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[LP CYOA] 傳

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Why overcomplicate this unnecessary? Why draw attention to ourself where before we were worried someone might spot us as Maniac's apprentice?

I say we go in this incognito. We can then freely mingle with our peers, getting the best info and contacts from them and learning who our targets even are. Something that is unlikely in the extreme if they even suspect we are connected with the Maniac - nobody wants to have anything to do with that lunatic. People are not going to talk to us as openly (or at all), and we decided to join the tournament precisely because of info and contacts we can get from our peers. Let's not sabotage that now.
 

Nevill

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Zero Credibility said:
Why draw attention to ourself where before we were worried someone might spot us as Maniac's apprentice?
Because there is no harm to it if they do not know whether it is our real identity, and whether we have something to back it up. It keeps the water muddled even after we start mowing the disciples one after the other. It spreads confusion and buys us time in the long run.

Zero Credibility said:
Something that is unlikely in the extreme if they even suspect we are connected with the Maniac - nobody wants to have anything to do with that lunatic. People are not going to talk to us as openly (or at all), and we decided to join the tournament precisely because of info and contacts we can get from our peers.
Unlike the Maniac, we haven't built a reputation of our own yet. I think people would be interested to know what kind of a person got to train under the tutelage of one of the Great Pugilists.

Baltika9 said:
Also, here's the problem with complex plans in general: they are much more prone to going awry if events don't follow your expectations, Shulgi learned that the hard way, and for someone like Jing, who has shit happen to him and often, that's a bad idea.
simplicity.jpeg


I kind of agree with you, but I just can't resist playing mind games with our new personality. It fits so well.
 
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Zero Credibility said:
Why draw attention to ourself where before we were worried someone might spot us as Maniac's apprentice?
Because there is no harm to it if they do not know whether it is our real identity, and whether we have something to back it up. It keeps the water muddled even after we start mowing the disciples one after the other. It spreads confusion and buys us time in the long run.
But if we didn't start this show in the first place, nobody would know about our identity either. You do not muddle the water if nobody knows you are there as it only serves to draw attention to you. If they even suspect we might be connected to the Maniac nobody is going to talk to us, no matter how many identities we throw at them. Or if there is somebody smarter then us there (and there most certainly is) they could feed misinformation to us. And all we get in return is to spread some conflicting rumours about us? Why the hell were we then all worried about keeping our identity a secret just a few update before? So that we could blow it wide open now?
 

TOME

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Unlike the Maniac, we haven't build a reputation of our own yet. I think people would be interested to know what kind of a person got to train under the tutelage of one of the Great Pugilists.

Or the people think we are mini-Maniac and flee from the scene.
 

Nevill

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TOME said:
Or the people think we are mini-Maniac and flee from the scene.
The town is under guard. Infighting is prohibited. Again, we don't have a reputation of being able to kill every guard in town and thus ignore the rules altogether. What would they be afraid of?

Zero Credibility said:
Why the hell were we then all worried about keeping our identity a secret just a few update before? So that we could blow it wide open now?
Sorry, the incognito ship had sailed when we decided to participate in the tournament. If losing is all we are going to do here, I don't see why we couldn't just watch the match from the sidelines.

We wanted them to think we are useless. This is a more effective way to do it. Simple as that.
 
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Tigranes

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"Complex plans often go wrong" is a general adage, but you don't trust general adages when there are specific factors in your situation telling you otherwise. As I argued, people know so little about us, our apprenticeship, our name, our face, our skills, etc. - that parading around puffing ourselves up as Super Killer Zhang Jue Junior actually further blurs our true identity. "Oh, that guy, he's a hack" + "Who actually is he, this or that?" is much more 'incognito' than "Oh, here's a strange guy who refuses to tell anyone who he is." And once there is sufficient confusion, even leaking small bits of information by mistake simply adds to the confusion and mitigates the damage, whereas if we are dependent upon nobody knowing about us, those mistakes add up.

And yes, if everyone has to know that it was Zhang's apprentice that just defeated them, then our incognito plan will only last till, the first or second of the Eight. That's still helpful for the tournament, but I think my plan will last us longer.
 

TOME

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The town is under guard. Infighting is prohibited. Again, we don't have a reputation of being able to kill every guard in town and thus ignore the rules altogether.

We don't have a reputation so people don't know what to expect. They do not know if we are able to kill every guard or not.

What would they be afraid of?

How about death? I don't think it reassures anyone that guards will come after you have died.
 

treave

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Basically, because there is not much information available to any of our interlocutors about our real identity, and because our face itself is not known either, almost every combination benefits us by adding to the confusion. (treave if I am mistaken here let us know).

This is correct, which is why I left the actual registration for a later choice, which I'm sure will also be debated once you find out more about the competition. For now, I'll just say that confusion can be added with A as well as with B.
 

Nevill

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We haven't killed anybody of renown for 2 years now. Why would people suspect us of being a crazy murderer just because we happened to be apprenticed by one? Yes, it shows that we are reckless and probably have got a death wish, but no more than that.

You don't suppose that a person you've met on a street is a psychopath just because you know nothing of them.

If we were able to kill everyone in town, common sense dictates they would've heard about that. Such prowess is hard to keep secret.
 
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Zero Credibility said:
Why the hell were we then all worried about keeping our identity a secret just a few update before? So that we could blow it wide open now?
Sorry, the incognito ship had sailed when we decided to participate in the tournament. If losing is all we are going to do here, I don't see why we couldn't just watch the match from the sidelines.
We voted for joining the tournament for "potential knowledge, contacts and benefits". For information on who our opponents will be. We voted for participating because it gave us access to "lockeroom". Nothing there about giving our real identity. Declaring ourself openly will compromise this badly. Sure, somebody (whoever was responsible for sending us the invitation) might suspect who we truly are even if we remain incognito, but our peers wont - they have no idea that the Maniac's apprentice was even invited to join the tournament.

Hell, if A wins, then I say let's just start taking out our targets right here and now. We are not likely to get much useful info from our peers, but many of out targets are likely to be here - let's do as many as we can. It could really cut down on the time we need to complete this assignment and leave us some free time to start working on our true mission. That would be much more useful than any rumours we might spread about ourself. Time for subtlety is gone.
 

Nevill

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Zero Credibility said:
Hell, if A wins, then I say let's just start taking out our targets right here and now. We are not likely to get much useful info from our peers, but many of out targets are likely to be here - let's do as many as we can.
Agreed. Let's slaughter the Great Pugilists while we are at it. There can be only one. Think of the exp!

No need to go crazy here. I don't think our real identity will close every door before us.
 
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Not slaughter. Defeat openly as a Maniac's apprentice during the competition - that would be OK with him wouldn't it? We are going with our true identity anyway, so why not continue with the blunt approach?
 

Nevill

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I was talking about Great Pugilists here. As in "something impossible at our skill level".

Defeat the best disciples from the Eight, one by one, in one fell swoop, with no prior information about them? We aren't Chuck Norris yet.
 

TOME

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You don't suppose that a person you meet on a street is a psychopath just because you know nothing of them.

But if we go parading about Southern Maniac being our master then they do know something about us.

Why would people suspect us of being a crazy murderer just because we happened to be apprenticed by one?

Why wouldn't they? It's exactly what people do when judging other people. Shaolin monks are honorable and follow strict rules, Wudang fight with swords etc.
 

Nevill

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TOME said:
But if we go parading about Southern Maniac being our master then they do know something about us.
Yes, they know that we are an apprentice of the Southern Maniac.
What do they know about us? As is, real facts? Our personality? Our moral conduct? Anything at all?

TOME said:
Why wouldn't they? It's exactly what people do when judging other people. Shaolin monks are honorable and follow strict rules, Wudang fight with swords etc.
The Maniac is a man, not a school with several hundreds years worth of traditions. He made a reputation for himself, not his disciples. There were many, and nothing is known about them except that they all died.
 
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Defeat the best disciples from the Eight, one by one, in one fell swoop, with no prior information about them? We aren't Chuck Norris yet.
Hey, the whole point of this (over)elaborate plan is to buy us more time by spreading rumours, right? Well, this way we get even more time. Not only are we removing those we manage to defeat now from our to-do list right away, but the next one after that will still not see it coming because we have only done so to win the tournament, and not at all because we are going to every sect to challenge them. Makes more sense to me then wasting our opportunity to get to know our opponents more to rumour spreading.
 

Baltika9

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treave, earlier you said that Orthodox sects heavily base their judgement of a student on a Master's reputation. Back in Songfeng, you said, our claims of Junior's guilt would have much more weight if we had a reputable master behind; here, if we get jumped, you said no one will believe us because of our repute.

The question is this: how harshly will we be judged for being a student of someone like Zhang in the Wuxia world? Since I'm not all that familiar with the rules of the setting (yet), could you please elaborate.
 
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Nevill

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Zero Credibility said:
Hey, the whole point of this (over)elaborate plan is to buy us more time by spreading rumours, right? Well, this way we get even more time. Not only are we removing those we manage to defeat now from our to-do list right away, but the next one after that will still not see it coming because we have only done so to win the tournament, and not at all because we are going to every sect to challenge them. Makes more sense to me then wasting our opportunity to get to know our opponents more to rumour spreading.
To defeat them would mean to go all-out. Showing every one of them every bit of our skills and techniques. The second disciple we would be fighting will know everything there is to know about us. So would the others.

If the challenge is a simple elimination process where the fighters are paired off, then the winners are paired off, etc, until only one remains, then we won't even get to fight all of them. That leaves us to deal with the rest on their own soil, on their own terms, with no aces to pull out of our sleeve. No thank you.
 
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I know, but it still make more sense to me than this plan. We take at least a few names of our list, something that is much more useful then spreading rumours about us. Maybe even more the a few. And sooner or later they would catch up to us anyway no matter what kind of rumours we spread about ourself.
 

Nevill

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Zero Credibility said:
I know, but it still make more sense to me than this plan. We take at least a few names of our list, something that is much more useful then spreading rumours about us.
That really depends on how many we would be able to take. If it takes 5 out of the picture, I'd say let's do it. If it only takes 2, it's not worth it. With no real information of what we are up against, I'd loathe to reveal our full capabilities in front of our every target.

Zero Credibility said:
And sooner or later they would catch up to us anyway no matter what kind of rumours we spread about ourself.
Yes, eventually they will understand what we are doing. But they still won't get to see us in action until we come knocking at their doorstep. This is huge.

And if push comes to shove, we can defeat Lingshu and Yifang without anyone connecting the dots. The former because of her debt to the Killer Physician, the latter because she would not suspect us if we challenge her to a friendly sparring match.
 

Baltika9

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Whoa now, since when are we aiming to participate in the tournament seriously? That wasn't a part of either plan if I remember correctly. Anonymous or not, we're aiming to keep our techniques a secret and learn as much as we can about our opponents, giving away as little as possible.
Sorry, the incognito ship had sailed when we decided to participate in the tournament. If losing is all we are going to do here, I don't see why we couldn't just watch the match from the sidelines.

We wanted them to think we are useless. This is a more effective way to do it. Simple as that.
No, it has not yet sailed, going in as the White Wolf/whatever is still a viable alternative that lets us maintain our secrecy.
 

Nevill

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Baltika9 said:
Whoa now, since when are we aiming to participate in the tournament seriously?
We started weighing up if it was worth it. In my opinion, it isn't.

Baltika9 said:
No, it has not yet sailed, going in as the White Wolf/whatever is still a viable alternative that lets us maintain our secrecy.
Yes. I guess I wanted to say that both of them are viable. Hell, I was all for secrecy until Tigranes came along. I just like his plan more.
 
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Esquilax

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Guys, it's important to keep in mind that if we hide our identity, it's still possible that we'll be discovered:

The first technique he taught you were the Shouwang Claws, (獸王狂爪, Mad Claws of the Beast King), his signature technique.
...
“I will not tell you if you should participate or not. That is entirely your choice. If you do, however, be careful about it. Luoyang is under our protection, and besides me, Grand Taoist Zhengchong of Wudang, Abbot Fangzhang of Shaolin and Taoist Cuishan of Kunlun will be there. I dare say that you should be safe, but there are no certainties in life. As a contestant we are obliged to protect you, but as the Maniac’s apprentice there will be those that hate and fear you.”

This is very important; we have three people other than the Abbess attending who have very likely seen the Southern Maniac in action at some point in there lives. So when this mysterious stranger comes along and kicks the shit out of their guys with Zhang's brutal techniques, it's going to start looking very familiar. I'm sure that they won't notice it at first, but give it a few matches, and they'll definitely start paying close attention to what it is we're doing.

There is also another advantage in coming in openly, and that's blackmail. We have all the dirt on Abbess Miecao's past:

If news gets out that the Abbess of Emei is raising her granddaughters on the mountain, it would be a great scandal for the sect; she would be seen as partial and unfit to lead. Besides, even if you didn’t tell her the truth now, she would definitely recognize you during the tournament. You doubt you could hide from the Abbess.

Going into the competition anonymously puts us and Miecao on an equal playing field. We know something dangerous about her, she knows something dangerous about us. However, if we go into the competition as Zhang's apprentice, suddenly that puts her on the defensive and the truth sets us free. She cares about her reputation, but being crafty unorthodox types, we don't care about ours.

If we come in openly and everyone hates us, I could see lots of strategies that could work. Personally, I would start with a speech:

What you lookin' at? You all a bunch of fuckin' assholes. You know why? You don't have the guts to be what you wanna be? You need people like me. You need people like me so you can point your fuckin' fingers and say, "That's the bad guy." So... what that make you? Good? You're not good. You just know how to hide, how to lie. Me, I don't have that problem. Me, I always tell the truth. Even when I lie. So say good night to the bad guy! Come on. The last time you gonna see a bad guy like this again, let me tell you. Come on. Make way for the bad guy. There's a bad guy comin' through! Better get outta his way!

Revealing the Abbess' past would make for a suitably dramatic introduction that could lead to the Emei getting kicked out of the tournament. With tensions at an all-time high due to our scandalous but entirely truthful revelations, we then challenge all the disciples of all the sects to fight us at once, in order to "make things fair", since we're a fair guy for telling the truth about Miecao.

We'd go for the 8-on-1 fight ostensibly because we can take them all on at once, but the real reason would just be to read the style of each of our opponent's down the road so that we'd know more about them than they would about us. This is far more believable than going in with our real identity and losing like a little bitch.

We wouldn't be able to do any of the stuff above as a wandering martial artist character. Plus, we'd have to be careful so that the various sect bigwigs (other than Miecao) don't start putting the pieces together as to who we really are.

If we say we are Zhang Jue's disciple straight up then lose on purpose, some will be fooled, but others will remain suspicious - many heads will know Zhang personally and refuse to believe that the disciple is so useless. Whereas if we did what I suggested above, they will either think we are crap and it is because we are an imposter, or we are crap and we are indeed Zhang Jue's apprentice, etc - it adds an extra layer that will make just about everyone think we are a pushover. Again, I do think we can think of something better, perhaps dovetailing with our other resources like laxatives, but I think that's the direction we should be thinking in.

I don't think that everyone will be fooled by it either: out of all the competitors, we are very likely the only one being personally taught by a Great Pugilist. We are also the only one who's managed to survive this long under Master Zhang's tutelage. Coming in openly and losing like a little bitch won't fool the cleverer observers here. Really, if you want to come in with our true identity, you gotta go big and make it dramatic as hell. That's the only way that it'll work.
 

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