Embezzlers of various amounts (500 & 10), you might want to consolidate behind the 50 g/turn embezzling vote if you still want to embezzle to fund our projects, as it looks like the non-embezzling vote is winning, and that combined with a 35g/turn repayment will leave us...without any money whatsoever.
Hmmm. Maybe this should have been a plan vote rather than by category - I notice that there's very little overlap between the voters for the leading embezzlement option (nothing) and the leading debt payment option (maximal). Oh well. Going to extend the vote twelve hours in case people want to rethink either embezzlement or debt payment.
I would nitpick, though, that the combination you mention will leave you with some money, but with no net income. This does not need to be a very large concern for your character, because you have a well-paid position and good standing in your clan, which means access to easy credit.
Personally I'm against embezzling because we are the Steward. We are the ones who will be in direct control of the faction's finances and as such we are basically stealing from ourselves. If we want to fund something we can just divert funds to it directly. Hoarding money in our personal pockets doesn't actually net us anything except a greater risk of being executed for corruption and or fired for incompetence.
Think about this, next turn we can propose a 'Pay Off Debts' action and just quietly put the personal debts of advisors under the same heading as national debts.
[X] [Inspiration] Metallurgy. The right sort of forge-complex might be able to produce starmetal from regular iron.
[X] [Debt] Pay back 35g/turn. Compound interest is bad, get it away. You'll be done paying in about four years.
[X] [Help] Chancellor Blade. He can talk debtors into paying and creditors into delaying.
[X] [Embezzle] 50g/turn. Some of the suppliers are corrupt. You expect you can replace them with honest ones and pocket the difference.
Vote called... and there's a tie between "embezzle 50" and "embezzle nothing".
But there's also two votes for "embezzle lots" (500) closer to the former and one for "embezzle very little" (10) closer to the latter, so I'm inclined to go with 50 as the winner unless a tiebreaker appears while I'm writing.
[*] [Inspiration] Metallurgy. The right sort of forge-complex might be able to produce starmetal from regular iron.
[*] [Help] Chancellor Blade.
[*] [Debt] Pay back 35g/turn.
[*] [Embezzle] 50g/turn.
Mercury does indeed watch over dutiful servants in trying times. She's a celestial deity and the priest you ask tries to give you a long explanation, but what you take away is "unlikely to notice your prayer in particular". So you pay the praisesingers for a week, even very busy deities should notice that. Previously that would have been a painful chunk of your wealth. But now? Now it's just one of the many larger offerings you'll be making on a regular basis, with your new salary (and your plans to secretly double your salary).
When you walk into the council hall for the next meeting, Gold Morning has arrived early, and he's grinning like a cat that got at the cream. "I found some interesting paperwork." he says, and you huff. Interesting is not a word you are minded to use about any sort of paperwork right now.
Chancellor Blade shows up next. While you're waiting, you take the opportunity to ask for his help, and he agrees readily. "It's my salary on the line too." he says.
Ebuskun is late. Void arrives, starts without her, and he also asks Morning what the man is grinning like that for. The spymaster looks from side to side conspiratorially, and stage-whispers: "One of the Abominations did keep notes after all." He hands over a page filled with mysterious scrawl, and adds "It's all in a strange dialect of the Old Tongue, but from the parts I've been able to decipher so far, it's a list of people's sins and vices and weaknesses and other blackmail. Runs to several hundred pages like this. It's going to be very useful for maintaining certain informants' loyalty - once I get time to read it."
The Portlord passes the page to the Sage. "Three. Can you read this any better than he can?"
Wolf Three is already staring wide-eyed at the page, and uncovers her third eye to read it better. "Yes. Yes I can." she stammers.
[Did you notice something wrong? Intrigue, 32+14=46. Yes.] Her reaction and grabbing the page looked unreasonably eager. You figure there's some very nasty dirt on her somewhere in those pages.
"Good. See you can find time to help him with all the blackmail. Burn anything concerning me, of course. But fascinating as this is, it's distracting from the agenda I set."
Ebuskun bursts in. "You have too many soldiers!" she says.
Wisdom Shining Void first cracks a smile, then slowly breaks into loud laughter. Ebuskun scowls at him. "First time I've heard of that problem. Why do you say so?"
"I cannot hope to learn the names of so many hundred people!"
"Then don't. Just learn the names of the officers, and ask them for the names of any soldiers who stand out."
Ebuskun scowls harder, but is eventually cajoled into accepting this as the price of commanding a large army while you daydream about a starmetal spear, and Void pointedly returns to the agenda.
"Morning. What are the prospects for vetting the intelligence service?"
"Good, I think. Nothing unusual has turned up yet, just collecting the names of contacts."
"Carry on, then. Blade. What of the clans?"
"Clan Bridge has taken offense to your demands for unity, building on their previous grudge about not being represented on the Privvy Council. They accuse you of wanting to be king and rule over them instead of guiding. They are backed by Plum, Island, and several other minor clans. I think we could peel Plum away with the promise of Great House status, though."
You grit your teeth. That prize should go to Avalanche, not Plum! But interrupting now will do you no favors.
Fortunately, the Portlord makes no such promise yet. "Steward Marble. Give all of Clan Bridge's requests, charges and fees a lower priority for the time being." he orders. Nice. "Answer nothing the same day. If they want to insult me, I shall return the favor. Now, what have you gathered of the palace finances?"
"In summary, the palace is over two hundred fifty talents of silver in debt, of money, goods, and services, and on course to lose another three hundred fifty this year." you inform him. "A talent of gold, no, even a talent of jade wouldn't cover it, if you could somehow get that much jade in one place. The palace is also paying out in the general direction of numerous missing people, and is owed money by other missing people. The full details are in my written report. It seems like a miracle creditors still accept my promises on your behalf, and even that will certainly cease once they discover our situation."
"No matter." Void is unperturbed. "I shall sign over five hundred talents of silver from the accounts of Clan Wisdom."
That's shockingly generous. Is it a display of power and wealth from Wisdom? Perhaps - but that would seem to strengthen the clan's position to the detriment of the Portlord's office. And how can one man command so much clan money without being a clan head? Why is Void so calm? Does he know something you don't? Well, obviously, he's twice your age. But what?
"Marble. I said, do you think you can reduce our losses by half at least? Over the next year."
"As you command!" you blurt out, embarrassed at having been caught so thoroughly off guard by his decision. "I'll hunt down debtors, find out which creditors are dead, replace-"
"I'll take a written report." he interrupts serenely. "No need to tell me all your plans now. I have another request, though - if you can somehow find the time, see about holding a census of some sort."
You wonder how you're supposed to hold a census of a million people, while Blade starts complaining that a census sounds worryingly kinglike and is going to reinforce Clan Bridge's complaint. Void brushes him off and resumes querying the council about their jobs. You find yourself pondering the transmutation of molten iron, while somewhere in the background the Portlord and the Marshal discuss expanding the palace guard, in spite of everything you've said about the wretched state of the palace finances.
"-where's our god?" you overhear Void saying. "I saw several small gods and other spirits at my coronation, even a few ghosts came out during the night, but the supposed patron deity of Silverport was mysteriously absent."
"I have no idea." says Three. The sage looks baffled.
"Unfortunate. Add that to your list of things to find out, along with researching the Abominations. And with that I think we're done here, everyone. I'll be sadly absent on a long-planned caravan expedition in a few months' time, so I leave the city in your capable hands - " he draws a breath, considering whether to leave more detailed instructions, " - if you're deadlocked, defer to Gold Morning."
Well, then.
---
Voting time. You have SIX (6) actions over the next six months (one turn). One action may represent a month of solid work, or one day a week over the course of the turn - please don't poke the abstraction too hard. Overwork choices give you an extra action rather than consuming one, so you can go up to nine if you're an absolute workaholic. Voting is by plan.
Do Your Job: The palace budget is still in tatters after the reign of the Abominations, but Void has provided a massive cash influx which will buy you time, and Blade has agreed to put his connections at your service to help you use that time to good effect.
[] Several city gates and nearby roads have been neglected with their minders gone. Some are untolled, some tolled by bandits. Those tolls should go to the palace.
[] Do a proper reckoning of the various ports, docks, quays and wharfs around the city to make sure you're getting all the tariffs you should.
[] Prioritize repairs, reconstruction and reutilization of palace-owned land so you can start charging rent on it again.
[] Begin lending out some of those five hundred talents to entrepreneurs. Then collect both interest and fees from them.
[] Ask your relatives for advice. Some of the older ones worked for previous Portlords and would know what to do.
[] The temple tithes and shrine offerings haven't been audited for decades. Some of these gods probably don't live here any more, or even exist. Who can you stop paying?
[] Go through the payroll of the palace guard and remove dead soldiers, missing soldiers, retired soldiers, and whoever else needs removing.
[] Issue threats of audits and inspections to everyone to encourage them to clean up their own act.
[] The Guardian and Dragon clans are dead, purge any remaining obligations to their former members.
[] Stall and procrastinate until problems hopefully solve themselves or creditors give up and offer to settle for less.
[] Write-in approach
Do Your Other Job: A census of Silverport has not been held in living memory. How might you go about such a thing?
[] Asking clan heads to count their clan members would be a good start.
[] Ask tariff collectors to count how many different people pass through the gates and ports every week.
[] Pick an ordinary district to count the population of, then divide Silverport's size by the district's size for an estimate.
[] Write-in approach
Follow Your Passion:
[] Look for materials. You'll need to buy a great deal of iron, of course, fuel, reagents, and a forge custom-built to your specifications.
[] Look for personnel. You'll need smiths, alchemists, probably a priest of the god of forges, maybe a thaumaturge or geomancer too.
[] Look for a starmetal sample. You'll want it as a reference to check the forge is on the right path.
[] Look for reference materials. Somewhere in an archive or library there might be notes on the artificial creation of starmetal.
Abuse your office:
[] Delaying Clan Bridge isn't enough. Undermine and sabotage them. Subtly, of course - it should look like Fate objects to people who oppose the Portlord.
[] Some of the less scrupulous members of your own clan have suggested you should be quietly sabotaging Clan Plum instead.
[] Why choose? Falsify a few contracts to make both Bridge and Plum think the other owes them something.
[] See if you can shuffle your personal obligations onto the palace finances.
Self-improvement: Can attempt to raise one of your attributes. Difficulty increases as the base attribute rises.
[] Practice. Take some time away from what you're doing to look at how you're doing it and whether there's a better approach.
[] Tutoring. Ask one of your fellow councillors for advice in their field of expertise.
[] Paid Tutoring. Hire a professional teacher, like the ones your clan used to pay for when you were younger.
[] Study the Old Tongue. You'd quite like to see some of this blackmail, and remove anything it might say about you. (Will begin a Learning skill)
Social actions: One of these can be taken for free each turn in your spare time. Each additional selection from this section will still cost an action. You do not need to socialize with your own clan - that happens automatically unless you choose to skimp on family obligations.
[] Get to know one of your fellow councillors. (choose which)
[] Spy on one of your fellow councillors. (choose which)
[] Socialize and build connections with one of the great clans of Silverport. (choose which)
[] Spend time with someone else. (choose whom)
Special actions:
[] Slow and Steady. Other planned actions this turn get a bonus die to their rolls. Cannot be used if overworking.
[] Overwork: skimp on family obligations. You get an extra action this turn. May damage your social standing.
[] Overwork: skimp on religious obligations. You get an extra action this turn. May damage your social standing.
[] Overwork: skimp on food and sleep. You get an extra action this turn. May result in poor health.
QM notes:
-The extra die from Slow and Steady is a weight towards the upper end of the range, rather than a flat bonus to rolls. It bumps up the mean result by about 5 points on the d50.
-Clarifying edit: Slow and Steady is not a free action, it represents time spent on proper prior planning to prevent poor performance.
-As a loose estimate, it will require ten successful budget actions to balance the palace budget. Your boss has set a target to have it half balanced after the next turn.
-Burning hell money for Grandmother Avalanche and other deceased ancestors isn't exactly a 'religious' obligation, but I'm having trouble thinking of a better name for that sort of thing. Mythological? Ceremonial?
This is actually very promising from our perspective, particularly as we have chosen to be a corrupt thieving git.
The fact he is not only willing but casually eager to cover up his own indiscretions means he is probably willing to overlook some irregularities so long as we produce results.
"I cannot hope to learn the names of so many hundred people!"
That does not bode well. We have the equivalent of a tribal war-chief trying to run a national army. We have a million people (ish) in the city. Even the standard 1% would give 10,000 soldiers. (Presumably we are rather below at present due to recent events.) I doubt this girl has even commanded a three digit force.
"In summary, the palace is over two hundred fifty talents of silver in debt, of money, goods, and services, and on course to lose another three hundred fifty this year."
We have two basic strategies here. Reorganise taxing live people or stop paying dead people. I would prefer to get the reorganisation done first as people in the habit of not paying tend to complain more than people getting their illicit earnings curtailed.
The threats of audit is… somewhat risky given the political climate. Probably best to wait untill we get that blackmail material.
Picks:
[] Several city gates and nearby roads have been neglected with their minders gone. Some are untolled, some tolled by bandits. Those tolls should go to the palace.
[] Do a proper reckoning of the various ports, docks, quays and wharfs around the city to make sure you're getting all the tariffs you should.
[] Prioritize repairs, reconstruction and reutilization of palace-owned land so you can start charging rent on it again.
These are very important. We will need friends on the council, friends in our clan, possibly friends in other clans. Plus this is generally a de-stressing opportunity. Spying is at present a bad use of time, we need to know who they present themselves as before digging deeper.
Picks:
[] Get to know one of your fellow councillors. (spymaster)
[] Spend time with someone else. (Our wife jade)
Picks:
[] Overwork: skimp on religious obligations. You get an extra action this turn. May damage your social standing.
[] Overwork: skimp on food and sleep. You get an extra action this turn. May result in poor health.
We have two basic strategies here. Reorganise taxing live people or stop paying dead people. I would prefer to get the reorganisation done first as people in the habit of not paying tend to complain more than people getting their illicit earnings curtailed.
The threats of audit is… somewhat risky given the political climate. Probably best to wait untill we get that blackmail material.
Very good point. Also stemming our cashflow bleeding out towards people that aren't entitled to our money seems like priority number one, so the financial ditch we're lying in doesn't get any deeper. Boosting our earnings or scrapping long-standing debts off of our balance sheet is priority number two.
This however:
[] Study the Old Tongue. You'd quite like to see some of this blackmail, and remove anything it might say about you. (Will begin a Learning skill)
Seems like a very valuable action to me. I'm leery of Three because of her affliction. Her being an Abomination mole inside the council doesn't seem implausible -- despite what the Portlord seems to think -- and seems like precisely the things they kept track of. Also knowing Old Tongue seems like it could be valuable for a whole host of other things, such as old manuals on metallurgy or other obscure bits of information. Furthermore, we have an eidetic memory trait, an afternoon with these notes and we are a living database of blackmail.
I would withhold on overwork right now. Our personal and family goals depend on us having political capital to throw around, and taking a hit to our health while new to the job seems like a great recipe for burnout.
That does not bode well. We have the equivalent of a tribal war-chief trying to run a national army. We have a million people (ish) in the city. Even the standard 1% would give 10,000 soldiers. (Presumably we are rather below at present due to recent events.) I doubt this girl has even commanded a three digit force.
Well spotted, though Ebuskun's current command is also rather below for another reason - the Portlord does not normally command the national army as a whole. Most of the major dynastic houses have some of their own forces with their own Marshals, plus there are mercenary companies of varying professionalism from army-for-hire to thugs-for-hire, and knightly orders run out of the temples and whatnot. The lack of a unified army is one of the points of national pride of Silverport not having a king, as seen in the coronation ceremony - the Portlord is supposed to be a guiding administrator, not a ruler.
I'm short on references for properly estimating the size of pseudo-medieval city-state economies, so I would like to leave some vagueness in the orders of magnitude between the large scale of the city budget and the personal scale of the character budget lest I wind up contradicting myself badly. But as a loose estimate to be taken with a grain of salt, I figure it might be around 100g.
Okay, lets see...we got major tasks of:
-Halve the losses(critical).
-Get a Census done(flexible)
-Indulge our fetish
Assessment:
[] Several city gates and nearby roads have been neglected with their minders gone. Some are untolled, some tolled by bandits. Those tolls should go to the palace.
Critical. This is a direct slight on the authority of the portlord, and its highly visible.
[] Do a proper reckoning of the various ports, docks, quays and wharfs around the city to make sure you're getting all the tariffs you should.
Urgent. Give the merchants even a WEEK of tax free and they're going to bitch like the almighty when it stops being free.
[] Prioritize repairs, reconstruction and reutilization of palace-owned land so you can start charging rent on it again.
Not urgent, but useful. The payout will be slow though, and we need to stop the bleeding.
[] Begin lending out some of those five hundred talents to entrepreneurs. Then collect both interest and fees from them.
Faster payout, but risky. Investment is normally high risk as it is, in the absence of order the most profitable investments are likely illegal ones. Avoid until we have the taxation lined up.
[] Ask your relatives for advice. Some of the older ones worked for previous Portlords and would know what to do.
Background advantage. We can get some of what we missed, but it does cost an action.
[] The temple tithes and shrine offerings haven't been audited for decades. Some of these gods probably don't live here any more, or even exist. Who can you stop paying?
Generally speaking we should leave this for later. Pissing off a god we thought is gone would severely complicate things at this juncture.
[] Go through the payroll of the palace guard and remove dead soldiers, missing soldiers, retired soldiers, and whoever else needs removing.
[] The Guardian and Dragon clans are dead, purge any remaining obligations to their former members.
These are less urgent, but thats a pretty substantial money bleed in the clans
[] Issue threats of audits and inspections to everyone to encourage them to clean up their own act.
We have the Blade synergy here. Do this. We got a whole book of blackmail getting stale there.
[] Stall and procrastinate until problems hopefully solve themselves or creditors give up and offer to settle for less.
We don't need this and it hurts the rep.
Do Your Other Job: A census of Silverport has not been held in living memory. How might you go about such a thing?
[] Asking clan heads to count their clan members would be a good start.
A good start indeed. They might misreport it however, especially since a Census is considered a sign of royalist ambitions.
[] Ask tariff collectors to count how many different people pass through the gates and ports every week.
This lets us track changes in population, but is not in itself sufficient.
[] Pick an ordinary district to count the population of, then divide Silverport's size by the district's size for an estimate.
This is how we get a hilariously wrong number. District densities vary enormously.
[] Write-in approach: Doesn't matter who they are. Everyone eats. Ask the tariff collectors to count the amount of grain going in and out of the city over the next six months. The difference is the amount consumed or wasted. By dividing this by the amount of grain needed for a person over six months, you will obtain an approximate count for the maximum number of people that could be living in the city. This won't be too far off, a merchant that wastes much grain won't stay a merchant for very long.
I have an idea.
Its crude as hell, but its fast and its simple. Some people eat more, some people eat less, but the gap isn't that huge once you average it out.
Follow Your Passion:
[] Look for materials. You'll need to buy a great deal of iron, of course, fuel, reagents, and a forge custom-built to your specifications.
[] Look for personnel. You'll need smiths, alchemists, probably a priest of the god of forges, maybe a thaumaturge or geomancer too.
[] Look for a starmetal sample. You'll want it as a reference to check the forge is on the right path.
[] Look for reference materials. Somewhere in an archive or library there might be notes on the artificial creation of starmetal.
Lets start with the reference materials first. The rest are costly, and we could be barking up the entirely wrong tree.
Abuse your office:
[] Delaying Clan Bridge isn't enough. Undermine and sabotage them. Subtly, of course - it should look like Fate objects to people who oppose the Portlord.
[] Some of the less scrupulous members of your own clan have suggested you should be quietly sabotaging Clan Plum instead.
[] Why choose? Falsify a few contracts to make both Bridge and Plum think the other owes them something.
[] See if you can shuffle your personal obligations onto the palace finances.
I think the sad part is we don't have TIME to do this
Self-improvement: Can attempt to raise one of your attributes. Difficulty increases as the base attribute rises.
[] Practice. Take some time away from what you're doing to look at how you're doing it and whether there's a better approach.
[] Tutoring. Ask one of your fellow councillors for advice in their field of expertise.
[] Paid Tutoring. Hire a professional teacher, like the ones your clan used to pay for when you were younger.
[] Study the Old Tongue. You'd quite like to see some of this blackmail, and remove anything it might say about you. (Will begin a Learning skill)
Most of these aren't urgent at all.
Social actions: One of these can be taken for free each turn in your spare time. Each additional selection from this section will still cost an action. You do not need to socialize with your own clan - that happens automatically unless you choose to skimp on family obligations.
[] Get to know one of your fellow councillors. (choose which)
[] Spy on one of your fellow councillors. (choose which)
[] Socialize and build connections with one of the great clans of Silverport. (choose which)
[] Spend time with someone else. (choose whom)
We're going to want the clan connections. As many as we can get. Wisdom is likely a good start. Never hurts to suck up to the boss family.
Special actions:
[] Slow and Steady. Other planned actions this turn get a bonus die to their rolls. Cannot be used if overworking.
[] Overwork: skimp on family obligations. You get an extra action this turn. May damage your social standing.
[] Overwork: skimp on religious obligations. You get an extra action this turn. May damage your social standing.
[] Overwork: skimp on food and sleep. You get an extra action this turn. May result in poor health.
Based on our action commitment we're going to need 5 actions devoted to unfucking things and they all have to succeed. We got two turns to do this, so we should avoid overwork for now, and use it in the final sprint.
So Plan!
[X] Plan Steady Progress
-[X] Several city gates and nearby roads have been neglected with their minders gone. Some are untolled, some tolled by bandits. Those tolls should go to the palace.
-[X] Do a proper reckoning of the various ports, docks, quays and wharfs around the city to make sure you're getting all the tariffs you should.
-[X] Ask your relatives for advice. Some of the older ones worked for previous Portlords and would know what to do.
-[X] Issue threats of audits and inspections to everyone to encourage them to clean up their own act.
-[X] Write-in approach: Doesn't matter who they are. Everyone eats. Ask the tariff collectors to count the amount of food going in and out of the city over the next six months. The difference is the amount consumed or wasted. By dividing this by the amount of food needed for a person over six months, you will obtain an approximate count for the maximum number of people that could be living in the city. This won't be too far off, a merchant that wastes much product won't stay a merchant for very long.
-[X] Look for reference materials. Somewhere in an archive or library there might be notes on the artificial creation of starmetal.
-[X] Socialize and build connections with one of the great clans of Silverport. (Clan Wisdom)
-[] Slow and Steady. Other planned actions this turn get a bonus die to their rolls. Cannot be used if overworking.
This should immediately resume taxation, if we're lucky we'd only need two actions next turn to meet expectations, but I suspect we'd be at 2/5 progress from failed rolls. Our family should give us more options too.
I quite like [] Plan Steady Progress but personally I'd replace the ask your relatives for advice option for one of the options to reduce expenditure, so:
[X] Plan Constant Progress
-[X] Several city gates and nearby roads have been neglected with their minders gone. Some are untolled, some tolled by bandits. Those tolls should go to the palace.
-[X] Do a proper reckoning of the various ports, docks, quays and wharfs around the city to make sure you're getting all the tariffs you should.
-[X] Go through the payroll of the palace guard and remove dead soldiers, missing soldiers, retired soldiers, and whoever else needs removing.
-[X] Issue threats of audits and inspections to everyone to encourage them to clean up their own act.
-[X] Write-in approach: Doesn't matter who they are. Everyone eats. Ask the tariff collectors to count the amount of grain going in and out of the city over the next six months. The difference is the amount consumed or wasted. By dividing this by the amount of grain needed for a person over six months, you will obtain an approximate count for the maximum number of people that could be living in the city. This won't be too far off, a merchant that wastes much grain won't stay a merchant for very long.
-[X] Look for reference materials. Somewhere in an archive or library there might be notes on the artificial creation of starmetal.
-[X] Socialize and build connections with one of the great clans of Silverport. (Clan Wisdom)
-[X] Slow and Steady. Other planned actions this turn get a bonus die to their rolls. Cannot be used if overworking.
[X] Plan Steady Progress
-[1] Several city gates and nearby roads have been neglected with their minders gone. Some are untolled, some tolled by bandits. Those tolls should go to the palace.
-[2] Do a proper reckoning of the various ports, docks, quays and wharfs around the city to make sure you're getting all the tariffs you should.
-[3] Ask your relatives for advice. Some of the older ones worked for previous Portlords and would know what to do.
-[4] Issue threats of audits and inspections to everyone to encourage them to clean up their own act.
-[5] Write-in approach: Doesn't matter who they are. Everyone eats. Ask the tariff collectors to count the amount of grain going in and out of the city over the next six months. The difference is the amount consumed or wasted. By dividing this by the amount of grain needed for a person over six months, you will obtain an approximate count for the maximum number of people that could be living in the city. This won't be too far off, a merchant that wastes much grain won't stay a merchant for very long.
-[6] Look for reference materials. Somewhere in an archive or library there might be notes on the artificial creation of starmetal.
-[Free] Socialize and build connections with one of the great clans of Silverport. (Clan Wisdom)
-[7] Slow and Steady. Other planned actions this turn get a bonus die to their rolls. Cannot be used if overworking.
Well spotted, though Ebuskun's current command is also rather below for another reason - the Portlord does not normally command the national army as a whole. Most of the major dynastic houses have some of their own forces with their own Marshals, plus there are mercenary companies of varying professionalism from army-for-hire to thugs-for-hire, and knightly orders run out of the temples and whatnot. The lack of a unified army is one of the points of national pride of Silverport not having a king, as seen in the coronation ceremony - the Portlord is supposed to be a guiding administrator, not a ruler.
So the 'martial' is actually more diplomat than general, being tasked with keeping the various companies pointed at the enemy.
I'm short on references for properly estimating the size of pseudo-medieval city-state economies, so I would like to leave some vagueness in the orders of magnitude between the large scale of the city budget and the personal scale of the character budget lest I wind up contradicting myself badly. But as a loose estimate to be taken with a grain of salt, I figure it might be around 100g.
Solid analysis. Bad plan, even ignoring the fact that you are using seven actions out of the six available. Slow and Steady is not automatic, it spends one action to slightly improve the other five.
Asking for advice doesn't improve things directly. We already have the knowledge to solve this problem, so long as we dedicate the time needed.
By the look of things Clan Wisdom is entirely in the Portlord's pocket.
I was thinking about tallying grain as well, but we're a port city so we'd have to tally all fish catches as well, as I image they'll account for a large part of the poor class' diet. Also there might be cured fish or meats around that can be preserved for quite a long while.
Drawing a leaf from the ancient world, why not tally the most ubiquitous preservant you need for making bread and keeping most foodstuffs fresh? Salt, of course. Though then of course there's also some people that will salt their fish with brine because they can't afford salt, but I think it'll cover a bigger slice than just grain, and is easier to tally and weigh.
Asking for advice doesn't improve things directly. We already have the knowledge to solve this problem, so long as we dedicate the time needed.
By the look of things Clan Wisdom is entirely in the Portlord's pocket.
We don't actually know everything because we voted not to take the helpful predecessor. Asking our clan is a chargen bonus(we picked the heir in good standing so they are default helpful), currently we don't even HAVE the 10 actions to fix everything identified, and we do have 2 turns to succeed at 5 actions.
Since I'm taking 3 tax recovery actions, if they pass we should be at 3/5 and can clear next turn with no overwork.
If they don't pass...we can take 5 fixing actions next turn after family feedback
I was thinking about tallying grain as well, but we're a port city so we'd have to tally all fish catches as well, as I image they'll account for a large part of the poor class' diet. Also there might be cured fish or meats around that can be preserved for quite a long while.
Drawing a leaf from the ancient world, why not tally the most ubiquitous preservant you need for making bread and keeping most foodstuffs fresh? Salt, of course. Though then of course there's also some people that will salt their fish with brine because they can't afford salt, but I think it'll cover a bigger slice than just grain, and is easier to tally and weigh.
-[X] Write-in approach: Doesn't matter who they are. Everyone eats. Ask the tariff collectors to count the amount of food going in and out of the city over the next six months. The difference is the amount consumed or wasted. By dividing this by the amount of food needed for a person over six months, you will obtain an approximate count for the maximum number of people that could be living in the city. This won't be too far off, a merchant that wastes much product won't stay a merchant for very long.
Well, tallying everything, including individual fish catches (are there even tariffs on this?) would be substantially more difficult than just tallying grain, hence my suggestion to keep track of the one good that you need for both bread, meat and fish instead.
[X] Plan Constant Progress
-[X] Several city gates and nearby roads have been neglected with their minders gone. Some are untolled, some tolled by bandits. Those tolls should go to the palace.
-[X] Do a proper reckoning of the various ports, docks, quays and wharfs around the city to make sure you're getting all the tariffs you should.
-[X] Go through the payroll of the palace guard and remove dead soldiers, missing soldiers, retired soldiers, and whoever else needs removing.
-[X] Issue threats of audits and inspections to everyone to encourage them to clean up their own act.
-[X] Write-in approach: Doesn't matter who they are. Everyone eats. Ask the tariff collectors to count the amount of grain going in and out of the city over the next six months. The difference is the amount consumed or wasted. By dividing this by the amount of grain needed for a person over six months, you will obtain an approximate count for the maximum number of people that could be living in the city. This won't be too far off, a merchant that wastes much grain won't stay a merchant for very long.
-[X] Look for reference materials. Somewhere in an archive or library there might be notes on the artificial creation of starmetal.
-[X] Socialize and build connections with one of the great clans of Silverport. (Clan Wisdom)
I'm also of the opinion that we can push socializing with clan Wisdom for a little bit: I would suggest Ascension for a few reasons.
1. They're the oldest clan, giving them an edge in social networks. Networking with them can open doors.
2. They're the Lore clan, we might find resources for our personal project.
[X] Plan Salaries and Blackmail
-[X] Several city gates and nearby roads have been neglected with their minders gone. Some are untolled, some tolled by bandits. Those tolls should go to the palace.
-[X] Do a proper reckoning of the various ports, docks, quays and wharfs around the city to make sure you're getting all the tariffs you should.
-[X] Go through the payroll of the palace guard and remove dead soldiers, missing soldiers, retired soldiers, and whoever else needs removing.
-[X] Write-in approach: Count the amount of salt going in and out of the city. Bread, vegetables, fish and meat, all require salt to be persevered and made. Besides, it is easy to weigh, doesn't spoil and is almost universal in value.
-[X] Look for reference materials. Somewhere in an archive or library there might be notes on the artificial creation of starmetal.
-[X] Study the Old Tongue. You'd quite like to see some of this blackmail, and remove anything it might say about you. (Will begin a Learning skill)
Gotta take a look at that blackmail before Three tears out the pages referring to her. She seems to be very very nervous about it, which raises all sorts of red flags. Spymaster can't read the script, and we have the intrigue, learning and memory to do this.
Well, tallying everything, including individual fish catches (are there even tariffs on this?) would be substantially more difficult than just tallying grain, hence my suggestion to keep track of the one good that you need for both bread, meat and fish instead.
Gotta take a look at that blackmail before Three tears out the pages referring to her. She seems to be very very nervous about it, which raises all sorts of red flags. Spymaster can't read the script, and we have the intrigue, learning and memory to do this.
Uh dude, learning a language takes time. We got at least 10 out of 24 actions(if they all succeed) committed to fixing the economy over the next 4 turns. 4 more on our pet project. And we need more than one action to census since the ballpark is probably insufficient.
One turn delay won't hurt that too much. We got more leeway next turn
[X] Plan Overdrive
-[X] Several city gates and nearby roads have been neglected with their minders gone. Some are untolled, some tolled by bandits. Those tolls should go to the palace.
-[X] Do a proper reckoning of the various ports, docks, quays and wharfs around the city to make sure you're getting all the tariffs you should.
-[X] Prioritize repairs, reconstruction and reutilization of palace-owned land so you can start charging rent on it again.
-[X] Begin lending out some of those five hundred talents to entrepreneurs. Then collect both interest and fees from them.
-[X] Ask your relatives for advice. Some of the older ones worked for previous Portlords and would know what to do.
-[X] The temple tithes and shrine offerings haven't been audited for decades. Some of these gods probably don't live here any more, or even exist. Who can you stop paying?
-[X] Go through the payroll of the palace guard and remove dead soldiers, missing soldiers, retired soldiers, and whoever else needs removing.
-[X] Issue threats of audits and inspections to everyone to encourage them to clean up their own act.
-[X] The Guardian and Dragon clans are dead, purge any remaining obligations to their former members.
-[X] Overwork: skimp on family obligations. You get an extra action this turn. May damage your social standing.
-[X] Overwork: skimp on religious obligations. You get an extra action this turn. May damage your social standing.
-[X] Overwork: skimp on food and sleep. You get an extra action this turn. May result in poor health.
[X] Plan Council Support
-[X] Several city gates and nearby roads have been neglected with their minders gone. Some are untolled, some tolled by bandits. Those tolls should go to the palace.
-[X] Do a proper reckoning of the various ports, docks, quays and wharfs around the city to make sure you're getting all the tariffs you should.
-[X] Prioritize repairs, reconstruction and reutilization of palace-owned land so you can start charging rent on it again.
-[X] Issue threats of audits and inspections to everyone to encourage them to clean up their own act.
-[X] Ask tariff collectors to count how many different people pass through the gates and ports every week.
-[X] Look for reference materials. Somewhere in an archive or library there might be notes on the artificial creation of starmetal.
-[X] Get to know one of your fellow councillors. (Gold Morning, Spymaster of Silverport) (Free)
Idea here is to leverage the book of blackmail, liaising with the spymaster while we do so.
I can't support the write-in options for the census. We don't have the infrastructure to accurately tally how much food is being eaten. How many vegetable gardens are in the city? How many animals? How much is wasted? How much is being stored after abominations destroyed granaries? How many granaries are being emptied due to farmers not bringing food in past the bandits and fishermen not having boats any more?
Against spending time with the Portlord's pocket clan.
