Quest Deep Periphery Quest (Battletech Sandbox Empire Builder)
- Thread starter LordSunhawk
- Start date
[X] Tancerka
Turn 86 - Sina Just Hides Her Eyes
Turn 86 - Sina Just Hides Her Eyes
Your HPG station on Sukiashi got an alert, the Crimson Storm were about to jump in. A day later, a massive convoy centered around a dozen Potemkin class vessels jumped in, escorted by a large fleet of light and medium warships. Your mom is with them. Several weeks later the convoy reaches Griffon itself.
According to your mother, the Crimson Storm was pulling up stakes and moving following sustained and severe attacks from the Black Steel. All of their capital units were currently engaged in battle with the Black Steel’s core fleet, the rest were fleeing to a previously surveyed system a half dozen or so jumps ‘south’ of Catachan.
Willis, unfortunately, was killed in one of the early attacks, and Jackie is in pretty rough shape. Only the fact that she’s become the ba of over a quarter million kids ranging from infants to teenagers is keeping her from losing herself in her grief, and the sheer affection shown by the youngsters towards your mother is heartwarming.
The Crimson Storm isn’t interested in remaining here, or in joining the Empire, but are willing to formalize a trade relationship with you once they are settled in their new home.
As much as you want your mother to be with you and your sisters and grandkids, you realize that quite honestly all you’d manage in that regard is to be with her for her final decline, she’s only got a few years left, and is set on spending them with the kids she’s been raising for the last dozen years or so. From the looks of it, she might even last longer with the Storm, even with all of your medical care, because they are giving her a purpose, a reason to stay alive, that as much as you love her and she loves you she’d not really have with you.
Of course, your mom wouldn’t be who she is if she didn’t troll you, and when she found out about the interference issues you’ve been having with HPG comms around Kainga and Chula she laughs, looks mysterious, and comments that she hopes you like Swedish meatballs before refusing to say anything else and acting like she’d utterly forgotten what she told you. You try counter-trolling her by serving Swedish meatballs at the next dinner, and she seems to not even notice the attempt.
Your mother is a far better troll than you are.
The Crimson Storm remains in the Griffon system for a month, giving you plenty of time to catch up with your mom, before moving on. According to them, the Black Pumpernickels should be a few weeks behind them, as they are also moving their base of operation to new pastures due to the Black Steel becoming a far too dangerous threat. And sure enough, a few weeks later the Black Pumpernickels contact you over HPG, advise you that they are coming through, and then their highly modified Texas and a single Newgrange transit your space, also heading to the galactic south.
There’s already a new emissary from the Space Bourbons, the Duchesse de Nouvelle-Normandie. A bland statement that a new Duc de Nouvelle-Picardie has taken his father’s place is the only further acknowledgement of the situation provided. You do note that a number of the ships that had been remaining in the New Port Royal system have departed, and a few new vessels of slightly different design have replaced them. The Duchesse is a very formidable woman indeed, and commiserates with your Foreign Minister over the appalling sexism displayed by the former emissary as ‘typical of the male breed.’
She also apparently keeps a large number of very fancy poodles, that are very loud, very yappy, and while the smallest seem to be merely brainless, the largest are so brainless as to also be fearless. According to your granddaughter, she also seems to be of the opinion that ‘idiot young heirs’ like her nephew are far better employed walking her dogs than ‘sticking their noses into dynastic politics’, that the old woman apparently Does Not Approve of your granddaughter ‘parading around in trousers’ when she’s in uniform, yet also according to your granddaughter has the sort of calluses on her fingers most often associated with being a very dedicated rifle and sword enthusiast.
The next message from your granddaughter includes a very pointed ‘do not challenge the Duchesse de Nouvelle-Normandie to a sparring match’, because even when wearing an ultra fancy and formal gown she is far more deadly with a rapier than any old biddy has any right to be. Unfortunately for the dignity of your granddaughter footage has been included, and you are pretty certain that the old lady would utterly paste you in the fencing salle, and you’d always considered yourself a quite accomplished fencer.
On the plus side the talks are moving forward, with the Space Bourbons dropping their demands for Stahlfurt, as, according to the new emissary, while they are Very Disappointed that you ‘stole’ the system from their ‘just and rightful rule’, they see no need to spill blood over it like ‘uncivilized bravos’, rather they are now shifting the goalposts into wanting to export goods to you with no tariffs whatsoever, while maintaining exorbitantly protectionist tariffs on any imports from you on the grounds that you clearly are nought but… sniff sniff… mere petit bourgeois merchants who should obviously relish the mere possibility of selling your plain and trite baubles to the noble Bourbons and should equally hunger for the civilized and superior products of true craftsmen without the petty greed of common bureaucrats inflating the just prices charged.
According to your Foreign Minister she managed to say all of that with a perfectly straight face, a properly elevated nose, and the perfect sniff of aristocratic hauteur, while giving off every impression that this is merely the opening gambit in the trade negotiations.
Parliament, meanwhile, is busy this year. On the minus side, this means you are having to review a large number of proposals that make it to your desk. On the plus side, 99.99% of them are so routine and ordinary that you could have given the job of approving them to your granddaughters pet lystrosaurus with confidence that the roly poly little critter would handle it just fine.
But there is one piece of legislation that you will have to actually handle. The Cultural Preservation Act of 3016 is actually fairly controversial for something that seems so trivial. The legislation would establish a large fund for the preservation of culture across the Empire, in order to prevent the sort of bland homogenization that the authors fear will happen as culturally distinct minorities are overwhelmed by the sheer juggernaut of the majority culture. The money would be used to finance language and cultural preservation efforts, promoting minority cultures, raising awareness of minority cultures in schools and to the general public, and other related tasks.
What is controversial is the scale, and the proposal that graduation requirements for students would be updated to include mandatory multicultural literacy as well as fluency in at least one language in addition to English. Not simply taking classes in a foreign language, but functional fluency in said language. Critics argue that this is extreme, both mandating that students who may have absolutely no interest in other cultures be forced to familiarize themselves with them, but also forcing students to master multiple languages. Proponents argue that having a broader cultural understanding would help unify the Empire, by ensuring that people across the Empire have a deeper understanding and appreciation of each other.
Considering that by the time you were 18 you spoke fluent Vietnamese and Polish in addition to English, you have very little sympathy for the argument that it is ‘too hard’ to learn languages. But the critics may have a point… a small one, but a point.
Your HPG station on Sukiashi got an alert, the Crimson Storm were about to jump in. A day later, a massive convoy centered around a dozen Potemkin class vessels jumped in, escorted by a large fleet of light and medium warships. Your mom is with them. Several weeks later the convoy reaches Griffon itself.
According to your mother, the Crimson Storm was pulling up stakes and moving following sustained and severe attacks from the Black Steel. All of their capital units were currently engaged in battle with the Black Steel’s core fleet, the rest were fleeing to a previously surveyed system a half dozen or so jumps ‘south’ of Catachan.
Willis, unfortunately, was killed in one of the early attacks, and Jackie is in pretty rough shape. Only the fact that she’s become the ba of over a quarter million kids ranging from infants to teenagers is keeping her from losing herself in her grief, and the sheer affection shown by the youngsters towards your mother is heartwarming.
The Crimson Storm isn’t interested in remaining here, or in joining the Empire, but are willing to formalize a trade relationship with you once they are settled in their new home.
As much as you want your mother to be with you and your sisters and grandkids, you realize that quite honestly all you’d manage in that regard is to be with her for her final decline, she’s only got a few years left, and is set on spending them with the kids she’s been raising for the last dozen years or so. From the looks of it, she might even last longer with the Storm, even with all of your medical care, because they are giving her a purpose, a reason to stay alive, that as much as you love her and she loves you she’d not really have with you.
Of course, your mom wouldn’t be who she is if she didn’t troll you, and when she found out about the interference issues you’ve been having with HPG comms around Kainga and Chula she laughs, looks mysterious, and comments that she hopes you like Swedish meatballs before refusing to say anything else and acting like she’d utterly forgotten what she told you. You try counter-trolling her by serving Swedish meatballs at the next dinner, and she seems to not even notice the attempt.
Your mother is a far better troll than you are.
The Crimson Storm remains in the Griffon system for a month, giving you plenty of time to catch up with your mom, before moving on. According to them, the Black Pumpernickels should be a few weeks behind them, as they are also moving their base of operation to new pastures due to the Black Steel becoming a far too dangerous threat. And sure enough, a few weeks later the Black Pumpernickels contact you over HPG, advise you that they are coming through, and then their highly modified Texas and a single Newgrange transit your space, also heading to the galactic south.
There’s already a new emissary from the Space Bourbons, the Duchesse de Nouvelle-Normandie. A bland statement that a new Duc de Nouvelle-Picardie has taken his father’s place is the only further acknowledgement of the situation provided. You do note that a number of the ships that had been remaining in the New Port Royal system have departed, and a few new vessels of slightly different design have replaced them. The Duchesse is a very formidable woman indeed, and commiserates with your Foreign Minister over the appalling sexism displayed by the former emissary as ‘typical of the male breed.’
She also apparently keeps a large number of very fancy poodles, that are very loud, very yappy, and while the smallest seem to be merely brainless, the largest are so brainless as to also be fearless. According to your granddaughter, she also seems to be of the opinion that ‘idiot young heirs’ like her nephew are far better employed walking her dogs than ‘sticking their noses into dynastic politics’, that the old woman apparently Does Not Approve of your granddaughter ‘parading around in trousers’ when she’s in uniform, yet also according to your granddaughter has the sort of calluses on her fingers most often associated with being a very dedicated rifle and sword enthusiast.
The next message from your granddaughter includes a very pointed ‘do not challenge the Duchesse de Nouvelle-Normandie to a sparring match’, because even when wearing an ultra fancy and formal gown she is far more deadly with a rapier than any old biddy has any right to be. Unfortunately for the dignity of your granddaughter footage has been included, and you are pretty certain that the old lady would utterly paste you in the fencing salle, and you’d always considered yourself a quite accomplished fencer.
On the plus side the talks are moving forward, with the Space Bourbons dropping their demands for Stahlfurt, as, according to the new emissary, while they are Very Disappointed that you ‘stole’ the system from their ‘just and rightful rule’, they see no need to spill blood over it like ‘uncivilized bravos’, rather they are now shifting the goalposts into wanting to export goods to you with no tariffs whatsoever, while maintaining exorbitantly protectionist tariffs on any imports from you on the grounds that you clearly are nought but… sniff sniff… mere petit bourgeois merchants who should obviously relish the mere possibility of selling your plain and trite baubles to the noble Bourbons and should equally hunger for the civilized and superior products of true craftsmen without the petty greed of common bureaucrats inflating the just prices charged.
According to your Foreign Minister she managed to say all of that with a perfectly straight face, a properly elevated nose, and the perfect sniff of aristocratic hauteur, while giving off every impression that this is merely the opening gambit in the trade negotiations.
Parliament, meanwhile, is busy this year. On the minus side, this means you are having to review a large number of proposals that make it to your desk. On the plus side, 99.99% of them are so routine and ordinary that you could have given the job of approving them to your granddaughters pet lystrosaurus with confidence that the roly poly little critter would handle it just fine.
But there is one piece of legislation that you will have to actually handle. The Cultural Preservation Act of 3016 is actually fairly controversial for something that seems so trivial. The legislation would establish a large fund for the preservation of culture across the Empire, in order to prevent the sort of bland homogenization that the authors fear will happen as culturally distinct minorities are overwhelmed by the sheer juggernaut of the majority culture. The money would be used to finance language and cultural preservation efforts, promoting minority cultures, raising awareness of minority cultures in schools and to the general public, and other related tasks.
What is controversial is the scale, and the proposal that graduation requirements for students would be updated to include mandatory multicultural literacy as well as fluency in at least one language in addition to English. Not simply taking classes in a foreign language, but functional fluency in said language. Critics argue that this is extreme, both mandating that students who may have absolutely no interest in other cultures be forced to familiarize themselves with them, but also forcing students to master multiple languages. Proponents argue that having a broader cultural understanding would help unify the Empire, by ensuring that people across the Empire have a deeper understanding and appreciation of each other.
Considering that by the time you were 18 you spoke fluent Vietnamese and Polish in addition to English, you have very little sympathy for the argument that it is ‘too hard’ to learn languages. But the critics may have a point… a small one, but a point.
| Initial Arguments | |
| Supporting the Cultural Preservation Act of 3016 | Opposing the Cultural Preservation Act of 3016 |
| In this age of increasing mass communication minority cultures and societies are at increasing risk of simply vanishing into the greater whole of the Empire’s dominant culture. As this happens alternate viewpoints and potential solutions to challenges are lost, to the overall detriment of the Empire’s long term well-being. Becoming a bland monoculture would inevitably result in stagnation and decadence, simply in the pursuit of new sensations. Promoting and preserving minority cultures contributes to maintaining a strong, vibrant, sense of community within the Empire, as it ensures that people do not come to think of themselves as nothing more than a faceless number in a spreadsheet. Language literacy is equally vital, studies show that students who are fluent in more than one language show greater aptitude for critical thinking and analysis than monolingual students. Moreover, the broader horizons brought about by learning languages helps students avoid excessive parochialism and insularity. | The enormous expense of this boondoggle is the most telling argument against it. Leaving aside the overly idealistic arguments about culture and language, the cold hard truth of the matter is that financing such a project would incur significant expenses that could be far better spent on things like defense and economic development than on making sure Johnny can speak both English and French. All of the benefits of this lie in the realm of academics, theory, and fuzzy notions of ‘healthy culture’. Our culture is healthy, that is why it is dominant. Promoting other cultures doesn’t strengthen our own culture, it merely preserves others from being outcompeted by it. If other cultures have elements worth preserving, they will be amalgamated into our culture naturally, as our people are quite able to recognize what is and isn’t valuable without some academic in an ivory tower dictating to them. |
| Counter Arguments | |
| The opposition makes much of the costs while hand waving away the benefits. We do not live on bread alone, we do not exist merely on spreadsheets. All of our lived experiences matter, whether economically, culturally, socially, politically, or otherwise. If we allow everything to be devoured into a single homogenous blob of tofu simply because we wish to apply Nietzian principles to our society then we lose extremely precious treasures that we’ll be sorely pressed to rebuild in the future. Everything is downstream of culture, everything depends on culture. Maintaining our existing cultural diversity and vibrancy means maintaining a diverse and vibrant economy, a diverse and vibrant military, a diverse and vibrant academia, etc. The critics of this legislation believe that there is something uplifting about bland mediocrity, about pale pastels and flavorless pablum. That we can only be unified if we are nothing but an undifferentiated blob. We reject that notion. In that direction is the foulest tyranny imaginable, the tyranny of the mob. We would be at the mercy of whoever best excites passions in a passionless world. | Culture is meaningless and worthless, economics and defense are everything. If culture wishes to survive, it needs to be able to outcompete the competition, and nothing at all should be allowed to prevent failed cultures from withering away into nothing. Ideally all spending wasted on useless cultural affairs would be diverted to more useful economic development, if people want culture, let them expend their own resources on it. If they can’t afford it, that’s their problem, not ours, and we shouldn’t spend a single penny on it. All this high-minded talk about vibrancy and mediocrity is nothing more than the sad bleatings of degenerates unable or unwilling to actually compete in the economic marketplace, and should be afforded absolutely no value whatsoever. What matters is the bottom line, nothing more, nothing less. If you want culture, you pay for it. Taking money away from the far more important work of building our economy and our defenses to spend on useless fripperies like ‘culture’ and ‘languages’ and ‘society’ is outright criminal, if they can’t survive on their own, they need to die and let the rest of us alone. |
| [] | Action | Results |
| [] | Support the Cultural Preservation Act of 3016 |
|
| [] | Oppose the Cultural Preservation Act of 3016 |
|
Don't we?
[x] Support the Cultural Preservation Act of 3016
I don't even know what culture America really has. so.. lets preserve the empires cultures we would not want our lovely pirate haven to become Griffin. we do not want to lose Pollux Man. let us save our history with as much fervor as we build mechs and warships.
I don't even know what culture America really has. so.. lets preserve the empires cultures we would not want our lovely pirate haven to become Griffin. we do not want to lose Pollux Man. let us save our history with as much fervor as we build mechs and warships.
Val the Moofia Boss
Well-known member
At this point, we should probably form an alliance with the Bourbons against the Black Steel. We might be able to convince Killburough to join in on the allliance but I'm not sure how much offensive firepower they could contribute.
[X] Support the Cultural Preservation Act of 3016
The homogenous mono-cultures of the Federation (and the modern West) is terrifying.
[X] Support the Cultural Preservation Act of 3016
The homogenous mono-cultures of the Federation (and the modern West) is terrifying.
AlphaOmega
Well-known member
[X] Support the Cultural Preservation Act of 3016
Bear Ribs
Well-known member
[X] Support the Cultural Preservation Act of 3016
Man, the Bourbons must have utterly screwed up their breeding program to produce consistently brainless Poodles. One of the identifying characteristics of the Poodle breed is extreme intelligence, with only the Border Collie managing to compete with them for the "Smartest Dog in the World" trophy.
Man, the Bourbons must have utterly screwed up their breeding program to produce consistently brainless Poodles. One of the identifying characteristics of the Poodle breed is extreme intelligence, with only the Border Collie managing to compete with them for the "Smartest Dog in the World" trophy.
Thors_Alumni
Well-known member
[X] Support the Cultural Preservation Act of 3016
They've clearly bred towards the "yappy annoying purse dog / dire rat" end of the canine gene pool; there's already *plenty* of trend towards that in poodles these days.
[X] Support the Cultural Preservation Act of 3016
The meta-benefits are pretty clearcut. In character. . . I'm a lot more dubious of the value of effectively providing government subsidies for something as ephemeral as "cultures".
The meta-benefits are pretty clearcut. In character. . . I'm a lot more dubious of the value of effectively providing government subsidies for something as ephemeral as "cultures".
Turn 86 - Policeman Taps His Shades
Turn 86 - Policeman Taps His Shades
The Bourbon emissaries agree to turn over navigational data on their holdings, if only to avoid ‘regrettable incidents’.
They appear to have four worlds under their control. The navigation information they’ve given you is little more than jump coordinates for the zenith and nadir points, so you have very little to go on in terms of what the worlds themselves are like beyond word of mouth.
The four worlds in question are cataloged in your charts as GX-J30, J31, I31 and H30.
The Bourbon presence in your space is now down to a pair of warships, the rest have all returned home. Signal intercepts combined with analysis of certain comments that have been made seem to indicate that beyond the Black Steel threat, the Bourbons are dealing with something else, but they’ve been annoyingly vague about what that could be.
You are dragged to the Pan-Griffon Games by your wife, this year being held in the Griffon system. Team Griffon itself does the best, winning 10 gold medals, which is well down from previous years as the talent has spread out rather widely throughout the Empire. The smallest system to take a gold medal was Nowy Wroclaw, who took the gold in Softball after a well played series against the New Capricorn team. You have the most fun at the various races, as Team Griffon takes gold in motorcycles and stock cars and silver in formula racing. Your grandsons were both driving for the Team Griffon stock car team, so you get added enjoyment over that.
Unfortunately, just when you started thinking that they’d been quiet for too long, the Department of Periphery Studies is at it again, this time holding a massive protest march that, in a move harkening back to the early days of the Empire, promptly gets lost and winds up aimlessly wandering the streets of the financial district as they distinguished tenured faculty of the Department protest the existence of the color ‘blue’ as a crime against nature and that the Empire should declare the color ‘blue’ to be illegal and mandate that all things which purport to be blue must declare themselves to be a ‘suitable shade of turquoise aquamarine, perhaps a lovely pastel’. They are also demanding that the Eldest dye his fur ‘a tasteful shade of neon pink’.
The Eldest, predictably, finds this incredibly amusing and has decided to capitalize on the hilarity by declaring a contest for schoolkids to find the most appropriate ‘tasteful shade’ of neon pink possible, by coloring pictures of the Eldest looking smug.
Of course, you are completely unaware of the existence of a tasteful shade of neon pink, but perhaps it exists somewhere in the universe. You do inform the Eldest that if he goes through with this you will start calling him the Pink Panther, which causes the oversized cat to start purring the Pink Panther theme music, much to your amusement.
And then it is time for your favorite time of the year, budget time.
General Jenkins worries you… he shows up in proper uniform, looking serious, with no apparent attempt at a practical joke in sight. Then your lips twitch as you realize that this IS the joke he’s trying to play on you, so you promptly put your feet up on the conference table and have one of your aides fetch you a cold beer.
“Well played, boss.” He realizes you’d caught on, so he drops the serious act. “While the Black Steel is a major threat, so far we’ve mostly been able to handle them, and with the breathing space purchased at Stahlfurt and by the Crimson Dawn we should, repeat should, be able to handle it. Most of the ground forces expansion we are recommending this year is in the category of ‘keep the factories busy and the workers employed’, although in the event of a major war it will come in incredibly useful. We know the Black Steel is an exclusively space based threat, but the Bourbons, for example, appear to have substantial ground forces, and there are indications of others. That being said, General Bradley?”
General Bradley takes the podium. “Your Majesty, preliminary information from the R&D labs are that our existing Ferro-Fibrous forges can be updated for the new materials under research at this time, therefore we would strongly advise significantly investing in new forges for them, as well as upgrading existing ones, in order to ensure that we aren’t caught short. Other than that, our strategic materials situation is solid for ground forces.”
She brings up a chart of procurement and production requests.
She checks her notes again, then brings up a chart. “Next, we have investment, focus, and infrastructure recommendations.”
Leila is off doing diplomacy with the Bourbons, and with the Pan Griffon Games going on there really isn’t any Cultural Affairs programming to be done this year. Therefore Lien is up next. “Your Majesty, the only recommendations from the political office have to do with continued expansion of both the Colonial Office and the Civil Service as a whole.”
Grace is up next. “Your Majesty, one of the challenges facing warship design is that as ships become larger it becomes less efficient and practical to mount lighter weapons on them, including the sub-capital lasers which have become such a useful anti-fighter and anti-missile system. Larger laser mounts are too cumbersome for such, at the present time. However a solution to that may be possible, although it would likely be quite expensive in practice, by building a more robust and higher powered mount for the full up naval lasers. I can have teams start work on that at your say so.” She checks her notes. “We have three teams available, Your Majesty, so if we dedicate one to this project, for the other two we recommend more advanced research work, this time into power transfer and electronics.”
General Messershmidt is smirking. Uh oh. “Your Majesty, I bring important news to you from my agents in the NRI.” He pauses dramatically. “Your cult has done nothing interesting all year long that they’ve not done before, and neither of your sister’s cults are up to anything untoward either. Your granddaughter, on the other hand, evidently has a small shrine on Nova Roma itself, although our agents haven’t been able to get me more information yet.”
“The NRR is continuing slow expansion to the galactic south, we know that they’ve been sending out survey expeditions in that direction. They have also purchased a number of Corvus corvettes from the NRI.”
Martina is up last. “Your Majesty, thank you for the expansion of the IGMP, it came just in time for Nya Kopenhamn to be handled. We have a proposal to establish legal commissions in that system to hopefully head off any feuds, retaliations, and such from occurring and thus smoothing the transition to Imperial rule. We have a golden opportunity to get in front of such, and I strongly recommend that we take advantage of it.”
The Bourbon emissaries agree to turn over navigational data on their holdings, if only to avoid ‘regrettable incidents’.
They appear to have four worlds under their control. The navigation information they’ve given you is little more than jump coordinates for the zenith and nadir points, so you have very little to go on in terms of what the worlds themselves are like beyond word of mouth.
The four worlds in question are cataloged in your charts as GX-J30, J31, I31 and H30.
The Bourbon presence in your space is now down to a pair of warships, the rest have all returned home. Signal intercepts combined with analysis of certain comments that have been made seem to indicate that beyond the Black Steel threat, the Bourbons are dealing with something else, but they’ve been annoyingly vague about what that could be.
You are dragged to the Pan-Griffon Games by your wife, this year being held in the Griffon system. Team Griffon itself does the best, winning 10 gold medals, which is well down from previous years as the talent has spread out rather widely throughout the Empire. The smallest system to take a gold medal was Nowy Wroclaw, who took the gold in Softball after a well played series against the New Capricorn team. You have the most fun at the various races, as Team Griffon takes gold in motorcycles and stock cars and silver in formula racing. Your grandsons were both driving for the Team Griffon stock car team, so you get added enjoyment over that.
Unfortunately, just when you started thinking that they’d been quiet for too long, the Department of Periphery Studies is at it again, this time holding a massive protest march that, in a move harkening back to the early days of the Empire, promptly gets lost and winds up aimlessly wandering the streets of the financial district as they distinguished tenured faculty of the Department protest the existence of the color ‘blue’ as a crime against nature and that the Empire should declare the color ‘blue’ to be illegal and mandate that all things which purport to be blue must declare themselves to be a ‘suitable shade of turquoise aquamarine, perhaps a lovely pastel’. They are also demanding that the Eldest dye his fur ‘a tasteful shade of neon pink’.
The Eldest, predictably, finds this incredibly amusing and has decided to capitalize on the hilarity by declaring a contest for schoolkids to find the most appropriate ‘tasteful shade’ of neon pink possible, by coloring pictures of the Eldest looking smug.
Of course, you are completely unaware of the existence of a tasteful shade of neon pink, but perhaps it exists somewhere in the universe. You do inform the Eldest that if he goes through with this you will start calling him the Pink Panther, which causes the oversized cat to start purring the Pink Panther theme music, much to your amusement.
And then it is time for your favorite time of the year, budget time.
General Jenkins worries you… he shows up in proper uniform, looking serious, with no apparent attempt at a practical joke in sight. Then your lips twitch as you realize that this IS the joke he’s trying to play on you, so you promptly put your feet up on the conference table and have one of your aides fetch you a cold beer.
“Well played, boss.” He realizes you’d caught on, so he drops the serious act. “While the Black Steel is a major threat, so far we’ve mostly been able to handle them, and with the breathing space purchased at Stahlfurt and by the Crimson Dawn we should, repeat should, be able to handle it. Most of the ground forces expansion we are recommending this year is in the category of ‘keep the factories busy and the workers employed’, although in the event of a major war it will come in incredibly useful. We know the Black Steel is an exclusively space based threat, but the Bourbons, for example, appear to have substantial ground forces, and there are indications of others. That being said, General Bradley?”
General Bradley takes the podium. “Your Majesty, preliminary information from the R&D labs are that our existing Ferro-Fibrous forges can be updated for the new materials under research at this time, therefore we would strongly advise significantly investing in new forges for them, as well as upgrading existing ones, in order to ensure that we aren’t caught short. Other than that, our strategic materials situation is solid for ground forces.”
She brings up a chart of procurement and production requests.
- Imperial Griffon Army
- Production
- New Ferro Fibrous Factory
- Nowy Wrocław
- New Double Heat Sink Factory
- Nowy Wrocław
- Expand all Ferro Fibrous Factories
- Expand all DHS Factories
- New Ferro Fibrous Factory
- Procurement
- Heavy/Assault Mechs
- 9 Heavy Combat Team Regiments
- Light/Medium Mechs
- 12 Medium Mech Regiments
- 12 Medium Scout Regiments
- LAM
- 3 Raider Regiments
- Conventional
- 12 Air Cavalry Regiments
- 9 Heavy Armored Regiments
- 9 Mechanized Regiments
- Garrison Forces
- 18 Garrison Regiments
- 18 Militia Rating
- Heavy/Assault Mechs
- Production
- Imperial Griffon Aerospace Force
- Production
- New ASF Lines
- Nowy Wrocław
- Nowy Slask
- New Phoenix
- New Pollux
- Okusawa
- Edelsteine
- Chuma
- New Castor
- New Capricorn
- Griffon
- New Ferro Aluminum Factories
- Nowy Wrocław
- Expand all Ferro Aluminum Factories
- New ASF Lines
- Procurement
- 30 Heavy Carrier Wings
- 25 Heavy Fighter Wings
- Production
- Imperial Griffon Navy
- Production
- Orbital Shipyards
- New Orbital Shipyard
- Okusawa
- New Port Royal
- Expand all existing Orbital Shipyards
- New Orbital Shipyard
- Escort Yards
- Construct Escort Yards
- New Pollux
- Kainga
- New Castor
- Okusawa
- Nowy Wrocław
- Construct Escort Yards
- Small Warship Yards
- Construct Small Warship Yards
- Nowa Warszawa
- New Port Royal
- Construct Small Warship Yards
- Medium Warship Yards
- Construct Medium Warship Yards
- Griffon
- Calliope
- Construct Medium Warship Yards
- Naval Armor Factories
- New Naval Armor Factories
- Nowy Wrocław
- Expand all Naval Armor Factories
- New Naval Armor Factories
- Germanium Cores
- New Germanium Processing Facility
- Griff’s Leap
- New Germanium Processing Facility
- Orbital Shipyards
- Procurement
- Regular Dropships
- 23 Trenton class Transports
- 50 Long Beach class Parasite Destroyers
- Large Dropships
- 30 Saipan class Parasite Carriers
- 11 Canopus class Parasite Battleships
- Jumpships
- 4 Galleon class Jumpships
- Escorts
- 5 Haida class Destroyer Escorts
- Small Warships
- 4 Wichita class Heavy Cruisers
- 4 Cleveland class Light Cruisers
- 4 Erebus class Missile Cruisers
- Medium Warships
- 1 Kongo class Battlecruiser OR 1 Furious class Large Light Cruiser
- Miscellaneous
- 290 PPG-001
- Defensive Stations
- Oasis II Recharge Stations
- Bari
- Skala
- Pieklo
- Silver Tower Defense Stations
- Bari
- Skala
- Pieklo
- Oasis II Recharge Stations
- Regular Dropships
- Production
- Scouting Requests
- GX-I25
- GX-H24
- GX-I22
- GX-G27
She checks her notes again, then brings up a chart. “Next, we have investment, focus, and infrastructure recommendations.”
- Development Focus
- Core World
- New Port Royal
- Peripheral World
- Griff’s Leap
- Core World
- Investment
- Okusawa
- Major Economic Investment
- Calliope
- Infrastructure & Industrial Zones
- New Capricorn
- Okusawa
- Nowy Wrocław
- Bari
- Nya Kopenhamn
- Military Infrastructure
- Nya Kopenhamn
- Bari
Leila is off doing diplomacy with the Bourbons, and with the Pan Griffon Games going on there really isn’t any Cultural Affairs programming to be done this year. Therefore Lien is up next. “Your Majesty, the only recommendations from the political office have to do with continued expansion of both the Colonial Office and the Civil Service as a whole.”
Grace is up next. “Your Majesty, one of the challenges facing warship design is that as ships become larger it becomes less efficient and practical to mount lighter weapons on them, including the sub-capital lasers which have become such a useful anti-fighter and anti-missile system. Larger laser mounts are too cumbersome for such, at the present time. However a solution to that may be possible, although it would likely be quite expensive in practice, by building a more robust and higher powered mount for the full up naval lasers. I can have teams start work on that at your say so.” She checks her notes. “We have three teams available, Your Majesty, so if we dedicate one to this project, for the other two we recommend more advanced research work, this time into power transfer and electronics.”
General Messershmidt is smirking. Uh oh. “Your Majesty, I bring important news to you from my agents in the NRI.” He pauses dramatically. “Your cult has done nothing interesting all year long that they’ve not done before, and neither of your sister’s cults are up to anything untoward either. Your granddaughter, on the other hand, evidently has a small shrine on Nova Roma itself, although our agents haven’t been able to get me more information yet.”
“The NRR is continuing slow expansion to the galactic south, we know that they’ve been sending out survey expeditions in that direction. They have also purchased a number of Corvus corvettes from the NRI.”
Martina is up last. “Your Majesty, thank you for the expansion of the IGMP, it came just in time for Nya Kopenhamn to be handled. We have a proposal to establish legal commissions in that system to hopefully head off any feuds, retaliations, and such from occurring and thus smoothing the transition to Imperial rule. We have a golden opportunity to get in front of such, and I strongly recommend that we take advantage of it.”