- Location
- I think somewhere. I might be nowhere though
I know. I made note of weather incidences still being a hazard a few posts back.
Who Needs Harmony?: An MLP Empire Quest
- Thread starter Questor
- Start date
- Location
- Italy
you know, I was thinking a bit more about gryphon/pony view of nature.
I'm imagining something like this happening if two random ones were to talk to each other about it
Gryphon: confused"I don't understand what's your problem with our methods and mindset. You obviously see nature as an enemy as well!"
Pony: offended "WHAT? NO WE DON'T?"
Gryphon confused "What do you mean you don't? You bent the sun and moon to your will, you control the seasons and the weather, you force your crops to grow at unnatural speed, you keep all the dangerous predators harshly contained in the wild, and if they ever attack your ponies you don't hesitate to go and kill them! You even go and wake up hybernating animals instead of letting them wake up on their own! You micromanage things to an incredible degree!
Pony not knowing what to answer "I... I..."
Gryphon: complimenting "It's admirable, really! We might want to destroy nature, but you went one step further! you enslaved it to your will, made it dependent on you. Honestly, there's quite a lot we could learn from you!"
Pony: blue screen of death, 404 pony not found.
I'm imagining something like this happening if two random ones were to talk to each other about it
Gryphon: confused"I don't understand what's your problem with our methods and mindset. You obviously see nature as an enemy as well!"
Pony: offended "WHAT? NO WE DON'T?"
Gryphon confused "What do you mean you don't? You bent the sun and moon to your will, you control the seasons and the weather, you force your crops to grow at unnatural speed, you keep all the dangerous predators harshly contained in the wild, and if they ever attack your ponies you don't hesitate to go and kill them! You even go and wake up hybernating animals instead of letting them wake up on their own! You micromanage things to an incredible degree!
Pony not knowing what to answer "I... I..."
Gryphon: complimenting "It's admirable, really! We might want to destroy nature, but you went one step further! you enslaved it to your will, made it dependent on you. Honestly, there's quite a lot we could learn from you!"
Pony: blue screen of death, 404 pony not found.
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- Location
- Washington
I know were probably gonna make Maretonia a Protectorate, but man do I wish we can keep it as an independent nation. A complete restructure of the government and placing one of the Abolitionists as the head of state would be great. A reborn Kingdom of Maretonia, forged from the fires of war after being torn apart by two warmongering noble houses. The institution of slavery would be seen as a necessary sacrifice for stability. Or perhaps under Abolitionist control, Maretonia would be restructured as a more Egalitarian nation — a Maretonian Republic if you will. Ah, I can dream.
- Location
- I think somewhere. I might be nowhere though
Having reread the last 10 updates (though not interludes) out of curiosity due to the recent upsurge in activity, it occurs to me one of the post-civil war issues we will need to deal with will be anti-pegasi prejudice. House White Star already had some unicorn supremacists (like that one Canterlot cult in the EaW Pax Changelingia) who supported House White Star because they were disgusted at the idea of a pegasus being their ruler. There will undoubtedly be heightened prejudices after the war, seeing as House Storm destroyed the country and is associated primarily with pegasi.
Cybandeath
Lord Darkness, and Representative of Mad Science
- Location
- The United States of America
I think we should annex up to the river in the north and break up the rest Balkan style, things are kinda overstretched in my opinion until we can consolidate more land directly such as by annexing our protectorate so we are better off making weaker, friendly and more manageable neighbors then a more united state with no real border changes especially since there seemed to a notable species divide that seperate nations for the three races are least for now could prove useful to aid future better intergration and equality between the races. That all being said I also I say the river as that is around where the Abolitionists have already been holding out and would be the easiest to integrate into the Crystal Protectorate or some kind of Border March, preferably the latter as I think the Crystal Ponies and our existing land is the most we can probably handle holding directly at least with the current Emperor we will need some serious time to pass and spread of our main Grypthon race and culture and get the religion question more better solved and developed before we take on other land with more entrenched identities, culture, and nationalism that would make other land difficult to intergrate.
Frankly speaking I dont think we can hold a further south Protectorate of the whole nation and its better to break things up to work out latter in my opinion and hell they may feed off the republics the minatours have to create more localized cultures.
Frankly speaking I dont think we can hold a further south Protectorate of the whole nation and its better to break things up to work out latter in my opinion and hell they may feed off the republics the minatours have to create more localized cultures.
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- Location
- I think somewhere. I might be nowhere though
Meh, this is our last real chance for major expansion seeing as the Yaks have formed an independent identity. I'd rather take it and deal with the bureaucratic issues while we're still big and prosperous enough to deal with it.
Besides, the population knows it's Gryphus that is helping them. It's Gryphus-stamped boxes that have seen to preventing their famines. It's Gryphus-made cannons that fights their war. It's Gryphus blood that will be saving them from enslavement. We have an upswing to help deal with the issues of integration and I want to use it to its fullest.
Besides, the population knows it's Gryphus that is helping them. It's Gryphus-stamped boxes that have seen to preventing their famines. It's Gryphus-made cannons that fights their war. It's Gryphus blood that will be saving them from enslavement. We have an upswing to help deal with the issues of integration and I want to use it to its fullest.
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Regarding the refugees , well it's important to note that many earth ponies that weren't enslaved were treated as second class citizens so refugees with that background are guaranteed to stay as they plainly have better life in empire opposed to not having any rights in Maretonia (even with reforms passed by abolitionists they already have new life and not much ties to their homeland) , as for Unicorns, their situation is different, but they have reason to stay nonetheless. Magic population is rare in Gryphus and so that means that they probably have a lot more chances to succeed in the Empire than in Maretonia (even as street performers, let alone working for the government, so we might see those talented in magic flourish), plus lot of Unicorns were educated as well so there is a good chance that they started new life here already, though then again abolitionist led Maretonia will probably need capable administrators and educated population as well so many may go back to try their chance at obtaining position in their homeland ( they have more options and beside our interest in magic we can't really offer them much else as we have different education and our administration related jobs are already taken), Pegasi on other hand are at odd spot as there is magic demand for them as well and more importantly they might stay due to racial backlash as house Storm isn't doing their image much favor in Maretonia so they might as well stay and start over in Empire.
Regarding the Maretonian future status, while i have my doubt about integration and protectorate (college of magic was against it and i believe sentiment is shared even between abolitionists as they are primarily reformist movement, not the pro Gryphus movement), if some form of unification is presented i will support it on basis of this being out last and most major chance at expansion, plus if we get Maretonia we also get large Unicorn and Pegasus population which pretty much puts us on par with magical powers of the world and will effectively transform us into undisputed superpower both in realm of science and Magic.
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- Location
- Italy
in the end the conclusion is the same as always.
IF we can expand by absorbing Maretonia without too much trouble or opposition, we should.
If we can't absorb all of it, but only part of it, we should do that.
If we're faced with too much negative backlash from it, we should settle for a Protectorate, and play the long game, like we did with the Crystal Protectorate.
In the end how far we take it will depend a lot on the level of support we'll have from Maretonian citizens. Worst case, we'll still likely get a lot of immigrants, and we could always use more ponies for their magic, no matter their tribe.
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Well i wouldn't exactly say citizens as Maretonia wasn't democracy and there wasn't common national indetity , it was more cultural one.
The support we need is that of the nobility and abolitionist movement , in this given that house WhiteStar crumbled and our noble mare working to take over Unicorn faction i could say we are secure there , if we can guarantee that nobility will be heard by the crown and keep some of their privileges (which shouldn't be a problem given that our nobility is quite well off ), abolitionists, well that depends, if we get Ambrosia on our side we should pull it of , as for Pegasus's and former military elite, they will be in bad position to negotiate (same with royal guard ), but if we can spare some lesser nobility among them and get them on our side they shouldn't make much fuss about it,
College of magic may rise some issues but if main factions agree we can appease them with significant autonomy and give them large freedom over their affairs.
Basically Maretonian situation is quite different than previous integrations and once house Storm falls we should get chance to negotiate with every faction and if we get abolitionists and nobility on our side and appease the College we should be able to pull it off. All in all there will be a lot of backdoor deals between all concerned factions.
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- Location
- I think somewhere. I might be nowhere though
One thing I'd like to note is that I believe Cyba's concerns stated here:
are not nearly as bad as he believes. For one, though the Crystal Empire is still legally a protectorate, it has been noted that is just legal fiction at this point. The ponies have adopted the culture of their liberators, the religion question is as settled as it will ever be (barring a crisis from a few voters wanting to make the Crystal Heart cult our state religion), and the bureaucracy and economy are intrinsically tied to our own. They are already practically part of the core.
As for the possible problem of "entrenched identities, culture(s), and nationalism," I'd say it's important to remember that Maretonia was a highly decentralized feudal monarchy that seemed to have more power and wealth in the hands of the nobility than in the Queen proper. Most "identities" would be to local land, which has already been disrupted thanks to the civil war causing displacement both internally and through emigration. Likewise, the assassination and civil war has also already destroyed any power structures and centers of pre-war governance.
There would still be some left in the form of the cities and the Royal Guard, but Pegicles blew down almost every city, burned down the last one in the form of Roam, murdered and destroyed the Royal Guard, and overall has managed to destroy what little left of entrenched powers and identities that might have been left due to mass population displacement and destruction of any remaining traditional governance.
There is also the potential power base of the nobility under White Star, but they've mostly died out (sometimes literally) or otherwise gone bankrupt due to our heist and due to investing in holing themselves up to try not to feel the consequences of the civil war. Their post-war power will be mostly dead.
There would definitely be a bureaucratic mess with integration, but it wouldn't be from entrenchment. It'd be from the lack of entrenchment meaning we'd have to build a bureaucracy from the ground up, all while dealing with a potential famine due to the population being everywhere and not having farmed significantly AND also dealing with pre-war land claims. Those are all dealable, however, and would just require time and investment to solve, rather than the difficulties we would have in fighting entrenched locals that Cyba proposes had they still existed.
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Regarding the culture and religion of Maretonia , while it did suffer major blow there still elements of it that may fill the void opposed to our own culture ( by the merit of them simply being on higher level of civilization than Diamond dogs and not being mind raped by Sombra) so even if they become part of us they probably will form their own separate cultural indetity opposed to mainstream Gryphus indetity we see in Core and Crystal protectorate.
See it something like Western/Eastern Roman Empire of sorts but with different values and priorities. For example Gryphus Pantheon probably won't find lot of success there opposed to let's say crystal heart simply based on former stratification which separated every race. Same can be said about attitude towards nobility, without some cataclysmic event like winter war and with most former Maretonian castes actually possessing traits like let's say unicorn magic to separate them from the from each other's opposed to divide among our races being mostly based on birth (and theoretical Gryphus nobility, being well Griffins) we can expect local ponies to view nobility different and vice versa, which probably means that if they join empire social cohesion will be weaker in Maretonia and that part will depend a lot more on welfare and well being of the citizens there opposed to the Griffon patrionsim (you can forget over a million grave stones in Maretonia, even with broken culture their mindset wasn't broken by the Sombra, heck we could expect that civil war and atrocities there should make them lot more pacifist and quite possibly idealist as well) . So you can expect that if you get in bar fight in Maretonia there will not be honor code preventing anyone from sending you to jail.
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- Location
- I think somewhere. I might be nowhere though
Oh I know. Just pointing out that the breakdown of all institutions, lack of centralized authority pre-war, lack of industrialized urbanization, and large areas of land with low population density means they don't have a common identity or culture like you guys are professing. Not saying it'd be easy to just slot in our own. Just saying we wouldn't be fighting some other culture in trying to integrate them.
It also helps that a good portion of Maretonia was explicitly unsettled pre-war and is thus basically empty land.
I'd also like to point out that I don't believe the factions you mentioned will be an issue. Not sure if you saw the edit in time, but I did put in a paragraph about the nobles under House White Star.
As for this...
...I think you're forgetting the Colleges of Magic are dead. They died and scattered to the winds when Roam was burned. We recruited a few of their mages this last turn, but the rest chose to fade back into the refugee crowd and never come near magic or Maretonia again. They aren't going to be an issue.
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I was mostly referring to noble faction as a whole, house White Star died out but we had our own backed noble and WhiteStars rival take over after so they control those lands now.
Yea my bad, i forgot about that.
I agree with that, even some post administrative integration autonomy would be fine, simply based on different cultural , languatic and legal values would be fine, as i said with bar fight, that would probably be taken a lot more seriously by them then by Gryphus administration.
Edit: I don't really argue about high national and social cohesion, it wasn't that high, while their pre war culture suffered heavy blow, my point is more languatic and higher civilization level than our former integrations, plus different mindset among races which will produce different values down the line.
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- Location
- I think somewhere. I might be nowhere though
I know. That's why I said the "nobles under White Star" and not White Star itself. Almost the entire nobility aligned with House White Star, and now most of them have either committed suicide, been killed by Pegicles, or are spending themselves broke hiring mercenaries to try to wait out the civil war. They are not going to have any kind of power left after the civil war.
The few nobility on the Abolitionist's side are explicitly minor nobility. In feudal talk, that translates to unlanded people whom are only considered nobility due to them or an ancestor of theirs having performed some service for the crown that gives them a title i.e. when people are knighted and given the title of "Sir". It literally means nothing in a world where every institution has been broken apart, and those minor nobility have about as much worth as a peasant now since their only claim to nobility was a prestige title without the land or money to back it up.
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This...
I could see this exact conversation happening.
I mean, ponies are so used to controlling the weather that the everfree was considered unnatural due to the inability to influence it, a mindset that griffons do not share, which combined with the different values...
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Well this is perfect , if there is time to expand , then that time is now. They are pretty much in ruins and every single faction that represented any form of Maretonian continuity is destroyed or about to be while abolitionists themselves at their core are young group that unified recently from various factions (we took action to help Ambrosia to unify them in cohesive group) that pretty much just wanted to abolish slavery and didn't have time to entrench themselves in Maretonian politics.
I can totally see Maretonia accepting Gryphus indetity similar how Greeks accepted Roman indetity and carried it until fall of Constantinople.
That would be a good idea if they couldn't weaponize the weather. It takes time to build up those storms but I'd rather not give them the opportunity. The only thing we can do to prevent that is zerg rush them with our superior numbers. I know it seems counterintuitive but the only way to prevent collateral damage is if we kill or capture a large number of their pegasi right away.
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- Location
- Maryland
+10 to a roll.
- Location
- Maryland
In the beginning it was, but at this point, even if Gawain were to leave, you'd still have three diplo actions, barring some special event like a massive war, in which case your priorities would change.
Possibilities for additional actions slots may become available at some point in the future, either due to assigning your children, or due to other actions you can take.
- Location
- NJ
Well time to get some assistances or apprentices for our advisors to either get more actions, or to get ready once the old guard retires.
- Location
- I think somewhere. I might be nowhere though
I've a related question to Gawain. Seeing as Garrick is off to war, are Gawain and Gabriella going to be ruling in his absence (alongside the advisers of course)?
Archimedes at least has either Genevieve and/or Sebastian once he grows too old (since he is rather elderly right now).
- Location
- Washington
Genevieve seems like the optimal choice to replace Archimedes.
- Location
- NJ
And the other Advisors, any characters for them?
- Location
- I think somewhere. I might be nowhere though
Not that I can remember off the top of my head.
I mean, Captain Kaboom might make a good replacement for Redbeak
