I’m also somewhat interested with the idea of an itinerant court where central power frequently change locations as the court move from one area to another, it can also give off the image of non-favoritism to any of the provinces and giving the ruler a fuller picture of the realm and also give them a more “personal” aura (which playing as a religious prophet, I wish to remain close to my followers). Don’t know how feasible it will be though since this form of rulling is only common in a feudal government and I still wished for an extensive bureaucracy for a centralized state.
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Largely, it simply didn’t make the top three. Aekos, Aegre and Avezia are all better choices in terms of central location and antinational symbolism (with Aekos being the most preferable because, well, it’s already the capital - but that might also be a reason to skip it). Corlune’s mercantile status didn’t come up in my thinking and it’s not too relevant. I’m empowering the merchants somewhat but not creating a plutocracy.
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Which is good enough reason for my mc to be dead set against it…assuming Aakos does not get turned into a (toxic) wasteland by either that monstrosity of a palace falling like a meteorite or my mc using it as a potential demonstration site for Xaos storms to dissuade Halassur or both.
Goes for any other city in Karagon too, my mc is fairly open and cosmopolitan but having to live in Karagon is still a bridge too far.
Too much of a costly boondoggle, look at the EU’s own itinerant Parliament and that just travels between two locations that already have the necessary infrastructure in place.
Honestly the parliament should just move to Strassbourg permanently, it’s nicer and greener than Brussels, France is mollified and the EU taxpayer would save a whole bunch of money.
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I’d like to think that my MC has nuanced/mixed feelings on both the koinon and imperial models of governance: he’s fascinated by the koinon’s (theoretical/utopian) idea of every former archonty having “a seat at the table”, but he’s also very scared of the possibility that the Grand Moot’s (very likely) gridlock (due to the differing cultures, needs/wants, and opinions of the Moot’s “senators”) could end up paralyzing the koinon into a state of indecision/stagnation (which is not a good place to be in when MC and his fellow low-anarchy allies are trying to maintain and/or restore order in the wake of the Thaumatarch’s fall).
Thus, my medieval-minded nationalist MC feels very inclined to propose that the de Syrnon monarchy should rise to the occasion to become the koinon’s executive source of stability (with each new successor monarch being educated from birth by Leaguer tutors to collaborate/“wheel and deal” with the Grand Moot, while also being granted the constitutional power to break the Moot’s occasional gridlock and thus make final decisions).
Alternatively, if an eternity of rule from hereditary Shayardene monarchs is too drastic of a pill to swallow for the koinon’s more democracy-minded leaders, then MC is prepared to offer the following compromise: have the Grand Moot assign the de Syrnon monarchy the situational, “break in case of emergency” role of Roman Republic-inspired dictator.
(with the koinon’s democratic (or oligarchic) balance of power returning once “insert hypothetical crisis/invasion” is resolved)
Surely, cleaning up the mess of the Hegemony’s collapse is an applicable emergency, right? 
What is your opinion of the Alliance (the faction from the Warcraft games/lore, assuming that you’ve heard of the series)?
And if you are familiar with the Warcraft Alliance, how does it compare/measure up to the various forms of koinon (centralized, decentralized, or otherwise) that can be created in XoR?
And if you aren’t familiar, then this Reddit post here can give you a pretty clear and concise summary of the Alliance’s past (and present day politics).
How many years from Game 1 will have passed once we have reached Game 5?
Will Phrygia have already retired (or died from old age) by the time that G5 MC might be interested in keeping Phyrgia around as the incumbent Archon of Shayard?
(Only difference being that Phrygia now takes orders from the MC instead of from the Thaumatarch, going forward)
Or will have enough time passed that G5 MC will be limited to interacting with the Leilatous from Teren’s generation (or younger)?
Will instituting a policy of census-taking and birth certificates (for all registered citizens) be an available feature for MCs who wish to create modernized governments by the time of G4/G5?
(especially if they recruited tons of ex-Telones (and other ex-Hegemony bureaucrats) such as Bleys)
So in other words, an evil version of Hogwarts (which has already been hijacked by Voldemort and his Death Eaters)? Cool!
And another question: after the Lykeion is presumably devastated by the Battle of Aekos, which part(s) of Shayard would be best suited for Homelander Wisard MC to host a replacement Lykeion?
And what is the Shayarin counterpart word (if any) for Lykeion? Here are the suggestions that come to mind for me:
#1: (Google translated French) “Église de Syrnon” = “Church of Syrnon”,
#2: (Old English) temple = Hearg
#3: (Old English) church = Hêafodmynster
I’d very much like to hear from you in more detail (about why Aragorn is second-tier in your opinion).
Also, I just realized that we’ve mostly been discussing our favorite Peter Jackson LotR heroes (wild card, in Gollum’s case), and have not yet discussed the LotR villains.
Christopher Lee’s portrayal of Saruman makes him THE definitive LotR antagonist (in my opinion), compared to the more passive/lurking Sauron; plus, Isengard’s theme/leitmotif is among my top favorite LotR soundtracks! (and is more memorable than Mordor’s theme)
So in other words, Jackson found a useful ‘hammer’ (the LotR formula), but didn’t quite comprehend that not every problem was a ‘nail’. Duly noted!
New potential MC LOTR analogy:
Homelander Wisard MC embraces his lust for power/world domination by becoming the equivalent of Saruman the White (revamping Shayard into an industrial powerhouse with Wiendrj’s help, manufacturing a massive battalion of armored, “Uruk Hai”-inspired Plektoi shock troopers,
overseeing the progress of his new empire from atop his “spiky black fortress tower” in Grand Shayard,
and then forming an alliance with fellow conqueror/“Dark Lord” Sarcifer)
Holy guacamole, so Cerlota grew up right next to the Erezza-Halassur border!
As a teenager/young adult, was Cerlota previously conscripted as a border soldier? (Prior to her later climb through the Hegemony Theurges’ ranks)
Or does her INT specialization suggest that she first started out as a humble clerk/bureaucrat/scholar?
How would Cerlota feel about a Westeros-inspired feudal contract between Shayard and Erezza?
(with the de Syrnon monarchy seating “the Iron Throne” while Cerlota’s recommended choice of Erezzan governor becomes the “Lord/Lady Paramount of Erezza” who still directly governs Erezza’s day-to-day affairs, including those of Avezia?)
Under the hypothetical negotiated terms, MC imagines he’ll…
1- Give Erezzan advisors a foothold in the de Syrnon royal court/cabinet
2- Show a genuine eagerness to have Shayardene and Erezzan cultures/soft nationalism co-exist (and even work together),
Amidst all the hatred and bloodshed at the border, have there ever been any rare Erezzan-Halassurq “Romeo and Juliet” love stories in XoR’s history? (That may or may not have contributed to past historical truces)
If your MC plans on getting crowned as the One True Queen, who is the lucky male NPC that gets to become her king consort?
(or will Caroline instead be a Queen Elizabeth who pushes away all suitors, and then dies heirless?)
How much parallels with the Mongolian Golden Horde, Cossacks, Winged Hussars, and other historical cavalry can we expect to see?
(looks at the map one more time) Oh really, and what about the Bloodless Reach sitting at the Whends’ border?
I think you’re onto something, here! 
FYI, the New Republic (in Disney’s current Star Wars continuity) “sought to reshape galactic politics in an effort to both prevent the abuses of the Old Republic and bring in disaffected worlds that had seceded from the Republic prior to the Clone Wars. To accomplish this, the new Senate decided that all worlds would have an equal say in their government, and as such all worlds had an equal chance of hosting the New Republic’s capital on a rotating basis, rather than simply remaining on Coruscant alone.”
So I’ve done both jailbreak and stop the harrowing playthroughs and still not completely decided on which of the two I consider “canon” for Caroline. Leaning pretty strongly toward the former though. In that case Abelard has a good head start. Could be a character that has not been met yet. It’s likely going to be a very pragmatic rather than romantic choice at the end of the day though to either increase her political standing or to promote Shayardene unity
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I’m not sure “democracy” is quite the right term. The most likely koinon model would as you later suggest be oligarchy, an elite council of (almost certainly unelected!) representatives sent by the member nations. The threat of gridlock in this oligarchy would for nearly any post-Hegemonic nation be a motivator to scrap the whole “koinon” idea and remain an independent principality, rather than agreeing to grant dictatorial powers to the Monarch of Shayard as a condition of joining your koinon.
A few things might change the picture. First, a nation that simply couldn’t feed itself in the wake of the Hegemony’s collapse and had no prospect of trading for its subsistence might be persuaded that joining a koinon (even an unjust one) with an agricultural surplus would be preferable to trying to conquer enough farmland to survive. As a real-world parallel, this would be like a somewhat more extreme version of the economic crisis that led Scotland to assent to the creation of the United Kingdom.
Second, a nation’s leadership might feel that its only plausible protection from external conquest was to annex itself to a stronger political entity. This could work either for or against your monarchical koinon, depending on the G5 circumstances.
Finally, you might be able to win the allegiance of weaker factions in each nation, who (a) have given up their hope of prevailing against the dominant local leadership using only their own resources, and (b) could be persuaded to accept your sovereignty in exchange for the assistance that strengthens them enough to seize power from the current rulers. A koinon of usurpers would be tough to form and hold together, but conceivable.
I read the Reddit post about the Warcraft Alliance when you shared it earlier. Seems to me to be a little odd but within the realm of plausibility – at any rate, enough thought has gone into explaining its oddest bits to keep my disbelief suspended. It’s a system with massive and obvious brittle points, notably the potential for a clash of authority between the High King and the independent sovereign heads of the member nations that could lead either back to “headless chicken” or autocracy. Or a NATO dynamic where Stormwind gets increasingly unhappy about the other Alliance members sheltering at low cost under their costly military umbrella (as we see from our world, the fact that Stormwind is the richest member and would be spending massively on its army anyway doesn’t cancel out this dynamic). Finally, because a couple of decades is more than enough time for a supreme commander to irretrievably screw up a war, I’m not sure I’d rely as much on the patience of longer-lived races as this system seems to. But I could swallow the idea that so far, all the key participants have maneuvered around its fragile points and made it work.
It’s worth noting that a system like this is the fruit of generations of adaptation and shared experience that have established some key points of consensus, e.g. we have x number of nations, among which Stormwind has the biggest army; we face a pretty consistent external threat from the Horde, and have more affinity with each other than we do with them; we suffer more from a fragmented Alliance than from yielding some sovereignty to the High King; etc.
In the immediate aftermath of an imperial collapse in the XoR gameworld, there’s going to be a lot less consensus on anything. “We have the strongest army” – maybe right now, but who’s to say we couldn’t change that? “We have the most food” – until the borders get redrawn. “The threat from Halassur is big enough to unite us” – or maybe we can make our peace with Halassur, and Shayard is the rapacious neighbor to worry about.
Not sure yet, but it’ll be a quite a few. It’s likely that Phrygia and others of her generation will have passed the torch by that point, one way or another.
I warmly recommend Seeing Like A State for a wide-ranging and readable summary of just how hard this is, and how many generations of work went into making populations “legible” by modern states. You’ll be able to see in G2 how far the Hegemony has got in this process. For all its precocious, magic-fuelled totalitarianism, it’s still a long way off from being able to carry out a precise count of its citizens.
I’d have thought that wherever you decide to drop your capital, you’ll want to have your Theurge training there too – put it somewhere else, and you’re significantly increasing the odds of that place eventually becoming the capital.
I don’t think there are any old Anglo-Saxon or Old French words for a place of education that don’t go back to Greek (as e.g. “school” does), and Lyceum or Lycee is the usual translation of Lykeion into English or French. Of the other possibilities you suggest, eglise and mynster are also both Greek words (ekklesia and monasterion) and Theurgic education is less churchly than words like “temple” would convey.
I agree that Christopher Lee was great, though I don’t think any of LotR’s villains are as iconic or central to its appeal as they are for (say) Star Wars, Harry Potter, or Batman – for my money, LotR’s strengths are all in its heroes (and Gollum). I don’t have any particularly interesting reasons that I found movie Aragorn roughly as appealing and memorable as Gimli or Legolas, rather than Gandalf-level. Just a gut reaction, not thought out.
No, she was a young noble and began Theurge training early. But as a Theurge, she’s fought the Halassurqs at the border and at sea. She was a deputy and possible successor to Ennearch Ilaria Lacevra, the only Erezziano among the Nine, who is responsible for overseeing (and, especially, allocating Theurges and blood to) the Hegemonic Navy.
If she were convinced that it really was the only way to strengthen Erezza against Halassur, rather than just being opportunistic exploitation by the big soft western neighbor, she could get behind it.
Let’s be clear: she will not easily be convinced of this.
I’m not planning to write any.
The Sami or Nenets never overran any empires that I’m aware of.
As I said, the Whends have no impending invasion to worry about.
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Conversely, @mshan95032 will also have to convince Shayard’s elites, whoever they may be post-revolution (he wants to keep the nobility more-or-less as-is, so the nobility) that Erezza is worth spending blood (both in the metaphorical and literal senses) and treasure defending instead of making peace with their friendly neighbors in Halassur, who just want lands that are theirs by right and were stolen by the illegitimate Thaumatarchy anyway.
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Halassur will never stop at just Erezza they want Nyral too, what’s more they seem to plan to enslave and quite possibly genocide the population of Erezza and maybe Nyral too, considering the Nyr don’t seem in a rush to join back up with their cousins.
Of course losing Erezza means foregoing any real chance of keeping up with Halassur militarily and technologically and condemns Shayard to remain a feudal, backwards pastoral backwater without the resources for heavy industrialization.
Halassur also has barbaric norms and practices when it comes to sex and gender.
Lastly for pure homelanders, giving in to Halassur means losing the chance to re-annex Avezia.
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I know all of that. The more parochial nobles don’t, which will be the challenge for any homelander who wants a secure border.
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(In the scenario that MC’s koinon’s foundation/source of legitimacy is its holy alliance with Eclect MC)
Does each ex-Hegemony province’s Xthonic priesthood happen to have its own appointed camerlengo? (FYI, for the Catholic Church, the camerlengo is “the cardinal who manages the pope’s secular affairs”)
If so, then MC would (ideally) like to stack his koinon council full of experienced Xthonic “camerlengos”.
(Unless, of course, the Archimandrites wish to “cut out/skip the middleman” by personally taking their respective province’s seat on the koinon council)
And on a separate, but semi-related note, the above topic has given me inspiration for a Homelander-flavored title to describe an Eclect Merchant Prince MC: Kamerling.
FYI, Camerlengo (plural: camerlenghi, Italian for “chamberlain”) is an Italian title of medieval origin. It derives from the late Latin camarlingus, in turn coming through the Frankish kamerling, from the Latin camerarius which meant “chamber officer” (generally meaning “treasure chamber”).
Could “Kamerling” work, or would a different term/language better suit your purposes?
Would this first scenario/option be most applicable to MC’s G5 dealings with Wiendrj? (mountainous (and not so fertile?) province which presumably relies on imported/traded food)
Can a combination of high CHA and low anarchy be sufficient for MC to push for fair koinon council elections in G4/G5, or will the transition to proper elections be limited to G5’s “generations later” epilogue?
Alternatively, are there other factors at play here? (that I’m not yet considering would help institute a fair voting policy across MC’s member faction provinces)
What would the Shayardene Leaguers’ collective attitude be? (Towards MC’s 'de Syrnon-led monarchical koinon" proposed model)
As MC would argue (in a hypothetical conversation with said Leaguers), his imagined model would most likely achieve the following boons:
1- Promising to help achieve executive power for the “One True King” will be the biggest incentive that brings enthusiastic Laconniers on board as the Leaguer’s allies (rather than bitter rivals/enemies)
2- And if the de Syrnons manage to hold onto the “High King/Queen of the Koinon” role for both the anticipated G5 future (and distant future generations to come), then Horion’s dream of a Shayard-led koinon is still technically achieved, right? (MC is curious about how much he can achieve with his “in the name of our faction’s founder, Horion!” emotional appeal)
And how many Cosmo Lite Leaguers would consider MC’s proposal a dealbreaker? (due to “allegedly betraying Horion’s principles instead of honoring them”)
Hopefully, MC’s modus operandi of binding his faction together (via one big happy “marriage alliance network”) will send the right signal (that he’s a “stronger AND trustworthy political entity” who’s flexible enough to “wheel and deal”, instead of being a “dreaded external conqueror who only understands the language of brute force”).
If my “alternative playthrough” MC is feeling more ruthless (than his “rule through respect”, nobler “canon playthrough” counterpart), then that MC looks forward to the opportunity to pull off multiple Red Weddings! 
And on another note, here’s my suggested achievement name for the hypothetical “koinon of usurpers”: “A Den of Thieves.”
Glad you liked and appreciated the post. And as ever, thanks for the consideration (and very detailed/thoughtful reply)!
Hooray for religious (Xthonic) soft power!
The applicable vocabulary term I’m looking for here is “suzerain”, right?
Oh crap, the Big Three (or some other vaguely defined, major foreign adversary) are probably going to be the ones who send infiltrators (and other rabble rousers) that stoke/fundraise the flames of Earlund nationalism against my monarchist MC, right?
Good thing my Homelander MC will have personally visited/formed connections with the Westriding during G3, though!
(while sending Zvad and an entourage of Leaguers as MC’s envoys to negotiate “terms of invitation/recruitment” with the G3 Whends)
What sort of metaphor/analogy would you use to describe a COM 6 MC?
(similar to how you earlier said that an INT 6 MC was Ennearch-level?)
How wealthy/poor and strong/weak is Cerlota’s birthplace, Moncesano? (compared to Soretto)
And at sea? How interesting.
And during those sea battles, has Cerlota ever befriended (or at least formed alliances of convenience with) any Erezzan pirates?
(E.g. the XoR counterpart of Anne Bonny, who may (or may not) be Cerlota’s ex-lover)
Okay then. Time for MC to lay out all (or most) of his cards on the table!
1- High CHA specialization
2- MC’s past G1-G4 past behavior demonstrates that he’s a soft nationalist (instead of a hard nationalist bigot) who loves Shayard, but is nonetheless open to the idea of forming mutually beneficial relationships with Shayard’s neighbors/(potential) future protectorates.
3- MC’s past G1-G4 past behavior demonstrates that he’s a kindred spirit who’s in sync with Cerlota’s worldview (about the need for a new balance of power which excludes Theurges from formal office), while also demonstrating that he has the competency/power to make that worldview a reality
4- To sweeten the deal, MC could provide support to enable Moncesano (Cerlota’s hometown/birthplace, which may or may not be a “weaker faction in need of assistance from an outside power”) to supplant Soretto as the new powerhouse/capital of Erezza
5- (Alternative to above #4, if MC wishes to avoid triggering an Erezzan civil war)
To sweeten the deal, offer a marriage alliance between bachelor (or recently widowed) monarch MC and a sufficiently influential Erezzan noblewoman.
Man, those Quiet Undead are some very patient (and/or very lazy) zombies.
And as a gesture of gratitude to the Game 1 Rim rebels who empowered him in the first place, MC will use his “de Syrnon kingly prerogative” to uplift Breden, Elery, and a handful of other loyal/top-performing ex-helots as the first generations of their respective new aristo lineages.
(thus combining the “old guard” Shayardene aristos with the newly created “Bonapartist” aristos)
Pros of Siding with Erezza (against Halassur):
And Dangers of Siding with Halassur (against Erezza)
1- Letting Halassur invade/harm Erezza is a betrayal of Cerlota, the mentor/“fairy godmother” who helped Shayard rediscover its wisardry-based heritage/potential.
2- We have no concrete guarantees (nor anti betrayal mechanisms) that Halassur is telling the truth (about wishing to harrow ONLY the Karagonds and Erezzans for the foreseeable future, and wishing to take back ONLY the lands previously stolen by the Thaumatarchy).
Erezza is a useful buffer state between Shayard and Halassur, and it will be much happier/more efficient at fulfilling that role if Shayard invests blood/treasure defending it.
Looking at the map too, the natural barriers past Erezza start to diminish. It will probably be hard for Halassur to maintain offensive momentum beyond a conquered Erezza, but a cooperative Erezza would pose a major danger to any post-Hegemony state’s or states’ security.
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Agreed, Erezza is extremely narrow which pretty much favour the defenders as the Halassurq can’t bring their overwhelming numbers to bear, and the corridor could be pretty heavily fortified from what I can infer from the previous posts (unless Hallasur has some extremely good naval capabilites then I will eat my words)
I was also intially planning to do this but after reading the earlier posts about how a great majority of my followers will be alienated by the MC’s marriage to the Diadoch, most of the founding rebels will probably be put on the chopping block before my “co-beligerence” with Phaedros/Phaedra is revealed to be more than a coincidence. If some helots still remained loyal even after I “sold out” to Karagond then at most they will get emancipated and turn into yeoman if some displayed competence then they will get some posts in the new regime but no noble titles. Those are reserved for whatever post-collapse warlords support that I need in order to pacify the realm, and I can’t hand out titles willy-nilly since I rely on the Diadoch’s faction support after purging probably 60%? of my powerbase so probably gonna court (or inflitrate) Hegemony loyalists immediately in G2 to earn brownie points.
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I’ve done it…… I’ve beaten the army in the woods, I’ve killed the theurges and their twice damned plektoi hounds with cold steel and hot blood. Although the price we paid was heavy, too heavy. The Hegemony will pay for this…. 400 of my followers. Gone… today we scatter like leaves in the win, fleeing in ones and twos to nearby villages and towns to spread the message of our battle, my second in command… my wife, left behind in the woods to March with the remnants of our army against certain death, gods how could I ask her to lead them? May xhaos have mercy on us, may xhaos have mercy on me. I must flee to the land outside the wards. From there I will March alone, where I go I do not know, but where I shall end up? That is a tale for another day, this?.. This is the tale of the Choices Of Rebels… The tale of how I Reynard de Serin, fought back against the hegemony, and won. May the angels bless all those who read this message, and may you find me in the near future, at the head of an army of Yaomen, helots, and all other free folk who wish for the harrowings to end, to see the proud shyardene men and women standing watch over our ancestral home, as our forefathers did before us.
Edit: All role playing aside, How do you guys learn magic? I wanna try that next play through. Beating the army in the woods was awesome but honestly I lost too many followers, as a leader I consider it a failure.
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You need to choose INT as your talent, and you’ll be able te learn theurgy.
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It does not, but thanks for teaching me a new word.
An Eclect is more pope than chamberlain, so I don’t think I’ll write “Kamerling” into the game, at least not in that specific context.
If Wiendrj splinters, some of its lowland areas will have a surplus while the highlands struggle.
It will be possible to introduce elections in some scale or form, but we’ll see what the conditions are. I’m not yet sold on the idea of an epilogue that’s not from the MC’s PoV…in real life we don’t get to see what comes after us, which I think is a relevant constraint on the social engineer and one reason so much change is incremental rather than revolutionary.
The Leaguers, like Horion, have no problem with a koinon where Shayard is the dominant party. Many of them will be concerned about monarchy’s tendency toward tyranny, however, and will be more supportive of oligarchic models.
“Suzerainty” connotes a larger sacrifice of sovereignty than I think the Warcraft Alliance has made – a high king with solely military authority (rather than, say, full control over all aspects of the tributary states’ foreign policy) is only a limited suzerain. The word’s not obviously wrong, but arguable. I could imagine the Alliance nations angrily rejecting it as a description.
On par with the finest military minds in the world. Better than the Hegemony’s current top generals.
You can search this thread for “Moncesano” to get a sense of what the city’s like. It would be a terrible place to have your capital as long as the war is underway–that’s why the Halassurqs actually changed their winter capital from their equivalent city, Otsamor.
Cerlota has no canon romantic history with a pirate, though feel free to fanfic whatever you like.
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I just read that Yebben is a ro and i wonder if not being a theurge lock us out of his romance since my last playthru he asked me to teach him theurgy or maybe being a theurge just give us extra scenes with him? I hope it’s the latter since i really want to romance him with my combat 2 noble mc opposites attract and all that lol. Also i want to ask if i choose to split up in chapter 4 do i always end up alone with only yed or is it because i failed somehow?
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Napoleon Musashi.
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Glad I could be of service! And FYI, I first learned of the word by watching the “Angels and Demons” movie adaptation (and totally loved Ewan McGregor’s performance as Camerlengo Carlo Ventresca).
Duly noted. Then how about this next suggested title: “Exchequer”, an Anglo-French derived word, to potentially describe one of the various following contexts:
1- Exchequer could describe a post-Hegemonic Syntechnia, one (which under the direction of Homelander Merchant Prince MC’s leadership) gets nationalized from private guild into Shayard’s royal/national treasury. (or if MC has his way, then post-Hegemonic Syntechnia also becomes the royal/national treasury of the overall monarchical koinon)
2- Alternatively, post-Hegemonic Syntechnia retains its name, with Exchequer instead describing Homelander Merchant Prince MC’s new official job as CFO of the de Syrnon cabinet (and/or the monarchical koinon cabinet).
3- Alternatively, Exchequer might be the “Shayardene rebranding” of the Hegemony’s former Telones.
Using this map as our reference, where would you say the unofficial dividing line is between the lowland-highland parts of Wiendrj?
How’s this for a simple rule of thumb: everything below the Wiendrj map label is lowland, and everything above the label is highland?
And while we’re still on the topic of “Whendish lowlands vs highlands” comparison, what (and/or where) are the respective birthplace cities/clans of…
1- Zvad and his fellow older generation of Whendward Bandits?
2- Korzsata, Bjel, and their fellow ex-Phalangite soldiers?
Could creating an “independent in name only” Earlund province (with Earlund’s leader mimicking the policy decisions of his Brimlund counterpart) be a sneaky way of artificially doubling Shayard’s vote in a “one vote per province” koinon election?
Or at this point, would it be far more efficient for MC to instead pursue a Soviet-inspired “nominal koinon” model?
(where all the member states are nominal republics, but are in reality, completely subjugated by a Shayard-based “Communist Party” council dictatorship)
Alternatively, maybe a fully unified Shayard has a sufficiently huge population for high-CHA MC (and his preferred allies) to easily dominate the koinon’s “popular vote only” elections? (thus removing the need for “artificial new province” subterfuge)
And in the event that Shayard’s population alone is not enough to reliably secure koinon election results in MC’s favor, then perhaps a combined Shayardene-Erezzan “holy Xthonic coalition” voting bloc (who are collectively entranced by a successful Eclect or Inner Voice Prophet MC) might make a difference?
(And I am of course, assuming that G5 Erezzan soldier casualties (at the Halassurq border) will be limited enough for Erezza’s overall population to still be voter-impactful)
If working in conjunction with MC’s koinon, do Whendish clan oaths obligate its clan members to “tow the party line” with whatever vote(s) their corresponding clan leader makes?
(thus potentially ruining the point of a (more democratic) koinon’s “every person is entitled to their own vote” policy?)
Or should the Whendish clan oaths themselves be renegotiated to allow leeway for “reasonable disagreement informed decisions” from non-leading clan members?
Then how would the Leaguers feel about one (or more) of the following proposed safeguards (or compromises):
1- Take steps to create a tight-knit, “insider culture” community: in which prospective de Syrnon heirs/heiresses are trained from an early age to befriend, trust, and collaborate with their fellow elites (aka the koinon’s future provincial governors and/or Grand Moot members)
2- (Establish Boundaries) Have the koinon’s rulebook firmly adopt the Warcraft Alliance-inspired definition of a High King’s limited suzerainty (military authority only), while also establishing an impeachment disciplinary system for High Kings who overstep (with the worst tyrannical behavior meriting a swift/timely dethroning).
In the worst case scenario (of a current de Syrnon ruler getting impeached, and then dethroned as a result), a Regent Lord/Lady (voted/approved by the Grand Moot) would rule in the High King/Queen’s stead (until the next de Syrnon heir is of age).
3- (Establish Independent Auditors) Behold, the Defenders of the Codex!
I found the Moncesano exposition section; yikes, both Moncesano and Otsamor look like total hellholes!
How did Cerlota survive growing up in a home as harsh/lethal as Moncesano? (or after birth, was she instead whisked away by parents (or other guardians) to a safer/cushier Erezzan hometown, where she could learn her Theurgic studies in peace?)
And how many times has Cerlota crossed paths with Erjan? (And other Halassurq spies/spymasters)
Is Cerlota angry enough at Halassur to wish to kill Erjan on sight (if MC ever decides to have the two interact at some point), or would Cerlota instead delight at the clever opportunity to feed Erjan misinformation?
As fun as it would be to contrive a Pirates of the Caribbean ripoff (starring Cerlota and Female Pirate OC), I’m more interested in the potential “friend of a friend” introduction that encourages (insert Erezzan pirate) to side with MC (e.g. “you can trust me, because Cerlota trusts me!”).
“who is responsible for overseeing (and, especially, allocating Theurges and blood to) the Hegemonic Navy.”
If MC wishes to co-opt most (if not all) of the ex-Hegemonic Navy (or at the least ones who stayed loyal to Ilaria), which relationship/alliance should MC leverage to encourage Ilaria to join his faction by the time of G5?
1- MC’s friendship/alliance with Cerlota (assuming that Ilaria is actually an Erezziano nationalist who’s been waiting for her chance to break free, and also implicitly trusts/respects Cerlota, despite Cerlota’s past desertion/defection),
2- Or MC’s surprise friendship/alliance with Phaedra? (assuming that Ilaria chose to stay loyal to the Thaumatarchic chain of command, despite Karagon’s defeat at the Battle of Aekos)
Were Cerlota and Ilaria born in the same generation (as fellow contemporary students of Theurgy), or is Ilaria at least one or two generations older than Cerlota?
FYI, having recently re-read “the 48 Laws of the Power”, it was a shock for me to learn that Napoleon’s escape from Elba was actually a sneaky three-way conspiracy (between Talleyrand, and “Castlereagh and Mettemich, the foreign ministers of England and Austria”) to decisively crush Napoleon once and for all.
(refer to page 88 of 476 of the following linked PDF below)
One diplomat in Vienna, who understood that Talleyrand was behind it all, said, “He has set the
house ablaze in order to save it from the plague.”
Ah, the tradeoffs of a high COM, low INT build!
Not at all. Yebben will be romanceable from G3 Ch1 for MCs of any stat specialism.
If you end up alone with Yed (not by choice), it’s because you didn’t beat or evade the Hegemony’s troops – either of which becomes a bit harder to do when you focus your early Ch4 prep time on sending people back to the helot camps. Going into G2 with only Yed for a companion should totally work, though, and even have some advantages (you don’t have to choose between protecting him and another companion).
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Can i also ask about who will be the ros in book 2? I know cerlota is probably one but who else?