Vox Vitae: Warhammer AI quest
- Thread starter Neablis
- Start date
- Mature Sci-Fi
If we don't tell them to immediately go for the systems where we have bases, then they don't go to those systems yet, and thus no decision is made on the subject of who gets the bases. This is presumably why the option has no effect either way on boons.
Well, that's one hell of a bandwagon. 23 votes for The Third Eye Opens so far. Which is honestly kind of frustrating, because I can't help but think that asking Denva to expand toward Caldereth and then saying "Nope, hands off my bases" just isn't a great idea in the long run. We've got the boons to pay for it, barely, but its hard not to see that engendering some ill will, especially if the Denvan navy ends up having to bail anyone out.
[X] Plan: The Third Eye Opens, With Enhancements, Mark 3
[X] Plan: Opening the Third Eye, now with Phone Safety, and Shipbuilding Prep
[X] Plan: The Third Eye Opens, With Enhancements, Mark 3
[X] Plan: Opening the Third Eye, now with Phone Safety, and Shipbuilding Prep
meianmaru
The Devourer of Fiction
I'm sorry for the frustration, but like I said earlier, I'm running some cold pragmatism here for the long run. Leaving those Cogitare bases under our command means that Denva won't benefit directly as much, but becomes more dependent on our help in those regions. Why do that, you might ask, when we already have such a good relationship with their polity already, besides the obvious benefits of more manufacturing under our control as well as steady supply of Cogitare?
Well, unfortunately, I don't feel comfortable relying on that goodwill in the truly long run without adding some... Incentives. Which are meant to keep it that way. Because I'm talking about the fact that Vita is an AI. It might be suspected by some, but the fiction that Vita is an Ancient human remains largely intact, or so it seems.
When that veil of fiction is pierced at some point, or we willingly do away with it? I would prefer that the Stellar Ascendancy has every emotional and practical reason not to cut off diplomatic ties with Vita. Or worse.
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Mechanically, having boons to pay for it means that our good will is... good for it. I don't think engendering ill will is a serious concern.
Ensuring that we continue to have levers in Denvan society that grow and spread along with the SA's expansion when and where we can is important, particularly when we won't always have first mover advantage.
And there's really no substitute for having clay next to the heartland for that, is there? Meianmaru goes into why, but it suffices for me to chip in to say that creating an maintaining pragmatic reasons to not consider war is part and parcel of ensuring the stability of an alliance.
Cultural, economic, and military integration is how you get there.
I'm skeptical that we'll see much in terms of recruitment from the outposts given we've been told that Cogitare doing nothing but teach have an approximate doubling time of four turns, we only left 42 Cogitare with other things to do at those outposts, and I believe we told them to pretty much teach OMC Operation to anyone even remotely interested with the intent of starting to uplift the planet rather than train apprentice Cogitare with the intent of having them come work for us.
Best case scenario, they've doubled their numbers twice and are half-way through a third round, with currently 168 Cogitare but that would seemingly only be possible if they haven't done anything else. Which is part of why I've been pushing so hard to set up an actual system for large-ish-scale recruitment in Denva. I could be wrong though...
@Neablis Do we expect to be able to recruit Cogitare from the outposts we set up without spending boons once we get back in contact with them?
Our leverage comes entirely from the fact that we put those bases in place decades ago. We have no idea of their status, and while the nature of Cogitare means the leadership is probably still alive, the fact remains that the lower ranks have never met us. Which leaves us two scenarios. Either A) they're fine, and can easily wait a turn to be recontacted by our ships, or B) they're under attack, in which case they are likely to be much more grateful to the Denvans rescuing them then us. So we either burn political goodwill for something that didn't need to be done this turn anyway, or we burn political goodwill for something that did need to be done, but we've done it in such a way that we're likely to lose the bases anyway.
It's the worst of both worlds. Either they need help now, in which case there's a significant chance of Denva being the liberating heroes means they have undue influence and you've burned the political capital for nothing, or they don't in which case you'd be better off having Denva scout the 3 unexplored systems right next to it and using an Order action to send an expedition next turn. If you want permanent manufacturing capacity, you'd be better off taking those three boons from transfering the bases and using them to buy this three times:
[Boon] Permanent Manufacturing capacity
Gives you a % of Denvan manufacturing every turn as you establish companies & manufacturing concerns within Denvan society. Doubles the voidforge miners BP/turn & growth. You can manage this BP with a free action. Picking it multiple times will increase the amount and how fast it grows, and you'll be able to leave them with a multi-turn project or a general direction if you leave. The value will increase naturally over time as Denva builds up.
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False dichotomy: The Denvans are there because we sent them, and existed to be sent because we saved the Denvans and developed the tech that let them go. Is a general denied credit for the work of their soldiers simply because they themselves did not fire a shot? Of course not.
And of course, the outposts exist as a result of Vita deciding to appoint someone else to act in her stead - 'someones elses' who are still alive, because Cogitare don't age out. They will not be confused by the notion that we delegated their reinforcement, and with warpaphones they won't even be out of contact to ask us for details directly.
Also, like. You can build up defenses just in time for them to be needed. That's a thing too. Will some people emmigrate from Vita territory to SA territory, given the SA is the entity closer at hand doing things? Duh, but that's going to be true no matter what, and the reverse will happen too. I'm not concerned with that.
By in-universe logic, we're fine. But there is also considerable out of universe assurance here as well:
Namely, the entire discussion about whether and how we retain sovereignty over our outposts started with Neablis saying that left to progress on its own, the outposts would go to Denva. Per that discussion, Neablis then set the price to ensure that they stayed with us.
Meianmaru is electing to pay that price, so if there is still an outpost to defend, we keep it. It's that simple.
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The general who gets the credit is usually the one who's present at the battle, not the one who enabled it from afar. History gives credit to MacArthur for liberating the Philippines, not Nimitz.
Now, ideally, there won't be any issues. Denva will make contact, and start trying to sell the locals on joining the Stellar Ascendency as it establishes trade relations. But if that's the case, we'd be better off investigating Denva's immediate neighbors because 75% of the systems within one jump of Denva are unknowns and this is kind of concerning.
And yes, I don't expect Neablis to try to screw us over or something. We have the boon to spend on this, and we can spend it. It still strikes me as trying to have your cake and eat it too.
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I may be missing what you're trying to communicate with that example, because my own knowledge of MacArthur is.. well, that his example concurs with rather than detracts from the notion that our agreement with Denva will cover for any issues.
See, MacArthur was a propaganda star. He was charismatic, yes, but the United States plastered his face all over anything to do with the Pacific Theater at a time when propaganda was far more in evidence than real-time telecommunications. I don't know that "history" credits him more than Nimitz here, so much as pop culture does as it tends to do with the subjects of successful propaganda in general.
It is the story that is spoken loudest and most often that is remembered, not the one that is most true. Our world would be completely unrecognizable if it weren't so.
Point being, we only get a MacArthur if Denva decides to run an influence campaign to elevate somebody else as, say, the hero of Caldereth. But that would transparently be a violation of their agreement with us even if it didn't flop, which it might because:
- It would be aimed territories that largely owe us, personally, for existing now and some of whose leadership literally worshiped us prior to that;
- Real-time communications would be established such that we are very much not going to be absentee from the affairs of the outposts.
Even if Denva goes out to find a smoking ruin, rather than having spent goodwill for nothing, they'll be going "wow, thank goodness there was a speedbump there" and be thankful to us for having erected it rather than feeling like they compensated us by defending and preserving our holdings for us. OOC, Neablis doesn't like having us pay for things we don't get - I'd expect the boons to be refunded.
I don't think the pitfalls you're describing are a plausible mode of failure, basically. "We don't invest enough for the outposts to serve their astro-political purpose before Denva gobbles up all available avenues of growth" is a more important issue imo, but that's not one we can address this turn.
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avatar11792
Et Sic Incipit
- Location
- Planet Earth, North America
I feel like this turn is going to be a BIG one. Never been a Voting Guide before. I'm pretty psyched, can't wait.
I don't know that the turn itself is going to be bigger, so much as we're coming up on crunch time for leaving the system, and a lot of people feel a lot of ways on what we most need to get done before then.
So we have a lot of plans, and because our resources are increasing, they're all fairly complicated.
So we have a lot of plans, and because our resources are increasing, they're all fairly complicated.
avatar11792
Et Sic Incipit
- Location
- Planet Earth, North America
With respect, I do disagree with your statement. Lots of big things are happening.
Aurora is coming into her (literal) power, her Third Eye opening. Whether that bodes ill or well, only the Dice Gods can tell. The first Navigator being born, raised, and educated without the oversight of the Imperium's Navigator Houses and their millennia-old monopoly on interstellar travel. We'd be drowning in hitmen if the Houses knew of Aurora's mere existence, bc it implies somebody else could do their job.
Denva and the Ascendency are ready to, well, ascend. The flower of a budding civilization is ready to bloom. Warpaphones were the last element needed to fully branch out from their home system, and now they have it, even if flawed and limited its a heck of a lot better than nothing at all. We're about to see a renaissance of culture and learning across the subsector, if we play our cards right.
We're on the verge of learning about how create more AI like ourselves, which could resurrect a "race" that has been lost for millennia. It must wear on Vita that she is so alone. Her children will wreak wonders.
IDK, those seem pretty big to me. And that's not even accounting for what could be coming our way, those portents sound ominous.
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I feel like you're overstating the immediate relevance to the upcoming turn of all but the first of those personally, but fair enough, I could be wrong.
- Location
- Near Freiburg in South-West Germany
Could I ask the thread to throw some approval votes to this plan which is the exact same one as the winning one, just with the addition of giving Aurora some chance at making friends? The idea seemed decently popular when discussed before the vote, but now it seems forgotten, and we only get one chance to give Aurora a decent childhood.
[ ] Plan: The Third Eye Opens with proper socialisation
[ ] Plan: The Third Eye Opens with proper socialisation
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I'm not sure it really needs specifying. Certainly not in that amount of detail - why wouldn't aurora already have as much access to telecommunications with Secondus as anyone else on the ship?
...To be honest, I suppose we just haven't seen much of Aurora on screen at all. I wonder what's up with that?
- Location
- Near Freiburg in South-West Germany
I would be happy with just a short "try to give Aurora the chance to make friends outside of the Spark", its just that even that isn't part of any plan.
And Aurora not really participating in discussions probably was because she was too young to really give feedback or be an active participant in a scene, and/or because she did not do much which was interesting enough to write about. She now is old enough to participate (at least towards the end of the turn) and making friends with a Vellkar (or whoever) might be interesting enough.
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Yeah, that's reasonable. @meianmaru, what do you think? Wouldn't be hard to bolt on a "safety first" approach to control for the third eye stuff. Anexa can't roll under normal success and is more likely to crit than not, so I don't think it'll hurt at least.
avatar11792
Et Sic Incipit
- Location
- Planet Earth, North America
I mean, it's implied in my plan, bc we don't have kids on the Spark. She'd have to reach outside the ship to socially interact with someone her own age.
MacArthur was a massive egotist who very much had political ambitions but that doesn't change the fact that there was a period where the liberation of the Philippines gave him massive political credibility, regardless of how staged the photo ops were. That he ended burning that up in Korea doesn't really change that. But that's getting a bit off topic, I suppose.
My fundamental criticism is that ultimately, I think you should commit. Either Caldereth isn't in immediate danger, in which case investigate the more immediate neighbors, or commit fully to sending in the Denvans, and give them a greater stake in the risk they're undertaking on your behalf. But it's very clearly that you aren't going to be swayed by what I said, so I'll drop the matter. Feel free to take the last word if you wish.
The issue is tabled until they do expand to those systems. You have warp comms now, they'll probably ask again when it becomes relevant. The benefits/costs may update when that happens. Which may not be for a while. It'll probably take them at least a generation for them to fully settle their first wave of colonization and be looking to expand again, though they might strick early warning stations further out.
Most likely. They're just growing and educating people and such, so you'll get an update on how many cogitare they have, how many they're training and what they're doing with it. Then you'll be able to redistribute or leave them for later as you like. Most likely each will have a hundred or so and will keep growing with time.
The unknown is part of why you're spending the boon. You're basically codifying in Stellar Ascendency law that those bases belong to you, an allied power. They (but not the systems they contain) are sovereign territory, your territory, and the Cogitare inside them are your employees. Even if they show up and your bases have been wiped out, you'll still own whatever remains of the locations where they stood.
Asheram
Not quite altogether
- Location
- Δ Hidden Forbidden Holy Ground
Or it's because folk are really concerned about focused warpaphones.
Edit: Ah! I see that it includes that as well. It got me really confused when the later TEO versions lacked it so folk seemingly ignored what came after.
Edit2: Frankly looks like a marketing issue.
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