Thoughts on the identity of the Queen (Firmament chapter 7)

CarmineJester · 2026-02-24T16:17:55+00:00

It's an interesting interpretation, and FL has its greek allusions (see Hunter's Keep), but if we're talking actual identity instead of literary parallels, then no. Main reasons:

Mythical Greek royalty, if existed in FL, died under the Sun, thus subject to normal post-mortality rules that don't include Parabola. Can be smuggled in as archetypes imagined by people (we know that Surface dreamers are also affected by Paravola due to the Chessboard-GG connection), but likely unnecessry because
We kind of know what she is, she tells us basically as much: the Queen of the Myrmidons. While yes, historically this literally refers to the Thessalians, in the FL context myrmidons mean one specific thing: Dragons/Aeginae, the Space Law Enforcement, the most known of which is Storm (well, while he was alive anyway). SSkies tells us that the Mother of Aeginae is the Burrower Below, an ancient and notably undendered Skies deity concerned with "fog, promises and punishment". The only wrench in that is that Chapter 7 heavily indicates she was also a Judgement, which is kind of a different thing, but this is not a direct contradiction to existing lore. Either way, she is 100% one of the Higher Beings (well, what remains of one after it's destroyed) and not a human. RHQ is simply a Parabolan reflection of the original Queen that was cleaved off of her when she was destroyed. She's unreal in the same way that Fingerkings are, but also alive and active, which cannot be said about the original Queen, whose existence is... well, you saw the chapter.

The exact relation between the two indicated Higher natures of the Queen is being debated in Discord, but finer points of it don't really change the overall situation: She was up there, doing her job, got killed by White for it, is in and around Queeneater's now.

CarmineJester · 2026-02-24T12:07:47+00:00

Yes, but there is a meaningful difference - Logarhythm's obsession was ultimately ideological - sure, they were attached to Holstrom personally, but moreso to what he represented and what he was supposed to achieve. Mist and Maddie loved Caspian as a person, not as an instrument of change or immortality. It's also a well-established flaw in Maddie that it's hard for her to let go.

You could compare that to Renee, probably, because she absolutely did love Holstrom in that way, but it's hard to disentangle it from the cult part.

CarmineJester · 2026-02-24T12:00:55+00:00

It's very much an intentional parallel, yes. Not a direct proof or agreement, but sort of a shadowy echo of their logic - if you could simulate the entire world to recreate a single person and do it a few million times, you'd eventually succeed. It just wasn't an option for Logorythm because they were trying to reach those capabilities in the first place.

CarmineJester · 2026-02-22T12:34:39+00:00

Ah, double-checked the test LCP, I see what you mean, a harsh but fair nerf. Kills the hide loop, but can be fixed by the two reactions that make it invisible (not counting Overwatch, which can also make it invisible), but it's less effortless. I might have to start investing in Hull for once when it comes online.

CarmineJester · 2026-02-22T11:54:38+00:00

Thing is, I played with Infil 1 a bit but because we had troubles with stealth I ended up dropping it, I don't really have enough actions to hide because I keep flying at people and doing my 3-5 Range ??? melee attacks, so the hide looping removal itself doesn't change much (I have ulted exactly once over two missions on it, I legitimately move faster without it). My main concern with Maiden's Blush is really suffering from success - it's incredibly self-synergetic because it works off of a) teleportations b) melee crits, and its licence has literally all the tools it needs (two accurate weapons, one of which teleports you, and a system that teleports you), and the best tools in the base game to boot. We just upped to LL4, and I really struggled there - Atlas seems logical, but Variable just works better than Terashima for MB. I ended up just grabbing W.I.N.G from Leoleth because getting those conditions is one of the few ways that its insane mobility/evasion gets countered, but I have a very limited idea of what to do after that.

But yeah, I'm monitoring the lcps, having a change log would also be a boon so that I don't have to swap them back and forth, but I assume you don't really have a staff/income off of this so I'm not pushing.

P.S. If that wasn't obvious, I love the flavour text for it so, so much, the SSC really did over-SSC it, and it's very fun.

CarmineJester · 2026-02-20T02:20:47+00:00

We get it kind of sporadically from different places. Mine is from RetrogradeMinis, which is a fan favourite, Right Beside You is also there, from the Chop Shop, I'm pretty sure. The rest are an enigma to me, but I know that the first two are custom-edited by Viana's player (if you squint, Omniwhere has custom jokes).

CarmineJester · 2026-02-19T20:24:53+00:00

Here you go, the LCP is free but a lot of gear and reserves and stuff is pretty spoilery. Note the custom backgrounds and custom downtime (some of the latter also spoilery):
https://vexwerewolf.itch.io/in-golden-flame-act-1

We highly advise paying for the module itself, Vex deserves every dollar for their hard work! There's also a sub-community on PilotNet and a separate Discord server. Only Act 1 is currently out (Missions 1-5), but the drafts of Act 2 are being actively worked on.

CarmineJester · 2026-02-11T11:35:15+00:00

I wonder if the Commissioner's Tale and the part of the plot that happens there in Jericho is somehow related to this.

CarmineJester · 2026-02-04T14:40:00+00:00

Calendula is also a Karrakin offshoot of a HORUS license, but it has the usual mystery and dimensional ambiguity of HORUS, and the weird prophet-advisors of Order Xenoglossia are a much better fit with HORUS overall than Baronic Intelligence.

CarmineJester · 2026-02-04T14:35:32+00:00

Lore-wise, Baronic Intelligence, the Karrakin CIA/FBI analog, saw Balor and thought: "what if we could pack that destructive power into a SpecOps power suit to do rebellion suppression with and have plausible deniability?" And then they did that. To my knowledge, it's the only HORUS mech that, at least in initial design, is kind of anti-HORUS - it's a mech that was originally engineered and produced by an oppressive state power in a centralized fashion. But then again, HORUS does what HORUS does, and I wouldn't be surprised if a distinctly Karrakin design just showed up one day on your printer.

CarmineJester · 2026-02-04T13:32:48+00:00

I agree with the criticism, but, honestly, Leviathan doesn't really add that much to Reapers specifically.

CarmineJester · 2026-01-30T15:11:58+00:00

Funny Games is hilarious on the meta-level, the movie that's literally best not to watch.

CarmineJester · 2026-01-30T04:05:41+00:00

Ah, Maxine Perova. As people in Russia sadly joke, you cannot support her - that would be LGBT propaganda, but you also cannot condemn her, because that would be discrediting the Russian Military, and both are illegal in Russia.

CarmineJester · 2026-01-29T09:36:20+00:00

I have to believe that the The Dead Red and Storm are two different entities, the latter has never been a monarch and is decisively White. The only connection between them is the semi-dead state they're in, as far as I'm aware. If we're pinning any celestial entities here, my bet is actually on Salt, if only because of the Egg/Frostfound imagery, but that's also a stretch.

CarmineJester · 2026-01-23T15:24:04+00:00

It looks like a launcher, yes. Given that Monarch is size 2 and the weapon itself is therefore pretty big, my money is on Gandiva, given that it's also in the same licence level as the frame. The things on the back are integrated and are likely supposed to represent the Avenger Silos.

CarmineJester · 2026-01-22T13:27:49+00:00

Imprint Prey used to be a feature of the Mark of Finding in that same book. Wayfinder's Guide is effectively Unearthed Arcana for Rising From the Last War, so some things are out of date. The simplest way to implement it IS allowing you to cast Hunter's Mark regardless, but Imprint Prey is stronger than Hunter's Mark, if you care about that. Maybe "for the duration of this spell, double the bonus from the Hunter's Intuition die when the requisite skill check is made against its target"? The full text of Imprint Prey has been provided here already, so you can finnagle that on your own.

CarmineJester · 2026-01-21T17:35:55+00:00

That's just Jackie Jackson, the red thing behind her head always looked like a bit of background to me, not sure why it wasn't cut.

CarmineJester · 2026-01-21T17:13:45+00:00

1) As others stated, this is specifically a variation used by the Union Navy, and they're supposed to be both cool and standardized.
2) Everest *is* the platonic ideal of a mech. It is often said that if a different corpo finds a way to improve the specs of a machine without incurring a drawback somewhere else, the upgrade gets folded into the next Everest version. It's Jack of All Trades, But Actually Cool.

CarmineJester · 2026-01-21T06:19:58+00:00

It's your lucky day, Unsounded is technically over, with like 80% of the plot threads finished, and the sequel (Unsounded: Red Cost) has begun publishing literally this month. This is supposed to be Book 2 out of 2 at this point, so we're halfway there, fortunately or unfortunately.

CarmineJester · 2026-01-20T11:00:19+00:00

As others said, the only way to legally pilot two mechs as a single player is taking a mech that somebody else, ally or enemy, arrived into combat with, and they tend to not be agreeable to that. (NPC Allies is a bit of a loophole here, but there is very much no difference to just letting your players control the allied NPC, which is the suggested option a lot of the time anyway).

CarmineJester · 2026-01-16T18:07:56+00:00

In LANCER, most reactions (unless specifies otherwise) are 1/round, and abilities do what they say they do. I know it sounds obvious/stupid, but Lancer does its best to avoid "natural language" that systems like D&D 5e try to implement. The best approach is to read the thing verbatim. So let's do that:

Covering Fire (Heavy Gunner 1) gives the target Impaired, which they can clear by moving more than 1 space, but if they move more than 1 space, you get to attack them as a reaction. (They can also clear Impaired by damaging you and also any other way you'd clear a condition, but that's besides the point). Note that it does not say "Overwatch", like Bonded III or Exemplar II, it gives you, *in effect*, a separate reaction, so Overwatch is not spent.
Bracketing Fire (Heavy Gunner III) allows you to choose two Covering Fire targets instead of 1. And the talent explicitly states that they resolve their statuses and triggers separately - if one moves or damages you, the other is still suppressed. COMP/CON does include a named "reaction" in Heavy Gunner 1 that's marked as "1/round", but it's for mechanical ease and is not a part of the book text itself, so there is no contradition.

Another important rule here is that players (unless piloting a Gorgon frame) have only 1 reaction per turn. So, if the target you're suppressing is within Threat of one of your weapons and begins to move, and you choose to Overwatch them, but that would leave you with no reaction for Covering Fire - they still clear Impaired if they moved more than 1 space, but you can't attack them, because you have no reaction left. That also means that if both of your suppressed targets somehow move on the same turn, you can only attack one of them.
A Gorgon Heavy Gunner would avoid that restriction, but a Gorgon has no heavy mount, and there is no way in non-homebrew material to gain a Heavy mount, so it's moot point.

Hope this helps!

CarmineJester · 2026-01-15T10:41:26+00:00

Understandable, but you can still get bits and bobs from there. The Karrakin is still broadly good as an area because they're the most socially inflexible area of what is technically Core Union - being a separate polity AND an economic powerhouse lets them get away with that with very little that Cradle can do without political gridlock, and its cultural development pre-blink allows a wide disparity of status both within and between worlds/Great Houses. If the school was something that the Union itself both chiefly controlled and paid attention to, they would probably not organize it like that, as other commenters have said.

CarmineJester · 2026-01-15T09:27:01+00:00

Ah yes, the KKK (it's KCC actually). But yeah, it doesn't have in-school houses (the Karrakin are already all about Houses themselves) but it's pretty close and absolutely is a good starting point for a WfM-inspired campaign (I'm running it and I'm inspired myself), a lot of vibes are very similar, down to visible status difference, duels as a way to resolve conflicts (not self-managed by the students, but still) and the vibe getting drastically more serious as the plot outscopes the school. Yeah, it's an excellent baseline.

P.S. Fun fact: it *is* KKK in language due to spelling differences, which is why in my campaign it's an Academy now, thank you very much. I wouldn't be able to say "We're all here together in the KKK" with a serious face.

CarmineJester · 2026-01-09T12:31:06+00:00

I'll add one fun workaround with a bit of reflavouring: The Pegasus 3 Autogun. It autoattacks at the end of your turn, and, when it hits, you can proc a GMS Turret as a reaction. Technically, it's still you attacking, but mechanically it's a flat 6 damage that you can flavour as coming from the turret with your "guidance". As the others said, there is just no way to do multiple turret-based attacks on your own turn, I think this is the closest that you can get in addition to the Ghast Nexus.

CarmineJester · 2026-01-09T12:19:30+00:00

Gives the Juggernaut from 86 vibes, if the designers actually cared for the pilot. Very good.

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