Wasn't there a trap literally inside the palanquin this last time? Unless the enemy can go invisible/inaudible/possibly-intangible he would have caught that, and either way he can serve as a deterrent.
e: Nope, going back over the update there were in fact two. I say we literally plop the little lizard down on a cushion inside the palanquin whenever it would otherwise be unattended.
Ah, I snuck in an edit to my post clarifying this 5 seconds before your reply. I see the table, which tells me that if Pandaa has 0-1k xp he costs 15 chakra to summon, 5 to maintain. Are we just assuming that he costs 15 chakra? I agree with that assumption, I was just checking if we had word of QM on the matter.
Oops, I was already asleep by then but it looks like it didn't matter. I would be very interested in any comments you have about the changes I made to @Roomba's plan. I don't want to be a force for cluttering plans with needless detail.
Not convinced by this one, as it is unclear what "join forces to throw off pursuers" means. You don't know if you have pursuers, you certainly don't know if they have pursuers, and there's no information on what kind of strategy you are proposing when you say "join forces". You could also have benefited from checking in advance with the Hyūga that this idea is viable, since it has plenty of potential failure modes.
If Keiko thinks it's appropriate, temporarily move traps into the summon realm instead of/along with cracking them. If possible, with the engineer on hand for repair/consultation. Use Zephyr's/Pangolin's Reach to assist, as appropriate.
Questionable, since traps will typically be fixed to whatever they're protecting (otherwise you could just pick them up and move them out of the way normally). But as a left-field field idea for Keiko that can be ignored if it doesn't work, it's fine.
Consider using illusory clone if caught. Advantages: shadowy environment, looks like a genin technique, doesn't have to have bandana. Disadvantage: it makes no sound.
The analysis is helpful, since it makes it easier to evaluate. However, clones are copies of the user, so unless you take the time to dispel any disguises and remove your bandanna before using the technique, you have problems. Then if the clone is recognised as you without the bandanna...
Upon a successful infiltration, covertly spread rumors of Lizardbreath's drug abuse amid the newfound legal limbo to academy drop outs nursing a grudge. Hazou used to be friends with one, if it's relevant.
I would say this is a complex enough idea to be worth expanding on, given the assumptions and risks involved. It would also help to have more detail to jog QM memory RE the dropout, since I cannot for the life of me remember what this refers to, but otherwise this piece of extra detail is a good idea.
Is this the kind of feedback you were looking for?
The analysis is helpful, since it makes it easier to evaluate. However, clones are copies of the user, so unless you take the time to dispel any disguises and remove your bandanna before using the technique, you have problems. Then if the clone is recognised as you without the bandanna...
@other players, Idea: Keep an eye on high power teams teams. Create physical clone, henge clone as them without the bandana if/when any of them leave their client. Get seen as such, then turn a corner and vanish.
According to the rules,
Both you and your client must be visibly wearing these bandanas [proctor indicates the bandanas] around your neck at all times in order to make it clear that you are part of the event. If you remove your bandana, you are disqualified from the event. If you remove another contestant's bandana, or cause it to be removed, you are disqualified from the event.
If you are disqualified then your team will be taken directly to the barracks and confined there for the duration of the event. Your score for the event will be a flat -50 points or whatever score you have earned if it is below -50.
The latter says nothing about their client. This means that if they are disqualified, their client is easy pickings to reduce their scores to a flat -200.
This is something we need to be aware of, too. If we leave our client any time other than bedtime hours, we should definitely make a clone of some sort to at least *pretend* to be there.
e: On reflection, I probably should have waited for the update to drop, but I'm fairly sure that the QMs either already knew about this exploit or would at least give us the opportunity to plan around it for having given them the idea of it.
e2: Another note: This strategy actually doesn't break any of the rules by my reading.
@Cariyaga I think making a clone that isn't wearing a bandana is against the spirit of the rules, if not the letter. Bandanas are meant to mark acceptable targets for the contestants; any scheme that messes with their function would constitute a danger to the village and its inhabitants. In principle, Noburi could make a water clone without a bandana and use that to attack clients, but I'm pretty sure it'd be considered a rules violation.
I was thinking about the current plan while skiving off from work, and something occurred to me. You guys are attempting to interfere in the internal affairs of a sovereign nation (specifically, the Village Hidden in the Mist, capital of the Land of Water) for your own profit and (at least in part) to put them in a disadvantageous position for negotiating with an enemy state. (The Village Hidden in the Leaves, capital of the Land of Fire.) You are doing this through stealth and good tactics instead of punching, since the nation is question is enormously more powerful in a standup fight. I think this makes you...
I was thinking about the current plan while skiving off from work, and something occurred to me. You guys are attempting to interfere in the internal affairs of a sovereign nation (specifically, the Village Hidden in the Mist, capital of the Land of Water) for your own profit and (at least in part) to put them in a disadvantageous position for negotiating with an enemy state. (The Village Hidden in the Leaves, capital of the Land of Fire.) You are doing this through stealth and good tactics instead of punching, since the nation is question is enormously more powerful in a standup fight. I think this makes you...
@OliWhail Oh progenitor of all things google doc, is there any way you could make a widget to easily add additional technique/skill rows without having to modify all of the skill pyramid entries individually?
...I'm probably misremembering, but there shouldn't be anything stopping you from doing that now. What causes the issue? Is the range for the skill pyramid sub-table a specific list instead of a range?
I am always here, watching and waiting, biding my time until the stars align, forcing me to rise from my ephemeral slumber... The sun is shining through my window into my eyes; time to get out of bed.
...I'm probably misremembering, but there shouldn't be anything stopping you from doing that now. What causes the issue? Is the range for the skill pyramid sub-table a specific list instead of a range?
It is a range, but I'd have to modify a minimum of seven entries, possibly more, to do so. I figured there was some google docs magic you could do to manage all of that for me automatically
...although, it occurs to me that it'd be easier to just make a separate page for skills or have each set of skills take up a separate column so the range could be infinite vertically...
The Old Schoolhouse loomed in the darkness like a slumbering behemoth, sated for now with the suffering of schoolchildren, but not averse to a late-night snack were one to stumble into its lair. Even now, with the lights out and its form indistinct beneath the faint moonlight, Keiko could feel it listening like a sleeping cat, deceptively peaceful yet ready to pounce.
DO YOU THINK YOU CAN JUST COAST THROUGH MY ACADEMY RIDING YOUR SISTER'S COAT-TAILS, MORI KEIKO? ARE YOU PERHAPS TOO GOOD TO RAISE YOUR HAND OR SPEAK BEFORE THE CLASS? DO YOU FEEL OUR EDUCATION SYSTEM DOES NOT FIT YOUR NEEDS? PERHAPS YOU'D RATHER OBTAIN AN EDUCATION ELSEWHERE? I HEAR THE TANNERS ARE TAKING APPRENTICES RIGHT NOW, AND THERE IS ALWAYS ROOM FOR ANOTHER STREET CLEANER. NO? THEN GO REPORT FOR DETENTION. I EXPECT TO HAVE NO NEED TO SEE YOU IN THIS OFFICE AGAIN.
DO YOU KNOW WHY A SERIOUS INSTITUTION LIKE THE MIST ACADEMY OF THE NINJA ARTS HAS A PLAYGROUND, MORI KEIKO? IT IS BECAUSE THE SOCIAL BONDS YOU FORGE DURING YOUR CHILDHOOD ARE WHAT WILL DETERMINE THE ENTIRE REST OF YOUR LIFE AS A NINJA. BOTH YOUR REFUSAL TO SIT WITH THE OTHER CHILDREN DURING LUNCH AND THE WAY YOU SPEND YOUR BREAKS ENSCONCED IN THE LIBRARY LIKE A WORM BURYING ITSELF INTO THE GROUND ARE UTTERLY UNACCEPTABLE. DO YOU FEEL YOURSELF ABOVE THE NEED FOR FRIENDS? PERHAPS THE IDEA OF TEAMWORK DOES NOT APPEAL TO YOU? THE NORTHERN VILLAGES ALWAYS HAVE ROOM FOR MORE HUNTERS AND TRAPPERS, THE ATTRITION RATE BEING WHAT IT IS. NO? THEN GO REPORT FOR DETENTION. I EXPECT TO SEE YOU PLAYING WITH THE OTHER CHILDREN WITH A SMILE ON YOUR FACE NEXT TIME I PASS THROUGH THE PLAYGROUND.
CAUGHT IN ANOTHER ALTERCATION, MORI KEIKO? IS IT TOO MUCH TO ASK OF YOU TO GO ONE SINGLE WEEK WITHOUT DISRUPTING MY ACADEMY'S DISCIPLINE? HAVE YOU CONSIDERED THE FEELINGS OF THE OTHER CHILDREN WHEN YOU PROVOKE THEM WITH YOUR ARROGANT BEHAVIOUR? WHEN DESPITE EVERY SIGN OF THEIR DISAPPROVAL YOU FAIL TO INTEGRATE YOURSELF INTO THE GROUP? DO YOU CONSIDER YOURSELF… UGH. NOT AGAIN. YOU GIRLS ALWAYS THINK A LITTLE CRYING WILL BE ENOUGH TO GET YOU OUT OF TROUBLE. MURANO! REMOVE THIS SNIVELLING CHILD FROM MY PRESENCE. SHE HAS A DETENTION TO ATTEND.
Ordinarily, Kei might have hesitated to target a man with a fundamentally civilian role who posed no obstacle to any of her objectives. Ordinarily, Kei might have hesitated to feed a man narcotic substances when a miscalculation could ruin his health, or worse. Ordinarily, Kei might have hesitated to destroy a man's career, or manoeuvre him into publicly humiliating the highest levels of government. Fortunate, then, that Old Lizardbreath had always claimed to be an extraordinary man. If there was any hesitation before Kei signalled to commence his downfall, it was because she knew that she could only savour the experience once.
"Proceed," she whispered to Panashe.
"Acknowledged, Summoner," came the hissed response, and then if Kei had not known what to look for, she might not have realised that the pangolin was no longer at her side.
Panashe invokes the scene Aspect "Darkest Night".
Panashe: Stealth ? + ? + ? = 47
Guards (highest): Alertness ? + ? = 38
Panashe melds into the darkness.
Panashe invokes the created Aspect "Lay of the Land".
Panashe: Examination (Casing) ? + ? + ? = 30
Casing TN = 20
Panashe spends several hours and acquires two pieces of information. She creates the Aspect "Dancing on the Pad of My Paw".
With no way to support Panashe's scouting, Kei could only wait. A few times, she could feel herself becoming drowsy, but all she needed to do was recall those visits to the headmaster's office, the sensation of her very sense of self shrivelling beneath his litany of contempt, and the flare of emotions would restore her to the peak of alertness.
Finally, there came another whisper. "Scouting complete."
"Report."
"There are three guards whose patrol routes take them through this part of the compound. Unimposing specimens, with no special equipment that I could see. They carry lanterns. Searching for traps was harder, but between watching the guards' movements and my own decades of experience in the field, it was child's play to figure out a safe route to the target location."
Kei nodded, then recalled that the act was pointless. "What is our infiltration window?"
"Fifteen minutes. After that, a guard will be in position to see any light from the office window."
Kei frowned. "How much light will you need to work on the traps?"
"Enough, Summoner. Surely you know that vision is not my kind's strongest sense. Why do you think my scouting of the area took so long?"
"Fifteen minutes," Kei repeated. "As the expert, do you feel this would be sufficient time?"
"For traps designed to fend off half-trained human children, certainly," Panashe said smugly.
"Then tell me when it is safe to move."
No rolls are necessary as Panashe has secured a (temporarily) safe route.
In her head, Kei commenced the timer. With all sound blocked off by the Silence Mine and the moon invisible behind the clouds, she was deeply, deeply grateful that Ami had taken the time to drill her in the practice of precise mental countdowns.
Ami. Ami whom she would never see again, not as a sister. Ami who must have felt so betrayed to know that Kei had left the clan once and for all. Ami, whose smile in those final moments had been a bottomless abyss that no amount of light could fill.
Panashe turned around, and pointed a claw meaningfully at the lantern. Kei steadied her hands.
The infiltration, at least, had been easy. The guards were, true to Panashe's word, neither to be seen nor heard. The path through the traps, while circuitous, was straightforward to follow, with no "step into my footsteps" nonsense. More remarkably still, Old Lizardbreath had been lazy enough to leave the window unshuttered before his departure, doubtless trusting in his traps and the strength of his reputation to ward off any would-be intruders. With a grim smile nobody could see, Kei added complacency to his vast pile of sins.
Panashe: Examination ? + ? = 39
Panashe takes a step up the time ladder from "ten minutes" to "a few minutes", increasing the trap TN.
Trap TN = ? + ? + ? + 10 = 37
Panashe beckoned Kei over and indicated a sliding panel in the floor, not that well-concealed—as if Old Lizardbreath wanted children to find it so that they could proceed to be mauled by the traps.
The trap is designed to be frequently disarmed and rearmed by human hands. Panache suffers from an Aspect penalty for using claws.
Panashe: Cracking ? + ? + ? = 21
Panashe spends a fate point to reroll.
Panashe: Cracking ? + ? + ? = 24
Trap TN = ? + ? + ? = 12
A great deal highly professional pangolin scrabbling later, Kei found herself with a nearly-full bottle of Kurohige's Revenge in her hand. Of course Old Lizardbreath would drink expensive premium whisky. He was a man convinced that he deserved the best of everything. Much about his behaviour could be understood if one considered how far the Academy was from being the best of everything if you despised children.
Fortune continued to favour the bold. The bottle was open (had it been sealed, the mission would have been a failure there and then), and while there was room for others, no other alcohol was in evidence tonight.
On the other hand, the disarming had taken longer than Kei had hoped. Looking at the disassembled traps, Kei suspected that, despite being a man of mediocre talent who had little respect for the skills of children, over the decades Old Lizardbreath had nevertheless found time to optimise his setup to a surprising level. She supposed he had to do something with all the free time generated by offloading his work onto his long-suffering secretary.
The rest was trivial. Kei extracted the flask of betel oil from her backpack and began to calculate the necessary dose based on Noburi's exacting instructions.
Her hand paused as it hovered over Kurohige's Revenge. Looking at the label again, the word called out to her. Could it truly be a coincidence that this was Old Lizardbreath's preferred brand? Or could it be called fate, or at least beautiful irony?
HOW MUCH DISCIPLINE WILL IT TAKE BEFORE YOU LEARN, MORI KEIKO?
It would be so easy to add a fraction too much oil. She had miscalculated, or perhaps her hand had slipped, or perhaps as a teetotal fourteen-year-old, she did not realise whisky was so strong. An accident. She could not be blamed. And in the end, a headmaster dead of a drug overdose would serve their purposes just as well. A one-off incident of betel oil-fuelled rampage could be concealed, but the death of so prominent a personage? Why, the Mizukage would be forced to declare narcotics illegal, if only to prevent a reprise of the incident. From that perspective, she would only be optimising the plan.
IS THIS HOW YOU LIVE UP TO YOUR SISTER'S LEGACY, MORI KEIKO?
Justice. Vengeance. The protection of innocents. The good of the team. It was a sign that all these factors should align so well. An opportunity to do some genuine good, not in Hazō's promised future but here and now, with an act with permanent, measurable effects.
"DO YOU THINK THERE IS ROOM AT MY ACADEMY FOR THOSE WHO REFUSE TO BELONG, MORI KEIKO?"
Her hand began to tip the flask…
(Timer ends.)
-o-
"Well," Granny Karina smiled, "I've been looking forward to this all day. Shall we see how you strapping young lads acquit yourselves?"
The client lounged back on the bed suggestively, the light glinting off her gold tooth (which had the horrifying effect of accentuating her other teeth). Hazō and Noburi naturally sat as far back against the opposite wall as human flexibility could allow… but politely.
Where was Keiko? She should have been back by now. Had something gone wrong? Had she been caught? Hazō would give his right hand to be able to go out and look for her (and flee the client in the process), but knew that his arrival on the scene could only make things worse. And besides, part of their objective right now was to distract the client from Keiko's absence. Admittedly, this wasn't difficult, since she generally showed no interest in Keiko apart from occasionally belittling her with uncanny precision, but she was also an evil, evil witch who might decide to do the least convenient thing on the spur of the moment.
Hazō prayed that Keiko was all right and would be back soon. Then they could invite her in here and stall with comparatively untraumatising conversation until it was too late for anything but sleep.
"You flatter us, Granny Karina," Noburi said in a not-at-all choked voice. "But I was actually wondering about how today went," he went on urgently. "Did you earn much money? Are you likely to need more stock?"
The client chuckled as her bony fingers rattled against the wood of the bed. "Low-hanging fruit. Delicious, juicy low-hanging fruit. Oh, we did well enough with the common apothecaries selling common goods, but that's not the kind of income that'll get us ahead of the game, hmm? I could spend the next four days trading in fever cures and bedroom salves, assuming there were enough buyers, and that wouldn't be so bad for me. But boys like you should be a little more ambitious if you don't want to lose the race to the fur and spice traders."
"You mean you know who the other clients are?" Hazō leaned forward attentively.
"Oops," the client smirked. "Naughty boys, trying to make Granny Karina spill her secrets. Though if you really want me to bare it all…"
For some reason, Hazō's mind offered up the image of one of his scarier sealing failures, when through the rift that was not a rift he briefly glimpsed a creature with too few limbs and too many dimensions, and realised that he was probably still alive only because its senses were the wrong senses for the substances he was made of.
"So what you're saying," he said as soon as he recovered, "is that even if you restock your common goods, you won't be able to sell them at enough of a profit to give us a good position in the event unless we also start dealing in the other kind."
"Clever boy," the client said approvingly. "Today was a good day for looking around the village and figuring out how you're all going to keep me safe, but if we want to get anywhere, soon we'll need to start talking to the interesting gentlemen with the long knives."
"Do you have an end goal?" Hazō asked. "I mean, a set amount of money that you want to make before you retire or something like that?"
The client's jaw dropped, and her eyes spun further away from each other than usual. "Me? Retire?! How rude! Just how old do you think I am, young man?"
Hazō and Noburi exchanged panicked looks to the effect of "Why would you even say something like that?" and "Shut up and help me find a way to get out of this!"
After several seconds of internal flailing, Hazō was shocked to hear the client cackle.
"Oh, you should have seen the looks on your faces, boys! That'll teach you to imply things about a woman's age. You'll never get yourself girlfriends if you go around being so tactless, hmm? Then again, why would you want to, with such a welcoming specimen of womanhood right in front of you?"
The client stood up from the bed, moving steadily towards Hazō and Noburi, and coincidentally interposing herself between them and the door.
"You've been such good boys today. And good boys deserve a special reward…"
She stepped within touching range, leaned over…
There was a knock on the door.
"Hazō? Noburi? Can I speak with you for a moment?"
The fact that it would mean certain agonising death notwithstanding, Hazō could have kissed Keiko just then.
-o-
"You're sure you weren't seen?" Hazō asked again.
"We were not," Kei reaffirmed with a touch of irritation. "Panashe reverse-summoned me as soon as she saw the glow of light from outside. Thanks to her detailed observation of the patrol routes, we knew exactly how long to wait before it would be safe for me to re-emerge."
Her neutral account withheld the shock of the moment, when Panashe reached out to clasp her on the shoulder, the pangolin's other paw grabbing the lantern even as the glow of a guard's approach became visible from outside. She could not describe the sensation of resolve shaken by the pull of interdimensional forces. She did not want to describe the horror of the subsequent revelation.
"What about the mission? Were you able to drug the alcohol stash before you got away?"
Kei remembered holding the whisky bottle in her left hand. The flask of betel oil raised in her right. Panashe's sudden touch, merged with the impact of arrival on the Seventh Path. Surprise. A lack of balance. Pouring oil. She had just barely caught herself in time.
"Yes," she said, feeling guilty, or relieved, or both, or neither. She did not know which, and it would no longer matter anyway.
"It went just as planned," she added with imperfect honesty. "There was exactly enough oil for the volume and potency of alcohol, though I was forced to leave an empty flask. However, the smell of the oil is distinctive, and I am confident that an attentive medic-nin would recognise it."
"Exactly enough?" Noburi gasped. "That much oil wouldn't be safe even if he was drinking water!"
"I assume you didn't actually use the rest," Hazō said more calmly. "What happened to it?"
Kei gave a melancholy smile, thinking of a monster's punishment slowly soaking into the ground of another world. "It was out of my hands."
-o-
You have gained 3 XP. Keiko has gained 2 FP.
-o-
This update ends when everyone goes to bed at night. Note that this means you have another chance to come up with a decent plan for how to spread the news of the prank, since the old one was significantly lacking.
-o-
What do you do?
Voting ends on Saturday 31st of March, 9 am New York Time.
Just my two cents here... In general I strongly disagree! I think in general the QMs are overly generous with OOC information, and it makes it actually harder to play the quest simulationistically. If you don't mind me reversing the question.. @Velorien@eaglejarl@OliWhail : Given that we're explicitly not supposed to be using magic OOC knowledge, why do we get interludes giving extremely important information that we shouldn't know? A great example would be our OOC knowledge of how Ami really feels toward Keiko. I know there's always the caveat that interludes might just be blatantly untrue and are there just for fun (e.g. CfG, whirlpool, telescope salesman) but that's not usually how the playerbase reacts to informational but just off-screen interludes (Hana getting news of Hazou being alive, Ren in Hot Springs, Ami caring about Keiko, Zabuza in snow)
I'll preface this by saying that I have no expectation of getting the information about Panache prior to the vote being called/plan being written. At this point I continue the line of conversation out of general principles/interest/stubbornness. So this is a fact-finding exercise/attempt to influence long-term QM policy rather than an attempt to influence QM policy in the now.
For one, I think it's worth teasing out the difference between Hazou having a plausible way to know information versus the party having a plausible way to know it. As an example, no one would bat an eye if you told us that Keiko made a point of assessing her summons' skills (particularly those, like Cracking, that might not transfer perfectly) upon making a contract. At that point all it takes for Hazou to know is to politely ask Keiko as a preface to formulating his mondo-plan.
Once you expand out the knowledge base to the party as a whole rather than just Hazou it's not a question of whether Hazou watched Panache run through a series of training exercises, but rather, did anyone. Now you could maybe say that no Keiko didn't (she had a lot on her plate, etc.), but if she had it certainly wouldn't be quite so absurd as how the theoretical Hazou-centric scenario plays out.
--
What "really" happened aside, let's swing back to my "Even if they couldn't [know Panache's Cracking]—and as it turns out it takes some amount of effort to find out how good Panache is at Cracking—the question/process of discovery is not very interesting" line. Let's take as given that—by your judgement as a QM and final arbiter—in a perfectly simulationist world no one has a gauge on how effective Panache's Cracking is, and there's no good way to find out before we have to commit to a plan of action for the burglary. Why are we letting these petty facts constrain us?
I have confidence in our collective ability to posit some semi-plausible in-world way for the team to have already gotten this information; it does no disruption to the narrative to have a line, particularly OOC, saying "oh yeah Keiko ran a test and Panache has Cracking in the low 20's". It's also the kind of information that we as players would dearly like to have, but couldn't reasonably have been expected to direct Hazou to find out in-character. If we're to flip this and say "well if the players want this kind of information then they should write it out in plans ahead of time" then... well that gets us into favorite color territory and is to be avoided.
--
e: To sum, here I attempt show that "the general case" is being defined too narrowly at the moment. I don't particularly want to split hairs over the Panache case in particular, but rather fear that similar cases in the future will be ruled as non-general enough that they too deserve a unique "nope you don't get to know that" exemption from the general case.
On the other hand, I think all of your general points here are right on the money and so maybe there are more cases where we should get a bit more info? Although in this particular case, it does seem extremely non-negligible to figure out Cracking proficiency. I don't think we ever had access to a bunch of trapped out buildings (of different levels of security) that we could run Panashe through to gauge that. It's a much harder skill to assess than just taijutsu proficiency.
38 Alertness roll on an academy guard? How in the world did any students get around that? @Cariyaga you were right to be paranoid about this. Thanks for being persistent and forcing me to revise it.
This is going to be tough to plan for though, as it'll require a lot of contextual knowledge. That's part of the reason spreading news of the prank was so lacking in the plan. @Velorien do the kids have any idea, for example, who we would anonymously report Lizardbreath to in Mist? Or whether he has any enemies, maybe within the school itself, who could take advantage of his upcoming mishap?
Awesome update, by the way, Keiko's flashbacks were a really nice touch. Do you have any feedback on the plan? Were parts of it over or underspecified relative to what you would've liked?
I'm a little confused. She used up all the poison, but only enough for the whiskey? And the extra was split between dimensions, or in the Summoner's realm, or other?
