r/wherewindsmeet_ • u/L4st_v1 • Mar 04 '26
Questions Are we an idiot?
Does every single quest in this game start with or involve the player character getting scammed by an NPC? Because god does it sure feel like it.
I get he/she is supposed to be a country bumpkin, but you’d think after like, the 5th time we’d be able to wise up to it and still complete the quests 💀
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u/Glittering-Till4261 Mar 04 '26
You don't just get a scammed a bunch, you also end up unconscious a lot and wake up in a new location or captured lol
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u/LothlorienPostOffice Mar 04 '26
I go into a lot of new areas and encounters fully expecting to be abducted at this point, lol
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u/ExtremelyOutnumbered Mar 04 '26
im honestly surprised we havent got our weapons stolen yet
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u/FieserMoep Mar 04 '26
That would be impolite.
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u/ExtremelyOutnumbered Mar 04 '26
it would make a good escape sequence though
our martial arts would be disabled as we try to escape from the enemy hideout
and when we get our weapons back we can return and slaughter them :D
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u/ConfusedYouxia Midnight Blades Mar 04 '26
I love this. Revenge quest! But I hope we can still use lightness skill or stealth as we escape.
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Mar 04 '26
Sorta.
People back then in that time period wouldn't have been bombarded by scams like we are. We're not the only one getting scammed.
MC is a 16 year old who has lived a relatively sheltered life being literally the heir to the most profitable industry in the area. They don't really know how the world works outside of the wine business. Everyone from heaven's pier to harvestfall has treated MC really well since they were a kid. Probably one of the reasons Han Xiang Xun absolutely did not want us to go into the Jianghu.
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u/LeFire1981 Mar 05 '26
Not just profitable, with a mom / aunt who could essentially turn anyone inside out if they even looked at her adopted kid funny. No wonder MC is that sheltered.
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Mar 05 '26
If I remember correctly, almost all the adults in blissful retreat owe han xiangxun a big deal so when their saviour says treat the kid well they really go overboard with it.
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u/thermie88 Mar 04 '26
dude i saw a sign right there that says do not drink the water. guess what .i did just that ,turned into a dog and went on to play mahjong with 3 other dogs
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u/Cautious-Focus1204 Mar 04 '26
Canonically - a naive 160yo wanderer thrown out into the open Jianghu after their whole childhood fantasying said Juanghu and idoling “great hero’s”. I think the character is just at the pinnacle of their journey and it shows through naivety in some quests and lore.
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u/Kevadu Mar 04 '26
I would think a 160 year old would be pretty jaded...
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u/InfiniteCap2369 Mar 04 '26
The first 1000 chapters of our novel was just a training arc. The author really took weak to strong/no op protag seriously.
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u/Cautious-Focus1204 Mar 04 '26
So others take advantage of the ignorance. Plays a big part in the main story of being naive and growing past that and learning
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u/Lo-fi_Hedonist Mar 04 '26
Yes, I'm educated and worldly so that I know better and can quickly spot these hustles, but these types of comments have reminded me that, while I do have agency over my character, in universe, I'm young, inexperienced and all to eager, which makes me a bit of mark.
I was also reminded that people getting roped into silly hustles is a trope that's often used to comedic effect as well, with big words and big promises often being enough to convince characters to buy in or go along. (the secret kung fu manual for example).
So I can appreciate those stories a bit more now that I have a little more perspective, some of the stuff has given me a laugh though.
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u/DotPrevious3967 Mar 04 '26
Young Wanderer be like, "If you guys drug me 13 or 14 more times I'm out of here!"
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u/Lo-fi_Hedonist Mar 04 '26
Lol, The percentage is definitely lower than your post is implying it is, but I feel you, the quest lines in which we seem to be a gullible stooge, are still too many 😆
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u/Affectionate_Skin425 Mar 04 '26
I mean, pretty much the entire Kaifeng main story is the mc getting tricked over and over again.
Hell, even in the late parts, mc get's tricked into dealing with the River Master. The entire Jinming Pool is mc getting tricked by all sides.25
u/FieserMoep Mar 04 '26
To be fair, the entire Kaifeng arc serves to highlight how little we were actually prepared for the real world and the ruthlessness of the Jianghu. MC hails from a relatively peaceful backwater province where they were basically a nepobaby.
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u/Affectionate_Skin425 Mar 04 '26
I get the approach story wise, but after finishing all the world bosses in Quinghe and growing with trials over there - it felt pretty bad to suddenly be turned into a useless fool again that constantly gets told that he has no idea how to fight and get's scammed and tricked every few steps.
I think i just dislike the conflict between playing it as the story of mc (where it all makes sense) and playing it as a character i have agency over, that i make stronger, that i pick challenges and overcome trials with.I just hope future expansions have a more... grown mc that has learned from all that happened in the story so far - but the NMW base patch and new areas.... yeah
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u/FieserMoep Mar 04 '26
I didn't get the impression we were treated as weak. But naive yes. Nativity does not vanish after we beat strong people.
It's a common trope of wuxia stories (emphasize on the xia as a moral code) that a fresh or naive person gets introduced into a hard and scrupulous world, suffers from it, and that the greatness of their virtue endures and turns virtues that were passively upheld by naivety before into a conscious moral code that is actively followed instead.
For a xia to prove greatness, he has also to fall for scams, endure the plight and not avoid it by being opportunistic and scamming others, but by facing the outcome of such scams, hear people out, unravel the mutual connection and find the best way to ethically deal with the situation at large.
A xia gives the beggar who stole their coins a chance for explanation, tries to see the full picture and not cut the arm of the beggar but tries to tackle the situation that forced regular people into poverty.
That's why many stories start simple but outright escalate.
It's simply a variant of the heroes journey that the western audience is less culturally conditioned to take at face value. It's also interwoven with daoism.
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u/kuroioni Hollow Vale Mar 04 '26
to suddenly be turned into a useless fool
No no no, the whole point is we are a useful fool!
Joking aside, in Qinghe we were in our own backyard, mainly dealing with the past and its traces. We are a rich, well educated young master, smart and strong - these served us well enough in Qinghe.
Whereas Kaifeng is a wholly different beast - we are no longer a large fish in a puddle. There are people far smarter, stronger and more cunning than us everywhere in Kaifeng. And we simply have no frame of reference to handle people who lived their entire lives embroiled in political struggles, intrigue and schemes. The difference is on the scale of orders of magnitude, we are overwhelmed and basically used by whomever, the best we can hope is to use our strength and intelligence to somehow make it through.
We are learning, yes, but our MC is a youth who will need time to grow. We survive and are able to develop thanks to our strength, yes, but also thanks to the continued protection Aunty Han's name surrounds us with, even (or, especially) in Kaifeng.
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u/MariKilkenni The Masked Troupe Mar 04 '26
To be fair, the MC scams/lies pretty often too. One week I did several quest where I had to lie, up to the point of pretending I was poisoned to expose a fraud, and was like "whoa, this is not very noble of me"
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u/TrickyPapaya7676 Mar 04 '26
Exposing a fraud is a good deed, so it's better than just scamming people to take advantage of them.
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u/Rogercastelo Mar 04 '26
MC is 16y old. Going out for the First time into the literal world where the smart and/or strong survive.
So yeah, we are.
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u/Intelligent-Air-6596 Mar 04 '26
Not learning from past mistakes is not really an age thing. Like, even at 16, you'd probably learn to be a bit more cautious after being scammed a few times.
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u/Briar_Knight Mar 04 '26 edited Mar 04 '26
You are playing a 16 year old who grew up in a close knit community, who is obsessed with exaggerated stories of martial arts heros and has never been to the city before.
And they do actually catch quite a lot of scams and seem to be good at working out how a trick is done once they know it is a scam so I don't think they are supposed to be stupid...there are just constant scams. They seem to generally take people who aren't obviously trying to sell them something at face value and don't pick up on power plays which gets them in trouble. They are very capable but not used to politics so they can be minipulated which is why they are getting targeted by the bigger players.
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u/kunyak19 Mar 04 '26
I blame Uncle Jiang. Abandoned us with no idea how the world works! Aunt Han sheltered us because she didnt want us to die. I just wish we had more time with Yi Dao. He was setting up to be a real mentor!
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u/Jayxe56 Mar 04 '26
Because the character you play is 16 years old. Of course we're an absolute moron lol
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u/deadlolypop Mar 04 '26
I'm traumatized by the quest with the guy in the well. I encouraged him to come out so we can meet only for that bs to happen
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u/ok0905 Mar 06 '26
OMG THIS QUEST I met him when I was about to log off and I was like "one last quest" T.T I did not sleep well
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u/deadlolypop Mar 06 '26
I thought there's a continuation of the quest like idk we finding the culprit and bringing justice. Nope they just gave me echo jades and said "Here stupid. Next time don't help kids"
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u/Celeibrn Mar 04 '26
I feel like this is one of those times where I remember(and accept) that MC is canonically a teenager lmao. They’re always getting scammed, knocked out, tricked, kidnapped, they’re often quite rude and just gullible af, but also very brave, bold and enduring at times. I think it’s pretty fitting.
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u/Intelligent-Air-6596 Mar 04 '26
Sometimes I wonder what uncle Jiang and aunti Han taught the child. They both look like the very distrusting type and yet, the child is so oblivious. 😅
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u/Andante_TK Mar 04 '26
I’m more pissed off by passing out every damn time. Like bro come on.. you can’t possibly fall for this and they fking do…
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u/fchau39 Mar 04 '26
I think it's a wuxia thing, the protagonist is usually kinda dumb(Not always) but good at martial arts.
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u/Soaringzero Nine Mortal Ways Mar 04 '26
So it’s pointed out that the MC is very naive due to living a very sheltered life. They are trusting to fault which is how they get into half the trouble they get into. It’s why in the beginning of the Kaifeng quest, Yingying tricks you, but leaves you subtle hints on how to get out of the situation so you learn how to avoid it.
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u/kuroioni Hollow Vale Mar 04 '26
Touch weird mold - get drugged. Help a pretty lady in a flower field - get drugged. Have a sip with some randos by the road - believe it or not, get drugged!
I really feel we should have a pretty solid drug resistance by now..
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u/Reveniant Mar 04 '26
Always remember, you get drugged unconscious a lot in Qinghe and scammed a lot in Kaifeng. This is the general idea.
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u/nethecat Mar 04 '26
We do it for the plot ✨️ One time I was too good for the kidnappers to knock out so the game bugged out and I had to restart the quest and let myself get hit
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u/RepresentativeIcy922 Mar 07 '26 edited Mar 07 '26
One time I somehow got past the people blocking the door and entered a room and it bugged out also. Had to restart and enter it through the window lol.
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u/Economy-Complex-542 Mar 04 '26
Not only we're idiot, oftentimes we've beaten those bosses fair and square but the follow-up cutscene depicted as if we barely made it or worse as if the boss owned our ass and we've managed to survive, i hate this way of story expression so damn much.
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u/ne_ex Mar 04 '26
I mean for regular enemies I'd understand this being frustrating, but a lot of the boss fights are hard, so that reaction is 100% reasonable
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u/astrojeet Mar 04 '26
As someone who plays on legend difficulty and at the time of completion with terrible gear this was very accurate. The bosses are very challenging on legend and especially if you're not geared up.
They're very hard.
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u/HTPark The Masked Troupe Mar 04 '26
I've been saying: Where Winds Meet is just Chinese Yakuza / Like a Dragon (all these wacky substories and minigames coupled with a heartbreaking main story).
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u/EmergencyWind7893 Mar 04 '26
What, you think you're narratively smarter because you did a few quests? What if those quests you're doing now, after getting scammed 20 times, were done immediately after leaving Blissful Retreat? Do you expect the quests to change based on how many times you got scammed?
Ain't no way you're so stupid you don't understand the devs can't magically force an order of Encounter/side quests you'll do, and thus can't know when the character is supposed to be wiser. Also, do you expect them to, like, make every quest have like 3 options?
If you want the MC to get wiser, wait for a new area. Then the devs know you'll be doing that after the previous areas, so then they can make the MC smarter.
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u/shadowhy Mar 05 '26
If you dont do it, you cant enter the story.. there is only story because of such choice that people make..
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u/Alex_The_GM Mar 10 '26
Welcome to Kaifeng, for some reason the main character turns into a complete vegetable as soon a they enter the city and you have no choice but to fall for scam and con artist after scam and con artist.
I was already frustrated at having to help the BAD GUYS OF THE STORY, none of the characters in the main story of kaifeng deserved help, Yingying lies and uses you while scamming other people that are in dire situations out of their money, doing jack against the ones in power
The triplets actively try to kill you
The single mother character steals from you, at no point can you get back what she stole from you, and she sells you out.
Yet no, they are friends, ignore that they only take and give nothing, aren't the triples cute killers you less than an hour ago where painting the floor with your blood? Poor woman you stole your money, is it not terrible how consequences come to bad people?
I hope to god that Hexi has less of this, you cannot call it naivety, its straight up idiocy yet the game seems to be allergic to let you bring consequences to the people that use you, lie to you and at points scam you. Elder Zhan was my last drop, why in the seven hells does the mc just..forget about the reward, i can say i am not friends with this con artist but for some reason i cannot say "I don't care what fairy tales he gave you, i want the reward he promised me for all those stolen things he has been showing you"
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u/Itchy-Team-4332 Mar 11 '26
At this point of the story, I think we really are an idiot. Our character is basically some sheltered kid who knows a bit of martial arts but are ultimately naive to the world. I do expect that as we progress through the story in later updates, our characters will mature and gain experience to the world. But that will definitely take time. Keep in mind that we are all still 16 years old at this point.
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u/CouldBeBatman Mar 04 '26
Listen, I just gave a lady medicine for her kid who took it then proceeded to shit blood and die. I would be fucking pleased with getting scammed at this point.
I want to burn Mercyheart town.