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Threads Of Destiny(Eastern Fantasy, Sequel to Forge of Destiny)

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Mother Nyx said:
Get a hand fan. Bai could never talk down on that, it gives us an instant plus ten in high society lady points.
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She can when Ling Qi gets one with knives inlaid in it.

As for talismans I think we should get something more generally useful and personally fitting. We don't want to get a specialized talisman and then a few months down the line find that we've filled the gap in the build and made the talisman kind of redundant. A social talisman for instance is useful in our current situation but in a year when we have three full social Arts we'll probably look back and wish we'd gotten something more in line with Ling Qi's more consistent priorities.
 
DeAnno said:
With a fan, either you want a purely social talisman while I'd prefer something useful for combat, or you want to cause handedness issues. Either way I disagree with you.
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The issue with your stance and argument is that you're basically against her using anything for her hands that she doesn't already have and that's an argument and stance that literally handicaps her from picking up any other tools that she'd have to hold. And, how is it a handedness issue when she'd have literally nothing else in her hands in a social situation. That's one of the purposes for the hand fans, for high society ladies to have something to do with their hands in high society that isn't just awkwardly waving them around. Also, there is nothing wrong with a purely social talisman, all her other ones are specced for combat in some way, shape, or form. It's part of Bai's argument and Cai's reasoning to back it even, they want us to get something that isn't just some clever trick weapon.

yrsillar said:
She caught the faintest touch of a smirk on Bai Meizhen's lips for a fraction of a second. "I believe what Cai Renxiang wishes to say is that it is past time for you to acquire further accessories."

"I approve of your desire to remain at top battle potential at all times," her liege continued seriously. "However, it is possible to retain your potency while not presenting too stagnant an image."
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yrsillar said:
"The last time you commissioned pieces for yourself, one of them was that silly hairpiece that spat blinding dust," her friend said with a sniff. "I will see you becoming dignified, even if I must hold your hand the entire way."
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yrsillar said:
"It is titled, 'The Analects'. The text is a collection of short, anecdotal statements and exchanges between a first dynasty scholar by the name of Kung and his disciples, as well as surviving fragments from a number of other books authored by them. He was quite an insightful man in many regards, I think, I regret that the volume is incomplete."
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I'm getting Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle vibes from this.
 
Ayashi said:
isn't qi largely a non-issue for Ling Qi right now ?
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I suspect we're going to learn what sort of talismans are appropriate 'party favors' and what not. Instead of walking around in full plate, we're going to learn what sort of effects constitute 'party hats' or those roll-up things that extend and make a noise when you blow into them.
 
Ok, so; equipment vote. Few things to consider:
  • There are 3 accessory talisman slots in Green, if we're going with "1 impacted stat per talisman" then those 3 choices better count.
  • A talisman looks like a way to either double down on a strength to help ensure superiority, or to help mitigate a weakness; either an area we're not particularly strong at or an core assumption our strategy relies on (look at under what conditions LQ loses and mitigate those).
  • This commission specifically looks like a high quality piece we won't be replacing anytime soon, so we should consider our tournament-time statline and not just the immediate term.

Looking long-term, with wind thief and our planned stats, all the dex and music-related stats should run uncontested at S+ before passives, likely SS+ with. Generally we should have very respectable stats in basically every category.

Since our stats should be high, I'll focus on things I see that could use a buff from a talisman in approximate importance order:
  1. Resist - this is an extremely important stat we absolutely want superiority in:
    • A better part of our offensive (and support-defensive) strategy relies on not having our area control techs dispelled.
    • More than that, parrying and partial blocks of area effects (e.g clear out a wedge from the mist) rely on dispel vs resist as well; if we want our offense to be overwhelming we'll have to invest.
  2. Spiritual Defense - especially sp.avoid; until Wind Thief picks it up we're only running ENM for it which isn't a lot. SNR has the armor aspect mostly covered and Sixiang definitely helps dealing with any aftermath, but not getting hit in the first place is the best mitigation.
  3. Combat Perception - we'll only really be running a CDE variant here at least until after the tournament where we'll have the time to modify it into a successor to suit our needs.
  4. Stealth - we'll have wind thief and hopefully high SS in the derived stat here, but a talisman helps maintain superiority while getting there and will help in punching up afterwards.
Notable mention goes to some sort of Qi regen, but it's not as high-value given the likely S+ available qi after spirits and upkeep techs and a reasonable resist/sustain art to replace SES (whether as TRF+ or something we look for explicitly in the archive).

With those 4 stated, here's some explicit "why not X":
  1. Music hit/pen - we're looking at around SSS in both, not something that needs the help (EDIT: also seems more the domain of weapons than accessories).
  2. Speed - setting aside the ~SS rank projected stat, Wind Thief will likely let us chain long-range teleports bypassing the stat entirely for short-medium range/duration engagements.
  3. Dance - it'll get to a very high level in due time (around SS), no need to rush, and with music as our dominant approach the secondary doesn't need to be as extremely overwhelming.
  4. Social - twofold reason:
    • Don't want the narrative risk of using a social talisman as a crutch.
    • With the suite we have planned and our likely quite high eventual social stats and skills the only thing we're lacking is experience and politics domain knowledge, not something a talisman can fix.

As for what specifically to get for our freebie Cai-sponsored talisman, though we'll want a resist talisman as 1 of the 3 since it's such a critical stat to our entire approach, any of the outlined options are fine at this point.
 
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yrsillar said:
"Even my honored Mother cannot pluck the lost words that dead men from ten thousand years past from the air," her liege replied, a very slight edge of dryness in her words.
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Hmm. I wonder if Ling Qi could work something out with one of the moons to give our liege one of the best birthday presents ever. Doing something Glorious Oppression can't is the first step to deprogramming our beloved Caibot and getting her to see her creator isn't infallible.
 
yrsillar said:
"Even my honored Mother cannot pluck the lost words that dead men from ten thousand years past from the air," her liege replied, a very slight edge of dryness in her words. "The scholar Kung was a resident of the Chou province."
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I know that your mother can't Renxiang... but we could. Eventually. If we choose to go down that path. We receive patronage from the hidden, dreaming, and grinning. If we put our mind to it, we could totally steal the secret ideas from a writer 10,000 years dead. When we're violet or Prism.

I mean... that could be a really cool gift for our liege sometime in the future, gifting her the remaining parts of her favorite written work.
 
Mmm... What would be a good resist talisman? A new sash/belt/obi/whatever the waist things are called?

Our current resist talisman is a necklace.
 
Regarding design choices, keep in mind we're getting the talisman commissioned from the same craftsman that made our (baseline) robe. It's quite likely he'll be touching up our robe as well, and will able to integrate an accessory talisman as a separate replacement of one of our existing robe's parts like the belt thing.
 
I'm down with resist.

It should be a headband to replace our hairpin, though, just to bite back at Meizhen.
 
yrsillar said:
"How have your meetings with the Bao gone?"

"We have not discussed politics much," Ling Qi admitted, noting the interested look she received from Meizhen as well. She glanced down at her work to buy a moment to compose her reply, noting with some frustration how clumsy her own project looked compared to theirs. The snowflake pattern that she was working at was good for mortal work, but it seemed dull compared to the shifting pattern Meizhen was working on, or the nigh living butterflies that fluttered across the pale blue cloth of Cai Renxiang's piece. We spent the time discussing more financial matters. However… Bao Qian seems like a talented young man, it does not seem like a wholly idle offer."
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Meizhen now has a name! Now it is time for her to stalk Bao Qian and find out his intentions regarding Ling Qi. Fear the stalking snake!
 
Bloodalchemy said:
[X] fancy elbow gloves
-[X] Resist
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I don't know if elbow gloves are the most suitable item for a Resist talisman. I feel like hand accessories are more appropriate for those who weild actual weapons in their hands.
Erebeal said:
Mmm... What would be a good resist talisman? A new sash/belt/obi/whatever the waist things are called?

Our current resist talisman is a necklace.
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A sash might be more suitable, yeah.
 
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