll have to see how he feels.

The other consideration for Thorns is that it'll give wound penalties, so we want to hit ASAP. Might want to accept more risk to get the first strike in and cut off a "hand," with the Silver safety blanket.

(De)Buffs: Refinement of Quickness should help- let's cast it immediately and/or before combat starts. We don't have Shadowcord buffs, but at the Fish's Rank it might not have helped much anyway.

Our Blood magic is at Rank 10.475. Hunger and Gisena should be buffed to the gills, however strongly that translates to stats at this point. Absent fuckery, enough to debuff even completed Armaments. It could be a lifesaver here, slowing and weakening the enemy that can one-shot us. I'm not sure how our range will interact with the Fish being a single continent-sized entity. Can we debuff the whole thing by focusing on a part of it? Ring magic is conceptual enough that I think it'd work that way, but if not, maybe being closer to a "heart" would be useful.

But, since the goal is to land Thorns, holding off on the debuff until we're about to make the first strike could throw the Fish off enough to be useful. Bloodflickering didn't work on Vanreir, but the Unerring wasn't a great target for that tactic even if he was much weaker.

Blasting Edeldross from 60->90% could be similarly useful near the end of the fight. The Rotbeast fight showed that it's much more draining than I thought, but it's still viable. And this time, Gisena will be in the area, which'll be neat.

The Fish might not even notice Gisena's Ult, but we should test how it reacts to Nullity blasts for the sake of science and the possibility of a pleasant surprise. As usual, do not put Hunger in the Nullity. I'm stating the obvious because the Fish has high Rank and I don't want to get keikakued into something stupid.

Gisena: Despite her awesomeness, I didn't expect Hunger to bring her along lest she be collateraled. But she's here, so let's take advantage. The obvious benefit is that she can shut down magical attacks that would pierce our non-Iridescent Protection. I'm not sure how well she'd deal with a superlaser, but Hunger will be grateful to not have to dance through 2hu bullshit.

Has it been 8 hours since Gisena started peeking at the spatial magics? Wait, no- she uses her green eyes in the update. It would be overly optimistic to expect her to be able to find a weakness or something, but no harm in trying. It's "Less Refined," so there might be hope.

And it's hard to tell through her subtlety and humility, but I'm pretty sure Gisena is a genius. She might have good advice.

Offensively, I struggle to see how Gisena could do anything. Unless she pulls out the secret powerup she's been teasing about for the past few updates, but I can't really plan around that. Time buffs would be nice here.

Gisena-Defending Stance: We do have to keep her alive, though. The Backpack is almost mandatory outside of bait- Gisena doesn't have the tankiness or mobility to survive in this fight for long without borrowing Hunger's. Hunger's mobility, that is, because Hunger isn't tough enough to throw down with the fish either. Wrapping her in the Mantle will protect against collateral damage, at least. Edelblood buffs, too. There's no chance we'll snap-buy UV, since ADS is clearly superior for this fight.

It's possible that the Fish might not care about Gisena, since she isn't the one with the horrible stinger. If so, we could leave her in a collateral-proof space. The main problem with this idea is that the Fish will have enough Rank to know that Hunger will defend Gisena and pull a Ber.

Gisena as Mondo Bait/I know that you know that: Which we could take advantage of, but again, Rank. The Fish's high Rank reminds me of the Avecarn fight, where he was informed that deception would be futile against Hunger's Guile-Defeating Stance. What a pain in the ass.

I have an outline of an idea relying on the Fish being able to read Gisena more easily than Hunger, where Gisena intentionally only has half the plan and so feeds the Fish bullshit information. I'm not sure if such a complicated construction wouldn't just get the "fuck it, disregard everything" response, but that would still be useful, maybe. I'm not smart enough to make the details work...

Gisena: I'm going to run over here to do a thing!
Hunger: I'm going to secretly follow her!
Fish: Stop her from doing the thing, she's vulnerable! Oh no, I have been stabbed!
Fish, alternative: Information is conflicting, oh no the thing has been done!

Disregarding how Hunger doesn't have the stealth for this, and the doublethink required to leave the genius out of the loop and etc. Something less hypothetical, uh. "Hey Gisena, use your Ult in ten seconds." The Fish uses its precog to expect the Ult in ten seconds, and reacts accordingly. Then, nine seconds later: "Lol JK, don't use your Ult."

People whose brains aren't currently sludge, please either help finish my thought or tell me it's a dumb plan.

Swim for your life: The Fish doesn't have anything to gain from fighting Hunger, it could cut and run at any time. Hunger is probably faster with Refinement of Quickness, at least. But it could blast a huge wave at Civilization #8173 to distract us. Not that exactly, the answer there is +Heartlessness, but something along those lines. A good opening strike could slow it down, as well as blood debuffs.

Environment: Fish+Water=Bad. I don't have many new thoughts on this, except that Edeldross flight might be incredibly slow by now if it doesn't benefit from +Agi. We need to see it in action to decide if the water is as much of a problem as story logic suggests, or if it just doesn't matter at this level and Hunger can ignore it. Could carve out a pocket of air/vacuum near the Fish?

Artful Thorn't: The worst case scenario is (LP falls, everyone dies)- okay, a bad case scenario is that Artful Thorn, which the whole plan is built to support, plain doesn't work, and we're left to fight the continent sized beast with a bastard sword. I dunno why it wouldn't, maybe the Foremost designed Armaments with specific countermeasures against the one cool trick that kaijus hate. Non-Thorn strategies will also help when we can't use any more Thorns because of the scaling- it should be mostly dead by this point, but maybe it caused us to miss a few and is still fighting fit.

I need to do some incredibly vague napkin math to see if hitting this thing to death is even plausible. Okay, the volume of a mountain range... can't find it. The volume of Mauna Loa, the biggest mountain, is 75,000 km^3. How many mountains in a moun-

Okay, let me go with area. Mountain Ranges are often 75-150 miles (120-240 km) wide, and greatly vary in length, let's go with 2000 km long. 400,000 km^2 of area in a Rotbeast. 24,000,000 km^2 for North America. If we assume a spherical cubic Fish and Rotbeast in a vacuum- 117575507654 km^3 vs. 252982212.813 km^3, the Fish is 464.758 times bigger. Based on rough nonsense estimates. I could have just taken Gisena's eyeballed "several orders of magnitude" as 1,000 and saved myself an hour of math. The work is my punishment for ignoring a genius - but a little math is fun now and then, so I shouldn't complain.

The Fish is 1,000 times larger than the Rotbeast, which would take Hunger around a day to kill. Has our DPS increased a thousandfold in the last two weeks? Luckily, we just got Whiteout to increase our DPS. ++Agi Skyveil, ++Agi/Might Bastion, ++Agi Tears, +20% Agi Tower, +100% Agi +30% All Stats Silver, +70% Physical Vigorflame. Str from 180 to 280, Agi from 130 to 350? Damn, okay. 50.7 Agi pluses to 157.5 (Not counting Cut Through)? Hunger is obscenely faster than he was before.

I'm done with math, it looks like there's enough "eh, I can see a 2x from dps coming from that" divided from the thousandfold bulk that going from 5.3 to 9.475 Rank should deal with the rest. Plus, this probably won't have the Rotbeast's complete lack of weak spots. tl;dr we can feasibly hit it until it dies.

One benefit of non-Thorn attacks is that they can be targeted, the downside is that they have to be. Fins, sense organs, "arteries," weapons (especially if we haven't grabbed ADS, for the 5x Ruin boost), the usual. I should note that we can obviously hit weakspots with normal Cuts even when we're still trying to Thorn if an opportunity presents itself, I never explicitly said that before. We can also use my old favorite of Bladewind spam! No need to get close to the fish and risk retaliation bodyslams, just keep cutting. I'm interested to see how it'll hold up in such a high-level fight. They should all be aimed rather than just hitting wherever, doing total HP damage with Bladewinds is like pissing into the ocean.

The best way to quickly increase DPS is to snap-buy ADS, or MoDS if we haven't mined the Arete. +5 All stats and 5x Ruin is no joke, and the autodefences would make this a bit less rocket tag-y.

Hunger-Defending Stance: I've written more about how to hurt the Fish than how to avoid getting hurt in return. We've been told one good shot can kill Hunger, which means that he's got to dodge for his life. If the Fish sends out a massive Rank-backed tidal wave that's too big to dodge, dodge it anyway. Refinement of Quickness is cool like that. It's a stamina hog, though, so we'd want to end the fight fast if we rely on it...

Proactive defense by spamming bladewinds at weapons, if we don't have ADS yet, would be useful. The same for Edeldross shields- they might be stronger after SIlver. Also Outer Shadow, we have lots of meh defenses to layer into something decent maybe. Have to work out how to layer them so they don't get eaten by Gisena's Nullity defenses, which are more important. Combined with Whiteout, some of the attacks that previously would have oneshot Hunger might only severely damage him- which, with Inherit and Healing, is the same as doing no damage if Hunger can get away quickly enough. Don't get hit by the Fish itself, that's still dead for sure.

I have a thought about Hunger cutting off body parts that are in danger so they can get physically destroyed without any soul damage happening, to be regenerated later, but I don't know enough about how that works to suggest it seriously.

Wacky Implausible Ideas (to varying degrees): Shift the Cloak to the Noontime Sky, the Fish will never suspect that it's still Hunger. Try to argue that because it's an "Armament," WeDS applies to the entire Fish. Check to see if there are any non-destroyed civs nearby that could give buffs. Try to slaughter a 0-1-pick enemy before the Fish's Rank tells it we want to kill it for powerups, and also to get used to Hunger's new powerlevel. Fly to the Outer Sky and crash back down, abusing Edeldross's fuelless kinetic flight for massive speed, and Fall of Night to take no damage (this one actually seems reasonable, at least for some fights). Mindbreak the Fish with massive Cha so it accepts its death. Use the Sea of Nullity to remove the sea of water, because words. Conceptual Sky bullshit to punish the Fish for pretending to be the horizon. Figure out how to take advantage of the Armament not having a pilot, and only being an "incomplete" person- hammer on the soul Vanrier style? Soul Cuts? Diplo the Fish before backstabbing it, I don't want to do this because it's mean. Try to figure out what Curse it has, that's Gisena's job. Grab giant whales as bait, it might get Hungry some time. Does it have any particularly important looking Runes to smash? Unleash max Edelboost+Sea and everything immediately to kill it before it notices us.

-How do I shot Rank: Even being around Hunger's uncontrolled Astral storm was dangerous for the party, so there's a lot of Pressure power to use there. Problem is, Hunger has no experience in this area, and neither do I, so who knows how feasible anything is. Is there an "On" button for a Shroud that may or may not exist? Could we use a super move like Versch has, with our connection to him? It would be awesome here, but I doubt it. Overwhelm our enemy, whiteout the sky with Bladewinds! Do they work differently now, can we power them up more? Can we use more fine-tuned soul attacks than "Pressure everything" now?

It'd be nice to play around a bit before the fight, but I don't trust that the Fish will sit obligingly and obliviously while we practice to kill it- it's good that Hunger learns best under pressure anyway, he'll just have to pay attention.

Ideal Astral Summon: Blood-having, to benefit from those buffs, if possible. A chargeable super attack, that would force the Fish to pay attention so Hunger can move in with Thorn, would be great. Defense or speed buffs? Illusions? Possibilities are endless.

Y'know, Astral Beasts are the natural enemies of Armaments anyway (for whatever reason), so... if whatever we summon can open a portal itself, we might have an army on our side, since we share a common cause. Just don't tell them about Versch lol.

Since that actually feels somewhat clever, I'll end with the Astral Army Made.
 
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The Fish might not even notice Gisena's Ult, but we should test how it reacts to Nullity blasts for the sake of science and the possibility of a pleasant surprise. As usual, do not put Hunger in the Nullity. I'm stating the obvious because the Fish has high Rank and I don't want to get keikakued into something stupid.
Can Gisena's ult even do anything. We know it does not work on Rank (see Sten's figh, where we shutdown his Soul Evocation but he was still our superior in Rank) and as Hunger said, this fish could be a lot faster than expected.
The best way to quickly increase DPS is to snap-buy ADS, or MoDS if we haven't mined the Arete. +5 All stats and 5x Ruin is no joke, and the autodefences would make this a bit less rocket tag-y.
Due to Whiteout the autodefense now is 11.25x and not 5x.

One of the questions is how much time does Hunger need to recover after Praxis casting. We can be a little bitch and just use Artful thorn and RoQ away and wait for some time and repeat this. If the fish could not follow us on land (doubt it, but still). Also I really don't know how can we use Gisena. If our contained Rank emanation causes her damage, the fish will flatten her. Her Nullity is useless on a continent scale enemy, her Ult will make her faint, her damage output is laughable compared to ours, her physical stats are shit compared to ours.

Honestly this feels like an escort mission with a giant Kaiju as a boss
 
This was supposed to be a shitty shitpost doodle but then I forgot to stop oops
That's disgustingly cute, I can just see Versch leaning forward in his dock to eat it right out of Letrizia's hand. Nibbling paradoxically delicately, even leaving some for his future pilot. 10/10, would sacrifice my lifespan to the eldritch war-machine, Attramemnar can fuck right off.
Can Gisena's ult even do anything. We know it does not work on Rank (see Sten's figh, where we shutdown his Soul Evocation but he was still our superior in Rank) and as Hunger said, this fish could be a lot faster than expected.
Yeah, her presence is confusing and a bit worrying? Nightmare Airlines is grounded until the next sunset, so she'll be around for the Fish fight. Unless the current one counts, but that'd put the cloak back on cooldown and delay Hunger's return to Nilfel, which has its own problems. The enemy's incidental movements can conjure civilization-erasing tidal waves. Nullity's strong, but does nothing against the second-order effects of magic (see Seram's thermobaric explosion vs. Gisena 1.0). Hunger'll have to defend her, which ranges from inconvenient to really bad, depending on the Fish's grasp of tactics.

Speaking of tactics, I think our bases are pretty much covered by various effortposts courtesy of Projectile/vali/etc. I am (fingers crossed) actually feeling pretty good about our odds. Maybe we have enough leeway to save up for the 7-Arete version of AHS, so we don't have to do this every month? We've got the perfect dodge to fall back on if cornered, can spend an hour on Enclosure; a slightly weaker summons to either protect Gisena or distract the Fish depending on its capabilities would be worthwhile. There's going to be mass destruction anyway, it's not as catastrophic if we summon something uncooperative as it would've been in the midst of Miren.
 
We probably want 2 Arete version of AHS given the unfortunate situation with Aobarus terminator we need to keep up with.
 
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That's disgustingly cute, I can just see Versch leaning forward in his dock to eat it right out of Letrizia's hand. Nibbling paradoxically delicately, even leaving some for his future pilot. 10/10, would sacrifice my lifespan to the eldritch war-machine, Attramemnar can fuck right off.
Versch nibbed a bit but probably spit it out and noped out. Ancient eldritch war machine, but even they know when to say - "Miss me with that gluten shit"

EDIT: Being gluten intolerant is not limited to the being that are intolerant to gluten. Versh asserts his dominance over the live choices of everyone else in the MORAL arena. Destroying 10% of the life force of everyone around you is a power move, but having impossible standards and dogmatic feelings of victimization and a moral superiority complex is a CHAD move. The Decimation is bad but if people stopped eating gluten their lives will be improved by at least 20 percent.
 
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Alright, I'll try to draw up some tactics too.

First things first, what do we know about the Armament-Fish, and how do Hunger's powers compare?

Armament-Fish
* Rank: 10
** I had hoped that maybe it doesn't have as much due to not being a fully matured Armament, but by now Hunger's military Rank is 9.475, and there is no mention of any Rank advantage we might have.
** thankfully we have HDS and our Defensive Rank is 10.475 due to Silver, so we have less to worry about when it comes to countering its humongous Rank
** if it is truly Rank 10, then it likely has a Shroud, which both intensifies Pressure in its vicinity and gives it a unique superpower
** should have an Astral shadow, and probably attracts invaders from that Realm like all Armaments do, though I don't know whether it happens to uninjured ones too
** same navigational capabilities as Versch?

* Stats: huge
** Armaments are supposed to have stats appropriate for their Rank, we don't, simple as that
** so we're at something of a disadvantage there
** well 'its roar is the death of island chains' and 'spawns tsunami waves capable of wiping entire civilizations away' should have been enough of a hint too, since we can't do that yet

* Size: Continental
** big enough to blot out the horizon
** makes it easier to hit, but conversely most types of damage will simply get lost in its mass
** barring stuff like Artful Thorn, we could probably plow through its body for days and fail to inflict any kind of meaningful damage
** maybe we could hit its equivalent of nerve clusters with Ruin like we did to the Tiller Wurm, unless its mental resilience is too great to be affected. We would either need to hit it from the inside for this (which Hunger doesn't think will work) or inflict a big enough wound that its nervous system is exposed to the outside
** its attacks are of commensurate size, so on the one hand they're more difficult to dodge, but on the other hand they're easier to predict and less focused
** we should look out for that roar

* Technology: Foremost
** it only has what it had been born with rather than interstellar-grade weapons we can expect from other Armaments, so that's something
** but we have no idea what the Foremost thought to be appropriate as built-in options
** it's not fully matured and Gisena says it's less refined, so maybe not all the systems are online
** from what Letrizia told us about Verschlengorge: "When he's at full strength, most injuries don't weaken his Pressure by much. But if you hurt him enough, I think he begins ablating Rank to preserve his fundamental structure. Unlike you, the Armament's not a complete person by itself. It was designed with a pilot in mind. Its astral shadow only exists because of its physical body, but it may be that high-grade Foremost technology can't exist in the physical world without some degree of support from Pressure. Kind of like how a black hole can't exist below a certain level of mass density. Since the two are co-dependent, it may have to sacrifice one side to shore up the other if catastrophic damage is taken."
** with enough injuries it presumably loses Rank and stats too (conversely, crippling it becomes more difficult?)

* Environment: Voyaging Sea
** since it's an Armament-Fish, it wouldn't be surprising if it benefited from a water-based environment or had water manipulation powers
** assuming the worst, maybe it can carry the Voyaging Sea with it wherever it goes
** maybe it would be less advantaged if we could lure it out (assuming that's possible), but at these levels of power movement wouldn't really be influenced that much by mundane factors
** it's likely the biggest Fish in this Sea, but there might be other inhabitants

* Intelligence: ?
** other Armaments are intelligent, but this one has just been born
** I wouldn't count on it being just a dumb animal, but it likely has little experience fighting against foes of equivalent power unless Astral Sovereigns decided to stage an incursion while we were off conquering the Voyaging Realm
** diplomacy might or might not work -> we have a significant advantage when it comes to Age & Treachery, though applying it will be nontrivial

* Curses: Apocrypha
** we've already noted that its appearance after Hunger's landing in the Voyaging Realm is likely not a coincidence and they're somehow connected
** combined with the fact that Armaments seem to be associated with Curses, it's possible that the Fish has a Curse attached to it too, maybe even one of Hunger's
** Apocrypha seems to be the most likely candidate unless they don't get unique Curses (Versch already has Decimator, Attramemnar has the Tyrant, and it can't have Geas for obvious reasons)
*** besides, it would be quite thematic for our Armament to have our Crowning Curse
*** Armaments appear to have powers related to their associated Curses, if Verschlengorge is anything to go by -> Fate powers?
*** frankly, the idea that the Armamanet would be able to collaborate with our Apocryphal Curse is horrifying, but hopefully things aren't that dire
** either way we've been warned that Apocrypha might get involved in this fight
*** maybe she will fall back on good old tactics and buff it like she did the Rotbeast
*** but in case she doesn't want to be predictable, there is an easy and dramatic way for help this Armament without using old tricks
*** Aramaments are designed with a pilot in mind
*** wouldn't it be just like Apo-chan to ntr Hunger and provide the Armamanet-Fish with a suitable pilot that would assist it with tactics? Totality means that personal power is mostly irrelevant, - barring Thorn counting the pilot as part of the Fish and hitting them in the Astral plane, - so she could just grab a tactical genius from somewhere

* Picks: three
** I don't remember what level of danger 3 picks precisely represent, but the Rotbeast was one such fight before we got Artful Thorn, with a death chance around 1-2% IIRC
** so things aren't quite that bad, especially if we Progress before the fight again
** getting a big jump in power likely means turning this into a 2-pick fight, but the safety might be worth getting less XP

* Time: 1-2 days
** that's how much time Adorie gave us, and obviously getting back earlier is better
** this still gives us some room for hit-and-run tactics, but we can't turn this into a week-long battle of attrition



Hunger


* Stats
** we are far worse when it comes to physical stats
** we have a lot of Protection and resilience too (from Mantle, Penitent and blood stuff), but getting hit is still a bad idea
** probably better at planning and scheming barring unforeseen circumstances

* Social
** we have a lot of Charisma, can we use that as an attack vector?
** pretend that we aren't here to kill it and are trying to become its pilot instead? Could get inside it that way
** Penitent makes it more likely for others to forgive us for inappropriate escalation to violence... can we exploit that? Say we're sorry, then sucker-punch it?
** Kind of scummy, but lots of lives are on the line

* Accretion
** Rank: 8.475
** Military: 9.475
** Defensive: 10.475 (I reckon it works together with the military Rank during fights)
** Blood: 10.475
** Anti-Guile: 11.475/10.475? depends on whether it stacks with military Rank, Avecarn fight showed that this works against feints too
** Abduction: a personal talent of Hunger, but unlikely to help in this case unless we want to try a repeat of the Mizuku Gambit (sticking our brain into Foremost technology)
** we seem to be neither advantaged nor disadvantaged here when it comes to direct Pressure confrontations, though indirect influence might still have an effect

* Edeldross
** we'll obviously want max buffs for Hunger
** using force blasts against the Fish is obviously out, but at least it will help us move in the air in case we can't just run on air for some inexplicable reason
** Graces... we have none, but we have Gisena with us and some time to spare; could she develop an appropriate Grace on such short notice? And could we learn it? Uncertain, but building a useful Artifact is even less likely without time or materials (unless we slice off parts of the Fish?..), and her Ultimate just doesn't affect a big enough area to help much even if we were willing to risk her thus

* Curses
** this fight could be one of the few cases where Decimator might serve as an actual weapon
** not necessarily in the sense of harming the Armament-Fish, but it would presumably sense being affected by the Affliction, so we could lure it somewhere
** how big is the affected area by now, and would we hit innocents?
** we can't really afford to wait long enough for the Curse to awaken by itself, so if we commit to this tactic, we would have to call upon it actively
** don't know what the Curse would think about being used to Mitigate itself, but maybe we could use this opportunity to tie it even tighter to Hunger
** focus the Curse through our Ring?

* Blade
** normal attacks (or even Cut Through) are of questionable usefulness unless we hit a critical weakness
** Second Stage... let's not go there
** Stances
*** Hero-Defeating helps against superior Rank, but we already have Defensive Rank for that
*** Guile-Defeating is of limited utility, since the Fish isn't scheming against us or trying to affect us with illusions (as far as we know); still helps against feints
*** Weapon-Defeating seems very applicable here, as the Armament is a weapon, though I don't know how much 5x Ruin (or rather 11.25x thanks to Whiteout) will really help against an opponent of this size
*** we can potentially acquire other Stances
*** maybe we'll scrounge up enough Arete for All-Defeating?
*** Magic-Defeating Stance seems less useful here other than as anti-Apocrypha defense
*** World-Defeating Stance would give us more Luck, Intelligence and Rank
*** Monster-Defeating Stance would be of great help against the Stats disadvantage;
*** if MoDS gives a Ruin multiplier that stacks with Weapon-Defeating Stance, it might be worth considering taking it instead of ADS
** Praxis
*** Quickness: we don't have a lot of uses for Quickness, especially since they compete with Artful Thorn, but it would be useful for a first strike or as an escape button; there are even more esoteric applications, like bypassing its defense/Rank or maybe even using some form of time fuckery (Hunger could have gotten some inspiration from the Forebear vision)
*** Artful Thorn: we'll clearly be using Thorn heavily in this fight, as it is our best weapon against the Armament; question is if we can aim it more precisely, like immobilizing it or blinding the Fish first
*** it wouldn't surprise me if we get an offer to learn more Praxis techniques mid/pre-fight; we don't have the Arete for RoB or Cold Light of Vengeance, but Refinement of Place is a possibility, as are Shatter the Pane and Unbound Severing
*** or completely new Praxis techniques? Something to coordinate with our Rank would be nice

* Ring
** indestructible, but unlikely to matter in this fight
** Blood magic
*** our Blood Rank gives us the necessary area of effect, though sensing or fine control on great scale is impossible for us atm
*** Buffs/debuffs: Verschlengorge has blood, the Fish hopefully does too, so we could affect it
*** Healing: if the Fish has healing capabilities, could we interfere and either prevent that or make it heal wrongly?
*** Bleeding: if Artful Thorn creates a bleeding wound, we could use Blood magic to exaggerate it
*** Plagues: this hasn't seen use till now, and its Rank might protect the Fish against such attempts, but we could develop a poison or a disease specifically for this Armament
*** Sensing: its size makes this both easier and more difficult; easy because there's more advance warning before movement, difficult because our sensing range is limited and we have no experience interpreting information from such a large opponent
*** Control: likely only works against weak targets, but perhaps we could find an army somewhere (Astral/Voyaging Sea), buff them with Blood magic and Edeldross to ensure they don't instantly die and sic them on the Armament Fish as a distraction
*** I'm grasping for straws here, but maybe we've reached levels where we can do some more funky stuff with Blood magic like making enemies see illusions or create blood clones that could be confused with Hunger?

* Mantle
** Perfect Defense from Silver, but can only be used once; we would also find it helpful against the Lord Protector, so best not to rely on it unless we have no other choice
** Sky Veil could give us some Stealth advancements if we take the time to hunt down appropriate targets
** Signs
*** Teleportation resets next Evening, so this could be another get-out-of-jail card if we wait; though that means that we'll have to put off our return to Nilfel till the Evening after that even if we win
*** Summoning could do anything, but we have more than enough time to try calling something useful and handle the aftermath if we fail
*** could be dangerous if the Astral summon decides to join forces with the Fish

* Progression
** one of our greatest advantages is that we can advance swiftly when provided with enough conflict
** so we could seek out some challenges before attacking the Armament-Fish
** kill all unintelligent life in the Voyaging Sea first? if we're going to be a walking ecological disaster, might as well get some use out of it
** Blood magic might make it too easy, so perhaps it wouldn't be challenging enough even for 1 pick
** subduing the Astral summon might count for a 2-pick if it's difficult enough; they can't harm us directly, which would reduce the reward, but perhaps we can countermand that rule
** hopefully we can develop some powers that would be especially effective against the Armament-Fish

* Skills: Fisherman
** well, it's a gift, though I have no idea how to transfer these skills to Armament-fishing
** can we bait it with something? what do continent-sized Armaments like to eat?
** wait, we do have that Summoning spell...
** so summon something delicious from the Astral realm, 'convince' it to work as bait since it won't be in any real danger (or just force the matter), use Blood magic to infuse it with poison/disease, and make the Armament-Fish swallow it
** don't know about the effectiveness of that, but better than turning ourselves or the Ring into bait?



So to summarize some of the plans that crystallized after writing that up:

1. Hit-and-run: the Fish is deceptively fast for its size, but we have Quickness on our side; if it chases after Hunger, he can try luring it towards more favorable terrain.
2. Age&Treachery: one possibility is giving it poisoned bait, another is trying to social it. We could try both?
3. Git gud: get some advancements under our belt first by pursuing other challenges. Lessens the reward from the Fish, but also makes the fight safer.

2624 Words
 
It's not clear how relevant non-Thorn attacks will be in this fight, or whether Artful Thorn damage is augmented when combined with more mundane striking power, but we do still have Fall of Night. Gain some altitude, use the Cloak to obscure us against the backdrop of the evening sky, and then fall on the Fish like a guillotine. If Gisena's green-eyed analysis can spot any vital components in the time it takes to summon something, that'd be nice, but I'm not optimistic about anything the Foremost made having a weak point to hit for massive damage.
 
This is a *very* dangerous line of thought, but we know that Astral denizens are inherently and almost uncontrollably drawn to attack Armaments, right? And we have an extremely high rank for our stats, and we're facing the Armament fish... we may well be able to summon a being that we have poor odds facing, but which can fight the BIG FISH as a peer opponent -- and more importantly, which would be aptly motivated to do so.
 
This is a *very* dangerous line of thought, but we know that Astral denizens are inherently and almost uncontrollably drawn to attack Armaments, right? And we have an extremely high rank for our stats, and we're facing the Armament fish... we may well be able to summon a being that we have poor odds facing, but which can fight the BIG FISH as a peer opponent -- and more importantly, which would be aptly motivated to do so.
Ah, the "let them fight" approach.
 
This is a *very* dangerous line of thought, but we know that Astral denizens are inherently and almost uncontrollably drawn to attack Armaments, right? And we have an extremely high rank for our stats, and we're facing the Armament fish... we may well be able to summon a being that we have poor odds facing, but which can fight the BIG FISH as a peer opponent -- and more importantly, which would be aptly motivated to do so.
After all, there's always a bigger fish...
 
Just throwing some ideas at the wall. Maybe we could try and make platforms via edeldross or run on the water via quickness. Also can't we fly with edeldross? Because that seems like a good way to avoid getting stuck in the water vs a fish. How fast can we fly? Does quickness effect that as well?

Another thought is to maybe try and rob the fish of mobility via edeldross constructs, though I suppose that might be beyond us. I wonder if we can maybe make some shinies as bait or something or dial down our charisma to zero so it won't find us as notable to strike from surprise.
 
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So, just started reading this quest from the beginning and have noticed people using the word Praxis as what seems to be a proper noun. What are they referring to? Is it in relation to an earlier quest I need to read first?
 
How do I get this to be an actual option?

I liked the Gisena stuff in the update but it looks like shes having trouble keeping up again. Needs more buffs or when we purchase OaF II we're going to kill our whole party.
I think Rihaku only fluffs the advancements like that to have fun, don't think he'd actually have consequences like that come about without warning.

So, just started reading this quest from the beginning and have noticed people using the word Praxis as what seems to be a proper noun. What are they referring to? Is it in relation to an earlier quest I need to read first?
this quest has far more information on the Praxis than any other, you don't need to read anything else to follow it all
 
So, just started reading this quest from the beginning and have noticed people using the word Praxis as what seems to be a proper noun. What are they referring to? Is it in relation to an earlier quest I need to read first?

The Imperial Praxis is the magic system practiced by the Accursed, and at the imperial level, it's capabilities are utterly ridiculous. Using Exaltion shard tiers for comparison, Imperial Praxis is a Solaroid exaltation. It's also a magic system with extreme reliability on a multiversal scale. You need to be a Cursebearer who took Imperial Praxis access as their remittance or for the Accursed to be able to like you enough for him to give you a True Wish that you use to get Imperial Praxis access. There are two lesser forms. The Royal Praxis(The Forebear was such a willful overpowered nutcase he managed to initiate himself/reproduce the section of the Praxis that applies to sword techniques indepently of the Accursed at this level of potency), which is a celestial (Lunar/Sidereal level) exaltation tier.

The Noble Praxis is floating around random civilizations across the multiverse and the Accursed's diffidently favored servants have access to it. This is the level below the Royal Praxis.

Edit: Apparently It would take a lesser wish and sufficient personal power to unlock the Royal Praxis. The first point Royal Sword Praxis techniques are seen is in Threefold Meditations.
 
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Has it been 8 hours since Gisena started peeking at the spatial magics? Wait, no- she uses her green eyes in the update. It would be overly optimistic to expect her to be able to find a weakness or something, but no harm in trying. It's "Less Refined," so there might be hope.

She's a High Sorceress now, she doesn't have meagre time limits!
 
So, just started reading this quest from the beginning and have noticed people using the word Praxis as what seems to be a proper noun. What are they referring to? Is it in relation to an earlier quest I need to read first?
Welcome! Always happy to see more people join in the suffering - er, I mean, the party! Yes, the party.

The Praxis is the Accursed's personal magic system/casting style. It's special because it's extremely reliable! The Praxis can be used in nearly any realm/setting - even ones that are explicitly anti-magic - because it is powered by the self and one's own efforts, rather than any physical or metaphysical form of magical energy source like mana/prana. I suppose in some senses you could say it's roughly similar to casting from a Stamina bar instead of an MP bar. However, it costs a great deal of personal effort to advance and develop new techniques in the Praxis.

It first appeared in the original Simple Transaction quest a few years ago, and was offered again in Even Further Beyond. This is the first quest where we have actually had the opportunity to use it, so it is not necessary to go back to either of the previous quests to know what the rest of us know about it, which frankly isn't much because we're limited to a specific branch/fraction of the system.
 
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Some tactics going into the fish fight - 860 Words

Astral Summoning tactics:
First we make some distance. By which I mean, turn tail and get away from the shore. At least far enough that there's cover from the Fish Horizon.
When we summon something to help us fight, I want negotiations to begin without it knowing exactly the sheer magnitude of what we're fighting. If we make a deal to fight a 'big monster' and it thinks that's merely on the scale of Versh or even the Rotbeast, that's a lot lot less that we have to cajole or trade for their assistance.

We could also perhaps trade in priceless Foremost tech, namely in terms of 'you get half of whatever you can pry off' as a way to motivate them to do as much damage as they can as it ties their payout to combat effectiveness.

Thorn Tactics:
We... don't actually need to challenge the full might of this fish. Part of the size disparity means that it's simply going to be hard to bring all of the fish's strength to bear against such a small target.

Imagine a mosquito landed on your foot. You could easily squash it with your other foot, or bend down and smack it with either of your hands if you so intend. But while you have the threat of using any of those three limbs it's not like the mosquito has to worry about the damage from all three at once. Whichever you commit to the squash is what it has to deal with, if you pick right hand the other foot reels back.

To wit, we're not even a mosquito in this scenario, we need to be more like one of those ticks that can give you a year long allergy to meat if they bite you once. Something people are much more afraid of than just mosquitoes, as well as having a similar bite profile to the danger we present.

This analogy got a little away from me.

We don't need to challenge the fish to a fight. We need to be a parasite that bites it all of four or five times with Thorn. We shouldn't even bother trying to kill it with Cut Through normal mode, rather we should focus the power of Ruin on clearing out a minuscule patch on the fish where we can safely use Thorn again and again. The fish is probably going to have a bunch of guns, something to keep in mind. Clear out the local firing lines, cut through the point defenses of the area, maybe make and Edeldross shell construct. Not for the buffing abilities for once, though that would be a boon regardless, but rather as a form of ablative and replenishable armor/bunker in which we can do our work inside.
Maybe even shape it into a recurved teardrop or somesuch where if it starts to get squished by forces too strong for Hunger to reasonably contest (which would be a lot of options available to the fish let's be real) it would squeeze and be spat out of the crushing forces instead of pinned and shattered like it should have been. Better to be launched away at dizzying speeds than killed after all.

Going back to the mosquito analogy because why not, blood control. It's honestly highly unlikely to me that we'd be able to effect the whole fish outright but as mentioned above we don't really need too. I feel much more confident on the ability to effect blood within a few hundred meters of us, and conceptually making a sour spot could pay off dividends. It actually might be better to effect everywhere around where we intend to Thorn because that's the one place that's going to get Cut Through anyway.

Finally, the Armament Shroud. Armaments have them! While this Fish might not have them up right at this second, the sudden snapping of them on should be considered while facing it. Pressure magnifies immensly while inside one, and that's not great for a build that can't contest them in that corner. We probably can't exhaust it in an easy manner either in order to sidestep this. Our best bet if one comes to life might be to combine the two most obvious forms of Pressure manipulation we have just seen, the first being Liz's ability to equalize a stupidly large Rank difference for just a moment by piecing through our blanket instead of having a blanket fight that she'd lose. The second being the Wall of Myth Pressure hardening, giving that metaphorical pressure rapier some heft to make up for how outclassed it would be in other parameters.

A big issue would be what to do with Gisena while that's up, because Pressure of that magnitude is an omnidirectional attack and she's just shown her inability to contest Hunger's pressure without getting visibly injured, let alone something that's going to be even stronger than that. I wonder if sticking her to us in a blanket of Stained Glass Shadow would help keep her from injury, in addition to the now customary layer of Evening Sky.
 
Baiting the Hook
You guys do now have enough Arete to purchase All-Defeating Stance if you'd like. It would certainly help in this fight, though it's actually not as well-suited to this combat as some other effects, as the Armament Fish is large enough that even enormous increases in defensive potency won't stop it from oneshotting Hunger's flesh body. On the other hand, now that so much of his power is derived from Rank, the penalties from Second Stage are much less relevant, meaning that Hunger can effectively fight in ghost form against some opponents!

Still, the +++++All Stats and vastly increased Ruin damage are both still highly relevant against the Armament Fish, especially with Overwhelm - Whiteout. It would give you a vector of offensive power that's at least somewhat effective against the Fish without relying on the Artful Thorn and its swiftly escalating cost per battle. Do you wish to become All-Defeating?

[ ] Purchase It - Even a moderate increase in win% is advisable to acquire at this juncture. Plus, it'll be useful against the Lord Protector as well, arguably far more so than against the Armament Fish itself.
[ ] Don't Purchase It - It's not truly fundamental to Hunger's success here and this way you may save enough Arete to pick up Pillars or Once and Future II from the picks of the Fish! You've got to capitalize on picks when they come, since Hunger is now so strong they are increasingly rare!

Hunger and Gisena have the whole day to deal with the Fish before his teleportation recharges, so there are a few strategies that could be pursued. A straightforward charge with Refinement of Quickness, Artful Thorn and Rank 10.4 Blood debuffs is the obvious tack, offering tactically simplicity that allows Hunger to focus on execution while remaining a highly effective and flexible plan. On the other hand, surely there are many who have attempted to halt the Fish's civilization-wrecking rampage and have failed for lack of raw power or allies. It may be worth looking around and seeing if Hunger's Rank can scrounge up some relevant allies for this fight... even a single additional combatant could serve as a distraction or help absorb one of the Fish's deadly attacks.

Hunger is fairly confident that the Refinement of Quickness will allow him to dodge any of the Fish's attacks that he can perceive, though being struck by anything but the most glancing of blows is likely still an instant Second Stage proc. It's only his utterly massive Protection and Rank, plus magnified Health, that allow him to tank even a glancing blow at all, considering the beast is many quadrillions of times his mass. All-Defeaing Stance increases the margin of error here but not to the degree that Hunger could actually survive a solid blow.

[ ] Cast Line - The monster's thrashing will cause even further apocalyptic damage in the event of a prolonged engagement; to save the most lives now Hunger must simply slay the beast as fast as possible. Attack directly with Artful Thorn and hope that continuous Thorn activations cripple the monster enough for Hunger's blood debuff to immobilize it, then begin the arduous process of ending its life. Benefits substantially from All-Defeating Stance.

*Does pose a significant risk to Hunger's life, though he gets "two" attempts with Second Stage. Finally relevant again!
*With the attentions of the Armament Fish focused on Hunger himself, Gisena's still highly-respectable stats should give her reliable odds of surviving the tidal waves to come.
*Gisena's can't really offer much assistance beyond a potential emergency ult and informational support, at her current level of power
*An Apocryphal proc could worsen the situation substantially, but this method ensures the smallest window of time for the Curse to act.
*Just shoot Cut Him.

[ ] Bait and Tackle - You've got twenty-four hours before you can return to Adorie's kingdom, might as well make the most of it. Spend your time in preparation; Hunger will search for allies while Gisena attempts to craft a one-use Artifact relevant to downing the Armament Fish. The potential exists to find one or more suitable allies whose combat relevance or utility abilities could drastically improve Hunger's odds of survival, though this comes at a cost in both time and lives. Leaving the beast alone for one day longer will result in countless territories buried under its catastrophic floods, its mere incidental movements raising tsunami waves capable of blotting out the sky. The Voyaging Realm is almost unimaginably vast, and the scale of this monster still comparatively tiny, but on the level of individual nations it still represents nothing less than a deluge of Biblical proportions. Even one day spared of its ravages could be billions saved.

*Likely to improve your odds significantly, though this does yield one further day for the Apocryphal to act, if it was going to
*No real downsides to Hunger personally beyond the uncertain prospect of Apocryphal risk, and the knowledge that he might have been able to save more. Still, with the beast having already slain tens of billions, one could argue that maximizing the chances of its downfall come before the lives of a single day's reaping.
*Utilizes all the assets and resources Hunger and Gisena have available
*You can summon an additional ally with Supreme Enclosure as well, if desired. >90% chance of a favorable outcome, but there is the outside risk of an incompatible denizen. Could theoretically be a vector for the Apocryphal to intervene.
*If you choose Bait and Tackle, there may be opportunities to spend Arete on either Gisena's Artifact or the nature of the allies Hunger encounters, if any. On the other hand, All-Defeatng Stance offers +++++Int, Wis, Wits and Luck, which would all help in the search...
*You may also decide to spend your Bait and Tackle time directly assisting Gisena instead of searching for allies. If Hunger gives it his all, she may be able to forge a relevant Artifact worthy of inclusion into his panoply, such as the actual Rod of Ages!

[ ] Attempt Diplomacy
- This is truly reckless, giving up the element of surprise and the crucial first Artful Thorn hit to instead attempt to communicate with the monster. What do you hope to achieve, given that Hunger must kill it to sate his Decimation? And yet other, less dangerous targets do exist, and the Fish if subordinated would be an invaluable asset, not just militarily but from a scientific standpoint... the development cycle of an embryonic Armament could yield tremendous insights in the fields of magical, Astral, and Foremost-related research! [+Letrizia, +Gisena if successful, --Aobaru, -Aeira if Decimation occurs for substantial length of time]

*If it truly is a newborn Armament, this is an event which is very nearly unique in the span of the cosmos. To simply kill it for Curse mitigation would be a tremendous loss.
*You may be able to resolve this situation peacefully.
*Opens up possibility of enhanced lore upcoming.
*That would still leave you with a Decimator target to hunt. Hunger would likely be forced to undertake whichever of the Lord of Stalks or Draining the Sovereignty (Territorial Waters) he finds first.
*If diplomacy is unsuccessful (unknown%), significantly (but not catastrophically) worsens your chances in the upcoming fight.
 
[X] Purchase It
[X] Don't Purchase It

[X] Cast Line
[X] Bait and Tackle
[X] Attempt Diplomacy
 
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