A Simple Transaction I

RedV · Jun 10, 2023

Box Lunch said:
There's no reason to repay creation for anything. It didn't cause the Forebear's Procession, nor Hunger's grim slog of years; it also offered no aid in his time of need and is due no specific consideration. The general consensus of creation is one of polite indulgence towards the affairs of heroes and conquerors alike. For one who has held both titles, the facile nature of such concern is argument for disregard, regardless of the multitudes involved.

I think I strongly disagree with this interpretation.

1) Hunger absolutely cares about people in general. He does actively try to do the most possible good, which includes saving lives. I think the clearest example is when we chose to hold the line vs Procyon, putting himself and his companions at great personal risk to defend the humans in Nilfel (if we'd run, which was the Gisena-approved plan, we'd progress enough to handle it in two days).

Like, if his perspective was "this world owes me nothing, it's only given me burdens", and "I only repay my debts", then there's 0 reason to risk that for a place you've been in for a month. He's even treated the people who enslaved the azure ring relatively lightly and did his best to reduce their casualties, when they have 0 debt to him to be repaid.

2) This is not specific to your arguments, but many Freedom arguments are representing the 4bear as much worse than he was. We know from the flashback we saw in Hour of Reckoning, that he attempts to free the people first / let them attain free will, and if that is not possible then deploy a Dynasty. *

I remember at least one argument claiming that the 4bear by nature is anti-free will and the people are little more than puppets, but there is clear in text evidence that this was just a last resort for the 4bear, when he'd exhausted all other means, and he did actively try to restore 'em to sound mind first.

Note that the Indenture is not destined to send us to fouler worlds everytime unlike the Procession so I am certain Hunger won't become as cynical as people think the 4bear was, but even full 4bear retained his rationality and had human-positive ideals.

3) The Accursed may prefer one choice, but he still offered Hunger both choices. No one held a gun to his head and forced him to give us Progression options - the crimes against Hunger and against many more sentient beings by the Hidden Ones weren't washed away and were grievous enough he specifically told us the Hidden Ones existed in the first place (otherwise we wouldn't even have considered Vengeance!).

He's just telling us to be aware of the risks. But, I feel that Hunger's IC characterization post Procyon is very amenable to taking these risks.

And he felt his blood rise at the thought of his mercenary disposition in the past; for what did it matter, that circumstance favored the monstrous and the calculating? They who pursued virtue did not do so out of expectation of victory, or acclaim, or of any reward material or otherwise: else it would not be virtue, but expedience only.

4) A relatively emotional argument and I'll stop posting after this post, but reiterate that we are trading everyone we know who has been good to us, for two unknown characters. Worse, this is a promise by our enemy, who has resorted to abhorrent tactics and mind control etc before to attempt to fuck us. Emotionally, this doesn't feel right. Going back to the update where we first met Haeliel**, both because it marks how her counsel changed Hunger and inspired him to be more heroic compared to how he prioritized expediency before, I feel there's a reason Vengeance gets Inheritance - because it marks a promise kept.

Or at the very least, we didn't give up on those promises when we had the best possible odds to date.

*

He stepped, and appeared on one of the few worlds un-ravaged. Its occupants bowed to him as a god and he discouraged them. He set his Blade down in the stance of rulership, sword in the stone with pommel upright, and severed the chains on their mind and soul. This sufficed not, for they had no spark of volition in the first place to stoke, and he resigned himself to the slow grinding process of deploying another Dynasty. Perhaps it was the very system of divine power-through-worship that lead to such unpalatable extremes. This realm needed to be restructured from the very fundament, the souls recycled and rebirthed into a plane more appropriate to some level of flourishing.

**

"Then you must ensure they keep up," She teased, "For I am only ever growing stronger! Now that I've imparted you my favor, I expect you to join our ranks someday."

Talace · Jun 10, 2023

[X] Vengeance

OctarineShrike · Jun 10, 2023

RedV said:
2) This is not specific to your arguments, but many Freedom arguments are representing the 4bear as much worse than he was. We know from the flashback we saw in Hour of Reckoning, that he attempts to free the people first / let them attain free will, and if that is not possible then deploy a Dynasty. *

I remember at least one argument claiming that the 4bear by nature is anti-free will and the people are little more than puppets, but there is clear in text evidence that this was just a last resort for the 4bear, when he'd exhausted all other means, and he did actively try to restore 'em to sound mind first.

Note that the Indenture is not destined to send us to fouler worlds everytime unlike the Procession so I am certain Hunger won't become as cynical as people think the 4bear was, but even full 4bear retained his rationality and had human-positive ideals.

Advisory: The Hour of Reckoning Interlude was before the Forebear broke through ISH 5.(Edit: World 1059)

HoratioVonBecker · Jun 10, 2023

WHISPER said:
I think that not just leaving Hunger forever but also the Accursed himself forever just because Hunger gave up infinite escalation power sounds like a sketch no offense.

Not Apocryphal Prime, obviously, just the portion Hunger is presently shouldering. I'm wondering if Freedom provides equivalent Apocryphal mitigation to the Accursed as Hunger achieving Complete Mitigation of his Apocryphal Curse would.

BrainInAJar said:
No bro, some outright said that the chance of success affected their voting. They were totally fine with the character arc as long as it was good odds. Which is totally inconsistent with how the Vengeance option was portrayed for the entire quest.

Well, speaking for me personally, it's a bit more complicated than that.
I thought Vengeance was risky, but I didn't know how risky, and while I had no idea what the ending condition for this Quest would be (barring premature game over), I did think that both paths would have an actual victory condition.
So "your rank was: A. You have up to one percent chance of eventual success!" is not really the sort of situation I expected, going in. Thirty percent chance with a B rank, sure. But one percent with an A rank doesn't really feel fair.
And sure, since Procyon, Hunger's quest has felt like it'd probably have an ambiguous fighting-into-the-sunset ending. But seeing it explicitly quantified, being told that the result of all the hard work and emotional energy we've poured into this quest over three years, is a chance somewhere between one-in-a-hundred and one-in-a-thousand of actually achieving the goal we've been working toward this whole time? It's upsetting, you know?
Admittedly, I also hate that we've passed over every single opportunity to resurrect Catherine, when she left such a big impression in her miniscule handful of appearances, and is clearly connected to Backstory Lore to boot. My wish for this story wasn't Forsaken Mask But Worse, but to resurrect Catherine and roll that 30%+ epilogue chance.
I don't think I can get that.

WHISPER · Jun 10, 2023

HoratioVonBecker said:
Not Apocryphal Prime, obviously, just the portion Hunger is presently shouldering. I'm wondering if Freedom provides equivalent Apocryphal mitigation to the Accursed as Hunger achieving Complete Mitigation of his Apocryphal Curse would.

Ok, but if it's not Apocryphal prime than I don't think it even matters if the Accursed's leaves too, it wouldn't free him the way that people actually want, and that's fully.

I'm not even sure how much Hungers part being gone would even really effect the Accursed considering the giant gap between the two in curses.

MoonSerpent · Jun 10, 2023

Come on people, it's the comfy Gisena has been teasing Hunger all along…

Hunger should finally

Orm Embar · Jun 10, 2023

The Accursed gets the Progression slot back with Freedom (per Discord info). It's reasonable to conclude that Apocryphal fragment also goes back to afflicting him, perhaps minus the mitigation Hunger achieved during the quest. Which wouldn't be nothing, but to call it even a drop in the bucket is charitable.

The thing with Vengeance is that lifting the Doom may be absolutely unique to Hunger, having issued it himself. Perhaps no other High Cursebearer could do this. Even the watered-down version's described as a difficult Curse to mitigate, more evidence of the Forebear's might. I would be - not happy, but content - if Hunger could die to mend his mistake. That's a form of redemption no less valid than Freedom.

Anyway, I'm wavering in other regards, so I'll step back from arguing for now. Explicit clarification of our odds is pretty depressing, given the all the work that went into the thread and having a sliver of the Imperial Praxis. I've said in the past that, revisiting the first vote, Freedom would've been better than dealing with the Apocryphal Curse. But to do it now is... simply not a fitting conclusion for the character we in fact played.

If that makes AST I a tragedy, then so be it.

Pittauro · Jun 10, 2023

for all of these talks, in the end I think it's still very simple.

Hunger is deciding if ideals/goals/aspirations (including the Victorious World) are more important than his personal happiness.

If he is willing to sacrifice an happy life with his wife and child, for a hope of making things better on an inconceivably large scale.

He'll still do good if he chooses Freedom, but by definition it will be good on a lower scale, and he knows there's always a chance that a bigger fish will come along. Because there's always lots of bigger fishes... unless you're a High Cursebearer, in which case there's very few left

And, again, both options are likely to live for a very long time... if with different quality of life.

Magical_Duck · Jun 10, 2023

Pittauro said:
Hunger is deciding if ideals/goals/aspirations (including the Victorious World) are more important than his personal happiness.

If he is willing to sacrifice an happy life with his wife and child, for a hope of making things better on an inconceivably large scale.

"Quack"

Rihaku said:
Happiness is lighter than a feather; duty is heavier than eons.

Pittauro said:
Because there's always lots of bigger fishes

"Quack!"

Pittauro · Jun 10, 2023

actually, to make it in even simpler terms:

Freedom: a good, happy life.

Vengeange: a life spent towards a higher purpose.

The Wise choice is to go for your happiness.

The Idealist will aim for the victorious world, even at the high personal cost.

What is better, to be great, or to be happy? That's a deeply personal opinion, though I'd guess most people would choose happiness.

And yet, it's the ones that choose greatness that change the world... and yet, they often live miserable life.

Random example: Nikola Tesla was great. he was definitely not happy, I think.

Same could be said for Alan Turing, or maybe Robin Williams... though then again all of them had mental conditions of some kind, I think. But you could say the same of Hunger, honestly.

Projectile · Jun 10, 2023

Bask in my Hubris, because I'm still not caught up but I've solved it anyway. Somebody slap me, because I was wrong the last three times I thought this.

Alright, so despite Vengeance being the blurb that lays breaking the Curse on the table, it's the other one that's talking about overcoming Tyranny.
The Tyrant (Not A Tyrant, if we can trust my understanding of the Maiden's thoughts) being less Tyranical has some nice pathos, but I won't spend too much time arguing about the Blood Halo breaking because-

Rihaku said:
You see now the self-same machinations behind the evil that set you first upon the Procession of Worlds and then your doomed mortal life.

Rihaku said:
You see now (this sentence)

A HIdden One wrote this. Or a One, because it's not hiding if you're announcing it. And most importantly-

Rihaku said:
The Lathe of Heaven. The object, the symbol, the pattern by whose revolution the world was destroyed and re-created. Fitting heraldry for Hunger's patron, given his ultimate objective. That too was implicit in the Lathe of Heaven, for those who knew where to look.

A kinder world than this.

Rihaku said:
*The Apocryphal Curse will depart as Hunger relinquishes his command over the Lathe of Heaven.

The great plan of the (Hidden Ones/Apocryphal Curse/??) is to keep Hunger Tyrannical because that keeps the Curse active. Stop pressing the Tyranny button. I'm pretty sure the best way to help the Accursed is to stop cursing him.

From the first post, from the Freedom option. Freedom is Vengeance- we just wouldn't have known we'd succeeded, back then.

Rihaku said:
*Perhaps the best revenge is living well.

-It is unlikely you will ever discover the truth behind your suffering, much less avenge yourself upon its architects. But the strings are cut, you are a puppet no more. Forget them, and live on.

[X] Freedom

Rihaku said:
Once you proscribed to pay me back for the powers I had imparted on you.

Rihaku knows more words than I do. I slotted "proscribed" in as "promised." It's actually more like forbid/damn/outlaw. He's not talking about the promise on page 1, here, "Once you cursed me because I smacked you." He's talking about us cursing him before he asks us to rest, to stop doing things.

________________

Rihaku said:
*The Forebear, naturally, gains the power of every non-contradictory advancement of the Forebear's Blade hence offered, including the Inheritance Heroic Advancement.

Hey why are you singling that one out? Lemme look.

[ ] The Forebear's Blade - Inheritance

May you forever disregard the counsel of your lessors, no matter their wisdom or cunning. May you stifle all law and paradigm not born solely of your writ. May you carry on unswervingly until the bitter and uttermost end.

May you be doomed to tyranny in deed, and in name forevermore.
Uttermost, End: The Doom of Tyranny is removed from Hunger's Curses; rather, it is simply how the Forebear is. 'Mitigation' is meaningless and impossible for such a fundamental pillar of the Forebear's essential nature.

At some point we have to take the cool spooky flavor text seriously, and I think the end of the story might be the time. And Tyranny coming from the Forebear rather than the other way around isn't just an entertaining semantic difference.

----------------------------

Rihaku said:
3) From an expected-value standpoint, as best Hunger or anyone around him can tell, he most hastens the Victorious World by choosing Vengeance. Haeliel seems to be more in agreement with this than not. The Accursed, aside from what he's already said, keeps his own counsel.

I'm... not sure the Victorious World has been the phrasing for the Accursed's utopia before this last update.

Wolfy · Jun 10, 2023

You are unwilling to take the risk required to conquer the Curse of Tyranny. Your choice is to sit around and have fun; it is nothing short of disrespectful to even imply that you would reach the results of people willing to put their lives on the line for a mere ghost of a chance of obtaining victory.

So you either get to assuredly survive and be happy, or you get to try and be a Hero who will try change entire existence with his might alone. You can't have both.

Box Lunch · Jun 10, 2023

Wolfy said:
So you either get to assuredly survive and be happy, or you get to try and be a Hero who will try change entire existence with his might alone. You can't have both.

But Wolfy! Might alone already determines who rules.

JOEbob · Jun 10, 2023

HoratioVonBecker said:
Not Apocryphal Prime, obviously, just the portion Hunger is presently shouldering. I'm wondering if Freedom provides equivalent Apocryphal mitigation to the Accursed as Hunger achieving Complete Mitigation of his Apocryphal Curse would.

iirc, the size of the fragment-of-curse a Cursebearer bears increases passively as the power of the Cursebearer increases, so the portion Hunger is personally shouldering is a lot smaller than the portion Hunger would be shouldering upon reaching heights sufficient for achieving Complete Mitigation.

[X] Freedom
-For the Accursed is owed his choice in what is the payment he receives for his offered transaction (so long as such is a payment that would've been accepted if demanded, at the beginning.)

Sir Stompy · Jun 10, 2023

[X] Freedom

ReaderOfFate · Jun 10, 2023

So, here's an interesting piece of information.

Red thought that Freedom meant that we'd be leaving everyone behind due to Indenture, and we'd be spending one Companions slot on our wife and another on our child.

In response, Rihaku said:
R' — Today at 6:03 AM
Not even remotely a problem that would challenge Freedom Hunger
Someone who can theoretically make it to HCB is way too badass to not be able to resolve this with like, a month's effort
making it to HCB requires like, successfully prosecuting infinite 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10+-pick fights (with associated transcardinal escalations etc) for a basically eternal span

Basically, we'll be able to take all of our friends even without dedicated Companion slots because Hunger is That Good (TM), so it's not really a problem.

BrainInAJar · Jun 10, 2023

Projectile said:
Bask in my Hubris, because I'm still not caught up but I've solved it anyway. Somebody slap me, because I was wrong the last three times I thought this.

Alright, so despite Vengeance being the blurb that lays breaking the Curse on the table, it's the other one that's talking about overcoming Tyranny.
The Tyrant (Not A Tyrant, if we can trust my understanding of the Maiden's thoughts) being less Tyranical has some nice pathos, but I won't spend too much time arguing about the Blood Halo breaking because-

A HIdden One wrote this. Or a One, because it's not hiding if you're announcing it. And most importantly-

The great plan of the (Hidden Ones/Apocryphal Curse/??) is to keep Hunger Tyrannical because that keeps the Curse active. Stop pressing the Tyranny button. I'm pretty sure the best way to help the Accursed is to stop cursing him.

From the first post, from the Freedom option. Freedom is Vengeance- we just wouldn't have known we'd succeeded, back then.

[X] Freedom

Rihaku knows more words than I do. I slotted "proscribed" in as "promised." It's actually more like forbid/damn/outlaw. He's not talking about the promise on page 1, here, "Once you cursed me because I smacked you." He's talking about us cursing him before he asks us to rest, to stop doing things.

________________

Hey why are you singling that one out? Lemme look.

[ ] The Forebear's Blade - Inheritance

May you forever disregard the counsel of your lessors, no matter their wisdom or cunning. May you stifle all law and paradigm not born solely of your writ. May you carry on unswervingly until the bitter and uttermost end.

May you be doomed to tyranny in deed, and in name forevermore.
Uttermost, End: The Doom of Tyranny is removed from Hunger's Curses; rather, it is simply how the Forebear is. 'Mitigation' is meaningless and impossible for such a fundamental pillar of the Forebear's essential nature.

At some point we have to take the cool spooky flavor text seriously, and I think the end of the story might be the time. And Tyranny coming from the Forebear rather than the other way around isn't just an entertaining semantic difference.

----------------------------

I'm... not sure the Victorious World has been the phrasing for the Accursed's utopia before this last update.

I don't get this theory. If all that's needed for the Doom of Tyranny to dissipate is to suppress Hunger's connection to the Forebear, wouldn't it have dissipated while he was living a normal life on earth? It's not like Freedom relinquishes the Forebear's Blade advancements either. And it leaves open the possibility of Hunger taking the sword again, so it's not a matter of destiny.

This is basically arguing that the Vengeance is a literal trap option as well, which doesn't sit right with me.

Wolfy · Jun 10, 2023

BrainInAJar said:
I don't get this theory. If all that's needed for the Doom of Tyranny to dissipate is to suppress Hunger's connection to the Forebear, wouldn't it have dissipated while he was living a normal life on earth? It's not like Freedom relinquishes the Forebear's Blade advancements either. And it leaves open the possibility of Hunger taking the sword again, so it's not a matter of destiny.

This is basically arguing that the Vengeance is a literal trap option as well, which doesn't sit right with me.

It is basically clawing to find any argument they might have. If opposition is reduced to "w-well actually our option does what other option does, because it just does ok", that is usually because they don't have much ground to stand on on their own. Freedom lets you chill in the personal paradise, Vengeance lets you have a shot at taking a Curse off Accursed. That's what they do. One is clearly infinitely more interesting that the other, especially if you consider that we did entire eternal paradise with your waifu ending last quest already

ilbgar123 · Jun 10, 2023

BrainInAJar said:
I don't get this theory. If all that's needed for the Doom of Tyranny to dissipate is to suppress Hunger's connection to the Forebear, wouldn't it have dissipated while he was living a normal life on earth? It's not like Freedom relinquishes the Forebear's Blade advancements either. And it leaves open the possibility of Hunger taking the sword again, so it's not a matter of destiny.

This is basically arguing that the Vengeance is a literal trap option as well, which doesn't sit right with me.

There is a difference between not making a choice to be a tyrant and actively rejecting tyranny in favor of freedom.

Vengeance could work, or Hunger could die, or Hunger could become the Forebear 2.0 and fight the Accursed again. Apocryphal exceeds Procession in horribleness. Procession offers some respite if you fix up the world you're on, Apocryphal will always find something to throw at you. Not to mention Hunger has Indenture, so it's like Procession+ if we take Vengeance, only really viable with Progression, and unlikely to work out in the end.

I'm kind of curious what the Forebear's odds were of breaking the Procession at this point in his own journey, if only to have a point of comparison.

Wolfy · Jun 10, 2023

ilbgar123 said:
Apocryphal exceeds Procession in horribleness.

It does not. Procession focuses on being terrible super hell central, Apo does not. Neither does Indenture.
They are sort of similar in that you need to have similar behavior patterns to surmount either, however Procession also just goes out of its way to be terrible, unlike our Curse combo.

ilbgar123 · Jun 10, 2023

Wolfy said:
It does not. Procession focuses on being terrible super hell central, Apo does not. Neither does Indenture.
They are sort of similar in that you need to have similar behavior patterns to surmount either, however Procession also just goes out of its way to be terrible, unlike our Curse combo.

Uh, have we been seeing the same Apocryphal procs? Rotbeast, Dien, Mordred, maiden? All pretty terrible. The last one had 'kill trillions of people for expediency's sake' as an opening move. Apocryphal+Indenture+Decimation+Tyrant is absolutely worse than the Procession, it's just that Progression helps balance it out.

Wolfy · Jun 10, 2023

ilbgar123 said:
Apocryphal+Indenture+Decimation+Tyrant is absolutely worse than the Procession, it's just that Progression helps balance it out.

Again, it is not, because point of those curses is not to be terrible, while the point of Procession is in fact to be (increasingly) terrible. Their terribleness is accidental to their actual purpose.

ReaderOfFate · Jun 10, 2023

Wolfy said:
It does not. Procession focuses on being terrible super hell central, Apo does not. Neither does Indenture.
They are sort of similar in that you need to have similar behavior patterns to surmount either, however Procession also just goes out of its way to be terrible, unlike our Curse combo.

It was specifically Indenture by itself that was easier than Procession, Wolfy.

Indenture + Apo, on the other hand, poses a 0.1% to 1% chance of success, so naturally it's a whole lot harder.

Here's what R had to say on the matter, anyways.

R' — 07/21/2022 3:06 PM
Indenture is not a serious problem for the likes of Hunger
Without Apocryphal
A mere 937 octillion years and some tasks of difficulty far lower than the Procession of Worlds!
The Forebear would hardly be worthy of his name if he could be so tritely unmade
Fib — 07/21/2022 3:08 PM
Doesn't indenture auto-scale?
R' — 07/21/2022 3:09 PM
Yeah, but imperfectly and to a degree far lesser than the Bane of Heroes

Aabcehmu · Jun 10, 2023

I think Wolfy's point isn't that the Procession is harder, but rather that it is more ~morally and aesthetically disgusting? At least at the later levels.

Wolfy · Jun 10, 2023

ReaderOfFate said:
It was specifically Indenture by itself that was easier than Procession, Wolfy.

Imagine if you had any reading comprehension whatsoever.

A Simple Transaction I

Refuelling

It must be raining somewhere else!

Avatar of Mandos

Imperfectly Aligned

IS VERY TRANQUIL!

Refutation

The One Who Quacks

Thinking of Rabbits

Confusion as a Natural State of Being