I thought it would face a very bad backlash and don't feel like having an argument. Too tired and frustrated. Sorry about this.
Bronzetongue is arguing from a supernatural perspective
I've been packing too much into the same posts on this. My general point is that this operation is a fractally bad idea, it has problems from every angle that compound with each other.
Rhetorically that's left my argument all over the place though.
We announced it to White Court. White Court are predators of mortals. They talk to mortals, yes, and the information does proliferate, yes, but by the time the information we gave when visiting White Court and then murdering a lot of them, it will be very distorted
Are you suggesting that the white court all collectively double crossed us? Because the nature of the announcement was the peace offering we got to placate us for the violation of our agreement.
The only way we're specifically connected to the event is by information that leaked through the channels which had that story in them. Unless you've got better direct observation, in which case you're probably more clued in and not less.
I disagree. A mobster is not an existential ever-present threat. A vampire lives by eating people
If they're expansive and successful at usurping governmental control they are to the government.
Here is an example of how I see this unfolding.
1) The mob expands, whether it fully cleans up or not makes no difference.
2) The mundane authorities flip a lid, because that kind of growth is a real problem for civil society and is exactly their job to handle. We can't shut this down without functionally obliterating the Masquerade.
3) As the mundane pressure mounts, probably with a few "helpful" little pushes from supernatural powers that don't like what's happening, we have a choice to make. Either defending the mob from the consequences of their actions using our supernatural nation state resources or letting them be damaged by the authorities.
Any sort of intervention we perform will intrinsically undermine the rule of law.
4) Supernaturally backed mobsters building a criminal empire is a dream case for Daedalus, and attention getting for any other law enforcement in the know.
Now the Library has the stain of association with the problem, which will be known because the evidence of our involvement will be in the hands of people the Feds are well equipped to investigate and exceedingly difficult to hide besides, and have to figure out how to stop a fight between us and federal government.
5) The forces which want to pick a fight grow, because there's a huge well of resources that they can tap which the cooperative ones can't because what they're advocating looks blatantly corrupt to the unaware and because the Feds are very comfortable with the idea that they are the top dogs.
6) Things proceed to (someone else's) hell in a hand basket.
Are you talking about people on the street or political operators? Separate those arguments, please. From the perspective of politicians, White Council is worse than Marcone. From the perspective of civilians on the street, White Court and ghouls are worse than Marcone. In both cases, we associate and/or support and/or command things worse than Marcone already
People on the street would find either option bad, but one worse than the other.
They aren't going to be framing it that way though, because it's not multiple choice if you only see the single manifest option in front of you. This one doesn't even need to involve our reputation, just this rebranded organization suffering from its overall past.
In terms of political actors I've partially addressed this above. The mundane authorities will take issue for unavoidable mundane reasons. Half of the supernatural government authorities will almost certainly egg them on because this is the low end of stuff they were founded to fight. The other half will need to fight a losing battle to keep them from pushing the envelope.
Just having people working for us isn't as much of a problem as what we have them doing. You could be 100% correct about the ethical implications of having a vampire in our accounting department and it wouldn't lessen the reaction to a new and different in your face problem we're backing.
No? Like, by the end of the discussion, I pretty much consider myself validated and think that the approach was fully correct. The elder Dragonblooded already knew a lot of this, and Odin already knew we were involved before we approached the elder. The elder was basically testing our character through the whole discussion. We proved ourselves genuine and not deceitful and earned approval of the elder.
So, they were already in contact with Odin. I amguessing he'll start featuring dragonblooded mercenaries soon.
[X] Hopefully trouble hasn't followed me so far, but there's certainly the wrong kind of interest afoot (Explain Anti-Bob's interest in Odin't actions especially the Kingfisher's purpose)
We pretty much have to do this with what we already disclosed.
One of the oldest tricks in the book is pretending you know more than you do to get people to share what you need to learn. I don't think it's wise to give the connection away until we know the game is up.
It's especially relevant because if Odin knew these people were linked to the dragon he wouldn't be sailing aimlessly around the sea looking for it. He'd follow the leyline to the source and do whatever he's planning to do.
I think we should try for a conversation short the Valkyrie, because she doesn't need free confirmation of anything.
Even mentioning the leyline is a mistake because it's natural for them to follow up on our business and that will lead them right to the dragon.
I think negotiations with Odin are something of a lose condition here, because he has so many ways to leverage our debt that it makes it significantly more difficult to work around him.
"Egypt, if it's anywhere on Earth it's in Egypt."
Speaking of language changing the way the matriarch mutters curses under her breath has a distinctly different feel to it than the Icelandic you heard around you in the city. Still it's understandable enough her her granddaughter —though there are most likely some more 'greats' in the— to give her a scandalized look. Ragnhildur turns to the Chooser to the Slain and says without preamble, there's your price then crow's daughter, help us pick the eyes of that corpse and set them to embers and you'll have our pledge to your master's working.
"What working?"
"To wake the Fire Serpent, that out liege might speak to him of the thing which he guards, once we find him at least," the valkyrie speaks. "Even as the memories of the dragonblood stretch it has been a long time since he coiled down onto a bed to stone to slumber and pulled the water over his head."
Here is your approach to the situation backfiring because you didn't consider our competition being here and negotiating with them in advance important to how people would act in the scene.
If we'd spilled to the elder alone we would have had an opportunity at a much better deal and wouldn't have given Odin so much free information.
We salvaged parts of things going forward, but fixing things isn't the same as them not having been broken and not screwing up would let us get further from the start.
Edit:
Not to ask you to prove a negative, but what do you think the position and information levels of these players is?
Say you run the task force on Marcone. What is your response to what a mundane investigator sees of this unfolding?
Edit2:
I'm going to back off from this a bit, because I'm getting too salty about it and clearly the thread doesn't agree with me here and so arguing the point continuously is just annoying.
I stand by everything I've written on this, but I don't see a point in writing hundreds of words that aren't changing anyone's mind.
