Hmmph... this junior is a good seed [Cultivation Management Quest]

[occipitallobe]

Good Seed and Omake Spreadsheet Rules:

Firstly, if you have questions about Good Seeds and the like please read here. If that doesn't answer your question please ping me in thread, or on Discord.

If you write a new Good Seed, or write an omake, please update the spreadsheet if you have access.

If you do not have access, please ping a collaborator (Swordomatic, Alectai, Quest, TehChron, Insane-Not-Crazy, Humbaba, ReaderOfFate, Kaboomatic, no., BungieONI) letting them know what you want and they will update the spreadsheet here. To gain access, you will need a gmail account of some kind. Throwaway emails are fine (I'm using one for the spreadsheet), but to gain access it's as simple as sending me either your email via PM, via DM in Discord, or just in Discord's #spreadsheet-requests channel.

This is mandatory. If a Good Seed does not record their omake by pinging collabs (or just requesting access and editing things themselves - this is the preferred option), I won't give out awards. If a new Good Seed is not recorded here, they won't advance. By doing this it makes the whole thing manageable for me - it's gotten pretty unwieldy!

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Omake Writer Instructions:

There are four fields you need to fill out.

Omake Link, which is just a link to your first omake for the turn. This makes it easier for me to read them as I do the update - without this it's tough to know off the bat which omake were written this turn, and to properly

Requested Bonus, which is your requested bonus for your omake. You can leave it up to me if you like. You can see more info in the Good Seed infopost here.

Cultivation Aims. For those following unorthodox paths - higher than 9th Heavenstage or later than 7th Dao Pillar paths. Please put in what you are aiming for before you break through. I have left it as 'default'. If you do not edit it, I'll go with that.

Turn Notes - Do you want to do something specific? Enter a Secret Realm? Help the Clan out in some way? If you have something specific you want to accomplish on this turn, put it in turn notes so I can adjust your Fate around it.

All other fields are for QM use to record character information to properly run the flow of the game.

 

[Mochinator]

She does perform solo without a troupe though lol.

Click to shrink...

Clearly it's time to abuse her position as one of the 13 and get some starry eyed juniors into her theater group. That or she can try borrowing minions from Ferenike. She has a lot of em

 

[Liliet]

Clearly it's time to abuse her position as one of the 13 and get some starry eyed juniors into her theater group. That or she can try borrowing minions from Ferenike. She has a lot of em

Click to shrink...

She literally has a carnival already.

She meets them once every decade. She'll give them her materials and they'll make a play.

Offscreen.

 

[occipitallobe]

Kleisthenes glared at him.

Manuel panted, running across the desert, feeling the lightning simmer in his meridians. He had absolutely no affinity with lightning, much less five-coloured lightning. The pain was quite frankly astounding, and had his flesh not been made of hardy bronze he suspected he would've been cooked from the inside-out by now.

Three days he had carried her before she awoke. Three days of being nearly powerless, relying on scraps of his cultivation, desperately fearing that one enterprising Core Formation junior from the Fifth Sea would find and end him.

How had this happened?

Oh, he had expected Heaven's counterblow. Smugly thought himself capable of deflecting it, making it possible for the Clan to survive with only moderately worse losses than the last Trials.

He looked at Kleisthenes, who had just woken up.

She shook her head, and tears began to flow. She spoke, voice raw.

"You let my sister die."

Manuel didn't respond. Not for a few seconds, and not for a minute.

After five minutes, he spoke.

"Yes. I did. I'm sorry."

She had nothing to that, and so he trudged on in silence.

He let her down that evening, setting up a small camp near a group of stones. The desert sun became a shimmering night sky, and while the cold of night was not threat to them they needed some way to cloak themselves from the dangers of the night. This far north, the desert life that came out at life might endanger them, weak as they were.

She spoke again.

"You know, Euphrosyne was never the pretty one when we were girls. Talented, yes. But not pretty. Even cultivation only made her plain. She envied me for decades, you know?"

Manuel said nothing.

"I could never catch her talent, though. It wasn't until I found the Spiral Yang Art that I even had a hope. Father always told me he wished I were born a boy. Euphrosyne had the talent, of course. He loved her talent. But for me... he wished I had been born a boy. At least that way I could carry on the bloodline and the name."

She laughed, and at the last it became a sob.

"I almost didn't give Hektor my name. But Father died twenty years before he was born, and I thought it better to let bygones be bygones. Euphrosyne ended up being the pretty one, and even with all my work, and all my sacrifices, I could never catch up to her. I hated her for centuries."

Manuel reached up a hand to comfort her, frozen in mid-air as she shook her head at him fiercely. She had the makings of a beard, now, growing out from her days of unconsciousness in the desert.

"No. I... when I saw her die. I was horrified, but part of me was happy for a moment. Can you imagine? Seeing your own sister die, and..."

Her voice trailed off.

Manuel wasn't sure what to say, so he remained quiet.

It was the next day of walking that he summoned up the nerve to speak.

"I was so certain I should save you, Kleisthenes. Why?"

She looked over at him.

"No doubt some gambit of yours, some thought put into play to rescue what little you could for the Clan."

He barked a laugh, painful, lightning sparks popping out of his mouth, burning his lips.

"No. I justified it afterwards that way. In reality, I could save one of three. My apprentice, my friend, or a councillor. There were only two people left in the world close to me in any way, and I chose to save my friend, rather than my apprentice who I promised to protect. What do you think that says about me?"

They both knew, somehow, that these secrets would never leave this stretch of empty desert, even if the two of them did.

She had no words to that. Somehow this had become a moment for them to confess to one another, to let each other know of their inner sins, their self-hatred. When you reached the heights of cultivation such things were weapons to be used against and you and carefully hidden away, but the horror of the last few weeks had made that less relevant. Who knew if they would live out the day, or the month? If the Trials ended, would there be a Clan left to save? Neither of them knew, and continued walking anyway.

It was nearly a week before either of them spoke again.

"He was just a boy. When I trained him at first, he was not even a century old, with the burnished skin of youth still on him. Nikephoros was competent, and hardworking, and he always longed for my approval. I think he always saw me as somehow more than just a cultivator, you know? More than a human being. Some sort of god, like the Imperator above. When I let his nephew die, I think it shattered that faith. In his last moments, I failed him. Then I let him die as well. Alexios made it seem easy, and then he died. He was invincible for my entire life, and I had faith he could solve any issue. Then he was snuffed out. I couldn't even see the attack that took his life. I think he preferred that, though. The teacher outliving the student..."

His voice trailed off again.

Kleisthenes looked down at her stump of a leg.

"Was it worth it?"

Manuel sighed, and turned his head to look at her as he carried her

"Today, I would say no. In a century... you can't feel this. But in the air, the sense of oppression has lifted. Heaven has weakened in drastic ways. There is a sense of opportunity, a possibility for growth that was not there a decade ago. We are near-crippled, but if we recover they will call me a visionary."

He smiled wryly.

"If we don't recover no doubt they'll call me a devil before the spear goes through my heart."

Kleisthenes grinned.

"Why not hope for both?"

They both laughed, and then stopped, looking at one another awkwardly. The pain was still there. Laughing together as friends was still possible, but not right now. Not, Manuel thought, for a very long time.

They came up to the Scorpion Road, and crossed it. Here it was merely two wagons wide, stone and smelted sand and runes all coming together to help you move faster than you ordinarily could.

On crossing it, something changed. The spirit of openness disappeared. Where they had been two cultivators, two old friends commiserating but a minute before, now they were Elder and Grand Elder, once again ready to take up their ceaseless tasks. Manuel couldn't explain why.

"So, Grand Elder. What happened? How did... that man win?"

Manuel took a deep breath, and spat out an errant bolt of lightning. It was building up in his meridians faster, now. Hopefully he'd be able to get to the Dawn Fortress and concoct a solution before it burned him out.

"I'm not sure. I managed to shatter his companion's token-"

"There were two of them?"

Kleisthenes interrupted him, surprised.

"Yes. Two, but one was unreadied. Bhrigu, as he calls himself, is incredibly strong. A league above myself, and with seemingly inexhaustible energy. He's young and foolish, though, so I led him into traps, kept him chasing after me, and so on. Forced him to take about every unfavorable fight he could. It wasn't until the end that he pulled out that peculiar key fused with a sword.. sword-key, perhaps? At first it seemed a normal magical treasure, and it got weaker as the fight went on. I lured him to you, and expected an easy enough victory. Shattering tokens is much easier than killing, after all. Then..."

Manuel remembered the raw potency. He still didn't understand. That artifact was beyond his understanding. He couldn't even sense the depths of its power, let alone counter it!

"Whatever that is, it's powerful enough in his hands to fight a Spirit Severing cultivator, I suspect. Maybe even defeat one. I'm not sure, of course. But there's definitely nobody under Nascent Soul who could stand against him wielding that thing. It doesn't overmuch matter, though. I've discovered his objective and how to prevent him from gaining it. Even if he returns, he won't be able to get what he wants."

"And if he slaughters everyone in the Clan out of anger?"

Manuel frowned.

"I don't feel that's possible. Something... something changed when he did. Heaven exerted itself mightly to allow for that moment. I don't understand how, or why. But if he required the assistance of the Heavens enough to purge one of our ancient curses to do what he did, where will he get such assistance again? I'm not completely confident, but enough to gamble."

Kleisthenes looked at him, anger in her eyes.

"Where did your last gamble get us, Grand Elder?"

He sighed.

"It's too soon to speak of failure, Kleisthenes. I let my apprentice die, I killed your sister, I let our juniors be slaughtered in droves. I know. But if we can make it through this... it'll be worth it."

His eyes burned with passion.

"It has to be worth it."

She looked up at him, unimpressed.

"Then make it worth it, old man. Don't insult my sister by letting what she did be in vain."

As they walked, bells rang. The end of the Trials.

A mere two weeks after that, they reached the Dawn Fortress. Almost abandoned, with a scant few cultivators moving back in.

Manuel let his spiritual sense move over it briefly, cursing as lightning flared up, searing his eyeballs for the audacity of his attempt.

This was not going to be easy.

 

[occipitallobe]

So, a few of our omake writers have volunteered to write a few Fates. Part of the advantage of the new system is that I can give specific outcomes (cultivation, Impact bonuses, Wounds, etc, etc) and have a Fate written around it. Mechanically there's no difference.

These are largely those easiest to roll (with shorter omake or no omake and consequently an easier time calculating Fate bonuses), but the rest are all upcoming, finally!

There are still more to do, followed by the council post (and Saving Juniors remainder), followed by the complete conversion + spreadsheeting therein, but we're done with all the tough 'can this system potentially work' conversations and even the 'how do we make this work?' conversations and finally onto 'lets get a few tasks done and the big horrid Turn 5 conversion will be done.

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Aurelia Xu
Fate - During the Trials Aurelia, already wounded, stood proudly against the attacks of a Fifth Sea Hunter in the Eighth Heavenstage who wished to breach the bunker she guarded. While she drove him away she was badly wounded in the process and could not make any progress in cultivation.
Cultivation - 5th Heavenstage
Health - Badly Wounded

Chrysanthos Krimta
Fate - The Trials are a perilous time to be a merchant, and the invaders from the Fifth Sea are not known to discriminate in their attacks. Much of his earnings since the last report had been invested in preparing treasures and talismans to aid in his survival, but he found them expended in the first season of the trials, eventually having his knees shattered by a cruel invader. He was rescued before a suitable junior could be found to claim his fortune, and evacuated to Pleuron, escaping with only moderate wounds.
Cultivation - 5th Heavenstage
Health - Wounded (1 turn to recover)

Constans Herculius -
Fate - Tragic. Overwhelmed by the temptation of experimenting with new and foreign Dao for his craft, Constans used his limited flight to harry and hunt down Fifth Sea Cultivators. This ended poorly, as Qi Condensation Cultivators of the 5th and higher Heavenstages looked poorly upon his predations and turned the tables upon him. It was only through the sacrifice of his Bronze Effigy fooling his hunters at a critical moment that enabled him to escape with his life.
Cultivation - 3rd Heavenstage
Health - Badly Wounded.

Damien Silver -
Fate - Continuous attempts to improve his swordsmanship led him to engage in a series of duels against enemy sword specialists during the trials, to the neglect of his cultivation. Unfortunately, he was unable to handle his opponent's Seven-Strike Moonlight Blade and was wounded, only barely managing to escape with his life. Must learn to gauge his own limits if he wishes to progress.
Impact Bonus: 0 Gained, 1
Cultivation Realm: 8th Heavenstage. 40 Years spent in Heavenstage.
Health: Badly Wounded.

Dmitry Kascheev
Fate - Dmitry managed to find a well of pure spirit water, a single drink of which catapulted him to the 9th Heavenstage and within its reflections of the sun received insights into the art of talisman making.
Cultivation - 9th Heavenstage
Health - Currently healthy.

Ilias Barallis - Fate - Tragedy! Attempts to replace his lost limbs backfired, as a medicinal agent used to bind the new flesh to the old had turned toxic. The new limbs were twisted, gnarled, and frail--and when the Trials sounded, he was unable to flee when the invaders fell upon him. Deemed poor prey--not even worth the effort of calling a junior, he was run through with a stolen spear and staked out to die in the desert, with bets being made upon the time of his expiry.
Health - DEAD

Nicovas Ceruleus -
Fate - Reliant on his great investments and the arrays he could purchase in the lead up to the trial, Nicovas Ceruleus believed he could ride out the storm--surely none would turn their gaze upon him at this terrible time? It was not to be--his bolthole was struck by a stray blow between warring Core Formation experts in the second season of the Trials, and he found himself badly burned with his supplies exhausted. He would have surely died if he was not discovered by Ambrus Nike, who shared water and medical supplies with him. The friendship would have surely gone places if they did not find themselves attacked by a lesser prince and his retinue of demon-elephant riders, and Ambrus was slain drawing them away. A tragedy, but perhaps one he can learn from.
Cultivation - 8th Heavenstage.
Health - Wounded (1 turn to healing) (Ambrus Nike expended himself as a Life Saving Treasure and has Died in your place!)

Lin Fan
Fate - Poor luck! Encircled by a Young Master and his entourage and Dao Protectors, was terribly wounded by an arrow the chest--grazing his heart--and was forced to utilize his Congealed Blood Stone to secure an escape. He subsequently secured a bolthole in the desert the attention of the Qi Condensation invaders were drawn to the siege of Pleuron, and has been licking his wounds since.
Cultivation - Remains at 8th Heavenstage
Health - Wounded (Would have been Dead, Life Saving Treasure expended)

Tie Jin
Fate - Cloistured in his Workshop, the events of the Demonic Bee War had soured him, having stalled out his cultivation for little gain. Twenty years spent, attempting to further his understanding of Metal Qi, the emanations of his forge obscuring his presence from Fifth Sea Hunters. As the Miracle of Pleuron occurred, he too had a breakthrough - the integration of Metal Qi into his Blood of Bronze sufficient enough to manipulate and shift it to take on other properties. The mutation of his Bloodline into the Myriad Smelting Physique also pushed him into the 9th Heavenstage at last, on the cusp of obtaining Foundation Building.
Cultivation - 9th Heavenstage (Two Turns to FB)
Health - Currently healthy.

Theron Strophios
Fate - Unlike most of his peers, Theron chose to the face the Trial headon. Engaging in duels with the Invaders, he soon found himself outmatched against a Invader of the 3rd Heavenstage. Each of his strikes being parried with ease, Theron was only able to survive with the aid of his damaged death crystal, allowing him to see the steps need to kill before he was killed. Pushing his meridians to the limit, Theron moved faster then the 3rd Heavenstage cultivator and stuck him down. The act of forcing the Qi within his body to flow that rapidly damaged his Meridians and erased all of his previous Cultivation progress, giving him a Light Wound that would not be healed until the Trials are done. Unknown to him, some of the Qi of the slain cultivator has reinforced his budding Sword Intent(+1 Impact) , allowing his sword strikes to land as if from One of a higher
Cultivation Impact Bonus - 1 Impact
Cultivation - 1st Heavenstage
Health - Lightly Wounded (Healed at end of Turn 5)

 

[Nordlending]

That's interesting. I can make people a life saving treasure.

Who is Brighs backer? Could be someone on the level above a spirit severing.

 

[ReaderOfFate]

That's interesting. I can make people a life saving treasure.

Who is Brighs backer? Could be someone on the level above a spirit severing.

Click to shrink...

He has a father or grandparent, I forget, who's at the Second Severing.

 

[BungieONI]

mysterious hidden library! Point to consider here being that if we have one such library in a normal Waystation, what kind of Forbidden Lore do we have in our main HQ ??

Also very nice Magic Library vibe, the mention of living scrolls and books definitely gives off a Western Feel that suits the Clan over the usual bamboo slips used in Chinese Xianxia.

Click to shrink...

You know I actually completely forgot that Jade and Bamboo slips existed while I was writing that section

Hey! Don't drive away my worshippers! I could have been a TREE GOD! Clearly me not hitting Nascent Soul is Ferenike's fault for not spreading the Word Of The Holy Vines.

Also point to consider, that was because i was becoming more Tree then man. So good for mortals, not so good for me

Click to shrink...

Lol.

 

[kalugin]

Dmitry Kascheev​

The preparation time for the centuries-old test was very terrible. The Koscheev family was at risk, since most of the cultivators were artisans. Of course they went through clan training and had mascot kits, but expect a woodworking specialist to defeat the best junior from another sea?
The greatest concern was caused by the fate of the grandmother (matriarch for others) Anastasia, who broke into the nucleus stage 20 years ago. For this stage, she was young, inexperienced and with no martial tao. She did not even have the arts for a new stage, as she was carried away by mass production. In general, she would have played anyone at the same stage.
Like all talented artisans, I waited out the tests in the shelters for nervous and hurried work. We found some shelters, some not. I was lucky, for me the trials ended without seeing more than one stranger. I was just following the plan for the production of talismans for the alien fighters. I hope that thousands of mascots of my production have saved thousands of lives, but I suspect that the count goes to a few.
The family was also lucky. Anastasia was not offered to participate in the ill-fated array that deprived the clan of most of the legates. She was not found by the enemy core cultivators. Although she herself is not happy because her teachers and relatives were killed. Power suddenly fell on her. She turned out to be one of the few survivors of Stage 3. Perhaps she will be invited to the council.
Bonus - A remedy for grief. Dmitry wants to become a foundation cultivator.

 

[ninjastar]

Well, let's hope this was worth it. We have the palace so our next generation will be slightly more powerful than before, which could stack up exponentially when combined with our formations. So long as we survive the next few turns, we should be fine.

 

[Garlak]

"Was it worth it?"

Manuel sighed, and turned his head to look at her as he carried her

"Today, I would say no. In a century... you can't feel this. But in the air, the sense of oppression has lifted. Heaven has weakened in drastic ways. There is a sense of opportunity, a possibility for growth that was not there a decade ago. We are near-crippled, but if we recover they will call me a visionary."

Click to shrink...

I was already thinking on this sort of thing before, yesterday. Thinking that: "Wow, Manuel is one hell of a gambler." "And... will people feel its worth it?" "Is it worth it?" "And yet, the problem is... there's no other way to expend the Curse than to take it on the chin. I think. Right?"

I was musing to myself, that... What if. What if, you cannot defeat the curse by the equivalent of preparing for a sudden challenge to come out of nowhere, and gamble on the odds of being able to beat an enemy you were heavily unfavored to win against.

The Curse only activates if you have already failed, lost, injured, crippled, or fucked up. (Or are incredibly close to rolling a 50, and it can push it over the edge.) The Curse of Karma, is not an "interesting times" curse. It is not an "worthy opponents" curse. It is a curse... that makes failure more painful. (And also more likely; it tips the odds a little bit.) It makes already-present wounds more painful. The Curse exacerbates any injures taken.

So therefore... The only way to bait out the Curse, was to bait it with an opening in your defenses, take the injury, and them gamble on being able to survive the injury.

... Well, maybe.

It's possible that those musings of mine above are wrong. It's possible that it was a "if you can just tough it out and beat a Boss Fight you weren't supposed to be able to beat, overcome an unfair challenge you weren't supposed to be able to match" thing, it would have counted, too. It's possible that if we had simply rolled really damn well, that the narrative manifestation of the Curse expending itself would have come in the form of Heaven throwing something at us and us managing to beat it. But that, instead, we rolled a bad disaster and Heaven decided to make it worse, as bad as it could.


Anyway.

The other thing I was thinking about, yesterday, before going to sleep was...

I was imagining the Good Seeds when they were young, when they were kids and teenagers and young adults. Imagining them at that age where they imagine themselves as shining heroes of the clan who'll win victory and glory. You know, kids pretending that they'll be the big hero that'll save the day, right? And then growing up into young adults who... have a more nuanced view of it, but still have that seed of optimism. That hope of "If I can just do well enough... I can help the Clan majorly. I can help save the world!" ((On a side note, some/a lot of the Good Seeds feel a bit like "late teenagers"/"young adults" even in their 120s. It's an interesting thought. They come off as young adults in their maturity and development somehow.))

So then...

What does it feel like, for you to declare to yourself, that you'll save the Clan, that you'll become strong enough to change the world...

And then find and suspect that Old Gold himself thinks the same thing?

You're a young adult! You're supposed to think you can change the world, can be a big hero, you're supposed to make dramatic and strong-feeling determinations to try to do the best you can! The thousands years old Elder isn't supposed to look at that and agree with you! He isn't supposed to look at you and go "You think you can save the Clan? Hmm... Okay. I'll gamble on you, child." It's one thing to make a promise to yourself, it's another thing to find out that the adults agree and take you completely stone cold fucking seriously on it.

...

It's one thing for a person to make a personal vow to change the world until the world is better.

It's another, a horrifying, thing to find somebody else who agrees with that judgment and determination of yours.

Much less the fucking Archegetes of the Clan.

Manuel is one hell of a gambler, as I've said.


I've been looking forward to the possibility that some of the omake characters here... take that view, too. That they look at what Manuel has done, that they curse and bitch at the horrible damage suffered because of course you curse and bitch and vent about that, but then go:

"... Fuck. Is he really actually believing our hype, our hope? Is he that much of a gambler? Fucking hell, Old Gold. You don't ask for much, do you?"

 

[BungieONI]

So therefore... The only way to bait out the Curse, was to bait it with an opening in your defenses, take the injury, and them gamble on being able to survive the injury.

... Well, maybe.

Click to shrink...

This was not the only way, as every time the Karmic Luck triggered, it weakened according to occipitallobe. It was however an effective way since the entire thing got expended at once at a time we probably can survive it.

 

[Garlak]

as every time the Karmic Luck triggered, it weakened according to occipitallobe

Click to shrink...

Yes. But it only triggered when it could actually hurt you or when you're already in pain. (EDIT: Or when you're in the borderline between bare failure and bare success, and it can push it over to failure. But that effectively means you're taking damage anyway, so.) That's what I mean and was trying to say.

You have to be able to tough out the wounds it gives you, make the Heavens miscalculate on whether the injures it intends to deal you would actually be able to kill you or not.

So, I guess Manuel could also have taken the really really long term view on it. On the other hand, the Imperial Optimatoi have been here for literal hundreds of thousands of years, so... So even "thousands of years" is a fairly short term view.

So he expended it in a quick and grand way. He made it end fast.

And the only way to do that, was by allowing the Heavens to take a big enough shot at you, and gamble on being able to avoid dying. To avoid entering a death-spiral from the damage taken. And the only way to avoid death-spiraling, is to make sure you can get Core Formation Elders again and experienced, which is... tough. (And also, make sure to not lose Manuel. Otherwise we just freaking die, or get conquered, period.)

 

[BungieONI]

Yes. But it only triggered when it could actually hurt you or when you're already in pain. That's what I mean and was trying to say.

You have to be able to tough out the wounds it gives you, make the Heavens miscalculate on whether the injures it intends to deal you would actually be able to kill you or not.

So, I guess Manuel could also have taken the really really long term view on it. On the other hand, the Imperial Optimatoi have been here for literal hundreds of thousands of years, so... So even "thousands of years" is a fairly short term view.

So he expended it in a quick and grand way. He made it end fast.

And the only way to do that, was by allowing the Heavens to take a big enough shot at you, and gamble on being able to avoid dying.

Click to shrink...

Ah yeah, we'll see if we can live.

 

[AlphaDelta]

You have to be able to tough out the wounds it gives you, make the Heavens miscalculate on whether the injures it intends to deal you would actually be able to kill you or not.

Click to shrink...

I'd say that it's less "make the heavens miscalculate" than "make the heavenly machine miscalculate".

The Heavens aren't smart. In CS parlance, it's a greedy algorithm. It takes what opportunities it can.

My read is that Manuel was triggering the Heavens through apparent avarice and hubris. Regardless, if we survive beyond the next Trial… Well. This is where the gamble will pay off.

(I don't think this is a short term play from Manuel's POV. It's a medium term play: the short term here is "until the next trial", whereas Long would be after 50-100 turns or so.)

 

[Alectai]

The good news, of course, is that we've got two turns that we can spend staunching the injury before the pressure really mounts up again, that won't get us back up to strength, but if we play our cards right and get decent rolls, we can hopefully lean into that advantage to parry the remaining pressure until we've mostly recovered.

But yeah, what Alpha meant is that the Heavens aren't good enough to consider context. This seemed like a really good opportunity for them at the incident level, but it failed to realize that we'd arranged a 40 year reprieve in the aftermath, which sharply mitigates the harm we took. If it was really on the ball, it would have waited until a time we couldn't get any recovery time.

 

[TehChron]

This was not the only way, as every time the Karmic Luck triggered, it weakened according to occipitallobe. It was however an effective way since the entire thing got expended at once at a time we probably can survive it.

Click to shrink...

Yeah I didnt want to spend the next twenty turns looking over our shoulder for a dozen Oasis Rebel incidents to backfire horribly on us in quick succession and provoke a war on us that we couldnt afford

 

[Garlak]

Hopefully Festus and Hektor Sarantapechos survive the Trials. Or at least, that both don't die in them. Would be sad if Kleisthenes lost yet more people.

 

[Juugo]

What I am more interested in personally is the effect this supposed Palace we gained will have on my young seed Zeno Angelus, because he will start after Pleuron on Turn 6 and should therefore benefit from this cultivation boost fully, I believe.
Can somebody link me a post where the effects of this Palace, which supposedly helps qi condensation cultivators cultivate, are explained?

 

[moon-llama]

What I am more interested in personally is the effect this supposed Palace we gained will have on my young seed Zeno Angelus, because he will start after Pleuron on Turn 6 and should therefore benefit from this cultivation boost fully, I believe.
Can somebody link me a post where the effects of this Palace, which supposedly helps qi condensation cultivators cultivate, are explained?

Click to shrink...

Honestly im guessing that mechanically once it kicks in any good seed that is still at qi condensation will get an impact bonus.

 

[Alectai]

What I am more interested in personally is the effect this supposed Palace we gained will have on my young seed Zeno Angelus, because he will start after Pleuron on Turn 6 and should therefore benefit from this cultivation boost fully, I believe.
Can somebody link me a post where the effects of this Palace, which supposedly helps qi condensation cultivators cultivate, are explained?

Click to shrink...

Narratively? It's either part of why a Good Seed is good, or the Good Seed is beyond it.

The advantage is for our generic disciples, this means far more of our Qi Condensation population numbers advance to Foundation Establishment, which means we were much more resilient to casualties and losses.

The real prize is if we can repair it up to the next level, because then Foundation Establishment gets the same benefit.

It's a five point, Sect-locked shiny. It had to be at least that good for it to be enough bait to be worth exposing ourself for.

 

[TehChron]

Not particularly for us good seed authors specifically

Good Seeds are treated as being on that level naturally. So rather than us being an outlier, at Qi Condensation your average clan cultivator will be equivalent to a 0 Omake Good seed.

 

[Garlak]

Yeah, it doesn't mean as much for a Good Seed mechanically (of course you can still write a Good Seed who originated from getting a lucky break at the Technique Palace, or write about your older Good Seed going into it to get something, or to find something for his Legionnaire subordinate cultivators) but it means that the Clan will benefit.

The Clan is more likely to get more recruits from its mortal populations, because there is now more to tempt young budding Cultivators with. The Clan can offer rewards to good and loyal Vassals, for their Qi Condensation Juniors. Maybe a bit of internal(ish) trade; internal within the whole of the Golden Devil territories and Vassals I mean, as opposed to trade with other big-name Clans and Sects.

The Clan's economy can potentially see a surge and increase, because suddenly a lot of people will be spending Contribution Points, in order to access the Technique Palace. And also because there are some Qi Condensation survivors from the latest trial who presumably are either getting paid or are needing money... So the Clan can set up all sorts of "Rebuild this place, Garrison X place, etc" missions on their Contribution Board, and people will be eager to do so in order to buy access to the Technique Palace.

How it can affect your Good Seed, is if you focus on Juniors and the masses!

You can encourage your Legionnaires to visit the Technique Palace in order to get good stuff, so that you can train them better. Your subordinates and Juniors are more likely to survive, because they are better, and so you can do more. You can motivate your Juniors by telling them that you'll pay for Technique Palace access, if they do well in their drilling or in mastering a Formation or etc.

...

This also means that saving a shitload of Qi Condensation Cultivators -- and Qi Condensation specifically -- in the latest trial, will have a good effect on the Clan; because all those Cultivators will be a little bit better now. Because you have a little bit more Qi Condensation then you expected to have, and which are now a bit more bloodied and experienced in war. (And also, they have a place to spend their Contribution Points, too.) Of course, this is a bit of a guess and a bit of an abstract. Because we don't yet know exactly how well we did in Qi Condensation numbers. And also because Qi Condensation Cultivators are the easiest and quickest to raise en masse. So having a lot of numbers leftover is questionable... hmmm. It's probably their experience and motivation that is the most valuable about them. Because they're going to be pretty motivated to build themselves up for the next Trials. And to pass on that spirit and willingness to their new upcoming Juniors.

The real prize is if we can repair it up to the next level, because then Foundation Establishment gets the same benefit.

It's a five point, Sect-locked shiny. It had to be at least that good for it to be enough bait to be worth exposing ourself for.

Click to shrink...

80 wealth to upgrade to Foundation Establishment, 200 wealth to upgrade it to Core Formation. Our coffers! Our poor coffers! ;_;

 

[TehChron]

Yeah, it doesn't mean as much for a Good Seed mechanically (of course you can still write a Good Seed who originated from getting a lucky break at the Technique Palace, or write about your older Good Seed going into it to get something, or to find something for his Legionnaire subordinate cultivators) but it means that the Clan will benefit.

The Clan is more likely to get more recruits from its mortal populations, because there is now more to tempt young budding Cultivators with. The Clan can offer rewards to good and loyal Vassals, for their Qi Condensation Juniors. Maybe a bit of internal(ish) trade; internal within the whole of the Golden Devil territories and Vassals I mean, as opposed to trade with other big-name Clans and Sects.

The Clan's economy can potentially see a surge and increase, because suddenly a lot of people will be spending Contribution Points, in order to access the Technique Palace. And also because there are some Qi Condensation survivors from the latest trial who presumably are either getting paid or are needing money... So the Clan can set up all sorts of "Rebuild this place, Garrison X place, etc" missions on their Contribution Board, and people will be eager to do so in order to buy access to the Technique Palace.

Click to shrink...

We...we do all of that already though?

It's how we repopulated the Burnished Crags and Uncast Molds in fact

 

[The Fourth Monado]

80 wealth to upgrade to Foundation Establishment, 200 wealth to upgrade it to Core Formation. Our coffers! Our poor coffers! ;_;

Click to shrink...

We'll never get the resources to sustain another Nascent Soul at this rate!

 

[Alectai]

Yeah, it's expensive as shit, which is why us getting it to the FE level would be potentially a game winner in itself. Getting to CF is just 'Well now you're just showin' of!' levels.

Just having it at its current level already helps quite a bit though.