Homebrew tabletop game system thread the II

[Panzersharkcat]

(OOC: PMed you the plan I thought up. Anyway, I was asked a while back as to the story of how Alfred survived the Striking Phoenix. I suppose him not being involved will have to do.)

He complies, fuming the whole way.

[Simon_Jester]

OOC:

I don't know, I can honestly believe a small detachment of the Twentieth having been defeated- it's not like they're immortal or never lose fights. But the most realistic outcome, if you do, say, overpower a squad, is that something much nastier comes looking and Alfred would have been running for his life. Better work that out with ECR.

IC:

So, they find some place no one's actually doing anything in right this moment.

"All right, now why don't you tell me what's going on, and why you think that the woman who commands the scariest army I've ever heard of decided to frame your cousin for murder? I know you're a man of rank, milord, meaning no disrespect, but I'd have done a good deal more bowing and scraping if I knew your family was that high up."

OOC MK II:

What Larric is unsubtly trying to get across (presumably after Alfred explains what the hell is going on) is that the whole thing, as Alfred interprets it, makes no damn sense. If Calvern wants someone dead or discredited, she really doesn't need to be subtle about it. Given the state of the county, there's very little stopping her from showing up at the head of a small flying column of her best troops and simply killing them all personally. About the only things I can think of that might stop her are "I don't want to travel all that way" and "there's something more exciting to do over here."

I'm sure she's capable of subtlety, mind you, but at the moment she's got more than enough brute force to make do without it.

So aside from the fact that the horrible news about Calvern being made Countess of Auvaine reaching us at the same time that Alfred finds out that his cousin is in trouble, is there any evidence to explain why he thinks this is true? What would she possibly stand to gain from removing a handful of mildly competent former underlings of a baron whose entire standing army she could hack and blast aside in an afternoon?

Is it not more likely that Ridebert himself is right, and that the plot is a relatively local affair cooked up by other people who used to be high in the baron's councils, scheming for purely local power, when they had no idea at all that this appointment was going to happen?

[Panzersharkcat]

"I admit I have nothing to go on but a gut feeling that this is not coincidence that news of her appointment comes at the same time that scapegoats for the potential removal of a rival are named. I will heed your words, however, and wait for proof of her involvement." He gives the letter back to Larric and goes off for food.

(OOC: If I understand correctly, the baron deVerett was assassinated and the murder pinned on Ridebert and the others. The baron was of some amount of power and would have been a potential rival to the Countess, even if not a militarily powerful one compared to the Striking Phoenix. Meanwhile, deTrick, the guy we need to deliver Radulf to, is off in the hills somewhere and Rohal is delivering things to him.

Anyway, I'll go work out Alfred's background with ECR. Maybe just taking out a squad or two of the Striking Phoenix with camouflaged troops before deciding he's getting in too deep and getting the Hell out of there.)

[Simon_Jester]

OOC:

This is worse than the "what forest" incident!

I don't have time to explain how mixed up this is. I'll get back to this later.

[Panzersharkcat]

(OOC: Yes, that would be much appreciated.)

[Kaelan]

Is William the only one who thinks this is great news?

You must admit that it is a perverse sense of justice that makes the person who wrecked the place is given the job of putting it back together again. I doubt she’s going to be allowed to keep her entire forces in the area as an elite unit such as the twentieth is bound to be tasked to other locations for other work instead of general government and peacekeeping.

Given the fact that Auvaine is about as popular as a rat in a royal kitchen her local attrition rate is going to be horrendous as she moves into a police action. No doubt as countess her superiors are going to be expecting results and progress at regular intervals. Ignoring the area as it turns into a political local quagmire of civil disputes and banditry is going to go down just as badly and raising the entire area to the ground. We (the local population) may not have the ability to contest the striking phoenix, but I have no doubt that her superiors who placed her here do.

After decimating the ruling class and the tendency of the local population to head for the hills as soon as she is seen she’s going to have a very hard time ruling effectively from upfront. She’s lost the PR battle before it even begun. Virtually everything is going to have to go through local emissaries to have any real chance of being effective. We already know that the elves have fractions that are stirring things up in the area.
William’s more than happy to be an ‘assistant’ to our new ‘beloved’ countess in return for cash & titles down the line. I think Larric would like the backing of imperial gold as well to fund his research. How does the party feel about a trip to pay our respects to our new countess once we’ve settled events here with Radulf and the local Baron.

[Agent Sorchus]

Just a heads up this week got unexpectedly full of things to do. Doubt I'll have anything at all this week, but I might on friday or Saturday. I just don't know yet.

[Kaelan]

OOC
Looks like we're going to be on pause until the weekend then. No problem of that from this end. I'll most likely wait for ECR to post before I post any more replies, unless somebody starts asking me questions.

[Panzersharkcat]

(OOC: Maybe. Alfred is none too happy about her crushing of the ruling class or whatever and he wrongly suspects her of being involved in framing his cousin. He's more likely to try to assassinate her even if it will undoubtedly end up badly for him and his family. That said, he'd probably prefer to lead a guerrilla movement against her when he's strong enough and acquire enough influence, with retreating in straight up battles against them to make them a bit overconfident for the plan I have in my head. I've only told Simon_Jester and FeralGnoll the rough idea I have for trying to take on the Striking Phoenix when we're strong enough.)

[Simon_Jester]

OOC:

I will go over the situation as ECR's described it in a few more hours.

(OOC: Maybe. Alfred is none too happy about her crushing of the ruling class or whatever and he wrongly suspects her of being involved in framing his cousin. He's more likely to try to assassinate her even if it will undoubtedly end up badly for him and his family. That said, he'd probably prefer to lead a guerrilla movement against her when he's strong enough and acquire enough influence, with retreating in straight up battles against them to make them a bit overconfident for the plan I have in my head. I've only told Simon_Jester and FeralGnoll the rough idea I have for trying to take on the Striking Phoenix when we're strong enough.)

IC, Larric thinks this is complete, utter lunacy and will try to talk Alfred out of it.

OOC, I think this is complete, utter lunacy and will try to talk Panzersharkcat out of it.

It's always fun when player and character have every reason to agree with each other on the proper course of action.

Is William the only one who thinks this is great news?

You must admit that it is a perverse sense of justice that makes the person who wrecked the place is given the job of putting it back together again. I doubt she’s going to be allowed to keep her entire forces in the area as an elite unit such as the twentieth is bound to be tasked to other locations for other work instead of general government and peacekeeping.

Given the fact that Auvaine is about as popular as a rat in a royal kitchen her local attrition rate is going to be horrendous as she moves into a police action. No doubt as countess her superiors are going to be expecting results and progress at regular intervals. Ignoring the area as it turns into a political local quagmire of civil disputes and banditry is going to go down just as badly and raising the entire area to the ground. We (the local population) may not have the ability to contest the striking phoenix, but I have no doubt that her superiors who placed her here do.

After decimating the ruling class and the tendency of the local population to head for the hills as soon as she is seen she’s going to have a very hard time ruling effectively from upfront. She’s lost the PR battle before it even begun. Virtually everything is going to have to go through local emissaries to have any real chance of being effective. We already know that the elves have fractions that are stirring things up in the area.

Most of this is exactly what I was thinking. If you're the fire-breathing dragon-oligarchs of a giant magical empire, there's a certain appeal in demanding that Calvern clean up her own mess.

On the other hand, do remember that she's still an insanely powerful being who's used to using extreme violence to solve her problems, and who's probably better at blowing things up than she is at politics. So all is not well in the county, even if we're not as totally doomed as some might think.

William’s more than happy to be an ‘assistant’ to our new ‘beloved’ countess in return for cash & titles down the line. I think Larric would like the backing of imperial gold as well to fund his research. How does the party feel about a trip to pay our respects to our new countess once we’ve settled events here with Radulf and the local Baron.

Let's say we cross that bridge when we come to it.

[Panzersharkcat]

(OOC: Eh, I've kind of lost my enthusiasm for taking them on for now, even if Alfred has not, what with me remembering that Alfred is not a Gauss minigun-wielding powered armor trooper capable of destroying an army of powered armor troopers single-handedly alongside a nigh-invulnerable mutant also with a Gauss minigun. I'd probably reserve fighting the Striking Phoenix for a few years down the line, which would probably be long after this campaign is over.)

[Simon_Jester]

OOC:

Sorry, man. It's just that you gotta remember which NPCs are too badass to fight at your present level, and save them for later.

Semi-OOC:

"I admit I have nothing to go on but a gut feeling that this is not coincidence that news of her appointment comes at the same time that scapegoats for the potential removal of a rival are named. I will heed your words, however, and wait for proof of her involvement." He gives the letter back to Larric and goes off for food.

(OOC: If I understand correctly, the baron deVerett was assassinated and the murder pinned on Ridebert and the others. The baron was of some amount of power and would have been a potential rival to the Countess, even if not a militarily powerful one compared to the Striking Phoenix. Meanwhile, deTrick, the guy we need to deliver Radulf to, is off in the hills somewhere and Rohal is delivering things to him.

[inigo]Let me explain. No, there is too much. Let me sum up.[/inigo]

When the Striking Phoenix came, brave Baron DeVerett bravely ran away, brave brave brave brave DeVerett. He ran away with lots of his best knights, and some wizards, and a bunch of peasants. Probably enough to beat anything, short of the Striking Phoenix or some other horrible giant fiery-death monster.

No one's heard from him in a long time. We don't know where he went. If he's dead, we don't know that, and we certainly don't know who killed him.

However, DeVerett didn't leave any one strong man who could take over the barony in his absence. He left a lot of posturing political toadies. He doesn't have an heir to run the barony, either- his wife is dead, he has a pile of cousins and step brothers to bicker over the succession. Supposedly one of his mistresses has his bastard son, and supposedly the other mistress is pregnant with his child. There's no proof of either child's paternity.

Now, reread dear cousin Ridebert's post closely. Also the bottom of this post.

I'm not sure whether it was the mistress with the child, or the pregnant mistress, but the assassin tried to kill one of them. The assassin then told all kinds of stories about who sent him to do it and so on, casting suspicion on a heap of people, including dear cousin Ridebert.

Ridebert himself seems like a competent man, who is frustrated at the number of incompetent toadies and fools trying to grab power in the barony in deVerett's absence. Flip side of that, they want him (and all the troublesome second-in-commands and whatnot) out of the way of their political games. Which is why a lot of those people were accused of being behind the assassination, of trying to kill the baron's bastard son.

Of course, there's the possibility that he's lying, and he really was behind it.


There is no reason to suppose that Johanna Calvern had anything to do with this. Think about it- she's coming in from gods-know-where foreign lands, and suddenly she's got a county to run. Why would she want to kill off meddlesome but competent people of low rank? Instead of, say, promoting them to run things because they already know where to find everything? And why would she even give a fuck about the baron's supposed bastard son? She needs barons to rule under her just as badly as the old count did, maybe worse.


Finally, Sir Detrick Lautern (his name is not deTrick, or de Trick, or anything like that) was one of the subordinates of baron deVerett, who's been doing most of the actual running things since the baron ran away. Catarin wanted Radulf taken to him, because she trusts Detrick to actually give a crap about what goes on in the southern part of the barony. Thinking about it, Larric (for example) agrees with her, although not for precisely the same reasons.

If we want the troubles of the southern part of the barony solved, Radulf must be brought to the attention of someone who will defend the southern part of the barony. Sir Detrick is the most likely candidate. Rohal went off with a message to deliver to him, which he has read, and will be coming back later in this very same day that we just got this horrible message about Calvern being made countess.

[Simon_Jester]

IC:

Alfred wanders off to go eat something... just before the wave of people coming out of the Great Hall demand to know what the hell was in that note. Larric hands it to the nearest of them with a look of disgust, then says "he left it with me, here, you read it to them."

Then Larric stalks off too, trying to get back to his gear- he has to operate on the pretense that life will go on, because otherwise, what's the point?

[Panzersharkcat]

(OOC: Alright. Thanks for the explanation. If you read Darths and Droids, I think I'd be like Jim, who plays Qui-Gon for Episode I, who tries to fight everything and gives out hilariously wrong explanations for the setting.

TC-14: It's an honour to have two such illustrious Jedi ambassadors on board.
Obi-Wan: "Jedi"?
Qui-Gon: It's a type of cheese.

I assume tackling the Striking Phoenix right now would be the equivalent of fighting level 30 Enclave troopers wearing power armor and equipped with Gauss rifles while at level 3 equipped with the equivalent of a dinky 10mm pistol and a leather jacket. God, the memories of Fallout 2 and being killed in two shots by random Enclave patrols.)

[Simon_Jester]

OOC:

Panzer, to respond to each of your sentences in succession:

You're welcome. De nada. Yes, you're like Jim. Yes, fighting the Striking Phoenix right now would be like fighting guys ten times our level and with gear that makes our stuff look like pointy sticks. Yes, they could kill us in two shots. If we're lucky.

[Feralgnoll]

OOC: you all make me laugh little wolfy laughs all the way back to your location.

[Eleventh Century Remnant]

I am back, and I am not dead, although it was a close run thing at times. Good show, great place, even if the parking wardens are small minded jobsworth obsessives. (grrr...)

Right, let me start making sense of this from the beginning.

The Striking Phoenix started off seriously outnumbered, and quite conservatively; as they gelled into a unit and realised exactly what they could do and what risks they could exect to take and get away with, they started to push more, break up into smaller units on parallel lines of advance, fight multiple actions widely separated at once, take greater chances-
mostly boldness paid off, but there's always the reverse of the medal, inevitably there were some bridges too far, subunits that bit off more than they could chew, went head on at something they should have fenced with. (I have an org chart somewhere, regiment breaks down into multiple batallions and batallion equivalents like the air component and the artillery, past that it's Squadron, Troop, Arvan- that last being ten to twelve troopers, squad equivalent.)

Being part of one or two actions like that doesn't stretch credibility too far. Although it does mean I have to go into slightly more detail about how they did it and what Alfred would have noticed. There are actually a lot of heads being scratched about this at the moment, most of all by the Authrani Army who know how the unit was supposed to be set up, and it wasn't supposed to have anything like that many wizards, especially ones prepared to charge in with the lance.

DeVerett wasn't assassinated, the attempt was on his mistress and multiple people were blamed, Simon has the right of it- although you would probably all be better off in the long run if he had been. I know roughly what decisions he's going to make, you should be able to guess a lot of it from the kind of man I'm trying to portray him as being, and the kind of person he keeps around him.


William has a fine nose for the politics, that's what I can say so far. Likely only the HQ Guard Squadron would be kept with her.
Rough idea as to how good they are, bearing in mind the quirks of the system and that superior tactics and superior skill are often a better defence than superior thickness of metal;
being a Cataphract unit (or the Authrani version of it) they are mounted ranged and close combat both, composite bow, lance and sword, and used the old mongol trick of having more than one horse (or war boar) per trooper, switching from tired to fresh as needed- in a running fight all the chances are with them; in a close quarters fight a line trooper could be expected to be about the equal of a veteran knight- daunting odds but not unbeatable, and the fights they tended to lose tended to be when bloodlust overwhelmed cunning and they pushed in for the kill too soon.

[Simon_Jester]

DeVerett wasn't assassinated, the attempt was on his mistress and multiple people were blamed, Simon has the right of it- although you would probably all be better off in the long run if he had been. I know roughly what decisions he's going to make, you should be able to guess a lot of it from the kind of man I'm trying to portray him as being, and the kind of person he keeps around him.

At a guess, he is at heart a toady and a trimmer when confronted with superior force. If so, he'll suck up to the Countess and probably make it too effortless for her to hurt the citizenry nominally under his care. Not quite a Quisling or a Laval, but close enough to get some blackening on his name if someone presses him to it.

Please don't answer that speculation, ECR; it would spoil the surprise if I'm wrong and depress me if I'm right.

Rough idea as to how good they are, bearing in mind the quirks of the system and that superior tactics and superior skill are often a better defence than superior thickness of metal;
being a Cataphract unit (or the Authrani version of it) they are mounted ranged and close combat both, composite bow, lance and sword, and used the old mongol trick of having more than one horse (or war boar) per trooper, switching from tired to fresh as needed- in a running fight all the chances are with them; in a close quarters fight a line trooper could be expected to be about the equal of a veteran knight- daunting odds but not unbeatable, and the fights they tended to lose tended to be when bloodlust overwhelmed cunning and they pushed in for the kill too soon.

Let me see...

That plus the magical support- so I'm picturing, I don't know, medieval cavalry on par with Byzantine cataphracts (including the sophisticated tactical manual, even if it isn't always followed)... but with Napoleonic horse artillery in tow.

Very dangerous if you let them dance and pound you from a distance, and capable of obliterating anyone dumb enough to charge their own formed and prepared ranks, but if they charge you you have a decent chance, because it stops looking like Victoria's troops Maxim-gunning dervishes at Omdurman, and looks more like the 21st Lancers charging dervish spearmen... while waving their own swords and spears, to make it a fair fight.

Which makes Alfred's premise that the secret is to lure them into a trap good if whoever's in charge of the unit takes the bait, which is not a given and becomes steadily less likely as the size of the unit and the seniority of its commander goes up.

[Panzersharkcat]

(OOC: To be specific about the plan I had, it was to make a tactical retreat into a booby-trapped city rigged to explode, luring the Striking Phoenix there and blowing it up. During the whole retreat, there were supposed to be snipers set up to pick away at enemy officers to hopefully sow some disorganization among their ranks. It's basically how the NCR defeated Caesar's Legion at the First Battle of Hoover Dam. What I didn't mention to Simon_Jester was the fact that I wanted to engage the Striking Phoenix a few times before that, retreating every time to lull them into a false sense of confidence. That has its own dangers, such as my own troops panicking and turning it into a real retreat or being taken down during one of the fake retreats.)

[Eleventh Century Remnant]

In terms of what actually happens- Rohal arrives back at about this time, passing a man in a fancy doublet galloping for his life away from the castle;

The note is grabbed by one of the knights of the castle, who looks at it, takes it in and hands it on as quickly as he can as if it was poisonous; the news passes urgently, and it's interesting to watch who flushes angry red and who goes deathly pale.
Almost no-one of rank agrees with William in thinking it's good news, although there are a couple of hotheads eager for a rematch; especaily those who missed the action the first time around.

this is going to be the major event of the day, people are going to be wandering around finding out what everyone else thinks about this for the next few hours- an outbreak of mutual espionage and fear.

On the bright side, expect house prices to go down.

Asking about it, there is actually a class gradient; the yeomanry seem to share William's ideas most, and there is one semi- retired centenar (yes, that is what it sounds like- a commander of a group of a nominal hundred men at arms, usually a personal retainer of the baron or his seneschal, in this case in deVerett's father's time) who came out to defend his home, apparently succeeded, who is willing to talk about it.

'Oddest, maddest thing I ever did see. Wasn't all green bastards, you know- there were a fair few pointy ears as well, although usually not in the same unit. Most of the animals should have been eating each other, so should some of the troopers. How she got them all trained and working together was probably the biggest act of magic of the lot.
Gods, they were proud- I'd say cocky but they could back it up. Even when we got lucky enough to get few enough of them and enough of you, we paid in blood.

Now she's in charge? Well, right of conquest- and I have to admit I'd rather be on her side than against. I don't know how much her own side would forgive her, though; holding together a mob like that is something.'


Alfred's plan is...interesting. I don't think his History is good enough to really know much about the War of Liberation, but anyone who does could certainly confirm that as they fell back in retreat the Terminal Empire, the Black Towers, did have a very impressive line in boobytraps- although mostly thaumaturgical.

[Simon_Jester]

IC:

Larric is trying to get his own affairs squared away early enough in the day to be finished before Sir Detrick could plausibly come back. He doesn't know exactly how long that will take, either, so he's picking up the pace. Get the stuff over to Maker Wright's (heh), explain once again that there's nothing in there that should be explodable, and that he generally tries to avoid explodability even under normal conditions, and that he'll be happy to lend a hand with the boatmaking work.

There, that's taken care of. Then back to the temple complex to make sure Alfred doesn't decide to declare war on the birds of the air or the great fish-squid-things of the deep too, while he's at it.

OOC:

In this setting, I'd think it's usually safest to substitute magic for chemical explosives anyway- they can't be detonated while still on your person by someone sneaky and mean-spirited. What would have happened to us, for example, if we'd been carrying several pounds of gunpowder between us and Dleamthayaran had the ability to make fire at a distance?

On a completely different note, it occurs to me that in one rather black-mood way, mid-winter might actually have been a good time of year for the Twentieth's attack for us: they hit after the harvest was in, but with months to go before the spring planting so there's some hope of restoring enough order in advance to make that possible. The food distribution network, such as it is, is a shambles, but unless the Twentieth went out of their way to hit granaries, there wouldn't be a net shortage of food.

Although a shortage of shelter is no doubt bad enough- Kuquan isn't cold enough for major rivers to freeze over, but I'm sure there's enough sleet and snow to make life miserable for anyone who doesn't have access to decent, semipermanent shelters.

[Eleventh Century Remnant]

You've been peeking at my notes somehow, haven't you? How did you find out about the tropical islander elves and their trained riding squid?
Spoiler

Actually that bit is entirely true, although they do bear about as much relation to an ordinary architeuthys dux as a Percheron does to a Przewalskii's Horse, being larger, longer lived and able to spend much longer periods running at high speed on the waterjet; they make excellent blockade runners, although it's likely to be some time before the group have anything to do with them.

The news spreads like wildfire, and Maker Wright has already heard it by the time Larric gets there; the temple/yard is in a panic, as he has just announced his grand plan; houseboats. 'We have a lake, we have trees, and I don't know why we didn't come up with it earlier. With her in charge- and it is true, isn't it? It's terrible enough to be true, nobody would make that up would they? Not even Elnur is that irresponsible.

Perhaps I'm getting carried away with the idea but it really does seem the best way to build something that we stand a chance of not having to rebuild straight away- to get people out of the line of fire. We'll need all the help we can get, and you and your friends, well, don't let anyone talk you into being a hero. Too many who were who we could have used now, and after that business at the tower, you probably look too much like a hero for your own good.'

[Simon_Jester]

IC:

Perhaps I'm getting carried away with the idea but it really does seem the best way to build something that we stand a chance of not having to rebuild straight away- to get people out of the line of fire. We'll need all the help we can get, and you and your friends, well, don't let anyone talk you into being a hero. Too many who were who we could have used now, and after that business at the tower, you probably look too much like a hero for your own good.'

Larric agrees, makes a note of it, and heads back to the complex, as noted.

OOC:

Kind of waiting on others- my stuff is done and I'm trying to find out what the rest of the party is up to for a change...

[Panzersharkcat]

Alfred, after eating, is emptying his body of waste products. He'd prefer to not shit his pants if he dies in battle, after all. After that's done, he'll go see if he can interrogate the prisoner.

(OOC: Substituting lots of gunpowder of a very powerful mage capable of making such a large explosion would be a bit wasteful since I could just have the mage blow up the whole 20th Cataphract while they're assembled for battle. That way, I wouldn't need to worry about blowing up a whole city. Mind you, that's not the only idea I have. Trying to pull an Austerlitz is up there, too, in the realm of fancy but impractical plans.)

[Eleventh Century Remnant]

The best way to do real damage to them is probably going to be to convince their high command that they've gone too far. Political weapons, those they are relatively vulnerable to. Huge explosions- well, nobody's immune to a big enough bang, but making it a surprise would be the really hard part.

Getting into the dungeons is surprisingly difficult; the guards have heard, and they have barricaded themelves in and they say they're not coming out. It's relatively safe down here- they don't want to go out where there are monsters like Colonel- Countess, now- Calvern roaming around.

There is much shouting occurring in the keep above, which isn't helping much- it certainly sounds like something is imminent, as the dispute shakes itself out between those who feel the need for vengeance, those who feel obliged to try, and those who prefer life.

Alfred does manage to get them to let him in, by force of pulling rank and threats- she's not here at this precise moment, but he is.

The assassin, supposedly, is not far off the sort of being Ridebert described- a scrote and troublemaker, thin, pale skinned, stringy hair, spotty, badly patched tunic; the idea that he could be trusted to get anything right looks far fetched, although there is a lurking foulness about him that suggests he would be perfectly willing to burn a woman alive in her bed.

What sort of interrogation did you have in mind?