I wish the happy music art synergized better with PLR. Much more mood-appropriate. PLR + Larceny fairy art is pretty magnificent, too - every attempt to strike Ling Qi has her dance away with wirefu leaps, disappearing into the crowd.
PLR + CWY + FVM is probably my favourite combo. Desire and delirium, draw them into the crowd, into the fog. The mad, muted dancing, while eerie notes ring out. Seized by unnatural desire, whirling from dancer to dancer, unable to approach Ling Qi. Shadows become revelers become shadows again. Alienation in a madhouse crowd.
Thematically this is the art of the social manipulator. Of Fu Xiang (probably, seems the type) and of Jack Slash, while not bad in and of itself, it does carry unfortunate connotations, especially coupled with its inherent themes of desire.
Which I guess if this keeps getting brought up is going to kill it in the cradle, which is disappointing.
(If you can't tell I quite dislike the comparisons to Jack Slash because he's an utterly poor point of comparison, and hilariously off topic.)
While I generally don't agree with the tone you wrapped your critique of Covetous in, I do actually agree with the utility critiques. Specifically the "keep the separation" and the entire thing with Welcoming Shadow's combat tactics critique.
Which I guess if this keeps getting brought up is going to kill it in the cradle, which is disappointing.
(If you can't tell I quite dislike the comparisons to Jack Slash because he's an utterly poor point of comparison, and hilariously off topic.)
While I generally don't agree with the tone you wrapped your critique of Covetous in, I do actually agree with the utility critiques. Specifically the "keep the separation" and the entire thing with Welcoming Shadow's combat tactics critique.
Sadly, she could not spend all of her time cultivating, While she was for the moment, content with her contribution points, the more expendable sect points in her possession were not something she had in great supply. If she wanted access to the sects best medicines, tutors and other resources, she would have to pay for them, and so, Ling Qi found herself taking errands, mostly those that involved stealing into a east or spirits nest and acquiring reagents without doing any harm.
It was relaxing in its own way, and with every carefully arranged acquisition, she felt her understanding of the grinning moons lessons sharpening. The joy of the acquisition was a goal in and of itself. Freed of the desperation of her youth, Ling Qi could enjoy the simple rush that came from sneaking into places she was not meant to be.
In her free moments, Ling Qi cultivated the ARgent Genesis Art and it came easily to her. Where the first Argent cultivation art had prepared the body for the strain of early breakthroughs, the Argent Genesis Art was focused wholly upon building ones third realm foundation, and readying oneself to set the first building blocks of their domain. It's first level was a mere preparatory step in that direction.
Potency: Yellow 3
Max Level: 6
Potency: Yellow 3
Keywords: Argent, Balanced, Composure, Neutral, Qi, Resolve,
Potency Growth: Green 1(2), Green 2(4), Green 3(6)
XP Requirements: 150, 250, 350, 500, 650
First Day Benefits
+15 dice to Spiritual and Physical cultivation up to Green/Bronze 1
+10 dice to Meridian cultivation
+5 dice to Argent Art cultivation
1 free die of qi experience per turn, up to A rank
User may bind up to grade 3 spirits(Upkeep doubled if beast realm is higher)
Once per turn add 30 to a single attribute or skill during a challenge
Grants the user 1 virtual Yellow Stone per week(4 per turn)
Second Day Benefits(Not unlocked yet)
+25 dice to Spiritual and Physical cultivation up to Green/Bronze 2
+10 dice to Meridian cultivation
+10 dice to Argent art cultivation
2 free dice of qi experience per turn up to A rank
User may bind up to grade 3 spirits
Spirit Upkeep reduced by 2 per spirit
Once Per turn add up to 30 to a single attribute or skill during a challenge
Grants the user 2 virtual Yellow Stones per week(8 per turn)
Things I particularly like about Argent Genesis:
-It highlights what is commonly thought to be important for Domain building(to the point that even a Ducal clan like the Bais consider it worth the time)
--Base cultivation - Because duh
--Meridians - Green arts are Meridian hungry and you need meridians to train them with any kind of efficiency
--Qi - Not sure we know why its important yet, but it suggests its important beyond having enough to power your combat.
--Spirits - This seems a particular focus of the Argent cultivation arts, considering both of them granted bonuses to spirit binding, and Argent Genesis lets you maintain large hordes of extremely weak bound spirits for free eventually. Sure, its never going to be that useful in combat, anything you could bind with 2 qi is basically at the bottom end of Red for spirits. But consider Renshu if he could bind that giant worm swarm individually for 2 qi each and discount that to 0, then apply that to multitasking.
--Virtual Stones - We figured this out long before. Virtual stones are god. Unconditional Virtual Stones are monotheistic gods.
Yet, for Ling Qi the thing that felt like the greatest drain on her time, despite the relatively small number of hours spent on it, was her time in the archive. The Inner Sect archive, or the part she had access too, was a sprawling complex with many wings, each one filled to the bring with scrolls, jade slips and books. There was some arcane method of organization to the thing, fiendishly complex in execution.
It had been, in fact her first days task to decipher that organization. The Sect officials presiding over the archive had been irritatingly unhelpful, apparently working out how to find anything was an unofficial test for new disciples. Still, after several hours of searching through whispering mazes and occasionally quelling a rowdy spirit or two, she found her way to the the books which described the workings of domains and the modification of arts.
Domains are the core of higher level cultivation, representing the path walked by their owners. Each domain is wholly unique, it is impossible for two individuals to have the exact same domain, though it is possible to come close. At the upper reaches of cultivation, domain affects everything a cultivator does, but in the green realm, its effects are much more limited.
Domain gains experience when the cultivator cultivates arts of green 1 or higher potency compatible with their domain. At the beginning all arts are compatible, but as the domain develops this will narrow down.
Domains have a number of open 'slots' which can hold effects, known as 'insights'. Insights are gained through mastery of qualifying arts, and new slots are gained via increasing the rank of your domain. Specifically 2 slots are gained at each rank.
At Green/bronze 2 and above, domain begins to intermingle with regular cultivation. It is not possible to advance to green/bronze 3 without at least 4 insights slotted into your domain.
Green 4 requires 5 insights, one of which must be advanced.
Advanced Insights are unlocked at Green 2, and will be explained when that stage is reached. Higher requirements will be similarly noted.
Insights are permanent, so be careful in choosing what you choose to slot in.
Green 3 needs 4 Insights huh? I'd think the harder part is choosing which. I have no idea how you'd even REACH Green 3 without mastering at least 6 Green arts. That makes arts which finish in Green 2 especially valuable and defining for your Domain.
Gotta keep that in mind when packing the Clan Build, since we're looking at:
-Red
--Clan: Build a breakthrough suite to test for affinity for particular elements and to make diversifying easier in Yellow. If starting young, you probably want single element, single meridian arts which Master within Early Yellow, for the express purpose of training wheels, followed by a reverse engineered predecessor art to your family's main stuff.
--Career Red Minions: Task-oriented 2-art suites to do ONE task very well.
-Yellow: Run the lap on gaming the system of breakthrough bonuses. The Imperial Eight and Traditional Five set bonuses aren't TOO difficult for Talent above 5 I think since we got there(those below this degree of Talent should have found that out by Red and MUST take a more specialized approach rather than going completionist), and to meet that purpose you want simple arts which complete in Mid Yellow for that. For our purposes, Darkness, Music and Moon are difficult elements...which is why you want them to score Mastery bonuses for their Yellow breakthrough so its easier in Green.
-Green 1-2: You want to assemble a list of family-friendly insights in art form(no idea what these are yet, this is long term theorizing). Ideally, 4 Yellow arts which finish in Green 1, 4 which finish in Green 2. Gives them a default set to pick up for Insights if they hadn't found something better by now
Oh well, not important in the next two in quest years. Just spitballing what we'd have done in a New Game+
Advanced Insights sound like taking things a step beyond the base insight taught by an Art.
Art alteration is unlocked at green/bronze 3. However, the alterations one can make at this level are limited to keyword substitution. A cultivator may spend actions further cultivating a mastered art, and alterations require 25 successes per level of potency. EG. Red 1 art requires 25 successes, yellow one art requires 100.
On completing this the cultivator will be given a list of possible changes available to the keyword they chose, based on their domain and abilities. An altered keyword cannot be altered again until green/bronze 5
Altering keywords will have varied and uncertain effects on arts, more fine control over changes can be attained at higher cultivation.
I'm guessing this is how we're getting our Clan arts. We take the arts we have randomly acquired and hammer them into a coherent mold.
On a personal level I will point out that advanced insights(Green 2, needed at Green 3) unlock in the same span as Art Alteration(Green 3). Might be related?
Keyword substitution also seems to include element substitution, which would be important for converting disfavored elements in mastered arts.
@yrsillar
How would modified arts count for the purpose of Art Copy Protection? Does the Argent Sect still object to teaching a modified Argent Art? What about a heavily modified Argent Art?
A couple of things we could try:
-Forgotten Vale Melody
--Water. Could replace the Water with Moon. Now instead of the Lonely Wanderer its the Drunk Adventurer who went to new places and lost everything gambling.
--Loss. Not a popular keyword around our playerbase, I suspect. But Loss is pretty centric to how FVM functions, in many ways. Not sure how prying it out for something else would react. Trickery might remove the chip damage for more creative debuffs? Projection might make the phantasms more real?
-Falling Stars Art(if we do this its probably mainly to experiment, because we probably won't be using any of it in Green 3)
--Heaven - Moon again. Instead of electrical laser arrows that dispel, we fire moonbeams that disorient.
--Archery - Switch it to Music vector. Play a song that calls down celestial fire
-Argent Mirror
--Lake - We could switch it to Moon. Replace serenity with adaptability. The Moon over the Mountain.
--Mountain - We could switch it to Moon. Replace stubbornness with flexibility. The Moon Mirrored on the Lake.
-Thousand Ring Fortress
--Armor - Wonder what happens if we plug Motion in here...
-Abyssal Exhalation
--Worms - Begone gross things. Become Moon Fairies.
--Earth - Replace Earth worms with other themed bugs? Moon again of course.
-Argent Current
--Unarmed - Music! Make it longer range than Close and it might actually be useful
-Argent Storm - Sorry I can't see what I'd even put in here to fix it.
-Frozen Soul Serenade
--Endings - Like FVM's Loss, I think this didn't really appeal to the playerbase much. However, unlike Loss, its quite integral to how SAVAGE an offensive art this can be. Replacing it would directly impact function.
--Water - Also Water can swap for Moon. Everything can swap for Moon!
Just for funsies.
<Stopping for now, get back to rest of updoot later>
But... that's also how Jack Slash used his power? When I said 'Jack Slash' I didn't mean "Oh Ling Qi will be mean". I meant "Aggressively use other people's weaknesses and desires to manipulate them".
Also, saying 'the power is not bad' is a bit weird considering you are the one saying that "using a power to manipulate people" is bad:
So first it appears that you added so.e of your own words to that quote as I most certainly never said that second half. Your comparison is horrific because you are comparing a power to a person. No matter what power Jack had he would have been a terrible person that would have failed every ethics and morality test ever invented. Jack's power could have been to fart real loud when someone looked at him and he would have used it to suffocate entire buildings.
With your comparison I should not drive a Honda Accord because it was the car of choice for a serial killer.
You did mention how exploit and manipulate have a bad connotation. However the evilness of such words lay in the why. Here is an example.
You give a girl flowers. What have you done? You have exploited the social value and norms of flowers in order to manipulate her feelings to be more in line with your goals. Sounds pretty awful right? Why did you do it though? You did it because she got fired the day before and you wanted her to feel better. Wow adding the why changes the whole meaning.
Exploit and manipulate have some very bad connotations. That does not change the fact that they are very powerful and clear words to describe basic human interactions.
I know Arkues that you are probably dead set against this art because of how slanted you have chosen to view this art so the following is for others.
Covetous Wraith's Yearning is our story. We clung to existence and relevance by finding those with desires and fulling those. We saw that Meizhen was lonely and exploited that desire for company. That lead to a beautiful part of the story. We are a person that has been filled with desires, freedom most of all, and have used those desires to become who we are right now.
A power or idea is very rarely completely evil. We have Like Suyins puppets as further proof of that. An art that reveals desires can be used to greatly help other people as well as our selves. It does not have to be an evil thing. It can be misused but so can anything. I have enough faith and trust in this community and Ling Qi that I believe that this art will be used to help those around her.
-It highlights what is commonly thought to be important for Domain building(to the point that even a Ducal clan like the Bais consider it worth the time)
What do you have in mind here? Also your wording is misleading because we don't know if Meizhen actually wants anything to do with Genesis. We also don't know how far it goes and "hordes" seems too far for initial ideas.
What do you have in mind here? Also your wording is misleading because we don't know if Meizhen actually wants anything to do with Genesis. We also don't know how far it goes and "hordes" seems too far for initial ideas.
-Argent Mirror
--Lake - We could switch it to Moon. Replace serenity with adaptability. The Moon over the Mountain.
--Mountain - We could switch it to Moon. Replace stubbornness with flexibility. The Moon Mirrored on the Lake.
Not sure we could pry out either element for the Argent Arts.
By all accounts, the power of the Argent Arts comes from unifying and balancing. Fire to Water, Heaven to Earth, Lake to Mountain, Wind to Thunder. Trying to jimmy one element out and sub in something else feels like it would just break the Art instead of altering it.
Lark and Memory are my frontunners. I'd accept Yearning or Divining in a pinch. Want nothing to do with Yang music, would completely quit the quest if that's chosen because that would be an indicator that the playerbase is totally opposed to me and I'll never get what I want about anything.
If I had to choose one art, I'd go with the Harmony of the Dancing Wind, largely because it is exactly what I want us slotting into our Domain. The art description is about seeing and touching connections, the first tech is about linking us with other people and (literally) sharing their perspective, and the second art is about granting allies optimism and hope based on their bonds with us. I feel like it speaks for itself.
Not sure we could pry out either element for the Argent Arts.
By all accounts, the power of the Argent Arts comes from unifying and balancing. Fire to Water, Heaven to Earth, Lake to Mountain, Wind to Thunder. Trying to jimmy one element out and sub in something else feels like it would just break the Art instead of altering it.
Yeah, I have no problem with the themes of Covetous Wraith. I just think it's not that useful and fails to cover our bases that well.
The taunt is honestly the opposite of what we want, with its only potential value being if it were a super long range attack that we could use to pull archers.
As Black Noise said: great for Meizhen, not for us.
(that being said, if PLR gained the ability to spawn clones that can use some of our abilities there could be hilarious synergy there)
If you want to do SCIENCE, pick up a low-level Red art, master it in 1AP, and do the art modification in anther 1AP. Messing with Argent Storm is way too expensive - it means we need to finish the art and them put another 175 XP into modifying it due to the final level being in Green 1.
If you want to do SCIENCE, pick up a low-level Red art, master it in 1AP, and do the art modification in anther 1AP. Messing with Argent Storm is way too expensive - it means we need to finish the art and them put another 175 XP into modifying it due to the final level being in Green 1.
Yeah, I have no problem with the themes of Covetous Wraith. I just think it's not that useful and fails to cover our bases that well.
The taunt is honestly the opposite of what we want, with its only potential value being if it were a super long range attack that we could use to pull archers.
As Black Noise said: great for Meizhen, not for us.
(that being said, if PLR gained the ability to spawn clones that can use some of our abilities there could be hilarious synergy there)
That is actually a totally valid use for this technique, because the art has spine meridians and Welcoming in Shadow looks like a spine technique. Huh.
It doesn't have the best defense, the horror, so it'd be a decoy for a bit but it is valid in the sense that we could put it in there and have it use the technique. How long it would last depends on how much the defense is boosted.
E: Looking further it appears what this would do is make it much more able to take a hit, given it has quite low defense. And it could be improved.
Either way it is a expendable attention grabber, which can be useful.
I am actually still interested in the secret fifth Argent Art Ling Qi would be getting by mastering the previous four, especially since it is a relatively low hanging fruit with two of the four being mastered already.
