Noumero
Omit Needless Words
Oh, right, I've self-assigned myself the task of selecting creative training ideas.
Does that look fine?
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Marked for Death: A Rational Naruto Quest
- Thread starter eaglejarl
- Start date
-
- Tags
- 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 open voting
Emstar
The Shining One
- Location
- Trapped in an extradimensional rift.
- Pronouns
- She/They
This is drawing from your list to put into the plan?
- Location
- Europe
[x] Action Plan: "More Like a Cobweb, Really"
Noumero
Omit Needless Words
Yes. Well, I'm not going to it put into the plan, I'll just put it on top of my compilation list and hide the rest under a spoiler.
Also, I wholly support doing this ASAP.
Emstar
The Shining One
- Location
- Trapped in an extradimensional rift.
- Pronouns
- She/They
Tentative "yea" on the first bit (I don't see any of those as sufficiently amusing to count) and a great big "Absolutely!" on the second point.
I really don't want to go into a hiatus over this. The Tower is making sealmasters smith skywalkers for pennies because this is the established way for them to do that within the framework of convention and war is imminent. Think "ship money". The Tower is sandbagging the selling price of other seals and hoarding them off the market because it needs them as well and it incentivizes sealmasters to create more skywalkers. In normal times the fiat price for Tower purchases is meaningless because they just "buy" what they need with a token payment out of respect for tradition and privilege while the right of first refusal is only enforced beyond that to monitor and collect data on the seal market.
"War is coming in a matter of days. If you spoiled inkmonkeys want to raise a fuss over a temporary tax hike we'll be happy to make you serve your duties with frontline combat instead. That's what we thought. Get back to work."
"War is coming in a matter of days. If you spoiled inkmonkeys want to raise a fuss over a temporary tax hike we'll be happy to make you serve your duties with frontline combat instead. That's what we thought. Get back to work."
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Rihaku
The Internet
It would be helpful if the GMs let us know what, if any additional work is necessary for economics to be done, assuming the present work is not sufficient!
Nah, that wouldn't work. As mentioned earlier sealmasters can just sell internally to clanmates, stockpile seals themselves, or do research until prices change. The only means to get more production that way would be to mandate additional quotas, which they have not done. Furthermore, the 'tower' itself has no implicit authority, being the vessel of the Hokage's policy; they are likely bound to carry out the previous (Jiraiya's) policy, which would not be antagonistic towards sealmasters, until a new Kage could be elected.
I'm not sure where you guys got the idea that lowering the price would somehow increase supply... any given merchant is already going to spend as much of their time as is practical on their most lucrative activity, if you make the most lucrative activity something else, that's not going to increase the target activity. If Seals pay well, Sealmasters will already spend all their time making seals; if they pay poorly, they'll spend more time doing research or making seals for personal / clan use. If you artificially lower the price of grain, you're not going to get people planting more grain, and existing grain farmers will switch to corn or opium instead.
If policymakers wanted to stimulate seal production it would be more logical to add temporary bonus pay for certain kinds of seals and (if fiat) print money or (if gold-backed) issue/pay with bonds. Just like how soldiers get hazard / mission pay for actual combat missions.
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- Location
- UK
- Pronouns
- He/Him
I'd like to say we're working on it, and we are, but I, at least, am utterly overwhelmed by the whole thing, so please don't expect an immediate response to the remarkable totality of your analysis.
- Location
- The Void
- Pronouns
- She/Her
I've been very confused why this isn't how the current situation has been represented
- Location
- America
[x] Action Plan: "More Like a Cobweb, Really"
this is due to @eaglejarl 's xp for unique voters initiative
this is due to @eaglejarl 's xp for unique voters initiative
- Location
- USA
[x] Action Plan: "More Like a Cobweb, Really"
[X] Action Plan: "More Like a Cobweb, Really"
Just another lurker emerging to claim the XP bonus. Noumero's plan seems unlikely to backfire horribly (barring meditations on disguise triggering a Watcher Interrupt) and the strategy session may turn up some interesting results. Hazō's ideas might elicit horrified stares, but that just makes it a typical Tuesday.
Just another lurker emerging to claim the XP bonus. Noumero's plan seems unlikely to backfire horribly (barring meditations on disguise triggering a Watcher Interrupt) and the strategy session may turn up some interesting results. Hazō's ideas might elicit horrified stares, but that just makes it a typical Tuesday.
- Location
- USA
- Pronouns
- He/Him
Expectation management: The plan is reasonable, but I am extremely behind on sleep and will be at a Memorial Day picnic for a good chunk of today, so it's unlikely I'll get through all of this. I may end up just doing an Interlude and leave it for @Velorien to do.
- Location
- Europa, Jupiter Orbit
[x] Action Plan: "More Like a Cobweb, Really"
I think we shouldn't do the unique voters thing again though. People who usually don't vote do so for a reason. Incentivising voter numbers only strengthens bandwagons.
Doing it once every few months to gauge how many lurkers or occasional participants hide in the woodwork is fine though.
On to economy:
@eaglejarl @Velorien @OliWhail
If you want to have the hivemind openly work on this (as opposed to taking one or more of us *cough*Rihaku*cough* aside and promote them to interim economic QMs or something) then we will probably need a list of world-building holy cows. Things that you definitely want to remain true in your world, be it for plot or flavor. As an example, you could ask us to ensure that clanless genin remain poor enough to not be able to truly take care of their families. Or that we find a way that keeps the Gokētsu in financial peril if they keep the compound. Or somehow make Leaf/Fire a nation-state that doesn't have agricultural taxation be the military government's primary income. Or things that haven't even come up in story yet but could be majorly disrupted by an economic overhaul.
Another thing we require is a general layout of the property Jiraiya bought as a clan compound. Size, location and quality above ground mostly, both for the building(s) and for whatever land we own that went with it.
I think we shouldn't do the unique voters thing again though. People who usually don't vote do so for a reason. Incentivising voter numbers only strengthens bandwagons.
Doing it once every few months to gauge how many lurkers or occasional participants hide in the woodwork is fine though.
On to economy:
@eaglejarl @Velorien @OliWhail
If you want to have the hivemind openly work on this (as opposed to taking one or more of us *cough*Rihaku*cough* aside and promote them to interim economic QMs or something) then we will probably need a list of world-building holy cows. Things that you definitely want to remain true in your world, be it for plot or flavor. As an example, you could ask us to ensure that clanless genin remain poor enough to not be able to truly take care of their families. Or that we find a way that keeps the Gokētsu in financial peril if they keep the compound. Or somehow make Leaf/Fire a nation-state that doesn't have agricultural taxation be the military government's primary income. Or things that haven't even come up in story yet but could be majorly disrupted by an economic overhaul.
Another thing we require is a general layout of the property Jiraiya bought as a clan compound. Size, location and quality above ground mostly, both for the building(s) and for whatever land we own that went with it.
I still don't quite understand what those expenses were supposed to be. Just mortgage or something else as well?
If a formerly average sealmaster lives a survival-based solitary lifestyle and invests the vast majority of XP in sealing and sealing-related stunts for ~15 years, doesn't that transform him into a great sealmaster?
- Location
- UK
- Pronouns
- He/Him
XP growth is slow without external stimuli/challenges.
The Cultural Underpinnings of the Elemental Nations
- Location
- USA
- Pronouns
- He/Him
Worldbuilding infodump time! The following are basic assumptions that underpin all the economics and politics discussion.
We acknowledge that the following is oversimplified and offering too much credit, but: 21st-century civilization recognizes that all humans are people, that they all have equal human rights, that everyone is equally capable both physically and intellectually1, that rising tides lift all boats, and that science is the path to advancement2.
None of those statements apply in the Elemental Nations.
Think about the exceptions to the above description of 21st-century civilization...actually, no. Let's choose a less politically/religiously charged example. Imagine the American South in 1850; they would have been better off had they freed all the slaves, educated them, and slotted them into the work force as entrepreneurs and skilled workers. Did that happen? No. Was the idea, in that time and place, considered utterly laughable? Yes.
MfD is similar to but worse than the antebellum South, because the division is not based on something as comparatively minor as skin color, it's based on the fact that 0.5% of the population is literally superhuman. Depending on where you are, the attitude towards civilians varies between "beasts of burden that can be trained to talk" to "second-class citizens at best".3 Fire in general is one of the best MfD places to be a civilian and Leaf in particular is probably the best of that, mostly because Hashirama was smart enough to create the Merchant Council and then personally and ruthlessly enforce their safety until their acceptance became part of the local culture. This likely has much to do with why Leaf is one of the most prosperous nations in the EN.
This moderately enlightened view towards civilians is extremely new; Leaf was founded in the year 1000 and the current year (as of Chapter 267) is 1069. All of the other villages are even younger. Before the Village Era, civilians had no rights and no respect whatsoever from ninja. They were effectively walking lootboxes for ninja to cash in whenever it was convenient.
Consider what has been shown onscreen in highly enlightened Leaf: Civilians matter-of-factly telling stories about physical abuse by ninja. Jiraiya admitting that it happens and usually isn't reported. A civilian detention monitor being sincerely convinced that Kagome was going to kill her, and utterly unsurprised that such a thing was happening. Civilians bowing and scraping whenever it's even possible that they might maybe somehow have offered a tiny bit of offense to a ninja. Civilians walking wide around a ninja in the streets. Hana being utterly dumbfounded at the idea that Hazō might want to help civilians. The fact that till'n'fills are a brand-new invention that people consider ridiculous and vaguely embarrassing.
That's just the social attitudes. Science effectively doesn't exist. Yes, sealmasters research seals and Kabuto researches biology, but they are wildly out of step with the general population, and even then their research isn't that similar to what we consider the norm in the real world. (e.g., the idea of double-blind randomized trials is nowhere to be found.)
Democracy does not exist in any meaningful sense. Every nation is a military dictatorship, de facto or de iure. The disproportionate power wielded by certain individuals distorts everything; Jiraiya could take the leadership of the most powerful nation in the world simply by saying "Do what I want or I'll kill you."4
When you do societal, economic, or political analysis on the world of MfD, your modern cultural intuitions will not serve you.
Now, is it true that the first nation to heavily emphasize infrastructure-related ninja missions is going to win the everything? Probably, as long as there aren't any civilization-ending wars, chakra-enabled plagues, etc. That does not mean that anyone in-universe recognizes that fact. If you still find that unbelievable, ask yourself this: Why are the real-world developed nations not throwing money at space development and nuclear power? NASA has been a 7:1 profit center for the USA, so why are they on a shoestring budget? Nuclear power is safer and more efficient than fossil fuels, so why didn't it become the norm decades ago? Thorium reactors generate less waste off of more available fuel than uranium reactors, so why are uranium reactors the standard?5 Jimmy Carter put solar panels on the roof of the White House in 1979; why isn't the USA running a nigh-100% renewable-energy economy?
Bigotry. Cultural blinders. Unexamined presuppositions. Powerful interests that enjoy the status quo and don't want it changed. Politicians who work for their donors instead of their constituents.
The next time you feel the need to say "But it doesn't make sense! They would be better off if they just <thing that is obvious to 21st-century people>!", please ask yourself if the problem can be explained by one of the above causes. If you think the answer is no, go back and check your analysis, because almost certainly the answer is yes.
Now for the good news: The societies of MfD are ripe for disruption. If the Gōketsu can manage to survive for another decade and if Hazō can remain influential in their decision-making then you can most likely transform the world. The first step in that, however, is for the hivemind to accept that the Elemental Nations are not the same as the modern world and that, although the actors within it are rational by their own lights, they do not share your definition of what 'rational' means.
The final objection that you might have: "But I don't agree that the world would be like this!" The reply: "We do." The QMs, after a lot of discussion and debate, have reluctantly convinced ourselves that the world of MfD works on these assumptions. The assumptions aren't up for debate, so you'll simply need to accept them as axioms if you can't agree with them. If that destroys your suspension of disbelief and ruins your enjoyment of the quest...well, there's a lot of other quests out there, and hopefully you will find something you enjoy more. Again, the assumptions are not up for debate.
The world of MfD is not the modern Western world.
That sounds simple, but it's not. Multiple times over the years that this quest has been running, we've seen statements like "Any nation that used its ninja for agriculture would outcompete all others", with the clear implication that "and therefore all nations must be using their ninja for agriculture or they aren't rational." Those statements are built on assumptions that simply don't apply.
We acknowledge that the following is oversimplified and offering too much credit, but: 21st-century civilization recognizes that all humans are people, that they all have equal human rights, that everyone is equally capable both physically and intellectually1, that rising tides lift all boats, and that science is the path to advancement2.
None of those statements apply in the Elemental Nations.
Think about the exceptions to the above description of 21st-century civilization...actually, no. Let's choose a less politically/religiously charged example. Imagine the American South in 1850; they would have been better off had they freed all the slaves, educated them, and slotted them into the work force as entrepreneurs and skilled workers. Did that happen? No. Was the idea, in that time and place, considered utterly laughable? Yes.
MfD is similar to but worse than the antebellum South, because the division is not based on something as comparatively minor as skin color, it's based on the fact that 0.5% of the population is literally superhuman. Depending on where you are, the attitude towards civilians varies between "beasts of burden that can be trained to talk" to "second-class citizens at best".3 Fire in general is one of the best MfD places to be a civilian and Leaf in particular is probably the best of that, mostly because Hashirama was smart enough to create the Merchant Council and then personally and ruthlessly enforce their safety until their acceptance became part of the local culture. This likely has much to do with why Leaf is one of the most prosperous nations in the EN.
This moderately enlightened view towards civilians is extremely new; Leaf was founded in the year 1000 and the current year (as of Chapter 267) is 1069. All of the other villages are even younger. Before the Village Era, civilians had no rights and no respect whatsoever from ninja. They were effectively walking lootboxes for ninja to cash in whenever it was convenient.
Consider what has been shown onscreen in highly enlightened Leaf: Civilians matter-of-factly telling stories about physical abuse by ninja. Jiraiya admitting that it happens and usually isn't reported. A civilian detention monitor being sincerely convinced that Kagome was going to kill her, and utterly unsurprised that such a thing was happening. Civilians bowing and scraping whenever it's even possible that they might maybe somehow have offered a tiny bit of offense to a ninja. Civilians walking wide around a ninja in the streets. Hana being utterly dumbfounded at the idea that Hazō might want to help civilians. The fact that till'n'fills are a brand-new invention that people consider ridiculous and vaguely embarrassing.
That's just the social attitudes. Science effectively doesn't exist. Yes, sealmasters research seals and Kabuto researches biology, but they are wildly out of step with the general population, and even then their research isn't that similar to what we consider the norm in the real world. (e.g., the idea of double-blind randomized trials is nowhere to be found.)
Democracy does not exist in any meaningful sense. Every nation is a military dictatorship, de facto or de iure. The disproportionate power wielded by certain individuals distorts everything; Jiraiya could take the leadership of the most powerful nation in the world simply by saying "Do what I want or I'll kill you."4
When you do societal, economic, or political analysis on the world of MfD, your modern cultural intuitions will not serve you.
Now, is it true that the first nation to heavily emphasize infrastructure-related ninja missions is going to win the everything? Probably, as long as there aren't any civilization-ending wars, chakra-enabled plagues, etc. That does not mean that anyone in-universe recognizes that fact. If you still find that unbelievable, ask yourself this: Why are the real-world developed nations not throwing money at space development and nuclear power? NASA has been a 7:1 profit center for the USA, so why are they on a shoestring budget? Nuclear power is safer and more efficient than fossil fuels, so why didn't it become the norm decades ago? Thorium reactors generate less waste off of more available fuel than uranium reactors, so why are uranium reactors the standard?5 Jimmy Carter put solar panels on the roof of the White House in 1979; why isn't the USA running a nigh-100% renewable-energy economy?
Bigotry. Cultural blinders. Unexamined presuppositions. Powerful interests that enjoy the status quo and don't want it changed. Politicians who work for their donors instead of their constituents.
The next time you feel the need to say "But it doesn't make sense! They would be better off if they just <thing that is obvious to 21st-century people>!", please ask yourself if the problem can be explained by one of the above causes. If you think the answer is no, go back and check your analysis, because almost certainly the answer is yes.
Now for the good news: The societies of MfD are ripe for disruption. If the Gōketsu can manage to survive for another decade and if Hazō can remain influential in their decision-making then you can most likely transform the world. The first step in that, however, is for the hivemind to accept that the Elemental Nations are not the same as the modern world and that, although the actors within it are rational by their own lights, they do not share your definition of what 'rational' means.
The final objection that you might have: "But I don't agree that the world would be like this!" The reply: "We do." The QMs, after a lot of discussion and debate, have reluctantly convinced ourselves that the world of MfD works on these assumptions. The assumptions aren't up for debate, so you'll simply need to accept them as axioms if you can't agree with them. If that destroys your suspension of disbelief and ruins your enjoyment of the quest...well, there's a lot of other quests out there, and hopefully you will find something you enjoy more. Again, the assumptions are not up for debate.
[1] Yes, not everyone is actually equal -- people vary by strength, intellect, etc etc. Please focus on the general point.
[2] Yes, 38% of Americans believe that the Earth was created in 6 days approximately 6,000 years ago and will fight tooth and nail to deny climate science, evolutionary biology, and anything else that might threaten the teachings of their Iron-Age book. Again, please focus on the general point.
[3] The QMs have not been as good about depicting this anti-civilian attitude as we perhaps should have been, but that is how the world is supposed to be.
[4] Granted, there are limits to how feasible it is to rule based purely on personal combat power. Jiraiya could probably have taken the hat, but he could not have kept it in the long term without the support of the clans. There needs to be some consent of the governed in order for a society to work, even if that "consent" is limited to "not actively rebelling".
[5] Because the USA wanted plutonium for nuclear weapons, and you get that from uranium reactors, not thorium reactors.
[2] Yes, 38% of Americans believe that the Earth was created in 6 days approximately 6,000 years ago and will fight tooth and nail to deny climate science, evolutionary biology, and anything else that might threaten the teachings of their Iron-Age book. Again, please focus on the general point.
[3] The QMs have not been as good about depicting this anti-civilian attitude as we perhaps should have been, but that is how the world is supposed to be.
[4] Granted, there are limits to how feasible it is to rule based purely on personal combat power. Jiraiya could probably have taken the hat, but he could not have kept it in the long term without the support of the clans. There needs to be some consent of the governed in order for a society to work, even if that "consent" is limited to "not actively rebelling".
[5] Because the USA wanted plutonium for nuclear weapons, and you get that from uranium reactors, not thorium reactors.
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The Economic Underpinnings of the Elemental Nations
- Location
- USA
- Pronouns
- He/Him
Please be sure to read the 'Cultural Underpinnings of the Elemental Nations' threadmark before reading this.
Here are the basic facts that should go into an economic analysis:
Here are the basic facts that should go into an economic analysis:
- Fire is about 300,000 people
- Leaf is about 30,000 people
- 0.5% of the population are ninja, and essentially all of them reside in Leaf
- According to the map, Fire is very roughly 300 miles wide and 200 miles high. It's extremely fertile and could be incredibly productive if it were more efficiently under cultivation. Unfortunately, a supermajority of it is old-growth forest with huge trees that are hard to log because they are (A) huge, (B) often lethally dangerous in their own right, (C) part of an ecosystem filled with lethal magical critters that consider lumberjacks to be tasty morsels.
- See previous comment about "extremely fertile". It's naturally rich ground and there's a lot of wiggle room to say "well, even with medieval tech and labor it's 5x as productive as medieval land because chakra worms or whatever".
- There is no chakrapunk in general circulation. Your average farmer has no seals, no jutsu, and no help from ninja.
- Taxes are high. People living in the countryside are poor.
- Leaf's Merchant Council are rich and powerful. They aren't villains, but as a general rule they don't care about maximizing human welfare, they care primarily about maintaining their own positions and secondarily about making Leaf more powerful than other nations.
- Clans are rich, powerful, and unshakably confident in the idea that they are better than clanless ninja...which, to be fair, is often true. Clans have wealth (and therefore better education) and either bloodlines or secret family lore that grants them greater personal power. They are very literally the 1%1 that owns a major plurality of the wealth in their various countries.
[1] Technically clans are the ~0.3%, since ~0.5% of people are ninja and ~⅔ of ninja are clan ninja.
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Description of Gōketsu Home
- Location
- USA
- Pronouns
- He/Him
This isn't just a house, it's a clan compound. It's at least two dozen acres of land, a square plot more than 300m on a side, that includes:
- A 10' wall around the whole area and an imposing gate
- A very large two-floor mansion at the end of a decorative multi-colored gravel walkway, with extensive basements and sub-basements, some of which were very clearly produced via jutsu.
- Five smaller one-family houses, again one-floor, with mundane basements
- A hedge maze with a meditation grove in the center
- Elaborate gardens, some of which contained rare medicinal herbs
- A hot spring with a communal bath house and segregated bathing areas
- A dozen minor outbuildings (sheds, a dedicated jail with 4 cells, etc)
- A training hall (a roofed building containing a 50' wide, 10' deep pit covered in sawdust to use for a sparring ground) plus an attached sickbay / recovery area
The main 'house' is more of a rambling mansion built approximately in the shape of an X. The central common area includes library (sadly, the books have all moldered away) and a commercial-grade kitchen. The wings are intended for living space and each contain various linen and cleaning closets, bathrooms, and 5 separate bedrooms varying in size from "1-person luxurious" to "master bedroom that's just silly". The basement contains the family vault. The first subbasement contains what was probably an alchemist's lab and storage for test subjects that were undoubtedly not humans, really, we promise, as well as a secret tunnel that comes up outside the walls of Leaf and contains a number of locked and barred gates down its length, as well as concealed pits and multiple sets of support beams with "PLACE EXPLOSIVE TAG HERE TO CAUSE COLLAPSE" painted on them. The exact number of subbasement levels is unknown, and it may be best left that way, since not even the ANBU wanted to go too deep.
The main house still looks impressive, but the roof leaks everywhere and has three head-sized holes where it's rotted out. (Fortunately, all on the side away from the street.) The furniture was all so musty and bug-eaten that it needed to be burned. Most of the outbuildings are badly damaged by weather, termites, chakra-enhanced varmints, etc. The grounds are second-growth forest at this point and swarming with minor varmints.
Jiraiya bought it because he felt it was a steal for what you were getting and he was planning ahead to when this would be a real clan with hundreds of people in it. As to why he thought he could afford it, based on your very limited understanding after perusing the clan account books it's clear at this point that:
He had significant training in accounting, presumably as part of running his spy network. Tracking the economics of foreign polities would have been a major focus of his efforts.
After 40+ years of ninja service and opportunities for looting the people he assassinated, he was stupidly wealthy. Of course, he left all his savings to Naruto, since he figured that the Gōketsu had enough in the bank + Pangolin income to be fine.
He had income streams aside from the Pangolin money. You can tell that they're there but you cannot understand what they are or how to put your hands on them because the paranoid bastard wrote the accounts in something that is at best a cryptic shorthand and may actually be active encoding.
If you manage to figure out what these revenues are and how to get at them, and if he hasn't bequeathed them to Naruto or someone else, then you'll be in better shape than you are.
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Noumero
Omit Needless Words
Alright, I vote we invent some kind of IQ test, make every civilian in Fire pass it, then adopt the 150+ IQ people into our clan and put them into thinktanks. The Five'll have nothing on us.
Shikaku had the right idea with Lady Yoshino; unfortunately, he didn't scale it up enough.
- Location
- France
Ah, thank you. That'll teach me to read the updates but not the discussion. Going to read it again now.
Noumero
Omit Needless Words
If you're talking about this, then, as EagleJarl says, that's just Caesar cipher.
I concede that many outside-Leaf civilians are likely to be illiterate (though I don't think we saw much trouble with local dialects), but what does that change?
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- Location
- France
I was saying that there would likely be immense logistical difficulties in even making the IQ tests, and then that there would be trouble in adapting these people to living in Leaf.
Thankfully it seems I was wrong, and was overestimating the problem.