I’m currently reading a book on China during the 10s and 20s, and I’m getting more convinced that we’re going to get a Warlord Era-esque cenario when the Hegemony stats getting pieced apart by influential bureaucrats, would-be revolutionaries and strong provincial generals.
And considering how some of the MC’s old friends might break way to other groups… well, it’s looking like we are going to have to square off against the Radmar Clique eventually.
Yeah RIP my old plan to make “dear” old dad the figurehead of state.
That’s quite possible, which is why we absolutely need our own WMD’s to keep Halassur at bay on a cold war footing to avoid an analogue to the Japanese invasion that did in Nationalist China.
But it is indeed likely that if we can come out as the top dog we will have to deal with a warlord era where we only have real state control over our core territory(ies), which in my case I hope are the Avezia region and the future canal zone as well as some other important, coastal cities.
Just dangle some mushrooms over a spike pit, easy
Refer to the list I sent you about the Imperial Dynasties.
Beiyang (Beijing/Peking) Republic: Collapsed due to warlord fighting, its founder deciding to be an Emperor, and rival military cliques.
Second Yuan: Yuan Shikai’s big oopsie, dissolved, and shattered the Republican Movement into tiny little pieces as they revolted.
Beiyang Republic 2.0: Zhili Clique Controlled, rule over China was nominal, overthrown by the Fengtian Clique during the Northern Expedition led by Jiang Jieshi and the GMT/KMT (along the way Jiang Jieshi purged the leftist elements out of the GMT/KMT causing many of them to defect to the Communists. This will not cause any problems at all), the Fengtian Clique was defeated by the GMT/KMT and fled back to their power-base in Manchuria where the Old Marshal was assassinated and replaced by the Young Marshal who was deposed while the Xuantong Emperor was restored to the throne, and supported by the Japanese.
Republic of China (Guomindang/Kuomintang): GMT/KMT controlled Republic based in Nanjing/Nanking. Its central authority was always shaky and reliant on the cooperation with various smaller warlords and other KMT armies in the other provinces. Had a life and death struggle against the Communists which was put on pause for a little while, before the Japanese invaded, and then happened quietly. Overthrown and exiled to Taiwan after losing the Chinese Civil War.
People’s Republic of China: Socialism with Chinese Characteristics!
Does the band get any spoils of war after decisively beating the phalangites? Perhaps noble prisoners worth ransom?
The survivors each get a sword on their hip, one more in each hand, and a “great job!” pat on the back.
Oop. Might need to do another playthrough using a different label, then. I called myself a goete during the run through that I meant to continue when the sequel comes out.
Being a goete really gets people’s goat.
But what about my collection of alastor ears???
The problem is that to my mc the other words are just as bad, Wisard irrevocably marks you as Shayardene, Theurge marks you as faithful to the nightmare religion. Neither of those fits my mc so in this case going with Goete has the least amount of disadvantages, at least for him.
@Havenstone, I’ve had some questions drumming in my head these last few days. Please take a stab at them when you have the time:
Nope. You get a reputation, but no meaningful material bonus. (Noble prisoners are a fun idea but would be more trouble to code than they’re worth.)
Can an MC who took the Healer path in Game 1 still allocate points to COM? Yes.
Can this same MC still write and draw using their sword arm? Yes.
Are there military academies in the XoRVerse? Is a landed title and/or loads of drachems necessary for entry? This answer is subject to change as I continue to phlesh out the Phalangites… but I’m going to say yes, there are military academies, mostly in Karagon, which are a shortcut to leadership in the Phalangites; and they’re open only to aristocrats who also have loads of drachems.
How important is the body for helot and yeomen funeral rites in the Archonates? Bodies are pretty important in most funeral rites, and there’s no exception for helots and yeomen in the Hegemony. Why do you ask?
Aside from arming every one of your rebels twice over. That does count for something.
In the sense that we looted the phalangite’s weapons, or that 75% of our rebels are dead and the survivors have to carry our entire armory on their backs?
The former. (Funny, though.)
Thanks for the quick reply.
That’s alright, then. I was thinking that getting a young and sufficiently rebellious clique of young officers would be helpful to the rebellion, and wondered if they existed.
I was trying to think of ways to extract aether without killing young people., and I kept wondering if the helots would give their recently deceased to do it. I had the impression that extracting it from the elderly and the recently deceased would offset the fact that we’re not taking blood from the living, but I guess they’d never agree to it. Plus, there’d probably be too much aether lost too.
I dunno how to start. I want to say thank you for writing this game.
I really love it and I can’t shut up about it and I’ve even encouraged my friends to play it.
The writing in Choice of rebels is superb, it got me emotionally affected. The little scenes and how the prose is written. It easily became my second favourite COG.
One route and character, in particular, got me depressed for weeks (I’m just really attached to the characters at this point).
I spent almost 5 days replaying the second chapter, mostly because I was trying to get an anarchy level of 18 or below XD.
Can I ask, for fanart purposes:
For families that adopt Karagond names like Hector and Calea Keriatou.
Would they be wearing Greek-inspired clothing (I think I remember in the thread that the Karagond is based on the Greeks)?
As opposed to the families that stayed the old Shayard way, I assume they would be wearing medieval clothing?
As some paragraphs mentioned articles of clothing such as kirtles and jerkins?
This is kind of an insignificant question so no rush if your too busy to answer. 
This was discussed a bit upthread, and the short version is that I don’t think it could be manageable given how fast aether degrades once someone dies. See the spoiler following “Grotesque Speculation” in this post.
@Umashroom, thank you so much for your kind words, and I’m so glad you enjoyed playing XoR. My vision for the clothing needs to be fleshed out a bit more before I can answer with confidence–I’ve got a blend of Greek and medieval Western European styles in mind that I need to articulate fully as part of writing the sequel, where how you dress (when you go to court in the capital) can be important.
There is a wonderful scene written by Raymond Feist that was in one of the many Magician books he wrote that covered a diplomatic dinner.
It was specifically dealing with clothing – the husband and wife were attending a foreign court’s reception dinner, and because they were newly appointed and foreigners, they lacked the proper court attire …
The hosts graciously provided proper dinner outfits and were promised the couple would wear what they were given.
Of course, the couple were set up by the anti-foreign court faction and were provided outfits that normally would cause a major scandal and political incident.
The couple were warned by a competing faction, so they were able to turn the incident on its ear, coming out with a huge diplomatic win.
It was a very well written plot point that has stuck with me for many years as a wonderful example of good writing.
All of this I wrote, to recommend you looking into this; it should help you. Unfortunately, the details of the scene have faded over the years, and I am unable to recall the exact novel he wrote this particular vignette in.
I hope that means That Evil Gandhi idea of EVERYTHING GOES TO CHARISMA NOTHING TO COMBAT. would shine through when Cities moment arrives and the attire and how present in each moment as a religious figure or as a noble Lord will have a impact. Poor Evil Gandhi having to kiss smelly Helots babies lol