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Marked for Death: A Rational Naruto Quest

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Veedrac said:
To make the unspoken spoken, it's worth noting that if this opinion reaches critical mass, the voters can just stop voting to set things on fire.
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I would like to point that many of the recent events have had nothing to do with player votes.

  • Akane was forced/pressured, offscreen, to take a mission far earlier than anyone else in her circumstances by a Piece of Shit Tower Employee that Shikamaru somehow missed, even after claiming to clean up shop after the war? And somehow, even though it was stupidly early in-universe for Akane to be taking her team on a mission, neither Hazou-pilot, Mari, Noburi, or literally anyone else noticed anything? By authorial fiat? No flubbed, in-character, "Alertness" Roll or "Empathy" roll to notice this in-universe anomaly that the playerbase wouldn't know?
  • When Yuno was radicalized offscreen? Because she, a jonin, apparently didn't hear the "S-Ranker in the area, GTFO" alarms?
  • When Hazou-pilot, who has infinite patience for QM darlings like Kei, Ami, and Shard, suddenly decides to act uncharacteristically cruel to Yuno because of "S-rank stress" (as though Hazou hasn't gone through similar instances of Essie Bullshit before?)
  • When the playerbase straight-up tells Hazou "speak calmly to your Hokage/religious pope analog/dictator" and Hazou-pilot instead decides to scream?
  • When Orochimaru decides he wants the Dragon Parts, "buys" them from Hazou with some old desk drawer contents, and then (in a noncanon update) tells Hazou that he could just take them with no repercussions, so Hazou should meekly accept what table scraps Orochimaru deigns to give away?
  • When Orochimaru sets his sights on murdering Kei, and Asuma goes "totes sucks bro. Good luck with that."
  • When Orochimaru forces Hazou-pilot to reveal bloodline secrets, and then skips merrily away to rip those secrets out of an innocent Kurosawa ninja?
  • When the Minami Clan randomly gets upset that we're actually following through on our previously-agreed upon plan to change/influence the Hyuuga?
  • When Jin and Mio are hypocritical dumbasses for wanting to keep their jutsu secret, even though their whole piss with the Clan System was that clans hoarde shit?
  • The Conclave that needs to be convinced to allow Hazou to help save them from Death by Dragonfire?
  • Hidan and Kakuzu appear in Leaf, contrary to Asuma's reassurances, right as Hazou is gearing up to lighthouse for a few weeks on some seals?
  • Hazou-pilot learns that the Akatsuki is gone from Leaf, and that he could make his denouncement risk-free, but does... nothing? The plan (an update that reeks of flippancy and distaste with its very contents) continues on, and Hazou-pilot finishes out the day. (If the defense is "player agency," then why not just end the update when Hazou learns the Akatsuki are gone?)
Honestly, I say we toss Noburi the Goketsu Clan Headship. Tell him that it's been four years (in game) and that we're obviously not "getting it," so it's his turn. Better yet, give it to the FOOMING Social Spec Jonin. I'm sure she can do better.

Then we can buckle down, working on seals while someone else deals with bullshit politics. Orochimaru and Tsunade have the right of it.

Or we could Ditch the Goketsu Clan entirely and do our own thing. Ostensibly, KEI automatically grants rights/protections to anyone non-Clan. Use their policies as a shield while we lighthouse our way into getting stronger and actually Dealing with Shit, instead of dealing with shit.

"The Hagoromo say we're a cultist?" I'm sure the KEI have something about libel, they can handle it while we work on a WMD to kill Dragons.

"Kei is mad at you!" When isn't she? She can talk to us when we're not too busy trying to crack open the afterlife, and pull her adoptive father-figure out.

----

I recognize that the above is somewhat uncharitable, but this is the way it feels.

Each event, taken on their own, is... sure, fine, whatever. There's an argument for them to happen. But when taken as a whole...

Look, I love this quest. I love this community. I love the characters and this story, and the amazing things we've managed to accomplish along the way.

But I've been thinking about taking an extended break because this cycle of "Hazou sits down to do a project, Hazou is impressed upon about how important his efforts are, Hazou is pulled away from those efforts to do [thing], only to fail at doing [thing] well/optimally, Hazou is [justifiably/unjustifiably] reamed for it and takes it on the chin, cue the 20 updates of apologies, Hazou sits down to do a project, repeat..." it just isn't spoon-friendly.

It's tiring.
 
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Personally, I've also noticed some conflict between the stated goals and what's actually done- for instance, writing meetings is unpleasant but a lot of the problems we're given to deal with require meetings at some point in the process because... actually, I know one of the previous times this came up it was suggested we delegate more and I feel like we've tried a bit to limited success. Does anyone else have a more detailed recollection of how things went regarding delegation attempts?
 
@Nebulus @RandomOTP I don't want to argue point by point, but it was a choice to cozy up to Orochimaru, it was a choice to push forward on Jashinism, it was a choice to practice Elemental Mastery, it was a choice to contact Akatsuki, and so on and so forth. I would hope and expect people are taking these choices because they thought they would value the fun of it more than they disvalue the fires they create, not because they didn't believe they were going to cause fires, but that's my point: if expectations or valuations change, the choice is in the thread's hands. Heck, you know Hazō is allowed to just not be clan head, right?
 
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DanZapman said:
Personally, I've also noticed some conflict between the stated goals and what's actually done- for instance, writing meetings is unpleasant but a lot of the problems we're given to deal with require meetings at some point in the process because... actually, I know one of the previous times this came up it was suggested we delegate more and I feel like we've tried a bit to limited success. Does anyone else have a more detailed recollection of how things went regarding delegation attempts?
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We're kinda sorta operating at maximum delegation/meeting-minimization as it is. Recent plans have really started to internalize the principle of "plan the X, then immediately do the X so the QMs can skip the planning and write the doing", and we offload almost all unimportant things to Hazoupilot and Gaku.

And yet. Sometimes we're stuck with a meeting update just because "do the X" isn't actually possible (e.g. our plan to learn Jashin-theology. We held a meeting with the brainiacs, then went to go have a Hidan scene but he was already gone). Sometimes a meeting has to happen to impart vital information to us for us to respond to with a plan (e.g. when Hidan and Kakuzu showed up and we realized we would have to spin this negotiation in a way that satisfies our goals and Asuma's goals without provoking either of these Essies into killing us).

Sometimes we're stuck needing to actively seek information from others with nothing actionable to do about it. This category we can sometimes offload into non-chapter infodumps, but it's context-dependent. Just recently we avoided needing to spend another update on the Kagome necromancy meeting by simply asking the QMs to summarize his answers to a few of our questions that we needed answers to before we could proceed. Unfortunately it's not always that easy, but we're doing our best.

The trouble, at the heart of this pacing problem, is that there are currently two gameplay modes: lighthousing and sidequests. All of our main story objectives right now are impossible to make progress on without solving a bunch of finnicky research problems in the meantime. We couldn't start the necromancy plotline now even if we wanted to: we wouldn't be just underequipped, we're fundamentally unable to open the rift right now. Primordial Sealing is a little more promising because right now there's an interesting hook about how to get more viable substrate for the art, but for the longest time there was nothing to say or do about the quest for 3D Sealing than "continue grinding Earthshaping".

90% of the time, we can't advance the main plot even if we wanted to, because we haven't had the time to put enough IC work into the project. Like, not even "too busy doing other things", raw hard time walls that we simply haven't conquered yet. The solution, if we want to move the main quests along, is to lighthouse. Let time pass fast as we put in the necessary work, and then we can move forwards on the main plotlines more actively in realtime after that.

But it's the sidequests that really get us. And I shouldn't really be calling something like the EM Nuke plotline a sidequest, given its importance to the setting as a whole, but instead of being a thing that advances our main plotlines it's more of a "thing we have to deal with". Similarly, Akane's death and the ensuing hunt is a "thing we have to deal with", and so is Hazou's Jashinism and his connection to Hidan. They're all important, each and every one, and we can't afford to ignore any of them. And they have to be front-and-center too, because, come on, do you think we can really gloss over an Essie staring Hazou down and forcing him to make a horrible moral choice? Can we skip past the manhunt for Akane's killers, or a high-stakes diplomacy meeting with multiple Essies? Can we take the apocalypse-prevention secret cabal and reduce its actions to a footnote in the chapters, even when their only viable solution is something horrible and we might just have a brilliant idea that turns the tide of fate and saves Isan?

As Veedrac said, these problems are coming our way thanks to decisions from long ago. We've been grappling with Hidan's fondness for us since O'Uzu when we first met. We chose to level Elemental Mastery and discover the nuke, which not only started the anti-apocalypse cabal but turned Akane's death from a mere horrible tragedy into a new vector for X-risk in its own right, warranting the massive response of hiring S-Rankers to solve this mystery. We've made the Dragons our business, we've made the Conclave our business, we've made Primordial Sealing our business, we've made Orochimaru our business, one by one over hundreds of chapters and the chickens keep coming home to roost and we can never ignore a single one of them.

And it's not that these "sidequests" aren't interesting and engaging in their own right. Each of these arcs is fascinating and horrifying and wonderfully intertwined with the world at large. We discuss whether nuking Isan might reduce our ability to fight the Dragons when the promised Crusade finally happens, our failed trip to secure the Squirrel Scroll granted us exactly the material we needed to crack Primordial Sealing. These plotlines are anything but wasted time...

...but they keep coming, and it's on the world's terms instead of ours, and they keep coming so fast that Hazou barely has a chance to grow from one to the other, and we've gone through so many and we're still so young, still full of unrealized potential instead of actualized power, and there's so much time yet to pass before our main plots can reach fruition, and every time it looks like we might find some peace and quiet another chicken comes home to roost and we're once again reminded that we've made the whole world our business and that we cannot and will not turn a blind eye when duty calls.

But I do think that things are calming down. Actually for real, even if it hasn't looked like it yet. We started this quest with a world on the brink of war, where violent conflict was inevitable within a few years at the most. We tipped the balance of power with Skywalkers and the whole setting fell like dominoes in its wake. We sparked the conflict between Leaf and Mist, which gave Akatsuki the opening they needed to clear their most difficult roadblock, which led invariably into the Battle of the Gods at Nagi Island, which led to the Collapse and the Rockwar and WWIV. And now AMITY is a thing, the dust is settling, and even if we pessimistically assume that AMITY does nothing to sway ninjaworld trends we're still looking at probably a decade of peace before the villages are ready to wage war again.

Of course, we saw the Colour Cabal in that one interlude, and it's possible that they'll seize on the current weakness of the EN to invade and take over or something, but even then that's just the one more domino after dozens have already fallen. At the end of the day there must be a finite number of ways the world can be destabilized, and we've already checked off the vast majority of that list.

I should stress this: we were so close. Right before Hidan and Kakuzu showed up, I was genuinely asking myself if there was anything, anything, left standing between us and progress on our core plotlines. I was drawing a blank. Everything seemed perfectly fine for us to hunker down and finally get to work. And then one more domino fell over, and we're handling the fallout, but even that will clear up soon. And then we'll go try and replicate the crystal fragments and go work on necro-seals and maybe go a month or two without something going horribly wrong. We're so close. We're so close. We're almost there, after all this time.
 
Veedrac said:
Heck, you know Hazō is allowed to just not be clan head, right?
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RandomOTP said:
Honestly, I say we toss Noburi the Goketsu Clan Headship. Tell him that it's been four years (in game) and that we're obviously not "getting it," so it's his turn. Better yet, give it to the FOOMING Social Spec Jonin. I'm sure she can do better.

Then we can buckle down, working on seals while someone else deals with bullshit politics. Orochimaru and Tsunade have the right of it.

Or we could Ditch the Goketsu Clan entirely and do our own thing. Ostensibly, KEI automatically grants rights/protections to anyone non-Clan. Use their policies as a shield while we lighthouse our way into getting stronger and actually Dealing with Shit, instead of dealing with shit.
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Oneiros said:
One thing that I think that's is being missed is that ultimately none of theses "fires" actually matters. Let's look at our actual goals. We want to crack necromancy, figure out 3-d sealing/defeat the dragons and, become powerful enough that we can do big moves safely. None of these goals are impacted meaninglfully by current events.
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Those fires might not matter if Hazou was an Ami that did not care about his family beyond basic utility. But Hazou does feel affection about his family, and therefore we should take that into consideration and not, for example, burn Yuno at the stakes to satisfy Leaf. I don't think it's a good idea to have Hazou just ignore it when his family is facing a crisis, or when another one of his values is in direct conflict with Priority Projects. That path lays madness. We don't want Hazou to be okay with mass-murdering civilians to get Hidan off our back.

Of course, it is unacceptable to stop actual urgent projects. But that's why we need to find a solution so we're not bogged down by drama, without having to compromise on our values. Like, yielding the lordship to Noburi so we get more time for ourselves.

Veedrac said:
@Nebulus @RandomOTP I don't want to argue point by point, but it was a choice to cozy up to Orochimaru, it was a choice to push forward on Jashinism, it was a choice to practice Elemental Mastery, it was a choice to contact Akatsuki, and so on and so forth. I would hope and expect people are taking these choices because they thought they would value the fun of it more than they disvalue the fires they create, not because they didn't believe they were going to cause fires, but that's my point: if expectations or valuations change, the choice is in the thread's hands. Heck, you know Hazō is allowed to just not be clan head, right?
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I am confused. What exactly is your claim? We make bad choices so we should stop... making choices? We make bad choices on purpose(and because it's fun), which is terrible, and therefore we should start being reasonable?

As a matter of fact, yes I know and advocate for Hazou not to be the clan head anymore. Do you know that there are other players, that they hold diverging opinions, and therefore whatever plan you believe is reasonable may not actually pass? That's why we debate plans and ideas, so we can convince each other why X is better than Y.

Inferno Vulpix said:
At the end of the day there must be a finite number of ways the world can be destabilized, and we've already checked off the vast majority of that list.
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Am I hearing cackling from the QMs corner? Probably my imagination.

Inferno Vulpix said:
We're so close. We're almost there, after all this time.
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We're getting closer to the starting line, yes:p progress is bliss, still.
 
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RandomOTP said:
I would like to point that many of the recent events have had nothing to do with player votes.

  • Akane was forced/pressured, offscreen, to take a mission far earlier than anyone else in her circumstances by a Piece of Shit Tower Employee that Shikamaru somehow missed, even after claiming to clean up shop after the war? And somehow, even though it was stupidly early in-universe for Akane to be taking her team on a mission, neither Hazou-pilot, Mari, Noburi, or literally anyone else noticed anything? By authorial fiat? No flubbed, in-character, "Alertness" Roll or "Empathy" roll to notice this in-universe anomaly that the playerbase wouldn't know?
  • When Yuno was radicalized offscreen? Because she, a jonin, apparently didn't hear the "S-Ranker in the area, GTFO" alarms?
  • When Hazou-pilot, who has infinite patience for QM darlings like Kei, Ami, and Shard, suddenly decides to act uncharacteristically cruel to Yuno because of "S-rank stress" (as though Hazou hasn't gone through similar instances of Essie Bullshit before?)
  • When the playerbase straight-up tells Hazou "speak calmly to your Hokage/religious pope analog/dictator" and Hazou-pilot instead decides to scream?
  • When Orochimaru decides he wants the Dragon Parts, "buys" them from Hazou with some old desk drawer contents, and then (in a noncanon update) tells Hazou that he could just take them with no repercussions, so Hazou should meekly accept what table scraps Orochimaru deigns to give away?
  • When Orochimaru sets his sights on murdering Kei, and Asuma goes "totes sucks bro. Good luck with that."
  • When Orochimaru forces Hazou-pilot to reveal bloodline secrets, and then skips merrily away to rip those secrets out of an innocent Kurosawa ninja?
  • When the Minami Clan randomly gets upset that we're actually following through on our previously-agreed upon plan to change/influence the Hyuuga?
  • When Jin and Mio are hypocritical dumbasses for wanting to keep their jutsu secret, even though their whole piss with the Clan System was that clans hoarde shit?
  • The Conclave that needs to be convinced to allow Hazou to help save them from Death by Dragonfire?
  • Hidan and Kakuzu appear in Leaf, contrary to Asuma's reassurances, right as Hazou is gearing up to lighthouse for a few weeks on some seals?
  • Hazou-pilot learns that the Akatsuki is gone from Leaf, and that he could make his denouncement risk-free, but does... nothing? The plan (an update that reeks of flippancy and distaste with its very contents) continues on, and Hazou-pilot finishes out the day. (If the defense is "player agency," then why not just end the update when Hazou learns the Akatsuki are gone?)
Honestly, I say we toss Noburi the Goketsu Clan Headship. Tell him that it's been four years (in game) and that we're obviously not "getting it," so it's his turn. Better yet, give it to the FOOMING Social Spec Jonin. I'm sure she can do better.

Then we can buckle down, working on seals while someone else deals with bullshit politics. Orochimaru and Tsunade have the right of it.

Or we could Ditch the Goketsu Clan entirely and do our own thing. Ostensibly, KEI automatically grants rights/protections to anyone non-Clan. Use their policies as a shield while we lighthouse our way into getting stronger and actually Dealing with Shit, instead of dealing with shit.

"The Hagoromo say we're a cultist?" I'm sure the KEI have something about libel, they can handle it while we work on a WMD to kill Dragons.

"Kei is mad at you!" When isn't she? She can talk to us when we're not too busy trying to crack open the afterlife, and pull her adoptive father-figure out.

----

I recognize that the above is somewhat uncharitable, but this is the way it feels.

Each event, taken on their own, is... sure, fine, whatever. There's an argument for them to happen. But when taken as a whole...

Look, I love this quest. I love this community. I love the characters and this story, and the amazing things we've managed to accomplish along the way.

But I've been thinking about taking an extended break because this cycle of "Hazou sits down to do a project, Hazou is impressed upon about how important his efforts are, Hazou is pulled away from those efforts to do [thing], only to fail at doing [thing] well/optimally, Hazou is [justifiably/unjustifiably] reamed for it and takes it on the chin, cue the 20 updates of apologies, Hazou sits down to do a project, repeat..." it just isn't spoon-friendly.

It's tiring.
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I don't think it would be productive for me to engage with this in my current mental state except to say that:
a) I fully sympathise with your feelings with regard to the broader trends in MfD even if I don't fully agree with the reasoning that underpins them, and hope that in the future we can make the quest more fun for you and other players who feel similarly
b) I think about two thirds of your bullet points are based on factually incorrect observations (e.g. you've already had Word of God that Akane's mission was earlier than usual but not flag-raisingly early)
c) It's worth mentioning specifically that aside from general characterisation, the reason the Hazōpilot is regularly patient with certain characters isn't because they are "QM darlings". Speaking for myself, I write him this way because I don't want to cause scenarios where e.g. the Hazōpilot lashes out at Kei, Kei lashes out in return, and suddenly the players have a load of Kei drama dumped in their lap which they did nothing to deserve but are now stuck dealing with. If the player base at large feels that the Hazōpilot is too patient/submissive and want him to be generally more aggressive (at the cost of generating more negative consequences) or to relitigate any given issue in a more hostile fashion, that is entirely your right, and if you vote for it, we will write it.
 
Inferno Vulpix said:
I should stress this: we were so close. Right before Hidan and Kakuzu showed up, I was genuinely asking myself if there was anything, anything, left standing between us and progress on our core plotlines. I was drawing a blank. Everything seemed perfectly fine for us to hunker down and finally get to work. And then one more domino fell over, and we're handling the fallout, but even that will clear up soon. And then we'll go try and replicate the crystal fragments and go work on necro-seals and maybe go a month or two without something going horribly wrong. We're so close. We're so close. We're almost there, after all this time.
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You do know that we'll never really lighthouse, right ? At best we'll get one or two research cycles before the next distraction.
The QMs don't want to write a lighthousing quest. The QMs can and will make new mechanics to stop us from lighthousing.
 
Shrooms said:
This is probably the worst time to do it as IV pointed out. "Hazou is accused of blasphemy -> Hazou resigns" looks really sus

just rez j and make him do it, we're at the goddamn finish line
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Not that I particularly enjoy thinking about this. But we ain't at the finish line. We're about halfway IMO. We are just starting to get to seals that interact with the rift. IMO we need to do 3 big seals before we can go full resurrection.

1. MS8 modified to open the rift to get more data for part 2/3
2. Refine Mod-MS8 to open the rift wide.
3. Research a seal/sealing array that can move the rift.

Now we can afterlife-dive to our heart's content without worrying about a Sasori- interrupt. That means researching specialist tracker seals and the like if we need them etc.

Hopefully it will look like the rift just decomposed to any observers. We might want to consider opening a rift to somewhere random just to camouflage our rift heist.
 
We have two major challenges with this crisis. First, how do we denounce Jashinism without Hidan getting mad at us later, and second, how do we persuasively denounce Jashinism when, at this point, it's not really going to be credible to anyone who matters that Hazou actually gives a shit about the Will of Fire? We could deliver an unpersuasive/lackluster denouncement and claim to Hidan that Asuma made us do it (the two day delay does help with this lmao), or we could try to somehow persuasively argue that we don't support Jashinism, and risk it actually working (and Hidan believing it). I suppose that since Hidan isn't in town, he'll only receive secondhand accounts of whatever we do say, and the persuasiveness or lack thereof of our speech won't affect him much. I'm leaning towards being as persuasive as we can, and hoping for the best in terms of Hidan.

Also @eaglejarl @Velorien @Paperclipped were you still planning on a vote for what Hazou actually believes, re Jashin and Jashinism? This could make a difference for what rolls we're making.
 
Sir Stompy said:
Not that I particularly enjoy thinking about this. But we ain't at the finish line. We're about halfway IMO. We are just starting to get to seals that interact with the rift. IMO we need to do 3 big seals before we can go full resurrection.

1. MS8 modified to open the rift to get more data for part 2/3
2. Refine Mod-MS8 to open the rift wide.
3. Research a seal/sealing array that can move the rift.

Now we can afterlife-dive to our heart's content without worrying about a Sasori- interrupt. That means researching specialist tracker seals and the like if we need them etc.

Hopefully it will look like the rift just decomposed to any observers. We might want to consider opening a rift to somewhere random just to camouflage our rift heist.
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Not to mention we need to level Noburi's Mednin skills high enough that he can research how to safely open Naruto's chakra gate.
 
RandomOTP said:
Not to mention we need to level Noburi's Mednin skills high enough that he can research how to safely open Naruto's chakra gate.
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In this, I suggest we buy some FGP people/ captured ninja/criminals and experiment on them.

It's flat out nasty and I don't like it one bit, but we cannot afford to injure Naruto.

We can give them resurrection priority. In addition to the payout from the FGP.

I'm not happy with it and I'm sure Nobs isn't either. But we can't afford to screw this up.
 
Sir Stompy said:
In this, I suggest we buy some FGP people/ captured ninja/criminals and experiment on them.

It's flat out nasty and I don't like it one bit, but we cannot afford to injure Naruto.

We can give them resurrection priority. In addition to the payout from the FGP.

I'm not happy with it and I'm sure Nobs isn't either. But we can't afford to screw this up.
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Honestly, I'm not going to bother thinking about the "how" until Noburi says his Mednin skills are high enough to research it.
 
Velorien said:
c) It's worth mentioning specifically that aside from general characterisation, the reason the Hazōpilot is regularly patient with certain characters isn't because they are "QM darlings". Speaking for myself, I write him this way because I don't want to cause scenarios where e.g. the Hazōpilot lashes out at Kei, Kei lashes out in return, and suddenly the players have a load of Kei drama dumped in their lap which they did nothing to deserve but are now stuck dealing with. If the player base at large feels that the Hazōpilot is too patient/submissive and want him to be generally more aggressive (at the cost of generating more negative consequences) or to relitigate any given issue in a more hostile fashion, that is entirely your right, and if you vote for it, we will write it.
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Speaking in terms of my personal experience, there's a world of difference between "Hazou does something wrong, of his own accord and owing to his own character flaws, and gets called out for it", and "Hazou does something wrong, the blame is laid at our feet, and we get called out for it". (There's also the big difference between when the latter case feels warranted/unwarranted, but that's neither here nor there). For as much as Hazou's character has been shaped by our ideals and tendencies, he's still to me an independent agent and when he makes bad choices of his own volition it's like when any other part of the setting goes wrong.

While I see ROTP doesn't agree with me about this, this is how I viewed him lashing out at Yuno. Sucks, but I see how Hazoupilot would behave like that in that specific scenario. I don't mind if this happens more often when narratively appropriate, as long as Hazoupilot's mistakes are blamed on Hazoupilot and our mistakes are blamed on us. I mean, when you get right down to it, "drama which we did nothing to deserve but are now stuck dealing with" describes like 99% of this deathworld setting. Solving problems like that is kinda sorta our job description as a hivemind.
T_of_A said:
You do know that we'll never really lighthouse, right ? At best we'll get one or two research cycles before the next distraction.
The QMs don't want to write a lighthousing quest. The QMs can and will make new mechanics to stop us from lighthousing.
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I do not think that we need Essies thrown at us to keep the story enjoyable while we do sealing research. I mean, do you remember the days back when Jiraiya was clan head and we didn't have to personally juggle all these problems? We had game nights, social networking, romance, other little plotlines that were no less enjoyable for their low stakes. When's the last time we heard of Shiori, do you recall? I think there was a WoG at some point that she survived the war, but I think there just hasn't been room to see her unique brand of romcom shenanigans liven up our lives. Maybe soon there will be, as we do our research.

We can do research. The story won't suffer for it. If anything, it looks like people would really welcome the chance to have some lighthearted social chapters like that again, as time passes and we get closer and closer to our main quest goals. The QMs certainly aren't going to be twisting the simulation into knots or re-designing the mechanics out a fervent desire to stop us from having fun.
 
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Sir Stompy said:
In this, I suggest we buy some FGP people/ captured ninja/criminals and experiment on them.

It's flat out nasty and I don't like it one bit, but we cannot afford to injure Naruto.

We can give them resurrection priority. In addition to the payout from the FGP.

I'm not happy with it and I'm sure Nobs isn't either. But we can't afford to screw this up.
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Iirc we've been told this is not a research project, but instead just a series of checks.

Edit: so there's no need to buy people to use as test subjects.
 
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