I don’t think you can; some dao upgrades are simply gated behind choice of a master, MC’s alignment etc. E.g. space path basically requires you to still be a Wu, otherwise you won’t get the upgrade that’s acquired when dealing with Wu city rebels.
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it should be possible, after all there is a level 4 choice for the demonic path
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Perhaps you are supposed to start nicely, get Ai to recommend you to her master and then slide into the evil path later. There’s only 3 instances to upgrade the elemental path in the current demo, (plus the one that is gated behind 4 skill requirement) and that includes the sect master.
There was also talk about removing the dao skill gating in general, so maybe it’ll be adjusted in future update(s).
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When you visit the tattoo parlor, check your current “tattoo capacity”:
This value is based on the current attributes of your MC, 1 point for every 1k in the physical attributes i.e. not counting Charisma. If the tattoo “weight” exceeds the free capacity then the option will be disabled. For the 30 capacity one you’ll need to upgrade your attributes quite a bit.
4 Likes
A minor suggestion:
*elsif atr_1 >= req_1
*label success_stat_check
*gosub apply_crushing_strength
*if (atr_1 >= (req_1*1.5))
*set critical_damage_resistance +0.05
*if atr_2 = "none"
[b][i]${atr_string} ... \u2705 (${atr_1}/${req_1})[/i][/b]
*if passive_overwhelming_invigoration > 0
*if (atr_1 >= (req_1))
*temp invig_health (100*passive_overwhelming_invigoration)
*gosub restore_health invig_health
*else
*set atr_2 round(atr_2)
[b][i]${atr_string} ... \u2705 (${atr_1}&${atr_2}/${req_1}&${req_2})[/i][/b]
*set stat_check true
it might be useful to have this subroutine indicate critical success with triple green check. I was sitting there dumbfounded why i’m not taking any damage in the later part of the fight with Yu Yeong, until i’ve checked the stats and it turned out that passing her “24 kicks” sequence manually has built up my damage resistance to 95% because at 14k agility those were almost all critical successes. :v
edit: @NickyDicky looks like there’s even more bugs with the stat system than reported earlier. Continuing the play through.
right before the tourney_1, character has this stat setup:
and 85 accumulated total_dao. strength and agility were increased by tiger tattoo taken at 8k stat mark, with 50% gain bonus on both.
After the upgrade event happens, the stats are like follows:
Now, logically, the option to refine strength should increase 13000 Innate to 14000 Innate, since it’s within the new 15k cap and all, right?
Well, wrong, and the game goes, “fuck you”:
much refining, great success ._.
Same thing happens with every other stat. Instead of raising the cap by 1k to the new 15k ceiling the game just eats the refinement point and snaps the cap down to 10k.
Why would it do that? Because it’s apparently hard-coded:
*if limit[refining] > 10000
*set limit[refining] 10000
instead of using max_limit variable.
7 Likes
I could make it show a message like ‘+5% DR’?
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It will be, yes.
I’ve seen Mortal saves where people had 140+qi total by the time tourney comes. Which should be feasible either on the demon path/saint path with the teaching and artifact buying. But, some day, I will finally adjust the qi values and move away from artifacts=main source of qi lmao
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How much route there is it to kill long Chen in expedition
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Can’t kill the roach
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Well, in this latest playthrough i did, i was sinking basically all my money into buying artifacts nearly every round after the time skip. I’ve had 85 total_qi at the end of it. So for a player who didn’t burn all their money but was saving up for expensive robe and other stuff, they’re definitely going to have less qi and less refinement points.
The only way i can think of getting that 140 qi you mention is going all-hog on murdering people at every opportunity, and siding with Mei Mei for the qi farming benefit she provides you as an option. But this is very much an edge case that i don’t feel the game should be really balanced around.
edit: also, what do you mean by getting qi from teaching people? I don’t see any such thing in the code. Pretty much all qi comes from instances of killing someon, with single exception of getting a small amount one time when you sex Ai.
also also, please reconsider thinking about this “saint path” or “demon path” nonsense as the only feasible way to play the game? If the player is effectively forced to only ever hit the same option (be it “good” or “evil”) because otherwise they’ll miss out on crucial elements, then you may as well just ask the player at the start to pick the path and then do away with any pretense of being able to mix their approach. It’s just another aspect of how the dao skill gating rendered the experience fairly boring, because it’d force/limit the player to a single tool and only single “choice” they could make because otherwise they’d just screw themselves over.
13 Likes
I think Niki is referring to the 6k or 7k gold we got weekly from the teaching, a max charisma good character should get that much when combined with other sources of income to buy 3 qi treasures, which cost at least 10k-15k each week
7 Likes
Ahh. I don’t think it’s going to make the difference though – like i mentioned, i have been buying artifacts pretty much every round in my play through, and it was a far cry from that 140+ qi in the end. So it doesn’t really matter what the money for that artifact buying comes from, you’re still limited to 3/turn at the end of the day.
Also, it’s not like you’re going to have max charisma character from the start, the teaching requires investment upfront and this level of income is pretty much only available to the “saint” characters. So unless you enjoy just mindlessly hitting the “nice” options to get your personality stats to 90+ this isn’t something you’re going to benefit from.
edit: i have run the math on teaching option out of curiosity. The breakdown is as follows:
- you get 22 “turns” between time skip and the tournament
- it costs 30k to rent the lecture hall, and takes a turn
- with 8k charisma and 90+ in both personality stats you earn 3000 x 1.5 multiplier = 4.5k gold per lecture
- this means you break even after 7 turns
- remaining (22 - 7 - 1) 14 turns will net you 63k gold… but that’s under ideal conditions of meeting the stat requirements from the start. Not sure if that’s even doable, especially on mortal difficulty without impacting your performance elsewhere.
tl;dr: it’s a bonus but far from some sort of magical qi gold mine.
4 Likes
Given that updates have given us more chances to get stronger and make the game easier by extension, I’m currently not concerned about lack of qi in the future.
Nicky still has ways to give people who don’t play optimally more breathing room.
To give a couple examples:
Activities
hunting could give qi as expected.
pills could give stat points, open an alternative alchemy pavilion.
drawing could give a dao point as a potential pay off.
activities could be expanded upon in general but I assume this stuff will see an overhaul anyway so it’s not worth mentioning.
Visit Someone
There is no way this is never implemented, right? This could be a good way to make encounters more natural by giving us more chances to improve relations. I’m currently doing out of character stuff like embracing Tigress simply because I’m not sure I can hang out with her otherwise.
Just one more competition with Ruo - seminar with Ai - training session with Tigress - bullying Guo and more insight to their character/glimpse into their daily life pls. 
Granted, recent changes lead me to believe this stuff might be scrapped and replaced with other events.
Anyway, I assume he’s probably still trying to tread the line between the game being too easy and players failing everywhere. There are odd decisions here and there like Mo Long killing himself because someone skipped their reading though. I don’t know why that event has such a specific solution compared to everything else.
4 Likes
To be exact, this wasn’t about shortage of qi per se, but about gaining enough refinement points in order to be able to up your stats to levels that the game apparently expects the MC to have at this pre-tournament stage. The qi gathering just happens to be how these points are currently earned.
5 Likes
On unrelated note, found a small bug/exploit in the demon squad fight:
*label trade_blows
"${surname} ${name}, how about we trade blows?" -- shouts the bald man, aiming his palm at your stomach.
*choice
//...
*disable_reuse #[i]Combat Menu[/i].
*gosub_scene combat_menu
*label squad_big_qi_moves
choosing combat menu will effectively bypass that particular sequence and jump immediately to squad_big_qi_moves after the game returns from combat menu subroutine.
edit: and another bug, that becomes apparent in longer fights like this:
*if atr_1 >= crit_req
*label success_stat_check_crit
*set critical_damage_resistance +0.05
//...
*if (atr_1 >= (req_1*1.5))
*set critical_damage_resistance +0.05
there’s no ceiling cap here, meaning you can rack up resistance all way past 1.0 and you get this:
(this hit is supposed to deal 30k damage, normally)
3 Likes
Hmm, okay, i was curious about the demon squad fight so i set my alignment to demonic to check it out…
-
on one hand, the current critical resistance bug/thing can make the fight a joke because the squad was totally not ready for this:
-
but on the other hand, this fight requires the MC to have ~120 qi on hand in order to get through the fight*, even if you try to avoid unnecessary uses which is… well, basically highly unreasonable. Even with the enlightenment necklace to nullify 3 expenses (which is very imprecise due to only being able to do it when the combat menu comes up) this effectively requires the player to put all their focus on collecting qi and never spend any through the whole post time skip part, or you’ll just find yourself painted into a corner with no way out. It could definitely use some tweaking there.
*) i have used the console to give the MC 250 qi at the start of the fight. Haven’t used any for regeneration etc. She was down to 131 qi at the end of the fight, bulk of those were burnt on auto-moves without any input from the player, with the cost of anywhere between 5-15 qi per move.
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Off topic, but how do you code-dive?
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