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Horatio's plan...

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Horatio's plan...

Postby Wargasm on Wed Aug 29, 2012 12:18 pm

You know, it occurs to me that the ol' goat isn't very smart. He wants your kingdom full of adventurers to leave. Why? Presumably, because you're invading his territory and killing his minions. How does he want to drive you out? By crashing your economy by flooding your market with monster trophies. These trophies are monster body parts; most of them vital to survival. Sure, maybe goats can spare their horns, and serpents have a spare fang or three. I'm not sure what a changeling's essence is, but it sounds pretty vital. A de-animated helm requires the destruction of the creature by nature.

So all in all, the big plan is to sacrifice his minions to cause you an economic boo-boo in hopes you'll stop killing his minions. Basically, he's beating you to the punch I guess in hopes that your people will riot and it's lulzier to watch them tear you apart themselves, assuming a crippled economy is enough to do that?

I dunno. Doesn't seem like the best strategy. Granted, there are some real world countries' politics which have at times adapted similar strategies (whether or not that worked especially well for them...) so maybe I should shut up.

(Yes, I am entirely aware I am grossly over-thinking this. Although it's nice to have a villain who not the machine-made "muhahaha I will kill you all and steal your souls" I just wish his creative plan made just a tad bit more sense. Not too many villains strike your economy point for massive damage, so it's cool if nothing else.)
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Re: Horatio's plan...

Postby fall_ark on Wed Aug 29, 2012 1:04 pm

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Re: Horatio's plan...

Postby Nandrew on Wed Aug 29, 2012 1:06 pm

Some goats just want to watch the world burn ... :P
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Re: Horatio's plan...

Postby Wargasm on Wed Aug 29, 2012 1:14 pm

Xykon isn't technically a man. Actually on two fronts; not alive and no genitalia. But even Xykon hasn't specifically sacrificed minions just to stop them from being killed. But yeah, I suppose if he's actually immortal and not just someone who calls themselves immortal, maybe he's just tired of living and wants to take out as much life as possible with him. I can kind of understand that. It's a lot better than burning the forest down to keep loggers out, which seemed like his initial plan. :p
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Re: Horatio's plan...

Postby fall_ark on Wed Aug 29, 2012 1:18 pm

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Re: Horatio's plan...

Postby Wargasm on Wed Aug 29, 2012 1:25 pm

It's fine either way, but that addition would be kind of lulzy, don't you think? I mean technically, it's more "I see my cunning plan of killing my minions to stop you from killing them hasn't been working", but your way is funnier.
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Re: Horatio's plan...

Postby Nandrew on Wed Aug 29, 2012 2:00 pm

I'll have to adjust the quest writing a little -- don't actually want to imply that Horatio is a particularly protective character, more that he rather just f$#%ing hates you.
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Re: Horatio's plan...

Postby Wargasm on Wed Aug 29, 2012 2:48 pm

I'm not sure that's for the best, really. If you write him that way, he's like 9,001 other villains who have no depth, just

"Hey, I just met you
And this is crazy
I really hate you
So let's fight, maybe?"

I mean, at least if he's protective of his fellow monsters - even if it's for some selfish reason, like he enjoys lording over them - it at least gives him a motivation. He's less cookie-cutter that way. The whole thing, including sacrificing his minions, would make sense if he had some other way to screw your economy other than killing his own minions. Maybe if he and the monsters were seizing gold mines. Or, in a very goat-like move, were trying to starve you out by eating all your grass. Without grass, then several farm animals couldn't be easily fed, which reduces both grown food and food from slaughtered livestock, so just being a goat very aggressively at you would work. It's just this exact combination of factors that's perplexing, currently.
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Re: Horatio's plan...

Postby Sidestepper on Wed Aug 29, 2012 3:06 pm

Horatio's actions make sense in the light of DTD being a satire of the hypocritical 'heroism' found in boilerplate high fantasy. In your typical fantasy adventure, the heroes brutally murder whole settlements of native creatures and then 'selflessly' loot their homes. The writer usually tries to give a thin justification for these depredations, but rather than making the actions seem heroic, it just makes the whole story feel like an apologetic for genocide.

DTD makes no attempt to justify the 'heroes' actions in any way. A lot of the humor comes from the reckless and naked greed of the Kingdom administrator and his alarming lack of respect for life, human or otherwise. Horatio works because he is in on the joke and shows the same disregard for his people that the kingdom does. He doesn't threaten the kingdom by mustering an army or conjuring demons or any other generic fantasy apocalypse, he attacks the player by threatening your income, which is really the only thing he could do that the player would actually care about.
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Re: Horatio's plan...

Postby Wargasm on Wed Aug 29, 2012 8:11 pm

Wouldn't the joke be better if Horatio were more human than human, so to speak, and he actually had a high regard for his supposedly feral monster allies when the heroes are the real villains, then?
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