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SIGSEGV
Nov 4, 2010


TheGreatEvilKing posted:

Any chance we can get this to a new page before the update?

May our posting swell that river under the old walls and drown that place that made negative sense.

E: It worked.

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TheGreatEvilKing
Mar 28, 2016





Governor Boris and the Rude Mercenaries

Last time on Tyranny we dicked around the Scarlet Chorus camp instead of making a decision. This time around we're going to actually do what Nerat wants us to do.





: [Leave] I'll head to the Blade Grave as requested.

: Travel to Trapper's Junction, where our trusted agent Jagged Remedy and his gang have a foothold in the Blade Grave. Speak with him, and bring us the scion of Ashe! And take care, dear Fatebinder, that the winds don't unravel the skin from your body.



Barik speaks up and offers to help us finish things at the Blade Grave.

: Could you elaborate?



For once Barik says something intelligent.



We know the backstory, of course - Ashe ordered Barik to march into the Edict of Storms to rescue a daughter who didn't want to be rescued, and it's important for Barik's backstory. Boris does not.

: [Lore 47] Is that all? Your manner has changed.





: You have much invested in this mission. Of course you can accompany me.

I don't think Barik is going to enjoy this.



Hey! That's below the belt! I get what he's trying to say, but, again, it's Graven Ashe.



We unlock Barik's loyalty level 3 with this.

TheGreatEvilKing summary posted:

: We're all going to die someday...something Graven Ashe will never understand. How's it going, Fatebinder?

: Heading out to the Blade Grave like you wanted.

: Excellent. Look for my commander Jagged Remedy, he's got a foothold there, and try not to die! Bring me Amelia Ashe!

: Could I come along? It's important to me.

: How come?

: Not in front of... that. Well... I submit to your Archon authority, Nerat.

: You seem really down, my dude.

: I... I lost many friends there, and we failed to carry out our mission.

: Sure, come along.

: Wow, you're being cool like Graven Ashe!

: I think I will accept that in the spirit which it was intended.



The thread voted to go to the Blade Grave for "babymurder", but we're going to make a quick detour. Don't worry! We'll do the Blade Grave story first, I just want to grab Sirin, the Spire, and a clue.



We get stopped by the Bronze Brotherhood again. This time, we're the military governor of Lethian's Crossing which is under the command of our erstwhile "friend" Nerat.



: [Address Will] This man will not be paying a toll today. Call your guards off and allow us passage immediately.

Without the backing of Kyros these assholes are just common bandits.





: I stand by my decision.

: Aster raises his hands in protest. I thank you for your efforts Fatebinder but it is not worth bloodshed. I will leave in peace.

: Will returns to his position and looks you over, his former genial mood gone. So, a Fatebinder in our little corner of the world. Who'd have ever thought this would happen. He spits between his feed then crushes it into the dirt with his boot.



The Bronze Brotherhood is not in nearly as strong a position as they think - while our party is capable of handling them, they're also probably within marching range of the garrison at the Crossing. This is not a good idea.

: He shakes the pouch around his neck, making the rings inside jingle melodically. Not that there's a shortage of those out here!

: What can this humble servant of the Brotherhood do for you, Fatebinder? And don't ask me to let you through, because that isn't happening.



: If you think you can get him to move, do it.



Diplomacy? What's that?

: One of two things will happen - either you will let us pass, or we will simply pass. There are no other options. Whatever role you have taken upon yourself to bar our way has already failed. You succeed only in delaying our task... and annoying me.





Barik keeps his pimp hand strong.

: Will rubs his cheek. Hold on! I'm just doing my job! I apologize if I offended. Raetommon will have my head if I let you through. There's nothing I can do about it!



Remember, Boris threw Raetommon and the Brotherhood out during the Conquest. It's gonna be a lot harder to pull a Cleo and talk our way through this one.



: But I'm sure you already know that. I couldn't help but see you over here, talking to Will and that traveling merchant. Only here for a moment and already sticking your nose where it doesn't belong, aren't you?

: I don't appreciate others invading my territory, Fatebinder.



It's easy to make fun of Will for being an idiot, but this is the response of a subordinate who is terrified of displeasing his boss. Raetommon is still a bad leader.

: Watch yourself while you are a guest in my land. If you have come to stir up more trouble, we are well equipped and will not back down in the defense of what is rightfully ours! He sweeps his arm in front of him, gesturing to the surrounding countryside.

: Welby and I might not always agree, but that is one point we see eye-to-eye on. If you step out of line, we will both correct you.

Of course, Raetommon also acknowledged that Boris is the governor. Not strong on consistency or planning, is he?

: His eyes narrow and he leans toward you. You are not welcome here.



: You would do well to watch your tone when speaking to a Fatebinder.



: I'm not welcome in your land? This is not your land anymore.



Enough of this poo poo.

: [Attack] If you're looking for trouble, here it is.



With leadership like this it's no wonder the Tiers fell to the likes of Ashe and Nerat.

TheGreatEvilKing summary posted:

: Dude, what the hell? You guys aren't even a legitimate authority, how the hell are you charging tolls? Fatebinder! Help!

: Let the merchant through. Now.

: Look, the Fatebinder agrees, move, rear end in a top hat!

: Lol I don't gotta do poo poo.

: Excuse me?

: Whoa, I didn't want anyone to get killed over this, I'm leaving! Thanks anyway, Fatebinder!

: Yea, Fatebinder! I'm the boss! Look at all this money we stole from travelers! Anyway, you can't get through, because Raetommon said so! Nyeah!

: Please let me beat his rear end.

: :sickos:

: MOVE BITCH GET OUT THE WAY!

: Lol I ain't doing shi - ow! Stop beating me! It hurts! Owie! It's not my fault! Raetommon will have my head! Oww! I'm a bitch! I'm a bitch!

: Oh, look, that loving Fatebinder. You just had to come back after ruining our lives and kicking us out of the Crossing, huh, Governor?. Well, I'm Raetommon, and I lead the Brotherhood. I'm just gonna casually threaten a Fatebinder, cuz I think I'm hot poo poo.

: Pleasedon'tblamemeforthisI'maloyalservant.

: gently caress off, Fatebinder.

: You're playing with fire.

: So? I will take back my land!

: It's not your land, you called me Governor.

: Pride goeth before the fall, Fatebinder!

: gently caress this. Time to die, fucko!

: I'm running away! Handle this, men! Whee!



Will actually hits pretty drat hard. He nearly one-shotted poor Eb.



The Brotherhood members all die, because the reward for following a tyrant is death. Will was a loyal bootlicker and look where it got him. This is something that both Boris and Nerat have yet to figure out.



The town is controlled by Chorus bros so we get a salute instead of more Tyranny combat. Thanks, bros!



If you're on any non-Anarchy path, you want to talk to this guy.



The seal was on the crates of iron, which Tunon explicitly asked us to look into.

: Could you tell me anything about this seal? I found it in Vendrien's Well.



: It came from a merchant caravan that was ransacked.



: Maybe you could start by telling me about the merchants.



: Tell me more about Hand-Over-Quill.



With Kyros' draconian permit laws it shouldn't surprise anyone that a black market sprang up. See Union, Soviet.

: A shipment of iron and weapons went missing. It was found - with this seal - in a house in Echocall Crossing.

: He strokes the shadow of beard growth under his chin. Suspicious, I agree. But war always has its little problems...



Nice try buddy. We know he runs Nerat's spy operations, he's a smooth talker.

: The weapons were meant for the Disfavored. And the Vendrien Guard suddenly had iron weaponry.



: Changes things? What does Hand-Over-Quill have to do with the Vendrien Guard?



Extorting a Fatebinder? Never a wise move!

: [Athletics 53] Have you considered that shaking me down could be even more costly?

Tunon would probably let us get away with whatever sentence we pass on this guy for this little stunt.





See, that wasn't so bad. If you missed the Fire Sigil like we did, you can buy it from Mr. Bronze here and continue on your merry way. We do so.

TheGreatEvilKing summary posted:

: Hey, do you know anything about this sigil?

: Oh, yeah, it's a black market merchant group. Stay away from them, they're super illegal.

: Do you know why it was on a shipment of stolen weapons used by the Vendrien Guard?

: Uh...uh...poo poo...you know, that information is gonna cost you a lot of money, because it could get me in trouble.

: You do realize Tunon would back whatever I sentenced you to for trying to shake down a Fatebinder, right?

: gently caress. Look, you didn't hear it from me, but Fifth Eye told me to get those weapons to the rebels. So, you gonna buy anything?

In any other legal system this would be a slam dunk conviction. Imagine the scandal that would ensure if an American general somehow "lost" a bunch of tanks and they showed up in ISIS hands. That guy would probably be executed for treason. Nominally this proves Nerat guilty of a crime that you can actually stick to an Archon, but in practice Tunon is so biased against them that we need more than this to convict.



We dodge the question by pointing out that we did this already and she asks to come along. Not wanting to turn down the most powerful companion in the game, I agree.



We grab the Spire as well. Look, it's the Chorus path, we're not even going to try to pretend the laws aren't anything except bullshit to maintain the status quo. Bleden Mark even said as much last playthrough, and he's the second legal enforcer after Tunon.



Rhogalus wants to know about Spires, and we do the whole Myothis chain offscreen.



NOW we can actually do what we're supposed to do.



We guide them out. Pretty sure I've shown this off before, but they give us an iron bar for our troubles. Boris isn't a dick all the time, but pretty much all of the power players in this game deserve it.



We've seen this before, we try to heal him and Mark gets mad.



Lantry likes it though!



Welcome to Jagged Remedy's camp. The impaled bodies are a big clue we might not be doing the wrong thing for the right reasons.





We're going to wish we'd listened to Sirin a lot during this update.





Yeah, we're off to a great start with Sirin warning us he's an unstable maniac and him complementing us for handing over a prisoner for torture.



We do get a [Betray Alliance] option here, but we are not doing Anarchy again.

: The Voices wants to invite some influential people to the Chorus. I'm here to help.



Even Jagged Remedy thinks the setup is weird. Oh well.



: Do you have a hard time conscripting soldiers?

: His eyes fill with delight. Soldiers put up a big show of resisting us, but that only makes their conquest all the sweeter. Pressing drunken sailors into service lacks the satisfaction of a job well done.



: How have you managed the recruitment so far?



In essence, Remedy needs us to be the good cop to his bad cop.

: I'm here to help. What's the problem?

: These rebels won't give up without a fight, but they're useless to me as corpses - unless Stalwart meat keeps better than pork. Nothing in his tone implies that he's joking. I want you to convince them to join my crew.

: Use that charm and skill that won you the Sunset Spire - how could these backwoods ingrates do aught but respect the person who owns the highest building in Lethian's Crossing? He smirks to himself.

The other reason the entire Chorus is expendable is to get rid of people like Remedy that would require the Empire's internal security forces to intervene. Sure, you can get away with it if you're an Archon, but by and large the more pragmatic tyrants don't want to waste manpower on this trivial poo poo. It's the basis of Kyros' Peace.



: What were the Unbroken doing before you cornered them?

: They spent the last year trying to reach Sentinel Stand Keep, the heart of old Stalwart and a bastion of strength.

: Of course, the Edict of Storms cut off the old fort from the rest of the realm.



: What do you know about the Edict of Storms?

: Only as much as I need to. The problems of this region are Graven Ashe's to handle. We're just here to make things worse for him. He smiles.



:ironicat:

Remember Graven Ashe's tendency to hide in his tent, or to send his men out to die when confronted by a powerful Archon? I remember.

As an additional irony, have you ever seen or heard of Kyros leading men and women into combat?

Of course, this entire thing is self-destructive, because if Nerat wins and becomes King of the Tiers he's still lost a ton of valuable farmland and living space. Then again, idiotically self-destructive is Nerat's middle name.

: Straydus Herodin, the Regent of old Stalwart, hid behind the walls of Sentinel Stand during the war. Of all the ruling bloodline to fight for the country's freedom, he was the last. To punish him for his cowardice, Kyros drafted this Edict and cursed the Regent bloodline. As long as Herodin lives, the storms will continue unabated.



It's implied that Remedy here is native to the North and probably made it into the Chorus so that Kyros could send away a sick gently caress. Either Remedy wins the war for Kyros or the Tiersmen get rid of him.

: I thought that Ashe forbade the Scarlet Chorus from entering the Blade Grave.

: Do you see Graven Ashe here, swinging his hammer with wild abandon? Jagged Remedy makes a show of glancing about the area. Neither do I.



: What do the Scarlet Chorus want out of the Blade Grave?

: They're a more stubborn, harder folk than you'll find anywhere else in the Tiers. Outside of the Beastmen, of course. And it helps that they put up a decent fight against the Disfavored. I'd invite that strength into my gang any day.



It's this bizarre cognitive dissonance associated with the parody of Objectivism. Somehow the soldiers get to being soldiers from conscripts. It does not occur to most of the Chorus commanders that training and outfitting their troops would give them more veterans to work with, and the ones that realize this don't have the skill to hold together a veteran army.

: I'll help you conscript as many Unbroken as possible.



We don't really have a choice Sirin. Tunon told us to get in good with Nerat. You may be an Archon, but unfortunately you don't have the political clout to sponsor us through this bullshit.

: Aren't you generous with your time? The Voices will hear of your devotion to our cause... assuming the Unbroken don't shatter your courtly bones. He laughs quietly to himself. Let me know when you've convinced that ragged group of upstarts to join our honored ranks.

TheGreatEvilKing summary posted:

: Hey, Fatebinder, I'm Jagged Remedy.

: Careful Fatebinder this man's fuckin nuts!

: That ruled when you gave that Regent to Nerat for.. interrogation, heh heh. Why are you here?

: Nerat sent me to help out. Give me the lowdown.

: Well, we've cornered a group of soldiers here and we want them to join us, because we gain people of influence and we can learn as much as we can before he breaks them, heh heh heh. Let's get Mattias!

: So, what's the problem?

: They're being stubborn, so I need a good cop to their bad cop.

: What about the Edict?

: Well, it fucks over the Disfavored, so... yolo!

: :mad:

: Didn't Ashe explicitly forbid us from doing this?

: I don't see him here, do you? It's a civil war, he can't do poo poo!

: Sure, I'm in.

: This is not gonna end well for you Fatebinder.

: :sickos:

TheGreatEvilKing
Mar 28, 2016





Governor Boris and the Broken Captain

Last time on Tyranny, we went to Lethian's Crossing for some powerups before meeting our Scarlet Chorus contact, who turned out to be a freaky Mengele dude that Sirin kept telling us not to trust. Today we're going to prove her right.



Sure, Sirin might have legitimate concerns, especially as she's worked with Nerat for so long, but our trustworthy friends in the Chorus love us! And if you can't trust the dude who decorates his camp with impaled corpses, who can you trust?



This obviously traumatized Disfavored prisoner? Nah.



Last time we were here we just tried to get information about the Dauntless. Today will be different.





: I've come on behalf of the Scarlet Chorus to deliver the terms of surrender.



Yeah, I'm not making portraits for these two idiots. The Sky Blade has a point, honestly, We'll come back to it in a bit.





: Captain of what's left of us, anyway. I've buried a lot of good soldiers over the last fortnight, and you can hardly consider this our full strength. He looks back at his camp with evident doubt.

: I've been in the storm too long to hear much news from outside it, but word of mouth has clued me in to your features, Fatebinder. He nods. I'm a little preoccupied dealing with Kyros' armies to deal with Kyros' dignitaries. If you don't mind, Jagged Remedy and his Chorus gang are giving me a headache of Edict-like proportions.



Goddammit Barik! Stop making GBS threads everything up with your idiot racism! Go back in the corner!

: What seems to be the problem?

: That should be no mystery to you, who pledged fealty to the Voices of Nerat. No doubt you witnessed your share of recruitment horrors in the past?

: The gang in our shadow has hunted us for weeks - launching surprise attacks in the middle of the night, starving us, bleeding us dry and hoping that we'll finally give in to conscription.



: What are your options?



: I'm surprised that the Unbroken still tarry in this wasteland of a Realm. What are you still doing here?

: He studies you and shakes his head. This 'wasteland' is our home. Believe it or not, we have centuries of history and tradition wrapped up in this place. Kyros' storms can level homes and weather our monuments to featureless nubs, but the sons and daughters of Stalwart are here to stay.



:ironicat:

: What are you trying to achieve here?

: He shakes his head and sighs. What I want can hardly be a mystery to you. We're in the middle of a war. Suffice it to say we want the forces of Kyros to withdraw or stick halberds up their asses. Whichever comes first.

Literally no one in this game uses a halberd. The halberd was invented in the 14th century. This is the bronze age.

: In the immediate present... I'll settle for an end to the Edict of Storms. It has some wartime advantages - we can attack and travel under cover, and the Disfavored are all but blind to our movements.

But...Kyros is omnipotent! She would never gently caress her own armies over li - who am I kidding.



:ironicat:

What Mattias doesn't know is that Nerat has no intention of ending the Edict.

: How certain are you that you're ready to join the Chorus?

: I suppose you ask from a place of personal interest? He frowns. The longer I weigh my options, the fewer I have. By the time the Chorus is our only option, I'll have lost more of my countrymen than I'm willing to allow. I want us to survive this war.



There's a BIG flaw in Mattias' logic here. Can you spot it?

: If I joined you in camp, I might be able to offer a more informed opinion.

: He studies you for a moment longer and shrugs. That's fine. If you keep a civil tongue and your weapons to yourself, you're welcome to accompany me behind the defenses. He moved[sic] to return to camp and waves you inside.



We go take him up on this immediately.





Irentis is the smartest guy in the room.

: Is everyone in the Tiers just disagreeable and confrontational? Is comparing the size of your sword just the way you pass time out here? It's a wonder they even have time to breathe.

Sirin is being snarky, but Irentis is making the point she was making a few minutes ago.



Here's the problem with Mattias' logic - the rebels don't have the leverage to force Kyros to do anything. There is no guarantee they'll survive in the Scarlet Chorus, the Chorus is explicitly made of disposable troops led by an Archon Kyros already tried to kill once. The first thing we learn meeting Jagged Remedy is that he's an untrustworthy rear end in a top hat. Nerat is especially untrustworthy, and he and Remedy explicitly are not going to give Mattias what he wants by breaking the Edict. Oh well!

: [Continue listening.]

: Irentis takes a step back, breathing heavily. All of it.

: That is what the leader of our great rebellion would have said, but I'm afraid he must be counted as a casualty in this war like the rest.

At first glance Irentis seems like an insane fanatic, but Kyros has proved to the inhabitants of the Blade Grave like nowhere else that loyalty to the Overlord does not guarantee survival. Remember, we warned them about the Edict and they watched as Kyros primarily nuked her own followers. Yes, the status quo of the Tiers was absolutely terrible, but these guys gain absolutely nothing from surrendering to Kyros and lose everything.



It's not hard to see where Mattias is coming from either - Stalwart is suffering from the quintessential problem small states face against large colonizing empires, which is that the latter can draw more resources from outside the battlefield and throw them against the locals.

: [Athletics 26] This is no time to lose control of yourself, Captain. Your soldiers are listening.



At this moment, Kyros has won. Remember, Kyros nuked the land - but Mattias has internalized Herodin's perceived betrayal so much that he's willing to sell out his homeland to the invaders, much like Lenin getting German help during World War I.

You also don't need the Chorus for this! Cleopatra proved it in the last run, the strength was in Stalwart all along.



Smartest guy in the room.

: My apologies for that. Irentis lost as much as anyone in this war, and his reaction is about what I expected. Surrender is a kick in the teeth, but it may be all we have left.



Considering that you're about to beg Nerat for patronage, I don't think you have a leg to stand on.





: The Voices of Nerat extends an invitation to the Scarlet Chorus.

If only we had the option to have them swear to Tunon through us, but we only get that on the rebel route.



: Tell me of your difficulties.

: He turns to the fire beside him and nudges it with a log, sending up a cloud of embers. Our real troubles began with the victory at Sentinel Stand. Instead of facing Kyros' forces in the field of battle, the last Regent of Stalwart decided to barricade the keep and look after himself. When Kyros proclaimed the Edict, it cursed the Regent bloodline for their stubbornness.



This is what Nerat wants the player character for. The Fatebinder is uniquely situated to provide a humanizing face for what, in reality, are a bunch of monsters who enjoy impaling people on sticks. If the Disfavored path is about disillusionment with the benign face of fascism, the Chorus path is a tale of the folly of thinking you can use evil means to achieve anything other than evil ends.

: The last of the Regents is responsible for this storm's continued existence. He's holding our nation hostage, and we won't survive this war until we claim Sentinel Stand Keep... and take his life.

: And if I'm desperate enough to consider conscripting with the Scarlet Chorus, well, that should tell you something.



: How do the Unbroken plan on breaching the keep walls?

: Assuming we get the chance to cross the windwall around Sentinel Stand, we'll simply blast the walls to rubble. He frowns. It's not actually that simple at all. Our alchemists have spent the last several months experimenting with powders and oils that can loosen stone or weaken fortifications.

That makes these guys seem far more valuable than either Ashe or Nerat are willing to give them credit for.



That would allow peasants to kill Archons with enough refinement.

: You call the last battle of Sentinel Stand a 'victory'?



The defenders at Sentinel Stand had imprisoned a Disfavored legion. I'll bet that Graven Ashe would have pulled his troops back if we threatened to push some of the captives over the rampart walls. He shrugs. A pity we never got the chance.



Shut up, Barik.

: He has information we need. Another moment.



: I thought Stalwart fighters never surrendered.



: The Scarlet Chorus seems to be your only choice.





: [Lore 42] A sign of their intention? What of yours? The Chorus needs to know that you're totally committed.



What do you think they plan to do with you? We opened with negotiating a surrender!



: An oath of fealty.



I...you realize what you said, right? You just gave Nerat permission to kill or torture you as he sees fit. Boris might not do that, but Nerat is a being who rose to fame for his skill at torturing people.

: He sighs. I hope that's enough to convince your... your friends that I'm with their cause. You should know something going into this, though - my soldiers won't be convinced unless the Chorus offers something in return.



: I'll see what I can do.

This means literally nothing, as we're about to reconscript them all anyway! :toot:



I accidentally click on Irentis on the way out.





: You're not seeing the bigger picture. Joining the Scarlet Chorus is your only chance at survival.



He's not wrong with this argument either!



: The Unbroken leader might be swayed if you released some of your prisoners.

: And give up my prizes? Those are the best of the lot - among the finest specimens I've taken of late. I wouldn't dare part ways with them. The ones I don't keep for my studies are going to the Voices of Nerat. He taps his chin to consider.

I missed that part about the "my studies", but wow, he really is just Dr. Mengele, isn't he?



: Mattias has pledged his fealty to the Chorus already. He promises that the rest will follow.



: He pledged an oath to the Voices of Nerat.



Translation: Nerat loves this kind of poo poo, and if word got out that Jagged Remedy wasn't honoring it Remedy's rear end would be on a spike.



The first option is if we want to indoctrinate them into the cruelty of the Chorus, a la the Spartan agoge.

: Release the Unbroken prisoners. An act of goodwill should set the appropriate tone.

: Ever the diplomat. I prefer to keep my engagements with others simpler, letting knives and leeches do the talking for me. To each their own, I suppose.

I am suddenly really glad we iced this rear end in a top hat in the Anarchy path.





Again, we are the velvet glove hiding a band of assholes that enjoy impaling people on spikes. Not all the Chorus members are like this, but much of the leadership is.

: He takes a deep breath. So be it. If the Scarlet Chorus are willing to show this much good faith, we will turn ourselves over to their mercy.

: We couldn't take Sentinel Stand as Unbroken, but there is still a chance to liberate Stalwart from the oppression of the Regent and this Edict.



Irentis, understandably, is not going to stand for this.

: The Chorus spared our soldiers! The Fatebinder here ensured that they would keep their word. The doom that visited these canyons may soon subside. Come and share in this small victory, Irentis.

The obvious question is, what happens when the Fatebinder's gone?



:owned:



: The Chorus have made their gesture of peace. It falls to you to reciprocate.

: No. If you think me so gullible as to allow the directionless flailing of my disgraced captain to dictate how I live or die, then you underestimated the Unbroken. Perhaps worse, you overestimated Mattias.

: Burying our traditions and freedom is no better than burying the dead. Mattias, I renounce you as my commander!



I mean, he's not wrong! Mattias just deluded himself that the Chorus would help him end the Edict, and we didn't correct him.

: Irentis, this will be the end of us! You take up arms against the only allies within reach - the only ones who can bring down the Disfavored, and... His speech slows down to silence as soldiers square off around Irentis.



: [Lore 42] You wanted this from the beginning, Irentis. Don't hide behind your delusions of patriotism.



Again, Irentis isn't wrong! Mattias sold them all down the river to Nerat, and Irentis is completely correct when he points out the new Chorus members can expect only brutal treatment and probably death. That's the point of the institution.



Sirin realizes this as well.



It's Tyranny combat. They all die.



: He would have served the Chorus better alive. It's a pity.





At least we can grab Dauntless.

: Nice job. You managed to get a good number of them to join. And less of them died than if we went with our... usual methods.

: The Voices of Nerat clued me into your mission. With Mattias absorbed into the ranks, our final prize is Amelia, the wayward daughter of Graven Ashe.



You already submitted to Nerat back at camp, buddy.

: Sentinel Stand is the seat of the old Stalwart Regent - the ruling power of the realm. Amelia hasn't been seen since the second year of the conquest. If she's alive and in Stalwart, I'll wager she's there.

: Since Mattias knows the region, I'll have him meet you there to go over your next move. He grins. I'll send him with a Chorus escort, so he gets properly 'welcomed' into the ranks, if you get my meaning.

Translation: forced to do war crimes to build loyalty via transgression.



: Jagged Remedy, do you concur?



:ironicat:

What did you expect?



Mattias, having heard what he wanted to hear (while Sirin thinks we should not trust Remedy at all, and she's right), happily continues betraying his homeland for his own made up bullshit. What a hero!

TheGreatEvilKing summary posted:

:hist101:: Why are you here?

: I'm here delivering terms of surrender from the Scarlet Chorus.

:hist101:: What? Why would we surrender to those wackos? They'll just put us on spikes?

: No, it's cool. Everything sucks and all my friends keep dying.

: Psst! Fatebinder! I gotta be a racist!

: Normally, we would never surrender, but I think it's time to surrender. I gotta live, and the Chorus can maybe end the Edict.

: Hey, if you let me into the camp, we can discuss you joining the Chorus.

: Sure, come on in! Hey, Irentis, wanna join the Chorus?

: Dude, WHAT THE gently caress????

: Lol do you guys just compare dicks all day?

: We're just gonna get killed out here!

: I'm sorry, I didn't realize that somehow joining Kyros, the tyrant who summoned a magical storm to kill his own men, was going to help us survive!

: The Chorus can help us kill the Regent!

: gently caress off!

: It is very sad. We keep taking horrific casualties and I do not know how we can achieve our goals. Perhaps if we joined a howling mob known for taking heavy losses, we would live longer. All we have going for us are the ability to fight on par with the Disfavored, and the explosives we recently invented that if we refined we could use to blow up mages and Archons. This sucks! Aside from those things, we're totally hosed! Anyway, I'm gonna swear allegiance to the Chorus now, so they can kill the Regent. I swear allegiance to the Voices of Nerat and I am his to throw in the dumpster as he sees fit. Can you get our prisoners released as a show of good faith?

: Sure. Hey, Remedy, release the prisoners, they swore to Nerat.

: Aww, man! I was going to build a combination of human centipede and Dickbutt! Fiiine, as Nerat will be mad if I don't.

: Cool. Everyone, we're in the Chorus now! Wooo!

: Dude, WHAT THE gently caress???? No! They're gonna kill us all. Everyone who doesn't want to die a slave, to me!

: :commissar:

: Mr. Remedy, will you help me break the Edict?

: Go gently caress yourself lol.

So we should take a good long think about what we're doing here. Nerat obviously plans for us to be the (false) face of a "kinder, gentler" Scarlet Chorus as seen in our recruiting of Mattias. Nerat also discards people he has no further need for by impaling them on spikes. As the Dictator's Handbook says, purge early and often!

There is no way this ends well.

Regallion
Nov 11, 2012

I am very confused as to why you think that surrendering is treason or that it's wrong.
Their choices, at this point are:

1. Suicide by fighting chorus
2. Suicide by fighting fatebinder (taken, idiotic)
3. Conscription into chorus with a high chance of dying.

Why would you ever pick 1 or 2 if you are not a complete moron?

SIGSEGV
Nov 4, 2010


So first I'm going to say "lmao".

quote:


In any other legal system this would be a slam dunk conviction. Imagine the scandal that would ensure if an American general somehow "lost" a bunch of tanks and they showed up in ISIS hands. That guy would probably be executed for treason. Nominally this proves Nerat guilty of a crime that you can actually stick to an Archon, but in practice Tunon is so biased against them that we need more than this to convict.


Because this basically happened, in part accidentally because bringing all those humvees and whatnot when pulling out of northern Iraq cost a lot of money and they could just buy more, so they left them behind and sometimes set them on fire, often not enough, also not burned enough lists of local collaborators as well, although I imagine that anyone finding any pile of weapons just decided to print lists of real and imagined little helpers to settle a few debts, and in part deliberately because, well, the American NatSec industrial complex is what it is and loves giving funding, weapons and training to naked proxies of the most evil fuckers around, for some reason.

Also, Lenin's decision to go with German backing instead of staying in the Great War makes a lot of sense IMO.

TheGreatEvilKing
Mar 28, 2016





Regallion posted:

I am very confused as to why you think that surrendering is treason or that it's wrong.
Their choices, at this point are:

1. Suicide by fighting chorus
2. Suicide by fighting fatebinder (taken, idiotic)
3. Conscription into chorus with a high chance of dying.

Why would you ever pick 1 or 2 if you are not a complete moron?

Because 3 is suicide. We know (although the Unbroken on the ground might not) that the entire Chorus has been marked for death by Kyros, and the purpose of the institution is to get people killed. This is not inference, this is stated multiple times by the game. The Chorus is run by untrustworthy sadists who explicitly shoot down the goal Mattias is hoping they will help him achieve. The actual list of decisions looks something like this:

1. Continue to fight the Chorus, go get the Dauntless and the Stalwart insignia to get through the windwall and free the country. Irentis was planning this.
2. Suicide by fighting Fatebinder - admittedly, this was a bad plan that deserves your scorn.
3. Join an organization that explicitly is founded to kill off undesirables run by sadists looking for an excuse to kill your dumb rear end for entertainment that Kyros hates and is planning to destroy, that will explicitly not help you achieve your goals because you have no leverage over them and plans to leave your country in ruins to win an internal struggle over which lovely tyrant overlords it.

It's also not really clear that the Chorus had the Unbroken pinned down in any meaningful fashion - IIRC, on the rebel route, you go get the Stalwart artifacts and the Unbroken just leave with you. Mattias is defeated mentally but not sure about physically.

SIGSEGV posted:

So first I'm going to say "lmao".


Because this basically happened, in part accidentally because bringing all those humvees and whatnot when pulling out of northern Iraq cost a lot of money and they could just buy more, so they left them behind and sometimes set them on fire, often not enough, also not burned enough lists of local collaborators as well, although I imagine that anyone finding any pile of weapons just decided to print lists of real and imagined little helpers to settle a few debts, and in part deliberately because, well, the American NatSec industrial complex is what it is and loves giving funding, weapons and training to naked proxies of the most evil fuckers around, for some reason.

Also, Lenin's decision to go with German backing instead of staying in the Great War makes a lot of sense IMO.

The key word is accidentally, IMO. I think if the media had gotten wind of someone deliberately funnelling tanks to a declared American enemy (it's OK to do this when bin Laden is anti-communist, "obviously") they'd be in trouble, but who the hell knows. You're also right that World War I really wasn't Lenin or the Russian people's war at all, but mocking inbred European royalty will have to be done later in the thread. The Romanovs sucked! If anyone is looking for some good reads, take a look at Grand Duchess Marie's memoirs - she's very insistent that the Romanovs of the period were never trained in actual rulership skills, which explains a lot of Nicholas and Alexandra's poorly thought out misadventures.

SIGSEGV
Nov 4, 2010


Oh, not tanks, that's very, very showy, and maintenance and fuel heavy too, but other stuff, tons of it, guns, ammo, ATGMs, training, MANPADS, money, lighter vehicles, and so on, and so on. The Syrian Civil War threads in various forums are very, very, very funny to reread with the future context, but they also were at the time, it just was unwise to pipe up with the obvious stuff, but the delusions were very strong, and very encouraged by a lot of lies.

I'm happy that even the regulars where I read groaned at the idea of praising HTS post name change, because that had magically made them a different organization with entirely different goals in a single night, and got them to doubt some more.

Regallion
Nov 11, 2012

TheGreatEvilKing posted:


1. Continue to fight the Chorus, go get the Dauntless and the Stalwart insignia to get through the windwall and free the country. Irentis was planning this.

Yeah but that's also impossible because the insignia belongs to the fatebinder one way or another, even if he doesn't own it yet and even if they do make it past the windwall, they still have to contend with regent's forces which will gently caress em up. (it's unclear how many people an insignia can cover at once too).

As for chorus being slated for death, they have no way of knowing that so it doesn't count. From their perspective it's just a long odds gamble to survive and maybe in a few generations try to rebuild stalwart. As of right now, they are functionally defeated and have exactly 0 winning plays, just '"maybe try to build the long odds" plays.

Zulily Zoetrope
Jun 1, 2011

Muldoon
I for one will take no part of this doomposting and look forward to Mathias carving himself off a nice gang position with his ranks of Unbroken troops following his lead. All he has to do is stand up to Jagged Remedy, and if it comes to blows and he kills Mengele man, all the better. :)

A jargogle
Feb 22, 2011

Regallion posted:

I am very confused as to why you think that surrendering is treason or that it's wrong.
Their choices, at this point are:

1. Suicide by fighting chorus
2. Suicide by fighting fatebinder (taken, idiotic)
3. Conscription into chorus with a high chance of dying.

Why would you ever pick 1 or 2 if you are not a complete moron?

Why is retreat not an option if one of the suicidal options isn't acceptable to them?

wiegieman
Apr 22, 2010

Royalty is a continuous cutting motion


A jargogle posted:

Why is retreat not an option if one of the suicidal options isn't acceptable to them?

They're pinned into the center of a canyon, completely surrounded by crazy people in red with their backs against a wall. If they get out of that, they're still in an occupied country at the end of a peninsula covered in a perpetual rust storm.

Basically, they have Side Character's Disease.

bewilderment
Nov 22, 2007
man what



The viability of retreat is definitely not clear, yeah.

But hey, look! Actually decent writing when engaging with the main thing of Tyranny, which is being a lackey to an evil dude! To me, at least, it's more interesting than the murdering through that happened on the no-masters route.

The Cheshire Cat
Jun 10, 2008

Fun Shoe

bewilderment posted:

The viability of retreat is definitely not clear, yeah.

But hey, look! Actually decent writing when engaging with the main thing of Tyranny, which is being a lackey to an evil dude! To me, at least, it's more interesting than the murdering through that happened on the no-masters route.

Yeah the anarchy route is particularly underbaked which is why it kind of sucks that we did it first, even if it does seem like the most attractive option initially. It feels like something where it probably wasn't part of the original design but someone at some point decided that they couldn't not have a "you all suck, gently caress all of you" option and so they kind of had to awkwardly retrofit it into the existing work they'd already done.

Evil Fluffy
Jul 13, 2009

Scholars are some of the most pompous and pedantic people I've ever had the joy of meeting.

TheGreatEvilKing posted:

The key word is accidentally, IMO. I think if the media had gotten wind of someone deliberately funnelling tanks to a declared American enemy (it's OK to do this when bin Laden is anti-communist, "obviously") they'd be in trouble, but who the hell knows. You're also right that World War I really wasn't Lenin or the Russian people's war at all, but mocking inbred European royalty will have to be done later in the thread. The Romanovs sucked! If anyone is looking for some good reads, take a look at Grand Duchess Marie's memoirs - she's very insistent that the Romanovs of the period were never trained in actual rulership skills, which explains a lot of Nicholas and Alexandra's poorly thought out misadventures.

The Reagan administration was committing treason during the 1980 election by working with the Iranian revolutionaries to delay the prisoner release until after the election and undermine Carter to help Reagan's election chances. Then you had everything after that with Reagan pardoning people like Oliver North as a reward for committing severe crimes (including, again, treason) and North now spends his days as a propagandist for Fox News, an outlet that exists to serve very specific (and wealthy) interests even if it undermines the country.

There was no accident in the Reagan campaign and administration's actions and nothing happened to them when stuff like the Iran-Contra scandal got out because everyone who mattered got a pardon and there were powerful interests who made sure that was the end of it when in reality every last one of those fuckers should've been executed on national TV. The legal system that would be a slam dunk conviction in only exists for the poor and powerless or the exceptionally stupid (Matt Gaetz, maybe, hopefully).

SIGSEGV
Nov 4, 2010


And to get back to the recent Syria stuff, various factions within the US state backed various factions, the US military, the DoS and the NatSec agencies were backing three different factions, which wouldn't have been that big a problem but they were backing factions that were actively at war with each other.

That's an indicator of pretty thorough state dysfunction.


In terms of Archon's Privilege, insider trading was a privilege given to congress members and senators, until it was removed not too long ago. We still see it happen with no convictions.

GunnerJ
Aug 1, 2005

Do you think this is funny?
Now that we're talking about this, it might be worth considering what real world weapons Edicts are an analogy for, and which nation has been the only one to use them in war.

TheGreatEvilKing
Mar 28, 2016





Surprised no one has brought up Petraeus sexytime blabbering either, but yes, I concede the point. The devs did say part of this was based on American exceptionalism, after all.

SIGSEGV
Nov 4, 2010


Analogies are tricky and don't necessarily represent a single defined thing. Edicts can be nukes or chemical weapons, or they can be weaponized diseases, the breaching of a dam a thousand kilometres up the river while in flood season, or they can be the pure magical embodiment of power, political, magical and otherwise.

Plenty saw the One Ring as "it's nukes" even though Tolkien was pretty adamant it wasn't, the reading still works.

So I'm going to be contrary and say that we're on the morning of 23 April 1915 and say they are obviously gas attacks projected through artillery. No, that's still obvious. Edicts are William the Second, world breaking idiot, belting out an incendiary speech before sending troops to China, telling them to make the white devils feared for one thousand years or whatever stupid formula he used. Anyway, something so dire that even the conservative newspapers of the time went what the gently caress man.

No, too contemporary. Edicts are some ancient Great King (as in the way the Pharaohs and international competitors referred to each other as, Hittite King, Assyrian King and so on) receiving some troubling news of some people being rebelious in the rear end end of an rear end end province and rolling their eyes, pointing at a noble at their table and saying "Bob, you'll go gently caress them up when spring comes, nail them to their trees with arrows or something inventive like that" and then getting back to talking about how many of those Lebanese Cedars they need carried across a desert or sailed up a river for that new temple.

The Cheshire Cat
Jun 10, 2008

Fun Shoe
I think the thing about edicts is that you can very easily map them as a nuke metaphor, and it does work, but it's also interesting to think about them more literally as just the kind of power that "the law" actually has. Like some of the worst atrocities in history happened not because someone developed a particularly potent weapon, but because laws were passed that made those atrocities inevitable (often that was the explicit goal of those laws). You don't need to drop a bomb on people when you can criminalize their existence.

GunnerJ
Aug 1, 2005

Do you think this is funny?
They're singular explosions of power that devastate whole regions and can end conflicts so I'm kinda sure they're mostly nukes. (It's also notable, to extend my point, that the fatebinder using an Edict made Kyros blink, and possession of nukes by an adversary is one of the few things that really makes the US military machine very cautious.)

TheGreatEvilKing
Mar 28, 2016





I will submit this: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cyrus%27s_edict

bewilderment
Nov 22, 2007
man what



The way the PC declares Edicts is pretty clear in game mechanical terms - capturing a Spire gives you Power, and putting an Edict on an area consumes that Power until you retract it to regain power.

So yes, they're a WMD analogue (not just an analogue, I suppose, they're also literally a WMD), but they're also literally a commitment to a use of force which can be ended.

FoolyCharged
Oct 11, 2012

Cheating at a raffle? I sentence you to 1 year in jail! No! Two years! Three! Four! Five years! Ah! Ah! Ah! Ah!
Somebody call for an ant?

GunnerJ posted:

They're singular explosions of power that devastate whole regions and can end conflicts so I'm kinda sure they're mostly nukes. (It's also notable, to extend my point, that the fatebinder using an Edict made Kyros blink, and possession of nukes by an adversary is one of the few things that really makes the US military machine very cautious.)

Chemical weapons have all of those qualities though. poo poo, Vietnam is still suffering from agent orange.

GunnerJ
Aug 1, 2005

Do you think this is funny?
I wouldn't really call them singular explosions of power. Like for Agent Orange it took a lot of planes to spray that stuff... but I'm not really that interested in arguing this to exhaustion and anyway, adding another Kyrosian war crime to the tally for the US is good for my broader point so I'll take it.

TheGreatEvilKing
Mar 28, 2016





The Cheshire Cat posted:

I think the thing about edicts is that you can very easily map them as a nuke metaphor, and it does work, but it's also interesting to think about them more literally as just the kind of power that "the law" actually has. Like some of the worst atrocities in history happened not because someone developed a particularly potent weapon, but because laws were passed that made those atrocities inevitable (often that was the explicit goal of those laws). You don't need to drop a bomb on people when you can criminalize their existence.

I think the latter is the better reading here, because you don't need fame or recognition to launch a nuke. Kyros and the Fatebinder get the power to use Edicts because everyone believes they have the power and thus reality/the political landscape is reshaped to fit the words of the Edict (which are also important for our metaphor). The wiki used to link the Edicts to Cyrus the Great's Edict re: the temple, but I can't find anything from Obsidian about that, so I'll use the Fugitive Slave Act instead - the law makes it possible to hunt down escaped slaves, so you have various assholes going from door to door and dragging people into slavery in new and creative ways. It's not even the law per se - the famous example is Henry II asking if no one will rid him of the turbulent priest, and a bunch of knights deciding they could please the king by ridding him of said priest. Much like going to war or passing some lovely new abusive law is going to have unintended consequences, the Edicts take on a life of their own and do their own things like aiding the Unbroken in fighting Kyros' forces.


GunnerJ posted:

I wouldn't really call them singular explosions of power. Like for Agent Orange it took a lot of planes to spray that stuff... but I'm not really that interested in arguing this to exhaustion and anyway, adding another Kyrosian war crime to the tally for the US is good for my broader point so I'll take it.

Not to flog a dead horse, but the Edict here would be the order to use Agent Orange and the planes represent all the power you had to accumulate by getting elected president/collecting the artifacts to become rightful King of the Tiers/kissing Nerat's rear end until a betrayal inevitably occurs/whatever.

TheGreatEvilKing
Mar 28, 2016





Governor Boris and The lovely Leader

Last time on Tyranny, we drafted Mattias into the Chorus despite literally everyone knowing this was a bad idea going in. Today we're going to continue that train of thought.



We COULD go to the Oldwalls and retrieve the Dauntless. In practice, I abandoned a recording session out of frustration because those Bane took my melee loving party apart super hard.



Back to Sentinel Stand. Things go a bit differently this time.



We meet Mattias again, and he got a new, shittier Chorus name.

: The Scarlet Chorus gave you a new name?

: Apparently it's the first step of initiation into a Chorus gang. The rest is open to the interpretation of whichever gang boss happens to be in charge and how they like to welcome new recruits. He grimaces.

: Without getting into any detail, I can say that Jagged Remedy is a sick gently caress. The journey here wasn't my finest hour.



: Why Brown Bottom?

: I... He hesitates, glancing away in discomfort.

: The initiation rites were severe. Jagged Remedy makes sure that his new recruits are too degraded and spoiled for any other gang to want them.



What did you think was gonna happen, buddy?

: These winds are extraordinary.

: That they are. And just beyond them, Straydus Herodin, the last Regent, sits in the comfort of Sentinel Stand.

: Mattias spits into the whipping wind. During the war, we kept the fortress provisioned to outlast any siege, so it's safe to assume Herodin won't starve to death. We'll have to find another way to make it through these winds.





: The storm didn't leave much behind.

: A year of brutal weather will do that. Kyros' Edict of Storms devastated the once-mighty Realm of Stalwart, all but wiping it from the map. There isn't much left of the old country, save for the Unbroken and their stubborn pride.



I ask Barik about the stand, but we've seen it already. We can ask about the Regents, and Barik gives the same answer - but Mattias pipes up.



It's a side of Herodin we don't normally see.



: I'm only interested in one thing - how we get inside.

: Couldn't say. The powers fighting over this realm must have some notion, otherwise they wouldn't squabble for control over this blasted wasteland. We should track down someone with answers.

: Stay vigilant, Fatebinder. Do you hear that? A voice, almost. Perhaps a song?





We get jumped by a bunch of Bane. I'll explain in a bit.



With the Bane gone we can continue the conversation.



It's Janos again! He's gonna make a bit more sense this time!

: You handle the Bane well enough, but what brings you to this forsaken place? He pauses as recognition dawns in his eyes.



Oops!



Even the narration boxes let you know just how much Mattias has fouled up here.



: I'm looking for Graven Ashe's daughter, Amelia. Rumor has it she's inside.

: Is that so? The Scarlet Chorus have mostly left this territory alone. It comes as some surprise that they would send troops into Disfavored-occupied lands to fetch one prisoner of war.

: I can't imagine what the Voices of Nerat wants out of Ashe's daughter. If he dispatched you to the task, she must be something special.

: Well, you won't be making it to Sentinel Stand any time soon. The only people to see the inside of the keep since 430 are the last Regent, his personal guard, and a few Disfavored prisoners.



: Why are you here?

: I make it my business to meet with overly-inquisitive travelers and give them the lay of the land. He offers you a blank stare.



: What was that about Disfavored prisoners?

: You were the one who brought up Amelia. If you know that she ended up behind the windwall, then you have half the story already.

: Before the Edict of Storms hit us last year, a Stalwart patrol captured a company of Disfavored. I know at least some of the prisoners made it to Sentinel Stand. No one's been in contact with the keep since the Edict hit, but I have it on good authority that one of the prisoners was the daughter of Graven Ashe.



: Barik, are you all right?

: Nothing. I... We can discuss it later.



: Why is the last Regent important?

: I don't know, Chorus rat - why don't you tell me? Or better yet, ask your new recruit. He tips his head at Mattias.

: Straydus Herodin is the last living Regent, and his bloodline is tied to the Edict of Storms. Mattias grimaces. The only reason that these storms persist is because Herodin hides within Sentinel Stand - a prison that even we can't breach.



: What do the Unbroken want?



: You didn't help us with the Bane.

Gee, really, Boris?



: How can I get inside Sentinel Stand?

: I'm not stupid enough to give up our plans to some Chorus rats, even if the lives of anyone in Sentinel Stand mean less to me than the piss I took this morning.

Ok, Janos' actions in the Anarchy route are making more sense now. I suspect he knew about Mattias' plans to defect, which is why he sicced Cleo on him. We were played!



: drat him... I wish his words didn't sting, but he's a good patriot and I can't fault his bias. Mattias sighs. In my heart I know I made this choice to get back at the Disfavored and the Regent, but it's not easy to face the censure of my countrymen.

Well... no, you're an ineffectual traitor.





: Why don't you go?



: Why should Elia cooperate with me?



Tunon gave us permission to kill Disfavored, so we are going to abuse the poo poo out of that.

: Tell me about these Regent heirlooms.

: They're items of incredible power - rallying symbols and weapons that defined great deeds in the history of Stalwart. Members of the Regent families wore them or wielded them as symbolic badges of office, though in truth they're much more than that.



: How can the Regent heirlooms help us?





This is why the Bane showed up seemingly at random. The idea that something of this dinky little backwards nation is capable of contesting against Kyros' power is an extremely heretical idea that whiplashes our little Fatebinder's cognitive dissonance hard.

: I'll head to Rust Canyons and contact Elia.





That last line is giving me real Jaime Lannister vibes.

TheGreatEvilKing summary posted:

: Man, this wind sucks! I thought I was gonna get through the wind, but all I got is a beating and a lovely nickname. Who could have foreseen this?

: What's the nickname?

: Jagged Remedy is a sick gently caress who tortures people, so I got.. uh.. Brown Bottom Mattias.

: Why do they call you..snicker...Brown Bottom?

: Well, they torture you super hard as part of initiation, and I kinda poo poo myself. Anyway, we gotta get through the winds to kill Herodin! gently caress him!

: :qq: It's still the same...same old trauma... gently caress Herodin!

: He used to be cool! Now he sucks!

: How do we work directly against the power of Kyros and get in?

: Random Bane!

:iiam: WoOoOoOoO!

: Nice job with the Bane, what are you doing here? Mattias? What the hell?

: I sold us out to Nerat, bro! it was the only way, bro!

: Wow, gently caress you.. Why are you here, Fatebinder?

: I'm looking for Amelia Ashe, she in there?

: The Scarlet Chorus never does rescues, strange. Well, Nerat has his reasons I'm sure, but you're not getting in.

: Why are you here?

: Go gently caress yourself, Chorus rat!

: What's the deal with Disfavored prisoners?

: There are a bunch of prisoners, I thought you knew that seeing as you brought up Amelia.

: :mad:

: Those men would make great hostages.

: Why do you care about the last Regent?

: Why don't you ask Mr. Poopy Butthole over there?

: Kill Herodin, and we end the Edict.

: What do the Unbroken want?

: Ask Treason Man over there. gently caress him. gently caress him forever.

: You didn't help us with the Bane.

: You know we're enemies, right?

: Do you know how to get inside Sentinel Stand?

: Go gently caress yourself, maybe ask the Fecal Traitor over there. I'm leaving. Maybe our next leader won't be a piece of trash.

: Oh, we gotta collect the Regent artifacts! They're powerful enough to get us through the storms - kind of like Nerat's powerful artifact staff. Huh, I guess we had a path to victory all along without the Chorus! Oops! Anyway, go find Elia, I have to go get tortured by the Chorus some more. She has a thing for men who kill Disfavored, maybe you can use that. Gotta go!

This helpfully answers the questions I had on the Anarchist path about why Janos basically handed us Mattias and Elia on a silver platter - he's not setting his cause back at all, he's using the Fatebinder to purge two potential traitors who were planning to sell out to the Scarlet Chorus. When we next meet Janos, he's promoted from scout to a leader of the Unbroken, so one might surmise he's using us to pull a power play a la Stalin being a secret informer for the Tsar's police. Whatever! Maybe we don't have to kill Elia this time?



We just kinda watch and do nothing and nothing changes. Teodor offers to make Elia his, erm, "camp slave", Elia tells him to go gently caress off, and then things get interesting.





Elia likes that we warned everyone to get out of the Edict's blast zone, which is a good start!

: I received word from Mattias that told me to expect you. He says we're to work with the Chorus to avenge ourselves on the Disfavored and the Regent. Normally I wouldn't trust a red bird, but I know our captain's handwriting. She frowns.

: The whole thing sounds like a wagonload of Beast poo poo to me, but I don't have time to send him my thoughts with the Disfavored breathing down my neck.



: Why haven't the Disfavored finished off this fort?



: The Disfavored are my enemy. I seek Graven Ashe's daughter in Sentinel Stand.

: You've come all the way out here for the sake of one prisoner? I can't decide if that's impressive or a waste of resources. Maybe both. I suppose the Voices of Nerat has his reasons for seeking the daughter of his enemy. Not that I want to know any of them.



: Were you able to find anything?

: She frowns and glances off, scanning the horizon of Rust Canyons. Not exactly. Not what we were looking for, in any case.



: What must be done?

: For now, I'll be pleased if we can hold this fort against the Disfavored.

: The fight will come to us whether we're prepared for it or not. My scouts have reported Disfavored forces closing in, so it would be in your best interest to arm yourselves for battle.

: We could always use an edge on the battlefield... Elia studies you and nods. Some of our men are captive to the Disfavored outside of camp. Deal with Kyros' soldiers and rescue ours - that will give us a few more warm bodies to hurl at our enemies.

That language is very similar to the Chorus commanders throwing conscripts into the fire. Interesting.



TheGreatEvilKing summary posted:

: Oooh, the Stormcaller. Well, thank you for the warning, and I guess we're working with the Scarlet Chorus now. Not the biggest fan, but we're screwed otherwise.

: Why haven't the Disfavored finished off the fort?

: No idea.. I think more are on the way.

: Well, I'm against the Disfavored and we're trying to get Amelia Ashe.

: Not sure if this is brave, a waste of resources - you know what, I don't want to think about what Nerat is going to do to that woman. Oof. Well, help us with the Disfavored and I'll give you the lowdown.

: Find anything?

: We almost found the Steadfast Insignia, but I need your help with the Disfavored. Go kill Teodor and rescue prisoners for our howling mob.



Time to talk to Teodor!

: He frowns and tightens his grip on his sword. Normally I would welcome a servant of the Court, but Ashe told me to keep an eye out for traitors stepping on our territory.

: Stand down, commander. I don't always agree with the Fatebinder's methods, but I believe we can get this war back under control. We have this opportunity to help each other and set the right example!

Barik is pulling a Mattias here I see.



This had me very confused for a moment, especially as I explicitly claimed multiple times over the course of this LP that Ashe never extended an offer for Barik to return. The more I think about this the more I think Teodor is acting on his own initiative here. Ashe could have sent a runner or a bird to reach out to Barik, but I think Teodor is trying to get his old friend out from under the Fatebinder's boot.



Barik has seen too much. He's not quite at the point where he realizes that the cruelty is the intended outcome, but he also saw Teodor cut down that prisoner and recognizes on some level that Ashe hosed them over by marching into the storm.



Oh, you're threatening me now?



: [Athletics 42] If any of you doubt your chances against me, leave now. I won't make this offer twice.





This guy just nopes the gently caress out, proving that the Disfavored bravery and discipline are just more hot air.

: You better run faster than the legion! We'll find you, traitor!

: He turns red with sudden fury, spittle flying as he barks orders. Men, to arms! Kill the Fatebinder and hold this position!

TheGreatEvilKing summary posted:

: Oh, I'm sorry you had to see me committing war crimes and threatening to rape Elia. She makes me so mad, you know? Normally, I'd be happy to see you, but Ashe said you are a bad traitor!

: Hey, the Fatebinder uses some weird methods, but we could win this war if we listen to him! We can work together!

: Come back to us, Barik! Ashe says you can be forgiven, like all the other times he shows forgiveness and mercy in this game! Pinky swear!

: I wish I could, but I'm realizing there's no glory to be had in this war, only horrible warcrimes. The Fatebinder is the only person insane enough to enforce some kind of order.

: I'll give you a good burial at least. Well, Fatebinder, are you here to steal Stalwart artifacts? We can take you, no problem!

: Everyone who doesn't want to die run the gently caress away.

:hist101:: AAAAAH!

: gently caress you, traitor! Time to die, Fatebinder!

: :commissar:



We do a bunch of Tyranny combat and they all die. If only the rest of the update went this well...



We release these guys.



There is one other mention of the Candle Mountains as far as I know, and it's the iron brand carried by Jagged Remedy which references "overworked smiths". Presumably these men were going to be used as slaves in a labor camp.



Elia lets us into the fort, and thus we have a LOT of Tyranny combat ahead.



We get the Unbroken favor ability at least.



Nothing of value is said - Elia says the defenses are partially ready, Barik comments that it's a lot of work to fortify something so worthless, and then the Disfavored show up.



This section involves killing a group of guys who bust through...



Then a guy runs up to send us to another location full of Disfavored...



Repeat for too drat long!



This is the last group.



Alright, Boris' totally legal murder has nearly won over Elia here.

: Troubling. If the Disfavored were sent on an assault without a commander, the move had to be a stalling tactic.

This would seem to be a suboptimal tactic - after all, Erenyos complained in Act 1 that the Disfavored were running low on troops and no reinforcements were coming. However, we know the Disfavored are dumb fascists who glorify death, so they are more than willing to throw away hordes of irreplaceable troops to desperately try to impress Graven Ashe, who will never love them.

: We won't survive the day if we stay here. Our walls have been compromised, and the winds grow stronger still. She points north, past the twisted remains of the gate. That's our only route. Teodor sent men to hold the northern junkyard. We have a chance with them, but only if we act now.



: What of you and your soldiers?



: Very well. I'll go now.

: One more thing, Fatebinder. Not all of my men made it behind the walls after the initial attack. My hope is that they're hiding in the northern canyons and still well enough to attack. If you find any of my crew, give them a chance to escape while there's still time.

TheGreatEvilKing summary posted:

: Hey, thanks for all your help! Now go kill more Disfavored while we gently caress around in camp!



These guys die, but drop some Disfavored armor for Boris. which is good, because he's probably the weakest link on the team right now.



We met these guys on the Anarchist route and killed them. They won't leave until all the Disfavored are dead.



We meet this guy, and here I gently caress up royally.

: [Say nothing]

: Graven Ashe will never forget this... his anger is something only an Archon could comprehend. I hope, for your sake, that you have the decency to die here.

We are going to. This fight is actually super dangerous, especially if you're a melee dumbass.





Yeah, that's, uh, two enemy mages. They beat the poo poo out of Sirin despite me having two tanks with fairly strong taunts.



Yeah with Lantry paralyzed and getting beaten up by warrior guys we're not winning this one.



gently caress! They even cut down Barik as he prayed to Ashe for protection. Oops!

Then I discovered that I hadn't saved, so I'd have to go all the way back to Teodor's warcrime again. One of two things is happening - either I'm going to respec Boris as a mage, or the difficulty is going down to easy mode.

Next time: Mash that difficulty slider like it owes me money.

bewilderment
Nov 22, 2007
man what



I played through Tyranny as a punchmage that was nowhere near as optimised as Cleo and so had to rely on a lot more punching, so I believe in Boris's ability to survive as a swordy guy that can theoretically do more damage.

I just couldn't tell you how at all.

Mr.Misfit
Jan 10, 2013

The time for
SkellyBones
has come!
Aye, I played as a swordy guy as well, because I like to test games that way, also I'm stupid, and I can assure you, it should be easier than it seems to be for you?
Did they rebalance the game between the base game and the release of the DLC perchance?

TheGreatEvilKing
Mar 28, 2016





I am 99% sure this is due to my terrible build and doing dumb crap like using heavy armor.

I'm also forgetting to prebuff because you never really need to do that as a mage, so this is very much LPer incompetence here. I'm expecting my application to join Kyros' armies to be approved any day now!

Zulily Zoetrope
Jun 1, 2011

Muldoon
I'm sure you could streamline your build and make Boris a viable armor person that contributes to battles.

I am also sure nobody would care if you just bumped the difficulty down a notch.

Keldulas
Mar 18, 2009
So I got curious and checked the defence tree. I.... honestly don’t see a reason to ever use it? Like, the talents just seem to kind of suck overall.

I also suspect that their stat balancing in this game is less than stellar. I don’t think there’s a benefit for stacking heavy armour due to stat calculations. I had Lantry using a heavy shield for most of the game and that made him noticeably more durable than the other mages, but I think stacking heavy armour gets into severe diminishing returns. Though admittedly I’m looking into the case with Barik where he never seemed to take focused punishment significantly better than the people with moderate amounts of armour.

At the same time, we’re really not here for the gameplay. I doubt anyone will care if the difficulty gets shunted down since combat never gets more than perfunctory coverage here anyways.

Falconer
Dec 7, 2003

Did you know, I was THE MOON once!

Yes! You see, one night it turned out the moon had been STOLEN!

The animal people asked ME to take its place as I am so WISE and BRILLIANT!!

Zulily Zoetrope posted:

I am also sure nobody would care if you just bumped the difficulty down a notch.

Yeah, from what has been shown so far Tyranny battle is a boring slog. Why not reduce the difficulty so that the slog is done with ASAP even with a less than ideal build? For me at least the appeal of the LP has been seeing how the various factions screw up even the simplest of tasks and/or set themselves up for Suicide By Protagonist.

TheGreatEvilKing
Mar 28, 2016





Governor Boris and The Bad Decisions

Welcome back! Last time on Tyranny, we got owned by my ineptitude playing melee characters. Thus, I am taking the following drastic action to improve my build:



Look, I'll be honest with you guys. I'm getting kind of burned out on Tyranny as despite the route there's still enough of the same dungeons and grind to go. I will finish this LP, but if I have to do all the combat again with actual time and effort there's a high chance I quit. We're mostly interested in the story anyway, and I already showed off how to beat the game on hard. One of these days I will LP a game with good combat. This is not that day



Autosave took us back to the beginning of the area, so we have to kill Teodor and do Elia's dumb bullshit all over again.



Incidentally telling Teodor that we're not here to fight gets him to act all smug and attack, avoiding fear with Barik and letting us just murder him.



We can taunt Jacomus as well, but we just get an interjection before he continues on his spiel.



He's not wrong that as a Scarlet Chorus member, we don't give a gently caress about any of that, but the alternative the Disfavored present is just paying lip service to those ideals and using them to send idealistic teenagers off to die.



The game plays itself on Story Mode, which is great, as it gives me more time to fend off Lugosi the cat's rude attempts to reschedule Feeding Time an hour early.



Here's Sirin's combo move.



It levitates up this rock, which explodes in midair. Unfortunately for us, we don't really care.





You know, this is going a lot better than last time.

: You were looking for an artifact, right?

: Aye, and we've been searching for some time. She glances around with evident exhaustion. You try finding anything useful in this garbage heap.



: What is the Steadfast Insignia?

: It's a symbol of Stalwart's determination in battle. Before the war, Regent Aspison wore it pinned to his cloak, and his soldiers grew more daring on the battlefield when they saw him enter the fray.



: What did you learn about the Regent?

: We were looking for the Regent's body. Instead we found records of his past movements. Just after the Edict hit, he was on his way to what we now know is a breach in the Oldwalls. I couldn't say what he thought he would find there, except its wild dwellers and an early death. She frowns at the thought. If he planned on unleashing the Bane on the Disfavored, I might have told him he was as dumb as Ashe's hammer.





: Do you know anything about Ashe's daughter, Amelia?



: So, where do you go from here?

: Away from Rust Canyons. I received word that there are still Disfavored in the area, but it sounds like the legion is in full retreat. I doubt they're in any hurry to feed more bodies to the storm.



Anyway, Elia is perfectly happy to continue being a member of the Unbroken to do...stuff... after Mattias joins the Chorus, and she and the party just go their separate, awkward ways.



It's cool, we'll just loot the sacred artifacts that prove rulership of your nation and you guys can chill leaderlessly in Trash Fort.



: How do I get to the local Spire?



: Farewell.

TheGreatEvilKing summary posted:

: Wow, that loving ruled! You killed them! Have some cash! Also, if you want to have some exposition we can stay here all night!

: Tell me about these artifacts.

: Well, they're in a boring rear end Bane infested dungeon. They're the symbolic regalia needed to lead my people, which I will give you, a ruthless man doing things at the behest of the trustworthy Voices of Nerat, freely for saving my life.

: How about Amelia?

: Yea, she's in the fort. Anyway, we're really gonna miss Mattias here in Trash Fort, and I guess with no actual leadership we're just gonna gently caress around here and fight the Disfavored some more. Toodles!



We've seen this dungeon before. You go in, you gently caress around collecting four keystones, you release a Havoc Bane and kill it to get to the Regent's body. I'm not gonna mess around with it too much.



We have this encounter with a merchant lady who's happy to sell to a Fatebinder, but all her inventory is healing potions and a spell reflection potion that would be moderately interesting if it didn't put all the healing potions on cooldown. Next!



We are forced to kill these guys again. They have different dialog as we can try to persuade them to join the Chorus, and they refuse because they're not idiots and/or people with personality disorders.



They die, we meet the Sage, he sends us to get the Keystone, yadda yadda yadda Bane fight boredom. A few things are a bit different in the dungeon, but not too many.



Lantry interjects because he's the knowledgeable guy. Of course, he doesn't have much to say that's really insightful here, but you want to take him to this dungeon to decipher the spell runes on the walls.





This actually goes into our journal as our first piece of evidence against Graven Ashe. Tunon will then turn around and point out that WE broke the law by going into the Oldwalls. Oh well!



Traps also work on enemies! This place is infested with them to make exploring even more tedious.



Imagine a bunch of Bane fights offscreen.



Also, we grab the Spire. I turn it into a Forge to make poo poo for Boris and co.



Get torchkey. Click stand. I have yet to see compelling dungeon mechanics in these kinds of games.



I missed grabbing this sigil last playthough but it's in the room with the Gravebow. Bring Lantry!



One tedious collectathon later and here we are. I throw up the buffs.



We kill it pretty easily as we're on permanoob difficulty.



Oh gently caress YOU! I send a refusal on the grounds that the DLC was legitimately awful.



This man obstructs our way and dies for the cause of giving Boris a new sword.



Grab Dauntless and give it to Barik.



Back to Sentinel Stand! Things are going to go very differently this time.



For one, Rumalan isn't a complete and utter moron this time!



: Janos, your own leader has conscripted to the Chorus. You should join him.

: N-never! I'd die before I took orders from the howling mob. Janos darts his attention between you and Rumalan.

You don't sound too convincing there, buddy.

: It may yet come to that, fool. She turns to you. Has the Scarlet Chorus given you a name yet, traitor? Has the gang taken turns breaking you in with their sick initiation rites?

Lady, considering that both the Forge-bound deserter and Barik talk about how much you Disfavored gently caress each other I'm not sure you really are in a place to kink shame.

: No matter. You'll be dead soon enough, and what remains of Stalwart will be under our control. Rumalan falls back behind the bridge with her troops.

The fascists having women commanders is kind of weird if you think about it - in Nazi Germany, Rumalan here would be told to go home and have babies for the fatherland, and they had all kinds of medals and poo poo for having kids. Here Rumalan is yelling at us for sexual deviancy and commanding men in combat. I get what they're going for, they want to show that Kyros has a few things on the surface you can point to as being really cool (gender equality! Free food!) and to show the Disfavored as extremely incestuous. I just can't think of any real world fascists off the top of my head who would put women into these positions.

TheGreatEvilKing summary posted:

: Let's kill these motherfuckers!

: We gotta get through the gate, men!

: Hey, Janos, why don't you join the Chorus like your leader, hmm?

: I... I don't like the Chorus or anything!

: Pssh. Fatebinder, have you had their degrading initiation rituals, which I am far too focused on? Anyway, time to just gently caress off over the bridge!



Janos dies like a chump again.



Jagged Remedy is here, and he provides us the way in - while we gently caress around in front of the drawbridge, he and his men will sabotage it so we can get in.

: May the Chorus sing of our bloodshed.



The question we keep dancing around for this segment is who would willingly join the Scarlet Chorus?

You can go in with the intent of using them, but at the end of the day they'll drag you down with you despite you supposedly knowing what you're getting into.



Anyway, they can shoot the drawbridge rope with an arrow which makes me wonder why the Anarchy path wastes your time with Rumalan sacrificing her patrols. Moving on!



Tyranny combat but Jagged Remedy and one of his Blood Chanters help out as well. It's a lot faster in Story Mode.



We've seen this before. The power to defeat Kyros was in Stalwart all along. Oops!



: Take us to Straydus Herodin! Barik advances on the guard with a menacing air. I don't want to hear any more of your petty threats or how much you loves your country. Deliver us the serpent at the heart of this nest!

:hist101: Whoa there, big boy! I just watch the storm all day. Straydus is behind the walls. She glances in your direction with wonder.

: [Athletics 51] [Roar over the volume of the storm]



I completely missed the bottom option, but Boris knows no mercy!



They die.





: You look presentable after a year in isolation.



I was going to omit this, but this line of dialog gives us more insight into how much of a fuckup Herodin is. We only really see two regents, and one's the idiot who takes the item that could break an Edict into the Oldwalls to do something stupid, and the other is Herodin who is an absolutely worthless leader.



:ironicat:

It's funny, because Barik is in his current position because of Ashe and his orders to march into the storm we personally warned everyone to stay out of. Barik's not wrong, but he's not smart enough - or not comfortable enough - to put two and two together that Ashe doesn't care about him, even as Ashe confesses he hates his men on his deathbed.



We've seen all this before. We want to take the first option to get another piece of evidence against Graven Ashe so Tunon will execute his rear end.

: The Voices of Nerat has no desire to end the Edict. Surrender and live.

: As if I would put my safety, or my people, into the hands of that creature? Herodin shakes his head. I know enough of his atrocities without subjecting myself to them. He would no doubt torture me into a mindless stupor, an echo of life for his enjoyment.



We've seen the rest of this. Herodin is absolutely correct that Nerat would devastate him and his people, but it's hard for me to describe him as anything resembling a good leader, and that's kind of the point. His poor leadership has driven the Unbroken right into the arms of Nerat.

: I've come on behalf of the Scarlet Chorus to deliver the terms of surrender.

: Then it's to be conscription and interrogation? Straydus nods and sighs. I suspected the Archon of Secrets would come for me eventually.



We proceed as normally and kill our way through the courtyard, blah blah blah.



The Scarlet Chorus busts in to help us out and doesn't change too much. We still have to punch our way through to the throne room.



Jagged Remedy and Mattias are already here to talk to Herodin, and things are going to get significantly more interesting.

: My elite soldiers, absorbed into the Voices of Nerat's slave army? He chuckles, but there's a lining of unease to it. The Scarlet Chorus will never control Sentinel Stand! This is the house of Regents - not the squatting den of your verminous gangs.

Of course, Herodin has already lost. Herodin loses every route. Even on the rebel route, recruiting the Unbroken to your personal army requires Herodin's death. Herodin lost as soon as he went along with the Edict and inflicted vast suffering on Stalwart to live in his cushy castle and hoard all the food.

: I came here to kill the Regent, not to conscript him! Mattias growls and looks at Jagged Remedy. You lied to me.

I am shocked, I tell you. What a moron.



: The Regent holds his weapon firm, but Jagged Remedy's words leave him troubled. Stay back, I tell you! The Voices will have to seek his amusement elsewhere. I refuse to become a servant of Kyros.



: Last chance, Straydus. Surrender Amelia and we might show mercy.





While Mattias is a dumb idiot who believed our promise of a kindler, gentler Scarlet Chorus and became internationally known as a poopy pants for his efforts, Herodin is smart enough to realize that the Chorus will never offer him anything beneficial. Unfortunately, he's doomed himself with his own lovely leadership.

: This is my seat of power, and I will not hand it over to the likes of upstart brigands!

A little revealing there! It's hard for any of us to take seriously that Herodin is acting in the best interests of his people by hoarding all the food and abandoning the nation to Kyros' storms, and at the end he just states he wants the power.





I let the game play itself while I play ball with Lugosi the cat.



: Straydus, I'm not above dragging you mangled and shrieking back to Cacophony. If you think this is finished, you quite mistake the matter.



: One of Straydus' soldiers moves between you and Herodin, tearing off her helmet. I won't let you do this!



If you haven't noticed from Sirin's interjections, this is going to go very, very wrong.

: I've come to take you away from Sentinel Stand.

: As if I needed your help? She huffs. I've been here for a year and then some. If I wanted to leave, not even Kyros would have been able to stop me.

Well that's some blasphemy right there.

: I'm not the Northern warlord I once was. She winces at the very thought. Sitting out the conflict made me see this conquest from a different perspective.



Amelia tries to convince us to do the right thing.

We are willingly working for a man who impales people on spikes. We are not going to do the right thing.



: Fighting for the Regent is treason.



She's not wrong! The problem is that she also has no leg to stand on, because instead of doing anything about this she hid in the castle and hoarded all the food with the Regent. I will give her a pass on the food thing as she's a nursing mother, but still...

: My father... Her voice catches, and it takes a moment to find her words. I love my father, but it's nothing compared to the love I felt for the father of-





: Too bad my orders didn't specify mercy.



If you're noticing the pattern of "we gain favor for becoming more like the Chorus" that's kind of the point.

: Amelia, stop! Straydus winces, hardly possessing the energy to argue. You have to keep your promise. Remember?



Amelia runs off again.







: Mattias, take the vengeance you were denied. Kill the Regent.





: Curious. I understood that the Edict of Storms would abate when the last of the Regents died. He glances your way. Could we have been mistaken?



More importantly than the family drama, let's check our quest log!



Hell yea! Ashe is going DOWN!



That was not a good idea, lady.

: Stay away from my daughter! You will not have her.



: How is this possible?





: Did you know this would prolong the Edict?





This would work on a decent person. We are a representative of a penal legion calling itself "the howling mob", and not in the funny reddit Gamestop stock way.



: Your daughter is the Regent heir?





This would, once again, raise doubts in a decent person, but consider what kind of person willingly joins the Chorus.

: Don't make this difficult, Amelia. The Voices appreciates challenging prey, but I don't.



Sirin is the closest thing the game has to a morality meter, and if she thinks you're doing the wrong thing she'll tell you.

Of course, she's the only party member who technically outranks you and is protected by Archon's Privilege, so while Lantry probably disapproves Lantry is probably having a mental flashback to the time we impaled that guy for making poo poo up.



Uh oh.



This is not a long fight, and it's not supposed to be. It's cowardly.





Oh, poo poo, we handed the kid over to Nerat, who per Sirin is a pedo, didn't we?







TheGreatEvilKing summary posted:

:hist101:: How did you get in?

: PEEENIS!

:hist101:: Huh, I heard a rude word and see the blood of my compatriots. Oh well, good thing we have all this food...except that the Regent's hoarding all of it.

: Sounds like bad leadership to me!

: I would speak with the Fatebinder! Why don't you get that I have the right to sacrifice the people for my idea of Stalwart?

: Yea, whatever, I don't care. Surrender to the Chorus and we won't kill you.

: No! They are morally bankrupt poopy heads who enjoy torturing people! Why can't Kyros, the tyrant whose economy relies on war spoils to function, leave me alone?

: :black101:

: Alright, shitlord, we have no orders to kill you, so surrender and you may live.

: You're not taking my sweet rear end regent power! Oh, and principle, I guess.

: Hey! You lied to me! I thought we were going to kill the Regent!

: We never said that, lol. We let you believe it, and now you're my bitch, Poopy Pants!

: I'll NEVER surrender! I'll never serve Kyros!

: You fool, your bad leadership drove your people into our service! Thanks for the help, dumbass!

: Give us Amelia and we'll show you mercy.

: Lol Fatebinder we all know you're a lying bitch.

: I wouldn't wish your mercy on my worst enemy, gently caress off. I will attempt to display principles before breaking down and admitting its about power and class!

: This is the Scarlet Chorus zone, bitch! We've all read Nietzsche, there is no god and morality is what you make it! Take him alive!

: :black101:

: gently caress, I'm owned.

: We're off to see Nerat, buddy.

: gently caress you! You sat back and let Kyros destroy my country! You fought to keep the storm alive while you hid in this comfortable castle! So long rear end in a top hat!

: Nooo!

: What? Amelia alive, but fighting for the regent? How?

: You're coming with me.

: Nope. Now I'm going to appeal to your principles! We have to save Stalwart, they're a noble people with a noble culture that resembles the lovely fascist culture my father set up! We can unfuck that! Don't you have principles, Fatebinder?

: Wow, I'm glad you cared about the people of Stalwart while you abandoned them to live in a castle, eat fancy food, and get laid.

: Yeah, that's some treason poo poo right there.

: You're just quoting Kyros' law! You don't even get it! You're just a stooge of the man! Like my father, who I love less than the father of my ch -

: Nooo! You can't foreshadow the twist before I die! Anyway, I will now dramatically offer to save my people, even though I'm dying and the time to do that was loooong ago.

: Well, too bad, no mercy today!

: CALLED it!

: Well, he's not coming peacefully. What do you think, Fatebinder, should we have Poopy Pants here do an immoral transgressive act to bind him to the Scarlet Chorus?

: We work for Kyros. That sounds rad. Mattias, waste his rear end.

: :yeshaha: :commissar:

: Wait, that should have ended the Edict... oh, the baby.

: One sec...adding this to my legal journal... Amelia... boned...the son of... Herodin... and produced an heir...that's... super mega treason. Ok!

: You get away from my daughter right now! I'm in the uniform of the people you're fighting a civil war with, doesn't that mean anything to you?

: Oh nooo! I can't kill Ashe's granddaughter!

: Yeah! I banged Herodin's son and got pregnant! We have a daughter and she's heir to the Regent bloodline! I don't like the Edict, but please, show some principles, don't take my daughter! Suddenly, I feel a responsibility to the people of Stalwart I've literally never interacted with aside from invading their country and killing them or hiding in this castle while they got electrocuted by magic storms. You don't have the right to kill her! Don't you have any mercy or principles?

: Uh, I voluntarily joined the people whose camp is a field of crucified prisoners and whose leader impales people on spikes! Do I look like I give a poo poo? I don't have time for this, the Voices likes this weird Michael Myers chase poo poo but I don't have patience for it.

: Dude, you're being really loving creepy! She's not some enemy combatant, she's just a mother and her baby!

: Oh, HELL no! I don't trust you! :black101:

: :commissar:

: At least we got the kid! Nerat is great at raising kids, and he's not creepy and certainly isn't on any kind of registry! We won! We control this area, we stuck it to Graven Ashe, we can take his grandkid hostage, we can end the Edict at any time! Hell yea! All we had to do is step over this young woman and her child! Hooray!

: poo poo, I hosed up.

Welcome to the first Chorus area! Today's question is "What kind of person would voluntarily join the Chorus", and if you look at the dialog options available to the Chorus Fatebinder you get the sense of a psychopath reveling in their legal authority to wield life and death. Sure, you can do that to some extent on the other routes, but if the Disfavored is a slow disillusionment with fascism, the anarchy path is you getting played by Bleden Mark to destroy the empire for revenge, and the rebels are you setting up the old, bad status quo but in the service of a foreign tyrant, the Chorus is knowingly working with violent psychopaths in the hope you can, at best, point them at deserving targets. Much like Ashe surrendering to Kyros and reveling in his newfound power - or the interpretation that Ashe was once good and tried to change the system from the inside - we are deliberately currying favor with an inhuman monster to advance our own interests, and this is the price you pay. Do not stare into the abyss and all that. Mattias learned this the hard way when he convinced himself that he could use the Chorus' power to save his country and all he'd have to do was kill the people he wanted to kill anyway, and he ended up with the Edict still ravaging the country and being forever branded as "Brown Bottom". Sure, he killed Herodin, but that was an empty victory that did nothing to fix the country, and he's still under the thrall of Nerat and the Chorus, his friends are either dead or despise him, and both Boris and the Chorus have revealed themselves as amoral monsters. Yes, we can do slightly nicer dialog options, but the outcome is the same - either Amelia dies fighting us, or she dies impaled by the Voices. Which reminds me:

Decisions Lie Before Us

Do we want to rewind and take Amelia alive? Also, do we want to ignore the DLC or kill everyone?

BisbyWorl
Jan 12, 2019

Knowledge is pain plus observation.


Let Amelia die here and kill everyone in the Wound. :black101:

Zulily Zoetrope
Jun 1, 2011

Muldoon
Everyone was calling this the baby murder route, but it is actually the only route in which you cannot murder the baby! So much for it being the explicitly most evil route!

Take her alive and cauterize the Wound imho.

Also, far more importantly, you cannot just mention playing with a cat and not post pictures of said cat. There are rules to posting on this forum.

Rubix Squid
Apr 17, 2014
Take her alive and purge the Wound.

Tendronai
May 7, 2008

My worst nightmare. It's a dream I have. I'm in a square cell, glass walls, just me and a little castle.
No rewinds, and for the love of God Skip the DLC.

Killing them all would be justified but it's also Tyranny combat.

I dont know
Aug 9, 2003

That Guy here...
Since Boris is going maximum rear end in a top hat, lets be as awful as possible. Take Amelia alive, and lance the wound. Obviously taking her alive is not a mercy. As for the wound, even if the two leaders deserve death the civilians especially the beastkin do not.

Xarn
Jun 26, 2015
Take her alive, and murderify the wound.

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mortons stork
Oct 13, 2012

Tendronai posted:

No rewinds, and for the love of God Skip the DLC.

Killing them all would be justified but it's also Tyranny combat.

seconding my vote for this. the point about the sociopathy of the chorus is well served by the options we've seen on offer so far, there is no need to make up one more to exceed the cruelty limit
and by god don't subject yourself to more of that awful garbage dlc

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