On the shoulders of giants: a new multiple choices LP!

[m4davis]

D. We may discover new medicines and herbs if we are really lucky we may get farming I may flip to A if someone can give me reasons I hadn't seen yet.

 

[Monty]

A

We're right next to the mountain and we still haven't made use of its resources. Climbing the peak would give a longer-range outlook, but even exploring the lower reaches would give us some advantage in this regard, as well as allowing us to investigate the caves. We'll have to go downriver at some point but I think we've ignored the mountain for too long.

 

[Omicron]

A.

 

[Kz3r0]

A.

 

[Jack]

All these options seems to be about equally beneficial to me, so unless anyone make a strong case for one of them I'm sticking to C, we will watch the lands from the great highs and be aware of any danger a long time before it threatens us. It will give us the time we need to prepare.

 

[Vernydar]

A

Enough, it's time to know what is on that mountain. It's like the third time we have the option to do so, and before we never went and explored it. Favoring instead the fucking bears. Nice to lose years on the useless bears. I don't care if B or C could warn us of incoming barbarian hordes or soul sucking demons, or world shattering beasts. I don't care if D gives us agriculture and medicine. I just want to finally know what is on that mountain....

 

[Zero Credibility]

Bears.

Sigh.

Voting D for now.

 

[Cassidy]

There is a time and place for Un Oso is A Bear

This isn't it.

A.

*Edit: This is what happens when you don't read the update.

 

[Esquilax]

See how "interesting" this update was? You can't build a society based on how wacky and random and silly it is. You can't expect to vote for the dumbest, most counter-intuitive option and expect cool and exciting opportunities to open up - things don't work that way. If we vote sensibly, we'll have far more interesting opportunities opening up because we'll have more options and directions to move our society in. I'm not saying we shouldn't vote on something unconventional from time to time, but it should be based on something more than LOLRANDOM!!1!

Alright, now that I'm done saying "I told you so", I'm voting for A.

 

[Jick Magger]

Well, THAT was a gigantic waste of time. And what exactly did we get out of this? Half a dozen perfectly good and experienced hunters dead, a council member dead, a bunch of bears that are still too disorderly and much too few in number to be used in a military capacity, an even BIGGER drain on our resources, and a handful of fucking animal companions that are still FAR too dangerous to be allowed near our settlement for a handful of hunters, brilliant. I know I said earlier that we shouldn't apply too much real world logic to what appears to be a fantasy universe, but expecting a bear to not behave like a bear is just stupid.

Also, A, we're not putting this off any longer. Fuck this bear cavalry horseshit, we're exploring the fucking mountain that we came here for IN THE FIRST PLACE. We could've been steppe-riding nomads or sea-faring merchants, but you guys wanted to be a bunch of bloody mountain-men. Now that we're at the mountain, and have BEEN at the mountain for years, you guys suddenly don't want anything to do with the goddamn mountain and avoid any option to explore it like the fucking plague.

Funny, people want to develop metallurgy when we don't even have furnaces, stop metagaming, also, iron pwned bronze.

Of course developing metallurgy isn't a one-step process, but simply finding ore will set us on the path to discovering it. As opposed to sitting on the base of the mountain with our thumbs up our asses trying to make friends with bears. Also, Bronze was much higher quality and overall better. It's just that iron stuff was just much easier to make and iron ore was much, much more plentiful. Quantity won over quality, and we obviously do not need to concern ourselves with quantity at the moment. This isn't metagaming; it's basic logic. Metal weapons are better than rocks.

 

[Kipeci]

It was worth a shot, and if we were able enough to tame zebras on a large scale, then why not bears? We still have some bears around anyway, despite the costs, and even if they're only loyal to their tamer they could still be a big help to us when we get invaded.

I vote C, as it's the superior version of A.

 

[oscar]

D

Nice work dumbasses. If your going to come here just to vote "LOL WACKEE" please get the fuck out.

 

[Hirato]

A

Enough, it's time to know what is on that mountain. It's like the third time we have the option to do so, and before we never went and explored it. Favoring instead the fucking bears. Nice to lose years on the useless bears. I don't care if B or C could warn us of incoming barbarian hordes or soul sucking demons, or world shattering beasts. I don't care if D gives us agriculture and medicine. I just want to finally know what is on that mountain....

(also voting A)

 

[Jick Magger]

It was worth a shot, and if we were able enough to tame zebras on a large scale, then why not bears?

Because, funny thing, Bears aren't Zebras.
We've got a bout three of them, at best we've barely trained them to not attack a very specific group of people, and even that may not stick. They're still not trained for fighting at all, keeping them anywhere near our settlement would be doing an invader's job for them, their effectiveness in a fight is doubtful (they'll probably simply run away the moment they're met with resistance. Such as, say, one or two people throwing rocks or spears at them. Hell, even just a guy jumping around while shouting and waving a flaming stick could probably rout one.), and for the icing on the cake; they're completely useless in winter!
Yes, spending years training a trio of resource-draining furry paperweights that'll eat our own men if we keep our eye off them for too long really was worth it. At least we'll be able to give the barbarian fanatics a goddamn circus show while they're tearing us apart limb from limb with their bare hands.

 

[Kipeci]

Bears aren't zebras, but both are animals which have presented huge problems in domestication that we were able to easily surpass in the case of the zebra... I'll grant that this turned out to be a bit of a disaster, but it had a potential to it. Who knows, it may still. Domestication of a species is a big thing that'll take a while, and whatever our present pains are, if we do manage to pull off bear cavalry, the worst case scenario is that we have a better footnote written about us in the histories of our conquerers than those fish guys.

 

[Esquilax]

No, fuck that. No bear cavalry, no more stupid wacky bullshit. I don't mean to be so harsh since I enjoy that this is such an active thread and I like that you're contributing to the discussion here, but seriously stop that shit. It was a bad decision, which is fine since we are bound to make a few fuck-ups here and there (it's part of the fun and the learning process) but that's just pure rationalization there, Kipeci.

This whole bear domestication fiasco is what you call a sunk cost. We've invested so much time, food, resources and lives into making domestication work so now what you're proposing is that we invest even more resources in order to at least get something, anything out of this poorly thought-out project. You're emotionally invested because you're thinking "oh, I've put so much time and effort into making this work that it's gotta pay off eventually, right?" and you want to recoup everything you've lost. It's sort of like a gambler who keeps losing money on a roulette wheel to the point where he starts thinking "Well, the ball has hit black for the past four times, so I'm definitely due for a red this time!" when in fact the probability of getting red is exactly the same as it was last time and all those previous attempts have no bearing on the next spin of the wheel.

So yeah, let's think this shit through a little bit. I'm not suggesting a meta-gamey approach of "well, we should follow exactly what the Romans/Greeks/Egyptians did because it's tried and true" - in fact I've voted for a lot of unconventional choices before (i.e. approaching the fire spirit) - all I'm saying is that it ought to be based on a little bit more than "lol bears are k00l"

Domestication of a species is a big thing that'll take a while, and whatever our present pains are, if we do manage to pull off bear cavalry, the worst case scenario is that we have a better footnote written about us in the histories of our conquerers than those fish guys.

You know what's actually even cooler than that, more interesting and a better scenario? Being the one writing those footnotes.

 

[Jick Magger]

Bears aren't zebras, but both are animals which have presented huge problems in domestication that we were able to easily surpass in the case of the zebra.

And a bear is a completely different animal, with completely different behavioural habits (it's a solitary animal, which is pretty much the polar opposite of what a Zebra is), a completely different level of aggression in regards to things such as territory, and is all-together extremely different from Zebras. Just because we were able, with much more difficulty than you infer (did you forget the part where we had to chase a herd for miles on end?), to tame X does not automatically mean we'll have the same success with Y.

But fuck it, we made a big mistake, and we can't change that. We just need to drop this complete foul-up and move on from here.

 

[oscar]

This whole bear domestication fiasco is what you call a sunk cost. We've invested so much time, food, resources and lives into making domestication work

To be fair wolves wouldn't have been bad. Dogs are pretty useful and a solid investment. Would have taken a while to come into effect and wouldn't have been a life-changer, but wouldn't have been the waste of time this was.

Even if this had worked I would have doubted their use. Our hunters can easily deal with bears. They are frightened of tall things, loud noises and fire. Things would have been even worse when arrows hit the scene and they become little more than target practice. Elephants sort of worked in history because of their tough hide but war bears was just stupid in general. So you end up with a really slow, small and weak elephant that can get scared off by someone yelling and waving a torch. It was dumb no matter how you looked at it.

I also don't think we need to pick the 'crazy' choices to spice things up. I've found this really interesting even with quite 'mundane' and sensible development. So great work Curufinwe and don't feel the need to throw realism to the wind to appease the 'agriculture and hunting and animal domestication? *yawn* where's the fireballs and dragons?' crowd.

 

[Vernydar]

Not to mention, exploring is the best way to find out uncommon and/or strange things.

But still an entire mountain is there, with its resources to be discovered. Which is why I voted A instead of agriculture. Say, timber? Yes, we might have a few wood tools or something, but not timber. You know, a good amount of easy to cut wood, basis in order to build huts? Or, Some different kind of rock? Or, clay? Because yes, we're near the river, but we do not have it. Or, who knows, coal? It IS sometimes in deposits that are near or on the surface.

Not to mention the caves. A place to store food? A place where food grows? (fungi!) A place to kickstart our culture, maybe by drawing things? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cave_painting

Or, any other sort of strange things could be on the mountain at large, other animals, some "monsters", maybe some "magical" or just generally not mundane places.

 

[oscar]

We've got cave painting.

 

[Vernydar]

I really don't think so Oscar. We've never even set foot in a cave before, how could we have cave painting?
That said, another thing against agriculture. Sure agriculture is useful but.... right now it's useless? Where are we going to put the harvested food? We have no containers, let alone a granary. Out in the open, under the rain and the sun, it will all rot away even if we learn agriculture. We would need to eat the harvest in at most a few weeks. Not exactly THAT useful

 

[Multiple Sarcasm]

Oh, well. On to lion riders then, next time.


A. I'd much rather we finally learned to build at least basic shelters (even zebras should've figured out how, by now), and farming is definitely tempting, but we've put off mountain exploration for far too long. Hey, maybe, we'll find dragons in there and tame them? Oooh, dragon cavalry.

 

[Jick Magger]

Hey, maybe, we'll find dragons in there and tame them? Oooh, dragon cavalry.

Now THAT would be a sound investment. Naturally armoured cavalry capable of flight and possibly having the ability to spit fire-projectiles too? Yes please Mr. Postman.
That is, of course, assuming they don't immediately try to incinerate us the moment we get too close to its nest.
The only feasible use of the bears that I can think of now is if the hunters learn how to communicate with them somehow and become druids or something.

 

[m4davis]

Hey, maybe, we'll find dragons in there and tame them? Oooh, dragon cavalry.

Now THAT would be a sound investment. Naturally armoured cavalry capable of flight and possibly having the ability to spit fire-projectiles too? Yes please Mr. Postman.
That is, of course, assuming they don't immediately try to incinerate us the moment we get too close to its nest.
The only feasible use of the bears that I can think of now is if the hunters learn how to communicate with them somehow and become druids or something.

The thing about dragon cavalry is that its more territorial then a bear and also solitary and if the dragons in this world are intelligent well then there even more dangerous so unless at some point in the far future we get mind control devices thats not really an option

 

[Multiple Sarcasm]

Heh, I was mostly joking there, but alright, if Curufinwe thinks dragons would be easier to tame than bears, then great. I'm thinking we won't find any, though, and the river folk were just telling tales about crocodiles or comodo dragons or somesuch.