Then they need a specialist buffer.
Orc Quest; or, A Critical Examination of Agency Through in Interactive Fiction (Warcraft)
- Thread starter FractiousDay
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Doomed Wombat
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1. Fel's easy, in fact its a problem. Most blade masters use fel and its one of the reasons they're all wandering around generally angry. Currently if we're splitting we'd be splitting light/shamanism, assuming we ever unlock either of them ever again. If we want to do something new light blade masters is the way to go.
2. Likely cultural. Shamanism got hit over the head by Gul'dan, so where clans that practised that kind of funerary tradition might have had a pyremaster, many would have ended up like normal shamen and picked up the fel. After that I'm not sure if Thrall's view of Shamanism includes the pyremasters, or he maybe trying to incorporate their role into the idea of Shamanism more generally, so any shamen (even a shit one who doesn't really deserve the title) like Grok can serve as one. Given the whole dead spirits thing there may also be some unpleasant implications as well, and some cultural stuff, like how a pyremaster's attentions seem to be reserved for the big people of the clan, with Grok's decision to use it on everyone being very out of the norm.
3. Step one deal with the burning legion influence. Not an easy thing to do while leading a clan of warlocks. In any case its theoretically possible, but figuring out the issue is going to take time and run into more cultural and magical tripping stones than we can imagine or predict.
Yep.
My thought was we need a priest basically. Someone who can buff weapons with the light, give shields and heal.
mmm...I wonder if we can make a human an honourary member of a clan? Probably.
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Doomed Wombat
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?
Do you mean the burning blade being an affiliate of the legion? If we're lucky he's changing that, but remember he's been in their pocket pretty much all his life, so my hopes are low.
Possibly, we'll see what the tactical situation is for next turn.
Doomed Wombat
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We can, but any reinforcements even if they went by zepplin (which is expensive) would take a while to get here.
Edit: Also no flameseeing, what do you think we are a Shamen?
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AzureShogun
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I really liked it, rather than bloat it felt like I was reading a real story here. This is what I think the quest system is made for, to help this sort of writing emerge.
Thanks for the chapter!
Also a big fan of this! I can certainly see the use in rolls to offload some decision making and encourage writing what might otherwise not occur to a writer, but on the whole the rolls themselves can stay in the background and they won't be missed.
Doomed Wombat
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To give musings on magic and all that jazz, I think it is an interesting point on the whole Gul'dan not really getting void/shadow thing.
Cause thing about Gul'dan he's an angry man, but I'm not sure that anger was really directed at anything or anyone except outwards. Maybe at his old clan, but he killed them first, but he never seems to have marked anyone else specifically for his ire even before he took the fel. Instead he was just so freaking angry in general that the fury of flame tore itself back from him (which has its own interesting implications, seeing as Gul'dan apparently had a strong enough elemental connection that Draenor's equivalent of Ragnaros came to greet him).
However, the kind of targeted malice that the strongest void/shadow magics require just doesn't seem to come naturally to a man whose just angry and wants to burn everything.
Which makes sense to me, if we consider that every magic has its opposites, and only the light/void are noted as inspiring/causing large numbers of specific emotions, ones that are specifically the inverse of the other at that, which makes sense.
By extension it also makes sense to me that the magics to the side of them are not quite as emotionally driven. Its not that they don't have emotions associated with them, but I don't think that the fel and the arcane are as "personal" while death/life are simply too expansive to have easy emotional connections which lets users interpolate them as they wish with greater ease.
Cause thing about Gul'dan he's an angry man, but I'm not sure that anger was really directed at anything or anyone except outwards. Maybe at his old clan, but he killed them first, but he never seems to have marked anyone else specifically for his ire even before he took the fel. Instead he was just so freaking angry in general that the fury of flame tore itself back from him (which has its own interesting implications, seeing as Gul'dan apparently had a strong enough elemental connection that Draenor's equivalent of Ragnaros came to greet him).
However, the kind of targeted malice that the strongest void/shadow magics require just doesn't seem to come naturally to a man whose just angry and wants to burn everything.
Which makes sense to me, if we consider that every magic has its opposites, and only the light/void are noted as inspiring/causing large numbers of specific emotions, ones that are specifically the inverse of the other at that, which makes sense.
By extension it also makes sense to me that the magics to the side of them are not quite as emotionally driven. Its not that they don't have emotions associated with them, but I don't think that the fel and the arcane are as "personal" while death/life are simply too expansive to have easy emotional connections which lets users interpolate them as they wish with greater ease.
Ner Zhul gets mentioned a lot which is fair when he is the lich king. It just never bode much thought from his kin in the horde.
A fun chargen would be someone from his clan spoiling his fun.
Anyway I need to make a list of the warband composition.
Vark: Grok's warsong brother in arms who likes to be the big tough one. Recently used a door as a tower shield.
Kartha: Shattered hand member who's spying on Grok. The sneaky one. Probably has one hand replaced with a weapon.
Scorn: That orc Grok captured before and recruited. Wants status.
Vok'Fon: Bandit troll who aided Grok in the isle where the dark spear lived.
Sorek: Black rock now blademaster aspirant.
Keldran: The warlock or shadow arts necrolyte.
Sesk and Ishi: Blademasters working for Feldad and largely doing their own thing.
Rest of them:
In GM's own words.
A fun chargen would be someone from his clan spoiling his fun.
Anyway I need to make a list of the warband composition.
Vark: Grok's warsong brother in arms who likes to be the big tough one. Recently used a door as a tower shield.
Kartha: Shattered hand member who's spying on Grok. The sneaky one. Probably has one hand replaced with a weapon.
Scorn: That orc Grok captured before and recruited. Wants status.
Vok'Fon: Bandit troll who aided Grok in the isle where the dark spear lived.
Sorek: Black rock now blademaster aspirant.
Keldran: The warlock or shadow arts necrolyte.
Sesk and Ishi: Blademasters working for Feldad and largely doing their own thing.
Rest of them:
In GM's own words.
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So as per above it looks like I was being poetic, but I'm open to you developing a buffing ability, I'm pretty sure pyremasters can.
It's one of those things I feel is often ignored. If you're in DnD and you're playing some 8ft dragonkin with a halberd and you try and go into an underground place, unless you take some special action I think there should be a malus for most actions. However, generally gaming systems avoid such things. Men and women for example might have identical stats, various physics issues might be ignored because the game wants to allow people to have fun. I'm not in the 'force your PCs to count their arrows' camp, but I do think adding elements of realism is good when the game is essentially a puzzle one.
While long term stuff is good, I might suggest you leave thinking about major reforms to clan culture till you're actually the clan chief. Instead of doing Pyremaster stuff yourself you could simply order the existing Pyremasters to expand their operations. For the moment you might consider looking at things you can do now and testing things, see if the doctrine or a particular innovation works in principle, see if X can actually be done. Can blademastering be done with the Light in the first place? (yes) That sort of thing.
Probably not. I imagine it verges on the sacrifice magic he doesn't like. There's definitely a transactional element of the magic in the rpg and that's pretty similar to other distinct traditions which also use sacrificial magic rather than Thrall's/the Frostwolves super respect stuff
Actually I was reading the latest chapter of DV which of course this fic is inspired by and a character apparently transformed into a dragon in the scene and this was entirely contained in rolls spoilers and I wouldn't have known about it apart from other characters remarking 'that dragon was cool' and so forth. I've somewhat of a curious relationship with rolls but yea, just sort of go with them I suppose.
Doesn't, twin axes, she's one of the younger Shattered Hand orcs where the tradition has started to die off.
As for hunting, lets say that about 40 of your grunts are good enough and familiar enough with ranged weapons that they could use them, primarily javelins and bows.
Also Darion Mograine will be around from the next chapter, your new equerry.
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Neat. I have to contemplate giving mediation a go.
I see. Twin axes too.
Cool. He's the son that didn't commit patricide. Is he good enough to be the military advisor?
Ok. Mayhaps they can upgrade to crossbows or just upgrade them with some light armor and more throwing weapons with light shields.
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Doomed Wombat
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Currently I think its kinda necessary, Grok's been bombarded with a lot of stuff currently. Needs to organise it.
He's around 12 so probably not.
His job is probably to inform Grok about things and make it clear to all crusaders that yes we are here with permission/blessing.
I'm ok letting it be for something else to pick up the slack when I intend no fighting next turn but more reorganising.
He should get some Crusaders with him.
Doomed Wombat
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I mean mental reorganisation of all the nonsense he's picked up.
Still disagree on the fighting part though if they're going to push fowards.
If nothing else its a bad time to ask for things then not put them to use.
I'd be surprised.
They can go on without the warband. If the warband takes too many casualties it can't continue fighting and would have to not continue fighting any further and get relegated to garrison duty.
AzureShogun
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DV? What's that?
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Keep in mind one of your objectives, though not the most obvious one, is to present the Horde and the Orcs as reliable and worthy partners, both in peace and war. If the Alliance are sitting around considering what to do about the Horde, whether they need to do anything at all, what's necessary to happen etc, and their experience of the New Horde is 'came over, fought a couple of battles, collapsed as a military unit and had to be propped up' then that's not a good look. Yes you and your warband would be safer as garrison troops, but, just as an example, it might also make the Kul Tiras decide that actually they need to have another go at destroying the Horde etc.
Divided Loyalties, one of the biggest quests running currently. The author started it off as a critical examination of advisor quests which I thought was cool, and it was what helped me come up with the idea for this quest and the emphasis on agency. Like DV I suppose I've developed more away from the central idea as this has gone on, but there are indeed still things on agency to an extent.
Doomed Wombat
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On the other hand its also not a great look to be the people who came over asked for a bunch of stuff then did not participate in the next big battle of the campaign.
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As I see it, doing Garrison duty and doing it PROPERLY would be an EXCELLENT test of 'can we live with the Orcs in Peace'.
Kul Tirans being jerks about things is their own bag, and frankly being model citizens enough that the Kul Tirans are the ones to start up hostilities, and for them to be VISIBLY the ones starting trouble from the eyes of others in the Alliance?
That might do WONDERS for the Horde's ability to work with the Alliance, for Thrall having the ability to reach out, and help bury the Hatchet all around, or at least actually HAVE the moral high-ground his stance seems to think it has. He can eat mud for exiling Grok and nearly the Burning Blade because that's the course our choices made, but I figure if the Kul Tirans outright pick the fight, the Alliance WILL notice and they won't all dog pile in on the Kul Tiran's side as a result. It might even enable some proper diplomacy to happen with the Gilneans BEFORE they all wind up fuzzy from rouge druids.
More importantly, it's the kind of thing that would be an excellent test internally from the perspective of orcs. No honor or glory, but it's a job that needs doing. Culturally, I'd think it'd be almost like Peon work, in alot of ways. But it's still useful, as it frees up Alliance troops who CAN fit in tiny-not made for Orc-sized combatants-tombs to get those Necromancers, and it'd do quite a bit of exposing common human citizenry to Orcs in 'downtime' when they're not being the hulking axe-wielding otherworldly invaders. I think it'd be good for ensuring our band of is loyal to Grok's way, instead of secretly taking orders from the Leigon, as I fear Sesk and Ichi or w/e that other 'blademaster' 's name is.
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Indeed, where was Gondor when the Westfold fell?
That's why I want one turn to properly regroup the warband.
Why are they placing too much of their hopes on a 100 man warband when they have other mainline forces to rely on?
Gondor at least had a kingdom despite Sauron nipping at their heels to not be able to render aid.
This warband has only themselves and the generosity of the Scarlet Crusaders base.
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Doomed Wombat
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And I think we're far from ready for that.
Update after next maybe, but not when we're teetering on the knife's edge popularity wise and most of our people still can't speak human.
As for the Kul'tirans remember that has already happened I think we won't be getting that done soon.
Fighting a different war, but we'll not have that excuse.
They're not basing their hopes on us, but we are a very visible hate sink for people who are already screwed up by various things and want someone to blame.
My view is that we take the requisition/training actions we need next turn, and do the next big fight with the crusaders, I've no idea how many casualties we might take, but at least we'll be fighting alongside them visibly, which we have not done before.
Its one thing to hear 100 orcs and see 100 orcs, or rather sub 100 orcs rather. That should give us the standing we need to get some breathing time alongside the crusade as it prepares for the next stage of the campaign, including trying to find a source of recruits such as Etrigg orcs.
Kufufu
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I actually agree with you on this, I didn't mutch care for the Idea before but now that so many people know of us dabbing our toes in the water I feel obligated to continue, both for the sake of Tirions own reputation and the clear diplomatic bonuses that comes with visibly using the light when fighting along side Alliance forces, those leaders were far kinder then I had anticipated and it's been noted that our training in the Light had a fair amount to do with it.