The Path Unending (A Cultivation Quest)

ReaderOfFate · Jun 11, 2020

KinOfTheMountain said:
About next week plans we need to give crafting a minimum of seven actions next turn. (2 for tutoring (tutoring rules were changed because the system was broken), 5 to be split between our three projects if we don't finish Xu's charm first.) We also need to hunt this week so that we can afford tutoring. So that's right actions we kind of have to do. We could hypothetically move tutoring to next week, but I don't see the point in doing that.

Not necessarily. My calculations tell me that there's actually a good chance that we'll finish Xu Yun's infusion this turn. (We roll 16 in an action on average, we need to hit 17.)

Plus, we'll only need three more actions to finish the DD Archer. (We already did 3 this turn, 1 more next week to finish build, 2 to infuse.)

Also, we don't know how the tutoring rules have been changed yet so we can't really speculate as to that. Besides, I wouldn't really class that under crafting actions, that's kind of misleading. Same goes for the hunt action, since it'd also be a Nokai social on the side.

We can spend a single action to start off the box next week, tbh. We don't need to get that much progress in next week, since we're not going to finish that anyway within that week.

Assuming bad luck, that's five crafting actions. With a small bit of good luck, we can do it in four, but in that case I'd prefer to spend one more to continue working on the Box.

(If you meant actions that are related to crafting, then I see where you're coming from though. Crafting actions by itself gives off the feel that the actions are all working on charms, which some people wouldn't like. The hunt action would be more of a social type thing, and the tutoring action wouldn't give the same vibes as crafting a charm by ourself because we'd be meeting someone new who would be teaching us.)

KinOfTheMountain · Jun 11, 2020

ReaderOfFate said:
necessarily. My calculations tell me that there's actually a good chance that we'll finish Xu Yun's infusion this turn. (We roll 16 in an action on average, we need to hit 17.)

Plus, we'll only need three more actions to finish the DD Archer. (We already did 3 this turn, 1 more next week to finish build, 2 to infuse.)

Also, we don't know how the tutoring rules have been changed yet so we can't really speculate as to that. Besides, I wouldn't really class that under crafting actions, that's kind of misleading. Same goes for the hunt action, since it'd also be a Nokai social on the side.

Vesv said he's making cost more actions and more money. If second level tutoring cost three actions, it's practically unobtainable.

ReaderOfFate · Jun 11, 2020

KinOfTheMountain said:
Vesv said he's making cost more actions and more money. If second level tutoring cost three actions, it's practically unobtainable.

He did say that, yeah, as the current tutoring actions are a tad unbalanced. However, we'll have to see how many actions they actually take before saying anything like that, you know? If it's too untenable, we can ditch the box for something else, but we'll only find that out when the week vote update is released.

Also, I made an edit over here, clarifying why I separated the others from crafting actions:

ReaderOfFate said:
(If you meant actions that are related to crafting, then I see where you're coming from though. Crafting actions by itself gives off the feel that the actions are all working on charms, which some people wouldn't like. The hunt action would be more of a social type thing, and the tutoring action wouldn't give the same vibes as crafting a charm by ourself because we'd be meeting someone new who would be teaching us.)

JohnnieBoy123 · Jun 11, 2020

If we want to go crazy, we could spend 4 actions this week improving the Dance another 4 actions next week and then ask Zhuan Kun to be our champion when that surprises him.

(This is a joke.)

Mirror Mage · Jun 11, 2020

It would make sense for higher levels to mean more spending actions. No matter the teacher, it always takes time to learn a new skill, much less learn it well. Not to mention higher sect levels will likely expect more out of us than lower ones, in both time and effort.

(Here's hoping the Action costs don't get too large, though.)

Knight-Radiant · Jun 11, 2020

I would like to say, I'm sorry if my actions caused anyone to feel like they had no say in this last vote. That was not my intent.

I love crafting. Not just in this quest, but in tabletop games, MMOs, etc... I think about designs, draw blueprints, and all that stuff just for fun. And I tend to use discord for my ideas because it's easier for me, SV's text box hates my phone lol. Also because if someone doesn't want to see my ramblings, it' s easy for them to just mute me in discord.

But given what's happened I'll try to put more of my stuff into the thread, and hope I don't annoy y'all to much.

Again, sorry if I caused someone to get less enjoyment out of this quest, that is not and will never be my intent

JohnnieBoy123 · Jun 11, 2020

In the spirit of experimentation how about we leave the Steel hammer mat in the Second of Eternity next time we swing by? It would be difficult to make a charm out of and it is only 1 point to begin with.

ReaderOfFate · Jun 11, 2020

JohnnieBoy123 said:
In the spirit of experimentation how about we leave the Steel hammer mat in the Second of Eternity next time we swing by? It would be difficult to make a charm out of and it is only 1 point to begin with.

Yeah, for sure. It'd be simple enough to leave a little blurb in our next infusion action, and it might result in something fun.

Personally, I think it might end up eventually accreting enough Time Anam to turn into a Time/Steel thing, which could be cool to use as a mat for a weapon. You could have a hammer that does damage the turn before it attacks, or something. (Or I guess a hasted hammer works too. Haste by itself is no joke.)

Irenicus · Jun 11, 2020

Not for now (especially given the vote has closed, and we have an urgent challenge), but I had an idea for a different charm.

[] Midnight's Challenge
- Game Piece (Mind 3), Timbers of the Caravan (Night 11)
- An intricately designed Stern-Halma board with only a single piece embedded into the center point of the board.
- When meditating on the game, the inherent Night on the board generates complex challenges, focusing the mind, and prompting strategic design based thinking- gain a bonus to crafting
- Limit use 1 per turn.

I don't know if this is legal/okayed by Ves, but it's an idle thought I had.

Wistways · Jun 11, 2020

Mei Daiyu- now with grudge punching action

DangerKitty · Jun 11, 2020

Hmm out of the stuff im seeing i think ima vote for whatever plan that does the most of the following:

-ask jai fa to be our champion
-hunt with nokai for moneys
-finish our archer charm and our commission
-investigates enemy champion (assuming we dont find out from mo this turn)
-cycles towards the dance
- investigate the farmers step.
-investigate the shallows for the armory quest. (Heavy emphasis on this for me because i wanna apprentice under siani so we need to keep prog up imo)

Cus we literally just cleared our stress box with shouxi. While im totally down with investing in that relationship in the future, but its not a priority for me this coming week. Similarly i dont want to start the box or do the tutoring quite yet as i think there aee more importanr things afoot.
Included the farmers step because as far as im aware we still know nothing about it and imo that needs to change.

SirSwagsire · Jun 11, 2020

DangerKitty said:
Included the farmers step because as far as im aware we still know nothing about it and imo that needs to change.

I agree with most of your actions, but I feel like researching the farmer's step can be put off for a few weeks. No one entering the 8th circle is expected to be more than a Solider, and I would think we could take care of it after the duel.

Tentatively from what everyone has said I would be leaning towards the following actions:

-Four for crafting (3 to finish DD Archer, 1 to either finish Xu Yun's charm or start the next one if have completed it already)
--Free action to give him the charm
-Talk to Jai Fa and ask her to be our champion, hopefully we can have this convo while sparring to get a success or two to the dance
-Find out Jin's champion - alternatively, if we use our favor from Mo to do this when we talk to her this week, we can put cycling towards the dance here
-Hunt with Nokai for more talents, conserve our Anam when possible
-Investigate the shallow area of the map with Jai Fa
-Introduce Jai Shouxi to Mo - not only will we be doing him a favor and connecting her to a pill-maker who's our friend, it may help him eventually change his ingrained impression of barbarians/Nokai and unify our friend circle

This would also wrap up many loose ends, so we could speed through next week by entering crafting/lessons seclusion and return to a more balanced schedule the week of the duel. If we can't finish a new charm including lessons in 9-10 actions at most, we probably need a redesign.

Also, what do y'all think of sending a letter home this week to let our parents know about the duel and contact with the other noble, which potentially could get us an allowance increase for the following week?

Knight-Radiant · Jun 11, 2020

So, in order to not repeat the events of the last vote, namely making people feel excluded, I wanted to post a design for the thread to review in advance.

Night/Hunger/Mind, BT +22

This idea has had many names suggested. Box of Pleasant Dreams, Hungry Dark, Midnight Repast, Witching Hour, Hungry Hungry Haunt, etc...

But what it boils down to is simple. It's a Traveler Charm designed to create/summon a Construct that fights for us. The Construct would be given form primarily by the Night and Hunger anam, and would be have just enough mind to follow orders thanks to adding in the +3 Mind material

When pitched to Ves in the discord he confirmed that making such a Construct would be possible for us and further that-

And yes, a mindless fog of teeth and despair with just enough conciousness to follow orders is within the bounds of that combo

So it would essentially be a fake Vestige/Kukuni that we could deploy when needed. It would likely cost alot of anam, but if our fight with the Crab vestige taught us anything it's that 2v1 is one hell of an advantage.

This idea has some extra appeal for the upcoming duel, which will be a 1v1 judged on how effectively charms were used to win. And I can't see a better use of charm in a 1v1 fight then a summon that makes it a 2v1 fight.

As for the actual design, it's pretty simple in concept. We have 3 timbers of Night Material, 6 feet long, 8 inches wide, and 5 inches thick. The idea is to cut them in half, then assemble those halves into a Triptych box that we wear like a backpack. Keeping arms and legs free for fightin.

On the outside, it would look like a plain wooden box, but open her up and you'd have an elaborate demon's face and other such features glaring out at the world. Using the Vestige Teeth to make horns and fangs for this face would be simple, and we could encapsulate the Game piece mind Mat within this face to protect it.

Keeping the outside plain helps disguise the danger of the charm, and we could go ham on making the inside a real work of art. Lacquer, precious stones, the works.

So, this was the idea being tossed around in the discord, mostly devised by Me and @Enjou tho others like Alectai, Kreenwarrior, ReaderOfFate, Chronobreak, and Vermeer have helped to refine it into it's current form.

What do y'all think? Do you like it? Do you have any suggestions or criticisms? Or do you have an idea you'd like to float instead.

I would absolutely LOVE to discuss charms with ya so fire away! ☺

Mirror Mage · Jun 11, 2020

SirSwagsire said:
Also, what do y'all think of sending a letter home this week to let our parents know about the duel and contact with the other noble, which potentially could get us an allowance increase for the following week?

I like this idea.

It would also be cool if we could ask them about the Jin clan for info, though I don't think we'd get the info in time.

Beastly · Jun 11, 2020

[X] Acrid Scourge

tryrar · Jun 11, 2020

I recently had an alternate take on the summon charm that incorporates the ice mat in what I think is an appropriate way that I want the thread's opinion on. It's a Night/Hunger/Ice/Mind staff carved from sections of the Caravan Timbers, with a carved totem headpiece in the shape of a highly stylized grinning beast representing a lore appropriate equivilant to a Yeti/Wendigo/whatever other beast that could plausibly be a combination of ice and hunger. The mouth of course is made up of the Vestige teeth, and the eyes are the Vestige Ice, it is clutching the game piece in its' claws like a trophy it picked up, and the whole thing is coated/painted in the ash of whatever leftovers from the timbers that we don't use in the shaft and headpiece. When activated, it summons a Shade of whatever beast we carve the headpiece to repesent that fights whatever the summoner directs it to.

DangerKitty · Jun 11, 2020

Knight-Radiant said:
So, in order to not repeat the events of the last vote, namely making people feel excluded, I wanted to post a design for the thread to review in advance.

Night/Hunger/Mind, BT +22

This idea has had many names suggested. Box of Pleasant Dreams, Hungry Dark, Midnight Repast, Witching Hour, Hungry Hungry Haunt, etc...

But what it boils down to is simple. It's a Traveler Charm designed to create/summon a Construct that fights for us. The Construct would be given form primarily by the Night and Hunger anam, and would be have just enough mind to follow orders thanks to adding in the +3 Mind material

When pitched to Ves in the discord he confirmed that making such a Construct would be possible for us and further that-

So it would essentially be a fake Vestige/Kukuni that we could deploy when needed. It would likely cost alot of anam, but if our fight with the Crab vestige taught us anything it's that 2v1 is one hell of an advantage.

This idea has some extra appeal for the upcoming duel, which will be a 1v1 judged on how effectively charms were used to win. And I can't see a better use of charm in a 1v1 fight then a summon that makes it a 2v1 fight.

As for the actual design, it's pretty simple in concept. We have 3 timbers of Night Material, 6 feet long, 8 inches wide, and 5 inches thick. The idea is to cut them in half, then assemble those halves into a Triptych box that we wear like a backpack. Keeping arms and legs free for fightin.

On the outside, it would look like a plain wooden box, but open her up and you'd have an elaborate demon's face and other such features glaring out at the world. Using the Vestige Teeth to make horns and fangs for this face would be simple, and we could encapsulate the Game piece mind Mat within this face to protect it.

Keeping the outside plain helps disguise the danger of the charm, and we could go ham on making the inside a real work of art. Lacquer, precious stones, the works.

So, this was the idea being tossed around in the discord, mostly devised by Me and @Enjou tho others like Alectai, Kreenwarrior, ReaderOfFate, Chronobreak, and Vermeer have helped to refine it into it's current form.

What do y'all think? Do you like it? Do you have any suggestions or criticisms? Or do you have an idea you'd like to float instead.

I would absolutely LOVE to discuss charms with ya so fire away! ☺

it sounds fairly neat however how much thought has been given for maybe saving it as a super project? it seems that this projects biggest flaw is the size of the charm. while making it a backpack is nice and all it would still hamper fighting ability with its unwieldiness.

some alternatives i thought up.

- we could learn woodworking and armor crafting and turn it into a wooden chestpiece that serves a similar function. we could also turn it into a wodden jewelry set that has a crown piece as an activator or some such.
- we could turn it into an intricate wooden medallion. i'd imagine that this would weaken the resulting beast but it would be less expensive anam wise and much more portable.
- A wooden shield i believe would also be a viable solution.
- Alternatively we could turn it into a staff or stave.

KreenWarrior · Jun 11, 2020

Researching the Farmer's Step, or more precisely "channel cultivation", is a good idea. While the Step itself might not be taken yet, if it's a matter of clearing multiple channels (something common to the meridian stage in xianxia, which seems to be the closest comparison based on the name) it might behoove us to start earlier rather than later - it might be a gradual process with incremental benefits.

Also, it seems like Ves may have dropped that as a deliberate hint.

While the Hummingbird's Dance is nice, we should be careful to distinguish what we want it for. Narratively, we have used the Dance in battles against vestiges. However, that should never be our primary strategy for dealing with spiritual enemies.

After the duel, I'd seriously consider renting a Wonder and trying to power through finishing BSA.

Mirror Mage · Jun 11, 2020

Beastly said:
[X] Acrid Scourge

Vote's already closed, but Acrid Scourge won.

Knight-Radiant said:
What do y'all think? Do you like it? Do you have any suggestions or criticisms? Or do you have an idea you'd like to float instead.

I would absolutely LOVE to discuss charms with ya so fire away!

I think it looks like an interesting idea. I was leery of how we'd carry around the box, but so long as it isn't liable to fall off our back or impair our movement, I'd be interested.

I can see other problems with using it in battle, though. It could still be a pain to carry around, and I'd hate to break it by accident during a fight.

Scheduling conflicts could also present issues. We've already agreed we'll need to get Woodcarving tutoring to finish the box on time, but if the ensuing lessons take more than one action, we could find ourselves on a time crunch.

It's definitely interesting, though, and I wouldn't mind saving the wood for an after-duel project if we can.

Jasten · Jun 11, 2020

Knight-Radiant said:
So, in order to not repeat the events of the last vote, namely making people feel excluded, I wanted to post a design for the thread to review in advance.

Night/Hunger/Mind, BT +22

This idea has had many names suggested. Box of Pleasant Dreams, Hungry Dark, Midnight Repast, Witching Hour, Hungry Hungry Haunt, etc...

But what it boils down to is simple. It's a Traveler Charm designed to create/summon a Construct that fights for us. The Construct would be given form primarily by the Night and Hunger anam, and would be have just enough mind to follow orders thanks to adding in the +3 Mind material

When pitched to Ves in the discord he confirmed that making such a Construct would be possible for us and further that-

So it would essentially be a fake Vestige/Kukuni that we could deploy when needed. It would likely cost alot of anam, but if our fight with the Crab vestige taught us anything it's that 2v1 is one hell of an advantage.

This idea has some extra appeal for the upcoming duel, which will be a 1v1 judged on how effectively charms were used to win. And I can't see a better use of charm in a 1v1 fight then a summon that makes it a 2v1 fight.

As for the actual design, it's pretty simple in concept. We have 3 timbers of Night Material, 6 feet long, 8 inches wide, and 5 inches thick. The idea is to cut them in half, then assemble those halves into a Triptych box that we wear like a backpack. Keeping arms and legs free for fightin.

On the outside, it would look like a plain wooden box, but open her up and you'd have an elaborate demon's face and other such features glaring out at the world. Using the Vestige Teeth to make horns and fangs for this face would be simple, and we could encapsulate the Game piece mind Mat within this face to protect it.

Keeping the outside plain helps disguise the danger of the charm, and we could go ham on making the inside a real work of art. Lacquer, precious stones, the works.

So, this was the idea being tossed around in the discord, mostly devised by Me and @Enjou tho others like Alectai, Kreenwarrior, ReaderOfFate, Chronobreak, and Vermeer have helped to refine it into it's current form.

What do y'all think? Do you like it? Do you have any suggestions or criticisms? Or do you have an idea you'd like to float instead.

I would absolutely LOVE to discuss charms with ya so fire away! ☺

tryrar said:
I recently had an alternate take on the summon charm that incorporates the ice mat in what I think is an appropriate way that I want the thread's opinion on. It's a Night/Hunger/Ice/Mind staff carved from sections of the Caravan Timbers, with a carved totem headpiece in the shape of a highly stylized grinning beast representing a lore appropriate equivilant to a Yeti/Wendigo/whatever other beast that could plausibly be a combination of ice and hunger. The mouth of course is made up of the Vestige teeth, and the eyes are the Vestige Ice, it is clutching the game piece in its' claws like a trophy it picked up, and the whole thing is coated/painted in the ash of whatever leftovers from the timbers that we don't use in the shaft and headpiece. When activated, it summons a Shade of whatever beast we carve the headpiece to repesent that fights whatever the summoner directs it to.

Instead of focusing on the Night-anam Timbers, why not focus on the Beast-anam shell we just received?

I'm not sure if Jewelry crafting would help render that whole shell down into beads, but that could instead make the backpack design into a multi-layer necklace. Keep the Teeth, Game-piece, and Ice Crystal alongside it, but instead of an apparition of Hungry-Night, we just get Beastial-Hunger.

Plus, a very dramatic necklace/upper body draping would work well without Hummingbird's Dance. It would sway and help misdirect things quite well!

(P.S, never did quotes before so I hope I got those right)

Knight-Radiant · Jun 11, 2020

DangerKitty said:
it sounds fairly neat however how much thought has been given for maybe saving it as a super project? it seems that this projects biggest flaw is the size of the charm. while making it a backpack is nice and all it would still hamper fighting ability with its unwieldiness.

some alternatives i thought up.

- we could learn woodworking and armor crafting and turn it into a wooden chestpiece that serves a similar function. we could also turn it into a wodden jewelry set that has a crown piece as an activator or some such.
- we could turn it into an intricate wooden medallion. i'd imagine that this would weaken the resulting beast but it would be less expensive anam wise and much more portable.
- A wooden shield i believe would also be a viable solution.
- Alternatively we could turn it into a staff or stave.

Mmmm I'd like to save it for later if possible, but you can't deny that a summon would be one hell of an ace in the duel.

I agree that the The size is the biggest downside. (Tho we have been informed that Zhi is strong enough that it wouldn't be a hindrance. He was able to carry all three wooden beams with no trouble after all) But that would be the case with any charm we make with the night mat. Since we have to use most of it to avoid losing anam or stability. Since the timbers are six foot beams their sheer size really makes jewelry unfeasible. A Staff would be great! But there is the concern that making a staff would use maybe one of our three timbers? As for a shield, that was actually my first pitch! ☺ But we'd need armor crafting for that, and while we could get it from tutoring... we already have +2 in woodcrafting. So we could just as easily get tutoring for woodcrafting and get a higher result.

Still great ideas tho! Keep em coming!

-Edit-

I will freely admit that I have a bias towards the demon in a box because it's just such a FUN idea. Rule of cool is playing a part in my thinking.

But I promise I will try to keep that out of any feedback or criticism I offer.

tryrar · Jun 11, 2020

My idea for the staff is we would carve the timbers into sort of a pie cross section, with the three staff sections being held together with twine and the headpiece. That should use most of the material, especially if we make the headpiece pretty large, and assemble it in pieces.

JohnnieBoy123 · Jun 11, 2020

KreenWarrior said:
While the Hummingbird's Dance is nice, we should be careful to distinguish what we want it for. Narratively, we have used the Dance in battles against vestiges. However, that should never be our primary strategy for dealing with spiritual enemies.

After the duel, I'd seriously consider renting a Wonder and trying to power through finishing BSA.

After the duel we will have made two charms that exist primarily to do magical damage, both extremely powerful by any reasonable standard*. Meanwhile the Dance helps provide a good baseline of power that we can count on for when we run out of anam.

Cycling anam from a Wonder into our Core is a basically a waste of an action and needs to be avoided if at all possible. However, if our ability to fight without anam is sufficiently worse than with it, we will be forced to. Even against a vestige, an amazing Dance would still let us get away and that's probably all we'd need when we are depleted.

*I want an unreasonably strong charm to show off, but that's not as important outside of the duel's context.

KinOfTheMountain · Jun 11, 2020

Knight-Radiant said:
So, in order to not repeat the events of the last vote, namely making people feel excluded, I wanted to post a design for the thread to review in advance.

Night/Hunger/Mind, BT +22

This idea has had many names suggested. Box of Pleasant Dreams, Hungry Dark, Midnight Repast, Witching Hour, Hungry Hungry Haunt, etc...

But what it boils down to is simple. It's a Traveler Charm designed to create/summon a Construct that fights for us. The Construct would be given form primarily by the Night and Hunger anam, and would be have just enough mind to follow orders thanks to adding in the +3 Mind material

You forgot to mention that there have been a some talks about adding the ice mat into the charm

bookofportals · Jun 11, 2020

KreenWarrior said:
Researching the Farmer's Step, or more precisely "channel cultivation", is a good idea. While the Step itself might not be taken yet, if it's a matter of clearing multiple channels (something common to the meridian stage in xianxia, which seems to be the closest comparison based on the name) it might behoove us to start earlier rather than later - it might be a gradual process with incremental benefits.

Also, it seems like Ves may have dropped that as a deliberate hint.

While the Hummingbird's Dance is nice, we should be careful to distinguish what we want it for. Narratively, we have used the Dance in battles against vestiges. However, that should never be our primary strategy for dealing with spiritual enemies.

After the duel, I'd seriously consider renting a Wonder and trying to power through finishing BSA.

Discord Ves has said that taking steps will get us more actions per week (not sure if this has been stated on thread yet). He specifically mentioned that the Farmer's Step is called that because it was popularized by farmers to give them more time for farming (he said that each step is named after the class of the person who popularized it).

Anyhow, more actions per week y'all. That would be really nice. The fact that we're not expected to do it doesn't mean it's not worthwhile. After all, don't we want to exceed expectations?

The Path Unending (A Cultivation Quest)

Recovering Rageaholic

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Recovering Rageaholic

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Recovering Rageaholic