Summer Updates - 010

[SteveMB]

I suspect that the relevant question is, why has Jillian's Royal status suddenly become much more important to Don King than the acquisition of three new cities? Given the much greater threat now posed by Gobwin Knob, the Don may be much more interested in the creation of a defensive alliance against Stanley than he was before. If Transylvito is sufficiently disliked by the other potential members of this new alliance, then perhaps he thinks that "Queen Jillian" would be better able to organize a new alliance than he could, if he allowed her to become a Queen, by helping her retake her old cities in Faq.

Interesting possibility. The one thing that might convince Jillian to take up her royal role is if it gives her an otherwise-denied chance to finally get Stanley the Worm....

[cloudbreaker]

...though I'm not really 100% sure about turn order now. It would seem that this is happening chronolgically after the previous summer updates, however as transylvito's turn was before GK's and this is also described as 1 turn since BfGK, then it gets a little complicated to work out!

Nobody was in Gobwin Knob's battlespace at the beginning of their turn, so Transilvito's turn may overlap Gobwin Knob's

[Bobby Archer]

Yeah, it seems like turn order is only enforced when units are in each others' battlespace, whatever that is.

[shneekeythelost]

...though I'm not really 100% sure about turn order now. It would seem that this is happening chronolgically after the previous summer updates, however as transylvito's turn was before GK's and this is also described as 1 turn since BfGK, then it gets a little complicated to work out!

Nobody was in Gobwin Knob's battlespace at the beginning of their turn, so Transilvito's turn may overlap Gobwin Knob's

It's a 'flashback', as in "While GK's Decrypted Army was being made... this was also going on"

[Rhyme-o-mancer]

Why does everyone think that Caesar is stupid. He's obviously a bully and intimidating, but he got to be Chief Warlord somehow. As for Jillian "getting back" at him, he is most likely a much higher than her, so he could probably take her out even though she has the Royal bonus and he only has the Noble. I like Caesar, I think he's an interesting character.

[Jay]

Sunrises are visible in high places first. The sunlight creeps downward, not upward.

They're in a valley. If there's a huge honkin' mountain between you and the sun, it's gonna creep.

Yes.. down. It creeps down the valley walls as the sun gets higher. Not: "climb up the cracks of the granite cliff". Putting a mountain between me and the sun doesn't change the direction the rising sun moves ("up").

[badninja]

I have a feeling that this will not end well for someone, hopefully not Jillian. This makes me wonder why they stopped going for FAQ.

[SuperSkimMilk]

In this kingdom, the perqs always went to whoever got the job done.

Typo, or previously unencountered reward system?

[Bobby Archer]

Why does everyone think that Caesar is stupid. He's obviously a bully and intimidating, but he got to be Chief Warlord somehow. As for Jillian "getting back" at him, he is most likely a much higher than her, so he could probably take her out even though she has the Royal bonus and he only has the Noble. I like Caesar, I think he's an interesting character.

I wouldn't say that Caesar is stupid. Crude and thuggish, yes, but I wouldn't (and I don't think anyone thus far's gone so far as to) say stupid.

As for a fight between Caesar and Jillian, she was a level 9 before going dragon hunting twice. We know that advancing past level 10 or 11 takes such incredible amounts of time and exp that it is almost unheard of. So, Caesar's likely very close in level to Jillian. Also, Jillian seems to be pretty well optimized for a fighting unit. She does a lot of impressive things in the comic, croaking dwagons and warlords. It's doubtful that Caesar can be much better than her in that regard . And, as you said, her Royal bonus beats his Noble bonus. They're likely a pretty even match.

Right now, though, Caesar's got a bunch of Translyvitan warlords and hordes of bats backing him while Jillian has a few gwiffins. Intimidation Translyvito-style.

[balder]

Sunrises are visible in high places first. The sunlight creeps downward, not upward.

They're in a valley. If there's a huge honkin' mountain between you and the sun, it's gonna creep.

Yes.. down. It creeps down the valley walls as the sun gets higher. Not: "climb up the cracks of the granite cliff". Putting a mountain between me and the sun doesn't change the direction the rising sun moves ("up").

You know...I wrote that passage two or three months ago, and must have re-read it in editing 20 times. But when did it occur to me that it was wrong? About 5 seconds after the update posted.

I actually thought to myself, "Oh well, maybe nobody will notice." As if these were not Erfworld fans I was referring to.

I shall rewrite that paragraph. Very embarassing.

EDIT: Fixed it. This is why writers need editors. And movies need focus groups. Sorry about that.

[Bobby Archer]

And now I'm kind of disappointed it was fixed. It could have led to all kinds of Epileptic Twee speculation on the unEarthly nature of photometrics in Erfworld.

Oh well, it's not like there isn't enough to speculate about.

[Fiendishrabbit]

Hmm. Vinny seems to be more and more of an exception among vampires.
The rest seem like major assholes with no class (come on, flashing steel in such a situation is thuggish to the extreme, and you'd expect better from the Transylvito top enforcer/warlord).

Transylvito seems to be a blend of Mafia ... and 50's greasers.

As seen during the dance act, I'm thinking Vampires meet West Side story...
...with Vinny as Tony.

As for Ceasar. He is a bit stupid IMHO. Not tactically/strategically, he's probably brilliant as Chief Warlord.
However, diplomatically he's incompetent. Not only thuggish but also prone to showing his weaknesses (Vinny could easily read that Ceasar was being cornered).
Now it's OK to have weak sides, but if he was smart he'd talk to Vinny and let Vinny break it to Jillian. Vinny is the more diplomatic of the two (which is probably the reason why he was chosen as the Transylvito liason to the Royal Crown Coalition) and it is stupid to ruffle more feathers than necessary.
The only reason why he wouldn't is if he and Vinny are competitors, which is quite possible if he feels that Vinny with his charisma (ey!), connections and diplomatic skills is threatening Ceasars position as Don Kings right-hand man.

[Xorbon]

Hair helmet? Awesome!

Is that a Flight of the Conchords reference? Probably not, but I'll just pretend it is.

[Jay]

I actually thought to myself, "Oh well, maybe nobody will notice." As if these were not Erfworld fans I was referring to.

Maybe you haven't noticed, but there's at least one post discussing EACH WORD YOU WRITE.

Btw, someone asked above about the word "perq". "perk" in the sense used here actually is a shortened version of "perquisite". Basically a fringe benefit.

http://dictionary.reference.com/search?q=perquisite&db=luna

[PapaSloth]

So, imagine you're Don King, and the alliance has just been wiped out. Gobwin Knob has just become a major threat, with a large treasury and a major standing army. Stanley is known to be imperialistic. What do you do?

Seems the first step would be to form a new coalition. Ah, but who will lead this coalition? The previous leader, Ansom, was croaked (Don King may or may not know he was Decrypted). It has to be someone with high stats, preferably a Royal. Even better if that person has a personal vendetta against Stanley.

So, why has it suddenly become important that Jillian is a Royal? Hmm.

[ShieldOfAthena]

It occurs to me... if Transylvito claimed the FAQ cities, it wouldn't properly be FAQ anymore, as a side. Jillian has pretty much forsaken her "overlord" position with FAQ as a side, but say SHE reclaimed those cities and made herself a Queen... would any remaining FAQ units be forced to be loyal to her? A certain Arkenplier attuned Croakamancer and her whole army, for instance. Would be a low loyalty score though, horrendously low....

[cservant]

Perhaps Don King's now aware of what's taking place with Ansom. So who's the best ah, tool against Ansom? Who knows more about Ansom? Jillian. Strangely, to counter my argument, why isn't any attention being place on Vinny if that's the case.

Hmm...

[Dahak]

As for a mechanism, I don't know if it's been discussed before, but have we known that possessions like the Count's coffin could be miniaturized before?

Eyebooks get resized a couple of times. And Jillian has the ability to have at least one costume change hidden away with out noticeable baggage since she's not in her dancefighting gear when she hears about the volcano.

[Itzal]

So, imagine you're Don King, and the alliance has just been wiped out. Gobwin Knob has just become a major threat, with a large treasury and a major standing army. Stanley is known to be imperialistic. What do you do?

The thing is is that nobody not in Gobwin Knob knows any of this. the fact that gobwin knob had their turn at dawn means that their units were the only ones in the area. The only thing any of them knows is that a massive army just dissappeared over the course of a few minutes. The only way anyone would know any of that is if they had a powerful lookamancer look into that (which is actually a good idea so it's entirely possible. The question is, does Transelvito have a powerful lookamancer?)

[raphfrk]

The question is, does Transelvito have a powerful lookamancer?)

That could actually make them a target if Parson or Stanley starts complaining about the need for a lookamancer, so they can reform the table.