In Progress [LP] Lord Captain, you've served your time in Hell! Codex plays Lords of Infinity, a text RPG of Politics and Warfare

[Storyfag]

Such a wonderful RPG.

I mean... this is the KKKodex way. I'm just glad we didn't vote for Sphere Bandit Diplomacy this time. Devour Soul (of our lady love, most likely) is still on the table tho.

 

[Lithium Flower]

I must focus all my efforts into preparing my Houseguard.

As far as you're concerned, there's only one way to force a conclusion to your situation now: to prepare your Houseguards as thoroughly as possible for an open confrontation before sending them into the forest to either defeat the roadsmen or force them to seek less well-armed prey.

Yet even after weeks of drill, it's clear that your makeshift fighting force still has a long way to go.

They can form ranks now, and move in straight lines without entangling themselves amongst each other, which you suppose is a vast improvement over their initial condition. Yet still, the sight of them parading in the open seems more a scene of farce than martial ardour, and despite your best efforts, much of your force remains slow to accept discipline, if not outright insolent in their resistance to orders. They may be your tenants, and you may be their lord and a gentleman of the blood, but it is clear that they remain steadfastly opposed to the idea that they've been reduced to nothing more than unquestioning common soldiers in the power of a highborn officer.

And that is the least of your problems. Even perfect drill and discipline would be of little use without the equipment needed to take advantage of them. While you doubt the roadsmen are as well-armed as the men you commanded in Antar, you have little doubt that they're far more formidably equipped than your gaggle of half-trained farmers and their odd assortment of hunting pieces and farming implements.

As things are, you fear that your improvised force will stand little chance against a gang of violent, hardened criminals. You shall have to effect some great improvements indeed if you mean to rectify that sorry state of affairs.

[There are 4 ways to upgrade our houseguard, and we have enough time to pick 2 of them. However, one of the options (unlocked by our high soldiering!) costs nothing beyond time, one is locked out to us, and the other two cost an amount of wealth such that we cannot afford both of them. So, I have automatically picked the first, free option, and will let you vote on whether to buy one of the other upgrades, or instead save your money.]

I must lead by example and teach them how to drill like proper soldiers!

It's clear to you now that the impersonal, rather distant methods you've been using to drill your Houseguard aren't working. The problem, it seems, is a simple one. Under the circumstances to which you're accustomed, it's usually the corporals and sergeants who do most of the work of actually drilling the men. Though the officer shouts the words of command, it is his common-born subordinates who step in to observe closely, ensure orders are followed, and apply correction, with their fists if needed.

Unfortunately, you have in your force no men particularly suitable for the job. Though some of your Houseguard certainly show qualities of leadership, they don't have the sort of ingrained, instinctual knowledge of the manual of arms and King's regulations which any competent drill instructor must inevitably possess in order to do his job.

In fact, the only one within twenty kilometres in possession of such is you.

It does not please you, to be reduced to a sergeant's job, but the idea of sending your Houseguard into battle completely untrained and unprepared likes you even less. So, you swallow your pride and get to work.

The task is not an easy one, not by a long measure. You discover that quickly enough. It isn't enough for a drill instructor to wave his arms about and shout; one must also watch for imperfections in drill as they happen and seek out any source of confusion before it occurs, even the slightest stray expression to keep the attention of the men fixed upon the matter at hand at all times. It is a job that requires eyes in the back of one's head and arms capable of reaching out twenty paces, and even then, you'd imagine it would be hard going.

You manage. You didn't survive twelve years of war by being unable to adapt to changed circumstances. Despite a few rough moments in the beginning, you quickly fall into the role. By the end of the first week, it almost comes easily to you. By the end of the second, your Houseguard shows marked improvement.

But it won't be enough defeat the roadsmen, not by itself.


1) I must purchase weapons and ammunition to properly equip my Houseguard. [Cost: 150 Wealth]

2) My Houseguard still needs subordinate leaders. Perhaps if I were to offer pay… [Cost: 120 Wealth]

3) Nothing more can be done, I've made all the preparations I can.


[Btw, we are now down to !133! tenants]

Personal Information

As of the Summer of the 615 of the Old Imperial Era:

Sir Alaric d'al Ortiga, Baron Ezinbrooke
Captain, Royal Dragoons (half-pay)
Age: 27

Current Funds: 201 Crown
Debts: 10660 Crown

Bi-Annual Income (Personal): 135 Crown
Bi-Annual Estate Revenues: 266 Crown

Bi-Annual Estate Expenses: 350 Crown
Bi-Annual Interest Payments: 107 Crown

Total Net Income (Next Six Months): -56 Crown


Soldiering: 70%

Charisma: 41%

Intellect: 9%


Reputation: 37%

Health: 62%


Idealism: 60% ; Cynicism: 40%

Ruthlessness: 42% ; Mercy: 58%

You are a Knight of the Red, having the right to wear Bane-hardened armour and wield a Bane-runed sword.

Friends and Enemies

Friends and Associates

Javier Campos: Colour Sergeant, the Royal Dragoons.
(Born 583 OIE)

Victor d'al Reyes: Eldest son of Baron Reyes. Major, the 8th Regiment of Foot. Formerly Commander, the Experimental Corps of Riflemen. ~Lost arm at Blogia~
(Born: 583 OIE)

James d'al Sandoral: Captain (half-pay), the Royal Dragoons.
(Born 592 OIE)

Efraim Saundersley: Solicitor-on-Retainer to the House of Ortiga.
(Born 570 OIE)

Octave d'al Touravon: Baron Touravon, Father of Alisanne d'al Touravon.
(Born 556 OIE)

Enemies

Hiir Cassius vam Holt: Takaran Ambassador to Tierra. Eldest son to Richsgraav vam Holt.
(Born 527 OIE)

Eleanora d'al Welles: Countess Welles. Proponent of Military Reform. Friend to Isobel, the Princess-Royal. ~Died at Blogia~
(Born 587 OIE)

Barony Overview

Ezinbrooke, a barony within the Duchy of Cunaris, possessed of 133 rent-paying households.

Respectability: 30%

Prosperity: 45%

Contentment: 34%

Manor...

…Being a country house of middling size in very poor condition. encompassed by a low stone fence in a state of much disrepair. Outbuildings include stables, coach house, and guard house, all in exceptionally poor condition.

Interior consists of eighteen rooms, including six bedrooms, a kitchen, a library, a small ballroom, a dovecote and a gun room.

Estate and Grounds...

…Being a barony of middling size, composed of a manor house, market village, and surrounding fields and hinterlands. It is located a week's ride west from the city of Fernandescourt, a journey rendered easier by the fine state of local roads.

The village of Ezinbrooke is a small hamlet, possessed of a traveller's inn, a publick house, a somewhat worn shrine to the major Saints, and an open market square. The surrounding cottages are few in number but of excellent condition, having recently been repaired and refurbished. Fields bound the village on all sides, and all available land is under cultivation.

Bi-Annual Estate Revenues
Rents: 266 Crown

Bi-Annual Expenditures
Estate Wages: 150 Crown
Food and Necessities: 75 Crown
Luxuries and Allowances: 75 Crown
Groundskeeping and Maintenance: 50 Crown
Other Expenses: 0 Crown

Total Balance: -84 Crown

 

[Lithium Flower]

Friendly note: given that you have 201 wealth, and will lose 53 next biannual turn, buying weapons may or may not lock us into a fucking fail state :D

 

[Optimist]

We can't really spend anything, can we? Will we have enough time to apply for additional credit if we go with the cheaper option?

 

[Lithium Flower]

We can't really spend anything, can we? Will we have enough time to apply for additional credit if we go with the cheaper option?

Lol. Lmao.

 

[Lithium Flower]

I would assume it would look like this:

-Say we spend 120 Wealth, down to 81.
-Next turn we lose 53, and are left with 28 (math!)
-We apply for credit that same turn.
-?Credit arrives the following turn? Just in time for us to get dinged, preventing us from going into the negatives and losing the game.

But this is my assumption. If a certain unnamed western government insider is still reading this thread, perhaps he can elucidate in an email or something.

 

[ERYFKRAD]

 

[Lithium Flower]

Upon hearing a strange noise (that sounded suspiciously like a communist computer god "voice-to-skull" transmission, you know, the one that everyone hears at 3 o'clock in the morning) I investigated my backyard where I discovered my pet dog being tortured and raped by a gang of high value alpha male business elites, presumably for adrenochrome extraction purposes - which was kind of weird, because the dog wasn't prepubescent, plus I don't recall owning any pets in the first place. Taking cover from NWO squadrons of black helicopters and stealth tic-tac-tech jets deploying chemtrails overhead, I retreated into the safety of my prepper bunker, constructed entirely from tinfoil and shungite (does anybody here know what shungite is ? No, not Suge Knight, I think he's locked up in prison. Talking shungite - anyways, it's like a two billion year old, like, rock/stone that protect against frequencies and unwanted frequencies that may be traveling in the air. That's my story, I bought a whole bunch of stuff, put them around la casa, little pyramids, stuff like that,) and accessed my stash of all-natural homeopathic GMO-free alt-medicine supplies.

After munching on some delicious halal-free beef-fed grass and injecting a triple dose of Ivermectin directly into my urethra, my mind was finally able to breach the false material confines of the Demiurge-Qliphoth matrix and received a divine providential message directly from the immaculate Sephirotic angel-grid, which I will summarize below:

-Slipping into negative wealth or failing to pay your interest payment isn't enough to trigger a game-over in itself, as the game will let you get a loan to remain in the green - however, at some point this will result in your interest rates spiking and your loan requests getting refused, and at that point failing to secure extra funds will result in a game-over. But it takes a long chain of financial fuck-ups and over-borrowing to get to that point.

-Even in the rock-bottom scenario of exhausting your loan options there will be an additional set of emergency options to but yourself some extra time to stabilize your situation - though those options will be very costly to your relationships and reputation.

-You are encouraged to be more financially irresponsible, especially to compensate for flubbing the refugee arc. Stimulus go brrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr

-In short, V O T E and don't worry about all the pesky money stuff it totally won't become a problem in the future

I'd share more but its hard to type with these hooves neeeeeeigh

 

[Kipeci]

Hell yeah gimme a stimmy.

 

[Kalarion]

1) I must purchase weapons and ammunition to properly equip my Houseguard.

Sending even trained and drilled householders into battle against men inured to violence, already whetted on previous abuse and killings, is tantamount to suicide for them. We would doubtless reap a bloody harvest, but our men would be fodder. They need weapons and ammunition to go with their training. Hopefully the experience of battle against a nasty enemy in defense of their homes will enliven their communal pride and our estate's respectability.

Hopefully...

 

[Grimgravy]

1

 

[Endemic]

2) My Houseguard still needs subordinate leaders. Perhaps if I were to offer pay… [Cost: 120 Wealth]

It's cheaper and coordination is just as important as weaponry at this level of combat.

 

[Storyfag]

I would advise against purchasing anything, seeing as how we are cut off from the outside world. The bandits are likely to intercept our weapons. The same is true for any officers we hire, but the bandits at least can't steal them.

Therefore 2.

 

[Lithium Flower]

[INFINITE TIES FOREVER AND EVER

TIES OF INFINITY AM I RIGHT

AAAAA

Anyway option 1 wins the tie.]

I must purchase weapons and ammunition to properly equip my Houseguard.

If there is any egregious shortage facing your improvised militia, it is that of proper weaponry and the ammunition with which to load it. Few of your recruits have brought real weapons. Most are still armed with farm implements and improvised spears. Even with the contents of your gun room distributed to your makeshift force, barely half of your men are in possession of working firelocks, and few of them have more than half a dozen cartridges to shoot with. In truth, you wouldn't have been particularly happy to lead so poorly armed a party to hunt fowl, let alone a pack of violent brigands.

If you are to face the roadsmen on anywhere near equal terms, then you shall have to secure additional firearms and enough powder and shot to allow your men to practise with them until they become proficient in their use.

There are additional guns and ammunition to be had within your fief, of course. It is not so rare for the residents of a country barony to keep a musket or a fowling piece for hunting, or a pistol for disquietous times like these. But you cannot simply walk into their cottages and take them; they are the private possessions of your tenants, and for all that they live within your power, you would be well outside your rights to rob them.

Instead, you must acquire the needed arms by less forceful means. You make the announcement that you're willing to pay good coin to any tenant willing to sell their firearm and ammunition to you.

It works, after a fashion. Within a day, your tenants begin bringing their firelocks to your house. With Saundersley at your side, you look over each submitted piece and negotiate what you believe to be a fair price. By the end of the week, you've acquired nearly two dozen muskets, fowling pieces, pistols, and carbines, along with over two hundred cartridges and enough powder and shot to make up two hundred more.

Unfortunately, very few of your newly purchased arms are in any state to be used. Some are the victims of years, if not decades of neglect, their barrels rust-pitted, their flint-screws missing, their springs and hinges sometimes entirely rusted shut. Most will require long hours of hard work to get them in any shape fit to be fired, and a few have to simply be discarded as beyond help.

Yet even so, after a week of scrubbing, polishing, filing, and hammering, you have enough firelocks available at last to fully equip your entire Houseguard. At least when it comes to equipment, your men will be equal to your enemies.

Now, you can only do your best to ensure that they will be equal in discipline and mettle, as well.

---

Then, one morning, you awake to fresh and terrible news.

No longer content to simply prey upon travellers coming in and out of your fief, the roadsmen have blocked all three roads out entirely. Barricades of stout logs cut off two of the roads, a third is less a blockade and more a fortified camp, with walls of timber, an abatis of branches, and even the sight of cookfires and tends beyond.

It you were under a figurative state of siege before, you're under a literal one now.

Your tenants are far from pleased, of course, but they almost seem to take their newly worsened situation in stride. Long months of living under a declared state of emergency seem to have worked to prepare them for the shock of seeing the roads blocked off by armed men, both mentally and physickally. Your tenants have been readying themselves for this eventuality for the whole of the summer. Now that it has arrived, business almost goes on as usual.

But you can only wonder whether it is all not so much a matter of mental fortitude as it is one of denial. These people have known peace all their lives; to imagine the possibility of a violent death so imminent must be as foreign to them as the bottom of the sea. Perhaps that makes it easier to pretend that the danger simply doesn't exist—a façade of normalcy over the roiling mass of fear.

You, on the other hand, find yourself in incomprehensibly high spirits. Instead of weighing upon your mind, the ongoing crisis has sharpened it. The constant threat of armed foes in the forest less than an hour's ride from your bed has filled you with a nervous energy. The burden of being responsible for the lives and deaths of those who have entrusted their lives and fortunes to your care brings you back to a state of familiar, almost natural focus.

Why, it is almost as if you were once again at war.

1a) Danger has become my natural habitat; what can I do but embrace it?

1b) This is part of who I am. I may not like it, but I'll not deny it either.

1c) No, this is wrong. I am not that man anymore.

---

Had the roadsmen contented themselves to merely preying upon the occasional traveller, then their depredations might have been endured, at least for the season. But by cutting off your fief from the outside world entirely, they have placed you and your tenants in an untenable situation. With the harvest only a few weeks away, you'll need to clear the roads so that your tenants may take their produce to market. Otherwise, the people of your fief will have little means to earn the money with which to pay you their rents, or purchase the tools, seed, and other necessities they'll need for the next year.

In short, if the roadsmen are not driven out of your barony, your fief may face a complete economic collapse. It has become a clear-cut question of you or them.

Your options are all profoundly imperfect ones.

First of all, there's the choice of simply staying put and awaiting aid from the Intendancy, an unlikely prospect, given that you have neither appraised them of your situation nor given them any warning whatsoever regarding your circumstances. For all that you know, the Royal Intendancy office in Fernandiscourt may not even be aware that your fief is dealing with roadsmen at all.

Alternatively, you have more direct options. You have made some effort in keeping your martial skills in fettle these past two years. Now might be a chance to use them.

Now that the roadsmen have shown themselves in the open, you could confront them directly with your Houseguard. They've come a long way since you first embodied them. Though they're far below the standard of any professional soldiers worthy of the name, they're at least well-armed enough and perhaps even well-trained enough to drive off your foes. Whether they would be able to do so without taking heavy, bloody losses is another question entirely.

Lastly, there is perhaps the riskiest option of all. You could approach the roadsmen and ask to negotiate.

There's no doubt that some of your tenants would see it as an act of surrender, and any talks resulting as the mere discussion regarding terms thereof. However, it is also the only way you might extricate you and your fief out of your current situation without either dependency on some outside source of aid or some great effusion of blood. Of course, you have little idea as to how the brigands themselves might react. They might be quite willing to discuss matters, or they might simply shoot you down as you approach. After all, you've done nothing to demonstrate good faith or a desire to negotiate over the past few months. They might just as easily see your sudden change of heart as a delaying tactic, or even a trap.

No course of action is without its risks, none of your potential choices are without disadvantages. Yet with so much at stake, all you can do is pick the one least likely to fail.


2a) I must wait for assistance, it is the best option I have.

2b) Deploy the Houseguard! Let us finish this with fire and steel!

2c) I must negotiate before it's too late.

[Please give one vote for set 1 and one vote for set 2. These will be counted individually - you know, just in case you need to agonize over the second set of choices for a few hours or something.]

Personal Information

As of the Summer of the 615 of the Old Imperial Era:

Sir Alaric d'al Ortiga, Baron Ezinbrooke
Captain, Royal Dragoons (half-pay)
Age: 27

Current Funds: 51 Crown
Debts: 10660 Crown

Bi-Annual Income (Personal): 135 Crown
Bi-Annual Estate Revenues: 266 Crown

Bi-Annual Estate Expenses: 350 Crown
Bi-Annual Interest Payments: 107 Crown

Total Net Income (Next Six Months): -56 Crown


Soldiering: 70%

Charisma: 41%

Intellect: 9%


Reputation: 37%

Health: 62%


Idealism: 60% ; Cynicism: 40%

Ruthlessness: 42% ; Mercy: 58%

You are a Knight of the Red, having the right to wear Bane-hardened armour and wield a Bane-runed sword.

Friends and Enemies

Friends and Associates

Javier Campos: Colour Sergeant, the Royal Dragoons.
(Born 583 OIE)

Victor d'al Reyes: Eldest son of Baron Reyes. Major, the 8th Regiment of Foot. Formerly Commander, the Experimental Corps of Riflemen. ~Lost arm at Blogia~
(Born: 583 OIE)

James d'al Sandoral: Captain (half-pay), the Royal Dragoons.
(Born 592 OIE)

Efraim Saundersley: Solicitor-on-Retainer to the House of Ortiga.
(Born 570 OIE)

Octave d'al Touravon: Baron Touravon, Father of Alisanne d'al Touravon.
(Born 556 OIE)

Enemies

Hiir Cassius vam Holt: Takaran Ambassador to Tierra. Eldest son to Richsgraav vam Holt.
(Born 527 OIE)

Eleanora d'al Welles: Countess Welles. Proponent of Military Reform. Friend to Isobel, the Princess-Royal. ~Died at Blogia~
(Born 587 OIE)

Barony Overview

Ezinbrooke, a barony within the Duchy of Cunaris, possessed of 133 rent-paying households.

Respectability: 29%

Prosperity: 43%

Contentment: 34%

Manor...

…Being a country house of middling size in very poor condition. encompassed by a low stone fence in a state of much disrepair. Outbuildings include stables, coach house, and guard house, all in exceptionally poor condition.

Interior consists of eighteen rooms, including six bedrooms, a kitchen, a library, a small ballroom, a dovecote and a gun room.

Estate and Grounds...

…Being a barony of middling size, composed of a manor house, market village, and surrounding fields and hinterlands. It is located a week's ride west from the city of Fernandescourt, a journey rendered easier by the fine state of local roads.

The village of Ezinbrooke is a small hamlet, possessed of a traveller's inn, a publick house, a somewhat worn shrine to the major Saints, and an open market square. The surrounding cottages are few in number but of excellent condition, having recently been repaired and refurbished. Fields bound the village on all sides, and all available land is under cultivation.

Bi-Annual Estate Revenues
Rents: 266 Crown

Bi-Annual Expenditures
Estate Wages: 150 Crown
Food and Necessities: 75 Crown
Luxuries and Allowances: 75 Crown
Groundskeeping and Maintenance: 50 Crown
Other Expenses: 0 Crown

Total Balance: -84 Crown

 

[ERYFKRAD]

1b We is what we be.
2b Finally a payoff for our soldiering.

 

[Optimist]

1b We is what we be.
2b Finally a payoff for our soldiering.

This

 

[Endemic]

1b, 2b.

 

[Storyfag]

1b
2b

 

[Kipeci]

1a 2c

Pointlessly contrarian vote on the second but kind of curious if having a rabble at our back would make good enough leverage for him to get them to go o shit

 

[Grimgravy]

1a
2b

 

[Kalarion]

1b We is what we be.
2b Finally a payoff for our soldiering.

BLOOD AND FIRE!

 

[Optimist]

1b We is what we be.
2b Finally a payoff for our soldiering.

BLOOD AND FIRE!

VICTORY AT THE SEA!

 

[Lithium Flower]

This is part of who I am. I may not like it, but I'll not deny it either.
You are not so insensible to your own disposition as to think that your time in Antar hasn't changed your way of thinking. No man can survive as severe and harrowing an ordeal as a dozen years of war and not have his attitudes changed. However, you are not a brute animal either, to be made wholly a product of one's own conditions. The war in Antar made you change the way you think, but it is your decision whether to accept those changes or not.

While it may be true that your years as a King's Officer have made the state of mortal peril indifferent or even welcoming to you, that doesn't mean that you cannot choose to repudiate that way of thinking now that your days as a soldier are in your past. Perhaps you may find yourself embracing that part of you which was forged in the fires of battle, and not the more peaceable form which you're expected to maintain now that you're once again at home.

But it will be your choice to do so, just as it shall be your choice to determine your response to the conclusion which you now find yourself facing.

Deploy the Houseguard! Let us finish this with fire and steel!
There's no more time for deliberation, no more time for delay. Your foes have come into the open, and every part of you knows that now you must face their challenge directly, immediately. Every day you allow yourself to sit inactive on your estate will serve only to dishearten your people and embolden theirs. Now! You must act now!

You put on your best uniform in the pre-dawn gloom, buckling on your helmet as the sun rises. For a moment, you consider putting on your armour and taking your baneruned sword with you, but only for a moment. Armour would be more a hindrance than a help in the thick underbrush, and you have no desire to set your own forest ablaze with the flames from your enchanted sword. Instead, you settle for your sabre and pistols, before heading out into the late summer morning, ready for war.

You call out your Houseguard and assemble them in the village square. They're not ready for battle, not by any definition, but you're out of time. They'll have to do what you demand of them, or die in the trying.

You march them out of the village, up the main road to where you know the roadsmen have their central camp in as good an order as you can muster. You can see the nerves take hold as you look into the faces of your improvised little force. They grip their weapons with white-knuckled hands, their eyes flicking side to side as if certain death might come at any moment. You can almost hear the shudders in their breaths, feel the excited tremble of their limbs, see the nervous looks in their eyes.

You feel it too. It never really goes away, not even after the hundredth battle. But it does become familiar, almost comfortable, the slipping on of an old coat. Yes, the old battle tension comes over you too, hot and cold at the same time. If you're fortunate today, you may never have to feel it again.

---

You're still two hundred and fifty paces from the trees when someone fires the first shot. You see the flash and puff of powder smoke before you hear the sound. The ball itself falls short, far too short, smacking into the road more than a dozen paces ahead of you with a puff of dirt.

When the sound comes, it comes as one which you've heard all too many times before. You don't even flinch. But your Houseguard recoils with shock, as if they had in unison been slapped hard in the face. Some stumble backwards, others go reeling. A few dive to the ground, barely holding onto their weapons. One or two level their own firelocks, as if to reply. Only your shouted orders stop them from wasting their powder.

You ought to have known. For all that you've trained them, your makeshift force has never been under fire before. You may know that the enemy is far out of range, that the chances of being hit at two hundred and fifty paces is about the same as being struck by lightning, but your men don't. To them, a single shot at two hundred paces seems as deadly as a battalion volley at twenty.

There's no helping it. Instead, you focus your efforts on getting your men moving again, back on their feet. Yet every time you get them advancing, another shot echoes from the forest, and the whole thing falls apart again, and it is another half-minute of shouting, chivvying, and waving to get them going again.

To you, the danger seems obvious. You're only a hundred and fifty paces away now. At such a range, a decent shot might have a one-in-five chance of hitting a man. If even a wide miss is enough to bring your men to a halt, what will they do once one of their fellows is actually struck?

Another puff of smoke, another sharp crack. The ball goes high, just close enough to clip the plume of your helmet. Again, your men reel. This is how attacks fail. You've seen it happen before, not just to half-trained militia but to veteran infantry as well. Faced with enemy fire, the attackers let paralysis sink in. Too proud to run, too terrified to charge home, they stand trapped betwixt two extremes as the enemy picks them off one by one, until the shredded remnants finally break.

Your fingers clench inside your riding gloves. Your left hand tightens around the hilt of your sabre. You cannot allow that to happen here! There's too much at stake! There must be something you can do!

1) I will take the lead and make them follow!

2) I must encourage them to keep going!

3) I must take a step back, look for a better way forward.

Personal Information

As of the Summer of the 615 of the Old Imperial Era:

Sir Alaric d'al Ortiga, Baron Ezinbrooke
Captain, Royal Dragoons (half-pay)
Age: 27

Current Funds: 51 Crown
Debts: 10660 Crown

Bi-Annual Income (Personal): 135 Crown
Bi-Annual Estate Revenues: 266 Crown

Bi-Annual Estate Expenses: 350 Crown
Bi-Annual Interest Payments: 107 Crown

Total Net Income (Next Six Months): -56 Crown


Soldiering: 70%

Charisma: 41%

Intellect: 9%


Reputation: 37%

Health: 62%


Idealism: 60% ; Cynicism: 40%

Ruthlessness: 42% ; Mercy: 58%

You are a Knight of the Red, having the right to wear Bane-hardened armour and wield a Bane-runed sword.

Friends and Enemies

Friends and Associates

Javier Campos: Colour Sergeant, the Royal Dragoons.
(Born 583 OIE)

Victor d'al Reyes: Eldest son of Baron Reyes. Major, the 8th Regiment of Foot. Formerly Commander, the Experimental Corps of Riflemen. ~Lost arm at Blogia~
(Born: 583 OIE)

James d'al Sandoral: Captain (half-pay), the Royal Dragoons.
(Born 592 OIE)

Efraim Saundersley: Solicitor-on-Retainer to the House of Ortiga.
(Born 570 OIE)

Octave d'al Touravon: Baron Touravon, Father of Alisanne d'al Touravon.
(Born 556 OIE)

Enemies

Hiir Cassius vam Holt: Takaran Ambassador to Tierra. Eldest son to Richsgraav vam Holt.
(Born 527 OIE)

Eleanora d'al Welles: Countess Welles. Proponent of Military Reform. Friend to Isobel, the Princess-Royal. ~Died at Blogia~
(Born 587 OIE)

Barony Overview

Ezinbrooke, a barony within the Duchy of Cunaris, possessed of 133 rent-paying households.

Respectability: 29%

Prosperity: 43%

Contentment: 34%

Manor...

…Being a country house of middling size in very poor condition. encompassed by a low stone fence in a state of much disrepair. Outbuildings include stables, coach house, and guard house, all in exceptionally poor condition.

Interior consists of eighteen rooms, including six bedrooms, a kitchen, a library, a small ballroom, a dovecote and a gun room.

Estate and Grounds...

…Being a barony of middling size, composed of a manor house, market village, and surrounding fields and hinterlands. It is located a week's ride west from the city of Fernandescourt, a journey rendered easier by the fine state of local roads.

The village of Ezinbrooke is a small hamlet, possessed of a traveller's inn, a publick house, a somewhat worn shrine to the major Saints, and an open market square. The surrounding cottages are few in number but of excellent condition, having recently been repaired and refurbished. Fields bound the village on all sides, and all available land is under cultivation.

Bi-Annual Estate Revenues
Rents: 266 Crown

Bi-Annual Expenditures
Estate Wages: 150 Crown
Food and Necessities: 75 Crown
Luxuries and Allowances: 75 Crown
Groundskeeping and Maintenance: 50 Crown
Other Expenses: 0 Crown

Total Balance: -84 Crown

 

[Lithium Flower]

 

[Kipeci]

1

Chaaaaarge!