The Architelone raid? I don’t remember that one.
I’ll go explore chapter 2 again. Thanks!
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That’s correct. EG is a port town where a significant share of local income and trade comes from fishery and catching Great-Eels (actually a giant sea mammal) and rendering their blubber into the eel-oil mentioned a few places in G1. C is cropland, I is intensive irrigation, generally found in major river valleys or where Theurgy facilitates higher than usual rates of water extraction.
Can’t believe you actually counted the boxes. 
As ever, having you put such time and care into analyzing my work is both humbling and a joy to read.
Soretto is a big city, the fifth biggest in the Hegemony (after Aekos, Shayard, Corlune, and Eskydra) but only about half the population of Grand Shayard, which benefits from being the governing center of the Hegemony’s breadbasket.
They won’t go back to a land that can’t feed them.
Shaping earth and stone into a house that will actually stay up when the Theurgy stops would be tremendously blood-intensive. Theurgy can be a quick way to get ditches and ramparts, but isn’t an efficient way to build buildings.
Not a novel species – just already-domesticated beasts that got caught in a Storm.
The realm was named for the city of the conquerors, so the city name doesn’t really work as a metonym. For the others, a seat of government can be a metonym for the current ruling claque, but not for the nation itself – not at this early stage of pre-modern proto-nationalism.
You’ve got the option to try! Worth noting that the Floating Palace is not Aekos – you couldn’t fit the millions of people who live in Aekos onto a single flying hill without it turning into the Floating Favela. (As it is, the biggest slums of Aekos are in the shadow/drainage zone of the Palace.) Whatever happens to the Palace won’t directly crush most of the city.
The best porphyra dye is made in Shayard, on the coast of Leurs and Bragat-Laconne south of Corlune. As Laj-jas will explain in Ch 3, some Abhuman clans would refuse to use it, considering the tens of thousands of snails a wasteful consumption of life…while others, like himself, luxuriate in it.
A tremendous amount; as you’ll see next chapter, the Shayarin of the yeomen of Irduin is quite different from the Shayarin you grew up speaking in the Rim. A family of dialects like Arabic is a terrific way to think of the language. The massive-scale trade in grain and helots has helped to smooth out some of the language difference that would otherwise have persisted, in large part by a steady Koine-ization of Shayarin. “Earlund” and “Brimlund” would themselves be abstractions covering over a huge amount of diversity.
When the Hegemony’s central authority collapses, the “natural” outcome would probably include Shayard splintering into a number of successor states, somewhere between its 5 subregions and its 60 aristarch-led districts (and with border areas like Avezia, lowland Wiendrj and the hill country between Veldrin and Chaton also in play).
Keeping a single Shayard more or less in its current boundaries will be possible, and building a strong “homelander” coalition will definitely be helpful in this – but in keeping with @Zincvit’s and @Ramidel’s observations, that will involve overcoming both regional identities and irredentist overreach to end up with a sustainably sized realm.
“Scout for opportunities to raid the institutions of the Hegemony,” and “Tax collectors—a mission so sensitive it will require my personal involvement.” To get the storyline that leads to the Xaos-lands, you’ll need to kidnap a tax collector’s family, and have him end up dead.
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I have seen this idea from you in the forum before and we encounter it in universe from Horion. Do you think there are some specific criteria to country/realm size for it to be sustainable? It seems like you have given this some empirical thought along with the geopolitics of the Hegemony.
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Yeah, I saw it the other day.
A rather dark path, so I think I’ll avoid it in future playthroughs.
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Hi Guys,
Just wanted to ask, wasn’t there a cheat version released for the 1st game (uprising)? I swear I saw a post about it a few days back.
Sorry if this isn’t the right place to ask.
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My overall thinking is that any realm/empire reaches a point in its expansion where, even if all is running smoothly in the imperial core – which of course it often isn’t – further expansion will be limited by some combination of (a) determined resistance in newly incorporated bits of the periphery, (b) communication breakdowns leading to administrative and military failures, and (c) logistical challenges around supplying soldiers and administrators in the periphery.
All these problems are geography-dependent (i.e. a landlocked empire or one with mountains, desert, or jungle nearby will run into them much more quickly than one with sea access or surrounded by a huge arable zone) and tech-relative (e.g. rifles, radio, and railroads all expanded the sustainable scale of imperial/colonial states).
All of them are also exacerbated to varying degrees with each new language/ethnicity you try to incorporate into your domain; the odds of long-term resistance increase when your soldiers and administrators don’t speak the same language as they people they’re trying to subjugate. There are imperial repertoires that empires use to manage diversity at scale; the most successful ones have allowed for huge diversity over hundreds of years.
But as an empire pushes the limit of that repertoire, the incentives for peripheral elites to try to create their own autonomous realms will reach a tipping point in more and more places. The empire will end up relying more on violent repression rather than voluntary compliance of its subjects; that’s massively costly, and quickly becomes unsustainable. (Even in a world like that of XoR where repression can directly fuel the technologies of imperial dominance.)
In game terms, depending on the choices you make as a rebel, there’s going to be an enormous “tech shock” in the gameworld affecting imperial sustainability – if you try to reduce Harrowing and have your realm get by with much less blood, for example, or democratize the knowledge of Theurgy.
As I’ve noted elsewhere, the Hegemony’s repertoire of power is heavy on cosmopolitan religiosity, and anti-clerical nationalism will be one of the most effective ways to mobilize resentment and resistance to it. But that will also undermine the social “glue” that has held Shayard together (as a pre-Hegemony empire, not just as an archonty) despite its own tremendous internal diversity.
Trying to not just keep the present “Shayard” together but incorporate regions that have been part of other realms for centuries, in the context of the many shocks around imperial breakdown, may be a challenge too big for even a historic talent like the MC to overcome. (If you choose to take it on at all. I feel I should emphasize that having a big empire isn’t the XoR “win condition.”)
I commend you.
No official version, and I’m afraid I didn’t write the code with an easy “God mode” in mind, so even people who’ve tried to mod the game to e.g. let them coast through the winter with unlimited food have found it tricky.
I’ve got no objection to people who’ve bought the game modding it any way they like and sharing info on how to mod the code with others… but please, folks, don’t hand around hacked APKs for free. The income from XoR funds my writing of the sequels, and we’ll get there even slower if people are stealing copies instead of buying them.
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But just Shayard would really feel like a loss since my mc is no homelander and does not aspire to use the Gryphon as a symbol at all.
Without Avezia there isn’t even a good choice for a capital in present-day Shayard.
Besides it seems we’ll need, at minimum, Erezza’s resources to stay both a great power and technologically relevant over the coming decades.
There is Koine, the common language, and that is certainly something my mc plans to keep on using and the regions of the current Hegemony have been together for a good 400 years now, it would be a shame to have that all implode, particularly if that leads to a Halassur dominated world order for the next couple of centuries since they don’t exactly practice equal rights for women and gay people. 
Besides that only a bigger empire can prevent a Karagond resurgence through its own Morgenthau plan for them and keep them reduced to an agrarian rump.
Simon for gay male mc’s FTW! 
Any steam update will break the mods again though, as does verify file integrity. In general I find it is better to play mods in an unpacked browser version, though that will disable achievements.
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Thanks for the update bro. I’ve already bought the 1st game when it came out, but i thought a new cheat version was released.
Good to know it wasn’t official 
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Your theory reminds me very much of the Abbasid Caliphate … both the rebellious rebirth, its waxing and growth and its eventual fragmentation and decline.
Because of my MC’s history in book one… the only other province i’d desire a union with is the mountainous one (name is escaping me) where my rebellion had first taken hold.
I feel an obligation to hold them as an equal part to my Shayard homeland and to make sure they rise along with Shayard.
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Oh, and here I told Horion that I would free all four nations fom Karagon’s dominion.
Well, it’s something to deal with in the future.
You know, that is something most adventures don’t really deal with. ‘Let’s bring the evil empire down!’. But then what do you do once it IS down?
I think that’s part of the allure of this series.Who are you, why are you rebelling, how will you face the Hegemony and bring them down, and what will you do after if you succeed? What will you create?
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Will the option to become the ruler of an empire be available only for high int MCs?
Also, I was reading the old thread from the first book and…
There’s a legend that the Broracha King summoned Xaos Incarnate to attack the Karagonds, but when the Angels defended the Hegemony, Xaos fled back to the one place It had been given as a foothold in our world: the capital of the Broracha. It consumed the King and began hurling out storms from the Palace of the Damned toward the Hegemony.
Could whatever is on Virgil be connected to the murder of Thaumatarch Hera? And the fact that Xaos consumed the king somewhat matches Cerlota’s theory about there being two minds behind the storm.
And some bugs I found
*if (((s_lover >= 5) and (s_rel > 0)) or ((k_rel = 4) and (k_rel > 0))) or ((bred_lover >= 4) and (breden > 0))
#Of course I don’t. There’s a lover waiting for me across the Ward.
The third parenthesis after (k_rel > 0) should be at the end after (breden > 0))
On the way to Virgil
@{gam ${gamgee}|Yed} steps at once to your injured side and puts ${ghis} arm under yours. “Don’t stop, @{gam love|${sojname}}. Press on.”
All companions, including Ciels, will refer to the MC as “love”.
I hope this turned out ok since it’s my first time using forum commands.
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I did a cheat mode. Paid and modified values
And yeah it’s an easy breeze most of the time but with how stats work it can sometimes fuck up and go anywhere. Food is easy but a 2 in everything run can sometimes score your game. Like attacking your cousin relies on different stats being different things and that ended up with my guy just dying regardless lol
Most of the time tho, it’s actually really good. Bit crazy but good.
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That actually wouldn’t work. CS can only handle two things at a time, so instead of (S or K or B) it needs (S or K) or B. The third para you mention is what lets CS parse all of the S and K stuff before it looks at B.
The other bug is a bona fide one, thanks! Should have been gamlove, not gam, in the second multireplace.
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Sorry, I thought that was the error, but there must still be some bug as this option doesn’t appear when my character is in a romance with Breden.
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An ace romance? If so I think I see the problem.
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I don’t think so.
Maybe it’s because some choices in the startup don’t change the variable breden.
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Question for you (after a wall of context for the question lol) since there’s been recent discussion regarding pros and cons of empire building vs building a strong independent Shayard. My MC is adverse to empire building due to both a critique of the efficacy of empires - largely aligned with the criticism you offered above - as well as his own ethical objection to the idea that he could (and should!) institute a form of governance over a people with their own cultural and political history that he is largely ignorant of.
That said, my MC is a helot who deeply believes that there is a universality to the oppression faced by all the members of his class and they deserve to be liberated. For this reason, an independent Shayard would be insufficient. In a certain respect, he would say that the helots have no nation and shouldn’t align with any national history as it has been established that the helots were still enslaved pre-Karragond. The brutality they face has certainly increased under Karragond rule but the main class distinctions are more or less consistent. Thus, merely reverting to a pre-Karragond form of social organization and law would not result in their liberation; and, leaving the other provinces to fend for themselves would mean forsaking the helotry there.
While I’m well aware of the Leaguers (and they certainly are my back up plan), it’s my understanding this is largely a noble-based movement to the extent that it exists. My MC has many reservations about allying with such a movement. Helotry are considered the property and assets of the nobility. Their liberation constitutes a major economic blow to the nobility - even the nobility who long for a change in governance and reforms. I could put all my points into charisma and yet, I extremely doubt that the nobility would be swayed into releasing their economic assets no matter how eloquent my MC would be. As a back up, i would settle for League of Nations with an egalitarian Shayard; however, long term, this is an incredibly tenuous position for an Egalitarian Shayard. I foresee sanctions, exiled nobles attempting to build power and support in the other provinces to reclaim their “lost property”, and/or even invasion on a long enough timeline.
Now with all that said, here is my question: will the game offer any chance to facilitate a Federation of Rebellions? I don’t particularly care if it will be extraordinarily difficult or that there must be a path in which they all succeed. I do know that we will be exposed to at least one other rebellion - which will be meant as a contrast to ours - but i suspect it would be likely that many rebellions will spring forth as my MC’s rebellion grows and the Karragond’s ability to control all the territories weakens. Will we have the options to make ties with other rebellions/movements and support their own self-determination without establishing our rebellion/MC as the de-facto authority over them?
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I would like to say that very dark playthroughs and “failruns” are a legitimate style of play in interactive fiction. It is worth it to push a game to the limit, seeing how bad things can get while still making it to the next part of the game. Additionally, the strategies developed in some of my failruns actually have some carryover to the strategies employed by minmaxed, very successful runs.
That said I do not write formal guides for failruns. If you want to see the horrific misadventures of Starn “Child-Killer,” you’ll have to dig through my Choice of Rebels Discord messages.
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1- Are Great-Eels also native to Shayard’s coasts, or exclusive to Erezza’s?
2- And when turned into Plektoi (instead of being eaten), can Great-Eel Plektoi alternatively serve as aquatic war mounts (or replacements for boats)?
After further pondering, another question came to mind: how do you reconcile your above-mentioned statement with your past answer concerning how “there’ll be no factions wanting to resettle on Shayardene land”? (On the original Uprising forum)
Can decommissioned Harrowers be repurposed to serve as underground burrowers/tunnelers/“mole machines”?
If so, then my MCs would like to find out if it’s possible for us to do the XoR version of the classic “digging from America to China” childhood fantasy? (assuming that most, if not all, of the Hegemony’s Wards can be deactivated)
Oh my goodness, I can already imagine the Vitamin D insufficiency! (from the widespread lack of sunshine)
Are snails also a staple food in Shayard? (Given its French inspiration)
Or is the ‘consumption’ of snails strictly limited to the “porphyra dye” example you pointed out?
If MC is as gender fluid as Laj, what’s the estimated allowable frequency? (that MC’s health, INT mastery, and XoR’s narrative would permit)
Will MC have the option of having an itinerant court/capital? (similar to the EU)
Got the Kindle book, and will get back to you on this later! (if any relevant feedback comes to mind by then)
Unless of course, high-CHA MC finds another social “glue” to replace Xthonic worship: e.g. Abhuman syncretism, Whendish paganism, Halassurq paganism, and/or Kenon cult of personality.
If an XoR NPC nation/faction gets annexed by another, then will their respective relationship bars (with MC) be merged into a consolidated relationship bar? (with the new bar representing the two former bars’ average score)
Wiendrj is the province you have in mind.
Anyways, what model of governance did you have in mind for your envisioned Shayard-Wiendrj union?
Austro-Hungarian style diarchy?
UK-inspired constitutional monarchy? (with Wiendrj acting as the Scotland/Wales to Shayard’s England)
Super decentralized tribal confederation?
Or some other model?
Looks like your MC is headed towards the direction of a Big Boss-inspired “soldiers without borders” faction of mercenaries.
(unless of course, you have a different intended analogy in mind)
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Wasn’t pre-conquest Shayard free of helots and Karagond just made a portion of Shayardene serfs into them?
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