[X] Use your momentum to push for a greater allowance for security forces and their support as well as more of their security infrastructure in the valley (+2 White Sky Favorability, -1 Ministry Favorability)
Threads Of Destiny(Eastern Fantasy, Sequel to Forge of Destiny)
- Thread starter yrsillar
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Voted best in category in the Users' Choice awards.
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- the internet
The thing is the White Plumes and probably MOI will likely want 2 up security too in response to this. it's the logical response. Which security force responsiblr for a border wouldn't want to have realms equivalent to the other side? so it basically turns into an arms race. We do not want that.
Also a positive thing I could see happen is that if the sovereign doesn't have it's usual entourage it means it has to interact with other people somewhat.
It's probably just wishful thinking but maybe that prods the tree into talking to one of our guys.
- Location
- Colorado
I could live with it if option 3 lost to option 1, I'd think we're a bunch of cowards for giving White Sky the bare minimum after the shit they had to put up with last chapter, but it wouldn't be too bad. Option 2 on the other hand, is just option 1, but we piss away a Ministry point for no reason. Is this the power of being a vote option that's positioned in the middle? Sometimes compromise is necessary, sometimes it's watered down junk that self-sabotages us.
I honestly don't think we can just take the win. It was a win for us, but the whole fiasco left our negotiating partners absolutely SHOOK. It was a huge display of everything they think is wrong with Imperial culture. It was a disaster, and we need to mitigate it as best we can. A token effort isn't going to cut it long-term.
[X] Use your momentum to push for a greater allowance for security forces and their support as well as more of their security infrastructure in the valley (+2 White Sky Favorability, -1 Ministry Favorability)
[X] Agree to push for a greater allowance of security forces for the White Sky (+1 White Sky Favorability.)
[X] Agree to push for a greater allowance of security forces for the White Sky (+1 White Sky Favorability.)
In a pure numbers game, -1 Ministry for +2 White Sky isn't the greatest, but it's also not terrible - as the Ministry is a pretty distant and uninvolved actor down the line. More importantly, it pushes White Sky favour basically back up to parity with the ES, and maintaining that high level of investment on both sides of the border is crucial.
Option 3, by contrast, trades +1 PT for -2 White Plume (over and above option 2), which is a very, very disfavourable trade for very little gain overall.
[X] Fully support White Sky desires including the emplacement of their sovereigns full court on a permanent basis (+2 White Sky Favorabilty, +1 Polar Theocracy favorability, -1 Ministry and -2 White Plume favorability.)
It's nice seeing the high MoI and WP favorability, but need to keep our eye on the ball. We didn't get fried to make the Duchess' clockwork army respect us, we got fried to make sure this peace alliance didn't fail. And right now despite our best efforts our would-be allies are on the brink of packing it up. Need to remember to get a treat for Xuan Shi's chicken, but in the meantime we can't rest on our laurels because there's still a lot of work to do.
The primary favorability is still the ES nobility and WS, I think. These are the people who have to be invested. The WP, MoI, and PT are more "just make sure they don't hate us so they don't sabotage anything".
Right now, PT is wobbling and needs shoring up. Narrative-wise, if we want to seriously ally with these people, a gesture of trust is warranted. Even if we're uneasy about the idea of more high levels around, we're not going to advance understanding between our peoples without high level interaction as well, so may as well start here.
And if we're worried about our long term relations with the WP and MoI, we should have plenty of time to impress them in the war with the ith-ia.
It's nice seeing the high MoI and WP favorability, but need to keep our eye on the ball. We didn't get fried to make the Duchess' clockwork army respect us, we got fried to make sure this peace alliance didn't fail. And right now despite our best efforts our would-be allies are on the brink of packing it up. Need to remember to get a treat for Xuan Shi's chicken, but in the meantime we can't rest on our laurels because there's still a lot of work to do.
The primary favorability is still the ES nobility and WS, I think. These are the people who have to be invested. The WP, MoI, and PT are more "just make sure they don't hate us so they don't sabotage anything".
Right now, PT is wobbling and needs shoring up. Narrative-wise, if we want to seriously ally with these people, a gesture of trust is warranted. Even if we're uneasy about the idea of more high levels around, we're not going to advance understanding between our peoples without high level interaction as well, so may as well start here.
And if we're worried about our long term relations with the WP and MoI, we should have plenty of time to impress them in the war with the ith-ia.
Setting aside the favor numbers, option two is "a greater allowance for security forces and their support," aka both sides setting up logistics to keep forces here long-term; logistics are logistics whoever's using them, though, so they are also useful for merchants, and I think we're going to take that MoI hit anyway if we want to actually use this embassy town for anything.
Option three, as mentioned, involves much greater shows of force on both sides, and commits a bunch of White Plume elites to what we damned well intend to be very unproductive duties.
Option three, as mentioned, involves much greater shows of force on both sides, and commits a bunch of White Plume elites to what we damned well intend to be very unproductive duties.
- Location
- Colorado
Pushing White Sky to +8 is not worth pushing the Ministry down to 2, especially since options that make White Sky happy are generally pretty popular. If you think PT at 1 is okay because we'll surely have an opportunity to shore that up this late in the game, then I don't know why you're worried about finding more White Sky points.
I also just don't care where we end with the White Plumes as long as it's not borderline. I don't care how funny their support is, we didn't do this to make them happy. Their favor is something that exists to be spent when we need it, and I think we need it now.
deadcrystal
Slaaneshi Cultist
- Location
- The Warp
[X] Agree to push for a greater allowance of security forces for the White Sky (+1 White Sky Favorability.)
The trades just aren't worth it. Ministry favorability is hard enough to come by as it is. The second option trades one hard to come by favor for two easy, and the last is net neutral, and the losses all come from hard favor sources.
Additionally option 3 ties up military forces doing nothing at a border where, if anything happens that would need them there, we have already failed. ES is going to war with the Cloud Tribes and the Shishigui, tying up a bunch of high realms here when they are needed elsewhere is a terrible idea.
The trades just aren't worth it. Ministry favorability is hard enough to come by as it is. The second option trades one hard to come by favor for two easy, and the last is net neutral, and the losses all come from hard favor sources.
Additionally option 3 ties up military forces doing nothing at a border where, if anything happens that would need them there, we have already failed. ES is going to war with the Cloud Tribes and the Shishigui, tying up a bunch of high realms here when they are needed elsewhere is a terrible idea.
If you want to spend White Plume favour, spend it on something actually worth the cost - and with a better rate of return.
Screwing up their force concentrations and operational freedom in the south in order to get into a dick measuring contest with the foreigners over high realm forces at the embassy for reasons of pride (and little additional security benefit) does nothing but annoy them. Beyond a measly +1 PT, this doesn't actually help us at all, and does a lot more to hurt us.
- Location
- Colorado
The Sovereign is already here, option 3 is just allowing them to bring their attendants over and while a few Indigos isn't nothing it's also not enough to screw up our force concentration in the entire south. Heck, we could make an argument that this is just evening the scales because a lot of Imperial experts we've already agreed to have here like the judges and the astronomer guy tend to be higher realm than the equivalents on the other side.
The White Plumes are at 5 right now and even bringing them down to 3 leaves us plenty of room to get through the end stages of negotiations. This isn't a bank account where all our points have equal value, it's more like a barter system where each type of point represents a different item, some of which are more valuable than others depending on circumstance. Trading 2 to 1 here is perfectly fine.
Also have we gotten any word on mitigation rolls?
Oh boy, Yrsillar really isn't pulling any punches with the first vote after the SWD battle.
First I will start with this quote on Summit's mechanics
So, to be clear, ANY faction in the negative will severely harm our future prospects. And that includes the PT.
I have seen a few comments likening the PT to the MoI as "distant observers", so it doesn't matter if their favor fall to even -1. That just isn't true. I would argue that even a 0 is already a failure. 1 is the minimum to aim for.
Even though it's true that ES and WS are the most important factions to keep as high as possible, the PT are an active and fundamental part of the Polar Nation, not some overseers sent from their capital like the MoI.
The blow to WS and PT hurts but it's not unexpected. The WS was so high that we are still at a good place with them, but the PT is really on the verge.
Thankfully, we got some nice MoI and WP favor as compensation so we can counterbalance it a bit.
Now, let's see the basics of each option
[ ] Agree to push for a greater allowance of security forces for the White Sky (+1 White Sky Favorability.)
This is the baseline, vanilla option. It aims to trickle the WS back up by conceding them the very minimum of their demands.
The upside is that it lefts the hard-earned MoI and WP favor untouched, so we can spend it in later negotiations. Which basically means the Embassy Town.
The downside is that it lefts the PT at a very precarious +1. The PT is also going to be one of the groups that it's going to oppose most to the Embassy town. Or at least is going to want to attach a lot of conditions, specially after the whole "the sky is on fire and bursting with nightmares" bit from earlier.
I see it likely that, if we don't recover some favor PT here, we'll soon be forced to forego an option we would want because it would reduce the PT even further. The Embassy Town is our main goal, so I don't want to be in a situation where we don't have any alternative but give unwanted concessions over the town to the PT.
[ ] Use your momentum to push for a greater allowance for security forces and their support as well as more of their security infrastructure in the valley (+2 White Sky Favorability, -1 Ministry Favorability)
Basically the same as the first option, but exchanging a MoI favor for an extra WS. Since the WS is still the second highest and one of the easiest to increase, just the opposite of the MoI, it sounds as a very bad deal.
It doesn't address the WS concerns as well as option 3, and it leaves us at exactly the same situation with the PT.
So we would still have trouble with the PT during the Embassy Town negotiations, except that we would have less of a buffer with the MoI. Since I can't see many options that would please the PT without annoying the MoI, this option leaves us in the worst possible situation for the upcoming negotiations.
We just got confirmation that Jaromilla also wants an Embassy Town, so we are sure to have more chances to increase their favor, since their interests align with ours.
I really don't see the value of getting WS to +8 instead of +7 in exchange of making future balance between the MoI and the PT much more difficult.
Seriously, why do people want to enter the final stretch with PT at +1 and MoI at +2? We would be cornering ourselves for no reason!
[ ] Fully support White Sky desires including the emplacement of their sovereigns full court on a permanent basis (+2 White Sky Favorabilty, +1 Polar Theocracy favorability, -1 Ministry and -2 White Plume favorability.)
The full-in option. It's the only option that raises PT, but it's also the only option with a net 0 gain of favor.
I think that people are getting too enamoured with the idea of ending with a quite high WP favor, of all factions. While that would obviously be valuable, that's hardly the purpose of the Summit, or the reason why we took on SWD.
Ending with a WP favor of 3 is more than acceptable, and we still got the General's roll bonus. I find it unlikely that going into the final talks like that will cause us any trouble.
The same with the worries about the level of force invested here. There were alreay going to be some 6th realm or the other to counter the Weeping Sentinel. We aren't adding more, only a retinue of 5th and 4th realms. That isn't going to change the course of the war. Rather, the Embassy Town would be such a clear and vulnerable target, that I'm actually relieved to have that level of security.
With this option, we would start the next stretch with both MoI and PT at +2, so we would have some leeway over which side we want to please at every vote.
[X] Fully support White Sky desires including the emplacement of their sovereigns full court on a permanent basis (+2 White Sky Favorabilty, +1 Polar Theocracy favorability, -1 Ministry and -2 White Plume favorability.)
First I will start with this quote on Summit's mechanics
So, to be clear, ANY faction in the negative will severely harm our future prospects. And that includes the PT.
I have seen a few comments likening the PT to the MoI as "distant observers", so it doesn't matter if their favor fall to even -1. That just isn't true. I would argue that even a 0 is already a failure. 1 is the minimum to aim for.
Even though it's true that ES and WS are the most important factions to keep as high as possible, the PT are an active and fundamental part of the Polar Nation, not some overseers sent from their capital like the MoI.
The blow to WS and PT hurts but it's not unexpected. The WS was so high that we are still at a good place with them, but the PT is really on the verge.
Thankfully, we got some nice MoI and WP favor as compensation so we can counterbalance it a bit.
Now, let's see the basics of each option
[ ] Agree to push for a greater allowance of security forces for the White Sky (+1 White Sky Favorability.)
This is the baseline, vanilla option. It aims to trickle the WS back up by conceding them the very minimum of their demands.
The upside is that it lefts the hard-earned MoI and WP favor untouched, so we can spend it in later negotiations. Which basically means the Embassy Town.
The downside is that it lefts the PT at a very precarious +1. The PT is also going to be one of the groups that it's going to oppose most to the Embassy town. Or at least is going to want to attach a lot of conditions, specially after the whole "the sky is on fire and bursting with nightmares" bit from earlier.
I see it likely that, if we don't recover some favor PT here, we'll soon be forced to forego an option we would want because it would reduce the PT even further. The Embassy Town is our main goal, so I don't want to be in a situation where we don't have any alternative but give unwanted concessions over the town to the PT.
[ ] Use your momentum to push for a greater allowance for security forces and their support as well as more of their security infrastructure in the valley (+2 White Sky Favorability, -1 Ministry Favorability)
Basically the same as the first option, but exchanging a MoI favor for an extra WS. Since the WS is still the second highest and one of the easiest to increase, just the opposite of the MoI, it sounds as a very bad deal.
It doesn't address the WS concerns as well as option 3, and it leaves us at exactly the same situation with the PT.
So we would still have trouble with the PT during the Embassy Town negotiations, except that we would have less of a buffer with the MoI. Since I can't see many options that would please the PT without annoying the MoI, this option leaves us in the worst possible situation for the upcoming negotiations.
We just got confirmation that Jaromilla also wants an Embassy Town, so we are sure to have more chances to increase their favor, since their interests align with ours.
I really don't see the value of getting WS to +8 instead of +7 in exchange of making future balance between the MoI and the PT much more difficult.
Seriously, why do people want to enter the final stretch with PT at +1 and MoI at +2? We would be cornering ourselves for no reason!
[ ] Fully support White Sky desires including the emplacement of their sovereigns full court on a permanent basis (+2 White Sky Favorabilty, +1 Polar Theocracy favorability, -1 Ministry and -2 White Plume favorability.)
The full-in option. It's the only option that raises PT, but it's also the only option with a net 0 gain of favor.
I think that people are getting too enamoured with the idea of ending with a quite high WP favor, of all factions. While that would obviously be valuable, that's hardly the purpose of the Summit, or the reason why we took on SWD.
Ending with a WP favor of 3 is more than acceptable, and we still got the General's roll bonus. I find it unlikely that going into the final talks like that will cause us any trouble.
The same with the worries about the level of force invested here. There were alreay going to be some 6th realm or the other to counter the Weeping Sentinel. We aren't adding more, only a retinue of 5th and 4th realms. That isn't going to change the course of the war. Rather, the Embassy Town would be such a clear and vulnerable target, that I'm actually relieved to have that level of security.
With this option, we would start the next stretch with both MoI and PT at +2, so we would have some leeway over which side we want to please at every vote.
[X] Fully support White Sky desires including the emplacement of their sovereigns full court on a permanent basis (+2 White Sky Favorabilty, +1 Polar Theocracy favorability, -1 Ministry and -2 White Plume favorability.)
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- Pronouns
- He
[X] Agree to push for a greater allowance of security forces for the White Sky (+1 White Sky Favorability.)
[X] Use your momentum to push for a greater allowance for security forces and their support as well as more of their security infrastructure in the valley (+2 White Sky Favorability, -1 Ministry Favorability)
[X] Use your momentum to push for a greater allowance for security forces and their support as well as more of their security infrastructure in the valley (+2 White Sky Favorability, -1 Ministry Favorability)
Abby Normal
High Clerk of the Ymaryn
- Pronouns
- He/Him
Calling it "a measly +1 PT" is unfair, what its really giving us is "the option to take any options that piss off the PT in the next few vote rounds without dropping them to 0". Points matter much more the closer to 0 the faction is, and while 1 -> 2 isn't *quite* as important as 0 -> 1, its still far more important imo than the difference between 5 and 3
Edit: note that yrsillar has previously said on the discord that "everyone above 0 is the minimum target" regarding the faction favorability scores
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- Location
- Spain
- Pronouns
- He/Him
[X] Use your momentum to push for a greater allowance for security forces and their support as well as more of their security infrastructure in the valley (+2 White Sky Favorability, -1 Ministry Favorability)