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Something is rotten in the state of Denmark...  What? Crusader Kings 2 is an excellent game made by Paradox: Interactive about the scheming and backstabbing politics of a medieval court. There have been a fair few LPs of it recently; for an understanding of the game mechanics and game foundations I direct you here. This game is going to get straight into the scheming and narrative without much discussion of the game mechanics behind it. What? While other Crusader Kings 2 Let's Plays have dealt with the trials and triumphs of Kings, Dukes and Emperors, Flamboyant Schemers concerns itself with the lowest of the low. We will be playing as Count Skjalm of Fyn. Count Skjalm rules a single, tiny, undeveloped insignificant province in the tiny, insignificant kingdom of Denmark. He has no titles, honour, prestige or political power to speak of. Moreover, Denmark is ruled by the disgustingly prolific Yngling dynasty, which starts the game with dozens of children and a stranglehold over the entire country so there's virtually no chance to murder our way into the throne. Instead of grand conquest, this game is going to be concerned with the petty, self-important bullshit of a nobody in the middle of nowhere. What? This game will be run using CK2+ 1.33.15 by Wiz and all the presently available DLC. TABLE OF CONTENTS Update 1: RISE AND FALL Update 2: THE SAINT Update 3: SORCERY Update 4: BROKEN Update 5: LEDGERS Update 6: RAGE Update 7: WORTH IT Update 8: TYRANT Update 9: KINDNESS Update 10: SOMETHING FANTASTIC Update 11: QUIET Update 12: FAT JESUS Update 13: POETRY SLAM Update 13.5: WORLD UPDATE Update 14: END TIMES Update 15: SUN SET Update 16: ACCULTURATION Update 17: SMALL THINGS Update 18: INTO THE BLUE Update 19: LEGEND OF THE NORTH Thanqol fucked around with this message at May 20, 2013 around 07:46 |
| # ? Mar 17, 2013 23:19 |
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| # ? May 20, 2013 08:51 |
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 (NB: The camera never moves from this spot on the map)  "Sit down, lowly peasants, and let me tell you about the most important man in Danish politics. Sit down and listen to the most marvellous and gripping tale of intrigue and betrayal you will ever hear. You have no doubt heard of me: Count Skjalm of Fyn, "The Webweaver", who is responsible for your well-being, prosperity and, yae, your very lives. Let me tell you of myself, and my many virtues. "Firstly, I am a grand diplomat, and my way with words is second to no man! And more so, I am famed for being the most honest and true man in Denmark, and every man across the realm knows that not a single lie will stain my lips. Finally, I am a man wise to the ways of my many, many scheming and diabolical enemies and always aware of their dark designs upon my person. "Let me tell you of the actors in this great game of chess. These are my key pieces, my rooks and knights, who serve me loyally as is their duty."  "Meet Signe, my wretched bitch of a wife. Not a single spark of life has ever crossed her corpulent eyes. She grubs money like a magpie. She has a vile temper and is constantly screeching at me like a devil from Hell to watch my weight, eat less, do more exercise. Fie, woman, fie! I spit on your vegetables; a ruler shall eat meat as is his right! It shall not be disease that does in the mighty Count of Fyn!"  "My long-passed father, Toke, looks down upon his righteous son from Heaven and is no doubt pleased! Never a more saintly and patient man was seen in the lands of Denmark, until his firstborn son and heir came to power of course. It was said that Toke once stood on the battlefield and faced down no less than four bandits and the knaves broke and ran before his blade, barely escaping with his coin purse and warhorse."  "My brother true, Auden Tokesen. He has a head for numbers, religion and poetry that I never did and I am not ashamed to say I rely upon him as my Steward."  "Bishop Lief is a good man, for a god-botherer. His word is true and his alms are generous and there is no guile within him, and I have appointed him the Chancellor of my court."  "Peder af Svendorg, a doughty knight and a loyal marshal - but do not trust him! I see the gleam of greed when he looks upon my throne; thank the Lord it is offset by the dull blade of sloth!"  "Esben is my accomplice in the schemes that shall take me to the unparalleled heights of the Danish kingdom. He has a sickening and cruel mind, but sometimes one must be cruel if one desires a crown."  "Unfortunately, that is the total sum of my competent staff. When required to fill the post of Court Chaplain I had to promote a stable boy purely on the fact that he was capable of reading."  "I only have one current vassal other than my loyal bishop - the treacherous mayor of Nyborg! He has dead eyes and a hideous beard and a barbaric propensity to duel when insulted directly. Not that he has ever dared to challenge one as great as I!" "So those are they, my loyal court and humble vassals, the sum totality of my glorious kingdom. Not much, you may think - but Alexander conquered Persia with naught but Greeks! Imagine what he could have done had he the Sons of Denmark at his back! Listen as I tell you of my grand successes in the years to come."  "As you know, this land is ruled by the mighty King Svend, and he sought support in his bid to tax the commoners fairly. He asked for support, and I gave it without question!"  "I was naturally rewarded for my troubles, given the honour of standing at the King's right hand side during court. This was just the beginning of the honours the king would bestow upon me."  "The king was a man famed for his understanding of money and wealth, with more bastard children than seemed proper for a Catholic King. I am sure his talent for finances and accounting will never do me any harm."  "My brother was wed to a noble from another land. I turned down the gifts of gold that were taken before me in celebration of the event - I am no greedy churl to taint an event like this with talk of money!" "So there I was; my demesne was secure, my position in court honourable, but I sought more. To increase the size of my land and holdings, some other fool would have to give his up! But the change of land in a kingdom as small as Denmark is no easy matter, and it required thought and cunning."  "The Duke of Selsvig was my best target. If I could send a missive to the Pope confirming his sin, then he would be excommunicated and his titles stripped from him. Then, as the king's loyal second, one would no doubt fall to me! The scheme was flawless, and a lesser mind would not have dared imagine using the Catholic Church itself as a weapon in his war!"   "While the wheels of intrigue turned, my foolish brother stirred up the peasants while trying to carry out his duties. For his idiocy, I only granted him the title of Master of the Horse instead of the more prestigious position of Cupbearer. Let that be a lesson!"  "My Solomonic wisdom proved the deciding factor in a case without legal precedent. The subject matter of the case is unimportant, simply remember that my decision was fair and just."  "Finally, it was time to go ahead with my scheme. And yes, I did compromise my reputation for honesty, but deception is the foundation of all war."  "However my bungling minions failed to execute a simple plan! The courier who was to take the letter to Rome took shelter in a Germanic castle and while there the foolish lout made love to a woman who turned out to be the Princess of Bohemia, and the two were wed at swordpoint to spare her the dishonour of carrying a child out of wedlock. Curses and damnation to all foolish messengers!"  "To make matters worse, my bungling Chancellor could not hold his over-honest tongue and told the King of Denmark in no uncertain terms what he thought of all his bastard children. And the King looked at me like it was my fault! I was surely fallen from his good graces; ay, all was lost!"  "To top it all off, my useless wife gave birth to a daughter. What a joke! Wed to that vile woman and she can't even provide me with an heir!" "And then, out of frustration and at my lowest ebb, an idea came to mind. A cruel idea. An evil idea. An unspeakably brilliant and diabolical idea."  "For you see, Count Ragnar was the Spymaster of the Danish Kingdom - a position that requires utmost trust. And while effective at his role, he would be no match for me were I in his place."   "Being a Spymaster requires trust, as I said before. And what is the best way to destroy trust and credibility? To sow nasty rumours! I immediately set to talking of the time that I had seen Count Ragnar fornicating with one of his island's goats and the scandal took the King's court like wildfire, until it reached the ears of the King himself. "They don't call me "The Webmaster" for nothing."  "The King called Count Ragnar to his throne one day, and questioned him in front of the entire assembled court about his sexual relations with goats. Ragnar's face flushed and his voice was impassioned as he denounced the rumours as lies, but the King kept asking his questions and the hall shook with laughter from the assembled mob. Eventually Ragnar fled from the room with tears in his eyes. Victory was mine! I had dethroned my scheming rival in one masterful stroke and was ready to take his place as my own!"  "I am so great."  "Flushed with victory, I invited a claimant to the Swedish throne to my court. He was an unlikeable coward, but now he was MY unlikeable coward - and with the success of my schemes recently I was considering making a move against the Swedish throne itself!"  "But moving against royalty would require funds. As Spymaster, I was in a perfect position to ensure that the Kingdom of Denmark would be providing those funds. "Embezzlement is such a nasty word. I was acting alone to help an honourable Prince of Sweden with his rightful claim upon the Throne! It was my duty as a Christian King to steal from my liege!"  "To assist in my brilliant scheme, I made a brilliant move. I invited the help of Princess Ingerged, an amoral bitch who seemed all to happy to assist me in my plot. "We, together, count and landless princess formed the intellectual core of a team to rob the highest authority in the land. Together we brewed a masterful plan for a heist: A bribed guard, an infiltration under the cover of darkness, and an escape cart cunningly disguised as a wooden horse. "The night is tonight. Everything is perfect, and I can feel the cool weight of the gold in my hands already. "When they speak of Count Skjam, "The Webspinner" of Denmark, they will remember this night. They will remember the impossible heist. They will remember this as the foundation of my war against Sweden which would leave me the loyal second to a grateful King with land to spare. "Mark my words. They will remember."  ... DATE: 1069 CHARACTER: Countess Christina  TOTAL ASSETS: - 75 gold ducats - 1 County - 2 Vassals - 1 Prince of Sweden - A Long Life Ahead Of You QUESTION TO THE AUDIENCE: What kind of person is little Count Christina going to be (assuming she survives)? What kind of personality will she develop? Does she want revenge against the King who executed her father, or does she blame Princess Ingerged? Should we educate her for diplomacy, martial, stewardship, intrigue, or learning? Thanqol fucked around with this message at Mar 17, 2013 around 23:23 |
| # ? Mar 17, 2013 23:19 |
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With all of these journals laying around, surely she will follow the path of intrigue! That bastard king killed her father! Vengeance must be had!
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| # ? Mar 17, 2013 23:39 |
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She will blame the Princess and follow in her father's footsteps with a diplomatic education. If you're going to be playing like that at least try not to get your family whittled down to an excessively small amount 
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| # ? Mar 17, 2013 23:40 |
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Diplomacy, it's a far better thing to let one's mutual enemies take care of your dirty work.
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| # ? Mar 17, 2013 23:49 |
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Intrigue Your father did a bad job at it.
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| # ? Mar 18, 2013 00:01 |
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Our infant heart cries out for VENGEANCE! Death to the King! Let us become masters of Intrigue and pick up the strand of our father's plot, and succeed where he could not. Let us grow up to be petty, vicious, cruel and spiteful and gain tutelage under the nearest master of deceit.
DrSunshine fucked around with this message at Mar 18, 2013 around 00:23 |
| # ? Mar 18, 2013 00:21 |
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Intrigue that damned king killed our father.
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| # ? Mar 18, 2013 00:23 |
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Intrigue, and the rules demand you not just kill the king but his whole dynasty or die trying.
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| # ? Mar 18, 2013 00:33 |
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Intrigue, and we must gain vengeance against the cruel King for his murder of our father! We must cause his realm to drown in blood!
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| # ? Mar 18, 2013 00:57 |
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Follow the one true path, Intrigue.
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| # ? Mar 18, 2013 00:59 |
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Martial and Vengeance against Svend's entire line for the future Warrior Queen! 
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| # ? Mar 18, 2013 01:19 |
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DrSunshine posted:Our infant heart cries out for VENGEANCE! Death to the King! Let us become masters of Intrigue and pick up the strand of our father's plot, and succeed where he could not. Let us grow up to be petty, vicious, cruel and spiteful and gain tutelage under the nearest master of deceit. No King but ours! The
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| # ? Mar 18, 2013 01:20 |
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Intrigue! Get ready to stab some backs.
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| # ? Mar 18, 2013 05:54 |
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  thanks game  "Countess Christina was my greatest failure. "My name is Gunnar, Spymaster of Skane. I perform my role with skill and discretion. I understand underhanded tactics and the necessity of cruelty. I have cut a man down in the duelling ring and watched the way his blood hardened into the sand. I have gutted a man from behind as he tumbled with a whore. I have strangled a bastard child of my liege, lest it shame him. I am good at my job. "I took your commission to train young Christina in the ways of subtlety and shadows, as was demanded of me. I understood her need for vengeance better than most; orphaned as she was."  "And it was a cruel fate that had orphaned her; her father had been cut down as a bandit, and her mother was cut down by a mysterious illness at the age of nineteen on the very same day. Either fate was particularly cruel or there was some dark link between the deaths. I admit, I am a cynic, and I am open to the idea that she tried to poison her husband but amateurishly slew herself."  "I believe this was the moment in my training of young Christina where I went wrong. A group of wandering Hedge Knights came by our castle, and the Countess welcomed them enthusiastically. I should have kept the corrupting taint of these rogue do-gooders away from the impressionable young Christina, but alas; alas.  "One of them sat by her side for many hours while he recovered from a tournament wound. He told her many stories of distant lands and honourable kings and other such nonsense. It quite ruined her development as a schemer."  "When I berated her about it, all she would do was smile. It was like she did not even want vengeance for her murdered father!"  "And this was frustrating because the child clearly had potential. When I truly pressed her she could spin a lie to rival the best of them! She could combine just enough excitement to hook the imagination, but not enough to become implausible."  "But just when she seemed like she was getting the hang of it, she stopped telling lies all together!"  "She even voiced her support for the king who's hands were stained with her father's blood. It was madness!"  "Soon after, I found that she had even been practising with a sword! I confronted her, aghast, and she told me it was necessary if she was to be a great knight like in the stories. "I naturally forbade her from ever displaying such mannish behaviour again, and she just nodded and said she understood my point. And then, if you can believe it, she said to me:"  "You're right. I don't want to be a great knight, I want to be a great king, who rules wisely and fairly." "What demon child have you saddled me with! All my lessons on scheming and intrigue have fallen on deaf ears! This is a disaster!"  "There were some small mercies for her quest for vengeance, though. At least she wanted to be a King, which would mean deposing the old king. I tried to encourage her in those terms."   "But honestly, some days I just stopped caring. Whenever she did anything which wasn't sickeningly pious and honourable, including overeating, I cheered her on in the hopes that it would make her at least a little better at the ways of intrigue."  "I even took some more drastic measures. I murdered her court chaplain and replaced him with a man who couldn't even pronounce 'Jesus'."  "However, that didn't work - he was struck by a bolt of lightning from a clear sky less than three months after I appointed him. A weaker man might have taken that as a sign of something."  "I was not such a man, though. I knew that to turn this girl's life around and make her into the schemer she was destined to be I'd need to call in one of my oldest contacts. I called in Rune, the Sorcerer of Gotland - a known infernalist, demon-summoner and torturer, a barely-catholic worshipper of the Old Gods. I had Rune instruct the girl on the proper persecution of witches, how to run an inquisition, and the secret signs to command demons. All the black lore that he possessed was poured upon the girl - the sixty-six names of Satan, the hidden rites of blood sacrifice, the depravity of the Old Ways. All this witchcraft and heresy was sure to corrupt her fragile mind and arm her for the fight against the Yngling Dynasty."  "I was so sure it would..." (NB: I had no idea this was possible, and I have no idea how it happened. Christina was apprenticed to a Intrigue-educated character so she should have picked up an intrigue trait even if she was terrible at it. She... didn't. She got Mastermind Theologian, the level-4 Learning education trait instead.)  "She took all that blackness and filth and spat it back up. She learned the pagan rites only to demonstrate how the power of Christ had mastery over them."  "And the very first thing she did upon coming of age was to order Rune imprisoned for his heresy and locked him away. "I have failed you. You demanded a schemer, and I have delivered you a saint. I foresee a life that begins and ends at the county walls of Fyn, and a father's ghost who will haunt these halls for eternity. "And that drat girl keeps smiling about it!"
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| # ? Mar 18, 2013 08:07 |
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Ahahaha, that's marvelous. And you've gotten a pretty damned good ruler out of it!
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| # ? Mar 18, 2013 08:20 |
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Education was never linked 100% to the guardian's education in the past, only somewhat. It's even less linked now, primarily because people were exploiting it to guarantee themselves 4 star education in whatever field they wished.
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| # ? Mar 18, 2013 08:30 |
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CK2+ makes child education a bit less reliable, too. Kind of a shame since learning is a pretty useless stat but it worked well from a narrative perspective!
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| # ? Mar 18, 2013 08:53 |
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That's fantastic. I love how things keep going against the plan. The narrative is amazing.
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| # ? Mar 18, 2013 11:46 |
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Get Lady Christina a good Marshal! Jeanne d'Arc has decided to make an appearance a few centuries early! I don't think I've ever had a lower vassal character with good Learning. I'm looking forward to seeing what you do with her.
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| # ? Mar 18, 2013 11:53 |
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I can tell even now that Christina is gonna be the best countess.  Eagerly awaiting the next update!!
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| # ? Mar 18, 2013 13:35 |
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CK2 really is Murphy's Law: The Game. Part of what makes it so great.
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| # ? Mar 18, 2013 15:28 |
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 with special thanks to the random number generator "Hear me, Lords of Denmark. I am Countess Christina of Fyn. "You may know of me - of how my father was cut down by the brutal hand of King Svend of Denmark, of how I refused to follow his shadowed path and instead immersed myself in the ways of the church. You may think me weak and womanly; no doubt my childish visions of justice, love and mercy seem destined to be my downfall. You may think that I am too weak to avenge the bloodstained killers of my family. "You know nothing. I carry my honour as my torch and I will achieve my revenge - and I will achieve it my way." "A promise I made to myself when I was young was that I would only marry for love. When I came of age there were many who courted me. Princes and dukes; even a son of the Kaiser of the Holy Roman Empire. However, for all their power and standing these men were weak and contemptible, ugly and violent. I searched farther afield and chose a man who I believed I could love."  "Ah... youth. "He caught my eye, this soft-spoken, landless knight from Brittany. He was as sharp as a razor wrapped in cloth of black velvet, so deep it absorbed the light around it. And much like my long-suffering mentor, he had his eyes cast downwards, staring into the mud rather than the heavens."  "I wed him in the month of May, and that sun-kissed day shines in my memory, a beacon to which I will always come home."  "... I'm sorry, I seem to have drifted off for a moment there."  "As happy as my days were, there were greater concerns in my life at that time. I girded myself in the armour of faith and descended into the dungeon inhabited by the Heretic, Rune. I spoke to him the Word of God for many days and nights, telling him that though he had fallen far the arms of the Lord Christ would welcome him back if he recanted his blasphemous beliefs. For many days he cursed and shrieked at me in tongues, mouth spewing an endless litany of blasphemies. I overcame, resolute, and I revealed his lies for what they were. "Eventually, broken before my faith, the sinner recanted all his heretical beliefs and begged the Lord for mercy. I chose to take him at his word and release him and hope he would find a brighter life."  "My husband told me this was a terrible mistake and that the Sorcerer of Gotland would return with vengeance in his heart. I chose to ignore him; as a Christian, I must offer the hand of mercy to any man who asks for it."  "Considering that done, I turned my mind to matters of state. I would need a great deal of money for what came next."   "Though the first invasion of England had been doomed to failure, the Lords of Denmark ensured that the second was not. The Normans were cast down and a Norwegian King now sat upon the English Throne. My men brought me home many treasures from the campaign."  "In this time, I had given birth to a beautiful son whom I named Hamlet."   "And the old king, thinking my heart was as soft and womanly as it seemed, appointed me to look after his pet swans. "Have you spent much time around the swans? They are beautiful creatures, truly, but they are also the most vicious and spiteful monsters imaginable. They will peck an outstretched hand fiercely enough to draw blood. All their beauty is mere distraction, surrounding hearts like flint. "I spent much time at court in those days."  "My quiet virtue and serene exterior impressed others much so that His Holiness, the Pope, sent me an elderly priest to act as my personal spiritual guide."  "... While I understood that Rome was far away, and my simple virtues as a woman did not merit much attention, the old fool that was dispatched as my 'guide' seemed almost like an insult. He knew not a tenth of my theology and never rose his debate above simple platitudes to spend all my time in prayer."   "I chose instead to spend much of my time concerned with matters of state. There was no time for a life of quiet religious contemplation if I was to carry out my duty as a daughter."  "I would be required to walk a different path."  "Patience had paid off, and I was finally ready to seek vengeance for my father. However, a more pressing matter arose - the heretic Rune was back to his blasphemous ways again. He had butchered several people in his Satanic rites and sown chaos across the countryside. This I could not abide; I sent my guard to capture him, but like a twisting worm, he escaped. "For a moment I thought that would be the end of it. "And then the earth cracked and broke, and the fires of Hell arose upon the land."  "I was called from my castle by a tear-stained commoner who begged my aid. He told me that the Sorcerer of Gotland had kidnapped his daughter and sacrificed her in a bloody ritual to bring damnation and vengeance to my land. He told me that the earth had broken open and the flames of Hell itself were burning the countryside. He told me the Sorcerer was cavorting above the pit, stained in blood and laughing like a demon. "I took up my sword, bible and holy staff and strode out across the moor to confront the sinner one final time."  "It was as the farmer had said; the demonic pit opened by the Sorcerer was screaming with all the fury and malignancy of Hell, and the countryside was blasted where it was not burning. The Sorcerer himself was dancing around the brim of the pit. I called out a challenge and demanded that he face me, but the cackling madman refused. The light that burned in his eyes was just as unwholesome as the black smoke pouring from the pit, and if I had previously thought myself numb to his blasphemies I was wrong - the torrent of nightmares emerging from his lips shocked even I."  "As a Christian, I knew this abomination could not stand. I drew my sword and ventured down to the brim of the pit to confront the Sorcerer directly and end his life with my own hand. With a prayer on my lips and a blade in my hand, I smote at him, but the fiend dodged like a bloodstained horsefly. Cackling, he climbed like a spider around the brim, taunting me and trying to lure me deeper into the Pit, and while I kept pace at first the ground was slippery and my sword was unbalancing. Far worse, the screaming of the tormented souls and the hot breath of Lucifer weighed heavily upon me. The madman was simply waiting for me to slip and fall into the fires of the pit, and I did not want to risk my Christian soul to end the life of one sinner. "I drew back and considered my options."  "It was obvious to me that black sorcery was best countered with miracles and faith. I gathered those men of learning I could lay my hands on, including my misguided old Priest, and strode back towards the Pit."  "Together, the three of us bellowed out a litany of abjuration and exorcism into the howling mouth of the void. Our voices rose together over the screams of the damned, but the old mystic roared back. For six hours we stood locked in battle, heaven against hell. While sometimes the sky would seem to clear and the madman would howl in fury, another surge of hellfire and sulphuric smoke would send us stumbling back. While my faith was strong, my allies quickly fell behind, fumbling the chant and even occasionally repeating the words of the Sinner like goldfish. While their hearts were true, their minds were not strong enough to endure blasphemy of this magnitude, and I pulled them back to save their souls."  "So I contemplated my options again, alone in the dark. Already my failure to close this infernal rift was causing me shame and humiliation. I decided in that night that I had to turn the dark techniques of the Sorcerer of Gotland against him. He had taught me the ways of sacrifice, and I had listened even if I had not believed."  "I gathered the common folk and their cattle, and I drove them together in a great stampede towards the pit of Hell!"  "I heard a brief scream from below, as the Sorcerer saw dozens of cows falling over the edge of the pit into the rift. One of the bloated animals struck him and crushed his body under it's weight, forever ending the life of the Sorcerer of Gotland. And finally, the pit was so filled with dead bovines that there was no passage for the flame or smoke of Hell. "Lucifer had been defeated! Praise Jesus!"  "What should have been my moment of triumph turned to ashes in my mouth. While I had been closing Satan's gate, the man who had killed my father had passed away peacefully of old age. The delay had cost me my revenge. I wept bitter tears of fury and cursed the old bastard for not clinging to life for two more years."  "In his place, his hated bastard, Bjorn. He was a viper, and he would pay for the sins of his father."  "But if I was to bring him down, I would bring him down MY way - through righteousness and valour, not underhanded scheming."  "My focus consumed all my life. I stopped eating, determined not to let my ambition slip away from me again.  "I gathered support from the discontented nobles of the realm, and ensured my land was ready for war. "And then, finally - I was ready. My finances were secure. My allies were committed. I stood at the eve of revolution. "And I was in that moment betrayed."  "How cruel are men? In my hour of greatest trial, in the moment when I needed him most, my husband begged me to put aside my thoughts of revenge. He told me my plan was foolish and would never work, and that I wasn't ready. And even if I won, he said, I would have gained nothing! I was not fighting for myself, I was fighting to press the claims of some selfish Duke who cared nothing for me. My political position would be weakened direly even if I won. "He begged me to flee with him, take our children, leave Denmark behind and live happily. "How cruel are men?"  "I left him behind, along with my heart."  "I contracted the Grand Company Mercenaries to ride with me to confront the King. They were a boisterous band, and chivalrous, and reminded me much of the Hedge Knights I had idolised as a child. They respected me as a leader as well as a woman."  "Some even swore themselves to my service permanently as bodyguards. They remain with me to this day."   "Two great battles were fought. I remember the sound of swords, the hot breath of horses, the clash of cavalry and a sky nightmarishly dark with arrows. I remember the first man I killed - he pulled me from my horse and we fought in the mud until I impaled him through the skull with my knife. I remember cold medical curiosity taking over in place of pounding fear and terrible adrenaline; examining how his brains spilled from the gap in his helmet."  "We were victorious. "And this was my vengeance, that I promised you, that I bided my time for. My own position was not advanced one step, but a far greater victory was achieved this day: The Yngling Dynasty, and all it's bastard heirs, no longer reign in Denmark. My foes have been brought low and are shamed, and without a crown they are exposed."  "And the new king, whom my politicking has raised to power... "Ah, me. How beautiful he was." Thanqol fucked around with this message at Mar 19, 2013 around 02:59 |
| # ? Mar 19, 2013 02:49 |
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Great set of updates so far! CKII really is the best game.
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| # ? Mar 19, 2013 03:24 |
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Excellent writing style and some hilarious twists. Please do go on.
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| # ? Mar 19, 2013 04:14 |
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Ahahahaha holy poo poo this event is great. This really is the best LP
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| # ? Mar 19, 2013 17:48 |
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Your writing style remains entertaining - And the RNG favours you! Keep it up!
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| # ? Mar 19, 2013 17:54 |
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That's right! Clog the arteries of hell with burger after burger until Lucifer himself has a heart attack! Hahaha! I agree that this is awesome. Jesus scheming is the best scheming.
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| # ? Mar 19, 2013 20:01 |
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Holy crap, that king you overthrew was an enormous rear end in a top hat. Sometimes this game's trait system can produce some really horrible-seeming people. A Deceitful, Wroth, Craven, Cruel bastard with no Diplomacy at all.
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| # ? Mar 19, 2013 23:52 |
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This LP is excellent and I am shamed that it took me this long to remember that it was going to be a thing. Can't wait for more
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| # ? Mar 20, 2013 01:43 |
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Sure, the invasion of Earth by the forces of Lucifer was single-handedly ended, but REVENGE!
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| # ? Mar 20, 2013 01:50 |
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Christina is the best. How much more can go wrong in order to go completely, wonderfully right?
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| # ? Mar 20, 2013 03:18 |
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 "Poor Christina. She deserved better. "My name is Auden. I've been here since the beginning. Skjam, the count of these lands some thirty years ago, was my brother. Christina was the best thing he ever did, but the poor girl's moment in the sun had passed after the Battle of Sjaelland. When she came home from that war she was feted as a hero, and all men praised her as a paragon. "And I'm not really sure what happened next. It wasn't a fall... it was just kind of a slump. Nothing ever really went her way again after that."  "In a cruel quirk of feudal law, even though she'd pressed the claim of King Vladimar and overthrown Bjorn, Bjorn kept his Ducal title and his authority over Christina. He was locked within the dungeons of Vladimar so wasn't able to punish Christina for her betrayal, but being beholden to a Ylving even after everything she'd done set Christina's teeth on edge. She clearly wanted to be in the court of the king who she adored, but was prevented. She rarely saw him face to face."   "And the Ylving Dynasty, even if they were no longer kings, kept their stranglehold over Denmark. Christina had been warned that her great revolution would be more symbolic than anything and that her personal political position would be just as paralysed as before, but now the reality was setting in and she couldn't do anything about it."  "She normally controlled herself well, but when her second son, Yorrik, questioned the nature of fairness to her she beat him savagely. I was surprised at her."  "Many nights I found her, stewing over tables and charts, troop dispositions and numbers, seeing if there was room to manoeuvre. Unfortunately, with the crippling war debts she'd taken on to hire the Great Company the numbers just didn't add up."  "Her time, when not spent scheming, was spent encouraging her children not to make the same mistakes she had."  "And in Yorrik's case, this meant disciplining him on how to keep and conserve money. Money and mercenaries, Christina had decided, were the only way to enact change in Denmark. "As for her first-born son, Hamlet, he was being trained by her estranged husband as an assassin. They rarely spoke."  "At this point in my life, my dear old wife was on her deathbed. I sat with her for many days as she slipped in and out of consciousness, and as a result I wasn't there for Christina as much as I should have been. But in the final moments of her life, my wife called both of Christina's vassals to her and made her swear to her that they would be eternally loyal to Christina and her family. 'For I go to the Lord now,' said Ida, indomitable even dying, 'And I'll carry your oaths with me to Heaven. The Lord will bear witness!' "What could they do but swear? "She passed away soon afterwards."  "But after my period of mourning was over, Christina surprised me again. She told me her research had found a Castillian Princess who believed that she could hear the voice of the Lord, and she wished to examine her to see if she was mad, and document her pronouncements if she was not. The best way to invite her here from France, she said, was to arrange her marriage to me."  "What was I, in my dotage, to do with this beautiful young firebrand? I couldn't remotely imagine. She was a saint in taking care of me, without doubt, but she could have been my granddaughter. I simply allowed her and Christina to argue it out over Church theology, and often the halls of the castle shook with their bickering long into the night. Christina would argue doctrinal thought and the assembled learning of saints and history, and Belaskita would argue what was right and what was wrong without regards to Church lore. Christina found a lot of Belaskita's views disturbing, especially as they clashed with her own memories of the Sorcerer of Gotland and the direct consequences of impiety. "But for all their bickering, they were two halves of the same whole. They made a sweet couple together, and Christina was never quite as happily distracted as she was with Belaskita."  "My advanced age was impairing my duties, though, so I finally stepped aside for a younger man to enjoy my retirement in peace."   "But there was a certain kind of rot that never goes away. As I was tending the stables, as my honorary title demands I do, I discovered the two young children practising a satanic ritual using the corpse of a rat. I dragged the little devils before their mother, who flew into a fury and lectured them for hours about sin and damnation. I was more concerned with the nature of the rite they were attempting - it seemed like the corrupt taint of the Sorcerer of Gotland had not left us yet. "I started making enquiries, but it was too little, too late."  "... ah, I wish it was someone other than me who had to tell dear Christina that her son had been murdered. I wish I had never had to see the poor child's body like it was. Even in death, Rune's black hands strike at our poor family again and again and again."  "The spymaster Sven who Christina's mentor had appointed had been an old disciple of the Sorcerer, but Christina had kept him where he was because he seemed loyal and had renounced Satan before her. She was so trusting, and the world just kept taking advantage of it. "But this was her son. Something in her broke."  "She locked him in the dungeon, and then walked out through the back of the castle with a shovel. She started digging, and dug and dug until she was exhausted. She came back and slept, and the next day she left and dug again. "Finally, when that filthy pit was deep enough for her to be satisfied no one would climb out of it, she threw the murderer down into the depths."  "And then she covered it over and nailed it shut. "I was shocked and horrified, but I didn't say anything. I felt like if she didn't do this, take some form of direct, extreme revenge, she'd go mad. "The screaming from the pit eventually died down."   "There after I wanted to know less of my home, and listened to the news from abroad. The Muslim leaders had conquered Byzantium and there were rumours they would strike next into Germany."  "Norway had lost it's grip on England, which was now an anarchic patchwork."   "Christina twice wrote to King Vladimar, to no response. She spent much time weeping."  "The hated Sven begged for forgiveness before he died. Christina never went to see him, but I did. In the moments before his death I convinced him to name his fellow traitors."  "Rune's influence ran deep, but I believe I rooted the last of it out."  "Christina had endured much. Betrayal, rejection, death. But the final straw was losing a stupid bird. She couldn't take it. Even though a blizzard was coming, she was determined to find this bird, in the foolish hope that setting this one small thing right she'd somehow set her entire life to rights. "She saddled her horse and made to ride out into the snow. But just as she left the gates, her son came before her, tugging on her sleeve. "'Don't worry, mom,' he said, smiling bravely. 'I'll take care of everything back here. I'll do everything you never got around to.'"  "She was smiling when she rode away."  "They found her body the next week. A frozen eagle's feather lay across her eyes."  "The boy was crowned the next day. He's a good lad, young and strong and with a good head on his shoulders. I'll be passing soon, but I'll be leaving the county in capable hands. "It's been a sad story, but it's had it's moments. It's had it's triumphs. I don't regret being there to see it." TOTAL ASSETS: - 106 gold ducats - 1 County - 2 Vassals - 1 Jesus - 1 Sister - A Long Life Ahead Of You QUESTION TO THE AUDIENCE: The biggest problem with a small nation is a lack of qualified help, and our council is comprised primarily of shitbags, scores around 7, following Christina's purges. However, money spent on recruiting new staff is high risk compared to investing in infrastructure. Do we want to try and recruit more help or invest for the future? Thanqol fucked around with this message at Mar 20, 2013 around 08:23 |
| # ? Mar 20, 2013 08:11 |
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Invest for the future. The Ylving yoke must be cast from the neck of Denmark and we are going to need a solid foundation to help accomplish that.
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| # ? Mar 20, 2013 09:35 |
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I'm liking this LP. Invest. With investment in infrastructure comes money and its own talent...if the the shitbags don't suck it all away with graft, first.
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| # ? Mar 20, 2013 09:46 |
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Invest for the future, since our court apparently has the collective lifespan of a mayfly, but gold is forever (until war breaks out).
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| # ? Mar 20, 2013 11:01 |
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Oh Christina  Invest.
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| # ? Mar 20, 2013 11:04 |
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Invest.
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| # ? Mar 20, 2013 11:37 |
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indeed. But yeah investing seems like the most prudent choice here, even if we spend cash on advisors there's no guarantee they'll be good ones - whereas you can't really go too wrong with investing in our holdings.
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| # ? Mar 20, 2013 12:57 |
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| # ? May 20, 2013 08:51 |
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Invest. Build villages and the things that give money.
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| # ? Mar 20, 2013 13:55 |
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