Nah, the Imperial Envoy was just presenting the Glorious Songstress Yu Nyan with the Sage Emperor's legendary Divine Crown of Heavenly Binding that would allow her to bind the Dragon King.
Threads Of Destiny(Eastern Fantasy, Sequel to Forge of Destiny)
- Thread starter yrsillar
- Start date
- Original Users' Choice!
Voted best in category in the Users' Choice awards.
All of her XPL (Xianxia Protagonist Luck) expended in one shot.
- Location
- Yes
[X] Reunions(Ling Qingge & Biyu, Su Ling, Xiao Fen)
[X] Requisitions (Bai Meizhen, Bao Qingling, Li Suyin)
[X] Requisitions (Bai Meizhen, Bao Qingling, Li Suyin)
- Location
- The Space Between
There's a fundamental misunderstanding here that the generalized Imperial Doctrine is what we should be doing with our "mooks" of the realm.
what is the purpose of a Red? We can treat them as line employees doing the grunt labor that is slightly more specialized than true commoners, but very similar. Those going on the combat line should focus mobility and defensive techs to protect their investment. This will be helpful for their Yellow purpose.
what is the purpose of a Yellow? These are Line Managers. Operations level managers. If they are going to cap in Yellow they should focus on buffs that will assist their direct employees/charges as well as sensory techs to make sure that something better-than-red is doing "quality control" on the actions being performed. Those that are looking to advance again may instead start specializing in something that they will emphasize in Green. Increased mobility from those on the Green track is expected.
what is the purpose of a Green? These are Tac Managers, first line. These managers are extremely potent and can be developed in a few ways. The three major threat types are Barb, Spirits, and Skaven. Spirits can be talked to. When someone says "let me speak to your manager" a green with spirit ken may arrive to smooth things out, saving time and resources through diplomacy rather than murder. On the other hand, Barbs must be alpha-struck to break the buff-chains. An assassin green would be well equipped to cause crippling highvalue losses to skirmishing forces. Mops are high aoe DPS units that slaughter mooks if they're unorganized, either due to collapse of leadership or lack of leadership overall. The last threat, Skaven, are sneaky and should probably be the realm of Cyan.
What is the purpose of a Cyan? A fourth realm? From what we have seen of Zeqing and now this Leigong they are Strategic level managers that handle big-picture flows and anticipation sort of issues. This is the level that should focus efforts both on long-term development and Skaven Defense. Jiao himself has difficulty tracking and detecting Gnawing One activity/plans (at least from his Talisman's post, not focusing directly on it) which means that the long term defensive planning around spirits and barbs should be Cyan administrated, but most importantly "Are the Gnawing Ones nibbling at our foundations" should be a worry of the Cyan while they do their development work on the ground.
In my opinion, you want Reds with mobility and defensive arts. This makes them as tough to chew on as possible, while the Line Manager Yellow buffs them and directs their multi-attacks. This is more suppressive-fire than deadly fire, the killing power coming from Rapid Response Greens ranging from Diplo/Bards trying parley to Assassins and Mops showing up to churn chaff and break barb webs. Dedicated Dispel would also be useful, though that can be supplemented by talismans.
These rapid-response units would be directed strat level by Cyan networking and infrastructure. the Cyan should be concerned with setting up material defenses and material travel networks and material information/communication networks. This kind of "indirect buffing" allows everyone to do their jobs better
Killing power overrated on mooks. High survival rates lead to greater experience and skill over time among stalled patients. The other option could be Barb-style layered buffs starting from Red and raising more personal power over time as talent shines through.
what is the purpose of a Red? We can treat them as line employees doing the grunt labor that is slightly more specialized than true commoners, but very similar. Those going on the combat line should focus mobility and defensive techs to protect their investment. This will be helpful for their Yellow purpose.
what is the purpose of a Yellow? These are Line Managers. Operations level managers. If they are going to cap in Yellow they should focus on buffs that will assist their direct employees/charges as well as sensory techs to make sure that something better-than-red is doing "quality control" on the actions being performed. Those that are looking to advance again may instead start specializing in something that they will emphasize in Green. Increased mobility from those on the Green track is expected.
what is the purpose of a Green? These are Tac Managers, first line. These managers are extremely potent and can be developed in a few ways. The three major threat types are Barb, Spirits, and Skaven. Spirits can be talked to. When someone says "let me speak to your manager" a green with spirit ken may arrive to smooth things out, saving time and resources through diplomacy rather than murder. On the other hand, Barbs must be alpha-struck to break the buff-chains. An assassin green would be well equipped to cause crippling highvalue losses to skirmishing forces. Mops are high aoe DPS units that slaughter mooks if they're unorganized, either due to collapse of leadership or lack of leadership overall. The last threat, Skaven, are sneaky and should probably be the realm of Cyan.
What is the purpose of a Cyan? A fourth realm? From what we have seen of Zeqing and now this Leigong they are Strategic level managers that handle big-picture flows and anticipation sort of issues. This is the level that should focus efforts both on long-term development and Skaven Defense. Jiao himself has difficulty tracking and detecting Gnawing One activity/plans (at least from his Talisman's post, not focusing directly on it) which means that the long term defensive planning around spirits and barbs should be Cyan administrated, but most importantly "Are the Gnawing Ones nibbling at our foundations" should be a worry of the Cyan while they do their development work on the ground.
In my opinion, you want Reds with mobility and defensive arts. This makes them as tough to chew on as possible, while the Line Manager Yellow buffs them and directs their multi-attacks. This is more suppressive-fire than deadly fire, the killing power coming from Rapid Response Greens ranging from Diplo/Bards trying parley to Assassins and Mops showing up to churn chaff and break barb webs. Dedicated Dispel would also be useful, though that can be supplemented by talismans.
These rapid-response units would be directed strat level by Cyan networking and infrastructure. the Cyan should be concerned with setting up material defenses and material travel networks and material information/communication networks. This kind of "indirect buffing" allows everyone to do their jobs better
Killing power overrated on mooks. High survival rates lead to greater experience and skill over time among stalled patients. The other option could be Barb-style layered buffs starting from Red and raising more personal power over time as talent shines through.
Think its stretching the premise a little bit. That works if you are building a professional army, but basic facts are that even Reds are not so cheap that raising whats effectively a non-income productive force of them is going to be affordable.
You'd be seeing much more of Red Woodsman(Leg, Head meridian, Perception and stealth arts, doubles as a hunter and when the army calls they're a peak human archer scout OR a superhumanly fast messenger) or Red Farmer(Double Spine meridian, superhuman stamina and strength, line infantry in the army) than Red Soldier(Spine, Leg meridian, defensive and mobility arts, civilian time messenger)
Keeping in mind the economics are important, or you can't sustain mobilization.
You'd be seeing much more of Red Woodsman(Leg, Head meridian, Perception and stealth arts, doubles as a hunter and when the army calls they're a peak human archer scout OR a superhumanly fast messenger) or Red Farmer(Double Spine meridian, superhuman stamina and strength, line infantry in the army) than Red Soldier(Spine, Leg meridian, defensive and mobility arts, civilian time messenger)
Keeping in mind the economics are important, or you can't sustain mobilization.
- Location
- Greece
In my opinion, the low and mid level soldiers should each be specialised to do 1 of 3 things, with those with more meridians being either given leeway to develop themselves, more specializations or a better specialization. Maybe, if you have the right art, they could focus on 2 or even 3, but what makes the squad more effective on those should be prioritised. The 3 things are:
-buff the rest of the army, including, preferably, their superiors
-protect their side's buffers of the same rank
-kill the enemy's buffers of the same rank, and maybe their defenders or attackers if it proves strategically valuable/ necessary.
How an army is split between those values, how each of those values are split themselves (it is preferable for buffers to buff more than one thing, different killers could focus on alpha striking or sustain, or maybe assasination, or every killer could focus on the same thing etc. etc.) are considerations of strategy, and affect your side greatly. The quality and quantity of arts available to soldiers are a consideration of logistics, and I'd argue that makes them even more important. The quantity of soldiers, on the other hand, is a consideration of economics, and as so, the wealthy can field more if they are so willing. Border provices and provices near the wilderness/Ashen walkers/on the barren and full of spirits Bao territory, though, should be investing on more soldiers on equal wealth levels that non border provices, which in turn should be fielding more soldiers than those on central territories. This may apply less to Counts and not at all to Dukes and certainly doesn't apply to the royals, as these ranks probably require a strong standing army to maintain thbeir positions from usurpers.
Edit:
on @veekie 's post, I want to comment than, should the economic reds be used in wartime, they'll probably be put in the second two roles. But fair enough, economy implies that one cannot even field efficiently all the reds they can field, thus making the economic level even more important than I stated.
Hmmm... dukedom/Count funded border barons/ viscounts that control outposts and small fortresses would actually up the defense of the empire a lot, as long as they are funded on the condition of raising specialised soldiers and putting every other moneymaking concern by far second.
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- Location
- The Temple of the Winds
The issue with that kind of specialization is if there's a face punch specialized Green enemy that pops up then you either need to burn a much higher level Cyan on the issue or mobilize a huge number of supposedly equal cultivation resources.
if all your Reds are face punchers not only does that causes issues to those that aren't limited to red realm and therefore aren't going to specialize in face punching, but it also causes issues for your overall team/army: If a yellow barbarian attacks you can't simply send one of your own Yellows since those are spec'ed into management instead of combat. You'd need to burn a red + yellow team or send a Green who would rely on higher realm to beat the enemy. It's even worse if the barbarian is higher level since you face punchers are more and more irrelevant.
Ultimately you need specialization at every level. Each level has to be both able to function on it's own, on the individual and team level, and also support/be supported by every other level around it.
You need debuffing, buffing and detection Reds not only so you don't have to call in a Green and a Yellow whenever those particular skills are needed (otherwise your Reds are rapidly going to be useless), but also so they can be relevant in above Red fights (ie: buffing their Yellow commander face puncher). Same thing for every other cultivation level.
Thankfully the story's cultivation world seems to be working like this anyway (with an emphasis on face punchers) due to everyone having to find their own Way (Dao).
Like, if you want a basis for comparison, look at the Bai-Bandit situation. Renxiang was deployed with a military force of professional full time soldiers and hunters suitable for a new barony or so.
How many people did she have?
Five Yellow Officers
Twenty Red Soldiers
Unknown number of scouts, but typically scouting elements wouldn't be more than 20% of your force, so lets say we have a Yellow Scout Officer and five Red Scouts
The rogue Bai baron's personal retinue, from a well established clan, were nine Yellow archers.
Thats how expensive a standing army can be.
It has its benefits, full time soldiers can project force without needing to be pulled away from other duties, and are your main responses to bandits and other military targets, while hitting substantially harder than levied common cultivators, you can see the genuine bandit cultivators, even the Yellows, struggle to do anything to us while the team of professionally trained Yellows was actually hitting often enough to chip us down if they could pin us.
By contrast, working cultivators produce their own upkeep, but cannot be pulled away save for the most dire emergencies
Just...temper expectations about how many elite units we can actually raise, because what few we CAN raise are going to be garrison or patrol duties when we get our fief
- Location
- Greece
I am a proponent for high war (and war related expenses) for more than one reason. But that said, I would never push for a War build to the point it becomes a millstone. I understand it is still secondary compared to our primaries (music, keeping our way/family, stealth, personal combat effectiveness in general), I am just pushing it to make it one of the important secondaries, if not the most important one ( the other ones being Spirit Ken and social stuff which are necessary) rather than relegating War and war related stuff to the tertiary slot, along with accessorising, bureaucracy and Speech.
That said, as far as reason 3: raising an army, which I may add is far to the future, is concerned, I must stress that I am trying to prove that a good army, even a small one, is helpful to any conceivable build, at least on the borders, so the only reason not to invest in it is because we can invest in things that have a better payout, or maybe because we do not have the war score to make an army good and instead can only create stuff like that useless bandit force.
Sure, I guess us being too poor to afford it is also an argument but to me its an argument that says "we should find a way to make more money so that we can afford a better standing army" not "we should give up". But when we gain an economy, maximizing its gains is gonna go right on the primary priorities anyway, so, again, it becomes a matter of payout.
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Arkeus
Crazy cat guy
- Location
- France
While your point is mostly right, this was post-raid, it's unknown if the men CRX had under her were 'suitable for a new barony'. I think it is, but it's a bit of an unknown, as the force themselves were Cai's, and the baron was conspicuously absent, with the town guards being gutted (included a third realm).
Also, it is four yellow and a partial third realm, for officers:
- Location
- Greece
If you didn't lock up so early, Requisitions would have won. It was almost there. 
Alright guys. It's been awhile and hopefully there won't be too many of these, but for the second time I am making a minor retcon to quest canon. The comb, that long wondered artifact of a forgotten plot thread, is being removed for now. The ideas attached to it may be revisted in a later storyline, but for now consider it banished to the retconnian.
- Location
- Greece
Nooooooooooooooooooooooo... not the most mysterious mystery of the story.
(seriously though, do what you think is best for the story... but it may be ankward for RR readers)
(seriously though, do what you think is best for the story... but it may be ankward for RR readers)
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- Location
- Greece
I quite clearly remember the RR story had it? One moment, I'll post the chapter in an edit.
- Location
- The Space Between
see the problem there is that you're not empowering the "line workers" to accomplish anything alone. I would argue for the reds to learn mobility and defensive arts first is that against a threat that their superhuman abilities and skill (if they're red-capped they have plenty of time to reach Peak Red Ability) cannot handle they need to be able to survive long enough to get help in terms of other reds or higher ups. By empowering the line workers, you can cast wider nets of lower density troops with the Yellow Line Managers using sensory techniques to keep track of them should they disappear without warning despite their focus on defense and mobility.
Green Face Punchers are cool and all, but a dedicated alpha striker should be able to significantly weaken a face-puncher while the numbers of Reds and Yellows that are relatively difficult to kill apply pressure and run interference. Reds mass buffing one another is cool but makes the web weak to isolation of individual elements *especially*if the yellows are incapacitated. I would rather the Yellows focus in on the buffing and sensory with their time while retaining the defensive spine and mobility legs of their days in Red.
Being able to Put the Target Down and Deploy Rapidly are the two most important things for an Assassin/HVT killer. Flip the spine defensive techs to a stealth/mobility mix and you've got a good asset to stunt Barbs with, exploiting the weakness of relying on web-buffs by sniping out HVT's after they've made the first move. Minimizing casualties with Defensive and Mobility spec. A few capped yellows that stay near the hardpoints that are specced into more Force/Power than Mobility would be good. All Greens coming out of yellow having some yellow era group buff arts is helpful, in case the HVT kill is successful they have heart meridians for ExtraCasualtiesDuringRout sort of buffs.
all of this emphasis on mobility is especially pertinent given the large distances being covered by our forces. The only person that beat us in Speed in Forge was Liling, and I think that's no accident. Outside of the regimented regions of Imperial Territory redeployment and reinforcement time are extremely important (as we saw with our own rapid response powers). Hell, dedicated transport/mobility Yellows might be important too. Making sure that their forces can arrive and beat with force of numbers
I mean I'm currently editing the chapter where ling qi received it, so you must be thinking of something else
RIP mom's gift. Gonna be a hole in that particular letter now.
Maybe replace it with mundane rice cakes or something?
Maybe replace it with mundane rice cakes or something?
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- Location
- New York
What's our replacement dangling plothook for several books worth of text? Archery arts?
- Location
- Greece
Ha, fair enough Yrsillar, not @ing you cuz it may be annoying if you are trying to write
Also fair enough. Guess War with immortals becomes a really really complicated game with a lot of factors.
Also fair enough. Guess War with immortals becomes a really really complicated game with a lot of factors.
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- Location
- The Space Between
now I agree with this. But I'm not calling for "face punching" I'm calling for priority training of Mobility and Defense for reds that will serve military roles, because we have multiple "if you aren't this tall you lose" effects and any individual specialization can occur both from expansion from the baseline training, as well as how Dao's are different for individuals. We cannot plan for that level of specialization though, because we don't know what individual talents we will find. Mmm.
Let me put it this way. If someone is red-capped and gets 4 meridian slots, I want them to know the Mobility and Defensive arts first and specialize later over time. With higher survival rates they'll be able to spend more time developing what they're talented at After we know they won't be a total loss-on-investment if we ask them to equip their Mobility and Defensive arts due to a big storm coming. The ability for people to swap out arts with a relatively short effort means that they can have "general alert" specializations that we can know can be swapped to "Red Alert" generic survival techs if necessary.
It's sort of the idea that we can't possibly tell them what they're individually best at and it's more practical to make sure they have the long life required to embrace their talents? Rather than go into it trying to make everyone a buffmachine when really we want to invest in those that will Survive long enough to pass on techniques and hone their Dao into specialization in Yellow and further in Green (down the generational line, should they found a Red House, yeah?)
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- Location
- United States of America
Clearly our jealous dress. She has consumed the flesh from a shadow of a white, and she is hungry for more!
Hmmmm
Where in a quest its called a plot hook,
In a fic, its called a long game foreshaddowing right?
Is that a good thing for a fic?
Where in a quest its called a plot hook,
In a fic, its called a long game foreshaddowing right?
Is that a good thing for a fic?