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Not gonna comment on much since, again, haven't used much from here. But Kalo is, obviously, the guy you want to use for Thumb stuff. However: This page is phenomenal, especially on Gebura's floor with its counter buff abno page. It draws a page and throws out a 2-6 counter die, all for only 2 cost. Sure, 2-6 isn't that big a die at this stage of the game...but if you're stacking enough Power onto it, the small numbers won't matter at all.
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Dec 6, 2022 10:59
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Appendix 28: The ThumbA Thumb Soldato’s Page posted:The Thumb is the most cultivated and humane of the Five Fingers. Just be polite, and know to respect others. But then, why did the Thumb top the list of Syndicates one would never want to get involved with in the survey for Fixers conducted by the Hana Association, in spite of such good manners? The reason is simple: Hierarchy is absolute for the Thumb. To us, it’s as natural as the fact of nature that spilt blood only flows downwards, not up. One is expected to give unconditional obedience to a higher authority. That’s where the relative courteousness of the Thumb comes from. Kalo’s Page posted:Capo dei capi (Godfather), Sottocapo (Underboss), Capo (Captain), and Soldato (Soldier/Goodfella)… The Thumb is divided into these four echelons. This hierarchical structure is still effective outside of the Syndicate. For example, a common Fixer is comparable to a Soldato, an Associate Fixer to a Capo, a board member of a Wing to a Sottocapo… This is how the hierarchy is to be interpreted. No outsider is exempt from this rule. No matter how you usually behave, you must remember your place and respect our rules when you’re dealing with the Thumb. If a young, oblivious Fixer walks up to a Capo and speaks to them, that poor picciotto will be rolling in the street the next day with his jaw and teeth missing. On the other hand, someone with the right level of authority or person of a higher class would be a different story. If a person on the same echelon as ours were to approach us, we’d gladly greet them and hear what they have to say with an open mind. Conversations with them are to be conducted with courtesy and decorum. Furthermore, if the person you’re dealing with stands on a higher echelon than yours… They must be treated with utmost devotion and delicacy. Such is the rule of ours, and the respect to their position. Don’t be too bitter over it. Indeed, class is earned, not given for free; it’s only right to give it the respect it deserves. Denis’ Page posted:Even in a powerful Syndicate, weaklings exist… Cowardice can surface among the strong, and chaos can ensue from the most faultless rules. Not everyone in the Thumb can abide the rules without a slip-up. Katriel’s Page posted:The Thumb’s chain of command is simple: Obey the orders issued by your superior unconditionally, and do not question the intentions of your superior. Kill if you’re told to kill, and die if you’re told to die. You cannot defy the orders no matter how baffling it may seem. Those who violate them are punished on the spot. Even if the order is made by someone whose rank is only one step higher than yours, you’re still obligated to follow it. There’s nothing you can do about it, unless another person whose position in the pecking order is even higher than your commander’s decides to step in and take your side. Boris’ Page posted:The Thumb uses various types of bullets. We pick the right ammo for the right situation. But, as you can guess, the price of those bullets is a serious drawback. Not even the Thumb, one of the Five Fingers sitting at the apex of the Backstreets, can just waste bullets willy-nilly… That’s how costly it gets. You can’t get trigger happy. Because of that, the Thumb fight with the bayonet and buttstock of their guns most of the time, and only fire bullets when it’s absolutely necessary. The buttstock is built to be solid enough to crush most things to a pulp, and the bayonet is pretty handy as a sword. Some just stick to raw strength, though.
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Dec 6, 2022 11:04
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actually La Regole isn't unique to kalo you can just splash it wherever, and stacking it is Very Funny
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Dec 6, 2022 11:11
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> If someone is trying to disrupt the hierarchy, they will be purged in a few days. Well, we have been on it for the last ten years and look: still not purged. So, Dennis, how will you explain that?
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Dec 6, 2022 16:00
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MetaMeme posted:actually La Regole isn't unique to kalo you can just splash it wherever, and stacking it is Very Funny Combined with other damage increasing mechanics like smoke, you can get some very interesting results, and some very short fights.
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Dec 6, 2022 16:32
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Also loving the details of the meta story, with Kalo getting promoted from a Capo to a Sottocapo during the 10 years when Lobotomy Corporation happened.
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Dec 6, 2022 16:38
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Oh boy, The Thumb! Or as I'd call it... my win button for about 90% of the Star of the City Missions! Boris is a natural built tank, stack some Defend ups on him and watch him just shrug off anything thrown at him or pass off the Grit to whoever to make them able to shrug off damage. Since the main rule is to die slower than your foe does, Grit helps with this in spades. Discipline, being a Boris Exclusive, allows him to give a severe beating to whomever he chooses. The simple fact that this Page has a total of 6 dice means it's always hitting for damage. As a personal opinion, I do love the animation of it as well. For any of your Ranged Builds, they can now upgrade their Key-Pages to Katriel or Dennis. Dennis Builds focus more on cycling their ammo in and out of their hand to slam constant debuffs into the reception, while Katriel is allowed more freedom for a simpler hodgepodge build of just flying what floats your fancy. For either, I would recommend a few Full-Stop cards to drop your deck size to not cause issues with ammo being tossed into your hand. Kalo is a bit different. Speed 3 is a different beast, where it gives him another speed Dice upon reaching Emotion 3, allowing him to reach 4 speed dice by max emotion. Honestly, I prefer Speed 2, but the difference is so minor, it's hard to argue either way. Threefold Tenacity will give him some free power to win more clashes, and that later full boost comes around right as he gets to Emotion 3 or 4 in a one reception fight. Note that it says 'fourth scene', so it does reset between multi-reception fights. Summary Judgement Is another 'toss ammo for damage boost'. This one is basically melee Shock Rounds with reversed dice powers and add an evasion dice in front. Useful for what it offers. Le Regole are very plain on the board. Every speaks italian... oh wait, wrong rules. My bad... Anyways, This card is a strong setup for dumping some massive damage on your foe the following turn. Just, make sure to remind yourself to set aside the cards you plan on using for that turn ahead of time Ferrous Guard is a simple block heavy dice, good for tossing at something dangerous to keep yourself taking minimum damage, and while Steel Knuckles is a strong card in Gebura's floor. It's also Pure Blunt, and Yessod always needs more options for an unga bunga blunt smash build.
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Dec 6, 2022 18:19
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Speed II vs Speed III is funny because Speed II is straight up stronger (with the cost to match). I guess it's in that order because Speed II appears earlier, specifically on Yujin to make up for the broken die.
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Dec 6, 2022 19:48
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MiiNiPaa posted:> If someone is trying to disrupt the hierarchy, they will be purged in a few days.
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Dec 6, 2022 20:02
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I haven't been posting here as often because of finals season, but I want to pop in real quickly and give TQ some respectable thumb-snaps for the rare and highly dangerous triple combob of 1) authoring a nugget storyline that's stretched out for several updates and has been compelling and well-written the whole way with a bittersweet cap, 2) putting in all the editing and behind-the-scenes work to make it happen, and 3) handicapping Yesod's floor for the foreseeable future. Since Kaori is down and out, I assume they'll be operating at -1 member for a little while, and the numbers disadvantage is a great way to balance how straightforwardly bonkers the Floor of Technological Sciences is (and that's if this isn't an excuse to take them off the table completely for the next little while).
TheDoomkitten fucked around with this message at 21:59 on Dec 6, 2022 |
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Dec 6, 2022 21:55
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Xenav posted:
I beg to disagree on Summary Judgment. Allow me to toss out comparisons to its two closest comparisons: - Shock Round - - This is Ranged. I'd call that an advantage over Summary Judgment in general, not just for the targeting difference. Yes, there's the issue of "If big die leads, all dice chunked," but in that case, you've got a better card to be using in a Thumb deck for that I'll be mentioning soon. Not to mention, +1 Power (instead of +2 due to bug, sad) with possibly some additional Effective Power (via debuff) from Armor-Piercing Ammo on a 5-10 die that's probably also getting Katriel's +1 Power boost can beat a fair few above-average dice. - This is Ranged. They both discard Ammo, but Summary Judgment doesn't even benefit from the Ammo effects. And despite the bug that gives Shock Round an equal +1 Power instead of +2, it does get both Ammo effects it discarded! Summary Judgment gets nothing. - Extra Stagger damage on this thing. +3 on the first, huge die to be exact. Not to mention, Blunt has some decent access to Stagger buffs already, but that's splitting hairs. - Oh by the way this fucker has PAGE DRAW ON USE, keeping your mainstay cards in hand while you juggle in some Ammo afterwards. - Alright, we've established that Power gains are similar, if not better, on Shock Round. Now let's check those offense dice (we'll address the defense die later). Let's see, Summary's got 3-6 and 5-10? What's Shock Round got- oh, 5-10 and 5-7? Hmm. Sounds roughly equal, if not slightly better. - Bayonet Combat - - Alright, a proper Melee comparison with the same dice flow. Let's see, assuming we get our +1 Power boost from uselessly discarding Ammo... Summary's 3-7, 4-7, 6-11, while Bayonet is 3-7, 5-7, 4-6. Methinks those first two dice are similar. - As for their first defense die, Summary's is an Evade die. That hits 3-7. In Star of the City. What are we dodging with this??? Meanwhile, Bayonet Combat's is a Block die, blunting incoming damage. This is that thing I was referring to as a better option to a chunky leading die. Summary Judgment could avoid a negative outcome against a big Evade die, but, uh. I'ma be real, I don't think the enemy recovering a bit of SR is that big of a penalty. Both will take Stagger damage into enemy Block dice, neither avoid that issue. - Summary Judgment burns Ammo without benefiting from the effect. Bayonet Combat, meanwhile, generates Ammo for your Ranged cards. Like, say, Shock Round, eh? Summary does have the potential to land a few Melee hits for Ammo generation, but. Like. So can Bayonet Combat? The second die is similar on both, with the third die being Summary's advantage point. One-third of an Ammo generation over Bayonet. Woo. Two mainstay cards in the Thumb do both jobs it's trying to do, but way better. Ammo Dump Damage is better served by Shock Round, and Defensive Melee Option is covered by Bayonet Combat. And both do beneficial things beyond those job descriptions. All while costing the same 2 Light. ...so, uh, why would I waste my deck space with this thing again?
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Dec 6, 2022 22:21
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TheDoomkitten posted:I haven't been posting here as often because of finals season, but I want to pop in real quickly and give TQ some respectable thumb-snaps for the rare and highly dangerous triple combob of 1) authoring a nugget storyline that's stretched out for several updates and has been compelling and well-written the whole way with a bittersweet cap, 2) putting in all the editing and behind-the-scenes work to make it happen, and 3) handicapping Yesod's floor for the foreseeable future. Since Kaori is down and out, I assume they'll be operating at -1 member for a little while, and the numbers disadvantage is a great way to balance how straightforwardly bonkers the Floor of Technological Sciences is (and that's if this isn't an excuse to take them off the table completely for the next little while). Angela says she's limiting Yesod to observation duties only, so Teequeue isn't handicapping themselves by being down a guy. Instead they're handicapping themselves by not using Yesod's floor, aka power go brrr.
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Dec 6, 2022 22:29
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LPFinale posted:
Yeah, it straight up has anti-synergy with the ammo mechanic. It does have cool animations though.
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Dec 6, 2022 22:42
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quote:But then, why did the Thumb top the list of Syndicates one would never want to get involved with in the survey for Fixers conducted by the Hana Association, in spite of such good manners? Oh no. The Hana Association is Buzzfeed.
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Dec 7, 2022 06:54
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Kaori! 
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Dec 7, 2022 07:43
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 Calling it now, we're doing Keter's Abnormality, The Snow Queen! Here's hoping this goes... smoothly.
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Dec 7, 2022 13:31
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Cripes, I hated this one. It was one of my 3 roadblocks in Star of the City. ...looking forward to seeing how TeeQue clowns on it.
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Dec 7, 2022 17:07
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MetaMeme posted:High school gets you absurdly long prose stretched thin like taffy, a doctorate is what will get your needlessly obtuse prose meant to show off how smart you are. I find this absolutely hilarious because if you go into industry (my experience is specifically in medical devices), it's the exact opposite philosophy. Anything you write down can and likely will be audited (by the FDA, in my case), so you're expected to keep things as concise as possible and choose your words carefully so that you're not making any claims that you can't back up. Nobody cares how smart you sound, and you're not trying to convince anyone of anything beyond the fact that your data is unimpeachable and your conclusion is ironclad. You're also bound very strictly to the Quality system - making sure that you use the right templates, follow all the procedures, document everything properly, etc. There's a lot of parallels between a heavily regulated industry and the Thumb, especially when being audited. You absolutely just shut up and say nothing to any auditors unless spoken to directly, and always defer to management. Obviously it's a lot more casual most of the time, but there are conversations and debates where hierarchies really do come into play and it's just as important a skill to know when to not talk as it is to know when to speak up.
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Dec 7, 2022 17:42
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Dirk the Average posted:I find this absolutely hilarious because if you go into industry (my experience is specifically in medical devices), it's the exact opposite philosophy. Anything you write down can and likely will be audited (by the FDA, in my case), so you're expected to keep things as concise as possible and choose your words carefully so that you're not making any claims that you can't back up. Nobody cares how smart you sound, and you're not trying to convince anyone of anything beyond the fact that your data is unimpeachable and your conclusion is ironclad. You're also bound very strictly to the Quality system - making sure that you use the right templates, follow all the procedures, document everything properly, etc. Humanities phD writing is similar, belive it or not! Good accademic philosophy and literature writing is about being as precise and nuanced as possible in as few words as it takes to get the thought or concept articulated. Unfortunately, the thoughts are often really complicated, so the writing is also full of jargon and therefore is predicated on the reader understanding the very specialized definitions of words that the author is using. Fortunately, this never causes misunderstanding, and it goes fine when non-academic audiences get their hands on words like "privilege." Octatonic fucked around with this message at 19:14 on Dec 7, 2022 |
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Dec 7, 2022 19:10
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Octatonic posted:Humanities phD writing is similar, belive it or not! Good accademic philosophy and literature writing is about being as precise and nuanced as possible in as few words as it takes to get the thought or concept articulated. Unfortunately, the thoughts are often really complicated, so the writing is also full of jargon and therefore is predicated on the reader understanding the very specialized definitions of words that the author is using. Fortunately, this never causes misunderstanding, and it goes fine when non-academic audiences get their hands on words like "privilege." Haha, yeah, industrial jargon gets to be the same way. Don't get me started on the number of acronyms every company uses, and the worst part is that those acronyms are company-specific to their system. You get people asking if you've done an XYZ and you have to ask them to explain what the hell an XYZ is, and you find out that you learned it as YZX, but they're otherwise virtually identical. And hell, new acronyms get coined at least once every 2 months, and some of the acronyms are specific to a department, so marketing will have an acronym that's the same as a quality acronym and they'll mean two different things because gently caress you for trying to communicate.
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Dec 7, 2022 19:30
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Been spending a few weeks reading this LP before going to bed to catch up and now here I am. Just wanted to mention my opinion on one of the reoccurring questions I saw in the thread: why hasn't the Head busted the library up yet? I think the answer is that they literally can't. The Library is effectively a pocket universe that can only be entered by invitaiton (or... whatever the Purple Tear did to get Roland in here). As powerful as the Head is, entering in another way is impossible. This was mentioned in the story before the second Thumb fight. Some people countered that Miyu, of R corp, received in invitation way back when the Library was just an Urban Plague, and at that point there's no world that the Library was prepared for their attention. But I think there's a specific element of the invitation: it will always, without fail, arrive in the hands of someone the library is in theory capable of handing, whose book is needed. And that was not Miyu. She got the invitation, but the Library knew she wasn't going to use it, because she was just investigating the W trains and the Library was a means to an end for that, and she wouldn't risk herself or her team unless she was getting paid for it--- and the Library wasn't worth R-Corp's attention at the time. And it probably ended up in her hands first because as flighty as Olga was, even she wouldn't have randomly signed some invitation to some weird magical library she knows nothing about. It had to go to Miyu first so it could be outsourced. Every invitation goes out to people with their own ends who for one reason or another intends to improve their position in life somehow, which goes against the violent stasis the Head has put in place for the City. I think the Head could assign Arbiters to finding and acquiring invitations and they'd... just never find any, because the Library doesn't want them to.
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Dec 7, 2022 19:54
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Yeahhhhhh... this upcoming Keter Abnormality fight is one of the strong contenders for the Worst Fight in the Game (tm) for a lot of people. While your mileage may vary with regards to the Crying Children, I don't think I've ever talked to a single person that liked this fight.
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Dec 7, 2022 20:57
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JT Jag posted:I think the answer is that they literally can't. The Library is effectively a pocket universe that can only be entered by invitaiton (or... whatever the Purple Tear did to get Roland in here). As powerful as the Head is, entering in another way is impossible. This was mentioned in the story before the second Thumb fight. A pocket universe doesn't seem to mean all that much in the City; tearing holes between dimensions isn't even a Singularity anymore as we've seen before. I mean, maybe it actually is what's keeping the Head, but it's also entirely plausible that they could just ram a Warp train filled with Arbiters straight through the Library's front door Helltrain style if they wanted.
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Dec 7, 2022 21:04
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I mean, if we think broadly, the options are: --The Head hasn't yet taken note of the Library. --The Head is deliberately choosing not to engage with the Library. --The Head is unable to interfere with the Library. --The Head is already involved, but in ways that are currently not clear to us. Given those, I'm guessing it either suits the Head's interests for the Library to remain active for now, or plans are already in the works. On a totally unrelated note, have we figured out what Roland was doing here yet?
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Dec 7, 2022 22:50
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Wait, we didn't get yeeted because of the Prescript? Yan's slipping. Though looking at the other responses, this may be a curse in disguise.
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Dec 7, 2022 23:17
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ZCKaiser posted:On a totally unrelated note, have we figured out what Roland was doing here yet? Nope. We know gently caress all about how he got there or what his reference to the Purple Tear at the very start of the game was about. He's still all "I'm just a poor ol' regular every day washed out Fixer who accidentally walked into a weird pocket dimension woe is me", which I'm pretty sure no one believes. Gebura doesn't seem to, if nothing else. Actually, Angela might believe that; she can be surprisingly naïve about these sorts of things sometimes.
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Dec 7, 2022 23:28
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ZCKaiser posted:I mean, if we think broadly, the options are: I think the answer is simply "there's nothing the Library is doing that is any worse than what a ton of other groups are already doing". Like sure they've moved up in the ranks fairly quickly but they still haven't really posed a threat to actual power, as far as the Head is concerned they're basically just another syndicate making waves among the lower classes. A few wing employees have disappeared in the library, but not important ones. This is a city where the fatality rate is already absurdly high, the extra deaths caused by the library probably wouldn't even read as statistically significant.
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Dec 7, 2022 23:48
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The Cheshire Cat posted:A few wing employees have disappeared in the library, but not important ones. That's not quite right though. The Train incident was clearly related to the Library and some first class passengers were involved in that, and they never made it out. One of them explicitly mentions being a board member of (I think) U Corp. There can't be that many of those around and while we don't know who the Head consists of, board members of the big corps are pretty good candidates. So that might have struck a bit closer to home than the Head would like.
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Dec 8, 2022 00:12
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Deep Dish Fuckfest posted:That's not quite right though. The Train incident was clearly related to the Library and some first class passengers were involved in that, and they never made it out. One of them explicitly mentions being a board member of (I think) U Corp. There can't be that many of those around and while we don't know who the Head consists of, board members of the big corps are pretty good candidates. So that might have struck a bit closer to home than the Head would like. That was the Puppeteer though. The library was an accessory, sure, but not the primary threat.
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Dec 8, 2022 00:21
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Materant posted:Yeahhhhhh... this upcoming Keter Abnormality fight is one of the strong contenders for the Worst Fight in the Game (tm) for a lot of people. While your mileage may vary with regards to the Crying Children, I don't think I've ever talked to a single person that liked this fight. It is not that bad. After you figure out what pages and what abilities you need it is decently challenging. (My initial team was Yujin / Kim / Crying Children / Thumb. Do not repeat my mistake)
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Dec 8, 2022 00:57
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The Cheshire Cat posted:I think the answer is simply "there's nothing the Library is doing that is any worse than what a ton of other groups are already doing". Like sure they've moved up in the ranks fairly quickly but they still haven't really posed a threat to actual power, as far as the Head is concerned they're basically just another syndicate making waves among the lower classes. A few wing employees have disappeared in the library, but not important ones. This is a city where the fatality rate is already absurdly high, the extra deaths caused by the library probably wouldn't even read as statistically significant.
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Dec 8, 2022 01:31
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Perhaps the Head is actively trying to get involved, but Binah's old Arbiter buddies just haven't finished writing their overtly flowery dialogue yet and are too busy brainstorming.
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Dec 8, 2022 01:57
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They all like black teas, obviously, but what constitutes a black tea? Can a oolong tea be a black tea? Should Pu'er teas be considered to be black teas? Are clonal darjeelings too artificial and flowery to really count? And what of adding milk or honey? Just kidding about that last one, no Arbiter, or anyone who wants to live for that matter, should do that.
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Dec 8, 2022 02:25
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Theantero posted:Perhaps the Head is actively trying to get involved, but Binah's old Arbiter buddies just haven't finished writing their overtly flowery dialogue yet and are too busy brainstorming. The Head will wait patiently to deal with problems, but only for 20 turns?
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Dec 8, 2022 02:28
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LPFinale posted:I beg to disagree on Summary Judgment. Allow me to toss out comparisons to its two closest comparisons: Summary Judgment is an odd trap card, because it sounds useful on paper. I used it once, then realized it wasn't getting any of those juicy status additions from the ammo I was tossing for it. Honestly, I think it was their INTENTION to do that, but they messed up somewhere.
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Dec 8, 2022 02:42
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I think Summary Judgement was originally intended to be a mixed ranged/melee card but they couldn't get that to work without destroying the game so it ended up as just a melee.
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Dec 8, 2022 06:44
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The Cheshire Cat posted:I think the answer is simply "there's nothing the Library is doing that is any worse than what a ton of other groups are already doing". Like sure they've moved up in the ranks fairly quickly but they still haven't really posed a threat to actual power, as far as the Head is concerned they're basically just another syndicate making waves among the lower classes. A few wing employees have disappeared in the library, but not important ones. This is a city where the fatality rate is already absurdly high, the extra deaths caused by the library probably wouldn't even read as statistically significant. Zereth posted:The Head probably doesn't like the Distortions, but I think people outside are still having difficulty conclusively tying that to the Library.
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Dec 8, 2022 06:56
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Kaori Losing Her poo poo took hold in my brain almost immediately.  thanks CSP assets for having 3d models of pistols because jesus christ guns are hard to draw in perspective
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Dec 9, 2022 11:47
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mercurially posted:Kaori Losing Her poo poo took hold in my brain almost immediately. 
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Dec 9, 2022 12:43
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This thread continues to deliver on amazing fanart
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Dec 9, 2022 17:08
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