@eaglejarl And here I thought that this will be your bog standard exam.

Also, it's weird that the ninja villages all use the same term ANBU, which literally means Special Assassination and Tactical Squad. There should be some variations in how the ninja villages name their special operation units.
 
@eaglejarl And here I thought that this will be your bog standard exam.

Also, it's weird that the ninja villages all use the same term ANBU, which literally means Special Assassination and Tactical Squad. There should be some variations in how the ninja villages name their special operation units.
Presumably it's like how the Russians have Spetznaz and the Americans have Navy Seals and South Korea has the Black Berets etc. etc. At some point it's easier just to call them all Spec Ops forces rather than come up with unique names for all of them.
 
Right then.

So we can actually expect twenty thousand seals, with the new estimate?

To clarify, this is twenty thousand seals which each have a small possibility of major seal catastrophe, which they seem to have so far avoided due only to being used incredibly rarely, when rich people want to show off in front of the Jones'es?

Y'know, just to make sure the characters and I are on the same page...

Well, if the number of seals used increases by a factor of 5, and we expected a probability P1 of zero sealing failures, we are now expecting a probability of P1^5 of zero sealing failures. So my previous estimates now return between 10% and 100% chance of one or more seals failing with normal use.
 
Oh shit, I think I know the Akatsuki plot here; they snipe that facility, they SEALING FAILURE the entire Elemental Nations power structure.

[X] Action Plan: CODE Z! CODE Z!
  • Find another proctor. ASAP.
    • As in, get everyone to run right the hell out of the base, blow it to cinders, and run at top ninja cruising speed.
  • While running, tell Keiko her worst case estimates are severely underestimating, because the process of drawing this blank is about five times faster than her estimate.
  • Get another night light seal. Check if it's just as volatile.
    • If it is, execute the rest of the plan.
    • If it is not, stop, hand in the seal, and report that there may be traitors among the Mist ANBU. Execute the previous plan as written at the new location.
  • If the seals are volatile, leave the area immediately. Don't stop for anything.
    • Throw explosives into the air in our path so that the other Leaf Genin know we're moving out of the combat zone.
  • Continue throwing explosives into the air when we head into town; we need to get attention fast.
    • When ANBU inevitably approach, tell them we need to see Jiraiya, priority yesterday
    • If they don't get the point, tell them that there are twenty thousand potential sealing failures in the next two days, where the lucky outcome is for them to explode in the user's hand. Unlucky is summoning a hellbeast invasion.
  • Show Jiraiya the night light seal. Tell him there may be up to twenty thousand, or whatever number Keiko mentally revises the count to, of these seals in circulation

Not at all. Kurosawa Ren knows that failure here will reflect on Mist, and by extension Ren far more than any blowback to that caln.

I wouldn't say traitors. It looked like no sealmasters check whoever incompetent invented this.
 
I wouldn't say traitors. It looked like no sealmasters check whoever incompetent invented this.
If a Mist ANBU was deliberately handing unsafe seals to foreign genin against presumable orders to do nothing of the sort, I think that qualifies you as a traitor.
 
Hazō stopped to think about that. "Well...these things are ridiculously simple and they don't actually store that much chakra so...let's say that the 'rip' would be very small. That's not right, but it gets the idea across. If enough chakra leaks out to make the seal collapse then the rip would almost certainly just close. If it didn't then it would probably just emit a puff of force or light or the smell of purple, but it could tear the rip wide open and create a massive breach to the Out."
"Get away from there!" Kagome said, shooing him back. "Sawdust burns!" From a hip pouch he produced a tiny blob of mushy red stuff, which he set in the center of the seal. "Berry," he said, pointing proudly. "Split it open, take out the seeds, use the squidgy part. Doesn't burn, won't hurt if it hits you at high speed. If it turns into steel before hitting you at high speed then the flattened-out shape will spread the impact. If it turns into a ravenous spikey monstrosity then at least it'll be a small one. If it dissolves into acidic goop then it won't do a lot of damage to the landscape. If it implodes into a tiny pinhole rip in the universe then nothing big will be able to get through. If the water gets pulled out of it and converted into high-pressure steam then there won't be enough to matter. If—"
If the rip is supposed to be very small wouldn't a sealing failure caused by the rip be, correspondingly, very small?
 
Right then. Priorities A-F and then some are making sure Water Country doesn't suffer an enormous invasion of hellbeasts or something equally awful within the next two days. This can be accomplished in roughly three ways:
  1. We take and then destroy all the seals
  2. We prevent anyone else from getting any of the seals.
  3. We force a recall.
Number 1 is difficult because of the way that getting the proctor to give it to you requires a substantial investment of chakra that we presumably can't get back. Odds are it's mathematically impossible for us to take all the seals with only the Leaf-nin group. Even then, it's not the best option because all of those seals are now active and full of chakra, which is exactly the situation we want to avoid even if they get destroyed in a controlled manner.

Number 2 is more feasible, but only by a tiny margin. There are more than fifty proctors out there, and we'd need to guard each and every one of them against enemy ninja. Spread that thin, there's no way we can do an adequate job keeping all the other ninja away. We could try to combine 1 and 2 by taking as many seals as we can and keeping other teams from getting any, but if that sounds familiar to you that's because it's the standard plan for this exam, and as such everyone will be expecting and planning counters to those moves.

So that only leaves Number 3, force a recall of the seals before Water Country does an Uzu. Really, the only person who not only would listen to us and know enough to confirm what we're saying, but also have the oomph to get something done about it is Jiraiya. To simplify all of the above, then, priorities A-F are getting Jiraiya to know that this exam might just un-happen Mist so he can do something about it.

Reverse-summoning is out unless we can get him to check in (he checks daily, does Keiko know exactly when and if now (evening) is before or after then?), which is probably one of the most likely things we can ask of a proctor/whoever's at the edge of the swamp keeping ninja in. Alternate messages include stuff along the lines of 'tell Jiraiya to come here, it's urgent' or 'tell Jiraiya to look at the seals being used'. It would be best to try all of these simultaneously at different parts of the edge to maximize the chance that a proctor agrees before word spreads that sneaky genin are trying to do something at the edge and they stop listening to us. If none of them bite, we need to send a genin out to talk to Jiraiya personally. A volunteer would be ideal, but barring that the best candidates are Hazou, for figuring out the problem in the first place, Noburi for having a good Diplomacy stat, and Keiko for her status as the Pangolin Summoner, and all three for being Goketsu. Personally, Keiko probably has the best chance of getting to Jiraiya, but 'favourite son' Hazou might be better.

Thoughts? Things I missed? Assumptions I made that were entirely unfounded and throw everything off?
 
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Twenty proctors times one hundred and fifty seals each is four thousand seals.
Minor quibble, but this should be three thousand; presumably four thousand is after Keiko's corrections to look at the worst case.

Also, just so we're clear, we think it's reasonable the seals haven't failed before despite significant use because they've mostly been night-lights for rich kids, and so haven't been blown up etc.?

@eaglejarl @OliWhail Do we know of any violent inter-clan conflicts in Mist in the past couple decades? Do Noburi and Keiko remember where the seals were placed in their homes? (e.g. if they're almost always on the ceiling, or if they're sometimes in places they'd potentially have water spilled on them or be set on fire.)
 
Sealing failures are not existential risks. Presumably, they happen from time to time (or why else does Sealing have it's reputation?) and presumably they do not generally result in catastrophic damage or loss of life (or else why would anyone outside a handful elite be allowed to study it?).

We are looking at a distribution for imminent failures with most of the probability squarely on 0, with perhaps a long right tail, but the vast majority being less than half a dozen.

We are also in a situation where hundreds of Genin, scores of Chuunin and ANBU, dozens of Jounin, all the Kages, and a few SRanks are ready and available to handle any crisis.

For the love of Jashin, please for once correctly assess the risks in the situation and take appropriate action without overreacting or charging in claws head first. This does not merit meaningfully deviating from the "Party Trick Swap" plan, and things will be safe enough with us hiding away most of (or at least a good portion of) the Nightlight seals in a reasonably fortified location.

(If it helps, we can still come up with a contingincy plan to evacuate and collapse the bunker if things go pear shaped.)
 
Note that we can also get the word out to everyone (as we've already done) to be aware of the possibility of sealing failures and give a few tips on containment/escape. This alone would greatly reduce the extent of any disaster scenario.
 
Let's not fail the exam just yet and make use of Hazō's judgement rather than have a plan to solely deal with the absolute worst case scenario. He knows sealing...well, he absolutely know something about sealing theory, while we know nothing aside from surface details.

What we can do is provide plans for Hazō depending on how much risk he think there is in the exam.
 
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Also: The Watchers are a thing, and if they aren't getting involved, that puts an upper limit on the potential danger.
 
If the rip is supposed to be very small wouldn't a sealing failure caused by the rip be, correspondingly, very small?
It could be, or maybe the amount of chakra involved could cause the rip to expand exponentially, or maybe etc. etc. Hazō is out of his depth and assessing this to the best of his Kagome-educated skill.

Also, he's trying to get across a bunch of sealing theory very quickly under stress, and his metaphors may not be fully adequate.
 
[X] Action Plan: We prevented Armageddon and all we got was this stupid Chunin vest

This plan is all about trying multiple different angles at once until we find at least one way to succeed. At the bare minimum, this plan will not only stop a catastrophical seal failure from happening but also earn some political capital for Jiraiya, some measure of goodwill from Mist for not publicly announcing the safety issues of their seals and, presumably, the respect of the Leaf clan heirs for our knowledge, dedication for the greater good and strategic thinking.

As a bonus, we are going to try pulling this off without anyone having to leave the Swamp area.

Goals:
  • Prevent a catastrophic sealing failure
  • Show off our Chunin skills
  • Remain in the second exam if possible, leave to deliver a message to Jiraiya if not
  • Deploy multiple strategies at the same time to increase the odds of having our cake and eating it


Step 1) Don't panic and double check
  • Get more samples from different proctors and have Hazo look into them to make sure we didn't just get a bad batch. Use Henges (Noburi/Keiko) or send people from the other Leaf teams to remove the bias against Goketsu. Hazo will remain at the camp to make Party Trick seals in the meanwhile but there should be at least two more people with him to guard him and the base at all times. If we can manage to befriend a Mist team (either through Step 3) or because we are that lovable), send them instead.
  • If the majority or even all of the new seals show the same problem, continue with the plan. Otherwise disregard this plan entirely and complete our previous Action Plan.
Step 2) Waiting for reinforcements
  • Hazo will continue to make Party Trick seals to be distributed among allies at the end.
  • Once our reinforcements have arrived (Team Asuma and Kurenai at the least have agreed to meet up) we will update them on the situation. Include Shino and Shikamaru into the discussion and listen to their input. Adjust the plan accordingly.
  • Stop drawing attention to our location once it did its job of signalling our allies. We cannot implement the trading unfortunately as that would incentivize people to infuse even more of the dangerous seals, so advertizing our location more than we have is a no-go.
  • Shuffle teams around so that each team has a tracker/sensor (that being Shino, Hinata, Kiba and potentially Noburi/Ino) and send them out to contact the other Leaf teams who we could not contact before entering the Swamp. All Leaf teams should be aware of our relation to Jiraiya and that our uncle Kagome and Hazo are sealmasters so they should be inclined to take our warnings seriously and help regardless of their initial plans.
  • Have at least a few combat pangolins stationed in the base and send the rest with the combat teams. Noburi is going to be put to good use here and we are out our most vulnerable during the next few hours so even if we cannot sustain the summons the next day, they will buy us enough time to implement our plans.
Step 3) Reducing the risk of sealing failures
  • At first light, send out teams (pangolins can be sent during the night) to inform the non-allied teams about the time limit of the night lights (Hazo mentioned them requiring varying amounts of CP, so if we are lucky some seals might have burned out by now and people will be more inclined to listen). Ask them to not infuse any seals until much closer to the dead line or they risk spending CP for no gain whatsoever and that you know this because you happen to have ex-Mist ninjas as team mates who have seen this type of seal beforehand. If questioned about why we give out this information for free, tell them that we are trying to build long term relationships by being helpful (the whole international cooperation bit from last plan; not going to write this here again). While all of this is the truth, the biggest advantage of them listening to us is that we buy time where they do not activate seals and by the time they are going to request their seals, we should have succeeded in contacting Jiraiya. Do not mention the potential sealing failure since they would not believe us anyway and we would give up the gains of solving this problem more discreetly (see below). There is also the fact that some of the Genin could try to weaponize sealing failures because they have no idea about the Watchers so the less they know, the less danger they will be to us and themselves.
  • Give each team a Party Trick seal that can be turned off and on as a gesture of goodwill and as proof that our source (Hazo, that is) knows what he is talking about. Ask them to spread the word among their allied teams.
  • Ask them for an expired or working copy of a seal to trade 1:1 in addition to the above if it is a Mist team to double check whether they got different and safer seals than anyone else.
  • Take out teams that blatantly refuse to listen to reason and that we think we can defeat without great risk. Do this however as a last resort only, otherwise leave the punching for the next day.
  • This step should happen concurrently with Step 4) while leaving at least one team or more (depending on how many Leaf teams we end up attracting) at the base to rest or to do things mentioned under 4).
Step 4) Contacting Jiraiya (Time Limit: 4h after first day light)
  • Ask within the Leaf teams if anyone knows where Jiraiya is. If someone knows, send a pangolin that carries both a letter and a night light seal.
  • If we cannot narrow down Jiraiya's position, send out pangolins to various parts of the city to draw attention and drop lots of letters (the content being "We need to talk to Jiraiya. Remember the Watchers. - G" or something like that; chances are we actually made up code phrases for emergency scenarios like these if not this situation exactly within our clan; additionally, add the sign for emergency of Leaf in there if such a thing exist (i.e. like how everyone knows what Code Red means IRL, Leaf likely has something similar)). If we are lucky, one of them will find their way to Leaf ANBU, Gai or Kakashi who will then take it from there.
  • Contact the Mist ANBU at the edge of the Swamp and ask them about the current whereabouts of Jiraiya or Ren. Use intermediaries with high Diplomacy like Ino to do the talking, avoid using Goketsu if possible. If the ANBUs still refuse, send Hazo to talk to them and play the "my dad is the Hokage and my aunt is the Mizukage" card to persuade them to tell them where Jiraiya is or even to send a message for him (the letter from above). Use bribes if necessary (storage seals, explosive seals etc).
  • If after 4 hours we do not see anything that gives us reason to think that Jiraiya got the message (like the Swamp stage being aborted entirely or the rules having mysteriously changed to not incorporate the seals), forfeit and leave the Swamp deliberately (whether we leave as a team or whether we just send one team mate depends on whether one person forfeiting disqualifies the whole team).
  • No worries though, we will still make up more than enough points to make Chunin*.
  • If the Mist ANBU refuse to let us go and search for Jiraiya even after we forfeited, cause a ruckus but avoid violence and fighting at all costs. If we cannot find Jiraiya then we can make him find us by drawing his attention like this.
  • If even that fails, ask to speak to your respective clan heads and try to get into contact with Jiraiya (preferably) or Ren. Hazo probably has the best shot at this via his Mom.

*
We were confident enough that the J-man could spin a victory out of using Party Lights and we are doubting if he couldn't do the same by pointing out that we chose to forgo promotion to save our fellow comrades from Leaf, our (future) allies from Mist and Suna and our temporary (for the exam) allies from the other Villages at the very minimum? All while letting Aunt Ren save face by not going public with this? Yeah, this is just inconsistent with our previous decision to rely on him.

If he can't spin this as a huge victory for our team and himself I will eat Panashe's top hat.

Add to the above that having good judgment, risk assessment skills and being a good leader are all traits desirable for making Chunin - all of which we demonstrate by risking our promotion for saving the lives of our team, our allies and even our opponents. This is in addition of giving Jiraiya a trump card to use against Ren when needed ("I am sure that the Raikage, Tsuchikage and Kazekage would be very interested in the fact that you risked the life of their best genin with these shoddy seals, don't you agree, Ren-chan?").
 
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Also: The Watchers are a thing, and if they aren't getting involved, that puts an upper limit on the potential danger.

We know precious little about the Watchers, but one of the things we do know about them is they threatened Jiraiya's life hours after he deliberately failed an infusion, but didn't/couldn't stop it. We can infer that they have a pretty hefty intelligence network, but we don't know how it works or whether they'd actually notice this budding threat, especially given that the one and only known case of their intervention involved a deliberate failure.
 
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We know precious little about the Watchers, but one of the things we do know about them is they threatened Jiraiya's life hours after he deliberately failed an infusion, but didn't/couldn't stop it. We can infer that they have a pretty hefty intelligence network, but we don't know how it works or whether they'd actually notice this budding threat, especially given that the one and only known case of their intervention involved a deliberate failure.

This is mostly reasonable. However, as a counterpoint, the extent of this incident is much greater and involves hundreds of people over the course of months, whereas Jiraiya's incident involved only himself (perhaps a few enemy combatants), and occurred with little warning on a remote area of a war zone.
 
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