Okay guys, here's my plan: Main settlement as far as we can get away from the DP and Nomads, Secondary Walls on our settlement closest to the DP, and Epand Warriors secondary. My thought is that if we draw the people that are really going to want revenge into our army, we can begin assimilation much easier with the most explosive elements being sat on. Then a Blackbirds action the turn after that to restore any lost stability, but critically, with their own relatives as part of the Blackbirds instead of feeling like outsiders getting picked on when we restore harmony.
Okay guys, here's my plan: Main settlement as far as we can get away from the DP and Nomads, Secondary Walls on our settlement closest to the DP, and Epand Warriors secondary. My thought is that if we draw the people that are really going to want revenge into our army, we can begin assimilation much easier with the most explosive elements being sat on. Then a Blackbirds action the turn after that to restore any lost stability, but critically, with their own relatives as part of the Blackbirds instead of feeling like outsiders getting picked on when we restore harmony.
Are some of us already talking about next turn scenarios with the dissension unlikely to flip . Not a bad idea given the voting chaos that happens for what like the fist 30 min to hour after a new main post.
Here are some scenarios and options I can see we might be interested in for next turn. Also to consider the Sacred War might still be triggered.
Strike Back/Break DP Momentum - Main war mission , Secondary 1 Expand Warriors, 2 Sacred Warriors or other
If all goes well we should ensure that DP are in losing position with as much as their army dead before they retreat out of reach. I can't imagine that they very stable at home life and live off the spoils of conquest/victories. The reason for more warriors is that we will have tons of new very eager volunteers. We might even rescue even more citizens too as a reward.
Turtle - Main Walls- lowlands or Settlement - coast , 1 unused main, 2 other or Settlement - coast
I rely don't think this will be necessary with as DP will have to carve through whatever left of the WC and get past the Spirit Talkers attacks . We will most likely have turn before any serious attacks as DP haven't seen our lands before.
Emergency action/ Stability -2 - Main Restoration of Harmony, Sec 1 More Blackbirds, 2 Expand Warriors or any other crazy idea to synergy.
Worst possible outcome for this turn. Restoration of Harmony will probably work because its failing last time was we fighting our own government and was first use. More men to enforce it will also help now and for war later.
Combo/ balanced - Main war mission , Sec 1 Walls- lowlands, Settlement - coast, or other construction , 2 Special want or action.
Not putting too much investment in war but it can still do effective damage against DP. As we can be flexible for a bit because of our tech level discrepancy, but we should stay competitive with our choices.
Main: Settlement (Far away from the DP)
Secondary: Expand Warriors
Secondary: Wall (Settlement Near DP)
We might be able to restore stability to at least zero with no need for a festival. Instead, we would be addressing the actual problems that are causing instability. First, we would be giving everybody plenty of living space. Second, we would be providing security for the WC refugees by putting them out of the line of fire. Third, we would be reassuring our own people that no, we haven't forgotten them (the initial driver of instability the last time). Fourth, we would be providing a vector for widespread integration with the expansion of the warriors, and reassuring both our new and old people that we have a plan. Normally I would be worried about our Economy, but we receive a boost from the refugees anyway, and our Main Settlement action will pay out the next turn to cover any shortfalls.
Frankly, I prefer practical problem solving to bread and circuses. Yes, we might have to take a turn of instability, but that was going to happen anyway. And if we already have WCR warriors, we can make some of them Blackbirds while we restore harmony the next turn.
Main: Settlement (Far away from the DP)
Secondary: Expand Warriors
Secondary: Wall (Settlement Near DP)
We might be able to restore stability to at least zero with no need for a festival. Instead, we would be addressing the actual problems that are causing instability. First, we would be giving everybody plenty of living space. Second, we would be providing security for the WC refugees by putting them out of the line of fire. Third, we would be reassuring our own people that no, we haven't forgotten them (the initial driver of instability the last time). Fourth, we would be providing a vector for widespread integration with the expansion of the warriors, and reassuring both our new and old people that we have a plan.
Frankly, I prefer practical problem solving to bread and circuses. Yes, we might have to take a turn of instability, but that was going to happen anyway. And if we already have WCR warriors, we can make some of them Blackbirds while we restore harmony the next turn.
I can't imagine that addressing most of the problems that could cause instability wouldn't help our stability. And we know that synergy is a thing; AN explicitly has mentioned that we have missed some synergy in the past. More, even if it doesn't work, we do have ways of correcting for that. Even on their own these actions would be good, leaving us in a much more favorable position to ride out the coming storm. We need a bigger and better military; everybody but the WC is teching up military hard and fast. And the WC, well, we really don't want to follow their example.
We've got methods to restore stability so the advancements LoO give us make this probably worthwhile. As to the North... we definitely want to bring shaman support to make sure the STs don't demonize us for backing off, so we have to go all-in.
And it moves to a 1v1: ST vs. DP, as it always has been. I know people want the megaproject, but will we be able to hold if the DPs attack us while we're building it? It might still be worth it, but that's something important to consider.
Defensively, I think the canal project might actually help, the Canal is projected to take 3-4 turns currently, while the DPs are going to take that long to get close...if we do some prep with walls and settlement expansion to speed it up.
@veekie@Powerofmind
Something to remember as well is that every time we bring people in there is an auto Create Settlement, such as north when we created walls and the people pledged themselves to us and the Southern Valley Village. So might not be necessary to build a new settlement at all. Also might hilariously give us a new Settlement at the edge of the lowland that we wanted>:lol (Probably won't be walled though if true, in which case that takes priority)
Actually, based on what we've seen we don't get autosettlements.
The two settlements we got for free were already extant, namely the Northern Settlers in the hills of the north, and the Southern Settlers in the hills of the south.
Actually as far as I can tell:
-Festival - Economy cost(scales with Main). Roll for Stability boost(higher chance with Main, min 0). Caps out after a number of uses. These are annual festivals, so more than 4 is going to face diminishing returns.
-Restore Order(Sacred War only) - Gambles Stability(+1 on a success, +0 on a failure, -1 on a botch) on a Martial roll. Likely cap on maximum attainable Stability(+1 my guess). 50% chance of improvement on a Secondary.
-Restore Harmony(Sacred War + Harmony combo) - Gambles Stability(+2 on a major success, +1 on a success, +0 on a failure and -1 on a botch) on a Martial roll. Likely cap on maximum attainable Stability(+2 my guess). 50% chance of improvement on a Secondary.
Ironically then, it seems Restore Harmony is more powerful when we're already at positive stability, preemptively rooting out dissent, while Festivals are better if we're at 0 but can afford to gamble Economy. However Restore Harmony must use a Main action, because of the risk of backfire.
That's the mechanical look at it.
Now for the narrative look:
Festivals - They raise Stability by increasing ties between the people, feasting to take minds off the woes and generally improve baseline morale. In essence, a Festival is to Stability what a Settlement is to Economy, an initial large investment with a diverse payoff over time, and takes more than one generation to really penetrate.
Restore Order - They raise Stability by putting the visible threat of force into the public consciousness. Immediate gains possible, as anyone not so dissatisfied as to fight professional warriors will shut up and get back to work. This requires Sacred War(or some other similar devotion trait) to perform when at non-negative Stability, as the warriors need to be able to dedicate themselves to something more than personal loyalty to be trusted with this kind of enforcement.
Restore Harmony - They raise Stability by identifying and dealing with sources of dissent. Sometimes this is simply listening to/spying on the people's concerns and addressing them to preemptively quell unrest. Sometimes this is looking for criminals or scapegoats to blame for troubles(with the advantage that there always are actual criminals). This requires Sacred War to generate the kind of abstract loyalty to enforce it, and Harmony/Justice to find a better way than just beating faces in until people listen.
umm, have you even been paying attention to the DPs? War is what they do. Their entire economy revolves around war. Hell, their entire civilization is all about war. They're going to try invading us first chance they get.
That said, if we leech the lowlands of WC slaves by accepting them all, they're probably going to have to take 2-3 generations to spread across the lowlands.
Honestly, if I wasn't totally sure nobody would vote for it, I'd be supporting two settlements and a main wall in the lower valley next turn. One generation of low stability is bad, but it's not cripplingly bad. Half of the reason stability drops in a massive refugee action is the overcrowding anyway! I would consider possible synergy with adding enough settlements to handle the influx would reduce the stab hit after the fact.
I'm willing to back Main wall, but depending on the stability drop, we really should do Stability restoration. Spending even one turn at low stability had been so intensely aggravating that I don't want to repeat the experience.
I see a war with the DP this way; they have to cross the entire lowlands to reach us first, which means they'd be having the 6+ month trip to attack in the other direction. In addition, they have enemies from the ST at least, and potentially from further east with their other tributaries if they think they can get away with it. In addition, we also have significant defensive bonuses in our territory, which is, in itself, highly defensive terrain. Then to put the cherry on top, we'll have village walls.
A war with the DP, so long as we're not going out of our own land to fight them, pretty much can't end well for the DPs. They'll be walking into an enemy's territory with the highest logistical support network in the era. They likely won't be able to harm the local flies without the bulk of our forces suddenly falling on them.
They can get past the first issue of distance by settling outward, but they'll still have to traverse the minefield of other internal advantages we have.
We absolutely need to wall the lower valley. It's close enough that they could do some damage if they do something silly like MAXIMUM OVERDRIVE directly into us.
Which we avoided rather effectively the last time.
Definitely walling the lower valley, and agreed on Main for it.
However, I doubt they would take that long to spread geographically across the area, especially with the main opposition removed. It'd just take a few generations to breed up to scale again.
Walls, then maybe foresting the southern border or the like, would be very helpful
Not sure which village to main, but yeah, that's the gist of my ideal turn next turn (assuming I can't start the canal next turn instead). I fully trust we'd be able to deal with one turn of instability and fix it the turn after (and maybe that the greatly expanded living space would negate a point of the stab hit afterwards from the elimination of the sudden overcrowding.
Not necessarily. We did it last time. People just got even more unhappy about giving good land to newcomers and how they should have gotten it instead grumblegrumblegrumble.
It'd help keep things from getting even worse, but it won't improve things outright.
A new settlement would auto-expand the associated industries(Forests, Pastures, Farms, Fisheries) around it gradually, but we still need to take a Fishing expansion to actually direct significant efforts towards that so as to unlock better shipping.
It's possible that your presence would have pushed them over the edge in not being able to pull off the trick they did, but ehhhh... *waggles hand* maybe?
Figured as much. Said as much.
They're a momentum build, so if we had taken a Martial improvement action last turn with a War Mission we'd probably have blunted their resurgence.
If that is, the plague didn't fuck us.
Yes, but you have to devote both each turn and it consumes double the Econ.
Hmm, useful in niche cases(where we have an excess of economy, but say the Dead Priests are ALMOST HERE and we want to rush it out of the queue for double progress), but generally speaking we'd be better off building settlements along the construction path, expanding forests to increase material availability, or expanding economy to offset the costs.
That's not necessarily how it's relative. The scale could never rise above 10, but it would be like building our canal with bronze age techniques instead of stone age ones; it simply takes less time/economy points to do the deed. We have mil 5 right now, but compared to what we were on the first turn, it may be comparable to mil 10+, and our econ 5 from very early on may be as low as 2, compared to now. The numbers don't change, their representation does.
It's a different kind of relative, especially considering most of the values represent ongoing costs and investments.
Like, our Economy represents total, uncommitted food and population. When we take an action which costs Economy, the food production and population are still there, it just means that the excess food and population has been channeled into work of the Second and Third kinds.
Which in turn means that our Economy 0 is "We are going to have to go on short rations immediately if the harvest fails" whereas the WC's Economy 0 is "We're going to face starvation if the harvest fails".
I'd suggest we Main the wall for the South valley settlement. The Dead Priests can likely deal with weaker walls, just as we could if we encountered them. If you know how to build one you know how to deal with one.
Plus Main Walls gives us a better chance of making Walls automatic.
We might be able to restore stability to at least zero with no need for a festival. Instead, we would be addressing the actual problems that are causing instability. First, we would be giving everybody plenty of living space. Second, we would be providing security for the WC refugees by putting them out of the line of fire. Third, we would be reassuring our own people that no, we haven't forgotten them (the initial driver of instability the last time). Fourth, we would be providing a vector for widespread integration with the expansion of the warriors, and reassuring both our new and old people that we have a plan. Normally I would be worried about our Economy, but we receive a boost from the refugees anyway, and our Main Settlement action will pay out the next turn to cover any shortfalls.
Frankly, I prefer practical problem solving to bread and circuses. Yes, we might have to take a turn of instability, but that was going to happen anyway. And if we already have WCR warriors, we can make some of them Blackbirds while we restore harmony the next turn.
We know it doesn't work like that. We've addressed the root problem, but the thing is Stability is not rational. See how the last Stability cycle happened:
-We took in the refugees, causing a stability hit as resources were stretched thin and people had to deal with migrants taking good land without earning it.
-We founded a new settlement to appease the people angry about new land. Which meant that the unhappy people were now bitching about who got what.
-Which led to corruption, as people lost confidence in central authority and started taking what they weren't allocated.
-Which led to even MORE unhappy people, as trust fell.
It's a self sustaining cycle. Removing the root cause doesn't stop unhappy people, because unhappy people will gladly generate brand new reasons to be pissed off for more people.
That's why Festivals to build bonds between people help remove the trust issues, and Restore Harmony cuts off offenders before they can make things worse. They solve the stability issue from the morale angle, but you still need to solve the practical problems or Stability hits will recur. Likewise, solving the practical problems will not stop the Stability spiral because people are pissed off and not rational.
You know, I take a day off to focus on classwork, and this goddamn thread jumps 20+ pages on me...STOP DOING THAT PEOPLE!
Anyway, looks like the Vote's called, and can I just say the history nut inside of me is squealing at the potential stories far future archaeologists will learn about us? Like, good god the Dead Priests are definitely going to feature prominently in studies about our (current) time period, and depending on the future we will be seen as direct opponents to them and the Spirit Talkers.
Alright, first off I'd like to apologize for taking so long to do this. I was busy for the last day or two so I didn't have time to do a proper write up and analysis until today. As such, I'll be looking at the previous two turns and their effects on us thus far.
Realizing that they and their predecessors had made a series of blunders - namely that while a useful fool was useful, they were also still a fool and giving them power was not a path to long term success - the village chiefs pulled out the only tactic that they figured would be able to turn this around, even if it meant that they were going to lose power. Or at least lose a little power now rather than a whole lot in a few years.
"We've been reviewing things, and have come to the conclusion that we are unfairly excluding the shamans from the process of selecting the next High Chief," the leader of the reform movement told the current High Chief.
While the man had obvious objections to the idea of not selecting his son, he stumbled over the idea of saying 'No' directly to the shamans. So instead he allowed the debate to go forward and he approved the idea of bringing in at least the shamans in charge of the two holy sites to be members of the elective council, and for probably more of the spiritual folk to have an explicit rather than implicit voice in the decision making process. Still, he figured that getting the best person he knew for the job to be elected by the wise wasn't going to be a problem.
As it was, the next time the chiefs met, they were joined by a pair of wizened shamans, who were given seats in the circle. While on the one hand the High Chief was sure that everyone would agree with his assessment, he was the High Chief and it was his job to decide what was best for the People, something niggled at the back of his mind that maybe the shamans wouldn't agree with him, and if they didn't... he drew a blank there. Shamans had always been better at being intimidating than him so he wasn't sure if puffing himself up to get them to realize that they were being stupid and pigheaded when they disagreed with him was a good idea. He'd never hit anyone within the People, but he sometimes liked to make it look like he could to make them listen to his point, but against spirits? No, no that was a bad idea.
"So, we've been thinking about the choices of heir to the position of High Chief, as was requested of us for this meeting," the elder of the two shamans noted once the initial rites of opening were completed and all turned to see what the newcomers had to say. After a moment he said with a smile the High Chief couldn't quite place, "And we think that the son of the current High Chief is definitely a strong candidate in our minds, but we would ask the High Chief for additional consideration."
"I think you will find my son the strongest and most charming man of his generation, and-" the High Chief began, only to cut himself off when the shaman raised a hand to calmly signal that further argument was unneeded. Like a child whose hand had been slapped, the High Chief closed his mouth and motioned for the shaman to clarify.
"It is not that we think that he is the wrong candidate, just that the other chiefs have exposed to us an additional consideration that we have been too focused on other matters to realize up until now. The struggle against the blight and the continued management of the forests, and the conflict against the vile practices of the Dead Priests has revealed to us additional conflicts. What we have not been appreciating before this point is that in addition to the struggles of men, there are also struggles between spirits. As such, following from the chiefs petitioning for our inclusion in these matters, we also petition the chiefs that the heir receive additional instruction in spiritual matters, so that our advice and counsel might be better understood," the shaman explained.
At this the High Chief froze. It wasn't a terrible idea and he had no real argument against it that wouldn't result in him being cursed, but he didn't like it. After a moment he articulated, "My son is a warrior, not well suited to such education."
"The Blackbirds are warriors," the shaman countered, souring the High Chief's face even as he forced himself not to act.
"Yes, but they're all... skulky, you know? My boy is tall and shining and is best on a cart rather than hiding his face behind a mask hiding in the trees," the High Chief protested.
The shaman nodded and said, "This is true, but perhaps he can bridge a gap for us? Among our discussions, it has come up with increasing frequency that there are many spirits we are unable to give sufficient attention to as the current locations are ill-suited to their nature. We have been thinking that a location in the open pastures among the northern hills might be a location for our shamans to commune with the spirits of more open spaces and the sorts of animals that live within them. A warrior and cart rider would have much to learn and contribute in such a place, no?"
The high chief hemmed and hawed for a long time, but ultimately he decided that the shamans both knew what they were doing and had a point. The village chiefs on the other hand quickly enough came around to his way of thinking, and seemed oddly pleased by the time all was said and done.
All in all, this was a short but very important turn. During the turn before, we decided to bring in the shamans in order to counterbalance the unstable High Chief-Sub Chief power dynamic. It seems that the shamans may be taking to their new responsibilities a little too well.
A few things to note here:
- The Sub-Chiefs fucked up and they know it. They're happy to have the shamans on the council because they can mitigate the damage their puppet leader can cause through sheer accidental incompetence
- The current High Chief is, at best, tactless and impulsive. Seriously, he comes off as a whiny man-child who's throwing a tantrum because he can't get what he wants, only to realize that the adults have taken notice and are about to give him a spanking. I'm seriously tempted to kill off all the Sub-Chiefs for having the gall to elect someone like this as the leader of our people
- Am I the only one who thinks that the shamans are acting just a little bit skeevy here? Their first act was to increase their own influence (via creating a New Holy Site in the plains) and reassure the High Chief that they're willing to back his son... if they are allowed to teach and influence the heir. It just feels a bit troubling to me, you know?
At the end of this turn, we chose to withdraw from the conflict with the Dead Priests since our Economy had dropped two points (though our Martial and Mysticism both went up a bit). IIRC, the actions that won the vote were:
The spirits, it seems, do not appreciate the High Chief attempting to appoint his own son the heir, for disaster soon follows the election, with two years of drought and a particularly nasty outbreak of seasonal disease that is associated with the warriors going south to the lowlands to punish the Dead Priests there, with the whole thing culminating in the High Chief's son and heir getting kicked in the head by a horse and dying of fever two days later. The High Chief taking this all rather badly and the chiefs interpreting this as the disapproval of the spirits results in an older and more administratively competent man being elected heir. By the next solstice that man found himself High Chief proper, the former man having lost the will to live over the spirits taking exception to him and his decisions, and the loss of the one man he had thought capable of taking up the role.
So, in order:
- Drought and disease. Again. Luckily, we're not as vulnerable as any of the other groups, but it's still a pretty nasty problem
- The shamans have taken the cue to go all "the spirits are not happy! We need to change things!"
- The High Chief's son had an unfortunate accident while he was studying with the shamans. Deliberate or coincidence? Either way, they wasted no time selecting a more competent person as the new heir
- The High Chief himself suffered from a bad case of "lost the will to live" soon after, allowing the more administratively inclined heir to take over
I can't tell if installing the shamans into government was a good idea, but they're certainly doing a lot of work. And hey, our High Chief is no longer an incompetent moron, so that's a plus.
Despite the protests of the shamans and the warriors that there were still Dead Priests to kill, the new High Chief called for a halt to the yearly raids on Dead Priest territory, in order to better implement quarantine and to ensure that long lasting food stuffs were horded in case of further drought problems instead of being used by the warriors as portable rations. While this left many distinctly unhappy, the logic was sound so they acquiesced, and through expert management the flare-ups of disease settled back down to the typical seasonal culling of the very young and very old. While the rains remained unsettled, the new High Chief also ordered massive expansions of food generating activities to help compensate. In particular, he cut through a number of old arrangements for land cultivation in the hills to bring about the full sculpting of the valley hills into stepped terrace farms and orchards, and ensured that the practice was fully brought over to the other settlements. He also saw to the setting aside of more land to be managed as pasture in the north to allow for the increase of the size of the herds there without disrupting the thin forests or spreading too far out into places where greedy nomads might steal off with livestock and/or people.
Out on the coast, the efforts to expand fishing are met with mixed success. The distances that need to be traveled to get more fishing grounds are simply growing too large, and the fishers need to either establish new settlements to be based from - something the chiefs control so that rationing can be controlled - or someone needs to figure out a way to move a boat faster across the water so people can get to and from their fishing spots quicker and more safely.
I am so, so glad that we decided to go full Economy recovery last turn. Having a new administrative leader to focus on maximizing our food production saved us a lot of trouble. Combined with our LoO trait, I expect that we're going to be the only local group who leaves the drought with an even stronger economy then before.
On a different note, I'm unsure if the Step Farms has managed to upgrade or not, but the Fishing action dice seems to have flubbed on us. On the plus side, it looks like we can either set up another coastal village to automatically expand our fishing grounds or try the Expand Fishing action again to reroll and hopefully get better boat tech.
And then news comes from the south.
The warriors of the Dead Priests had evidently been occupied elsewhere since the construction of their damned wall, and are now pointed squarely at the Western Confederacy. Boiling out of their city like a summer plague, they swept away those raiding their western settlements and then began to push for the easternmost settlements of the Western Confederacy, the ones that had pushed into the lowlands. The fighting was by all accounts incredibly brutal, with the Dead Priests seeking out open conflict with masses of warriors instead of picking at vulnerable locations with raids, and while both sides were getting people killed by the gross, the Dead Priests had worked out a nasty new trick. They would divide their captives up into groups of fourteen and then lead them around their city, ritually sacrificing a person at a sacred location until there was only one person left, at which point they would force this person to add the skull bricks of their sacrificed compatriots to the wall, and then introduced to representatives of other peoples who had chosen to bend at the knee to the Dead Priests rather than continue resistance. The survivors were told that all the Dead Priests needed was someone from each settlement to be sent to them for each full moon. Just a minimum of thirteen people a year, and they could be drawn from the slaves, criminals or hated neighbours. If they sent more there were definite rewards, and by participating in battle with outsiders their contributions to the fight and captives could be counted towards their tribute of blood.
And then they escorted the survivor back to their own lands and let them go to tell their friends and family all of this. The Dead Priests also sent out messengers to do prisoner swaps after battles, a last chance to save those who might be sacrificed for Dead Priest warriors who would either be enslaved or executed. All of this contributed to massive pressure on the Western Confederacy, which was already in recent trouble from the bad harvests. The one bright point was that the Spirit Talkers demonstrated a preternatural ability to get their demon warriors into the flanks of the Dead Priest formations and were reaping a terrible toll. Unfortunately it wasn't like they had any intention of letting the threatened settlements stay there, so the chiefs were given a nasty choice: bend knee to the Dead Priests and hope they can fight off the Spirit Talkers and former confederates, or hope to survive against whoever won of the Dead Priests and Spirit Talkers. It wasn't a good choice, and while only one relatively unimportant chief had decided to switch sides, hundreds were fleeing the lowlands in a panic and the various chiefs from different regions were in extended screaming fits with each other.
Yeesh. Things are really heating up down there. To sum up:
Dead Priests
"Ahahahaha! Fuck you all! Surrender or die!"
Since they've got some trait that lets them turn fighting into Economy, they're not very badly hurt by the plague or drought.
They've got a pretty big army, from what we can tell. One that's big enough to push back the Western Confederacy and crush any minor settlements in their path. They've also come up with some kind of formal war thing. Instead of killing everyone, they're forcing their opponents to choose between death or surrender and sending over regular sacrifices as tribute.
Western Confederacy
"Shit shit shit shit!"
They're in trouble. The drought already hammered their economy, and now with the Dead Priest's increased aggression they're taking the blunt of the casualties. One of their chiefs has already decided to switch sides, while the others are torn between trying to keep fighting or just packing up and running away. Unless they pop out a Hero Unit or something next turn, they're pretty much fucked.
Spirit Talkers
"IS THAT HERESY I SEE DOWN THERE?"
They're... still giving it their best shot. Their berserkers are apparently doing a lot of damage, but there's only so much they can do alone.
Minor Lowland Settlements
"Welp, we're done. GG, guys"
These guys? Are fucked. In the past, the Dead Priests were willing to let them be so that they could be 'harvested' periodically, but now the DPs are making things official by making them choose between "We all fight to the bitter end (and die horribly)" or "We agree to serve you, oh mighty Dead Priests. Please don't kill us all!"
No matter who wins this war, these guys are going to lose. Which is why a lot of them are making a run for it. And guess who's got a reputation for being friendly and welcoming of refugees?
The People (Us)
"Oh man, this drought thing really sucks. We've only got enough food to last five years instead of ten!"
Once again, I am super glad that we left the war when we did. Without that turn to boost our economy, we'd be in far worse shape right now. As it is, we're probably the most stable and prosperous group here, which is going to attract a lot of refugees. And we have that oh so lovely trait that lets us benefit from bringing in refugees, so our economy is only going to get stronger in the short term.
The Northern Nomads:
Then, as if this weren't enough, word came from the north that someone had forced mass numbers of the tribes there to kneel to his banner. Soon enough a representative from the Thunder Horse Tribe arrived at the northern settlements and said that while their chief was not going to declare friendship with the People, he was interested in having a contingent of warriors meet with him. Alongside this rather odd request came a private message along the traders network of marriages and relations that the leader of the Thunder Horse had a matter of some mystical significance and had also sent a similar delegation to the Spirit Talkers, so sending along spiritual support was probably a good idea.
- Oh don't tell me they've spawned another goddamn Hero Unit. Once was enough! Although this guy seems more reasonable then their last Hero, so maybe we can actually have peace this time?
- He seems to be inviting delegations from their neighboring groups, so it behooves us to send in an impressive contingent. At the very least, we want to avoid letting the Spirit Talkers swoop in and pull the nomads into their bosom
- I really, really, really want to avoid getting dragged into another war with the northern nomads, especially since the DPs are only a turn or two away from crushing the WC entirely. Once that buffer state falls, we're their most likely next target, so having to send warriors up north to deal with another batch of nomad raiders is going to really hurt our defensive capabilities
For now though, let's move on to STATS:
-----------------------------------
Unfortunately, I don't have the techs and stuff for last turn, so I'll be taking those from the previous-previous turn instead.
General
Diplomacy 4
Economy 1
Martial 5
Stability 1 (confident)
Organizational
Centralization 4
Hierarchy 5
Cultural
Art 6
Mysticism 5
General
Diplomacy 4
Economy 3
Martial 5
Stability 1 (confident)
Organizational
Centralization 4
Hierarchy 5
Cultural
Art 6
Mysticism 5
On the raw stats section, our Economy has gone up to 3 again, which is excellent. Even better is that Stability 1, which allows us to potentially take in more refugees then usual. Our Martial and Diplomacy are both pretty good, so I'm hoping we can take a turn or two to just focus on Economy and tech actions.
Administration
Memory
Early Writing (Logographic)
Construction
Wood
Masonry
Early City Walls
Energy Production
Muscle Power
Animal Power
Food Production
Fishing
Horse Milling
Mollusc Cultivation
Orchards
Step Farming
Terra Preta
Our first choice: How many lowlander refugees do we agree to take in?
Land of Opportunity
[] Accept a few people fleeing the Western Confederacy
[] Accept many people (Small stability hit, large Econ gain)
[] Encourage people to flee to you (Large stability hit, massive Econ gain)
Bear in mind:
- Our stability is at +1 now, so we can take a hit to stability without collapsing
- The more people we bring in, the stronger our Economy becomes
- The more people we bring in, the faster the WC falls and the fewer people there are for the DP to grab
At the bare minimum, we should take the second option. We can afford a minor stability hit, especially since we're getting Econ for it. Personally, I'm actually leaning towards the third option but I'm not going to complain if the second option wins instead.
Our second choice: What do we do about the nomads?
Delegation to the Thunder Horse
[] Refuse
[] Minimal delegation
[] Significant force of warriors (Potential Martial loss if things go poorly)
[] Sizeable number of war carts and Blackbirds with shaman support (Definite Martial loss if things go poorly)
Personally, I'm inclined to go for the last option. Go big or go home, and all that. We have a big military already and are expecting a whole bunch of refugees who might soon be converted into warriors, so even if things go poorly we can quickly make up our losses. If things don't go poorly, however, we'd be able to learn about what's going on up there, hopefully impress our hosts and keep an eye on the Spirit Talkers.
As such, my votes for this turn are:
[X] Encourage people to flee to you (Large stability hit, massive Econ gain)
[X] Sizeable number of war carts and Blackbirds with shaman support (Definite Martial loss if things go poorly)
[X] Encourage people to flee to you (Large stability hit, massive Econ gain)
[X] Sizeable number of war carts and Blackbirds with shaman support (Definite Martial loss if things go poorly)
The spirits, it seems, do not appreciate the High Chief attempting to appoint his own son the heir, for disaster soon follows the election, with two years of drought and a particularly nasty outbreak of seasonal disease that is associated with the warriors going south to the lowlands to punish the Dead Priests there, with the whole thing culminating in the High Chief's son and heir getting kicked in the head by a horse and dying of fever two days later.
So it turns out the lowlands are pretty much plague central there, which our warriors have been encountering and bringing back in small doses. Good for immune systems at least. No doubt it's been blamed on the treatment of corpses down in the lowlands
While I initially suspected the Blackbirds of eliminating the bad heir, after some consideration it doesn't make sense, they already got the kid for the shamans training and squeezed concessions out of the chiefs.
It's just bad luck.
The High Chief taking this all rather badly and the chiefs interpreting this as the disapproval of the spirits results in an older and more administratively competent man being elected heir. By the next solstice that man found himself High Chief proper, the former man having lost the will to live over the spirits taking exception to him and his decisions, and the loss of the one man he had thought capable of taking up the role.
And the High Chief committed suicide over it. Good riddance I guess.
Despite the protests of the shamans and the warriors that there were still Dead Priests to kill, the new High Chief called for a halt to the yearly raids on Dead Priest territory, in order to better implement quarantine and to ensure that long lasting food stuffs were horded in case of further drought problems instead of being used by the warriors as portable rations. While this left many distinctly unhappy, the logic was sound so they acquiesced, and through expert management the flare-ups of disease settled back down to the typical seasonal culling of the very young and very old.
Current High Chief is an Administrator with high Diplomacy. This is good for projects, not so good for war.
Good thing we're out then.
While the rains remained unsettled, the new High Chief also ordered massive expansions of food generating activities to help compensate. In particular, he cut through a number of old arrangements for land cultivation in the hills to bring about the full sculpting of the valley hills into stepped terrace farms and orchards, and ensured that the practice was fully brought over to the other settlements.
Step-Farms now automatic with all farms, and presumably successful. + 1 Econ.
He also saw to the setting aside of more land to be managed as pasture in the north to allow for the increase of the size of the herds there without disrupting the thin forests or spreading too far out into places where greedy nomads might steal off with livestock and/or people.
Pastures maxed out. We've taken all viable pasture land now unless we claim and wall more plains settlements or expand forests to boost viability. +1 Econ.
Out on the coast, the efforts to expand fishing are met with mixed success. The distances that need to be traveled to get more fishing grounds are simply growing too large, and the fishers need to either establish new settlements to be based from - something the chiefs control so that rationing can be controlled - or someone needs to figure out a way to move a boat faster across the water so people can get to and from their fishing spots quicker and more safely.
Fishing maxed out. We've taken all viable fishing sites within range of the village, unless we roll a boat improvement, the action will be wasted until we claim a new coastal settlement. +0 Econ.
The warriors of the Dead Priests had evidently been occupied elsewhere since the construction of their damned wall, and are now pointed squarely at the Western Confederacy. Boiling out of their city like a summer plague, they swept away those raiding their western settlements and then began to push for the easternmost settlements of the Western Confederacy, the ones that had pushed into the lowlands.
So it turns out last turn's Dead Priest withdrawal was to dump raiding entirely for a project. What project?
The fighting was by all accounts incredibly brutal, with the Dead Priests seeking out open conflict with masses of warriors instead of picking at vulnerable locations with raids, and while both sides were getting people killed by the gross, the Dead Priests had worked out a nasty new trick.
They discovered massed unit warfare in reaction to our chariot raids. This is a military technology that's a pretty big leap forward, and it's one of the things which make siegecraft more potent.
They would divide their captives up into groups of fourteen and then lead them around their city, ritually sacrificing a person at a sacred location until there was only one person left, at which point they would force this person to add the skull bricks of their sacrificed compatriots to the wall, and then introduced to representatives of other peoples who had chosen to bend at the knee to the Dead Priests rather than continue resistance. The survivors were told that all the Dead Priests needed was someone from each settlement to be sent to them for each full moon. Just a minimum of thirteen people a year, and they could be drawn from the slaves, criminals or hated neighbours. If they sent more there were definite rewards, and by participating in battle with outsiders their contributions to the fight and captives could be counted towards their tribute of blood.
And THAT sounds like another Wonder, allowing them to raid for Stability AND diplo-annex populations nearby. Join us and sacrifice others or be sacrificed.
And then they escorted the survivor back to their own lands and let them go to tell their friends and family all of this. The Dead Priests also sent out messengers to do prisoner swaps after battles, a last chance to save those who might be sacrificed for Dead Priest warriors who would either be enslaved or executed.
The WC meanwhile, had been gettign reamed hard by the weather, despite general claims.
Funny how the two sides from the last vote got everything wrong:
-The ones claiming the Dead Priests were beaten and we could quit were wrong that the DPs were down, but right that we needed to quit.
-The ones claiming that the Dead Priests were going to go Zerg anytime now were right, but whether remaining stuck in would have helped is another matter entirely.
The one bright point was that the Spirit Talkers demonstrated a preternatural ability to get their demon warriors into the flanks of the Dead Priest formations and were reaping a terrible toll.
Unfortunately it wasn't like they had any intention of letting the threatened settlements stay there, so the chiefs were given a nasty choice: bend knee to the Dead Priests and hope they can fight off the Spirit Talkers and former confederates, or hope to survive against whoever won of the Dead Priests and Spirit Talkers. It wasn't a good choice, and while only one relatively unimportant chief had decided to switch sides, hundreds were fleeing the lowlands in a panic and the various chiefs from different regions were in extended screaming fits with each other.
STs sounds like they've discovered or improved flanking/shock tactics. And are enforcing the claims on the east of our river.
Then, as if this weren't enough, word came from the north that someone had forced mass numbers of the tribes there to kneel to his banner. Soon enough a representative from the Thunder Horse Tribe arrived at the northern settlements and said that while their chief was not going to declare friendship with the People, he was interested in having a contingent of warriors meet with him. Alongside this rather odd request came a private message along the traders network of marriages and relations that the leader of the Thunder Horse had a matter of some mystical significance and had also sent a similar delegation to the Spirit Talkers, so sending along spiritual support was probably a good idea.
Hmm, sounds like they ran across some strong omens and now we get to decide if we get to set them to Trade mode or Raid mode.
What could trigger them though? I doubt it's discovering some shiny(they wouldn't ask for significance), but a meteor might get this reaction, as might plague or famine.
When I heard that they'd deliberately installed an incompetent warrior leader, I thought he'd be a well meaning but overwhelmed guy who simply wasn't familiar enough with administrative work to do the job properly. Instead, it turned out that we got an 80s movie jock with all the brains and tact of a rock. I'm just glad that we managed to replace him in time.
Can you imagine what it'd have been like if he was still in charge when the drought hit us?
- Am I the only one who thinks that the shamans are acting just a little bit skeevy here? Their first act was to increase their own influence (via creating a New Holy Site in the plains) and reassure the High Chief that they're willing to back his son... if they are allowed to teach and influence the heir. It just feels a bit troubling to me, you know?
Power seeks power. It worked out anyways, as everyone got some of what they wanted and nobody got screwed.
Shamans now have three votes to the Chiefs five. And the same influence on the heir as the chiefs normally do(remember the new high chief is to get an internship under the chiefs by tradition)
Social Values (3/3) Shapers of the Land
This world is good, but through tremendous effort and skill, it can be made better, an act which your people take immense joy and pride in. Tread not lightly upon land defended by its sculptors.
Pros: Bonuses to all actions relating to land management, bonuses when fighting on own terrain, additional Econ and Stability whenever completing a land management type Megaproject
Cons: Additional strife caused by deliberate environmental disruption unless it is for the long term betterment of the land, or loss of territory to others
Protective Justice
Punishment and retribution are not justice, but tools of justice. Justice exists to encourage desirable behaviours, and thus can be best served by discouraging bad behaviour before it happens.
Pros: Justice is an objective, and thus can be served without retribution or retaliation
Cons: Sometimes the call for justice comes early...
Land of Opportunity
You welcome all, offering food and shelter if they will contribute to your community. Sometimes these newcomers behave badly, and sometimes they bring strange new ideas, but in general they strengthen your community, especially in the long run
Pros: Enhanced absorption of new ideas, +1 social value from current or historical neighbours, whenever a neighbour suffers a stability drop, have the option to also suffer a stability drop in exchange for a large boost to Econ and technological and social advancement by absorbing especially large numbers of people
Cons: Many think you weak, not accepting the needy can cause stability drops
Honourable Death (Spiritual/Honour) (LoO Linked)
Death in service to the People and the spirits is the best death of all, removing the fear of death from the truly honourable.
Pros: Warriors fight harder, losses in battle are less disruptive
Cons: Seeking a good death, and the means to achieve it, becomes desirable
Spiritual Values (2/2) Harmony
To live in harmony with oneself, ones neighbours, and ones environment is to live in harmony with the spirits. To live in disharmony is to invite disaster.
Pros: Bonus to collective action
Cons: Disharmony is to be corrected
Sacred War
Those who are in violation of the laws of nature and the spirits must be punished, lest disaster fall upon all.
Pros: Bonuses to fighting foes with conflicting spiritual beliefs
Cons: Can become locked into fighting with foes with conflicting spiritual beliefs
Legacies
+2 Centralization Tolerance
Government Type Ancient Kingdom (Elective)
Among the powerful groups, it is now common that there is a single man at the centre of all things who delegates outwards. This sub-type involves the king being selected by those in the rulership class rather than inheriting.
Pros: Access to additional infrastructure projects, bonus to collective action
Cons: Certain actions like new settlement development do not happen organically, but require direct intervention
Administration
Memory
Early Writing (Logographic)
Construction
Wood
Masonry
Early City Walls
Energy Production
Muscle Power
Animal Power
Food Production
Fishing
Horse Milling
Mollusc Cultivation
Orchards
Step Farming
Terra Preta
Sacred Forest
While the forests stand and the people care for them, the forests shall care for them. As long as the Sacred Forest is intact, all forests under the control of the People are considered managed, and gain the new action Expand Forest.
Actually, the future high chiefs are screwed over. As the power block multiplied and strengthened. our meritocracy is getting closer to the end of its life. In short, kicking the can down the block.
Feygurthyn rode in a cart because that was what was expected of powerful warriors among the northern nomads, but if anything went wrong he was probably going to hop out at the first opportunity. He had been chosen for his combination of warrior skill, leadership qualities, and above all else discreetness. The High Chief wanted this meeting to go well in a way that historically had not happened among the nomads, and if necessary for the expedition to be able to fight its way out. The oddity of the request and the mysteriousness of the additional information passed along had a number of people curious and wary at the same time.
As it was, the designated meeting place was occupied as it had been said it would be, with an accumulation of felt and leather tents surrounded by herds and patrolled by hundreds of war carts. On approach the People were asked to make their weapons unready, except for Feygurthyn who was prompted to leave his bow strung, have his blades ready, and to remain within his cart. Apparently as the expedition leader he was to be allowed to present himself to the nomad leader with full panoply. For that, he was quite pleased that it did not take long for the nomad chief to show up to where the People were waiting, although the fact that he had been allowed to keep his equipment was not just a statement but compounded the statement the chief was making.
The man who rolled up in his cart was rich. His war cart was a curious design that used only a single pair of wheels, but they used a strange set of construction whereby they were made out of several carved planks of wood bound together, allowing them to be very large and lift the cart higher up off the ground, giving it better clearance. The construction also seemed to forgo binding with cord and leather in certain areas in favour of extravagant uses of copper, while the man himself was decorated with beads and rings of copper, silver, and gold. Quite visibly slung at his side was an axe, the head gleaming the red-orange of copper instead of the grey or black of stone as one might expect. Despite this frankly obscene display of wealth and power, the man still had an easy and friendly smile.
Still, the People weren't going to pull out the full amount of tributary goods they had brought until later, once some degree of trust had been established. The nomads had already washed away that trail in the past.
"Greetings, members of the Ymrri!" The man said, using the diminutive form of his language's term for the People, which was translated somewhat as 'Southern Devils', but which was probably better translated as 'Dangerous Adversaries from the South', but the term itself was close enough to how the People pronounced the word 'People' to be annoying. Those who had trade dealings with the nomads sort of learned to filter it out, especially when they used the diminutive form, which was a semi-affectionate "Lil' Devils!" sort of term.
Still kind of annoying, but judging from the man's accent he wasn't from the more southern tribes that were in more frequent contact with the People, one way or another, and thus probably only knew that of the two terms available for describing them, the People preferred 'Ymrri'. Feygurthyn responded with, "Hail, High Chief of the Thunder Horse Tribe of the Horse Folk. I am Feygurthyn of the People, here to answer your request for dialogue between our peoples."
"I am well and glad that you came, Feygurthyn. Please send my regards to your High Chief for mustering this display of prowess on my behalf. You may call me any of Wendtikwos, Blood of Gigan, Scourge of the South, or Bearer of Thunder," the man stated, raising an eyebrow among the People. 'Gigan' was the derogatory version of the ancestral spirits Gygo or Gygoya, who many within the powerful families of the People claimed descent from and the northern nomads cast as a demon figure. From the way Wendtikwos used the term, Feygurthyn suspected that it was a political title adopted to cow his southern enemies, a sort of "Oh yeah, I'm so totally hardcore I'm definitely descended from a demon!", the reverse of how the People who claimed descent from the progenitor spirits did it.
"Well met Wendtikwos, Blood of Gigan, Scourge of the South, Bearer of Thunder. I think that simply Wendtikwos will suit us all, just fine, if you do not mind," Feygurthyn stated.
"Yes, yes, that works just fine for me. Truth be told, now that you are hear, I am quite eager to move forward with business. I had originally planned to have a great contest between you and whatever representatives from the Spirit Talkers came, a test of physical and spiritual prowess, but they basically told me to piss off, so I guess you win by default!" Wendtikwos explains, frowning in frustration and anger at the rudeness of the Spirit Talkers, before he shrugs it off and says happily, "Come, I see that you brought priests, this is most excellent of you!"
Gesturing for some of the old men who had been assigned to this expedition, Feygurthyn hopped off his cart and then followed Wendtikwos into a nearby tent under heavy guard. Going inside, they found it empty except for a wooden platform with an axe on it, illuminated by a quartet of braziers. Drawing closer, Feygurthyn's eyes grew wider as he took in the weapon. The wood of the handle was a deep, charred black wood that had received a heavy polish and had been decorated with bands of copper and eagle feathers, wolf's teeth hanging by a cord from the butt, and that was the least spectacular part of it, for the head of the weapon was a double-fist-sized teardrop of silvery metal set with spectacular rectangular patterns. From the looks of it though, it was not any of the metals known to the People.
"It's made from a star," Wendtikwos breathed in excitement and pride. "I found it when I was a young man, binding it with a branch that had been struck by lightning to make a mace. The spirits have favoured me ever since, chiefs betting their entire tribes against me to have it, and all falling before me. Finally though, I took it far to the west, across great rivers and to the far side of the sea, where men pull copper and silver and gold from the ground, so that I could purchase their expertise. With great effort they reworked it from a simple lump into this deadly blade. Stronger than copper and can hold an edge like stone, it is almost complete."
Feygurthyn and the assembled shamans looked at the manic glee and excitement on the man's face and he said, "Those who worked metal already blessed it, but I knew that to complete this weapon required the input of the most powerful shamans in the world; I just wasn't sure if it was the Spirit Talkers or the Ymrri. I suppose the spirits have given me the answer. So, bless this weapon, imbue it with the power of your spirits, and I promise the Ymrri a favour. A big favour that my sons and sons' sons will feel compelled to hold to, although do be reasonable in your requests."
Feygurthyn immediately went to consult with the shamans. They then asked for some time to go over spiritual matters in private, before returning and with charcoal and leather sketched out an idea. They would scribe into the axe the symbols for 'Thunder', 'Horse', 'Fist/Power' and 'Uncountable Many/Endless', imbuing it with those concepts. Wendtikwos was absolutely delighted with the idea, although he also said that while he would allow careful scribing of the metal, any permanent damage would end poorly for the people. As it was, once they got to the task, the shamans discovered that the starmetal was almost impossible to work with the tools they had, and they went through a ridiculous number of stone, bone, and horn chisels before they managed to very carefully cut the marks into the surface; all done by moon- and starlight to honour the celestial origin of the material, for extra significance/difficulty in crafting.
By the time they were done, the messenger they had sent off by cart to return to the People and get the input of the High Chief had also returned with instructions as to what sort of favour to ask Wendtikwos.
Favour from the Thunder Horses
[] There is much glory to fighting in the south
-[] We will offer you safe passage through our lands
-[] The easiest pass through to the south is the Spirit Talkers, and they did insult you...
[] Contact with the Metal Workers and safe passage for caravans going that way
[] Have you a piece of the star for us?
Meanwhile, the High Chief had let it be known that any person seeking shelter from the depredations of the Dead Priests would be welcomed with open arms, and a place for them to work within the lands of the People would be set aside for them, along with food to tide them over while they got set up. The threatened people in the lowlands took up this offer en masse, much to the irritation of a number of chiefs among the Western Confederacy who were rather upset by the complete disruption of their inter-tribe trade networks and marriages and all the other deals they had. Fortunately, while somewhere between one and two thousand people came all at once, it didn't cause the complete collapse of the Western Confederacy, and the People were just able to bear the burden for the few years before all of the new farms started to produce food, aided by the way the people of the Western Confederacy were sort of used to packing up, moving, and setting up farms elsewhere. Still, that many newcomers produced an incredible amount of friction with the pre-existing populace, if only because the People had so many different rules for the the newcomers to get used to, and behaviours that were acceptable or tolerated before were now punishable by sanction or even half-exile.
Of course, the massive new influx of people also had the potential to reshuffle the way the People viewed the world.
Reshuffle Land of Opportunity?
[] No (Keeps Honourable Death)
[] Western Confederacy (Gain Pioneering Spirit)
[] Northern Nomads (Probably gain Honour Value)
[X] Northern Nomads (Probably gain Honour Value)
[X] There is much glory to fighting in the south
-[X] We will offer you safe passage through our lands
I know it isn't going to win, but I strongly suspect a good chance of a long lasting alliance followed by merger if we do this. Especially since our terraced valley is terrible for their fighting style and we'd be throwing a lot of parties "in their honor" while adopting some of their values. And even if they do take over, the terrain is still perfectly suited for farming by the people and terrible for horse raids so they'll basically just end up demanding tribute and then being absorbed into our culture.
also their "The honouring of given word and deals" value says good things about this plan
if we hire them as mercenaries and let them through our lands (and they don't attack us), it will cause more instability ... but it also gives us the chance to tie them to us as friends and allies. The same thing we did to the Trader Clan basically.
Especially since they'd be travelling through festival-land while we're doubling down on stabilization. Which may even have a nice synergy bonus if we say the festival is in their honor. Of course it would also be flaunting our wealth to raiders.
On the third hand, they'd get to see our farming. Which we just finished improving even farther.
