Marked for Death: A Rational Naruto Quest
- Thread starter eaglejarl
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- naruto rationalist romance armageddon is looking better and better damn you kishimoto explosions everywhere explosives solve everyone if in doubt surrender to the mercy of zabuza it seemed like a good idea at the time looks like a really bad case of being a jōnin my god. where does the lore end? precommitting is the winning plan screaming in kagome screw the rules i have explosives something bad might still happen sometimes you gotta sociopath stabby zabby subsection c of paragraph 9 should include we can weaponize this so hard open voting
- Location
- Yes.
For all we know Daiji's consciousness got separated as he dissolved and merged into different trees, among other things. All screaming soundlessly due to not having any mouths to scream out of.
- Location
- The Soviet Republic of Canuckistan
- Pronouns
- He/Him
E: to be clear, I care a little but I would strongly prefer that the QMs and story focus on other stuff. I present below a minimal thing that seems like it would be easy to do which would knock the entire thing on its head. I have zero problem with being dead: I'm sad and a little disappointed that the manner of our death, which I think there is QM confirmation was not part of the simulation, has possibly cost us the Dog scroll. That would suck and I don't think it's necessary. That is it.
A statement to the tune of 'the players will not be unfairly disadvantaged by the non-simulationist aspects of ch. 702 that they didn't get to vote on; details will be resolved as they become relevant (e.g., once you near your exit of the afterlife)' with a sprinkling of 'we honestly haven't even considered whether Orochimaru might have looted Hazo's corpse or what became of the Dog scroll; decisions on these topics won't be made without player consultation' would probably do it.
I would feel pretty bad/discouraged for us to effectively lose the Dog scroll as well as our seals to Orochimaru effectively by QM fiat; I'm down for us to be dead, but spending time alone with Orochimaru in our Prime body without anyone to notice that we're dead until possibly hours later struck me as out of character for Hazo at the time, even given that we'd come to trust Orochimaru more and more. I totally understand why the chapter was written as it was, but for that to persist would feel Not Great.
Solutions like 'Tsunade smelled a rat and came back just too late to prevent Hazo's death but threw a big enough fireball that it incinerated Hazo's body/seals and popped Oro's clone, thus denying him the scroll' would work just fine for me, as would 'Hazo figures out how to manipulate exactly where in space and time he comes back to life, giving him the opportunity to instagib a totally baffled Oro who was certain that he'd just killed Hazo extremely dead or at least snag his corpse/scroll and fight a successful retreat to the main body of Leaf's forces'.
I would really like not to have to go on a quest to track Orochimaru down to get the Dog scroll back, even if it does wind up in someone else's hands.
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- Location
- florida
Did Anyone have Docetism comeback on their 2025 bingo card?
Heleor
^_^
Wait, is this another quest where we can vote to eat a tree in the afterlife? It's not a lot of nickels but weird it's happened twice.
- Location
- Liverpool
Was the other one a bleach quest?Wait, is this another quest where we can vote to eat a tree in the afterlife? It's not a lot of nickels but weird it's happened twice.
- Location
- Yes.
Was it the one where the hivemind voted to stab themselves?
- Location
- The Maple Syrup Mountains
One thing that was revealed to us about Orochimaru's thought process here is that he was very worried about making his play only to wind up killing a SC. If Orochimaru attacks and pops a SC, Hazou immediately knows that he's been betrayed and goes to ground, and now Orochimaru is faced with the much more daunting task of locating and killing a hostile runemaster who knows a Sannin is after him, all while Hazou undoubtedly builds anti-Orochimaru defenses that might even prove strong enough to beat Orochimaru's immortality.
Taking the bioseal sealed our fate for two reasons: first, we needed his maintenance to survive, and all he would need to do is not give it and we'd just croak in Leaf a month from now or something. But second, it's a kill-switch that is intrinsically attached to Prime, and so Prime will definitely 100% die when it's used.
Paranoid as he is, Orochimaru never felt he had a clear shot at us before now. (Indeed, we made a point of only ever meeting him via SC). He finally got his chance to guarantee our death when we accepted the bioseal, at which point we were dead to rights. The only reason our story did not end there is because installing the kill-switch meant Orochimaru could still 100% for sure kill Hazou after he lent his services to the rift battle.
(I also feel like if Orochimaru was sufficiently motivated, if he had reason to believe we would turn on him sooner rather than later, he would put in the work and line up the killing blow to his satisfaction even without us walking into his hands. In time he probably would have done so even without provocation. But that would have taken a large diversion of his efforts at a time when the threat of the Akatsuki still loomed large, with the significant risk that a single mistake might alert Hazou and bring about the worst case scenario of an actively hostile runemaster. Not only did we deliver ourselves into his hands and let him take us out with negligible effort or risk, we did so at exactly the right time for him to seize the rift and stop having to worry about Pain's resurrection. The perfect opportunity at the perfect time, it's no surprise he chose that moment to end us.)
Yeah this entire plan is basically "have Hazoupilot think about stuff" which is passive and boring, also the QMs don't like it. I suggest rewriting it so it's active.
I personally, do not care enough about this right now for you guys to figure it out. I'd rather you spent your mechanics spoons on the afterlife stuff.
[X] Training Hazou: 4th Box
Physique 39 -> 40 (spend 40 Pangolin XP)
Technique Hacking 10 -> 32 (spend 946 Note XP)
Medknow 10 -> 29 (spend 380 Note XP)
Mednin 10 -> 19 (spend 135 Note XP)
Physique 39 -> 40 (spend 40 Pangolin XP)
Technique Hacking 10 -> 32 (spend 946 Note XP)
Medknow 10 -> 29 (spend 380 Note XP)
Mednin 10 -> 19 (spend 135 Note XP)
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- Location
- Yes.
This, tbh.
- Location
- Texas
[X] Training Hazou: 4th Box
imo the only problem with the Science and Civilization plan is that it lacks a TL;DR. The actual actions of the plan seem to be:
1. existential crisis,
2. head to town,
3. stop for any shimmers along the way.
It's not any more or less activity than the other plans, it's just that the actual actionable steps are buried in the bullets.
@redzonejoe consider adding something of the sort? maybe flip some of the subbullets around, like:
1. existential crisis,
2. head to town,
3. stop for any shimmers along the way.
It's not any more or less activity than the other plans, it's just that the actual actionable steps are buried in the bullets.
@redzonejoe consider adding something of the sort? maybe flip some of the subbullets around, like:
- Head to town (to ask questions)
- Priority 1 is information. We need to create a map of the afterlife, we need to find the people we care about, and we need to find or create a way home.
- There's likely plenty of experiments we could run and things we can learn by ourselves, but it would likely be faster and more efficient to just ask somebody.
- Priority 1 is information. We need to create a map of the afterlife, we need to find the people we care about, and we need to find or create a way home.
- Check any shimmers along the way (if there are any)
- Priority 2 is capability. Having information only matters to the extent that you can act upon it. In this case, that means we need chakra. Keep an eye out for shimmers.
- If there are any shimmers we can reach without significantly delaying our journey to town, grab them.
- This might include activities like climbing trees or backtracking while we travel, to ensure good visual coverage... though currently standing on a mountain should be enough to start with.
- This should ultimately be determined by Hazopilot; Getting to the shimmers and restoring his chakra is important, but we would like to end the update in town, preferably. Time might not be as reliable as it used to be, so what qualifies as a 'significant' delay is hard to determine.
redzonejoe
Vaguely Pastafarian
- Location
- Canada
Do you want me to write out what tests specifically Hazo should be preforming to take the burden off of Hazopilot?
Do you just want Hazo to not think about his situation at all and walk down the path whistling a tune, head blissfully empty?
As it stands, I think Hazo thinking about things would take maybe a quarter of the update, potentially far less if the QMs really hate writing this section and rush through it, and would be paired with a variety of physical actions. Cutting, pinching, squeezing, tearing, whatever. Stuff. Stuff that's important for people to know and deserves to be on-screen.
It's not just a meeting with himself, it's Hazo learning about this new environment. An environment which I'm sure the QMs put a lot of work into making and are probably happy to show off some of what they've worked out. Either Hazo finds that things are different which is very important to know asap, or Hazo finds that things are the same which is also useful to know, and can be summed up quickly and brushed past to move on to the meat of the update.
Okay. Yes, that's fair. I appreciate your perspective on this, though I disagree that the first section should be summed up as an 'existential crisis', that's just me being defensive. I can edit to make the actionable sections of the plan take priority and stand out more, sure.
I feel like including thoughts, motivations, goals and the like are generally good. Gives the QMs more to work with. They don't necessarily need more to work with, they're great writers with a good grasp of this character they've been working with for years now... but they're writing a quest, not just a story. Anything we leave out is just stuff they're going to have to fill in. In that way, giving a 20 word bullet point plan actually leaves more of the update to Hazopilot than what I wrote.
Sometimes simpler is better, gives more room for the QMs to get creative. Sometimes all of our wordcount is taken up by actions and contingencies and what-ifs. I don't think this is one of those times. Hazo has a very clear path forward this time, and aside from deciding left or right (wilds vs town), I think most of what we can contribute to our half of the quest this update is in Hazo's head.
- Head to town to ask questions
- Priority 1 is information. We need to create a map of the afterlife, we need to find the people we care about, and we need to find or create a way home.
- There's likely plenty of experiments we could run and things we can learn by ourselves, but it would likely be faster and more efficient to just ask somebody.
- Priority 1 is information. We need to create a map of the afterlife, we need to find the people we care about, and we need to find or create a way home.
- Check any shimmers along the way (if there are any)
- Priority 2 is capability. Having information only matters to the extent that you can act upon it. In this case, that means we need chakra. Keep an eye out for shimmers.
- If there are any shimmers we can reach without significantly delaying our journey to town, grab them.
- This might include activities like climbing trees or backtracking while we travel, to ensure good visual coverage... though currently standing on a mountain should be enough to start with.
- This should ultimately be determined by Hazopilot; Getting to the shimmers and restoring his chakra is important, but we would like to end the update in town, preferably. Time might not be as reliable as it used to be, so what qualifies as a 'significant' delay is hard to determine.
- Figure out what you can as you go.
- Hazo is no average ninja. He didn't reinvent rune-crafting by being stupid. Look, test, think.
- Daiji seemed to evaporate mid-air. The seals don't seem to be drained so much as just... paper with ink on it. What is Hazo, and all of his stuff, even made of any more?
- Test your body. Do you bleed?
- Test your stuff. Is it made of the proper materials, or just copies made out of afterlife particles? Maybe both?
- Test the world. Daiji said things stay when people expect them to, but can change from once glance to the next. Can Hazo's perceptions, expectations or willpower affect the world around him?
- Prepare yourself to distrust what you are told. If perception can affect the afterlife, then don't let other people limit you. Above everything else, believe this: You will find (or make) a way back home.
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- Location
- Yes.
If the afterlife-reality adjusts itself such that it conforms to what most [nearby] people's memories believe it is, can we create a portal to the Human Path by creating enough false memories that involve a portal to the Human Path?
Like, a few hundred people, if we can find one decent genjutsu mistress...
Fuck, now I want to relitigate Chapter 702 to retcon Mari as having died with Hazou, so she can mindfuck everyone in the settlement into thinking there's a portal to the Human Path, then have them dump the memories of said portal out to create it.
Iris-Iven-Ibis
Interested-Idiot-Immortal
- Location
- You know
[X] Action plan: Science and Civilization
I do think we should try to figure out what is happening with our blOod limit as soon as possible
I do think we should try to figure out what is happening with our blOod limit as soon as possible
redzonejoe
Vaguely Pastafarian
- Location
- Canada
Ah... customizable afterlife. A portal made of afterlife belief that brings us to a place created by our own expectations, where nothing can ever surprise us anymore. A permanent genjutsu cast not on Hazo, but on the pocket world he created, filled with soulless people who act exactly how we'd expect them to. Our own little slice of heaven will be the false belief that we're alive.
For starters
I don't care to write thoughts into Hazou's head in most circumstances. The QMs are capable of handling that.
No, think you're misunderstanding something about planwriting. I have quite a bit of experience at it by now, so let me explain my thoughts.
In general, while it is not a hard rule, the thing that gets the most word count in the plan is what the update will focus on.
The plan is a prompt for the QMs and they read it top-to-bottom, left-to-right. So if you bury the actions of the plan in the ruminating, as this plan did originally, then the rumination is likely to take a front seat.
So if you have a plan that is 95% ruminating on the existential implications of the afterlife by wordcount you're likely to get at least 50% of the update doing the same. Unless of course, you annoy the QM enough they ignore your plan, as happened for my first winning Action Plan.
That word count could have been spent progressing the story and I want to progress the story, not navel-gaze. Is the exact nature of matter important here? I'd rather go fight some monsters. We can always contemplate this stuff later when we have more people to talk to.
Why would an internal property of this Path allow boring a hole to an entirely different Path? Even if the witnesses remember a portal it seems likely it would just dump you into the Out. This is a comfortable no I think.
Unrelatedly, @eaglejarl @Velorien @Paperclipped
How is the Brevity XP bonus/penalty being handled in the feat-based system?
To be clear, I think the "existential crisis" questions are important to ask and I would love to read Hazo's exploration of it. I picked the term as a tongue-in-cheek summary of "ask lots of questions about how the universe works," not to denigrate the idea. I'm really glad the actions are simple enough that there's enough room in this plan to muse on all this stuff.
Note that the training plan is updated to make the most of out notes XP while raising no additional stats as pyramid supports.
- Location
- USA
- Pronouns
- He/Him
To be clear, "this chapter wasn't simulationist" should be understood to mean "we weren't particularly bothering about the simulationism, preferring instead to end up with the state that would eventually have occurred without bothering to wait the additional chapters that would be required." Once Hazō took the extra coil, he was dead whenever Orochimaru wanted him dead. If Orochimaru wanted to get the Dog Scroll and Hazō's typical seal loadout, he could simply continue with the "yes, I am a good friend and you have rehabilitated me" act, wait a few weeks or months until he had the right chance, and then execute Hazō. So yes, this specific chapter content was not focused on being simulationist but the outcome was.
The current QM vibe, as I understand it, is "we don't particularly want to spend brain cells on this right now and if we have to then we're happy with the reasonableness of the final outcome but maybe in the future we would do something different." I'm certainly in that camp. That said, I'll check with the others and we'll see about maybe doing something different.
Still under discussion. There's a half-finished writeup on it being worked over.
- Location
- United States
Eh. Orochimaru was on a countdown from the moment he killed Hebikyōtei. The moment we learned he disposed of his oath-snake, that option would have been completely closed off to him.
I'm really not sure Orochimaru would have had months. After some discussion on discord, I had already started advocating for stuff like what you see below within chapters of the implantation.
I really don't think Orochimaru would have been able to string us along for a few more weeks or months. Would he have still been able to kill us (or cause our death through bioseal decay)? Absolutely. Would he have been able to goad us into a remote location where he'd be able to trivially obtain the Dog Scroll and MARS? I doubt it.
At least, not without some serious consequences for him with the Snake Clan. Even in the scenario where he urgently summons us to the Great Seal, we'd have to completely lose our senses to not quickly check in with Kumokugo or another arachnid on our way over. I imagine that the entire path would absolutely lose their shit with him if it got out he baited us to the Seventh Path by falsely claiming an emergency with the Great Seal only for him to murder us and steal our scroll.