Commercial Break (Worm / Slut Life) (Borderline SFW)

[0th Law]

Yeah, if an 11 (or was it 9?) year old can do it, you can definitely achieve incredible power with the aid of an Intelligent Device. I really think that she should go with the Nanoha option.

 

[edale]

It doesn't matter how good she is at math now, her ability to multi-task with her swarm means she could match or out pace most devices. This system of magic would be the best for her.

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Neither Taylor nor Slut Life are aware of just how great Taylor's multitasking ability is. Her multitasking scales with the number of bugs she has access to, and she's only had access to a few dozen so far.

And the multitasking might help some with speed, but the real advantage would be she could cast dozens, if not hundreds or thousands, of spells simultaneously. (as someone who has only read a few fanfics, and never seen the actual series) Memory Partition is such a useful and OP ability in Nanoha because of that multicasting ability. And if the 'Education' entertainment option (one of the most OP things offered by SL, especially if you go for the 10 year run to really milk it... Or the new home option to keep it after the run ends...With Lifelong learning to keep swapping out subjects; especially given that the education is at SL's society's level, meaning clarke tech and magic can be learned) is taken with Nanoha-style mathematics as one of the courses... Taylor could probably out-perform a Lost Logia... as well as anyone else in Nanoha's cast. (actually, thinking on it, let Dragon take a look at the Education setup when we get back! She could reproduce it!)

I fully agree that Nanoha-style magic would be Taylor's best option here, but no one in-story could have any guess that that's the case just yet. It is possible that they'll figure out about the multitasking before the contract is signed, but I doubt it.

 

[0th Law]

With Lifelong learning to keep swapping out subjects

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What are the prereqs for Lifelong Learning? Whenever I try to choose it it gives the "invalid" feedback thing (orange, category is outlined in red)

 

[Jonakhensu]

What are the prereqs for Lifelong Learning? Whenever I try to choose it it gives the "invalid" feedback thing (orange, category is outlined in red)

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I think you need to take either "You're here forever" or "New Home." You should be able to do it with "Long Play", but I've been told that the CYOA viewer is horribly programmed, so I'm not surprised it doesn't work.

 

[D'znn-Xy'lll MetaChthonia]

I'm pretty sure she'll go with the Cutie but I still hope she'll also go with the adorable Futa. Wonder if she'll go with the Insect Queen or if she's forbidden from that one for obvious reasons? Well, she has 100~ hours to fill!

 

[edale]

What are the prereqs for Lifelong Learning? Whenever I try to choose it it gives the "invalid" feedback thing (orange, category is outlined in red)

Click to shrink...

I think you need to take either "You're here forever" or "New Home." You should be able to do it with "Long Play", but I've been told that the CYOA viewer is horribly programmed, so I'm not surprised it doesn't work.

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Checking on a different version of the COYA, it lists the requirements as "You're here forever" or "New Home" (which Taylor is taking).

It should be noted however, in that COYA it takes 3 months to learn 3 years of learning on ONE topic. This COYA takes 1 year to teach you 3 years worth of learning on 3 topics.

I think that lifelong learning or education is a subject of a mistype on that COYA generator, as the 3 month thing would mean you never actually finish a topic, I think it was either supposed to match the other COYA (takes 3 months to finish a course), or it's supposed to let you change every year.

That said, no matter which setup it uses, if you've gained an immortal ageless body from the show, then you'll eventually learn pretty much everything to above-mastery levels, even if it takes a century or two.

But really, the synergy of the Education entertainment option, and the Nanoha style magic is insane. Already learned everything that can be learned about the magic equations themselves? Well, here's a course on how to do math in your head at accelerated speeds! Now the course on multitasking techniques! Now the course on Nanoha style spell development/creation/programing! And now the course on intelligent device construction! Ect. IIRC some nanoha characters are hundreds or thousands of years old, and you could eclipse their raw knowledge in a decade or two.

And lets not forget this is magic through math that ANYONE can use (by Cindy's words if not Nanoha canon, and something I'd really hope Taylor would pick up on). That makes it something Taylor can teach others when she gets back to Earth Bet (and that's completely disregarding how OP Taylor would be from her multitasking).

Honestly, a Education/Nanoha magical powers Taylor setup, with her multitasking from QA, could probably beat Zion... Easily. Without any other boosts or powers.

Then again, Number Man, with Nanoha style magic, and no device could probably solo Zion.

 

[Ack]

I'm not surprised they're interested in her for the bugs. After all, there's nothing else significant about her that they're aware of. So of course it will factor heavily in their decisions.

 

[Guardian54]

I fully agree that Nanoha-style magic would be Taylor's best option here, but no one in-story could have any guess that that's the case just yet. It is possible that they'll figure out about the multitasking before the contract is signed, but I doubt it.

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Honestly, a Education/Nanoha magical powers Taylor setup, with her multitasking from QA, could probably beat Zion... Easily. Without any other boosts or powers.

Then again, Number Man, with Nanoha style magic, and no device could probably solo Zion.

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One of THE most irritating things to a whole lot of people is "grossly wasted potential" (see RWBY hate-dom, A Cloudy Path hate-dom, Harry Potter hate-dom--because if you weren't too dumb to Reducto death eater faces off in Year 5 when Hermione could easily have told you it was clearly a war of genocide a la WWII, Teddy wouldn't be an orphan, ETC.).

If Taylor doesn't pick massive parallel casting capable magic, then this story is sandbagging the CYOA to such a degree that she might as well not have any advisor at all and just get stuck in front of the selection screen by a ROB. More importantly, if she's going to make so many bad choices, don't let us see her making the bad choices! Just start from Day 1 of the SL show and go from there until said bad choices come back to bite Taylor in the ass! In-story "So much regret" and readership collective "wait what the fuck you didn't take that? *FACEPALM*" might actually be better than watching this build-up.

People have a hard time looking away from train crashes after the fact, but very many people are not fans of watching an idiot driver (or two) play chicken with impassable terrain or each other. Hell, we tend to RUN AWAY from such and only come back to spectate AFTER the explosions. Even at Crush, Texas people many panicked and ran when they realized that shit was crashing and exploding for real. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crush,_Texas

Look, if you want to do a CYOA story without:
a) Quest format. Expect massive exploiting (e.g. my suggestions on using hammerspace breasts to store battle planets or similar, but from EVERYBODY).
b) wank wank stomp stomp... oh wait that's not the right wording in a world where Taylor can get a penis and masochism... alright, a "lolpwnage" story, better?
OR
c) setting the thread ON FIRE with rage at the gameplay equivalent of "guarding arty" in World of Tanks or "guarding the carrier" in World of Warships, possibly to such eruptive magnitude that you the author throw up your arms and quit.

...Then you probably should not let us see what's behind the curtains until Taylor falls into her own traps. Seeing someone repeatedly fall into traps can be slapstick and funny. Watching someone spend a looooong time digging holes that you 100% know they'll be walking blindly into gets tedious really fast while they're still digging, unless this is a Rube Goldberg trap sequence they'll be falling into in either insanely convoluted ways or ones the audience do not generally see coming.

Most of us have probably had too much of fics that can be summarized as "World Shits on Taylor. World Shits More on Taylor, World Shits Even More on Taylor, The End" for "obliviously setting herself up to fail" to be funny anymore.

You might want to consider reading the other Taylor game story happening right now. Waifu Warz is a quest, but the way it rammed "new body that fucks all your body image issues to death with a flaming chainsaw" down her throat right away in a fuckoff massive system shock that makes all her later decision making more competent is something you might want to contemplate when Taylor has to go back over things due o the massively negative credit sum at the end. After all, those body mods take time to install... even with clarketech version of Panacea at work.

 

[edale]

Look, if you want to do a CYOA story without:
a) Quest format. Expect massive exploiting (e.g. my suggestions on using hammerspace breasts to store battle planets or similar, but from EVERYBODY).
b) wank wank stomp stomp... oh wait that's not the right wording in a world where Taylor can get a penis and masochism... alright, a "lolpwnage" story, better?
OR
c) setting the thread ON FIRE with rage at the gameplay equivalent of "guarding arty" in World of Tanks or "guarding the carrier" in World of Warships, possibly to such eruptive magnitude that you the author throw up your arms and quit.

...Then you probably should not let us see what's behind the curtains until Taylor falls into her own traps.

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@Jonakhensu I'm sorry for some of your readership's inability to understand the various times you've explained what type of fic this is, and propensity to keep complaining about the same thing over and over hoping it will be changed.

Not all of us are that bad, I swear; and some of us actually enjoy reading it the way you've chosen to present it.

 

[Guardian54]

Not all of us are that bad, I swear; and some of us actually enjoy reading it the way you've chosen to present it.

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If I didn't find this enjoyable I would not still be here. A Cloudy Path burnt me enough on trying to communicate through a hugbox or writing buffer (both are forms of inertia to not change) that I would absolutely GTFO the second I stopped enjoying a story with either of those phenomena, possibly with a "sorry, can't stomach this anymore" post if I feel the author wrote well enough overall.

It IS in fact still fun to have a stage "magician" demonstrate exactly what he is doing using transparent boxes and curtains and pointing out all the mirrors and the Rube Goldberg machine components one by one.

But it really, really, REALLY loses all hope of still seeming like "magic".

A normal magic show with things mostly hidden from the audience and permission to speculate, followed by ex post facto justifications/explanations/realizations of mechanisms, is like watching this video:


The whole time you are probably reacting something like "what the fuck what the fuck what the fuck I don't even wheeeeeeeeee!" on some mix/loop with some sprinkled "how many retakes and recalibrations did they have to do" or "how many hours did the guys stand there in the cold waiting for the Christmas tree to light up, and was it after Christmas by the time they finished recalibrating the outdoor bit for the latest snowfall?".

Imagine, instead of watching the completed machine in action, you are given an exhaustive step-by-step walkthrough of how the machine is built, with every single blooper, misfire, design failure and redraft, etc. put into direct sight of the audience. Still great fun, and a much better time-waster, but... the magic is kaput. And seeing screw-ups that you can see coming but the people on the scene insist on doing, simply miss, or don't notify others of? That gets annoying REAL FAST, and soon feels like the people on the scene are doing it on purpose to troll the audience.

 

[edale]

I don't know, Heromaker's Legacy and Taylor Varga both use a similar format, and neither loses out on the "magical" factor.

Keep in mind, this is still essentially the prologue of what's going to start out as mostly slice-of-life.

As far as mistakes... First of all, ANY D&D DM will lambaste you (if not outright kill your character off) for using OOC knowledge IC. A good QM will do the same in quests. And a good author doesn't need to be told this. Why insist on giving such harsh criticism repeatedly for an author following one of the golden rules of fanfiction?

You keep talking about avoiding hate/hug-boxes, but seem to be trying to form a one-man hate-box at the same time. That may not be your intent, but that is how it appears.

 

[necrolectric]

Some people just don't seem to understand that if an exploit (QA multitasking and Nanoha device) depends on the characters involved knowing about the exploit in the first place, then the characters are not going to risk it over something that they know will provide a given amount of benefit.

Anyway, I for one, am enjoying this ride immensely, and I look forward to the moment of horrified realization as Taylor realizes just how far into the hole she's put herself, and what sort of punishments she'll have to subject herself to to make up for it.

 

[Guardian54]

As far as mistakes... First of all, ANY D&D DM will lambaste you (if not outright kill your character off) for using OOC knowledge IC. A good QM will do the same in quests. And a good author doesn't need to be told this. Why insist on giving such harsh criticism repeatedly for an author following one of the golden rules of fanfiction?

You keep talking about avoiding hate/hug-boxes, but seem to be trying to form a one-man hate-box at the same time. That may not be your intent, but that is how it appears.

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1. There's nothing wrong with shining a light on holes in Wildbow's world-building.
Or, COMPLETELY IC, cheesing the part-time jobs to max out credit gain from Jobs. It's not like you get less magical girl, car mechanic, whatever training from doing it part-time FFS.
Unless Taylor is so bad at math she can't do elementary school addition, she WILL end up taking a pile of part-time jobs for efficient credit gain because I HIGHLY doubt she'd choose being fucked by a dragon or "Everyone" instead of taking four part-time jobs.

2. This is a good point... and "one-man hatebox" reminds me of one time when I lol rekt a Total War Arena enemy last-ditch fastcap force with a 2-survivor pike unit by phalanxing just as they were about to hit me with their remaining 20 guys... ended up wiping their unit by walking the pikes side to side with how bad the pike phalanx mechanics were (basically lightsaber death zone in front and on the pike shafts).

Anyway, I for one, am enjoying this ride immensely, and I look forward to the moment of horrified realization as Taylor realizes just how far into the hole she's put herself, and what sort of punishments she'll have to subject herself to to make up for it.

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We can depend on fanon/canon Taylor to put herself in the absolute worst punishments because she has no flexibility whatsoever in her personality when it's suggested by outside forces instead of her spontaneously deciding to compromise, then?

I'm not using any OOC knowledge whatsoever on the part-time jobs exploit (well, other than "fanon and canon Taylor are portrayed as almost as stubborn/tunnel-visioned/insane as Entities"). Nor the 140% pay and 10 credits exploit in the 3.0.3 system this one runs on.

I too look forward to the flaming spike pit she's going to find herself falling in after digging it for herself.

 

[0th Law]

Nor the 140% pay and 10 credits exploit in the 3.0.3 system this one runs on.

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That exploit was literally mentioned in the chapter.

 

[HereticZAKU]

Could we please move this conversation elsewhere? It's not really adding anything to the discussion of the story nor is it actually giving the author any sort of actionable advice.

 

[Guardian54]

That exploit was literally mentioned in the chapter.

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Yes, she noticed that exploit. So why exactly is say party planning so bad in Taylor's view that it WASN'T mentioned? Or the part-time credit exploit?

Because Party Planning in "part-time creds exploit" is IIRC the same level of cred gain per work hour as Magical Girl????

Could we please move this conversation elsewhere? It's not really adding anything to the discussion of the story nor is it actually giving the author any sort of actionable advice.

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You're right. I'll just set the part-time multi-job exploit down as "Taylor is (stupidly) not min-maxing credit gain. Or 'isn't interested' in the other jobs--you'd think with her background she'd know her Dad can barely find any form of jobs let alone preferred ones for the DWU de facto work gang, and thus be less choosy--because she hasn't noticed how bad she is on credits yet".

I will look forward to the crunch and when she realizes she can't be so choosy, and will have to use the part-time exploit.

 

[Tortoise]

You realize that the story does not absolutely have to follow the CYOA formula literally and in every detail? There can be storytelling reasons to prefer some set of choices. Complaining that some minmaxing exploit is not being used in the story is a pointless criticism in my view. In particular, I think exploits that make some choices redundant should be considered more like errors in the CYOA, and you should assume that in-universe those have been ironed out in a game show run by a massive organization (as opposed to a CYOA hacked together by some random people). There'd only be reason to complain if the story itself implied that some exploit should work in-universe and the characters still kept ignoring the possibility.

 

[Guardian54]

There'd only be reason to complain if the story itself implied that some exploit should work in-universe and the characters still kept ignoring the possibility.

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Taylor found and used the 140% pay with +10 credits exploit already.
My problem is finding just that and not the part-time jobs exploits with how DESPERATELY BAD her credit balance is right now... or is Cindy just saving that absurdly negative number to smash Taylor into taking some of the nastier punishments/owners for audience entertainment (read: weekly duel of massed bugs versus a dragon, who's actually amused at not being expected to fuck for once and likes the various handicaps he uses to challenge himself in such a duel)???

 

[Fractla]

...is there anything stopping Taylor from learning Nanoha style magic from the Internet and without a device later and just relying on extreme multitasking to get use out of it?

 

[edale]

That "the 140% pay with +10 credits exploit" isn't a mistake with that version of the COYA. It's actually on EVERY version of the COYA, although the net gain can change a bit (to a total of +5 points usually, rather than +10, but always a net gain).

It's not an exploit if it's supposed to be there.

 

[CrimsonFate]

Just because she can learn Nanoha style of magic doesn't mean she have good magic potential.

 

[edale]

Just because she can learn Nanoha style of magic doesn't mean she have good magic potential.

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Cindy specifically said anyone can learn it, which branches it slightly away from Nanoha's canon setup.

That said, with everything SL Corp can do, do you really think they can't artificially create a magic core for Taylor if she doesn't have one? Worst case they grow her a new clone body with a core included.

 

[Guardian54]

It's not an exploit if it's supposed to be there.

Click to shrink...

"Something clearly positive with no downsides for no credit cost" in a CYOA is definitely a design oversight i.e. exploit.

Worst case they grow her a new clone body with a core included.

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There was a satirical SupCom short fic named "A Treatise on the Mating Habits of EhSeeYuus" (spelling of the last word may vary) once upon a time. It refused to post an image of the Aeon ACU due to "being too curvy and lewd".

Taylor, now stuck as an AI controlling an Aeon ACU for the duration of the show: "When I wished for a nice tall body with much bigger curves, a huge magical core and ability to call on a powerful swarm of easily replenished, rapidly reproducing minions like with my bug control, this REALLY wasn't what I had in mind."

 

[edale]

"Something clearly positive with no downsides for no credit cost" in a CYOA is definitely a design oversight i.e. exploit.

Click to shrink...

It's only a net positive if you take the 2 options together.

Also, if it was a oversight/exploit, then it would have been fixed at some time between now and SL COYA 1.0, it hasn't, so it's not an oversight, it's SUPPOSED to be that way.

And it's a REALLY good idea from a business model too, takes care of the company's charitable donations for tax and PR reasons without them needing to do a thing.

 

[Jonakhensu]

All right, time for some nice spaghetti... Here's some responses to most of the comments I feel warrant a response, mostly in order to save time when several people have made the same comment or it otherwise doesn't need a response.

Damn I was hoping she would go for them but I know she wouldn't be Taylor if she did.

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That was basically my thought on the matter as well. Personally, I would have loved to have Taylor living or working at an apiary, but I couldn't see it happening in character.

It doesn't matter how good she is at math now, her ability to multi-task with her swarm means she could match or out pace most devices. This system of magic would be the best for her.

Or she could get a planetary tap on an unclaimed planet in her system, 'cause they're only just exploring those dimensions.

Click to shrink...

They don't know that Taylor can multitask like that. In fact, I can't remember anything saying she could use her multitasking for mathematics to begin with. I think that would probably have given her a higher thinker rating than her (from the wiki) Thinker 1. As for the mana taps, that possibly could work, though it's much less versatile than most of the other options, and most planets Cindy would be able to think of have probably been tapped already. Knowing you deal with at least six dimensions intellectually doesn't mean you always think on that level.

I fully agree that Nanoha-style magic would be Taylor's best option here, but no one in-story could have any guess that that's the case just yet. It is possible that they'll figure out about the multitasking before the contract is signed, but I doubt it.

Click to shrink...

Also, mostly this. No one knows that Taylor would be great at math, assuming she actually is, especially given her year of educational sabotage.

I'm pretty sure she'll go with the Cutie but I still hope she'll also go with the adorable Futa. Wonder if she'll go with the Insect Queen or if she's forbidden from that one for obvious reasons? Well, she has 100~ hours to fill!

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Well, Taylor can have up to seven owners, so there's always hope, right? But yeah... I quite like Velma Platt. If it helps for visualization, she's fairly heavily based on Velma Dinkley.

Checking on a different version of the COYA, it lists the requirements as "You're here forever" or "New Home" (which Taylor is taking).

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I've been looking at so many versions of the CYOA and kludging together one for future use that I no longer remember half of the specifics. The reason you can't take Life Long Learning with just Long Play is that you eventually leave.

That said, no matter which setup it uses, if you've gained an immortal ageless body from the show, then you'll eventually learn pretty much everything to above-mastery levels, even if it takes a century or two.

But really, the synergy of the Education entertainment option, and the Nanoha style magic is insane. Already learned everything that can be learned about the magic equations themselves? Well, here's a course on how to do math in your head at accelerated speeds! Now the course on multitasking techniques! Now the course on Nanoha style spell development/creation/programing! And now the course on intelligent device construction! Ect. IIRC some nanoha characters are hundreds or thousands of years old, and you could eclipse their raw knowledge in a decade or two.

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This is the main reason I probably won't have anyone important to the story take Life Long Learning. It'd probably make the story boring after a while, even if it is a good choice from the min-maxing perspective. I'm trying to write an interesting story, not a boringly OP character who doesn't need to bother with anything.

And lets not forget this is magic through math that ANYONE can use (by Cindy's words if not Nanoha canon, and something I'd really hope Taylor would pick up on). That makes it something Taylor can teach others when she gets back to Earth Bet (and that's completely disregarding how OP Taylor would be from her multitasking).

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First, Taylor doesn't know that this works different than in Nanoha, and I probably didn't notice I shouldn't have said that because I've never seen the show. I just started listing as many different styles of 'magical girl empowerment' I could think of. I doubt you could learn up to Nanoha levels without having an actual mana source beyond what little you can draw from your body.

I'm not surprised they're interested in her for the bugs. After all, there's nothing else significant about her that they're aware of. So of course it will factor heavily in their decisions.

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I think Taylor realizes this, but is somewhat put out that it seems to be her defining trait.

If Taylor doesn't pick massive parallel casting capable magic, then this story is sandbagging the CYOA to such a degree that she might as well not have any advisor at all and just get stuck in front of the selection screen by a ROB. More importantly, if she's going to make so many bad choices, don't let us see her making the bad choices! Just start from Day 1 of the SL show and go from there until said bad choices come back to bite Taylor in the ass! In-story "So much regret" and readership collective "wait what the fuck you didn't take that? *FACEPALM*" might actually be better than watching this build-up.

People have a hard time looking away from train crashes after the fact, but very many people are not fans of watching an idiot driver (or two) play chicken with impassable terrain or each other. Hell, we tend to RUN AWAY from such and only come back to spectate AFTER the explosions. Even at Crush, Texas people many panicked and ran when they realized that shit was crashing and exploding for real. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crush,_Texas

Look, if you want to do a CYOA story without:
a) Quest format. Expect massive exploiting (e.g. my suggestions on using hammerspace breasts to store battle planets or similar, but from EVERYBODY).
b) wank wank stomp stomp... oh wait that's not the right wording in a world where Taylor can get a penis and masochism... alright, a "lolpwnage" story, better?
OR
c) setting the thread ON FIRE with rage at the gameplay equivalent of "guarding arty" in World of Tanks or "guarding the carrier" in World of Warships, possibly to such eruptive magnitude that you the author throw up your arms and quit.

...Then you probably should not let us see what's behind the curtains until Taylor falls into her own traps. Seeing someone repeatedly fall into traps can be slapstick and funny. Watching someone spend a looooong time digging holes that you 100% know they'll be walking blindly into gets tedious really fast while they're still digging, unless this is a Rube Goldberg trap sequence they'll be falling into in either insanely convoluted ways or ones the audience do not generally see coming.

Click to shrink...

I'm not sure making a character as absolutely OP as possible is the same as writing an interesting and engaging story.

I'm also not sure what bad choices she's making, beyond not taking the choices you think she should. I'm sorry to have to tell you this, but Taylor is not you. She does not have a min-max mentality a lot of hardcore gamers seem to develop. I'm also not sure how not picking the choices you want her to constitutes this being like a train crash.

What traps of her own making has she fallen into so far? Nothing she's picked is set in stone, so she still has time to fix any real problems.

Spoiler: WoG on story tone

This is NOT a "Being Taylor Hebert is Suffering" story.

On a different note, can you do me a favor and stop using bold? I'm sure you don't think it comes across as unnecessarily antagonistic, but it does.

You might want to consider reading the other Taylor game story happening right now. Waifu Warz is a quest, but the way it rammed "new body that fucks all your body image issues to death with a flaming chainsaw" down her throat right away in a fuckoff massive system shock that makes all her later decision making more competent is something you might want to contemplate when Taylor has to go back over things due o the massively negative credit sum at the end. After all, those body mods take time to install... even with clarketech version of Panacea at work.

Click to shrink...

I read a few segments of it, but I'm not caught up currently. I'm also not sure what you're saying here, as the contract will be finalized before any modifications to her body are made. It's similar to how, in the original CYOA (not the one linked in the first post), you supposedly chose your reward at the end of the year, despite it costing or providing credits for the rest of your run. Obviously, I am ignoring that because it makes no logical sense. Similarly, starting body mods before things are finalized also makes no logical sense.

Guys don't worry Taylor can go for the hidden exploit in the system, she can become a green lantern, then she can learn the magic anyone can learn.

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Alternatively, she could always have a sequel and get more things that way.

Keep in mind, this is still essentially the prologue of what's going to start out as mostly slice-of-life.

As far as mistakes... First of all, ANY D&D DM will lambaste you (if not outright kill your character off) for using OOC knowledge IC. A good QM will do the same in quests. And a good author doesn't need to be told this. Why insist on giving such harsh criticism repeatedly for an author following one of the golden rules of fanfiction?

Click to shrink...

Very true. Arc 1 is recruiting Taylor and filling out her contract. Arc 2 is setting up all the preparations. Arc 3 (and maybe 4) will be the actual show. After that, the story will return to Earth Bet for added fun.

I'm trying to avoid using meta data as much as possible, though, thanks to the shadowy cabal that controls the multiverse, some people have more meta knowledge than others. Cindy, fortunately or not, has basically none. Honestly, I'm probably going to have a harder time pacing her growth curve until she figures out some of the really cool nonsense I've figured out for her later on.

Anyway, I for one, am enjoying this ride immensely, and I look forward to the moment of horrified realization as Taylor realizes just how far into the hole she's put herself, and what sort of punishments she'll have to subject herself to to make up for it.

Click to shrink...

Now that you mention it... I don't actually remember how far in the hole she'll be when she finishes going through the Owners... Of course, she also hasn't finalized basically anything, so things are still very fluid. She'd looking at her options and seeing what looks reasonable right now.

1. There's nothing wrong with shining a light on holes in Wildbow's world-building.
Or, COMPLETELY IC, cheesing the part-time jobs to max out credit gain from Jobs. It's not like you get less magical girl, car mechanic, whatever training from doing it part-time FFS.
Unless Taylor is so bad at math she can't do elementary school addition, she WILL end up taking a pile of part-time jobs for efficient credit gain because I HIGHLY doubt she'd choose being fucked by a dragon or "Everyone" instead of taking four part-time jobs.

Click to shrink...

In order to use the job exploit, you have to realize it's there and also not want a full time job for other reasons. I'd like to point out that it took you over a week to notice that exploit. Taylor has been looking at the form for less than three days and is under a lot more stress right now... and isn't a min-maxer by nature so would be less likely to think of looking for exploits. I see no reason why math skills have any bearing on this.

...is there anything stopping Taylor from learning Nanoha style magic from the Internet and without a device later and just relying on extreme multitasking to get use out of it?

Click to shrink...

Other than possibly not being able to multitask in the proper manner? The lack of a substantial mana reserve could make it difficult to get very far.

Just because she can learn Nanoha style of magic doesn't mean she have good magic potential.

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Basically this. I figure most, if not all, sentient beings produce at least some miniscule mana just by existing. This can be shaped if you know how, but you don't have very much without a proper Linker Core, Mana Pool, Magical Core, etc. to supply more energy.

That said, with everything SL Corp can do, do you really think they can't artificially create a magic core for Taylor if she doesn't have one? Worst case they grow her a new clone body with a core included.

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They can. This is basically what would happen if Taylor picked the Nanoha-style magic or another that requires having actual magical reserves.

It's only a net positive if you take the 2 options together.

Also, if it was a oversight/exploit, then it would have been fixed at some time between now and SL COYA 1.0, it hasn't, so it's not an oversight, it's SUPPOSED to be that way.

And it's a REALLY good idea from a business model too, takes care of the company's charitable donations for tax and PR reasons without them needing to do a thing.

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Considering the other versions of the CYOA let you donate anywhere from five to fifty (or one hundred) percent of your salary to charity, I don't think this was unplanned, and was likely a PR ploy that worked out well for everyone involved.

 

[easlyamused]

They don't know that Taylor can multitask like that. In fact, I can't remember anything saying she could use her multitasking for mathematics to begin with. I think that would probably have given her a higher thinker rating than her (from the wiki) Thinker 1. As for the mana taps, that possibly could work, though it's much less versatile than most of the other options, and most planets Cindy would be able to think of have probably been tapped already. Knowing you deal with at least six dimensions intellectually doesn't mean you always think on that level.

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First off, why would she try to do advance mathematics on the fly in canon? No reason too. But I'm not talking about what she can do according to canon, but what she ought to be able of with her canon powers as described. And yes I know that she and Cindy don't know any of this.

Secondly, Cindy has told Taylor that SL is expanding into the "area" which means none of the "local" planets should have a planetary mana tap on them. If there are, then it's not a newly explored "area." The real problem would be whether or not any of the planets qualify for a mana tap.

Also, mostly this. No one knows that Taylor would be great at math, assuming she actually is, especially given her year of educational sabotage.

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And they know Taylor's education has been sabotaged, so an aptitude, IQ and placement tests ought to have been done. Which could also be a good thing, because the results provide encouragement to Taylor.

What really bothers me, is that Cindy isn't qualified for the job of recruiting specifically Taylor, she's good for recruiting knowledgeable and willing contestants. There should be a room nearby full of experts feeding Cindy information about everything Taylor asks. And a psychic reading Taylor's mind to help let Cindy say just the right thing.

 

[Guardian54]

What traps of her own making has she fallen into so far? Nothing she's picked is set in stone, so she still has time to fix any real problems.

Spoiler: WoG on story tone

This is NOT a "Being Taylor Hebert is Suffering" story.

On a different note, can you do me a favor and stop using bold? I'm sure you don't think it comes across as unnecessarily antagonistic, but it does.


I read a few segments of it, but I'm not caught up currently. I'm also not sure what you're saying here, as the contract will be finalized before any modifications to her body are made. It's similar to how, in the original CYOA (not the one linked in the first post), you supposedly chose your reward at the end of the year, despite it costing or providing credits for the rest of your run. Obviously, I am ignoring that because it makes no logical sense. Similarly, starting body mods before things are finalized also makes no logical sense.


...isn't a min-maxer by nature so would be less likely to think of looking for exploits.

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Snipped for length.

1. The credits pit she has dug herself into is like starting with -150 credits in difficulty.
1a. It is good to have you state this, but I've been burned by LacksCreativity's claims to similar effect before, so please forgive me for having doubts and deciding to wait and see first.
1b. Huh, I've just been using it as highlighting keywords/phrases (because an exploit to store battle planets inside your boobs to have a good selection of weapons to fire through the nipple portals is "obviously" a key phrase/concept when discussing reasons why a sane woman might want "Fuckable Nipples"). My actually raving tone is, well, generally ALL CAPS plus whatever other emphasis level, such as BOLD FONT SIZE 6+ or something.

2. You are sadly correct.

3. Oh she WILL BE unless she wants to give up a lot of goodies. Also, canon Skitter was kind of a min-maxer (in theory, in reality she just had an absurdly OP power but mental disabilities in exploiting it that gradually were overcome over time)... and the underlying personality tenets didn't shift THAT much in 3 more months of being bullied...

 

[0th Law]

1. The credits pit she has dug herself into is like starting with -150 credits in difficulty.

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As he said, Nothing She's Picked Is Set In Stone. She has not gone over the actual details of everything, and thus cannot make lasting decisions with any semblance of a right mind, which she has at the very least.

1b. Huh, I've just been using it as highlighting keywords/phrases (because an exploit to store battle planets inside your boobs to have a good selection of weapons to fire through the nipple portals is "obviously" a key phrase/concept when discussing reasons why a sane woman might want "Fuckable Nipples").

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Normally, people don't think like that, especially if they're traumatized 15-year-olds and not "Spacebattles Competent".

 

[Guardian54]

As he said, Nothing She's Picked Is Set In Stone. She has not gone over the actual details of everything, and thus cannot make lasting decisions with any semblance of a right mind, which she has at the very least.

Normally, people don't think like that, especially if they're traumatized 15-year-olds and not "Spacebattles Competent".

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1. I suspect you know full well it's the "pre-decision" phase that has the most nail-biting (insert GIF of nail-biting and panic here).

2. Obviously, the part I edited in later in a bracket is partly sarcasm. Even I'm not sure how much.

 

[selonianth]

[responses]

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... Maybe spoiler if you're gonna do so many responses all at exactly the same time. It triggered the wordcount alert.