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Dec. 1st, 2021 06:33 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
iniquiticitysome stuff on dairon, essek and matt's paradigms/approach as a dungeon master
i've been thinking about this post a lot. you should read it, but the summary of the post is:
in c2e71 dairon asks beau to introduce them to beau's contact in the dynasty and beau refuses, saying that 1) dairon's strategy will jeopardise the nein's strategy and 2) she couldn't do it without arousing suspicion.
beau almost certainly would have introduced them to essek, who was, of course, the exact traitor dairon was looking for - we just didn't know it at the time. essentially the post concludes "so much had to happen the way it happened to get the arc we had" re: essek. which i agree with!
i'm more interested in the dynamic of "how would this have changed the story of the mighty nein?" which i have expounded upon under the cut.
becuase you see, despite our unending well of affection for him, essek is an npc, and his arc happens only as an accessory to the nein's path. i wonder what percentage of matt's brain generated essek's redemption arc BECAUSE it benefits the nein/the players. because another option would have been him becoming resentful of his change/abandonment! (which i explored with pornography, of course). this would have punished the players, which matt doesn't do. more on this later.
going back to the dairon/essek choice, i wonder what would have been different from the perspective of the nein. because my idea of how that story would evolve would have ended up screwing either dairon (going to jail/fleeing because essek is on their tracks) or essek (fleeing when/if dairon realized they were the mole OR being outed to the dynasty/empire). i would have been really interested to watch the nein choose between them - either 1) convincing dairon NOT to out essek as the mole, or 2) breaking dairon out of jail / convincing the dynasty to release dairon.
would either of these have been "a punishment"? maybe, maybe not. maybe this speeds UP essek's redemption arc because they rescue essek from execution OR essek sees their kindness to dairon and is changed.
either way, this might've centered the nein's actions on an NPC - forced them to make a choice. they would know the doors are there and have to pick one. (As opposed to not knowing the doors are there, such as the arc we didn't get with the Augen Trust.) In my experiece Matt typically hasn't forced them to make decisions or punished them for what they DO pick, or what they decide to do. for example, he didn't...
..... have jester/artegan suffer any significant consequences with the moonweaver re: travelercon
.... kill dagen when fjord ordered him to engage lucien/the tombtakers (side note: essek/matt clearly let fjord/travis make that decision, even though essek was in charge of that group)
.... have the hag come back after jester modified it's memory re: nott/veth's curse
... punish jester for returning to nicodramas, even after she pranked the guy who made her flee the first time (pre-campaign)
... make essek resentful of the epiphany the nein gave him and/or his abandonment through the travelercon and early aeor arc
... have astrid be angry at caleb when caleb exploded vergessen sanitarium with dunamancy after she asked him to break in quietly
and i'm sure there are more!
the only REAL choice matt makes them make is if they want to take essek or trent/astrid/eadwulf with them in aeor?
(he does ask them to pick the lawmaster in zadash or the gentleman very early, but they could have done both if they wanted, so it doesn't count.)
Let's assume that the nein do not suffer significant damage if beau introduces dairon to essek. they are not kicked out of the dynasty OR make an enemy of dairon. i think dairon is more likely to flee because they are not The Xorhas NPC, but that's sort of irrelevant.
So four nein questions (and i'm sure there are more):
1. does essek still teleport them around xorhas looking for yasha?
2. does essek/the dynasty still view the nein as valuable enough to parlay and ceasefire?
3. is essek still at vurmas outpost in eiselcross? does he still feel like he's about to be caught?
4. does the bathtub conversation with essek happen? when caleb learns essek is the mole in 91, what do the nein do? is it possible they just outright kill him because they're not at the same level of friendship?
5. has dairon provided enough evidence to the empire to make the assembly a source of suspicion?
i think matt would have structured a way for the nein to chase yasha becuase chasing yasha is obviously what the nein wanted to do, so 1) isn't a particularly interesting question to me. also 5) isn't super relevant to the campaign - it was only brought up generally in the epilogue.
2) is interesting because obviously the game would have gone to the aeor arc one way or another, but it didn't seem like that was a priority UNTIL the war was settled. maybe matt would have found a reason for them to go to aeor, ostensibly for peacekeeping, then get sidetracked into the somnovem, then feature a chunk of the epilogue around the parlay?
3) and 4) are the MOST interesting questions to me because
.... if essek is dead, he obviously is not at vurmas
... if essek felt like he had dispatched dairon as a threat (being that they fled), maybe he wouldn't have gone to vurmas
OR
... if essek hadn't felt so close with the nein but still felt threatened and was at vurmas, maybe he would have only volunteered items, like allura
in either case, maybe the nein DO decide to go to aeor with trent, astrid and eadwulf instead.
1) they clearly WANTED to, even though it would have been a mistake, and maybe with a REALLY high roll they could have convinced essek to go, but this was one of the few times i feel like matt actually said no to something
2) they would not have known there was another option because essek wouldn't go / wasn't changed enough / wasn't there.
3) the arc would have been VERY different (more fucked up but not as fucked up as i would've wanted, because matt), but i think in the end they would have killed trent and had astrid and eadwulf as allies in the lucien fight. which would have been good!
this has been a post.
i've been thinking about this post a lot. you should read it, but the summary of the post is:
in c2e71 dairon asks beau to introduce them to beau's contact in the dynasty and beau refuses, saying that 1) dairon's strategy will jeopardise the nein's strategy and 2) she couldn't do it without arousing suspicion.
beau almost certainly would have introduced them to essek, who was, of course, the exact traitor dairon was looking for - we just didn't know it at the time. essentially the post concludes "so much had to happen the way it happened to get the arc we had" re: essek. which i agree with!
i'm more interested in the dynamic of "how would this have changed the story of the mighty nein?" which i have expounded upon under the cut.
becuase you see, despite our unending well of affection for him, essek is an npc, and his arc happens only as an accessory to the nein's path. i wonder what percentage of matt's brain generated essek's redemption arc BECAUSE it benefits the nein/the players. because another option would have been him becoming resentful of his change/abandonment! (which i explored with pornography, of course). this would have punished the players, which matt doesn't do. more on this later.
going back to the dairon/essek choice, i wonder what would have been different from the perspective of the nein. because my idea of how that story would evolve would have ended up screwing either dairon (going to jail/fleeing because essek is on their tracks) or essek (fleeing when/if dairon realized they were the mole OR being outed to the dynasty/empire). i would have been really interested to watch the nein choose between them - either 1) convincing dairon NOT to out essek as the mole, or 2) breaking dairon out of jail / convincing the dynasty to release dairon.
would either of these have been "a punishment"? maybe, maybe not. maybe this speeds UP essek's redemption arc because they rescue essek from execution OR essek sees their kindness to dairon and is changed.
either way, this might've centered the nein's actions on an NPC - forced them to make a choice. they would know the doors are there and have to pick one. (As opposed to not knowing the doors are there, such as the arc we didn't get with the Augen Trust.) In my experiece Matt typically hasn't forced them to make decisions or punished them for what they DO pick, or what they decide to do. for example, he didn't...
..... have jester/artegan suffer any significant consequences with the moonweaver re: travelercon
.... kill dagen when fjord ordered him to engage lucien/the tombtakers (side note: essek/matt clearly let fjord/travis make that decision, even though essek was in charge of that group)
.... have the hag come back after jester modified it's memory re: nott/veth's curse
... punish jester for returning to nicodramas, even after she pranked the guy who made her flee the first time (pre-campaign)
... make essek resentful of the epiphany the nein gave him and/or his abandonment through the travelercon and early aeor arc
... have astrid be angry at caleb when caleb exploded vergessen sanitarium with dunamancy after she asked him to break in quietly
and i'm sure there are more!
the only REAL choice matt makes them make is if they want to take essek or trent/astrid/eadwulf with them in aeor?
(he does ask them to pick the lawmaster in zadash or the gentleman very early, but they could have done both if they wanted, so it doesn't count.)
Let's assume that the nein do not suffer significant damage if beau introduces dairon to essek. they are not kicked out of the dynasty OR make an enemy of dairon. i think dairon is more likely to flee because they are not The Xorhas NPC, but that's sort of irrelevant.
So four nein questions (and i'm sure there are more):
1. does essek still teleport them around xorhas looking for yasha?
2. does essek/the dynasty still view the nein as valuable enough to parlay and ceasefire?
3. is essek still at vurmas outpost in eiselcross? does he still feel like he's about to be caught?
4. does the bathtub conversation with essek happen? when caleb learns essek is the mole in 91, what do the nein do? is it possible they just outright kill him because they're not at the same level of friendship?
5. has dairon provided enough evidence to the empire to make the assembly a source of suspicion?
i think matt would have structured a way for the nein to chase yasha becuase chasing yasha is obviously what the nein wanted to do, so 1) isn't a particularly interesting question to me. also 5) isn't super relevant to the campaign - it was only brought up generally in the epilogue.
2) is interesting because obviously the game would have gone to the aeor arc one way or another, but it didn't seem like that was a priority UNTIL the war was settled. maybe matt would have found a reason for them to go to aeor, ostensibly for peacekeeping, then get sidetracked into the somnovem, then feature a chunk of the epilogue around the parlay?
3) and 4) are the MOST interesting questions to me because
.... if essek is dead, he obviously is not at vurmas
... if essek felt like he had dispatched dairon as a threat (being that they fled), maybe he wouldn't have gone to vurmas
OR
... if essek hadn't felt so close with the nein but still felt threatened and was at vurmas, maybe he would have only volunteered items, like allura
in either case, maybe the nein DO decide to go to aeor with trent, astrid and eadwulf instead.
1) they clearly WANTED to, even though it would have been a mistake, and maybe with a REALLY high roll they could have convinced essek to go, but this was one of the few times i feel like matt actually said no to something
2) they would not have known there was another option because essek wouldn't go / wasn't changed enough / wasn't there.
3) the arc would have been VERY different (more fucked up but not as fucked up as i would've wanted, because matt), but i think in the end they would have killed trent and had astrid and eadwulf as allies in the lucien fight. which would have been good!
this has been a post.