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[Mlamlah]

To clarify, he is already the feudal lord of a township as your knight, with all of the traditional duties of taxation and military support that normally entails. He's essentially asking for permission to claim more lands and increase his station, legal rights and power.

[VoidSlayer]

Still, we should expect him to reaffirm his oaths before we formally discuss a land grant.

I am thinking for taxation and other things we can basically give normal terms with the new Barony but reduce taxation for a while to allow him to build industry and his new castle.

[Weirdsound]

Alright. Tell him that before he departs, we would like to sit down with him, our scribe, and our barrister to figure out what land he needs and formally grant it to him. Tell him that if his skills in managing and developing his new land prove sufficient, you will make him a Baron. Of course, this assumes that he re-affirms his oath.

I'd still try to patch things up by being honest about our inexperience, and asking for his council regarding Balpher. He seems to share our goal of taming and developing the providence, and would make a great ally/advisor if we can can get on his good side and figure out what makes him tick. It would also be awkward to host a war-council and take Balpher seriously in front of the knight without first explaining that his main flaw is lack of initiative, not lack of competence.

[Mlamlah]

3821, the fourth month of the year, and the second month of spring.

Adeeb Wasirri, Lord Governor of Dhum-Blud

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

20 years old
Health and Physical Abilities
Fit
Healthy

Social Skills
Practiced in Court Manners
Rogueish Charm

Practical Skills
Competent Swordsman
Competent Tumbler
Mediocre Rider
Novice Sneak
Novice Field Commander

Personal Possessions.
A well bred riding horse. (Mare.)
An aging riding horse. (Stallion.)
A Fine Duelling Saber.
Several Sets of gentleman's clothes.
Walders old clothing and perfumes. (The former is gaudy and a little big, and the latter is a little too strong.)

Councilors, Vassals, Allies and Agents.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Formal Councillors
Aldagor. Barrister, Elderly noble courtier.
Balpher. Garrison Commander, noble courtier.
Desan. Steward, young noble courtier.
Elerik. Junior Garrison Commander,Low-born Wasirri Guardsman.

Agents
Vest. Friend, Lowborn duellist and former smuggler.
Eduard. Lowborn Courtier.
Adventuring Trio.

Vassals
Mayor Veera
Sir Madagor

Holdings.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Bonewatch
-Tiny Stone Keep on a hilltop.
--Sparse Furnishings
--Well Stocked Larder (Decent quality, including wine, salt pork, local spices and the other imported goods)
--Small dungeon under the castle. 12 cells.
-Stables (11/25)
-Barracks (Sufficient space and bedding to hold a little over a hundred men.)
-Armoury (Stocked with Spears, swords and bows of mediocre quality. Stocked with Quilted armour and padding of poor quality. Stocked with plenty of poor quality arrows.)
-Rickety wooden outer palisade.
-patchy overgrown "dirt" roads.
-Mostly Unmanned rickety wooden watchtowers.
-a handful of wooden homes within the walls.
-A well with plenty of fresh water.
-A few nearby farming families.

Bleak-Haven
-Village
--The Wretched Mut A seedy Tavern
--A well maintained Windmill
--A small shrine to the local patron spirit
--A few scattered homes.
--A few poor craftsmen.
-Your Manor
--A few Fine furnishings.
-Overgrown Patchy "Dirt" Roads
-An interconnected farming community in the local area.

Military
-Bonewatch Garrison. (53 soldiers of passable discipline and mediocre combat training, but decent morale. Armed with bows, spears and short-swords of varying quality. Girded in quilted linen armor, steel caps, and the occasional breastplate. Wearing the King's colours.)
-Unnamed Fortified Watchtower Garrison (20 soldiers of good discipline, wearing the King's colours.)
-Household Gaurd. (19 Skilled Fighters trained in urban and close-quarters combat. Armed with arming-swords, bucklers and longknives. Girded in Quilted Doublets, steel breastplate,open-faced helms, greaves and bracers, all of good quality. Loyal to your family and wearing your family colors.)
-Bleakhaven Community Watch. (A group of locals that fluctuates in number, protecting, keeping watch on and patrolling the town and outer farms.)
-Bleakhaven Garrison. (6 soldiers, functionally identical to Bonewatch Garrison)

Assets
-A heavy bag of gold "Crowns" (7/8)
-A chest half full of Silver "Crowns" (Many clipped and restamped.)
-Nine Light Riding Horses (local breed, frisky and quick, but also small and unsuited to long, hard travel)
-4 Rickety Wooden Carts
-6 Months worth of poor quality local grain. (at current consumption)
-4 Months worth of Imported Food-Stuffs (at current consumption, includes beans, pickled vegetables, salt, butter and wheat flour all of decent quality)

Firstly, you attempt to clarify your reasoning and motivations in regards to your garrison commander. You explain the poor state you originally found your garrison in, and though your situation has improved at your own urging, you still don't trust Balpher to attend to his duties if you ever needed to rely on his own initiative. You also state that you don't want to stretch your authority too far so soon after taking your position by stripping one of your advisors of their own authority. You have a hard time reading his response, but your vassal listens carefully to your concerns as you speak, and you believe he understands your concerns. His response is blunt, though even and respectful. "You are concerned about your inability to rely on this particular servant, and want to avoid the difficulty of dismissing him. This is understandable, but you are still dismissing him. I will indulge this... political move, without complaint if you will it, but if you were to dismiss him openly, and he were to respond badly, you would at least have legitimate cause to be rid of him entirely."

With that, you both move on to matters that your vassal clearly seems to consider more important. You discuss his desire to be raised in rank, and explain you are amenable to his request. You will of course, first require him to to renew his vow of fealty to the King, and you through proxy. You, he and your officials will decide the exact details of the grant later, and if all goes well, you will raise him to Baron once he has captured the enemy stronghold and you are confident in his abilities to manage that land. He interjects briefly that he hopes you will honour the spirit of your words once the time comes. Once you inquire as to how he will get the materials to build his castle, he explains that he will form quarries for the task on the newly acquired land, something both in your interest and his. He states that he will need a suitable stronghold to properly launch military efforts from if the two of you plan on turning the tide.

The initial negotiation finished with you invite him to dinner, stating that he can renew his vows while he partakes of your hospitality. When a few hours later you and your court are gathered with your vassal at table he does just that, with only a little ceremony. Once everyone is seated and he has eaten your meat and drunk your wine he kneels down before you at the head of your table, laying his sword at your feet. There he vows to defend the Kings interests, and obey his commands as a vassal to the crown, and as such, as your vassal by proxy. The meal is short, the food and drink simple fare, but your Knight makes no complaint. Several members of your court seem a great deal more reserved than usual, possibly owing to the presence of your vassal. Balpher and Aldagor in particular, seem rather intimidated by the man, though there is palpable relief once he's said his vows to serve you. Once everyone has had their fill, and the servants have carried away the table scraps for their own dinner you call war council.

...

You, Sir Madagor, his squire, Balpher, Elerik and the trio of adventurers all seat yourselves around one corner of your rather large council table. There, your hirelings discuss in detail the stronghold they found, with the aid of updated maps drawn up by your scribe. The maps you look over include mostly just the territory of you and your vassals, and as you consider them you are struck with just how vast the province is, the area depicted is not unsizable, and yet it makes up a fraction of Dhum-Blud, with this sense of scale provided, you realize you've heard of small kingdoms about this large. After taking a moment to appreciate the enormity of the task placed upon you, you turn your attention to the topic at hand. The ruined castle is seated on a hill that seems to have partially collapsed long ago, leaving a third of one of the walls, and a tower with it, in crumbled ruin. That seems to be the primary weakpoint of the fortress, though it has been fortified. A palisade and wooden gatehouse have been built into that section of wall, wooden stakes driven into the earth narrow the path to the makeshift entrance, and a scaffold has been built around this, which could potentially allow archers to rain arrows down, though they themselves would be exposed in doing so. These makeshift defences seem to be unweathered and freshly built, though they appear somewhat crudely cobbled together. The path to these defences is itself improvised, and uneven terrain, wheras the path to the original gatehouse is much smoother. The gate there however, is rusted and unused, probably even inoperable, and has even been crudely barricaded. From what your adventurers observed, they seem to at least partially subsist on trapping and foraging, and they noticed one rider depart from the ruin to deeper into Dhum-Blud, though they did not attempt to track them. Madagor observes that the estimate of at least thirty fighters might be a little conservative, no matter how little activity your adventurers may have noticed. The building of such defences, even crude as they are, would require more men than that. They may have additional, common labourers among them, who themselves would likely be drafted into it's defence, possibly even twice that in combat-ready soldiers. He notes however, that being so close to your own holdings such a force should have been very noticable, so it is unlikely that they are quite that strong, and may have even had outside assistance in establishing their defences.

With the situation established, your council begins to discuss possible tactics and strategy. A little intimidated by the summary given, Balpher suggests it might be prudent to siege the place, and starve them out. Sir Madagor acknowledges this as possibly legitimate, but also mentions that it's likely that the bandits entrenched at the ruin are probably allied or even part of one of the three prominent outlaw factions. With this in mind, he states it might be better to harry them with some of your weakest troops, goading them into ambush and hopefully destroying the strongest of their force. Depending on how such goes, it can be decided on whether to siege or assault from there. Balpher seems rather discontent with the risk, but mostly allows himself to be intimidated into silence. If you do attack, breaching the gate or palisade will be the trickiest part. You and Sir Madagor currently both lack any kind of sophisticated siege equipment or powerful spellcasters, so your options are limited mostly to ladders, ram's or at best, a crude field catapult. Elerik offers little during this discussion, mostly observing as you are. He does however, offer that if you can get the Wasirri Gaurdsmen in the wall or within the keep, that they would make short work of any resistance in the chaos of combat, such close quarters being their speciality.

Seeming to realize your lack of understanding at the mention of the bandit factions, Sir Madagor explains. "There are three powers among the provincial outlaws. I suspect this group is tied to the Vultures, who are a common sort of outlaw group, mostly smugglers and thieves. They and the second group, the Red Kinsmen have an uneasy understanding, often squabbling and skirmishing, but also trading and working together against the third and strongest of the factions, Jackar's claws. The Red Kinsmen are rebels as much as bandits, made up of those who don't recognize the authority of the King on these lands, and while the Vultures are mostly disorganized, the Kinsmen have a few experienced commanders among them. The claw's are a little more enigmatic, led by a sorcerer named Jackar, who's probably pretty old by now, though they are currently outside our domain of influence, and i've been unable to slip scouts by into their territory."

Sir Madagor asks you what you plan on contributing to the offensive yourself. He also mentions that if you command him to send for a greater portion of his forces he will obey. After casting a brief look at your fashionable clothing he offers to spare a helm and a shirt of mail for your use if you have nothing suitable. Though he does not mention it, you wonder wether you should call Mayor Veera to arms, or gather a levy from Bleakhaven, and who among your court you should bring, and whom you should leave behind.

[Baffler]

Harrying the bandits seems like the best option, and maybe also tracking their foraging and raiding parties as they leave the fort, ambushing them once they've come some distance away or we've learned their preferred routes. These aren't professional troops, they're just like the name says: vultures. They probably won't be able to hold together once they come up against opponents in the open who can actually fight, or put up an organized defense against organized pressure. Our own men aren't top quality either, but that shouldn't matter with our side picking all the battles and with our advantage in leadership. Once they've lost some of their number in skirmishing, we can focus our attention on their fort.

What I wonder though, is what the rest of their band will do. They have ties to the Vultures, so will they send reinforcements? Try to retaliate? I can't decide if it would be more useful to see if and what the Vultures commit to the fort's defense, or to avoid the risk and try to prevent them (and the Red Kinsmen by extension) getting word out of what's happening.

[Playergamer]

I feel it's better to strike a crushing blow now, and force them out, then try to lay siege and pick off foragers/pickets. It'll make us look better, give the men much more confidence, and there's little to no chance of the Vultures bringing in any reinforcements.

[Weirdsound]

Harrying the bandits seems like the best option, and maybe also tracking their foraging and raiding parties as they leave the fort, ambushing them once they've come some distance away or we've learned their preferred routes. These aren't professional troops, they're just like the name says: vultures. They probably won't be able to hold together once they come up against opponents in the open who can actually fight, or put up an organized defense against organized pressure. Our own men aren't top quality either, but that shouldn't matter with our side picking all the battles and with our advantage in leadership. Once they've lost some of their number in skirmishing, we can focus our attention on their fort.

I like this idea, but lets try this first.

---

"Does anybody know where we could find some oil? Might it might be possible to send a few individuals under cover of darkness to ignite the wooden defenses before we reveal our presence and cause them to raise their guard? The attempt would cost us little, and if it creates a breech, we could simply assault it outright with my House Guard and Madagor's armored troops. If it fails, we simply fall back to either besieging or harrassing them."

---

Say you at are least willing to commit half your Garrison to the effort, as well as your house guard. Although mention that it might be more advantageous to send your inexperienced men to aid in the defense of Madagor's holdings so that he may call upon a greater number of his own troops, which you assume are better armed, trained, and organized than your own. Also add that if the hirelings are willing, you would offer them coin to aid in harassing the bandits.

Take him up on the offer of armor.

Ask those assembeled what we could expect the mayor to send in terms of men if he was called to arms.

Since we likely going to have spend some time shuffling troops around, bring up the group wandering near the watchtower, and ask if Madagor could send his riders to round them up for an audience (or destroy them if they don't come peacefully) in the meantime.

I feel it's better to strike a crushing blow now, and force them out, then try to lay siege and pick off foragers/pickets. It'll make us look better, give the men much more confidence, and there's little to no chance of the Vultures bringing in any reinforcements.

I don't think Vulture-Reinforcements want any part of Madagor's men in the field. If my plan above is feasible, it might have the effect of a crushing blow.

[Aigre Excalibur]

I feel it's better to strike a crushing blow now, and force them out, then try to lay siege and pick off foragers/pickets. It'll make us look better, give the men much more confidence, and there's little to no chance of the Vultures bringing in any reinforcements.

There's no harm in investing the camp before attacking it directly. Reduce the chances of enemies escaping. Any levies we can get from the Mayor could at least supply manpower to build and man the siegeworks. And/or serve as a reserve or perimeter watch to prevent escapes.

[VoidSlayer]

The fort might make a good home base for the adventuring company.

If we have a small group bring oil to the gate under the cover of night then ignite it from a distance with burning arrows we can cause confusion, then when they try and put it out we can have archers fire on the defenders from the dark.

Night fighting is dangerous and difficult work, but if we can employ skilled archers and pitch, maybe have the adventurers do the sneaking up, we could break the wall, demoralize the enemy and then charge our street fighters in.

[Baffler]

We would have the advantage there, since they'll be illuminated by the burning palisade and unable to see our men standing in the dark nearby. They'll also be really easy for our archers to spot if the fire really gets going, and at night it's likely that most of them are back in the fort so we won't have to worry as much about being surprised by returning parties coming from behind our lines.

[Detoxicated]

Declare criminals enemies of the state.
Claim that criminals willing to put down their criminals life and affiliate to you once again will pe pardoned, offer this to entire towns as well.
It is clear that we must first take the smaller factions, so we can size up the main enemy led by the wizard. I think it would be helpful to try to lure criminals unaffiliated to the Red-Kinsmen nor the wizard to work with us again, to take the remaining forts reasonably easy. Once we acquired their land we go after the kinsmen. On the way we should look for possible vassals as we will be in the position to grant fiefs, and we should do so too.

In regards of the wizard, we should definitely find out more about him, and possibly engage diplomacy to find out more about his character.

Also how about promoting the king a little bit. I mean look at it this way, if we promote the kings position we could definitely depend on his support in regards of the wizard.

Tell Rat-Mage to breed healthy fat rats to consume as food,

[Gotdamnmiracle]

Ptw.

[VoidSlayer]

Tell Rat-Mage to breed healthy fat rats to consume as food,

-1

We should breed them for luxurious coats then pass them off as beaver pelts.

[Aigre Excalibur]

Tell Rat-Mage to breed healthy fat rats to consume as food,

-1

We should breed them for luxurious coats then pass them off as beaver pelts.

-1 to both. If we start killing them, it'll be impossible to weaponize them as intelligence units or saboteurs. It is far simpler to look for conventional solutions for livestock breeding for food and economic purposes. We can start a cattle breeding program by meeting the peasants again after the battle.

Offer the Rat-Mage any number of dungeons cells in Bone-watch Keep of his choice to breed and train the rats as spies and saboteurs. Ask him about and provide any tools and equipment he might need.

Call up Mayor Veera to arms with whatever militia he can bring. Inspect his troops.

If we take to the field we could send cavalry to reconnaissance in force and hopefully harass and lure the bandit forces into the ambush that we want.

[Gotdamnmiracle]

Why not have the rats bred as scouts? I feel that they would be much more useful in gaining accurate land information and locational data as well as what is exactly lurking in those woods rather than troop movements and internal affairs, neither of which we need at this exact moment. I would like to know exactly what sort of atrocities lie in the woods and where more bandit strongholds are located. That way, atleast we would not bd caught off guard by some unknown.