I feel like I should start out by saying that I really appreciate what
@eaglejarl, @Velorien, @OliWhail have done in creating this quest. You guys have done a truly incredibly job in making a simulationist quest that feels this viscerally
real. You've made me care about the characters in ways that most stories never even come
close to managing. You guys visibly put an insane amount of work into doing this, and I really appreciate it. From a simulationist perspective, this most recent twist makes perfect sense, and I support you guys if you want to stick with it.
So, I myself read through the proposed plan wherein we revealed Noburi's mist draining ability without noticing the problem. Before the Great Rebalancing, I modeled mist draining as something almost no Wakahisa could do, and a clan secret. However, I misinterpreted the Great Rebalancing posts. I believed the Great Reblancing had altered things such that the mist draining was something the vast majority of Wakahisa who were at least high genin could do (as it only takes 120 EXP, or a month or two of investment for a normal ninja) and thus the ability itself was not a clan secret, or even something reasonable to be a clan secret. I assumed, as it was something the majority of Wakahisa could do and using it would make them both more useful and less likely to die, it would be widely known as something that at least
some Wakahisa could manage. In fact, my exact model was that it was well known that this was something some Wakahisa could do, but the clan was keeping the
ease of learning the ability secret, rather than its very existence. This was incorrect. I went back and reread the Great Rebalancing posts, wherein it is stated that:
- Is Noburi still a VD prodigy? or is draining through mist something every Wakahiza has by the time they're chuunin?
We don't think it's too much of a spoiler to disclose: Noburi's skill with VD is well above those of his age mates and yes, draining through mist is still a legendary technique among Wakahisa youngsters. This is for two reasons:
- Most Wakahisa genin are being trained for things other than their bloodline. Since they are intended as second-rank support there is no expectation that they'll need to use it in combat, so it doesn't matter if it's slow. Noburi has been able to be much more self-directed in his study, so he's focused on it enormously more than his peers.
- There's two reasons the draining through mist technique is legendary:
- It's an ace-in-the-hole that the clan doesn't want spread around. Kids are not good at keeping secrets so you don't tell them about it until they figure it out on their own, by which time they're grownup enough to keep quiet.
- Because there's an informal rule among the grownups to not talk about it. They got sick of all the youngsters going "when will I learn to drain through mist, huh?" and "sensei, I wanna learn how to drain through mist" and "ooh, I got it, I got it! There's definitely something over there, honest!" etc. Easier
I simply didn't remember 2-1, which makes it pretty clear that the ability as a whole is being kept secret. I don't know exactly why; it's clearly a pretty important thing to remember. I do have some ideas, though. It's possible I may have been reading quickly and made my mistaken assumption due to that. However, the interesting thing seems to be that basically the entire thread made that mistake with me, and that wouldn't explain the issue: it's not likely that
everybody would make the same error as me if my error was simply reading too quickly and thus misinterpreting something. I think I know why the error was so common.
The Kurosawa aptitude for sealcrafting is a secret relatively easily kept. The ability to suddenly copy seals isn't going to get a Kurosawa out of a life or death situation; a Kurosawa isn't going to be in a position where keeping that ability secret means death. They certainly aren't going to frequently be in ones where not using a secret ability makes one drastically more likely to die. In addition, the Kurosawa use that ability to have a few sealmasters every generation for the good of the clan, and the ability can be leveraged without quickly becoming common knowledge. The Kurosawa can get the benefit of the ability to some degree while keeping it secret.
The Wakahisa ability to drain chakra through mist is quite different. Suddenly draining someone through mist is going to relatively frequently be something that would get a Wakahisa out of certain death. Wakahisa are going to often come up against situations where their chance of living is much higher if they use the ability, even if death isn't certain without it. The Wakahisa gain greatly from having a few people every generation make use of the ability, much like the Kurosawa do. A ninjutsu specialist jonin who can drain through mist is a recipe for an S rank, or at least a high A rank, and it would be incredibly useful to the Wakahisa to have one of those every generation. However, the Wakahisa can't do that and get the benefit of the ability while keeping it secret.
It would be
incredibly valuable to the clan if they pumped out 1 or 2 A or S rank ninja every generation, even if the clan was otherwise known for being support ninja. Combined with the difficulty of keeping it a secret that Wakahisa can drain through mist at all, and its likely that the clan would aim for keeping "all Wakahisa can do this" as the trump card, rather than "this is possible at all". One secret is much easier to keep, and more advantageous to keep. The ability or the clan to use their trump card is a one time thing, only useful once to prevent the clan from being destroyed in a single all out attack. It makes way more sense for the secret to be that it's not actually a legendary technique, rather than the secret to be that it's a possible technique at all.
The secret that draining chakra through mist is possible only needs one desperate Chunin in a life-or-death situation to get out. Or one very dumb Wakahisa to brag to his friends/rivals. And if people find out about it, its an ace they don't have, but the sensible way to react to the knowledge getting out that draining through mist is a possibilty
at all is to keep how widespread the ability is secret and have a few people every generation "master the legendary technique" and become incredibly valuable combat specialist A or S rank jonin. The Wakahisa might get more out of that state of affairs, actually. If under attack they can suddenly have half the clan drain through mist rather than 2 of them, which is still a useful ace to have, and they also get famous A or S rank ninja they wouldn't have out of the deal.
This is basically the situation I assumed existed. After the Great Rebalancing I thought the ability was "legendary" in the sense that people knew it existed but didn't expect anyone except maybe the clan head and heir to be able to use it. I think I arrived at this understanding because it makes more sense than the Wakahisa successfully and obsessively keeping the ability entire secret for centuries. After all, the only reason to do so would be because it would be a useful trap to spring on a sudden attacker, whereas the Kurosawa are keeping their ability secret because its use would be fundamentally opposite to their philosophy, and if it became known their entire way of life would be destroyed and they'd all be used as sealing factories. On the other hand, the Wakahisa gain about as much from the ability being completely secret as they do from it being thought of as a "legendary technique", and that's a much easier secret to keep.
I think this is the reason why nobody thought of telling Minami as giving away valuable clan secrets. As time passed, we filled in the actual world with one that made more sense to us. We didn't expect the ability itself to be a secret because we hadn't been thinking of it as one it was viable long term to keep, or as something that wasn't already known to be
possible, if not common. I would have expected a summary of Wakahisa abilities by someone who had heard a bit about them to be something like, "They have way more chakra than normal and can store it in barrels full of water that they carry on their backs. They can transfer chakra to allies by letting them drink some of their chakra water. Apparently they can drain chakra through water, and rumor says the clan head can even drain through mist."
If something does get retconned, I think this would be the best way to do it. It's a relatively minor change, and the only result is that the Clan Leader and their Heir are known to be badasses. This would change the secret Hazou carelessly gave up to the fact that Noburi knows the secret technique, rather than that its possible at all. The retcon would also have minimal impact on the world and on the update. At most, this most recent update would be rewritten (maybe with a new plan voted in? I don't know how this would work) and the Wakahisa would be known to churn out 1-2 combat specialist Jonin every generation. They'd still be a support clan, and this seems to both be a reasonable change that retcons what the QMs would want retconned, and also correct for what seems like a holdover from joining a pre-TGR and post-TGR mechanics system.
EDIT: Of course, as long as I'm giving out "things to retcon iff you feel like doing that" ideas I might as well throw out the very obvious "retcon last update so Hazou realized the plan voted in required giving up clan secrets and instead he only proposes the plan that didn't do that." However, I'm sort of assuming you guys are opposed to that for reason of "seriously, you guys should have known" and other reasons of player agency. However, if we end up going with giving Hazou more agency from hereon out and you guys want to retcon things in the very nice way that we probably don't deserve given how dickish we've been, this seems like the way to go.
There's also the obvious "insert a scene where we realize the mistake we made last chapter, have us vote in a new plan for this one" if y'all decide that you erred on the amount of information to give us.
