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Bound to Earth: A CK2 Earthbound Quest in an 8-bit Dystopia

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Alrighty so my hypothetical plan is:

[] Challenge the Sharks…to Baseball?: Kyoko
  • This one should be self-explanatory enough. The DC for this is half as much as challenging the sharks. Plausible deniability if the cops have awareness, and we're synergizing our High Martial with Kyoko's High Martial. 15 + 16 = 31 ; 40 - 39, we have a 91% chance of success of some formhere.
    • "Additional Checks will follow on success" doesn't indicate how many, and so. yknow, this might just get us an audience.. but I imagine it's a 40 / 50-60 / 70-80 tiering matter, and getting anywhere around 40-50 would likely net us a full success on this.
    • Potentially: the DC might get a -10 if this doesn't count as a combat-based martial action and a sporting competition, guaranteeing some form of Success.
  • I do want to ask, @Crosswire : In the event of a success would this play out like an interlude in any capacity?
    • I'm asking namely because I want to know if we can activate Speed Up α in the event a game does play out. (also would like to confirm if the -50 penalty occurs in the adjacent diplo act hypothetical)
  • Alternatively: I'm not opposed to Challenging The Sharks. that's an 80 DC, BUT we have a -39 making that a 51% chance of success, and THEN it initiates Battle, which with Kyoko's Bonus Actions.. could be SERIOUSLYvital to this paying off.
    • Cover Story: BB can be deployed, theoretically.
[] Letter Writing Campaign: BB
  • "Meri how the fuckle do you expect to deploy BB to diplomacy with humans", well, it's simple: these are letters, not in-person interactions. Granted, BB can't exactly write with pen and pencil more than likely, but BB could likely dictateand help CD with brainstorming before presenting the matter to the gang at large. The odds aren't all that great, but frankly this has a better shot with someone deployed to it than not.
    • The point of this is increasing our odds of success with both Riot! and Protest! or just overall buying ourselves more time.
[] Invest More Into the Factory DC: 40/60/80 [-4 Funds] (Rewards: Increase share in factory, chance to increase passive income. A high enough degree of success may decrease amount of money needed for investment. Minimal success or failure may incur reputation loss or debt)
  • This is a little risky, but frankly I think this may be the most worthwhile immediate-term usage of our funds. This gets a step closer to buyout of the factory from Pirkle, probably decreases the Baseball Factory Deal DC even further, and my pie in the sky theory: get the baseball factory workers on our side when it comes to Protest!
[] Track the "Sugared": Porky
  • 3+27 = 30, giving us a roughly 80% chance of success in some capacity. This isn't striking a blow at the aliens, but frankly this is also the best option we have that isn't abducting a random sugared member. I think it's a good precursor to staging abductions with the sharks to disinfest people.
[] Research: (backup BB route if Letter Writing Campaign cant work)
  • - [] Research Improved Bats:DC: 40/80
  • - [] Research Simple Armor: DC: 40/80
  • I know that presently we'd probably want to go for wildlife, but I think we have two good options. We can either go for Even Better Offense, or Have Any Defense At All. If we're going for either Riot! and Protest! we'll probably want our gang of children to not have any grievous injuries from a night stick. Alternatively the baseball game could be helped by our kids having armor. I lean towards Research Simple Armor most just because that's our other glaring gap.. and that will remain true for the forseeable future, even if we recruit adults, let alone The Sharks... our personnel aren't as armored as the cops.

Summary: This is yet another turn where I suggest we think Long-Term-ism's...
  • Achieve some form of victory in terms of getting The Sharks to cooperate with us. If this works out? Concerns about them stirring the pot are MUCH less of a priority.
  • Attempt to hamper OPF's reputation + sow distrust in Pirkle. This is to curb Fresh Breeze Movement and maybe get us an opportunity to walk it back to Stage 1 again.
  • Increase passive income + give a stronger chance of success in future Diplomacy and Stewardship actions.
  • Progression of curbing the alien actions. If the sharks are on our side + we're tracking the aliens, we might be able to prevent either of those from provoking the OPF
  • Bettering our Martial Action odds, as that's our best strength, and we could SERIOUSLY use that given that we have (1) healer.
I have to leave the house soon so personal actions can wait in detail, but my shortlist

CD

[ ] Hang Out with a Hero: That unit will gain a +10 opinion of you for the next three turns and you may learn more about that hero.
-[ ] Kyoko
[ ] Go To School: Attend classes, for once. It likely won't make you any smarter but it will temper your ability to put up with people. Who knows, maybe you might be able to graduate someday. It will certainly put your siblings at ease.
[ ] Play Baseball: It's been a while since you were able to play a game of proper baseball. You'll get some exercise and get to practice your swinging and pitching. It will make good practice!
[ ] Do Your Taxes: You've never been good with numbers, nevermind money, but if it's a skill you need to learn eventually then why do tomorrow what you could do today?
[ ] Treat Kart and Floppy to Something Nice: You realize that you've just been tending to your siblings. Making sure they're not dead isn't the same as caring for them.

Synergies
  • Hang out with Kyoko + Take Kart & Floppy out to Pizza (while Kyoko gets a bite to eat)
  • Hang Out + Go to School with Kyoko (while Kyoko goes to school)
  • Do your Taxes + Invest in Baseball
  • Play Baseball + Challenge the Sharks + Hang out with Kyoko
And then big whammy big whammy
[ ] Help with a Construction Project: You're not an engineer, but if you can swing a bat you can swing hammer. Plus with all this extra energy needs to be used up somehow. (This option requires 2 of CD's personal actions. This allows Expand Treehouse or Build a Facility to be done as a personal action instead).

Personally, I can compromise on taking Help with a Construction Project if it's The Lab, as we won't have funds for the radio room as useful as it would be.
If we do that however, I'd HEAVILY prefer that we do synergistic actions with both our other actions + Kyoko, ex
  • Hang Out (Kyoko), Take Kart & Floppy Out, Help with Lab Construction (while Kyoko goues to get food)
  • Hang Out (Kyoko), Go to School, Help with Lab Construction (while Kyoko goes to school)
  • Hang Out (Kyoko), Play Baseball, Help with Lab Construction
  • Go to School, Play Baseball, Help with Lab Construction (while Kyoko goes to school)
  • Do your Taxes, Play Baseball, Help with Lab Construction
  • Take Kart & Floppy Out to Pizza, Play Baseball, Help with Lab Construction (while Kyoko goes to get food)

BB

[ ] Invent Cover Story: literally no further thoughts here except possible synergy.

Porky

[ ] Try to get a...mole?: His ambition can probably wait 1 turn, whereas we could benefit from having a mole with any of the factions local to the area.
[h2][/h2]

Kyoko

  • [ ] Write A Letter: Long-termism for her sanity. Might help her diplomacy.
  • [ ] Go Out for a Bite: I have an Omake idea for this one where Kyoko asks her mom if she could introduce her mom to one of her new friends (after her mom's had a hard day at work, some positive news: her daughter has made a friend or two). Good for her morale.
  • [ ] Go to Classes: This one probably boosts Stewardship, which Kyoko may someday be deployed to.
 
Meridian said:
[] Letter Writing Campaign: BB
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Crosswire said:
A Bug I am...Not: Buzz Buzz is very physically fragile in their current state. Any Faction Roll they are assigned to that results in a SMAAAASH Failure, may result in their outright death. Due to being an alien, and a bug alien at that, any diplomacy action they are assigned to may have its DC increased by +50 or more when dealing with people who hold fear, bigotry, or a grudge against extraterrestrials.
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Meridian said:
  • Achieve some form of victory in terms of getting The Sharks to cooperate with us. If this works out? Concerns about them stirring the pot are MUCH less of a priority.
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for this at least, i'm pretty pessimistic?
a game of baseball doesn't mean we necessarily give them reason to avoid setting things off, just that they're intimidated, right? could make them respect us more, but also could make them want to do more stuff to reassert their dominance? especially if they would have done these things anyhow and it didn't *stop* them somehow

idk, does the game have stakes to make them stand down on some stuff? could work in the short term, but might be hard to get them to follow through on much/we might have to have an ante that'd be hard to repay...

woweed said:
I did, I should have clarified. Absent a statement, I'm not sure about that.
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they gave a reason why buzz buzz would work fine on it, don't worry.
stronger reasoning than me for learning at the very least, and a more immediately useful thing to put them on than learning too? if letter writing wins i wouldn't mind buzz buzz going there (though they do only have 6 diplomacy unfortunately)
 
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Doing letter writing before the protest may cause other people to join in once it happens.
Both protest and letter writing have a chance of using the climate of uncertainty to definitively tip public oppinion against the police, in one case by showing them as unreasonable, in the other by giving an impression of pre-existing consensus/popular oppinion.

Action on the factory will have a limited time window, as once the lockdown lifts, their situation will improve again. However, that doesn't mean we should just run headfirst into acting on it carelessly. The blockade will be here for a little longer, and by then we'll have gotten more funds from stewardship actions.

Also, I want to advocate for Buzz Buzz doing a [] Practice your own PSI (Focus on Survivability) type action. Something happening to him would be seriously bad for CD's mental state.
 
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woweed said:
I did, I should have clarified. Absent a statement, I'm not sure about that.
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So, I want to commend you on recalling that trait, but I also want to point something out
Crosswire said:
A Bug I am...Not: Buzz Buzz is very physically fragile in their current state. Any Faction Roll they are assigned to that results in a SMAAAASH Failure, may result in their outright death. Due to being an alien, and a bug alien at that, any diplomacy action they are assigned to may have its DC increased by +50 or more when dealing with people who hold fear, bigotry, or a grudge against extraterrestrials.
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Crosswire said:
As always, what character you place on a roll can affect how it plays out and cause knock-on effects. An AI critting on a robotics-based roll for example is likely to provide a much more impressive breakthrough than a spy assigned to the same action, and indeed a spy's crit success bonus might have more to do with hiding your Internet activity than expanding it.
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Crosswire said:
Example: You've recruited Youngest Joey and his Rattata as Starfox and assigned him to a diplomacy based mission. In this situation, him talking about how his Pokemon is in the "the top percentage of Rattatas" likely wouldn't be much help, and Starfox would likely end up doing most of the actual work. However the two could build a stronger understanding of one another, and Joey could learn more about how to talk to others or at least not annoy them, increasing his Diplomacy stat.
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On first glance, this would point to "BB can't make it work"

but I would remind you of something big:

Letter Writing Campaign

Crosswire said:
[] Letter Writing Campaign: Even if it's easy to ignore, sending enough letters voicing outrage or concern towards the lockdown, the police, and the mayor's policies could help erode their reputation in Onnet. You doubt the ones recieving the letters will care, if they even read them. But if people catch on that a lot of letters are being sent, they might start to send their own, or more freely speak in anger about what's been bothering them under the belief others are basically doing the same. And if you mess with the postage and addresses, no one will know just who sent the letters. Of course, you're going to need to write more then a few. Hope your gang has good handwriting...
DC: 50 (Reward: Decrease OPF & Pirkle's reputation in Onnet)
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So, let's review:
  • Letters are NOT an in-person diplomacy action
  • BB has spent enough time observing humanity that he probably knows better than to write "HELLO, I AM AN ALIEN, I AM LOCATED AT CD'S ADDRESS,"
  • This action probably doesn't require BB to actually be around humans other than CD. If the cover story succeeds, maybe, but even then, is it necessary for a talking bug to interact with the gang during a letter writing campaign, directly?
  • The -50 is not guaranteed to be applied to all Diplomacy actions, let alone all wherein someone would react poorly to him being an alien
  • The outright death scenario is not guaranteed to result from all Diplomatic Smaaaaash Failures
If there is any Diplomacy Action that BB could be assigned to... this is probably it.

There are some assumptions I've made here, and I'll admit that.

That's why I pinged the QM to ask about my idea and clarify things.

I have done this before, and gotten responses. Optimistically, Crosswire might clarify that "yes BB would still get the -50 and would still be risking death by even attempting to help CD word a letter carefully"

I get the concern, but I feel like not much consideration was put into that I probably considered the trait and the risk and wanted to discuss that the option might even exist at all. Hell, I even gave a backup option for where BB could be most useful in the event that it's not an option!

Edit: I do also want to know that our Community Minded trait would be an additive benefit should we do Letter Writing Campaign or Protest
 
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My reading of the Baseball game is that it's a low difficulty, low consequence way to "prove" ourselves to the Sharks, and get our group into competition, without getting them into combat. I don't think it will directly lead to a fight or partnership, win or lose, but it might make us closer, lower some DCs, and provide a chance for the gang to level up their martial.
 
On a completely different note, I love that Porky is a hero in this quest, because once we get him a mech, every fight he's involved in can use one of the many incredible tracks associated with him from Mother 3, and have them be triumphant.
 
hmm, while it might not work out on its own if we combine a baseball match *with* shark diplomacy the actions could also combine? hopefully making it easier overall like substituting our martial for part of the negotiations but can't say for sure
would use up both the martial *and* the diplomacy action, but if martial has to be playing sports with the sharks then it might be improved enough to be worthwhile with the that in diplomacy?

martial's our main "building up our faction" slot(even with those personals) so i want to use it on something handy long-term, whilst diplomacy's our main "stop things from exploding" slot so i want to do what's most effective at that (which i think of being shark diplomacy)
the other three slots seem more interchangeable/lower stakes, at least? got preferences but a lot of stuff works fine since there's less competition

oh, this might be random but changing my mind on porky's personal, getting a mole seems best. if we're talking to the sharks already then it might be easier to pull off, and even if it's only a little useful having less need to do stuff to get that info would ease our action economy regardless?
 
[] RIOT!: Fuck the police! Causing a ruckus to draw the police into a fight. Straight up beating the cops asses for the whole town to see will make it clear you're not to be taken lightly and will weaken the police a substantial amount. Of course, that's easier said than done and the cops are pretty well equipped to deal with a bunch of untrained, rowdy punks led by one or two people who actually know how to fight.
DC: 110 (Reward: Initiates Battle with the O.P.F, giving a chance to end the Lockdown and permanently damage their control over Onnet)
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Gotta say, I'm kinda surprised that the DC had only gone up on this. I mean yeah, the OPF got three buffs off, but we've gone from One (1) semi-professional teen hooligan to a small mob of amateur teen hooligans lead by said professional. Quantity has a quality of its own, that should really drop the DC a bit.
Not arguing we should do it, just wierd.
 
IndustrialVice2 said:
Gotta say, I'm kinda surprised that the DC had only gone up on this. I mean yeah, the OPF got three buffs off, but we've gone from One (1) semi-professional teen hooligan to a small mob of amateur teen hooligans lead by said professional. Quantity has a quality of its own, that should really drop the DC a bit.
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I'd say we're not really professional yet. And, yeah, i'd imagine the OPF getting their buffs off is useful.
 
Yeah, it's actually interesting to see what went up and what went down

Tagging Territory [Onnet]
+10/+20 (police being more vigilant)

Expand Treehouse and Facitity-building
Stayed same

Claim Territory by Force
Same

Challenge the Sharks
-10 (outfielders becoming better at fighting)

RIOT
+10 (police)

Make Connections at School
-10/-15
(Presumably due to being less depressed? Or because the police forces everyone into school?)

Baseball Factory Deal
-15

Protest!
+10/+10/+0 (police being more... eh? more tight and less "embrace violence - break the wind"?)

Invest More Into the Factory
action changed: it costs less (because C.D has less funds now; so it's underinvesting comparatively), DC went -10/-20/-20, but rewards also went down, to the point where both failure is much worse and the fisrt degree of success may be not really the success.
Really not worth doing in this state.

Look into the O.P.F's Plans
-5

Steal a Police Cruiser
+10

Read Up on Different Areas
-30/-40/same/same/same (probably due to Kyoko being non-local?)
 
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Meridian said:
I have done this before, and gotten responses. Optimistically, Crosswire might clarify that "yes BB would still get the -50 and would still be risking death by even attempting to help CD word a letter carefully"
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I'm sorry, I missed this!

I'll say that BB's trait wouldn't apply for something indirect like this since you could argue they are helping without being seen, pitching in their own way, or offering guidance of some kind. It's not like you can tell someone's from outer space unless they start writing in moon-runes.

If the circumstances were any different, then the -50 would still apply.
 
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Crosswire said:
Oops, that's what I forgot to add. Here's the revised version for extra clarification.

DC: 40 (Reward: Initiates a game of modified baseball with the Sharks. Chance to greatly improve relations or unite factions, provided risks are taken. Additional checks and options will follow on success)
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Thank you, and also, not to backseat mod and I know you're the OP, but, uh...Could you not triple-post in future?
 
Ok Caught up after a few days and I'm of the mind of Plan: Miridian. We have 3 big enemies right now, The Sharks, The O. P. F, and the Aliens and tensions are getting more and more ramped up everyturn, The Baseball game, Letters, and Tracking Sugared all hamper those factions in some way. Right now we need to team up with the sharks temporarily or have them join under us as quick as possible. As warfare between them and the police are Onett's biggest worry right now, so having them agree to our terms to not cause major problems until we're both ready is paramount.

The Letters, while the least important of the three, causing the people of Onett to doubt and turn against the Police and Pirkle are still extremely helpful as they delay their goal, as the police said before the need the people to trust them when they try sending the kids away to whatever "alien bootcamp" and if that weakens, we have a way to beat them. While protest is better, the DC is higher and I think narratively doing the more anonymous one first as it feels more reasonable to believe than doing it publically as we are the teens the police are against so it wont hit as hard as thinking your 30 year old neighbor John is against this movement potentionally. Even in this new update, the fact that we defaced those signs were used as a tactic for the movement being effective (Though mechanically, i dont think it means anything)

While we wont be able to do much in one turn about the Sugared, having Porky find all of them is really good, though sadly we cant stalk all of them, as they seem to be really trying to start that war against the Gangs and the Police. But its better than nothing and could still stop escalations. I do think though when we have the sharks with us though we'll have enough man power to track all of them.

Stewardship and Learning I dont really care what action we pick though, as Learning I see benefits from everything suggested. and Stewardship (While i'd rather not use all our funds this turn) I'm not gonna be to picky if we go the bat factory investment (As that will most likely lower the DC for the Deal action as well)

My main point is WE DO NOT HAVE ENOUGH TIME!!!
The enemy factions have taken major leaps in such a short amount of time! like the police have gained so much footing from the last set back in like 3 turns already, we need to push them all back to give us MORE TIME, to deal with every threat. Democracy againt the sharks is nice and all, but Martial is our best stat, especially now with Kyoko ontop of it (Plus checked after the fact but CD's SPORTY trait should activate for the baseball game and possibly the following roles during the event so that should give us along with the martial scores a +40ish bonus for the baseball role). so im confident it will be better, especially as it involves extra roles as well most likely, and it will probably be more martial, and we have two good martial heroes for them while we have none for the democracy action.
 
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Based on the now clarified rewards for Baseball, I think it's probably the best option to go for. Even leaving outside the lower initial check, Martial is one of CD's best stats and we have an explicit bonus to anything involving athletics, we have Quickup and Lifeup, and now that we see the police are doubling down on their Break Wind campaign, we need to find ways to stall them from getting Momentum. This frees up Diplomacy to use by sending letters or taking other actions to try to negate the police.

Will comment on other options when I have more of a look at them.
 
Yeah big reason why im petitioning for Baseball over Diplomacy for the sharks here is our bonus's are better, and we really need to get them as soon as possible in my opinion.

Also I know a good amount of people want the school connections but i'd feel like we should do that next turn as, if we do the letter and succeed (which as long as we roll semi decently we should hopefully be able to with the +13 of CD's and Buzz Buzz's Diplo not including Omake bonus's too) that should give us atleast a turn of breathing room to do long term goals.

Not fully sure if we should use two of CD's Personal to work on the treehouse, though if we do the baseball investment we'd only be able to expand the treehouse, since we'd most likely run out of funds to make a facility (unless we get a really good role on the investment, but thats too risky in my mind)
 
IndustrialVice2 said:
Not arguing we should do it, just wierd.
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i'd assume the dc is mostly to engage in combat in the first place (get people the chance to fight properly rather than being ganked?), and the boosts would help during it?
also kyoko would help make it easier if she's acting as a hero, i guess
Josiah said:
Really not worth doing in this state.
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possibly, though note we don't have many better options so might as well?
Crosswire said:
provided risks are taken. Additional checks and options will follow on success)
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good to know i was right on us needing an ante of our own

right now i guess one factor is whether our gang members are even any good at baseball and we'd be able to make the followup rolls work? since we probbly can't completely carry them if it's a "combat" minigame (though they at least have training now) who knows lol, it's not like we've trained for this so i wouldn't ger hopes up?
unless... do you think we could give the intel we have over the OPF/aliens as our ante? if so it might work out, because even if we lose they're still getting it and it's a cost we're prepared to pay?

Rocketplaz said:
Not fully sure if we should use two of CD's Personal to work on the treehouse, though if we do the baseball investment we'd only be able to expand the treehouse, since we'd most likely run out of funds to make a facility (unless we get a really good role on the investment, but thats too risky in my mind)
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note that if we're doing the lab it's free since we have equipment for it ready?
that said personals are valuable so idk if doing it is actually wise
 
For Baseball: If we can discreetely apply quickup to our teams batters, that'd make it much more plausible for them to hit the ball even without good skill. (Also, it would make running around the field quicker.)

Researching basic armor might be useful for the kind of hooligan-baseball we're about to play. Though substantial benefits from that probably require another buying action. Then again, we might end up buying some baseball protective equipment anyway? (The bestiary could also be convenient, if in a more diplomatic manner.)

If we use baseball to try and tame the sharks, a personal on playing baseball seems wise. (Physical activity is also good for you mentally.)

Both letter writing and school connections are viable diplomacy actions. Letter writing probably has lower direct effect on police rep than protesting, but with our faction specialty, it'd still be a -5 added for both targets hit.
School is a great recruitment ground right now, and having all our guys at school means they won't be hassled by police. (There might also be another part of the police plan that's happening at the school, but that's mere speculation.)
 
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