Watching Caster work was an experience I doubted I'd ever be able to find an equivalent to, even if I managed to live for another century after this war ended. Even action deliberate; a level of concentration I don't think even I'd ever rivaled, way back when… And how he got his materials… he just… willed them into existence; whatever he needed, he had in but a moment, reaching out to his side and materializing his, well… material desires at a whim.
I had read the description of how the labyrinth worked, of course. In fact, it had easily been the longest description of anything I had read from the character pages. I understood why Caster refused to budge on the workshop core being at full capacity: it was how he remained competitive in the war.
His mana parameter? Sure, the Brand of Athena skill boosted it slightly, though by how much exactly it didn't say, and the downsides of the brand… well, the boost was unlikely to outweigh the downsides it brought alongside it. But by bringing the workshop to it's maximum potential, his mana parameter ranked up as well. I had been surprised at first by its high rank, considering Caster was never a mage in life, but it was mostly the labyrinth doing the heavy lifting there, it seems. How that worked, exactly, I wasn't sure. A question I would have to ask either him, or maybe Sortiara and Johnathan, if I could find a way to bring it up without unraveling the web I've made…
Same with his skills. Or skill, as it only affected Item Construction, but considering Caster, that was probably his main method to winning the war. For anything he made to be worth a damn, he needed the workshop. Anything made by him outside the workshop, or within a lower classification of the workshop, experienced reductions in their rank. Yes, even the tools Caster made were ranked, and based on what understanding I could get on how all that worked from the skill descriptions and Caster himself when I'd asked, you really wanted these things at high ranks.
"What I make are classified officially as pseudo Noble Phantasms" Caster had sighed despite apparently being willing to answer. "Meaning yes, they can technically harm a servant, but considering most servants are going to have famous weapons or armor of their own, and with them being proper Noble Phantasms no less, well… A sword of mine made without the workshop here enhancing my abilities, while still capable of annihilating anything the modern world could make in terms of quality, is more than likely going to break after it connects with a famous piece of armor, or a famous blade, a few times. You want a pseudo Noble Phantasm to stand against the real deals? Best be damn sure that pseudo Noble Phantasm is a good rank or two higher; in for quite the… precarious situation otherwise."
In short, it wasn't just that the labyrinth made Caster feel more comfortable, or even just that it enhanced him; Caster was hardly a servant at all without it! However, if he could maintain it, combining the high mana parameter it granted him with the high rank of his Independent Action skill, Caster was a very… resilient servant, in terms of magical energy upkeep. Truly, he was the definition of a late game unit.
Only downside being that, as I was by no means a magus, I couldn't really help him on the magical energy front, and with the high rank of Independent Action… well, I understood why he was always threatening to kill me if I ever so much as dared to give him orders. Caster would do as he wishes, when he wishes; get out of his way, or be run over. Considering the man's history… I can't say I was surprised for that to be the very base of his mentality.
I wouldn't really want it any other way though… Not like I could bring out the full extent of the beauty Caster is capable of better than he could himself.
Ah, but I distract myself! The materials he could grab at a moment's notice: it expended magical energy, yes, but very minor amounts. Varied by what he wanted too, but even then, it was never a major burden. I had been fearing that Caster would be drawing lots of attention to himself by stealing materials for his works, especially more modern-day materials like wires, or other electronical parts.
He had, of course, to some extent. As it turned out, the workshop could… replicate, so to speak, materials that had been used within it prior. So, for materials like stone, bronze, or wood… things like that, Caster already had access to from his life. But for wiring, gears, circuitry… things of that nature, Caster needed to get real versions of them first. Hence why he had stolen some small things, like alarm clocks and watches. Or so he claimed, at least.
"You know, Caster, there is something that I'm curious about" I eventually broke the silence between us, looking over to the slab of stone in the one corner of the workshop. "That massive block of stone over there: that's for your second Noble Phantasm, yes?"
"…It would be, should I wish to use it" Caster eventually grunted dismissively. "Yet another reason why I must keep my workshop in top form: I actually can't create anything for that Noble Phantasm with the workshop being so. Not that I plan on using it, admittedly."
"…You don't plan on using it" I was surprised. "But from what I've understood about it, it's basically a private army if you desire it! Why wouldn't you use it?!"
"Ah, so you can analyze servants then; thought you were far better informed than our prior meetings."
"I... found a way, yes. But that's besides the point. Why don't you want to use it?"
"Many reasons" Caster sighed, never turning to face me or stopping in his work. "For one, it's time consuming. Powerful it may be, but for what are effectively golems of varying shapes and sizes, their power is tied to their quality, and quality statues take time to make, even for me. A lone statue can't stand up to a servant; you'd need many of them just to take out a weak servant, and they'd need to be at least a B rank for them to even be worth a damn in a fight. They're fairly slow to move, being made of stone, unless I make them really small, in which case there goes their fighting power. In terms of precise movements, like swinging a sword in a fight, I have yet to find a way to make them flow, if that makes sense. Any Heroic Spirit worth shit would be able to easily avoid anything a lone statue tried, again stressing the need of a massive mob of them to be effective."
"That's for more… humanoid statues, correct?"
"Correct. I could also go the more animalistic, or bestial, route: lions, elephants, boars… can even do things like chimeras and hydras; you name it, I can make it. They might find more success, but they're also far more complex to create, therefore taking even more time to make at any decent quality. They also can't be fully controlled; humanoid or bestial."
"…Meaning?"
"Meaning once you give one an order, that's it. That's it's order, and the only order you'll ever be able to give it" Caster sounded exasperated. "I have yet been able to figure out a way to give one more than a single order. So sure, you can tell it to go hunt down whatever servant you wish, but from there it's going to act on its own accord; how it fights, collateral damage… you have no way of knowing how that's all going to turn out. Finally, there's the issue of the brand, as I'm sure you must also be aware of if you know this Noble Phantasm."
"…Right… Each one would carry a copy of the brand…"
"Indeed. So, even if I spent days to make one at an A rank in quality, if the brand ends up in a clearly visible location, and the enemy notices, then my identity is revealed; doesn't matter that they never heard the name of the Noble Phantasm; the brand reveals all. Considering how the ever so merciful Athena just loves to screw over us mortals, just like the rest of the blasted gods, the odds of me getting lucky on where the brand ends up on the statue is, practically speaking, zero. Meaning even if I just wanted poor quality scouts, it would be too risky to use most of them. In short, that Noble Phantasm simply isn't worth the time commitment required. The magical energy isn't the issue; they're actually rather nice in that regard, but no, I refuse to waste my time with those things."
Caster pointed over to the one weapon rack on the wall that actually had some weapons hanging on it.
"See those there? Their brands ended up being etched into the grip; wrap some leather over it and hold it, nobody is seeing it. Those can be used safely. Want to know how long it took for me to get those?"
"Uh…"
"Almost sixteen hours" Caster growled before I could even properly respond. "Sixteen blasted hours, and all I got were five swords! C rank, no less!"
"I see…" I muttered warily. "I take it that's not… good?"
"Of course it isn't good child!"
So, that Noble Phantasm seems out… Pity; would have loved to see it in action…
Caster swiftly returned to his work; miniature rant seemingly done with. As for myself, I wandered over to the weapon rack and picked up a couple of the blades. To me, they seemed perfect; immaculate craftsmanship, razor sharp edges, perfectly balanced… If this was only a C rank sword, I really wanted to see what one at an A rank would be like! Still, not like I would turn my nose up at one of these for now.
"…Can I take one" I asked Caster, finally deciding on a blade.
"What" he asked in return, seemingly unable to decide if he was going to laugh or not at the request.
"The swords. Can I take one?"
"No, you can't. Honestly child, I can't tell if your previous line of thought was a fluke, or if you're just intentionally acting stupid most of the time. What good would it do for you top be wandering around with a sword?! You're human; you can't stand against a Heroic Spirit! Even Assassin would walk all over you, and then some!"
"Yeah, but… It's not like I'm going to go and pick a fight."
"Then you don't need it!"
"…Still want one though…"
"Oh for- fine" Caster shouted, turning around to face me. "Fine, you can take one of them, under conditions!"
"I'm listening…"
"For one, you are not to go around parading and showing it off to anyone!"
"Alright."
"Two: you are not to ever let it out of reach. I will not have my identity revealed by someone just coming across that sword and accidentally uncovering the mark!"
"Ok."
"Finally, if you end up getting arrested for carrying a sword on you, I'm not bailing you out."
"…Wait. You know about jail and shit?"
"You act as if we didn't lock people up in my time…"
"Oh. Yeah, good point" I grinned, though it only seemed to irk Caster.
"…You really don't make this easy for me" he eventually sighed. "But I assume that you're still going to go running around at night?"
"Naturally."
"…Then there is actual merit to you carrying around some means of protection, I suppose. Armor would be too obvious, but a sword can be concealed, provided you know what you're doing… Have you ever used a sword before, child?"
"Nope."
"…Have you ever used any weapon before, child?"
"Well… if you count a knife as a weapon, then-"
"Close enough" Caster cut me off with a wave of his hand. "Then I won't waste either of our time going over weapon safety. If I lost the master anchoring me here because he stabbed himself…"
"I'll be careful Caster; made it this far, haven't I?"
"A damn miracle in of itself…" he muttered. "But yes, fine, take it and go. Get out! I'm trying to get some actual work done, so get out of my hair and don't come back till tomorrow!"
"Sweet! Thanks Caster" I left the workshop grinning like a damn idiot, new, magical, Daedalus forged sword in hand.
Oh man, this thing is going to look so cool mounted on my bedroom wall! …After the war, that is.
Author's Notes (Answering Review Question As Well!)
First off, want to say sorry for the short post here. Wanted to have this and a Fragment go up, but had a bad couple night's sleep in a row (and was busying double checking everything I 'know' for the question I was asked, admittedly xD), so the Fragment isn't done yet. Will go up with the next Chapter posting, promise!
Secondly, and the BIGGER point of discussion for this A/N: I got a good question/comment thing in the reviews that I want to address here!
To start with, a disclaimer first: I by no means consider myself to be an expert in FATE lore (or the lore of the expanded... 'nasuvers'?). AT ALL! All I 'know' if from wikis and online discussions I've had with others; none of this comes from any official sources. If I get something wrong here, and you know of an official source that has the correct information, please, please, PLEASE: SEND IT MY WAY IF YOU CAN! I would love to get ANYTHING official on this stuff, because I've had no luck finding anything official for this shit myself yet!
...Now for a more... personal disclaimer, I suppose: I really, REALLY HATE the mechanical systems behind the FATE IP (as I understand them). They are convoluted, open to basically any contrivance an author can think of, and (if you ask me) seem to be completely disregarded by the authors of 'canonic' entries to the IP anyways!
So, the question I want to address is this: "How can Daedalus' NP have the rank EX; EX rank NP are Anti-World, so how can it be EX?"
A very good question! Seriously, I'm SO GLAD someone asked; means I don't have to try and explain this shit in the story proper in some backwards ass way! I love questions like these, so if anyone else ever has a question similar to this for something I write, PLEASE ASK!
Now, as to the answer... That's not how EX rank works in FATE, as far as I understand it.
To start with, the letter ranking system of E - A is, essentially, a stand in for numbers; a way to make it look 'pretty' for the VN's original release, I assume. All the wikis I've read on this never give me a name for what this number is called (they simply refer to it as the 'value') so for this explanation here, I'm going to call it 'Power'.
The basic scale only goes from E - A. E stands for a 'Power' of 10. D stands for 20. C for 30, B for 40 and A for 50. That is the base ranking system used by Parameters, Skill ranks and Noble Phantasms.
Then you have the +'s and -'s that you sometimes see alongside the letter. I have seen a lot of people think that a B+ is just better than B but still worse than A- or A. Understandable, but this is not fully accurate.
A '+' besides the letter actually signifies the 'potential' for the Power of whatever it is in question to be doubled. So, say a servant has a weapon of rank B+: that weapons is, for the vast majority of the time, still at a Power of 40; it is on par with a rank B weapon. However, provided whatever conditions that are required for the '+' to kick in are met (most likely varying on a case by case, servant by servant basis, seeing as I can't find any definitive listing; see what I mean by open to contrivances...) then that weapon will not be at a Power of, say 45. It will have a Power of 80. For that temporary moment, that B+ weapon is 1.6x STRONGER than a flat rank A weapon with a Power of 50.
If you have a B++, then it is still normally a Power of 40, but can turn into a Power of 120. B+++; 40 or 160 Power, depending. I say 'or' here because, again, I can't find anything saying it can fall between 40 - 80 for a B+, or 40 - 160 for a B+++; only that it goes from 40 TO 80 or 40 TO 160, flat!
For '-', it's halving instead of doubling. Meaning that Lancer in this story of mine here, if you remember his Parameters, has an Endurance equal to 50, being ranked A-. However, the '-' means that, under certain conditions (yay, maybe I'll throw in my contrivances xD), Lancer's Endurance will fall down to 25. He will have worse Endurance in that moment than a servant with a base C in Endurance. Same rules for the double '-' and triple '-': a B- will be either 40 OR 20, B- either 40 OR 10, and B- either 40 OR 5, under the rules of the ranking system as I understand it. Granted, while I have seen double and triple '+', I have never seen a double or triple '-'; this is just how it seems to work ON PAPER.
Now that all of that is out of the way, dealing with EX rank...
EX rank does not fall on the scale linearly with the others. By which I mean EX is not 60 at base. If the scale of E- to A+++ has the lowest bound of 5 and the highest bound of 200, then EX stands on it's own outside the scale, effectively speaking. Something ranked EX basically just means it is so powerful in what it does that it renders comparison meaningless. For all anyone knows, something ranked EX could have a Power of 500, 5,000 or even 1,000,000; at that point you've go so far beyond the vast majority of relevant things to compare it to that there's simply no longer a point in doing a comparison!
As for EX rank NP's needing to be Anti-World classification... That is something I can definitively say just isn't true, based on what has shown up in actual 'canonic' works.
I'm sure for the vast majority of people, when they think EX rank NP, they think of Enuma Elish (most likely from Gilgamesh, but potentially also Enkidu's version of Enuma Elish). That would most definitely be Anti-World, yes. But Karna also has an EX rank NP: Vasavi Shakti. However, that NP is classified as Anti-Divine, not Anti-World.
Artoria also has an EX rank NP (or at least had... seriously girl, sheath OVER sword; Merlin EXPLAINED THIS!), being Avalon: the sheath of Excalibur. However, that NP is not even an offensive NP; it is classified as a Barrier NP. Asterios (the Minotaur) has an EX rank NP: Chaos Labyrinth (Yes, the exact same name as the NP I gave Daedalus; if people want to know why I made it work FAR differently, then let me know and I will dive into that, but it is separate from this point here). Fan favorite Iskandar from FATE Zero has his famous Ionioi Hetairoi also ranked EX, despite being only classified as Anti-Army. EX rank NPs come in all kinds of classifications; they don't need to be Anti-World, or even offensive NPs to have the rank EX; they just need to be so powerful in what they do that they have no meaningful comparison to be made with.
...As a final, side note, to the part of the review post saying it should be classified as a Fortress or Anti-Unit NP... well, no. Asterios' Chaos Labyrinth is actually classified as a 'labyrinth' type NP (or 'Maze' if you play FGO in English; seriously wtf is up with that name for an NP class... fucking 'Maze' xD), and I don't see why Daedalus' NP wouldn't share that same classification, considering its also a labyrinth.
..I hope this doesn't come off as unfriendly or hostile to anyone and deter them from asking more of these types of questions. No flame or disrespect to the poster of that review at all; FATE's systems are weird and confusing at even a surface level, and I can't find official sources no matter how hard I try (and I bet I'm one of the only poor saps who actually gives a shit about the systems' most minute workings; when has any fight in any FATE 'canonic' works gone by what should have overpowered the other on paper?) I honestly just like discussing FATE as I find it to be a really cool IP, and I figured this would be a good question to discuss out in the open, because if one person is asking, then there's probably many more out there that think the same way, but simply won't ask.
So please: ASK ME ANYTHING! I would LOVE to have more discussions like this in the A/Ns, or via PMs on this site, or if I ever learn how to respond to individual reviews if people don't want their question aired out like this in A/Ns.
As always, thanks for reading y'all xD
TL;DR - EX rank is weird! FATE's ranking system in general is weird (and typically ignored anyways from what I've seen)! Yes, Daedalus has an EX rank NP, just like how Asterios (the Minotaur) has his NP at rank EX; I will not be changing the rank of Daedalus' NP.
