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On the Road to Elspar [Book 1] (Dryad Mercenary Schoolgirl Quest)

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The Laurent said:
I wonder, how many snide comments about Dryads are we missing because people only say them when there's not a dryad in the room/only in their internal narration?
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I kind of like that the only one who actually says anything particularly ignorant about dryads out loud to our face is Azalea.
Adhoc vote count started by Gazetteer on Apr 25, 2018 at 9:45 AM, finished with 90 posts and 29 votes.
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Kinruush said:
Vesna and Emilie did as well, when we first met. And Stephanie, but iirc she was just messing with us. Still, I do think Azalea has done so the most consistently.
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Oh, thanks, as soon as I posted that I had this thought like "you're probably forgetting something". It's been way too long since I've read Kei's eariest posts in this topic.
 
There absolutely are stereotypes about dryads, although much of it is driven by lack of information rather than racial tensions. Like, for elves, humans, and aseri, the relationship is akin to that of the U.S., the politics of which are muddled by a history of prejudice that often goes multiple ways. By contrast, dryads are like - to use an imperfect example - something like Mongolians: You (or at least the average Western person) probably don't actually know the first thing about modern Mongolians and/or Mongolia, the Mongolian history you do know is probably restricted to the Mongol Empire under Genghis Khan, and you probably think they're still horse-riding nomads living in gers, but you don't have a history of racial tensions with them, and at least they aren't brown/black or Muslim. (I guess another example I could use here is the Amish, but.)

I'll try to get several write-ups of characters very soon, including a codex I didn't think was ready, but which I may as well share.
 
I really hope we get Interludes of characters we don't or often interact with as to show all the interesting stuff we're missing with them plus their perspective of Neianne.
 
I should have read it sooner, this is absolutely amazing quest. @Kei is a treasure.
[x] Emilie
[x] Mia Honette
[x] Nikki
[x] Vesna Rainer

Btw, a vote for an "old" crew we've met at ceremony , I think?
 
[] Elizabeth Irivich Zabanya
[] Lucille Lorraine Celestia
[] Azalea Cherilyn Charmaine
[] Sieglinde Corrina Ravenhill

How many of these top four votes are nobles?

We can't spend too much time around nobles, it'll warp our perspective on the world.
 
The Laurent said:
[] Elizabeth Irivich Zabanya
[] Lucille Lorraine Celestia
[] Azalea Cherilyn Charmaine
[] Sieglinde Corrina Ravenhill

How many of these top four votes are nobles?

We can't spend too much time around nobles, it'll warp our perspective on the world.
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All of them are nobles. And each considers their sacred duty to tell us we do not understand their problems - although we probably understood after first couple of repetitions. Guess they are just being considerate of mental abilities of not-noble, quite kind of them.


But, to be fair, lack of access to diverse diet, top-notch medics and tutors are in no way compatible problems to theirs, so them focusing on their problems is commendable and reasonable. Silly Sieglinde and her having at least some awareness of other classes having problems too and sometimes even talking about those; goes to show that books are not everything and she should read about silly plights of peasants less, eh?
 
I mean, ctuhuslp is perhaps overdoing it with the sarcasm, but I do remember at least several conversations in which noble problems are centered above any others, @Kei . You're free to tell me as the author (and someone who thus knows the body of work better than me who has forgotten many of the details) if I'm remembering wrong?

[x] Stephanie
[x] Vesna Rainer
[x] Melanie Aster
[X] Wendy


I'm only choosing three instead of four because this is a strategic vote. It's not that I want to know absolutely nobody who is a noble... it's that plenty of people have already voted for the nobles, and at the current vote we'll be talking to *only* nobles, which I'm sure will have no impact on anything, so I'm trying to swing it around. I still expect at least a few nobles will get in, but maybe at least one person will win who has non-noble experience.

(I should read this Quest again, but that's the general impression I got?)
(Watch as I accidentally pick a noble.)
 
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I admit, maybe I'm reading this wrong? Like, @Kei , part of understanding a work is understanding where it lies? As in, someone going into a Pokemon Quest/story/etc and screaming about how it's all animal abuse is annoying, as I understand. And so on and so forth, genre conventions and etc.

So if Nobles are meant to be read vastly different than IRL Nobles, or to fit the whole 'is noble' thing, or it's meant to be a case where the system works fine or something else? And thus worrying about, like, class-based stuff is really out there? But I did note that there seems at times to be a lot more work put in on the part of the MC to understand the milleu of nobility than the other way around, if that makes sense?

Then apologies. (I really should read through all this again. Gah, there's always so little time...)
 
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The Laurent said:
I mean, ctuhuslp is perhaps overdoing it with the sarcasm, but I do remember at least several conversations in which noble problems are centered above any others, @Kei . You're free to tell me as the author (and someone who thus knows the body of work better than me who has forgotten many of the details) if I'm remembering wrong?

[x] Stephanie
[x] Vesna Rainer
[x] Melanie Aster

I'm only choosing three instead of four because this is a strategic vote. It's not that I want to know absolutely nobody who is a noble... it's that plenty of people have already voted for the nobles, and at the current vote we'll be talking to *only* nobles, which I'm sure will have no impact on anything, so I'm trying to swing it around. I still expect at least a few nobles will get in, but maybe at least one person will win who has non-noble experience.

(I should read this Quest again, but that's the general impression I got?)
(Watch as I accidentally pick a noble.)
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mmm.
In my defense, I had all of 2 hours of sleep due to some deadlines and is generally a bit ruffled by life atm, so my apologies if it was (it probably was if your instinct is to distance yourself hah) too acerbic or harsh or whatnot.

But yeah, the whole "nobles only" thing is rather one-sided and, given that we mostly view the world via dialogues so far, it seems, skews both IC and OOC view on events. The only exception to such trend I see is Sieg, who seems quite self-aware about the societal order and problems being not unique to upper class and etc.
 
ctulhuslp said:
I should have read it sooner, this is absolutely amazing quest. @Kei is a treasure.
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Aw, you're so sweet, thank you~ ^_^

The Laurent said:
I mean, ctuhuslp is perhaps overdoing it with the sarcasm, but I do remember at least several conversations in which noble problems are centered above any others, @Kei . You're free to tell me as the author (and someone who thus knows the body of work better than me who has forgotten many of the details) if I'm remembering wrong?

[x] Stephanie
[x] Vesna Rainer
[x] Melanie Aster

I'm only choosing three instead of four because this is a strategic vote. It's not that I want to know absolutely nobody who is a noble... it's that plenty of people have already voted for the nobles, and at the current vote we'll be talking to *only* nobles, which I'm sure will have no impact on anything, so I'm trying to swing it around. I still expect at least a few nobles will get in, but maybe at least one person will win who has non-noble experience.

(I should read this Quest again, but that's the general impression I got?)
(Watch as I accidentally pick a noble.)
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The Laurent said:
I admit, maybe I'm reading this wrong? Like, @Kei , part of understanding a work is understanding where it lies? As in, someone going into a Pokemon Quest/story/etc and screaming about how it's all animal abuse is annoying, as I understand. And so on and so forth, genre conventions and etc.

So if Nobles are meant to be read vastly different than IRL Nobles, or to fit the whole 'is noble' thing, or it's meant to be a case where the system works fine or something else?

Then apologies. (I really should read through all this again. Gah, there's always so little time...)
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Narratively speaking, I'm not trying to depict the nobility as more important or more centered relative to the rest of the quest. (I mean, yes, they're socially, politically, and economically more important, but that's not what this question is about.) Granted, many of the major players would've been mentioned in passing nonetheless had you not befriended them (because they're nobles and reasonably popular), but through determined voting or sheer accident (such as picking Elizabeth as a squadmate before knowing who she even was), the voters have basically placed Neianne in the orbits of plenty of nobleladies. Which is fine - and I have attempted to balance this out, including giving characters like Penelope and Wendy a large role than initially planned, as well as putting you back together with Vesna, Emilie, and Nikki for Midwinter's Feast - but as I said, there will be narrative consequences to this. I'm not using "consequences" in a bad way; there are definitely some good consequences to it. But they won't be all good. Nor would all the consequences have been good or bad had you chosen a different set of friends. Again, this is a narrative quest, and we're not minmaxing.

If you have the impression that the narrative is weighted towards the nobles, I want to defend myself by saying that I went in accordance with your votes and that this is what you wanted, but it also probably means that I'm not doing a good enough job guiding the quest along if this is turning out to be a problem.

Also, no, the social, political, and economic systems in Caldrein don't "work fine". Or, perhaps better described, they're not perfect. There are some serious flaws in the whole system, just as there are serious flaws in Tenereia (and Ornthalia, and everywhere else, all in different ways). Penelope and Wendy may not express it in a way that necessarily endears them to the rest of the cast (or even the rest of the apprentices), but their attitudes and grievances do not come out of nowhere. I'm trying to "take it easy" during the first year so I can ease you into the setting, but years two and three will be somewhat heavy thematically as I try to present the "other" side to Caldrein. One that fifteen, sixteen, and seventeen-year-old children generally don't start off wanting to talk about until time passes and things get uglier.
 
Right, vote change. Elieli and Linda are getting in no matter what but I do sorta want to see some of the non-nobles so we don't get executed by Penelope once the revolution comes

[X] Stephanie
[X] Vesna Rainer
[X] Penelope
[X] Wendy

ps melanie worst girl
EDIT: wow, okay, this actually places Linda behind Stephanie :thonk:
 
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Ostrich said:
Right, vote change. Elieli and Linda are getting in no matter what but I do sorta want to see some of the non-nobles so we don't get executed by Penelope once the revolution comes

[X] Penelope
[X] Wendy
[X] Stephanie
[X] Vesna Rainer

ps melanie worst girl
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sieg is a most aware one so far so she will be guillotined last is nice and I don't mind her

Eliza, OTOH, looks and sounds 100% like an average DnD protagonist. Which is not a compliment.

ps: Melanie is a cute, but cute does not a good soldier make, so.
Though she seems determined I guess?
 
[X] Elizabeth Irivich Zabanya
[X] Melanie Aster
[x] Azalea Cherilyn Charmaine
[X] Vesna Rainer


I am getting Liz times. Can't stop. Won't stop. She's pretty cool and electrifying.
 
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[X] Stephanie
[X] Penelope
[X] Wendy
[X] Elizabeth Irivich Zabanya
 
Problems in the system...So far the general gist I get is this:
Caldren as a whole has grown to rely overmuch on it's heroic Mercenaries. Like Neianne is already a match for a Squirrel 1v1 or so I think, and that's cool! I bet even Lucille would be a competent soldier if not elite potential with the training she's recieved.
The problem, is that while any Caldren mercenary can probably reliably fight 10v1 and WIN, and the whole warband fighting at once probably looks like something out of a movie or Fire Emblem game...They're also the equivalent of having an army full of top-tier units in an RTS. If you lose them, it HURTS because they're expensive. They don't replenish quickly. And you're not really going to do well in slug-fests where you're gonna lose someone unless you already have considerable advantages.
Why bring up RTS concerns? Because that expense comes out of the pocket of others. Caldren might have some of the deadliest warriors alive, but it comes at a price.
They're self-sufficent, maybe with a little left-over for trading, but overall they're more 'doing well enough to squeak by' rather than 'we have a surplus!'...
I'd rather not start hanging around Penelope&Wendy overmuch either, no offense but that thing with Zabanya and their general attitude is one I do not like. Penelope feels like she's kind of rooted in that old 'street rat' origin and strikes me as actually the kind of person who would excerbate the issues of Caldren with the hero-unit focus via agitating for preferential treatment. Wendy isn't as bad, I think she's in the same origin but more just a carrier of the opinions rather than someone who would espouse them personally.
On the other flipside of the coin of the negatives of hero-focus, we have Lucille. Who frankly is slowly getting crushed under the weight of being Noble, of being one of the 'heroes' of Caldren despite not having the inclination or desire towards being a hero. And due to really not being able to bear that weight she seems likely to mess up at a critical juncture and crack the whole philosophy as a point of failure. This is bad because her example would erode the entire system, rather than 'trimming the fat' as I think Sieglinde plans on doing. Our presence here will help, but let's be wary of how many actions we spend-Lucille will only be bolstered so much by our presence and the only true cure is getting to stand on her own two feet.

...Sonnova beep. THAT's probably a nastier reason why Sieglinde left her to sink or swim on her own. Because Lucille's failling would indeed help Sieg's goals-showing the Caldren nobility as fallible is certainly part of her interests. And who can say Sieglinde could have prevented deaths? Risky move possibly if Sieg underestimated the threat but...Well, let's not bring up Sieg's thing out of private rooms, because if Penelope catches wind of that it will go down horribly...Lemme swap tracks to talking about the rest of the nobles for a bit?

Azalea...I don't think we're going to get a great view of her from Neianne's perspective-ironic as it sounds, the Dryad Noble has a story arc that seems like it will be the most steeped in racism with Dryads. Whether this is a bad thing or not I can only guess. Honestly? I think she's going to basically act as a 'signal booster' anytime Neianne does something awesome, and generally act as a PR agent, in hopes of getting the Dryads out of the forests and into the limelight. I also imagine she'll aggressively seek Neianne out if we utterly fail to take actions to be with her, especially if we keep the awesome stories flowing, so there's not that much need to seek her out.

Sooo weirdly enough, I can see Sieglinde actually semi-backing Penelope. Only vaguely though- while Penelope would make a nice stick to the carrot Sieglinde might offer, I can't help but imagine Penelope taking it too far/causing problems and hitting ideas&tactics that are cold but effective. Azalea probably would also be someone Sieglinde semi-likes/possible ally of conveinence, if only because Dryad nobles would bring a naturally fresh perspective to thigns that might help the changes Sieglinde wants.

Willheima probably is going to be more of a traditionalist, and thus a rival if not opponent to Sieg. Probably more rival though, especially if we get the two to orbit enough and in ways that they come to be friendly with each other, thanks to Sieg getting to be smug over Caldren's eventual fall long-term. Of course, this is mostly down to me imposing this character arc on Willheima, rather then it being something she personally espouses-I don't actually KNOW what her thoughts&opinions are.

I'll need to go check because I know ONE of the last-name lacking characters (Nikki?) had a blacksmith company that was having problems due to not wanting to take the bursting bubble to deal with wartime but the needs of the war draining her family's coffers anyhow. That's probably the finest arguement and Sieg would LOVE to be introduced to her, especially as her family last I checked was actually fairly successful.

Stephanie...The biggest mystery box. I can only guess what her deal is.
 
Kei said:
Aw, you're so sweet, thank you~ ^_^





Narratively speaking, I'm not trying to depict the nobility as more important or more centered relative to the rest of the quest. (I mean, yes, they're socially, politically, and economically more important, but that's not what this question is about.) Granted, many of the major players would've been mentioned in passing nonetheless had you not befriended them (because they're nobles and reasonably popular), but through determined voting or sheer accident (such as picking Elizabeth as a squadmate before knowing who she even was), the voters have basically placed Neianne in the orbits of plenty of nobleladies. Which is fine - and I have attempted to balance this out, including giving characters like Penelope and Wendy a large role than initially planned, as well as putting you back together with Vesna, Emilie, and Nikki for Midwinter's Feast - but as I said, there will be narrative consequences to this. I'm not using "consequences" in a bad way; there are definitely some good consequences to it. But they won't be all good. Nor would all the consequences have been good or bad had you chosen a different set of friends. Again, this is a narrative quest, and we're not minmaxing.

If you have the impression that the narrative is weighted towards the nobles, I want to defend myself by saying that I went in accordance with your votes and that this is what you wanted, but it also probably means that I'm not doing a good enough job guiding the quest along if this is turning out to be a problem.

Also, no, the social, political, and economic systems in Caldrein don't "work fine". Or, perhaps better described, they're not perfect. There are some serious flaws in the whole system, just as there are serious flaws in Tenereia (and Ornthalia, and everywhere else, all in different ways). Penelope and Wendy may not express it in a way that necessarily endears them to the rest of the cast (or even the rest of the apprentices), but their attitudes and grievances do not come out of nowhere. I'm trying to "take it easy" during the first year so I can ease you into the setting, but years two and three will be somewhat heavy thematically as I try to present the "other" side to Caldrein. One that fifteen, sixteen, and seventeen-year-old children generally don't start off wanting to talk about until time passes and things get uglier.
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I mean, I agree. I do remember, though, that because of how many nobles we know that a lot of the conflicts/conversation/etc (when it's not more general) has been about the problems, challenges, conflicts, complaints/etc, etc of the nobility. I mean, Neianne being shy and retiring and etc probably makes it worse, but she seems to basically sorta. Well, you said it. In the orbit. Their problems are the center and the focus (not Neianne's), and Neianne's sorta the friendly and valued peanut gallery? One of their non-noble friends in a way that, like. I could see getting really old?

I mean, hopefully now that Lucille has gone (trying to be polite about it, but), "You're not a noble, you can't understand the pressure I'm under once" she won't ever be saying it again, but. :p

Edit: Some of it is narrative moving? Like, it feels like Neianne is the one doing the work to move into their orbit and understand them with only limited or personal (as opposed to, like, corporate) reciprocity on the other side? That is to say, plenty of people getting to know her as a person, but none considering the overall picture in the way that she sometimes seems to have to do with "Nobles as a class."
 
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By the way, @Kei , going through it again I think I have my first constructive criticism, sorta?

And it's this. In the first sections, because nobility were more prominent and called out, they were personalized earlier. Like, if we didn't know Sieglinde's name and etc from her being a noble, then there would have been less chance of us (though not none) of us having picked her as the second conversational partner.

This sorta makes sense, of course. Of course people are going to gossip like, "Oh, that's the daughter of countess so and so" but at the same time, that probably did somewhat influence the direction of the votes? There's no way for it not to, though. But if I was looking at a genesis, that would be part of it?

I think, at least. (double-checks how she was introduced in 1.3). Yeah, nobody said, "She's nobility" but she has three names and honestly she's introduced in the company of a series of other nobles.
 
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...Why is this a problem? She's basically a celebrity? People are going to talk about famous people more than unknowns. That's just reality, and should be taken into account even from a narrative standpoint.

Matter of fact, I want to hear about more nobles, now that this is who she is rubbing shoulders with. Who are the most famous fighters that mercs would look up to? Are there any cultural heroes that dryads have?
 
Lazy Minx said:
...Why is this a problem? She's basically a celebrity? People are going to talk about famous people more than unknowns. That's just reality, and should be taken into account even from a narrative standpoint.

Matter of fact, I want to hear about more nobles, now that this is who she is rubbing shoulders with. Who are the most famous fighters that mercs would look up to? Are there any cultural heroes that dryads have?
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Ah yes, because there are no non-noble heroes.

Dryads literally have one noble family, and that's it. All of the dryad cultural heroes except one family are non-nobles, by default. And this one noble family is pretty new.

Edit: So if you're actually interested in hearing about dryads, talking about nobles is barking up the wrong, pardon the pun, tree.
 
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The Laurent said:
We can't spend too much time around nobles, it'll warp our perspective on the world.
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ctulhuslp said:
All of them are nobles. And each considers their sacred duty to tell us we do not understand their problems - although we probably understood after first couple of repetitions.
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The Laurent said:
I mean, Neianne being shy and retiring and etc probably makes it worse, but she seems to basically sorta. Well, you said it. In the orbit. Their problems are the center and the focus (not Neianne's), and Neianne's sorta the friendly and valued peanut gallery? One of their non-noble friends in a way that, like. I could see getting really old?
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An uncharitable outside view of this would be to see Neianne as a sad little plant puppy chasing after the nobles to be their hanger-on whatever chance she can, to the detriment of her relationship with anyone else.
 
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