CASE: BREWING SUSPICION MONTH 7
- Location
- Somewhere over the rainbow
Martial:
Protection Detail:
DC: 10. Roll: 17 + 2 + 4 + 7.0 = 30.
The action, at this point, is trivial; the mob has been quieted, and none of the nobility wants to stick their necks out for a clearly doomed regional count. Still, Kerrie and the mercenary companies go and do their job; when the court cases are presented, they are an honor guard to the prisoners, and they prevents the conspirators from leaving or breaking out even as their legal representation strides without a care in the world.
Diplomacy
The Low Rumors II:
DC: 18. Roll: 17 + 2 + 9.0 = 30.
Cormag in his presence as a member of the faith reminds the crowd that the trial is soon, and justice will be dealt; the justice of the king and justice of the nation may be slow, but it will be long and arduous for the Count and his band of robbers, he preaches. The lower-class are receptive, and are willing to watch and judge the Gorlin conspirators as they are shuttled from trial to trial.
In hindsight, perhaps you allocated your resources towards combatting the wrong threat.
Intrigue
Mapping the Network II:
DC: 24. Roll: 22 + 2 + 9.0 = 33.
Your efforts to make sure that the agents of the conspirators don't manage to achieve their goals works like a charm - you find one bribed guard, who leads you to a low-ranking but suspiciously well-off tavernkeeper, who writes a letter to a woman in the countryside, who sends an agent back with money earmarked for the judges.
Naturally, that money disappears, and Cormag lumbers into the tavern, agent over his shoulder, baldly lying that he found the agent wasted outside of a known gambling den, and the only place he could bring him was the tavern.
+20 Budget.
Learning
Experimentation:
DC: 23. Roll: 20 + 2 + 5.1 = 27.1
Ser Tekla attacks the experiments with a glee, rapidly putting your Endless Pen to work as he fills several pages on the qualities of tea and their leaves; the obvious use of steeping tea is obvious, but what about baking? Compression? Dessication? Different combinations of tea and other liquids?
You remembered that last one vividly. Seeing him drunk on a combination of wine, tea, and the sheer hubris of discovery was something else - especially trying to restrain him.
Eventually, when all is said and done, he sniffs the air.
Strange. The lab is nearly odorless, despite every atrocity against alchemy and plain good brewing that he's done. You shudder to think about the time he thought mixing milk and honey and tea and alcohol was going to work out, but...well, the less said about that night the better.
He makes a note of it, mentions it to you, and then you immediately drop everything and ask him to test how odorless he can make it.
If you can sell something to rid an area of odor...well. That would be very profitable indeed.
Odor Remover designs acquired!
Stewardship
Advancing the Case IV:
DC: 10. Roll: 22 + 2 + 3.9 = 27.9
With your court cases lined up, it's time to begin.
The first trial begins to much pomp and circumstance. The eager crowds surround the courtroom, and a hush falls over the crowd as the opening gavel comes down. The court cases open to a roaring broadside: you flat out declare that the Count and his conspirators are guilty of lying. You present your notarized receipts as the assessor of the tax office - on it, there is an item labeled "agricultural produce - chai". Tekla's evidence that chai and tea are identical slams down on the table next, presenting that the Port Authority lied to the Crown about what they were shipping. You then invite the members of the court to determine the difference between two boxes of chai and tea that you had prepared beforehand. One sampling session later, they all say that they can't clearly identify which is tea - they both taste like tea, and have the kick of tea, so for the purpose of the Luxury Tax, well... chai had to be tea, then.
The defense weakly attempts to argue that this "chai" was not the genuine article but tea that the assessors had planted and technically this wasn't proof of anything - but this is the point where the mob outside promptly begins to scream their guilty verdicts, and your judge, paid off ahead of time, speedily concurs.
One down, three to go.
The second trial, hot off the buzz of the first trial, opens to an even more explosive charge - stealing from the Crown. To prove this, you need to show that not only has the former Port Authority knowingly lied about the difference between chai and tea, they must have also collected the taxes of their own account.
You present the Port Authority's internal accounts from last year. They had oh-so-helpfully labeled the Luxury Tax collections, giving you an approximate number of the amount that the Port Authority had collected.
Measured against the amount sent to the Crown in the official receipts, and the conclusion was inevitable.
The only quibbling was over the fine owed.
Menacingly, you bring out a much larger stack of papers, slam it on the desk, and present it as the internal financial records from the Port Authority's past years. You conveniently don't mention how many of those papers are blank - it simply helps you make your rhetorical point, which is that the conspirators owe the Crown a gargantuan debt. One you've already estimated.
The outcome was never in doubt.
The gavel slams down guilty to thunderous applause, and the houses of their families are required to repay the amount stolen from the Crown, by decree of the high court.
Two down, two to go.
The next court case would be relocated to the Royal Village, where the highest of the high courts would determine whether the Count and his conspirators had violated the terms of the Gorlin Charter - and at this point, people could almost see the spirits of disaster hanging over their heads. The outcome was likely to be an unquestionable victory.
That was the mood as the Yarognev and Ainsworth companies paraded them out of the city, to thunderous applause and cheering.
Stewardship
Deeper Thinking
DC: 25. Roll: 22 + 2 + 8.0 = 32.
That said, it was time to start thinking ahead. You had mentally flagged down something strange with the grain prices last month, especially as you reconstructed their change before the runs on bread. Prices had risen, despite the general abundance of the last year's harvest - what exactly had gone on?
To find out, you first tracked down the people who you had tapped to help run things during the month of August. Happily, you find them continuing to organize their people - you would have hated to invest all that effort without at least looking a little bit towards the long run. From there, it only takes a few more questions to figure out who the merchants who had begun raising prices were - and critically, where they were from.
Once you have that, you start finding the remaining grain merchants from the region and pay them to tell you the general route they take. It greatly helps that they're aware that you could likely call a mob down on all of their heads should they not comply, so most of them decide that getting paid for something they could be intimidated for is the much better decision.
As for the rest, once you have an initial set of data, you don't need theirs anymore.
From the route you can construct, the prices increase from region to region - each additional region the merchant passes through on the way to the capital, the higher the grain prices increase. Understandable - paying for transporting the grain and the various patchwork tolls would naturally raise the prices the longer the distance traveled.
What set the alarm bells ringing for you was two provinces; one located in the west and one located in the east. From what you could tell, the amount that the grain prices jumped their was anomalously high - in fact, you were fairly certain that there were grain merchants that had traveled in the opposite direction because they had realized that they could make more money heading to those provinces rather than the capital. Without traveling to the provinces in person, you wouldn't be able to do anything more than make conjecture, but...
From what you could tell, prices had raised across the board in the western provinces, while the eastern province had seen an uptick in grain prices and a reduction in everything else.
Prices raising across the board to you sounded like either the prelude to a city in revolt or someone messing with the money supply. The situation to the eastern provinces may have just been a bad harvest, or a famine, or something, but in either case it was probably over your head at the current moment.
Nevertheless, it would probably be better to check on those problems sooner rather than later...
Random Event Roll: 17
You're awoken to the sounds of knocks and an arrest. A Duke you've never seen before orders you to quietly disarm and come with them to the county jail on suspicion of riling up the crowds.
You ask what evidence he has.
He answers with an order to cease talking.
You gauge your opposition, and the likely results of breaking out right here and now, and decide to come quietly. You signal Kerrie to fade away for now; she could come fetch you all later if the situation arose.
You and your companions are thrown into separate cells - in an ironic echo, you're fairly certain that these cells held the Count and his conspirators, at least before you shipped him off to the seat of royal power for the last and most important trial.
Patiently, you wait.
No sense in getting mad at a temporary inconvenience.
Piety
Justice at Long Last
DC: 25. Roll: 20 + 2 + 5.1 = 27.1
Not, at least, when you could be busy doing something about your position. At least, praying to Justice to answer your call.
Justice answers.
Your court cases will be seen through.
Also, there's a crowd thousands strong demanding your release.
Um.
Other Revenue: 20 Budget.
Mercenary Expense: 6 Budget.
Publicity Expense: 2 Budget.
Research Expense: 2 Budget.
Lodging and Materials Expense: 1 Budget.
Salaries and Wage Expense: 4 Budget.
Net Profit: 5 Budget.
Remaining Budget: 80 Budget.
Someone has done something extraordinarily foolish and jailed you. The people on the street, freshly energized from their victory over the now-hated Gorlin Conspiracy, were suddenly thrown a new battle - fighting for the heroes of justice who had kept the grain flowing at reasonable prices and brought criminal nobility to heel.
Also, you contacted Justice about the situation, and Justice decided to make the situation...more, by organizing the protests and groups.
At least Justice assures you that the case against the conspirators will go fine. Justice guarantees it.
Thus, just two scant months after the July Days, the September Days kicks off with a roar.
Wonderful.
Now...what to do about this jail cell.
[] The High Road
Demand a swift court case to exonerate you, and prepare to fight a legal battle - by which you mean, the judge is getting bribed and the people outside are going to make sure that there's only one real correct answer. Will grant more power to the Capital streets.
[] Untouchable
Don't even respect this farce of an accusation. Leave your jail cell - which you can do pretty much at will - and live your life free of this nonsense. Immediately head to the Royal Village and continue the court case against the conspirators there. Will grant more power to hostile Capital nobles.
Protection Detail:
DC: 10. Roll: 17 + 2 + 4 + 7.0 = 30.
The action, at this point, is trivial; the mob has been quieted, and none of the nobility wants to stick their necks out for a clearly doomed regional count. Still, Kerrie and the mercenary companies go and do their job; when the court cases are presented, they are an honor guard to the prisoners, and they prevents the conspirators from leaving or breaking out even as their legal representation strides without a care in the world.
Diplomacy
The Low Rumors II:
DC: 18. Roll: 17 + 2 + 9.0 = 30.
Cormag in his presence as a member of the faith reminds the crowd that the trial is soon, and justice will be dealt; the justice of the king and justice of the nation may be slow, but it will be long and arduous for the Count and his band of robbers, he preaches. The lower-class are receptive, and are willing to watch and judge the Gorlin conspirators as they are shuttled from trial to trial.
In hindsight, perhaps you allocated your resources towards combatting the wrong threat.
Intrigue
Mapping the Network II:
DC: 24. Roll: 22 + 2 + 9.0 = 33.
Your efforts to make sure that the agents of the conspirators don't manage to achieve their goals works like a charm - you find one bribed guard, who leads you to a low-ranking but suspiciously well-off tavernkeeper, who writes a letter to a woman in the countryside, who sends an agent back with money earmarked for the judges.
Naturally, that money disappears, and Cormag lumbers into the tavern, agent over his shoulder, baldly lying that he found the agent wasted outside of a known gambling den, and the only place he could bring him was the tavern.
+20 Budget.
Learning
Experimentation:
DC: 23. Roll: 20 + 2 + 5.1 = 27.1
Ser Tekla attacks the experiments with a glee, rapidly putting your Endless Pen to work as he fills several pages on the qualities of tea and their leaves; the obvious use of steeping tea is obvious, but what about baking? Compression? Dessication? Different combinations of tea and other liquids?
You remembered that last one vividly. Seeing him drunk on a combination of wine, tea, and the sheer hubris of discovery was something else - especially trying to restrain him.
Eventually, when all is said and done, he sniffs the air.
Strange. The lab is nearly odorless, despite every atrocity against alchemy and plain good brewing that he's done. You shudder to think about the time he thought mixing milk and honey and tea and alcohol was going to work out, but...well, the less said about that night the better.
He makes a note of it, mentions it to you, and then you immediately drop everything and ask him to test how odorless he can make it.
If you can sell something to rid an area of odor...well. That would be very profitable indeed.
Odor Remover designs acquired!
Stewardship
Advancing the Case IV:
DC: 10. Roll: 22 + 2 + 3.9 = 27.9
With your court cases lined up, it's time to begin.
The first trial begins to much pomp and circumstance. The eager crowds surround the courtroom, and a hush falls over the crowd as the opening gavel comes down. The court cases open to a roaring broadside: you flat out declare that the Count and his conspirators are guilty of lying. You present your notarized receipts as the assessor of the tax office - on it, there is an item labeled "agricultural produce - chai". Tekla's evidence that chai and tea are identical slams down on the table next, presenting that the Port Authority lied to the Crown about what they were shipping. You then invite the members of the court to determine the difference between two boxes of chai and tea that you had prepared beforehand. One sampling session later, they all say that they can't clearly identify which is tea - they both taste like tea, and have the kick of tea, so for the purpose of the Luxury Tax, well... chai had to be tea, then.
The defense weakly attempts to argue that this "chai" was not the genuine article but tea that the assessors had planted and technically this wasn't proof of anything - but this is the point where the mob outside promptly begins to scream their guilty verdicts, and your judge, paid off ahead of time, speedily concurs.
One down, three to go.
The second trial, hot off the buzz of the first trial, opens to an even more explosive charge - stealing from the Crown. To prove this, you need to show that not only has the former Port Authority knowingly lied about the difference between chai and tea, they must have also collected the taxes of their own account.
You present the Port Authority's internal accounts from last year. They had oh-so-helpfully labeled the Luxury Tax collections, giving you an approximate number of the amount that the Port Authority had collected.
Measured against the amount sent to the Crown in the official receipts, and the conclusion was inevitable.
The only quibbling was over the fine owed.
Menacingly, you bring out a much larger stack of papers, slam it on the desk, and present it as the internal financial records from the Port Authority's past years. You conveniently don't mention how many of those papers are blank - it simply helps you make your rhetorical point, which is that the conspirators owe the Crown a gargantuan debt. One you've already estimated.
The outcome was never in doubt.
The gavel slams down guilty to thunderous applause, and the houses of their families are required to repay the amount stolen from the Crown, by decree of the high court.
Two down, two to go.
The next court case would be relocated to the Royal Village, where the highest of the high courts would determine whether the Count and his conspirators had violated the terms of the Gorlin Charter - and at this point, people could almost see the spirits of disaster hanging over their heads. The outcome was likely to be an unquestionable victory.
That was the mood as the Yarognev and Ainsworth companies paraded them out of the city, to thunderous applause and cheering.
Stewardship
Deeper Thinking
DC: 25. Roll: 22 + 2 + 8.0 = 32.
That said, it was time to start thinking ahead. You had mentally flagged down something strange with the grain prices last month, especially as you reconstructed their change before the runs on bread. Prices had risen, despite the general abundance of the last year's harvest - what exactly had gone on?
To find out, you first tracked down the people who you had tapped to help run things during the month of August. Happily, you find them continuing to organize their people - you would have hated to invest all that effort without at least looking a little bit towards the long run. From there, it only takes a few more questions to figure out who the merchants who had begun raising prices were - and critically, where they were from.
Once you have that, you start finding the remaining grain merchants from the region and pay them to tell you the general route they take. It greatly helps that they're aware that you could likely call a mob down on all of their heads should they not comply, so most of them decide that getting paid for something they could be intimidated for is the much better decision.
As for the rest, once you have an initial set of data, you don't need theirs anymore.
From the route you can construct, the prices increase from region to region - each additional region the merchant passes through on the way to the capital, the higher the grain prices increase. Understandable - paying for transporting the grain and the various patchwork tolls would naturally raise the prices the longer the distance traveled.
What set the alarm bells ringing for you was two provinces; one located in the west and one located in the east. From what you could tell, the amount that the grain prices jumped their was anomalously high - in fact, you were fairly certain that there were grain merchants that had traveled in the opposite direction because they had realized that they could make more money heading to those provinces rather than the capital. Without traveling to the provinces in person, you wouldn't be able to do anything more than make conjecture, but...
From what you could tell, prices had raised across the board in the western provinces, while the eastern province had seen an uptick in grain prices and a reduction in everything else.
Prices raising across the board to you sounded like either the prelude to a city in revolt or someone messing with the money supply. The situation to the eastern provinces may have just been a bad harvest, or a famine, or something, but in either case it was probably over your head at the current moment.
Nevertheless, it would probably be better to check on those problems sooner rather than later...
Random Event Roll: 17
You're awoken to the sounds of knocks and an arrest. A Duke you've never seen before orders you to quietly disarm and come with them to the county jail on suspicion of riling up the crowds.
You ask what evidence he has.
He answers with an order to cease talking.
You gauge your opposition, and the likely results of breaking out right here and now, and decide to come quietly. You signal Kerrie to fade away for now; she could come fetch you all later if the situation arose.
You and your companions are thrown into separate cells - in an ironic echo, you're fairly certain that these cells held the Count and his conspirators, at least before you shipped him off to the seat of royal power for the last and most important trial.
Patiently, you wait.
No sense in getting mad at a temporary inconvenience.
Piety
Justice at Long Last
DC: 25. Roll: 20 + 2 + 5.1 = 27.1
Not, at least, when you could be busy doing something about your position. At least, praying to Justice to answer your call.
Justice answers.
Your court cases will be seen through.
Also, there's a crowd thousands strong demanding your release.
Um.
Other Revenue: 20 Budget.
Mercenary Expense: 6 Budget.
Publicity Expense: 2 Budget.
Research Expense: 2 Budget.
Lodging and Materials Expense: 1 Budget.
Salaries and Wage Expense: 4 Budget.
Net Profit: 5 Budget.
Remaining Budget: 80 Budget.
Someone has done something extraordinarily foolish and jailed you. The people on the street, freshly energized from their victory over the now-hated Gorlin Conspiracy, were suddenly thrown a new battle - fighting for the heroes of justice who had kept the grain flowing at reasonable prices and brought criminal nobility to heel.
Also, you contacted Justice about the situation, and Justice decided to make the situation...more, by organizing the protests and groups.
At least Justice assures you that the case against the conspirators will go fine. Justice guarantees it.
Thus, just two scant months after the July Days, the September Days kicks off with a roar.
Wonderful.
Now...what to do about this jail cell.
[] The High Road
Demand a swift court case to exonerate you, and prepare to fight a legal battle - by which you mean, the judge is getting bribed and the people outside are going to make sure that there's only one real correct answer. Will grant more power to the Capital streets.
[] Untouchable
Don't even respect this farce of an accusation. Leave your jail cell - which you can do pretty much at will - and live your life free of this nonsense. Immediately head to the Royal Village and continue the court case against the conspirators there. Will grant more power to hostile Capital nobles.