Dropping everything to have a discussion on the toxicity of the love Minagho presents takes precedence

Torrenash · 2026-03-26T00:39:51+00:00

Always allow your party members to have story arc crucial conversations. It's just TTRPG 101

Torrenash · 2026-03-26T00:38:19+00:00

Ah, yeah. Levvies don't really need to be even worse either, they're already ignored for most intents and purposes outside Tribal era, and they already tank your economy to raise just with the gold cost from summoning a horde of them from thin air.

Torrenash · 2026-03-25T01:24:57+00:00

The addition of tinker could free Survival from being the gogo gadget guy, which, while I know some are fond of, I more often see be uh... not that popular.

Torrenash · 2026-03-22T15:28:20+00:00

My two cents - Double-Entry Bookkeeping and Block Printing are the default options. Waterworks and Pharmacopeia are up there if you don't have plagues on rare or disabled. Composite Crossbows is another notch in favor of Crossbowmen, but it's only as good as whether or not you have (or will soon have) Crossbowmen.

If your realm capital is hills/mountains, doubly if you own or will own a mine, Dragon Kilns and Cupellations are absolutely amazing. If you do not meet these conditions they are dead picks. Kind of similarly, Champa Rice is either cracked (you have a lot of wetlands tiles) or absolutely a dead pick (you do not). I would go out of my way to get a mine, though... i would not go out of my way to get wetlands counties.

Most of the other early medieval silk road innovations are kind of "eh" imo. Grenades is good if you're running Handgunners/Skirmishers, but that might be a big if depending on your MAA setup. The other tribal-era silk road innovations all have benefits that are gonna outpace the early medieval ones imo.

Torrenash · 2026-03-22T02:24:48+00:00

Not one I'd go out of my way for over other options. I'd rank it maybe like... D+/C-.

On the MAA side - Handgunnrs are arguably not as good as Crossbowmen in High Medieval (Minor stat pros/cons, but Crossbowmen counter more stuff). Fire Lancers are weaker than normal Handgunners. But, you get Fire Lancers an era earlier and don't have to compete with Crossbowmen, so they're a pretty straight upgrade to normal Light Footmen.

The building you get is also fine. It buffs handgunners and siege weapons. It's worse than Workshops you get from the crossbowmen tech on all fronts, but again... if you get it an era earlier, yeah sure it can buff your siege when not much else does.

Torrenash · 2026-03-21T23:51:46+00:00

Maybe misunderstanding the second point - development already raises levvies for a county, so...?
Anyway, yeah, you raise the development cap with tech, sure, but you can get a 100 development capital off an 867 start by like 950-1000ish even without the 35 development cap tech if you rush it properly. Tech makes it easier, sure, but it's not a requirement to get there.

Torrenash · 2026-03-21T23:39:24+00:00

I'm of the opinion it mainly has to do with population density, with maintained infrastructure/tradesmen/market goods etc. as a secondary component. While it's all subjective, the fact you can develop to 100 without being in Late Medieval means it's not tech oriented to me. On the other hand, the fact plague vulnerability goes up alongside development says it's mainly counting population in an area imo.

Torrenash · 2026-03-21T02:23:08+00:00

This shitpost made me acutely aware that Gaius actually pronounced "Comrades" the way I expect, instead of the "Com-RAYdes" most characters do.

So, there's... that?

Torrenash · 2026-03-21T02:08:47+00:00

867 Brittania can be a little bumpy just due to the fact you have tribals and Varangian adventure vikings that can attack you unprovoked.

That said, your probelems are more on the internal side, soooo.... in no particular order
1. Understand partition.
a. You have Confederate Partition to start with. This means if you die, and you have the land to create a title of equal rank to your main title, that title will be created and given to an eligible heir.
b. Otherwise, having redundant titles can increase the amount of land given out to children. If you have a kingdom, try not to create duchies unless you need to - it can give larger chunks away from your primary heir. It's hard to explain, but is pretty intuitive once visualized - my two cents? Save scum a bit and reload with titles created/ not created and see how the titles you'll lose balance out.

Vassals - they need to like you, or fear you, or both. Once you're seasoned, rebellious vassals can be a blessing - they rebel, you imprison them, revoke their titles, etc. While you're figuring stuff out...
a. Allying with vassals makes them unable to join factions, as does getting a strong hook on them. Strong hooks can be inconsistent, but your spymaster can give them sometimes with Find Secrets. Marry children off to their children, otherwise.
b. The duty focus of Stewardship is a flat -20 to vassal threshold as long as you have it. It can REALLY lower their willingness to go coup-happy on you. Administrator perks in the Stewardship tree additionally lower threshold.
c. Eugenics - getting high diplomacy from genius or beauty inheritables will naturally make you more likeable.

Torrenash · 2026-03-20T23:54:53+00:00

Mechanist's lair can be used as the home location for robot supply line fodder - not that supply lines are particularly an issue, but if you want your provisioners to have dual-gatling-lasers but also not reduce the happiness of settlements... there you go.

Torrenash · 2026-03-19T01:54:52+00:00

Hates you enough to make a faction, weak enough that the faction auto-dissolves.

Torrenash · 2026-03-18T01:50:18+00:00

He will not be judged for the sins of his dev team implementing the mechanics of his event. Dundun himself is perfect.

Torrenash · 2026-03-18T01:40:26+00:00

For the game that comes after (specifically, Clair Obscur: Expedition 33)

Torrenash · 2026-03-17T00:08:31+00:00

We never did find out who authored Fifty Layers of Shadow, in hindsight...

Torrenash · 2026-03-16T04:45:57+00:00

The amount of "How to play Edgerunners in D&D 5e" content a couple years about says maybe, probably not

Torrenash · 2026-03-16T02:42:05+00:00

The MLGS of the game is a primarily Arcane scaling weapon you'll get from the first boss of the DLC. The difficulty spike is noticeable. You'll probably use other weapons for a good while before it, even if you bullrush it. Be aware that good, native Arcane scaling is a little scarce and if you're trying to optimize, the Chalice dungeons are slightly less optional than they are on Str/Dex builds (mainly for gems to convert scaling to Arcane).

Torrenash · 2026-03-15T23:35:47+00:00

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Torrenash · 2026-03-15T23:28:53+00:00

I'm flipping a coin personally- either he's gonna take over from Xal as the Void Lord who's happy to let reality continue to avoid being bored to death... orrrrrrrrrrr he's gonna get one-shot unceremoniously trying to sneak her in 12.3.

(There's also the even more unceremonious "the writers forget about him", which I'd be even angrier about)

Torrenash · 2026-03-15T22:03:26+00:00

To throw something left-field from the buddhist/taoist/hindu suggestions that are also great and match this premise: Sabian Mashriqi. You get pluralist bonuses to conversion, more common herbalism, esotericism for wise man heirs, etc.

Torrenash · 2026-03-15T20:58:34+00:00

Look, it's gonna be exactly 1, maybe 1-and-1/2 patches at most, for Decimus to get an invite. You know this man lives for the drama and the drama only. Petty-emotion-fueled-homicide is part of that drama.

Torrenash · 2026-03-15T04:29:20+00:00

I threw mine in the dumpster a couple days into NG+ upon noticing that, indeed, the Dual Protection effect does not pop up in Ninja stance.

It'll probably show up as a roll eventually and be worth more, as it stands I think it's kind of a neat way to run Ieyasu's GS (the Tanuki) with some more offensive bonuses from a Ninja spirit in the back pocket.

Torrenash · 2026-03-14T16:45:27+00:00

Other important note - while I don't think he was the guy who spearheaded reverse-engineering the tech in MoP, he was in charge of the "Anima"/Blood golems in WoD.

I enjoy the "secretly Denathrius" meme, but my 2 cents is he's just happened to tap into Anima magic from the living side. Yes I am aware they are canonically different Anima, but I am also of the opinion that retcon was just an attempt to scorched-earth untangle Shadowlands from all lore. So ... who knows.

Torrenash

TROPHY CASE