cokerpilot
Here comes the rain.
Cant help but feel we missed a hell of an opportunity here.
Warhammer Fantasy: Divided Loyalties - an Advisor's Quest
- Thread starter Boney
- Start date
- Fantasy Users' Choice!
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- Tags
- warhammer warhammer fantasy fantasy be gay do crimes (gay) female protagonist pansexual protagonist ck2 quest divided loyalties mountain vietnam ranald is real this is a dwarf quest (dwarfs) this is maybe an elf quest this is not a vampire quest this is not an empire quest try it and find out open voting
Voted best in category in the Users' Choice awards.
Omegahugger
Inattentive Idiot
Approximately half the thread probably feels that way.
The other half probably feel like we narrowly dodged wasting two actions.
What's one and a half actions against dragonrider's stories?
Omegahugger
Inattentive Idiot
Don't ask me, I voted to pet the dragon.
I just recited what I remember of the opposition's arguments.
- Location
- Norway
I think it is entirely possible we missed a hell of an opportunity. I just don't think it's very likely. Elves are usually stuck-up and standoffish to begin with, dragonrider elves are worse, Mathilde's diplomacy is bad, and Asarnil's notes aren't going to be entirely lost just because Mathilde skipped out. Someone else will write them down, and then Mathilde can buy the book. (Possible side note: make sure those notes get published.)
Um? The Steward helps manage familial wealth and the Chancellor is main for state interests, I'm not really seeing how one advisor would juggle both of those.
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- Location
- Memphis, TN
Rather not be eaten by a dragon for a snack thank you very much
I recon pretty much every merchant republic post will be filled with people backed by strong trade houses with a lot of interest in their own wellbeing. So that'll be juggling what's good for MC's family against what's good for the republic as a state. Trade republics are even more of a political/financial tangle than feudal courts.
We can afford not to sword them then. We're the spymistress, not an adventurer, it's not our job.
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Omegahugger
Inattentive Idiot
The books Mathilde reads proves she has terrible taste, so that would be worse for the dragon.Rather not be eaten by a dragon for a snack thank you very much
- Location
- Memphis, TN
Being vomited out by a dragon doesn't sound much better than being eaten to be honest
chocolote12
A Penguin Flailing Against The Keyboard Of Life.
You take that back. They're just... niche, that's all.
Turn 11 Results - 2475
Winning Vote:
It's not what I expected would win, but the lyrics are incredibly suitable and actually a little dark in the context of a Warhammer wizard. I looked up the song: it was written to be the training montage music in a movie called No Retreat No Surrender, about a teenager who is trained by the ghost of Bruce Lee to stop Jean Claude Van Damme from taking over all the dojos in America. The eighties were a magical time. The entire movie is on Youtube if you want to experience it for yourself. The winner, @HanEmpire, has been granted their Boon, and has decided the form it will take; if they wish they may share the details of it, but the thread is not to badger them for it if they decide to keep it to themselves. Do know, however, that they were explicitly forbidden to seek the thread's help with deciding the Boon.
---
In the coming years, very much will rely on Gustav. Your past investigation of him revealed that he was a suitable if not outstanding candidate, but there's no way to tell if he'll flourish or flail with thirty thousand lives resting on his shoulders. So, you reason, there's two possibilities: either he'll rise to the occassion and therefore will be worth learning from, or he'll be a burden in the near future and will need a very close eye kept on him. Either way, you'll benefit from having spent time with him now.
That reasoned out, you approach him one morning in the dining room of Fort Redemption's keep, and say to him: "Gustav, I would like you to teach me to be a better warrior."
He looks up from his breakfast of bread, sausage and cheese. "Hmf. You are an odd one. Known a wizard or two in my time, and none of 'em like you - but then, none of them were your colour." He carefully cuts a piece of sausage and chews on it while he thinks. "You left that vague on purpose, I suppose?"
"Yes. Whatever you think is most important."
"Hmm. Hell of a question, that is. Ask fifty fighters, get fifty answers." He thinks it over for a while, munching his way through the rest of his sausage. "Suppose that was your intention. That ghost horse of yours, it only does what you want it to, right?"
"That's right."
"Damned useful, that. Half of training a cavalryman is teaching him how to get his horse to cooperate." He puts down his knife and fork and strokes his moustache thoughtfully, and then nods at the scabbard on your back. "I've seen you training with that thing, you seem to be decent at it, so I won't try to argue you into using a nice sensible saber instead. But here's something a lot of young would-be warriors die learning: there's many a thing in this world you cannot win against once they get at blade's length. There's no amount of training that will make you stronger than a minotaur or faster than a vampire or bendier than an elf. For things like that," he pats his hip, "you shoot them. Sure, there's a lot of things that won't die to a bullet, but nothing that fights better with a bullet in them." He takes a long drink out of the wooden mug, then stands. "Let's go. No better time to start than in the dawn light."
---
You'd think it was simple - point it at the target and pull. But it turns out there's more to it than that, and as you send hundreds of rounds through the spare pistols from the Pistolier regiments, if it weren't for Gustav's instructions progress would have been agonizingly slow. Every time he visits you at the earthen bank used as a firing range, he has you fire a few shots, corrects some small thing that surely wouldn't make a difference, but sure enough you're that much closer to the target. After a few months of daily practice, you're hitting a target the size of a man's torso reliably at twenty yards, a puff of sinister-looking fog arising from each impact. You're happy with the progress you've made, but you're aware that to truly call yourself proficient, you have to start doing so without taking time to line up a shot. In what little free time he has, you spend time with the man, getting to know him better while picking his mind further; while a master of light cavalry, you're starting to get the impression that as a Marshal, he's out of his depth. Time will tell, you suppose.
[1-10 Saber, 11-40 Pistols, 41-70 Rifles, 71-85 Leadership, 86-100 Military Tactics: 29, 46. Both rolls are firearms, so he will focus entirely on the first.]
[Learning roll: Martial, Breakpoints 20/50/80, 35+11=47.]
[Teaching roll: Martial, Breakpoints 20/50/80, 69+16=85.]
Your days are also filled with reading; both of the few as-yet-unread books of undead lore that the Colleges are willing to loan out, and of the very heavily encrypted spell-scrolls delivered directly to your hand by a harried apprentice with stern instructions to burn them after reading. They are densely packed with intricate and jargon-heavy instructions in the language of the Colleges, so it's doubtful any thief could even begin to understand them even if they could crack the code, but you take the warning to heart anyway.
Take No Heed is in an interesting spell. Where Mindhole assaults the mind of your target, Take No Heed changes you in such a way that you slip right through the minds of all but the most attentive or the strongest of will. One morning, you're sitting in what may be the only quiet corner in Fort Redemption - the 4th has arrived, and though a number of tents have been set up outside the walls there's still nearly twenty-five thousand men inside them - when Gustav stumbles across you on his way to one of his innumerable other duties, and evidently finds himself curious enough to delay them. As he approaches and asks what's consuming your attention, you're grateful that you don't have to make up a lie about what you're reading - you left your other reading materials in Wurtbad. You pat the small pile of reading material beside you. "The scrolls are from my Master, instructing me in spells; the books are on the topic of the Undead, and how to destroy them."
He looks torn between wariness and curiosity at that. "Spells, eh? Anything useful?"
You close your eyes and let Ulgu flow into you, and take a pinch of nothing, and release it into the air, disturbing its fall with a few gestures and whispering a few mystical words. "Turn around and walk ten paces, then turn and return back to me."
He gives you a quizzical look, but does so; when he turns back around, his eyes look back and forth, and rest on you for a moment before passing by. Then he frowns, thinks, shakes his head and looks back at you, then returns to you. "That was bloody odd," he says. "I could clearly see that there was a person there, but I didn't notice anything about them, and it didn't occur to me to pay any attention to them until I stopped and thought about it and reasoned that you must be that person."
You smile. "It's not quite invisibility, and it fails if against the strong-willed and the determined, but it should prove useful."
---
Burning Shadows is not so easily demonstrated on a live target, but you can practice on scrolls from your Master and reports from Julia that need destroying anyway. It's more complex than any spell you've ever attempted, and the typical material component is the poison known as Black Lotus, and is ruinously expensive and sourced from half a world away besides. And you don't know enough about pharmacology to find a local source you could harvest yourself.
So you find yourself hunched over a candle night after night, trying to instil magic into the the shadows your hands cast. Doing so at all is easy - Ulgu needs little encouragement to fill the shadows - but to have it turn corrosive is an entirely new skill. It's only after long weeks of effort that the scrolls that you're targeting start to blacken where your shadow falls, but once you've learned the knack of it, it grows in effect by leaps and bounds, and soon the parchment is turning to liquid where your shadow falls, and leaving nasty stains and burns on your writing desk.
The tricky part, both magically and mechanically, is distance. Within about twenty yards, it's simple enough to both cast the shadow and instil it with the required effect, but beyond that it takes a brighter light and greater concentration. You practice at night from the watchtowers of the Fort, where a shadow thrown by a torch can go for hundreds of yards; it takes commensurately more time and concentration to perform, but with enough time and concentration you manage to blacken the shape of your hand into a large patch of grass at just under two hundred yards. Now that could come in handy.
[Learning Take No Heed: Learning, Req 60, 93+16=109.]
[Learning Burning Shadows: Learning, Req 70, 58+16=74.]
[Burning Shadows at a distance, Roll, 30+16+20 (Ranald's Blessing)+9 (rollover from Take No Heed)=75.]
You also spend some time trying to recreate the bound spells back from the business with the infiltrators; sadly, with almost three years passed you spend most of your time trying to recall hazy details. Weeks of concentration and meditation refreshes the memory of the spell's structure in your mind, but your attempts to divine how it works so you can start to replicate it with Ulgu instead of Dhar are frustrated at every turn. You don't even have the enchantment vocabulary to keep notes. All you can do is hold a picture of the spell's structure in your mind, and you know it will fade with time. If you had more time or more general knowledge or if the memories were fresher, you know you could manage this, but with so many other priorities you eventually have to put it aside.
More prosaic is your continued readings into the restless dead. With your upcoming excursion into Sylvania, your Master appears to have pulled some strings and had the College library send a few of their more restricted tomes, along with the usual dire warning as to what would happen if you were to lose them. Explanations into the magical side of the undead are conspicuously absent, but there's still a great deal of data, sometimes contradictory and pulled from a thousand sources though it may be. By the time you finish reading your way through the document, you're ready to put the finishing touch on the paperwork for your Intelligence Attachés, refining it down to a single page of twenty questions that, if answered accurately, would allow the knowledgeable - such as you - to identify the form of undead as reliably as if they had seen it themselves. You have the finished form delivered to Julia, who takes a moment away from her expansion of the Attachés into the 4th Division to commission some time from a printing press in Altdorf, and soon enough you have a stack of forms taller than you to be distributed to every officer in the Army of Stirland.
[Bound Spell reverse engineering: Breakpoints 50/70, Learning, 58+16-20 (two full years passed)=54. Time penalty reset.]
[Studying the Undead: Breakpoints 20/50/80, Learning, 86+16=102.]
---
Before you threw yourself into training in earnest, you empowered the former leader of the Guild of Nightsoilmen and the de facto leader of the equivalent branch of the Watch to increase their ranks and scope, and now it is your unfortunate fate to have to read the report this produced; you really must see about getting a leader for it one of these days. The report says that recruitment was easier than expected; that it was on the government payroll meant that it was seen as a more stable and legitimate occupation than when it was an independent guild, though it was still necessary to offer slightly more pay than usual for unskilled labour to make up for the obvious downsides of the job. They also found no trouble expanding alongside the Watch, absorbing local guilds in Worden and Purgg and bringing new but badly needed services to the villages.
The end result is impressive - it's still not close to making the Watch revenue-neutral but it is defraying a significant portion of the costs. And depending how the next few months go, Stirland might badly need every shilling.
Your other reports make for easier reading, as information from all over Stirland flows to you:
- The mood across Stirland is acceptable as rumour of the Purge's ambitions spread, split between those that think that Van Hal's ambition is going to lead to a lot of deaths and those that think that finally putting a Witch Hunter in charge might allow actual process in pushing back the Dead.
- Morale in the 2nd is high, though only average in the 4th.
- Events in the Stirhugel came to a head much faster than you expected, with the Watchmen in Ohlsdorf managing to pick up a trail of whatever it was that was preying on the sheep. To the relief of everyone involved, it turned out to be mere bandits; the Watchmen went back to Ohlsdorf, deputized a number of the burly locals with strong opinions about the theft of livestock, and led them into the camp with sword and bludgeon. Those that survived the assault were subjected to swift and merciless trial, and had already been hanged by the time a report had been prepared. The rural folk of Western Stirland take a very dim view of rustlers.
- The Knights promised by Talabecland are on the way; when the report was written, they were in Wurtbad, so they're likely at least at Halstedt by now.
- The Attachés to the 4th was mostly without problem, though with no retirees coming out of the Army of Stirland she had to cannibalize the Watch for recruits. Their numbers are now stretched worryingly thin, and they may be less effective until numbers are brought back up to a good place.
In closer news, the would-be scribe that arrived from the University of Altdorf didn't manage to perform the duty expected of him; the banished Prince quickly grew sick of being asked to explain things every few minutes and sent the scholar packing. As a member in good standing of the University of Altdorf's longstanding rival, it pleases you to see one of them humbled, but as someone that was looking forward to reading the end result it's more than a little frustrating. A shame, but then, you have more pressing concerns than elf stories.
---
Information Network: Intelligence Attaché attached to 4th Division.
Stirland Watch: Gong Farmers have now expanded into every city the Watch has a presence in, and will continue to do so automatically if/when administrative staff or a Leader is acquired.
Acquired skill - Pistols: Advanced.
Take No Heed learned!
Burning Shadows learned!
Undead Lore proficiency achieved!
Weapon acquired: pistol.
---
Discretionary Income: +200g
Regional informants: -90g
Watch informants: -10g
EIC informants: -20g
Julia: -30g
Townhouse staff: -20g
Literacy lessons: -10g
Attaché program: -120g
---
Net: -100g
Personal Income: +50g
Estate Profit: +10g
Tithe: -6g
Student Loans: -35g
---
Net: +19g
---
There is no formal meeting of the council this month; there may not be one for quite some time. You've delivered written reports to Van Hal, though you're not sure if he's been able to read them - he's been entirely occupied with the finishing touches to the plans for the Purge, and in a rare minute you manged to snatch with him he said to use your judgement and then hurried off. You did manage to get informal updates on everyone's progress - Wilhelmina and Kasmir have the 1st provisioned and serviced by Chaplains, Gustav is happy with the preparedness of the men, and Schultz's road is long-finished and he's putting the last touches on a rather uninspired siege train. You even have a rare chance to talk to Anton as he returns from Zhufbar; they're apparently quite pleased, in their understated Dwarvish way, that the manlings are taking action against the blasted dead, but they're too engaged in battle with some sort of beastmen in their lower hold and the greenskins in their immediate surrounds to sally forth in the immediate future. Then he's off again to Averland.
As thirty thousand men break camp and prepare to march, you consider your own path for the coming months. You itch to join them, though you're not sure if that's the best use of your time. Will the initial push into the Hills be more or less frantic than later on? Would it be useful for you to be personally present for every yard of five thousand square miles of purging?
---
PLAN FOR THIS PURGE TURN
ORGANIZATIONAL ACTIONS - pick ONE from the category 'Information Network' and NONE from 'Stirland Watch':
The Stirland Watch actions can still be taken with personal actions; the action chosen for the Information Network will be their direction for the next three Purge Turns.
Information Network - pick ONE (no action expenditure required):
[ ] Expand your information network into another province (choose one)
[ ] Expand your information network into another county or barony (choose one)
[ ] Expand your information network into the military (choose a Division)
[ ] Expand your Intelligence Attaché program to another Division (choose one)
[ ] Off the Leash: Let Julia handle the network without your micromanagement from now on.
Information Network finances - can be chosen INSTEAD of a selection from the above.
[ ] Attaché Paperwork: The Intelligence Attachés are your biggest expense by far - see if you can have them paid for by the Army of Stirland instead.
[ ] Information Broker: Start selling tidbits of information, just enough for your information network to start paying for itself.
[ ] Fixer: Work with the Wurtbad Thieves Guild, supplying them information in exchange for a portion of profits.
[ ] Special Branch: Pull some financial trickery to get the information network classified as part of the Watch, so that their costs are covered by the Stirlandian treasury.
[ ] Trade Delegation: Convince Wilhelmina and Markus to partner your network with the EIC based on the value of market information.
Stirland Watch - pick ONE (no action expenditure required):
[o] Expand the ranks of the Watch, so that they're able to start covering even the poorer parts of their covered area. (cannot be taken until army retirement resumes in one year)
[ ] Expand the Special Branch into areas already covered by the Watch, so you have an additional pool of manpower you can call upon to supplement the full-time Watchmen.
[ ] Improve the training of the Watch, hiring trainers and dedicating paid time each week to sharpening skills.
[ ] Integrate the Roadwarden network of covered areas into the Watch.
[ ] Headhunt administrators from other organizations in Stirland.
[ ] Seek out a new leader for the Watch.
---
PERSONAL ACTIONS - CHOOSE BETWEEN TWO AND THREE. ANY CHOSEN BEYOND THE FIRST TWO WILL COME WITH RISKS - PLEASE SPECIFY THE 'ADDITIONAL' TASK:
Genießt den Krieg - join the divisions entering Sylvania:
[ ] Attach yourself to the general staff, so you can be present for anything interesting that might happen and keep a finger on the pulse of the war.
[ ] Attach yourself to a specific regiment so you can spend some time in the thick of things.
Miscellany:
[ ] Financial Jargon: Everything with the EIC flew right over your head last time. Try again. Succeeding here will mean that you can take a more active hand in the company, adding it to the organizational actions; failing or not attempting means Mathilde will remain a silent partner.
[ ] Hang Out A Shingle: Spymasters don't advertise, but wizards sometimes do. Make an official announcement that there's a wizard in residence, and see who comes out of the woodwork.
[ ] Formal Proposal: Your idea for an undead research team was received poorly, but Van Hal is still open to the idea in theory. Write in details: Name, who it is technically a part of (Watch, Witch Hunters, Military, College, none), and whether it reports directly to you (becomes a new Organization you command) or, if not, who it would report to.
[ ] Scribe: Altdorf's scribe did not get on well with the Prince. He's going to be rather busy with burning things, but maybe that'll put him in a better mood if you offer your own services. (NEW-ish)
[ ] Gun Shopping: You're currently using a pistol that was a spare for the pistoliers. Visit Nuln to upgrade. (Choose: dueling pistols for accuracy and range, repeater pistols for weight of fire, dragons for hand shotguns. Choose: whether you will acquire and use two pistols at once or keep one hand free.) (NEW)
[ ] Write up a proposal for Wilhelmina to approve a short-term increase in Discretionary Income, for the duration of the crisis. (NEW)
Self-Improvement: Things have been going well so far, but the skills of a Journeyman Grey Mage can only go so far.
[ ] Practice, Practice, Practice: Having been thrown into the deep end of imperial politics, it would probably be a good idea to brush up on your skills and internalize the lessons you've learned (choose which trait; can be taken multiple times; will be more effective if you've used the trait a lot lately).
[ ] Tutoring: One of your fellow councillors may be willing to teach you in their chosen field (choose who; can choose which, or you can let them decide).
[ ] Really Good Swords: You have achieved proficiency with the Greatsword. Future progress is possible, though it will take more effort to see results.
[ ] Pistols at Dawn: You've taken some great strides in an entirely new form of combat, but you're still not entirely proficient. Finish your training. (NEW)
[ ] Combat Training: You're virtually surrounded by armed warriors of various sorts. See if you can convince one to teach you (choose who).
[ ] Combat Training, In The Free Market: You haven't made many heavily armed friends yet, but gold is good for that. Go out and buy some training. (-personal gold)
[ ] Enchantment: You're naturally talented at enchantment; so far, this just amounts to being able to make your desk meow for about an hour. See if you can improve on that, or at least figure out a way to make that useful.
Home Comforts: Your Palace-Shrine is bursting with potential. And also mud.
[ ] Diggy Diggy Hole, Remixed: You're getting sick of having workmen tramping in and out of your abode. Recruit an entire team and personally oversee them to clear out all of the reachable portions of the Palace-Shrine and be done with it. (-personal gold)
[ ] Enchantment: You've finally got the equipment, now you've just got to unpack it all and set up your laboratory.
[ ] Filled with Potential: You've got a room cleared out and ready to be put to use. Decide what you're going to put there and get started on equipping it. (write in the purpose of the room)
Research:
[ ] Undead Research: You know the basics, now. Perhaps a great deal of effort will allow you to advance further. (NEW)
[ ] Snooping: Van Hal gave you a key to his Study. He didn't specifically say not to poke around and see what you could find.
[ ] Shyish-kebabs: The Shyish swords are hideously dangerous as weapons, but fascinating as a subject of study. Try to reverse-engineer the lost enchantments woven into them.
[ ] Bound Spells: Though the corrosive Dhar made them high-maintenance, the design of the bound spells in the castle's infiltrators has fascinating possibilities. The memories had faded but you've managed to refresh them. Try to adapt it for use with Ulgu. (NEW-ish)
[ ] Qhaysh Juice: Whatever it is, it's dripping out of the box at a steady rate. You've got two gallons of the stuff and it's still coming out. It's got to be good for something.
[ ] Qhaysh Skunkworks: It would take careful study to unlock the secrets of the liquid. It would take considerably less time to find out if it can be made to burn, or explode, or do something militarily useful. (NEW)
[ ] As a Journeywoman, the path to Magister is marked by mastering more than the two shadow spells you already know. Send to the Grey Order for the basics and work on figuring out one of the others.
Influence:
[ ] Thieves Guild: It's currently little more than a church group, albeit of a very unconventional god. If it could be expanded under your aegis, it could be a powerful tool.
[ ] Biderhof: This village based on woodcutting and agriculture, has adopted you as one of it's own. Maybe you should adopt it as your own, in a literal sense.
[ ] Non-Thief Guilds: Wurtbad, like all major cities, is home to a number of guilds. Reach out to them and enforce your will.
Relations:
[ ] Getting To Know You: Spend time with one of your fellow councillors or your liege, offering your help in their tasks and generally getting a feel for them (choose one).
[ ] Getting To Know You Whether You Like It Or Not: You've been given good reason to mistrust your fellow councillors. Perhaps you should see what they spent their time doing (choose one).
[ ] Letters Home: You might be able to wring more information out of your Master, or you might just be able to get news, information and guidance in general from the Grey Order.
[o] Free Time: Now well-established in Wurtbad, you can spend some time in your scant off hours getting to know someone better. Pick one character. (not possible during Purge Turns)
---
FINANCES: NO ACTION POINT EXPENDITURE.
Personal Income: 60 gold/turn
Discretionary Income: 200 gold/turn
Informer Payroll unlocked
Currently paying Grey College tithe (-6 personal gold/turn)
Currently paying Grey College student loans (-35 personal gold/turn)
Not currently embezzling
Currently funding regional informants (-90 discretionary gold/turn)
Currently funding Watch informants (-10 discretionary gold/turn)
Currently funding EIC informants (-20 discretionary gold/turn)
Currently funding Intelligence Attaché program (-120 discretionary gold/turn)
Currently employing Julia Massif (-30 discretionary gold/turn)
Currently maintaining the staff of a townhouse in Wurtbad (-20 discretionary gold/turn)
Totals:
+19 personal gold/turn
-90 discretionary gold/turn
Bills will be paid every third Purge Turn. You can go into 'debt'; normally this would draw negative attention as you defer payments and take on loans in Stirland's name, but during the Purge it is to be expected; if you make good by the end of the turn immediately following the end of the War, all will be well.
[ ] Begin plumping the informer rolls (choose ratio of real:fake informers. Almost impossible to detect, but also very difficult to increase or decrease the amount quickly)
[ ] Change tithe payment/loan payment/embezzlement (specify)
[o] These agents are getting expensive. Write up a proposal for your discretionary budget to be increased, instead of waiting for Van Hal to decide to increase it. (Van Hal does not have the attention to spare)
- Welcome to the Purge. Each Purge Turn will be two months; you get two actions per turn and Julia will get an action every three turns. Feedback and oversight will be at best utterly minimal and more likely nonexistent; if there ever was a time for boldness, or to try to get away with something, it is now.
- Size comparisons: the Haunted Hills, at about 5000 square miles, are about the size of Connecticut or Northern Ireland, and makes up about a quarter of Sylvania. While we're at it, Stirland (without Sylvania) is about 80k square miles, or the size of Kansas or Austria. Squinting at a map of the Empire gives me a figure of about 650k square miles - Alaska, or two and a half Texases, or two Germanies.
- If you use a personal action to get a leader for the Watch, they'll be able to take actions on their own like the Information Network is during times like this.
- If you venture into Sylvania, you will be accompanied at all times by your bodyguard platoon of 25 greatswords.
- I didn't give you a Mastery for Take No Heed despite the crit because it didn't occur 'in the field' - you can't develop a deeper understanding of it while learning it by rote from scrolls.
- What you learned of Gustav has already been added to the Dramatis Personae threadmark.
- Ranald's Blessing will still be available, but will have a lesser effect during these turns.
- Note that there's two sets of finances in the post, which could get confusing. The first set is the finances for this turn; the second is the projected income and costs for next turn.
It's not what I expected would win, but the lyrics are incredibly suitable and actually a little dark in the context of a Warhammer wizard. I looked up the song: it was written to be the training montage music in a movie called No Retreat No Surrender, about a teenager who is trained by the ghost of Bruce Lee to stop Jean Claude Van Damme from taking over all the dojos in America. The eighties were a magical time. The entire movie is on Youtube if you want to experience it for yourself. The winner, @HanEmpire, has been granted their Boon, and has decided the form it will take; if they wish they may share the details of it, but the thread is not to badger them for it if they decide to keep it to themselves. Do know, however, that they were explicitly forbidden to seek the thread's help with deciding the Boon.
---
In the coming years, very much will rely on Gustav. Your past investigation of him revealed that he was a suitable if not outstanding candidate, but there's no way to tell if he'll flourish or flail with thirty thousand lives resting on his shoulders. So, you reason, there's two possibilities: either he'll rise to the occassion and therefore will be worth learning from, or he'll be a burden in the near future and will need a very close eye kept on him. Either way, you'll benefit from having spent time with him now.
That reasoned out, you approach him one morning in the dining room of Fort Redemption's keep, and say to him: "Gustav, I would like you to teach me to be a better warrior."
He looks up from his breakfast of bread, sausage and cheese. "Hmf. You are an odd one. Known a wizard or two in my time, and none of 'em like you - but then, none of them were your colour." He carefully cuts a piece of sausage and chews on it while he thinks. "You left that vague on purpose, I suppose?"
"Yes. Whatever you think is most important."
"Hmm. Hell of a question, that is. Ask fifty fighters, get fifty answers." He thinks it over for a while, munching his way through the rest of his sausage. "Suppose that was your intention. That ghost horse of yours, it only does what you want it to, right?"
"That's right."
"Damned useful, that. Half of training a cavalryman is teaching him how to get his horse to cooperate." He puts down his knife and fork and strokes his moustache thoughtfully, and then nods at the scabbard on your back. "I've seen you training with that thing, you seem to be decent at it, so I won't try to argue you into using a nice sensible saber instead. But here's something a lot of young would-be warriors die learning: there's many a thing in this world you cannot win against once they get at blade's length. There's no amount of training that will make you stronger than a minotaur or faster than a vampire or bendier than an elf. For things like that," he pats his hip, "you shoot them. Sure, there's a lot of things that won't die to a bullet, but nothing that fights better with a bullet in them." He takes a long drink out of the wooden mug, then stands. "Let's go. No better time to start than in the dawn light."
---
You'd think it was simple - point it at the target and pull. But it turns out there's more to it than that, and as you send hundreds of rounds through the spare pistols from the Pistolier regiments, if it weren't for Gustav's instructions progress would have been agonizingly slow. Every time he visits you at the earthen bank used as a firing range, he has you fire a few shots, corrects some small thing that surely wouldn't make a difference, but sure enough you're that much closer to the target. After a few months of daily practice, you're hitting a target the size of a man's torso reliably at twenty yards, a puff of sinister-looking fog arising from each impact. You're happy with the progress you've made, but you're aware that to truly call yourself proficient, you have to start doing so without taking time to line up a shot. In what little free time he has, you spend time with the man, getting to know him better while picking his mind further; while a master of light cavalry, you're starting to get the impression that as a Marshal, he's out of his depth. Time will tell, you suppose.
[1-10 Saber, 11-40 Pistols, 41-70 Rifles, 71-85 Leadership, 86-100 Military Tactics: 29, 46. Both rolls are firearms, so he will focus entirely on the first.]
[Learning roll: Martial, Breakpoints 20/50/80, 35+11=47.]
[Teaching roll: Martial, Breakpoints 20/50/80, 69+16=85.]
Your days are also filled with reading; both of the few as-yet-unread books of undead lore that the Colleges are willing to loan out, and of the very heavily encrypted spell-scrolls delivered directly to your hand by a harried apprentice with stern instructions to burn them after reading. They are densely packed with intricate and jargon-heavy instructions in the language of the Colleges, so it's doubtful any thief could even begin to understand them even if they could crack the code, but you take the warning to heart anyway.
Take No Heed is in an interesting spell. Where Mindhole assaults the mind of your target, Take No Heed changes you in such a way that you slip right through the minds of all but the most attentive or the strongest of will. One morning, you're sitting in what may be the only quiet corner in Fort Redemption - the 4th has arrived, and though a number of tents have been set up outside the walls there's still nearly twenty-five thousand men inside them - when Gustav stumbles across you on his way to one of his innumerable other duties, and evidently finds himself curious enough to delay them. As he approaches and asks what's consuming your attention, you're grateful that you don't have to make up a lie about what you're reading - you left your other reading materials in Wurtbad. You pat the small pile of reading material beside you. "The scrolls are from my Master, instructing me in spells; the books are on the topic of the Undead, and how to destroy them."
He looks torn between wariness and curiosity at that. "Spells, eh? Anything useful?"
You close your eyes and let Ulgu flow into you, and take a pinch of nothing, and release it into the air, disturbing its fall with a few gestures and whispering a few mystical words. "Turn around and walk ten paces, then turn and return back to me."
He gives you a quizzical look, but does so; when he turns back around, his eyes look back and forth, and rest on you for a moment before passing by. Then he frowns, thinks, shakes his head and looks back at you, then returns to you. "That was bloody odd," he says. "I could clearly see that there was a person there, but I didn't notice anything about them, and it didn't occur to me to pay any attention to them until I stopped and thought about it and reasoned that you must be that person."
You smile. "It's not quite invisibility, and it fails if against the strong-willed and the determined, but it should prove useful."
---
Burning Shadows is not so easily demonstrated on a live target, but you can practice on scrolls from your Master and reports from Julia that need destroying anyway. It's more complex than any spell you've ever attempted, and the typical material component is the poison known as Black Lotus, and is ruinously expensive and sourced from half a world away besides. And you don't know enough about pharmacology to find a local source you could harvest yourself.
So you find yourself hunched over a candle night after night, trying to instil magic into the the shadows your hands cast. Doing so at all is easy - Ulgu needs little encouragement to fill the shadows - but to have it turn corrosive is an entirely new skill. It's only after long weeks of effort that the scrolls that you're targeting start to blacken where your shadow falls, but once you've learned the knack of it, it grows in effect by leaps and bounds, and soon the parchment is turning to liquid where your shadow falls, and leaving nasty stains and burns on your writing desk.
The tricky part, both magically and mechanically, is distance. Within about twenty yards, it's simple enough to both cast the shadow and instil it with the required effect, but beyond that it takes a brighter light and greater concentration. You practice at night from the watchtowers of the Fort, where a shadow thrown by a torch can go for hundreds of yards; it takes commensurately more time and concentration to perform, but with enough time and concentration you manage to blacken the shape of your hand into a large patch of grass at just under two hundred yards. Now that could come in handy.
[Learning Take No Heed: Learning, Req 60, 93+16=109.]
[Learning Burning Shadows: Learning, Req 70, 58+16=74.]
[Burning Shadows at a distance, Roll, 30+16+20 (Ranald's Blessing)+9 (rollover from Take No Heed)=75.]
You also spend some time trying to recreate the bound spells back from the business with the infiltrators; sadly, with almost three years passed you spend most of your time trying to recall hazy details. Weeks of concentration and meditation refreshes the memory of the spell's structure in your mind, but your attempts to divine how it works so you can start to replicate it with Ulgu instead of Dhar are frustrated at every turn. You don't even have the enchantment vocabulary to keep notes. All you can do is hold a picture of the spell's structure in your mind, and you know it will fade with time. If you had more time or more general knowledge or if the memories were fresher, you know you could manage this, but with so many other priorities you eventually have to put it aside.
More prosaic is your continued readings into the restless dead. With your upcoming excursion into Sylvania, your Master appears to have pulled some strings and had the College library send a few of their more restricted tomes, along with the usual dire warning as to what would happen if you were to lose them. Explanations into the magical side of the undead are conspicuously absent, but there's still a great deal of data, sometimes contradictory and pulled from a thousand sources though it may be. By the time you finish reading your way through the document, you're ready to put the finishing touch on the paperwork for your Intelligence Attachés, refining it down to a single page of twenty questions that, if answered accurately, would allow the knowledgeable - such as you - to identify the form of undead as reliably as if they had seen it themselves. You have the finished form delivered to Julia, who takes a moment away from her expansion of the Attachés into the 4th Division to commission some time from a printing press in Altdorf, and soon enough you have a stack of forms taller than you to be distributed to every officer in the Army of Stirland.
[Bound Spell reverse engineering: Breakpoints 50/70, Learning, 58+16-20 (two full years passed)=54. Time penalty reset.]
[Studying the Undead: Breakpoints 20/50/80, Learning, 86+16=102.]
---
Before you threw yourself into training in earnest, you empowered the former leader of the Guild of Nightsoilmen and the de facto leader of the equivalent branch of the Watch to increase their ranks and scope, and now it is your unfortunate fate to have to read the report this produced; you really must see about getting a leader for it one of these days. The report says that recruitment was easier than expected; that it was on the government payroll meant that it was seen as a more stable and legitimate occupation than when it was an independent guild, though it was still necessary to offer slightly more pay than usual for unskilled labour to make up for the obvious downsides of the job. They also found no trouble expanding alongside the Watch, absorbing local guilds in Worden and Purgg and bringing new but badly needed services to the villages.
The end result is impressive - it's still not close to making the Watch revenue-neutral but it is defraying a significant portion of the costs. And depending how the next few months go, Stirland might badly need every shilling.
Your other reports make for easier reading, as information from all over Stirland flows to you:
- The mood across Stirland is acceptable as rumour of the Purge's ambitions spread, split between those that think that Van Hal's ambition is going to lead to a lot of deaths and those that think that finally putting a Witch Hunter in charge might allow actual process in pushing back the Dead.
- Morale in the 2nd is high, though only average in the 4th.
- Events in the Stirhugel came to a head much faster than you expected, with the Watchmen in Ohlsdorf managing to pick up a trail of whatever it was that was preying on the sheep. To the relief of everyone involved, it turned out to be mere bandits; the Watchmen went back to Ohlsdorf, deputized a number of the burly locals with strong opinions about the theft of livestock, and led them into the camp with sword and bludgeon. Those that survived the assault were subjected to swift and merciless trial, and had already been hanged by the time a report had been prepared. The rural folk of Western Stirland take a very dim view of rustlers.
- The Knights promised by Talabecland are on the way; when the report was written, they were in Wurtbad, so they're likely at least at Halstedt by now.
- The Attachés to the 4th was mostly without problem, though with no retirees coming out of the Army of Stirland she had to cannibalize the Watch for recruits. Their numbers are now stretched worryingly thin, and they may be less effective until numbers are brought back up to a good place.
In closer news, the would-be scribe that arrived from the University of Altdorf didn't manage to perform the duty expected of him; the banished Prince quickly grew sick of being asked to explain things every few minutes and sent the scholar packing. As a member in good standing of the University of Altdorf's longstanding rival, it pleases you to see one of them humbled, but as someone that was looking forward to reading the end result it's more than a little frustrating. A shame, but then, you have more pressing concerns than elf stories.
---
Information Network: Intelligence Attaché attached to 4th Division.
Stirland Watch: Gong Farmers have now expanded into every city the Watch has a presence in, and will continue to do so automatically if/when administrative staff or a Leader is acquired.
Acquired skill - Pistols: Advanced.
Take No Heed learned!
Burning Shadows learned!
Undead Lore proficiency achieved!
Weapon acquired: pistol.
---
Discretionary Income: +200g
Regional informants: -90g
Watch informants: -10g
EIC informants: -20g
Julia: -30g
Townhouse staff: -20g
Literacy lessons: -10g
Attaché program: -120g
---
Net: -100g
Personal Income: +50g
Estate Profit: +10g
Tithe: -6g
Student Loans: -35g
---
Net: +19g
---
There is no formal meeting of the council this month; there may not be one for quite some time. You've delivered written reports to Van Hal, though you're not sure if he's been able to read them - he's been entirely occupied with the finishing touches to the plans for the Purge, and in a rare minute you manged to snatch with him he said to use your judgement and then hurried off. You did manage to get informal updates on everyone's progress - Wilhelmina and Kasmir have the 1st provisioned and serviced by Chaplains, Gustav is happy with the preparedness of the men, and Schultz's road is long-finished and he's putting the last touches on a rather uninspired siege train. You even have a rare chance to talk to Anton as he returns from Zhufbar; they're apparently quite pleased, in their understated Dwarvish way, that the manlings are taking action against the blasted dead, but they're too engaged in battle with some sort of beastmen in their lower hold and the greenskins in their immediate surrounds to sally forth in the immediate future. Then he's off again to Averland.
As thirty thousand men break camp and prepare to march, you consider your own path for the coming months. You itch to join them, though you're not sure if that's the best use of your time. Will the initial push into the Hills be more or less frantic than later on? Would it be useful for you to be personally present for every yard of five thousand square miles of purging?
---
PLAN FOR THIS PURGE TURN
ORGANIZATIONAL ACTIONS - pick ONE from the category 'Information Network' and NONE from 'Stirland Watch':
The Stirland Watch actions can still be taken with personal actions; the action chosen for the Information Network will be their direction for the next three Purge Turns.
Information Network - pick ONE (no action expenditure required):
[ ] Expand your information network into another province (choose one)
[ ] Expand your information network into another county or barony (choose one)
[ ] Expand your information network into the military (choose a Division)
[ ] Expand your Intelligence Attaché program to another Division (choose one)
[ ] Off the Leash: Let Julia handle the network without your micromanagement from now on.
Information Network finances - can be chosen INSTEAD of a selection from the above.
[ ] Attaché Paperwork: The Intelligence Attachés are your biggest expense by far - see if you can have them paid for by the Army of Stirland instead.
[ ] Information Broker: Start selling tidbits of information, just enough for your information network to start paying for itself.
[ ] Fixer: Work with the Wurtbad Thieves Guild, supplying them information in exchange for a portion of profits.
[ ] Special Branch: Pull some financial trickery to get the information network classified as part of the Watch, so that their costs are covered by the Stirlandian treasury.
[ ] Trade Delegation: Convince Wilhelmina and Markus to partner your network with the EIC based on the value of market information.
Stirland Watch - pick ONE (no action expenditure required):
[o] Expand the ranks of the Watch, so that they're able to start covering even the poorer parts of their covered area. (cannot be taken until army retirement resumes in one year)
[ ] Expand the Special Branch into areas already covered by the Watch, so you have an additional pool of manpower you can call upon to supplement the full-time Watchmen.
[ ] Improve the training of the Watch, hiring trainers and dedicating paid time each week to sharpening skills.
[ ] Integrate the Roadwarden network of covered areas into the Watch.
[ ] Headhunt administrators from other organizations in Stirland.
[ ] Seek out a new leader for the Watch.
---
PERSONAL ACTIONS - CHOOSE BETWEEN TWO AND THREE. ANY CHOSEN BEYOND THE FIRST TWO WILL COME WITH RISKS - PLEASE SPECIFY THE 'ADDITIONAL' TASK:
Genießt den Krieg - join the divisions entering Sylvania:
[ ] Attach yourself to the general staff, so you can be present for anything interesting that might happen and keep a finger on the pulse of the war.
[ ] Attach yourself to a specific regiment so you can spend some time in the thick of things.
Miscellany:
[ ] Financial Jargon: Everything with the EIC flew right over your head last time. Try again. Succeeding here will mean that you can take a more active hand in the company, adding it to the organizational actions; failing or not attempting means Mathilde will remain a silent partner.
[ ] Hang Out A Shingle: Spymasters don't advertise, but wizards sometimes do. Make an official announcement that there's a wizard in residence, and see who comes out of the woodwork.
[ ] Formal Proposal: Your idea for an undead research team was received poorly, but Van Hal is still open to the idea in theory. Write in details: Name, who it is technically a part of (Watch, Witch Hunters, Military, College, none), and whether it reports directly to you (becomes a new Organization you command) or, if not, who it would report to.
[ ] Scribe: Altdorf's scribe did not get on well with the Prince. He's going to be rather busy with burning things, but maybe that'll put him in a better mood if you offer your own services. (NEW-ish)
[ ] Gun Shopping: You're currently using a pistol that was a spare for the pistoliers. Visit Nuln to upgrade. (Choose: dueling pistols for accuracy and range, repeater pistols for weight of fire, dragons for hand shotguns. Choose: whether you will acquire and use two pistols at once or keep one hand free.) (NEW)
[ ] Write up a proposal for Wilhelmina to approve a short-term increase in Discretionary Income, for the duration of the crisis. (NEW)
Self-Improvement: Things have been going well so far, but the skills of a Journeyman Grey Mage can only go so far.
[ ] Practice, Practice, Practice: Having been thrown into the deep end of imperial politics, it would probably be a good idea to brush up on your skills and internalize the lessons you've learned (choose which trait; can be taken multiple times; will be more effective if you've used the trait a lot lately).
[ ] Tutoring: One of your fellow councillors may be willing to teach you in their chosen field (choose who; can choose which, or you can let them decide).
[ ] Really Good Swords: You have achieved proficiency with the Greatsword. Future progress is possible, though it will take more effort to see results.
[ ] Pistols at Dawn: You've taken some great strides in an entirely new form of combat, but you're still not entirely proficient. Finish your training. (NEW)
[ ] Combat Training: You're virtually surrounded by armed warriors of various sorts. See if you can convince one to teach you (choose who).
[ ] Combat Training, In The Free Market: You haven't made many heavily armed friends yet, but gold is good for that. Go out and buy some training. (-personal gold)
[ ] Enchantment: You're naturally talented at enchantment; so far, this just amounts to being able to make your desk meow for about an hour. See if you can improve on that, or at least figure out a way to make that useful.
Home Comforts: Your Palace-Shrine is bursting with potential. And also mud.
[ ] Diggy Diggy Hole, Remixed: You're getting sick of having workmen tramping in and out of your abode. Recruit an entire team and personally oversee them to clear out all of the reachable portions of the Palace-Shrine and be done with it. (-personal gold)
[ ] Enchantment: You've finally got the equipment, now you've just got to unpack it all and set up your laboratory.
[ ] Filled with Potential: You've got a room cleared out and ready to be put to use. Decide what you're going to put there and get started on equipping it. (write in the purpose of the room)
Research:
[ ] Undead Research: You know the basics, now. Perhaps a great deal of effort will allow you to advance further. (NEW)
[ ] Snooping: Van Hal gave you a key to his Study. He didn't specifically say not to poke around and see what you could find.
[ ] Shyish-kebabs: The Shyish swords are hideously dangerous as weapons, but fascinating as a subject of study. Try to reverse-engineer the lost enchantments woven into them.
[ ] Bound Spells: Though the corrosive Dhar made them high-maintenance, the design of the bound spells in the castle's infiltrators has fascinating possibilities. The memories had faded but you've managed to refresh them. Try to adapt it for use with Ulgu. (NEW-ish)
[ ] Qhaysh Juice: Whatever it is, it's dripping out of the box at a steady rate. You've got two gallons of the stuff and it's still coming out. It's got to be good for something.
[ ] Qhaysh Skunkworks: It would take careful study to unlock the secrets of the liquid. It would take considerably less time to find out if it can be made to burn, or explode, or do something militarily useful. (NEW)
[ ] As a Journeywoman, the path to Magister is marked by mastering more than the two shadow spells you already know. Send to the Grey Order for the basics and work on figuring out one of the others.
Influence:
[ ] Thieves Guild: It's currently little more than a church group, albeit of a very unconventional god. If it could be expanded under your aegis, it could be a powerful tool.
[ ] Biderhof: This village based on woodcutting and agriculture, has adopted you as one of it's own. Maybe you should adopt it as your own, in a literal sense.
[ ] Non-Thief Guilds: Wurtbad, like all major cities, is home to a number of guilds. Reach out to them and enforce your will.
Relations:
[ ] Getting To Know You: Spend time with one of your fellow councillors or your liege, offering your help in their tasks and generally getting a feel for them (choose one).
[ ] Getting To Know You Whether You Like It Or Not: You've been given good reason to mistrust your fellow councillors. Perhaps you should see what they spent their time doing (choose one).
[ ] Letters Home: You might be able to wring more information out of your Master, or you might just be able to get news, information and guidance in general from the Grey Order.
[o] Free Time: Now well-established in Wurtbad, you can spend some time in your scant off hours getting to know someone better. Pick one character. (not possible during Purge Turns)
---
FINANCES: NO ACTION POINT EXPENDITURE.
Personal Income: 60 gold/turn
Discretionary Income: 200 gold/turn
Informer Payroll unlocked
Currently paying Grey College tithe (-6 personal gold/turn)
Currently paying Grey College student loans (-35 personal gold/turn)
Not currently embezzling
Currently funding regional informants (-90 discretionary gold/turn)
Currently funding Watch informants (-10 discretionary gold/turn)
Currently funding EIC informants (-20 discretionary gold/turn)
Currently funding Intelligence Attaché program (-120 discretionary gold/turn)
Currently employing Julia Massif (-30 discretionary gold/turn)
Currently maintaining the staff of a townhouse in Wurtbad (-20 discretionary gold/turn)
Totals:
+19 personal gold/turn
-90 discretionary gold/turn
Bills will be paid every third Purge Turn. You can go into 'debt'; normally this would draw negative attention as you defer payments and take on loans in Stirland's name, but during the Purge it is to be expected; if you make good by the end of the turn immediately following the end of the War, all will be well.
[ ] Begin plumping the informer rolls (choose ratio of real:fake informers. Almost impossible to detect, but also very difficult to increase or decrease the amount quickly)
[ ] Change tithe payment/loan payment/embezzlement (specify)
[o] These agents are getting expensive. Write up a proposal for your discretionary budget to be increased, instead of waiting for Van Hal to decide to increase it. (Van Hal does not have the attention to spare)
- Welcome to the Purge. Each Purge Turn will be two months; you get two actions per turn and Julia will get an action every three turns. Feedback and oversight will be at best utterly minimal and more likely nonexistent; if there ever was a time for boldness, or to try to get away with something, it is now.
- Size comparisons: the Haunted Hills, at about 5000 square miles, are about the size of Connecticut or Northern Ireland, and makes up about a quarter of Sylvania. While we're at it, Stirland (without Sylvania) is about 80k square miles, or the size of Kansas or Austria. Squinting at a map of the Empire gives me a figure of about 650k square miles - Alaska, or two and a half Texases, or two Germanies.
- If you use a personal action to get a leader for the Watch, they'll be able to take actions on their own like the Information Network is during times like this.
- If you venture into Sylvania, you will be accompanied at all times by your bodyguard platoon of 25 greatswords.
- I didn't give you a Mastery for Take No Heed despite the crit because it didn't occur 'in the field' - you can't develop a deeper understanding of it while learning it by rote from scrolls.
- What you learned of Gustav has already been added to the Dramatis Personae threadmark.
- Ranald's Blessing will still be available, but will have a lesser effect during these turns.
- Note that there's two sets of finances in the post, which could get confusing. The first set is the finances for this turn; the second is the projected income and costs for next turn.
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[X] Plan The Front Don't Need Us Yet
-[X][Intel] Information Broker: Start selling tidbits of information, just enough for your information network to start paying for itself.
-[X][Personal] Seek out a new leader for the Watch.
-[X][Personal] Scribe: Altdorf's scribe did not get on well with the Prince. He's going to be rather busy with burning things, but maybe that'll put him in a better mood if you offer your own services. (NEW-ish)
--[X] Ranald's Blessing(if available)
Intel 1/1
Personal 2/2
Overwork 0/1
Blessing 1/1
The initial push shouldn't need our personal attention yet. Lets offload the admin/budget crap and try our luck with Asarnil.
We need him to be in a cooperative mood, not in a shit fit because the scribe pissed him off and now he wants to do whatever
You REALLY don't want the superheavy to do whatever.
Watch action would keep the Watch busy for the next 3 turns, so we can spend our time more precisely when shit starts going down.
We probably want to be in the command tent starting from the second turn. Van Hal has it covered for now with Kasmir.
-[X][Intel] Information Broker: Start selling tidbits of information, just enough for your information network to start paying for itself.
-[X][Personal] Seek out a new leader for the Watch.
-[X][Personal] Scribe: Altdorf's scribe did not get on well with the Prince. He's going to be rather busy with burning things, but maybe that'll put him in a better mood if you offer your own services. (NEW-ish)
--[X] Ranald's Blessing(if available)
Intel 1/1
Personal 2/2
Overwork 0/1
Blessing 1/1
The initial push shouldn't need our personal attention yet. Lets offload the admin/budget crap and try our luck with Asarnil.
We need him to be in a cooperative mood, not in a shit fit because the scribe pissed him off and now he wants to do whatever
You REALLY don't want the superheavy to do whatever.
Watch action would keep the Watch busy for the next 3 turns, so we can spend our time more precisely when shit starts going down.
E: My god our Marshal is probably outclassed by Mathilde without his traits?!
We probably want to be in the command tent starting from the second turn. Van Hal has it covered for now with Kasmir.
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Alectai
Speaks Words of Wisdom... On occasion
Yeah, honestly, Mathilde is best as a fast messenger at the moment attached to the General Staff.
Also, Blessed Hands is amazing for pistols, normally using an enchantment on a ranged weapon means you only enchant the bullet you're about to fire. Auto-enchant weapons you hold means that we can have magical bullets on demand.
Also, Blessed Hands is amazing for pistols, normally using an enchantment on a ranged weapon means you only enchant the bullet you're about to fire. Auto-enchant weapons you hold means that we can have magical bullets on demand.
fallintolife
the worst vegan
- Location
- Los Angeles
- Pronouns
- They/Them
[X] Plan The Front Don't Need Us Yet
King Arthur
The Once and Future King
We need money.
The option I most like is Trade Delegation, but that might not be enough.
- Pronouns
- She/Her
[X] Plan The Front Don't Need Us Yet
I really want to chat with Arsnil.
I really want to chat with Arsnil.
Good point, clarified it - you still have it but it'll be lesser during these Purge Turns.
Yeah, Peter Principle in action - outside of his niches he's actually pretty bad at his job. That said, his niches of 'killing things while on horseback' and 'teaching people to kill things while on horseback' are pretty damn useful.
FlyingScanian
Tea Addict
- Location
- Land of Eternal Night
- Pronouns
- He/Him
[X] Plan The Front Don't Need Us Yet
Suggestion (for later, obviously, we're a bit busy right now): try to put him up with a few reasonable underlings who cover his weak points?
Attache paperwork. The Attaches are costing us half our budget, which is more than any income option is likely to pay.
Also Trade Delegation is dangerous because we still don't know how the EIC works yet. Granted, all the moneymakers are dangerous in their own ways
But come the payment turn we can offset it for now. Personal income can be used to escape going into debt for a couple of turns while we work to write it off.
But we need that Watch Commander so we can delegate them to moneymaking or messing with the Watch without eating one of our actions.
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chocolote12
A Penguin Flailing Against The Keyboard Of Life.
[X] Plan The Front Don't Need Us Yet
Dangerous suggestion, since from his traits he might be pretty offended if we make some kind of statement implying he's inadequate(also he still has better specs than Anton in Diplomacy
)
- Location
- Norway
...we're going to wind up paying back much of our embezzlement, aren't we. That's funny.
On top of business, trying to do so now would be a good example of trying to change horses midstream. You could try something like this later on, though with how prickly he was about the attachés, it might be difficult to get him to go along with it.