the towel is average 2.8 rolls with a 1/23 chance each to produce a success worth 100, and 3 rolls with a 1/21 chance each to produce a success worth 80, for a total of 16 average progress
Hogwarts Sect of Witchcraft and Wizardry
- Thread starter Karf
- Start date
- Fantasy
If I understand the question correctly, no effect. You won't lose meridians.
- Location
- United Kingdom
Summer actions I feel are best saved for electives or socials. The former will obviously be the priority, as we can't reliably train them otherwise until third year, and the latter for any summer exclusive actions.
And 1 each in Meridians/Charms would probably still be better than Herbology in September, because the boost they give to rolls is a lot broader than Herbology's benefit.
We could do something like:
Sep: 3x Astro, 1x Charms, 1x Meridians
Oct: 5x History
Nov: 5x Defense
Dec: 2x Herb, 4x Trans
By the last month 2 actions would be enough to get us straight to Apprentice, and 4 would get us the next 2 milestones in Transfiguration.
I expressed this before, but personally, I really want to train and get info on every new/unknown skill (Electives, Astronomy and Herbology) before going back to what's the most optimal path odds-wise (History, Defense and Transfiguration) because:
-I'd hate to discover later on that the thing we decided not to train was cool AF.
-The low hanging fruits give comparably more bang for our buck (so to speak) since they cost less (i.e. 750 points for 3 technique-equivalents rather than 750/1000+ points for 1).
-Knowledge is power, or to be less dramatic, having the most data helps us make better choices.
Also, and this is mostly guesswork based on this:
More likely than not, the ingredients Herbology provides will give their mechanical benefit (probably to potions' effects, maybe to something else) without needing meridians assigned to them, unlike charms (artefacts), rituals/sites (locations) and techniques (skills).
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- Location
- United Kingdom
I don't doubt Herbology would be cool/useful for us, especially considering it's apparent synergy with CoMC in addition to Potions, but I was referring more to the base mechanical effect than what we get from the ingredients (Charms giving +1 to dice size).
Plus if we wait until after we've trained up History we can get to Apprentice in 2 actions instead of 3.
Sure, but since my argument was "I'd rather go Herbology first before the odds-wise most optimal History/Defense/Transfiguration", you can imagine how the same applies (and applies more strongly) to Charms (which is inferior to them), which is why I didn't mention it.
Still, we can fit Charms x1 in October, for example, with History x4 giving us those same +2 dice to pools that we'd get with History x5 (i.e. only a couple hundreds points less in it, but same milestones). And we can fit a Meridian action in July/August.
Basically, I'd rather not trade Herbology for going very slightly faster.
FriedIce
The Authentic Fake
- Location
- Hyperreality
I'd laugh if they only explain how to open meridians to first years who pass before the summer break. It'd be very Xianxia if they just expect everyone who had to resit in August to figure it out for themselves.
Just to clarify, your proposed plan for the next few months is:
July - 2x Ancient Runes, 3x Care
August - 2x Divination, 2x Arithmancy, 1x Meridians
September - 5x Astronomy
October - 4x Spiritual, 1x Charms
November - 5x Herbology
If so, that seems fairly solid until November and my opinion on Herbology taken then will depend on how challenging the end of year target feels.
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Not quite.
July (I'm flip-flopping on various versions of this turn, but right now):
-Runes x2, Malus Runes x1
-Malus CoMC x2
August:
-Divination and Arithmancy x2
-Malus Meridians x1 (an argument could be made for Charms instead)
September:
-Astronomy x3
-Herbology x2 (or maybe a compromise of Herbology x1 and what we didn't pick between Charms/Meridians x1)
And then go from there depending on new information and a lot of other factors. Plans that look too far ahead are not that reliable, but generally speaking, the things that improve our training the most are History (Spiritual), Transfiguration and, when it gives us an extra action, Defense (Physical), so sooner rather than later, I do want to get back to them. I just want to discover what everything else does, first.
CedeTheBees
Probably high right now
- Location
- Somewhere
- Pronouns
- They/Them
I think I prefer this setup. 3 CoMC actions when we're already halfway to Apprentice feels a bit much. I'd rather work on Runes for those sweet sweet lowered August thresholds.
FriedIce
The Authentic Fake
- Location
- Hyperreality
What would 3x Astronomy and 2x Herbology get us, on average?
On the Charms vs Meridians question I'd be inclined to go for Meridians. We're going to have a load of stuff which needs Meridians by the end of the Summer and it's not like we're never going to invest in Charms again - it's strong enough mechanically that we're basically guaranteed to invest in it sooner or later.
Not counting meridians' stuff, nor the rerolling of 1s for Herbology, that's about 1100 points for Astronomy and 700 for Herbology. You're gonna have to ask others (probably zinay) for a simulation of actual odds (that also includes the things I didn't).
(By the way, zinay and Karf, I've just found out that tagging people can be considered rude. I apologize if it was annoying for you, since I know I've done that quite a bit for requests and questions, respectively, in this thread. I honestly had no idea I was doing something that commonly irks others.)
We're going to invest in both, so that looks like a moot point. There's a few other things to consider, in my opinion:
1) The odds of getting 115 points for Beginner 3 Charms (5d21 DC15 at +30), vs the odds of getting 20/70/180 points for 1/2/3 new Meridians (5d21 DC14 at +30).
2) The odds of future actions rolling d24s instead of d23s vs the odds of future actions with 3/4/5 Meridians slotted instead of 2.
3) The chances of getting new "slottable" stuff (like charms and techniques) from the Electives that's worth more (i.e. improves odds of future actions more, but also completely different but still desirable kind of benefits) than what we currently have available.
4) The value of getting information on what Charms offers at Apprentice vs. no new information.
5) The chances of naturally opening meridians by rolling within 1% of the max.
I might be missing others, too. As things stand, I think an argument could be made for either option, but I'd edge towards Meridians (Edit 2 - ehhhhh... actually, I think I prefer Charms. Either way, it's very close, and mostly dependent on points 1 and 2).
Edit - It's probably worth mentioning that I have this particular action being discussed for August in my plan because of the (lowish) chance of either Runes or CoMC not capping at Beginner 2 in July, in which case I'd advocate for it to be assigned to whichever one it is, rather than Meridians/Charms. Hopefully it won't happen, but it's there (in August rather than July) exactly for that safety reason.
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I'd drop Ancient Runes and Divination and just go for Arithmancy, ComC, Astronomy and maybe Herbology during the summer. I'd rather focus on the subjects that boost subjects we can actually study throughout the year. If a jade Chit cost a training action I'd prioritize that over a subject.
I'd also like Rei to take a break and actually have if not more socials than training actions, then atleast an equal amount. It's her vacation after all.
I'd also like Rei to take a break and actually have if not more socials than training actions, then atleast an equal amount. It's her vacation after all.
Me too. I was working under the assumption that it didn't, but after rereading the relevant bits, it's not totally clear. I'd expect it to be mentioned if it cost an action, but we might as well just ask the QM and make sure. Could you clarify, Karf?
Edit - Oh, one more question, sorry: are the Electives capped at 550 or at 749 points (or even a different arbitrary number, perhaps)?
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I can't speak for others, but considering that you're always polite and have nice things to say, the little red icon next to the bell rather gives me a hit of dopamine. Feel free to keep tagging me whenever my input is appreciated.
Same goes for anyone else regarding me.
It does not. For the sake of the example, lets assume Rei's taking transfiguration techniques - she'll gain the chosen technique, both narratively and the associated mechanical benefit (should she equip it to a meridian), but no progress in the transfiguration subject.
As I hate hard caps, all progess is saved, but you won't be able to benefit above 550, nor choose to train it again once that's been reached. I'd be surprised if you guys intentionally tried to stack the number and go way above that, but at worst it'd just be an annoyance to write and justify in a year's time.
This is just enough to get you the barebones description (basic), the first taste of what it's actually like (beginner I) and a followup to take off some pressure on the first choice (beginner II). Which admittedly doesn't match reality already (CoMC: basics - familiar - new tricks), but at least that was the original intent.
@Karf hi, I wanted to ask. Once we learn the Horizon Slicing Technique, does it replace the Whip Shear Technique? I mean, hst seems to just be a plain upgrade to wst. So if they are different techniques why would we want to use wst? Also, if in the future we learned the Thunderous Cut Technique would we be able to use it in conjunction with HST to increase the range?
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At first I wanted to ask if after buying hedge shears, there's still a use for nail clippers, but then I realized there's more to the question.
Techniques in a Law are meant to have some synergistics, but they're not supposed to be replacements. Barring the fact that Thunderous Cut is gone forever (at least as planned when writing this), something similar would indeed be usable in conjunction with previous techs. I guess the best way I can describe it is that they're supposed to build on previous ones, without supplanting them outright.
The HST could aslo be handwaved away as taking more concentration, willpower or what-have-you, so unless she needs it, Rei can still use the WST, if that explanation seems more satisfactory.
My interpretation of it was that, just like the Humble Light Bringer Law can potentially let us use light, darkness and color separately and at the same time (with the first, second and third techniques), then the Separating Void Paradigm Law can let us make a cut nearby and a cut at range separately and at the same time (with the first and second techniques). Mostly, this could be useful in combat as a double attack of sorts, split between a target in melee and one at range. Kinda situational, but HST's main appeal is that you can use it instead of WST, anyway. And in the end, the combat rules are streamlined in a way that the specifics don't really matter to them, but mostly serve a narrative purpose.
Glad to hear!
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- Location
- Wörms, the half continent
Alrighty! I've not done the odds for Wuxing stuff or Charms (I will add that at some point, but like, there are so many bloody options to codify and make an option), but on average three actions for Astronomy at current stats (which might improve over the summer from COMC stuff) it's currently 1008 progress. If we improve COMC by one stage, we get 1100, and by two we get 1191. For Herbology, it's 676, 737 and 800 respectively, and that is with Herbology rerolling 1s.
If you want actual Odds, Herbology has 35%, 47%, and 59% of completing all of Apprentice with two actions, once again for each stage we complete of COMC. For Astronomy it's 86%, 92%, and 96% for reaching Apprentice.
We also might improve charms over the holidays, which would affect these dice again as we'd have a 24 against a 23, so yeah. Also the chance of passing the first apprentice milestone with Astronomy is about 11% with two COMC, so yeah. Unlikely.
Thanks for running the numbers! However, we can only improve CoMC by one milestone, as that would be its effective cap of Beginner 2, so those last odds can't apply. Either way, I personally don't mind them being on the low side for Herbology, as my reason for training it is not necessarily to take it to the next stage (though that would be great, of course), but rather to simply find out how it works/looks and what kind of benefits its ingredients give.
And coming back to the Jade Chit Vault, assuming we win the House Cup, of course, could we get better Alkahest from it, @Karf ? I'm not sure, 'cause on one hand, I don't see why that wouldn't be possible in-universe, but on the other, that could feel a bit like the bad side of mixmaxing/powergaming, maybe. Hard to say without knowing what the Potions skill offers in later stages, to be fair, but depending on how good a version of Alkahest we'd get (and how much our max potions limit would increase), it could end up feeling like an abuse of the system or the taking advantage of a loophole thanks to the Jade
Edit - On the other other hand (I have three, don't look at me like that), we'd lose a Jade Chit use that would give us an additional technique/charm/whatever, for a big immediate advantage that would later on disappear entirely once our Potions skill catches up with its effect. So it could maybe balance things out?
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Lol, so I read but didn't grok.
Don't we need to have at least one transfigurations action to be eligible to return? (We've got potions and this is next closest to the 1500 milestone that gives us apprentice?)
Don't we need to have at least one transfigurations action to be eligible to return? (We've got potions and this is next closest to the 1500 milestone that gives us apprentice?)
That is to my understanding the first milestone in apprentice but reaching apprentice is done through finishing the previous one. If there is a mistake there we'll find out by failing the exam this turn and need to fix it before the makeup exam.
The QM confirmed you need 900 points in each cultivation and 750 in any 2 skills to meet the requirements. We're good.
FriedIce
The Authentic Fake
- Location
- Hyperreality
I just had a thought about why we've yet to hear any mention of Voldemort or Tom Riddle so far in this story. It's clear that some sort of conflict happened (Harry's parents are dead, so are Susan's, and Neville's are incapacitated) but we've not heard a single mention of He Who Must Not Be Named and Harry is Lord Potter not the Boy Who Lived. So where is Tom Riddle?
Tom's ultimate goal was to live forever, it's even in his name - Voldemort is 'flight from death' in French. It's why he mutilated his soul to create a horcrux. It was only after his immortality was assured with a horcrux (and was potentially driven mad by it) that Tom started on his political aims and his war of terror.
But this is Xianxia land. Whilst I wouldn't be surprised if Horcruxs existed in this there's already a well define path to immortality - cultivate to the peak and ascend. And Tom is a genius, he's almost certain to be able to ascend relatively quickly if he puts his mind to it.
So my guess is that Tom mono focussed on ascending and then buggered off to a higher plane as an Immortal.
Tom's ultimate goal was to live forever, it's even in his name - Voldemort is 'flight from death' in French. It's why he mutilated his soul to create a horcrux. It was only after his immortality was assured with a horcrux (and was potentially driven mad by it) that Tom started on his political aims and his war of terror.
But this is Xianxia land. Whilst I wouldn't be surprised if Horcruxs existed in this there's already a well define path to immortality - cultivate to the peak and ascend. And Tom is a genius, he's almost certain to be able to ascend relatively quickly if he puts his mind to it.
So my guess is that Tom mono focussed on ascending and then buggered off to a higher plane as an Immortal.
