-
Going forward, links to content from Twitter (now X) will no longer be embedded. Pre-existing links should not be affected.
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.
"Some family named the Weilu or something. Buncha scrubs who aren't around anymore. Kind of embarrassing to be related to them, huh Mom."
- Location
- United States of America
[X] Moonlight Accompaniment: Transforms the wisps from pure observation to focal points. This will allow centering an aoe music techniques origin on a wisp. Combines Inquisitive study, Seeking Moon's Eye and Watchful Moon Analysis.
As much as I love the name "Auditorium of Secrets," I will choose to vote for this option. We moved away from precognition with our choice of Roaming Moon Eye and I don't want to feel like we hedged that choice with this future choice. I also think that this is a really cool expression of Ling Qi's desire to flit about learning new things while bringing music along with her.
But maybe I'm just reading too much into it.
As much as I love the name "Auditorium of Secrets," I will choose to vote for this option. We moved away from precognition with our choice of Roaming Moon Eye and I don't want to feel like we hedged that choice with this future choice. I also think that this is a really cool expression of Ling Qi's desire to flit about learning new things while bringing music along with her.
But maybe I'm just reading too much into it.
Will we be getting passive Music perception regardless of which vote wins?
- Location
- Europe
Take a moment to think back to every time you said something you thought was funny, and then saw someone else take it the wrong way a second later. With precog, you can make sure that never happens again. Think back to when you said something, and then found out someone else was actually leading you into a verbal trap. Think back to the time someone said something really sweet, but you weren't expecting it and didn't react as well as you would have liked.
Precog is extremely useful, all the time, every time, for anything. This is part of the reason I'm hesitant to vote for it. I don't see how the setting could function with precog that was about as useful as precog should be, without everyone and their mother having it. You rapidly run into the Exalted Perfect Attack/Defence problem, where you need to either have very powerful pre-cog or very powerful pre-cog defences just so you don't get bodied. But Yrsillar has been clear that isn't the story they want to tell, so even voting for pre-cog seems like it'll cause problems one way or the other.
Either we vote for pre-cog, and it ends up much less useful than we'd want. Or it's as useful as we'd want, but it starts distorting the setting.
Seems like the kind of thing we'd get from training and upgrading perception, not from modding an art.
I should clarify that my concerns aren't really mechanical, and I don't think either option weakens the perceptive functions of the art. I'm concerned the way the art is developed impacts its themes and narrative roles, as well as their interplay with Ling Qi's character concept more broadly.
What are the stories each development helps Ling Qi tell, or be told about Ling Qi, and are those the developments we want? The boombox is mostly going to be about attacking people, because that's mostly what it enables. We've had a lot of that, enough that it sometimes chokes out the other things Ling Qi could be doing in encounters, in ways that make it actually quite difficult to showcase/develop her core Domain/Way. One extreme is it's used to attack people, the other extreme is it's not really used at all. We'd probably fall somewhere in the middle, but those being the ends of the scale is kind of a problem by itself, for a perception art.
Precog doesn't have quite the same issues, but still feels like it's moving the art away from narratives of inquiry, curiosity, and discovery. And that feels odd in an Art named Songseeker's Eye.
What are the stories each development helps Ling Qi tell, or be told about Ling Qi, and are those the developments we want? The boombox is mostly going to be about attacking people, because that's mostly what it enables. We've had a lot of that, enough that it sometimes chokes out the other things Ling Qi could be doing in encounters, in ways that make it actually quite difficult to showcase/develop her core Domain/Way. One extreme is it's used to attack people, the other extreme is it's not really used at all. We'd probably fall somewhere in the middle, but those being the ends of the scale is kind of a problem by itself, for a perception art.
Precog doesn't have quite the same issues, but still feels like it's moving the art away from narratives of inquiry, curiosity, and discovery. And that feels odd in an Art named Songseeker's Eye.
Last edited:
While I can't speak for everyone, from what I'm seeing being discussed both now and during the plan vote (and also dimly remember from discussions months ago), what's wanted isn't "better options," it's one (1) single option.
Namely, instead of describing scenes seen via wisps by way of sight and visuals, the art mod makes it so that description of scenes will be heard via wisps by way of sound and emotion. That is, the grace notes were you've included phrases like "The air still tingled with electricity and grief" just this past update, or the drums in the dark scene where Ling Qi translated military rhythmic drumming into coherent words.
The upset, I think, is that the art mod was not meant to add new functionality; it was to simplify character capabilities by taking the visual-primary perception art and impose on it an existing character trait -- Ling Qi's Music mastery and her ability to discern and comprehend audio communication and emotional expression.
[X] Moonlight Accompaniment: Transforms the wisps from pure observation to focal points. This will allow centering an aoe music techniques origin on a wisp. Combines Inquisitive study, Seeking Moon's Eye and Watchful Moon Analysis.
While precog is an interesting choice, and potentially very powerful with further investment, it just doesn't offer the immediate synergies and thematics as untethering our physical location from our Music arts.
A fully ramped up Ling Qi isn't just the concertmaster at the center of the Carnival, she IS the Carnival.
While precog is an interesting choice, and potentially very powerful with further investment, it just doesn't offer the immediate synergies and thematics as untethering our physical location from our Music arts.
A fully ramped up Ling Qi isn't just the concertmaster at the center of the Carnival, she IS the Carnival.
- Pronouns
- He
[X] Moonlight Accompaniment: Transforms the wisps from pure observation to focal points. This will allow centering an aoe music techniques origin on a wisp. Combines Inquisitive study, Seeking Moon's Eye and Watchful Moon Analysis.
The vote has been suspended for now, Yrs is gonna give us new options tomorrow.
Yrs is going to make some new options but this really clears up what my opinions now that I've had time to think. I don't want our wisps to be little grenades or create blizzards. I want them to be little sprites that flit around and find what others might overlook. Not active parts of our offense, not blanket awareness. I want them to be focused on hidden secrets, focused on focus itself in that they let us notice things others might miss, little pieces of our attention that aren't omnipresent but allow us to split our Intensive Focus skill on multiple things rather than noticing everything.Yrsillar on Discord said:
I like the idea of being able to throw the focal point of our Music elsewhere but the wisps are thematically tied to secrets and through that subtlety, and making them into a source of conspicuous, offensive Music feels off. Nor do I need them to be specifically about precognition that takes in a scene and senses danger, rather they should find lost things, subtle stirring of qi, odd details, off or missing notes or hidden enemies. I don't know what Yrs has in mind and I'm sure I'll like the new options as I liked the last, and I would like to develop the theme beyond what it is, but from the current themes rather than adding new ones for now.
Empiricist2
Let's play doctor!
- Location
- Baton Rouge
On the one hand, yes, this is entirely sensible, on the other, I like to imagine cultivator diplomacy is as sped up as cultivator combat. They're belting out 5 paragraph essays in the time it takes a mortal to choose how to start their next sentence. In that silly case, single digit second precog may be a bit more useful.
- Location
- The Space Between
I like the idea of accompaniment or the auditorium, but I don't think that RME's wisps have been that for us. Nor have we really used them that way.
They're more like stagehands? Like. They're part of the overall show, but they're doing a lot of the behind-the-scenes work. They do intense, focused scrutiny of scenes for secrets and details, ways to improve on the fly. They roam wide, to find our audience and learn more about them. They stay out of sight, because their presence would disrupt the performance.
For me, RME has been best in pre-fight utility but has also worked as "hey I know you're busy but, you notice that ________ over there? Seems important" within a scene.
If we're talking about less mechanic and more thematic/narrative, RME developing towards a "stagehands" place should be neat.
Little wisps which search for secrets or strangeness and ping us when something's weird. It's leaning on the "can't know the future" and investigating the present as thoroughly as possible from many perspectives in response. We can know the present, and that's good because who knows what's coming next.
Little wisps which are able to assist in the disruption of formations would also work on the "stagehands" line. Little helpers that are setting the stage and making the future harder to predict for the opponent. Almost like little moonless saboteurs. That'd be neat. Just seeing how things currently are, and nudging them in a preferred direction.
They're more like stagehands? Like. They're part of the overall show, but they're doing a lot of the behind-the-scenes work. They do intense, focused scrutiny of scenes for secrets and details, ways to improve on the fly. They roam wide, to find our audience and learn more about them. They stay out of sight, because their presence would disrupt the performance.
For me, RME has been best in pre-fight utility but has also worked as "hey I know you're busy but, you notice that ________ over there? Seems important" within a scene.
If we're talking about less mechanic and more thematic/narrative, RME developing towards a "stagehands" place should be neat.
Little wisps which search for secrets or strangeness and ping us when something's weird. It's leaning on the "can't know the future" and investigating the present as thoroughly as possible from many perspectives in response. We can know the present, and that's good because who knows what's coming next.
Little wisps which are able to assist in the disruption of formations would also work on the "stagehands" line. Little helpers that are setting the stage and making the future harder to predict for the opponent. Almost like little moonless saboteurs. That'd be neat. Just seeing how things currently are, and nudging them in a preferred direction.
Mother Nyx
Mother of Elpis
- Location
- The Kei Klub
- Pronouns
- She/Her
[ ] Auditorium of Secrets: Transforms wisps into focal points for a modular zone around the user enabling limited combat precog within. Combines Inquisitive study, Seeking Moon's Eye and Watchful Moon Analysis.
Last edited:
- Location
- The Star Kingdom of Manticore
Voting has been delayed.
