Ah yeah, that makes sense.
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Thinking of the scores of saves I have for each of Cata and Havie’s games.
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I have 6 mc’s planned for XOR, 4 for Infinity Sea and 4 for Fallen Hero and already have mutilple saves each for the ones I have (1 for XOR 3 for Sea, 2 for FH) done so far 
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I agree here, especially with how the bars manifest (Unity often over a hundred, suspicion not punishing even if you max it out, strain being utterly incomprehensible). I think narrativizing which breakpoint the player is at will be more intuitive, and will allow the player to strategize and plan for future runs better, since they know the rough levels that are causing things.
@Havenstone is the repeated imagery of bleeding palms as a sign of self-wrought Change an intentional reference to the stigmata, or just a happy coincidence? Will we (especially if spreading mass Theurgy) be able to adopt the bloodied palm as a sign of our movement, of its outreach and capacity to change and self-sacrificing nature? Figured it might be a neat icon for a certain kind of rebellion.
Oh also, small addition: irdname should be displayed on the stat page, with your alias(es). Very small quibble on the final entry in the timeline as well: “army” is too grand. Just “tagma” or perhaps “a force” fits better with the vastly expanded scope we learn about in this game.
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You can ask M’kyar about this and for the most part, removing scars counts as a permanent Change that would keep you from crossing a Ward. The alternative is re-opening the wound and healing it cleanly enough that it leaves little or no scar, which takes a very skilled healer and a lot of blood to do properly.
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My personal theory is that Irduin was supposed to be an inconsequential place. After all, the majority of secrets we can extract out of Irduin have to deal with either large scale tax fraud commited by the town or societally unnectable romances.
Irduin would’ve been fine if our rebellion hadn’t spread so fast. And now we get to see the fine balance that kept the place running collapsing, which we can either prevent or accelerate.
Irduin is like, an experiment I guess, for us to determine wether or not we want to preserve some bits of the old order, or tear it down completely.
This is training ground for Grand Shayard, a place that will have actual impacting secrets, with the direction that we take it in having also big consequences.
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First, a general thanks to everyone who’s made suggestions to improve the game. If I don’t respond to your specific suggestion below, it’s almost certainly because I agree and am going to incorporate it into the next version. 
Second, to jump ahead to @Rashad – I love honest, thoughful criticism, and yours was bending over backward to be the opposite of disrespectful. Please don’t ever feel you need to hold back, folks…and that includes people who don’t like anything I’ve added, not just folks who can start by praising the writing quality and talk about the things they loved.
Thinking about pacing/tension issues and how to introduce Erjan’s sister Dilek early, I’ve decided to end Sojourn with a bit more of a bang – by adding a scene in which you have to go and rescue Garab’s Red Kestrel (and the incoming wind-spitter shipment) from an advance party of Theurges who’ve come across to check whether Sojourn is ready to be scoured again. Dilek will be with the wind-spitters, and you’ll all meet her on the battlefield. That will hopefully keep it from feeling quite so much like we’re going straight from peaceful interlude to no-stakes-ville.
Let’s also see how the Rim rendezvous sessions turn out, and whether I can use that to raise the stakes of Irduin at least a little – as it links to your rebellion’s ability to spread right across the rural Rim. And of course I’ll try to write the conclusions with a satisfying bang, and in a way that can suggest that your time in Irduin has had at least some significance beyond the thematic.
At the end of the day, it might be that I’m writing out of my greater tolerance for pacing dips. As a teen I loved Modesitt’s early Recluce books, and especially the lengthy middle section in Magic of Recluce where the main character drops out of the plot for a while to stay in a little village and help its failing carpenter. That’s stayed with me even as I lost my taste for a lot of Modesitt’s other quirks and flaws; and while Irduin is quite different from that scene, it’s got a bunch of it in its DNA.
As for your companions, including Cerlota, the way they’re written now is most definitely not how I’m going to leave them. I’ve written the spine of the plot first because it all needs to work whether or not they’re with you. My plan is then to go through and write them into it more thoroughly afterward, so you get some variation based on who’s with you, and more character development for them.
Let’s touch base again after each update and see if I’ve succeeded in moving it a little more in a direction you enjoy. I’m pretty sure I’m not going to change my plans and end in Grand Shayard, so let’s see if I can make the Irduin ending tolerable.
Here’s what I have M’kyar saying about it in chaos2.txt:
(As @Sneaks has said while I was writing this post!) Either a specialist Theurge MC or a MC with great Abhuman relations will be able in later games (probably Wardfall) to get their scars healed – but that’s not going to be possible in the next game or two.
Torture pretty reliably gets info, as it did in this case. Did it get useful info? I don’t think that’s at all clear yet.
@Zamfir, I think I’m going to pass on making the torture scene any longer than it is – it wasn’t something I enjoyed writing – but thanks for the suggestion.
And “vast realms” in that choice refers to anything too big for the rulers to be in regular contact with the people. Shayard would certainly qualify, let alone the Hegemony.
I think the average HG/CoG player reads each game once – but XoR is unabashedly not written for the average player. It rewards, invites, and comes pretty close to demanding rereads. If that leads to a few poor reviews, I’m happy with them.
I’d tried with diegetic cues but those were feeling too understated – but I agree that the bars aren’t working well. I’ll try the short blurb approach for the next version.
I’m kind of stunned to say it, but happy coincidence. Or subconscious trope. The bloodied palm would be a great sigil, you’re absolutely right.
Is that how you’d describe the helot-sparing arrangements? Or have you just not come across those yet?
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Well useful enough to potentially warn Erjan and hope that slows down and costs the Hegemony more resources. Maybe even useful enough for Cerlota to replicate it, given time. Pity even high int mc doesn’t have the skills to take a stab at the possible formula themselves yet.
Even if we can’t replicate the formula on our own we do know that it exists now and thus know to keep our eyes and ears open for other opportunities to get at it. Although that information can be obtained without torture by just eavesdropping.
Hmmm…sadly by wardfall the benefits of doing it gently and retaining the ability to cross a ward with it likely wouldn’t matter as much anymore. Might as well brute force by then it, or, depending on how much time has passed by then go for straight up rejuvenation including possible beautification and the kinds of changes that would make it impossible to cross a ward in any case. By then it also wouldn’t serve much practical purpose since at that point mc should be well beyond fearing draptekyne’s or accidental back exposure as at that point mc should easily be able to take on any slave hunters that will remain or even more likely have his own guards who’d most likely make sure those people couldn’t get close enough in the first place to begin with.
Ugh, that leaves my poor mc with no reliable alternative but to get good at dressing well and even fashion to always try to slightly overdress when undercover always having to find the fine line of looking like a young fool showing off his good fortune but also avoid being too excessive with it. 
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That sounds like a cool and awesome way to end the chapter with a bang! Do you think you’ll add a way for us to “lose” the encounter and get the shipment destroyed/lose some lives?
That’s fair enough, it is a pretty gruesome scene and definitely made me feel pretty bad for what I did. 
I was just thinking it would be a cool way for ruthless MC’s to extract some extra satisfaction.
My answer, at least as far as the larger Hegemony is concerned with that secret would be: “…yes, kind of? 
”
What I was trying to say with my comment is that I don’t think Kleitos is losing any sleep by not knowing Irduin’s secrets. (This is also why I don’t think there would by any Kryptasts stationed in Irduin)
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With how he is said to have transformed himself does he even sleep at all?
Hey, @Havenstone is this intended or a bug?
Meanwhile, we’ll also need to find you a wife. That will take more care than your grandfather was able to give. I want you involved." Is this meant to drive home that Hegemony nobles do get to court and marry partners of their preferred genders without needing to focus on biological heirs?
Just asking since the De Irde’s seem so traditional in a lot of other things and I thought the noble adoption culture was a Karagond, not Shayardene thing? Or were nobles at least already free to marry the same sex in the old Shayardene Kingdom/empire before the Hegemony too?
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He’s missing out on a lot by not sleeping, sleep is divine! 
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Hmm I don’t understand why giving Sojourn the seed takes time (unlike finding the bone token where you go on a small adventure) outside of game balance reasons. Maybe you can put in that the mc spends a lot of time helping plant the seed and taking care of it.
Also as part of my earlier criticism maybe you can make it so that the mc spends time with all the factions (maybe make it optional if you are worried about taking up too much of the players time like you did in Sojourn) in Irduin after the intro (I don’t think what’s there is enough by itself) to the village without being able to make big choices about them or finding their plots like the player second faction choice but even more limited. It might make players care more about the village and make them more curious what what they can learn on a another playthrough
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Honestly I’m not really sure why but… I think Auche is my favorite character in Irduin. The most compelling, at any rate. I think it’s because he’s the kind of character that I’ve been wanting to see for a while, which is a power-broker who is willing to give up that power for the sake of an inferior, even if my read on him is a little off. Every noble we’ve seen thus far would rather die before making a meaningful concession to or for the helotry, but Auche is willing to take the leap into untitled rebellion not out of some grievance with how the nobility are treated, but out of genuine love and compassion for a woman who should by all rights be fuel for his lifestyle. Even S can’t say that much, I’m not at all certain they’d want to see the helotry freed if our revolt wasn’t a helot-based one.
If I’m not wrong about my read on his character, I feel like he, more than any of the other de Irde, knows that what they do is wrong, even when compassionate. He is shown multiple times to be extremely intelligent and enterprising, and yet refuses to engage with the “work” of running the de Irde estate. While one could attribute that to a teenaged laziness, and his willingness to sacrifice for Earith teenaged folly, I choose to believe that he knows that by engaging with the kind of work Alasais would have him do and learn he’s only contributing to the suffering of Earith and people like her. To even fathom giving up one’s name and family and patrimony, as he says, shows a massive strength of character that I don’t know if we’ve truly seen from another character in a similar position.
Or maybe I’m entirely wrong and he’s just a lazy asshole who doesn’t know what he’s saying who will balk at the moment of truth. I hope that’s not the case however, it’d be quite disappointing.
Yes I know they’re cousins but they don’t know that and I think the same observations apply regardless. As far as incest goes it’s not the worst and it lacks the usually disgusting social factors.
Edit: Yknow @Havenstone I’m now wondering how Auche might react to a confidant!MC revealing their helot origins (independent of or alongside the MCs rebel status). Probably just my urge to radicalize the youth speaking, but I think showing a noble that the “low-born” retainer they’ve placed their trust in used to be a slave to a man like them could be an interesting scene (also whip-scar integration).
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I wonder, is Kleitos so changed that he no longer needs to sleep?
Oop, just realized @idonotlikeusernames had the same thought.
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But like you said, that level of intelligence you can get with trust, not torture.
Intended. While the Laconniers have got a bit fixed on the idea of a royal bloodline, same-sex marriages and inheritance by adoption have been part of Shayardene culture for centuries – it’s not just Karagond. Marriage alliances are vital to tie families together, but aren’t necessary for heir production.
Good point. I’ll remove the sparetimetick for that one. It’s not a real game imbalancer.
No, sorry – that would be a bloat disaster. I feel like I’m asking enough of the readers’ patience already with two. And I don’t think sharing limited information about thirty-odd significant characters is as likely to engage people as spending much more time with five to ten.
I’ll say that going on the run in poverty is a much bigger deal than Auche has prepared himself for. But let’s see how he copes with it…
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Yeah, I figured something like this might be the case. Still, that he’s willing to take the step at all is a testament to him, and that so far he doesn’t balk even when the MC makes shit real. If any plot gets a happy ending in Irduin, his is near the top of ones I’d like to see. Something that I hope can be explored more with the management sections is how the Commotion can, despite its danger and struggle, become a safe-haven for those who don’t fit with the Hegemony, and I think Auche is a good vehicle for that sort of narrative.
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Indeed,
But I feel that if someone like my mc does choose to spend time with the nobles, like I am doing for playtesting now he should at least warn poor Auche seek out someone like Yebben’s protection and whatever he does steer clear of Kala and her group, at least at the beginning. She has her uses, unlike Breden, but kindness and mercy even to former nobles is not one of them.
And I think my mc can do that even without revealing who he truly is by making it seem like Yebben is just his one contact among the rebels of the rim commotion. 
If indeed they are committed and make it that far Yebben would be the best one to integrate them into the group and find them some relatively skilled work that does not waste their talents since both of them seem to be able to read quite well. Though it is more Earith than Auche my mc would consider a great boon to have as it seems that as one of the rare helots who can read and write quite well she’d make for a superb teacher. But…well…if Auche is the price of Earith then my mc would take the package deal. I’m sure Auche could still be potentially useful as Bley’s assistant or something like that, although my mc would love to see Auche’s face if he does make it that far assisting a former telone, knowing his family’s trouble’s with telones. 
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Can K read? I’m thinking some sort of letter of protection from the rebel Captain might ease integration, if we send the couple off into the depths of the commotion.
K is an excellent tactician, probably better than even Elery. Radmar is mostly just large, but K has a mind for combat that’s very hard to replace (they’d beat S every day of the week in a battle, even if S wins the 1v1 duel every time).
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I value Breden’s ability to bring in recruits and mules before she meets her inevitable end in game 1.
I feel like K doesn’t add anything I don’t already have from Radmar.
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My mc did well enough without Breden and it spares the band from some of his worse nonsense about religion and nobles to boot. And without Breden far less, even near zero raid and making a stand and fighting troubles without him undermining the rebel’s morale or his numerous “clumsy” slip ups. The reduced losses from going at it smart, getting decent RNG and not having Breden almost completely make up for the additional recruits they can bring in without letting them completely off the leash. Without Breden I now raid the yeomen for mules one time in the beginning and with decent RNG I found it to be enough and, presumably unlike the prouder yeomen in a place like Irduin, the Rim’s yeomen in our backwards backwoods are not that difficult to assuage later on with compensation and a sincere apology.
Kala, I don’t think so, from what I recall she didn’t seem much interested in the literacy classes but that could have changed in the year the mc was away. Korszata who my mc left in overall charge of the rebellion in his absence can read but my mc doesn’t want to send them straight to him as that would be too big a clue as to who he really is. Having one contact in the rebellion is one thing writing a document that basically orders around its interim leader quite another. But I think my mc could teach them a code phrase to use on Yebben and, if, necessary Kala too that would let them know Earith and by extension her former noble lover are under his protection.
Yep, although my mc put Korszata in overall command of that area Kala and Elery both have potential as possible future generals it is just that with Kala she will tend to use the most savage and brutal tactics she can, very useful in some cases, not so much in others but if properly utilised she is quite valuable. Radmar is a good brawler and one of the largest rebels we have, literally speaking, he’s good in a fight but not so much a tactician. I view him more as a Simon but without the education and years of formal weapons training.
Indeed, that part we can get through being either sneaky or trusted but not the part where we can give Celota an inkling as to the potential formula. But we’ll have to see if it pans out. And, like I said, that was one of the more frustrating parts for my mc as his own knowledge in the field of alchemy or chemistry is still too lacking to even guess if Cerlota’s hunch is correct.
So, yes, the torture may be all for nothing if Cerlota’s hunch turns out to be a dud. Only you know that right now because you are the author Havie. 
In any case, should our warning successfully reach Erjan the Halassurq infiltrators will presumably also be looking to capture some of those new ordnance officers themselves and while my mc has no trouble with Halassur getting that formula per se he wouldn’t want them to have it while not having it himself too. Sadly I do not believe the Hallasurqs would treat any of the new ordnance officers their infiltrators might succeed in capturing any more gently than we treat poor Agarrie in that vile scene.
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