Threads Of Destiny(Eastern Fantasy, Sequel to Forge of Destiny)
- Thread starter yrsillar
- Start date
- Original Users' Choice!
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Varder
Tired Cultist
- Location
- Hell
A couple of days of half-hearted tutoring areenough to justify level of skill that is peak for most people in the world? No, not really.
- Location
- North Carolina
Er, it wasn't exactly a few days. It was, in fact, a month.
The Skill does not seem to include knowledge of any noteworthy Formations, only basic skills. LQ did work on it on her own (remember when she asked Xuan Shi for a good book?), with Suyin (they worked on the book she took from the barbarian together) and got that tutoring which was basically a lecture that she wrote down and probably use as reference in her own studies. Saying that she didnt do anything for the C is not really true
Varder
Tired Cultist
- Location
- Hell
Really? I though it was like.. a week ot total time and some of it was spent on larceny and other stuff?
Arkeus
Crazy cat guy
- Location
- France
Only a week of that tutoring was spent on formation, and that translate to a couple day considering it was 1 action out of 6 we spent that week.
She did much less in formation than in, say, blade or unarmed. or even spears, really.
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Those stats were adapted from the old mechanics. I dont know how it was justified then, but just going by narrative we can just say that she has more talent with formations than with blades. Both her work with formations and her lack of skill with swords were mentioned enough that it doesnt seem that contrieved to me
- Location
- The United States
- Pronouns
- He/They
"Compose a piece about fear and disquiet, and how they might be defeated"
I don't really think this will result in an Art, what with us being Green Appraisal and all instead of Cyan, but if it does through Muse chicanery or something a Bravery AOE song using one of our elements would be a baller juxtaposition.
"You use Fire to stoke Valor and Metal to reinforce rational thinking through some Heart Meridians? That's cool, I do that sort of thing with Lungs and Hearts by using Darkness to Eat Fear."
I don't really think this will result in an Art, what with us being Green Appraisal and all instead of Cyan, but if it does through Muse chicanery or something a Bravery AOE song using one of our elements would be a baller juxtaposition.
"You use Fire to stoke Valor and Metal to reinforce rational thinking through some Heart Meridians? That's cool, I do that sort of thing with Lungs and Hearts by using Darkness to Eat Fear."
Black Noise
Curious
- Location
- About 1AU from Sol
Lonliness and Cold is the one that would serve best as a basis for a "Ling Qi" art, since it reflects both her own journey and her effect on those she considers close. Hope we'll get a chance to do it when art-making is a thing. Otherwise Fear and Disquiet is good for both the challenge and facing our personal issues here.
- Location
- The Temple of the Winds
One other thing to make note of is how long ago we trained it.
A whole month or two training a skill in early to mid red realm will be giving us a lesser skill rank than a couple days on it now at green realm.
Why? Because if Ling Qi had every good, noteworthy or even exceptional skill in something at red realm, a exceptional red cultivator only translates to a very poor skill level in the green realm playground.
In the old system you could say that green cultivator's auto-dice would beat the red cultivator's skill dice all the time.
- Location
- scrabbling
Ling Qi was solidly Yellow at that point. Maybe even Late/Late, I don't remember. But not that far in cultivation terms.
e-I meant formations, derp
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- Location
- The United States
- Pronouns
- He/They
Not quite on either of your timelines really, we were Middle in each at the beginning of Zhou's advanced class, and advanced to Late right before Thunderdome, which we were Late Red for.
Arkeus
Crazy cat guy
- Location
- France
She would have been a sore winner exactly in all those cases if she had taken them as losses, though in some of those she thankfully was aware enough to know those were a win.
Ling Qi's attack on Yan Renshu destroyed his three bases and meant he was utterly unable to do anything anymore (Fu Xiang flat out said we shattered his power there) and Ling Qi made out from there with around 4GSS worth of items... and paid 200YSS. If Ling Qi consider had considered that a 'loss', she would be a stupidly sore winner. Thankfully, she gushed afterward on how well she made off there, so she didn't.
Ling Qi did Elder Jiao's test near perfectly, and she knew it. Thankfully this wasn't a case of Ling Qi feeling she had a loss either, as she was aware of how well she did there. The only sadness she had there was about Xiulan. That you think that anything that's not completely perfect is a loss is, I think, the issue. Ling Qi did a perfect on the Ogodei test, then did nigh-perfect on the Western Jungle test. She would have done perfect had she survived a couple more hours, but this was a test designed to make Ling Qi understand that a victory is relative, and Ling Qi understood it.
No, the real issue with Ling Qi being a sore winner comes from Sun Liling and King of the forest. In the former case of Sun Liling, she beat someone who vastly overpowered her and managed to utterly cripple Liling. In the latter, she managed to succeed at everything she set out to do and had more reward than she expected from her incredible successes.
Rewards are not "all that it takes" for a win. What a win needs is for Ling Qi to show herself as blasting through the tests and achieving everything she had set out to do. Like how a win doesn't need to have her be 'totally crippling her enemies', her loss don't need to be 'totally crippling Ling Qi'... However, Ling Qi did manage to 'totally cripple Sun Liling and Yan Renshu', and in the former cases she felt like it was a loss.
So, sore winner.
Ji Rong, though? Ji Rong's loss were unambiguous losses where he didn't manage what he set out to do, and didn't get bonus prize for them. Ji Rong didn't manage to be an enforcer of CRX, he didn't manage to beat Xuan Shi first time in revenge, he didn't manage to punch CRX in growing pains, he didn't manage to ambush GG's people and got captured, he didn't manage his revenge match against Ling Qi.
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- Location
- The Star Kingdom of Manticore
I don't think you know what a sore winner is. A sore winner is someone who rubs the fact that they won into the face of the loser. When has she rubbed her victory into peoples faces? That time she "gushed" about her victory over Yan was from what I could find all internal dialogue. When has she bemoaned her losses for the world to listen? She confided into her close friend the fear and other various feelings she was experiencing during these times. This is perfectly normal and set up a amazing scene.
What I get from your complaints is that you feel that Ling Qi is not able to correctly see that she has won. The question then becomes, why is this a problem? Do you as a reader feel unfilled because someone is not suffering enough? Do you feel as though the lack of your vision of loss is limiting the potential of the story?
However this is not what this argument seems to be originally about. On page 261 you said the following of which this argument seems to spread from.
There are two sides to this whole argument.
To those that say that Ling Qi handles loss well.
Why does someone need every key skill? The argument of what counts as a loss could go on forever so instead lets focus on this. Why does Ling Qi need this key skill? If anything it adds more depth to Ling Qi and makes her more real. No one is good at everything.
There is no need to try and make Ling Qi perfect. It is the flaws in her character that make this story so special.
To those that say Ling Qi does not have the key skill of handling loss.
How do you know this? By your own argument, that she has not experienced loss in the outer sect, we cannot possible know how she handles loss. It is a big mystery box for us since, according to you, it has not happened yet. Some people just handle loss better than others. I have known several people that have experienced loss over and over and handle each one no better than the one before. I have seen some one whose life was a smooth ride until it all fell apart and they handled it better than anyone could have possibly expected. There is just no way to know if someone has this key skill until it is needed. Some people simply have it, others never learn it. We just won't know until it this skill is needed and Ling Qi either falls short or exceeds exceptions.
It is pointless to say someone doesn't have something when you have never seen them need it.
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- Location
- United States of America
Can I just take a moment and mention how mistimed this response is? It's been over two weeks and thirty-one pages since the last discussion on this topic, but apparently now is the time to return to it with a post that misdefines terms, tries to redefine what they consider a win is from their previous post, and demonstrates, again, the point that they reject any potential loss as a loss on Ling Qi's part if we got any sort of reward for our activities. And yet, "rewards are not 'all that it takes' for a win. "
That is the deep inconsistency in the logic. The fundamental flaw in this "Ling Qi has never suffered loss" narrative. Even the new definition of a win is inconsistent with what they call a win at the beginning of the post. Unless, of course, the Yan Renshu raid is mischaracterized completely, the original goals for the raid revised, and we begin indulging in revisionist history. Should those things happen, then I suppose there is no logical disconnect between achieving all of our goals and considering the Yan Renshu raid a win where we didn't achieve all of our goals. I suppose the more charitable alternative would be that they misunderstood my post and were talking about our Grinning Moon task where we did actually complete our objectives and broke his power base, but didn't loose 200ys in the process. So perhaps they are aggregating the two? But saying that we completed all of our objectives in the Yan Renshu raid is at best completely mischaracterizing what happened and at worst disingenuous given that the goal of the raid was to stop Yan Renshu as a threat but after the raid we had to go to Cai Rexiang to broker and enforce peace between us because we feared his capability to strike back.
Furthermore, there are even more inconsistencies in the argument. If what it takes for a win is "for Ling Qi to show herself as blasting through the tests and achieving everything she had set out to do" then the trials weren't a win because we didn't pass the Western Jungle trial. We set out to pass the Western Jungle Trial but failed because we couldn't even last until nightfall. We set out to pass but,
And I see nowhere where we set out to not entirely pass. Now, we can argue whether a partial pass is still a pass but it is clear from the Elder overseeing and judging the trial that we did not entirely pass and if Ling Qi's goal was to pass with full marks then she didn't "achieve... everything she had set out to do." So that can't be a win by the current definition. So either Ling Qi set out to not entirely pass and thus it was a win because she "achieve[ed] everything she had set out to do" or she did set out to entirely pass and thus it wasn't a win because she didn't "achieve... everything she had set out to do." Also, applying this new standard of winning to Xiulan during this trial means that she didn't win if she gunning for Elder tutoring. But... you said that
So... which one is it? Did Xiulan win or did... not win? And is the definition of winning that one gets "arts + Pills + experience" or that it is "achieving everything she had set out to do." Or, is it possible that non-playable characters are held to a completely different standard?
Now let's get to the sore winner argument. A sore winner is not someone who believes they lost when other's consider their actions to be a win. Wiktionary defines a sore winner as "one who gloats over victory." And I can find no definition that disagrees with that, even on less reputable sources. Nothing you point to depicts Ling Qi gloating over Yan Renshu or Sun Liling about her victory. Nothing you point to depicts Ling Qi gloating over her achievements to others. There is one scene I remember where Ling Qi has pride in her accomplishments internally, but that is not gloating. So everything you point out about sore winning is misdefining sore winning and using that misdefinition to demonstrate your argument.
As to your point about Ji Rong... using your brand spanking new definition of achieving objectives then I would agree with you. Ji Rong isn't a winner. If you use the bonus rewards definition (which for some reason you want to do still) then I disagree with you. Ji Rong got access to Sun resources because of his imprisonment by Xuan Shi. He got training from Hell because of his capture at the hands of GG. If Ji Rong hadn't been imprisoned, then Sun might not have been able to convince him to join her cause. At least Cai has that belief. And if he hadn't gotten captured by GG then he would have most likely continued on engaging in raids and would not have received his training from Hell. There is a direct link between two of his losses and rewards, which would make him a winner by your rewards definition. But you have two definitions going on right now, achieving objectives and getting rewards. Which one would you like to stick to?
So, in conclusion, your characterization of the Yan Renshu raid is terrible given that we didn't accomplish our objective of removing Yan Renshu as a threat. This is demonstrated by our actions in getting Cai Rexiang to deal with Yan Renshu after the raid. So we didn't accomplish our objective and yet you characterize it as a win because a win is "Ling Qi to show herself as blasting through the tests and achieving everything she had set out to do." You have two definitions floating out there as to what a win is and no indication as to which one you consider more valid. Your definition of a sore winner is completely inaccurate. And finally, you give Ji Rong special treatment and place him on a pedestal of losers despite him receiving opportunities and rewards causally connected to his losses which contradicts your reward definition of winning.
- Location
- The Maple Syrup Mountains
We don't need to curate our win/loss ratio, in my opinion, we just need Ling Qi to meaningfully struggle enough to keep the story engaging.
I feel like you are being unfairly dismissive of Ling Qi's internal experience here. Her response to both Sun Liling and King of the Forest weren't "being a sore winner" - it was "being traumatized".
For example, the Sun Liling fight was an unambiguous victory, but it was also a painfully close brush with the helpless vulnerability that defined Ling Qi's existence on the streets. It was a direct blow to the feeling of security that Ling Qi had been developing in the sect; is it any surprise that she reacted poorly, even if objectively she came out far ahead?
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- Location
- The United States
- Pronouns
- He/They
No need to write original update for challange, just transcribe and genre shift this.
Edit: oh no'os, this was supposed to go in PM's.
fictionfan
Please sir, may I have some Meows?
- Location
- Tempe, AZ
At this point I would not be surprised if Ji Rong wasn't getting the cultivation penalties of uncertainty from how many loses he has had.
- Location
- USA
- Pronouns
- He/Him
I would be surprised if he got penalties of any sort since NPCs don't run on mechanics and their cultivation level is decided only when they come up in story.