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Completed [LP] Bleed for your Kingdom, officer! Codex plays Guns of Infinity
- Thread starter Lithium Flower
- Start date
LordTryhard
Novice
- Joined
- Jul 7, 2018
- Messages
- 55
So, to explain what went wrong there:
Basically, you have four options on where to deploy your Squadrons:
-Clear the Walls (given to you automatically by Marcus)
-Assign Flank Guards (requires 50 Intellect in order to be available)
-Send Men To Guide Reinforcements (requires 50 Soldiering in order to be available)
-Order remaining men to support the main attack (automatically attaches all unassigned Squadrons to Marcus.)
The optimal approach would have been to send Third Squadron to clear the Walls (you did right there), First Squadron to guide reinforcements (which even someone with 5% Intellect can handle), and your own Squadron to guard the flanks (or in this case support the main attack, since guarding the flanks wasn't an option.) Assigning flank guards basically stops the flanking attack in its tracks, and assigning guides for reinforcements allow the reinforcements to arrive quicker. These decisions directly impact how many losses you take.
Had you assigned a Squadron to guide reinforcements, or to protect the flanks, you would have also gotten some additional dialogue with Marcus, and the opportunity to boost your relationship with him.
Oh, they're not going to relax, they're running off to pillage.
---
Also, for anyone else who is interested, I'm pretty sure Options 1 and 4 are crossed out because our ruthlessness isn't high enough.
Basically, you have four options on where to deploy your Squadrons:
-Clear the Walls (given to you automatically by Marcus)
-Assign Flank Guards (requires 50 Intellect in order to be available)
-Send Men To Guide Reinforcements (requires 50 Soldiering in order to be available)
-Order remaining men to support the main attack (automatically attaches all unassigned Squadrons to Marcus.)
The optimal approach would have been to send Third Squadron to clear the Walls (you did right there), First Squadron to guide reinforcements (which even someone with 5% Intellect can handle), and your own Squadron to guard the flanks (or in this case support the main attack, since guarding the flanks wasn't an option.) Assigning flank guards basically stops the flanking attack in its tracks, and assigning guides for reinforcements allow the reinforcements to arrive quicker. These decisions directly impact how many losses you take.
Had you assigned a Squadron to guide reinforcements, or to protect the flanks, you would have also gotten some additional dialogue with Marcus, and the opportunity to boost your relationship with him.
Oh, they're not going to relax, they're running off to pillage.
---
Also, for anyone else who is interested, I'm pretty sure Options 1 and 4 are crossed out because our ruthlessness isn't high enough.
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2. To deny our men their more bestial urges is deny them the pleasure of victory and war. They do not have our sense of duty, and so must be motivated in other ways. The velvet touch must alternate with the whip or the whip is all they shall know. And when it is done remind them that it was YOU who loosened their bonds.
In stat term I think it means losing in discipline and gaining in morale and/or loyalty.
LordTryhard
Novice
- Joined
- Jul 7, 2018
- Messages
- 55
Option 1 is basically you taking the time to fill your own pockets, while with Option 4 you threaten to execute your own men if they decide to loot. If you've been playing the series as a soft idealistic marshmallow up until this point, I guess the author considers it out-of-character for you to take either of those actions.
On a side note, if you have high enough Discipline (or it could be Loyalty - I don't remember, because I usually do the Forlorn Hope with Caius), your men will actually stop and ask for your permission before they run off to loot, instead of simply running off without orders like they're doing now.
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Lithium Flower
Arcane
- Joined
- Nov 29, 2016
- Messages
- 1,832
You try appeals to their better nature, you try appeals to reason, to discipline, then finally to dire threats.
Nothing works.
With every word, more of your men run off. With every second, those who remain grow fewer in number.
At last, only a loyal few stand by you.
-
With only a few men left to you, your safety within Kharangia's walls is hardly guaranteed. While it is possible that a few holdouts still mount a defence, you are rather more worried about the chaos and destruction set loose by men from your own army. Already, you can see the dim flickers of fires rising from the buildings to the flanks of the square.
No, the only real course of action is to head back out of the city and return to the camp. A quick look behind you swiftly disabuses you of the notion of going out the way you came in. The breach is packed with soldiers rushing through its narrow confines. The rest of the army has smelled the blood of the fallen city, and they hasten to rip away their own prizes from the savaged carcass.
Only the city's gates remain as viable points of exit. That means you shall have to move your men through the chaotic maelstrom of the sack to reach one which might still be defended by the enemy.
So, resigned to the least uncertain of a handful of terrible options, you and your small knot of loyal subordinates begin to pick your way through the gloom.
-
The trip through the streets of Kharangia is a stroll through a gallery of nightmares. With every few steps, you come across some new scene of cruelty and depravity, like oil paintings done in hellish tones by the black fog of the powder and the orange glare of the spreading fires.
There, you see an old man held down by leering figures in Kentauri uniforms. "Hol' im down! Hol' im down!" one shouts over the struggling wretch's screams, as he raises the butt of his musket high and brings it down with a sickening crack on the helpless civilian's teeth. One of the Highlanders reaches into the wailing ruin, grinning cruelly as he draws out a single speck of gold, shining in the filthy light.
Another few steps finds a knot of infantrymen, swaggering and smelling of drink as they smash open a door. There are screams as the leaderless gang in Tierran uniform rush inside, at first high and terrified, then sobbing, regular, hopeless.
Then, there is a pair of men in the grey-green of the Dragoons, their tunics blood-splattered and their helms askew. They restrain a battered, bleeding couple in what had once been fine fur cloaks. A third screams at them, demanding the locations of gold and silver. The Antari, terrified and uncomprehending, only shake their heads and blubber in fear, causing their interrogator to scream louder. With every failed exchange, the dragoons holding their prisoners strike them with the hilts of their sabres, adding fresh cuts and welts to their hapless prisoners.
By the time you finally find a gate, the air is filled with a thousand sounds of soldiers reduced to animals and a populace reduced to victims. Every breath is filled with the stench of death, of booze, and of the fires which ravage the city's buildings even as Havenport's rabid army ravages its people.
You find yourself much distraught by what you see.
Over the years, you have known your share of cruelty and brutality. You thought that you had seen the very limits of man's depravity. Now, to bear witness to horrors an order of magnitude greater conducted by men serving the same sovereign, even wearing the same uniforms, and upon a defenceless citizenry…
It is atrocity, travesty, injustice of the highest order…
…and you did nothing at all to stop it.
-
The city is almost entirely ablaze when the rains finally come.
It is not a cleansing downpour like the sort in faerie stories; the first drops come down black as ink, having fallen through the filth of the powder-fog and smoke, only to drop onto the fallen city and leave sooty tracks down the shattered stone and on men's faces.
They are the heralds of a downpour to come, the first of the autumn rains and the end of the campaigning season.
Yet this year, they come a day too late for the people of Kharangia, for though the fires begin to die under the black downpour, the sack continues. The soft sound of rain is drowned out by the unending cacophony of splintering wood, cruel laughter, and despairing screams.
No help is coming. The King and his General, the Duke of Havenport, have won the day. Kharangia is fallen, a triumph for Tierran arms, a victory to erase the shame of Blogia, a day of glory to be engraved in great letters upon the stones of history.
Yet, to you, the air tastes of nothing but ash.
-
It is still raining six days later as you stand on the roof of the great bastion of Kharangia's citadel.
What had been a drizzle on the night the city fell quickly grew in weight over the next few days. Now it is an unceasing downpour, a constant torrent soaking through your thick greatcoat and plastering the red-and-white plumes of your helmet flat against the polished black leather.
You hardly stand alone in your misery. The other officers of the Duke of Havenport's army stand with you, arrayed by regiment atop the massive triangular fortification. The rain falls upon them as well, and they too must bear the burden of soaked overcoats and hats made cold and twice their dry weight by the rain.
All around you, the roll of drums rises, a sodden rattle. From the assembled mass of the Tierran officers, the Duke of Havenport steps forward, carrying himself as if he were before the Imperial Court of the Kian'Zi and not soaked to the skin standing on the cannon-scarred fortification of a burnt-out foreign city.
Your army's commander has every reason to be proud, for another man is carried slowly forward to meet the Kentauri General, Havenport's opposite in every aspect: paunchy, white-bearded, and stooped. His eyes droop and his head lolls listlessly in the fugue of the irreparably senile. Where Havenport strides forth with chin held high, his counterpart is hauled forward on a covered, sagging palanquin, head resting precariously on a set of silken cushions.
He is Prince Boleslaw of Kharangia, a lord of the Antari League Congress, and he has come to formally surrender his city.
CHAPTER VI
Wherein the CAVALRY OFFICER winters in the city of KHARANGIA.
It is still raining six days later as you stand on the roof of the great bastion of Kharangia's citadel.
What had been a drizzle on the night the city fell quickly grew in weight over the next few days. Now it is an unceasing downpour, a constant torrent soaking through your thick greatcoat and plastering the red-and-white plumes of your helmet flat against the polished black leather.
You hardly stand alone in your misery. The other officers of the Duke of Havenport's army stand with you, arrayed by regiment atop the massive triangular fortification. The rain falls upon them as well, and they too must bear the burden of soaked overcoats and hats made cold and twice their dry weight by the rain.
All around you, the roll of drums rises, a sodden rattle. From the assembled mass of the Tierran officers, the Duke of Havenport steps forward, carrying himself as if he were before the Imperial Court of the Kian'Zi and not soaked to the skin standing on the cannon-scarred fortification of a burnt-out foreign city.
Your army's commander has every reason to be proud, for another man is carried slowly forward to meet the Kentauri General, Havenport's opposite in every aspect: paunchy, white-bearded, and stooped. His eyes droop and his head lolls listlessly in the fugue of the irreparably senile. Where Havenport strides forth with chin held high, his counterpart is hauled forward on a covered, sagging palanquin, head resting precariously on a set of silken cushions.
He is Prince Boleslaw of Kharangia, a lord of the Antari League Congress, and he has come to formally surrender his city.
-
Havenport stops before the defeated Antari lord. He bows. The two men, one still young and vigorous, the other elderly and ailing, exchange a handful of words, all drowned out by the quiet hiss of the autumn rain.
Prince Boleslaw makes a motion to his side. An attendant rushes forward with a box of dark wood chased in silver, its flanks glowing with the faint light of the Bane. Within sits the great seal, a confection of silver and ruby. To hold it is to hold the city; to relinquish it, the most definitive act of surrender. More words, then with a wave of his hand, Prince Boleslaw orders his servant to hand the box to the Duke of Havenport.
The Duke takes the box with both hands. The runes upon the dark wood flicker out as Havenport opens the lid and glances inside. After a moment, he nods, his expression no more awed than that of a farmer taking possession of a cow.
He closes the box, and the runes flare back to life. The Antari servant steps back and kneels in customary obeisance, officially acknowledging the Kentauri General as master of Kharangia.
It is done.
The three customary cheers sound as the Duke returns to his assembled officers, but the voices come out weary and sodden. The oppressive grey downpour dulls even the lustre of victory.
The man next to you likely bears yet more worry, though his scarred face does not show it; Caius d'al Cazarosta was supposed to be promoted to major for his part in leading the Forlorn Hope, yet there has been no word of the promised promotion. While the army's administrative workings have never been particularly efficient, you cannot help but wonder if such delay has less to do with bureaucracy and more with Cazarosta's deathborn status.
You suppose that only time will see a resolution to the matter.
-
Only one part of the surrender ceremony remains.
As the sound of the taut, joyless cheers subside, three more men emerge from the Tierran ranks. One carries with him an immense triangle of folded cloth, resplendent in orange and blue. To the sound of a single drum's beat, they walk to the centre of the bastion, where a wooden flagpole rises. The drums rattle again.
With practised movements, two of the three officers step forward to pull down the powder-stained, tattered, and sodden rag which had served as a symbol of defiance for the city. In its place rises a splendid new flag: the gryphons and towers of Tierra, worked in bright silk.
The sight fills you with a sense of…
1) Emptiness; one city will not win us this war.
2) Guarded optimism; we've won a battle but not the war.
3) Pride; this is a great victory, and ultimate victory is within reach.
LATE SUMMER, 609:
A comprehensive report on the Battle of Blogia is published for general circulation. The competence and ability of the late Duke of Wulfram becomes a matter of fierce public debate in Tierra. With the Crown now nearly 40 million crown in debt and no end in sight, criticism quickly spreads from the Duke of Wulfram's conduct to that of the entire army.
Assisted by a battery of experimental siege guns, Kharangia's walls are breached. The city is taken by storm.
SUMMER, 609:
The Duke of Havenport's army begins to lay siege to Kharangia. Initial progress is slow, with Havenport's artillery proving inadequate for the task of breaching Kharangia's walls.
The King's division takes the town of Solokovil on the northern edge of the Great Forest, facing Khorobirit's army.
SPRING, 609:
The army in Antar splits into two divisions. The King's division, consisting of 12 000 men, is to head north, while the Duke of Havenport's division of 11 000 men is to advance west and take the fortified Antari port city of Kharangia.
Two regiments of line infantry, three companies of engineers, and the Experimental Corps are dispatched from the Duke of Havenport's division to reinforce Fort Kharan, an extant outpost at the northern crossing over the River Kharan.
Prince Khorobirit moves his army to the town of Mhillanovil in preparation for the year's campaigning.
WINTER, 609:
The Earl of Weathern is able to assemble a temporary coalition between the various factions of the Cortes for the duration of the war. Rumours abound that both Lord Barithorne, the head of Royal Intelligence in Aetoria, and the Queen-Dowager Gwyneth d'al Havenport were heavily involved in negotiations.
Major Victor d'al Reyes of the 8th Regiment of Foot submits a proposal for the creation of a small force of foot skirmishers armed with rifled muskets. The King responds positively to the proposal and orders the creation of a temporary Experimental Corps of two hundred men, under Major Reyes's command.
SUMMER, 608:
Still mourning the death of his father, Ewen d'al Candless, the new Duke of Wulfram makes his first appearance in the Tierran Cortes. The young Duke aligns himself with the peace faction, throwing the precarious balance of power into disarray.
A board of inquiry is commissioned by Grenadier Square for the purpose of investigating the events of the defeat at Blogia.
AUTUMN, 607:
With the onset of the autumn rains, Prince Khorobirit retreats to winter quarters near the fortress of Januszkovil, on the southern edge of Antar's southern plains.
King Miguel orders the temporary reinforcement of line infantry regiments serving in Antar with men from marine complements serving on-board the ships of the Royal Tierran Navy. The move proves deeply unpopular with the Tierran Admiralty, but it serves to help replenish the Army's depleted ranks with hardened veterans.
Faced with the spectre of food riots an order of magnitude more severe than those of the year before, the Cortes, led by the Earl of Weathern, implements a grain subsidy. With Tierra starved of Antari grain by the war, Tierrans must now buy their grain from Kian merchants, who do not hesitate to raise prices to meet increased demand.
SUMMER, 607:
The Duke of Havenport is officially appointed Lieutenant-general and Councillor-Militant, to replace the late Duke of Wulfram.
Prince Khorobirit begins to send raiding parties south to probe Tierran defences. Anxious to avoid making plain the weakness of his position, the Duke of Havenport orders the Tierran cavalry, under the command of the Duke of Cunaris, to intercept these raids with utmost vigour.
LATE SPRING, 607:
Leading the bulk of Tierran forces in Antar, the Duke of Wulfram fights a larger Antari army led by Prince Mikhail of Khorobirit in a set-piece battle north of the town of Blogia. The Antari score a decisive victory, killing the Duke of Wulfram, many of his senior staff, and nearly three thousand Tierran soldiers.
The battered remnants of the Duke of Wulfram's army retreats to Noringia. King Miguel of Tierra arrives in Antar to take personal command, leaving the Earl of Weathern to lead the government in his stead.
Starved of supplies and reinforcements by the machinations of his rivals within the League Congress, Prince Khorobirit is forced to halt his advance on Noringia.
For the purposes of replacing the men lost at Blogia, the King orders the beginning of limited conscription. Vagabonds, debtors, and the unemployed are now liable to be forced into the army by recruiting agents in Tierra, to be sent to Antar.
Nothing works.
With every word, more of your men run off. With every second, those who remain grow fewer in number.
At last, only a loyal few stand by you.
-
With only a few men left to you, your safety within Kharangia's walls is hardly guaranteed. While it is possible that a few holdouts still mount a defence, you are rather more worried about the chaos and destruction set loose by men from your own army. Already, you can see the dim flickers of fires rising from the buildings to the flanks of the square.
No, the only real course of action is to head back out of the city and return to the camp. A quick look behind you swiftly disabuses you of the notion of going out the way you came in. The breach is packed with soldiers rushing through its narrow confines. The rest of the army has smelled the blood of the fallen city, and they hasten to rip away their own prizes from the savaged carcass.
Only the city's gates remain as viable points of exit. That means you shall have to move your men through the chaotic maelstrom of the sack to reach one which might still be defended by the enemy.
So, resigned to the least uncertain of a handful of terrible options, you and your small knot of loyal subordinates begin to pick your way through the gloom.
-
The trip through the streets of Kharangia is a stroll through a gallery of nightmares. With every few steps, you come across some new scene of cruelty and depravity, like oil paintings done in hellish tones by the black fog of the powder and the orange glare of the spreading fires.
There, you see an old man held down by leering figures in Kentauri uniforms. "Hol' im down! Hol' im down!" one shouts over the struggling wretch's screams, as he raises the butt of his musket high and brings it down with a sickening crack on the helpless civilian's teeth. One of the Highlanders reaches into the wailing ruin, grinning cruelly as he draws out a single speck of gold, shining in the filthy light.
Another few steps finds a knot of infantrymen, swaggering and smelling of drink as they smash open a door. There are screams as the leaderless gang in Tierran uniform rush inside, at first high and terrified, then sobbing, regular, hopeless.
Then, there is a pair of men in the grey-green of the Dragoons, their tunics blood-splattered and their helms askew. They restrain a battered, bleeding couple in what had once been fine fur cloaks. A third screams at them, demanding the locations of gold and silver. The Antari, terrified and uncomprehending, only shake their heads and blubber in fear, causing their interrogator to scream louder. With every failed exchange, the dragoons holding their prisoners strike them with the hilts of their sabres, adding fresh cuts and welts to their hapless prisoners.
By the time you finally find a gate, the air is filled with a thousand sounds of soldiers reduced to animals and a populace reduced to victims. Every breath is filled with the stench of death, of booze, and of the fires which ravage the city's buildings even as Havenport's rabid army ravages its people.
You find yourself much distraught by what you see.
Over the years, you have known your share of cruelty and brutality. You thought that you had seen the very limits of man's depravity. Now, to bear witness to horrors an order of magnitude greater conducted by men serving the same sovereign, even wearing the same uniforms, and upon a defenceless citizenry…
It is atrocity, travesty, injustice of the highest order…
…and you did nothing at all to stop it.
-
The city is almost entirely ablaze when the rains finally come.
It is not a cleansing downpour like the sort in faerie stories; the first drops come down black as ink, having fallen through the filth of the powder-fog and smoke, only to drop onto the fallen city and leave sooty tracks down the shattered stone and on men's faces.
They are the heralds of a downpour to come, the first of the autumn rains and the end of the campaigning season.
Yet this year, they come a day too late for the people of Kharangia, for though the fires begin to die under the black downpour, the sack continues. The soft sound of rain is drowned out by the unending cacophony of splintering wood, cruel laughter, and despairing screams.
No help is coming. The King and his General, the Duke of Havenport, have won the day. Kharangia is fallen, a triumph for Tierran arms, a victory to erase the shame of Blogia, a day of glory to be engraved in great letters upon the stones of history.
Yet, to you, the air tastes of nothing but ash.
-
It is still raining six days later as you stand on the roof of the great bastion of Kharangia's citadel.
What had been a drizzle on the night the city fell quickly grew in weight over the next few days. Now it is an unceasing downpour, a constant torrent soaking through your thick greatcoat and plastering the red-and-white plumes of your helmet flat against the polished black leather.
You hardly stand alone in your misery. The other officers of the Duke of Havenport's army stand with you, arrayed by regiment atop the massive triangular fortification. The rain falls upon them as well, and they too must bear the burden of soaked overcoats and hats made cold and twice their dry weight by the rain.
All around you, the roll of drums rises, a sodden rattle. From the assembled mass of the Tierran officers, the Duke of Havenport steps forward, carrying himself as if he were before the Imperial Court of the Kian'Zi and not soaked to the skin standing on the cannon-scarred fortification of a burnt-out foreign city.
Your army's commander has every reason to be proud, for another man is carried slowly forward to meet the Kentauri General, Havenport's opposite in every aspect: paunchy, white-bearded, and stooped. His eyes droop and his head lolls listlessly in the fugue of the irreparably senile. Where Havenport strides forth with chin held high, his counterpart is hauled forward on a covered, sagging palanquin, head resting precariously on a set of silken cushions.
He is Prince Boleslaw of Kharangia, a lord of the Antari League Congress, and he has come to formally surrender his city.
CHAPTER VI
Wherein the CAVALRY OFFICER winters in the city of KHARANGIA.
It is still raining six days later as you stand on the roof of the great bastion of Kharangia's citadel.
What had been a drizzle on the night the city fell quickly grew in weight over the next few days. Now it is an unceasing downpour, a constant torrent soaking through your thick greatcoat and plastering the red-and-white plumes of your helmet flat against the polished black leather.
You hardly stand alone in your misery. The other officers of the Duke of Havenport's army stand with you, arrayed by regiment atop the massive triangular fortification. The rain falls upon them as well, and they too must bear the burden of soaked overcoats and hats made cold and twice their dry weight by the rain.
All around you, the roll of drums rises, a sodden rattle. From the assembled mass of the Tierran officers, the Duke of Havenport steps forward, carrying himself as if he were before the Imperial Court of the Kian'Zi and not soaked to the skin standing on the cannon-scarred fortification of a burnt-out foreign city.
Your army's commander has every reason to be proud, for another man is carried slowly forward to meet the Kentauri General, Havenport's opposite in every aspect: paunchy, white-bearded, and stooped. His eyes droop and his head lolls listlessly in the fugue of the irreparably senile. Where Havenport strides forth with chin held high, his counterpart is hauled forward on a covered, sagging palanquin, head resting precariously on a set of silken cushions.
He is Prince Boleslaw of Kharangia, a lord of the Antari League Congress, and he has come to formally surrender his city.
-
Havenport stops before the defeated Antari lord. He bows. The two men, one still young and vigorous, the other elderly and ailing, exchange a handful of words, all drowned out by the quiet hiss of the autumn rain.
Prince Boleslaw makes a motion to his side. An attendant rushes forward with a box of dark wood chased in silver, its flanks glowing with the faint light of the Bane. Within sits the great seal, a confection of silver and ruby. To hold it is to hold the city; to relinquish it, the most definitive act of surrender. More words, then with a wave of his hand, Prince Boleslaw orders his servant to hand the box to the Duke of Havenport.
The Duke takes the box with both hands. The runes upon the dark wood flicker out as Havenport opens the lid and glances inside. After a moment, he nods, his expression no more awed than that of a farmer taking possession of a cow.
He closes the box, and the runes flare back to life. The Antari servant steps back and kneels in customary obeisance, officially acknowledging the Kentauri General as master of Kharangia.
It is done.
The three customary cheers sound as the Duke returns to his assembled officers, but the voices come out weary and sodden. The oppressive grey downpour dulls even the lustre of victory.
The man next to you likely bears yet more worry, though his scarred face does not show it; Caius d'al Cazarosta was supposed to be promoted to major for his part in leading the Forlorn Hope, yet there has been no word of the promised promotion. While the army's administrative workings have never been particularly efficient, you cannot help but wonder if such delay has less to do with bureaucracy and more with Cazarosta's deathborn status.
You suppose that only time will see a resolution to the matter.
-
Only one part of the surrender ceremony remains.
As the sound of the taut, joyless cheers subside, three more men emerge from the Tierran ranks. One carries with him an immense triangle of folded cloth, resplendent in orange and blue. To the sound of a single drum's beat, they walk to the centre of the bastion, where a wooden flagpole rises. The drums rattle again.
With practised movements, two of the three officers step forward to pull down the powder-stained, tattered, and sodden rag which had served as a symbol of defiance for the city. In its place rises a splendid new flag: the gryphons and towers of Tierra, worked in bright silk.
The sight fills you with a sense of…
1) Emptiness; one city will not win us this war.
2) Guarded optimism; we've won a battle but not the war.
3) Pride; this is a great victory, and ultimate victory is within reach.
As of the Autumn of the 609th year of the Old Imperial Era
Sir Alaric d'al Ortiga
Age: 22
Rank: Captain
Wealth: 398
Income: 15
Soldiering: 75%
Charisma: 43%
Intellect: 5%
Reputation: 23%
Health: 65%
Idealism: 82% Cynicism: 18%
Ruthlessness: 31% Mercy: 69%
You are a Knight of the Red, having the right to wear bane-hardened armour and wield a bane-runed sword.
You have no decorations as of yet.
Sir Alaric d'al Ortiga
Age: 22
Rank: Captain
Wealth: 398
Income: 15
Soldiering: 75%
Charisma: 43%
Intellect: 5%
Reputation: 23%
Health: 65%
Idealism: 82% Cynicism: 18%
Ruthlessness: 31% Mercy: 69%
You are a Knight of the Red, having the right to wear bane-hardened armour and wield a bane-runed sword.
You have no decorations as of yet.
Sixth Squadron, Royal Dragoons
Senior NCO: Staff-sergeant Hernandes
Discipline: 54%
Morale: 54%
Loyalty: 39%
Strength: 79%
Senior NCO: Staff-sergeant Hernandes
Discipline: 54%
Morale: 54%
Loyalty: 39%
Strength: 79%
IAGO D'AL BLAYLOCK
(Born 588 OIE) Lieutenant of the Royal Dragoon Regiment. Noted duellist. Baneblood.
LOUIS D'AL ENGLESSEY, EARL OF CASTERMAINE
(Born 558 OIE) General-of-brigade in the Tierran army. Commands an infantry brigade in the King's Army. Baneblood.
SIR CAIUS D'AL CAZAROSTA
(Born 585 OIE) Lieutenant in the King's Army. Commander of Third Squadron, Royal Dragoons. Knight-Companion of the Order of Saint Joshua. Illegitimate son of the Countess of Leoniscourt. Deathborn.
SIR JOHANNES D'AL FINDLAY, DUKE OF CUNARIS
(Born 556 OIE) Colonel-in-chief of the Royal Dragoon regiment. Knight-Grandmaster of the Order of Saint Jerome. A sitting member of the Cortes and head of the noble house of Findlay.Commander of the cavalry brigade in the King's Army. Lost the use of his legs at Blogia. Married with three children. Banecaster of the eighth calibre.
ULRIKE ECKHARTS
(Born 458 OIE) An Intendant of the Takaran Empire, assigned as an observer to the Duke of Wulfram's army prior to the Battle of Blogia.
LORD DAVIS D'AL ELSON
(584-607? OIE) Captain of the Royal Dragoon regiment, eldest son of the Baron of Hawthorne, a poor but politically influential Cortes noble. Former commanding officer of Third Squadron, Royal Dragoons. Missing and presumed dead after the Battle of Blogia. Banecaster of the third calibre.
LORD RENARD D'AL FINDLAY
(Born 594 OIE) Lieutenant of the Royal Dragoon regiment, eldest son and heir of the Duke of Cunaris. Baneblood.
EDMUND GARING
(Born 575 OIE) Master gunsmith and junior partner in the Aetorian firm of Garing, Gutierrez, and Truscott. Baneless.
WINTHROP D'AL HARTIGAN, VISCOUNT OF HUGH
(Born 580 OIE) Lieutenant-colonel of the 5th Regiment of Foot. Related by marriage to the Elsons of Hawthorne. Banecaster of the second calibre.
ARTHUR D'AL HAVENPORT, DUKE OF HAVENPORT
(Born 573 OIE) Lieutenant-general of the Tierran army. Succeeded the Duke of Wulfram as Councilor-Militant and Lieutenant-general. Baneblood.
LORD MARCUS D'AL HAVENPORT
(Born 588 OIE) Lieutenant-colonel of the Kentauri Highland regiment. Younger brother of the Duke of Havenport. Baneblood.
LORD ROLAND D'AL KEANE
(Born 571 OIE) Lieutenant-colonel of the Royal Dragoon regiment. Baneblood.
PRINCE BOLESLAW OF KHARANGIA
(Born 533 OIE) Antari lord of Kharangia. Allied with Prince Mikhail of Khorobirit. Banecaster of the second calibre.
PRINCE MIKHAIL OF KHOROBIRIT
(Born 573 OIE) A powerful Antari nobleman and the League of Antar's greatest general. Defeated the Tierran army decisively at Blogia in 607 OIE. Baneblood.
LORD KAROL OF LOCH
(Born 569 OIE) An Antari Church Hussar sworn to the service of Prince Mikhail of Khorobirit. Baneblood.
ROBERT MARION
(Born 581 OIE) Corporal in the Royal Dragoons, bat-man to Captain Alaric d'al Ortiga. Baneless.
HARLANDO D'AL MARRAS, BARON OF MARRAS
(576-607? OIE) Lieutenant-colonel of the Royal Dragoons, formerly second in command of the Regiment. Missing and presumed dead after the Battle of Blogia. Baneblood.
HIS TIERRAN MAJESTY, KING MIGUEL OF HOUSE RENDOWER
(Born 586 OIE) Reigning monarch of the Unified Kingdom of Tierra, as well as Duke of Aetoria. Young and impetuous, but capable. Baneblood.
ALEJANDRO D'AL NEILLE
(Born 580 OIE) Major of the Kentauri Highlanders. Baneblood.
HELENA VIZTELAS
(Born 471 OIE) Captain of the Takaran Imperial Guard. Military attache to Intendant Eckharts.
JAMES D'AL SANDORAL
(Born 592 OIE) Lieutenant of the Royal Dragoon regiment. Baneblood.
"STRELLYK"
(Born ???) Antari freeholder turned partisan. Commands a small group of irregulars raiding the Tierran-controlled stretches of the Imperial Highway. Baneless.
SIR ENRIQUE D'AL HUNTER, VISCOUNT OF WOLFSWOOD
(577-607 OIE) Lieutenant-colonel of the Grenadiers. Knight-Captain of the Order of Saint Jerome. Former commanding officer of 2nd Battalion, Grenadier Guards. Killed at the Battle of Blogia. Banecaster of the ninth calibre.
HECTOR D'AL CANDLESS, DUKE OF WULFRAM
(542-607 OIE) Formerly commanding officer of the King's Army in Antar and Duke of the northern duchy of Wulfram. Killed at the Battle of Blogia. Banecaster of the sixth calibre.
(Born 588 OIE) Lieutenant of the Royal Dragoon Regiment. Noted duellist. Baneblood.
LOUIS D'AL ENGLESSEY, EARL OF CASTERMAINE
(Born 558 OIE) General-of-brigade in the Tierran army. Commands an infantry brigade in the King's Army. Baneblood.
SIR CAIUS D'AL CAZAROSTA
(Born 585 OIE) Lieutenant in the King's Army. Commander of Third Squadron, Royal Dragoons. Knight-Companion of the Order of Saint Joshua. Illegitimate son of the Countess of Leoniscourt. Deathborn.
SIR JOHANNES D'AL FINDLAY, DUKE OF CUNARIS
(Born 556 OIE) Colonel-in-chief of the Royal Dragoon regiment. Knight-Grandmaster of the Order of Saint Jerome. A sitting member of the Cortes and head of the noble house of Findlay.Commander of the cavalry brigade in the King's Army. Lost the use of his legs at Blogia. Married with three children. Banecaster of the eighth calibre.
ULRIKE ECKHARTS
(Born 458 OIE) An Intendant of the Takaran Empire, assigned as an observer to the Duke of Wulfram's army prior to the Battle of Blogia.
LORD DAVIS D'AL ELSON
(584-607? OIE) Captain of the Royal Dragoon regiment, eldest son of the Baron of Hawthorne, a poor but politically influential Cortes noble. Former commanding officer of Third Squadron, Royal Dragoons. Missing and presumed dead after the Battle of Blogia. Banecaster of the third calibre.
LORD RENARD D'AL FINDLAY
(Born 594 OIE) Lieutenant of the Royal Dragoon regiment, eldest son and heir of the Duke of Cunaris. Baneblood.
EDMUND GARING
(Born 575 OIE) Master gunsmith and junior partner in the Aetorian firm of Garing, Gutierrez, and Truscott. Baneless.
WINTHROP D'AL HARTIGAN, VISCOUNT OF HUGH
(Born 580 OIE) Lieutenant-colonel of the 5th Regiment of Foot. Related by marriage to the Elsons of Hawthorne. Banecaster of the second calibre.
ARTHUR D'AL HAVENPORT, DUKE OF HAVENPORT
(Born 573 OIE) Lieutenant-general of the Tierran army. Succeeded the Duke of Wulfram as Councilor-Militant and Lieutenant-general. Baneblood.
LORD MARCUS D'AL HAVENPORT
(Born 588 OIE) Lieutenant-colonel of the Kentauri Highland regiment. Younger brother of the Duke of Havenport. Baneblood.
LORD ROLAND D'AL KEANE
(Born 571 OIE) Lieutenant-colonel of the Royal Dragoon regiment. Baneblood.
PRINCE BOLESLAW OF KHARANGIA
(Born 533 OIE) Antari lord of Kharangia. Allied with Prince Mikhail of Khorobirit. Banecaster of the second calibre.
PRINCE MIKHAIL OF KHOROBIRIT
(Born 573 OIE) A powerful Antari nobleman and the League of Antar's greatest general. Defeated the Tierran army decisively at Blogia in 607 OIE. Baneblood.
LORD KAROL OF LOCH
(Born 569 OIE) An Antari Church Hussar sworn to the service of Prince Mikhail of Khorobirit. Baneblood.
ROBERT MARION
(Born 581 OIE) Corporal in the Royal Dragoons, bat-man to Captain Alaric d'al Ortiga. Baneless.
HARLANDO D'AL MARRAS, BARON OF MARRAS
(576-607? OIE) Lieutenant-colonel of the Royal Dragoons, formerly second in command of the Regiment. Missing and presumed dead after the Battle of Blogia. Baneblood.
HIS TIERRAN MAJESTY, KING MIGUEL OF HOUSE RENDOWER
(Born 586 OIE) Reigning monarch of the Unified Kingdom of Tierra, as well as Duke of Aetoria. Young and impetuous, but capable. Baneblood.
ALEJANDRO D'AL NEILLE
(Born 580 OIE) Major of the Kentauri Highlanders. Baneblood.
HELENA VIZTELAS
(Born 471 OIE) Captain of the Takaran Imperial Guard. Military attache to Intendant Eckharts.
JAMES D'AL SANDORAL
(Born 592 OIE) Lieutenant of the Royal Dragoon regiment. Baneblood.
"STRELLYK"
(Born ???) Antari freeholder turned partisan. Commands a small group of irregulars raiding the Tierran-controlled stretches of the Imperial Highway. Baneless.
SIR ENRIQUE D'AL HUNTER, VISCOUNT OF WOLFSWOOD
(577-607 OIE) Lieutenant-colonel of the Grenadiers. Knight-Captain of the Order of Saint Jerome. Former commanding officer of 2nd Battalion, Grenadier Guards. Killed at the Battle of Blogia. Banecaster of the ninth calibre.
HECTOR D'AL CANDLESS, DUKE OF WULFRAM
(542-607 OIE) Formerly commanding officer of the King's Army in Antar and Duke of the northern duchy of Wulfram. Killed at the Battle of Blogia. Banecaster of the sixth calibre.
LATE SUMMER, 609:
A comprehensive report on the Battle of Blogia is published for general circulation. The competence and ability of the late Duke of Wulfram becomes a matter of fierce public debate in Tierra. With the Crown now nearly 40 million crown in debt and no end in sight, criticism quickly spreads from the Duke of Wulfram's conduct to that of the entire army.
Assisted by a battery of experimental siege guns, Kharangia's walls are breached. The city is taken by storm.
SUMMER, 609:
The Duke of Havenport's army begins to lay siege to Kharangia. Initial progress is slow, with Havenport's artillery proving inadequate for the task of breaching Kharangia's walls.
The King's division takes the town of Solokovil on the northern edge of the Great Forest, facing Khorobirit's army.
SPRING, 609:
The army in Antar splits into two divisions. The King's division, consisting of 12 000 men, is to head north, while the Duke of Havenport's division of 11 000 men is to advance west and take the fortified Antari port city of Kharangia.
Two regiments of line infantry, three companies of engineers, and the Experimental Corps are dispatched from the Duke of Havenport's division to reinforce Fort Kharan, an extant outpost at the northern crossing over the River Kharan.
Prince Khorobirit moves his army to the town of Mhillanovil in preparation for the year's campaigning.
WINTER, 609:
The Earl of Weathern is able to assemble a temporary coalition between the various factions of the Cortes for the duration of the war. Rumours abound that both Lord Barithorne, the head of Royal Intelligence in Aetoria, and the Queen-Dowager Gwyneth d'al Havenport were heavily involved in negotiations.
Major Victor d'al Reyes of the 8th Regiment of Foot submits a proposal for the creation of a small force of foot skirmishers armed with rifled muskets. The King responds positively to the proposal and orders the creation of a temporary Experimental Corps of two hundred men, under Major Reyes's command.
SUMMER, 608:
Still mourning the death of his father, Ewen d'al Candless, the new Duke of Wulfram makes his first appearance in the Tierran Cortes. The young Duke aligns himself with the peace faction, throwing the precarious balance of power into disarray.
A board of inquiry is commissioned by Grenadier Square for the purpose of investigating the events of the defeat at Blogia.
AUTUMN, 607:
With the onset of the autumn rains, Prince Khorobirit retreats to winter quarters near the fortress of Januszkovil, on the southern edge of Antar's southern plains.
King Miguel orders the temporary reinforcement of line infantry regiments serving in Antar with men from marine complements serving on-board the ships of the Royal Tierran Navy. The move proves deeply unpopular with the Tierran Admiralty, but it serves to help replenish the Army's depleted ranks with hardened veterans.
Faced with the spectre of food riots an order of magnitude more severe than those of the year before, the Cortes, led by the Earl of Weathern, implements a grain subsidy. With Tierra starved of Antari grain by the war, Tierrans must now buy their grain from Kian merchants, who do not hesitate to raise prices to meet increased demand.
SUMMER, 607:
The Duke of Havenport is officially appointed Lieutenant-general and Councillor-Militant, to replace the late Duke of Wulfram.
Prince Khorobirit begins to send raiding parties south to probe Tierran defences. Anxious to avoid making plain the weakness of his position, the Duke of Havenport orders the Tierran cavalry, under the command of the Duke of Cunaris, to intercept these raids with utmost vigour.
LATE SPRING, 607:
Leading the bulk of Tierran forces in Antar, the Duke of Wulfram fights a larger Antari army led by Prince Mikhail of Khorobirit in a set-piece battle north of the town of Blogia. The Antari score a decisive victory, killing the Duke of Wulfram, many of his senior staff, and nearly three thousand Tierran soldiers.
The battered remnants of the Duke of Wulfram's army retreats to Noringia. King Miguel of Tierra arrives in Antar to take personal command, leaving the Earl of Weathern to lead the government in his stead.
Starved of supplies and reinforcements by the machinations of his rivals within the League Congress, Prince Khorobirit is forced to halt his advance on Noringia.
For the purposes of replacing the men lost at Blogia, the King orders the beginning of limited conscription. Vagabonds, debtors, and the unemployed are now liable to be forced into the army by recruiting agents in Tierra, to be sent to Antar.
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2. We're not out of the woods yet. Not near enough has been done to ensure victory. We must be on the guard always, ready for chances at advancement. Indeed, we must also wonder at the politics of this war, for our rival has not been promoted to major despite his own stellar performance, though it is certainly less than our own capable acts.
LordTryhard
Novice
- Joined
- Jul 7, 2018
- Messages
- 55
Looks at Reputation
23
Um...
Anyways, considering what our naive character just witnessed, I say Option 1
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2
We lost reputation!
Granted it's just 1 point, but we just took part in a successful assault!
We lost also 20% of our men
We lost reputation!
Granted it's just 1 point, but we just took part in a successful assault! We lost also 20% of our men
Lithium Flower
Arcane
- Joined
- Nov 29, 2016
- Messages
- 1,832
2
We lost reputation!
We lost also 20% of our men
pretty sure the reputation ding was for taking command when Keane fucked off
LordTryhard
Novice
- Joined
- Jul 7, 2018
- Messages
- 55
But you only did what Marcus told you to do, and you failed to prevent your men from disgracing themselves.
Our character did a relatively poor job. You get reputation for doing exceptionally well.
It is. And as far as I can tell, there aren't actually any consequences for taking the extra time to look for him, which spares you the rep loss.
To help put our horrible reputation into perspective, a character who outright deserted at the end of Sabres is universally despised, but begins Guns with 15 Reputation.
Also my concern was more with the fact that he seemed to placing our role in the siege above a Forlorn Hope.
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1. I wish I had chosen 3. earlier. Better a yet-more depleted squadron and a possibly dead main character than to have walked out of the city turning a shamed eye away from the atrocities committed by Tierran men.
Lithium Flower
Arcane
- Joined
- Nov 29, 2016
- Messages
- 1,832
True, it is a momentous occasion. The fall of Kharangia is a great victory and goes far towards improving the overall strategic situation. Tierra's fortunes are on the rise once again.
However, that does not mean victory is within reach yet. Khorobirit's army still remains in the field, and it will take more than the loss of a single city to bring the League Congress to the table.
You take care not to allow your thoughts to veer towards the over-optimistic as you depart the ceremony. Kharangia is a great victory, but there will more likely than not be a great deal more fighting to come.
-
The main streets of Kharangia have been cleared of rubble and bodies for two days now, but not even the rain has yet washed away the sharp sulphurous stink of gunpowder and the cloying smell of death.
You have become used to the smell now, just as you have become used to the sight of burned-out buildings and the glimpses of piteous clusters of refugees, driven out of their homes by fire or Tierran soldiers and forced to huddle together for warmth. They stay to the darkened alleys and side streets for the most part, hiding from the path of the swaggering invaders.
They have good reason to fear, you suppose. The orgy of pillage, arson, murder, and rape had lasted three days after the city's fall. So great was the carnage wreaked upon Kharangia's citizenry that there was not enough dry wood to burn all the dead; hundreds of bodies had been tipped into the harbour, to be washed out into the Calligian Sea with the tide.
The task of actually putting an end to the sack had been an even more difficult proposition. Almost the whole of the army had gone berserk and could not be brought back under discipline. For those three days, the Duke of Havenport's army had effectively ceased to exist, save for portions of its high command, and a handful of isolated units.
In the end, the Duke had resorted to drastic measures: he had some of the few troops still in good order construct a set of gallows in the main square, then made it known that he would arrest and hang one looter every hour until the men were back under the discipline of their officers.
Still, it had taken nine hours for the looting to end.
-
You pass under the shadow of the gallows as you cross the main square. A corpse still hangs from the rain-soaked rope, a half-rotting carcass dressed in rags which had once been a line infantryman's jacket.
The rain has driven away the flies, and the carrion birds flew south weeks ago, but the maggots remain, pale-bodied colonies bubbling and churning in the cavities of the corpse's discoloured mouth and the empty sockets where its eyes used to be. It is both a reminder and a warning of what is to happen the next time Tierran officers lose control of their men.
You cannot help but find the whole business to be…
1) Drastic but necessary.
2) Needlessly cruel.
3) Far too lenient.
However, that does not mean victory is within reach yet. Khorobirit's army still remains in the field, and it will take more than the loss of a single city to bring the League Congress to the table.
You take care not to allow your thoughts to veer towards the over-optimistic as you depart the ceremony. Kharangia is a great victory, but there will more likely than not be a great deal more fighting to come.
-
The main streets of Kharangia have been cleared of rubble and bodies for two days now, but not even the rain has yet washed away the sharp sulphurous stink of gunpowder and the cloying smell of death.
You have become used to the smell now, just as you have become used to the sight of burned-out buildings and the glimpses of piteous clusters of refugees, driven out of their homes by fire or Tierran soldiers and forced to huddle together for warmth. They stay to the darkened alleys and side streets for the most part, hiding from the path of the swaggering invaders.
They have good reason to fear, you suppose. The orgy of pillage, arson, murder, and rape had lasted three days after the city's fall. So great was the carnage wreaked upon Kharangia's citizenry that there was not enough dry wood to burn all the dead; hundreds of bodies had been tipped into the harbour, to be washed out into the Calligian Sea with the tide.
The task of actually putting an end to the sack had been an even more difficult proposition. Almost the whole of the army had gone berserk and could not be brought back under discipline. For those three days, the Duke of Havenport's army had effectively ceased to exist, save for portions of its high command, and a handful of isolated units.
In the end, the Duke had resorted to drastic measures: he had some of the few troops still in good order construct a set of gallows in the main square, then made it known that he would arrest and hang one looter every hour until the men were back under the discipline of their officers.
Still, it had taken nine hours for the looting to end.
-
You pass under the shadow of the gallows as you cross the main square. A corpse still hangs from the rain-soaked rope, a half-rotting carcass dressed in rags which had once been a line infantryman's jacket.
The rain has driven away the flies, and the carrion birds flew south weeks ago, but the maggots remain, pale-bodied colonies bubbling and churning in the cavities of the corpse's discoloured mouth and the empty sockets where its eyes used to be. It is both a reminder and a warning of what is to happen the next time Tierran officers lose control of their men.
You cannot help but find the whole business to be…
1) Drastic but necessary.
2) Needlessly cruel.
3) Far too lenient.
As of the Autumn of the 609th year of the Old Imperial Era
Sir Alaric d'al Ortiga
Age: 22
Rank: Captain
Wealth: 398
Income: 15
Soldiering: 75%
Charisma: 43%
Intellect: 5%
Reputation: 23%
Health: 65%
Idealism: 82% Cynicism: 18%
Ruthlessness: 31% Mercy: 69%
You are a Knight of the Red, having the right to wear bane-hardened armour and wield a bane-runed sword.
You have no decorations as of yet.
Sir Alaric d'al Ortiga
Age: 22
Rank: Captain
Wealth: 398
Income: 15
Soldiering: 75%
Charisma: 43%
Intellect: 5%
Reputation: 23%
Health: 65%
Idealism: 82% Cynicism: 18%
Ruthlessness: 31% Mercy: 69%
You are a Knight of the Red, having the right to wear bane-hardened armour and wield a bane-runed sword.
You have no decorations as of yet.
Sixth Squadron, Royal Dragoons
Senior NCO: Staff-sergeant Hernandes
Discipline: 54%
Morale: 54%
Loyalty: 39%
Strength: 79%
Senior NCO: Staff-sergeant Hernandes
Discipline: 54%
Morale: 54%
Loyalty: 39%
Strength: 79%
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3. Let's up the ruthlessness a bit. If it were I, these men would be lined against walls twenty at a time and shot or worse, one after another. That an army goes pillaging is no concern. That an army disobeys so frantically and quickly its leadership to do this is inexcusable. Burn them all.
1.
LordTryhard
Novice
- Joined
- Jul 7, 2018
- Messages
- 55
3. HANG THEM ALL!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
- Joined
- Sep 25, 2012
- Messages
- 28,346
3. Major_Blackhart has the right of it.
Reinhardt
Arcane
- Joined
- Sep 4, 2015
- Messages
- 29,587
3
Edit: The scenes of the sack of the city reminds me of the occupation of Moscow in War & Peace (it's the only I've read which deals with such a subject), I just hope we won't have to leave in the middle of winter
Edit: The scenes of the sack of the city reminds me of the occupation of Moscow in War & Peace (it's the only I've read which deals with such a subject), I just hope we won't have to leave in the middle of winter
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Lithium Flower
Arcane
- Joined
- Nov 29, 2016
- Messages
- 1,832
Did the Duke of Havenport really think that such a token gesture would do anything to maintain discipline within his ranks? To you, the hanging of a handful of men for the aggregate sins of an army is a sign of softness, at best.
No, it would have been better to hang them all; every looter, every rapist, and every murderer caught wearing Tierran uniform. That was what the King's Articles of War demanded, after all. That would have been a firm show of resolve, no more, and certainly no less.
To punish less than a dozen men for the crimes of thousands smacks of arbitrariness and unfairness to you. Not only would such a petty gesture soon be forgotten in an army which does not hesitate to flog its infantry, but it leaves the vast majority of the guilty to walk free.
No, you do not think it will do, not at all.
-
Kharangia is a city fit to make Noringia look like a mere fishing village. Before the siege, it had boasted a population of more than thirty thousand, six times the pre-war population of the provincial port town which had served as the main base of operations for the King's Army until now.
The city had been even greater once. Two generations ago, it had been twice as populous, the major conduit of commerce between Southern Antar and its overseas trading partners. Its massive docks had been built to service that trade, and long ago, the city's superb natural harbour had been filled with ships from throughout the Northern Kingdoms.
King Alaric's War had changed that.
To Tierrans like you, the last war betwixt the Unified Kingdom and the League of Antar had been triumphant proof that Tierra could stand on its own as a naval power. To most of the League Congress, it had been a humiliating but minor defeat. To the rest of the known world, it had been an inconsequential thing, a six-year sequence of naval skirmishes between the fleets of a disunited and declining Antar and a third-rate power who happened to possess a passable navy and a few bold captains.
For Kharangia, it had been disastrous. For six years, the lean frigates of the Royal Tierran Navy and privateers in the pay of bold, young King Alaric Spitfire had stalked the Callingian Sea, dismantling the Antari merchant fleet. By the end of the war, the maritime trade that had been Kharangia's lifeblood had dried up entirely, and the city fell into a long decline.
Still, even in its current state, decrepit, battered, and broken by siege, Kharangia is a massive city, full of grand houses and opulent mansions. As a relatively senior officer in the Duke of Havenport's army, you have been given one for use as your billet, a granite-faced two-story manse in the stately High Garden district, complete with a cobbled courtyard and a small coach-house for Thunderer.
You may be about to winter in a hostile city full of resentful inhabitants as an officer of an invading army, but at least you shall be comfortable.
-
Marion is waiting for you as you step through the heavy double doors and into the plush-carpeted antechamber. He strips off your soaked overcoat and helmet with brisk efficiency, as you allow the warmth of the well-lit room to seep through your wet clothes.
They are next to go, stripped off in the privacy of your bedroom. Perhaps you will have a glass or two of the strong Antari potato-wine which somehow escaped the looting intact to help further warm yourself.
Alas, no sooner do you finish changing into a dry shirt and trousers does Marion knock on the door. "Lord Renard is asking for you downstairs, sir," he announces through the door. "He seems quite distraught."
Your drink, it seems, shall have to wait.
-
Lord Lieutenant Renard d'al Findlay appears to you more than merely distraught as you descend the stairs. "I ain't mean to trouble ye, sir, but…" He takes a deep, shuddering breath. "I fear I've found m'self in most dire need of your counsel."
You nod warily. In the past two years, you have never seen Lord Renard in such a state of worry. "Would you like a drink, Lieutenant?" you ask for courtesy's sake.
The young aristocrat shakes his head. "No, sir. This…" He takes another breath. "This best be done with a clear head."
Lord Renard is no drunkard, but you have never known him to turn down a glass of wine. Whatever is on your subordinate's mind must be a weighty matter, indeed. "Very well, Lieutenant. What is it you need?"
"Well…" He pauses and tries again. "It's just that…" No matter how he begins, he cannot seem to avoid choking on his words, until finally, he blurts it all out: "Sir, we's on the right side, ain't we?"
Your reaction and your outrage come immediately and automatically. "I beg your pardon, sir?" you ask, flat and cold.
"I was seven years old when this war started," the other officer recounts. "From that time on, I ain't heard nothing save talk of how we were in the right, of the heroism of the King's Army. Ain't any wonder that I'd got meself a commission in my father's regiment as soon as I could, t'come to Antar, kill me some villainous foe, fetch me own glory." The adolescent lordling sighs. "Two years of this war. I ain't seen glory, and I ain't killed any villains, only men whose crime was t'rise against an invadin' army. Still, I kept me thoughts to meself, until…"
Understanding grasps you. "Until we stormed Kharangia."
Lord Renard nods. He doesn't have to explain further; you had been there with him. "It ain't the Antari to blame, either. Those was men in Tierran colours, our fellows, and we let it happen, encouraged it even. Ain't that make us the villains?"
1) "The sack disgusts me as much as it does you."
2) "It was a cruel necessity."
3) "Do you mean to cling to this childish rubbish about heroes and villains forever?"
No, it would have been better to hang them all; every looter, every rapist, and every murderer caught wearing Tierran uniform. That was what the King's Articles of War demanded, after all. That would have been a firm show of resolve, no more, and certainly no less.
To punish less than a dozen men for the crimes of thousands smacks of arbitrariness and unfairness to you. Not only would such a petty gesture soon be forgotten in an army which does not hesitate to flog its infantry, but it leaves the vast majority of the guilty to walk free.
No, you do not think it will do, not at all.
-
Kharangia is a city fit to make Noringia look like a mere fishing village. Before the siege, it had boasted a population of more than thirty thousand, six times the pre-war population of the provincial port town which had served as the main base of operations for the King's Army until now.
The city had been even greater once. Two generations ago, it had been twice as populous, the major conduit of commerce between Southern Antar and its overseas trading partners. Its massive docks had been built to service that trade, and long ago, the city's superb natural harbour had been filled with ships from throughout the Northern Kingdoms.
King Alaric's War had changed that.
To Tierrans like you, the last war betwixt the Unified Kingdom and the League of Antar had been triumphant proof that Tierra could stand on its own as a naval power. To most of the League Congress, it had been a humiliating but minor defeat. To the rest of the known world, it had been an inconsequential thing, a six-year sequence of naval skirmishes between the fleets of a disunited and declining Antar and a third-rate power who happened to possess a passable navy and a few bold captains.
For Kharangia, it had been disastrous. For six years, the lean frigates of the Royal Tierran Navy and privateers in the pay of bold, young King Alaric Spitfire had stalked the Callingian Sea, dismantling the Antari merchant fleet. By the end of the war, the maritime trade that had been Kharangia's lifeblood had dried up entirely, and the city fell into a long decline.
Still, even in its current state, decrepit, battered, and broken by siege, Kharangia is a massive city, full of grand houses and opulent mansions. As a relatively senior officer in the Duke of Havenport's army, you have been given one for use as your billet, a granite-faced two-story manse in the stately High Garden district, complete with a cobbled courtyard and a small coach-house for Thunderer.
You may be about to winter in a hostile city full of resentful inhabitants as an officer of an invading army, but at least you shall be comfortable.
-
Marion is waiting for you as you step through the heavy double doors and into the plush-carpeted antechamber. He strips off your soaked overcoat and helmet with brisk efficiency, as you allow the warmth of the well-lit room to seep through your wet clothes.
They are next to go, stripped off in the privacy of your bedroom. Perhaps you will have a glass or two of the strong Antari potato-wine which somehow escaped the looting intact to help further warm yourself.
Alas, no sooner do you finish changing into a dry shirt and trousers does Marion knock on the door. "Lord Renard is asking for you downstairs, sir," he announces through the door. "He seems quite distraught."
Your drink, it seems, shall have to wait.
-
Lord Lieutenant Renard d'al Findlay appears to you more than merely distraught as you descend the stairs. "I ain't mean to trouble ye, sir, but…" He takes a deep, shuddering breath. "I fear I've found m'self in most dire need of your counsel."
You nod warily. In the past two years, you have never seen Lord Renard in such a state of worry. "Would you like a drink, Lieutenant?" you ask for courtesy's sake.
The young aristocrat shakes his head. "No, sir. This…" He takes another breath. "This best be done with a clear head."
Lord Renard is no drunkard, but you have never known him to turn down a glass of wine. Whatever is on your subordinate's mind must be a weighty matter, indeed. "Very well, Lieutenant. What is it you need?"
"Well…" He pauses and tries again. "It's just that…" No matter how he begins, he cannot seem to avoid choking on his words, until finally, he blurts it all out: "Sir, we's on the right side, ain't we?"
Your reaction and your outrage come immediately and automatically. "I beg your pardon, sir?" you ask, flat and cold.
"I was seven years old when this war started," the other officer recounts. "From that time on, I ain't heard nothing save talk of how we were in the right, of the heroism of the King's Army. Ain't any wonder that I'd got meself a commission in my father's regiment as soon as I could, t'come to Antar, kill me some villainous foe, fetch me own glory." The adolescent lordling sighs. "Two years of this war. I ain't seen glory, and I ain't killed any villains, only men whose crime was t'rise against an invadin' army. Still, I kept me thoughts to meself, until…"
Understanding grasps you. "Until we stormed Kharangia."
Lord Renard nods. He doesn't have to explain further; you had been there with him. "It ain't the Antari to blame, either. Those was men in Tierran colours, our fellows, and we let it happen, encouraged it even. Ain't that make us the villains?"
1) "The sack disgusts me as much as it does you."
2) "It was a cruel necessity."
3) "Do you mean to cling to this childish rubbish about heroes and villains forever?"
As of the Autumn of the 609th year of the Old Imperial Era
Sir Alaric d'al Ortiga
Age: 22
Rank: Captain
Wealth: 398
Income: 15
Soldiering: 75%
Charisma: 43%
Intellect: 5%
Reputation: 23%
Health: 65%
Idealism: 82% Cynicism: 18%
Ruthlessness: 37% Mercy: 63%
You are a Knight of the Red, having the right to wear bane-hardened armour and wield a bane-runed sword.
You have no decorations as of yet.
Sir Alaric d'al Ortiga
Age: 22
Rank: Captain
Wealth: 398
Income: 15
Soldiering: 75%
Charisma: 43%
Intellect: 5%
Reputation: 23%
Health: 65%
Idealism: 82% Cynicism: 18%
Ruthlessness: 37% Mercy: 63%
You are a Knight of the Red, having the right to wear bane-hardened armour and wield a bane-runed sword.
You have no decorations as of yet.
Sixth Squadron, Royal Dragoons
Senior NCO: Staff-sergeant Hernandes
Discipline: 54%
Morale: 54%
Loyalty: 39%
Strength: 79%
Senior NCO: Staff-sergeant Hernandes
Discipline: 54%
Morale: 54%
Loyalty: 39%
Strength: 79%
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