[quote=Teaspoon]There’s another reason that the Bazaar and the Masters might not have wanted anyone to know what they were doing down there. What if it makes contract negotiations for a Sixth City harder? Or indeed impossible?
I don’t think there’s a backup plan for not being able to buy any city…[/quote]
It could happen!
Or the Masters might have to settle for, say, Fallen Buford.
edited by Lady Sapho Byron on 7/24/2017
The one certainty: death and taxes.
[quote=Lady Sapho Byron][quote=Teaspoon]There’s another reason that the Bazaar and the Masters might not have wanted anyone to know what they were doing down there. What if it makes contract negotiations for a Sixth City harder? Or indeed impossible?
I don’t think there’s a backup plan for not being able to buy any city…[/quote]
It could happen!
Or the Masters might have to settle for, say, Fallen Buford.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PhinDeli_Town_Buford,_Wyoming[/quote]
I’d rather have Fallen Monowi, who has a mayor that grants herself a liquor license and pay herself taxes. Feducci’s a joke compared to her!
Fallen Llanfairpwllgwyngyllgogerychwyrndrobwllllantysiliogogogoch when?
The answer to this is Fallen Swindon.
[quote=Teaspoon]There’s another reason that the Bazaar and the Masters might not have wanted anyone to know what they were doing down there. What if it makes contract negotiations for a Sixth City harder? Or indeed impossible?
I don’t think there’s a backup plan for not being able to buy any city…[/quote]
The simplest backup - which has been mentioned in-game - would be a serious illness that providentially strikes someone a city-owner loves (were there any negotiations before the Fall of London? It seems unlikely, especially as Victoria is styled ‘the Traitor Empress’). But there certainly are wheels turning on the Surface now, which is suggestive. Some nations seem understandably keen that the answer to ‘whose Capital is next for this honour?’ is ‘not ours’. Others might even get desperate and ruthless enough to offer up their own cities for access to the treasure-house of knowledge that’s in the Neath…or attempt a bait-and-switch. I really doubt it’s possible to fool the Masters twice, though. Or wise to try.
Here’s what I don’t get about the Great Game: what’s the real reason why Neath spies are tattooed?
All exaggerated Victorian prudery admitted – and we’re not here for the historical realism – I have problems with the given explanation for spy tattoos. Why would you do something that not only marks you as a spy, but makes it potentially worthwhile for someone to collect your hide? Would the relentless Special Constables really balk at making you strip? And the tattoos are not generally messages. They’re symbols and implied to be intricate, skilled work.
But Neath espionage does have two unique problems: Snuffers, who are natural spies, and face-tailoring, which must be every agent’s nightmare. Faced (or not) with this, you might resort to uniquely marking your body so that you at least could prove who you were and where your allegiances lay, and expect the same of your contacts. At least, that’s the best I can come up with.
All the same, whenever I try to imagine how any of this works in practice, the results degenerate into that scene in The Man With the Golden Gun where Bond is earnestly pretending to be a three-nippled assassin, and Roger Moore can barely keep his act together.
So what if…
What if the Surface Powers actually don’t invest so much spycraft into London? What if it’s an self-reinforcing illusion spun into being by Irrigo and the loss of self?
I mean, the Surface Powers probably have some interest in London. They probably all have at least one contact down there. But what if the majority of Players down in the Neath are actually Neath natives who have successfully been “turned” to the interests of another power? With the presence of Irrigo and the loss of self, history, etc., that a crafty handler can give a new identity and a new allegiance to anyone who finds themselves without one.
After all, the point of the Game is to play. If you don’t care who the winner is, then why even care who the players are or what side you’re one?
It could also be that the Great Game is exported from London to the Surface, rather than imported. It seems that the Revolutionaries and Anarchists spilled out of the Neath and did a number on the Surface, even though some form of them were already on the Surface historically. Perhaps the same thing is true of the Great Game–spies and spycraft also spilled out of the Neath and changed the entire political landscape of the Neath, but the average Joe didn’t notice because they were all super-secretive.
I love the idea of an agent setting off an elaborate scheme, confessing and forgetting, then uncovering and attempting to dismantle said scheme. It is entirly possible for a London spy to be their own bitter rival and never find out.
Unrelated but [quote=Anne Auclair]
[color=rgb(194, 194, 194)] “When everyone is dead the Great Game is finished. Not before.” When one is dead, life is finished, not before, not when one happens to achieve whatever he may have wanted. That the game has no ultimate purpose makes it so dangerously similar to life itself. [/quote][/color]
[color=rgb(194, 194, 194)]
[/color]
[color=#c2c2c2]Equality in Death?[/color]
[quote=Vexpont] I have problems with the given explanation for spy tattoos. Why would you do something that not only marks you as a spy, but makes it potentially worthwhile for someone to collect your hide? Would the relentless Special Constables really balk at making you strip? And the tattoos are not generally messages. They’re symbols and implied to be intricate, skilled work.
[/quote]
Like all things in the Neath, it may not be that simple. Serendipitously, I’ve been running through some of the Clathermont content today and there’s this passage in one of the storylets, where one of Clathermont’s "daughters" is talking to another:
A tattoo that requires the artist to have a particular eye color, let alone an artist whose eyes might change colors, isn’t the sort of illustration that we commonly associate with the word "tattoo". There’s also the peculiar word "hatching" which one might assume to refer to cross-hatching but which might potentially refer to something else entirely unrelated to the simple act of injecting ink into someone’s epidermis.
[quote=slickriptide]One thing about a deep cover assignment in London - The Neath changes a person, and past a certain, not precisely knowable time, that cover becomes a lifetime commitment.
Long term agents in London would be among the most committed in the world.[/quote]
Even more committed would be the Surface agents who take up postings far away from London: the Khanate, the Elder Continent, the Tomb Colonies, and Hell… Especially Hell, the spy who managed to infiltrate Hell is without a doubt one of the most committed agents in the world:
[quote=The Pianist]You pass on the message, and ask who she’s trying to smuggle out of Hell.
"A spy. Damnation is the deepest cover. The crowns of Europe are hungry for news of Hell, and I intend to oblige them. Even the old feller in Rome."[/quote]
.
edited by Anne Auclair on 7/28/2017
[quote=Teaspoon]There’s another reason that the Bazaar and the Masters might not have wanted anyone to know what they were doing down there. What if it makes contract negotiations for a Sixth City harder? Or indeed impossible?
I don’t think there’s a backup plan for not being able to buy any city…[/quote]
While this likely played into their choice to keep the Neath hidden for so long, it seems the revealing it has had the side-effect of other cities wishing to take London’s spot. Off the top of my head, The Empress’ Shadow wishes to sell Berlin, to spite her mother. Also Paris wishes to be sold, is something I’ve heard a lot.