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Forge of Destiny(Xianxia Quest)

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Erebeal said:
e that many of our gains have come from people/tortoises being impressed by how we aren't a selfish asshole, right?
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How does this have anything to do with anything?

Being able and willing to win smartly has nothing to do with not being a selfish asshole.

This ain't no Brettonian Knight Quest. People kill and die all the time in the setting. Enormous armies are thrown against each other, the Empire is assailed from all slides and also occasionally from within. Killing in battle and killing in the dark have the same moral consequence: that of killing.

Given that killing is perfectly a-ok here, and we will soon need to get familiar with it? Any hang-ups are self-imposed or something we'd need to get through anyway.
 
TotallyNotEvil said:
I think you are oversimolifying things to an extent here. Just because we are willing to do it, and capable, doesn't mean we are bound to do so.

Not having the ability costs us serious opoortunities when acting within our stealth role.
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I'm with Thor's Twin. Being an assassin isn't about having an ability, it's about being a role. A thief may have some of the skills needed to assassinate if the situation calls for it, but being an assassin defines someone. We've seen hints about how progressing past Cyan requires a cultivator to choose a path. I really don't want Ling Qi to choose the path of the assassin even if I'm ok with her being able to kill if she really needs to.
 
Assassination-wise, if such an option opens, it is preferable to be a court-ordained assassin than a random murderhobo.

Of course, taking the role of spymaster or even dabbling into matters of intrigue have the chance of having assassination as one of the more palatable choice.

I dislike the idea of becoming a mercenary silent death, but I am amenable for assassination for specific narrative goals.

Taking out the charismatic but corrupt cultivator, or taking out the barbarian shaman warchief, much better than taking out a petty noble's rival for spirit stones...
 
wankongyew said:
I'm with Thor's Twin. Being an assassin isn't about having an ability, it's about being a role. A thief may have some of the skills needed to assassinate if the situation calls for it, but being an assassin defines someone. We've seen hints about how progressing past Cyan requires a cultivator to choose a path. I really don't want Ling Qi to choose the path of the assassin even if I'm ok with her being able to kill if she really needs to.
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And, again, I never say I wanted for us to go full Agent 47.

I'm saying our next Moon Quest/path, which should be showing up at any time now, should be Bloody Moon, or at least I will support such. It's currently taking the aspect of retribution. Not of killing.

I'm not against running the odd assassination mission when we have to, which doesn't include the near future for non-monsters targets.
 
Actually, I like assassins. Dark Brotherhood questline in skyrim is my favourite. I love sneaking up on people and ganking them before they're even aware I'm there.

My objection to being an assassin at present is that we're going into the inner sect, where there are probably few opportunities for assassination. I'd be much more willing to do this in the future when there's less oversight and fewer rules constraining us.

If Bloody Moon is less assassination and more retribution, I'd still rather do New or Hidden for now. We are still too young and weak to be spending lots of time pursuing relatively petty grudges. Better to go for formations and hidden knowledge to make us someone not to be fucked with rather than cultivating any kind of vengeance mindset. I'd rather only pick this option if we find someone really worth going all Vengeance on.

In fact, if Bloody Moon is more about retribution than assassination, I'm actually less inclined to pick it. We've got too much to do to get bogged down settling petty grievances.
 
Deathbybunnies said:
But we mock Hard Men Making Hard Decisions because they tend to tunnel-vision, to the point where they don't see/believe less drastic measures will work when really they would. The corollary to that is that the opposite viewpoint - that there's always a third option, and we never have to make Hard Decisions at all - is an equally fallacious viewpoint.

Also, wanting to read about a different viewpoint/type of character is not the same as subscribing to that viewpoint at all.
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When you're saying that morality is a luxury then you're tunnel-visioning (or have an overly simplistic view of morality... Or are a lapsed Kantian :p ).

In any case, we are literally a thief. We have shown no concern about screwing people over, and, as has been noted before, have a fairly limited monkey-sphere. We are hardly a saint here, and I see no reason to believe that bland good-guyness is in any way a real concern.
 
Kai Merah said:
Actually, I like assassins. Dark Brotherhood questline in skyrim is my favourite. I love sneaking up on people and ganking them before they're even aware I'm there.

My objection to being an assassin at present is that we're going into the inner sect, where there are probably few opportunities for assassination. I'd be much more willing to do this in the future when there's less oversight and fewer rules constraining us.

If Bloody Moon is less assassination and more retribution, I'd still rather do New or Hidden for now. We are still too young and weak to be spending lots of time pursuing relatively petty grudges. Better to go for formations and hidden knowledge to make us someone not to be fucked with rather than cultivating any kind of vengeance mindset. I'd rather only pick this option if we find someone really worth going all Vengeance on.

In fact, if Bloody Moon is more about retribution than assassination, I'm actually less inclined to pick it. We've got too much to do to get bogged down settling petty grievances.
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Your point about the Inner Sect being a poor setting for an assassin is well-made, though I think we could probably get away with poisoning people non-lethally.
 
One thing to consider, thinking of CRX's vassal option, is what Cai would have us do in the short term if we take her offer. For one, she'd probably want us to build a certain way skillwise. She's made it fairly clear she wants a spy, and we'd probably then be training more spy stuff. You don't want to hire a spy who proceeds to put all their energy into painting abstract expressionist art or the like, or one who doesn't improve at sneaking and focuses on party play or building pure support. An investment in our growth would also likely be, to some extent we don't fully know, an investment in the direction of that growth.

For another, being known as a spy is a disadvantage to having one. The sect's for training, which is important, but that also means you don't play your hand too overtly, because you don't want to throw away advantages that you'd keep outside of training in the middle of it. This makes it somewhat reasonable that Cai would be pushing us to be in the background a bit more. Developing Ling Qi more outside the sect would make sense from her perspective, and asking about what we'd be asked to do in, rather than long term plans, the next six months, would be quite useful to deciding if we want her offer.

Lastly, taking her offer probably means committing time at her discretion to doing things assigned to us. Knowing how onerous this would be, and how much training we may lose would be good to judge the choice well.
 
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Lazy Minx said:
Am I the only one who does not mind the assassin route?

Clinging to morality does not suit this setting.
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Deathbybunnies said:
Don't really care for the moral hand-wringing going on here. Every quest protagonist eventually ends up the same whitewashed, idealised person with Perfect Morals that would never countenance doing the wrong thing or being selfish. I get that people like to make "better" choices where the expected cost/payoff is effectively happening to a character in a book and not actually to themselves, and end up doing great anyway because authors don't feel comfortable effectively punishing players for "doing the right thing", but it would be nice not to go down that route for once.
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I realize the two of you are different people but I just want to point out that we can't have it both ways. Every Xianxia protagonist ends up the same, a murderer dressed up in the moral superiority of being the Designated Main Character. Like every quest protagonist ends up being the Only Sane Person With Morals? Are we really avoiding playing things by the book either way? I say we aren't; it's impossible. Even putting away the hyperbole, the idea that we are going to avoid or conform to some sort of genre expectation just doesn't fit this quest.

In realistic terms, I can only really judge what we should do by what kind of person Ling Qi is, because Ling Qi herself is a unique character. And thus far, Ling Qi has even bigger hangups about killing, or even injuring others, than her civilized noble friends. That may well change, but I can't see Ling Qi suddenly deciding one day to kill in cold blood. For example, a bloody moon quest that asks her to kill someone, as Ling Qi is right now, might be rejected out of hand.
 
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I don't see ling qi enjoying the assassin route honestly , and while it may be something to dabble in do remember that there are bunch of other moon phases as well.

We still got music moon to explore
Got secret moon
Thief moon is ridiculously fun
Guiding moon

Etc.

It's not necessarily about white washing a character or making them morally upright, it's about taking into account that yes we will get to explore many avenues but what will make ling qi happiest?

Killing enemy generals and high priority targets during war Is one thing. Killing political adversaries , noble rivals and other empire people is a complete different thing.

And we can be dammed sure the second we cross that threshold we wI'll be asked to do I again.

Secondly while an argument can be made about saving troops lives by assassinating generals and shamans, a equally fair counter argument can be made about weakening our troops/vassals that we have by denying them potential battle experience.

This is a death world full of danger, and we are a support build specialist.

In the future when we lead troops we will be making sure they grow strong enough to defend our borders against raids, spirits etc.

One does not survive the Frontier lands of the empire by being weak.

Assassination will weaken the enemy forces but I feel like it will become the threads go to strategy when fighting opponents.
 
"Assassin" can refer to a vocation/lifestyle or a skillset. We know this is true because people in this very thread are variably using these definitions. Whether any individual agrees or disagrees with one or both of these definitions is pretty immaterial to the fact of the use of these definitions. Let's not succumb to moral fluster because of semantics.

If we're going to kill someone, and let's face it it's all but inevitable Ling Qi will kill somebody eventually, we're most of the way to justifiably(from our perspective) assassinating them. I'm fine with having an "Assassins" toolkit, which here I assume refers to powerful but subtle first strike capability, at least in part, and general subterfuge ability.

Edit: the thread was pretty on board with killing that Cloud Tribe shaman from stealth, the only reason it didn't attempt it was a justified certainty of that approach's failure.
 
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Erebeal said:
When you're saying that morality is a luxury then you're tunnel-visioning (or have an overly simplistic view of morality... Or are a lapsed Kantian :p ).

In any case, we are literally a thief. We have shown no concern about screwing people over, and, as has been noted before, have a fairly limited monkey-sphere. We are hardly a saint here, and I see no reason to believe that bland good-guyness is in any way a real concern.
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Fair enough I suppose, but there were definitely people opposing assassination because "it's wrong", which I felt obliged to speak up against.

SynchronizedWritersBlock said:
I realize the two of you are different people but I just want to point out that we can't have it both ways. Every Xianxia protagonist ends up the same, a murderer dressed up in the moral superiority of being the Designated Main Character. Like every quest protagonist ends up being the Only Sane Person With Morals? Are we really avoiding playing things by the book either way? I say we aren't; it's impossible.

In realistic terms, I can only really judge what we should do by what kind of person Ling Qi is, because Ling Qi herself is a unique character. And thus far, Ling Qi has even bigger hangups about killing, or even injuring others, than her civilized noble friends. That may well change, but I can't see Ling Qi suddenly deciding one day to kill in cold blood. For example, a bloody moon quest that asks her to kill someone, as Ling Qi is right now, might be rejected out of hand.
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I'm not super familiar with Xianxia norms to know if this is the case, so I'll take your word for it. I think on balance I'd prefer to tend towards Xianxia norms than Quest norms because I'd prefer to follow the setting rather than the medium, but I appreciate that you might not want to be Yet Another Xianxia Protagonist.
 
At this point it seems everybody is fighting their own straw men like Don Quixote is in town. Let us bumb this up to Discord and talk about it when/if we get a new moon phase quest opportunity.
 
Deathbybunnies said:
Your point about the Inner Sect being a poor setting for an assassin is well-made, though I think we could probably get away with poisoning people non-lethally.
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Probably, yes, but I'd kind of rather not. Like, there's a reason I said retribution is much less appealing to me than assassination.

When you revenge against someone, and they don't die, there's a good chance they continue to be your enemy. We're too young to be racking up all the enemies and getting into vengeance spirals with them. I'd much rather pursue this later, out of the Sect, when we're out in the real world and enemies can have 'unfortunate accidents' happen to them, and grudges can be shut down with rather more finality than anything we can do while in the Sect.

Basically, assassination is great, I don't mind Bloody Moon, but now is not a good time. Vengeance spirals with every idiot that insults us that we cannot put down is not how I want to spend my time in the inner Sect.
 
Leonidas333 said:
The thread has been pretty adamant about not making Ling Qi any sort of assassin, and I completely agree.
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I've seen a handful of comments about not wanting to kill people or trying to teach Cai that murder is a last resort, hardly the thread being adamant about it. I doubt Cai would be casual about asking us to kill people, but having the power to decide life and death is a crucial thing for nobility in this setting, and getting up in arms about the willingness to ever kill for our bosses seems silly.
 
If we say assassination as a tool, then I agree to have more tools and options.

If we say assassin as a role, I am still okay, becase that position would sometimes be needed, and one can still switch roles. Though I don't feel such a role is necessary in the current Outer or Inner Sects. Our current roles as spy, saboteur, or battlefield controller/support are still amenable.

If we say Assassin, like it is an end goal, whoa, wait a minute here. How did Ling Qi go from thief to assassin?

She went to the support role because she wanted to be considered precious.

She got battlefield control and stealth from a spirit's interest from her time as a thief.

Assassin? Well, we got SCS, EPC, and talent with bows... Those are about the only reasons we can have Ling Qi as an assassin.

Narratively, there seems to be no reason to walk such a specialized road.

+shrugs+
 
mc2rpg said:
I've seen a handful of comments about not wanting to kill people or trying to teach Cai that murder is a last resort, hardly the thread being adamant about it. I doubt Cai would be casual about asking us to kill people, but having the power to decide life and death is a crucial thing for nobility in this setting, and getting up in arms about the willingness to ever kill for our bosses seems silly.
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Broadly, I don't think anyone particularly has a problem with killing people who really need killing (though for Ling Qi's happiness it would be good to minimise this). What people are more concerned about is a) ending up using murder as the answer to all our problems, and b) "Lord so-and-so is so annoying... It would be a shame if he were to have an 'accident'" *wink*.

Anyway, if we're going to talk about morality, character, and Renshu there are more topical things to say. For instance, what do we actually want to do about him? And what can we do? Because the first thing that should be noted is that Renshu has the ideal build to screw with us, and it's very difficult to actually stop him. The only thing we really can do is work around him. If we could somehow find him, we could possibly get Xuan to imprison him and his spirit for some time, but that is inherently temporary. Ultimately, there are no permanent solutions here.

Moreover, I don't think we can actually get to him right now. He's clearly learned his lessons from how we got to him the first time, and his dead-drop system is designed to make sure we can't find him. Maybe if we had a something like a good darkness perception art that allowed us to track his worms under the earth we could find him, but absent that... I suspect that Meizhen's little adventure is going to accomplish very little (since his minions don't know where he is), save from reminding us that she is actually a really nasty piece of work who is rather too keen on torturing people she doesn't like (yeah, I went there :p ).
 
sol·dier
ˈsōljər/
noun
noun: soldier; plural noun: soldiers
  1. 1.​
    a person who serves in an army.
    synonyms: fighter, trooper, serviceman, servicewoman

So, yeah. Unless I am way off my mark, we're gonna have a job killin' folk.

And, you know, insofar as being an extremely well trained cultivator on the Empire's dollar, something tells me we are not getting away with a non-combat position.

This, in turn, will likely lead to a situation vaugely like this: our squad gets into a battle, and takes heavy losses, and it turns out that while the enemy commander was pretty smart he wasn't so strong, and oh gee, if someone would have killed him in his sleep last night none of our buddies would be dead right now. But assassination isn't cool, we're too cool for assassination, so they all died.

We're going to be a FUCKING SOLDIER.

Killing is in the job description.

I'm going to need to hear a different argument than 'coolness' or morality to turn away from this opinion.
 
Golden Lark said:
sol·dier
ˈsōljər/
noun
noun: soldier; plural noun: soldiers
  1. 1.​
    a person who serves in an army.
    synonyms: fighter, trooper, serviceman, servicewoman

So, yeah. Unless I am way off my mark, we're gonna have a job killin' folk.

And, you know, insofar as being an extremely well trained cultivator on the Empire's dollar, something tells me we are not getting away with a non-combat position.

This, in turn, will likely lead to a situation vaugely like this: our squad gets into a battle, and takes heavy losses, and it turns out that while the enemy commander was pretty smart he wasn't so strong, and oh gee, if someone would have killed him in his sleep last night none of our buddies would be dead right now. But assassination isn't cool, we're too cool for assassination, so they all died.

We're going to be a FUCKING SOLDIER.

Killing is in the job description.

I'm going to need to hear a different argument than 'coolness' or morality to turn away from this opinion.
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Ling Qi doesn't like it.
 
Erebeal said:
What people are more concerned about is a) ending up using murder as the answer to all our problems, and b) "Lord so-and-so is so annoying... It would be a shame if he were to have an 'accident'" *wink*.
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So people are getting concerned about a thing that has not happened yet, won't happen any time soon in or out of character, and would presumably be pretty justified if it ever did if we give Cai even the slightest benefit of the doubt?
 
TotallyNotEvil said:
Thing is, Bloody Moon isn't some bloodknight. For now, it's about extracting retribution, much like the more modern interpretation of it.

I'm not taking about killing disciples here. The Moon aint that shallow, or stupid as to force our hand like that.
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Everything we have from the quest about the Bloody Moon is fairly murder-oriented:
Bloody Moon Mentions said:
"I had a pretty spotty education," Ling Qi replied evasively, glancing away despite herself. "What about the Grinning Moon, and the Bloody one?"

"The waning and waxing crescents are dangerous spirits," he replied shortly. "Mercurial and unmerciful… yet not to be ignored. A captain who plans a night attack or ambush without an offering to the Grinning crescent is a fool," he shook his head. "I will not speak of the Bloody Moon, though it be in favor at court, such skullduggery is foul. Knowledge of spirits can be sought out on the shelves yonder," the broad featured boy pointed over her shoulder, indicating a set of shelves in the far right corner.

...

Information on the two crescents was more… difficult, older books seemed to match what she already knew, the Grinning Moon loved tricks and thievery, rewarding cleverness and ingenuity. The Bloody moon… well it was regarded as the spirit of assassins, of lives taken in the dark, unseen. Newer books painted it differently though. The Bloody Moon was regarded as the spirit smiling upon those who sought out and dealt justice to those who hid their misdeeds, and the Grinning Moon was one which smiled upon clever investigators who unveiled the foolish conspiracies of those who went against Imperial law.

...

From the other crescent came the image of puppet wearing her face and and the flash of a knife cutting down the dark shadow pulling its strings.
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Traditional Bloody Moon is described as "foul" and the spirit of "lives taken in the dark." Modern Bloody Moon smiles on the extrajudicial executions justice dealt out by the Ministry of Love Integrity. The Bloody Moon mission involves a knife cutting down Yan Renshu.

I mean, I'm open to seeing our enemies come down with a bad case of dead, but starting that kind of thing while we're among fellow countrymen in the sect is a little much. The Moon is giving us the flexibility to delay taking the assassination mission until later in our career. We have two other missions right now with up to five more possibly opening up before we'd be forced to take on the Bloody Moon quest for 100% completion.
 
jacobk said:
Everything we have from the quest about the Bloody Moon is fairly murder-oriented:

Traditional Bloody Moon is described as "foul" and the spirit of "lives taken in the dark." Modern Bloody Moon smiles on the extrajudicial executions justice dealt out by the Ministry of Love Integrity. The Bloody Moon mission involves a knife cutting down Yan Renshu.

I mean, I'm open to seeing our enemies come down with a bad case of dead, but starting that kind of thing while we're among fellow countrymen in the sect is a little much. The Moon is giving us the flexibility to delay taking the assassination mission until later in our career. We have two other missions right now with up to five more possibly opening up before we'd be forced to take on the Bloody Moon quest for 100% completion.
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Now this was a well-reasoned point. Based on the ritual we blew open, mass slaughter of civilians is on the table for our national enemies. Assassination is, quite frankly, too good for them, but it will do.
 
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