Re: Jorkandros, lunar command, etc...

From: dzo01 <dzo_at_...>
Date: Sat, 06 Mar 2004 16:47:41 -0000


Jeff:
> Excellent! I love the idea of Jorkandros is surrounded by his
Buseri
> and star-charts.

Well, one of the charters of the group was to bring in people's PC's into the action. I can't be the only one who played a Buserian can I? <grin>

> > I would be inclined to make him the "stereotypical" staid, by-
-
> > book Polaris general. Just the type that you want protecting
your
> > supply lines while the wunderkinds are at the bleeding edge of
the
> > invasion, but totally out of his depth when faced by the
tactical
> > innovation of Bryon.
> >
> > This gives us a start at the command staff - a possibility would
be
> > the Buserian starseerer who is looking at the "big picture" but
> > completely lost in the day-to-day tactical neccesities.
>
> This is great! I assume that starseerer stays with the command
when
> Tatius takes over.

I would certainly hope so - albeit with much reduced influence. Actually that gives me a fun idea. Maybe this Buserian gains significant insight into the Orlanthi relationship with the stars and sky-world, something that the DH's are woefully ignorant of. Enough so that later he has incilings/vague prophecies that something is going to go horribly wrong at the dedication of the TotRM but, because of his being discredited and fallen out of favour during WhiteWall, these are ignored by the Lunar HC. This also provides a good hook for lunars PCs if they are the only one's who believe him...

> > I also think that there just has to be a Shargashi who just
wants
> to
> > crush the city asap without the log prolonged siege and to hell
> with
> > the casualties - they all end up in the enclosure anyway.
> >
> > This gives us some lower level conflict in the lunar camp that
PCs
> > can be involved in as well as the higher level conflicts such as
> > Fazzur any Tatius which the PCs aren't really involved in.
>
> Yeah. I wonder if in the final assault there should be a unit of
> Shargashi hell-men? I think so!

That must be a given. Particularly if, as you suggest, they are using the Shargash kills Umatum myth they mythically have to be prominent.
>
> > Just to add a little balance to the overwhelmingly pro-orlanthi
> > slant to this list so far (hi Jeff! ;).
>
> Needed and useful balance (as always). What do you think of the
> Temple Plot?

I'm inclined to believe that the lunars certainly had a plan to "chain" Orlanth and that this probably does include killing off the parts of Orlanth that can't be healed. (How's that for a compromise - you can do anything with semantics!)

I do, however, think that WW was not initially intended to be THE lynchpin or culmination of the Kill/Chain Orlanth campaign, but that it evolved into this by the actions of both sides. It certainly escalated when Tatius took over and I think he saw a successful end to the siege and mythically overcomming Orlanth as a ploy in the "game of houses" in the Empire. As things drag on he gets more and more desperate to get it finished that he commits more and more of his political capital on a succesful outcome so that eventually he cannot be satisfied with anything less than massive overkill - hence the "Killing of Orlanth" and the mythic fall-out that surprised the lunars as much as the Orlanthi...

Whether the level of the defeat of Orlanth needed to be as extreme as it turned out to be for the dedication of the TotRM I don't really know.

(Oh yeah, France is great - when are you and Dianne comming to visit? I'll stock up the wine cellar...)

Cheers,
Yak

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