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Lieutenant Arisukawa Haruna

Balance Stats
❁ • Work / Life • ❁
❁ • ❁ Warrior / Princess ❁ • ❁
❁ • ❁ Radical / Respectable ❁ • ❁


Tactical Stats
Gunnery 0, Navigation +2, Command +2, Technology -4, Personal -2, Strategy +3

Stress: 3


PLEASE READ THE QUEST RULES BELOW

You collectively vote on the actions of Arisukawa Haruna, the first woman to serve openly in the Imperial Akitsukuni Navy.

This quest is set in a universe which is much like our own circa 1910, but with different politics, cultural norms, and ideas about gender and sexuality, as well as some unusual and advanced technology in places.

We are using this quest to explore themes like breaking the glass ceiling, divergent outlooks on gender and sexuality, colonialism and imperialism, and the place of royalty.

Content Warning
This quest goes some dark places.

There is violence, often explicit, often unfair, often against undeserving targets.

There are not always good options forward. The protagonist is not necessarily a good person.

There is implied content and discussion of sexual harassment and assault.

This is a world where people are often racist, sexist, queerphobic bigots. Sometimes, even the PC and the people they are friends with.

Voting Rules

We will tell you if write-in votes are allowed. If we do not say that write-ins are allowed, they are not. This is to prevent people from unrealistically hedging their bets.

You may proposal other options in a non-vote format, subject to approval, on non write-in votes.

We will tell you when a vote allows approved voting. If we don't say the answer is no, pick an option. We like making people commit.

Discussions makes the GM feel fuzzy.

Game Rules
When we ask you for a roll, roll 3d6. You are aiming to roll equal or under the value of your stat. If you succeed, Haruna gets through the situation with no real difficulties. If you roll above the target value, Haruna will still succeed, but this success will cost her something or add a complication.

Whenever Haruna loses something or faces hardship from a botched roll, she takes Stress. The more Stress Haruna has, the more the job and the circumstances she's in will get to her, and it'll be reflected in the narrative. Haruna must be kept under 10 Stress: if she reaches 10 Stress, she will suffer a breakdown and the results will not be great for her.

Haruna loses stress by taking time for herself, by making meaningful progress on her dreams, and by kissing tall, beautiful women.

Meta Rules
Author commentary is in italics so you know it's not story stuff.

Please don't complain about the system or the fact we have to roll dice. We've heard it before, we've heard it a thousand times across multiple quests. We're not going to change it, and it wears at our fucking souls.

Just going "oh noooo" or "Fish RNGesus Why!" is fun and fine. Complaining at length because you didn't get what you want less so.

If you have a question, tag both @open_sketchbook and @Artificial Girl. If you only tag one of us, you will be ignored. Seriously, we both write this quest.

And yes this is an alt-history type setting with openly gay and trans people, ahistoric medicine, and weird politics. Just... deal, please?

This quest employs a special system called Snippet Votes. Please read this post for more information.
 
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[] Look up Major Arita (ret.)

Edit: Ah, Cyber ninja'd me
Edit2: Jokes aside, it might be good for Haruna to talk to someone else with some of the same angsts regarding war that she has
Hmm, but I do like

[] Pick up a magazine featuring one of Arita's stories. Even if it's about airplanes, it's good to support an acquaintance.
 
Hmm, but I do like

[] Pick up a magazine featuring one of Arita's stories. Even if it's about airplanes, it's good to support an acquaintance.

The pipeline goes:

> be Haruna
> be bored and depressed and lacking your girlfriend
> grab a magazine to read because you're bored
> it's about airplanes
> fml
> maybe you ought to know some of this stuff so you can do that 'polite evisceration' thing next time one of those Jeune Ecole fucks tell you battleships are obsolete
> wasn't Arita a fighter pilot?
> look him up, not like you have anything better to do.
 
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After all I did and can do
The achievements and adventures
I still end up back in the silken chains of the palace
 
Haruna really, really sounds like someone who needs to keep herself occupied right now. The way to do that is by having to deal with other people. Also, she was just talking about how paperwork and politics didn't seem real, so the palace probably isn't the right way to do that. Combine people and a vivid activity, and my thought is a sport. She could practice her fencing or take up Taekwando?
 
The thing about the palace is that... as a reader I really don't foresee having any fun reading about Haruna dealing with all the politics and family drama involved. Going back to the palace isn't going to lead to character growth, it would just make Haruna miserable. :(

At least, that's the vibe I get.
 
[?] Get a book on airplanes, grab a bottle, and start reading.
-[?] write a list of the impossible features and outlandish requirements that would be required to turn an aircraft into a feasible weapon of naval warfare.

Maybe it could be written in an ambiguous way that Haruna obviously means it to mock the idea but airplane enthusiasts take it as a recommendation for future RnD and she accidentally becomes regarded as a plane person.
 
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[joke] Go learn to fly an airplane.
[ ] Throw yourself into some sport or hobby - electrical stuff? Taekwondo? Shooting range practice?
 
Aircraft Carriers for sure. I think she's mostly ok with submarines, especially the relatively big ones. Other than the dreep, I remember her mostly liking serving on one under Kenshin.
 
Anyway, let's come up with some ideas :

[] You are about to leave the house when you encounter one Aileen Middlemiss, Intrepid Reportrix, who has found presumably by arcane means, and wants a story.

[] You've heard Aiko talk about her work with the Women's Equality League before. You'd never been, time not permitting and secrecy of utmost performance, but neither thing mattered now. It wasn't much, but perhaps some of Aiko's friends could be yours.

[] Dive into your physical training routine. You didn't have time for it on your tiny boat (nor on the battleship), and didn't have the desire for it on the cruise. You didn't do anything intensive since your desk job. Time to dive in and see what damage you did.

[] You never truly understood Aiko's field of study, a lack in your knowledge that caused a minor diplomatic incident, a failed espionage mission and made you put Aiko in danger. So, it seems you'll have to face your demons and figure out what electricity is once and for all. Maybe some of the students at the university will do tutoring.

[] You'd been separate from Aiko before. Write some letters, then hassle the foreign office for location and the ability to send some pretty important telegrams.

[] This whole thing reminds you of the fight. Aiko wanted stability, security, and you see now that you need that too. Go buy some gifts for her when she comes back, with implications that are not entirely unintended. You'll figure out a plan to deal with the family reactions later.

[] You nearly had an accidents on board the Myogi because you could not give the ship all the focus it deserved. You've heard modern medicine has solutions to this problem. It might do well to get a small supply.
 
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[] Go home to the palace. See your mother, get the news you can via the imperial connections, be quiet voice against the war. Do what you think Aiko would be proud of you for doing.

Yea it'll suck but this is a vote that's gonna suck anyways. At least going home after character growth will lead to ~drama~
 
[ ] You can't stand this waiting about and reading boring journals about stupid planes and constantly working out how far away from a bar you are. Go right down to the Admiralty and (ever so politely) demand another seagoing command!

I don't think Haru has ever gotten involved in the real politics of the Service. Now is a good time for her to learn! Brutally!
 
Maybe it could be written in an ambiguous way that Haruna obviously means it to mock the idea but airplane enthusiasts take it as a recommendation for future RnD and she accidentally becomes regarded as a plane person.

oh my god, you're a genius
an evil, evil genius

'first of all, you can't mount real guns on the stupid things, and it's not like they can fire torpedoes-'

the entire airplane community: 👀💦

but listen these aeroplane contraptions are never gonna catch on, it's absurd, and unless you can start flinging them from the decks of ships or flying them far enough to take off in friendly territory and drop bombs on things you otherwise couldn't get at, which i highly doubt, they're going to remain a novelty at best and a waste of resources otherwise-
 
[] Cadet Kurasaka was a mess. What the hell are they even teaching cadets at the academy these days? Let's head down there and find some teachers to heckle
 
oh my god, you're a genius
an evil, evil genius

'first of all, you can't mount real guns on the stupid things, and it's not like they can fire torpedoes-'

the entire airplane community: 👀💦

but listen these aeroplane contraptions are never gonna catch on, it's absurd, and unless you can start flinging them from the decks of ships or flying them far enough to take off in friendly territory and drop bombs on things you otherwise couldn't get at, which i highly doubt, they're going to remain a novelty at best and a waste of resources otherwise-
One thing to consider here is that Airships in Gaia are considerably more advanced than they were at this point IRL, making cross continental voyages and carrying significant amounts of cargo and people. They've even carried planes. (It's how Matsura got home from the races).

So, it seems quite likely that the first aircraft carrier will be flying, not floating.
 
Did you know that the human snorkel wasn't invented until 1938? Man, that explains why subs sucked for so long. The modern cylindrical hull on the other hand is actually cheaper to produce than the complex cruiser type due to having less complex curves. You can use the same machines and techniques to form all the cylindrical section, and simplified conic/hemispherical sections for bow and stern are also fairly simple geometry. Modern conventional boats even use lead acid batteries.

I'm thinking we get Haruna to drop something important in the water and have to jury rig a snorkel to look for it.

So, it seems quite likely that the first aircraft carrier will be flying, not floating
The US's Akron class both crashed due to weather. In a world before satellite forecasts airships are not that attractive. If Haruna is bitching about how airplanes are useless without perfect weather then airships are gonna get it even more.
 
The US's Akron class both crashed due to weather. In a world before satellite forecasts airships are not that attractive. If Haruna is bitching about how airplanes are useless without perfect weather then airships are gonna get it even more.
This is not that world though. Gaia verse has a looser approach to engineering.

The Tsar Tank lived, we had a wacky submarine with a revolver torpedo system before WWI (hydraulic loading systems for torpedoes was a feature of the Type XXI, the nazi wunderwaffe), the pyramids are a kilometer tall, and airships are doing cross continental flights that put the R-101 to shame (before it flies into a hill and bursts into flame).

So we know that regardless of whatever issues should be there, big airships are already a thing that exists and works.
 
[ ] Get more ammo for your service pistol so I convince Erika and Emy to write that one crossover omake I've wanted for like a year.
 
[X] Dive into your physical training routine. You didn't have time for it on your tiny boat (nor one the battleship), and didn't have the desire for it on the cruise. You didn't do anything intensive since your desk job. Time to dive in and see what damage you did.


[X] Go home to the palace. See your mother, get the news you can via the imperial connections, be quiet voice against the war. Do what you think Aiko would be proud of you for doing.


[X] You've heard Aiko talk about her work with the Women's Equality League before. You'd never been, time not permitting and secrecy of utmost performance, but neither thing mattered now. It wasn't much, but perhaps some of Aiko's friends could be yours.


I like all three of these.
 
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