I don’t know if I’ve misinterpreted again. But MC just read a letter from their sister, yet one of the choices says “refuting me father’s desire”
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Nope, that’s something wrong. Just fixed!
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Oh, this would be giga-brained and I absolutely love it… Shattered Eagle AU, where Prefect Leta opened her mouth faster when?
I would honestly wonder how this AU would even go, I would assume Leta would back an MC-Tristitia for the Throne, so all her resources would be at our disposal but in such a scenario, I would assume Julia-Titus would be less of a factor for the throne than Aite-Iblin.
Julia is fresh from a massive victory and has the backing of Havernica, plus her Loyal Legion, but without the Prefect aiding her, a certain “Goddess” not in her ear yet and the handicap of Titus? I wonder how big of a threat she would be to our go at the Throne…
The real kicker would be Iblin, psycho as his wife Aite may be. He is pure ice and math. I think it would be fair to establish his weakness as war. 15 years of planning, and he fails to take Kyro from us when we didn’t even know what was happening and defeated his forces in a single night. Not to mention losing to a Julia-MC in the battle of river name I cannot remember right now. Even if sending his cavalry to ford a raging river and losing an impressive amount of them screams Prince Khorobirit at Blogia, like Antar, he still lost in the end.
But he has an adept hand at subterfuge, turning either the Senate or Foederati to his side, reclaiming his throne in Hadat etc.
Kind of a rock beats scissors beats paper beats rock scenario. While we may beat Julia, she may beat Iblin who may beat us.
Who wins in such a thing? Invida, who will charge us $3000 for a GPU with a smile on their face. Who doesn’t have to lift a finger as the wolves tear each other apart around her while she gets debauched in her bacchanals…
I’d still play this AU ngl, even if we don’t win the Game of Throne in the end. The chance to give Tristitia some love and a chance at the life she deserves makes my heart go a-flutter
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I’m not certain I would characterize him as weak at war, necessarily. The Battle of Kyro was a significant gamble that did not win the war in a stroke like he wished, but it’s fair to say that Iblin also accomplished what no military force had ever done before in Iudian history. He was pushed back, but as the Prefect can discover, it was at deep (or even devastating) cost. He knew when to cut his losses and avoid the destruction of his own forces by a loyalist counterattack, and if the battle at the palace was lost, he even nearly succeeded at kidnapping the Empress, which would’ve effectively been equal to a loss for the defenders.
It’s also the case that the Battle of the Vescia may not have been lost as it was, if Aite had not charged, or had survived her charge. Even if they lost regardless, Aite could have regrouped and consolidated her support to push again across the river after weeks or months. That was why Julia was so adamant about killing Aite quickly, for it disintegrated the legionaries and auxiliaries supporting Aite, forcing Iblin and the Hadati to withdraw.
EDIT: also, the time between the last civil war and now was 10 years, nearly 11. It cannot be guaranteed that Iblin was able to spend all of that planning an invasion of Kyro. You may discover what he was doing soon.
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I didn’t mean to fully disparage his ability to conduct war, merely that of the two skills he has demonstrated (Subterfuge and Warfare), one led to the reclaimation of his homeland and alliance with traitorous groups, and the other led to losing two crucial battles.
Perhaps in the next chapter, we will see his fiscal policies and know for sure which is his dumpstat.
I would argue this speaks more to his cunning rather than his skills in the art of war, said historic event was only capable of occurring due to (using my canon run as an example), the traitorous Senate taking advantage of their fleet… Advantage, or more appropriately, our lack of a navy.
Can Iudia’s enemies say they broke through Iudia’s fleet and took Kyro’s dock? More circumstantial than Iblin’s genius in play but perhaps that is just my views on the matter.
Yeah, this I will give to him. A failure Prefect has no one to blame on this one but themselves for failing to play the game.
Maybe I was wrong, and Rhetoric is Iblin’s dumpstat /j Should’ve placed more points into it and gotten Aite to chill like he did before.
Being a single father to a teenager? /j I’d assume he spent the majority of his time looking for the Lance of Juba weapon (can’t remember its name rn sorry, coffee isn’t doing its job) when he wasn’t taking care of his daughter.
Iirc, I think the Hadati noble said he only recently came into possession of the Lance, so he either spent a decade looking or had been sitting on it for a while (I believe the former rather than the latter tbh)
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It’s no problem. I only wanted to establish for future context that he’s known to be no slouch at warfare, even if he has been forced back by Julia and the Prefect before. Is he the best general in the world or an undefeated strategist? No.
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statss :]
Victory Clock (Battle for the Spire): -3
Victory Clock (Battle for Kyro): -14
Arcanii Battle Strength: 58
Kyro Status: 3
I’m convinced that Victoria’s Lance of Bodmil is a fake created using Sorcery. It’s known to use fire and we know that Iblin and Victoria have access to regular fire lances. It’s possible that they have someone on their side who knows Sorcery and used their skills to create a fake Lance of Bodmil. My guess is in the future a Prefect that knows Sorcery will be able to detect that it’s just Sorcery and use that knowledge to their advantage by crumbling VIctoria’s Hadati support.
For info, I’ve decided to put a lengthier POV between the last two pages of Chapter VI in my content update to come. Rather than showing what Victoria is doing now (much the same as the last POV), it will be a flashback which will lend new insight into her character. Most Act II interludes will be POVs of her side of the story.
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I think a Victoria POV would be interesting, but I also think an Augusta POV would flesh out her character. She’s been absent for Ch. V and the majority of Ch. VI, and there have been massive changes to her life since then, including the death of her idolized mother and her ascension to empress. Having more insight into how she’s been dealing with that would be welcome.
She’s also spent a good portion of time, several months, as the most powerful person in Kyro while either alone or with Titus, and besides her studies we don’t know what she’s been up to. Seeing a POV of her getting acquainted with the state apparatus and preparing to take a greater hand in rulership, even before her mother is mortally wounded, would make sense. After all, she’s clearly expressed that desire in Ch. IV.
As a final point, Augusta is a character essentially shaped by our actions, and a POV could allow those choices to be shown in their entirety while deepening player attachment to her (not that she needs the help, judging by the polls) by expressing the world through her eyes and thoughts.
Victoria’s aims and life history are certainly more obscure to the reader than Augusta’s, besides the anger over the death of her mother and feeling as if the throne is her birthright. However, there might be something said for furthering a sense of immersion by not providing information at the end of Ch. VI and letting the mystery linger a while longer. It puts us in the same situation as the Prefect and the general population. Nobody has any idea what this ghost from the past wants or what she’s been up to. She’s an enigma, at least until information begins to get out. As you’ve noted, we’re only a week from her unveiling and the events of Ch. V.
Ultimately, I think either ‘cut-scene’ would be beneficial and keep the unified and effective narrative structure established thus far, but I wanted to provide an idea as to how focusing on Augusta here might better serve the purpose.
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The Western Roman Empire fell for a lot of different reasons, such as corruption and invasion, but fundamentally, a big part of its failure to weather the crises of the 5th century was that local elites perceived no or little benefit in central authority and the imperial apparatus. The continental civilization splintered into a variety of successor kingdoms because nobody in the Western half of the Empire saw much benefit in maintaining it. Some of them paid lip service to ‘Rome’, like the Ostrogoths to the Eastern Empire, but all the warlords around the western Empire saw no utility in a series of weak emperors with no ability to actually help them.
In this regard, I can see a pretty clear parallel between the Battle of Kyro and the Sack of Rome in 410. It was a hugely significant event despite Rome managing to repel the assault eventually. Despite the Empire’s largely unchanged territorial extent or still powerful number of soldiers, it was a flashing indicator of looming collapse, demonstrating the lack of central authority to actually coordinate internal security.
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i dont think we are close to crises of the 5th century we are more likely in 3th century one. ludia currently is much stronger then rome was in 5th century and there are a lot of reasons for it, empire is not divided in east and west, legions are still strong, foderati don’t want there own kingdoms yet and prefer to get more power in system, senate is much stronger. civil war is still about who will rule whole empire and how not about it’s dissolution or destruction. i can see mismanaged civil war starting real decline of empire but you have to really mismanage situation for that. what’s bigger problem is that our neighbours from east that want to visit us, they are existential threat like which roman empire never really faced.
im following old roman tradition of taxing Seyet to ground any chance i get 
its 2 points of favour. why taxing seyet is good because IF you don’t tax it you get -35 points
if you tax it you get +10 so difference between person that taxed and did not tax is culminative 42 points. i fear that taxing seyet will have very big impact going forward (it definitely should have )
its practically is mandatory if you want to go for compromise because you very rarely get chance to increase opposite factions influence and any deacrease in it hurts very much
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I can see that. I’ll write the Victoria flashback, but you make a good point since I did consider an Augusta POV as well. If I decide on the latter, I’ll merely insert the Victoria POV later.
It has parallels for certain, though that it was so severely attacked by an internal force likely helps some as well to counteract the image. It’s a step down the Fall for Iudia, but even I argued in a thesis that the 410 Sack had mainly been a psychological blow rather than a material one due to the lack of damage (that was the Vandals later on) and the death knell for the WRE came in the form of the loss of North Africa, where the damage was not fatal beforehand.
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So will I, at least until we actually get to see the consequences of doing so. Right now, it’s a free five favor from everyone, though I get the feeling that won’t last much longer.
Yes, I do agree with the broader statement that Victoria needs to be the main focus of Act II cutscenes. We’re unlikely to meet her very often or have in-depth characterization face to face, since we are on opposite sides of a war and such unpleasantries. I’m excited to see what drives her besides mere revenge, and what possible nuance or sympathy she might have for us.
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i do find it funny that having reluctant foederati is much much easier then having reluctant cato 
quite easy to see what he wants
*if ((ally_side_chosen = false) and (barbarian_favor >= 40))
*set reluctant_rival true
meanwhile what’s happening here
*if ((ceto_deal = true) and (criminal_dealt_method = “gang”)) and ((rations_delivered = “people”) and (mob_favor >= 35))
and you know what im 100 precent sure that male prefect is never passing these check if you are romancing julia and then don’t tax seyet. (sorry seyet )
*set reluctant_ceto true
also these looks so weird i never learned choicesript but condition looks weird i understand what it whants to do but i dont think it works like that 
im not sure that if (military_favor >= 50) is ever necessary to pass
*elseif criminal_dealt_method = “legion”
*if ((military_favor >= 50) or (military_favor >= 40)) and ((veteran = true) or (rations_delivered = “legion”))
*if dagr_loyalty = true
*set victory_clock -1
*else
*set victory_clock -2
dagr_loyalty gets us worse results because foderati are worse at cooperating with legions i can see that
with my 0 kwnoledge of choiscript i will say code should somthing like
*if ((military_favor >= 50) and (veteran = true) ) or (((military_favor >= 40 and rations_delivered = “legion”))
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Hello, I’ve come back to read the newest chapter, and I love the drama and action in this one. It’s nice to see how cool a Warfare or Veteran Prefect can be in combat, although I noticed a lack of mention for their war injury if you’re part of the latter. I know it’s just flavor text, but I would like to know whether the omission of the injury was intentional or not.
Augusta’s rulership being different for each lesson is also a nice, interesting take. A lot of the games that involve raising an heir usually involve more or less a ‘wise’ vs ‘selfish’ path or a variant of that. Your approach to the results of the MC’s tutorship opens up a lot of interesting, complex storylines that make each replay very unique and fresh.
It makes me more curious to see the difference between a combat Augusta and a strategist Augusta. Although we can already see the divergence where the former can successfully defend the palace with her praetorians, and the latter thinks about the overall army movement. Maybe it would be a matter of battle tactics vs strategic warfare?
It also makes me wonder whether a speechcraft Augusta could be really good if she becomes a First Citizen?
The scholarship Augusta is the one I’m unsure about. Could this enable her do some weird politicking/subterfuge? Say, an ambitious Prefect/Emperor Dowager looking to usurp the throne, only to be tricked and coup’d by that scholarship Augusta?
Here were my stats at the end of the battle:
Victory Clock (Battle for the Spire): -2
Victory Clock (Battle for Kyro): 2
Arcanii Battle Strength: 73
Kyro Status: 2
Interestingly, this had a way better score than with my previous, favorite run of Veteran Rhetoric/Warfare Emperor Dowager. I only got a -6 victory clock for Kyro, but still got the Saviour of the City achievement, and yet for this run, I didn’t get the achievement bubble despite the text saying I was successful.
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This is why in the past two battles, I had the MC on horseback. Their injury can be compensated for in this manner.
Ah, I see what you mean. I’ll have a warfare penalty of a point for that fight in my docket then and mention it upon entering, that’s a good point.
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Apologies, I was more referring to the scene where the MC dismounted and charged into the Sortiarorum.
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A tyrant scholar Augusta whose illegitimacy was revealed can propose spreading rumors that Victoria is the illegitimate one and that Victoria killed someone as a sacrifice to the Hadati gods. She can even pin the blame on the attack on the Spire on Victoria.
Very Machiavellian and I’m looking forward to seeing how a paragon scholar Augusta uses her skills
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I’m a little confused. You have victory clock at 2, which means the palace battle was missed, and you have Kyro Status of 2. That means you had an incomplete (I.e. 1/2 KS) rather than a complete 3.
VC needs to be 0 or lower to arrive at the palace in times
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