We know that Sunless Skies’ storyline involves the mass abandonment of Fallen London for the High Wilderness. This would clearly be a major setback to the Bazaar’s plans — with the Fifth City’s population severely depleted, who’ll create the love stories it needs? With no-one left to drive commerce, who’ll produce other goods and services to trade for love stories? And if the Bazaar can’t get enough love stories out of the Fifth City, it can’t move on to the Sixth, AFAIK (correct me if I’m mistaken).
So what’s a poor lovestruck extraterrestrial messenger to do?
Well… It’s been very strongly implied that the Bazaar isn’t the only Neathy power capable of pulling down a Surface city. Varchas is very likely Angkor Wat, sent below by the Sun. Then there’s Irem, a city of Arabic legend said to have sunk beneath the sands and connected with Parabola.
So… Suppose the Bazaar had to strike a deal with one of the other major players in the Neath in order to get a city brought down. Not the city the Masters wanted, but something expedient. A Surface City in the grasp of the Fingerkings, perhaps, that they were willing to part with cheaply enough to make the bargain acceptable. Not a replacement for the Fifth City, but a supplement, dropped next door perhaps.
The Fifth-and-a-Halfth City, if you would. edited by Xenu’s_Paradox on 10/31/2016
I wouldn’t agree with that. It seems most of the masters are fairly eager to move on to the sixth, implying the Bazaar’s getting close to her quota. A bit like the itch you get when you’re almost done with your maths class and are eager to move on to biology just for the sake of change. Personally, I see the Traitor Empress’ exodus more as a result of the sixth city’s fall than as a cause. That is, soon the Bazaar’ll be close to getting all the love stories she needs, and the Traitor Empress, foreseeing the death of London, tries to salvage what she can from it.
Of course, we won’t know for sure until Sunless Skies is properly kickstarted and/or released, but we can always speculate.
We don’t know the specific nature of the arrangement between the Bazaar and the Masters (certain destinies imply the relationship is closer to a debt or obligation than an alliance). It could be, the Masters’ "contract" is for seven cities regardless of what the Bazaar gets out of it, and it’s up to the Bazaar to make sure things turn out favorably for itself.
If we’re looking at cities that were removed from the Surface for other reasons than being sold, then one place to look would be cities around the Rim of Fire: San Francisco, Los Angeles, Honolulu, Seattle, Anchorage, Tokyo, Jakarta. If a seismic event happens, any of these cities could find themselves realizing they have hours before they are wiped off the map. Bargains could be struck on favorable terms. Do any players in the Neath have the potential to cause such a seismic event? Hell seems the most likely.
We don’t know the specific nature of the arrangement between the Bazaar and the Masters (certain destinies imply the relationship is closer to a debt or obligation than an alliance). It could be, the Masters’ "contract" is for seven cities regardless of what the Bazaar gets out of it, and it’s up to the Bazaar to make sure things turn out favorably for itself.
If we’re looking at cities that were removed from the Surface for other reasons than being sold, then one place to look would be cities around the Rim of Fire: San Francisco, Los Angeles, Honolulu, Seattle, Anchorage, Tokyo, Jakarta. If a seismic event happens, any of these cities could find themselves realizing they have hours before they are wiped off the map. Bargains could be struck on favorable terms. Do any players in the Neath have the potential to cause such a seismic event? Hell seems the most likely.[/quote]
The Bloody-Handed Queen has an unusual tendency to cause crimson earthquakes. But it would be quite irresponsible to unleash such a thing, wouldn’t it?
I imagine that stars being killed off by mysterious revolutionary assailants would have a great impact on the Bazaar’s plans.
Either the list of the Liberation’s celestial victims includes those Judgments that originally levied the charges on Unlicensed Love, Amalgamy, etc., in which case the Bazaar might be off the hook entirely, or the Sun itself may be in danger, in which case the Bazaar might try to hide it in the Neath.
Of course, there’s also a related scenario/conspiracy theory that has been speculated about on the IRC:
The Sun is dead and the Victorian Empire colonized its cooling corpse, thus gaining access to its power and resources.
If that is the case, nothing the Bazaar does will matter anymore (barring a reckoning). edited by Passionario on 11/1/2016
We don’t know the specific nature of the arrangement between the Bazaar and the Masters (certain destinies imply the relationship is closer to a debt or obligation than an alliance). It could be, the Masters’ "contract" is for seven cities regardless of what the Bazaar gets out of it, and it’s up to the Bazaar to make sure things turn out favorably for itself.
If we’re looking at cities that were removed from the Surface for other reasons than being sold, then one place to look would be cities around the Rim of Fire: San Francisco, Los Angeles, Honolulu, Seattle, Anchorage, Tokyo, Jakarta. If a seismic event happens, any of these cities could find themselves realizing they have hours before they are wiped off the map. Bargains could be struck on favorable terms. Do any players in the Neath have the potential to cause such a seismic event? Hell seems the most likely.[/quote]
Certainly not hell, they don’t have all that much influence over the real world, due to their, ah, poor relationship with the judgements. I doubt Hell has any interest in toppling a city, even if it could. The closest any mortal’s gotten to getting through the ceiling would probably the irrepressible cannoneer or whoever preceded him in trying to weaponize the red science (that’s how the hole above Aestival was made).