NorseQuest (A Norse Xianxia)

[TheCount]

I mean, Quick Recall would let us steal his sword if it was already disarmed and retrieve our own weapon instantly if we lost it, so it's not useless by any means...just not 'steal people's armor' kinda useful

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Nah, not steal people's armor off of them, just give them a good tug or push, in a place they don't expect or at a time they can't let anything disrupt them, like blocking or delivering a hard blow, so it disrupts them.
By the rules/guesses of battle seidr we know, it's both cheap and quick.
But it can have great effects.

 

[DeadmanwalkingXI]

Nah, not steal people's armor off of them, just give them a good tug or push, in a place they don't expect or at a time they can't let anything disrupt them, like blocking or delivering a hard blow, so it disrupts them.
By the rules/guesses of battle seidr we know, it's both cheap and quick.
But it can have great effects.

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That's plausible, yeah, but it's still a very different thing from our current Tricks in that regard.

 

[Bass11]

I wonder how Gabriel would do against another squire.

 

[Shard]

Squires are definitionally weaker than Gabriel. He's basically a knight minus the title.

 

[DeadmanwalkingXI]

I wonder how Gabriel would do against another squire.

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Depends on the Squire, I'd imagine. I suspect he's got a few less flashy tricks but more combat experience against peers (since they're used to fighting lower powered people), which means he'd probably wreck most of them.

Squires are definitionally weaker than Gabriel. He's basically a knight minus the title.

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Ehhhh....we were told that 4th Decade was the earliest you could be a Knight, with the implication that becoming a Knight in the 4th Decade was maybe not universal. It would not surprise me if there are other early 4th Decade Squires out there, though they're clearly gonna hit Knighthood in the near future. Like, I think Gabriel is at the cusp of Knighthood, power-wise, but I don't think other Squires are necessarily knighted the moment they hit the 4th Decade, so other Squires of his power level are possible.

 

[Bass11]

I'm sure there is something else that allows them to progress to a knight besides sheer combat experience. They seem like they would tightly control knighthood in the christian lands.

 

[Shard]

I'm sure there is something else that allows them to progress to a knight besides sheer combat experience. They seem like they would tightly control knighthood in the christian lands.

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Access to Knightly Armor or lack thereof.

 

[Bass11]

Access to Knightly Armor or lack thereof.

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I'm sure there are knightly weapons too I guess.

 

[DeadmanwalkingXI]

I'm sure there is something else that allows them to progress to a knight besides sheer combat experience. They seem like they would tightly control knighthood in the christian lands.

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I mean, they tightly control who can become a Chivalric Cultivator and receive the training in the first place...I suspect that once you're on that path you just need the armor (and maybe weapon). And a ceremony, of course, though to what degree that has a meaningful effect in terms of power level I'm less clear...it probably does matter, though.

 

[Skippy]

I think I'm actually going to remove the mention of Halting Vortex from my plan altogether, it's only inviting misinterpretation from voters or from IF for that matter.

Yeah, looking at it that's a real problem...those defenses will not stop any attack he's gonna throw so they might as well not exist. Anything short of 30d6 is spitting into the wind, and 40 or 50 would be better.

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Yeah, like, I can see a logic that says he will completely neglect his defences this round, so only launching attacks that are <20d6 is viable. To be clear, I think that logic is wrong - even a light defensive effort from Gabriel is going to be =/>20d6, because he's working with roughly equivalent or slightly greater resources than us, and we could easily stop attacks hitting with only 17d6 even if we were putting minimal effort into defence.

But I can't see a logic which presupposes Gabriel will completely neglect his defence, and simultaneously that he will completely neglect his offense at the same time. Where would all Gabriel's dice even be going? Is he having a really vivid daydream, or a mild stroke? In that scenario we might stand a chance of hitting him or stopping his attacks.

Like honestly @Alectai, I like having a diversity of plans, and I'm not trying to tell you how to live your best Questing Life but... just put 20-25 Orthstirr worth of Hone on top of literally everything in your plan and maybe add in some Flashfire Cleave + Contested Movements, and I'll stop complaining. It's just not throwing enough big piles of dice around at the moment*, and that's a problem you live in a shounen and your opponent is using a bigger number than you do.



*(This also reinforces my belief that something which says "this is a rough benchmark for how much dice the other guy puts into stuff, if he's throwing stronger attacks or weaker defences, it's all relative to that" would be very useful to have in this system, because it would probably have avoided this happening. I know Alectai is a smart guy, I think it's literally that like, the number of dice both Halla and her enemies are throwing at eachother has seen a steady power creep throughout the game, and this maybe forgets that.)

 

[Shard]

I want a plan that does a ton of attacks to make Gabriel bleed his Fervor dry by going under him (optionally with a handful of Sharpen and Trick attacks), but otherwise mainly focuses on Not Getting Wrecked by Gabriel's high-expenditure offense.

Which plan does this?

 

[DeadmanwalkingXI]

I think I'm actually going to remove the mention of Halting Vortex from my plan altogether, it's only inviting misinterpretation from voters or from IF for that matter.

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I feel like if literally everything else has failed it's worth a shot. It's only 4 Orthstirr to try Halting Vortex and by the time you've burned every other defense and failed that's a drop in the bucket. I can ditch it if anyone would actually vote for my plan without that, though...it's a last ditch thing that's not expected to work.

Yeah, like, I can see a logic that says he will completely neglect his defences this round, so only launching attacks that are <20d6 is viable. To be clear, I think that logic is wrong - even a light defensive effort from Gabriel is going to be >20d6, because he's working with roughly equivalent or slightly greater resources than us, and we could easily stop attacks hitting with only 17d6 even if we were putting very little effort into defence.

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In fairness, the final attack in 'Like A Book' also adds all the accumulated Stoker Dice per the plan, which should up it to north of 40d6. The Slice Asides are the only real issue, in terms of number of dice.

*(This also reinforces my belief that something which says "this is a rough benchmark for how much dice the other guy puts into stuff, if he's throwing stronger attacks or weaker defences, it's all relative to that" would be very useful to have in this system, because it would probably have avoided this happening. I know Alectai is a smart guy, I think it's literally that like, the number of dice both Halla and her enemies are throwing at eachother has seen a steady power creep throughout the game, and this maybe forgets that.)

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I'll mention again, whether this is a feature or a bug is a matter of perspective. Us being able to easily misjudge how many dice to use due to the opacity of information is, in general, not a bad thing for the system if the intention is for it to be part of the necessary puzzle solving.

I want a plan that does a ton of attacks to make Gabriel bleed his Fervor dry by going under him (optionally with a handful of Sharpen and Trick attacks), but otherwise mainly focuses on Not Getting Wrecked by Gabriel's high-expenditure offense.

Which plan does this?

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None of them exactly. Defense in Depth and Counterattacks do most of this, but both do also include one 'opening' attack to get him to pay attention, and while Alectai's lacks that and goes harder on the 'run him out of defenses' idea (that idea is in all of them, but that plan goes much harder at it), its defenses are a bit anemic. Personally, I obviously advise my own plan, but then I'm obviously biased.

 

[Skippy]

I want a plan that does a ton of attacks to make Gabriel bleed his Fervor dry by going under him (optionally with a handful of Sharpen and Trick attacks), but otherwise mainly focuses on Not Getting Wrecked by Gabriel's high-expenditure offense.

Which plan does this?

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I would say Deadman's or mine - I'm launching seven attacks plus at least two that he cannot block and will go through his armour, and have a strong layered defence with lots of dice behind it.

Deadman is doing basically the same thing, the main difference is his plan uses a Spark Bomb to get through without Contested Movement (which I'm slightly nervous of), and I use Slice-Aside Tricks which then chain into our Basic Attacks, whilst he's using Hefty Halter Chop.

In fairness, the final attack also adds all the accumulated Stoker Dice per the plan, which should up it to north of 40d6. The Slice Asides are the only real issue, in terms of number of dice.

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Fair enough, I did forget that one, but it's more like, all the Firebomb Strikes which don't have enough dice to get through any kind of defence.

Like, with Basic Attacks I can see the logic in terms of wearing down defences because they're very cheap and generate Stoked Dice - but Firebomb Strikes are not that cheap, and don't get us anything. Also with how the attack system works in this game, every attack we make is inviting another attack until we run out and the turn ends. So throwing a lot of weak attacks whilst not having sufficient defences... can be asking to be hit a lot.

Oh, speaking of Basic Attacks, can the Basic Attacks in my/your plan right now actually hurt him if we presuppose one got through and hit his armour? If not, what do I need to add to make that happen?

Because Slice-Aside actually stops him from using his sword to defend if it wins, and then launches a Basic Attack as a followup, so in my plan it's not impossible in my plan that he'll get hit with some.

 

[DeadmanwalkingXI]

I would say Deadman's or mine - I'm launching seven attacks plus at least two that he cannot block and will go through his armour, and have a strong layered defence with lots of dice behind it.

Deadman is doing basically the same thing, the main difference is his plan uses a Spark Bomb to get through without Contested Movement (which I'm slightly nervous of), and I use Slice-Aside Tricks which then chain into our Basic Attacks, whilst he's using Hefty Halter Chop.

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I'll note that HHC potentially disarms him, which is self evidently great. Better than another Basic Attack, IMO.

Fair enough, I did forget that one, but it's more like, all the Firebomb Strikes which don't have enough dice to get through any kind of defence.

Like, with Basic Attacks I can see the logic in terms of wearing down defences because they're very cheap and generate Stoked Dice - but Firebomb Strikes are not that cheap, and don't get us anything. Also with how the attack system works in this game, every attack we make is inviting another attack until we run out and the turn ends. So throwing a lot of weak attacks whilst not having sufficient defences... can be asking to be hit a lot.

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So, Alectai's plan seems to be relying on him being, basically, out of defenses by then, having wasted all of his on the first 6 basic attacks and their Sword Strike follow-ups. So the Firebomb Strikes would, in the world where that works, be relatively unopposed. I'm...fairly dubious of relying on that personally, but it's not impossible by any means.

And making more attacks doesn't subject you to more attacks. One person running out of attacks is not a round end, inherently, that's when both people have run out of attacks. Like, if nothing stopped it, and one person made 10 attacks and the other made 60, at the same speed, they'd trade attacks for 10 exchanges and then the guy with 50 extra attacks would make their remaining 50 unopposed. That's...very unlikely to happen, as IME, well over 80% of rounds have a round break before anyone is actually out of attacks, but it could happen in theory.

Oh, speaking of Basic Attacks, can the Basic Attacks in my/your plan right now actually hurt him if we presuppose one got through and hit his armour? If not, what do I need to add to make that happen?

Because Slice-Aside actually stops him from using his sword to defend if it wins, and then launches a Basic Attack as a followup, so in my plan it's not impossible in my plan that he'll get hit with some.

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So, the basic attacks both our plans have on offense could definitely hurt him if they hit, yeah. Assuming that his armor wasn't pierced, they'd do 4 damage to it and it'd get Pierced after three of them. So each individually isn't huge, but they matter and he does need to actually defend against them.

Whether the ones from Slice Aside work is actually a trickier question. Basically, you need to spend over Rebuke in Orthstirr on an attack for the attack to get through it. So...does the Orthstirr spent on Slice Aside itself count for that, or is that only counted as part of the defense not the counterattack? If it counts on the attack, they work, if not, they do literally nothing.

Which way does that actually work? We have no idea. Which is why I'm reluctant to use Slice Aside in this fight.

 

[Shard]

See, from what I can read of Gabriel's plan, it looks like this:

~130 Combat dice (d4s, not d6s, equivalent to our own pool x1.5)
~660 Fervor, pending how Fervor works compared to Orthsirr (and Gabriel's ability to get more Fervor while in the Norselands, if Fervor is 'worth less', then probably ~1000 Fervor maybe)

Probably spent a net 60 Fervor in round 1

From what I can tell, since you can't add multiple combat dice to a single basic attack or defend, you're just stuck with even-ized Fervor spending. Probably 20~30 Fervor per basic attack or defend, and there's nothing actually stopping Gabriel from saying 'keep defending until I run out of Fervor' in a plan, which could be exploited.

Gabriel might not have a Reinforce equivalent (or learned it more like), forcing him to Hone-equivalent the shit out of his attacks and defences evenly. This would explain his basic attacks and defences rolling 83, 90, 93, which about makes sense if this is the case.

In that event, the proper response is:

1. Lots of Honed attacks (to the bare minimum of doing damage) you don't expect to get anywhere
2. Lots of Honed+Reinforced defences to stop basic attacks that roll in the ~100 range
3. Contested Movement and/or High Dice maneuvers to handle his Tricks Prayers that pierce perfects and probably dispel Slipstream(???).

 

[DeadmanwalkingXI]

~660 Fervor, pending how Fervor works compared to Orthsirr (and Gabriel's ability to get more Fervor while in the Norselands, if Fervor is 'worth less', then probably ~1000 Fervor maybe)

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Gabriel recovers 66 Fervor per round every round. I think that might be literally all he gets, though. On the other hand, I think it might grant 2d4 per point spent or something like that. Each point being worth more than 1 Orthstirr, at least numerically, seems very possible.

The evidence is that Squires and Knights don't nova super well...they can't spend more than a certain amount per turn from what we've seen...they just get to spend that whole amount to enhance their huge dice pool every single turn. Meaning we'll lose if the fight goes too long...we want to beat him before his sustainability becomes a deciding factor.

1. Lots of Honed attacks (to the bare minimum of doing damage) you don't expect to get anywhere
2. Lots of Honed+Reinforced defences to stop basic attacks that roll in the ~100 range
3. Contested Movement and/or High Dice maneuvers to handle his Tricks Prayers that pierce perfects and probably dispel Slipstream(???).

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If you accept '6' as 'lots' for #1 this is pretty directly both my and Skippy's plans. Well, with Atgeir Guard and Sword Guard hopefully handling some of the defenses.

 

[Shard]

Gabriel recovers 66 Fervor per round every round. I think that might be literally all he gets, though. On the other hand, I think it might grant 2d4 per point spent or something like that. Each point being worth more than 1 Orthstirr, at least numerically, seems very possible.

The evidence is that Squires and Knights don't nova super well...they can't spend more than a certain amount per turn from what we've seen...they just get to spend that whole amount to enhance their huge dice pool every single turn.

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I have extreme doubt that Gabriel only has 66 Fervor per round with no reserve. There's no way that could possibly work mechanically, they would be squished so easily by literally anyone who can outspend their regenerating pool.

What we've seen is that Squires and Knights don't have a limit on Fervor expenditure aside from their cap, just as Norsemen don't have limits on Orthsirr expenditure. The raid in itself showed that already. Nova isn't their plan but it's what they have to do when going up against Norsemen. They can definitely be attrited in the timeframe of combat rounds.

If you accept '6' as 'lots' for #1 this is pretty directly both my my and Skippy's plans. Well, with Atgeir Guard and Sword Guard hopefully handling some of the defenses.

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I would want, like, 9.

 

[DeadmanwalkingXI]

I have extreme doubt that Gabriel only has 66 Fervor per round with no reserve. There's no way that could possibly work mechanically, they would be squished so easily by literally anyone who can outspend their regenerating pool.

What we've seen is that Squires and Knights don't have a limit on Fervor expenditure aside from their cap, just as Norsemen don't have limits on Orthsirr expenditure. The raid in itself showed that already. Nova isn't their plan but it's what they have to do when going up against Norsemen. They can definitely be attrited in the timeframe of combat rounds.

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Depends on if their costs are the same as Norsemen's. It's plausible that all their Prayers cost low amounts of Fervor...if they're spending 1 Fervor for things that would cost us 5 Orthstirr, suddenly that'd work just fine, but I admit that they could also have a bigger pool and that's just their regeneration.

I would want, like, 9.

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I can go to 9, on top of the other attacks in the plan, if it'll get an additional vote.

 

[Alectai]

Okay, awake now, going to go over the feedback and make adjustments.

 

[Shard]

Depends on if their costs are the same as Norsemen's. It's plausible that all their Prayers cost low amounts of Fervor...if they're spending 1 Fervor for things that would cost us 5 Orthstirr, suddenly that'd work just fine, but I admit that they could also have a bigger pool and that's just their regeneration.

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We saw in the raid that the Squire throwing javelins at us was being like, super economical to the extent that he was 'full on Fervor' when we actually got to him - His Javelin Attacks were filled by his regen because he wanted to be topped up for the fight. Gabriel's doing something similar - He'll spend at least (not at most, at least) 66 Fervor, because otherwise it's going to be wasted, but after that it's a combat decision on just how much Fervor he wants to spend on any given attack or defend.

Also I'm looking at it and from what I can tell literally the optimum plan should be just, massed normal attacks with doublecost (optionally Sharpened) Swordstrikes to effectively double our attack speed. No need for tricks, even! We just hit him with as many attacks as possible that roll 30s to his 90s(+15), and at some point he will run out of Fervor for defences and we start getting in a whole bunch of unopposed attacks. Just completely overwhelm him.

Obviously this plan would work better if we went for 4x Attack Speed, but c'est la vie.

 

[Alectai]

ADJUSTMENT LOG:

A) Significantly increased the dice pool on the Slice-Aside Tricks, bringing them up to 35d6+8 each. @Imperial Fister, the investment on the Trick means that the counterattack attempt will still be considered strong enough to break through Rebuke, right?
B) Altered the counterattack from Contested Movement to be Flashfire Cleave.

Was there any major feedback that I missed?

 

[DeadmanwalkingXI]

A) Significantly increased the dice pool on the Slice-Aside Tricks, bringing them up to 35d6+8 each. @Imperial Fister, the investment on the Trick means that the counterattack attempt will still be considered strong enough to break through Rebuke, right?

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This is still pretty low, IMO. We can't afford to take damage again and if we're gonna go through 6 Basic Attacks before we start actually hitting Gabriel, then we need the ability to reliably weather at least a full 6 attacks. He was throwing numbers of 105 last turn and he's going heavy offense this turn which means that number is likely to jump significantly...an average of less than 130 (which is what you get at 35 dice) isn't gonna cut it reliably. Like, I would expect those to work maybe 2/3 of the time vs. his dice pool numbers, and that means we get hit over four attacks that interact with them. And we can't really afford that very well.

Basically, if he breaks the Atgeir Bodyguard early on, I don't think those are gonna be enough. Like, much better than 20d6, obviously, but I'd put a minimum of 40 in each, likely more...it's only a bit more Orthstirr and being stingy with that is not a great plan, I don't think.

 

[Alectai]

Good enough, I'll do that.

EDIT: Done, Slice-Asides are up to 40d6 now.

 

[Skippy]

So, Alectai's plan seems to be relying on him being, basically, out of defenses by then, having wasted all of his on the first 6 basic attacks and their Sword Strike follow-ups. So the Firebomb Strikes would, in the world where that works, be relatively unopposed. I'm...fairly dubious of relying on that personally, but it's not impossible by any means.

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For one thing, if he has any kind of persistent defence like an equivalent of Sword Guard or Semi-Pefect Halting Vortex, we're sort of screwed. I wouldn't put that past him, in particular the way he was able to fend off our Sword Strike even when we were launching it simultaneously with other things kinda seems like plausible evidence in that direction.

And making more attacks doesn't subject you to more attacks. One person running out of attacks is not a round end, inherently, that's when both people have run out of attacks. Like, if nothing stopped it, and one person made 10 attacks and the other made 60, at the same speed, they'd trade attacks for 10 exchanges and then the guy with 50 extra attacks would make their remaining 50 unopposed. That's...very unlikely to happen, as IME, well over 80% of rounds have a round break before anyone is actually out of attacks, but it could happen in theory.

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I think I may have misspoken here; I guess what I'm saying think if we're throwing X attacks in a round, then Imperial Fister prolly adjudicates it so that the other guy is throwing X +/- N depending on whether our opponent is pursuing a high-attack (+ve N) or low attack (-ve N) strategy that round, so things roughly fit neatly within a Turn. (Assuming nothing round-breaking happens.)

But if we're throwing X attacks and they're throwing X+1, but our defences only hold up for the first attack, let's say... then we're potentially open to X attacks. Realistically what seems to happen here is we get punched in the face and then get a forced Turn Break to regroup, but that's still not great.

So yeah, this is maybe a long-winded way of saying that I think one Atgeir Bodyguard is tempting fate a little.

I'll mention again, whether this is a feature or a bug is a matter of perspective. Us being able to easily misjudge how many dice to use due to the opacity of information is, in general, not a bad thing for the system if the intention is for it to be part of the necessary puzzle solving.

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That's fair enough, but I think there would still be opacity of information if you gave a baseline value for dice pools, it would just be centred more in terms of correctly reading enemy intentions and anticipating their actions. Rather than misreading what the "floor" of dice is to begin with and ending up in a place where none of your attacks or defences work.

So I think a baseline rather than removing hidden information entirely, would more move it in a direction which is more fun and more centred in the story/fight itself, which feels broadly preferable to me?

I would want, like, 9.

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Done!

 

[Alectai]

I don't think he has an active persistent or it would have been called out given our massive Tactics result, the 'Persistent Defense' that Chivalrics have is by putting down a "You Must be This Tall to even roll to attack me" approach.

And yes, it's very annoying because it effectively takes cheap, Basic Attacks completely off the table, meaning that a Chivalric will inevitably win against a Norse as long as they maintain control of the battle. More importantly, it's called Rebuke, I would be unsurprised if an attack that bounces off it allows him to get an immediate follow-up regardless of attack speed, which explains why Chivalrics are just absolute blenders in Mass Combat. "I commit all of my dice to individual basic attacks, and rely on Rebuke to let me turn each of those into a kill against mortal level targets at a fearsomely quick rate"