Feudal Quest

[Arkeus]

Re: Resources and Status

The Black Beast of the Wood - In the forest south of Corzu lives a great black beast, part bear and part serpent, that devours anyone who enters its land. It has lived there since before Borjeria was reclaimed from the darkness, and some primal evil taints its woods. Lords, paladins, priests and wizards have all faced the beast and fallen, unable to rid the land of its terrible evil.

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"South Of Corzu" means out of Corzu so we don't need to kill it before activating our regency magic, or is it simply a forest situated in the south of Corzu, and we do need to kill it?

Walked borders with Pischia, Kiscun and the Black Wood - only the Rogatica border remains.

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Looks like it might be the 'Black wood'.

 

[Walkir]

According to her the main reason for their poor equipment is the high tarrifs your family charges on river traffic, since they have to buy all their iron at prices that are double what would be normal in the more central parts of the kingdom.

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It seems we either want to cripple our neighbors or someone made a poor decision on the tariffs as far as elasticity of demand is concerned...

Looks like it might be the 'Black wood'.

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The Schwarzwald,why am I not surpirised. ,)

 

[Arkeus]

It seems we either want to cripple our neighbors or someone made a poor decision on the tariffs as far as elasticity of demand is concerned...

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This. So many things point to Nikolai maybe having an alliance with Rogatica that he is keeping secret. It's worrisome.

 

[ShaperV]

Update - May 1, Year 1​

Project Results

Dominic - Visit Castle Pisch & Walk the Borders
This turned into much more of an adventure than you expected, and ended up consuming all three of your projects for the month. However, you have now finished dealing with every border except the one with Rogatica. You've also gained quite a bit of practical experience in numerous skills. So, apparently adventures can give much faster advancement than training if they're dangerous enough…

Dominic - Research Flesh Sorcery (Healing)
This turns out to be a tricky field, and your initial ideas about bolstering the subject's life force or balancing disturbed humors don't seem to work. After a week of fruitless research you're nearly ready to give up when you happen to stumble across a completely different approach. It feels more like sculpting clay than healing, but you've found that you can cause small cuts to close up in a matter of minutes. This is fairly tiring, and it doesn't seem to actually repair all the internal damage caused by an injury, but could be an effective way to stop bleeding.

Bialas - Collect Taxes
Your knight grumbles a bit about spending the month squinting at records and counting pennies instead of leading troops, but he gets the job done. He reports collecting 974 SP, and there are another 28 families who owe payments at harvest time.

Dita - Training
Your cousin finishes training her Light Sorcery up to level 2, and then gets with Kat to investigate whether she can actually do something about purifying corruption. This research is such a resounding success that she suspects the hand of her goddess at work. Not only can Dita cleans Kat's wards of corruption, she's pretty sure she's actually banishing the fel energy back to whatever hell it came from instead of just dispersing it into the environment.

As a result, Kat's construction rate is now doubled whenever Dita is at the same location. Providing regular purification does not use up a project for Dita, it's a free effect she can provide to anyone nearby. Kat and Dita both think the speedup will get even bigger once they have a few months of practice with it, and get a better feel for what they can safely do and how to organize things efficiently.

But while this is all well and good, Dita is getting anxious for some physical training. She's determined to spend the next month working on combat skills of some kind, although she'll listen to your advice about what to study.

Jaroslaw - Train Rangers (Skill)
Your ranger training is finally complete.

Katiana - Construction
Kat apparently took your instructions to mean 'get ready to do the job right' rather than 'grab some guys and get right to work', which may or may not be what you meant.

At this point Kat has completed a survey of the current state of the keep, organized a 20-man work crew out of the labor tax you're owed, had them haul off a lot of the debris, recruited carpenters from Tamasi and Igal to supervise the woodwork, practiced purification methods with Dita, drawn up possible floorplans to use for the repaired keep, and shored up the stonework to make sure the place doesn't collapse while it's being worked on.

When you return from your adventures she presents you with a plan to complete the work using four months of her own time, another 140 man-months worth of labor tax and 115 SP in cash. You'll need to decide whether you want the renovated keep to have an internal layout meant to quarter a maximum number of troops, or one that gives you a proper audience hall and comfortable quarters for yourself and your important retainers.

Kat has also demonstrated her engineering skills by pointing out a number of other problems and possible projects for Corzu Keep (see Shaky Foundations, Tower Loft and Unstable Cellars in the status post).

Traian - Audit Tariff Collection
Your accountant writes to report that he encountered quite a bit of resentment and petty obstructionism during his stay in Eztergrom, but he's managed to reach an understanding with the harbormaster. Their recordkeeping is a bit shoddy, and he suspects there was some pocketing of funds going on before he arrived, but having an honest accountant on hand pretty much put a stop to it. He's been collecting Corzu's cut of the taxes at the end of each business day instead of waiting until the season is over, and currently has 1,350 SP waiting for you in a lockbox at the local bank. Licenses are still being sold, and he projects you'll end up with a bit over 1,500 SP

Investigation
Your limited investigation of Atalaya makes it clear that everyone who lives in Tamasi is terrified of her, but they seem to think they'll be cursed if they say anything. Mira actually starts crying when you remember she's from Tamasi and ask her about it, begging you not to make her talk because she 'don't wanna die like that'. Aldona shushes her urgently at that comment. But the next day, you notice that a single lock of Mira's hair has turned white…

Dita finds occasion to visit Tamasi in secret at some point during the month, and reports that Atalaya's house is suffused with black magic. She's pretty sure there's a powerful creature of supernatural evil that visits the place regularly, which has her a bit concerned about what will happen if you go after the apparent witch. She offers to ask Inovia to send one of her Chosen here to investigate, although she has no idea if her goddess would actually listen to such a request.

Other Events
Katiana provides the requested birth control magic with a knowing grin. But the spell she's familiar with isn't as convenient as you might like. It's a ward that prevents the woman it's cast on from conceiving, which takes ten minutes to set up and lasts about six weeks. But she doesn't know a version that works on men, so if you want to be safe Kat's going to end up knowing exactly who you're fooling around with.

Dita and Katiana have become friends during the course of the month, and you've caught Kat sharing gossip with Mira and Aldona a couple of times as well. Your mistresses seem to be in awe of the exotic foreign sorceress, but for some reason Kat has been going out of her way to be friendly with them.

Your peasants are all hard at work in the fields now, performing all the myriad tasks involved in getting the spring planting done. You should probably avoid calling in too much of the labor tax until they finish.

 

[fitzgerald]

ShaperV

Can Kat design the grainery?

 

[ShaperV]

ShaperV

Can Kat design the grainery?

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Yes, that's a pretty simple job. If you ask her to put a plan together she can have a construction cost for you next turn.

 

[Thomasfoolery]

Alright, here's a possible plan for next month, it basically finishes off the border riding, gets us started on the granary project which we need to finish before harvest if we want that extra 7,000 Sp, and locates the beastmen for a strike next turn, while building up some more forces to deal with them. Let me know if you think of any actions that could be improved on.

Dominic

Major actions
1) Walk the Rogatica border with the Baron
2) Recruit Seneschal
3) Train with Dita in swordsmanship

Minor Action
1) Send a letter to our father detailing our experience in Pisch, he can pass it up the chain if necessary.
2) Monitor Mira to see if you pick up any further changes. See if Kat knows what kind of methods could have been responsible for the change we noticed
3) Send a letter to Gavrilla to get an idea about when she's planning to stop by and any preliminary thoughts she might have, mention she may want to keep her eye open for male prospects as well, as Chesna will likely be heading down soon.
4) Ask Dita to try to call for a Chosen
5) Link up with Traian on the way back from recruiting a Seneschal for added security
6) Ask Katiana for any professional assessment she can give of the Dark Moon Well, Three Bells Tower, and Black Beast of the Wood, based upon her greater knowledge of magical phenomena and the rumors we've heard.

Dita
1) Training: Swordsmanship
2) Training: Swordsmanship

Kat
1) Plan Granary, begin construction

Sir Bialis
1) Recruit Troops (Spearmen, and replacements for our casualties if possible)

Jaroslaw
1) Recruit Troops (Spearmen)

Traian
1) Training: Engineering

Men at arms
1) 6 accompany Dominic, rest escort Traian home

Archers
1) 6 accompany Dominic, 4 escort Traian, Rest Garrison

Rangers
1) Hunt threat: Beastmen

 

[staplesdex2]

I'd also like to add some more actions for Dominic.

Major:
- Start Practicing on Force Magic
- Get a Majordomo to handle the domestic affairs back at the castle
- Get Kat to start working on the Grainary
- Deal with the situation with Atalaya, permanently

Minor:
- Send troops to escort Traian home.
- Research ways to make more profit
- Keep practicing Flesh Sorcery to see if he could make his own birth control magic
- Practice Seduction Technique to get Kat as a mistress

Reasons:
- We need to find ways to make more money.
- Atalaya seems to be a more apparent problem after some investigation and it's time to resolve the situation in a more permanent manner.
- I chose Force sorcery if only to be like a Jedi or a Sith with their fetish for choking out our opponents from a distance.
- Look at my sig for the last two.

 

[Thomasfoolery]

Added a minor action asking Dita to try to call up a chosen because why not, as for the rest, I suggest you check the front page to get a better idea how actions work.

 

[ShaperV]

A few comments on the above:

1) Kat doesn't need a whole action to plan the granary construction, she was just assuming you'd want ehr to keep on with the current project and look at that in her spare time. If you want her to start than now she can work up a plan and go right into starting on construction this turn, it just means you won't know exactly what the price tag will be in advance. But her rough estimate is that it'll be a bit less work than repairing the keep, and will probably take 3-4 months.

2) This world uses realistic melee combat, so unusual fantasy weapons like a 'chain whip' mostly don't exist and wouldn't actually work very well anyway. If you want a physical attack with a little range I recommend hand axes or thrown daggers.

3) Force choking would be a plausible application of Force Sorcery, but you'd probably have to deal with some annoying limitations like having line of sight to your target and managing to hit them with the effect.

4) You'll probably want to add a minor action sending some troops to escort Traian home with all that money. He only has four men with him, and 1500 SP is enough money to attract some pretty determined thieves if anyone figures out it's there.

 

[gryllidae]

You... You do realize chain whips are an actual weapon, right?
Like people actually used them. For fighting. In real life.

 

[Thomasfoolery]

snip

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Alright I've changed that up a bit to account for that, will starting granary construction not take to many peasants away from the planting? Also in general does our labor tax roughly amount to 1,000x2 months or so?

And once that's used up how much does it cost to pay them to work on projects?

 

[Silenteight]

As an alternative to training, Dominic and Dita could accompany the rangers on their hunting expedition. They may be able to gain some practical experience from it, and back on page 10 ShaperV said that Dita could increase the chance of success for hunting actions.

Kat can bless fields in the spring to increase productivity, and I think this month might be the last chance to do it this year.

Depending on what recruiting a castellan entails, Dominic might have to go into the city, so he might as well pick up Traian on the way.

 

[Silversun17]

I think we shoud take Dita, Kat and some of our rangers and use flaming arrows on that witches house.

 

[Thomasfoolery]

As an alternative to training, Dominic and Dita could accompany the rangers on their hunting expedition. They may be able to gain some practical experience from it, and back on page 10 ShaperV said that Dita could increase the chance of success for hunting actions.

Kat can bless fields in the spring to increase productivity, and I think this month might be the last chance to do it this year.

Depending on what recruiting a castellan entails, Dominic might have to go into the city, so he might as well pick up Traian on the way.

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Woodcraft isn't a combat skill though, also he said the rangers or Dita could increase the success, and since this is just an expedition to get an idea about where they're located rather than a full assault I don't think we need to be sending our characters along.

Linking up with Traian seems like a good idea and I'll add that in.

Kat basically needs to start work on the granary immediately if we want that finished in time for harvest though, so I don't think taking her off that is a good idea.

I think we shoud take Dita, Kat and some of our rangers and use flaming arrows on that witches house.

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Or we could wait and see if we can get a superhero to show up and make things much less risky for us, since everyone already agreed it was fine putting it on the back burner (nothing the investigation revealed was particularly surprising given what we already knew), I don't see why we should jump the gun now before seeing what Dita might be able to turn up. Also I'm wondering if the creature visiting her place might be the monster from the woods.

 

[staplesdex2]

I'm just worried that the witch might grow powerful enough to be a direct threat to us so I asked if she could be dealt with.

 

[fitzgerald]

@ ShaperV

Could Dita work on enfusing her weapons with light magic?

The idea is to work uptowards either arrows of light or a light sabre

 

[ShaperV]

You... You do realize chain whips are an actual weapon, right?
Like people actually used them. For fighting. In real life.

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It real life there isn't any such thing as a chain whip. Whips and chains are two different things, and you can't make a length of chain behave like a whip. Also, even if such a thing were possible it would be completely ineffective against enemies who wear armor, which is just about everyone you'd actually be worried about fighting. This is one reason whips were never commonly used as weapons (the others being that they're a lot better at inflicting pain than actual damage and you can't parry with them).

The major weapons used in Borjeria are bows, lances, spears and various polearms, swords, maces and sometimes flails.

Could Dita work on enfusing her weapons with light magic?

The idea is to work uptowards either arrows of light or a light sabre

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Dita's magic tends to want to act like actual light most of the time, rather than coalescing into stable shapes or infusing solid matter. It might be possible, but she's a little doubtful.

 

[Graig]

Would Dita be satisfied with training a magic based combat skill?

Light magic might be very useful for dealing with some of our haunt problems. I would probably suggest something like one action for a ranged light attack and another action for making her magic effective against intangible things we might want to deal with such as ghosts.

We have more urgent things to deal with than recruiting a Castellan and Dita is fully capable of training swordsmanship on her own. If we can't find anything better to do it might be a good idea to get our Diplomacy skill to level 2 before riding the border.

 

[Falconis]

Behold, the chain whip.

A more modern version

For the truly stylish Wushu practitioners

The Chain whip is a weapon used in real world martial arts, particularly Chinese martial arts styles both Modern and Traditional.
The weapon consists of several metal rods, which are joined end-to-end by rings to form a flexible chain which is swung like a whip to impale or slash targets a moderate distance away.

 

[Thomasfoolery]

Would Dita be satisfied with training a magic based combat skill?

Light magic might be very useful for dealing with some of our haunt problems. I would probably suggest something like one action for a ranged light attack and another action for making her magic effective against intangible things we might want to deal with such as ghosts.

We have more urgent things to deal with than recruiting a Castellan and Dita is fully capable of training swordsmanship on her own. If we can't find anything better to do it might be a good idea to get our Diplomacy skill to level 2 before riding the border.

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Our staff is now too large to function properly without a Castellan, so we do need to recruit one, added with the fact that he'll be very useful for many types of actions we have on our plate right now and in the future that are not efficient for our current retainers to do, and that it dovetails nicely with escorting Traian back, I think now is an excellent time to get one.

Also we wouldn't have Diplomacy leveled anyway, mini-turn events are done with what we have at the start of the turn, not the end, as we saw during the latest adventure.

Finally I do not believe Dita is capable of self study in this, as it was specifically mentioned earlier she needed someone to instruct her.

 

[staplesdex2]

I included a need for a majordomo in my list of orders. I chose the word because of personal taste but still has the same meaning.

 

[Arkeus]

When it comes to Dita, she has some Leadership but not Tactics, which is a combination that is rife for bad possibilities.

I would actually argue to have her train Tactics (possibly with Sir Bialiis as a teacher?) and then train swordmanship with us. Those are two things she really needs to improve in.

As for chain-whips, yeah, they are actually real weapons in real life. Not like i think they would be good to use here, especially as there is no one to teach us how to use them.

Oh, and a question for ShaperV: Apparently we lose training if we don't follow it up in the next few following months right? does this mean we have to hurry and continue everything our adventure gave us, or is the timeline for losing training amounts forgivable?

 

[Walkir]

15 veteran men-at-arms (Skill 2, Discipline 3, Equipment 2) – 8 SP/turn
20 green archers (Skill 2, Discipline 1 [+1/4], Equipment 1) – 7 SP/turn
10 rangers (Skill 2, Discipline 2, Equipment 1) – 5 SP/turn

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Shouldn't we train the archers up to the next Discipline level? It's already started, after all.
And with another 1,500 SP expected on top of the 1,019 we currently have, getting all of them Equipment 2 should be easy as well.

Edit:

Oh shit...

Shaky Foundations - Katiana reports that much of the north wall is suffering from serious foundation damage, and is likely to collapse easily if it's ever attacked by siege engines. Normally the only way to repair this would be to pull the wall down and build a new one, but Kat can use her earth magic to repair the damage at a cost of 1 month of her time.
Tower Loft - Kat currently plans to leave the top of the keep with a bare, flat surface just like it was originally build, but this will be prone to leaks and isn't terribly useful. As an alternative she could put up a sloped roof of slate, adding about two storeys to the height of the keep and creating an enclosed area that could be used for storage or additional living space. This would take her an extra month, and cost 20 man-months of labor tax and 30 SP cash.
Unstable Cellars - The cellars beneath Corzu Keep have not been used in decades, and Kat reports there are several areas that are a bit unstable. She can repair the damage with two weeks of work, 10 man-months of labor tax and 10 SP cash, which will ensure nothing collapses when you start restocking your siege stores and otherwise using the space.

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The walls, meh, but the cellars might become a problem... Also sound pretty cheap.
The granary still is more important, though. Maybe repair the cellars half a month and plan the granary the rest of it?

 

[staplesdex2]

Before I deleted my suggestion for Dominic to wield a chain whip, I was referring to this Combat Cross to see if it is feasible here and the GM said no.

 

[Walkir]

For the orders, I propose the following cvhanges:

Kat
(1 week due to Dita's influence) repair the cellars
(3 weeks) Plan Granary, begin construction

Traian
1) Purchase the wagons and boats necessary for the harvest scheme
Also get that lockbox
If possible in the same turn as he's already at the harbor, get better equipment for our troops.

Archer training should wait until after we recruited replacements ion case they lower it... and needs Bialis unoccupied, anyway.

But yeah, a Majordmous is a good idea.

 

[Thomasfoolery]

For the orders, I propose the following cvhanges:

Kat
(1 week due to Dita's influence) repair the cellars
(3 weeks) Plan Granary, begin construction

Traian
1) Purchase the wagons and boats necessary for the harvest scheme
Also get that lockbox
If possible in the same turn as he's already at the harbor, get better equipment for our troops.

Archer training should wait until after we recruited replacements ion case they lower it... and needs Bialis unoccupied, anyway.

But yeah, a Majordmous is a good idea.

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The cellar has kept for decades, as long as we don't start stocking it up before repairing it I don't see the rush.

Traian will be bringing the cash back regardless, but better equipment sounds like a good possibility to check on

@ShaperV, how much would it cost to upgrade our units to equipment two, and is that the sort of thing we could do in house once we recruit an expanded retinue of craftsmen?

I would actually argue to have her train Tactics (possibly with Sir Bialiis as a teacher?) and then train swordmanship with us. Those are two things she really needs to improve in.

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She wants to learn physical combat skills, and if she wants any practical use out them soon they need focused investment, plus she's unlikely to be leading a squad in the near future, so tactics can wait in my opinion.

 

[Arkeus]

She wants to learn physical combat skills, and if she wants any practical use out them soon they need focused investment, plus she's unlikely to be leading a squad in the near future, so tactics can wait in my opinion.

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getting Tactics 1 is a single training action- it is definitely worth it, as her leading men is actually very likely given she has leadership already. Not only that, but given her charms/leadership people are going to look at her regardless. Having her knows what to do is stupidly important.

As a potential epic hero Tactic is so much more important than just a single action back on swordmanship. I still want her to ALSO get swordmanship this turn, but priorities, man.

 

[Walkir]

She already has leadership 1, so yeah. Let's switch one action of hers to training tactics.

 

[Thomasfoolery]

getting Tactics 1 is a single training action- it is definitely worth it, as her leading men is actually very likely given she has leadership already. Not only that, but given her charms/leadership people are going to look at her regardless. Having her knows what to do is stupidly important.

As a potential epic hero Tactic is so much more important than just a single action back on swordmanship. I still want her to ALSO get swordmanship this turn, but priorities, man.

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Priorities? Look at how many possible units we have to send out, then look at possible leaders, there's already three people on the shortlist ahead of her to be tapped, and she's almost always going to be deployed with one of them, you're really reaching here I feel.

Taking one of her actions off swordsmanship also means three months minimum until payout, rather than two.