I'm curious do we have any sources of granite or marble around us?
@Redium
No marble. Granite can be found pretty much everywhere around Crystal Lake and Hill Guard. There's a transition between the two around River-Bend.
It's curious to hear though that Aeva is considering sealing in the cave of the Stars. Does that mean permanently or only accessible to a certain few?
You're voting on that this turn. Your options are basically: invite people to come see it, let people come see it, prevent outsiders from seeing it, and only allow the shamans into the cave.
I'm guessing we aced an innovation roll for this turn then? One of the acolytes probably developed concrete or mortar for us right? That's what I assume they were mixing earlier in the update.
This was a bit of a forced innovation. Your construction needs had vastly overstepped your ability to produce mussels and other shells. The obvious solution to that was to grow more mussels, but you didn't do so and it would've eventually triggered a crisis, similar to the recent one where you ran out of birch bark for boats. Instead of facing this crisis, one of your Ember-Eyes in training got desperate trying to meet his quota and ended up dumping stone, specifically limestone, in his kilns in that hope that it would somehow make up the difference. It did.
This then triggered a spiritual debate within the Ember-Eyes. Before, you 'knew' that taking a seashell, something made of water and earth, and then subtracting the water by burning it would produce a powder (earth). Once this powder had water added to it, it would release fire and change in composition, up taking water and turning to stone (aka: earth). Elements could be added and subtracted within a substance.
That lowly Ember-Eye accidentally rewrote how you understand the elements to function. Limestone doesn't have any water in it, thus, how can it 'lose' water when burned so it can be reuptaken later.
We must be pretty advanced if our construction techniques have come this far. I'm curious if the techniques shown here were recently developed just for this or whether we've had them for awhile? Either way while the injuries and deaths are sad, they're not too unexpected considering the era we are in.
The techniques are new and part of mortared masonry.
Did we completely deforest the Wicked Woods?
No, only a small part immediately around the Cave of Stars. Most of it's still standing.
I hope this is just figurative compared to the other curse last turn with the illness that is spreading down south. What happened to that anyway?
The 'curse' Taavi talked about was mostly figurative. The sickness is mostly gone away, it still strikes down some people, but the People are quite resistant to it. It's more prevalent in other tribes, but seems to be subsiding.
Wonder what this means. Just a simple observation of could she be more than she seems like an important matriarch or an overseer or something.?
She's just a worker. Taavi's comparing her to his grandmother just because Age (a-GEE) reminds him of her.
Damn, what exactly is making our food situation so bad? I'm guessing our population is still increasing while the weather is not optimal. We do live in Canada after all.
The weather's actually improved this turn.
This story seems awfully common. I'm guessing when it comes to oddballs or outcasts or he stupid this is seen as an accepted scenario?
Viil isn't an oddball or outcast. He's just not liked because he's an arrogant shit.
Oddballs actually have it better, they tend to get picked up as shaman.
I'm guessing that we had another bad weather roll this turn, considering how cold it appears to be during summer?
@Redium
If you asked any of the other People, they would say that the night was not cold. At least, no more than an average summer evening.
This seems to be an example of one of the symbolic tally in action then? What exactly is it that the supervisor is measuring and tallying, and for what purpose?
Yes. The supervisor is double checking how many limestone blocks they have ready to be used. They have a rough idea of how fast they're used up, he was just double checking if the temple was running low. If they were, then that caravan of canoes would likely be incoming to give them more.
Are bandits common during this era? As this is the first time I think we've heard of them. I'm guessing the incident a few years ago involved violence in the camp, probably among the young men?
Bandits are pretty common. It's really, really easy to lose yourself in the wilderness so a lot of people who are criminal find it easy to hide out and prey on other people. Theft and murder happen all the time. The number one cause might be men killing each other over women, but the second most common cause is over food. If you're hungry, it's extremely tempting to take what you need, especially when Flat Arrow Outlook explicitly acknowledges that violence does solve problems.
I'm guessing that something like dealing with bandits has happened before considering this response. I'm guessing the fangs are being used for this due to being seen as the best hunters and trackers.
One of the most important functions of professional warriors in peacetime is hunting down bandits. Not only does it keep order, but it allows them to practice their skills on actual human targets.
I'm curious about Aeva, considering that soon after she appeared to us in the turns we instituted the adult trials, is Aeva a mother since that is what we implemented in order for women to be considered adults?
Aeva's gay. I think I was too subtle, but the woman who spoke to her in 15.0 was her wife. Aeva does not have children; that's what's going to precipitate your gender trials crisis. Aeva's coasted so far on Kaspar's reputation, but as she becomes elderly, people are going to challenge her position.
Considering we have two actions, I find that curious since it seems like our weather is not that favorable as it was mentioned how chilly it was during summer. But I won't look a gift horse in the mouth.
The weather's getting closer to average right now.
As the status page still has us as semi-nomadic, I don't think this is necessary at the moment, we already have one wonder we want to occupy at the moment.
That's a mistake; you've lost semi-Nomadic. I'll delete that in a second.
Nope, no can do at the moment. We not have the econ tiers necessary for this to occur. I'm guessing River Fork is the location next to the Cave of the Stars, right?
Yes, River Fork is next to the Cave of Stars.
We should probably get on this eventually. I think we have manage forests for sugar down, considering how often we did it in the past. Timber seems new but I don't think we have a pressing need for more timber production right now. Medicine would be nice to do later on, but I don't think we have the specific techs for it at the moment, nor the dire need. What exactly is gathering mean in this case?
Gathering means going out into the woods and looking for things to eat: berries, nuts, roots, fruits. It's strictly suboptimal compared to agriculture, but there's a chance of discovering a new cultivate (like nuts, for example).
Curious as to what this is, possibly a mortared masonry wall construction?
Nope. You're thinking too small scale.
I don't think we'll get many evolution opportunities anytime soon due to how many of our seem maxed. What exactly is the weight of our actions? As I think we've been pretty balanced so far.
You're roughly balanced right now (Flat Arrow Outlook, I Want To Be The Very Best, and Wondrous World are most weighted) but that's actually a bad thing. A completely balanced society is one where Values are competing, confused. You want a society that have a specific direction because that promotes unity and shared understanding. The more closely aligned your values are, the fewer cultural problems you'll have.
I'm guessing the beasts the Northlands herd are the Mastodons? Also, I'm also inferring that there are other undiscovered factions out there that have done domestication as well? If so, I'm hoping they have horses so we can get it off them.
All I will say is that undiscovered factions have discovered domestication, but you're not likely to interact with them for a long time.
Hmm...not sure if that's a good thing or a bad thing. What exactly do we need to do to push it over the edge?
Your temple should do it.
How did it affect them? Are they still suffering from it? Is their hero still alive?
Their Hero is actually dead, they died of the sickness. They're the roughest off from the sickness and weather out of everyone. They weren't as badly touched by war as most of the other tribes, but they're the most agriculturally advanced. They also lack extensive irrigation so they're even worse off than the Island Makers.
What are they using mica for now?
Mostly gems; they look pretty. They're also frequently ground down and dusted onto pottery to make it sparkle.
As a Biologist, and someone who studied in STEM, I know how you feel. I thought that the social sciences like anthropology would be less susceptible to that, though.
The social sciences are worse off. There's not often a definitive 'right' answer. Correlations and causation are significantly weaker since living things tend to be quite complex. While a physicist might be satisfied by a correlation of 999,999:1,000,000, a psychologist might be satisfied by a correlation of 1:5. Living systems are just way more complex and statistical noise is simply more common. Atoms don't think so they're easy to count.
After you get to anthropology and history, it becomes extremely difficult to test correlations at all. It's not easy to test a hypothesis about a hunter-gatherer tribe. They simply don't exist any more. Even uncontacted tribes are majorly influenced by modern civilization. Whether that's from our trash or our destruction and invasion of their homes, they can't escape us. At that point, science is like trying to piece together a piece of pottery that's been smashed to ten thousand pieces when you only have half the shards. You have to extrapolate and use the information you have to fill in gaps. The entire picture simply isn't there. That type of argumentation leads itself a lot to bias.
I can get the retaining fat part, but how do small hands and feet help? Also, how will mutation and changes like that be a thing later?
Small extremities reduce heat loss in cold climates.
I'm probably not going to track mutations beyond extremely broad ones.
Is that because out of the civilizations we've met, we've been one of the few who have developed the technology to utilize the earth and stone? When you mean land development for the Island Makers, is that related to how well they were when it came to forestry?
The Island Makers are inferior to you in forestry. They're better when it comes to land management, agricultural and farming.
For a people called the Peace Builders, having a trait that focuses inherently on human conflict is deeply amusing to me. Still, even if we may seem weird, I like our Trial by Fire trait as it is one that allows us to be risk takers, which is valuable when it comes to innovation I guess.
The Peace Builders are a fusion of the Peace Seekers and Mound Builders, with the later basically exploding out of the former. They needed to harmonize some of their values.
What are their values like by any chance? I would think that the Peace Builders might get it too considering how cultural they are compared to us. What were the other starting values per chance anyway?
Peace Builders have:
Social Values:
Speaking Circle: consensus is extremely important.
Protective Justice: the purpose of justice is the protect the community.
Honour Values:
I Want To Be The Very Best (equivalent): this trait was home grown in them.
Hand or Fist: a hand is offered in friendship, but the other is clasped as a fist.
Spiritual Values:
Sacred War: War is a sacred struggle, not only between groups, but between their spirits.
Do it Or Die: If it's worth doing, it's worth dying for.
Considering we are their greatest trade partner, and super wealthy to boot, I wonder how much we've influenced them to get Culture of Commerce?
They picked up Culture of Commerce before meeting you. They got it as soon as they struck Lapis luzili.
Is that a very centralized form of government? I doubt it considering how similar it seems to our government.
It's more centralized than you, but less than the Island Makers.
Will we eventually realize that our decision to breed specific types of animals is causal when we develop smarter dogs?
Eventually, but eventually is a long time.
I was refering to this segment, and I hadn't seen anything to indicate it had changed.
You're right, I forgot this.
Right now, the People are sucking up all of the Pearl Diver's available salt so all that's happening is you're paying double for it. Once the Pearl Divers raise their production enough that it satisfies your demand, you'll get the benefits of it trending.
That's good to know. Do the rest of the People teach immigrants how to care for and raise dogs too?
Yes.
What does the Wicked Woods count as? Just another facet of the Cave of Stars? What do other tribes think about our natural wonders?
It's attached to the Cave of Stars. It augments it.
Are we really that odd in the eyes of other tribes? Such as our history? You said we were intimidating, but what are the rumors surrounding us? Also, are our walls really that tall in comparison?
Your status on the 1st page are essentially a snapshot of where the People are at.
I can get behind properly paranoid, we may be the big dog right now, but who knows how long it is until an unknown threat pops up over the horizon. So when you mean, turn everything into a defensive structure, does that mean something like every brick home can become a blockhouse or something different?
Not that far. A brick house is a lot more durable than a bark one. A bark house can be broken into with an axe and five minutes. A brick house simply can't.
I'm guessing the Arrow Lake Tribe haven't really done much or gotten much prestige then, simply kept doing what they've always done then, right?
They have a fair amount from mining lapis. Having access to exclusive resources or technologies can also grant prestige.
So does that mean that we're the only customer of the Pearl Diver's salt then? Since we're the closest ones to them relatively speaking, I'm guessing that would make us the Middle Man for the rest of the civs who want salt, which should allow us to benefit if it ever becomes trending right?
Yes.
Anyway,since previous attempts at asking this as part of a larger discussion have failed,
@Redium, what does Undergo Ordeal actually do?
It involves the People preparing for incoming hardship; usually by training, stock piling food, etc. This gives you a bonus on any hardships rolls, whether this is war, sickness, or natural disaster. If, however, you still roll really badly, you take more stability damage since the People are convinced the spirits hate them. If you roll well, then it gives you extra Stab as the People are reassured of their ability to survive hardship.
Just remember guys: We're going to want to get Quinoa locked in as an automatic action as soon as possible. Because it looks like it's a crop that is weather resistant, giving us something we can farm that's not going to run into major problems if we have early and long winters all the time... Which is a big problem right now.
Quinoa is better than all of your other crops, but it's not a cure-all. If you get snow in the middle of April or beginning of May (rare, but happens), then you're still out of luck.
Leader Board:
- The People! (Prestige: 19, Army: Professional Neolithic Warriors and Holy Orders, Economy: Hunter-Gatherer with early Agriculture, Art: Sacred Designs and High Quality Tools, Magic: Fire and Stone)
- Tribe of the West (Prestige: 18, Army: Numerous Professional Neolithic Warriors, Economy: Battered Agriculture, Art: Innumerable Tools, Magic: Life and the Living)
- Peace Builders (Prestige: 16, Army: Fanatical Neolithic Warriors, Economy: Broad Agriculture and Aquaculture, Art: Ephemeral Crafts and Imported Quality Tools, Magic: Of Song and Story)
- Island Makers (Prestige: 14, Army: Elite Neolithic Warriors, Economy: Intense Early Agriculture, Art: Advanced Quality Tools, Magic: Earth and Water)
- Arrow Lake (Prestige: 12, Army: Informal and Untrained Militia, Economy: Early Agriculture, Art: Sacred Iconography, Magic: Stone)
- Pearl Divers (Prestige: 10, Army: Informal Militia, Economy: Early Fishing and Aquaculture, Art: Beautiful and Dependable Tools, Magic: Sea and Salt)
- South Lake (Prestige: 7, Army: Vengeful Killers, Economy: Near Starvation, Art: Cruel Weapons, Magic: Bloody and Black)
- Bond Breakers (Prestige: 7, Army: Vengeful Rabble, Economy: Hungry, Art: Durable Weapons, Magic: Little)
- Mountain Clans (Prestige: 5, Army: Hungry Raiders, Economy: Hungry, but Changing, Art: Little, Magic: Little)
- Northlands (Prestige: 3, Army: Every Man an Archer, Economy: Hunter-Gatherer with early Herds, Art: Bone Tools, Magic: Bonds and Beasts)
