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Marked for Death: A Rational Naruto Quest

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OliWhail said:
Noooo let EJ write a real update! Plus y'all need to re-learn to do it without me, I won't always be here (case in point)

Also Hazou definitely needs to call him "Orochi-chan" and "Orochi-senpai",if only because it'll be the only petty revenge we can achieve before our demise
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To be honest, while I doubt Orochimaru would be as reasonable a host as Jiraiya is, and rational!Orochimaru is absolutely terrifying to me on an existential level, I don't think that meeting him would be instant death.

...although the thought of Hazou refering to Orochimaru as his senpai would probably legitimately cause Kagome to go into convulsions.
 
So how about we double down on the "the seal mistress is already here" and have her come to us at a location outside of town that we set up? We already are making waves, so why not use that to our advantage by sowing as much confusion as we can that the Target comes to us to figure out who the hell has been using her name. we shift the ambush to be outside the supposed camp where we tell those in town we are at. We could gain the support of the Leader of the village by selling the idea of figuring out who is bringing the Target into the village.
 
Cariyaga said:
Good luck with that "socializing" with "real life people" thing.

I would agree but the last time we asked for an omake we ended up with Zabuza on our ass. With our luck it'll end up that giving Eaglejarl time to plan against us ends up with Orochi-senpai literally in the town with us.
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Would I do that to you? *evil smile*

ChronOblivion said:
Soon, we'll have @Radvic back and we'll have our Three List-keteers all together.

And yeah, I doubt that we can get away with a lore update again.
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I 1.5-dog dare you. :>
 
1234qwerty said:
Let's try that collaborative plan making thing?

Here are some concerns I can think of that need to be addressed:
  • Fixing our opsec mistakes
  • Attempting to locate/blitz Arikada a fair distance before she gets to town
  • Preparing for observing Arikada if she gets to town
  • Preparing for unexpected Zabuza and/or Orochimaru intervention
If some people want to pick pieces to work on, plan making would theoretically progress faster. If I missed anything, feel free to mention it.
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Personally, I like our current unofficial Plan for Plan-Making, having a couple of primary plan developers that post the general consensus plan and try to include everything they feel is important, and then incorporate thread suggestions until voting is closed. Up for this @Twofold?

In the meantime, trying to develop stuff for certain parts is a good idea. I'm much more comfortable drawing up battle plans, training plans, and relationship stuff than I am waging social duels, webs of intrigue, or informational warfare.
 
We could increase the noise ratio for our opsec by going half Kagome, so that "A group of six missing ninja from multiple villages did it" becomes the area 51 of the MfD world that everyone knows is "true."

We spread our names far and wide that every nation could claim to be feeding us missions and support and any one report of our actual location get drowned out by the false information.
 
Things to do:
  1. Make another wilderness base somewhere else.
  2. See if we can get a place near the Hinago compound.
  3. Have 'Kasuga' leave with hints of returning under another identity.
  4. Start making plans with the drugs we've gotten.
  5. Start making plans with the additional intel we've gotten on the Irie/Hinago.
  6. See if we can't get something about the Murano.
 
1234qwerty said:
I've been thinking about it, and the mayor seems like a really useful person for uplift quest. She's a civilian that can out-deceive jonin infiltration specialists, has governing experience, and who's values match up with our goals. I wonder what's tying her to Sarubetsu and whether she has a successor in mind. She said she's paid ninja for lessons. I'm thinking if things go okay, we can try to teach her some sealing and see if civilians have enough chakra for applications like that. Even if they can't, she seems like a knowledgeable person to consult for how to go about distributing civilian operable seal machines. Having someone like her to help out with political maneuvering when we return to VHitM would be a relief, too.
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Note that this would qualify as Getting Involved In Rice Politics, which is apparently something so intricate and ridiculous that no sane man wishes to tangle with it.

I mean, we did get some pretty legit practice at Hidden Mountain, but I'd only be comfortable doing this if the clans were not involved.
 
ChronOblivion said:
Note that this would qualify as Getting Involved In Rice Politics, which is apparently something so intricate and ridiculous that no sane man wishes to tangle with it.

I mean, we did get some pretty legit practice at Hidden Mountain, but I'd only be comfortable doing this if the clans were not involved.
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Do we, though?

I mean, Emiya's pretty good at her job, why do we need to dive in when she's already at the bottom of the proverbial pool?
 
ChronOblivion said:
Personally, I like our current unofficial Plan for Plan-Making, having a couple of primary plan developers that post the general consensus plan and try to include everything they feel is important, and then incorporate thread suggestions until voting is closed. Up for this @Twofold?
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The problem with that plan-making strategy is that there's usually very little useful stuff for the primary plan maker to collate. Usually it ends up with the plan maker just doing whatever he wants and then maybe someone will add corrections or adjustments after it has been posted.

It would be way easier for the plan maker if people figured out at what things needed doing, and then tried to come up with smart ways to do it. Writing a plan is so much easier when you don't have to come up everything by yourself.

I don't have time to keep a plan updated till the deadline (and I kinda sorta don't feel like writing a plan in the first place), but here's how I would start tackling one.

The reality of the situation is that only Mari is good enough to dodge scrutiny from the local ninjas and operate in the town without them noticing. We should assume that whatever the other party members try to do inside the town, it will be seen by the local ninjas.

Oh, and our base has probably been compromised. Not sure what to do about that though.

First we need to go to town and buy the drugs and start the rumors that we have changed personas. After this trip only Mari should enter the town to collect info from the the mayor.
  1. Go and buy three doses of Vermillion Sigh from the Irie
    • Swap Keiko with Mari transformed to Keiko's persona
    • Keep the meeting short, tell him something came up and that we need to leave the town for now and we don't have time for small talk
  2. Disseminate rumors among Irie and Hinago how our sealmistress is going to change personas
    • Visit Irie and Hinago bars and try to find the ninja we met
    • Thank them for their hospitality and emphasize to them how you are definitely leaving right now and totally not coming back with new henges or anything
    • Make it look like the worst cover up attempt ever (we should know what failing looks like)
This might actually work, since it requires actively failing at Deception, which we seem extremely good at.

The biggest difficulty here is that we need to interact with the not-Orochimaru again. If he is good enough, he might notice that we are misleading him with the "we are leaving fast" or that Keiko got swapped for Mari. We can counter the former by just not talking about that with him and the latter by not swapping Keiko for Mari. But frankly we are fucking up so much that we need her for the disseminating rumors portion. If we mess that up the whole mission basically fails because we can't find Arikada.

While we wait for info from the mayor, we should keep eyes on people coming to town. The mayor will probably get reports on who comes through the gates, but since the clan ninjas might be allied with Arikada those reports could easily be compromised. The northern wall is a priority mostly because that would be the best "they are not going to expect it" angle someone who is good with traps (like a sealmistress) could use to enter the town.

  1. Observe the town for anyone trying to make an entrance
    • Priority area to cover: The gates and the heavily trapped northern wall
    • Count the people coming and leaving; pay extra attention to group sizes for cross checking with the mayor
    • Set the observation posts far away from town and use Transformation Telescopes for remote viewing
      • Transformation Telescope: Two teammates (or Clones if applicable) transform into giant lenses
        • INSERT HOW TO ACTUALLY DO THIS IN PRACTICE
      • If there are usable vantage points near the town, build one using 5SB
        • INSERT A HOW-TO ON BUILDING A 5SB TOWER HERE
The other option is to observe or patrol in the general direction of "west" and hope we get super lucky and spot Arikada.

Personally, I don't see us catching Arakida while she approaches the town. Even if we do, judging by Mari's reaction it's going to turn into a massive and deadly fight and probably see party members dead. So I would just observe the town, hopefully get info from the mayor and move on from there.

Then again our ability to operate in the town without drawing attention is very poor, our covers are blown, there are unknown hostile elements inside the city, and starting a fight inside will net us a response of three dozen murderous ninjas. So maybe it might be better to hope that we spot her and then force the fight. I don't know. Someone should probably make a decision about that.


That should get any aspiring plan maker started, we have ~15 hours till the deadline. I know we got some new participants from the lurker side recently; here's your chance to get your hands dirty.*

*Just try to make sure that the dirt is not blood from our teammates and you'll be golden.
 
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Ugh, I need to nap and then I'll try to spend some time meditating on how fucked we are and how to fix it. I doubt I'll be as good at that as Keiko is, though, so don't expect too much.
 
I'm not cleaning up this thing, I need to sleep soon. If you want to improve on it copy + paste, be my guest.

Goals:
  1. Survive.
  2. Leave our wilderness base.
  3. Buy Vermilion Sigh.
  4. 'Leave'.
  5. Watch for Arikada's arrival.
Methods:
  1. Leave our wilderness base.
    1. It's compromised. We need to GTFO.
    2. Make a new one elsewhere.
    3. Make sure we're not seen. Again.
  2. Buy Vermilion Sigh.
    1. Get it from the Irie.
    2. If possible have Mari pretend to be Keiko pretending to be Keiko's Henge identity.
    3. Keep the meeting short.
    4. Suggest that we are 'leaving' (see below).
    5. Be hyper-aware that Shintaro is hyper-aware of our mannerisms. Make sure Mari can mimic Keiko appropriately.
  3. 'Leave'.
    1. Visit Irie and Hinago bars and try to find the ninja we met.
    2. Thank them for their hospitality and emphasize to them how we are definitely leaving right now and totally not coming back with new Henge or anything.
    3. Make it obvious that we're suggesting we're coming back under a new identity, but they shouldn't hint at it for plausible deniability purposes.
  4. Watch for Arikada's arrival.
    1. Priority area to cover: The gates and the heavily trapped northern wall.
    2. Count the people coming and leaving; pay extra attention to group sizes for cross checking with the mayor.
    3. Set the observation posts far away from town and use Transformation Telescopes for remote viewing.
      1. INSERT HOW TO ACTUALLY DO THIS IN PRACTICE
    4. If there are usable vantage points near the town, build one using 5SB
      1. INSERT A HOW-TO ON BUILDING A 5SB TOWER HERE
 
So... rereading over it, Shintaro actually didn't seem particularly antagonistic toward us at all. Amused at our efforts to conceal ourselves, among other things, but... hm. He might be a good ninja-side contact if we can sufficiently ingratiate ourselves to him. It's fortunate that Emiya doesn't think Arikada is siding with the Irie.

So, who wants to navigate the minefield that is getting the Irie on our side in this conflict (and inevitably putting ourselves in their service)? It would definitely be a lot easier than taking on a sealmistress by ourselves, but we wouldn't be able to use them as meatshields...
 
Well if all the lurkers and people on the thread came together we could make up for twofold and oliwhail.....barely.
 
Modifications in bold italics.

[X] Action Plan: How do planmake?

Goals:
  1. Survive.
  2. Leave our wilderness base.
  3. Buy Vermilion Sigh.
  4. 'Leave'.
  5. Watch for Arikada's arrival.
Methods:
  1. Leave our wilderness base.
    1. It's compromised. We need to GTFO.
    2. Make a new one elsewhere.
    3. Make sure we're not seen. Again.
  2. Buy Vermilion Sigh.
    1. Get it from the Irie.
    2. If possible have Mari pretend to be Keiko pretending to be Keiko's Henge identity.
    3. Keep the meeting short.
    4. Suggest that we are 'leaving' (see below).
    5. Be hyper-aware that Shintaro is hyper-aware of our mannerisms. Make sure Mari can mimic Keiko appropriately; ask her if she thinks it appropriate to henge as Keiko for this? -- make sure she's good enough at Shogi to do so effectively. Try to plant seeds for future contact with him (make it more worth his while to not out us to for instance foreign hunter nin). Mari should talk to Emiya (or decide on her own) about giving Shintaro slightly more information because he knows that we're getting drugs for a client and can put things together on his own.
  3. 'Leave'.
    1. Visit Irie and Hinago bars and try to find the ninja we met.
    2. Thank them for their hospitality and emphasize to them how we are definitely leaving right now and totally not coming back with new Henge or anything.
    3. Make it obvious that we're suggesting we're coming back under a new identity, but they shouldn't hint at it for plausible deniability purposes.
  4. Watch for Arikada's arrival.
    1. Priority area to cover: The gates and the heavily trapped northern wall.
    2. Count the people coming and leaving; pay extra attention to group sizes for cross checking with the mayor.
    3. Set the observation posts far away from town and use Transformation Telescopes for remote viewing.
      1. INSERT HOW TO ACTUALLY DO THIS IN PRACTICE
    4. If there are usable vantage points near the town, build one using 5SB
      1. See 1234qwerty's details here
  5. Misc.
    1. Make sure to tell Mari "I told you so" with regard to being honest. Immediately get put in your place for getting caught out down to your clans.
    2. Please be nice to us Eaglejarl-sama we're experimenting with a new style of plan-making with little time to do so and without everyone here that usually is.
 
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ChronOblivion said:
You guys are talking like this was a personal failing of Inoue's judgement, when this was Inoue being beaten in a Deception dice roll. A civilian mayor having enough Deception (maybe Awareness too for the bruises) dice to do that is extremely impressive and wasn't predicted by any of us, and the lost dice roll manifested in Inoue having a minor flaw in her disguise(?) and not bullshitting her backstory well enough to get through the interrogation.
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Late I know but that "I'm starting to doubt Inoue now" was the accumulation of all the previous fuckups Mari has done weather it was botching dice rolls or personal failing of judgement.
 
1234qwerty said:
Here's my attempt at laying out how to make the platform in a clear way.

-Start from a high place if possible.
-Have an unobstructed view of Arikada approach from the west.
-Have an unobstructed view of the city, particularly north, west, and south entrances. Ask the mayor beforehand how which way Arikada enters the city changes her opinion on who's responsible for hiring her.
-Use a see through material for the platform(could use suggestions since glass and plastic are rare. if none can be found, building the tower will use non-see-through material, but the last platform will be an invisible force wall. otherwise it's safer to 5BS a see through platform). See through materials I can think of: ice, but it's delicate and melts, glass, soap?, quartz.
-Build it at night when we can't be easily spotted.
-Recommended distance from Sarubetsu of at least 5 miles(horizon at 100m will be ~22 miles of visibility. Ninja travel at 20mph. The further away from town we engage Arikada, the more time we have before Rice patrols arrive)
-Ask the mayor for help getting away from our camp outside of town to do this without getting spotted. During a patrol shift or something. Don't explain the platform thing except if we have to, just say we're trying to intercept her outside of town and to delay ninja investigation if combat occurs.

Building the platform itself:

5BS locks the object it's applied to in place with respect to the center of the earth. Both central and supporting seals cannot be moved, must be equidistant, and 3-100 meters away from the central seal. The duration is 30 days. Force wall doesn't lock and fails when moved. Always 4m-by-4m in size. duration 12 hours. The platform only needs one floating floor to function. It may be desirable to have extra platforms below for climbing down. 5BS platforms can be incrementally locked, used to make higher 5BS platforms, then unlocked to be used as the next higher platform in the chain. If platforms are transparent, making some higher than tree level is fine. If not, extra platforms should not go higher than tree level because they risk exposing our location. If force wall is used for the highest platform, it should have 4 small 5BSed objects below its corners as supports to keep it from falling.
More contingencies for not getting our fingers cut off are welcome. I suppose you could make a force wall cube, but to make somewhere for the 2 vertical seals you would need to 5BS some steel wire or something not very visible to hang them on. A string perimeter may be used to mark 1 inch from where the edge begins.

Here's a method just for getting one platform to the requisite height.
1. Use 2 1m-by-1m pieces wooden palettes with a circular hole in the middle large enough for a person to fit through comfortably. Have Akane make them if necessary.
2. Lock one in the air with one person holding it steady and the supporting seals below on the ground(or on something slightly higher to be close enough to the central seal). If it can't be held steady enough by a person, use 4 wooden columns to balance it over a flat surface.
3. Climb through the hole, then unseal the next platform from a storage scroll.
4. Use the same method for locking the second one into place above the first.
5. Carefully remove the central 5BS seal of the platform below while staying on the platform above, storing it in a storage scroll.
6. Repeat steps 2-5 until at the desired height.
7. For the last platform, lock 4 flat, small objects into place with 4 separate 5BS in a configuration to support a horizontal 4m-by-4m force wall. If the force wall can't be placed directly on those objects, stack other flat objects on top of them to place the seals on.
8. To get on top of the force wall easily, lock the remaining 1m-by-1m platform to the side as a stepping stone.
In the end, you should be left with 2 palettes in storage scrolls, 4 5BSed objects supporting the force wall platform, 5BS supporting seals on stationary objects near the ground and at least one person on top of the force wall. Other people can be brought up by rope. Extra forcewalls to make the platform bigger aren't hard to add, only requiring similar 5BS supports to remain floating. I used 1m-by-1m palettes since that's the largest size that fits in one storage scroll, but more can be used for more stable footing while building up the tower.

Things to do after successfully making the platform:
-Develop a signaling system with reflective material that can be used to flash the ground team similar to morse code(the narrow beam of light shouldn't be observable to others) and vice versa.
-Have preferences for terrain where to engage Arikada.
-Maybe even end the update upon spotting Arikada, since coming up with contingencies for how to handle her will be complicated depending on the size of her retinue.
The observer on the platform should be henged into camouflage.
-Teammates or clones henge into lenses.
-Have substitution targets by the ground(test if the floating platform allows for the use of substitution down or up).
-Have 100m of sealed rope for getting back up if the substitution only works for going down or not at all.
-Be prepared to transform into blankets in case of an accidental fall(only have team members with henge level 10 or higher on the platform).
-If arikada is spotted, if Keiko can observe her without binoculars, have her summon Pandaa, tell him to tell Panchipamaa to reverse summon Keiko in half the amount of time it would take for Arikada to meet our approaching group, resummon him when he's done to go with the intercepting group while Keiko stays behind for last minute adjustments to the group's course, then have panda summon her back after she's been reverse summoned by Panchipamaa at the pursuing group's location to pass on the info. Timing would rely on accurate estimates of how long it would take Pandaa to find and tell Panchpamaa, Panchipamaa reverse summoning Keiko at the right time, and Pandaa summoning her back.
-Discuss quickly setting up such a platform for the purpose of engaging Arikada(initiating genjutsu or weapons barrage. for genjutsu, a forcewall can be set up to defend while keeping line of sight) with the team.
Any problems?
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I don't see any immediate issues but we're only two people so, yeah. Gonna put a link in it and if we don't get more feedback from others we'll have to count on Kei, Kagome, and Akane to tell us why we're dumb.
 
[X] Action Plan: Measure Twice, Cut Once

e: God, I hope this doesn't turn into as much of a clusterfuck as the last time I made a plan (A Bonfire of Tapirs).
 
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1234qwerty said:
Leave our wilderness base.
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This should probably be done after we "leave".

1234qwerty said:
one to be manned by Inoue, Noburi, Kagome and Pandaa, the other with Keiko, Hazou, and Akane
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I think we need to tweak the division of labor here.

Transforming into lenses is probably not something you can do with Transformation 1, so Keiko and Akane can't be used for lenses. Same thing with Hazou's clones are probably with Nobby's too.

Then there's the problem of Awareness scores which we will be rolling here. Currently they go from worst to best something like this: (Akane: 9, Keiko: 12, Noburi: 12, Hazou: 15, Kagome: ??, Inoue: 18).

So, if we need to split into two teams, I would go with: Inoue + Keiko + Akane and Kagome + Hazou + Noburi + Pandaa.

So basically Inoue takes one observation job alone with her clones. Keiko and Akane are not really needed for that but they can watch her back or work as a patrol unit in case of local complications. If clones don't work as lenses, swap Keiko for Noburi and have Akane and Keiko work as observes in their respective teams.


1234qwerty said:
When getting the details from the mayor suggested in the post regarding how to build the 5BS tower, offer to leave behind a fail safe way to make it up to Emi in case the seal mistress gets the best of us. Have Akane make an appropriate amount of ice to store in a storage scroll and hand over to the mayor. Don't hand over the storage scroll unless the mayor doesn't have one of her own to use or an appropriate place to store ice. This doesn't preclude making it up to Emi a different way if the operation is a success, it's only a contingency and a show of good faith.
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Making ice is not really fast, especially if we need it for building materials. Besides, we are doing her a favor here by getting rid of a dangerous sealmistress, she should be paying us not the other way around.

1234qwerty said:
Please be nice to us Eaglejarl-sama we're experimenting with a new style of plan-making with little time to do so and without everyone here that usually is.
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Don't give up before the damn plan is even voted in! :mad:

Some contingencies:
  • After leaving the town, get rid of exotic or scent tracking
    • Physical body inspection and VD check
    • Burn the clothes used and throw away all disposable items
    • Inspect all high value items with VD
    • Repackage the drugs and burn the old packaging
 
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