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>>31292145
>3.

You concentrate for a few moments, having practiced in the last fortnight, and summon that strange frame of energy throughout your body. You feel the aches and strains of your muscles fade away and you feel completely fresh again – ready to trade blows with the god-knight again.

While Sala keeps him busy, you glance over to see how Gnome and Vad are doing. The two appear to be significantly winded and having no more luck than you are. You see Vad punch a hole in the knight’s chest as the two double-team the monster in close quarters, but it closes up once he withdraws his hand and the combatants separate. That doesn’t bode well, but you figure it must have limits. All regeneration has limits, from your experience.

Sala darts back, having taken a nasty cut along her arm from a glancing blow, and you charge in, swinging hard and fast to match the god-knight.

[DC12/17 Attrition Fight]

Rolled 12

>>31292191

Rolled 15

>>31292191

Rolled 5

>>31292191
pls

Rolled 13

>>31292191
dice pls

>>31292191
aim for limb slicing.
Even if it can regenerate a limb, it will be crippled for long enough that you could dice it up and overwhelm its regeneration

Man, we've been barely passing the lower DCs tonight....something's up with the /tg/ dice.

Quick, placate them like one does to a lonely woman at night!

>>31292191
what does iron body actually do?
Its not the latest PC char sheet

>>31292365
It's our regen power.

>>31292371
I vaguely remember it coming with a cost...

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>>31292365
Wait, it's not? Damn, I knew I missed something.

Iron Body I –you make yourself immune to pain and gain enhanced regeneration. Even in situations where you should collapse or suffer from grievous wounds, you do not fall or suffer.

Effect:
>A frame of magical energy seems to lock itself into place over your body, though you sense it rather than see it. There’s no glow or other effects, but the pain vanishes and you can move your arm again. Focusing, you can sense the damage that you’re doing to your arm by using it despite its condition but you can’t feel it. Even so, you also sense your power mending the damage slowly.
>It’s not healing like you thought it was before, but it acts like it. If using it in battle, it’s probably a good idea to get somebody to finish the hearing or wait for the slow regeneration to kick in before dismissing the power. You don’t want your body to suddenly fail because you took a serious injury without realising it.

>>31292388
we end up extremely winded when it ends, since the fatigue and exertion hits us like a freight train, it's just a massive CON buff

>>31292388
Exhaustion, and not being able to tell when you went too far.

>>31292388
Wait, actually, it might be our ability to shrug off attacks. The cost you're talking about might be that we won't be able to tell when we're really fucked up and need to run.

Captcha: Was tedream

Wasted Dream? Are you deep in your bottle tonight, Captcha?

>>31292408
>you can sense the damage that you’re doing to your arm by using it despite its condition
>it’s probably a good idea to get somebody to finish the hearing or wait for the slow regeneration to kick in before dismissing the power.
That is what I was remembering about damage.

>>31292408
What kind of activation cost does this have? If it is close to that of our general stat enhancement buff we might want to turn it on every battle.

>>31292449
>That is what I was remembering about damage
or rather, vaguely remembering.

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>>31292479
It's a constant mana cost unlike empowerment and you can only use it for so long. Untrained like it is now, you're better off only using it in a pinch as it doesn't actually give any buffs, it just lets you ignore hard blows and not get winded from injury and exhaustion.

>Lower target met

Just as before, you trade a rapid series of blows with the god-knight. It’s almost instinctual as you meet each of his blows and riposte. You have the sense of mind now, with Iron Body alleviating the strains of your body on your mind, and you realise that although the actual technique is different the way you and the god-knight fight is very similar. Long, broad strokes that would leave a normal man wide open for a counterattack but delivered with a speed and strength that makes a mockery of normal technique and wisdom. If this fake knight fights anything like the real thing then it would seem that the method of fighting you developed is natural for the inhumanly strong.

You find yourself growing frustrated, however, as the knight refuses to leave any real openings. The managed to get lucky with some of Sala’s help and slice of its sword hand but it regrew as fast as it closed the hole in its shield earlier – sword and all. The dismembered part merely turned in that mysterious black vapour.

Then, just as you’re about ready to give up slaying the monsters it just… fades into that same vapour before disappearing. You stare in shock for a second, before hurriedly checking the rest of the battlefield. It’s been some time now, but you can see that the battle still rages on – the archers and mages that were trading fire with your own appear to have either all died or fled but the Taouran knights continue their melee up the hill.

>continued

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>>31292512
“How? How are you all still here?” comes a raspy voice. It sounds like that booming voice from earlier but much weaker. “You should all be dead.”

In the middle of the field, where the knights first appeared, stands a wizened old man wearing some rather expensive robes, covered with some light armour. You can feel an almost oppressive power coming from him. He’s drawing heavily on some form of magical power that you can just sense.

“No matter. I will just have to finish you myself,” he says, the power returning to his voice as he raises his short staff into the air. As he does so that same wispy black vapour forms around his staff. You think you’ve found the source of your problems.

>And that’s the thread

Next thread is April 11th, 6pm EDT. I’ll be here for another half-hour or so to answer questions.

And yes, this was an intentionally hard battle.

>>31292532
Jesus, i hope we can regroup after fighting this old man.

>>31292532
Vad is currently the only one in our group capable of a sending... maybe we should have him send to the HMK to stop retreating and come back to aid us. And maybe for the fliers to as well (with their heavy magical bombardment)

>>31292569
Nobody in your group is capable of sendings, actually.

>>31292532
Arrgh, they were summons all along!
Now I really wish mal was with us, he could have probably dispelled them what with being an expert in both summoning AND dispelling.

>>31292532
This fucking faggot, I hate him so much.

>>31292569
well i think the wounded are getting treated, so they should be able to come back.
>>31292532
If any of our soldiers survive this battle will they level up?

>>31292587
oh, damn.

We should REALLY learn how to do sendings ourselves considering we are supposed to be a commander

>>31292591
>he could have probably dispelled them what with being an expert in both summoning AND dispelling.
Debatable, it seems like this oldman(maybe a day walker), is drawing from a lot of power, maybe a pact from an infernal is my guess.

>>31292601
>If any of our soldiers survive this battle will they level up?
Yes. Lots.

>>31292591
>Now I really wish mal was with us, he could have probably dispelled them what with being an expert in both summoning AND dispelling.
That reminds me...

Mal wouldn't have been the deal-breaker for this fight some have made him out to be, though he would have been damned useful. There were too many talented enemy mages for him to disrupt them all, even after you'd reduced their numbers. As for these being summons and Mal dispelling them, I'll be able to explain about that once the fight is truly over.

>>31292610
One of the foundry projects is to create smaller sending devices for you to use as in battle without requiring somebody else like Undine or your aide to send for you.

>>31292596
He could be enthralled...
actually, I was wondering, since magic power allows resisting thralldom. But there is no known way to break free... does enthralling apprentice mages and then having them train all their life (without wasting time on frivolous things like fun, and friends, and so on) can get a vampire super mage thralls.

if so, they probably comb the countryside for gifted children to enthrall and send to mage towers to educate.

And isn't magic genetic? probably have a breeding program too.

>>31292621
well, even if he couldn't dispell them outright he could reduce the effectiveness, or at least make it take longer to draw...
Although, now this guy here is doing magic in range of gnome's magical disruption!

>>31292532
I bet he is an archmage
>Shoot astral arrow at archmage
>Get a nat20 or FR
>Instagib without a long, drawn out fight

>>31292667
>Although, now this guy here is doing magic in range of gnome's magical disruption!
Not really. Gnome's disruption is very close range. I mean, she could bullrush him and try to stop him.

>>31292532
>>31292512

Dammit, You guys. I called those motherfuckers being summons. I called it. We could have cut the Gordian knot if we had peeled off after the artillery with those bastards chasing us.

ah, well. we're still alive, and we're about to do that anyway. C'est la vie.

>>31292723
What about Vads?
Also is what >>31292667
>He could be enthralled...
>actually, I was wondering, since magic power allows resisting thralldom. But there is no known way to break free... does enthralling apprentice mages and then having them train all their life (without wasting time on frivolous things like fun, and friends, and so on) can get a vampire super mage thralls.
>
>if so, they probably comb the countryside for gifted children to enthrall and send to mage towers to educate.
>
>And isn't magic genetic? probably have a breeding program too.
>
Says true?

>>31292532
>the power returning to his voice
Does he sound the same as the guy who called out and rallied the taourians after we did the FR blast on their mages?

>>31292713
>I bet he is an archmage
Are you fucking crazy? The only other Archmage that we know is the leader of the magi league and can single handed beat entire army. If he was a Archmage or even closer in terms of power, we and our entire army would dead by now.

>>31292737
It's him.
>It sounds like that booming voice from earlier but much weaker

we've found the source of this army's courage. We gank this guy, they'll cut and run.

Rolled 8

>>31292532
>the power returning to his voice as he raises his short staff into the air

Anyone besides me thinking it would be hilarious to use astral projection to blast his staff like we did the anti-magic?

>>31292737
Now that you highlight that dialogue it seemed like he was expending a lot of power making these guys.

>>31292653
>One of the foundry projects is to create smaller sending devices for you to use as in battle without requiring somebody else like Undine or your aide to send for you.
That would be very useful for our entire army, as well as economy.
But I would still want to learn how to send just in case (although it is probably a lower priority).

Actually, here is something. Only undine can heal our elementals. If she is injured nobody can heal her, she must rest to naturally recover.
We need to get the mage towers to do some research on healing elementals and get some healers (or dare I dream, consumable items) that can heal elementals.

Rolled 6

>>31292731
Issue there is if I was the mage I would order them to charge Talons army and it isn't like these knights are slow.

>>31292713
I wouldn't say archmage. Probably just a grand magister or something.
>>31292767
he just summoned a pair of god-knight clones. GOD-KNIGHTS. TWO OF THEM. Of course he's winded. he's probably a hell of a lot weaker right now.

>>31292737
Yes. That was what I was trying to get across with the booming voice comparison, but I probably should have made that clearer.

>>31292734
Vad is more about shields and punching through barriers. He can't really disrupt spells.

And no, the idea of enthralling apprentice mages then having them train to be stronger isn't that useful. As they grew in magical power they'd find it easier to throw off the compunction. Not everybody would mind you (in fact, most magisters would be incapable of doing so against a non-trivial daywalker), so they might get a few useful thralls but they'd run the risk of even one overriding their suggestion and letting the authorities know.

>>31292787
You can't use sendings, at least not the same way as everybody else, as it's sorcery.

>>31292653
Hey, aspie. What's the ETA on the Sarah FTB?
Now that Gnome's finished, that's next on your dancecard, right?

>>31292794
>he just summoned a pair of god-knight clones. GOD-KNIGHTS. TWO OF THEM.
Which are actually superior to the original.
He also has probably participated in the rest of the battle, and we know he sent that daywalker clone to assassinate sala earlier

>>31292832
>Which are actually superior to the original.
I didn't see them use astral power, so I'm calling this bullshit.

>>31292847
The astral-adepts use astral power
The God-Knights are created by the astral adepts using astral power. But AFAIK do not actually use it themselves.

>>31292847
They are stronger and faster then the originals talon thinks anyway and rapidly heal.

>>31292847
They might be superior in bladework, but yeah, the real meat and potatoes of god-knights is Astral Power. Still, even without their main gimmick they would have killed us without some very lucky rolls.

>>31292832
>Which are actually superior to the original.
that's far fetched in my opinion, since the only reference we have is our familiars(too busy fighting), and a fever dream.

>>31292867
>The astral-adepts use astral power
>The God-Knights are created by the astral adepts using astral power.
If talon is really an astral adept, it should be within his power to create god knights...
Too bad we have no clue how to do so

>>31292826
Sometime between the 19th and 26th is my current plan. As I have no work that week. I may also run additional threads, but I'm not sure yet.

>>31292832
>superior to the original
That was supposition of Talon as he didn't think ordinary god-knights could be this strong. He could be wrong or some may be stronger than others.

>>31292847
You were fully empowered, with an effective strength of 7 (you could lift about a metric tonne, for reference) and these guys were matching you. They're using astral power or something that produces a similar effect.

>>31292893
God-Knight Dragonborn Lynn would wreck all KINDS of shit. I want to see this happen.

>>31292893
I don't think he is one to be honest. He seems to lack a lot of ties that the God knights have.

>Too bad we have no clue how to do so.

Tune our astral power to fire. Lord of ember created the rites and he used that as his astral focus.

>>31292945
>I don't think he is one to be honest. He seems to lack a lot of ties that the God knights have.
God Knight =!= God (self proclaimed)
Talon is channeling astral power, that is the mark of a (self proclaimed) God aka Astral-Adept.
Talon isn't a God-Knight (for one thing, he isn't 10 feet tall)

>Tune our astral power to fire. Lord of ember created the rites and he used that as his astral focus.
Lord ember created the rites as a mortal. cast them as a mortal, and then ascended.

>>31292978
>Lord ember created the rites as a mortal. cast them as a mortal, and then ascended.
correcting myself here, he created the rites to ascension into Astral-Adept / God as a mortal.
He created the God-Knights after his ascension
I misread your post

>>31292917
So, that's your FTB timeline, but is the next thread going to take that long to happen as well? You're killing me here, Aspie. I want to get my Empire-Builder on more often than once every two weeks,

>>31292917
>metric tonne
Actually, that might be too little. I may revisit how much weight a specific strength level can lift. I can't remember whether I quoted Sala as lifting 500kg with or without empowerment, tbh, and I have no notes on it.

>>31292826
Speaking of FTB
the very first FTB is still at 95% complete...

>>31292978
Yeah but he has a lot of shit they don't. For one his astral power doesn't seem completely set which the God knights and the likes seem to have.

>>31292917
>You were fully empowered, with an effective strength of 7 (you could lift about a metric tonne, for reference) and these guys were matching you. They're using astral power or something that produces a similar effect.
Damn, ok that IS impressive

>>31293003
Next thread in six days, actually. Unless you meant specifically having time to do the empire management side of things which doesn't really have an ETA.

The FTB takes longer as it takes a while for me to write those. Same deal with major pastebin updates.

>>31293015
I'm not sure if I plan on adding the fluff parts to that one. I can't even remember what I planned them to be (though I think I alluded to them in threads).

>>31293033
What I want to know is, how high do Stats go? Like I know that peak vanilla ability is 5, but how much can a full-blown bitch-fucking Astral Adept pull off?

>Disarm (at the wrist) the shadow-god-knight
>It grows a new arm AND a new sword
I want to be able to do that...
I wonder if we could make some sort of energy blade out of astral power... like that guy from yu yu hakushi or a psiblade. It sounds right up our alley... then again, it is probably far more effective to magically boost a metal blade than to make out entirely out of magic energy.

>>31292917
>strength of 7
We have a base strength of 5 and with Empower Self II we go to 7, but we also have battlefield control I that increase our stats for one when fighting in a battlefield that we made, did you forget about this skill or the battlefield was not "made by us" enough?

>>31293050
Man, I'm good with anything you put out there. You do good work, And just want to see more of it coming our way more often. I mean, seriously, you don't actually intend to tell us you have anything besides this, do you? a, quote-unquote, 'life'? a 'job'? puh-lease. you're not fooling anybody. you're just being lazy.

Speaking of empower self, have we actually tried the plan to keep it on at all time while we are awake?
It lasts 3 hours per cast. So with a 16 hour day it would take 6 casts to do that.
We only have 5MP when we wake up in the morning IIRC. but this constant practice with it should help us achieve higher levels of mastery of this invaluable skill

>>31293120
>It lasts 3 hours per cast.
It last 6.

>>31293140
oh, you are right.
It used to be 1 hour when the quest started, then it got upgraded to 3. I didn't realize its up to 6 already.

Well in this case its only 3 MP to keep it up all day (while awake). Definitely doable

>>31293068
Raw stats max at ten, abilities and skills at 4.

However, stats combined with abilities and skills can go as high as they like.

For instance, if I have Strength 8 and Empower Self IIII my effective strength is 12 even though that's above maximum otherwise.

>>31293087
I was using 7 for raw power reference as Battlefield Control is an 'effective' increase. You don't get physically stronger when it's active. It just acts like an increase mechanically, if that makes sense.

>>31293120
You could run empowerment all day now and only use about a third of your reserves.

>>31293171
Fantastic. We are now able to make all the 'mine goes up to 11' jokes we want now.

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Alright, I'm off for a few hours. If there's any more questions, I'll be able to answer them when I get back if the thread is still alive.

For everybody else, I'll see you in a week. This was a fun thread to run, guys. Thanks for a great session. It really has been too long since the last proper big battle

>>31293171
>You could run empowerment all day now and only use about a third of your reserves.
lets do this from now on.
as a bonus, this also boosts our int and cha for non combat stuff

>>31293253
http://suptg.thisisnotatrueending.com/archive/31281947/#p31291824
>>So, Aspir. As the GM, with all your GM secrets, and given that we literally went balls-to-the-wall against the biggest army in the area, how well are we playing against them so far?
>Better than expected. Assuming the thread doesn't die too quick, I should have some time to talk about this sort of thing post thread. Not too long left of content posts, methinks.
So. how did we do?

Okay, so I've been reading the Pastebin, and I came across this in the enemies section.
>If a battlemage is to a regular mage what a Mage-knight is to a peasant, then Combat Magisters are the same again to their battlemage cousins.

Pretty sure that's what this guy with the God-Knight magic is. Apparently they're mainly in the Magi League, so if we can whack this guy now we've taken out what is probably Taour's strongest mage by an order of magnitude. they won't recover from it if he dies.

>>31293339
And while we are it, lets practice iron body until we are completely out of juice every night before going to sleep (but not when in a combat zone like taour, only on our conquered territories)

>>31293377
isn't maloric a combat magister?
This guy could be a grand magister (which, even if a research mage, would still mage a combat magister level in combat if I am not mistaken in my reading)

Also, I think the loss of the blood farm and the 100 HMK vamps and the 200 highly level mages and so on might hurt more than his loss.
And we haven't won yet, he may still kill gnome, sala, or vad... or us in the upcoming battle

>>31293431
He's a Channeler, mainly. He has useful combat applications, but he's not going to be bringing down the wrath of god on his enemies like a Combat Magister would.

>If a battlemage is to a mage what a mage-knight is to a peasant, then combat magisters are the same again to their battlemage cousins. Exceedingly skilled and experienced warriors, combat magisters field in small tight-knit units and unless a wide-array of magical death to their foes. The Magi League uses them as surprise shock troops, hiding them in regular units only for them to suddenly charge out and obliterate the unit they are facing. A highly skilled magister can destroy a unit of mage-knights at range but a unit of elite combat magisters can shatter the entire core of an army in a few brief minutes. Luckily for the RSK, combat magisters are both rare and difficult to replace so every one they kill is a serious blow to the League.

He's good, but not that good. His talents lie elsewhere.

>>31293474
mal ;_;

Though at least we can get some good research in.

Just to add on to the thread. I'm hoping we killed a good section of the foes warriors. If we killed around 400 of the medium knights then it would be pretty equal in numbers and the knights will be tired from the fight while we are mostly rested.

>>31293369
Right, so this deserves a bit of a longer response. Given how many battles will take place in the future, I hope this also gives some insight into how I intend to keep planning them.

This was the first really big battle. It’s about more than winning – it’s also about not losing too many men. A pyrrhic victory would be a terrible result given how much more military might Taour is packing. You were up against a foe that could match you, being full of as many veterans as you have and being slightly larger. Taour also has some really good fighters, capable of matching your elite fights and yourself, by virtue of having vampires.

The basic set-up was that either side would hit the other hard as hell early on and then that would set the scene. Taour had a better chance of coming out on top, with their ranged superiority (their mage unit was chock full of journeymen and magisters, compared with yours being full of adepts) and the vampire HMKs. If they slammed you early on, this could potentially become a Fort Locke repeat if you didn’t retreat (but hopefully with many more hints to take that action). If you slammed them, the idea was for the old man to hit you hard.

Instead, the battle mostly stayed tipped only a little in your favour with you never getting the big successes you needed to really push it over the edge, but never failing the important rolls (like the attempt on Salamander). So it sort of trundled along with you maintaining an edge until you stumbled headlong into the bossfight. Then you sent everybody away and slogged it out. This went better than it could have gone – bad rolls here could have caused a Fate Point to burn (or some FR points). If you’d kept your men here, you would have had a better time against the god-knights but taken heavy losses short of a Nat 20. God-knights can’t destroy armies in small numbers but they can do a lot of damage.

>super long comment is continued

>>31295227
Right now, you have the final stage of the bossfight (geez, it sounds like a video game) plus the results of Parras’ fighting up on the hill. You’ll win (unless you get slammed by the old man), but the magnitude of the army losses might vary a bit depending on rolls. You’ve done well so far, but the protracted melee up top is bad although sending your HMKs back makes things better.

>>31293431
>>31293474
Mal's still pretty good at combat, but he's no match for a dedicated combat magister. For reference, a unit of five elite combat magisters is a serious threat to most people in the setting (including the Champion candidates at full power).

With that said, Mal's also not at the peak of his potential. He's in his mid-30s. Even Alyce, who is very young for her power, is in her 60s. He will grow into being a big, bad awesome mage over time if he survives all the travails of the quest.

>>31294927
The losses you caused them before you sortied and charged their artillery units are probably around:
100 Flying Mage-Knights
100 Heavy Mage-Knights
400+ Medium Mage-Knights
700+ archers
400+ men-at-arms
150 battlemages

>>31295255
>protracted melee up top is bad although sending your HMKs back makes things better.

Hopefully we won't lose too many men. We need enough to fort into the land and wait out Taour.

>>31296059
or raze Heien to the ground and employ scorched earth on their most vital areas. It would be bad PR but would be devastating to taour

>>31295227
>>31295255
thanks for the answer

>>31295299
This is actually really nice on our part. flyers and Heavies are completely gone, Battlemages cut down by 75%, and the Mediums are hacked down by 25%. Archers are down to 1300, and men-at-arms are relatively untouched at 1900. overall, at least 1850 of their soldiers are dead. a roughly thirty-percent casualty rate.

Now, the only question is, How many of our men have died so far? Aspie, if you read this, It'd be nice if you can confirm for us all the soldiers that are 100% dead and not reliant on future rolls. You mentioned before that depending on our rolls mean up in the skirmish may take more losses; you don't have to mention those guys. just tell us the bare minimum of who we lost if we were to Nat 20 for every single roll next thread.

>>31296826
It's better actually. Because that was before we charged so we probably wiped a good chunk of their mages out.

Our biggest issue right now is the slog out at base. Though our heavies we sent back help a bit right now.

>>31292945
Technically, I don't think that the Lords are Astral adapts. They're essentially, the archangel to their angel, and we don't know their origin. Also, I think the water focus can do something similar.

>>31295299
>>31295255
>>31295227
So I gotta ask
What did you think of our use of FR point? Good? Questionable? WTF are you guys doing?

WE don't know how to recharge them, but you do. And I can't help but picture you shaking your head in shame of us if we make a bad call in the uncertainty of what the hell we're facing.

>>31293253
If you're still around, could we have a bit more information on Faurun? I realize their weaker than us or Taour, but I would like some idea of how much force they could muster, to know if cutting some sort of deal with them is a good idea, and to figure out the possible downsides of Taour thralling enough people in their kingdom to instigate a war with us. After all, if they get desperate I could see them trying just that.

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Huh, this thread's still up.

>>31301525
It was a little surprising to see one used to early. With that said, it was probably a good call. It let you take out a whole lot of their mages - if you hadn't you would have had to do something else to deal with them blowing all your shit up.

>>31302640
Farun is pretty small and weak (weaker than Vitria was), as are the couple of other factions in that region above you. What makes dealing with Farun troublesome is that they have some connections with the Mage Guard and they're staunch royalists (anti-Magi League). Also, whether they'd be willing to fight Taour is another matter.

>>31296826
I'm a little unwilling to tell you guys things of consequence that Talon doesn't know. I can give you Talon's thoughts from his experience at the most.

You'd lost about 300-400 men, largely from your ranged contingent, by the time you sortied. If Moss did well with his archers, you figure that he might have lost another 200 from that group (depending on whether the enemy's artillery fled or fought to the last). As for the melee, if Parras handled it correctly (and the Taourans had no more surprises) he could probably have kept the losses below 500. Maybe even less depending how quickly Phrace got back with the HMKs.

>>31296747
Remember that General Parras has staunch morals. It's safe to say he would not like you razing Hiien with everybody in it.

>>31304372
>Farun is pretty small and weak (weaker than Vitria was), as are the couple of other factions in that region above you. What makes dealing with Farun troublesome is that they have some connections with the Mage Guard and they're staunch royalists (anti-Magi League). Also, whether they'd be willing to fight Taour is another matter.
True. From what I understand they also tended to have Mage Guard Inquisitors helping keep the mages in line. Now that the Mage Guard has withdrawn from the region, they're probably getting nervous, about both potential Mage rebellion and either us or Taour attacking them. Also, they may see this as the chance to get out of being a puppet state of the Mage Guard.

>>31304372
By smaller and weaker do you mean just a peacekeeping force, or something like 500 mage knights, plus 3000 or so people in a levee?

>>31304372
>Little surprising so early
Yeah, but two nat 1s in a row for a fight we knew was gonna be hard in the first place? Just. Just no man. This is basically the fight to decide the war here. If we lose here, we're gonna need to pull some serious stuff out of our ass to make anything in the future work.

That being said, I am sad we had to spend it so early too. I wanted to save it for a really good maneuver we needed a crit success on. Like say, hammering this mysterious Mega Wizard you showed us just now, whom I suspect is channeling the magic of all the other mage that are still alive (I remember you mentioned they had rituals that let them fuse their magic strengths and such. We should steal the plans for those rituals if they don't involve blood magic)

A side note: I REALLY hope that leaving Mal behind pays off. Not only do we need it if we're gonna be conquering more Taour territory, but we paid hard not for bringing him. He wouldn't be lynchpin, like you said, but his assistance would've helped a lot too. But hell, everyone's help is helping a lot, so that's not really saying much I guess.

>>31304372
only 400 confirmed dead so far? that's utterly fantastic. I didn't even realize we were being so effective on this. Guess those traps really did us some good for us. If we take out this magister, and everything rolls well, we'll have only lost a thousand men in this entire clusterfuck of a campaign. jesus. I'm actually confident about our chances now.

>>31304651
Probably closer to the latter, thoguh don't forget they'll have some mage towers and knightly orders too. The big powers tend to sell MK suits to their vassals/puppet states on the cheap.

>>31304720
>We should steal the plans for those rituals if they don't involve blood magic)
Ritual circles are pretty basic stuff. Mal and Sarah used one in order to break the magical defenses on Robert Talbeth's saferoom. The trick is drawing and focusing on a ritual in the middle of a battle, particularly when one of the casters might drop dead any second. It's more about training in that case - something your battlemages largely lack, despite their experience.

>>31304816
>Our BM lack training
Ah. I see. So we should definitely try to fix that as soon as possible. It WILL be nice to have most of our army not be so Green after this fight, though. As long as we can hold off on the fucking nat 1s for a while, we should be okay.

>>31304871
>implying you can stop the nat 1s

The dice gods love our screams. there are no breaks on this rape train.

>>31304816
The fluffy tails of the fox-people are artificial, made by someone to help him control astral better, right?
I also believe that mana is just astral power filtered by the reality/world.

>>31304816
Speaking of Blood Magic, what does ot actually do?
Is it summoning demons and shit like in Dominions?

Speaking of the demons/infernals, are they actually any more evil than the angels? I seem to recall there being a lore post about how both races enslaved the mortals, but I could just be misremembering.

>>31304871
Agreed, after this we should make our army train like crazy, they really need it.

>>31304895
Nah. I was never under the impression we could stop them. I just...wish we could direct them towards social rolls only, or something. Anything that isn't this fight really.

>>31304988
I think Aspir said that training and experience were two different things. I was under the impression all our troops were as well trained as they could be without experience. But I think I was mistaken on that part.

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I'm off to work now. If this thread is somehow still alive in 10 hours (highly unlikely), then I'll see you guys on the 11th for the next thread.

>>31304930
You're on to something with the foxes, though you're only warm right now.

>>31304975
>Speaking of Blood Magic, what does ot actually do?
Blood magic is just a good emergency catalyst. Any mage can use it, though it's probably not the best idea to induce blood loss in anything other than a dire emergency. It can also be used to fill in for some very expensive stuff in complicated rituals, for the poor genius mage.

>Speaking of the demons/infernals, are they actually any more evil than the angels? I seem to recall there being a lore post about how both races enslaved the mortals, but I could just be misremembering.
History says that humans, elves, dwarves and dragons all served the divine races (infernals, angels plus some others you don't know of). As for how evil the infernals are, that's all in the eye of the beholder.

I will say that although there is an 'always chaotic evil' faction/race, it's not the infernals.

>>31305132
>I was under the impression all our troops were as well trained as they could be without experience.
Your soldiers are well trained, but the battlemages not so much. Too many low-level mages, not enough high-level ones in short.

>>31305203
Ah, so I was mistaken. Very well then, good to know. Let's hope this massive fight fixes all that huh?

Have a nice day mate.

Spinach

>>31305203
>'always chaotic evil' faction/race

Watch it be fairies.

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>>31304930
>>>31305203
>the fluffy tails are grafts and kitsunes as a race don't exist naturally

DON'T.

YOU'RE SHAKING MY WORLD HERE, ASPIE.

I CAN'T COPE WITH THIS.

>>31309570
>Not being happy that you can graft tails to waifus.

>>31305203
the tails are a sapient parasite that embeds itself in a host and takes over its body?

>I will say that although there is an 'always chaotic evil' faction/race, it's not the infernals.
the monsters beyond the wall of marie?

>>31311531
>monsters beyond the wall

Aren't those like mindless seeming?

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So, you guys appear to have kept the thread alive. If you have any questions to ask, fire away. My response rate may be a bit slow as I have some chores to do.

>>31315372
>>31311531
The shadowbeasts appear to be mindless, so I wouldn't really consider them to have an alignment.

>>31309570
>>31309610
>>31311531
Well this certainly went interesting places.

>>31305313
Battle-mage training is a little different. Soldiers don't learn formations mid-battle, after all. You need to get some experienced battle-mages to teach the rest (though they'll otherwise slowly shift up ranks). There's a listing in the Empire Pastebin of the exact ranks your battle-mages hold.

>>31317087
>Shadowbeasts have no alignment
I figured as much. They strike me as 'Neutral by virtue of having no morals'. If we're going by tabletop alignments anyway.

You definitely make the Fae sound pretty messed up tho. Maybe not evil, but definitely selfish and self important. I wonder if there are any nice fae. Would be nice to find, if we did.

>Battle-mage
I get what you're saying, I think. When I picture formations, it would basically mean how good they are at recognizing the best formation for incoming attacks.
So, 'Loose' for fireballs. Or 'Tight' for charges. Basics right there, but the point remains.

A thought: I don't want to get too micro managey with the formations, so I assume they happen based on the training of our units. But if anyone came up with a formation idea, would you apply that to whatever off screen calculator you do? Assuming you don't just eyeball DCs.

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>>31317138
>But if anyone came up with a formation idea, would you apply that to whatever off screen calculator you do?
If somebody came up with a good enough formation idea to convince me to change the strength of individual units (or the way they combine), sure. Or I might apply it as a conditional modifier (which is eyeballed). Depends how good it is.

>>31317250
Cool. You're a pretty fly guy Aspirational.

>>31317250
Yo I got a question. If you don't mind divulging it that is.

When it comes to big battles and such-would you mind giving me a quick overview of how you calculate all those variables? From archer attacks, trap successes, and just full on melee?

I understand if you'd rather not get into specifics, just curious.

Oh also, I wanted to know how effective experience is in comparison to training. Is it a multiplier for combat power? Or does it just mean that the unit counts a little closer to a higher tier unit (like say, Veteran/Elite Man-at-arms making his way to being better then a Green Mage Knight or whatever)

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>>31317282
>When it comes to big battles and such-would you mind giving me a quick overview of how you calculate all those variables? From archer attacks, trap successes, and just full on melee?

My original system mostly involved using three stats for units, which were summed together and compared in conjunction with commander ability. This fell apart a bit with only parts of an army attacking the whole of another army (e.g. archery) - in this case, I either eyeball it or use a major NPC's stat (usually Talon's).

One of the things I really want to do before moving to the continental phase (where huge army battles will be common) is make a new system for mass combat that is suitable for how the battles are actually playing out (rather than how I pictured them doing so before I started AEQ).

>Oh also, I wanted to know how effective experience is in comparison to training.
Training would be represented in actual stat increases (effectively a change in unit type). Battle-mages are a bit wobbly, due to the fact they're made up of many mages, and they'll be getting changed up a bit. Experience has set increases to certain stats. It's largely morale related, but Conscripts are considerably weaker than Green/Regulars/Veterans and Elites are considerably stronger.

This may change when I redo my system.

For your example, an Elite Man-at-arms would be a match for a Conscript Medium MK but weaker than Green or higher (they could still win, though).

>>31317572
Hm...I see. Large battles are difficult, and I was wondering how you handled such a thing, it's good to know it's all in capable hands-you seem like a pretty smart fellow when it comes to number crunching.
Notably, that sort of calculation is hard. That is, archers hitting enemy lines without an actual engagement. Even some video games get that wrong (See some of the Total War Games archery units for example. They got better in Shogun, but they were useless in earleir formats due to lack of real impact beyond morale)

>Make a new mass combat system
That's quite the tall order, and it'll be a shame we can't empower all our armies with the same force we're bringing here right now, but we're only one man Until we get shadow clone techniques from Vad of course.
But seriously, you might consider some tabletops that already do heavy crunch for such a thing, if only to give yourself a base to work off of? Starting from scratch can be hell, and there are plenty of games (Some I'm sure you know about already) that might have a good idea where to start there.

All that being said, numbers ain't everything. I wouldn't let yourself get too tied down by it all, if you think something is unfair, or it'd make for a better story otherwise. I've known too many a GM superglue themselves to a rulebook, and never step away.

>Experience is largely morale related
I figured as much. Which can be quite important in a fight, especially in a fantasy world where we're fighting increasingly terrifying things. (Like shadow god knights, and vampires).
I imagine the guys who fought the shadow beasts had to be Veteran to survive any time against them.

But what you're saying is there is a clear step between Conscript and Elite from the normal experience ranks, eh? Sounds interesting. I wonder if we will get an Elite unit some time. Sounds tough to get.

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>>31317700
Number crunching is fun. I'm also damned glad I calculated all the probabilities for best of three d20 before I started. Real lifesaver there.

>But seriously, you might consider some tabletops that already do heavy crunch for such a thing, if only to give yourself a base to work off of?
I usually poke around at them, but the real issue is that most tabletops work on a smaller scale. Even with more rolls, I'm still deciding a lot more with a roll than most games do.

>I imagine the guys who fought the shadow beasts had to be Veteran to survive any time against them.
A lot of the soldiers who fought reasonably well against the shadowbeasts have special stat ranges, on top of their experience bonuses. You've seen that before, with Veteran MMKs becoming Green HMKs - that's because the statline of the HMKs is higher than the MMK, so I bumped down their xp to account for it.

>Which can be quite important in a fight, especially in a fantasy world where we're fighting increasingly terrifying things. (Like shadow god knights, and vampires).
Morale will be increasingly important against those sorts of foes. It hasn't been a huge problem for you so far, but you've also mostly fought mundane armies. Imagine being on the receiving end of those summoned monster-hounds in Vitria? There's a reason Talon has a Leadership skill.

>>31317778
>Number crunching is fun
Heh. The fact that you think so is excellent news for the future of our quest, I reckon. And yeah, d20s have never been my favorite system, too many extremes, but if you're gonna use them, then using them the way you do is probably best. I've heard people say tg dice 'aren't actually randomized' but I have no idea how something isn't 'actually randomized'.

I'm sorta rambling now. Sorry.

>Other tabletops
The only one I can think of is Warhammer, which apparently uses specific stats for groups of specialized units that have special powers, and a bunch of other things that I don't fully understand. But the end goal (continent phase you said) probably is about as big as scales get, beyond planetary sized battles and shit.

>Veteran MMK becoming Green HMK
Riiight. I remember you mentioned that. Is that just because being HMK means by default they have a whole new set of skills they need to master, making them a newb again? And therefore susceptible to morale issues? Or is it just a combat modifier at that point? I mostly ask because, if we're fighting a frightening foe, it may be wiser to keep a more confident fighter (say, Veteran) instead of bumping up their combat prowess at the expense of battle experience in said gear.

>Morale
I am INCREDIBLY disappointed by our nat 1 for our inspiring speech. That really weakened the core of our army. If the traps hadn't gone so well, we hadn't saved Sala, and had let the god knights into our ranks, then I have little doubts we would need to seriously consider retreating right about now.
But hey, nat 1s are a bitch sometimes.

>Summoning monsters
Oh yes, I imagine that has quite the effect on morale. Why do you think I am incredibly interested in the different types of mage? I really want us to look deeper into summons and golems. That type of fighting power (on top of fear effects) could be very important for key fights, albeit situational.

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>>31317861
>And yeah, d20s have never been my favorite system, too many extremes, but if you're gonna use them, then using them the way you do is probably best.
d20s were a bit of a toss-up. I wanted criticals and often, as they add variety and I could work plot elements into them (a different one for each PC), but the range was a bit murky. Having done some more research, I would probably use a best of three d100 with a slightly boosted critsuccess range or an additive 3d20 system (with crits being when the sum is above or below a certain amount).

>HMK thing
If you're using unfamiliar equipment, you're less confident when shit goes south. In exchange, they get better stats otherwise (including being much more intimidating to the enemy).

>summons
As the savvy may have guessed, there's a good reason that the lorebin contains a ton of info on patterns, constructs and summons. You can do some interesting stuff with them and you're not the only person aware of that fact in the setting.

>the nat1 comment
To an extent, this is why I like the criticals. It's an easy way to (force myself to) add the unexpected into situations. Sometimes it becomes a little causality bending (like the speech a bit), but I think it's for the better. It meant the battle could have run very differently quite quickly and cause a large change of pace in decision-making.

>>31317932
>d20
I suppose that is fair enough for the reasoning behind it all. Crits do lend urgency to a situation, but sometimes, it feels like it's a bit much depending on how often we roll (of course, that's coming from a guy who's played DnD for years, so you know) but I can't say I'm complaining either. Nat 1s suck, but they don't ruin us completely (or haven't so far, from what you've done). The thing that confuses me a bit is some rolls are quite clearly more important then others (for a variety of reasons) yet all of them have the same chances of raw failure, or raw success. As I said, I think you roll with it pretty well, but that always nags at the back of my mind, worrying me, making me doubt the next time I have to type in the dice command.

Call me paranoid cuz I totally am.

>HMK
Ah, so I was right. Glad to understand that then.
While Heavy armor is not always suitable for our entire army simply due to how slow they'd be, I do wonder what the best combo of armor types would end up being. Thankfully, there are plenty of anons around who actually know a thing or two about army tactics. I may not get to participate when it comes to that stuff, but reading what happens is still fun.

Now I must wonder if we can make better HMK armor... Juggernaut Armor.

>Summons
Indeed, and there are a number who are planning lots of creative things once we have the facilities to actually produce things.

>Nat 1
That's an interesting take on criticals if I've ever heard one. I suppose that's good. Using it as a means to insert more challenges for us to overcome, instead of just using it as a tripping block for whatever we hope to do like some choose to do. More should try that route.

That being said, morale is a precious resource in this fight. Let's hope we can stomp head-mage guy and earn a bunch of morale. I assume watching us kick ass inspires our allies, or something similar.

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>>31318019
>Using it as a means to insert more challenges for us to overcome, instead of just using it as a tripping block for whatever we hope to do like some choose to do.
Ultimately I'm telling a story here, not running a game. I've got a lot invested in this (more than I dared to hope for when I started) so I like to think it's in my interests to keep things as interesting as possible rather than reward and punish. Of course, there's still the QM aspect, so I need to do a little of that.

>Now I must wonder if we can make better HMK armor... Juggernaut Armor.
The Knights of Basette had some pretty huge armour, even if it was largely mundane. You hear tales of the Order of Malataine's knights wearing very large armour, too. So the idea might not be too foreign.

>I assume watching us kick ass inspires our allies, or something similar.
Yes, though there will also be the possible benefit of there still being time to join the melee and turn the tide yourself. As well as, you know, not dying.

>Indeed, and there are a number who are planning lots of creative things once we have the facilities to actually produce things.
It'll be interesting to see how yours and other player's ideas differ from what I might expect. And how all of you react to my ideas when they eventually show up.

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>>31318115
>Ultimately I'm telling a story here, not running a game.
Well, really, that's what all GMs do. QM, DM, whatever you call them. The mechanics do as they should, and fade into the background, and everything else becomes the focus. Which is good, that means you have a lot of meaty details that are important enough to cloud out mechanics junk. Most of these questions are just my curiosities.

>Juggernaut Armor
Not gonna lie, anytime I picture it in my head, all I get are pic related. And I love it.

>Join ourselves
Not dying is always lovely. I assume we're burning a bit of stamina during this fight with the god knights (though there's no super clear indicator, it was heavily implied I believe). So we may not be able to get too hands on right after this. Whatever the hell Sala did during her trap, it was basically a super move it looked like to me, so her mana has gotta be hurting. Unless I'm missing something, in which case feel free to correct me.

>Design ideas
Something I noticed about tg ideas: A lot of them are strange. Not bad, but somewhat impractical. I love that there are enough people thinking of stuff to run over ideas like that, though. The whole cavalry discussion is a good example (In a world with such intense magic where cavalry are rendered obsolete, sorta that is). Still, I enjoy watching you talk with the other creative anons about stuff like that.

Personally, most of my ideas involve some sort of golemancy, a vehicle of some sort, or siege weaponry.
Since we don't have the ability to make anything of the sort right now, that's all on the backburner. Once we conquer Taour (knock on wood) and take this region, a year or so of peace to rebuild, rearm, defend, research, tax, and settle would be amazing. I doubt we'll have such a luxury, but such is the way of things.

A side note: I was thinking about the smaller region with connections to the bigger factions. Maybe we can take them as vassals? Unless that is seen as an insult somehow.

>>31318115
The heavy losses among our Battlemages and AAs has got me thinking.
Can we make magic 'deployable shields', as in a spike or mobile bulwark that projects a one-way magic barrier in one direction?

Also, caltrops, stakes rammed into the ground to deter charges, that kind of good stuff.

For that matter, could we have ordered our troops to make minor fortifications or construct siege engines or something?

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>>31318229
>I assume we're burning a bit of stamina during this fight with the god knights (though there's no super clear indicator, it was heavily implied I believe).
You are, especially having taken a few hard hits. The joy of Iron Body is being able to work through that, though - you might want to keep it from being overworked while Undine is down for the count or you might collapse when you deactivate it.

>Whatever the hell Sala did during her trap, it was basically a super move it looked like to me, so her mana has gotta be hurting.
That was Immolate II at full power. She burnt up a lot of energy but she also has a fair chunk (high Magic is pretty useful for that).

>The whole cavalry discussion is a good example (In a world with such intense magic where cavalry are rendered obsolete, sorta that is).
Cavalry went obsolete because the horses were high maintenance and magical items could do their job better. If you could find ways around that then cavalry would still have some solid advantages.

>Once we conquer Taour (knock on wood) and take this region, a year or so of peace to rebuild, rearm, defend, research, tax, and settle would be amazing. I doubt we'll have such a luxury, but such is the way of things.
One of the things I hinted at was that the Magi League and RSK weren't going to go at it (aside from minor skirmishes) for a while. It's more a matter of whether the critical mass of players wants to slow down.

>A side note: I was thinking about the smaller region with connections to the bigger factions. Maybe we can take them as vassals? Unless that is seen as an insult somehow.
You'd have to offer them something to convince them. There would also be the issues with the royalist issues as the royal line of Farun and nearby kingdoms probably won't be interested in sacrificing their positions and power.

>>31318359
>Over working Ironbody
On that note: Is it leveled up by use, or by training? Because if by use I say we keep using it, and stay out of the fight for a bit. If by training, then we shall indeed lay off of it.

Ah but that is all for next thread. Our fight with the Wizard man is next, and that will eat up what remains of our power (though, surely he is exhausted as well. He wouldn't reveal himself if he wasn't confident, though).

>Immolate II
Whoa. That was level II? I can't even imagine IV. I love watching those girls work sometimes, I swear.
I hope they level up their abilities along with us.

>Cavalry
I vaguely remember most of that conversation, but I think it went that 'speed' nowadays was handled by LMK. Still, making us a group of Mage Horsemen who ride flaming Nightmares into battle, wielding magic flails HAS to be worth some fear points, right?

>More of a matter if we want to slow down
I hope we do after all immediate threats are dead. Here, it makes sense to be a little rash, being not nearly as well supplied against a very antagonistic enemy, and going off momentum of a good conquer of a large city. But the RSK or Magi League would laugh at our bullrush tactics.

But hey, that's all me rambling about future stuff. Should probably focus on the here and now.

>Vassalship
Money is always a lovely thing, you know. Especially for a really small country. If we were hoping for a peaceful sort of vassalship (the kind not made at the point of swords, and such), then offering them a nice big fat sack of cash would be a great start. As for the royalist issue, that is a little tougher, and likely would descend into negotiations. I'd like to think offering them positions as nobles would be enough to sate them, but people have a nasty habit of not wanting to let go of any power once they have it.

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>>31318357
>Can we make magic 'deployable shields', as in a spike or mobile bulwark that projects a one-way magic barrier in one direction?
You could, but it would be enchantment. Major wards and barriers in walls require a constant connection to the ground, so if it's something that moves it will need to be enchanted.

>For that matter, could we have ordered our troops to make minor fortifications or construct siege engines or something?
Your men were helping Gnome construct the fortifications for this battle. Your structural mages in the logistics unit were helping to reinforce it but didn't have the time to layer proper anti-magic barriers into it.

>>31318430
>On that note: Is it leveled up by use, or by training? Because if by use I say we keep using it, and stay out of the fight for a bit. If by training, then we shall indeed lay off of it.
Levelling is done depending on how 'actively' you use something and how difficult it is to do so. Using Iron Body when you're near death in order to keep fighting a fierce opponent gives more points than using it when you're in decent condition (like you are now). Training/grinding gives minimal benefits, mostly for balance reasons (like that old shounen cliche where you learn more in a battle than a year of training or something).

>Whoa. That was level II? I can't even imagine IV.
Sala was preparing to cast that for a while, so it was as though she was casting from a ritual - basically a superpowered version of her normal casting. The higher level versions will be very powerful. The Champion candidates can do messy things to armies (or, in one case, most individuals) at full power.

>As for the royalist issue, that is a little tougher, and likely would descend into negotiations.
Don't forget there are political issues with the RSK and League over that. Mercenie may have said her mistress wasn't worried, but that may not last if you go around openly supporting royal lines.

>>31318585
>like that old shounen cliche where you learn more in a battle than a year of training or something
Haha, yeah I figured as much. Thanks for that. Well, good then, I figure the best idea then is to try and make use of all of our abilities as much as we can. We have plenty of stuff to keep us alive, and since we are built around being a tank, not making use of that is bad.

That being said, getting ourselves critically wounded is NOT on my to do list, even if it would level our Endurance and Iron Body to the heavens. The same amount of caution I would normally use, but with a layer of "Talon is useful for more then barking orders" thrown on top.

>Champions are quite good
Indeed. You know, harem or not, the elemental sisters are still I think the best pick we could've asked for. They really compliment Talon's strong anti-boss fighting style.
Still thinking of Sylph, one day...but for now, these three are wonderful.

>Politics
Indeed. That is gonna be another facet of things. I picture we're eventually going to have to have a nice big round table discussion with RSK, Magi League, and whoever else is throwing their weight around, and have a nice long shouting match at one another.

I can not even imagine how tough keeping this madness together must be. I commend you for it, sir. My eyes glaze over just a bit when I read too fast through some of the more politic heavy posts, but that's more my own fault then yours. Trying to dig into that stuff is hard.
Very thankful we have anons who know this stuff.

Oh yeah: Thanks for bothering with this anons ramblings. I have no clue the time it is for you, but it's insanely late for me. I appreciate the communication all the same.

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>>31318649
>Indeed. You know, harem or not, the elemental sisters are still I think the best pick we could've asked for. They really compliment Talon's strong anti-boss fighting style.
It's funny to think having all three elementals mostly happened because you guys gave me the idea. I think the biggest mistake I made with the Champions is that they're all characters I like which makes it hard to resist the urge to try and include them in the story ASAP. Not necessarily bad for you guys, but it does make pacing harder for myself than I need it to be.

>Oh yeah: Thanks for bothering with this anons ramblings. I have no clue the time it is for you, but it's insanely late for me. I appreciate the communication all the same.
It's good to talk with you guys as well, so thanks for staying up and chatting. It certainly made for a nice distraction from the various chores I've had to do tonight and it helps me work out some of the things you're all thinking.

I'll probably see you and the other anons reading this in the next thread (I think this is the third or fourth time I've said that this thread?).

>>31318773
>Sisters
Mm. I know what you mean. Especially for Gnome, since I believe you said you liked her the best. Personal bias is always gonna be subtle in stuff you do anyway. But I think things balanced out pretty well. Sure, we have three powerful sisters, but we're facing a force way larger then ours anyway right now so we need em.

So all in all, I'd say you did a good job at it. Learning about each of them, and their personalities is always fun too.

>Last bit
No problem at all, happy to be a distraction, one way or the other. Benefit of having a thread like this, I suppose? It'll probably survive another day or two, depending on who all bumps it. Good place for Questions and such, I reckon, even if most of what I asked is probably in that massive pastebin somewhere. I just hope I helped answer someone else's question by asking my own.

And heh, yeah, I'm fucking hyped over the rest of this fight, which is part of why I kept this thread open, to see what happens in it.
I hope there's a bit of a monologue before we fight Master Wizard man, so everyone can have time to slip in and consider things. Your peak hours have the strangest flux rates.

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>>31318853
>I hope there's a bit of a monologue before we fight Master Wizard man, so everyone can have time to slip in and consider things. Your peak hours have the strangest flux rates.
I didn't consider that. It might not hurt to open a little slowly to let some people arrive. Every time I think I've worked out the pattern of activity, it changes. I've just sort of given up. Seeing the crazy hive of activity that was the last thread, when battles have previously been the least active threads, was surprising too.

>Good place for Questions and such, I reckon, even if most of what I asked is probably in that massive pastebin somewhere.
It doesn't hurt to have the answer in the thread. The pastebins are large enough they're intimidating me. It's why I broke out the empire and NPC info from the general bin, because they're the bits that most players will want to be able to look at on their own.

>Especially for Gnome, since I believe you said you liked her the best.
I do like her best, but Sala has grown on me a lot. I'm feeling a bit lost on Undine, as I've mentioned before, as I like her a lot but I need to find a good dynamic for her.

>It'll probably survive another day or two, depending on who all bumps it.
If people keep this thread bumped with questions, I'll answer them as I wake up or get home from work. I might not stick around for as long as I have this time, though.

>>31318915
>Attendance rates
Well, I don't blame you for giving up trying. But almost certainly everyone that follows this quest is not here all at once. There's a lot of em, not counting lurkers who never vote anyway.
I'm not 100% on when the people following this can show up best anyway, but a slowish open that leads into the fight would be nice, I think anyway.

>Pastebins
They intimidate even you? Damn, they really are something. Well, I'll tell you that they work at least somewhat. The other day, when people kept throwing around the name 'Arail' and I forgot who that was, I just went to the pastebin and found it really fast.
If nothing else, they do work, despite the bulky size.

>Undine
I remember. Actually, I might be the same guy you talked to last time. She really needs a chance to come out of her shell some (and for you to get more chances to use her). I certainly wouldn't mind seeing Undine pull off a big move some time too. Then again, battle isn't really where she would shine brightest, like Sala does (just a consequence of her abilities, really).

I'll be honest: I am hoping that whole spa business opens the door to some cool Undine moments. It's water, after all, and she can do plenty with that, yes? It'd be really interesting to have some scenes in there, just for that effect.

>Answers
Oh no, I imagine not. It's mostly me keeping you here now, I reckon haha. But hey, maybe some will come today from the tweet you sent to ask their own stuff?

>>31318984
Or just have our enemies have to cross a river to engage us.

>>31319005
That's a pretty good one too. Hopefully we can force such a move at some point.

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>>31319005
We really have been lacking bridge and river battles so far, haven't we? I'll have to rectify that.

>>31318984
>They intimidate even you? Damn, they really are something.
The lorebin is too big but at the same time, not big enough. I've got a rather long list of things to add to it but every time I start I stop. It doesn't help that I don't like the way I did the whole 'X says' thing but I don't want to rewrite the whole thing.

Anyway, I need to get up early for work so it's off to bed for me. Thanks for sticking around and chatting.

>>31319058
I don't blame you man. Rewriting that big a portion would suck enormous amounts.

>Thanks
Nah, thank you man, for being cool and answering shit. Sleep well and all that such.

>>31318019
>Juggernaut Armour
I have so many ideas for this, literally so many.

The basic plan I have in my head is that we take what is effectively a suit of LMK plate, replace most of the speed enhancements with strength/stamina ones, then make what is effectively another set of incredibly bulky plate to go on top of it (this suit with mostly defensive enhancements). And then we give them an enchanted huge weapon (like an electrified spear, an earthshaker warhammer or a high-heat greatsword/axe) in one hand and a magitech/enchanted ranged weapon (flamethrower, lightning gun, magazine-loaded crossbow version of what the AAs use) in the other.
And then we treat them like Astartes Terminators.

Now obviously there would be massive research and construction issues with the whole 'multiple enchanted armour layers' thing, and trying to make it actually wearable in combat instead of being the most clunky pile of garbage ever concieved by man, but if we succeed...

Yeah, Terminators.
And that's awesome.

>>31319295
You.
I like you.
My original thought for Juggernaut Armor was that it'd be one guy in a team of HMKs, kinda like walking bunker busters to sprinkle through teams of Heavies, or Mediums...but

Well, needless to say I love all this. So many things, so little time.

>>31319409
We also totally need to make ballista versions of the AA's bows.
And start researching active camo.

>>31319567
and magitech bikes !

>>31320533
I wanted to, but I got shot down, and with good reason.

The jetbikes, on the other hand...

>>31319567
>Ballista versions

Gawd, can you imagine that? An AA fires a regular arrow, and that sucker activates the enchantments on the arrow so it grows to 5 times it's size. it wouldn't even need to be used for Siege, that sucker would decimate regular armies. Even better would be if we could enchant these bunker-buster arrows to explode on impact. That'd fuck up fortresses, and it'd shut down any mage units that try to use that wall move against us again. They block the horde of arrows, only to get shredded by the explosion ripping through their shield afterwards.

>>31319295

I think the issue here is we don't quite know the enchanting properties of other mediums, i.e. cloth, chain, etc. All the armour our military uses is made up of, assumingly iron, and from what we've gleaned that is the most effective item to enchant/machine and is thus the most common.

That said if we can figure out a way to machine/weave/enchant an undercoat for our soldiers that doesn't step on any possible toes of "layering magic" and we'll have a huge step up on our foes. I also say weave because I have it in my head that we might need to look into other avenues for construction and magical cloth weavers sound kind of awesome to me.

Secondary thought is we still need to at least standardize our military outfits, right now we're still fighting like a Merc General with our ragtag pieces of military outfitting. I know right now in our military there is; Darlasian, Vitrian, RSK, and Taour, and I'd imagine small bits and pieces of others. I'm fine with individual groups of our military, such as Vitria having their own standing military outfitted in the same, but the rest of our controlled military should be similar. It has a certain intimidation and "yeah, I can do that" feel.

Hell we don't even have a name for the greater whole of our nation present. Harrowmont seems to be both our capital and name. Which I'm fine with but that leaves us with no national identity. Harrowsmen? Sure maybe?

Also I'd like to see us take Mier and Olmn under Harrowmont's direct influence, much in the same way the Archduchery of Vitria is set up. Just so we have more of a power basis that is similar to our territory within a territory.

A lot of that is during downtime post Taour though I'd believe. When we have the funds and ability to redo some things and look like a proper nation, not something a Merc decided he wanted to conquer one day.

>>31320755

I remember Aspirational stating we haven't even entirely reached the apex for our AAs. Something about Undine.

Hell we don't even know their standard uniforms since we just sort of built them out of nothing and made them a military unit. If we can take the time after the bows are machinable, we should think about creating a new type of armour for them as well to supe them up would be sweet.

I am so down for crazy magical bunker buster arrows though. I'd imagine they'd be rarer and something we bust out every once and awhile.

>>31320755
Yeah, I was thinking that it would have been useful to break through the Taouran barrier earlier this battle.

>>31320771
Yeah, you're right that I'm probably getting ahead of myself.
I'd imagine that many possible enchantments would need types of magic that we haven't seen yet, maybe the dwarves or elves could help out once we find them?

>>31320771
Making an Archduchy of Harrowmont seems like a good idea, yeah. It lends us authority, and helps solidify our empire's bureaucracy. Chain of command is going to be vital once we really start getting big.

I think Figuring out a name for our fledgling empire is going to have to wait until after we've defeated Taour. Once that's done, we'll have conquered just about all of the Darlesia region that we're physically capable of at this point, which would probably be a good time to step back and examine ourselves as a whole. Naming ourselves will probably take an entire thread of brainstorming to do, though. I personally want something that relates back to the Source, in an obtuse kind of way, since it's the center of our power right now.

We could certainly stand to standardize our army, yeah, but I kind of like the way that each group has their own unique flair. Maybe all our armor will be the blue of our flag, with a quartered shield containing the Griffon and some other symbol that represents which Archduchy they came from. Something to give them pride and bragging rights, you know? That shit's good for morale.

>>31320941

I like the idea of each of the Archdurchies having their own uniforms. Like Vitria has their current, Taour would likely end up with their own, and Harrowmont could possibly come up with one someday. As long as it has an embossed griffon on the chest piece I'm fine.

The idea of bringing our entirely standing army to bear with three different legions of men sounds intimidating as fuck. Imagine that coming up to your doorstep. And then Talon comes flying by them with companies of HMKs detaching after to lead the charge. That shit would be incredible.

>>31320913
>AA Armor

Oh, god, I just had this beautiful idea about AA helmets where they've essentially got an Eagle Eye enchantment, where not only can they see far beyond what regular human eyes can see, but they also create a trajectory tracker with their bows, to see exactly where their arrows are going to land. This is going to be crucial to their success once we figure out how to get our designs and enchantments strong enough that our AAs can literally snipe the enemy coming from a mile away. And since these guys are going to be so valuable as our game-changer, we could machine some one-shot barriers for them, like a charm bracelet of 3 barriers for each AA, so they're allowed time to reposition when somebody tries to take them out.

They're also going to need to be lightweight, which is why I'm also digging the Magical Seamstresses idea. Not only would that work for undercoats for our tankier units, but it'd work for our AAs, and even our battlemages could get these for robes. Imagine, a battlemage with localized ritual runes woven into his robes so that mages from miles away can channel energy to him and stay completely out of battle. An HMK comes charging at him to take him out, and the battlemage just JUMPS and he's already gone, using the one-shot teleport woven in, and then the HMK is then incinerated by a supercharged ritual fireball from the mage he just missed. I'm really getting excited about these ideas, you guys...

I think my favorite part about brainstorming like this is when Talon tries to relay all the crazy ideas in his head to his guys and they mad scramble to make it work.

Half of the mages probably think he's out of his god damn mind every time he wants to make something new.

>>31321058
Given what I'm looking at on the maps, The territory that Taour has taken should probably be split into two Archduchies: the Archduchy of Darlesia (containing Darlesia, Crece, and Darrlouf) and the Archduchy of Taour (containing Taour, Raupe, Deodain and Forfdain). that way, whoever we put in charge of each has a roughly equal size territory to control as the other Archduchies. that should help prevent things from getting to unwieldy, as well as prevent inter-empire power plays.

>>31321124

Oh, you know they love it. The thing about R&D is that when somebody comes up with a crazy idea, the first thing they think of is not how it's impossible, but how they could make it work. That's their entire job, you know, taking the crazy and making crazy awesome.

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>>31321165

The real issue is not having another good province to add to the Archduchy of Harrowmont to keep the land proportions similar.

Mier and Olmn are really under developed too. They both are really rich in materials and they essentially are just sitting there. In order to bring them up to par with the other Archduchies we might need to put some work into them. Assuming that we do take them under Harrowmont.

>>31321307
well, each Archduchy would be 3-4 counties, so I don't see a problem with the proportions so far. but if we're really worried about it, we can start settling Marnn. Dunno how well that'd work out for us, but it could be worth a try.

>>31321329

I remember someone once suggesting we build a mountain forts/castles in Marnn. Carve it into the side of the mountain and use them as waypoints between a mountain path we'd also have to build.

I don't know what else is in those mountains other than Undine's PoP but we could certainly settle it in a military fashion at least.

>>31321381
That sound like a great idea, but we'll need to clear the place out of enemies first and I believe it will take a while, but at same time we could use it to make our soldiers more experienced.
>>31321329
There's also Neir, she have land in RSK and considering that she wants to join us, we could add that land to harrowmont Archduchy.

All the talking about AA gave me a idea, what if we get Undine and Maloric to do arrows that release fog after hitting something?
We could also see if he could add some enchanting that blocked all sound inside the fog, Aaron Tabeth had something similar in a room in Craol.

>>31321381
There has to be some kind of application for the PoP of the prime water elemental of the entire world.
Perhaps we could use it as a focus to summon an army of elementals later in the game?

>>31321483
There is an application: we used it to summon Gnome. My understanding is that it's power is now being channeled into maintaining her presence. We could try something else, like building a fortress around it, but I don't think we're going to get any more direct magical effects from it anymore.

>>31321462
Neir is in the RSK, and we're not nearly strong enough to take any kind of province from them right now. By the time we're taking the fight to them, the Archduchy of Harrowmont will be well established, and adding in another province will only disrupt a well-oiled machine. Farrlouf can be the basis for another Archduchy within the territory instead.

Hey, guys. Once we take Hiien, we should start sending spies and such throughout the Taour lands to spread the word to unthralled humans to hold out and survive against the now-starving vampires, and that we're coming to save them when the winter ends. That way, we'll severely weaken and fracture the Vampire's base withing Taour, and if the humans know to run and hide, Vampires will starve that much faster. We might even get some provinces to defect to us without a fight, like Darlesia.

>>31323400
>>Neir is in the RSK, and we're not nearly strong enough to take any kind of province from them right now.
What? We're not taking land from RSK, Nier have land there and she want to join us and I doubt that her land is not coming along with her.

>>31323744
That's not how things work. Or rather, her official defection will result in loss of title and land.

>>31323779
It don't need to be official, also, do we even know how thing work in a official way in this setting and in RSK?

>>31323842
The practical effect is that if we try to take land from a sovereign country they usually object with violence. Having a good legal case doesn't help.

>>31323878
Yeah, we should probably try reinforcing the pass between Harrowmont and Mier that blocks off Mitromar.

Perhaps put the currently concept-only Arcane Ballistae on top of the walls/towers.

>>31320941
Honestly I think we shouldn't go duchy anything with harrowmount. It should be called something a tad more grand.

Also guys to be honest I would rather focus on Patterns for research. The last guy who took over the place used those to do it so it's tried and true.

>>31324831
The last guy was the most powerful mage in the known history of the setting

That said, patterns do sound fun. Those are the persistent created beasts, right?

>>31325379
>The last guy was the most powerful mage in the known history of the setting.

Mals going to be in the top ten at least.

>That said, patterns do sound fun. Those are the persistent created beasts, right?

If I remember right they are magical effects that last forever and let you create things that last forever.

>>31325913
>>If I remember right they are magical effects that last forever and let you create things that last forever.
Sound like the beast beyond the wall of marie, betting that Kushan have something to do with these things.

>>31325963
Pretty sure the lords beat the shit out of him by that point. The barrier wasn't built till about 400 years or so later.

>>31326030
I was thinking more along the lines that someone used patterns created by him to create these beast and/or something that he was making, but didn't got the chance to complete before being killed.

>>31325913
Can we use patterns to create magical races?

An Orc/Goblin/Ogre army might be cool.

I'm still gunning for jetbikes, terminators, deployable shields and arcane ballistae though.

>>31326303
Patterns are permanent summons that involve creating a very powerful unique ritual circle (the pattern) and a physical shell that it will go into (which must be unique to the pattern) and then using magic to bind the two together. A lot of work must go into the creation of the pattern and shell, and then very complex rituals are required to create the summon(s) from the pattern. Patterns were very popular in the Golden Age of Magic, and a lot of comprehensive research was conducted on them - patterns are even regarded as the ultimate synthesis of magical theory, due to the amount of complexity and knowledge required to create truly great ones. Of course, although many magisters enjoy researching and creating patterns, few actually create the summons as they lack the ability. Even Maloric, who has the affinity for it, says he would have difficulty creating a high level pattern summon. It's largely the domain of transmuters. Interestingly, Kushan supposedly made extensive use of patterns in conquering the world.

>>31326480
That's very interesting and all, but it doesn't actually answer my question.

>>31326303
>terminators
What are you plant about them? I was thinking about super-heavy unit that we would teleport in the middle of the army enemie (because they're too slow to anything else) and wreck shit.

>>31326678
Siegebreakers, defensive infantry, that kind of thing.

If we can find a way to teleport them then that would be swell, otherwise I just see them being super-HMKs.

>>31326651
The answer is "Its too much work unless each individual unit is quite strong." So goblins and orcs no, ogres maybe.

>>31326744
Maloric already teleported us once, if we give him the time I'm sure that he can do something about the quantity.

>>31326782
I was more referring to the possibility of them being able to breed.

Because that would be useful.

>>31326810
Maloric is one man.

We can't rely on one man for all of our empire-wide stratagems.

>>31326782
Who says that Goblins and Orcs have to be the same cannon-fodder that they are in different games? Who says that our orcs can't be all Uruk-Hai levels or even greater? Who says our Goblins can't be on the destructive level of Tucker's Kobolds? You're letting yourself get bogged down in the meta of the fantasy genre. Let yourself go, and think of ways to reimagine things for our patterns, because they are competely under our dastardly design.

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Well, hello there. I don't have the time to respond to everything I would like to, but needless to say it's pretty awesome to see so much discussion.

>all the talk of province organisation
Something I wouldn't mind some feedback on: I was initially thinking when we transition to the continent map to drop the province map (except for the major cities) but it looks like you guys are interested in developing that area. THe main reason I was going to do this was time, so my thinking is I'll maintain the province map for your home region but the other regions will largely be described beyond their major landmarks (e.g. the biggest cities and castles). Any thoughts on this?

>>31320755
>exploding arrows
Just remember it's very difficult for human sorcerers/evokers to enchant explosives into things.

>>31320771
>All the armour our military uses is made up of, assumingly iron
Steel. Loads and loads of magitech/factory manufactured steel.

>I think the issue here is we don't quite know the enchanting properties of other mediums, i.e. cloth, chain, etc.
Generally, the more earthy and dense the material, the better it will take to enchantments. Clothing is popular for mages to enchant because you can layer cloth and enchant different parts of it (e.g. Mal's most outer layer might have anti-element wards but his most inner layer would resist force).

>doesn't step on any possible toes of "layering magic"
Basically, don't try to apply the same enchantment to a person twice. Enchantments on separate items don't conflict so long as the enchantment only affects the item not the user (e.g. a durability enchantment works but something to enchance the strength of the user doesn't).

>>31320913
>I remember Aspirational stating we haven't even entirely reached the apex for our AAs. Something about Undine.
She did something for you (outside of combat) in the first couple of threads that could be pretty useful for your archers if she could teach others.

>more coming

>>31327037
Fluffy Tail is artificial made, probably through pattern by someone that wanted something to control astral power better, right?

>>31327037
>Dropping the Province map

Man, I love what you've done in creating the feeling of progression in conquering each tile. It'd be great if you continued that for each other region we get into. You could change the map that's next to the continental map every time we move our focus to a different region, and have all the other maps we have open for perusal on request. or, even better, you could stick the old provincial maps in the pastebin.

TL;DR keep doing this conquering land piece-by-piece thing you've got going on.

>>31327174
I actually agree with this guy, I feel that removing the provincial map would remove a lot of the tactical/strategical elements of the quest so far.

>>31327174
Agreed.

>>31326856
I said that he would come with something, didn't say anything about him being the only capable of using it. He could create (probably already exist, so just teach) the way and teach it to our mages.

>>31327173
Eh, I reckon they're the result of a successful infernal experiment to ram fae into a mortal body.

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>>31321080
>teleportation
Still outside the realm of enchantment for now, but the RSK and League have been working very hard on correcting that. If they can get huge portals to move between cities they could simplify troop movements.

>>31320941
>>31321058
>empire name
I'll take any suggestions on that.

>legions
That reminds me, I had planned to try to move to a system where you have organised legions/regiments (rather than just gathering up the troops you need). The military organistion taken on recently gave me the idea, as did the Traditions system in Rome 2.

>>31326303
>Can we use patterns to create magical races?
Patterns do raise genuine theological issues, given that they're permanent manifestations of magic and the current theory of the world holds that all matter is also composed of magic (meaning there's a crazy theory, according to Mal, that all humans, elves etc are just weak patterns). There would be the issue of souls, but that would just cause more arguments amongst mages as to how vital souls are for life.

>>31327173
>>31327333
You can always try asking Tsucchi once she arrives in a week or so, if she's anywhere near as knowledgeable as Vad implies.

>>31327174
>>31327212
>>31327225
Part of me just worries about how long it might take, though. If you guys are really into having it, I might keep it and the tactical elements of it and think of ways to work around the time issue. After all, it's not like every dirt farm is going to pose a real threat or every castle needs you to be there to do the fighting.

>>31327037
>>She did something for you (outside of combat) in the first couple of threads that could be pretty useful for your archers if she could teach others.
Only thing that I can think is fog.

>>31327344
>time issues with the provincial map

Don't we have multiple generals? We can just have them deal withthe military things we don't want to and leave local governance to the, er... local governors.

>>31327490
Hmm not sure but I'd rather go wth meditation
>>31327344
So Asp, did you mean meditation, cuz it is only non-elemental thing that she taught us and actually would help our mages and archers aswell

>>31327344
>work around the time issue.
We can always have multiples invasion at the same time and I doubt that by that time we will have to lose so much time in how control and manage the province.

I'd like to question our losses during the archer skirmish.
Our soldiers and Gnome built quite a few barricades, which should help avoid damage.
You did mention them getting destroyed to some extent.
Has this been accounted for in our losses?
Were they lowered in any way thanks to our defenses, or were they useless?

>>31318229
> somewhat impractical. I love that there are enough people thinking of stuff to run over ideas like that, though. The whole cavalry discussion is a good example (In a world with such intense magic where cavalry are rendered obsolete, sorta that is).
yea it was a rather silly notion
>Personally, most of my ideas involve some sort of golemancy, a vehicle of some sort, or siege weaponry.
... so, last time we seriously discussed cavelry the idea came about of magical bikes instead of horses. Built for ramming. Cost came up as a big limiter (its better to get better or more magical plate)
but your phrasing just now gave ma an idea. Golem mounts, not the slow and lumbering, think tiger shaped and tiger fast. Limber, supple, with great jumping ability, great flexibility...
I am not sure a golem can do that, but if it can...

although I am still not sure if it would be cost effective.

>>31318359
>Cavalry went obsolete because the horses were high maintenance and magical items could do their job better. If you could find ways around that then cavalry would still have some solid advantages.
one of the options we discussed back in the day, was to have gryphons or rocs or wyverins or similar magical beasts as mounts. Their magical abilities should make them worth the cost.
But the question is, do such creatures actually exist int he setting?

>>31318359
>One of the things I hinted at was that the Magi League and RSK weren't going to go at it (aside from minor skirmishes) for a while. It's more a matter of whether the critical mass of players wants to slow down.
you also hinted that both of them are on the verge of breaking apart into warring micro kingdoms

>>31327666
Cavalry isn't obsolete, by Aspie's word, it just needs to be cost effective. That's where R&D will likely come into play, because there is definitely a place for fast-moving cavalry units.

>>31327344
Aspie, how easy is to make the charms that was in the room in which we talked with Aaron, in Craol, the one that blocked sound?

I wonder if anyone we know knows who the old geezer we're about to fight is.

Maloric and Gnome probably know who this crazy strong summoner is. Especially Gnome, in case this guy is actually so old that he knows what a god-knight is like.

Alternatively, the god-knights became shadow beasts after that war, and those shadow beasts are what he summoned against us. I could be crazy, though.

>>31319058
I have read all the bins and I think their size is fine, if anything I wish they will grow bigger :)

>>31327832
What? I'm confident that the God-Knights are just the guy that serve under the lords, hell, Talon himself already seen one.

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Off to work now. I'll answer any questions when I get back or, if the thread is dead, in a pastebin I'll link on Twitter.

>>31327749
Trivial in a well-constructed stone room/building.

>>31327710
>But the question is, do such creatures actually exist int he setting?
Not in any great numbers and they can be hard to find.

>>31327621
They were accounted for. The enemy had 1500 archers and 60 highly skilled battle-mages when you started trading blows, so the barricades kept their archers from doing too much damage and kept your melee units from getting blasted, too.

>>31327490
>>31327583
The Undine thing was in thread 2 and wasn't related to combat in any way (or meditation).

>>31327848
Well, you'll get your wish over my Easter break.

>>31321307
We don't actually have anyone to whom we promised darlesia. so it doesn't need to be an arch duchy. we could just have it be directly under harrowmont.
Vitria is an arch duchy because we got large parts of it via diplomacy rather then conquest.

Another option, btw, is to have harrowmont be a "washington DC".

>>31327037
>Something I wouldn't mind some feedback on: I was initially thinking when we transition to the continent map to drop the province map (except for the major cities) but it looks like you guys are interested in developing that area. THe main reason I was going to do this was time, so my thinking is I'll maintain the province map for your home region but the other regions will largely be described beyond their major landmarks (e.g. the biggest cities and castles). Any thoughts on this?
This seems like a good idea. A good justification for micromanaging and developing the area immediately surrounding harrowmont is because we have the source in there. This isn't an issue with most other zones.

>>31327735
>Cavalry isn't obsolete, by Aspie's word, it just needs to be cost effective
>Cavalry isn't obsolete, its just obsolete
not being cost effective is the very definition of being obsolete.

> That's where R&D will likely come into play
The problem is that even with R&D its still less cost effective unless we have some creative idea that will mitigate it.
So far the strongest idea we had was to tame and breed magical beasts.
The idea was raised of making mage-plate for the horses, but that would be taking research that could have gone into making supering MMK, and will cost more or the same as making an mmk. and that a mmk on the back of a horse with mmk is not worth several mmks. or lmks or whatnot.

>>31327875
I'm not seeing what thing Undine did in Thread 2. as far as I can tell, unless I'm being absolutely blind, all she did in 2 was be summoned, agree to serve us, cradle us when we passed out, met the rest of the cabinet, talked with us about our ambitions, and then started shouting at Caitlyn. I have no idea what thing she did, unless it's actually in thread 3 and that 2 is a typo.

>>31328131
Maybe he mean the ability to become invisibly? Thinking about it, is really something that would be lovely if the archers learned.

>>31328103
>The problem is that even with R&D its still less cost effective unless we have some creative idea that will mitigate it.
This is according to who, exactly?

No, seriously, I'd like to know where it's been said that there's nothing we can research that will make cavalry cost-effective.

>>31328210
>This is according to who, exactly?
according to having a functioning brain, it was debated ad nasium.

It is not cost effective even with R&D because:
1. Your mages are now designing two different suits (one for horse, one for rider) instead of one. Meaning they have less time to develop each, meaning both are inferior.
2. A horse is larger than a human, it will require a larger magical armor. This is at the minimum costs the same as one additional MMK, but most likely costs more
3. Being a dumb animal, the horse can't put the magic into as good a use as a human could
4. magic plate is so ridiculously useful, that having several more plates is more useful than having a magically armored horse.

That is assuming you are even using horses, ideas have been suggested to make magical bikes and the like, which according to aspir will be doable but require LOTS of research (reasonable)

>>31328180
Yeah, in thread 3 Undine turns herself invisible. That's definitely what he's talking about here. That would actually be pretty awesome for our AAs to learn how to do. They're cloaked, arrows ready, and then they let fly, devastating the enemy army before they know what hits them. I don't know whether they're able to maintain invisibility while they're attacked, but if they can, jesus, there's no stopping these guys. we've got our ace in the hole, here.

>>31328348
You're making a fatal mistake here which is coloring your entire argument: nobody is saying that the only way to make cavalry cost-effective is to give them a suit of Mage Plate. It's certainly one way to go about it, but it's not the ONLY way. And the entire point of R&D is to discover which idea out of many is going to give us the most bang for our buck. Now, calm your tits and think about how we can go about making Cavalry cost-effective without using expensive Mage Plate, to back up your idea; otherwise, you're just shitflinging in an honest discussion.

>>31328468
In the case that they can't learn how to become invisible, I suggest that we enchant it in their armor, thanks to the way that enchantments work they couldn't use both enchanted strength and invisibility at the same time, but I still think it's worth, just get them behind the enemy line while invisible, turn on the strength enchantment and the rest is count the dead bodies.

>>31328348
But we weren't even talking about horse-based cavalry.

Also, the argument of 'less time to design each makes inferior suits' is flawed, the obvious answer being to just take more time.

>>31328468
>>31328560
Operator AAs here we go.
Invisibility, specialty arrows, deployable barriers...
Reckon we could issue them incendiaries with a fuse enchanted to stay dry?

>>31328555
>You're making a fatal mistake here
>Now, calm your tits and think about how we can go about making Cavalry cost-effective without using expensive Mage Plate
let me direct you at >>31328103
>The problem is that even with R&D its still less cost effective unless we have some creative idea that will mitigate it.
> some creative idea that will mitigate it.

I have been trying to think about it. IIRC I was the first to suggest magical beast riding, I have been involved in the designing of the magical bike idea (although not the original suggestor, i made improvements to it all liked... but admitted at the end it is still too pricy to justify redirecting limited research allocation to it) and have in this thread come up with the idea of fast, lith, "tiger like" golems as mounts.

The "just do R&D" is saying "just throw money at the problem". if we did that all we would get is traditional solutions. aka, magical plated horse.

>>31328664
The idea of enchanting the arrows to release fog, if possible also enchanting it to make so inside the fog no sound can be passed, along with the ideas these would turn our AA in monsters.

>>31328762
>canceling noise in an area

That'd make it so that the enemy wouldn't be able to hear the orders they're being given, causing disarray. I like it.

What other horrible things can we apply to our arrows? A slowing aura? Making the area around it cold/hot? Exploding after impact?

>>31328762
Man, the more we talk, the more we're turning our AAs into platoons of Green Arrow. I like it.

>>31328911
Arrows enchanted to release oil. The would AA shoot the arrows above the enemies army, the arrow would release oil in them, Sala cast fire ball, I don't think I need to continue.

>>31328911
it was more than that, we attacked under magical fog that suppressed sound.
they didn't see us, they didn't hear the dying screams of their bretheren so it took them a while to figure out that they were even under attack. and our AA could see through it and snipe those who seem like they might raise an alarm (such as patrolling guards)

>>31328990
>Enchanted arrows which release oil
how would you time when in flight it would happen? can you even make arrows that (presumably) manifest or conjure oil (or have extraplanar space).
Why not just go with the firebomb grapeshot idea from previous threads?
step 1: catapault
step 2: make a grapeshot of molotov cocktails (using oil or high purity alcohol. each is less effective then a modern molotov cocktail made with gasoline, but there are a lot of them!)

if you didn't know, grapeshot is when you load a cannon with a sack full of small cannon balls instead of one large ball.. it turns it into a giant shotgun like shot.

>>31292826
>aspie
it is aspir. short for aspirational
aspie is someone with aspergers

>>31329241
We've been over this in an earlier thread.
Both are short for Aspirational.

>>31329168
>>how would you time when in flight it would happen? can you even make arrows that (presumably) manifest or conjure oil (or have extraplanar space).
That's for the developing team to resolve, after all, we're paying them for things like that.

Also, while the idea of using catapult for that is good, if we could depend in only arrows would make things much easier for us, the cost in research is probably going to be great, but I think it's worth.

>>31329241
He answers to both of them. When it comes to shortened nicknames, it's not really a big deal.

>>31329284
>if we could depend in only arrows would make things much easier for us
How?

I mean, I get that we wouldn't have to drag the 'pults with us this way, but they're still naturally better suited for this.

>>31329495
We can have many more archers in a place than catapults, we would to bring along less things if we can do that with arrows, would cost us much more though.

So wait, if we're developing arrows to release oil, why not just have them release corrosive acid to eat away at the armor or skin of what they hit? I'm sure the armor is magicked against rusting, but a highly potent corrosive acid? However, this is still all relying on the unconfirmed notion of arrows being able to do this in the first place.

>>31329585
>However, this is still all relying on the unconfirmed notion of arrows being able to do this in the first place.
Good point, I'm betting that is possible, but first it will take lots of research and the amount that it will release is very small and that goes for everything, not only oil.

>>31329573
You know that we can enchant catapults too, right?

>>31329284
>That's for the developing team to resolve, after all, we're paying them for things like that.
you are missing the point. in order for an arrow to explode at a predetermined location it needs to be somehow programmed to do that...
you could have it be "automatically trigger after flying 300 ft"
or "read the mind of the user and trigger when just in the right spot".
or "fly until over an enemy then trigger"
or "have a way to set it to different timings before firing"
the latter suggestions are immensly more difficult than the former. And the less complex (and thus doable) you make it, the harder it is to successfully use such a device

>>31329740
>>31329573
in fact, enchanted catapult shots were used against us before in a seige, it is a standard way of bringing down the magical shield domes around forts.

also, magic holding potential of an item scales with its size and density (the bigger the better, the heavier the better). so an arrow can hold a fuckton less magic than a catapault bolder

I think you guys missed the point of invisibility. These are military mennot mages and turning oneself into nothing is difficult. Now enchanting an invisible armor? Plausible but you run the risk of literally losing your men. Now work with me here for a moment this is how I would set up an Aa.

Helm, eagle eye, ad discussed, it had been confirmed they use something similar already, easy.

Gauntlets, strength and steady aim. Our flyers come with two spells loaded in their gauntlets, this is similar.

Armor, cloth or leather. For reasons explained later. Give that speed and muffled sound.

Give then the now and you now have an elite unit. Fast and steady under pressure, and highly mobile. But what about invisibility? The arrow. Enemies use projectiles to figure out basic locations. With the invisible arrow you can move your AAs on companies in the shadows, quickly bang out a shot and move again. What about communication? That sending device we want worked on. Give the ladder of the company one,boom coordinated attacks. No longer will magic Shields be an issue, go around it. No more pissing contest military stand offs losing men needlessly. We would have what amounts to a ghost on the field, couple that with normal archers support and diversions, fog oil, etc. and you destroy larger armies with a cheaper easier to use and produce item.

>>31329860
You do know that enchantments can possess an on-off switch, right?

>>31329860
There's one thing about making arrows invisible, the fact that our AA can kill a MMK was in the first thread said to be most thanks to the arrows being able to punch through the armor, by putting the invisibility enchanting in the arrow it would make it lose power, could be good, but I'm against it be the norm.

>>31329860
1. arrows have weakened power if invisible
2. magically fast arrows are too fast to see where they are coming from, the enemy generally just looks at and sees the group of archers (although at sufficient distance you can detect the arrow.

I like the idea of invisible units, the thing is, it will be incredibly costly to do and can be seen through with significantly cheaper enchantments. it would probably work for a little while, but then the enemies would adapt and all that invisibility plate would be useless.

that being said, working just a few time could give us immense victories that would allow us to have enough power to resort to traditional tactics.

Why don't we issue AA bows to FMKs?

>>31330156
I agree, but I think that if we use them carefully we could have it last, just don't let many of the enemy survive and make sure to not attack places that there's absolutely other way to someone die other than something invisible attacking, so the best strategy could be having them attacking in places very close to the fighting and where other AA could reach. About the enchanting, I was thinking in making it in a scarf rather in the armor, would probably cost less.

>>31318229
>Since we don't have the ability to make anything of the sort right now, that's all on the backburner. Once we conquer Taour (knock on wood) and take this region, a year or so of peace to rebuild, rearm, defend, research, tax, and settle would be amazing. I doubt we'll have such a luxury, but such is the way of things.
with how good our pr has been and how we are recruiting idealists, it would be good to focus our offense at, well, offensive enemies.
with how we went about "saving vitria from the RSK/magi war" being a perpetual warmonger would make us seem no better.

However, one big thing we could do is take a personal pilgrimage to the various PoP and bind them all. as long as they are not in our territory someone could potentially fight their way into them and claim them away from us. But most people don't even know where they are, and even if they did couldn't fight their way into one (remember how tough a battle this was). And heck, can't use them even if they did (we are binding them through the source)
I am thinking bind 4 to undine to max her out, then the last one bind to talon. And that one we should conquer before binding.

Considerng travel time, it would take months to do the above, which would allow our generals and the like to solidify control over our territories, do research, etc.

PS. am i the only one who is uncomfortable with constantly separating sala and mal?

>>31330225
Don't the FMKs already have ranged attack in gauntlets or something like that?

>>31330306
>ith how we went about "saving vitria from the RSK/magi war"
I think that "Saving the Darlesia region from the Vampire menace" would be much better.

>>31330328
Yeah, but they're not on the same tier as AA shots.

>>31330225
1. FMK are flying due to their armor being enchanted with flight spells while for the AA we plan on getting them strength and speed boosting armor to go with higher draw bows to make their arrows be even moar deadly.
2. flying makes you an easy target as you lose cover. remember how our AA annihilated 100% of the taur FMK in a rather short time

>>31330225
Depending on how flying works, they might not be able to draw the bow properly.

>>31330360
we made both arguments
we said we saved vitria from being dragged into the rsk-magi war where many of the vitrian citizens would be butchered for a war they didn't ask for
AND we are saving them from the vampire menace.
Both arguments were made by talon in a public speech he gave, justifying his right to rule.

So, I am saying that making public speeches about how you saved them from X only to inflict X upon them later is bad policy.

Now, if we could arrange for justification... from false flag operations to simply non publicly goading them into a preemptive strike. we could fight them without harming our pr

>>31330225
Loaded gauntlets with magic works well.

The invisible arrow isn't about power, it's about tactical warfare. We got beat up because we sat there and traded blows with a tactically better army. The AA I proposed is about movement and key kills, causing disarray and confused solders from invisible death. There is a place the typical powerful punch arrow, I propose they are just outfitted differently and given wider range of options. There's a reason we moved away from pissing contest military stand offs

>>31330441
speaking of false flag... one of my earlier ideas was to come at the vampires from the south and drive them into farun. maybe with some secret dealings... then we "rescue" farun from the vampires... and we keep it since obviously their prior rulers were too incompetent to defend the people from the vampires.

>>31330441
I doubt that we should continue talking shit about RSK, remember, they're much above us, if the king hear of this and get pissed, things could end bad for us. Perhaps we could use "Foreign Menace" for solve that.

>>31330457
>The AA I proposed is about movement and key kills, causing disarray and confused solders from invisible death.
You proposed visible AA using invisible arrows to sneak. this is a much worse idea than invisible AA using visible arrows.

Now, if you have invisible AA, I could see justification to give them invisible arrows to go along with it.

Also, the thing about the arrows getting lost... rather then making them always invisible, have the arrow only turn invisible when it is launched.

>>31330478
we didn't shit talk the RSK. we said we don't want to die fighting their war.
I do remember they are much higher then us. they and the magi league and lord ember are the 3 super powers on the continent. each one is ~15x bigger than us or so.
However, there is talk about both the RSK and magi league potentially fragmenting into individual internally warring factions.

>>31330494
The thing is that the invisible enchant would drop the power of the arrows, If our archers are already invisible we should try and put them in places that the enemy is not expecting and not going to see the arrows even if visible. If you guys go with the idea and put both, I suggest that at least let the AA carry a few no invisible arrows in case.

>>31330526
>>we didn't shit talk the RSK. we said we don't want to die fighting their war.
The RSK king ordered the killing of Farloun because he felt that he wronged them, the guy is batshit insane, I would prefer that we avoid even mentioning anything about RSK in public.

Also, let's hope that fragmenting really happen, but not now, we need time to build after all.

>>31330494
So creating an entirely new template of armor is more econmical and viable option then building an invisible arrow that are simple to mass produce comparably.

>>31330674
Yes. On account of the invisible armour actually being fairly useful.

>>31330583
>The thing is that the invisible enchant would drop the power of the arrow
I know, I explicitly said as much!
I also explicitly said invisible arrows are worthless with non invisible archers. but are ACCEPTABLE (merely acceptable) with invisible archers.

>. If you guys go with the idea and put both, I suggest that at least let the AA carry a few no invisible arrows in case.
I thought it was clear that I was talking about having both. why wouldn't we have both?

>>31330664
>The RSK king ordered the killing of Farloun because he felt that he wronged them, the guy is batshit insane'
it was a perfectly sane action for him to take considering he is magically immune to being killed by people he hasn't personally wronged.
It was evil, but sane.

>>31330734
Agreed, it's funny how he's ignoring how invisible arrows wouldn't probably not even be able to kill MMK effectively and how the archers could always be spotted.

>>31330762
We don't actually know if he is.

It's entirely possible that that little bit of royal protection doesn't even exist.

>>31330674
what >>31330734 said
invisible arrows are completely and utterly fucking worthless if shot by a visible archer.
Because it is extremely super fucking rare to actually even SEE the arrows in flight. what people see is the 200 archers standing in formation over yonder.

>>31330274
A scarf might not be able to contain it, and is rather fragile too.. but I like the idea of having it be a removable component... that way you can pass it to another type of unit... need invisible archers? pass it to them. need invisible HMK? pass it to them. need invisible mages?...

>>31330809
>We don't actually know if he is.
the entire world believes this to be fact. it has been suggested that this might potentially be a myth an ancestor of him invented. in which case he either believes the myth too, or he seeks to maintain it.
either way his actions are completely sane, just evil.

>>31330762
>he is magically immune to being killed by people he hasn't personally wronged.
There's a "supposedly" right there in the Lorebin, you can also see this
>>The Royal Seraphi Kingdom wipes out the Farloun - one of the few remaining magocracies. All hell breaks loose. Half the mages in the east revolted. They were bloodily put down, though magic has become so vital to society that it was limited.
He caused that only because felt that he wronged them, while it's not even confirmed that the thing is true. Even if he isn't insane, he's fucking scum and care fuck nothing for lives.

>>31330735
What I said was more to confirm your point and I forgot to also quote the other faggot that you replied, my bad.

>>31330895
>Even if he isn't insane, he's fucking scum and care fuck nothing for lives.
did you miss the part where I said, in the post you quoted "he isn't insane, just evil"

>>31330781

Not at all, the bows themselves carry the bulk of the enchanting for punch power, when it wad early on the quest we didn't use the special arrows as much and still railed MMK.

Otherwise speed and muffled sounds with advanced movement traffics. Guerrilla warfare us highly effective against standing armies.

>>31330970
Early in the quest we also had special arrows, it was even said that without it would lose a good chunk of the power.

>>31330970
see
>>>29100267
>>>arcane archers
Acceleration and mass-increase enchantments on arrows (i.e. on impact with something at high speed, the arrow increases its acceleration and mass incredibly)
>>>29103605
>>"Enchanted arrows that can penetrate magical plate – or even magical barriers. I can’t believe we never thought of this before.”
Thread IV.

>>31330970
>>31331005
Also, we could always use moar power..
heck, make the arrows homing or some such. Or, be able to pierce through cover AND an HMK armor.

or.. oh shit, magic shield piercing arrows! the enemy magical shields blocked our enchanted arrows, imagine if instead of just being faster they were specifically enchanted to be magic piercing? it might be impossible to make them entirely shield piercing but then we can probably have them be shield damaging, that way every volley of hundreds of arrows will either shatter the shield (causing backlash on the casters) or significantly tire them so their shield drops before our shield does.

>>31331105
Considering that the arrows already can pierce magical plate and "even magical barriers" is safe bet that they can pierce a magical shield, but I agree, moar power would be better.

>>31331157
>Considering that the arrows already can pierce magical plate and "even magical barriers" is safe bet that they can pierce a magical shield
anon, we used a FR point last thread because they could NOT pierce the magical shield our enemies erected. So use used FR to suppress their shield while sniping their mages

>>31331242
There a motive why I used ", that's from Maloric himself(See>>29103605). I'm assuming that the barrier was just abnormally strong.

>>31331340
>abnormally strong
not the last time we will encounter something like that, in fact i am sure we will encounter stronger barriers in the future. Taour is high mage country... magi league is VERY high mage country. ember. angels... lots of factions would give us a very bad day

>>31331529
That's really something that we need to work around, AA's ballista is probably our best bet. Thinking about all these strong as fuck factions make me wonder how well in strength our continent is compared to the others.

>>31331752
well, we know one other continent is unified under a single empress that rules the whole continent and a tribe of mystic foxes as well (1/6th the planet's pop supposedly).
I am guessing fucking strong!

As for working around it, hence the idea of magic shield piercing arrows. can be used to snipe the mages who maintain the shield. or force them to spend extra

vad did pretty well against them too with his attacks bypassing the shield... i wonder if he could help our guys in developing the suitable enchantments

>>31332505
The thing these arrows are already supposed to be capable of piercing the shield, but making a more specialized and made for only that could be a good idea, probably going to cost us a fuckton though.
Also, Vad while talking with him about it could help, he's not really the people for a thing about piercing magic shields from a long distance, when he himself said that he can't do that against the magical defense of a mage, the guys that these arrows should aimed at. I think that we should get a specialist in that, maybe even Talon himself.

>>31332773
we are talking about two different things, shield break and shield piercing. i suggested both kinds.
shield piercing are designed to bypass a shield while leaving it intact. shield break are designed to break the shield such that all other projectiles go through (or at least drain lots of mana)
vad's attacks did not break the shield, but they pierced it. he was able to kill mages through the shields, with the exception of those top mages performing the big ritual whose shields were too strong for him.
that being said, he might not know anything about enchanting... or he might know about astral wards

>>31332996
>he was able to kill mages through the shields
Don't remember that if he was killing mages or just MMKs, but I'm sure that he himself said that he couldn't do that(kill mages) from long-range. And indeed, he probably know jack shit of enchanting, could probably help a bit with insight from a different point of view, but not really the guy for the job.

Almost forgot, found the post that he himself said that he couldn't kill mages from long range >>31283082

>>31333205
You were arguing that he couldn't pierce shields at all, not that he had a range limit.
also for fucks sake make a proper link to an archive.
like so http://suptg.thisisnotatrueending.com/archive/31281947/#p31283082
> My real talents are in taking out mages, though. My abilities punch straight through their magical defences. I need to get up close though.”

anyways,
http://suptg.thisisnotatrueending.com/archive/31281947/#p31287732
>You grin as you see the Taouran barrier drop as they volley into your barrier. Some of their mages are doing something and you know you’ve only got so much time – also, they appear to be panicking a bit every time Vad caves a few chests in. The fox is focusing heavily and you’ve gotten a little more used to the warping sensation. The strange patterns his tails weave as he’s casting are becoming a bit familiar and you realise he’s using them as magical foci.

>Your ready your own shot at what you think is the command unit, with a group of mages maintaining a strong barrier around it. Vad had taken a shot at them earlier, but whatever he was using to punch through their barriers wasn’t able to get through that one at this distance.

As I explicitly stated earlier, he was able to snipe some mages through the shields, while others were too strong for him to penetrate.

>>31333874
>My real talents are in taking out mages, though. My abilities punch straight through their magical defences. I need to get up close though.”
Why not just fire him out of a catapult?

>>31334500
Frodo, pls.

>>31334500
because afterwards he will get swarmed by mmk and killed

>>31334986
We can send reinforcements after him.