Transcript
Garrett: Welcome everybody to another episode of into the malediction. I think we're on episode 13, which is pretty exciting. I hope you all listened the last two episodes with our special guest Chago.
Garrett: Um, this week we're going to be talking about two of the short stories that came out. don't know if I could call these short stories are pretty long at this time. And they're all about the conclave of this fears.
Garrett: Uh, So we're going to have a full episode on those two and going into them in detail. I am Garrett, also known as Admiral Tater, joined, of course, by my co-hosts, Nick and Alan.
Nick: everybody, this is Nick, known as Fetty315 in the discords.
m3rcier: Hey, it's Alan on Discord. I am Mercer.
Garrett: and And... Recent news. Okay, so I'm pretty excited to say this. This is this is my own plug. Plug for me ah this week.
m3rcier: Shameless plug. Shameless
Garrett: Shameless plug. By the time that this episode releases, the officially licensed Admiral Tater Malediction accessory line will be available at AdmiralTater.com and also my Admiral Tater Etsy.
Garrett: ah And so the we're going to call this Wave Zero because I do plan on releasing waves of of new accessories. The game expands. We add things. But in Wave Zero, we're going to start with Echo and Mastery Trackers for each of the factions as well as a generic one.
Garrett: And so there's like a conclave one that's made out of some really cool, what I'm calling the Astrum blue. And then like the Legion of the fallen is like, uh, it's like an issue, anish, uh, green.
Garrett: And then, the other ones are pretty exciting. And then we've got the, I think the the coolest thing, the most important thing is we found a way to make flexible rulers, uh, that are durable and not like the PVC plastic. And so they're made out of, uh, like a leatherette type material.
Garrett: And so they're super flexible. They go back straight really nice. And of course they come in all four factions and then a generic one and then a generic silver one, which I really like.
Garrett: And then on top of that, we've got ah wound markers that are, you know, a fancy acrylic wound dials. And then I've got a token pack to replace the cardboard wound markers. And those are really neat. Double-sided one fives, all one size.
Garrett: And then... There will also be acrylic initiative token and then acrylic 10-inch rulers and acrylic 3-inch rulers. And they're like the widget ones where the 3-2-1 and like 10-6-2 six two and 1-inch as well.
Garrett: And they're double-sided and all that stuff. so yeah, we're going to lot of stuff. I'm super excited about it. And of course, for prize support, if Harold wants to contact me, we can make this stuff cheaper for you guys to make some really cool things. And hopefully we can get these added to some more OP kits as the year goes along.
Garrett: Anyways, that's it for Mike Shambles Plug. Let's get back to the stories. We're going to have Nick introduce our main topic here, which is the Council of Nexi. Here we go. here we go
Nick: Alright, so the Council of the Nexi. in the order i was taught that every rightte was an important piece of the faith and that the harmony between the powerful would be the salvation of the powerless in the conclave i was shown that nothing was too sacred not to sacrifice and that no path towards power should be ignored People I once called friends showed their true colors as soon as they had a taste of power.
Nick: Worse still, I saw this machine working, its cogs fueled by blood, achieving progress. But at what cost? And that quote comes from us from Melandriel, Spellwarden of Sphere Akenza.
Nick: So, and nothing i that i think is necessarily out of line with our current feelings on the Conclave and how they run things.
Garrett: Yeah, she's such a goody two-shoe.
Nick: Hey, you leave Laundrie alone.
m3rcier: don't know she's goody two-shoe, but ah she does not mind hitting you with that glaive.
Garrett: She really is ridiculous. Really, actually, pretty powerful seeker. Range attack.
Nick: Yeah, so the Council of the Nexi. So this article is going to be all about Conclave the Spheres, specifically the governing body that is the Council. And so what is a NEXI? NEXI are the highest appointed, or I guess elected, and we don't really know, highest ranking um member of each sphere.
Nick: So remember, as we talked about the conclave, the spheres, each sphere has its own special practice and study. And so the council has a representative from the five greater spheres to basically run the government of the conclave.
m3rcier: Yeah, but the Nexis are specifically the five that are from the greater spheres. If you're a lesser sphere, you don't necessarily have Nexi.
Nick: They have masters, right?
m3rcier: Yeah.
Nick: Yeah. So, um, yeah, as we get into this article, uh, this one's a long one, uh, just like, just like the, seven rights was, uh, so we're going to cover the five greater spheres, but before we kind of get to that, I'm going to continue talk a little bit about the council and the makeup.
m3rcier: Yeah.
Nick: Um, as we know, the conclave uses, it's kind of, uh, It has an, uh, the astronaut based economy. It has political influence and the exchange of information. They have the transportation across the continent.
Nick: They have the, uh, sea trade and sea routes. They control, they put they have their fingers in a lot of different pies throughout the continent. And so the council has a lot of power because they,
Nick: dic they yeah they get to get dictate how the conclave as a whole operates in which direction. And so the Nexi have a little bit of sway to kind of benefit their own spheres in that regard.
Nick: But ultimately they are still also responsible for running the government, which means they, to some extent, we don't know the full details, but some extent they are regulated by the overall conclave itself.
Nick: So they have, you know, ah they determine the laws, um the manners of trade, certain regulations around Liastrum control. And we'll get to some of the more details of what they do when we talk about specific spheres and how they also function within Conclave.
Nick: But the biggest thing they do is they keep the Moloch Oracle. So as we discussed before, the Moloch Oracle is the source of Liastrum on Silesia.
Nick: it Moloch turned his gaze to the sky and peered into another dimension and poured his soul into this vestige that is slowly drip-feeding Liastrum from some interdimensional space that is just pure magic, pure energy.
Nick: And so the council is responsible with keeping it um functioning, safe, and controlled, specifically by appointing a keeper of the oracles. We do know from Pauline Over's backstory that he was in line, or or expected at least, to become the next keeper, but the political intrigue around his fall from grace kept him from that role.
Nick: So we do know, let me see, we go on to say that every sphere has a quota, of the Astrum that they're allowed to to get, either to distribute to their members or to fund their research projects or or work on different productions.
Nick: And there are exceptions to, you know, if you need more than you're allotted, you have to go get approval, you have to go plead your case. If you've ever done any kind of ah graduate level research, it's probably gonna be a very familiar process of getting your grant money.
Garrett: Yeah, the the Conclave is like a giant, like if if the university ran the government ah with no, like ah nobody stopping them with their programs.
Nick: Yeah, and there's no there's no higher body than the university.
m3rcier: Yeah,
Garrett: Yeah, it's really interesting. The idea that Liastrum is such a finite resource, like they can they can legitimately run out if it if they don't distribute it correctly, because it comes out so slowly.
m3rcier: yeah they they can only draw so much from ah from wherever they're drawing it from.
Garrett: Yeah.
Nick: Right, right. Yeah, so i do I just find that interesting to think of like, you know, you have to you have to plead your case to your master of like, hey, I want to do this research project.
Nick: And then they're like, okay, well, draw it up we're going have to present to the council because it's going to put us what like well over a quota for the month.
Garrett: Yeah, and you gotta pay for it with something too.
Nick: So you yeah. Yep.
Garrett: Cause like no nothing happens for free in the Conclave.
m3rcier: Yeah.
Nick: Yeah. Yeah. So, and again, we've talked about before, they're very much like the capitalist wizards. And so, um but they do, we actually, in the article, we do get a kind of currency.
Nick: ah everything in the Conclave is backed by Liastrum. They use tokens of brass, copper, or bronze to track payments, and those payments can be redeemed for Liastrum. We've got a Liastrum standard in the Conclave.
Nick: And it does nod that Resta's Leisure uses gold or silver coins, so we can kind of assume a more traditional economy with the rest of the factions. But i like that. like ah you know This implies that it has to be some kind of exchange rate between factions.
Garrett: Yeah. Yeah, like there's a real like there's a market like keeping track of like what what pound what ounce of gold is worth like two copper quota tokens.
m3rcier: how much liash from correct.
Garrett: Yeah.
Nick: small Sell, sell, sell.
Garrett: Oh, for real.
m3rcier: And then the,
Garrett: Yeah, because you can stockpile the tokens, it looks like.
m3rcier: yeah. And if you're a master, so if you are, and we don't know how you get the title of master, but if you're a master within one of the spheres, you do have a right to draw liash from directly from the Oracle for your personal use. So if you try and draw like an obscene amount, the keeper is going to stop you.
m3rcier: Uh, but the keeper's the one who, and I guess it'd be interesting to find out cause I'm sure it's taxing to draw it out of the Oracle. Is it just the keeper that's doing the the massive amounts of drawing so that it could be divvied out or is it done by ah the other next?
m3rcier: I also, or is there like a group that works for the keeper that
Garrett: I, I, in, yeah, later in the article, and I wrote it somewhere in the our notes later on, but there's assistants to the keeper. And you, like, the keeper's not doing the physical labor.
Garrett: The assistants are the ones who handle the, uh, the actual, like, liastrum logistics.
m3rcier: pulling it out.
Garrett: Yeah. they're probably just, like, assistant mages, right?
Nick: It's dangerous job.
Garrett: So they're expendable.
Nick: Yeah.
m3rcier: Yeah, so the lesser sphere can become a greater sphere.
Nick: Well, and, and,
m3rcier: So you know, the the lesser ones will band together to get more influence or have more I guess blackmail material or however, however they can to get what they want. They don't, ah or they, you know, buddy up to another greater sphere. So there's a lot of political intrigue in the conclave alongside the, you know, the university and the corporate.
m3rcier: So it really is all three of the big things in like our society nowadays. It's the corporations, the government and the universities.
Nick: Oh man, yeah we just can't get away from it. it's
Garrett: ah But yeah, no, I think I think this whole like the tokens are I never even thought about him doing like that because we I know in earlier episodes we had talked about the like, could we teleport last room? No, um you got it. You have to like buy certain quantities and stuff. But the idea that.
Garrett: So first off, there's there's tokens you exchange for it, but then on top the tokens, you have to go to a place that you can exchange the tokens at which are pretty limited. And then the fact that if you order liastrum, like in, uh, Veloma, for example, that liastrum has to be transported by sea to ah port and then up the river potentially, um, physically.
Nick: Mm-hmm.
Garrett: So like you're paying, you know, for more than just the liastrum, right? You're paying for the logistics of getting it to yourself.
m3rcier: Yeah, and it's transported by the Conclave.
Garrett: Uh,
m3rcier: like You can't send someone to pick it up from them.
Garrett: mm-hmm.
m3rcier: They will bring it to you because most people that are outside the Conclave aren't going to know how to use it. One, they're not going to have the gauntlets to to do it. So they have a lot of control over their own product, which is ah not crazy because we're seeing that nowadays.
Garrett: Yeah, and this is...
m3rcier: But ah you buy the product, and then they come in allow you to use it.
Garrett: Yeah.
Garrett: And ah this is kind of off but on topic, but the idea that the Conclave has a ah massive shipping network ah around the entire continent is really interesting to think about, like,
Garrett: You know, they have the teleporters, the towers of Mircos or whatever, but then this like huge fleet that has to be running all the time to be able to keep that economy churning. You know i mean?
Nick: Yeah.
Garrett: And, you know, Chaga mentioned just how dangerous the water is. So they've got to be some absolutely skilled sailors and boat builders.
Nick: Well, imagine you probably have a lot of Liastrum protections and awards around your ships as well, ah because every every ship has to be treated so carefully, you right?
Garrett: Yeah. Yeah.
Nick: i you know we saw this
m3rcier: Yeah, they're they're but essentially big bombs.
Nick: yeah we and We saw this in our own on history with like the East India Company with like the idea of insurance.
Garrett: Yeah. Yeah.
Nick: That was like where that first started was the idea that, like well, I need to put my money between 10 different boats so I don't lose all of it if my one boat goes down.
Garrett: Yeah.
Nick: And it created this idea of spreading your investments and, you know, hiring, you know.
Garrett: yeah
Nick: So I like the idea that, like, the – because we talked about before. Like, the Order doesn't have, like, any coastal cities. in The Legion is – like, all their coast is mountainous. And Primal, I don't see them taking to maritime trade.
Nick: So, like, yeah, yeah, 100%.
Garrett: Yeah, beyond like fishing.
m3rcier: i don't I don't think they do a lot of trade unless it involves cutting your head off and taking it. Yeah.
Garrett: ah Yeah, like literal flesh. But I bet a lot of lesser spheres make a lot of money doing the ship stuff.
Nick: Yeah. And one thing I find interesting with the money, the last year back like tokens is that that opens up the opportunity for you to be like a like truly a merchant that is not ah like in of themselves a like mage of the conclave.
m3rcier: Yeah.
Garrett: yeah
Nick: You know, you don't have to be the one actually using the Astrum. You can just be like, no, I just buy and sell. Like I collect money, this this currency, and I move it around and I buy and trade.
Nick: And so people that buy from me can exchange it directly for Lea Astrome from the Conclate.
m3rcier: ye And that that ties in perfectly to the next thing, which is the the power of the spheres, how they have power. ah Their power and influence is directly determined by the products and services that that specific sphere offers, which we'll get into a little bit more later.
m3rcier: ah But within Quinvala and on Seligia, their products and services, that's where they get their power from. So like Garrett said, some of the lesser spheres and also the greater spheres might have a closer relationship with the Order or the Legion, depending on what they what they produce, what they sell, and who uses it.
m3rcier: ah And then the greater spheres, which are going to be the spheres that are doing the most profitable or have a monopoly or something that's highly used.
Garrett: Yeah, they have IP.
m3rcier: I guess his example would be your yeah you're you're spellbound, your warding spells, the spheres that you know have the most mercenary power. Those are going to be your greater spheres, which again, we'll get into in in a little bit more.
m3rcier: ah But we did do the gold and silver, which is what Seligia uses. And then the Conclave still deals in Lee Istrom, but it's it's it's backing the gold and silver standard. So those tokens or trinkets that we talked about, those are probably made out of gold and silver.
m3rcier: So like if I had one that said I could have you know four gallons of Lee Istrom, I could actually sell that to someone in the order or the Legion for their silver.
m3rcier: And I make money, but I just sold them where I from. Now, how they get it is up to them. But so there's there's some interesting economics that you can do with the way they're set up.
m3rcier: They do hold contracts very in high regard. So if you if you give your word, if you sign a contract and you break it, ah probably not going to end well for you unless you have more power or more influence.
m3rcier: And then the other one, and this is this was my favorite part of all these stories, we found out a little bit more backstory about Landriel and Polynor. So Polynor was the Nexi of Sphere Avalon.
m3rcier: think that's how you say it.
Garrett: That's what i say.
m3rcier: ah which is no longer a sphere because after his downfall, ah the sphere just, it all of its members, you know with Polynor's fall from grace, the sphere also suffered and it suffered so much that Polynor just dissolved it.
m3rcier: All of its members ah had to go to other spheres and join other spheres. So he just completely dissolved the sphere because of how far it had fallen. It was one of the greater ones. which is how he was in line to become the keeper.
m3rcier: But it's pretty interesting to hear that and see how very quickly it happened.
Garrett: Yeah.
Garrett: It didn't tell specifically what the sphere specialized in, but Nick wrote a hero wrote note about Apollonor's bookkeeping. And so the fact that Avalon is, the city of Avalon itself is on the coast, I bet it was like just a huge shipping hub.
Garrett: And I bet that's where a ton of their profit came from, was running a port.
m3rcier: Yeah, and he is at one of those port cities now, whichever one is the... I'm willing to bet the one that's on the other side.
Nick: It was like, gateway, right?
m3rcier: it say gateway? It might have. I have to go back and look. But he still has some of that... it Probably still uses some of that experience if he's at one of the port cities that is the focus of all the relics coming back before they go to the conclave proper.
m3rcier: Yeah.
Garrett: Yeah, because he's got to fund his malediction expeditions, which are not cheap. like they cost They cost money to do that.
m3rcier: And then sphere Sybil replaced Avalon as the in the next greater sphere when Polynor's group fell.
m3rcier: And their thing is prediction. So they use...
Garrett: Yeah, we'll talk about them more in the future in this next section here.
m3rcier: <unk>
Garrett: But ah yeah. I think the the idea was that they um
Garrett: might have been responsible, like planned out this thing. Like, can they have control of what happens?
m3rcier: Yeah, well they so if they're one of their things is prediction magic, which for some reason my mind can't figure out what that is in our world right now.
Garrett: ah fu Futures. What is it? Kaleshi? Is that the app? What's the...
m3rcier: What are the
Nick: Oh, Calci.
Garrett: Yeah. Yeah.
Nick: Yeah.
m3rcier: and what are the what are the little like the fortune tellers?
Garrett: Yeah.
m3rcier: They're the commercialized professional fortune tellers of the setting.
Garrett: But like real in this world.
Nick: Yeah.
m3rcier: Yeah, and apparently they're really good at it.
Nick: But really.
m3rcier: so All right, so the five greater spheres, and we're going to start with the the greatest of them all. ah It's going to be sphere Chimer. They're the oldest, they're the most powerful, and they're the only ah only one of the current five greater spheres that has always been a greater sphere.
m3rcier: They have never fallen ah out of the top, and that mainly derives from the fact that they have a Monopoly on Spellbound, which the entire Conclave and those that do business with the Conclave depend on Spellbound.
m3rcier: So unless you find a way to to do something that is better than Spellbound, I don't think you're ever going to kick these guys off council.
Garrett: Yeah, well, I think specifically it's like a monopoly on flesh crafting, which I think is a sub category of spell bounds. But I'm not 100% sure. o
Nick: Yeah.
Garrett: But that's just what the the article said. So I took that at face. But because I think other people can make spell bounds, but being able to manipulate flesh, I think it was the big thing.
Garrett: Kind of like the Legion does when they're combining stuff.
m3rcier: The other ones would probably have to be constructs, not like any spellbound with flesh.
Garrett: Yeah.
m3rcier: And their latest and greatest thing they're going after is genetically modified crops. And when i say genetically, I mean, like, I strim modified crops.
m3rcier: They're trying to enter the foodstuff market using the ice from to modify the food. which is hilarious.
Garrett: Genius.
m3rcier: But hey, they got to find a way to increase those profit margins somewhere, right?
Garrett: Genius idea.
Garrett: i love that your options are getting food from skeletons who are farmers or GMO Leastrom.
m3rcier: yeah Well, no, the it's not the skeletons. ah I mean, they probably grow their own food. But Tiago shared with us that the breadbasket of Silegia is the order.
m3rcier: Dinus is like the most fertile lands.
Garrett: Oh, oh yeah.
m3rcier: So they produce the the vast majority of like the foodstuffs, which is probably why their caravans get raided by the primal so much.
Garrett: I forgot about that. Yeah.
Garrett: Looking for snacks.
m3rcier: Just steal the food, don't don't need to grow it. All right, sphere number two, and this is to our understanding the second greatest sphere, is it going to be sphere Akinsa.
m3rcier: that how y'all say it?
Garrett: Yeah. Good enough.
Nick: Yeah. Yep.
m3rcier: This is going to be the sphere that D'Arrel Laundriel is part of, I believe. No, I think I might have that wrong.
Nick: Yep.
m3rcier: Hold on.
Nick: No, you're right.
m3rcier: No, I had it right. Okay. brain's just there. And this is where i know Nick and I, and I would bet Garrett too, we like this because there was a Callan Island reference in this.
Garrett: Yep.
m3rcier: But not too much to go on, just that it disappeared. And because of its disappearance, they the the Conclave put some... ah
m3rcier: Regulations in place in a Kinza is the one they enforce those regulations. So they're basically internal and external security slash the military for the spheres.
m3rcier: This is where you get your mercenaries and that type of thing. Actually, no, I think I might be wrong there. This is internal security.
Garrett: It's their extra is so it's external like, uh, defense magic defense.
m3rcier: They're HR. The, uh,
Garrett: So not physical defense, but magic defense and internal magic defense is what I think what they're going for.
m3rcier: Yeah.
m3rcier: And they make sure that you're, they make sure you're following the magical regulations. Like if they say you can only put three ounces of Lee Istrom in a drink or whatever. I don't know.
m3rcier: They're the ones in that they're the magical enforcers, ah which is why they they're the only ones with the spell wardens who spell wardens have a great deal of power within the conclave.
Garrett: Yeah.
Nick: Yeah.
Garrett: yeah
m3rcier: they are at will. They can go in and say, hey, I don't care what sphere you're part of. I want to see your lab. I want to tour your lab and make sure everything's right. You can't tell a spell word. No, they're able to go in and inspect the labs.
m3rcier: Now they are bound. If they learn any of your sphere's trade secrets doing that inspection, they are not allowed to share that with their own sphere or anyone else. So while they do have a lot of power, they also have responsibility that they misuse that power the conclave does come down on them uh enchanted armor and then what's that note about tentacles coming out of the sky portal okay
Garrett: So, but, uh, yeah.
Nick: Surely that doesn't come up very often, right?
Garrett: Well, the, the art. So there's two things here. Like, so the Kalen Island, I feel like we should mention this first is the, uh, it was an independent nation. It wasn't part of the conclave. Um,
m3rcier: do we know that
Garrett: Yeah, it says that in the article, they were an independent nation. So it's like maybe they were doing some sort of experiment, like the Conclave was on them, and they messed up and then the entire island just disappeared.
Garrett: And at that point, that's when they were like, hey, we need a we need somebody in charge of making sure nobody does an experiment like this, because what if we make our own island disappear?
m3rcier: Well, think that's what prompted them to put those places.
Garrett: Yes, yeah, that's probably become a greater sphere.
m3rcier: we do like we don't We don't want to lose a whole island. ah
Garrett: Right.
m3rcier: But yeah, Spell Wardens, the Enchanted Armor, which, I mean, they probably make armor that allows them to be better Spell Wardens and Defenders.
Garrett: but now But yeah.
m3rcier: So kind of makes sense there.
Garrett: But yeah, the big thing here is on the article itself, there's this piece of artwork. and i Is this on a card? and I just missed it. But it's like Cthulhu coming out of a portal in the sky.
Nick: uh that's dimensional breach i think that's a yeah it's a blue spell that you the kimer spirit kimer
Garrett: Okay, so that is a card already.
m3rcier: Yeah.
Garrett: i never...
m3rcier: Yeah. It's already in a card.
Garrett: I never looked that close to the card. um
m3rcier: The only artwork that is new is going to be the one just under Apollonor.
Garrett: So this is ah like this is confirms that like things are coming out of other dimensions.
Nick: yeah yeah and that's why um that's why especially when you know you go through the lore article Because, you know, I didn't read the lore article before I started playing the game. Like, I got into the game first.
Nick: And so, seeing cards like de Dimension Breach with, like, these tentacles coming from, like, a portal, I was just like, well, let's we're getting some Cthulhu, like, Lovecraft. And then, when you read about, like, the Moloch Oracle and how it's, like, straight up, he looked up to the sky and said, like, well, there's got to be something else out there. Reached into, like, the Aether and pulled the Astrum out of it. I'm like, oh, okay. So, we're just doing, like, Lovecraftian horror now.
Nick: Like, we're just we're just there.
Garrett: Right, right.
m3rcier: Nope. And wait till it goes bad. That's that's the part that's going to be interesting with these guys. ah So next sphere is going to be sphere amblis, which is our transposition magic.
m3rcier: We've always, and I don't think that the lower people really care, but it's not teleportation magic. It's transposition magic. We're not teleporting you. We're changing your position.
Garrett: Listen, going to keep saying it. they can They can come and take me out of the house.
m3rcier: I don't.
Garrett: It's fine. I'm waiting.
m3rcier: ah This is going to be Murakos. this is probably These are probably his ah fanboys. Because he made the Towers of Transposition. They're the ones that were able to reactivate them and know how to work them.
m3rcier: ah That's how they are a greater sphere, because they control all of the towers to which we know of. Hold on, I wrote this down. We know of exactly seven so far.
m3rcier: Seven.
Garrett: This is a lot.
m3rcier: There's Stormcrash Rest, which is a conclave outpost on the south side of the Malediction.
Garrett: Yeah, yeah that's for their gate.
m3rcier: The Citadel, the Nexus, Avalon, Gateway, which are all conclave other than the Citadel. There is a hidden tower in the Paxos, somewhere that the conclave maintains so they can get there.
m3rcier: And then there is a ah one in Tenebria, that's either inactive or active and no one's manning it. Those are the seven that we know about.
m3rcier: But yeah, you can transport entire armies if you have the money or the Liestrom to pay for it. I believe Chiago did share that you cannot transport Liestrom through the towers though.
m3rcier: You can't transposition Liestrom itself. ah
Nick: It goes bad.
m3rcier: Makes big bomb.
Garrett: Yeah, it has to go up by C. I do wish when we had him on, I would have remembered to ask him, like, how does it work to transport a whole army? ah
m3rcier: It's probably like a Stargate. You turn it on and you just walk through, maybe.
Garrett: Yeah, maybe, I don't know.
m3rcier: I don't know. Or are you stand on a big rune and maybe maybe you have to do multiple transports because the army can't fit on the pad or something. But...
Garrett: Yeah, well, because there's this there's a sentence that says, you know, you can transport armies, like, behind enemy lines.
m3rcier: ah
Garrett: But in my head, ah I thought we declared that like you have to transport to a tower.
m3rcier: Mm-hmm.
Garrett: So does that mean it's possible to transport to random places?
m3rcier: I did.
m3rcier: No, I think he said it is tower to tower and then they could do like the mages can teleport people behind enemy lines, but I think it's tower to tower.
Nick: it's c
Nick: but And that's where we, yeah, I feel like there's a gray area because we yeah we talked we talked about it and then you have like this line because I'm with you, Garrett, where, you know, the idea that, you know, mages are able to rescue stranded soldiers, relocate personnel.
Garrett: That's what I thought too.
Nick: Well, it's all like, what are we doing with it? Like, what is the difference between the towers and like what the mages are doing?
Garrett: Yeah, is is there like a ah distance limit, like with the spell or something?
m3rcier: think it's just scale.
Nick: Separately.
m3rcier: that I think it's distance and scale is what, is what ah if I remember right, what Tiago said is distance distance and volume are the difference between a tower.
Nick: Yeah.
m3rcier: Like if you want to move long distances and a lot of stuff, you have to use a tower. Otherwise the majors can do it themselves. But other than just the transportation teleporting you, the way these guys make money is, since there's no Wi-Fi or cell phones and that kind of stuff in this setting,
m3rcier: You pay an Ambulus Mage, he will transposition himself and deliver your message in person.
Garrett: Yeah. Uh, I had a funny word for it. I can't remember. It was a play on pony express, but i can't remember what the pony word was anymore.
Nick: Yeah.
m3rcier: Ambulus Express.
Garrett: Uh, dang it. Ambles. What'd you call it?
m3rcier: Ambulus Express.
Garrett: That's, pretty that's good.
m3rcier: hello
Garrett: No, that's good. No. Nexus express. Um, but yeah, uh, okay. Uh, and then i'm I'm gonna take over here for, uh, the next two. So the next one we have is sphere sphere Vertan, uh,
Garrett: And these are your these are your warriors. So they're all about using the Liastrum to perfect the art of war. And instead of making other experiments or tools, they make actual weapons out of Liastrum.
Garrett: And the next part of our podcast is specifically all about this one. So i won't go into super detail. ah But one cool little detail we got was it talks about how the Liastrum weapons, where the blades are actual magic Liastrum instead of like steel, is it rivals the work of the Volker Forgemasters in Iron Keep, which is like that independent Volker nation in the mountains next to Veloma.
Garrett: And so it tells me like it the effect that it rivals them, like the weapons coming out of the Iron Keep must be pretty good if they can go toe to toe with ah the magical Liastrum stuff. Because later on it talks about how ridiculous they are.
Garrett: um They're kind of like, they're a war college and then a they're professional mercenaries. So it, Conclave itself doesn't have an army because we've already discussed, it's like a technocracy, technocrats almost a little bit.
Garrett: Yeah.
m3rcier: It's a loose coalition.
Garrett: Yeah. So they don't have a standing army, so they have professional mercenaries and Sphere Verton is that. And so the Conclave hires those mercenaries themselves. And then also anybody else, if they have the the money can hire them as well.
Garrett: Um, and that's how they came to be was they made a ton of money during the age of strife after the malediction became a thing, um, charging to defend people, uh,
m3rcier: Yeah, so you i mean, outside of the game, so game mechanics prevent, you know, Conclave mages from being in an order unless you're a laundry thing.
m3rcier: But you could in in the greater scheme of things, you could be like a an ordered knight who wants to go in and find a legacy. You could hire some Conclave mages to go with you if you have the money to pay for it. There's nothing like the Conclave ain't going to say no. They're going to take your money and send the mages.
m3rcier: Order might not be happy you did it, but ah these are mercenaries. So while in game, some of that stuff can't happen just you know out of the blue. From a lore perspective, some things can.
Garrett: Yeah, if we get some independent seekers someday, like independent seekers from Veloma or something, I think it'd be pretty cool to like be able to pick cards from anything. He makes some really wild decks.
Garrett: Uh, and then, so we'll talk about them more later. And then the last one is the one that, uh, that replaced sphere Avalon and that's sphere Sybil or Sybil. I'm guessing it's Sybil though.
Nick: I say, yeah, Sybil.
Garrett: Um, Yeah.
m3rcier: Yeah, Sybil.
Garrett: so now we talked about this. They specialize in the research of the forces behind chance and destiny. So this is like, they found it's like, you know, when you're sitting in there somewhere and you've got to come up with a product idea and everybody else is doing everything you can ever imagine. And they're like, what if we make magic about stuff that isn't real?
Garrett: And I feel like that's where they started. Like, what if we just tell people we can predict things and then they slowly actually figured how to use Leastron to, ah change, chance, destiny, and luck.
Garrett: um
m3rcier: Yeah.
Garrett: Now, it's are they really good at just predicting things are they actually good at what they do?
m3rcier: We'll see that's... don't
Garrett: um It's hard to know with stuff like that, right?
m3rcier: and know. I have to give them some credit. They have to be pretty good at it. If they've made it to greater sphere status, they can't be like... there' There's got to be some reality to it. Otherwise, there's no way they would have been able to make it to the greater sphere of status.
Garrett: Right.
m3rcier: We do have a a flavor text on the card that I think has to be attributed to them.
Garrett: Yeah, well... their biggest. Oh, yeah.
m3rcier: It doesn't say it is, but going to read it. So it's on brewing fate. It's called, the text is luck creates good mages. Great mages create luck.
m3rcier: That has to be like the calling guard of this sphere.
Nick: Yeah, I agree. i After this article, I kind of want to go through and build a Conclave deck for like each sphere. you know like yeah Obviously, you're going to have overlap, but you know I kind of want to sit down and be like, what would an Amblysscene so you know, an Amblis-focused Malediction expedition look like, using, like, Telekinesis and Dimension Breach, or, you know, if you're doing Vertan, you have the Vertan Battlecasters as, like, a mainstay, you know. I kind of really, all of this, like, lore gets me when I go back in get my teeth into, like, a thematic deck.
Garrett: Yeah, and feel free to hire the Sphere Vertine guys.
m3rcier: Yeah.
Nick: Right, yeah.
m3rcier: Well, so we have, let's see, we have Landryl is from Akinsa. Polynor is not really from any of the greater Sears because his fell.
m3rcier: ah You have, I'm I'm trying include the others. So Lyanna is a Conclave and then Polynor. Those are the three blues, right? Or is there another that i'm missing?
Nick: Yep. Morita.
Garrett: Morita, but she's gone.
m3rcier: Yeah, but she's still part of it. So I'm i'm trying to align the seekers with what sphere they might've studied under or been part of. So Morita, who would, which sphere would she have been in Probably Chimer because they're flesh shapers.
Nick: I mean, maybe Chimer.
Garrett: Spellbound.
Nick: But there could also be, i mean, we don't, there could be any number of lesser spheres that we just don't
m3rcier: And then...
Garrett: Right, because she just kind of, she learned the craft and then bounced. And then... in
Nick: Yeah, like, i don't we don't know that she even went through, like, the days of Moloch. You know?
m3rcier: No, she did because that's, I think...
Nick: like
Garrett: I think she did go through that. So she i think I think that's how she gets access to her Lyastrium, is she has a a monthly quota she can still get from passing school.
Nick: Is that? Okay.
m3rcier: She can get...
Nick: That's right.
m3rcier: And then Liana did because she found her legacy was within the Oracle in a hidden chamber.
Nick: Okay. Okay.
m3rcier: But like Liana, which one would she belong to? Because definitely not Chimer because she went to another faction to for them to build her something.
Garrett: I don't know if she's really a part of one either though, because she bounced also and left.
m3rcier: Uh, she left, but she is still being poisoned. And I don't think she really holds any allegiance to the primal since they tried to screw her over, but she definitely, uh, yeah.
Garrett: No, I think she's like an independent. She's like Moretta where she's just an independent actor.
m3rcier: yeah Just with, with, uh, was just trying to see who she might've studied, but I don't think we know enough about her to, to give us a, oh, she was in this sphere or anything.
Garrett: Right. Probably just a lesser one.
Nick: right
m3rcier: Yep.
Garrett: Um,
m3rcier: David Price- which there's there's so many of them that they didn't bother to name the lesser stairs that's like.
Garrett: but yeah, they're like, there's like thousands of them. Um, and, and like they're innumerable apparently. Um, cause like,
m3rcier: David Price- we're not easy to start it can I just like follow a 1092 and say hey i'm sphere llc and I have a sphere now.
Nick: yeah i mean you can think about it right well i'm you know you gotta have ah you gotta have a
Garrett: yeah I think you just need a master and and one mage and it qualifies.
Nick: I'm sure there's like a sphere for like, you know, um everlasting era architecture and historians.
Garrett: Right,
Nick: And then just kind of do like, hey, how do we how do we rebuild like the aqueducts that they had during the time of everlasting? You know, like who knows the the various minutiae that you could get into like this world.
Nick: Right.
Garrett: right right, right, right. Like I'm a, uh, you know, we specialize in bricks, bricks that don't fall apart. Don't decay. Lee asked for bricks. Get them here.
m3rcier: but they might poison you over time.
Garrett: Yeah. if fight too
m3rcier: kind of like Kind of like some of the building materials we've used in the past 50 years.
Garrett: If you live in the house with them.
Nick: Just asbestos? Yeah.
Garrett: Asbestos. ah Okay.
m3rcier: Don't worry, it's it's not hurting you.
Garrett: Okay. Before we go to the next one, let me finish this simple thing real fast. ah they So the big thing that made him, I think that the obviously the greatest fear is is the downfall of Polinor. They jumped at it and they called it was going to happen.
Garrett: and then had enough money to do it. And the way they're making their money is they're selling their stock advice across the continent. They can tell you what's gonna go up, what's gonna go down, and that's, they made bank doing that.
Garrett: ah And then,
m3rcier: They can tell you if if your planned effort, like, hey, we have this plan to make a billion dollars. They can tell you if it's going to work or not ahead of time.
Garrett: yeah. And this is like a new idea, like the idea of the Lyastrum Destiny. And so the the rest of the Conclave is like worried about this because they're starting to think that they can pull strings and make things happen.
Garrett: And the Polynor thing is their first hint that, you know, maybe these guys have more power than they're letting on. i And so that's going to create some tension within the i think the council.
Garrett: Because if they figure out how to like manipulate the future, you know they can cause the downfall of the other spheres.
Garrett: So that's the last thing I've got i've got on that one.
Nick: Yeah. Yeah, it always gets it's oh man it always gets tricky when you start dealing with people who can see the future. but
Garrett: Right, right, right, right. Yeah, because that's like how a lot of ah Norse mythology gets so weird, right? Because no one's in charge of their fate, really.
Nick: Yeah. have votedin and Yeah. how do you How do you ever trust somebody who can see every possible, like every possibility, right?
Garrett: Right. It's a very powerful... That's why i think they're overplaying their hand a little bit. I think they just they're just pretty good at slight predictions and are right more than 50% of the time, and that's how you make money.
Nick: Right, just like a fortune teller, just kind of reading like body language and being like, h you are distressed today. It's like, how could you tell? ah
Garrett: Exactly, exactly. Okay, okay.
m3rcier: I don't know. fact your skin is cracking.
Garrett: All right, you're blue. All right, Sphere of Votan, Sphere Votan. Vertan, Sphere of Vertan.
m3rcier: You going read the the quote, Nick, or do you want Garrett to?
Nick: Sorry, sorry. I'm scrolling down. I'm scrolling down.
Nick: Stubbornness is a common trait among the masters. Most would rather die than agree that they were wrong, and amidst the spheres, Vertan surely competes for the title of most hard-headed of them all. I'm not in a position to demand better masters. Being tutored is privilege enough, but if I may ask for something, I just hope that Seratrin's eyes aren't aligned with the blood he spilled.
Nick: Bel- Bel-Aim, apprentice of sphere Vertan.
m3rcier: That's a name drop I missed, Sertan. So her master is Seratentrin.
Nick: as are I just read it. Seratrin? Yep.
m3rcier: Yeah, so this is Sphere.
Nick: Yeah, so a little more detail in the Vertan.
m3rcier: Work.
Nick: So, like we just talked about, these are our warrior mages. and
Garrett: Yeah.
Nick: they used And I do love, especially on the the full sculpt of the Vertan Battlecaster, the you can really see the sword made of pure Liastrum coming straight out of their sphere.
Nick: Yeah, it's awesome.
Garrett: yeah
Garrett: It really is um And in the article, people need to look at this article. They they put some concept art in the article of a unit. Is this unit in the game? I'm really bad at remembering these units of cards.
Garrett: I'm so sorry.
m3rcier: No, it's not in the game.
Garrett: Okay, good.
m3rcier: But it's it's the artwork of the Mini itself, not just like the artwork of the unit. So like they have the Mini on its base. It's really cool artwork.
Garrett: Yeah, this is coming soon. Whatever it is. But it's a guy with like dual blade, like copper. uh liastrum axes things there's a name for this i can't remember this it's not a site but it's something similar to a site
Nick: Like, a yeah, like throwing axes or, you know, he's like throwing him
Nick: ah couldn't tell you. it looks like It looks like a few different, it looks like ah a number of different weapons.
m3rcier: A battle boomerang.
Garrett: battle it does it does okay i'm sorry
m3rcier: looks like it would hurt to get hit with.
Nick: It's okay, it's okay. So, um yeah, so going back again, War of the Everlasting. we you know The early days of the Conclave, the mages got together and just kind of formed Sphere Vertan by like just mercenary mages who were focused on the art of war. right So we get a name drop. The first nexi of Sphere Vertan is Gianni Vertan.
Nick: He discovered the combination of martial skill with spellcasting would overcome some instability that they had with early Liastrum use in the Age of Strife.
Nick: m And I'm guessing that's some kind of like you know bodily control, folk you know some kind of meditation or or focus stance that better enabled them to for that like kind of somatic element of spellcasting.
m3rcier: Yeah. And so as a note, after the fall, Lee Eystrom did not work the same as it did before the fall. So the fall even had an effect on Lee Eystrom. It made it more chaotic, more unpredictable.
m3rcier: So there was, even though it's from quote unquote another dimension, because we don't know that the fall did have an effect on it, which is what the Marshall form of the version kind of tippered the Lee Eystrom.
Garrett: Yeah, it's like the discipline behind doing whatever they're doing made the magic less ah chaotic.
Nick: Yeah.
m3rcier: Let's follow the title.
Nick: Yeah, and and you're right. It kind of didn't mean to skip over, but yeah, exactly. um We've talked about it before. During the fall, like, all the magic kind of gets cut off. Even Liastrum was different after the after the fall.
Nick: So, you know, now we have, ah and we don't know, it's not the first Sphere. um So we just still don't really know exactly how deep the Conclave, you know, what was the first sphere or anything like that, like the true origin of the Conclave yet.
Nick: But we do know that Vertan
Nick: and kind of led these like battle mages. And, the you know the article yeah we're going to go into, why they're important to the Conclave.
Garrett: I think Kymer, Kymer, I'm sorry, I think Kymer is definitely a oldest.
m3rcier: That's the oldest we know of.
Garrett: Yeah, i think I think they started.
Nick: Yeah. I think they are set they do mention the the oldest of those fears, right?
Garrett: ah
Garrett: Yeah, so i think they probably started it and then for like like logistics, right? All these other things formed up around it naturally over time.
Nick: Yeah.
m3rcier: Yeah, and the part of the well say part of the reason for FHR10 is that directly after the fall, all of the masters or those who had knowledge of certain techniques and abilities
Garrett: Sorry, anyways, continue, I'm sorry.
Nick: It was probably...
m3rcier: If they were killed in war, the Conclave lost that knowledge. So they have to they're having to relearn some of their own techniques, some of their own spells. ah Part of Vartan is to try and prevent that.
m3rcier: If they can protect the Masters, even from other spheres, when they're out because they're mercenaries, So if I'm a, you know, if I'm a Nexi of Chimer, I might have some Vertan mercenaries in my entourage to protect me.
m3rcier: I wonder how far the, they would take that, you know, do we kill his inner sphere protectors to make sure we get him back if they're trying to hold him back? So his knowledge isn't lost. Like how far are the warriors going to, going to go to protect the knowledge?
Nick: I mean, I think to some extent they have to, they like, I don't know. It's hard also because if you are a master of the Conclave and you possess, like, knowledge that really only you have, why are you putting yourself in positions that you can possibly be murdered?
Garrett: Yeah, well, I don't think they saw the...
Nick: um
m3rcier: Yeah.
Garrett: ah Are we still talking about the malediction fall?
Nick: but The fall was one thing, yeah.
m3rcier: yeah i don't i don't think they saw Yeah, I don't think they saw the fall coming.
Garrett: Oh, yeah. I don't think they saw that coming.
Nick: but But there was a war going on there, too. You know, like...
Garrett: Yeah, it's
m3rcier: Yeah. but but But wars are profitable, remember? So they were out there trying to make ah they were out there trying to make some money and got themselves killed
Nick: That's why you have... That's why you have apprentices.
m3rcier: Yeah, so during the during the Age of Strife, which is the, I think, 500 years from the fall until Veloma walked out of the Malediction with the first legacy, ah the Conclave worked deals with the Wystrel, which is that coastal region between the Malediction and Quintinval, with all those cities along there.
Nick: That's why...
Garrett: true. It's true, true, true.
Garrett: Yeah, close enough.
Nick: Maybe, yeah. It's hard to keep it all straight.
Garrett: The free cities.
m3rcier: Well, the Free Cities and then all the Conclave cities along the coast, they offered protection. So they would, their mages from Vertan would go out and protect those cities. ah
m3rcier: Yeah. And that was something that Tiago mentioned.
Garrett: Okay, well...
m3rcier: mentioned And then Garrett, do you want to you want to tell the audience about your your your map search?
Garrett: I mean, I can listen, I couldn't find whistler on the map. Okay, I looked everywhere. And Nick is like, it's just the land of the free city.
m3rcier: For how long?
Garrett: it's like, oh my gosh. Listen, here, however, skipping that, skipping that, hold on. It mentions the article it's hunting down the agents of the scour. What is that?
m3rcier: Yeah. So the Scour is the Everlasting that betrayed Moloch and Mircos.
Garrett: What is that?
m3rcier: He's the one that unleashed the giants to kill Moloch.
Garrett: Thank you. I could not remember that.
m3rcier: So I'm sure, i guess my thinking is we don't know too much about him. We just know that he's kind of like the Loki ah of the Everlasting. But part of me wants to say he was probably one of the three founders of the Conclave, or at least he was kind of like Galdron to the Order, where he's not...
m3rcier: He's loyal to him and he he works for him, he's kind of a ah a second tier everlasting.
Nick: kind of a wild card. Yeah.
Garrett: Yeah.
m3rcier: Yeah, so I'm thinking of the scorer because a lot of where we hear about him, it has to do with the conclave. So maybe he was the third will and when Mercos left, he wasn't kept in check anymore and he killed, you know.
m3rcier: So I just know that he's probably the everlasting we hate.
Garrett: But now now we don't know where he's at, though.
m3rcier: no no one knows where he is.
Garrett: he's not he's He's still alive. It doesn't say they killed him. They just hunted down some mate some agents.
Nick: Yeah, we don't know we Well, we don't know the fate of most most or most half of the Everlasting. Yeah, Skyward is only mentioned a couple of times.
Garrett: Yeah, this is a...
m3rcier: Yeah.
Nick: And even Lord Primer.
Garrett: This is a serious lose-in.
Nick: Yeah, the Skyward and Everlasting reviled by all others.
m3rcier: Yeah.
Nick: That's the...
m3rcier: So he must've done something to make some people mad.
Garrett: Yeah.
Nick: Yeah.
Garrett: Well, the Giants, that would probably be pretty bad.
Nick: Which is which i find I find interesting, too, because the everlast like the original 13 were all brought together. like they They were kind of chosen or chose each other. And so it makes me think of like, what kind of skills did this everlasting bring to the table that everybody was like, i don't really know how I feel about that guy, but you know, we do need him.
Garrett: I don't know what he is, but he's got it.
m3rcier: At some point they had to have disliked him or they did like
Garrett: But he was he he's able to wake up Giants, so that's pretty impressive, right?
Nick: He's called, he's called the scourer. He doesn't even have a name other than that.
Garrett: Yeah.
Nick: So.
m3rcier: that's because they struck his name from the history books.
Garrett: That's just rude.
Garrett: They're just jealous because they couldn't make Giants, and he's over here waking Giants up.
Nick: Well, yeah.
m3rcier: Somewhere in one of my millions of text files that I have, I have a list of all of this, uh, all of the everlasting. For some reason, I want to say that he's dead, but I don't think we do. I don't think we know that.
Nick: Yeah.
Garrett: Uh, I don't think, I don't think we do. I don't think we do.
m3rcier: And it might be in our...
Garrett: Um,
m3rcier: Oh, yeah. No, I have a note right here. Scour I have a question mark because we don't know if he's dead or not.
Nick: There's so many.
Garrett: okay.
Nick: We're starting with all these lore articles, especially. We're starting get the point where there's so many things to reference. We don't have everything in one place.
Garrett: Yeah.
m3rcier: Yeah.
Garrett: It's, it's literally our jobs for the people who are supposed to know, uh,
m3rcier: I'll
Nick: But we we know. we have We figured it out.
Garrett: ah All right. All right. Listen, listen, next step.
m3rcier: just...
Garrett: Okay. Veloma and the first secret. ah Listen, this is when they really spilled profit. This was it. This was it, baby. ah Selling protection services going in the malediction immediately overnight elevated to great sphere because they were charging out the nose to go into this thing.
m3rcier: and Think about it. You send, you know, it's it's a war band going in. They got the wannabe seeker. He or she has, let's say, half a dozen people with him. And then they hire half a dozen to a dozen of seer verdran to protect them. And if that relic is really juicy, or if that legacy is really juicy, there's more of us than there is of you.
m3rcier: We will just kill the people and take the legacy before we leave the malediction.
Garrett: Yes. Now, however, that's right.
m3rcier: Now, they didn't do that because they're contractually bound not to, but...
Garrett: They are respected, all right?
m3rcier: and know
Garrett: And trustworthy. It specifically says trustworthy and respected.
m3rcier: Well, get that, but you can keep that trustworthiness if you're the only people that make it out of this out of the malediction.
Garrett: Listen, questions would arise. Uh, all right. All right. So modern day sphere for 10, it's modern day. your 10. When I say modern day, modern day malediction. Uh, we got two groups. The sphere is broken down into two groups. You got the Aspis and the Doru.
Garrett: Uh, listen, it's simple. It's yeah the officer core, the strategists and tacticians and the Doru, the frontline warriors and battle casters. So it's, it's like every other army.
m3rcier: I see.
Garrett: It's, you got your officers and you're enlisted.
m3rcier: You're officers and you're enlisted.
Garrett: That's right. Um,
m3rcier: so
Garrett: Now that
m3rcier: question real quick, Nick, Aspis and Duro, are those linguist? Are lingued or those Latin or are they?
Nick: No, i I don't recognize them for anything. um i really I really, yeah, I got nothing. And I even looked it up.
Garrett: do we ask AI?
Nick: I even looked them up and i they don't come from any consistent language.
Garrett: What did
Garrett: okay, great.
Nick: unless it's Unless it's something that you know anybody who's an actual genuine linguist might might know.
Garrett: Original.
Garrett: We'll ask them. All right, so Liastrum weaponry. so This is another spot they make its good money on. so like we said earlier, they're not using actual steel, they're using Liastrum blades.
Garrett: And are pretty cool. um Back to Lord of the Rings. The blades, when they cut you, it's like like the...
m3rcier: Nazgul Blade.
Garrett: Yeah, where it poisons Frodo and stuff. So anyways, so these, they cut deeply. guess step one to a good blade. ah Poisons your blood with the Lyastrum. And even if you were to survive the wound, you're driven mad by otherworldly pain and the corruption festers in your veins. So if you get cut by it, you're not going to have a good time.
Garrett: In fact, it sucks so bad that if you just hire some of these Sphere Vertan mercenaries in a dispute, the other side might just be like, you know what, it's not worth accidentally getting cut by these guys. We're just going to call it.
Garrett: ah You win. um
m3rcier: You guys win.
Garrett: Yeah, okay. So the economics, I think this is pretty cool. So they yeah they have two products. Product one is their weapons and services. And they make the weapons so difficult to use that they, I guess, should not be... ah haven't there must be some sort of rule where you have to be able to sell everything you make in the conclave because they'll sell you the sword but the problem is you got to buy the class to use the sword um and then the class takes like you know your entire training life to figure out how to use it so it's cheaper in the end to just hire the mercenaries with the with the weapons than it is to uh buy the sword and learn how to use yourself but like any oh right
m3rcier: could Good chance you'll kill yourself if you just buy the weapon.
Garrett: but like any good business, they also offer a cheaper product. Uh, and the cheaper product are their super easy to use spells. Um, I think it's so funny that there's this whole paragraph about how these spells are affordable, easy to use and learn.
Garrett: And they're just like, I just, they, they make a ton of money on these apprentices can you use them. Masters can use them. Um, I just think that's pretty cool that, uh, that that's their, that's the real moneymaker is these cheap, easy to use spells gets everybody hooked.
Garrett: Um, But yeah, ah and then the final note is, you know, they're the main, the main guys who go into the malediction, um especially for the conclave. I think there was a sentence that's like, if there's five people going in the conclave, of two out of the five Vertan mages usually.
m3rcier: And there's, so the artwork on this one at the very bottom is going to be the new, we we already have Elite, so it's one of the new units from the expansion that's coming up.
m3rcier: It's, I'm trying to see if I can find, I have to turn Discord back on to do this.
Garrett: it's it's It's Iron Man's arm.
Nick: Yeah, it's Mega Man.
m3rcier: Mega Man, not Iron Man. Mega Man.
Nick: Mega Man.
Garrett: Oh, Mega Man, yeah. Uh-huh.
Nick: And I, okay, I want to, I want to jump back in to redeem myself on this one.
m3rcier: Mega Man.
Garrett: He's jumping. Reduce.
Nick: and um So Aspis and Doru, I didn't find anything while I was looking for Doru.
Garrett: All right, here we go.
Nick: However, if we expand our, we open our minds a little bit, the Dory, right, it was a Greek, that was the Greek spear that was used in ancient Greek battles.
Garrett: Okay, like it.
Nick: And oh usually the Hoplite, Hoplite warriors were armed with a dory and a Hoplon, but the another name for the Hoplon was an Aspis.
Garrett: Okay.
m3rcier: Okay. There's two weapons that they will.
Nick: And so we have ah we have a spear we have a spear and shield.
Garrett: Okay.
Nick: So your spear is your warriors and your shield is your tacticians.
Garrett: I like it. I think that's it confirmed.
m3rcier: Yeah.
Nick: So I think that's pretty, pretty spot on.
m3rcier: Pretty close.
Nick: It's official.
m3rcier: All right.
Garrett: That's official. According to Luth Studios, they're going to put it in writing.
m3rcier: Yep. So the the artwork is the same artwork from the card that's been leed or that wasn't leaked. It was used at Adaptive Contents. Athen, the Prime Decimator.
m3rcier: I'm going to assume that he is part of this sphere. ah Even though he had to have... Well, I mean, he replaced an arm with a freaking cannon. So kind makes sense.
m3rcier: But pretty cool artwork.
Garrett: that's commitment to the craft.
m3rcier: Pretty cool artwork there. I like how he's holding... It looks like he's holding his heart where his heart would be. i don't know if he has this.
Garrett: I think he's holding a Leastron ball.
Nick: He's, he's put, yeah, it's Leastrom.
m3rcier: I think he is, but, but is it embedded in his chest or is he just holding it against his chest?
Garrett: Yeah, hes yeah man he's he's changing magazines.
Nick: ah We, no, yeah, we see, I think there's another unit that has like that, um like breast mounted Leastrom.
Garrett: Yeah.
m3rcier: Okay.
Nick: We've seen it in other, it's like one of the Conclave Scholars or so or something, I think has that ball up on the chest.
m3rcier: Uh,
Garrett: Yeah, it's ball-fed.
Nick: Ball face.
m3rcier: Let's
Garrett: Ball-fed cannon.
m3rcier: one
Garrett: It's like a Leastrom Mark 19.
m3rcier: let' see, anything else on these that we have?
m3rcier: Just case. Yeah, so they're the they have a monopoly on Laistrom weaponry. No one else in the Conclave can make Laistrom-based weaponry.
Garrett: Well, they can.
m3rcier: Only this
Garrett: They can. It's just super-duper hard and not worth That's the key.
m3rcier: No, it says it in here. It says Chimere hold the monopoly over art of infusing living tissue with Leistrom. Vertan holds the monopoly over creation of Leistrom-based weaponry.
Garrett: Well, they hold they have a monopoly, but you can do it.
m3rcier: Oh, and the semantic techniques to use them.
Garrett: Yes, it's just hard. It's the hard thing. I think that's the other that's the thing with Chimer, too, is it's just so hard to do. You got to be in their sphere to learn from the mages how to do it
m3rcier: yeah and So the other one the other spheres can They either buy the weapon redirect from Burton or they have to buy the schematics, which have an extremely high price. ah And then without the schematics to use the weapons, they're pointless. So ah they built an entire circular product here where you can't.
m3rcier: Like their monopoly is self-enforced by the product of itself.
Garrett: Yeah, it's it's great. That's why they sell the cheap spells. It's beautiful. What a system.
m3rcier: Simple to learn. I've been used since Apprentices and Masters likes since the fall. So definitely come look at the artwork because there's... It would be two if you're new to the game because there's two pieces of artwork that aren't in the game yet.
m3rcier: But one of them we've known about for a while.
Garrett: Yeah, I like this. I like this one where the guy got cut with a blade and he's ah the last one is like seeping out of his torso.
m3rcier: Oh,
Garrett: Yeah,
Nick: That's a last discharge.
m3rcier: um that's... Yeah.
Garrett: it's looking rough.
m3rcier: but's I caused the live stream in your body to blow up and kill you and people around you.
Nick: Yep.
Garrett: I love it. I love it
m3rcier: All right, so I think our next is going to be the Community Spotlight, something we're going to try to do on a regular basis, but we're not sure if we're going to be able to do every episode.
Garrett: it. We need jingle for this.
m3rcier: But for this one, we're going to do... well
Garrett: Community spotlight.
m3rcier: Well, I actually wanted to do... You remember the old Armada guys when they did the Golden... or It's coaster or what? i can't remember their little jingle for if the card was a good card or not.
Nick: Yeah, oh God, I remember.
m3rcier: i want to I want to go back.
Nick: um
m3rcier: I want to listen to their jingle, write it down, and then we can make our own jingle for our cards.
Garrett: Oh, that's genius. Let's do it.
m3rcier: But that's not what we're talking about right now. Right now, what we're talking about are fan creations, community spotlights. So... I am going to utterly butcher this guy's name and I feel bad because he's a fellow Texan.
m3rcier: Uh, let me find it because he only talks when he wants to talk.
Garrett: That's what I like that.
m3rcier: Uh,
Garrett: i like that.
m3rcier: But it's the the name of the website is Harold Helper. It is a great resource. It has all the cards in the game. You can filter them by faction. You can filter them by trait on the card. So like if it says human, like for Paul Norris, says unit seeker human.
m3rcier: If you want to see just all the humans in the game, you can you can filter by echo cost. it's it has He has a bunch of stuff in here that make it super easy to filter through the cards.
m3rcier: ah Nick, have you played with it any?
Nick: have not yet. um So I will have to. I will have to definitely get on there because...
Garrett: I use this lurking for keywords. That's what I use this for.
m3rcier: Yeah, and it is, do not know how to say his handle, Potes, W-A-P-O-T-E-S, so Potes. He whipped this up. I don't know how long it took him, but I know he mentioned it to me, and then within like a week, he he sent me a link to and said, hey, what does this look like?
m3rcier: uh it's got a great ui i my immediate feedback was like hey can you turn this into a deck builder and can you also make it a tournament organization software uh and he was like i would love to but i have a life so
Garrett: the the i will say The biggest thing is when you click on a card, is it brings up the FAQs related to that card.
m3rcier: yes that is for if you're a herald that runs
Garrett: That is, listen, that is the biggest thing. That is number one.
m3rcier: any events, you need to bookmark this because instead of having to search five or six different resources, you can come here.
Nick: Thank you.
Garrett: Yeah.
m3rcier: He updates stuff very quickly. Like the other day, a few of us pointed out some discrepancies and he fixed it same day. I'm not gonna promise you he's always gonna do that because you know he has a job and I believe he has a family too, but he's so far he's been very Johnny on the spot on getting stuff done with us.
m3rcier: So it's been it's been pretty good. I love the website. It does have a link to the rule book. where like if you want to search for what does absorb mean, you can pull up that keyword.
m3rcier: but He did a really good job of digitizing and making the rule book easy to consume using a website.
Garrett: Yeah, it's it's great. um We need to get him we need to get some into the malediction merch. What do we got to yeah we have we have merch.
m3rcier: Do we have merch? Are you making us merch?
Nick: I said we need to come up with some merch first.
Garrett: We got merch.
Nick: Okay.
m3rcier: Okay. yeah right. And then, I mean, do y'all, in anything y'all want to talk about?
Garrett: Merch confirmed.
m3rcier: Anybody that y'all have seen? That was just the one that I brought because I've used his website a lot now.
Garrett: Nope. No, we can't we can't do more than one. We're going to run out of community spotlights. We have to space these things out, Alan.
m3rcier: Okay. Good.
Nick: Yeah.
m3rcier: Good point.
Garrett: All right?
Nick: and but You know, there's there's like a saying about like sharing the spotlight, you know?
m3rcier: Good point.
Garrett: There's...
Garrett: Yeah, but this guy, let him have a son, right? This is good.
Nick: Yeah.
m3rcier: All right, and then our other community spotlight is also our events. ah Going to be the the same running now, Lone Star Open on August 1st in Dallas.
Nick: Mm.
m3rcier: I will be there as a TO. I will be using Herald Helper. ah Come get some games in. We're going to have some... ah Really good prize support. You won't leave empty-handed.
m3rcier: You will leave with something to take home. Gen Con is Friday, July 31st and August 1st. ah Friday is 2v2. Saturday is one v one My co-host will be playing in both of the events. And then Nick will be doing demos, I think, on Sunday, right?
Nick: ah Saturday. I'll be doing Learn to Play on Saturday.
m3rcier: Saturday. All right. So go learn how to play the game or just go harass both of them. You can get some kudos from me.
Garrett: Yeah, I'll be there. I'll be there hanging out and playing all all week, even on the off days, be hanging out and playing.
m3rcier: And then August 29th and 30th in Denver, Colorado is Tacticon. I believe that's going be a 1v1 event there. so And then some other news.
Garrett: And, uh,
m3rcier: we We're in July, so we should be getting a rulebook and a FAQ update this month at some point. ah Don't know if it'll be before...
m3rcier: Gen Con and LSO or after, i mean it's supposed to be in July, so it really can't be after, but dropping them super close to some tournaments doesn't seem like something that most game companies would do.
m3rcier: ah But we don't know because we haven't read into this before.
Garrett: I got full faith confidence in Nick, Nikki and Fabio. They'll probably do it in August. Probably. That would be, that'd be smart.
m3rcier: right, and then a word from our – I was going to say a word from our sponsor, but our sponsor already shamelessly plugged himself.
Garrett: That's right. That's right. Man. Everyone needs to, everyone needs to ah submit more events.
Nick: You only get one.
Garrett: We need our event list is getting close to done. we need more events.
m3rcier: Yeah, um I'm going to go through the the the play thing and see if I can find any, and I'll beat up all the ah True Heralds and Journeyman Heralds see if we can get anything going because – If you email it in to us, I'm going to say that.
m3rcier: I believe I gave both of you all the email, username, and password. i haven't checked it in a couple weeks, so we need to get better about that.
Garrett: You did? Okay.
m3rcier: So email in, find us on Discord, just let us know about your event, and we will give it shout out.
Garrett: Notice.
Garrett: Great. Okay. Well, that's it, everybody. Thank you for listening to another great episode Into the Malediction. I've been Garrett.
Nick: I'm always Nick.
m3rcier: I have been out.
Garrett: Great. Great. Great. Goodbye.
m3rcier: Good night.
Nick: Bye, everyone.
