Part 71: Governor Boris and The Bad Decisions

Governor Boris and The Bad Decisions

Welcome back! Last time on Tyranny, we got owned by my ineptitude playing melee characters. Thus, I am taking the following drastic action to improve my build:



Look, I'll be honest with you guys. I'm getting kind of burned out on Tyranny as despite the route there's still enough of the same dungeons and grind to go. I will finish this LP, but if I have to do all the combat again with actual time and effort there's a high chance I quit. We're mostly interested in the story anyway, and I already showed off how to beat the game on hard. One of these days I will LP a game with good combat. This is not that day



Autosave took us back to the beginning of the area, so we have to kill Teodor and do Elia's dumb bullshit all over again.



Incidentally telling Teodor that we're not here to fight gets him to act all smug and attack, avoiding fear with Barik and letting us just murder him.



We can taunt Jacomus as well, but we just get an interjection before he continues on his spiel.



He's not wrong that as a Scarlet Chorus member, we don't give a fuck about any of that, but the alternative the Disfavored present is just paying lip service to those ideals and using them to send idealistic teenagers off to die.



The game plays itself on Story Mode, which is great, as it gives me more time to fend off Lugosi the cat's rude attempts to reschedule Feeding Time an hour early.



Here's Sirin's combo move.



It levitates up this rock, which explodes in midair. Unfortunately for us, we don't really care.





You know, this is going a lot better than last time.

: You were looking for an artifact, right?

: Aye, and we've been searching for some time. She glances around with evident exhaustion. You try finding anything useful in this garbage heap.



: What is the Steadfast Insignia?

: It's a symbol of Stalwart's determination in battle. Before the war, Regent Aspison wore it pinned to his cloak, and his soldiers grew more daring on the battlefield when they saw him enter the fray.



: What did you learn about the Regent?

: We were looking for the Regent's body. Instead we found records of his past movements. Just after the Edict hit, he was on his way to what we now know is a breach in the Oldwalls. I couldn't say what he thought he would find there, except its wild dwellers and an early death. She frowns at the thought. If he planned on unleashing the Bane on the Disfavored, I might have told him he was as dumb as Ashe's hammer.





: Do you know anything about Ashe's daughter, Amelia?



: So, where do you go from here?

: Away from Rust Canyons. I received word that there are still Disfavored in the area, but it sounds like the legion is in full retreat. I doubt they're in any hurry to feed more bodies to the storm.



Anyway, Elia is perfectly happy to continue being a member of the Unbroken to do...stuff... after Mattias joins the Chorus, and she and the party just go their separate, awkward ways.



It's cool, we'll just loot the sacred artifacts that prove rulership of your nation and you guys can chill leaderlessly in Trash Fort.



: How do I get to the local Spire?



: Farewell.




We've seen this dungeon before. You go in, you fuck around collecting four keystones, you release a Havoc Bane and kill it to get to the Regent's body. I'm not gonna mess around with it too much.



We have this encounter with a merchant lady who's happy to sell to a Fatebinder, but all her inventory is healing potions and a spell reflection potion that would be moderately interesting if it didn't put all the healing potions on cooldown. Next!



We are forced to kill these guys again. They have different dialog as we can try to persuade them to join the Chorus, and they refuse because they're not idiots and/or people with personality disorders.



They die, we meet the Sage, he sends us to get the Keystone, yadda yadda yadda Bane fight boredom. A few things are a bit different in the dungeon, but not too many.



Lantry interjects because he's the knowledgeable guy. Of course, he doesn't have much to say that's really insightful here, but you want to take him to this dungeon to decipher the spell runes on the walls.





This actually goes into our journal as our first piece of evidence against Graven Ashe. Tunon will then turn around and point out that WE broke the law by going into the Oldwalls. Oh well!



Traps also work on enemies! This place is infested with them to make exploring even more tedious.



Imagine a bunch of Bane fights offscreen.



Also, we grab the Spire. I turn it into a Forge to make shit for Boris and co.



Get torchkey. Click stand. I have yet to see compelling dungeon mechanics in these kinds of games.



I missed grabbing this sigil last playthough but it's in the room with the Gravebow. Bring Lantry!



One tedious collectathon later and here we are. I throw up the buffs.



We kill it pretty easily as we're on permanoob difficulty.



Oh FUCK YOU! I send a refusal on the grounds that the DLC was legitimately awful.



This man obstructs our way and dies for the cause of giving Boris a new sword.



Grab Dauntless and give it to Barik.



Back to Sentinel Stand! Things are going to go very differently this time.



For one, Rumalan isn't a complete and utter moron this time!



: Janos, your own leader has conscripted to the Chorus. You should join him.

: N-never! I'd die before I took orders from the howling mob. Janos darts his attention between you and Rumalan.

You don't sound too convincing there, buddy.

: It may yet come to that, fool. She turns to you. Has the Scarlet Chorus given you a name yet, traitor? Has the gang taken turns breaking you in with their sick initiation rites?

Lady, considering that both the Forge-bound deserter and Barik talk about how much you Disfavored fuck each other I'm not sure you really are in a place to kink shame.

: No matter. You'll be dead soon enough, and what remains of Stalwart will be under our control. Rumalan falls back behind the bridge with her troops.

The fascists having women commanders is kind of weird if you think about it - in Nazi Germany, Rumalan here would be told to go home and have babies for the fatherland, and they had all kinds of medals and shit for having kids. Here Rumalan is yelling at us for sexual deviancy and commanding men in combat. I get what they're going for, they want to show that Kyros has a few things on the surface you can point to as being really cool (gender equality! Free food!) and to show the Disfavored as extremely incestuous. I just can't think of any real world fascists off the top of my head who would put women into these positions.




Janos dies like a chump again.



Jagged Remedy is here, and he provides us the way in - while we fuck around in front of the drawbridge, he and his men will sabotage it so we can get in.

: May the Chorus sing of our bloodshed.



The question we keep dancing around for this segment is who would willingly join the Scarlet Chorus?

You can go in with the intent of using them, but at the end of the day they'll drag you down with you despite you supposedly knowing what you're getting into.



Anyway, they can shoot the drawbridge rope with an arrow which makes me wonder why the Anarchy path wastes your time with Rumalan sacrificing her patrols. Moving on!



Tyranny combat but Jagged Remedy and one of his Blood Chanters help out as well. It's a lot faster in Story Mode.



We've seen this before. The power to defeat Kyros was in Stalwart all along. Oops!



: Take us to Straydus Herodin! Barik advances on the guard with a menacing air. I don't want to hear any more of your petty threats or how much you loves your country. Deliver us the serpent at the heart of this nest!

Whoa there, big boy! I just watch the storm all day. Straydus is behind the walls. She glances in your direction with wonder.

: [Athletics 51] [Roar over the volume of the storm]



I completely missed the bottom option, but Boris knows no mercy!



They die.





: You look presentable after a year in isolation.



I was going to omit this, but this line of dialog gives us more insight into how much of a fuckup Herodin is. We only really see two regents, and one's the idiot who takes the item that could break an Edict into the Oldwalls to do something stupid, and the other is Herodin who is an absolutely worthless leader.





It's funny, because Barik is in his current position because of Ashe and his orders to march into the storm we personally warned everyone to stay out of. Barik's not wrong, but he's not smart enough - or not comfortable enough - to put two and two together that Ashe doesn't care about him, even as Ashe confesses he hates his men on his deathbed.



We've seen all this before. We want to take the first option to get another piece of evidence against Graven Ashe so Tunon will execute his ass.

: The Voices of Nerat has no desire to end the Edict. Surrender and live.

: As if I would put my safety, or my people, into the hands of that creature? Herodin shakes his head. I know enough of his atrocities without subjecting myself to them. He would no doubt torture me into a mindless stupor, an echo of life for his enjoyment.



We've seen the rest of this. Herodin is absolutely correct that Nerat would devastate him and his people, but it's hard for me to describe him as anything resembling a good leader, and that's kind of the point. His poor leadership has driven the Unbroken right into the arms of Nerat.

: I've come on behalf of the Scarlet Chorus to deliver the terms of surrender.

: Then it's to be conscription and interrogation? Straydus nods and sighs. I suspected the Archon of Secrets would come for me eventually.



We proceed as normally and kill our way through the courtyard, blah blah blah.



The Scarlet Chorus busts in to help us out and doesn't change too much. We still have to punch our way through to the throne room.



Jagged Remedy and Mattias are already here to talk to Herodin, and things are going to get significantly more interesting.

: My elite soldiers, absorbed into the Voices of Nerat's slave army? He chuckles, but there's a lining of unease to it. The Scarlet Chorus will never control Sentinel Stand! This is the house of Regents - not the squatting den of your verminous gangs.

Of course, Herodin has already lost. Herodin loses every route. Even on the rebel route, recruiting the Unbroken to your personal army requires Herodin's death. Herodin lost as soon as he went along with the Edict and inflicted vast suffering on Stalwart to live in his cushy castle and hoard all the food.

: I came here to kill the Regent, not to conscript him! Mattias growls and looks at Jagged Remedy. You lied to me.

I am shocked, I tell you. What a moron.



: The Regent holds his weapon firm, but Jagged Remedy's words leave him troubled. Stay back, I tell you! The Voices will have to seek his amusement elsewhere. I refuse to become a servant of Kyros.



: Last chance, Straydus. Surrender Amelia and we might show mercy.





While Mattias is a dumb idiot who believed our promise of a kindler, gentler Scarlet Chorus and became internationally known as a poopy pants for his efforts, Herodin is smart enough to realize that the Chorus will never offer him anything beneficial. Unfortunately, he's doomed himself with his own shitty leadership.

: This is my seat of power, and I will not hand it over to the likes of upstart brigands!

A little revealing there! It's hard for any of us to take seriously that Herodin is acting in the best interests of his people by hoarding all the food and abandoning the nation to Kyros' storms, and at the end he just states he wants the power.





I let the game play itself while I play ball with Lugosi the cat.



: Straydus, I'm not above dragging you mangled and shrieking back to Cacophony. If you think this is finished, you quite mistake the matter.



: One of Straydus' soldiers moves between you and Herodin, tearing off her helmet. I won't let you do this!



If you haven't noticed from Sirin's interjections, this is going to go very, very wrong.

: I've come to take you away from Sentinel Stand.

: As if I needed your help? She huffs. I've been here for a year and then some. If I wanted to leave, not even Kyros would have been able to stop me.

Well that's some blasphemy right there.

: I'm not the Northern warlord I once was. She winces at the very thought. Sitting out the conflict made me see this conquest from a different perspective.



Amelia tries to convince us to do the right thing.

We are willingly working for a man who impales people on spikes. We are not going to do the right thing.



: Fighting for the Regent is treason.



She's not wrong! The problem is that she also has no leg to stand on, because instead of doing anything about this she hid in the castle and hoarded all the food with the Regent. I will give her a pass on the food thing as she's a nursing mother, but still...

: My father... Her voice catches, and it takes a moment to find her words. I love my father, but it's nothing compared to the love I felt for the father of-





: Too bad my orders didn't specify mercy.



If you're noticing the pattern of "we gain favor for becoming more like the Chorus" that's kind of the point.

: Amelia, stop! Straydus winces, hardly possessing the energy to argue. You have to keep your promise. Remember?



Amelia runs off again.







: Mattias, take the vengeance you were denied. Kill the Regent.





: Curious. I understood that the Edict of Storms would abate when the last of the Regents died. He glances your way. Could we have been mistaken?



More importantly than the family drama, let's check our quest log!



Hell yea! Ashe is going DOWN!



That was not a good idea, lady.

: Stay away from my daughter! You will not have her.



: How is this possible?





: Did you know this would prolong the Edict?





This would work on a decent person. We are a representative of a penal legion calling itself "the howling mob", and not in the funny reddit Gamestop stock way.



: Your daughter is the Regent heir?





This would, once again, raise doubts in a decent person, but consider what kind of person willingly joins the Chorus.

: Don't make this difficult, Amelia. The Voices appreciates challenging prey, but I don't.



Sirin is the closest thing the game has to a morality meter, and if she thinks you're doing the wrong thing she'll tell you.

Of course, she's the only party member who technically outranks you and is protected by Archon's Privilege, so while Lantry probably disapproves Lantry is probably having a mental flashback to the time we impaled that guy for making shit up.



Uh oh.



This is not a long fight, and it's not supposed to be. It's cowardly.





Oh, shit, we handed the kid over to Nerat, who per Sirin is a pedo, didn't we?








Welcome to the first Chorus area! Today's question is "What kind of person would voluntarily join the Chorus", and if you look at the dialog options available to the Chorus Fatebinder you get the sense of a psychopath reveling in their legal authority to wield life and death. Sure, you can do that to some extent on the other routes, but if the Disfavored is a slow disillusionment with fascism, the anarchy path is you getting played by Bleden Mark to destroy the empire for revenge, and the rebels are you setting up the old, bad status quo but in the service of a foreign tyrant, the Chorus is knowingly working with violent psychopaths in the hope you can, at best, point them at deserving targets. Much like Ashe surrendering to Kyros and reveling in his newfound power - or the interpretation that Ashe was once good and tried to change the system from the inside - we are deliberately currying favor with an inhuman monster to advance our own interests, and this is the price you pay. Do not stare into the abyss and all that. Mattias learned this the hard way when he convinced himself that he could use the Chorus' power to save his country and all he'd have to do was kill the people he wanted to kill anyway, and he ended up with the Edict still ravaging the country and being forever branded as "Brown Bottom". Sure, he killed Herodin, but that was an empty victory that did nothing to fix the country, and he's still under the thrall of Nerat and the Chorus, his friends are either dead or despise him, and both Boris and the Chorus have revealed themselves as amoral monsters. Yes, we can do slightly nicer dialog options, but the outcome is the same - either Amelia dies fighting us, or she dies impaled by the Voices. Which reminds me:

Decisions Lie Before Us

Do we want to rewind and take Amelia alive? Also, do we want to ignore the DLC or kill everyone?