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The Long Night Part One: Embers in the Dusk: A Planetary Governor Quest (43k) Complete Sequel Up
- Thread starter Durin
- Start date
I think people figured we'd have a more specific vote on things to talk about after this initial vote of who to talk to. All you told us at this point was that you needed to know who to invite, so that's pretty much what you got from the vote. We won't know if you need more details unless you tell us.
I know most of us were hoping to talk about forgiving some of the debt as reparations, so maybe include that? I think most of us were good with forgiving the 10% we could do without looking foolish, and then letting Olaf take the credit for negotiating such a generous settlement.
The Ninth Meeting of the High Council Part Four: A Meeting begins
- Location
- Alice Springs, Australia
The Ninth Meeting of the High Council Part Four: A Meeting begins
Once the High Council Meeting ended for the day you wasted no time in arranging a meeting with Governor Olaf of Vamaheim in order to discuss the current issues between Avernus and Vanaheim. The first thing you notice after meeting him is that he is far more relaxed and friendly once you are alone, indicating that a lot of his earlier hostility was putting on a show for his people. After a bit of small talk he explains that while normally an incident like your propaganda campaign could be swept under the rug in exchange for a favorable trade deal the people who discovered it had connections to his opposition who are using it as a political tool.
According to Olaf the oppostion are using this event as proof that Avernus cares nothing for the rest of the Imperial Trust's beliefs and is trying to highhandedly force the rest of the Trust into following their own beliefs and that Governor Olaf is too connected to Avernus to deal with the problem. The oppostion goes on to claim that this event is just the latest in a series of issues, starting with the lobbying for the Quartok and including trade deals with soul-eating Xenos and installing a puppet Fabricator-General.
While Olaf knows that many of the accusations are baseless they have gained a great deal of traction among the Vanir and his positions is looking weak. Hiss earlier proposal was an attempt to seem to be opposing Avernus while ensuring that Avernus will not be unconvinced by his plan, he thanks you for offering the funding as it will make it seem like he achieved something to hos political opponents.
At this point you have to come up with a response and possibly offer ways in which you can help strengthen his position.
His main suggestions are having him manage some sort of political victory over you and in the longer term slowing you efforts to force the Imperial Trust to change
Once the High Council Meeting ended for the day you wasted no time in arranging a meeting with Governor Olaf of Vamaheim in order to discuss the current issues between Avernus and Vanaheim. The first thing you notice after meeting him is that he is far more relaxed and friendly once you are alone, indicating that a lot of his earlier hostility was putting on a show for his people. After a bit of small talk he explains that while normally an incident like your propaganda campaign could be swept under the rug in exchange for a favorable trade deal the people who discovered it had connections to his opposition who are using it as a political tool.
According to Olaf the oppostion are using this event as proof that Avernus cares nothing for the rest of the Imperial Trust's beliefs and is trying to highhandedly force the rest of the Trust into following their own beliefs and that Governor Olaf is too connected to Avernus to deal with the problem. The oppostion goes on to claim that this event is just the latest in a series of issues, starting with the lobbying for the Quartok and including trade deals with soul-eating Xenos and installing a puppet Fabricator-General.
While Olaf knows that many of the accusations are baseless they have gained a great deal of traction among the Vanir and his positions is looking weak. Hiss earlier proposal was an attempt to seem to be opposing Avernus while ensuring that Avernus will not be unconvinced by his plan, he thanks you for offering the funding as it will make it seem like he achieved something to hos political opponents.
At this point you have to come up with a response and possibly offer ways in which you can help strengthen his position.
His main suggestions are having him manage some sort of political victory over you and in the longer term slowing you efforts to force the Imperial Trust to change
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This isn't about the money. Sure a favorable debt reduction deal here might buy some goodwill, but it likely won't save Olaf. This is about many Vanir believing that we're maneuvering to force the rest of the Trust to follow our beliefs.
Since half the discussion in this thread is how to force the rest of the Trust to follow our beliefs, they have a point.
I feel like durin gave us a hint. Only outside pressure can bring unity. The Vanir feel we're trying to force our beliefs on them, but wait until we start dealing with whatever the rest of the Imperium has mutated into. Our tiny differences with Vanaheim will seem quaint. Unfortunately we're not going to get that until the warp storm ends, so what can we do until then?
Here's what I think. We should ask Olaf to help us find some common ground. I'm going to write it as a proto-plan to see what people think before giving it a vote.
[] Work with Olaf to set up a cultural exchange between Avernus and Vanaheim
-[] Acknowledge that Avernus is a young world. In many ways its culture is yet fluid. We don't have the tens of millenia of history that the other worlds in the Trust do.
-[] Find some of Vanaheim's cultural beliefs and traditions that aren't too offensive to our Reformist beleifs. Things that don't have anything to do with xenos or or technology.
-[] Organize a massive cultural exchange to sell the people of Avernus on how great Vanaheim is. I know that seems backwards; don't we need to get them to like us? But people like you when you like them. If the people of Vanaheim see that their culture is being exported into Avernus, even in small amounts, they will start to see themselves in us.
Since half the discussion in this thread is how to force the rest of the Trust to follow our beliefs, they have a point.
I feel like durin gave us a hint. Only outside pressure can bring unity. The Vanir feel we're trying to force our beliefs on them, but wait until we start dealing with whatever the rest of the Imperium has mutated into. Our tiny differences with Vanaheim will seem quaint. Unfortunately we're not going to get that until the warp storm ends, so what can we do until then?
Here's what I think. We should ask Olaf to help us find some common ground. I'm going to write it as a proto-plan to see what people think before giving it a vote.
[] Work with Olaf to set up a cultural exchange between Avernus and Vanaheim
-[] Acknowledge that Avernus is a young world. In many ways its culture is yet fluid. We don't have the tens of millenia of history that the other worlds in the Trust do.
-[] Find some of Vanaheim's cultural beliefs and traditions that aren't too offensive to our Reformist beleifs. Things that don't have anything to do with xenos or or technology.
-[] Organize a massive cultural exchange to sell the people of Avernus on how great Vanaheim is. I know that seems backwards; don't we need to get them to like us? But people like you when you like them. If the people of Vanaheim see that their culture is being exported into Avernus, even in small amounts, they will start to see themselves in us.
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For our response...
I suppose we can give our reasoning. Avernus deals with Chaos on a daily basis, and the majority of cultists, few as they are these days, are Abomination cultists. This colors our perspectives and priorities. Xenophobia is a vector for corruption by the Abomination, and we find it desirable to minimize this within the Trust. That's not to say we're pro-xeno, and our relations with the Quartok are lukewarm at best, but we prefer to deal with xenos in a pragmatic fashion rather than simply hating them automatically - our view is that the Quartok are a minimal threat, a good fit for a protectorate, and possibly will save us a lot of trouble when dealing with xeno empires in the future.
For strengthening his position...
1. Forgive 10% of the debt to Vanaheim as reparations, the most we can do without appearing weak or foolish. Allow Olaf to claim that he was the one who proposed this form of reparations, and that had it not been for his personal connections to us that he would not have been able to get that much.
2. We're willing to invest a significant amount of our personal time and diplomatic resources on coming to Vanaheim and talking things over with people, smoothing ruffled feathers. He could recommend the right people for us to talk to, how to interact with them, etc, so that our efforts would be better targeted.
One possible addition to the reparations - @durin, if we do the 10% forgiven, what about say adding 5% on top of that to pay for some ships to be fixed and donated to the Imperial Trust Navy (not as tithes, but as donations). Would that help without harming or reputation?
I suppose we can give our reasoning. Avernus deals with Chaos on a daily basis, and the majority of cultists, few as they are these days, are Abomination cultists. This colors our perspectives and priorities. Xenophobia is a vector for corruption by the Abomination, and we find it desirable to minimize this within the Trust. That's not to say we're pro-xeno, and our relations with the Quartok are lukewarm at best, but we prefer to deal with xenos in a pragmatic fashion rather than simply hating them automatically - our view is that the Quartok are a minimal threat, a good fit for a protectorate, and possibly will save us a lot of trouble when dealing with xeno empires in the future.
For strengthening his position...
1. Forgive 10% of the debt to Vanaheim as reparations, the most we can do without appearing weak or foolish. Allow Olaf to claim that he was the one who proposed this form of reparations, and that had it not been for his personal connections to us that he would not have been able to get that much.
2. We're willing to invest a significant amount of our personal time and diplomatic resources on coming to Vanaheim and talking things over with people, smoothing ruffled feathers. He could recommend the right people for us to talk to, how to interact with them, etc, so that our efforts would be better targeted.
One possible addition to the reparations - @durin, if we do the 10% forgiven, what about say adding 5% on top of that to pay for some ships to be fixed and donated to the Imperial Trust Navy (not as tithes, but as donations). Would that help without harming or reputation?
I am against debt forgiveness. It's trying to paper over the issue with money rather than solving the root problem, which is that we're not listening to Vanaheim at all.
Just because it's not the root of the problem doesn't mean it would hurt to do it. Olaf needs political victories in order to keep his position - getting a big chunk of the debt to Avernus forgiven as reparations would be such a victory.
It's part of the solution, not the whole of it.
Reparations for what? The financial cost of anything we did was very, very low. You're trying to pay back in money a cost that wasn't incurred in money.
I guess it's worth bringing up, but only if Olaf says that's how Vanaheim does things. If there's a cultural tradition that you pay a weregild and make a crime right with money. If there's no such tradition then it's just a bribe, and it might raise our relationship status but it won't raise real opinions of Avernus.
I still feel like the key is in Vanaheim's culture.
Maybe there's the common ground. They're a paradise world. We're a hell world. But both of us appreciate the natural habitat of our world in different ways. We're not trying to glass over the surface of Avernus... we wouldn't dare. Where they protect their environment out of love, we respect our environment out of fear. We don't dare go to war with it.
Maybe we can learn something from how Vanaheim organizes itself, especially in terms of orbital habitats and orbital industries. They've been doing this for thousands and thousands of years. Inviting them to help, to share what they know, might ease tensions and we might gain from it. We could improve relationships while gaining something instead of giving it up.
- Location
- Alice Springs, Australia
a donation that size to the Imperial Trust Navy will not hurt your position at all
We need to give him a significant concession and we do plan on expanding our mines in the future, so something like 75% of our metal from those expansions might do.
We could also give Vanaheim a short term monopoly- 50 years on repairing battleships for the Trust when we get our Huge Shipyard done since they would be best at that anyway.
We could also give Vanaheim a short term monopoly- 50 years on repairing battleships for the Trust when we get our Huge Shipyard done since they would be best at that anyway.
- Location
- Alice Springs, Australia
they have no fears that you will ever challenge their dominance as shipbuilders
Yeah, we won't beat them where they are best at, but a concession like this might have done the trick if they were fearing about some of the biggest business in the battleships going our way and harming their profits a tiny bit.
By the way durin, when Vanaheim was sending their orbital construction teams to help out in the Trust, could we do that now since we can make 4 small shipyards per action now?
Doomed Wombat
Let's go Darling!
- Location
- Dancing on wires!
This is kinda true, we really don't care for they're beliefs.
- Location
- Alice Springs, Australia
at least half
it will not negatively effect your reputation as long as you still have enough metal for Avernus
Well we'll have to commit to several runs of Mass Conveyors to have enough shipping for that much metal- 2-3 billion of it a year.
Well of course we are not listening. They are wrong. Us getting caught does not make their position any less stupid.
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Doomed Wombat
Let's go Darling!
- Location
- Dancing on wires!
Heck this is only really bad cause the people who caught us were Olaf's enemies not Olaf's people.
So a rough draft for keeping Olaf in power
[x] Plan Olaf is better
-[x] Forgive 10% of the debt Vanaheim owes to us, and donate 5% of the remaining in ships built or repaired for the Imperial Trust
-[x] Commit to trading 75% of our current metal and future metal annual income to Vanaheim.
[x] Plan Olaf is better
-[x] Forgive 10% of the debt Vanaheim owes to us, and donate 5% of the remaining in ships built or repaired for the Imperial Trust
-[x] Commit to trading 75% of our current metal and future metal annual income to Vanaheim.
Doomed Wombat
Let's go Darling!
- Location
- Dancing on wires!
Better to turn this into an additional 5%.
Or it could look like we haggled him down.
Well got that bit off of Enjou's question to durin on it, and it wouldn't affect our reputation at all to include it instead of as pure debt forgiveness compared to using as a donation.
Doomed Wombat
Let's go Darling!
- Location
- Dancing on wires!
Its not that.
5% of the remaining is less.
If its we forgive 15% with ten just being forgiven and 5% going to the navy that's more.