Marked for Death: A Rational Naruto Quest

Zampano · Sep 4, 2023

Oneiros said:
That's targeting the wrong graft. The Daimyos are the one's taking most of the extra Ryo

Well, the internal monologue of this one tax guy certainly indicates that he believes this to be the case. But surely the Rulers of the People, imbued by the Will of Fire, will-

roobee · Sep 4, 2023

roobee said:
I don't expect the Daimyo to have a large enough standing army to defeat a village.

Then again. We know that there are enough random bandits amassed to steal from villages.

MadScientist · Sep 4, 2023

> Akane has lost 1xp
> Akane has lost 1xp
> Akane has lost 1xp
> Akane has lost 1xp
> Akane has lost 1xp
> Akane has lost 1xp
> Akane has lost 1xp
> Akane has lost 1xp

Paperclipped said:
"Thanks, Gōketsu Akane," Rieka said. "When we get back, we're gonna need to find out who she was and send her a prayer. C'mon Shunsuke, let's get out of here."

> Akane has gained 30xp

AKANE: wait, what the fuck?

roobee · Sep 4, 2023

We should also pay Daimyo Noriyasu some money to incentivize his behavior among the daimyos. He's only one person so it's logistically feasible

Edit:

roobee said:
The Daimyo could hire bandits to take their taxes anyway, but they no longer have their biggest crutch (ninja military support)

Unless the daimyo call the villagers who don't pay the fake taxes bandits, and post a bandit suppression mission. I mean, would the typical ninja stop to question the bandits on whether they are bandits before killing them? Although there is still a risk to life of the daimyo to doing this. And even small life risks make people hesitate. But the daimyo could have a minion post the mission instead, evading responsibility from the angry ninja

MrRobot · Sep 4, 2023

The only thing i noticed just now is the internal monlouge of kakuzu when he was glaring at Hazõ.

It was a loop of "I must not shake the money child until he spill the secrets of profit, not yet"

_The_Bomb · Sep 4, 2023

roobee said:
Unless the daimyo call the villagers who don't pay the fake taxes bandits, and post a bandit suppression mission. I mean, would the typical ninja stop to question the bandits on whether they are bandits before killing them? Although there is still a risk to life of the daimyo to doing this. And even small life risks make people hesitate. But the daimyo could have a minion post the mission instead, evading responsibility from the angry ninja

That sounds like a great way to get publicly executed by Konoha for lying about critical mission information.

charlesrwest · Sep 4, 2023

Just finish the roads and keep working on literacy. The main thing allowing this is the information advantage the tax men have. The more cross contact your communities have the harder this sort of thing will be to pull off.

coldcutconvict · Sep 5, 2023

Paperclipped said:
Hazō and Ino often drew stares in the streets of Leaf. Actually, that wasn't quite right. Ninja drew stares in the streets of Leaf.

Interesting choice to start the chapter with a self contradiction. Invites deeper questioning, contemplation. Dissonance. A stutter step? No, a refinement.

Paperclipped said:
"Just be nice," Ino said. "It's a happy occasion. Just smile a lot and keep it light. No one's going to bring Jashin up unless you do first."

Ha! Just one of those awkward things, feels so much more significant from inside, hee. A messy break up, not getting into the school you wanted, Jashin worship.

Paperclipped said:
"Seems like a lot of trouble," Hazō said. "Maybe it'd just be easier to wait for a couple weeks, do some sealing research while people calm down and internalize the stuff I talked about at that speech, and only then get back into the swing of Leaf politics."

No!

Paperclipped said:
"No!" Ino said. "Are you crazy? Getting invited to small private events with the Hokage is great for your rep, but disappearing off to who-knows-where to worship who-knows-what is awful!"

Ino is a blessing.

Paperclipped said:
"Asuma-sensei!" she said. "Congratulations on the new baby! When did you find out? Have the healers told you if it's going to be a boy or a girl yet? Have you started thinking about names? You're going to name the baby after me, right?"

And a brat.

Paperclipped said:
Asuma accepted the hug for a couple seconds, but started trying to peel Ino away halfway into her endless stream of questions. "Ino, you can't just attack me like this in public, it's unseemly."

Daddy lion giving the cubs a win? No treason or world ending crises? Feels surreal.

Paperclipped said:
We haven't yet asked a Hyūga about whether the baby's a boy or a girl, and Kurenai asked Hinata not to say anything yet. We've thought about names, yes, but your name is not in the running."

Asking for an Ino, Hinata team up. Maybe a not far off day, Asuma will find himself eavesdropping on Hinata whispering something to Ino about twins or triplets.

Paperclipped said:
"I think 'Ino' has to be up there, sir," Hazō said to Asuma, keeping his face straight. "The world would be a better place with more Inos."

Put away your ruler and say aaaaaaa because there are no feet in that mouth.

Paperclipped said:
"And that's why you should teach me Shadow Clone," Ino said to her sensei, with a sweet face.

Chipping away. Almost.

Paperclipped said:
"Yeah," Kurenai said, tapping a finger to her cheek, "but if you know why he did what he did, why are you still annoyed by his… style?"

Feel of an ongoing conversation. Kurenai doing absent parent, sensei-in-law mothering.

Paperclipped said:
Kurenai laughed. "No, the minx has been well behaved for once in her life. Still weird, but she's always had a really bad case of jōnin. Actually, Ami came over for a nice dinner the other evening. She seemed to hit it off with one of Asuma's cousins."

Huh. Do not get to see much of how Ami interacts without us in the room, what others think of Ami.

Paperclipped said:
"A seduction specialist falling in love?" Kurenai said with a wry grin. "Less likely than a freeze in July. I think she's just making an excuse to come over to the estate a couple more times before she presents us some weirdly optimized restructuring of the buildings that we can't really deny since it would improve defensibility, but would also require us to hire a construction company of her choice and tie us into some nasty web of complicated obligations."

Love, Leverage, and the Lies She Told: A Necromancy Memoir.

Paperclipped said:
He looked away

Too long without a "Hazō" to use "he" for my short term memory.

Paperclipped said:
Ino sighed. "You're supposed to say yes. Maybe you don't see it with your eyes, but you can feel it in the mood. The excitement? It's not about what's actually there, it's about the potential, y'know?"

The implication. The subtext.

Paperclipped said:
"So… this is all performative?"

Affirmative, babies pass tags to mommy's Presence rolls.

Paperclipped said:
"Yeah," Ino said. "Kinda that. Kinda not. We're in the play, but we're also getting to enjoy it. Also, it's real. Anyway, want to go tease Asuma-sensei?"

Meta.

Paperclipped said:
"What do you think you're saying, young man?" Asuma said angrily, leaning in close to Akimichi. "I know we're in a private space, but I am the Hokage, and you cannot be saying things like that!

New theory, babies bring out canon personalities.

Paperclipped said:
Asuma sighed. "I was hoping you wouldn't see that. Well, we're even now. That gives me a fifty percent chance to win, right?"
Shikamaru selected his piece and shifted it sideways on the board, already preparing a new attack. "Lower, Asuma-sensei. Much, much lower."

Fought from a weaker position to a draw in material. Two in one hundred that it is fifty-fifty.

Paperclipped said:
They seemed to be enjoying themselves. Hazō didn't understand. He'd seen the figures for new jōnin promotion survival rates. Sure, in the aftermath of the war and the advent of AMITY, there would be fewer risky missions for jōnin to take. But still, the woman would likely be dead within a year or two. And Kurenai just accepted it and smiled and laughed, and didn't do anything about it.

What would it be for without the smiles and laughs?

Paperclipped said:
Hazō remembered Asuma, grappling with the moral weight of the decision, but electing to kill Isan anyway. Five hundred lives, ended within seconds by his ninjutsu. Asuma had been a ninja for two decades before that moment, and five hundred likely hadn't even been a tenth of the deaths he'd caused over his career. And now, for all that, he would bring one more life into this world. A happy life, perhaps, though the child would no doubt grow up to be a killer themselves.

Glad this was in pilot's head.

Paperclipped said:
"Nothing," she said. "We can ask Asuma to babysit, maybe."

Age old 'babysit to see how you are around kids' technique.

Paperclipped said:
Not taking the jutsu you have available would be a disadvantage. But maybe a strong signaling tool. If you need to take them, you could try remunerating KEI. You could have any clan ninja with KEI jutsu join the exchange, but only on the teaching side. That way, the techniques continue to be taught to the KEI population, and they don't become a clan secret."

Smart.

Paperclipped said:
Mari had drilled proper tea etiquette so deep into his bones that he couldn't ignore it if he wanted to.

Iron Nerve in shambles.

Paperclipped said:
Jin chuckled, a low and deep rumble that still somehow sounded faintly mocking. "I am pleased to hear, Lord Hazō, that after the previous weeks you have decided that your public image is in fact important."

Bad habit, but tend to look back at social mistakes as good smokescreen. Unobstructed rise to power would scare other clans too much. And other than unforced errors, more too lose in social conflicts than there is to gain. At S-rank, for ignoring politics, could face rank obstructionism and Mari's revenge for prematurely greying hair.

Paperclipped said:
Alarm bells went off in Hazō's head as he read the paper. Whatever the last scroll had been, this was definitely a trap. "I've already given the order, Jin. Is this a necessary component?"

Also alarmed but too smol brained to understand Jin's gambit.

Paperclipped said:
"I see," Hazō said. "Thank you for the feedback. If you have anything more you need to say, just know that my door is always open."

"It's not," Jin said. "And if it were, you're rarely there."

Hazō sighed. "It's a figure of speech. You can ask Gaku if you want my time, and I'm always glad to give it. In fact, that's exactly…"

Oouch. Ignoring good, direct feedback.

Paperclipped said:
Mio continued to glare at him. She probably thought she was keeping her face neutral, but she was a combat specialist. For all that he'd been neglecting Mari's training, Hazō could still read a new-ish chūnin that had never really tried to become a better liar.

Social social social combat!

Paperclipped said:
"I'd heard that the rumors were only targeting me," Hazō said.

"Yeah, but what does that say about the people that follow you?" Mio asked.

Part true, part looking for a reason to be mad?

Paperclipped said:
Mio waffled for a second before coming to a decision. "Oh, it's nothing," she said, voice bitingly sarcastic. "I joined a clan hoping to be treated equally, only to discover that the clan head's inner circle was treated way better than everyone else. Sure, I could deal with being an outcast. I've only been one my entire life, you know? And then my sister dies. So that was great. And now my clan head's actions mean that everyone I knew outside the clan is pushing me away because they don't want to associate with blood cultists and despite the fact that my sister's dead, I'm still a twin so I'm unclean anyway!"

Rough to see your dead sister in every glance at your reflection. Fight against twin prejudice like we fought for Kei's marriage? Big clans have to contend with 20 new academy graduates, 20 deaths a year. Borrow their wisdom?

Paperclipped said:
"Oh, don't fucking say it," Mio said. "You don't care about her. You didn't care about her. You gave her a funeral, then bounced away to parts unknown for months on end. She never mattered to you in the slightest."

What would change her mind? Not logic. Snap her out of her fugue by calling attention to a skill she used to be proud of but has allowed to deteriorate? Share more details about how we spend our time. Take to Orochimaru's lab for a day of ESing the Great Seal replica? Explain our difference in skill as a sealer between when she joined the clan and today. Demonstrate what that means with oldest + newest macerators. Oldest and newest rocket boots. Time it took to research Minato seals. What it means for the clan's strength in the next two years.

Paperclipped said:
"She did," Hazō said, insistently. "It's why we adopted her, and you. To get you the techniques you needed to maximize your odds of survival in the war. I promise you, we really did share everything we could have shared. There were a few things left out at the time – specialized seals for sealing research, outright state secrets, but there was nothing else that we had that we didn't give you. Unfortunately, it's still a war, and the odds of survival can never be a hundred percent.

Weak clan that shares everything is not more comforting than a strong clan that only shares weak things.

Paperclipped said:
Mio looked at the proffered seals in his hand for one, two seconds, before raising her own and striking the seals out of his hand. Slips of paper fell through the air.

Paperclipped said:
"This is exactly what I fucking mean," Mio said, raising her voice. "Any of us die, my sister dies, and what happens? A funeral. An engraving on a rock. But your girlfriend dies? Suddenly you're opening up a giant charity in her honor, chaining Shinji and Kazushi to their desks to run it, reconsidering your life choices and researching new seals to make yourself feel better. If it had been me that died out in the field, you know what would have happened? Funeral. Engraving. That's it.

Lose lose. Too little is too little. Too much is faking how little you cared when she was alive.

Paperclipped said:
"And you know what? It wouldn't be that bad if you just accepted it. Acted like the Hyūga, like I should be happy to lick the scraps off your dinner plate once you're done with it. Instead, you think that you're so great, that you're so different from the other clans, when really you give about as much of a shit about any of us as they do!"

Organized a meeting between Leaf clan adoptees? Let them compare how they are treated? Desirably, with Mari's finger on the scale.

It would be so easy to be loved. They want to love us if we give them our time and attention. But... it could never rise to the importance of the disasters we are juggling. Even Akane was not spared from that. Maybe we could share what we can and trust them to understand that. Hope we spar together for training.

Paperclipped said:
"Yeah, sure," Yūma said. "It's what any other ninja would do. But I was wondering if we were gonna do something better than that. It's been a bad season for chakra beasts, right? Maybe these guys were just driven out of their home and needed to find any life they could."

Paperclipped said:
"Ah, alright," Yūma said. "Wait, this isn't a Jashin thing, is it?"

Flawless comedic timing. How dare you.

Veedrac · Sep 5, 2023

Paperclipped said:
Look, if the walls stay sturdy and the kami are merciful, things are gonna be okay.

🎶 Roads update! Roads update! 🎶

"You saw how they made the walls," Kōji said. "Using their magic to pull stone from the earth chunk-by-chunk. It would have taken them a long time to protect the entire path, and for what? They don't care about our shrine. They care about our farmland."

No no no, as the saying goes, teach a man to farm, and you feed him for a lifetime, but excise the continent of chakra beasts and you help him kickstart civilization's exponential technological uplift.

Maybe that was the point. The ninja could afford to be a little less rich, so everyone else could be a little more rich. The daimyo, the peasants, and most of all, the tax-men.

As the other saying goes, always check the data. No, not later. No, not the data coming out of the model... no! Don't summarize the data first! Go to the source and look at the inputs to your model. Randomly subsample it if you need to. But don't forget to look!

coldcutconvict · Sep 5, 2023

Paperclipped said:
Thankfully, he didn't need the Pangolin Scroll memories at all in order to make progress. In fact, for all its help in analogizing the Great Seal to his conventional sealing knowledge, Hazō had found that eldritch insight to be occasionally counter to the reality of three-dimensional seals. This ancient style of sealing was unimaginably different from ordinary sealing. It made him feel like he'd barely scratched the surface.

What does it mean for three-dimensional seals and summon scrolls to differ? There was an Enma quote about maps.

eaglejarl said:
"The Monkeys believe that the essence of being is indivisible," Asuma said. "Your reflection is yourself. The map is the nation. The broken halves of a staff are still the staff. Work the correct jutsu on the reflection, you affect the person. Work the correct jutsu on the map, you affect the nation."

If true of summon scrolls, could it mean paper seals derive their function from partially mapping the essence of Out? That they would not work without their source? Isan learned sealing from studying a locking seal around the Pangolin Scroll. Pleasing if all paper sealing was the same on a deeper level.

Paperclipped said:
He may not have escaped with the Scroll's design stored into his bloodline, but he had gained a far greater insight into sealcraft.

He didn't know why, but there was something different about the Summoning Scrolls. They were inviolable – but the Great Seal was too (well, almost), and he could easily summon his memory of the Great Seal for all that it had overloaded his bloodline at first. Perhaps it was something about how they made new matter inviolable. Ink and blood applied by a summoner would never fade. There was something to the Summoning Scrolls, something that made them more than everything else, but he couldn't quite put his finger on it.

If a perfect map is not different from the territory, because summon scrolls are inviolable, fully copying them into a brain would lock the part of the brain they are copied to.

A bloodline copied the Great Seal. Sage made the Great Seal and bloodlines. Are bloodlines three-dimensional bioseals?

Left-Hand Mutant · Sep 5, 2023

charlesrwest said:
Just finish the roads and keep working on literacy. The main thing allowing this is the information advantage the tax men have. The more cross contact your communities have the harder this sort of thing will be to pull off.

Semi-Agree! Literacy and roads help, but will take a long time. And that still leaves the daimyo+taxmen in an adversarial position to the farmers.

Getting info about the true taxation rate to farmers and separating it from rumor won't be easy, especially if the daimyos and officials are working to interfere/obfuscate. And it won't stop the daimyo/taxman from simply demanding more anyways.
(Also, we're trying to prove to the tower that lower taxes benefit the economy. waiting years for roads and education won't do that.)

I'd rather give the daimyos a strong incentive to make sure taxes are collected correctly, and then let them manage and audit the taxmen.

---
Solution:

Ask Asuma to run an audit mission on a few random daimyos. Offer to pay for the mission, and suggest Goketsu Haru to do it, as he has the right skillset (he's willing to help civilians without cutting corners, is learning economics, and understands how to threaten people).

The mission is to visit various villages, ask people how much their tax was, and if(read: when) fraud is discovered, go to the daimyo and inform them that this is unacceptable. Threaten to brand/sever a hand(or however thieves are punished in the land of fire) if the audit discovers mass theft again next year.

Suddenly, the daimyo is very interested in correctly taxing the farmers, and closely supervising his taxmen.
Check in next year and see how things are going.

Oneiros · Sep 5, 2023

Left-Hand Mutant said:
Solution:

Alternatively, we have Mari cast a Genjutsu on the moon and we force the actual tax rate into everyone's brain.

Sir Stompy · Sep 5, 2023

Left-Hand Mutant said:
The mission is to visit various villages, ask people how much their tax was, and if(read: when) fraud is discovered, go to the daimyo and inform them that this is unacceptable. Threaten to brand/sever a hand(or however thieves are punished in the land of fire) if the audit discovers mass theft again next year.

I don't think this is harsh enough, just threatening? Not even actual punishments? No we need to go all the way. We cannot afford to look soft. Execute the worst offenders, and confiscate their possessions. Then promise clemency to the rest as long as they respect the lowered tax rate. I don't think anything less will do.

Remember, all of this takes place out of sight of their ninja overlords, and it will continue to do so. All we can really do is be hardasses and keep the daimyo scared enough to follow through.

MrRobot · Sep 5, 2023

Honestly if you people want that to be addressed you would want to go full IRS... Honestly this is a good use to "skinwaste" ninja be the mean audit taxman, we probably could not deal with any of the nobles asside from taking their money (and giving a kickback to the nobles that actually upheld the taxes) but the taxman, well they can be replaced quite easily.

roobee · Sep 5, 2023

One thing to be careful about with audits. Is to not make the farmers life worse if we discover them to have been hiding their crops and paying lower than the true taxation rate

Edit:

MrRobot said:
we probably could not deal with any of the nobles asside from taking their money (and giving a kickback to the nobles that actually upheld the taxes) but the taxman, well they can be replaced quite easily.

Daimyo compete to buy the land rights. We can just replace them with one who failed to buy the land if we want

Edit2: it would be cool if the farmers could just pool their pre-tax money and elect someone to buy the land tax collection rights for them. But that sounds logistically infeasible

MrRobot · Sep 5, 2023

roobee said:
Edit2

Yeah lets not try to get a Co-opt running. The general people on the EN can't be trusted to not fuck that up.

Shrooms · Sep 5, 2023

Paperclipped said:

Sealing Research for Chapter 612

Timeline:

Click to expand...

Click to shrink...

Paperclipped said:
~~Prime: Days 1-8 prep on Reusable Rocket Boots, Day 9 attempt~~

So on Day 9 his long-day clone was popped after the sealing failure, though this happened at the end of the infusion day and 'after the chapter ends.' I'm taking this to mean we do get the last notes block from that day, though if QMs disagree that's fine. It's the difference of a singular XP AFAICT lmao

Paperclipped said:

Sealing Research for Chapter 612

Timeline:

Click to expand...

Click to shrink...

Paperclipped said:
~~Prime: Days 1-8 prep on Reusable Rocket Boots, Day 9 attempt~~

So on Day 9 his long-day clone was popped after the sealing failure, though this happened at the end of the infusion day and 'after the chapter ends.' I'm taking this to mean we do get the last notes block from that day, though if QMs disagree that's fine. It's the difference of a singular XP AFAICT so it's not really all that important either way. Because Hazou was working on RRB, he is not stagnant and gets the full value of the notes for these 9 days.

After that, 4 days pass before we enter the dungeon. However, on the 4th day where we actually enter, Hazou doesn't have any SCs active, so only 3 more days of notes will pass - and these days experience the effects of stagnancy (as far as I am aware.)

Shrooms said:

Hazou:

Click to expand...

Click to shrink...

Shrooms said:
~~Sealing:~~

~~Jiraiya's Sealing Notes: S:1500, B:0, R:0~~

~~Oro Batch 1~~

~~Orochimaru's Sealing notes #1: S:200, B:0, R:0~~

~~Orochimaru's Sealing notes #2: S:200, B:0, R:0~~

~~Oro Batch 2~~

~~Orochimaru's Sealing notes #3: S:150, B:0, R:0~~

~~Orochimaru's Sealing notes #4: S:72 B:78 R:0~~

~~Orochimaru's Sealing notes #5: S:0, B:33, R:67~~

~~Orochimaru's Sealing notes #6: S:0, B:33, R:67~~

~~Orochimaru's Sealing notes #7: S:0, B:16.5, R:33.5~~

~~Orochimaru's Sealing notes #8: S:0, B:1, R:49~~

Orochimaru's Sealing notes #5: 9 * 2/day + 3 * 2/day * .5 (Stagnancy) = 21 Sealing XP
Orochimaru's Sealing notes #6: 9 * 2/day + 3 * 2/day * .5 (Stagnancy) = 21 Sealing XP
Orochimaru's Sealing notes #7: 9 * 1/day + 3 * 1/day * .5 (Stagnancy) = 10.5 Sealing XP
Orochimaru's Sealing notes #8: 9 * 1/day + 3 * 1/day * .5 (Stagnancy) = 10.5 Sealing XP

Hazou:

~~Sealing:~~
- ~~Jiraiya's Sealing Notes: S:1500, B:0, R:0~~
- ~~Oro Batch 1~~
  - ~~Orochimaru's Sealing notes #1: S:200, B:0, R:0~~
  - ~~Orochimaru's Sealing notes #2: S:200, B:0, R:0~~
- ~~Oro Batch 2~~
  - ~~Orochimaru's Sealing notes #3: S:150, B:0, R:0~~
  - ~~Orochimaru's Sealing notes #4: S:72 B:78 R:0~~
  - ~~Orochimaru's Sealing notes #5: S:0, B:54, R:46~~
  - ~~Orochimaru's Sealing notes #6: S:0, B:54, R:46~~
  - ~~Orochimaru's Sealing notes #7: S:0, B:27, R:23~~
  - ~~Orochimaru's Sealing notes #8: S:0, B:11.5, R: 38.5~~

~~We've got about 40 days left on the Sealing notes, and only for the very last one. The rest have 23ish days to go.~~

The first 9 days accounted for in this post were already totaled, so I'm redoing the totals in another post.

Shrooms · Sep 5, 2023

Shrooms said:

So on Day 9 his long-day clone was popped after the sealing failure, though this happened at the end of the infusion day and 'after the chapter ends.' I'm taking this to mean we do get the last notes block from that day, though if QMs disagree that's fine. It's the difference of a singular XP AFAICT lmao

So on Day 9 his long-day clone was popped after the sealing failure, though this happened at the end of the infusion day and 'after the chapter ends.' I'm taking this to mean we do get the last notes block from that day, though if QMs disagree that's fine. It's the difference of a singular XP AFAICT so it's not really all that important either way. Because Hazou was working on RRB, he is not stagnant and gets the full value of the notes for these 9 days.

After that, 4 days pass before we enter the dungeon. However, on the 4th day where we actually enter, Hazou doesn't have any SCs active, so only 3 more days of notes will pass - and these days experience the effects of stagnancy (as far as I am aware.)

Orochimaru's Sealing notes #5: 9 * 2/day + 3 * 2/day * .5 (Stagnancy) = 21 Sealing XP
Orochimaru's Sealing notes #6: 9 * 2/day + 3 * 2/day * .5 (Stagnancy) = 21 Sealing XP
Orochimaru's Sealing notes #7: 9 * 1/day + 3 * 1/day * .5 (Stagnancy) = 10.5 Sealing XP
Orochimaru's Sealing notes #8: 9 * 1/day + 3 * 1/day * .5 (Stagnancy) = 10.5 Sealing XP

Hazou:

Click to expand...

Click to shrink...

Shrooms said:
~~Sealing:~~

~~Jiraiya's Sealing Notes: S:1500, B:0, R:0~~

~~Oro Batch 1~~

~~Orochimaru's Sealing notes #1: S:200, B:0, R:0~~

~~Orochimaru's Sealing notes #2: S:200, B:0, R:0~~

~~Oro Batch 2~~

~~Orochimaru's Sealing notes #3: S:150, B:0, R:0~~

~~Orochimaru's Sealing notes #4: S:72 B:78 R:0~~

~~Orochimaru's Sealing notes #5: S:0, B:54, R:46~~

~~Orochimaru's Sealing notes #6: S:0, B:54, R:46~~

~~Orochimaru's Sealing notes #7: S:0, B:27, R:23~~

~~Orochimaru's Sealing notes #8: S:0, B:11.5, R: 38.5~~

~~We've got about 40 days left on the Sealing notes, and only for the very last one. The rest have 23ish days to go.~~

Don't think I ever subtracted out Sealing 51 (102 XP)

Which notes I'm subtracting from is technically not what it would have been but same diff lol
Hazou:

~~Sealing:~~
- ~~Jiraiya's Sealing Notes: S:1500, B:0, R:0~~
- ~~Oro Batch 1~~
  - ~~Orochimaru's Sealing notes #1: S:200, B:0, R:0~~
  - ~~Orochimaru's Sealing notes #2: S:200, B:0, R:0~~
- ~~Oro Batch 2~~
  - ~~Orochimaru's Sealing notes #3: S:150, B:0, R:0~~
  - ~~Orochimaru's Sealing notes #4: S:72 B:78 R:0~~
  - ~~Orochimaru's Sealing notes #5: S:54, B:0, R:46~~
  - ~~Orochimaru's Sealing notes #6: S:48, B:4, R:46~~
  - ~~Orochimaru's Sealing notes #7: S:0, B:27, R:23~~
  - ~~Orochimaru's Sealing notes #8: S:0, B:11.5, R: 38.5~~

The first 9 days accounted for in this post were already totaled, so I'm redoing the totals in another post.

Left-Hand Mutant · Sep 5, 2023

Left-Hand Mutant said:
Semi-Agree! Literacy and roads help, but will take a long time. And that still leaves the daimyo+taxmen in an adversarial position to the farmers.

Getting info about the true taxation rate to farmers and separating it from rumor won't be easy, especially if the daimyos and officials are working to interfere/obfuscate. And it won't stop the daimyo/taxman from simply demanding more anyways.
(Also, we're trying to prove to the tower that lower taxes benefit the economy. waiting years for roads and education won't do that.)

I'd rather give the daimyos a strong incentive to make sure taxes are collected correctly, and then let them manage and audit the taxmen.

---
Solution:

Ask Asuma to run an audit mission on a few random daimyos. Offer to pay for the mission, and suggest Goketsu Haru to do it, as he has the right skillset (he's willing to help civilians without cutting corners, is learning economics, and understands how to threaten people).

The mission is to visit various villages, ask people how much their tax was, and if(read: when) fraud is discovered, go to the daimyo and inform them that this is unacceptable. Threaten to brand/sever a hand(or however thieves are punished in the land of fire) if the audit discovers mass theft again next year.

Suddenly, the daimyo is very interested in correctly taxing the farmers, and closely supervising his taxmen.
Check in next year and see how things are going.

Sir Stompy said:
I don't think this is harsh enough, just threatening? Not even actual punishments? No we need to go all the way. We cannot afford to look soft. Execute the worst offenders, and confiscate their possessions. Then promise clemency to the rest as long as they respect the lowered tax rate. I don't think anything less will do.

Remember, all of this takes place out of sight of their ninja overlords, and it will continue to do so. All we can really do is be hardasses and keep the daimyo scared enough to follow through.

I appreciate this thought!

I softballed the proposal somewhat because I really don't know what relationship Asuma/Leaf has with the daimyo, or how big an issue a dead/hostile daimyo is.
IFF Asuma approves it, I'd go for more severe measures, like mutilating a hand(or EN equivalent) and threatening execution on repeat offense.

I'd rather not kill for the first offense, for (at least) two reasons:

It's Bad Communication: We didn't make the threat in advance, and the daimyo didn't expect us to care about skimming extra taxes, let alone care enough to execute people. A reputation for killing people for seemingly no foreseeable reason is often a Bad Thing[1].
Turnover is costly: I don't know how daimyo succession normally works, but I assume it will take the new guy a little while to figure out the ropes. a newer daimyo with a less stable powerbase will have a harder time forcing the administration/tax collectors to behave.

Left-Hand Mutant · Sep 5, 2023

Left-Hand Mutant said:
A reputation for killing people for seemingly no foreseeable reason is often a Bad Thing[1].

[1] Note that one of Jiraiya's big advantages was being a basically reasonable dude it was safe to interact with, while nobody sane wants to even interact with with Orochimaru/Hidan. There is a lesson to be learned here.

Shrooms · Sep 5, 2023

On the topic of notes, I would recommend we buy MedNin 10 (55 XP) at the next earliest convenience and start doing the MedNin/MedKnow notes. It's ~1000 XP for a tenth of the cost, which gets them both to 33ish, and having two more 30s is helpful for pretty much any direction we want to take our build, as the 10s/20s are very cheap to acquire while 30s are where supports start getting pricey.

Left-Hand Mutant · Sep 5, 2023

Shrooms said:
On the topic of notes, I would recommend we buy MedNin 10 (55 XP) at the next earliest convenience and start doing the MedNin/MedKnow notes. It's ~1000 XP for a tenth of the cost, which gets them both to 33ish, and having two more 30s is helpful for pretty much any direction we want to take our build, as the 10s/20s are very cheap to acquire while 30s are where supports start getting pricey.

Counterpoint: I really want to raise Hazou's Presence/Deceit to 39, and using them as supports to get mednin/medknow to 30 makes it much harder to boost Presence/Deceit later.

Shrooms · Sep 5, 2023

Shrooms said:
Hazou:

Sealing:

Jiraiya's Sealing Notes: S:1500, B:0, R:0

Oro Batch 1

Orochimaru's Sealing notes #1: S:200, B:0, R:0

Orochimaru's Sealing notes #2: S:200, B:0, R:0

Oro Batch 2

Orochimaru's Sealing notes #3: S:150, B:0, R:0

Orochimaru's Sealing notes #4: S:72 B:78 R:0

Orochimaru's Sealing notes #5: S:0, B:33, R:67

Orochimaru's Sealing notes #6: S:0, B:33, R:67

Orochimaru's Sealing notes #7: S:0, B:16.5, R:33.5

Orochimaru's Sealing notes #8: S:0, B:1, R:49

Okay I doubled counted the 9 days, so I'm redoing this. First, we pay 102 XP for Sealing 51

Shrooms said:
Hazou:

Sealing:

Jiraiya's Sealing Notes: S:1500, B:0, R:0

Oro Batch 1

Orochimaru's Sealing notes #1: S:200, B:0, R:0

Orochimaru's Sealing notes #2: S:200, B:0, R:0

Oro Batch 2

Orochimaru's Sealing notes #3: S:150, B:0, R:0

Orochimaru's Sealing notes #4: S:150 B:0 R:0

Orochimaru's Sealing notes #5: S:24, B:9, R:67

Orochimaru's Sealing notes #6: S:0, B:33, R:67

Orochimaru's Sealing notes #7: S:0, B:16.5, R:33.5

Orochimaru's Sealing notes #8: S:0, B:1, R:49

Only 3 days of stagnant notes research have occurred:

Orochimaru's Sealing notes #5: 3 * 2/day * .5 (Stagnancy) = 3 Sealing XP
Orochimaru's Sealing notes #6: 3 * 2/day * .5 (Stagnancy) = 3 Sealing XP
Orochimaru's Sealing notes #7: 3 * 1/day * .5 (Stagnancy) = 1.5 Sealing XP
Orochimaru's Sealing notes #8: 3 * 1/day * .5 (Stagnancy) = 1.5 Sealing XP

Hazou:

Sealing:
- Jiraiya's Sealing Notes: S:1500, B:0, R:0
- Oro Batch 1
  - Orochimaru's Sealing notes #1: S:200, B:0, R:0
  - Orochimaru's Sealing notes #2: S:200, B:0, R:0
- Oro Batch 2
  - Orochimaru's Sealing notes #3: S:150, B:0, R:0
  - Orochimaru's Sealing notes #4: S:150 B:0 R:0
  - Orochimaru's Sealing notes #5: S:24, B:12, R:64
  - Orochimaru's Sealing notes #6: S:0, B:36, R:64
  - Orochimaru's Sealing notes #7: S:0, B:18, R:32
  - Orochimaru's Sealing notes #8: S:0, B:2.5, R:47.5

Oneiros · Sep 5, 2023

Left-Hand Mutant said:
[1] Note that one of Jiraiya's big advantages was being a basically reasonable dude it was safe to interact with, while nobody sane wants to even interact with with Orochimaru/Hidan. There is a lesson to be learned here.

Yeah we need to either keep all our murders secret, pin them on someone else or, kill everyone who knows anything. Just like Jiraiya

Shrooms · Sep 5, 2023

Left-Hand Mutant said:
Counterpoint: I really want to raise Hazou's Presence/Deceit to 39, and using them as supports to get mednin/medknow to 30 makes it much harder to boost Presence/Deceit later.

It really doesn't imo. HLaM, Living Roots, Earth Clone, and Tunnel Jutsu are all skills I would like to raise an AB or so, and we can get the XP for it in like three weeks. Two halfcost 10s and two halfcost 20s -> 265 XP -> ~20 days. And then we will have a bunch of 30s which makes raising Ath, Alt, and so on easier.

Marked for Death: A Rational Naruto Quest

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In doubt there's always the Sun!

In doubt there's always the Sun!

In doubt there's always the Sun!