- Location
- Texas
Omake time 👀
Speaking of training plans, I wonder if it's worth pausing FOOM here and boosting callig so that we can more safely uncap Hazo's Sealing stagnancy.
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
Speaking of training plans, I wonder if it's worth pausing FOOM here and boosting callig so that we can more safely uncap Hazo's Sealing stagnancy.
Agreed, I'd be a lot closer to voting for this plan if it didn't include Shikamaru. He's lost a lot of trust from me given his reaction to Akane's death and possible motive therein. We don't have to snub him, but there's no reason to include him.
- Location
- Book Fort
- Pronouns
- They/Them
It would cost a total of 308xp to raise Callig from 40 to 47 (eff 50). That's 197 more xp than we have right now...
Resolve 68 (next FOOM goal) is only 282 more xp than we currently have.
Given the two, I think I'd rather keep to Shrooms's plan and maintain the course for Resolve 68.
- Location
- UK
- Pronouns
- He/Him
PoI: You haven't shared any real afterlife lore/secrets with Kei or Shikamaru. Everything you know about the rift is already publicly available from the O'Uzu report, and you haven't provided anything about Hazō's specific research other than "We're working on a seal to reopen the rift". In some ways, the flow of information has actually gone the other way, with Kei correcting you RE Naraka/Pure Land and her, Shikamaru, and Ami variously offering practical insights on how things could go wrong and what to do about it.
Wasn't this the other way round?
- Location
- The Void
- Pronouns
- She/Her
Why? We're currently loosing three-ish XP per day to stagnancy compared to the .3 to .4 we get with a resolve step.
[x] Action Plan: Due Diligence
[x] Action Plan: Due Diligence
- Location
- UK
- Pronouns
- He/Him
According to Hidan in the update, Jashin made the Sage bleed, while the Sage cut out Jashin's tongue. The order of events was not clarified, nor the reason for their disagreement (and both seem responsible for a lot of disagreeable things).
- Location
- Book Fort
- Pronouns
- They/Them
"Why does this bad thing exist?"
"Flip a coin. Heads, blame the Sage. Tails, blame Jashin."
- Location
- UK
- Pronouns
- He/Him
300 years from now:
"Why does this bad thing exist?"
"Flip a coin. Heads, blame the Sage. Tails, blame Jashin. Out, blame Gōketsu Hazō."
- Location
- Book Fort
- Pronouns
- They/Them
@Noumero, boosting this
- Pronouns
- She/Her/They/Them
I have a question regarding sealing challenges: Hazō had the zero-G incident not too long ago, but that was a calligraphy failure iirc. Would a hard (for his level) calligraphy check also be a suitable challenge, or is it only the sealing proper?
Also, now that I think of it, did the special jōnin test not count?
More generally, I wonder what constitutes a challenge - is it the same as the past unlock mechanic, wherein there must be something on the line (and you can't e.g. just spar with Lee for an "easy" (painful) unlock)?
For what is "level appropriate" I trust the QMs and expect it to be defined as what they think it is.
For the risk... well, unlock mechanic or no unlock mechanic, that's just how the setting goes, innit? Come for the deathworld, ninja magic, and fookin DRAGONS, stay for the dating and the deadpan.
Your Jashin must be out of juice. Have you tried murder?
What do you mean? That's just sealing
So "they" was the Sage, uh? Iiiiiinnnnnteresting 😎
Think we could get in Hidan's good graces forever if we ask Noburi to regrow his tongue with his future epic mednin skills?
@RandomOTP Noumero is including Shika because they think is will cause less Shika suspicion/interference than not inviteing him.
I think you need to either argue that point to Noumero, or fork the plan.
FWIW, I'm unconvinced about including Shikamaru. Even if inviteing Shika manages his suspicions better than doing nothing, there're probably options besides "include" and "ignore".
I wish we knew how much info Kei will share with Shikamaru.
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- Location
- UK
- Pronouns
- He/Him
A little feedback.
+ this plan is concise without sacrificing comprehensibility and the high level of detail makes it easy to follow... for the most part. The links are helpful too.
- the exceptions feature a lot to unpack. Just "Synthesize the information. Put it into larger/historical context. Form models" seems like it crams hours of QM cognitive effort into eleven words with little guidance.
= there's a ton of content here, with each line needing its own discussion. I hope you're not expecting me to get through the whole thing in one update.
[x] Action Plan: Due Diligence w/o Shikamaru
Word count: <300.
Word count: <300.
- Meeting: Kei, Snowflake, Mari.
- Topic: Jashin. Shikamaru told us to keep away. That ship's sailed...
- ... and was never a good approach. Shikamaru didn't know Jashin was real. Unknown threats of this scale are apocalyptically concerning, as "the Eaters" taught us.
- We need to investigate the threat, not ignore it. What if it's also about to break free?
- Preparations:
- To Mari: You suspect Kei may concealing information. Watch for that. Don't raise suspicion.
- (Refresh her on your Thinker-conspiracy inferences.)
- Review the ANBU transcript of your Hidan conversations. Anything you don't remember?
- Keep a live transcript. Periodically review it.
- To Mari: You suspect Kei may concealing information. Watch for that. Don't raise suspicion.
- Pool ~all relevant knowledge.
- Priority: Your Orochimaru Q&A. You followed a strict list, then "forgot" about Jashin, apparently repeating yourself.
- An antimeme?
- Everything Hidan said about Jashin. Balance, conviction, death and birth, quotas, dreams...
- Particluars:
- Some alleged interest in humanity's prosperity and non-extinction.
- "'They' cut out Jashin's tongue."
- Jashin making the Sage bleed.
- Jashin's symbol. Recognizable?
- Events at O'uzu and Bakuchioka.
- Jashin's powers. Probability-manipulation?
- Hidan's powers/blessings.
- Potential Hierophant connection.
- Relation to "summoning Death"?
- Priority: Your Orochimaru Q&A. You followed a strict list, then "forgot" about Jashin, apparently repeating yourself.
- Do they know anything?
- Shikamaru told us none of such remaining entities are friendly to humanity. Very specific. Whence such confidence?
- Synthesize the information. Put it into larger/historical context. Form models.
- You're uniquely well-positioned for get more information from Hidan. Prepare for that.
- What are the highest-priority questions to ask?
- (This justifies Mari's presence: she's to figure out Hidan's psychology, best approaches for questioning him.)
- Topic: Jashin. Shikamaru told us to keep away. That ship's sailed...
- Meet Hidan (with Asuma's permission). Express interest in finally getting that theological knowledge.
- Ask how the Five play into Jashinism. They are other extradimensional entities, how does Jashin view them?
- Inquire about Jashin's values, metaphysical nature, history...
- What are Jashin's long-term goals? What's His ideal world?
- Justifications (if needed):
- Clearly your insight's useful.
- If you start a Jashinism branch, you'll need to know what to preach.
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- Location
- Book Fort
- Pronouns
- They/Them
You've put this before @Shrooms's actual plan. If you don't mind, would you please insert the vote after his plan?
- Location
- Pacific standard
FUCK IT MAKES SO MUCH MORE SENSE NOW
The sage is nonbinary and uses a singular they
- Pronouns
- He/Him
Well if the people with gods in their heads were the original band of 5 then ig the Sage would be there too. Which I guess gives some credence to the band of five being the first hosts rather than monsters themselves? Or maybe Hidan meant, the people with gods in their head need to be killed bc those gods cut out Jashin's tongue
- Pronouns
- He/Him
I have no doubts we can uncap Sealing without much trouble, so at least for that reason I don't find that a strong argument to slow down FOOM. There's a decent argument that finishing projects faster in general is reason enough and I think that's more defendable.
We're about 300 xp out from needing to have significant combat encounter(s) so I feel a little more persuaded by bumping Alertness to 39 first so we're more ready for that before going back to Resolve 68. I'm not fully sold yet though, still considering it.
- Location
- The Maple Syrup Mountains
[X] Action Plan: Due Diligence
Speaking in terms of ships already sailed, Shikamaru already views Hazou as a pseudo-Thinker whose Voice has power over causality at what appears to be an arbitrarily precise level of finesse. I have already been directly in favour of approaching Shikamaru to ask if the Nara have any non-clan-secret advice for keeping Jashin at bay, both to convince him we can still be trusted (as opposed to being modeled as a pawn of Jashin to be viewed with nearly indefinite suspicion given Jashin's means of acting on this world) and to maybe get some more fragments of lore to fit together.
This plan is good for similar reasons. It conveys to Shikamaru that we're taking the threat seriously and coordinating with him to mitigate it, which will go a long way to assuaging his concerns (the counterfactual model of "Hazou is a complete Jashin puppet by now and is only doing this to advance Jashin's will" would still exist but can't be disproved by any evidence and is thus of limited epistemic value) as we prepare for the Forbidden Lore discussion with Hidan.
I think we also make arguments that are pretty compelling to Shikamaru. We've already seen from his calculations on the future prospects of civilization that he considers further unknown existential horrors like the Dragons distressingly plausible, and if Jashin is such a threat then Hidan, the directly self-avowed High Priest of Jashin with clear Jashinist powers who spends his entire waking life spreading Jashinism is much more of a threat to the world than "might theoretically be a secret Jashinist buying trust by actively coordinating against Jashin" Hazou. Shikamaru can't afford to not take this conversation seriously, and he can't afford to treat Hazou as a greater threat on that risk vector than Hidan. The more we coordinate against Hidan and against Jashin, the more Shikamaru will be convinced that we're probably not secretly advancing Jashin's unfathomably terrifying will.
Speaking in terms of ships already sailed, Shikamaru already views Hazou as a pseudo-Thinker whose Voice has power over causality at what appears to be an arbitrarily precise level of finesse. I have already been directly in favour of approaching Shikamaru to ask if the Nara have any non-clan-secret advice for keeping Jashin at bay, both to convince him we can still be trusted (as opposed to being modeled as a pawn of Jashin to be viewed with nearly indefinite suspicion given Jashin's means of acting on this world) and to maybe get some more fragments of lore to fit together.
This plan is good for similar reasons. It conveys to Shikamaru that we're taking the threat seriously and coordinating with him to mitigate it, which will go a long way to assuaging his concerns (the counterfactual model of "Hazou is a complete Jashin puppet by now and is only doing this to advance Jashin's will" would still exist but can't be disproved by any evidence and is thus of limited epistemic value) as we prepare for the Forbidden Lore discussion with Hidan.
I think we also make arguments that are pretty compelling to Shikamaru. We've already seen from his calculations on the future prospects of civilization that he considers further unknown existential horrors like the Dragons distressingly plausible, and if Jashin is such a threat then Hidan, the directly self-avowed High Priest of Jashin with clear Jashinist powers who spends his entire waking life spreading Jashinism is much more of a threat to the world than "might theoretically be a secret Jashinist buying trust by actively coordinating against Jashin" Hazou. Shikamaru can't afford to not take this conversation seriously, and he can't afford to treat Hazou as a greater threat on that risk vector than Hidan. The more we coordinate against Hidan and against Jashin, the more Shikamaru will be convinced that we're probably not secretly advancing Jashin's unfathomably terrifying will.
We should ask Hidan about the Five and the Tama. There's circumstantial evidence that one of the Tama worshipped a deity that sounds like Jashin.
Plus Hidan blabbered about the Seedling, he seems like he might just tell us everything he knows about the Five if we ask him.
As to the other parts of the plan, I don't see why we need to involve Shikamaru in this. Just Kei and Snow provide most of the value he contributes, since he isn't going to share anything, he does not do that.
Plus there are very real downsides to including him. Half the thread thinks he ordered Akane's murder. Does that seem like the kind of person to take council from? He might decide Hazou is too close to Jashin and find a caldera. Kei would never do that.
As to rousing suspicion by excluding him. Just ask Kei not to mention it, that we'd like to play Jashin close to the chest. That is the normal ninja thing to do. It sure as shit isn't like he shares information with us. Kei has meetings at the Goketsu estate all the time. It isn't unusual for her to talk to Mari and Hazou (see every sanity check ever). So nothing out of the ordinary is happening.
I'm surprised we've never asked Ami about the five, she might be much more willing to share. I think this conversation isn't the right croud for it, but I also don't want to make the QMs write the same convo twice.
In conclusion: *shrug*
In conclusion: *shrug*
Is this an assassination attempt?
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