- Location
- United States
I just realized that I have been reading all of Cannai's lines in your voice.
Marked for Death: A Rational Naruto Quest
- Thread starter eaglejarl
- Start date
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- 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
- Location
- United States
If we did truly lose our ability to summon, then we're walking a very fine line to treason by not telling Asuma about it immediately. Remember, the conditions of the contest stated we had to be deployable or he would give the scroll to someone else. By not telling him, we make it seem like we're concealing important military informations so that we don't lose the scroll.
- Location
- Yes.
*we're all gonna dieeeeeeing in faflec*
- Location
- Texas
I would not include treasonous acts in the possibilities. Swearing fealty to a Mist ninja and swearing to attack a fellow Leaf ninja are both real bad imo.
If at all possible, I would include something about attempting to redirect Ami's ire to Oro, though that may be part of a much larger conversation.
From my point of view, the reason we were so constrained was because of a very rare set of circumstances that forced the Goketsu to temporarily place Kei is a degree of danger. Had Oro not been a member of Leaf, they could have been expelled from the village, or attacked, or any other number of options. Had they not been so strong, the Goketsu's combined power could have scared them off. Had they cared about the Goketsu's contributions to Leaf, they would have seen that the potential price wasn't worth it. Had they not been an S ranker, the Hokage could have handled them.
There is only one ninja that fits that criteria, and Kei and Ami are choosing to take their displeasure out on Mari because they can't do shit to Oro.
Probably part of a larger discussion, if ever mentioned.
Noumero
Omit Needless Words
Suggested modification, @Shrooms:
- Relay Ami and Snowflake conversations to Akane, Noburi, Mari, and Kagome
- Probe their opinions on contracts Ami would accept
- Mari: Hazou expects she'd be opposed to indulging Ami at all, and might try to handle it on her own, social-spec to social-spec. Hazou trusts her judgement, but he'd greatly appreciate if she looped him into anything she does, preferably before doing it.
- Akane, Mari, you've chatted with Ami often. Do you think Hazou handled things correctly?
redzonejoe
Vaguely Pastafarian
- Location
- Canada
Giving up Goketsu assets to Hyuga? That's weak af.
Instead, commit to activating 50, no, 100 implosion seals stacked together on or near Hazo's body, with Mari also being within arm's reach, at a location of Ami's choosing (preferably with Hazo being allowed to offer arguments or suggestions), within a timeframe of no longer than it would take to fetch Mari and reach the target at full speed. Additional details to be decided, but it's a start.
If Mari tries to sacrifice Kei, Mari is instead/additionally commiting her and Hazo's life. And also the lives and assets of anyone or anything anywhere close to whatever Ami chooses as a target that could somehow hurt Mari the most. The Hokage tower? The middle of Mari's home? Somewhere near Orochimaru? Maybe just do leaf a solid and blow up all of rock or cloud?
Didn't implosion seals open up a rift to the beyond at like, 11 or something? you think 100 is enough for the kind of impact we hope to never have to make?
Instead, commit to activating 50, no, 100 implosion seals stacked together on or near Hazo's body, with Mari also being within arm's reach, at a location of Ami's choosing (preferably with Hazo being allowed to offer arguments or suggestions), within a timeframe of no longer than it would take to fetch Mari and reach the target at full speed. Additional details to be decided, but it's a start.
If Mari tries to sacrifice Kei, Mari is instead/additionally commiting her and Hazo's life. And also the lives and assets of anyone or anything anywhere close to whatever Ami chooses as a target that could somehow hurt Mari the most. The Hokage tower? The middle of Mari's home? Somewhere near Orochimaru? Maybe just do leaf a solid and blow up all of rock or cloud?
Didn't implosion seals open up a rift to the beyond at like, 11 or something? you think 100 is enough for the kind of impact we hope to never have to make?
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- Location
- The Maple Syrup Mountains
It's unclear whether adding more implosion seals to the stack creates the risk of multiple sealing failures, or if them all going off at once simply creates one big sealing failure. If you want to create multiple sealing failures, I would recommend the following:
- Set up many piles of implosion seals, each well past the safe range. Give them to various civilians in our spy network in a small wooden box and tell them to keep the box safe until further instruction. If we renege, orders go out to all said civilians to toss the box into a fire.
- Publish intentionally, subtly false research notes, of the kind that will inspire sealmasters to attempt his design and fail miserably because even though it looks like it should work it doesn't actually work.
- Buy out supply stores for sealing-grade paper and ink and subtly contaminate the supplies so that all seals made from such materials are likely to fail when used.
- Attempt to earthshape the Great Seal into a pretzel.
This leaves us with a rather narrow margin of acceptable actions, as we cannot promise to destroy many civilians of other nations - this is presumably already being done to the best of Leaf's ability - or other actions to our distaste but Leaf's advantage, and we cannot promise actions directly to Leaf's disadvantage, but we still need the action to be of such impact to our sensibilities that we would never consider breaking the promise. In that light, signing all Goketsu assets over to the Hyuuga is actually a very sensible first option - it's not to the direct benefit or detriment of Leaf as a whole as measured by its dictator, and yet transferring all of our material wealth from the most liberal clan to the most conservative clan will naturally be something we do not wish to do.
That said, I'm not too keen on the Hyuuga option either. After all, they stand to gain tremendously from the promise being broken, do they not? It's honestly a pretty gaping weak point, since the whole point is to make sure nobody threatens Kei and here we are giving the Hyuuga elders the opportunity of a lifetime: declaw a great enemy and gain excessive amounts of wealth? Maybe they'd resist the temptation, but if Ami were happy with that level of confidence we wouldn't be here in the first place.
So in conclusion, it needs to be treason-neutral, neither something Leaf is already doing nor something we would be executed just for planning, and also not to anyone's benefit so as to give them incentives to disrupt the contract. Secrecy of the contract cannot be assumed because only a fool would bet their existence on their enemies and rivals not being good at espionage, and yet the act must be so repugnant to us that we would never seriously entertain accepting such a consequence. Good luck.
- Pronouns
- He/Him
Not that she'd necessarily be comfortable with these but the main point is to make Ami believe Mari would be unwilling to sacrifice Kei. These seem more like Hazou-centric consequences to me than Mari-centric
redzonejoe
Vaguely Pastafarian
- Location
- Canada
Opening up rifts is just the bomb's variation of spreading radiation/salting the earth. Primary goal of the stacked implosion seal is "nothing nearby remains intact". Explosions are one thing, but dimensional rifts are a bit harder to protect against or recover from.
My point was to turn Hazo into a suicide bomber. If Mari thinks protecting Hazo is worth Sacrificing Kei, this is a commitment that says no, you are sacrificing Hazo.
On top of that, I added Mari being in arm's range of the implosion to additionally remove her from the equation. If she somehow still decides to sacrifice Kei even knowing the additional costs of doing so, clearly she can no longer be allowed to live long enough to sacrifice anyone else. Especially if Kei manages to remain alive, can't go sacrificing her a third time.
But there might, theoretically, be some goal that's worth sacrificing both Hazo, herself, and Kei for, along with potentially others. So giving Ami control of the target means whatever it is hypothetical future Mari thinks is worth the Sacrifice, Ami can see it destroyed. Whether what Mari is protecting is uplift, or leaf, or her family, or just herself, Ami can turn to Hazo and say "Blow that shit up" and Hazo will be contractually obligated to do so.
Of course it's unlikely Hazo would actually go through with such an action. "Oops Mari fucked up time to suicide bomb her myself and everything I've worked for all my life" is not a realistic expectation, contract or no. But it's a starting point, details to be worked out later. Perhaps we can give Ami the stacked seals and she can choose Hazo/Mari as a target, with whatever else is around merely being collateral damage.
Anyways the real purpose is that the threat is severe enough that Hazo and Mari and anybody else aware of it will be highly incentivized to not sacrifice Kei. Hopefully enough to satisfy Ami's protective instincts. "Ami might kill me" obviously isn't enough, but "Ami has
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- Location
- Book Fort
- Pronouns
- They/Them
You know how Hazou has repeatedly mentioned how Ino, Akane, and Sealing are the only things that can quiet his overactive/overfull mind? I wonder if this is Ami's equivalent?
I suppose the next question would be "is it a familial, platonic reaction, or one rooted in romance (as Hazou's is with his partners)?" Or maybe it's one of those odd friendships tinged with an undercurrent of romantic/sexual tension? I'm told that the grey areas between "platonic" and "romantic" are thrilling things to meander around (though, to the best of my knowledge, I've obviously no personal experience in the matter).
The notion of "we're strictly friends, but I'd take them out on a candlelit dinner if they were ever interested" seems like it might map well onto Ami's relationship with Hazou. But I'm approaching this from an outsider's perspective, so perhaps not.
Of course... Ami did mention that she's considered herself to have gone in several dates with Hazou before, she did propose marriage to him at least once, and Hazou did form a verbal pact with the Ami that is about to become officialized into a contractually binding agreement. And they have a certain amount of affection for each other.
@Velorien, did Hazou just marry Ami in every way that matters? Contractually binding his life to hers, for the purposes of protecting Kei (publicly affirming a private pact made some time ago, which had been witnessed by a beloved third party)? Sure seems like it.
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- Location
- Book Fort
- Pronouns
- They/Them
This is scarily accurate.
When Ami was going to use the rumors of an Akane pregnancy as an excuse to go back to Mist (we misunderstood and thought that she started the rumors), I had drafted up a plan that essentially boiled down to "Ami, there has been a disconnect in your model of us and our priorities. You hurt us today by [bleh] and let's work together to clarify this miscommunication and reforge our friendship all the stronger for it."
When Ami was talking to Hazou-pilot, she said something to the effect of "my model of you was that you would tell me how I hurt you --as if I didn't already know --and work to overcome that together."
It was... quite odd, being seen by a fictional character in such a way --however inadvertently. It's partly why I headcanon that Ami knows about the existence of Hazou's Hivemind, even if he, himself, doesn't.
Like Velorien said: "Hazou-the-character is insane by any common metric," but also that "someone with familiarity regarding pluralities may be able to deduce the similarities between Hazou's ever-shifting values/priorities and that of a plurality."
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Noumero
Omit Needless Words
Edit:
@Shrooms, maybe include that.
So @Paperclipped on Discord noted that this has happened again, and we should absolutely ask now.
An additional issue is the difficulty of decommitment — of dismantling the commitment — which needs to sky-high. For example, a contract to become the Hyuuga's vassals could be left with the Tower, encrypted with a cypher divided into three parts separately given to the Nara, the Hyuuga, and Tsunade, and stipulated to be decrypted and put into effect in the event of Kei's death. To get out of that contract, we would need to either destroy the Tower, completely annihilate one of the key holders, or flee Leaf, in addition to killing Ami. By comparison, something informal and bound into our own person, like "Hazou blows himself up", could be avoided just by deciding not to, then somehow dealing with Ami — at which point the contract is useless, since if Mari sacrificed Kei we'd need to kill Ami anyway, so it offers no additional protection.
@Shrooms, maybe include that.
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- Location
- Europa, Jupiter Orbit
That's a non-enforceable contract. The Hyuuga thing means that if Mari threatens Kei's life them Ami can show the contract to both the Hyuuga and the Hokage, thus ensuring absolute calamity upon the Goketsu.
Anyway, I am against it. We can't risk the livelihoods of everyone who lives on the compound for just one person. Not if the clause can be determined by something like "as determined by Ami or her representative" (who even is that). I do not trust Ami enough to do that. I can imagine possible future situations where she could trigger it or cause it's triggering deliberately. Not many, but more than zero. Which is too many.
- Location
- United States
I think it would be important to say, explicitly, that Hazou is disgusted by what Mari did and agrees it's not the Goketsu way to sacrifice others and that a formal enforcement/policy of this standard of behavior would be appropriate. That Uplift is about self sacrifice for others, not sacrificing others for the self.
I'm not sure how to phrase that tersely, but not including it will imply (a) that Hazou is tacitly ok with what Mari did (I know some of the Hivemind is ok with it from a consequentialist perspective, but consider Kei/Ami's emotional perspective), and (b) that Hazou knows he can't stop Mari from doing it in the future but doesn't want to constrain her at risk to himself/the clan, and is only doing this under duress of Mari being killed - meaning he's putting Mari's welfare ahead of the clan's and ahead of Kei's (which is actually pretty screwed up to consider it as Clan Head), which means (c) the only way to justify putting the Clan in potential future jeopardy is by saying we're not a Clan if we're without our guiding principles, so this will ensure that our principles control and guide our actions.
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Separate from my comments on the plan in particular, in general, I'm also rather concerned that any contract involving another clan will result in Mari/any Goketsu being intentionally placed/tricked into a position of choosing immediate and imminent safety over a very minor perceived risk to Kei and making a snap decision for the downfall of the Goketsu. That would be a prime exploitable target by our political enemies. Also, things like the Isan plan that Kei thought was a sacrificial plan - that could potentially trigger the terms of the contract, imagine losing the Clan because of that?
The more I think about it, I think any contract like this is a bad idea. Normal clans don't need to do this because their Clan Head's authority is sufficiently accepted and followed, and the clan culture is defined by years and generations of history and practice. With FOOM, in two years time, Hazou will have absolute authority in the Clan via punching, so any external check on decisions that may impact Kei would no longer be necessary at that point.
Also, from a more meta perspective, I'm inclined to argue about the specific words and comma placement in a contract so serious that the Goketsu Clan's existence may depend on it being done appropriately. No one wants this Quest to become a contract negotiation simulator. The issue is that Ami is a generally rational operator, and her response to any of our raised concerns about abuses of the contract will be (a) then don't do it (Ami is in a much stronger negotiation position rush us and doesn't need a contract she isn't fully satisfied by), (b) Ami is judging potential violations (don't you trust her good faith and assurances she won't personally abuse it in order to coerce the Goketsu into doing things she doesn't want?) or (c) those are reasonable concerns but the contract would be valueless with all the exception clauses so Ami refuses.
Waiting on Kei and Snowflake's input, but I doubt there will be a good contract that is satisfactorily unlikely to be abused and can justify putting Mari ahead of the Clan - barring a principled position, but those same principles must condemn Mari simultaneously, which would lose her the protection of those principles - much like the pedophile Hazou executed. So there really isn't a justifiable perspective to put so much at risk to save Mari from Ami, except (perhaps) from a consequentialist perspective, but even that is lacking here because a consequentialist couldn't really justify accepting the risk of ending the Clan on Mari's behalf.
- Location
- UK
- Pronouns
- He/Him
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- Location
- Temporally? Now.
First off:
AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHH!
Being in the unstressful situation of reading the conversation instead of having to live it in real time, I was very frustrated with how Hazou handled the talk. I understand that it's realistic to have the injured, overworked teen not perfectly think about what classes of arguments would work on this person and which would be counter productive (exemplar god-mode conversationalist MC when?), but it was still frustrating to have the update basically be a beautifully written slow-motion train wreck.
Ami's entire argument basically boils down to "I think I might I agree that Mari did everything right, but I require a 100% guarantee that this will never happen again or I'll destroy your loved ones."
She stated that she believes that Kei is perfect in every possible way (which she's intelligent enough to know is irrational), and directly stated that she knows her belief that her bond with Kei being utterly and completely unique is irrational. Yet she still allows (or purposely uses) this irrational and incorrect belief to justify her actions, and expect everyone else to go along with it.
Put another way, my interpretation of what happened was:
Ami admitted that her version of reality was wrong and irrational, then stated that in accordance with that irrational reality, she was going to destroy Mari unless we let her put a knife to the Goketsu's necks. She's doing this for herself, for her own emotional validation.
I'd argue that there are two main things that weren't directly stated in the update that might be true here, and they might both be:
I mean, I get it. She's been having to deal with Orochimaru-esque situations her whole life, where someone powerful is insane at her and she has to figure out a work around or suffer their entitlement or incompetence. I don't know if she's self aware enough to realize that she's doing the exact same thing here.
This is, unfortunately, a very normal human thing. Hopefully, normal enough that our social spec has a reasonably proven approach/solution.
I also think it's interesting that her only solutions are destructive in nature, though I might be reading too much into that. When Keiko was being bullied, she never considered uplifting the bullies to understand that their actions hurt them too and prevent them from getting to the optimal solution of everyone being allied. She presumably only talked with Keiko about forceful solutions, as Keiko would almost certainly have allowed a peaceful and uplifting solution that helped everyone. Same with this situation. Oro is the real problem. She can't attack Oro, so Mari makes a convenient substitute target.
Wow. After typing all that, I think I could have just said "She doesn't optimize towards solutions, and instead optimizes towards emotional validation of her preexisting issues and trauma through the use of force (usually socially)."
Which, you know. That's such a common IRL thing that if we solve it, we should stop playing this quest and go solve all the worlds problems. And get all the Nobel Peace Prizes. Forever.
Alternately, she wants the emotional validation of hurting people due to existing trauma, so she's set an unreachable, arbitrarily high goal so that when we fail to reach it she's justified in her attack. If we do reach said goal, we'll have essentially (un?)conditionally surrendered to her.
AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHH!
Being in the unstressful situation of reading the conversation instead of having to live it in real time, I was very frustrated with how Hazou handled the talk. I understand that it's realistic to have the injured, overworked teen not perfectly think about what classes of arguments would work on this person and which would be counter productive (exemplar god-mode conversationalist MC when?), but it was still frustrating to have the update basically be a beautifully written slow-motion train wreck.
So...the contract is nuts, right? There's no way we'll do this? Right?
Ami's entire argument basically boils down to "I think I might I agree that Mari did everything right, but I require a 100% guarantee that this will never happen again or I'll destroy your loved ones."
She stated that she believes that Kei is perfect in every possible way (which she's intelligent enough to know is irrational), and directly stated that she knows her belief that her bond with Kei being utterly and completely unique is irrational. Yet she still allows (or purposely uses) this irrational and incorrect belief to justify her actions, and expect everyone else to go along with it.
Put another way, my interpretation of what happened was:
Ami admitted that her version of reality was wrong and irrational, then stated that in accordance with that irrational reality, she was going to destroy Mari unless we let her put a knife to the Goketsu's necks. She's doing this for herself, for her own emotional validation.
I'd argue that there are two main things that weren't directly stated in the update that might be true here, and they might both be:
- Mari is just a stand in for everyone she couldn't hurt while having to watch Kei suffer. Ami alluded to this, but didn't directly say so.
- Mari is a stand in for the people that were unreasonable and threatening to Ami, and this incident is a trigger-justification for being unreasonable and threatening right back while getting the emotional validation of no longer being on the receiving end, like how quite a bit of real world bullying works.
I mean, I get it. She's been having to deal with Orochimaru-esque situations her whole life, where someone powerful is insane at her and she has to figure out a work around or suffer their entitlement or incompetence. I don't know if she's self aware enough to realize that she's doing the exact same thing here.
This is, unfortunately, a very normal human thing. Hopefully, normal enough that our social spec has a reasonably proven approach/solution.
I also think it's interesting that her only solutions are destructive in nature, though I might be reading too much into that. When Keiko was being bullied, she never considered uplifting the bullies to understand that their actions hurt them too and prevent them from getting to the optimal solution of everyone being allied. She presumably only talked with Keiko about forceful solutions, as Keiko would almost certainly have allowed a peaceful and uplifting solution that helped everyone. Same with this situation. Oro is the real problem. She can't attack Oro, so Mari makes a convenient substitute target.
Wow. After typing all that, I think I could have just said "She doesn't optimize towards solutions, and instead optimizes towards emotional validation of her preexisting issues and trauma through the use of force (usually socially)."
Which, you know. That's such a common IRL thing that if we solve it, we should stop playing this quest and go solve all the worlds problems. And get all the Nobel Peace Prizes. Forever.
Yes
Because she's being irrational.
Alternately, she wants the emotional validation of hurting people due to existing trauma, so she's set an unreachable, arbitrarily high goal so that when we fail to reach it she's justified in her attack. If we do reach said goal, we'll have essentially (un?)conditionally surrendered to her.
I think she probably got it anyway.
I completely agree, but keep in mind that they're ignoring Oro's presence in this situation (because they can't do anything about it). So to them Keiko was only in danger due to Mari . Therefore, Mari doesn't get any credit for risking herself to save Keiko. Never mind that Snowflake was advertising the thing that put her in danger and Oro could have found out at any time and would have eventually.
Probably something along the lines of "If you can't contend with my agency when I'm nominally aligned with your goals and am almost a clan member by relationships, how can you hope to accomplish uplift in the face of powerful people that oppose your end goals and would think nothing of destroying you. If you can't do this, how am I to trust that you can accomplish uplift at all? Something something self-deception. Something something cynicism."
Thank you. These needs to be said more.
I think she stated in the update that she didn't feel that her actions would be an infringement on Kei's agency. Whether that's a disingenuous belief or not, only Ami knows.
Hopefully she'll try killing Ami before she tries killing herself.
I think Ami was stating that only Ami had a good model of Ami.
This needs to be brought up to both of them. Probably Kei first. Actually, probably Mari first.
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- Location
- Book Fort
- Pronouns
- They/Them
With Ami? No such thing! Part of why I enjoy reading her character, to be honest
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- Pronouns
- He/Him
Every time Hazou has discusses the subject he has indicated he feels the opposite. He even already gave Mari his heartfelt thanks already which made Yuno mad at him. This just doesn't make sense for him to say in-character imo
They're my favorites so if they both died I would be real sad
While I agree with this generally, I think that Ami thinks that her own wrath is a good enough 'stick' for the contract. As in, if we don't follow through to what she considers a sufficient level, she will 'destroy the Gouketsu' completely and utterly. So I don't think we need to make it too difficult to disarm, because if we don't do it in a way Ami likes she will go nuclear anyways, and at least by her estimation, she would succeed.
I do really like this point and want to try to find a way to work it in
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- Location
- Book Fort
- Pronouns
- They/Them
I propose that, when we bring the signed contract to Ami, we tell her the similarities between this and a marriage license. It'll be wonderful!
[X] In Which Hazou Proposes Catastrophic Damage As Damage Control
- Pronouns
- He/Him
True! Although, I want to see what everyone says about such a contract before we as a playerbase actually vote one in...
Still, if we end up doing it then this would be amazing
- Location
- Italy
What stops me from voting for this is "Ami thinks Hazou wants to cheat out of the agreement by using Kei and reacts badly" that...is exactly what we're doing?
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Noumero
Omit Needless Words
RE: Mari vs. Ami
Generally speaking, my impression is that Mari doesn't have much respect for Ami or her bullshit. She recognizes her as a fellow player, concedes to her greater expertise in certain matters, acknowledges her skills and achievements... But that's all. To Mari, she's just the sum of her capabilities; not a force of nature like Kages and Sannin. The last time Ami pissed Mari off, she beat her at a game of deception, then gleefully drowned her in soup. The last time Ami peeved Mari, she was gearing up to "teach her her place once and for all".
Much of the hivemind seems to be approaching the situation with the mindset of appeasing a nascent essie. I feel like Mari's attitude is going to be more along the lines of "You told Hazou to do what? Come over here, you little shit...", to unclear results.
Maybe the fact that she brought Ren down would change that, but maybe not. Like most ninja, I suspect Mari has some trouble seeing past her probable ability to murder Ami in spontaneous combat.
(Or, at least, that might be her initial reaction, before the Heartbreaker takes the wheel. At which point... You know, maybe the real outcome of the latest update was buying the Heartbreaker enough time to put a proper assassination plot in place.)
And the thing is... I'm not sure Mari would be wrong about this? Ami talked a big game about being untouchable and more well-positioned than the Gouketsu, but I suspect much of that was a play to assert dominance, because c'mon.
I mean, yeah, realistically speaking we aren't going to do anything to her, probably not even if she outright gets Mari killed. It'd require committing significant resources to a negative-sum game, and this just ain't how the hivemind rolls. (Maybe if Ami actually killed her and somehow got access to FOOM against our wishes, in which case she'd be both reviled and a credible long-term threat. Or something on that order.) But imagine if there was, like, a 10,000 XP bounty on her head, with a stipulation that we need to preserve our position in Leaf at the end to collect it. We'd make enemies, burn bridges, maybe risk another killbox, but I really doubt she'd survive the month with her geopolitical relevance intact. Or if we told Mari that Ami has become a Problem and gave her carte blanche on resolving it.
We aren't going to do that when push comes to shove, and Ami knows it, so our threats to that effect aren't credible as-is. They can't be used to enforce Ami's behaviour, either: if we precommit to destroying her if she hurts Mari, she'll just work to quietly destroy us without triggering the precommitment. But I'm feeling fine about our chances if it comes down to open warfare, and very confident when it comes to proactive assassination.
Generally speaking, my impression is that Mari doesn't have much respect for Ami or her bullshit. She recognizes her as a fellow player, concedes to her greater expertise in certain matters, acknowledges her skills and achievements... But that's all. To Mari, she's just the sum of her capabilities; not a force of nature like Kages and Sannin. The last time Ami pissed Mari off, she beat her at a game of deception, then gleefully drowned her in soup. The last time Ami peeved Mari, she was gearing up to "teach her her place once and for all".
Much of the hivemind seems to be approaching the situation with the mindset of appeasing a nascent essie. I feel like Mari's attitude is going to be more along the lines of "You told Hazou to do what? Come over here, you little shit...", to unclear results.
Maybe the fact that she brought Ren down would change that, but maybe not. Like most ninja, I suspect Mari has some trouble seeing past her probable ability to murder Ami in spontaneous combat.
(Or, at least, that might be her initial reaction, before the Heartbreaker takes the wheel. At which point... You know, maybe the real outcome of the latest update was buying the Heartbreaker enough time to put a proper assassination plot in place.)
And the thing is... I'm not sure Mari would be wrong about this? Ami talked a big game about being untouchable and more well-positioned than the Gouketsu, but I suspect much of that was a play to assert dominance, because c'mon.
I mean, yeah, realistically speaking we aren't going to do anything to her, probably not even if she outright gets Mari killed. It'd require committing significant resources to a negative-sum game, and this just ain't how the hivemind rolls. (Maybe if Ami actually killed her and somehow got access to FOOM against our wishes, in which case she'd be both reviled and a credible long-term threat. Or something on that order.) But imagine if there was, like, a 10,000 XP bounty on her head, with a stipulation that we need to preserve our position in Leaf at the end to collect it. We'd make enemies, burn bridges, maybe risk another killbox, but I really doubt she'd survive the month with her geopolitical relevance intact. Or if we told Mari that Ami has become a Problem and gave her carte blanche on resolving it.
We aren't going to do that when push comes to shove, and Ami knows it, so our threats to that effect aren't credible as-is. They can't be used to enforce Ami's behaviour, either: if we precommit to destroying her if she hurts Mari, she'll just work to quietly destroy us without triggering the precommitment. But I'm feeling fine about our chances if it comes down to open warfare, and very confident when it comes to proactive assassination.
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- Location
- Temporally? Now.
The contract, or anything that could be large enough in scale to substitute, seems nuts to me. At the risk of straw manning, I'd like to present how I feel this would go over with the clan:
Hazou:
Hazou:
Hazou:
This evening is the soonest that I can get back on here, so if I don't see a plan by then that has us firmly saying no to capitulating to Ami, and then discuss what to do, I'll make one.
Hazou:
Hey, does everyone remember that foreign social-spec that's really good
at twisting people around to basically be her pets? Well, that foreign operator just threatened to destroy a high level member of our clan and one of the few remaining jonin our village has. Don't worry though, I managed to talk her into not doing that so long as we sign a contract designed to completely destroy our clan under certain circumstances.
Yes, during our conversation she did admit to being irrational about the subject the contract is about, and set literally impossible standards of 0% risk.
That being said, I think we should go along with it if it's ok with Kei and you all.
Everyone:Have you considered that this is an attack?
Hazou:
Yes this is an attack. However, I don't think it's a social ploy or disingenuous attack where she pretends to be offended to make us think her attacking is justified. I think she genuinely feels like she's entitled to this, and I for one am inclined to go along with it. And put that in writing. In a legal contract. That is explicitly about destroy our clan.
Everyone:Isn't this treason?
Hazou:
Yes, the hokage might like to know that the foreign social operator is threatening high level konoha jounin. And is saying she'll only stop if we we do something on the scale of risk destroying a clan on the clan council, possibly massively altering both the war effort and konoha politics. But I thought that I should come talk to you all first. About accepting.
Everyone:<eyes each other>
Hazou:Oh you guys worry too much. No one could possibly think that I'm the social specs pet, and I'm definitely still good to lead this clan with my proven amazing judgment. Don't worry.
I don't mean to disparage plan makers, god knows I rarely put forth the effort to vote, so don't really get to complain about the direction the story takes, but going along with this seems bad in every way. Like, definitely bad enough to no longer be the clan head, and possibly bad enough to be considered treason.This evening is the soonest that I can get back on here, so if I don't see a plan by then that has us firmly saying no to capitulating to Ami, and then discuss what to do, I'll make one.
- Location
- Book Fort
- Pronouns
- They/Them
HAZOU: "Before I sign this, would it be appropriate to make a joke?"
AMI: "You've intrigued us... Go ahead."
HAZOU: [Explains how this is like a marriage contract]
AMI: "Hm. While we acknowledge the superficial simil--"
HAZOU: [hands over the signed contract]
AMI: "But you just said you believed this was similar to marriage?"
HAZOU: "Yup."
AMI: "And you signed it anyway?"
HAZOU: "Or, maybe, because of that."
AMI: "We're going to hug you now. But, for the record, you get to explain this to Akane."
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- Pronouns
- He/Him
When did Ami say or imply this? I don't think she has a problem with us running the contract by Kei.
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