Do we even need to eventually upgrade the flute? I think FVM is the only actual woodwind technique, and Ling Qi had all those singing lessons with Zeqing. Freeing up her hands creates so many more options as well. Not likely to be relevant for ages, but I'd like it if we just passed the flute down to Biyu and go without once it gets outgrown.
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.
Arkeus
Crazy cat guy
- Location
- France
We definitely, definitely want to have a weapon slot for music, and woodwind is this close to getting to S (might have gotten to S if we had chosen differently this turn).
I don't think having our hands free actually provide opportunities nowadays, while having a weapon does. @yrsillar has gone on record previously saying that weapons (and armour to a lesser degree) are stronger 'slots' than the others, and can do things the other slots can't.
glyph
completely and utterly fine
What did you say?
-500x500.jpg)
Augh.
That thing would do quite a bit of damage to my suspension of disbelief.
...
We've already got a Singing Sword, so if we reallly want a mixed-use weapon I'd prefer an option like a set of crystal throwing daggers that all resonate at different frequencies, or something.
Black Noise
Curious
- Location
- About 1AU from Sol
A while ago I talked about our AP/cultivation plans and possible stretch goals by the inter-sect tournament. This time I'd like to talk about what the plans look like for skill and attribute training.
First, what's known:
As side note: Qi is something we can train without limit at 1 dice per point, but is basically never worth it because we're getting free dice every turn from SSC which will be enough to bring us to S around turn 14-15, possibly before.
With that long list out of the way, let's talk about the current plan.
Resources:
Goals:
The Plan (end-of-turn 18 target)
And that's our main plan. There's 2 more topics I want to cover though.
Plan beyond turn 18:
Currently open questions: There's 2 decisions about the turn 18 stat plan worth bringing up here in thread:
I'll leave these 2 points up for discussion here while we wait for the update. If it looks like there's no clear consensus we'll probably ask to have them brought up as vote options in some upcoming vote.
First, what's known:
- We get 40 "points" per turn to allocate between skills and attributes. Skills up to B cost 1 point per die while attributes and advanced skills cost 2 per die.
- We're limited to a certain number of dice per stat per turn, currently it's 4 dice but will rise to 5 once we're bronze 4 (further increasing to 6 by G6/B6 but that's for later).
- When we assign dice to a stat for training, it may get additional xp per die depending on some aspects, in plans we represent these with *'s next to the stat (e.g Dex 4* = 4d6+1*4, War 2** = 2d6+2*2):
- If the stat shows up as a keyword in that turn's cultivation, it gets +1 per die (all attributes are represented in base cultivation)
- Our moon site adds +1 to skill keywords of arts trained there for the turn.
- The water/lake site adds +1 to all social skills and attributes if an art is trained there for the turn.
- We get +1 to qi dice as a way bonus.
- All stats in 3d realm have a hard cap in S unless uncapped. We currently only have Music and Dexterity uncapped. It's not realisitc to expect more stats to uncap (though we can hope for e.g qi).
- In addition to the hard cap, skills have narrative-locked softcaps and must become advanced versions to progress further at C>B, A>S, and (for uncapped skills) SS>SSS. Attributes have no such softcaps. Skill which pass a softcap generally split off an advanced version at a higher rank, leaving the base skill with any leftover xp in it, e.g dance C(33/25) -> dream step B(0/35) + dance C(8/25).
- Other than the 40 points/turn, we also get xp from events. It's hard to estimate how much of it we're getting, and how much is going toward "useful" stats. We do know attributes will not be getting event xp outside of big events (like the initial barbarian incursion or this expedition).
- Finally, there is the option to suplement stat training with omake xp at 2 points per 1xp for attributes and 1:1 for skills (any, including advanced), up to a limit of 4/stat/turn unless yrs okays an exception.
As side note: Qi is something we can train without limit at 1 dice per point, but is basically never worth it because we're getting free dice every turn from SSC which will be enough to bring us to S around turn 14-15, possibly before.
With that long list out of the way, let's talk about the current plan.
Resources:
- 10 turns left = 400 points (turn 18 cultivation/training is included, we asked).
- Attributes have the highest point costs:
C>B: 18-22, B>A: 22-27, A>S: 29-36, S>SS (dex only): 71 - Skill point costs (+1 to +3):
C>B: 4-6, B>A: 11-16, A>S: 12-18, S>SS (music only): 25-36 - The main takaway here is that attribute level goals require planning well in advance because even a single rank up requires 3-4 turns at maximum focus.
- Other important considerations are:
- aligning training to optimal keywords/site use.
- giving skills enough time to advance.
- generally stopping training stats at 1 rank below a desired target to maximize relevant event xp gain. - Event xp is hard to estimate but generally current plans "overbook" and assume some average relevant xp/turn to offset any excess point spending.
Goals:
- The tournament (and war stuff) heavily favors combat-relevant stats, so one of the primary goals in current plans is to make LQ an excellent and versatile combatant.
- Taking advantage of LQ's uncapped stats is an important part of making sure we're keeping ahead (or at least keeping up with the ducals who definitely have their own uncapped stats).
- At the same time, it's important we keep up our social stats and skills, both because we're expected to perform well being Cai's left hand and all, and to advance LQ's own spirit-social themes.
- For overall long-term growth we ideally want to advance our attributes over skills when both would provide appropriate increases to derived stats, mostly because attributes are very slow to train compared to skills and as such need consistent large investment. Also having high attributes is relevant for attribute tests, which makes low attributes iffy.
- Lastly, there's currently some planned allocation toward utility or thematically appropriate options like Formations and Art. And for completeness: blades D was one such allocation and is considered enough of an investment for now. rank C is the long-term maximum that's desired but is not a priority before the tournament.
The Plan (end-of-turn 18 target)
- Methodology:
- Numbers are automated and done in my math spreadsheet>xp plan section.
- Specific stat ranks for combat stats are selected largely based on marginal value, that is how much they contribute to derived stats vs the statpoint cost.
- Attributes (~300 points)
- Dexterity A >> SS (85 pt) :: in-theme, take advante of uncap, affects speed, stealth, initiative, p.avoid, and dance hit. High marginal value despite the cost because it affects so many things.
- Stamina C >> B or A (13+27 pt) :: leaning B, only affects health and stamina tests. Zhengui's Way affords LQ +1 rank for tests, which makes B less bad than it would be. Low marginal value on A (medium on B even).
- Strength E :: keep as-is, we use spiritual/social stats for might and dexterity for grapple escapes so it's literally useless to us outside of like archery damage.
- Intelligence D >> B (28 pt) :: while we don't have derived stats that scale with int, it seems important enough for tests and long-term growth.
- Wits B >> A (26 pt) :: affects initiative and combat perception, is somewhat in-theme.
- Resolve B >> S (44 pt) :: both physical and spiritual armor, as well as resist. Extremely important for the build, plus has a nice benefit for tests (high marginal value).
- Presence C >> A or S (35+29 pt) :: our Power stat; affects penetration/damage for our music and dance, as well as UGM's automatic dispel. Social stat benefits.
- Manipulation A >> S (21 pt) :: affects music hit, fade, and social perception, plus social stat benefits. Very high marginal value.
- Composure C >> B or A (15+22 pt) :: affects Poise only; ideally we'd be able to get away with B thanks to having other high social attributes/resolve and a largely sincerity-based approach.
- Combat Skills (~150 points)
- Sable Grace A >> S (7pt) :: dodge is dodge.
- Unbroken Will B >> S (33 pt) :: both spiritual and physical armor, extremely high margianal value (+thematically nice with resolve S).
- Fade C >> A (19 pt) :: spiritual dodge, ideally will merge with Dream Step on hitting B, thereby saving ~15 points and reaching S instead of A.
- Vanishing A >> S (15 pt) :: stealth is stealth, very important to have it as high as possible if we want to use it at all.
- Athletics C >> A (13 pt) :: speed stat, S has low margin value and between dex SS and ridiculous passives we'll be running mid-SS+ speed anyway.
- Intensive Focus B >> A (9 pt) :: combat perception, S has low marginal value. Does leave us with only ~high A c.perception but that's why a talisman for it is a priority. Plausible sixiang and zhengui pick up some slack too.
- If we want a different perception skill that would cost an additional ~4 points + waiting time and gamble on advancement in a direction we want.
- Woodwind A(capped) >> SS (29 pt) :: signature uncapped skill, music hit and pen, plus feeds into spirit ken with MoSS. high marginal value. SSS was considered but it better saved for end-of-sect.
- Vocals B :: keep as-is, maybe one of the social skills will merge into it. Otherwise no benefit other than thematic appropriateness, much like what's planned for Art.
- Dream Step B >> S (27 pt) :: dance skill, S isn't amazing value but for thematics it's planned, plus it's likely to get fade and/or athletics merged which makes it great.
- Social and Utility Skills (~70 points)
- Sincere Negotiator B >> A (11 pt) :: speech/human social skill, goes into Poise. S would be nice but costs ~12 points which are better spent on attributes. A skill allows for low A poise with composure B which isn't amazing but isn't really a weakness either.
- Empathy C(capped) >> A (13 pt) :: social perception skill, A skill is enough for S in that.
- Spirit Ken C(capped) >> A (11 pt) :: spirit social skill, important for theme but hard to justify S in by turn 18; music SS with MoSS will likely carry though.
- Government D >> B (6 pt) :: likely the intruigue skill, efficiently trainable with MSS; important for the social game (A costs an additional 13pt).
- War D >> B or A (7+12 pt) :: war skill seems important given the actual for real war the sect is involved in, and LQ's tendency to play a central role in any battlefield she's in, especially with her spirits taking a similar aoe approach.
- Academics D >> C (3 pt) :: round out a potential weakness a bit.
- Formations C >> B (4 pt) :: take advantage of RME's themes to potentially get a ward-breaker advanced skill, which is currently the only variant of formations skill we can afford since anything creative would require AP spent on research, materials, and a further training a support skill like Craft.
- Beast Handling E >> C or B (5+3 pt) :: potentially better combat combo moves with Zhengui. Hard to say if it's worth it for the marginal cost.
- Art F >> C (6 pt) :: thematic fluff mostly.
- Things that didn't make it:
- Blades C (talked above, not a priority). Polearms, projection and archery in a similar situation.
- Craft, mostly because of the corresponding AP investment which we can't really afford when our marginal value is something like 1 art level at G5 potency or a senior accessory talisman per 2 AP.
- Survival; text fluff is:
Aka the tracking part of combat perception, and probably the loot/threat identification skill. Important if we were exploring a lot but given the war it just isn't a priority. Definitely eyeing it for after turn 18 though.
- Notes:
- So as you can see, the current plans account for ~520 points of the 400 we actually have to spend. The extra 120 will require ~25 relevant event xp/turn, or if we're failing to meet that, from sacrificing some of those stat ranks. Though if we're doing better than expected then hopefully we'll see it early enough to either pick up some of those extra attribute ranks, or push some A-target skills to S.
- Worth noting that I don't account for potential skill mergers at all, each of those (especially for combat skills) can potentiall save 10-20 points, which would make hitting the plan target easier.
And that's our main plan. There's 2 more topics I want to cover though.
Plan beyond turn 18:
- This has a lot less of a consensus behind it.
- Obviously a priority should be to advance our relevant social/utility skills to A or S, as well as get the rest of our attributes to at least A.
- I personally would like keep advancing our uncapped stats:
- Music SSS is both fairly easily attainable before the end of sect and is very relevant as one of the few ways we can further scale our combat power.
- Dex SSS, while not currently even possible to aim for by end-of-sect, is still something I think we should put xp towards so that next thread we aren't starting at SS from 0 out of like 320 xp, basically make end-of-sect stat goals that aren't too greedy and dump the rest in dex as a long-term investment.
Currently open questions: There's 2 decisions about the turn 18 stat plan worth bringing up here in thread:
- Do we want a different Perceptiveness advanced skill from Intensive Focus or is IF fine as our main c.perception stat.
- I've seen it argued that IF doesn't really work like we'd want it to. I'll let the people who actually care about it make the arguments for it.
- Personally I think it's fine, and we'll have an opportunity to make it fit better in the A>S skill evolution when we eventually get there.
- Do we want to go for Presence S or do we aim for presence A.
- Presence affects our penetration stat (which feeds into damage), and thanks to UGM, it also feeds into our ability to negate enemy defenses, as well as group buff-layer defenses.
- We've seen how in team combat a coordinated force has ways to mitigate our death fields, and we know from the demonstrated combo-move with Sixiang that dispels are effective at countering at least some of that mitigation. Combined with harder hitting offense behind those dispels, and the presence rank can potentially make a huge difference in group fights.
- Mechanically, we're unlikely to pick up +dispel passives so raw prsence would be the only way to really scale our dispel offense. Plus as currently expected passives stand, presence A>S will likely cross rank breakpoints for derived penetration stats on a lot of our music and dance offense (from mid-high S to low-mid SS).
- Presence is also a social attribute; "The characters force of personality and personal magnetism." an advantage not to be discounted considering how much we're seeing Manip A matter in recent social events. I especially expect high presence to matter for talking to spirits.
- The cost is the only downside, with a 29 point marginal cost. Plus if we decide we're going for it the 32 dice-from now cost means we'll have to keep training it almost as much as we do with dexterity (ignoring event xp).
- Other serious contenders for the margin would be things like Composure A, stamina A, and pushing some skills to S.
I'll leave these 2 points up for discussion here while we wait for the update. If it looks like there's no clear consensus we'll probably ask to have them brought up as vote options in some upcoming vote.
EternalObserver
eYe Gaze baCk
- Location
- The Void
I personally think some skills are worth pushing up to S like Sincere Negotiator and other future skills over some attributes
Edit:
I don't have any strong feelings regarding our currently specialized Perception skill (Internsive Focus), though it is very clear (in discord and sometimes here in thread) that some others do.
Some people have been wanting a more "detect" kind of Perception that corresponds with Music. Kinda like a radar or an echo effect that enables us to sense our surroundings and detect danger (which is very useful as a scout/spy). Intensive Focus is useful too, but in a niche kinda way (it was born from trying to spot weakness in a golem and attack certain spots).
Edit:
I don't have any strong feelings regarding our currently specialized Perception skill (Internsive Focus), though it is very clear (in discord and sometimes here in thread) that some others do.
Some people have been wanting a more "detect" kind of Perception that corresponds with Music. Kinda like a radar or an echo effect that enables us to sense our surroundings and detect danger (which is very useful as a scout/spy). Intensive Focus is useful too, but in a niche kinda way (it was born from trying to spot weakness in a golem and attack certain spots).
Last edited:
Survival is more important than art or some of the others such as beast handling IMO. From a fluff perspective, we have been training as a scout to be able to read the environment and track traces down. As such, I would expect any survival tests to be delegated or handled to us in a field situation with our team. From an ooc team composition perspective, Cai Renxiang is likely to have high craft and high art but probably not high survival. I'd like us to pick it up so that we can actually guide a team through a field exercise or track down an opposing team.
Arkeus
Crazy cat guy
- Location
- France
Yeah, gotta agree on Survival. I'd also argue that depending on team compositions (E.G, if Meizhen is allowed to join CRX) it's less important for Ling Qi to be a badass in combat than for her to be a badass for utility stuff. So, Vanishing/Survival/Sincere Negotiator/ Empathy would all rank higher to me than Presence (and Dex SS). Of course, Dex SS also helps Speed/Vanishing.
I would like to see a return of the throwing daggers Ling Qi used to use, even if it was as a support item.
Black Noise
Curious
- Location
- About 1AU from Sol
There's a few things to say about this:
- If some of our social skills merge then that's enough to push the resultant combined skill to S without additional cost and is probably fine.
- Failing that, I think it works better for the narrative to leave social skills at A considering we're unlikely to max out our social arts, and only set up the advancement to socials S after the competition when we have the AP to max out our socials.
- Considering that, it's not even a guarantee we'll get the S-rank advanced skills up in time for the contest, and in the meantime we'd probably be missing out on event xp which makes this option more costly than just a matter of pushing some things forward.
- Plus, skills A>S is a matter of 1 turn, 2 if unlucky; compared to attributes at 3-4 average per rank. Focusing on attributes now leaves us more flexible later.
- Location
- The United States
- Pronouns
- He/They
1: IF is fine.
2: Presence S is important beyond the mechanical implications.
3. Survival would be nice, but I like it post 18 as well.
2: Presence S is important beyond the mechanical implications.
3. Survival would be nice, but I like it post 18 as well.
Black Noise
Curious
- Location
- About 1AU from Sol
So a note on survival, we have 10 turns left and it's been averaging 2.8xp/turn over the last few turns, there's a decent chance it'll reach softcap on its own by turn 18...
- Location
- The United States
- Pronouns
- He/They
Incidentally, obviously everyone's Omake points is to do with as they please, but how does the math play out for efficiency of Omake point:Training die ratio?
About Art vs Survival:
The reason why training this skill would be reasonable is that we have an art with the keyword. SSC not only has the keyword, but it is also a Moon art and Art is a social skill. This means that in turns with SSC training, we get a +3 bonus on every die we roll for the skill.
Art D requires 6+15 = 21 xp, which translates to about 4 dice ( 4d6 +12, 4d6 needs to roll >9)
and Art C requires 21 + 20 = 41 xp, which translates to about 7 dice ( 7d6 +21, 7d6 needs to roll >20)
Survival has no arts or anything else that give it bonuses, so we roll it at +0
Survival B requires 23 xp, which would also cost about 6-7 dice.
so we can for the same cost go from Art F to Art C or Survival C to Survival B.
now if we consider that we got quite a bit of survival xp from events in the past, then i think we should look if we can get Survival B for free.
The idea about Art was that we could go to Art D when we next train SSC (turn 10 and 11) and then spend the 3 dice for Art C when we train SSC again after getting to G5
The reason why training this skill would be reasonable is that we have an art with the keyword. SSC not only has the keyword, but it is also a Moon art and Art is a social skill. This means that in turns with SSC training, we get a +3 bonus on every die we roll for the skill.
Art D requires 6+15 = 21 xp, which translates to about 4 dice ( 4d6 +12, 4d6 needs to roll >9)
and Art C requires 21 + 20 = 41 xp, which translates to about 7 dice ( 7d6 +21, 7d6 needs to roll >20)
Survival has no arts or anything else that give it bonuses, so we roll it at +0
Survival B requires 23 xp, which would also cost about 6-7 dice.
so we can for the same cost go from Art F to Art C or Survival C to Survival B.
now if we consider that we got quite a bit of survival xp from events in the past, then i think we should look if we can get Survival B for free.
The idea about Art was that we could go to Art D when we next train SSC (turn 10 and 11) and then spend the 3 dice for Art C when we train SSC again after getting to G5
Black Noise
Curious
- Location
- About 1AU from Sol
Conversion rates, higher is better:
• Base skills rate (+3, +2 and +1): 0.15, 0.18 and 0.22 points per omake point
• Advanced skills (+3/+2/+1): 0.31, 0.36, 0.44 points/omake
• Social attributes (+2): 0.18 points/omake
• Other attributes (+1): 0.22 points/omake
So generally speaking: any advanced skill, preferrably something like unbroken will that only gets +1 >> slow training base skills = mental/phys attributes > fast training base skills (e.g beast handling) = Social attributes.
Plus it's generally ok to complete base skills that are close to a softcap breakpoint, and when we're gonna start getting attributes to where we want them, make those cross a threshold without having to spend more dice to guarantee it (provided we can't rely on event xp or would like the benefits of the higher attribute immediately).
Thanks for all your hard work, @Black Noise!
So. Perception skill. I think it's worthwhile to get Perceptiveness to where it needs to be to generate a second advanced skill. Intensive Focus(IF) is, as the name describes, a skill designed around deliberately narrowing one's focus on specific objects of attention. For a number of reasons, I feel this does not best meet our needs.
1. Ling Qi's combat paradigm is heavily focused around groups, crowd control, and support(buff/debuff mix). This role isn't best-served by a perception skill that trades away awareness of the broader conflict when used to its full potential, since broad-scale changes are her own focus of impact on the battlefield. Keeping broad awareness of the fight at the forefront of her attention is especially important with arts like SNR, which has a perfect defense than can shield allies, but only in a limited area around Ling Qi. Understanding everything that's happening on the battlefield mostly-equally is vital in deciding where to deploy techniques like that to best effect.
2. As a scout, one of Ling Qi's main duties is to search out enemy forces or other kinds of threat. However, danger can take a very wide variety of forms, and a scout is looking over wide areas at a time. Thematically, a skill that leans itself to focusing on specific things won't shine brightest in this role. She can focus on the task of searching for danger, but full use of the skill won't engage without something more concrete to work from. Intensive Focus is well-aligned with the scrying in RME, but the scrying is ill-suited for scouting or exploration given its limitations.
3. Ling Qi's build isn't good at using IF in combat. She has relatively few techniques that can decisively take advantage of specific details or vulnerabilities she might discover about a single opponent using Intensive Focus. Almost all of Ling Qi's techniques are AoE and thematically aren't great at, say, breaking through a weak point in an enemy's armor. FSS's CtE is a potent single-target attack, but that attack requires setup and basically doesn't care about what flaws or weaknesses an enemy has, given its potency. It's difficult to argue that Ling Qi has the tools necessary to leverage IF's best qualities in combat.
4. For utility, Intensive Focus is at its best with things like cracking Formations or tracking an enemy, but these skills haven't been rewarding or used very much at all. It's also solid with scrying, but the limits of our scrying technique make it very unlikely to ever be used in opposition to interfering effects. Thematically, it would make sense for IF to help with things like studying Academics or Government, however those also aren't things that it should be necessary to have a B+ rank Perceptiveness skill to effectively study in the first place. Intensive Focus suffers from Ling Qi rarely making use of skills it is best suited to boost and/or not mechanically benefiting from the skill. Fluff benefits don't need the skill to be developed any further than it already is, honestly.
IF isn't a bad skill, and Ling Qi's character is richer for having it, but it's not the best for Ling Qi's adopted combat role and the things it is best at don't come up enough, and aren't likely to, to be ideal.
Instead, it makes sense to get another skill, something with a "bigger picture" focus to match where she's putting her efforts and needs to pay attention in a fight. Something related to how she was picking up on enemy death-screams from beyond the physical, or the Shishigui's war drums would seem appropriate and fitting with her character.
In min-max-y terms, a perception skill with that flavor would also be a lot more likely to fuse with Empathy when one or the other broke through the soft-cap. Huge gamble not worth basing the whole decision on, though.
So. Perception skill. I think it's worthwhile to get Perceptiveness to where it needs to be to generate a second advanced skill. Intensive Focus(IF) is, as the name describes, a skill designed around deliberately narrowing one's focus on specific objects of attention. For a number of reasons, I feel this does not best meet our needs.
1. Ling Qi's combat paradigm is heavily focused around groups, crowd control, and support(buff/debuff mix). This role isn't best-served by a perception skill that trades away awareness of the broader conflict when used to its full potential, since broad-scale changes are her own focus of impact on the battlefield. Keeping broad awareness of the fight at the forefront of her attention is especially important with arts like SNR, which has a perfect defense than can shield allies, but only in a limited area around Ling Qi. Understanding everything that's happening on the battlefield mostly-equally is vital in deciding where to deploy techniques like that to best effect.
2. As a scout, one of Ling Qi's main duties is to search out enemy forces or other kinds of threat. However, danger can take a very wide variety of forms, and a scout is looking over wide areas at a time. Thematically, a skill that leans itself to focusing on specific things won't shine brightest in this role. She can focus on the task of searching for danger, but full use of the skill won't engage without something more concrete to work from. Intensive Focus is well-aligned with the scrying in RME, but the scrying is ill-suited for scouting or exploration given its limitations.
3. Ling Qi's build isn't good at using IF in combat. She has relatively few techniques that can decisively take advantage of specific details or vulnerabilities she might discover about a single opponent using Intensive Focus. Almost all of Ling Qi's techniques are AoE and thematically aren't great at, say, breaking through a weak point in an enemy's armor. FSS's CtE is a potent single-target attack, but that attack requires setup and basically doesn't care about what flaws or weaknesses an enemy has, given its potency. It's difficult to argue that Ling Qi has the tools necessary to leverage IF's best qualities in combat.
4. For utility, Intensive Focus is at its best with things like cracking Formations or tracking an enemy, but these skills haven't been rewarding or used very much at all. It's also solid with scrying, but the limits of our scrying technique make it very unlikely to ever be used in opposition to interfering effects. Thematically, it would make sense for IF to help with things like studying Academics or Government, however those also aren't things that it should be necessary to have a B+ rank Perceptiveness skill to effectively study in the first place. Intensive Focus suffers from Ling Qi rarely making use of skills it is best suited to boost and/or not mechanically benefiting from the skill. Fluff benefits don't need the skill to be developed any further than it already is, honestly.
IF isn't a bad skill, and Ling Qi's character is richer for having it, but it's not the best for Ling Qi's adopted combat role and the things it is best at don't come up enough, and aren't likely to, to be ideal.
Instead, it makes sense to get another skill, something with a "bigger picture" focus to match where she's putting her efforts and needs to pay attention in a fight. Something related to how she was picking up on enemy death-screams from beyond the physical, or the Shishigui's war drums would seem appropriate and fitting with her character.
In min-max-y terms, a perception skill with that flavor would also be a lot more likely to fuse with Empathy when one or the other broke through the soft-cap. Huge gamble not worth basing the whole decision on, though.
- Location
- New Brunswick, NJ
- Pronouns
- He/Him/His
Intensive Focus seems really useful for a social setting (hyperfocus on one person and the details being picked up from them), but I think Empathy does that, not Perceptiveness.
BungieONI
Seven gremlins in a trench coat
- Location
- Lickwidget
- Pronouns
- She/Her
I agree with your points quite heavily honestly, and wanted to bring facets of this specific one to attention which I think are worth noting. With the sprite eyes Ling Qi can create Intensive Focus is particularly useful if she can be stationary and hidden out of sight to observe and listen safely. Its particularly useful for the specific facet of scout/spy work which is espionage via eavesdropping where you might need intensive focus to both bolster the technique and make out whispers from a sprite hidden away somewhere. Like it has A Use, but I don't think it covers All Uses Ling Qi could feasibly attempt right now.
Kind of like what Ao Xiaoli did when Ling Qi met her. Intensive Focus has some use in one on one private conversations or interrogations, and so it should be present in Ling Qi's tool kit, but I agree that she needs a wide ranging perception advancement as well. Getting both and moving forward from there would be what I want, and some of what I talked about earlier about liminal perception paradigms (only partly related to the Liminal Realm) in the below post.
We could leverage IF in combat if Ling Qi developed a dueling specialty - pick out the leaders, standard-bearers and support specialists, and use Ling Qi's Loneliness shtick to force a one-on-one despite being in the middle of an enemy army.
But that's a pretty big divergence from what I understand is the most pushed build for her, and if we developed it exclusively as a sideline we'd still need a perception skill that supported her main role.
The social arena is definitely where the flavor of Ling Qi's monofocus has been strongest(aside from on cultivation itself, ofc). That aspect of Ling Qi's character is part of why the flavor of IF is as popular as it is. But you're right that that's not actually what or where the skill Intensive Focus affects things, mechanically.
Ling Qi's also been trying pretty hard to grow away from that at least somewhat, to broaden her consideration.
Last edited:
- Location
- the internet
If I'm correct, it was also useful during our investigation of the Green 3 that was assassinated in our last field mission correct? We were looking for clues at the scene of the crime and IF helped with that I believe.
However, I really do like the idea of a Music/Perception combined skill...call it World Rhythm or something. It would allow us to hear things down to the smallest sound for a Very Far range. We could hear both the spiritual as well as the physical presence of enemies trying to hide themselves. Or maybe if there were lets say, stellar qi poisoning the ground again but further beneath us, we could hear the earth being eroded by the poisonous stellar qi. Would be useful and in-theme for LQ. I'd imagine it would become useful in battle as well. She could hear an opponents preparation of a technique before its visible maybe.
I was thinking something like Echoes, as a nod to our latest Domain insight we slotted. Coming up with names for things is fun!
The other consideration is Intensive Focus is a skill defined by an approach to perception. If we got another skill defined by a means of perception, their applications should be able to stack in terms of focusing on one thing. The chance of conflict seems pretty low.
