Is the story not really making much sense?

[Magic Negro]

so i just finished act 1 and im kinda freely exploring act 2. ive been trying to roleplay a neutral lawful Tunons' loyal subject and im scratching my head at the way the story is unfolding.

so spoiler:
i chose the disfavored to lead the assault on the gate and the Voices of Nerat literally tried to attack me in the cutscene. so why is it after going back to Tunon he just never brings up the events and i cant accuse him or the chorus of treachery?

later on im seeing the scarlet chorus all over the place and they are interacting with me like nothing is wrong, you even find one in the disfavored camp settling some ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ dispute despite being in open war with each other.

furthermore, i get the game is trying to give you the option of turning on Kyros, but why are all the rebel factions declaring war on disfavored/choir, yet treat me like im some friend or ally when they talk to me FOR THE FIRST TIME.

the entire thing is a bit immersion breaking and i feel like im being railroaded into a rebel role, or at least if going some loyal route that im completely impotent

[fauxpas]

What you are missing is that the ONLY person loyal to Kyro is Tunon and possibly the Fatebinder.

Oh, and the Rebels if you join them and drag them kicking and screaming with you.

[LHGreen]

Hey, you said you wanted to be neutral. Well, now you're neutral.

Anyway, there's actually a whole bunch of diplomacy that goes into war, at certain stages. You've already conquered the weak and infighting-plagued nation, now it's about incorporating it into the empire and getting everyone to play nice with each other. Even the so-called civil war has the unusual circumstance of both sides involved being (ostensibly) loyal to the established order, or at least saying they are for the sake of appearances, and not splitting off and going against the whole rest of the government, too. It's kinda like different sects of the same religion, I guess. Or maybe like The Prophesy. You ever see that? After heaven won the war against hell, all the remaining angels split into one group that was loyal to god but wanted to destroy humanity, and the other group was loyal to god and wanted to spare humanity and leave it alone. It's like that. So, because of this strange and complicated situation (which I get the feeling isn't entirely unprecedented in this world), an arbitrator like Tunon is necessary. And as you are both Tunon's duly appointed representative and the member of the court with the most experience and background knowledge regarding the current circumstances, you've been ordered to investigate in order to help determine which side the government should officially support, and which side should be punished. Whichever side you claim to be working WITH, you are always working FOR Tunon and Kyros, and nobody's gonna ♥♥♥♥ with you if they don't deem it absolutely necessary for as long as that's the case. Whether you decide to stay loyal to Kyros or attempt to ACTUALLY go rogue is a choice you make much later. But you haven't actually gone rogue yet, even though you may feel like you are.

As for the railroading, yeah, you are very specifically being manipulated and railroaded by the evil overlord. You're specifically told in character creation that "you are by no means free, but as a representative of the courts, you are freer than most". What, did you think that was just for flavor? Nah, that's a game mechanic, buddy! This is life in a totalitarian dictatorship, not a wild-west-rules, fantasy-themed, no-man's-land of wilderness where the only law is at the tip of your sword! Go dungeon crawling in some other rpg if you want that ♥♥♥♥! This ain't tabletop night, ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥, this is Tyranny!

Anyway, you're living in a regime where every aspect of life that can be at all influenced by an outside force is under government control. You're meant to explore what a system like this is like, and how people live their lives in such a society. One theme that keeps popping up in subtle but ever-present ways is that no one can ever be something that the system, or the person running the system, actively doesn't want them to be, and it often dictates what they are on their behalf. The system is designed to oppress and control everyone for the alleged purposes of so-called "peace", and even the player character is always being manipulated and influenced by it. Whether that manipulation stops if you escape the system, or even if you actually can or ever do escape the system, is up for debate, (I have my own views of it, which are: no, it does not necessarily stop; yes, it's hypothetically possible, and a group of people alluded to at various points very well may have, albeit temporarily; no, regardless of your choice you never actually escape it, at least as the story stands now) but questions like that won't come up until later, anyway. So yeah, you are not the master of your own destiny, at least at first, and you'll notice a lot of push-back as you start showing the potential to become master of your own destiny. You're struggling within the system, both in terms of the story and the gameplay itself, and it's an excellent metaphor for how governmental and societal systems in the real world do this, too.

[Magic Negro]

but why would Tunon even need me to asses which archon/army is loyal or not. graven ashe did everything right and Voices of nerat literally attacked me (and by proxy Tunon) . they would be branded traitors on the spot or at least taken into custody during my investigation.

[fauxpas]

Originally posted by Magic Negro:

but why would Tunon even need me to asses which archon/army is loyal or not. graven ashe did everything right and Voices of nerat literally attacked me (and by proxy Tunon) . they would be branded traitors on the spot or at least taken into custody during my investigation.

You are either overly bias towards Ashe and against Neret and have chosen to ignore facts in evidence or aren't understanding what the investigation is about.


You were sent to force the Archons, who both had more than enough force to crush the Oathbreakers into action or to die trying (and I believe Kyros would have preferred the latter option as a simple clearing of the board) and instead found them both too involved in personal vendettas and corruption to follow Kyros' will, which is a pattern that both Tunon and Kyros noticed during the Conquest (probably before the Conquest if we are being honest, but I don't remember that being spelt out explicitly) and the scene where you choose one Archon over the other is worth replaying to see how both options play out.

[Magic Negro]

Perhaps i am overly biased towards Ashe because the two times they were in his tent together, Ashe would complain about tactical deficiencies while Voices would just use petty insults while "twirling his staff" to secretly talk to me (to direct more petty insults at him in my head).
obviously ill side with Voices in NG+ but saying they were both equally bad is false.

even now when i have the Trial of Archons quest, all the evidence against Ashe is either that his forces were unprepared or that his inferiors did something not related to his direct command, meanwhile Voices supplied all the rebel factions with weapons,armor and information

[LHGreen]

Ashe and Nerat may not be equally treacherous, but they are pretty much equally bad. They're both quite awful, even though Nerat is definitely crazier. By Kyros' metrics, they may very well be equally treacherous, but that's not really the point of the trial, is it?

Still, convicting an Archon is nothing like convicting a regular person, there's much more procedure involved, all kinds of gathering information and evidence to present, and Fatebinders don't really get to oversee a case in that situation, it's something only Tunon or Kyros ever adjudicate. There isn't necessarily always a trial, and usually it involves Bleden Mark performing his duties in a typically secretive, quiet, low-key sort of way, but there's also not usually an active war going on at the time, with armies and potential revolts in play.

This is a very delicate situation by itself, and it's happening within another extremely delicate situation. They can't risk the deployed armies AND everyone the realm that's back in the main part of the continent which that particular Archon rules suddenly rebelling and trying to stage a coup or seceding from the rest of the empire. They're trying to control their populace through perpetual war and conquest which THEY THEMSELVES have very carefully planned and orchestrated; having a war suddenly pop up in an already-subjugated region without any preparation for it, or having their well-trained and strategically-placed armies spontaneously switch sides in the war and completely eviscerate the entire campaign, is just chaos, which is the opposite of control!

And that's exactly what they're worried would happen if they try to execute either of those Archons without making damn sure that they do everything just right and that they can maintain control of those forces after the trial. The last thing the empire wants is some superhuman opponent who is not only a martyr, but also the direct object of the worship of said superhuman's own vassals. That's a double-whammy, to say the least, and it would quickly snowball into a potentially regime-ending ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥. Just the appearance of something like that is enough to kick-start and drive whole religions into becoming arguably the most dominant, far-reaching, and millennia-spanning world power that history has ever seen in the real world. Now try to imagine what it would be like if that were to actually, provably happen in this magic-laden fantasy world that only takes place on a single continent.

There would basically be no stopping something like that, unless Kyros has some sort of Edict of Spam-nesia that could be cast everywhere at once, but I doubt a "Big O" style reset of the entirety of known civilization could be in any way considered a favorable outcome for those in charge, given the way power works in this world. So, the best course of action is to investigate, THEN pass judgement. Shooting first and asking questions later is gonna backfire hard in a situation like this.




TL;DR: Bottom line, there's a lot of politics and diplomacy and subterfuge and all that good stuff involved, like I said earlier. You obviously don't get to be as powerful as Kyros and Tunon are by just stupidly charging into ♥♥♥♥ without thinking ♥♥♥♥ through.


P.S. TBH, this seems like something a lot of players have figured out pretty easily on their own, without having to ask about it. That's all just common sense, you know? There's a number of plot holes, loose ends, and nebulous, poorly fleshed-out, under-discussed, and/or contradictory details in this game's lore, when you dive deep into it and see that maybe the various people and teams involved hadn't all reached the same consensus before finishing and releasing the game. But you're obsessing over the one that isn't actually a story problem, it's just a case of the creators feeling that they didn't need to explain things any more thoroughly than they did, because they figured most people would catch on.

[fauxpas]

Originally posted by Magic Negro:

Perhaps i am overly biased towards Ashe because the two times they were in his tent together, Ashe would complain about tactical deficiencies while Voices would just use petty insults while "twirling his staff" to secretly talk to me (to direct more petty insults at him in my head).
obviously ill side with Voices in NG+ but saying they were both equally bad is false.

even now when i have the Trial of Archons quest, all the evidence against Ashe is either that his forces were unprepared or that his inferiors did something not related to his direct command, meanwhile Voices supplied all the rebel factions with weapons,armor and information

Ashe is definitely better at wringing his hands and making excuses; but you are ignoring the fact that the Chorus' complaints appear to be valid as well in the field, no matter how ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ insane Neret legitimately is.

[Anvos]

Originally posted by fauxpas:

Originally posted by Magic Negro:

but why would Tunon even need me to asses which archon/army is loyal or not. graven ashe did everything right and Voices of nerat literally attacked me (and by proxy Tunon) . they would be branded traitors on the spot or at least taken into custody during my investigation.

You are either overly bias towards Ashe and against Neret and have chosen to ignore facts in evidence or aren't understanding what the investigation is about.


You were sent to force the Archons, who both had more than enough force to crush the Oathbreakers into action or to die trying (and I believe Kyros would have preferred the latter option as a simple clearing of the board) and instead found them both too involved in personal vendettas and corruption to follow Kyros' will, which is a pattern that both Tunon and Kyros noticed during the Conquest (probably before the Conquest if we are being honest, but I don't remember that being spelt out explicitly) and the scene where you choose one Archon over the other is worth replaying to see how both options play out.

You really weren't paying attention. Ashe might have overstepped, fallen for Nerat's goading, and put the safety of Disfavored ahead of expediency, but Nerat was literally committing treason.

1. Verse and Barrik reveal Nerat had the Chorus sabotaging the Disfavored from the get go when the reason they know their siblings is because the Chorus was shooting down Disfavored messenger birds during the Bastard Tier Campaign.

2. Nerat literally organized having Iron arms fall into the hands of the Bronze armed rebels.

3. Nerat was literally giving the enemy Disfavored battle plans and at times having the Chorus arrive late to battles to hurt the Disfavored.

4. You can literally get the leader of the Vendrien Guard to admit Nerat was aiding her.

5. Not a crime the way Kyros words it, but the general lack of control Nerat allows over the Chorus creates rebellion, when his "army" acts more like marauders who continue to terrorize sections of the Tiers that are already controlled, disrupting restoring order for the Chorus' gain.

6. It becomes clear the Chorus blatantly only adheres to the law when it benefits them. Such as seen where a gang boss allows a Fatebinder to fight his crew and admits he was okay with his men dying until it doesn't end the way he wants, then he cares for the law.

7. Its quite clear the Chorus wasn't doing their job at Vendrien's Well when you literally have to convince or bribe them to do their roll to aid the Disfavored.

8. Just as much as the Disfavored prioritize their own safety ahead of the campaign the Chorus just as much if not more prioritizes "recruiting" over what is good for the campaign.

9. Nerat is the party in the wrong when moving in to end the Edict of Blades. Its just basic military strategy that the Disfavored being a professional well equipped army would be the core of the advance with Chorus providing back up. You want the army least likely to route at your core, that isn't the Chorus.

10. Again not a crime, but the Disfavored are literally easier to fix in a post conquest world. Once he submits to you Ashe even admits the concept of the Fatebinder creating a tiers army built upon Northern discipline to aid the Disfavored is a good idea.

[fauxpas]

Giving rebels free reign to operate in exchange for illegal prisoner exchanges; allowing Cairn to use WMD level force in order to weaken the Chorus by denying them recruits, throwing his troops away knowing an edict was coming, and trying to turn the Chorus' bread basket into a blighted ruin in order to starve the Chorus.


Both Archons are underhanded traitors and are undeserving of thier position under Kyros' Laws, which is why the conquest started to flater after the first year and stagnated after the second.

[LHGreen]

Originally posted by Anvos:

Originally posted by fauxpas:

You are either overly bias towards Ashe and against Neret and have chosen to ignore facts in evidence or aren't understanding what the investigation is about.


You were sent to force the Archons, who both had more than enough force to crush the Oathbreakers into action or to die trying (and I believe Kyros would have preferred the latter option as a simple clearing of the board) and instead found them both too involved in personal vendettas and corruption to follow Kyros' will, which is a pattern that both Tunon and Kyros noticed during the Conquest (probably before the Conquest if we are being honest, but I don't remember that being spelt out explicitly) and the scene where you choose one Archon over the other is worth replaying to see how both options play out.

You really weren't paying attention. Ashe might have overstepped, fallen for Nerat's goading, and put the safety of Disfavored ahead of expediency, but Nerat was literally committing treason.

1. Verse and Barrik reveal Nerat had the Chorus sabotaging the Disfavored from the get go when the reason they know their siblings is because the Chorus was shooting down Disfavored messenger birds during the Bastard Tier Campaign.

2. Nerat literally organized having Iron arms fall into the hands of the Bronze armed rebels.

3. Nerat was literally giving the enemy Disfavored battle plans and at times having the Chorus arrive late to battles to hurt the Disfavored.

4. You can literally get the leader of the Vendrien Guard to admit Nerat was aiding her.

5. Not a crime the way Kyros words it, but the general lack of control Nerat allows over the Chorus creates rebellion, when his "army" acts more like marauders who continue to terrorize sections of the Tiers that are already controlled, disrupting restoring order for the Chorus' gain.

6. It becomes clear the Chorus blatantly only adheres to the law when it benefits them. Such as seen where a gang boss allows a Fatebinder to fight his crew and admits he was okay with his men dying until it doesn't end the way he wants, then he cares for the law.

7. Its quite clear the Chorus wasn't doing their job at Vendrien's Well when you literally have to convince or bribe them to do their roll to aid the Disfavored.

8. Just as much as the Disfavored prioritize their own safety ahead of the campaign the Chorus just as much if not more prioritizes "recruiting" over what is good for the campaign.

9. Nerat is the party in the wrong when moving in to end the Edict of Blades. Its just basic military strategy that the Disfavored being a professional well equipped army would be the core of the advance with Chorus providing back up. You want the army least likely to route at your core, that isn't the Chorus.

10. Again not a crime, but the Disfavored are literally easier to fix in a post conquest world. Once he submits to you Ashe even admits the concept of the Fatebinder creating a tiers army built upon Northern discipline to aid the Disfavored is a good idea.

Those are YOUR definitions of treason, not Kyros' or Tunon's definitions, necessarily. You say treason, but maybe Nerat says diplomacy. He is a lot better at it than Ashe is, but pretty much everyone is better at diplomacy than Ashe is. You're forgetting that they aren't fighting a war of destruction, but a war of assimilation. They're try to conquer these people, not annihilate them. These aren't enemies, these are future friends, companions, allies, and loyal subjects, so you can't just treat them like enemies and that's it, despite what Ashe would have you think. Everything you described could be viewed as Nerat currying favor with the tiers, and slowly integrating them into Kyros' empire, which is what the approach has been for like the 50 or so years leading up to the war. That's when the actual start of the conquest was, when the tiers were slowly being acclimated to the empire's culture over the course of decades. The Fatebinder even points out in Act 1 that at this point, the military occupation is just a formality. As far as can be determined at first glance, Nerat's only fault is knowing well enough to play the good cop, and Ashe is too dumb to understand he's the bad cop. Ashe is the straight man, and the straight man doesn't always have to know he's the straight man; sometimes it's actually better if he doesn't.

For example, let's say Nerat comes down on them pretty hard and they don't break, so he goes "okay, if we're gonna be in this for the long haul, I'm gonna need to get some coffee", then he leaves and Ashe comes in and comes down on them WAY harder. Then Nerat steps in towards the end of the beatdown, pulls Ashe off and keeps him held back a bit, and goes "Oh, I'm so sorry for my partner, he has a temper and he gets like that, honestly I ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ hate working with him, it's just impossible because he's always like this. Look, I don't want this to keep going, so I'm gonna offer you a better deal, you just give us what we need and he goes away, you may never even see him again. Here, I got something from the vending machine outside, you can have it. Would you like some coffee? Let's just sit down and talk this out. Maybe you could work for me as an informant or something, there's always positions available, I'm sure we can come to some arrangement". And usually, whoever they're dealing with grabs desperately at this offer, as if they forgot that the good and bad cop work for the same system, and the same guy. The principle we have in this game is pretty much the same as that.

So is Nerat's being nice to and helping out and recruiting people in the tiers, even those who are opposed to him, really treason? Even real world legal theory allows for cops to pay CI's, do things while undercover that would otherwise be crimes, etc., and this is a ♥♥♥♥♥♥-up byzantine-law world, where only two people on the planet actually know what is and isn't illegal, or what does and doesn't constitute treason. So by their own metrics, and even by the real world's metrics, it's not as simple as you're making it out to be. As for how messed up the Chorus is, it's no wonder Nerat is so much more brutal and merciless towards his own army than he is towards any enemy army; he has to be the "good guy" all the time, if he ruled with anything less than an iron fist (in a tattered velvet glove, of course), they'd walk all over him. He can't afford to be compromising with them, so he set it up so that they can't afford to be compromising with each other, and that way they do a lot of his work for him. Appeal to their ego and power lust, structure your system so that only a few of them can rise to the top, just pit them against each other and watch them fight, keeping themselves in check so that you don't have to, and set them loose on the opposing army when those who can survive are strengthened by this.

Of course, none of this is an actual defense of Nerat, just an explanation of what he's doing and why the reaction to him is what it is. And yes, it turns out Nerat IS actually treasonous, because both he and Ashe are, in Kyros' eyes at least, and both of them are awful by any measure. They just both have their own methods and justifications and arguments as to how or why they're not, and they both point to and blame the other. You're not wrong about Nerat, per se, you're just not right about Ashe. The fact that you're actually in favor of or speaking out for one of them over the other just means that you fell for all the smoke and mirrors ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ that they've both set up. A surprising number of players do that, for some reason, even though everyone is told from the outset that both of these guys and the ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ they work for are evil and horrible and wrong, and no one in their right minds should actually be in support of any of these scumbags, let alone these two, specifically. Both of them are guilty, but justice doesn't actually matter in this world, just control. And you can convict either one of them, but holding one of them to account doesn't matter, just having a scapegoat.

I'm sure Kyros would have gotten around to killing them both, in time, but having a legitimate opponent that can be controlled (either willingly or unwillingly, doesn't matter), instead of just some ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ you can easily steamroll who only think they're a serious challenge, is a lot more useful if you need to keep people's aggression focused on some external target instead of pointed at the true cause of their outrage, namely the person in charge of them. I wish they had mentioned something about this in the Edict of Execution ending, instead of keeping it so incredibly vague as to what actually happened after it comes to pass rather than being prevented. I suspect Kyros followed Occulted Jade across the sea to wherever she ended up and started a new war there, eventually, but that would only be a guess.

[LHGreen]

Except for point number nine, which I didn't address, where you're just plain wrong. Given the Chorus's massive numbers and their inside knowledge of how tiers armies think and work, versus the Disfavored's far greater skill and discipline but lack of numbers and inside info, they're both equally likely to be routed, and which one to go with is basically a toss up. the Chorus may seem a less conventional choice, but it really is just six of one, half dozen of the other.

So let's see, in order that would be:
1. both sides are guilty of interfering with the other, as Faux already pointed out, so as an argument of one over the other, this doesn't hold up
2. diplomacy and response 1
3. diplomacy and response 1
4. diplomacy and response 1
5. not a real point for your argument, because Nerat can rule as he damn well pleases and he has his reasons, as I addressed
6. responses 5 and 1, and in the case you pointed out they actually did fully obey the law
7. response 1
8. diplomacy, which in this particular case IS good for the campaign
9. not a real point for your argument, as it's based on a fallacious assumption
10. response 9, plus that's you falling for Ashe's ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥, which I also addressed.

[Dorok]

If both are Kyros traitors, in many paths it's the concern of Fatebinder only for a Faithbinder blindly faithful to Kyros.

For me more relevant is the morale point of view.

I read Nerat is a kind guy but it's not the the game I played. Nerat has no morale only power objectives. That Ashe lost temper easily is insignificant in comparison.

At first there's no match, it's disfavored that win the morale debate, but when you dig more, it becomes less clear. Still there's close to no morale but only power focus for Chorus leader, when there's a high care of morale for Disfavored leader. The problem is the Disfavored morale code itself.

Still no morale at all can hardly be better than a wicked morale code. Chorus is no way more merciful, the real choice they offer is become slave or die, Disfavored kill traitors looks not worse to me. But with Beastmen it's slave or die for Chorus, and die only for Disfavored, that's what bring some balance the racism aspect of the Disfavored morale, still they have a morale code, there's none for Nerat or Chorus. Common Chorus even kill them each other and in back at night, and this is encouraged by their leader, that's pure no morale and pure evil. Be sure that in real life you'd prefer a lot more live among Disfavored than Chorus.

[LHGreen]

Originally posted by Dorok:

I read Nerat is a kind guy but it's not the the game I played.

No, not kind. Nice. Big difference. He's a nice guy, when he wants to be, but he is never kind.

[fauxpas]

Originally posted by LHGreen:

Originally posted by Dorok:

I read Nerat is a kind guy but it's not the the game I played.

No, not kind. Nice. Big difference. He's a nice guy, when he wants to be, but he is never kind.

And that is an important distinction.

[Anvos]

LHGreen you described Tunon not Nerat. Tunon is the one who used law and politics to turn a nation to loyalty to Kyros and imperial culture peacefully. What Nerat tried and did isn't that, and unlike Tunon, Nerat and the Chorus is the picture of abusing the law for personal gain. In the end even Tunon can be convinced the law needs reform, by somebody not stifled by Kyros' power, to make it better.

Nerat's spies and agents didn't achieve any meaningful support for Kyros. That it is so easy for Lantry to point out all the edits to the Chronicle that make the Tiers look more in favor of Kyros shows how jack squat Nerat achieved before. Let alone its heavily implied it was the Tiers own culture of infighting between the city states that made them an easy conquest.

The Chorus and Nerat are by no means the good cops, they turn civilians into rapists, murders, and pillagers, destroying the foundations need to restore order after a conquest, let alone their problems with feeding and equipping their army stem from this marauder mentality. Then lets add in that they continue to plunder the countryside of areas already under the empire's thumb.

Helping create and arm a rebellion isn't endearing yourself to the locals its just shooting your empire's cause in the foot for your own gain. Let alone Verse's story more less shows Nerat for the monster it is, where he seeks how he can use everybody under his authority for its own gain. Let alone how he essentially brain pans his eyes.

Let alone if you dig up the Lore of the last conquest there is a bit to imply that Nerat is doing this because their still holding a grudge at how well Ashe did against his previous Chorus in the north.

The Disfavored may be a blunt weapon but they are fair and when you accept their rule and laws your perfectly fine continuing on your civilian life as part of the support structure for their army. Nerat's system meanwhile only barely functions as long as they have another enemy to fight and steal from.

Calling racism an inherent bad thing in a setting where a different race isn't just a skin tone but an actual different creature is iffy. Let alone when said creature is naturally antithetical to your society. Beastmen literally can't grasp a non-tribal leadership system and their adaptions to fight bane have stunted their intellectual growth and ability to learn to use tools. Their a smart beast but not something you should be treating as an equal to humanity. Let alone I'd hardly call the Chorus' way of dealing with Beastmen as really any more merciful.

---------------------------------------------

Did Ashe go overboard salting the land with magic to break the Chorus sure, but the Edict had already wrecked its ability to go back to being the bread basket of the Tiers any time soon and if you ended the Edict of Storms and secured the Crossing there is ample land for the people of Azure to resettle in. Let alone the Chorus and Disfavored were in open war with each other since Vendrian's Well.