Guidelines for the Exchange

So Arch, since I will soon be out of the country until the end of July, I'm writing this post to give you a few pointers as to what the Exchange will do next if you need to advance the timeline. I will have access to Internet from time to time while I'm gone, so don't hesitation to ask me questions if need be. Here we go.

Two new superintendents

I've offered a promotion to two of the managers who I interviewed for the position of superintendent of middle management. Please refer to the sheet I created for the Exchange in the Reference section of the online campaign forum.

Also, any minor details about what the Superintendents should do is also written on that sheet.

Exchange sheet

Zigund of Seeker

Kill what's left of him, examine the body, then burn it. If the woman survived the encounter, Advoc will look after her (and make sure she wasn't infected). As for the corpses of the Exchange employees, make sure to identify them, gather any memorabilia they have on so we can give it to their family (assuming the objects are not affected either), then burn all of them as quickly as possible. DON'T miss any corpse, take extra time to find them all. We'll keep one for examination, in a cell. Once it is done, we will also burn this body. If the woman survived and was infected, we'll keep her under quarantine.

Zeiss will give a decent stipend to the families of the deceased. If it costs 2000 gp or less, just pay for it. If it's anything more, wait for my confirmation. In case we're asked who did this, we will strongly hint at the Naverre Raiders, whether it's true or not.

Kolson will examine the equipment we recovered and try to discover what the hell they did to Zigund. It doesn't sound like he was the mastermind behind this (no surprise), and whoever is responsible seems to have a beef against the Exchange as a whole, not just Zeiss. So we'll continue to investigate to find out who is responsible so we can kill them. Let's just gather as much information as we can on the house where Zigund was experimented on, the equipment we acquired, and any other clue related to that.

The meeting on the 7th of May

Presumably with the Queen and the Eleven. We had no confirmation from the dwarf who subtly gave us the time and place of this meeting, but his timing was too impeccable. So assuming it's them, we simply want to know what they're planning. In exchange, I will them what I'm planning; to destroy the Pinnacle, along with the Order. We'll probably have to rely on more covert operations to bring down the Pinnacle, but as for the Order itself, we'll simply take away their charity duties, thus rendering the organization obsolete. Yes, I'm planning to destroy the Order by becoming a better humanitarian than them. I'll need a lot of money and influence though, which is why I am trying to take over the Undermarket.

If our interests are aligned, I don't see why we couldn't become allies. If they're amiable towards us, we will also ask if they know a way to protect our minds from Scion influence. Surely a Lord Elf like the Queen knows something, since Radnaal of Highspring didn't seem to be affected by it.

If she isn't working with the Eleven, I'm not telling her my plan. First, I would need to know who she's working with. If it's the Pinnacle, she would become my enemy, but I would pretend otherwise.

The spy network

Once Sareth is back from hiring the spy trainers, we'll try something new. Every spy I currently have will secretly be considered an informant by me and Sareth. What that means is I don't trust them with secrets, so I'll have my true spies working in the shadows, unbeknownst to anyone but me and Sareth. We will handpick them, one by one, which means we'll have very few of them, but they'll be much more competent than the informants we have. Two kinds of people we're looking for; the consummate professional, or the inexperienced recruit. If it's the latter, we'll help their family, friends or lovers so they become loyal to us, then have our trainers put them into shape. Our caring for them will be genuine, if a little distant.

As for our informants, me and Sareth will compartmentalize them into groups. Standard procedure, where the members of one group don't know about the others, nor should they. We'll acquire safe houses across the city, and distribute the informants among them, so they can infiltrate the numerous institutions of Holtburg.

The Blades

Kolson is the one who will focus the most on that. It's simple; build the front, establish a base within the Veil, recruit new soldiers (average requirements), and train. The Exchange will take care of the paperwork for now.

The expedition to Marae Lassel

I'm hesitant, but if Kolson agrees, I think Zeiss should stay in Holtburg while Kolson and the squads leave for Marae Lassel. If nothing else, I think Kolson should take full responsibility of this mission since he is the Blades' commander.

The mission is simple: eliminate any opposition, subdue them if they wish to surrender, take control of the island, and while you prepare for the arrival of the Aluvian military, gather as much information and artifacts as you can.

Unless Kolson writes a battle plan, here's the general approach; use the airship and the two ships to approach from two directions and get the drop on the enemy.

The unification of the Undermarket in the Holtburg province

Once Qui-Gon has gathered the information necessary, he will ask the province's warlords for a meeting in Holtburg where we will discuss the future of our Blocs. They will be lodged at the Black Butterfly at the Exchange's expense. If the Lady of Holtburg's influence is needed to make that happen, we'll wait until the expedition is a success and cash in the Favor (supporting the Exchange now and in the future), but I'm sure it's possible to arrange a meeting without her help, no? If so, that's what we're doing.

Then we'll have a long talk around a table, which will undoubtedly descend into chaos as many of the warlords will disagree about who should govern the others. By that point, Zeiss will have made his appeal to the many leaders present to support him as leader of this unified front, citing his numerous achievements (including the ability to assemble these people together), and he will ask who would agree to become his vassals. There's probably only going to be a handful of supporters, at which point Zeiss will ask for Tollar's men to enter the room and arrest every dissenter, who will then be thrown into prison for [insert reason here]. The rest of the people present will then process to discuss how to split the territory of the expanded Exchange among themselves. Zeiss will make sure to reward Gretta of Firebeard of her loyalty by granting her more territory than the others. Of course, only Zeiss and Tollar knew about the plan to arrest the warlords, to avoid any leak of information.

Here's how things will work: the new upper managers of the Exchange pay tribute to Zeiss and follow his rules. To ensure a unified front against the Naverre Raiders, they will relinquish command of their armed forces to Kolson, the commander of the Blades, who will then proceed to integrate the new soldiers into the company. Now, I'm sure they don't want to do that for fear of losing power, so here's my proposition; every warlord gets an equal share in the company (the Blades, not the Exchange), and Kolson is the one who decides how to manage it.

In summary, Zeiss creates a feudal system in which he's the leader, and the other warlords his vassal, but they all own a equal share of the Blades, where Kolson is the CEO and Commander.

The Tuskers

As soon as Zeiss learns of the Tusker army, he will send Qui-Gon to Yarak (he has access to the Hub) to broker a deal between Aluvia and Yarak; more specifically, to form an alliance against the Tumeroks and take back the Dryreach Zone from them. If that works, I expect I'll be able to ask a Favor from the Lords of Aluvia, which is probably as big as a Favor can get. That's the only idea I have to take care of the Tusker problem, so if that doesn't work, Aluvia is screwed.

I could try to go and negotiate with the Tumeroks directly (and find a way to establish communications with Kolson's help) so that Aluvia doesn't need to fear them, but that won't solve the Tusker problem. Ugh. But at the very least, the Exchange will have established communications with the Tumeroks. I think the most probable outcome we could go for is to have the Tumeroks as backers of the Exchange, but we would need to discuss a lot of things first, such as what they're really after and whether our goals coincide or not.

That mysterious spy I cornered did advise me to associate myself with the biggest shark I could find, and the Tumeroks are probably one of the biggest active factions.

Aluvia loses the war?

If Zeiss can foresee Aluvia losing the war, he will do whatever it takes to keep the Exchange afloat. No doubt a new government would be put in place by the conquerors, and if the Queen is working with the Eleven, I would prefer to work with her government and help her with the transition. I might disagree with the Eleven's perception of organic life, but they're a good-aligned group. If the Queen isn't working with the Eleven though, and with someone like the Pinnacle instead, screw her. Separatists it is.

if the Separatists are one of their possible choices, Zeiss would side with them. He would reestablish contact with the Separatists, explain to them he had to cut them off to win the Lady's of Holtburg trust, look for an opportunity to backstab her, after which he would present Holtburg to his allies, pretending that he was working from within for all this time since he had no other choice after they lost the battle several weeks ago. The Exchange is based in Holtburg after all, and he couldn't really leave all his assets behind (which is actually true). The timing would have to be precise, since if he acts too late, he would look like a betrayer who sided with the Separatists to save his own skin, but if he acts too soon, he might get caught by the current Holtburg authorities.

Tollar of Anvilmar might disagree with that. If he can be reasoned with, I'll explain that there are only bad choices to choose from, and the Separatists aren't the worst from the lot. At least, we'll have some influence in the new government, and we're supposed to help the people, not the current leaders. I would like to hear a better idea from him, but if he doesn't, that's what we'll be doing.

I would support the conquerors themselves last. After all, an Aluvian puppet government is better than a foreign one.

Although, if we've established contact with the Tumeroks and they're willing to work with us, I might be willing to help them take over the territory so they can put us in charge (or just help us gain more power so we can cooperate with the real threats of this world), but I would need some reassurances. Don't want to become their slaves after all. I would have to play the other parties against each other until they get here, and make sure the Tumeroks understand it's better to work with us than enslaving us. Efficiency is important, yes, but you also need to take into account the emotions of your subjects and add it to the equation. So really, slavery is a dumb method for any civilization since rebellion, military escalation, resistance from the populace become real threats. In other words, try the carrot instead of the stick.

Well, that whole discussion about slavery might not happen if we learn the Tumeroks haven't invaded the Lassels, so we'll see.

Lots of unknown variables, so I would need more information before I commit to this idea. But really, allying ourselves to the Tumeroks seems like a good way to force the other groups to respect us.

Might as well add something; whatever happens, Zeiss will present himself to all political factions as an ally. Think Littlefinger from Game of Thrones. No reason to cut bridges with the Queen right away if I don't like what she's doing.

"Of course, we could work together. Let's discuss it."

Just to give me some time to consider my options and play the factions against each other if I can.

I'm sort of trying to play catch up on both sides here. The hammer hasn't fallen on Aluvia just yet, but it just fell on Rory and Higaide so I'm sort of focusing on them more in the immediacy. I JUST got caught up with Features a couple days ago, trying to bully my brain back into creative mode for GMing, and was thinking I'd hesitate on updating the Exchange until you got back.

Oh, don't worry about updating the Exchange Arch. I wrote that post just to cover my ass in case you do need to update the Exchange so its canon is in sync with the live campaign.

I was basically making sure I would get a moment where I could consider all my options once I gathered a little more information about the numerous factions at play. You do your thing while I'm on vacation.

The Primus stuff has been fun to watch too.