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

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My problem is, we want that Starstone- the Twelve Stars Confederation wants that Starstone. If we intervene and demonstrate a tenuous understanding of the political landscape by focusing solely on the Shishigui collaborators, then we are implying that we know enough to know the Twelve are trying to awaken 12 fallen stars and that the Imperials are deeply committed to stopping that.

The Twelve Stars confederation want to hold off on attacking the Empire until they've reclaimed more of their fallen stars, by revealing the jig is up here I think they're liable to commit anyways. Because now the Imperials are going to be forewarned and forearmed about a new Great Khan awakening things that Imperial Theology equate to some of the oldest evils they know of. Better for them to commit now to the ones who can help them awaken the fallen stars quickly now that surprise is lost than hesitate and allow a potential ally to be destroyed piecemeal before the Imperials mobilize against the Khan.
 
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picklepikkl said:
The highest ranks of cultivation are fundamentally solitary and separated from other entities of similar degree. Purity of concept means uniqueness.
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I hope this is merely a drawback of the Imperial cultivation philosophy. Bonds exist after all, why can't we embody them?

As for the update, I'm leaning towards this goalpost:

[] Securing the Starstone
Although I'm tempted to wreak havoc with our field effects, we don't know what the Green / Cyan cultivators can do. If they are powerful disruptors, we've pretty much wasted our initiative.
 
Well, isn't it nice to find our enemies all gathered in one place?

Am I the only one crossing his fingers the White Sky guys will bug out promptly once an attack starts? From the conversation they seem the least invested in this alliance?

As for the where we deploy our assets. Guan Zhi is our only heavyweight and we need her to tackle the 12 star Cyan. I Trust Cai to pin down the Shusigui and company (I assume our Bardic Rival is included with their party.)

My only real question is what does Linq Qi do? If we help Cai we improve our chances of swiftly putting down one of the enemy parties, but a smash and grab on the Macguffin is also very tempting.
 
[][Cai Renxiang] The Shishigui representatives
[][Guan Zhi] The Twelve Stars confederation representatives

[] Securing the Starstone

Assigning Cai to the Rats means we an assist via securing the stone. We're the ones with experience dealing with both the star and the rattys.
 
Eastern Calculus said:
I hope this is merely a drawback of the Imperial cultivation philosophy. Bonds exist after all, why can't we embody them?
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We discussed this a long time ago actually.
Unless something has changed since then (possible) then we actually can cultivate some kind of friends and family bonds route, but it would almost certainly never make it to full ancestor spirit mode due to its nature. Cultivating it would tie us more firmly to the world and advancing beyond a certain point would require an insane degree of hoop jumping and work, to the point where we'd never make it to the top tiers in our lifetime.

IIRC it was still deemed an acceptable route by some due to the fact that LQ is unlikely to make it all the way to the top in a reasonable time frame anyway, but there was no widespread approval of the idea.

We're still currently doing some of that though, with the crazy tree-family-spooky-ghost-girl domain, but I don't know how far we'll take it.
 
yrsillar said:
"We have said many times that our allies are different, if you-" another, younger barbarian spoke up, his voice hot and irritated. She recognized him, surprisingly enough. She remembered the ozone crackle of lighting, and the taunting song that had almost baited her into chase. There on his red maned horse was the Barbarian singer she had faced in the village. He wore a mask of painted bone, and thick armor of leather and metal studs.

He was silenced as one of his companions raised a clawed hand. Beside him was a shishigui. It was unusual for it's kind, standing straight without the usual hunch. Because of that it towered over the singer, more than two meters tall. It's spindly body was armored in gleaming blue black chitin, like a carapace of a beetle, an impression only made stronger by the pronged horn that rose from it's helm. The creature was at the seventh stage of the third realm.
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yrsillar said:
There were two other shishigui with him, hunched and crouching as was more common, they were only second Appraisal stage. The four barbarians with them were a step higher, and their mounts entered uneasily beneath the gaze of the other tribes raptors.
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yrsillar said:
The last group was the smallest, with only two people. One was an unassuming barbarian, mounted upon a winged horse with pale blue fur, and feathered wings as white as a cloud. He wore heavy furs in place of armor, and his mask was a thing of glittering ice, and he was a sixth stage third realm.

Beside him was a strange, pale woman, she was tall, taller than any of the men present, excepting the shishigui speaker. Her hair was a pale yellow shade, like faded gold, and worn in a thick braid gathered around her throat. Her features were odd and foreign, the shape of her grey eyes strange. She wore a dress of pale blue and white. It was made of fur like the other barbarians, but seemed oddly well cut and… elegant, for lack of a better word, almost like imperial tailor work.

Ling Qi felt uncomfortable looking at her. The woman felt familiar despite her clear foreignness. She felt like a cold winters night, fierce and independent, like a more aggressive Zeqing. She was peak third realm. As she watched, the woman leaned in to whisper to the man.
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Enemy forces look to be:
100 Yellows led by 6 early greens.
1 Cyan with ten warriors, five third stage greens, three fourth stage, and two fifth stage greens.
1 Bardbarian who I think is at the same stage as Ling Qi with seventh stage Shishigui, two second stage Shishigui, and four third stage green cloud tribe folks.
1 Married Man at the sixth stage of green, 1 Ice Wife at eigth stage of green.

The Twelve Stars are going to be worried about the star stone so we're already in conflict, and they are mustering their strength so we're going to be in conflict in the future anyway. Attacking them directly is going to definitely cement the political issue here but they don't really think any lowlanders are trustworthy and demonstrating to them that the Shishigui and Cloud Tribe alliance isn't very tenable is an option.

White Sky doesn't give much of a toss but if the Twelve Stars are pushed to hard that may push them towards White Sky? That's speculation though.

Attacking White Sky exclusively means attacking the most isolated party here, but not interfering as badly with the star stone and shishigui dance. And might give us ideas on their construction project.

I'd speculate that if we can cause enough of a scrum then the Starstone can be nicked and no one knows who took it which might greatly piss off the Twelve Stars.

I don't think directly attacking the Twelve Stars is wise.
 
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Hmmm

[] Securing the Starstone

On one hand, I'm obliged to pick the option that's daring and has us use Larceny

[] Target Shishigui

One the other hand, I do want Bardbarian rematch
 
Plan Warpstone Theft
[ ] Secure the Starstone
[ ] [Guan Zhi] The Shishigui representatives
[ ] [Cai Renxiang] The Shishigui representatives

The plan for if we think killing the shishigui will scare the others off of immediate attack, and wqant to postpone most of the Southern War for enough time to win the Underground War.
 
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Hoooo boy. Are we outnumbered by realms? Cyan v cyan, three other clouds plus the deep dweller superior to us in cultivation, and a dozen or so other greens?
 
TehChron said:
The issue is that they're already hostile and kiiiiiinda have the biggest stick in the room so leaving them the initiative under those circumstances is pretty risky
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So much this. Even if they weren't already hostile, giving the only cyan in the room a free action to decide which way to jump to is a bad idea. For all we know the guy just doesn't like people who interrupt meetings.
 
After reading the discussion, I'm coming around to

[][Guan Zhi] The Twelve Stars confederation representatives
[][Cai Renxiang] The Shishigui representatives
[] Target Shishigui

on the grounds of deploying our Cyan to counter an enemy Cyan (too risky to leave them unengaged, we don't want them to be able to get the first shot) and then bullying the shishigui along with our liege lady. This lets us have a rematch with Bardbarian and hopefully puts enough pressure on Twelve Stars and the Shishigui that the starstone doesn't get taken away before reinforcements arrive to secure it.

Remember: We don't need to steal it personally, we just need to make sure that the enemy can't escape with it.
 
TehChron said:
The issue is that they're already hostile and kiiiiiinda have the biggest stick in the room so leaving them the initiative under those circumstances is pretty risky
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They're hostile but the dude was, for all his belligerence, berating the Shishigui aligned guys for haste and he seems reticent to commit completely. Basically, on the fence and I figure its possible to convince him that the Shishigui are unreliable allies who can't put up when its time to shut up, by beating the shite out of them.
 
The problem with the 'Statstone and kill Skaven" plan is that breaching the peace here might get them to attack us on principle of "No attacking our meetings" anyways.
 
This would be my plan - throwing it out there for discussion.

[ ] Plan Mobile Fortress
- [ ] Guan Zhi: Target Twelve Stars
- [ ] CRX: Target Shishigui representative
- [ ] Ling Qi: Securing the Starstone

Look, we just need to make sure no one else gets it, and we need Guan Zhi to duel 12 stars so that that cyan just doesn't kill everyone and run off with the stone. Plus, those guys want to fight us anyway; they're just not ready and I'm not inclined to let them engage us on their terms when they've gotten a boatload of stars to arm their high ranks.

Also I think that the Shishigui can't fly so he'll be within range of our debuffs for us to support CRX's light show while we park ourselves next to the stone.
 
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glyph said:
That's true, but if we can even delay them joining the war, that's already a net positive. Gives us time to mobilize and consolidate our forces, and maybe take some of the players out of the game already.
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That doesn't really change anything about the fact that there's quite a difference between someone unwilling to escalate the war just yet and someone unwilling to defend a diplomatic meeting when the other ambassador is attacked directly in front of them and the attackers make a move to steal an artifact culturally and strategically relevant to themselves.

White Sky might back off because they honestly don't give a shit and these guys being more desperate is actively something they benefit from.
The Twelve Stars just want their allies to listen to their marching orders more. Which is why they'd actually benefit from putting the others in their debt.
 
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