Part 9: 1329: Sacred Time

I guess I shouldn't be surprised that the people following the LP with fantasy and cows in the title know about the OG cow thief. Dad used to send me to sleep with stories about Cu Chulainn, because grandmother said we were direct descendants of the high king of Ireland. She said a lot of things like that, and cheated at cards.

Our clan will have to dig deep to live up to the standards of the greatest of the Saiyins Irish.




The choie I'm NOT leaving to you is how long to make the game. In a short game, when the prophet shows up instead of furthering the plot he congratulates you for having won the game. That's lame. In the Long Game (ours!) we must gain in wealth and influence, use the guidence of the gods to form several clans into a mighty tribe, then become elected king by the tribal council, rule justly for a period, and finally go on the greatest heroquest of them all to unite all of the tribes, friends and enemies alike, into a single great kingdom that rules Dragon Pass! That'll show the Pharaoh.

I'm putting it on normal difficulty. Hard just makes you start with fewer resources, which means the game is longer but not significantly more challenging. Weaksauce.



We built a clan hall, some steads, and a temple to Orlanth. But when we left Heortland, we lost much of our connection with the gods.

Other clans we knew back in Heortland also sent emigrants to Dragon Pass, so we already have friends and enemies in the new land.

It's now time for the annual allocation of our clan magic.

This is a picture of our tula. It's non-interactive, but by mousing over an element we can learn more about it... so I can learn that we have 105 hides of barley, wheat, and rye, enough for 753 people, while having 138 cotters to raise our sheep, 277 carls to tend to the cattle and harvest, 10 crafters to build goods for trade, 8 hunters to feed an astounding 16 people, 10 weaponthanes to defend our lands, and 28 nobles to sit around doing fuck-all. We also have a mighty herd of 750 cattle, which are the backbone of our economy and living testaments to our power and skill, as well as 1462 sheep, 1492 pigs, and 50 horses that no one's really impressed with.

The hill bears the mark of Orlanth, king of the gods, and the temple next to it is a moderately sized temple giving us two blessings. normally we'd get two small temples, but we chose Orlanth twice so go us. We're receiving the blessings of Rain for the crops and Lightning for killin' stuff.

That line about losing our connection to the gods means that we start the game with almost no magical rituals, no blessings, no knowledge of the history of our people beyond our clan's creation myth, and a largely unimpressed group of ancestors. We'll have to fix that.



The Orlanthi year is broken into ten months and two weeks--the ten months are five seasons. The excess two weeks are the first two weeks of the year: The Sacred Time. All work stops as every member of the clan comes together to pray, dance, and sing in honor of the gods. It is here our god-botherers use their magic for the good of the tribe.

Allot 2 to crop magic. Our herds are also important, so earmark 2 for them. Leave some magic available in case we need to call on the earth goddess.

Our clan magic would be stronger if our chief were a devotee of Orlanth.

We have not yet honored our clan diety by performing the heroquest of "Orlanth and Aroka."

Oh, shush, you're all fired as soon as sacred time is over, it's not like I'm going to listen to you.

What?

We don't even know the heroquest Orlanth and Aroka. Speaking of which, how did you even get to be chief? You clearly don't worship Orlanth. Those three horizontal lines say you worship Chalana Arroy, goddess of being a tremendous pussy.

Goddess of healing. And I demonstrated the greatest leadership potential of all of our thanes.

What the hell have the followers of Orlanth been doing with their time that you're the best we have?

Drinking heavily.



Well, it's clear our clan needs some help. Fortunately, we have goons on the job!

We have seven points to magic to spend. As you can see, we can only spend so many on each type of magic. Crops, Children, Herds, and Trade simply increase the amount of each you get. Health wards away illness, but you never know if you simply wouldn't have gotten ill at all. War strengthens every military action we take for the entire year. Quests make our heroquests more successful, which would be great if we knew any. Mysteries makes any attempt to learn the secrets of our gods more likely to succeed, but does nothing if we don't try to sacrifice specifically to learn new things. Diplomacy is important, as it helps close feuds and start friendships--we know literally nothing about our enemies among the clans, so it might be a good idea to end our feuds quickly before choosing a good pansy clan to raid the shit out of. Hunting helps our 8 hunters gather marginally more food. Compared with our hundreds of herdsmen and farmers--yech. And we can save magic to use in specific battles or events--a little bit of juice can help in some random events. However, saving magic specifically to use in war is inferior to spending on war during the sacred time.

As you can see, we can only put one point in war, because we have no devotee of a war god on our clan's ring. Likewise, a lot of gods of diplomacy are represented, so we can put two there.

Where shall our magic go?