So it's not really relevant to the vote at hand, unless some major changes occur, but I want to share my thoughts on [ ] Bloodwraith
There is a lot to like about it mechanically, and lots of people have eluded to it's short and long term impact on survivability, so I won't spend too much time reiterating those points. I will note that it comes packaged with a -1 pick, so far all intents and purposes it is a 1 pick 2 Arete item that more than gets the job done.
Secondly:
Verschlengorge gets a slap in the rank. Not the end of the world, what can be drawn from him can be replaced in time. Additionally, we would be slower on the return trip - potentially relevant, probably equivalent to the +1 day spent outfitting him unless we beef him up before leaving.
Thirdly, and what I'm most interested in talking about, is --Letrizia.
Mechanically, it has been pointed out, that this is basically what relationship points are for. You get +happy now so you can -sad them later, and they'll continue to kill stuff with you. And from the perspective of a spreadsheet, it's hard to find anything incorrect with this.
Before the trip she was at 6 happy points, after this she'll only be down to 5. She'll like as as much as she did when we started healing Versch with the Pristine Light! I think... this is about as far as mechanics can take us though.
Letrizia is a young woman who has had to grow up fast. I can only speculate on a lot of things, but it's probably not a stretch to say an Armament pilot isn't going to have a great many friends.
Add to that, she is grappling with a great deal of uncertainty about whether she has been betrayed by the folks who would have been her friends. While she's pretty certain the human sphere will welcome her back, she has to have some amount of trepidation about what she might uncover.
Now bring in Hunger. In front of Letrizia, who has he been? In the beginning - a hero. He came in, slew the dragon, andflirted with Gisena Gisena flirted with him. What's heroic about that? Okay it's not, but I had completely forgotten that happened.
He was quick to sign up for escort duty afterward, and has pretty steadfastly been a positive role model for her since. We've been light with each other, ribbing and playful. It's easy to bounce things off all three of the cast. Letrizia knows, based on every interaction we've had with her, that we care about her. We're looking out for her, whether she needs us to or not. We are a friend.
So leaving behind mechanics, where would we be narratively? [ ] Bloodwraith's danger isn't that it arbitrarily knocks off a few happiness points. The issue is that it completely alters the relationship between them.
This will be the first time we break her trust. We would hurt her, and that would be bad enough, but this will be the first time we wield the ugly face of the Tyrant against her. She may understand we have a problem, but it has never been directed at her.
We will be introducing the concept that we don't always have her best in mind, that sometimes we aren't even her friend. Thats going to hurt the worst for someone so lacking in trustworthy companionship.
It's easy for humans to rationalize things, it's also easy to makes excuses for friends. Especially if they don't have many. Especially if the problem being caused isn't personal. Letrizia can feel compassion for Hunger when Gisena swoops in after a Tyrant proc on a random noble. When Gisena explains he has issues they are working on, Letrizia can understand and want to help. Directed at anyone else, Letrizia can justify our Tyrant curse.
It becomes exponentially more difficult for humans to forgive when the offense is directed at them. And most humans could at least ask for forgiveness, but lets look at what we'll be dealing with:
*Doom of the Tyrant: Hunger will extract large quantities of Verschlengorge's blood for his experiments without even thinking to ask Letrizia, weakening its Astral Rank to 4. After all, he's its bonded Cursebearer, a position both he and Verschlengorge know is above that of its pilot!
This is full on Tyrant speak. She's going to be upset and hurt, and Hunger is not going to care. In the same way he didn't give a damn about the border, he's going to inform her that she had no right to know. He's going to be blunt, inconsiderate, and quite possibly cruel. I don't want to ever see the conversation where Hunger lets Letrizia know he's *above* her in regards to the only constant she has had in her life. Ick.
The other issue is that this opens pandoras box. I don't believe at all that this won't reverberate throughout the story. If we show that Hunger is willing to let the Tyrant take over in regards to his personal relationships, I guarantee we'll see it in the story from now on.
Currently, with our friends, we embody all the traits we vote on. We're heroic, steadfast, loyal, protective, all these things you wouldn't bat an eye at. They are just a part of his character. This will be adding a new column into our interactions, we'll be slotting in the Tyrant for dinner because we've decided that is acceptable.
I believe that this vote, and in the future others like it, are indicative of who Hunger is. If we don't want to see him abuse his friends, run roughshod over them, we have to keep this in mind.
This is not at all to say -relationships are eternally bad, but we have to look very carefully at the context of each one. If we are what we eat, Hunger is what we vote.
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I know I'm kind of making a mountain out of a mole hill with the state of things, but I still wanted to say my piece and articulate it for myself as well. Similar votes could be in our future and if I'm wrong about how this might narratively affect things, I'd love to have that discussion now when the stakes aren't high.
There is a lot to like about it mechanically, and lots of people have eluded to it's short and long term impact on survivability, so I won't spend too much time reiterating those points. I will note that it comes packaged with a -1 pick, so far all intents and purposes it is a 1 pick 2 Arete item that more than gets the job done.
Secondly:
Verschlengorge gets a slap in the rank. Not the end of the world, what can be drawn from him can be replaced in time. Additionally, we would be slower on the return trip - potentially relevant, probably equivalent to the +1 day spent outfitting him unless we beef him up before leaving.
Thirdly, and what I'm most interested in talking about, is --Letrizia.
Mechanically, it has been pointed out, that this is basically what relationship points are for. You get +happy now so you can -sad them later, and they'll continue to kill stuff with you. And from the perspective of a spreadsheet, it's hard to find anything incorrect with this.
Before the trip she was at 6 happy points, after this she'll only be down to 5. She'll like as as much as she did when we started healing Versch with the Pristine Light! I think... this is about as far as mechanics can take us though.
Letrizia is a young woman who has had to grow up fast. I can only speculate on a lot of things, but it's probably not a stretch to say an Armament pilot isn't going to have a great many friends.
Add to that, she is grappling with a great deal of uncertainty about whether she has been betrayed by the folks who would have been her friends. While she's pretty certain the human sphere will welcome her back, she has to have some amount of trepidation about what she might uncover.
Now bring in Hunger. In front of Letrizia, who has he been? In the beginning - a hero. He came in, slew the dragon, and
He was quick to sign up for escort duty afterward, and has pretty steadfastly been a positive role model for her since. We've been light with each other, ribbing and playful. It's easy to bounce things off all three of the cast. Letrizia knows, based on every interaction we've had with her, that we care about her. We're looking out for her, whether she needs us to or not. We are a friend.
So leaving behind mechanics, where would we be narratively? [ ] Bloodwraith's danger isn't that it arbitrarily knocks off a few happiness points. The issue is that it completely alters the relationship between them.
This will be the first time we break her trust. We would hurt her, and that would be bad enough, but this will be the first time we wield the ugly face of the Tyrant against her. She may understand we have a problem, but it has never been directed at her.
We will be introducing the concept that we don't always have her best in mind, that sometimes we aren't even her friend. Thats going to hurt the worst for someone so lacking in trustworthy companionship.
It's easy for humans to rationalize things, it's also easy to makes excuses for friends. Especially if they don't have many. Especially if the problem being caused isn't personal. Letrizia can feel compassion for Hunger when Gisena swoops in after a Tyrant proc on a random noble. When Gisena explains he has issues they are working on, Letrizia can understand and want to help. Directed at anyone else, Letrizia can justify our Tyrant curse.
It becomes exponentially more difficult for humans to forgive when the offense is directed at them. And most humans could at least ask for forgiveness, but lets look at what we'll be dealing with:
*Doom of the Tyrant: Hunger will extract large quantities of Verschlengorge's blood for his experiments without even thinking to ask Letrizia, weakening its Astral Rank to 4. After all, he's its bonded Cursebearer, a position both he and Verschlengorge know is above that of its pilot!
This is full on Tyrant speak. She's going to be upset and hurt, and Hunger is not going to care. In the same way he didn't give a damn about the border, he's going to inform her that she had no right to know. He's going to be blunt, inconsiderate, and quite possibly cruel. I don't want to ever see the conversation where Hunger lets Letrizia know he's *above* her in regards to the only constant she has had in her life. Ick.
The other issue is that this opens pandoras box. I don't believe at all that this won't reverberate throughout the story. If we show that Hunger is willing to let the Tyrant take over in regards to his personal relationships, I guarantee we'll see it in the story from now on.
Currently, with our friends, we embody all the traits we vote on. We're heroic, steadfast, loyal, protective, all these things you wouldn't bat an eye at. They are just a part of his character. This will be adding a new column into our interactions, we'll be slotting in the Tyrant for dinner because we've decided that is acceptable.
I believe that this vote, and in the future others like it, are indicative of who Hunger is. If we don't want to see him abuse his friends, run roughshod over them, we have to keep this in mind.
This is not at all to say -relationships are eternally bad, but we have to look very carefully at the context of each one. If we are what we eat, Hunger is what we vote.
--------
I know I'm kind of making a mountain out of a mole hill with the state of things, but I still wanted to say my piece and articulate it for myself as well. Similar votes could be in our future and if I'm wrong about how this might narratively affect things, I'd love to have that discussion now when the stakes aren't high.
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