Second Season, 201 AL
Sara Galliene
Sara starts sending scouts and surveyors into the neighboring uninhabited regions, with instructions to look for suitable sites for settlement and expansion. Any resources or terrain of note is to be reported back to her as soon as they can relay it.
Your scouts and surveyors encounter a lot of problems when striking past the borders of your territories - the land is rough and the wild animals hinder their progress. Weather, despite remaining mostly normal, turns foul and bogs a lot of them down. As it stands, they make no progress and all and you learn that it will take repeated efforts to get over the bad luck.
Scouts are also sent to Stormport, to assess it's military strength of the city, a few emmisaries being sent to try courting it into joining the kingdom proper without violence
Your scouts investigate the defenses of the city - it’s walls and port are well-stocked and fortified and the city has a competent city guard and missile troops, but not a lot. It can be taken by force, but the odds are, the siege would be unwinnable without strong fleet to blockade the city from the sea. Several hundred of city watch, archers and several squads of marines on their warships compose standing army, although citizen militia of several thousand can be raised as a desperate measure.
Your offer to join the kingdom is politely rejected. The city has no interest in joining an isolated kingdom with no trade and no outward power, and even if threatened, it would seem that city fathers think themselves competent enough to see you off.
A few agents are sent to keep watch on the Brotherhood of Blood, and to learn what they can about them and relay that information back.
You send your scouts in search of the knights, and your luck holds. You don't find much track of the Blood Riders, but you find out that they have a central base from which they operate, the Galava Castle. Hidden in the depths of the wilderness, the ominous fortress is their nerve centre and stronghold of the Knights from which they lead their dreaded hunts. The matter of finding the place is somewhat complicated, as all tracks are well covered and those that get too close are killed - the only reason you know this much is because your scouts kept to the safe side and did not venture too far in search of the castle.
Józef Rajunc
Send scouts and surveyors to the north-west, along the east bank of the Matec, to the mouth of the river. Look for a natural harbor close to the estuary.
If a natural harbor is found, and the scouts don't encounter too many monsters in the area, prepare an expedition to colonize the area.
As you send the surveyors and scouts north, you do not hear a word from them for a long while. You send a second party to look for them and few maddened stragglers are found, with the rest attacked by beasts and dragged off into the forests. The second party forges on and gets to the mouth of the river, but fear of being attacked forces them to go back. You know that there is a way to get to the coast but also that without proper clearing of the ground, you won’t be able to settle safely.
Allow the Sejm to choose a wife for Józef. Retain the right to veto ridiculous proposals (i.e: 70 year old women, and such.)
Despite there being some viable options outside of your realm, like Galliene sisters or ladies of the princely court in the Lake Kingdom, the Sejm presents you with a string of girls - most of them their own daughters and nieces, all of them lovely but ultimately none of them interesting to you personally, with the affair resembling a sordid market.
If you really have no care for whom it is, the choice will be narrowed down to a random woman, but your diplomatic options to other kingdoms will be curtailed. (will roll up random person)
Trent Greysteel
Attempt to convince the various lords of the Houses in Ironpeaks to invest in the hiring of prospectors, engineers, and other experts required to make deep mines along with the creation of said mines with the money they have invested. Based on the amount each lord invests they will receive a share of any of the minds in any lords' province who takes part with House Greysteel taking forty percent for themselves.
Your encouragements to expand the mines are taken very positively and there is a veritable rush to invest in the mining operations - despite the supply being plenty and domestic demand being low, the encouragement from foreign traders is enough to cause an influx of prospectors and miners from the cities who suddenly were allowed to explore the Ironpeaks.
The 40% share is seen as reasonable enough, given the guidance of your house in the whole affair. In the end, there is an investment of 5000 from other houses, and with returns of over 20% and your share of 40% of that, you end up with additional annual income of 400, with pretty much no personal investment from you - well done.
Prince Vishkar
Raise 500 Bowmen (6000 cost) and spread them as royal garrisons to defend against drowner attacks. Encourage local lords to build their own defenses and train their peasantry to do the same.
Troops are trained and dispersed throughout the country. While in smaller numbers they cannot be as effective, they give the peasants enough of a lift in spirits. The lords are somewhat convinced themselves and militias are raised. The drowner attacks are reported less and less as a result, with large patrols scaring off the beasts and bowmen making short work of others without any serious fights or incidents.
Meet with local and visiting merchants and would-be merchants, encouraging them to increase their trading with the promise of royal protection on the roads. Large caravans shall receive jahangiri escorts for the way.
Despite your encouragements, the traders remain unconvinced, be it the drowners, the small number of your riders or just plain disinterest on behalf of the merchants who are unwilling to risk their livelihoods on a poor kingdom. You might try to convince them again next season, but on this occasion, you will not see any merchants this year.
Falrak Oberith
Raise 100 Rangers (3000 cost), Invest 3000 to resettle refugees in/around the capital.
Expect the other Lords to begin contributions to the strengthening of the whole kingdom.
Your troops are hired and added to existing numbers. The fleeing people are settled among your existing settlers and even though you spend a lot of effort and money on making sure they have their own space, you do not get a great deal out of that ( 3000 X 5%+3(roll) = 240 extra income).
Your other lords are persuaded to make their own contributions, and they do so accordingly, settling their people alongside existing villages. Their income is not great either, but you can count on similar amount flowing your way. (240 income from Tribute)
Lord Mayor Morghaen up Velkyrod
Expand the Merchant Fleet: put down 10.000 towards Armed Merchantmen with Detachments of Marines as additional Protection. The Free Traders are to start trading with Pŕlensk, Calisaren and Valden along their major rivers.
Ships are deployed and troops allocated. Your traders take to the routes outlined and load their cargo in the port. It will take a bit of time to see returns from your merchant endeavour, but you have a feeling it was worth it in the end.
Invest another 10.000 into a mixed Program of Colonization and Infrastructure in the unsettled lands between Velkyrod and Pálensk: A Single Highway, with Waystations every 30 kilometers. Each Waystation is to be outfitted with a stable, tavern, a guardhouse with a Garrison of sufficient strength to hold off any ordinary bandits and monsters and a messenger post, if the money suffices establish semaphore stations for those wayhouses. THese are the nucleus of the new settlements along the Velkyrod-Pálensk Highway
The highway is established and you are surprised that there is little getting in the way of both the colonists and the highway. The works are carried out swiftly and despite long and elaborate process of gradual turning of the road from a simple tract to solid surface, it does not stop the flow of people or resources and soon enough, villages grow around the Waystations. The land yields easily and beasts are strangely absent, perhaps driven off by the sheer volume of activity. (Income from villages = 1000, Highway maintenance = -960. Final balance - 40)
Invest the Rest of the Treasury into Velkyrod Marines to staff the Merchant Fleet, Settlement Programs and as a general standing army. Set aside 1.000 for dedicated Monster Hunters to begin commercial hunting of monsters in the new Settlements to make them safer.
Money is spent and orders are put down. New villages add extra money to your coffers (+210 income). Out of all kingdoms in the region, your trade city seems to organize itself the best, with notices for beast hunters put out. Although it’s a rather insane idea, few nobles and sellswords take it up. (+2 to next colonist roll against beasts)
((Apologies for somewhat haste assembly of this. Rolls are invisible on this occasion as I forgot to note them down as I did this over a period of a week but you can count on a more solid update now that I'm settled. Let me know if you notice any mistakes.
E: This is it btw, you can post now.))
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Topic: Lords of Eseria [6/6] - Claim the land! (Read 4897 times)