Then why did you phrase it like that?
So again, no real ambitions beyond establishing a status quo with you in charge and appeasing those who can help you do that. But also don’t desire personal power. So what’s the point in all this?
Depends on the number left at the time. Also, only Shayard has the nobility. They ain’t seizing a third of Hegemonic territory.
I was asked to inform you, by the Discordites, that there’s a way to get K in a completely non-violent playthrough. (See the images above.)
It’s pretty simple. Any 2 INT 1 CHA character should be able to achieve it, though I did it with an aristo (because you can then deal with Hector by parleying with Calea). You have to fail to restrain the helots in Chapter 1. Choose the minimal violence options and you’ll fail because of your 1 CHA, that gets you to 17 anarchy. Then in Chapter 2:
Congratulations, when you complete C2 you’ll get K! Then any standard pacifist approach will get you to the end with both K and the non-violence achievement, no matter how little sense that might make. Basically you’ve ended up with a violent rebellion despite never ordering violence through sheer ineptitude.
I heard “refuses to admit” being used to mean “is in denial” in the past.
Practically, yes. I still think that it will lead to democracy, as happened in oligarchies like Rome and Athena with a strong lower class and no monarch.
The nobles won’t just sit around and let you kill them. The reason it worked for Robespierre was that the nobility had already surrendered their power in 1789, and they had surrendered because they did not have large private armies and the revolutionaries were united.
Ok so you said it exactly as I insinuated. Again, extremely presumptuous. I’m not in denial. I don’t have secret doubts about this.
Don’t need them to. Just fight ‘em, and kill ‘em. Also not seeing how they take a full third. Even if they took all of Shayard, that’s more like somewhere between a fourth and a fifth. And they ain’t doing that.
I meant that you are obviously wrong, not that you have secret doubts. The idea that revolutions end badly just because the new ruler nearly always cares little about ideology and is simply “power-hungry” is not believable.
I don’t understand what you are imaginating. The nobles will just move away from the frontline, and then you won’t reach them. Besides, their power is not in their numbers, but their skill at administration and command, and control over other people, such as guards
I did not mean that they will conquer a third of the Hegemony, I meant a third of Shayard.
One, not what denial means. Two, I didn’t say that was the only sort of dictator. I was saying that moderate, “independent” types can just as easily become tyrants and a lot of the examples people cite for ideologues becoming tyrants because of pure, unadulterated radicalism aren’t actually examples of this.
The idea of a frontline is to move it forward. Plus, the more you kill while they are scattered and have yet to organize this cohesive resistance, the fewer their ultimate numbers will be.
Their ability to raise an army depends upon their perceived legitimacy and if my rebellion is doing well enough to be the dominant post hegemonic faction, that’ll have taken quite a hit.
Also they’re not the only faction who can do that. The other Archconties have their own government systems with their own ruling classes. Depending on what we learn of say, the Wiendish clans, they may be good options for allies.
To be clear, I avoid radicalism to avoid instability, and by avoiding instability, my state will avoid authoritarianism. My MC does not avoid radicalism because radicals are more authoritarian
How quickly do you think the frontline will move!? If you ever reach a point where the frontline moves so quickly that nobles that didn’t know that they are in striking distance are massacred in huge numbers, then the hegemony has already collapsed. Also, the fact that they are scattered and incohesive does not make your job much easier, it just means that the Hegemony is defending them. It is not defending them well, but it is still defending them well enough to prevent you from significantly reducing their numbers through surprise raids, for example
Nobody joins the aristocratic armies because of their legitimacy, they join because they get paid, and because the aristos are the only social class that hires soldiers (to defend their land).
Are you seriously going to administrate Shayard with Wiendish clan heads? Even if that would work, there just aren’t enough of them.
The reason I mentioned the administrative skill of nobles was not to point out what you are missing out on, but to lay out that killing random nobles will not solve their biggest danger: the general experience and competence of their administrators working for your enemies far beyond the frontline
And when are they making this move in your scenario?
Which will not be the case once the Hegemony collapses.
They’re meant to help me eliminate the nobility by contributing their skills to the cause.
Killing a large quantity of nobles absolutely eliminates that threat. Because it kills a large number of these officials.
I think this whole argument misses the fact that no one doubts turning a whole class into your enemies is gonna cause administrative and stability problems - they know. Everyone knows. The French knew killing the nobles would cause a shitshow, the Haitians knew killing the slaveowners would be a mess, the Russians knew the revolution would be a mess, so on and on. This isn’t some hidden wisdom that everyone is missing.
The reason they’re doing it is because they believe fighting this class is necessary for their goals - they think the hit to stability is both survivable and worth it for perceived benefits.
“I’m gonna compromise with everyone” isn’t some unique plan. Every single society is built around compromise between its different social classes. If anything, I’d rate a plan built around compromising with everyone is more likely to cause instability, because the imperial collapse means all these classes are going to be possessed of individuals looking to increase their power at the expense of the others, and you’re choosing to balance the wants of far more groups than those choosing a handful from among them.
Setting aside this… stimulating argument, @Havenstone how common is it for Theurges of all stripes to adopt toponyms in lieu of their family names? This is specifically me wondering if there’s a ‘Theurge Acron’ out there somewhere (almost certainly Ganelon’s bio-mom) that we might have the chance to spot out as we get further afield. Has the Rim produced many theurges at all? I’m curious how many non-Karagond theurges there even are.
I am not very well versed on political history, but its nice to see people with such a passion for it. But i think it would be good to remember we are all entitled to play the game the way we want and that what we think and do in the game is not going to infringe on anyone elses play. I look foreward to everyone applying their ideas and sharing the results in the future.
What i am though is a serial replayer, and i for one will probably attempt something similar to what your both proposing in different runs.
I dont think anyone in the form needs to argue about what works and what wont, we will all get the chance to play in future and share our rebels stories
Attempting to compromise with everyone, with a primary focus on democracy and stability rather than any particular governing ideology, could somewhat describe the Kerensky government that existed between the fall of the Tsar and the October revolution. It lasted less than a year, was constantly at great risk of reactionary takeover, and (in a literal cause-and-effect sense) lead to Stalin just as surely as the Lenin government did. Any imperial collapse will give rise to mutually exclusive interests and a faction that doesn’t pick a side risks becoming irrelevant
Same here I have about 6 different mc’s in mind and splits for a few of said mc’s 
The Reign of Terror did not cause an administrative collapse or even civil war (the Vendée rebellion was actually caused by the unrelated conscription), because the revolutionaries had been in charge for 3 years by that point. The Russian Revolution did cause a civil war, but the war was going excelently for the Red Army before Germany attacked them from the flank, and there was no administrative collapse, because the Reds controlled the soviets (councils) of most Russian cities before the October Revolution even started. There is a reason for how these “grassroots” revolutionaries passed so many reforms and occupied so much land so seamlessly: they were already partially in charge even before they overthrew their governments. Haiti is an accurate (though extreme) example of what happens when you massacre literally the entire administrative class: it is hard to administrate, but it is also hard to even make, manage, and maintain an army
I agree completely, but I am “only” trying make the free urban poor, yeomen, and merchants support (not even love) me. For the rest, I am simply trying to make supporting me tolerable, because every group has people willing to deal with the devil. I know that my “broad but shallow base” strategy causes instability, but it is necessary for my very specific strategy of “stability through prosperity”.
Unrelatedly, one of the ROs should be infertile. You can bet that even players that will have replayed Hegemon 30 times will forget to make the connection between “Elery can’t have children” and “I need an heir or everything goes to shit”
So, as I understand it, Wiendrj has clans as its main government, Erezzo and Shayard both have nobility, and I think Karagond is run by the church directly. I don’t QUITE understand how Nyrial does things other than that they have helots in the cities and otherwise have pastoral tribes forfeit people by lot instead of having Helotry. I’m not sure who governs the cities however.
Now what I’m wondering is how our relationships with the various Shayarin classes will impact the ability to win over their counterparts in the other Archconties.
For example, Shayard and Erezzo both have nobles but as I gather they don’t particularly like each other. So I have to wonder if an MC who wants to return to feudal government would have an easier time wooing both into their alliance or if having one’s favor makes winning over the other harder. I mostly use the feudal commonality as common ground because a) others aren’t doing that and b) feudalism is based on marriagees between families all over the place so there may be houses that are closely related to each other. And since the Erezzians weren’t united before and seem to hate each other, I also have to wonder how many will cooperate with each other at all.
Meanwhile it doesn’t seem that your animosity towards the nobility affects the clans’ opinions of you. Being openly opposed to the nobility doesn’t stop Korczata from declaring you clan chief. Iirc, Havie mentioned winning over the Wiends or nobility’s could grant you a significant portion of the Phalangite forces and he mentioned them separately.
Not sure what would translate to Nyrish favor/animosity. Merchants is the one I see touted a lot since a lot of merchants come from there. If so, my relations with them should prove useful.
I imagine being a known skeptic will probably help in Nyryal. The biggest win is high cosmo for Wiendrj though, you’re going in a clan leader. I’m not sure a helot MC ever quite internalises the consequences of that. They’ve essentially gone from former slave to a legitimate member of the ruling class in another state in as long as it takes to accept the oath.
Imagining a noble mc trying to collect these titles like Thanos.
I don’t think that Shayardene aristocrats dislike Eretsin nobles, and if the Eretsins have a dislike of Shayardenes, then it is not deep. When you say “alliance”, do you mean alliance or vassalage? I assume that you mean the latter, and in that case I think that it depends on the circumstances. If you want a centralized state, then you will only be able to convince one of them to join you. If you decentralize, then they will be happy to have a protective Shayardene umbrella.
The Thaumatarch has actively prevented ties from forming between archonties, so that all of them depend of Karagon. I doubt that good relationships with Eretsin houses are beneficial frequently enough to warrant a significant amount of marriages
@Havenstone So I was reading a blog post by Paul Wang on his thoughts about his most recent release (Lords of Infinity), and what he would change or do differently in hindsight now that the game is out. One that caught my eye was him talking about how there were some scenes/paths he really enjoyed writing or thought were some of his most interesting, but only about 2% of players actually saw the scene (going by achievement stats in steam)
So my question for you is if there are any parts of game 1 that you particularly treasure for any reason, but aren’t seen very often because few players go that particular route/playstyle?
Potential add for Irduin if you want to try moving Maurs content out onto a separate ‘free time’ track: etiquette lessons with Cerlota? She might not be ideal but it would allow players who don’t interact with the nobility/merchants to pick up some scraps of the stuff.
Also how does Hallasur treat orphans, war or otherwise? Does Hallasurq culture allow for the Harrowing of children older than infancy, or is the idea more if you’ve passed infancy you’re clear of the Harrower (excepting for grievous crimes)?
Also also, what do Wiends look like? Like, in terms of phenotypic stereotype? Scouting out the ethnography of this world one can identify three major ethnic strains (the Abhuman-western Shayardene continuum, the eastern Shayardene-Karagon-Erezzan continuum, and the Hallasurq-Nyr-Brauracha continuum), but the Wiends stand out as seemingly unrelated to any of those. Also I might be wrong on the people of western Shayard being descended from the same people the Abhumans are, but it seems most logical to me (also this would be the origin culture that built Sojourn, and the buildings like it in Corlune and Grand Shayard).
