Aurelia

[kirill-busidow]

Aurelia, is she good or evil? What are her ultimate goals?
To create new empire and end constant conflicts or she wants land to become dead?
She wants to make world a better place or wants world to get worse?

I am conflicted, not sure if Aurelia goals and aims are just and noble or not.

[Ddraig Lleuad]

Ultimately whatever goals she talks about don't matter. Neither does the necromancy, to be frank. She's an empress reigning over an empire which aggressively expands by force of arms; that's evil. Anything beyond that is just icing on the cake.

[Jack Blaze]

Aurelia and all of the other factions are all in the grey area imo, can't really put em down as something simple like good and evil

They're all doing fückëd up shït and all of em have fairly/somewhat understandable reasons for doing so. My dislike of the Stouthearts notwithstanding

Originally posted by Ddraig Lleuad:

Ultimately whatever goals she talks about don't matter. Neither does the necromancy, to be frank. She's an empress reigning over an empire which aggressively expands by force of arms; that's evil. Anything beyond that is just icing on the cake.

Rana - Fückën Genocide on everything not Rana lol
Barya - Literal Slavery cuz muh Mercenary code lmao
Arleon - Every man and dog for himself + the strongest Barony are literal tyrant bästärds kek

Means of achieving all these goals?

Force of arms

Evil möthërfückërs, the lot of em

[Ddraig Lleuad]

Originally posted by Jack Blaze:

Rana - Fückën Genocide on everything not Rana lol
Barya - Literal Slavery cuz muh Mercenary code lmao
Arleon - Every man and dog for himself + the strongest Barony are literal tyrant bästärds kek

Means of achieving all these goals?

Force of arms

Evil möthërfückërs, the lot of em

Disagree. Rana are a bunch of escaped slaves who have, so far, reclaimed their ancestral swamplands and murdered a ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ of their oppressors. That's not evil. It could get real dodgy real fast depending on how far it goes, like if Rasc goes ahead and pursues the 'kill all humans' agenda beyond the swamps, but so far as I know it doesn't go that far yet, and there are some occasions where he comes across human settlements that he finds aren't slavers, and treats them reasonably enough, so he's not totally lumping all humans into the same bucket.

Barya I don't know the specifics, haven't done that campaign yet. History is replete with models of slavery, some of which are... not awful? Like they're not good by any means, but they're bad the way that being born on the bottom rung of any ancient society is bad, not revoltingly ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ like the Triangle Trade. Barya might well be a bunch of evil ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥, and certainly the ones enslaving Rana are going by the accounts in the early Rana campaign of getting worked to death in mines, but as a whole I'm prepared to reserve judgement.

Arleon likewise is more of a mess than evil. It's a bunch of feuding aristocrats prizing their honour. There's room for evil there, but I wouldn't call them evil on the whole, and it's not total 'every man and dog for himself' anarchy. Dunno what you mean by the strongest Barony being tyrant bastards either.

Like, ultimately the problem is not 'they achieve their goals through force of arms'. People invade and kill each other for all sorts of reasons, some of which can be righteous. But an expansionistic empire that's out to conquer its neighbours is never on the side of the angels. An empire, by definition, is a regime that conquers its periphery and plunders them for resources to enrich the imperial core; that's what an empire is. A bloody-handed bully snatching food off your plate so he can eat well enough to grow big muscles to show off how ripped he is, and keep everybody in line. They talk a lot about 'order' and 'progress', but it's all in service to their own enrichment. Rome built roads so its legions could march easily to crush rebellions and ensure the taxes were paid on time, that's all.

[Metro]

Originally posted by Ddraig Lleuad:

Originally posted by Jack Blaze:

Rana - Fückën Genocide on everything not Rana lol
Barya - Literal Slavery cuz muh Mercenary code lmao
Arleon - Every man and dog for himself + the strongest Barony are literal tyrant bästärds kek

Means of achieving all these goals?

Force of arms

Evil möthërfückërs, the lot of em

Disagree. Rana are a bunch of escaped slaves who have, so far, reclaimed their ancestral swamplands and murdered a ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ of their oppressors. That's not evil. It could get real dodgy real fast depending on how far it goes, like if Rasc goes ahead and pursues the 'kill all humans' agenda beyond the swamps, but so far as I know it doesn't go that far yet, and there are some occasions where he comes across human settlements that he finds aren't slavers, and treats them reasonably enough, so he's not totally lumping all humans into the same bucket.

Barya I don't know the specifics, haven't done that campaign yet. History is replete with models of slavery, some of which are... not awful? Like they're not good by any means, but they're bad the way that being born on the bottom rung of any ancient society is bad, not revoltingly ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ like the Triangle Trade. Barya might well be a bunch of evil ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥, and certainly the ones enslaving Rana are going by the accounts in the early Rana campaign of getting worked to death in mines, but as a whole I'm prepared to reserve judgement.

Arleon likewise is more of a mess than evil. It's a bunch of feuding aristocrats prizing their honour. There's room for evil there, but I wouldn't call them evil on the whole, and it's not total 'every man and dog for himself' anarchy. Dunno what you mean by the strongest Barony being tyrant bastards either.

Like, ultimately the problem is not 'they achieve their goals through force of arms'. People invade and kill each other for all sorts of reasons, some of which can be righteous. But an expansionistic empire that's out to conquer its neighbours is never on the side of the angels. An empire, by definition, is a regime that conquers its periphery and plunders them for resources to enrich the imperial core; that's what an empire is. A bloody-handed bully snatching food off your plate so he can eat well enough to grow big muscles to show off how ripped he is, and keep everybody in line. They talk a lot about 'order' and 'progress', but it's all in service to their own enrichment. Rome built roads so its legions could march easily to crush rebellions and ensure the taxes were paid on time, that's all.

Dude did you even read the dialogue in the Rana campaing?
Everyone describe their past as a very agressive and genocidal empire (until Aurelia came with her beacons). it took the combine forces of almost every non Rana species to defeat them (Harima, Human, Faey).
I feel that Baryans only keep as slaves out of spite for what they did on the past.
Aurelia just feels like a case of control freak and even the Gaye Queen seems a bit sus to me

[Ddraig Lleuad]

Originally posted by Metro:

Dude did you even read the dialogue in the Rana campaing?
Everyone describe their past as a very agressive and genocidal empire (until Aurelia came with her beacons). it took the combine forces of almost every non Rana species to defeat them (Harima, Human, Faey).
I feel that Baryans only keep as slaves out of spite for what they did on the past.
Aurelia just feels like a case of control freak and even the Gaye Queen seems a bit sus to me

I did, yes. Setting aside that this is the history being told by the people who won that war and now see their old enemies resurging, with a vested interest in not letting the people they crushed get their own back - even assuming the story they tell is accurate, that was the Rana of then. As well to blame the baronies of Arleon for being descended from the conquering Aurelian empire.

No, I'm more interested in the Rana of now, and the Rana of now hinge on Rasc's decisions. Rasc could easily go down a similar route, he certainly talks a 'kill all humans' line enough that he Does Me A Concern, but his grievances are legitimate, and there are enough times when he treats non-slaving humans fairly that I'm willing to give him the benefit of the doubt.

[div.ide]

On Aurelia's side, there's little to redeem the fact that necromancy is uh... let's call it an extreme measure to meet an end. Hard to say much good about that no matter how you movtivate it.

And while the oath can only be taken completely voluntarily, intentionally and consciously, the end result (mindless hordes of no longer self-conscious undead) puts in question the intent behind the design. To my knowledge it's currently up in the air whether undead losing their sense of selves is a result of malfuctioning magic with time-worn infrastructure (beacons etc.) or if it was by design in the first place. On that note I can't tell if Aurelia's the intent was leaning on benevolent or malevolent side, and if the end goal was utopia or tyranny. I think that is intentionally open ended and up to interpretation. Still, her goals are undeniably imperialistic, and that's not exactly very saintly regardless of intent.

Then, we have Barya the lawful stupid merchant/merc state, and Arleon the feudal stupid lawful (courtesy mainly of the Stouthearts), which while clashing systems, to an extent strike me as surprisingly similar under the hood, if using quite different means to the similar ends.

Barya in their stubborn honor before reason act gets repeatedly caught up being a paid muscle in other faction's messes and unwittingly making things worse for everyone. While on that side there seems to be no ill intent (mostly shortsightedness), their explicit kidnapping and slavery of Rana is on the darker side. Their concept of indebted may also be up to debate.

Arleon is just a bunch of baronies stuck in political feud, and together with fey they compulsively take the forceful approach refusing to listen to anyone about anything becuase might makes right and you're my turf. They're about as bad as their leaders are egocentric and immune to compromise. Stouthearts in particular being heavy-handed with Hammonds and Silkspool stoke more conflict than necessary out of pride and inexperience.

Rana get some pity points from the start with their slavery and breaking the chains, but by the end of campaign they go above and beyond reestablishing themselves and venture out of their marsh - not for freedom, but for vengeance. There's several explicit expressions of intent to push out humans from entire continent completely and permanently, and for epilogue we're served with Rasc looking at Barya's lands all my work here is not yet done like. They do have some undertones of genocidal rage (the marsh expands and all that), even if provoked in recent times.
Little tidbits about their past from other campaigns also paint Rana as a force of nature that ravaged lands once before, casually resorts to complete (literally) scorched earth, allegedly hunted Harima for sport and/or snacks, considers themselves (eth'dra and dragons) the pinnacle of evolution and everyone else inferior, and was among reasons why beacons were constructed and oath designed in the first place. All of that ties into motivations of other factions to suppress Rana from all sides so forcefully. Though the present Rana know little to nothing about that.

Moral grey area all around.

[Ddraig Lleuad]

Originally posted by div.ide:

On Aurelia's side, there's little to redeem the fact that necromancy is uh... let's call it an extreme measure to meet an end. Hard to say much good about that no matter how you movtivate it.

To be honest, I've always had trouble viewing necromancy as having a moral dimension, in itself. So many fictional works that use it trade on the simple expectation of undead = spooky = evil, and I've never been able to quite take that for granted.

If you don't take it for granted that reanimating the dead is Bad, then what's actually evil about necromancy? And that's not such an out-there question to ask. In a fantasy setting where necromancers are running around speaking to the dead, you could have all kinds of cultural ideas about what happens to your body after death even without drawing on real-world traditions of ancestor worship, which can easily translate to venerating the dead as guardian ancestors rising to safeguard the living. But usually there's no acknowledgement of any of this, it just goes as far as, 'they're using a stock spook as a minion, therefore Bad Guys'.

It's part, I think, of why you can see a steady recurring of people trying to homebrew neutral necromancers into their favourite fantasy settings - along, of course, with the aesthetic appeal of being None More Goth.

One of the things I really like about Songs of Conquest is the way some genius of a writer managed to short-circuit the whole debate with the Barony of Loth by making them ideological necromancers as well as mystical ones. It fits so incredibly well, I'm shocked I haven't run into it before - of course necromancers are as obsessed with the legends of the past as they are with exhuming the bones of the dead. When you're the type of person to not just dig up graves but invest the act with mystical significance, then what is history but another tomb to plunder? They're the type of people who yearn for a nostalgic golden age that never was, given the power to literally reanimate The Good Old Days to wage war on the present!

[zastcat]

Originally posted by Ddraig Lleuad:

To be honest, I've always had trouble viewing necromancy as having a moral dimension, in itself. So many fictional works that use it trade on the simple expectation of undead = spooky = evil, and I've never been able to quite take for granted.

If you don't take it for granted that reanimating the dead is Bad, then what's actually evil about necromancy? And that's not such an out-there question to ask. In a fantasy setting where necromancers are running around speaking to the dead, you could have all kinds of cultural ideas about what happens to your body after death even without drawing on real-world traditions of ancestor worship, which can easily translate to venerating the dead as guardian ancestors rising to safeguard the living. But usually there's no acknowledgement of any of this, it just goes as far as, 'they're using a stock spook as a minion, therefore Bad Guys'.

to complicate things further, d&d (the thing a bunch of modern fantasy uses as an easy baseline understanding to draw from) had healing spells and resurrection classed under necromancy for a while before moving it to untyped or conjuration magic later, only the act of actually making undead (which in universe was more because it involved messing up something's soul) was inherently "evil" and even then there were cases of undead that were actually meant to be seen as benevolent guardians

"they have undead, they're the bad guy" really is mostly an aesthetics thing and usually relies on the point of the undead being mindless or some background detail to justify it after the fact

It's part, I think, of why you can see a steady recurring of people trying to homebrew neutral necromancers into their favourite fantasy settings - along, of course, with the aesthetic appeal of being None More Goth.

One of the things I really like about Songs of Conquest is the way some genius of a writer managed to short-circuit the whole debate with the Barony of Loth by making them ideological necromancers as well as mystical ones. It fits so incredibly well, I'm shocked I haven't run into it before - of course necromancers are as obsessed with the legends of the past as they are with exhuming the bones of the dead. When you're the type of person to not just dig up graves but invest the act with mystical significance, then what is history but another tomb to plunder? They're the type of people who yearn for a nostalgic golden age that never was, given the power to literally reanimate The Good Old Days to wage war on the present!

fairly sure that has been done before in a few places, in fact "historian/archeologist uses necromancy to find out ancient secrets" isn't even that uncommon of a villain thing, albeit usually on a more individual level than cultural

in my opinion that's partly because necromancy as usually portrayed in media is more about holding on to power and refusing to let it go than trying to bring back or fully realize some idealized past, you get more liches who were the best magic users of their age and refuse to die than apprentices who keep hearing stories about old experts and decide to bring them back to see it in person

most of the "we will recapture the (exaggerated) glory of the past" factions in fiction are more akin to successor states, they base their authority and grandeur on that (false) image of greatness and some usually falsified connection to the people in charge at the time to justify reconquering the land that former empire used to hold, and part of maintaining that image is playing up the bright shining aesthetic they want their predecessors remembered for and not...well... "spooky zombies and skeletons with decaying clothes and rusted equipment"

[div.ide]

To reiterate, I didn't make a "necromancy bad" claim, just that it is an extreme measure and those are always gray area (no way to paint it as good). Plus, what I find interesting and refreshing, all people involved in the oath signed up on their own volition, in contrast to more run off the mill approach of enforced compellment. Cool stuff. My point of contention is whether what they got is what they signed for (unclear). And the imperialism.

For clarity, in this context I'm referring to just the act of animating the dead rather than entire magic school of necromancy.

I can agree on Loth being the most interesting faction on the side of their goals and motivations. Maybe, in a twist of irony, one of the more sane and consistent too.

[Greedygreen]

Most of the argument boils down to this is my land or this land belonged to us hundreds of years ago (kinda ironic since the latter is a reason (allegedly) some of the current wars are happening)

So yeah, this is less about good or evil and more about the ownership of the land, you can even meet villagers caught in the crossfire that are not willing to be part of this but still forced to do so by some wielders (*cough*Cecilia*cough*)
or plainly just attacked for living in the land that apparently belonged to someone else

In a way it's like 40k

[Imry von Larisch]

Just want to leave the comment because this is most entertaining discussion I found about the game so far. I love this lore ♥♥♥♥. That's why I like ambiguous writing even tho lots of old school players complain about writing, like, oh HoMaM used to be campy, we had fairies and ♥♥♥♥, this is bad. But then I see discussion like this and my interest in story doubles. Please to on.

TLDR: entertain me my little monkeys

[Jacobheder]

while i am admitely very biased, i would say she is lawful neutral. her goal is the same as unseen and loth which is the restoration of the Aurelian empire. this would in a way be world conquest, at least of the so far known world but she is willing to cede territory to the rana if they will keep to their swamps. though she did also say that dragon bones are needed to fix the beacons so how long such an agreement would last is unceirtan. overall id say that her aims and goals are the best for all, excludeing the faye and the rana. we will see how it is with the future factions.

regarding necromancy it is somewhat unclear just how severe of an impact it has on the world. on one hand we have the visual effect and i think some descriptions but on the other the loth money building is a farm, while this could obviously just be due to gameplay it does hint that it could not adversly affect aggriculture and the like too much. not killing the world "mearly" twisting it.

the oath and its effects we learn in the loth campaign that there have been several iterations of the oath (from corals notes in mission 2) and we are told by some scholars in mission 4 that it was allways the intent that the oathbound should return with their minds intact and not only being driven by their purpose as most currently are. i think aurelia said in mission 3 or 4 that she will have coral and wiesh work on fixing the oath but i am unceirtan. i have not played the barya campaign yet and do not know how the oath is talked about in the other campaigns. the whole timeline regarding the oath is a bit unclear so as far as i know the oatbound are like this due to being cut of from aurelia for so long and/or the last version coral and wiesh managed to create before aurelia died was still flawed and without her powers they could not really fix it.

so what would an aurelian victory bring. well she would spread undeath and necromancy througout the lands but as said it is a bit unceirtan just how severe of an effect it would have, and it is also likely that if possible they would try to fix this aswell. in return for that the wars between the baronies and the city states would end, since they all get annexed by the empire. the tireless march of the fully consious legions would viritually end the danger bandits, other criminal groups and wild animals, or they would be obliterated by the empresses power. unity, order and stability which is about the most pepole could ask for in the world we see, all made better if they fully manage to return the golden years of the empire. it woud as said likely be the best outcome for humans and harima, especially with the looming threat of the dragon empire returning with a vengance.

but the truely best result of of her victory would be the TOTAL ERADICATION OF THE FAYE! f++k em and ethylle in particular. she and barya are the reason the world is even in this state in the first place.

in short Aurelia is the best for (most of) the world. togeather for her.

[Jack Blaze]

Originally posted by Jacobheder:

but the truely best result of of her victory would be the TOTAL ERADICATION OF THE FAYE! f++k em and ethylle in particular. she and barya are the reason the world is even in this state in the first place.

in short Aurelia is the best for (most of) the world. togeather for her.

Amen to all of that, you giga based brudda

Together for her

Though, I'm not entirely sure how Barya themselves are to blame for the current state of the world since from my understanding, they were just one of the factions that broke off after the OG Empire fell far as that initial chaotic period goes

That said, the way their Mercenary Code works means that they should have been used to cause far more of a mess than they did in the shown on-screen time period. That thing is so easily exploitable it ain't even funny

Fück Ethylle tho, dumb goat caused pretty much the entirety of the mess that lead to the fall of the OG Empire and left the world in more or less the same shït state it was in to begin with

[Jacobheder]

Originally posted by Jack Blaze:

Originally posted by Jacobheder:

but the truely best result of of her victory would be the TOTAL ERADICATION OF THE FAYE! f++k em and ethylle in particular. she and barya are the reason the world is even in this state in the first place.

in short Aurelia is the best for (most of) the world. togeather for her.

Amen to all of that, you giga based brudda

Together for her

Though, I'm not entirely sure how Barya themselves are to blame for the current state of the world since from my understanding, they were just one of the factions that broke off after the OG Empire fell far as that initial chaotic period goes

That said, the way their Mercenary Code works means that they should have been used to cause far more of a mess than they did in the shown on-screen time period. That thing is so easily exploitable it ain't even funny

Fück Ethylle tho, dumb goat caused pretty much the entirety of the mess that lead to the fall of the OG Empire and left the world in more or less the same shït state it was in to begin with

the barya thing is a bit of a hyperbole and i meant the now state of the world, with all factions that raises and the story. it is mainly due to silkspool and bihgli but primarily the former. as we know silkspool is the reason the rask got free and thus rana uprising and the return of the dragons in on them.
and at the start of loth mission 2 ambertina tells us she got the crest of the legions thanks to baryan mercs, which is actually the story of the first 2 missions in the barya campaign, for while i have not played it i have watched the post mission songs on youtube. and bihgli did this because he was told to do this by silkspool since he owed him.

hence barya is resposible both for the return of the dragons and the GLORIOUS RETURN OF THE AURELIAN EMPIRE, or in other words the undead being a thing.

[DonPete]

To be more specific, the people hate the rana come from the dragons who are also rana. Aurelia waged war with the dragons because they killed her son. After she won with the beacons (and survived) she sought to become eternal.
Harima seem to have some sort of genetic memory since they remember vividly how the dragons hunted and ate them for sport which is why they hate the rana, the humans in the lands of arleon descent from the Aurelian empire. Aurelia does care for her people and wants to restore the glory of her time. Aurelia at some point does start working the oath, which is flawed in its current itteration and will cause memory loss, she never got to perfect it because she got killed. Now we have the queen of the faey that we can assume shes a bit suspicious since she killed Aurelia her creator then her husband who was carrying her ashes. Even she agrees that the dragons had to go, sadly the froglins being rana are also hated because of this.