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
TaliesinSkye
Occasional Editor
- Location
- Northeast Ohio, United States
The suicide watch is grim but depending on how she reacts/seems when we talk to her it might be wise. Best case scenario is that necessity and the kids needing her motivates her to action rather than despair, but both are possible.
The bad blood with Minami/Hyuga is a good point to know, it suggests they'd probably back Tsunade over Hiashi, if they don't have anything against Tsunade.
I'm not up on the Cloud situation; why are they likely to start a war soon?
The whole job is the social stuff. That's what leadership is. He's the candidate you want, but that doesn't make him the best candidate or the candidate most acceptable to the clans.
Yeah, but who is most likely to accept them, perhaps other than the minor villages? Sand?
Just get someone to become reagent. Or better yet, turn the elective monarchy into a Tanistry.
TaliesinSkye
Occasional Editor
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- Northeast Ohio, United States
You really, really seem to want to find some way to make Naruto Hokage.
The clan heads don't think the same way. They'll want someone they know, someone with a proven record and respected reputation built up over a long time, someone who will advance their clan's interests. They do not care about the boy like you do. They have no emotional attachment, and even if they did they wouldn't let that take precedence over what is in their best interests and Leaf's best interests.
Naruto is just not in the running. I'm sorry, I don't believe getting a child picked as leader of the village is viable in a rationalist setting. Pick a respected adult that we can maybe politically swing despite Hiashi's power bloc.
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- [REDACTED]
Ehh, I largely agree with you. My vote count suggests it might be easier for Tsunade to get the hat, for one. Yet I think you might be overstating your case just a bit here. Being inexperienced could make Hiashi and others believe they can influence and "guide" Naruto, and we don't actually know that the clan heads are opposed to a teenager taking the hat. We have strong reason to suspect, but we don't know.
Jello_Raptor
(Confirmed Jelly)
- Location
- Left of Center
We just need so much context that we can't feasibly get, given QM spoons, in order to plan effectively.
- Location
- [REDACTED]
It occurs to me that if Minori could figure out what Zabuza had been about to say when he crashed game-night, then just about every other intelligent person there could figure it out as well. Suddenly, to those in the know, Hazou looks a hell of a lot smarter for the stunt he pulled.
- Location
- Europe
@Velorien , @eaglejarl , @OliWhail , Can you guys give us the list of all the ninja that were at the battle? Pretty sure we would be told about that.
Also did the Minami head go to the battle?
On another subject, Ren has Skywalker now. Fucking Kurosawa have the seal now.
Also did the Minami head go to the battle?
On another subject, Ren has Skywalker now. Fucking Kurosawa have the seal now.
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- [REDACTED]
Seems that social-spec and raw personal power are about equally as important, tbh. Pretty sure Jiayra wasn't even in the top 3 social-spec nin in Leaf, maybe even top 5.
- Location
- France
@TaliesinSkye you make sense, but you are forgetting that this is Naruto. The setting clearly shows us that insanely precocious children exist, and that they are capable of being functional rulers. Therefore there must be something which makes your arguments incorrect in this specific context.
On another note: does anyone know if "the angel without mercy" is dead ?
On another note: does anyone know if "the angel without mercy" is dead ?
No, he was a master manipulator. Jiraya was amazing socially - he was just mostly known for his emotional persona and his ability to crush his enemies into paste.
Tua
鸡肉面条汤
- Location
- شوربة الدجاج المعكرونة
I only had time to skim through the following 4-5 pages after this so it's possible I am repeating a bunch of stuff but hey, less bias that way right?
I am always curious about how much our actions have changed the course of things in general and this battle in particular. (As an side: Do you guys plan to release the behind-the-scenes docs for the quest once it has wrapped up -which will hopefully not be any time soon?)
Anyway, I am guessing that our intel of Bloodrage and Noburi's secret mission gave Orochimaru an advantage here because he was aware of how Hidan's blood licking technique worked so he could find a counter for it beforehand.
Damn.
Two more characters I wish we could have spent more time with. At least Gai went out on his own terms by using the gates like his father did.
Anyone up for wearing a Youthsuit and an eye patch for a month to honor those two?
Look, I know this was a very sad and serious chapter but I really can't help find the stark contrast between epic battle scenes and Ren fumbling around as anything but hilarious.
1) Badass.
2) :[
3) Now I am not saying Hazou is any way responsible for killing Zabuza but none of these statements are false either: a) Zabuza picked a fight with Hazou. b) Zabuza died shortly after.
I am a sucker for redemption plot lines so it's a darn shame Oro's got cut short.
But hey, maybe his cursed seal horcruxes still work and he is only mostly dead?
Another character I really regret to see die. Jiraiya was becoming a real part of the Uplift Family, character development and all that. And now that's gone in an instant.
I also note that the history between Yahiku/Konan/Nagato and Jiraiya still seems to be mostly intact even in MfD.
When a character is so powerful that you realize the chances for your Best Ending disappeared the moment Jiraiya and/or Orochimaru died. It probably wouldn't even have mattered if everyone else had survived (battered and chakra exhausted as they would have been), they still would have had to take his deal and let him resurrect the Akatsuki members.
Nagato being reminded of Yahiku sacrificing himself to save Konan and Nagato? Is that why he is offering the compromise or was that his plan all along and he is just acting?
Tsunade would be the only one that knows about their backstory but she doesn't react to it. And considering Nagato is holding all the cards, why would he go through the trouble of pretending?
Is this new Minori character really the only reason this didn't end up in a total party kill?
Is this the big Minori Conspiracy pay off?
Do you mean Akame? Or did her parents really name her Akane Akame?
"The AMI demands free ice-cream every friday for all shinobi."
"Very well."
All in all some of the battles reminded me more of the end of the canon manga (without the stupid OP Edo Tensei).
Damn shame about losing Jiraiya, Orochimaru and Shikaku though. At least the latter will live on through his memes.
I am always curious about how much our actions have changed the course of things in general and this battle in particular. (As an side: Do you guys plan to release the behind-the-scenes docs for the quest once it has wrapped up -which will hopefully not be any time soon?)
Anyway, I am guessing that our intel of Bloodrage and Noburi's secret mission gave Orochimaru an advantage here because he was aware of how Hidan's blood licking technique worked so he could find a counter for it beforehand.
Damn.
Two more characters I wish we could have spent more time with. At least Gai went out on his own terms by using the gates like his father did.
Anyone up for wearing a Youthsuit and an eye patch for a month to honor those two?
Look, I know this was a very sad and serious chapter but I really can't help find the stark contrast between epic battle scenes and Ren fumbling around as anything but hilarious.
Glad to see she survived though.1) Badass.
2) :[
3) Now I am not saying Hazou is any way responsible for killing Zabuza but none of these statements are false either: a) Zabuza picked a fight with Hazou. b) Zabuza died shortly after.
I am a sucker for redemption plot lines so it's a darn shame Oro's got cut short.
But hey, maybe his cursed seal horcruxes still work and he is only mostly dead?
Another character I really regret to see die. Jiraiya was becoming a real part of the Uplift Family, character development and all that. And now that's gone in an instant.
I also note that the history between Yahiku/Konan/Nagato and Jiraiya still seems to be mostly intact even in MfD.
When a character is so powerful that you realize the chances for your Best Ending disappeared the moment Jiraiya and/or Orochimaru died. It probably wouldn't even have mattered if everyone else had survived (battered and chakra exhausted as they would have been), they still would have had to take his deal and let him resurrect the Akatsuki members.
Nagato being reminded of Yahiku sacrificing himself to save Konan and Nagato? Is that why he is offering the compromise or was that his plan all along and he is just acting?
Tsunade would be the only one that knows about their backstory but she doesn't react to it. And considering Nagato is holding all the cards, why would he go through the trouble of pretending?
Is this new Minori character really the only reason this didn't end up in a total party kill?
Is this the big Minori Conspiracy pay off?
Do you mean Akame? Or did her parents really name her Akane Akame?
"The AMI demands free ice-cream every friday for all shinobi."
"Very well."
All in all some of the battles reminded me more of the end of the canon manga (without the stupid OP Edo Tensei).
Damn shame about losing Jiraiya, Orochimaru and Shikaku though. At least the latter will live on through his memes.
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Normally I'd agree that Naroto had a low chance of getting in, but currently all but about three or so of our clan heads are children. Who probably would have less experience then the now dead previous clan heads.
The thing I'm wondering is how many of them will have regents, and how many will be sitting as themselves
- Location
- UK
- Pronouns
- He/Him
Note that Hazō knows of exactly one successful Bloodline Limit transplant.
You must be mistaken. I've never spelled it "Pein" once in my life, since the man himself is explicit that he is using the English word with its English meaning.
Maito Gai, in case you're wondering, works the other way round. Partly because "Might Guy" sounds stupid on multiple levels, but mainly because Gai is a real Japanese name, and in fact the person who first brought this up with me had a Japanese friend called Gai. My Japanese dictionary also lists Maito (舞斗) as a name, though it doesn't specify what kind of name it is.
- Location
- Italy
So, important questions first:
@eaglejarl What is going to happen to Jiraiya corpse?
This said
[X] Action Plan: To Stride Forward
Suggestions:
I suggest talking not only with the ones who lost someone, but the ones that did not.
Hiashi is still alive, this doesn't mean Hinata will be.
On Naruto: Jiraiya was our father too, the "Poppa" things is something to retain, very good thinking, but we should reframe it as "We already lost a father once, this is second time and we know it's shitty" instead of "We lost our father before, we know how it feels", especially because it is true.
Jiraiya at the end of the day became Hazou father in a way.
I would discourage antagonizing Akatsuki, let's someone else take point at least
1)Konan jutsu would greatly help us become more powerful + she is only of the few that knows something about Rinnengan research.
2)Two, their goal roughly align with us, we can help each other in the future
3)I want to punch Konan in the face for what she did to Jiraiya, can't do that if she's dead.
4)It antagonizes the strongest asset in existence.
And...a line about Analyzing assets?
What Jiraiya left for us, Orochimaru research ect? The Rinnengan?
@eaglejarl What is going to happen to Jiraiya corpse?
This said
[X] Action Plan: To Stride Forward
Suggestions:
I suggest talking not only with the ones who lost someone, but the ones that did not.
Hiashi is still alive, this doesn't mean Hinata will be.
On Naruto: Jiraiya was our father too, the "Poppa" things is something to retain, very good thinking, but we should reframe it as "We already lost a father once, this is second time and we know it's shitty" instead of "We lost our father before, we know how it feels", especially because it is true.
Jiraiya at the end of the day became Hazou father in a way.
I would discourage antagonizing Akatsuki, let's someone else take point at least
1)Konan jutsu would greatly help us become more powerful + she is only of the few that knows something about Rinnengan research.
2)Two, their goal roughly align with us, we can help each other in the future
3)I want to punch Konan in the face for what she did to Jiraiya, can't do that if she's dead.
4)It antagonizes the strongest asset in existence.
And...a line about Analyzing assets?
What Jiraiya left for us, Orochimaru research ect? The Rinnengan?
- Location
- Potato land
Agreed. The Sage will get his comeuppance one day.
Probably. At this point, their most useful play would be to become the enemy of the world in an effort to unite it, and they don't need us for that.
While this is something we need to get to sooner rather than later, right now the focus should be on sorting out the mess that is both Leaf internal politics and the international balance of power. Knowing what's in the black sites won't help us in the event of Hiashi becoming Homage.
- Location
- UK
- Pronouns
- He/Him
Just making sure it's obvious, but jōnin Iron Nerve welders don't randomly trip over rocks.
Tua
鸡肉面条汤
- Location
- شوربة الدجاج المعكرونة
Admittedly I wasn't 100% sure if her line that Kurosawa never lose control was confirmation that this was a deliberately feigned weakness or whether she was trying to convince herself that she wasn't in way over her head fighting against S-rankers.
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- Location
- Potato land
@eaglejarl do you think we could get an interlude this voting cycle?
This is an incredibly important moment for the quest, with a huge density of decision points. It's not very clear how the plans should be structured - our conversations with Tsunade and Naruto will be very important, for example, but we don't even know the state they're in right now. Looking at the winning plan, I see a ton of potential scenes that I don't think any of us want to skip, but you'll never fit them in a single update. I think we might need a different level of time compression for the next few updates.
Plus, this way @Velorien gets to reveal Akane's fate, as was prophesized, and you guys get to have more time to figure out what happens next, which I imagine to be a challenge.
What do you think?
This is an incredibly important moment for the quest, with a huge density of decision points. It's not very clear how the plans should be structured - our conversations with Tsunade and Naruto will be very important, for example, but we don't even know the state they're in right now. Looking at the winning plan, I see a ton of potential scenes that I don't think any of us want to skip, but you'll never fit them in a single update. I think we might need a different level of time compression for the next few updates.
Plus, this way @Velorien gets to reveal Akane's fate, as was prophesized, and you guys get to have more time to figure out what happens next, which I imagine to be a challenge.
What do you think?
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Emstar
The Shining One
- Location
- Trapped in an extradimensional rift.
- Pronouns
- She/They
Not particularly, I just disagree with your argument
For the record, my preferences for Hokage are (in order):
1) Tsunade
2) Naruto
3)Chouza
4) Hiashi
Of these, I am pretty much ambivalent about which of the non-Hiashi candidates win.
@MadScientist :
First: If we could word the first bullet to be like
- Touch base with and offer condolences to our allies.
- Tsunade
- What do we do?!
- Shikamaru and Ino
- First, be supportive if they need a friend. They've just lost their fathers.
- We know you're grieving, but we need to work quickly to secure the political situation. Is there anything the Nara had in place for such an outside-expectations scenario?
- Tsunade
Second comment:
If Mari is adamantly giving you the "Woe is me, I am so evil this is my fault." act: Shock her out of it. Begin Hazou rant: No, you don't get to take credit for this one, because NO ONE could've seen this coming--SHUT UP MARI *I* am talking here, you can feed me a pile of bullshit I'll disregard out of hand later, because right now there is. No. TIME ! If you don't like the person you've been then change that by taking the first step-- the hardest step-- now. Pull it together, or you'll be failing us along a completely different axis than the one you think you are!
Third comment:
We need a pile of Skywalker blanks YESTERDAY and on the double! All of these in-clan conversations need to take place while Hazou is literally printing these on a desk a la Ch 259. Kagome needs to help too. Sleep is a luxury the next few days, everyone will have to deal with a few hours worth of power naps crammed in wherever we can fit them.
Fourth:
Adopt Naruto. Get the paperwork done.
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- Location
- The Deep Blue Sea
At one point I counted up across 50 simulations and it came out like 26/24 Allies/Akatsuki. I remember one where the only survivors were Jiraiya and a Sand puppet weirder. This whole thing was very much on a knife's edge.
HDK. You haven't heard any mention of new jinchūriki, not anything about rampaging tailed beasts.
You might be surprised.
Not so. Sand had one jōnin *survive the battle*. Not all their jōnin were part of the strike force, nor were all the Mist or Leaf ones.
We'll see what we can do.
Not so far as Hazō is aware.