Successor (BTVS)

I have no real idea if this plan has any worth, or even makes sense out of the confines of my own mind, but this has piqued my interest, so I'm throwing my two cents in. Fair warning though I don't know BtVS, I've never watched more than bits and pieces of the show, and most of my knowledge comes from other pieces of fiction.





[X] Plan Professional, not Personal
-[X] Sigh, and then ask Willow and Xander to step out of the room for a little while. While they are both making rather good points in regards to Amy, they're also engaging in hostilities with her which undermines your own position.
-[X] "I don't like you and I don't trust you after what you did... but this isn't about me and my personal feelings. Right now I'm not acting as Buffy, I'm acting as Mayor of an crumbling town, desperately trying to keep a broken and abused system running for just that extra little bit of time, day in and day out, hoping that it won't come crashing down on all of our heads —your fathers included."
-[X] "Mayor Wilkins made a deal with a Daemonic Rat God thing that has an evil law firm by the Name of Wolfram and Hart breathing down our necks for a contractual violation. The monster skeleton that Rack took was supposed to go to the Rat thing, and in return it would prevent Hellmouth Plagues from spreading all over the place." Explain the potential consequences of not being able to verify what the Rat God is saying, and the possible Beni fits of being able to come to a mutually beneficial deal while excluding Wolfram and Hart.
-[X] "Frankly, I'd rather not have to make deals like this, but that's not and option, so instead, you can go free. You can keep living here in Sunnydale. You can become an independent magical contractor even. I don't really care what you do, as long as it's not causing harm. That freedom does come with conditions though."
-[X] Have Amy be put on parole with set terms and conditions with the following possibilities; limitations on what types and quantities of magic she can use, being barred from specific dealers of magical goods and paraphernalia, having a curfew or specific areas she cannot go. Some things that should not be negotiable should be Drug Counseling of one form or another, possibly Therapy regarding her mental state, and participating in some form of training for the City Watch. The conditions should be somewhat open ended with the idea of giving Amy some rope to work with, but not enough that she could immediately turn on us.



In the world of politics, war, and businesses the enemies of today can quite possibly be the friends of tomorrow if the circumstances are right. Thus it is our job to weight the scales as much as possible in a beneficial direction. The plan is based on the idea of not gaining an enemy where possible and that Buffy needs to at least weight the options, not just reject things out of hand because of what happened.


To my limited understanding Amy is mostly a victim of Rack, drug abuse, and a terrible home life being exploited leading to a relatively damaged personality. Give her enough rope to hang with, and she might surprise you and become loyal to the person who gave her a second chance. Or at the very least try and make sure the powerful magic user remains stable through counseling, family, and not spending her days having a group of people to hate for locking her up.


We have leverage over her with her father, she cares for him in some capacity, and if we can't figure out a solution with the Rat he has the potential of dying from the plague as well as her and all of us. This solves the issue of keeping her loyal for the moment, the later is solved with keeping Amy relatively close and under some type of watch which reduces over time.

Nurgle said:

how is this for a plan? Any criticism?

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None of your spellcasters currently knows any spells to actually turn people into rats, but you could always lie about that part, and Willow could likely figure it out eventually. You could also try beating on Amy until she willingly turns herself into a rat if it comes to that, but that has a lot of ways to go wrong obviously. The general theme of threatening violence for misbehavior is perfectly allowable (and as far as Buffy can guess, Matt won't bat an eye at such threats.)

Keeping Amy around to do odd jobs is fine, that was one of Xander's main arguments.

Also though, what's a "chit beating"?

DeAnno said:

None of your spellcasters currently knows any spells to actually turn people into rats, but you could always lie about that part, and Willow could likely figure it out eventually. You could also try beating on Amy until she willingly turns herself into a rat if it comes to that, but that has a lot of ways to go wrong obviously. The general theme of threatening violence for misbehavior is perfectly allowable (and as far as Buffy can guess, Matt won't bat an eye at such threats.)

Keeping Amy around to do odd jobs is fine, that was one of Xander's main arguments.

Also though, what's a "chit beating"?

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Sorry that is suppose to be chair beating.

Lyres Veneer said:

possibly Therapy regarding her mental state

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It behooves me to warn you that while the thrust of your plan is reasonably IC (be professional, appeal to Amy's love for her father, and try to reform her), Buffy Summers would absolutely never suggest anything involving professional therapists, except possibly to torture someone. Buffy being temporarily involuntarily committed post movie and pre show is canon for Successor.

Also remember that this may all be in Buffy mind and she may just be a crazy person in the marvel universe.

Just as a general announcement, to make sure there are no misunderstandings:

• I'll usually only comment on a plan if there are parts Buffy absolutely just would refuse to do, or if asked directly about the plan. If there are things that are just a bit off usually I can smooth them into something more reasonably IC while maintaining the general idea.
  
• Any comments I make about plans are only relative to things Buffy knows herself, or could easily find out from her friends just by asking, and I generally limit even these to factual information like no one being able to rat-ify people right now.
• Obviously me saying anything about if various plans will be productive or unproductive in a larger context would be pretty cheaty, so I don't do it. Me saying things are OK or not in these kinds of comments should purely be interpreted as "something Buffy would do" and not "something that will work." The stick plans and the carrot plans are obviously very different in nature and I'm not trying to comment on which approach is better.
• I was going to tell you that Buffy is definitely not a crazy person in a mental asylum, but then again I haven't given you any interludes yet so that's not an unreasonable paranoid fear to have. Carry on.

Actually it's hinted at that Buffy in the marvel universe is a mutant that can see her life in a alternate universes. Since in the marvel universe she is the cousin of one of the XMen.

Do people actually want to go with the rat nobles being allowed to travel the city option? That seems like the only pick that makes Amy staying around seem worthwhile. If she stays in sunnydale long term she is absolutely going to cause problems, it is literally all she does in canon. We already have one blond to keep an eye on and under control, I really dont see the appeal to adding another if we dont absolutely need her.

@DeAnno do we know when the last time the Rat King got paid was?

mc2rpg said:

do we know when the last time the Rat King got paid was?

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He was last paid on March 24th in 1992, with three Lyr eggs. That payment was previously negotiated on October 14th in 1983, which was the date of the previous payment. Payments seem to happen every five to ten years, with the next payment and the date of next payment negotiated during the payment and added to the contract. All the payments so far (going back to the first in 1931) have been various objects like the eggs or the skeleton, rather than services, or the 'Pacts' that were brought up in the meeting.

Stealing that skeleton just gets more and more appealing. I hope Amy can put a much nicer spin on the Pacts than Lindsey did, because I doubt any of the Pacts are going to count as forever payments.

So now that we're here and Amy's unrepentant are we stuck with her option? The vote was by one and it wasn't particularly heated and she isn't looking like she is going to change her tune. Can we go talk to the rat king and steal the bones if we don't like/trust what we hear?

Lost Egos said:

So now that we're here and Amy's unrepentant are we stuck with her option? The vote was by one and it wasn't particularly heated and she isn't looking like she is going to change her tune. Can we go talk to the rat king and steal the bones if we don't like/trust what we hear?

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You can make a plan to let her rot and go do something else instead, if you really hate her that much; part of the point of bringing Willow and Xander was to get a read on her, after all.

You'll also get to make decisions while/after talking to the rat king, so you could use Amy to talk to him, and then decide to try to steal the bones anyway if it still seems like the best idea. Some of the things people have brought up in thread will automatically be brought up in the Rat King discussion, like getting more specific terms for the Pacts, checking on deal durations, asking if he would maybe just like someone murdered instead, and so on.

I am still very in favor of stealing the bones, and am kind of hoping we end up doing that. However Amy did win so we might as well try to negotiate with her and see what the rat king has to say before we consider refighting that fight. Maybe it wont be necessary and Lindsey was horribly skewing the offers. Whether or not Amy is helpful and leads to an easy solution for the problem though I would really prefer to get her out of Sunnydale. She wants to stay, and that's understandable, but it isnt acceptable.

In canon once Amy was left alone for a season she started tossing horrible curses at people almost at random, and I dont think she is going to get much better if she is allowed to sit around sunnydale feeling smug about pulling one over on Buffy. Better to have her end up somewhere else and pissed off and scared, that way if we ever see her again we will know she is coming as an enemy rather than just constantly having to wonder if she finally talked herself into thinking she is hot shit that can get away with anything.

[X] Plan Professionals Have Standards
-[X] Ask Willow and Xander to step out of the room for a little while. While they are both making rather good points in regards to Amy, they're also engaging in hostilities with her which undermines your own position.
-[X] "I don't think I can trust you after what you did. I don't think I can even like you, but this isn't about me and my personal feelings. Right now I'm not acting as Buffy, I'm acting as Mayor of an crumbling town, desperately trying to keep a broken and abused system running for just that extra little bit of time, day in and day out, hoping that it won't come crashing down on all of our heads — your father included."
-[X] "Mayor Wilkins made a deal with a Demon Rat God Thing that has an evil law firm breathing down our necks for a contractual violation. The monster skeleton that you helped Rack take was supposed to go to the Rat Thing, and in return it would prevent Hellmouth Plagues from spreading all over the place." Explain the potential consequences of not being able to verify what the Rat God is saying.
-[X] "Frankly, I'd rather not have to make deals like this, but that's not an option. I either have to trust an evil law firm that would happily sell everyone as demon chow, or call for help from amoral crusaders who would probably try to kill half the people I know... or I can work with you. I might not be able to trust you, but I trust my other options even less. So you can go free. You can keep living here in Sunnydale. You can become an independent magical contractor, even. I don't really care what you do, as long as it's not hurting people. But that freedom comes with conditions."
-[X] Have Amy be put on parole with set terms and conditions with the following possibilities; limitations on what types and quantities of magic she can use, being barred from specific dealers of magical goods and paraphernalia, having a curfew or specific areas she cannot go. Drug counseling (or magical rehab or something like that) isn't negotiable, because if what Amy said before is true, that she went along with everything to get her next fix, then she needs help. The conditions should be somewhat open-ended with the idea of giving Amy some rope to work with, but not enough that she could immediately turn on us. If she violates her parole we are entirely willing to go to her father and demonstrate magic and the supernatural to him, then tell him exactly what has been going on with Amy -- we haven't done that yet because we know how much it can screw with your life, having someone mess with your parents.
-[X] Make it clear that if Amy works with us, not for us, not as a 'minion', but as a person who knows just how bad things can get and is willing to put personal issues aside for the sake of saving people, that the City of Sunnydale would be willing to hire her services on occasion.

Ugh, just ugh to this whole situation. Amy is half entitled and other half smug through pretty much all of this. She doesn't show a hint of remorse or even that she feels suitably scared by this (she said she 'didn't like being in jail' but that was pretty matter of fact, I don't think prison changed her). If she showed a bit more willingness to work with us, or leave after she's done, maybe I could get working with her... but I just don't see it here. She sold or mom off and then tried to backstab us and her main concern is still numero uno.

Maybe, if we had enough resources we could constantly keep an eye on her and make sure she wasn't up to evil, but it's been pretty obvious that we're always going to be short on something and spreading ourselves thin just so we can keep her in town isn't a great deal (and she's going to balk at every limitation we throw at her, which will further sour how well she helps us with the diplomacy here). If we tell her we won't let her stay though, she's almost certain to either backstab us (if we don't agree to let her go if a deal can't be brokered) or just be useless and not give us much real information to work with (wasting our time and putting us back at square one if we do agree to let her go).

I don't want to let her go in town. Best case scenario is that she's dumb enough to pull some nonsense and get caught quickly, but I think she's too smart for that after this time. No, more likely is she'll lay low, only causing a few minor bad deeds that she can slip by here and there. We'll forget about her in time, but she'll be waiting, ready to backstab us with the first group that seems strong enough to take us. She's quite ready to sell her magic already, Wolfram and Hart would probably love an in with a magic user for sale in Sunnydale. Glorificus and her cult are going to be a nightmare to deal with already, them having a magic user would certainly make things worse. Hell, maybe she'd team up with Faith and some other villain and form a New Triumvirate. Whatever happens, leaving her around is going to get us stabbed in the back.

I don't think it's worth it, especially since the end result would still leave us paying a price at the end for the Rat King, and no guarantee even if Amy really did try her best to help us (definitely not assured) that we'd even get that much better a deal than Rat King is offering already. I say screw her and her demands. My vote goes to stealing the skeleton from Wolfram and Hart (though I could be convinced to ask the Watcher's Council for help if people are really leaning towards that option instead. We might have some trouble with any onerous demands they give us, but they're better than the other diplomacy choices and probably have the resources to help us out with payment as well [though the more we ask, the more they'll demand in control]).

[X] Plan: Diplomacy's Overrated, Intrigue all the Way
-[X] You've talked to Amy and her terms and attitude are just unacceptable. Go for plan Willow, steal the skeleton from Wolfram and Hart

I assume if we go for this option we'll get another vote to choose how exactly we're trying to do the heist/gain information to do the heist, right @DeAnno ?

Can we make her release conditional on her attending magic rehab? Willow went to England for that, so two rabbits, one really large hammer.

Lab_Accident said:

Can we make her release conditional on her attending magic rehab? Willow went to England for that, so two rabbits, one really large hammer.

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Edited my plan to make that aspect a bit clearer.

[X] Plan Professionals Have Standards

Let's put on our big girl pants and start mayoring shit.

Blueshift said:

I assume if we go for this option we'll get another vote to choose how exactly we're trying to do the heist/gain information to do the heist

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I agree that the ideal end state is bouncing back to theft, but I feel like immediately trying to revote the last vote without giving this a real shot would be a bit tacky. Would you consider giving her a deal that includes her getting out of town and then deciding on whether or not stealing is the right way to go after she has either turned us down or talked to the rat king?

Wait, by the sounds of it.
She is the reason why we have the problem with the rat king himself.
Likely the law company hired the whathisname to steal the skeleton and they in turn used their slavishly drugged up Amy do get it.

Amy was the one stealing and smuggling out the bones one by one anyhow? So if it'd be unlikely we'd have the full skeleton in any case.

How to carve out a spot for her I wonder, so she'd cheat other people instead of the town.
If we manage to employ Amy permanently, it'd be like employing the Law company. But Amy's one person, not a business.
It'd be fine long as she managed to bamboozle our foes, to if she did that to our allies....

[x] Plan be a good little rat
-[X] Amy will be given "bail" but will be return to jail if a deal is not reached with the rat king. Also her record will be "lost" but if she does her old tricks it can be found again.
-[X] if Amy attempts anything she will be turned into a rat after a severe chair beating.
-[X] Amy will be allowed to remain in Sunnydale
-[X] if Amy is found doing something that Buffy consider evil or dangerous rat and chair beating.
-[X] Amy will also be on call to make deals with the rat king or if her expertise is required or she is called upon.
-[X] follow Buffy rules and one day when she is called on she will be compensated the city does have a good benefit package.
-[X] Remind Amy how much Buffy understands having one parent in her life and how a parent can be devastate by hearing something horrible about a child they love.

This sounds good, we pay her and if she does anything we disprove of she's back to the rat-cage in a rat form, or beaten by a chair.

On a second thought I'm ok with just letting her wallow in her cage too.

[X] Plan: Diplomacy's Overrated, Intrigue all the Way
-[X] You've talked to Amy and her terms and attitude are just unacceptable. Go for plan Willow, steal the skeleton from Wolfram and Hart

Surely when we start to turn around, she wouldn't start begging? Tho I doubt we'd comply to her, considering that's not in the vote or the intention.

Blueshift said:

I assume if we go for this option we'll get another vote to choose how exactly we're trying to do the heist/gain information to do the heist, right @DeAnno ?

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If you vote to heist I don't think you'll get a vote to back out (Buffy is only capable of so much waffling), but there will be choices to make inside the heist.

Lab_Accident said:

Can we make her release conditional on her attending magic rehab? Willow went to England for that, so two rabbits, one really large hammer.

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Magic rehab in England (with the Devon Coven) is up to their eyeballs with the Watcher's council. Only Giles even knows about that, he hasn't suggested it, and if you tried to do it you might as well involve the Watchers anyway. Plus, Amy probably would interpret that as being exiled with more steps. No go, doesn't make sense for Buffy to try in this situation because Giles wouldn't have reason to bring up it's a thing.

You COULD make a condition of her release having Willow, Giles, or someone put strict limits on her magic usage here.

mc2rpg said:

I agree that the ideal end state is bouncing back to theft, but I feel like immediately trying to revote the last vote without giving this a real shot would be a bit tacky. Would you consider giving her a deal that includes her getting out of town and then deciding on whether or not stealing is the right way to go after she has either turned us down or talked to the rat king?

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Fine, though I don't think we'll get too much useful stuff out of her given that we are banishing her afterwards (though that in itself is a good option as long term we don't really have a jail for her. Let's see what she says then think heavily about stealing the bones.

[X] Plan Exile or Else

[X] Plan: Diplomacy's Overrated, Intrigue all the Way
-[X] You've talked to Amy and her terms and attitude are just unacceptable. Go for plan Willow, steal the skeleton from Wolfram and Hart

[] Professional Plans

Are not going to work Amy doesn't care about the greater good and can't be trusted not to defect in any prisoners dilemma.

Amy (maybe) leaves the cage in 12 hours.

EDIT: These plans are a bit of a tangle of tangles, so people should remember to approval vote if that makes sense for them. In hindsight voting by task might have done this a little more cleanly, but hindsight is 20/20.

[X] Plan: Diplomacy's Overrated, Intrigue all the Way
-[X] You've talked to Amy and her terms and attitude are just unacceptable. Go for plan Willow, steal the skeleton from Wolfram and Hart