MEIOU&Taxes 2.0 Brittany AAR/Mod Showcase -- Part 9: Plague and War

Welcome back to the worst AAR of the summer, full of crass humour and boring mechanic explanations of a mod that's ridiculously obscure and complex! Now with 100% less fascist apologism!

It's been 56 years since 1356, and that took 9 parts. I think at some point I need to quicken the pace a bit, but not in this part.

Because in this part the grim reaper announces its comeback tour. Death metal fans across Europe are excited and are already buying coffins and digging graves.

The closest province with the plague is Lisbon, and from there it will likely spread to us in a year or two.

This might spell doom to some of the small towns which have recently grown in Brittany, like Treguier, which apparently has more population in 1412 than it does today (modern pop. is about 2,500). The province, like Bro Gernev, doesn't actually have enough infrastructure to attract such an urban populace, but apparently rural pop increases urban gravity too, and Bro Dreger has plenty of that. Can't say for sure as the wiki says fuck all and I'm not gonna dig through the files to solve this mystery.

The plague spreads quickly along the Portugese coast, not penetrating inland at all because it's hilly and lowly populated. I've covered plague mechanics pretty extensively in a previous part so this time I'm just gonna show you where the plague goes. It's always entertaining to see which parts got raped and which parts survived. Although it's usually the exact same places so maybe not.

King of Naples makes peace with the crowns of Aragon and Castile. Nobody gains or loses anything except Naples gains Sicily for free. Also, Provence and Corsica got fucked, but who cares about those places. Aragon still holds Malta.

The plague has spread to almost all of Portugal. Next stop: Castile.

Here's a little balance issue: Picardie, a province with loads of farmers making dye and some regular cloth production, makes 1,31 ducats from production (most of which goes to the local economy instead of the crown). The trade value of produced dye is 3,6 * 1,5 = 5,4.

Meanwhile nearby Brugge is a center of luxury cloth production with 10 urban pop, likely using the dye produced in Picardie. From production it makes 0,82 ducats from production. The local trade value comes mostly from urban production as local wheat only has a measly trade value of 0,18. Basically, a raw good, blue dye, is more valuable than the refined luxury good. R E A L I S M, this time ironically.

Plz nerf blue dye

Oh and also M E C H A N I C E X P L A N A T I O N, I guess.

TOP 10 ANIME BETRAYALS

Castile declares war on Aragon, with whom they just fought against Naples. They might call us to war, but that's unlikely as Castile has a fuckhuge army.

French autonomous vassals also go to war. I bet the winner will then be immediately assimilated by the French crown.

Meanwhile in Anatolia, the grim reaper's concert tour is a grand success! There's not just one black skull icon, but two!

The tickets were sold out in Constantinople and the concert grounds -- aka the cemeteries -- were filled!

There was a third plague spawn somewhere in Ruthenia which I didn't notice until later. It probably won't do much as there's loads of underdeveloped and forested provinces all over the place.

oH sHiT

Queen Maria I Trastamara decided to call her breton sis to war after all. Duchess Jane wants to preserve the alliance so she answers the call.

I had lowered my military upkeep to 0 because more money is always good in M&T and I wasn't expecting to go to war any time soon. It'll take a while for our morale to recover.

I'm not sure but I think morale recovery is slower in M&T.

Because Gilles died we need a replacement. We're chums with the greater nobles so we'll loan another general from them. We also only have about 15 army tradition so their general will likely be better.

No it fucking won't be. For fuck's sake, not again.

A noble named Loïc of Roscoat (Roscoat is a name of a number of Breton villages and a river in Bro Dreger) arrives in Nantes to lead the army. Once a famed captain who served Duke John during the previous war, he's now much worse due to a head injury sustained during one of the last battles. The nobles assure Jane that he's talented and capable, either out of ignorance or out of spite. Jane assumes they're honest Christians and believes them, although her husband Louis is more sceptical and decides to accompany him to war.

Jane is not hesitant to pursue war despite Jesus saying a million times that killing people is wrong. A large community of heretics has formed in nearby Constentin and she'd like to fuck them up before they spread their falsities to her pious Duchy.

Heretics can spring up if you're tolerant of them (because, for example, you promulgated an edict of tolerance or something) and you can choose to either leave them alone or evict them. They can cause religious unrest and should proper heresies like hussites or protestants arrive they can join them. Basically what the tooltip says.

why did i write that why am i not sleeping its 2am

Navarra also has greater noble problems. The local defensiveness penalty will help us a bit.

Castile goes on the offensive. Last time they fought a war with Aragon they lost and had to cede the provinces of La Manchuela and Cartagena, but now they can have revenge and take back their rightful clay.

hey look the pope is dead yeah i'm tired of this joke

The new Pope is little more than a corrupt pawn of the King of Naples, but no one dares to complain as his authority is as strong as iron.

The Castilian navy engages the Aragonese one. Having control of the seas would help sieging down the wealthy and well-fortified provinces on the coast. The battle seems pretty even as Aragon's galleys get a bonus in the mediterranean.

Because the army will go hunting heretics, Jane does not give orders to Loïc to restrict looting.

I don't encourage looting mostly for RP reasons and because I don't want to lose siege ability. Also, I don't really have my eyes set on any wealthy provinces.

The count of Schwarzburg has become an elector of the HRE.

Schwarzburg is an OPM with 3 rural pop and nothing else.

sometimes I wonder what the logic behind assigning electors is.

Fun fact: the last Prince of Schwarzburg abdicated in the German revolution of 1918 and died in 1925. The house of Schwarzburg went extinct in 1971. Schwarzburg is also right next to Weimar, which is familiar to you if you know general German history.

The Plague has spread to almost half of Iberia already, although it's already weakening quite a bit. If the initial plague has a red icon, it likely won't be that bad. If it's black, you might as well spread your asscheeks in preparation.

While there's plenty of mild plagues in Anatolia, they're mostly in provinces without urban population. All major cities got hit pretty hard. Like i said, black icons mean serious butt business.

The death metal concert tour isn't doing too well in Russia.

The small and crappy Breton merchant navy is conscripted to help in the war. Two of the ships are outdated and the fleet can only blockade a province with 6 population. They won't be able to help much at all.

The truce with England (and a little later with all her allies) ended, which means I can once again guarantee Aquitaine. Once the war is over, that is.

The Battle of the Gulf of Lyon is raging, with neither side having a notable advantage.

Yeah we can't do jack shit with this navy.

Isn't it great that upper class population is counted to total population? Makes blockades on highly populated provinces even harder.

In fact, I don't think they've touched the blockade mechanic at all. Good luck trying to blockade any Chinese coastal provinces then.

Jane realizes that the navy (which isn't a formal navy, mind you) needs expanding and improving. Building a new ship now would take one and a half years and would drain the coffers, so Jane decides to postpone ordering a new ship. It wouldn't help that much anyway. But once the war is over, the navy will undergo significant expansion.

La Manchuela has been retaken and will eventually return to Castilian hands via war dynamism. A small navarrese warband is roaming Asturias while the battle of the Gulf of Lyon is turning to Castile's favor.

In the end Castile wins, although only barely, and now controls the seas. Further north an Aragonese army has marched across Aquitaine and besieged La Rochelle. The siege of Chirebourc is well underway, however, and won't be abandoned. Aunis isn't even fully integrated yet anyways.

Also, if we were to attack them now we'd be outnumbered, as we just lost 500 soldiers to dysentery.

Fun fact: modern-day department of Manche (which has identical borders to the in-game province of Constentin) has a population of 500,000. According to M&T, its population didn't even double in 600 years.

Hmmmm

Woah, some nice siege bonus you got there. 2 artillery and 1 siege pip. How can I swap Loïc with Hermendildo?

The plague is weakening quite a bit. It hasn't even spread to all of Iberia yet it's already mostly mild. Maybe it won't spread outside of Iberia? I know what will happen, but you can still keep your fingers crossed. Not that the plague will do much except kill a bunch of useless peasants and some filthy capitalist burghers.

Usually the first plague is really cool and dramatic and exciting and the second plague is a massive let down that doesn't even horribly kill that many poor people. Sad!

But in Baghdad it's the opposite of a let down. THREE black icons, holy shit. And a flood in Baghdad just in time to wash away all the corpses.

I hope this devastating plague+flood+province trauma= famine so I can finally fucking show off famine mechanics. Worryingly I haven't seen a single famine since starting this campaign. Why aren't the damn peasants starving? Is something wrong?

The plague is spreading across the Balkans and Anatolia, killing a lot of people especially in cities.

Russia, Ruthenia, the Baltics and Poland are better off and only get mild plagues, although the plague keeps spreading in most places.

I'd love to cover the flood mechanic in more detail at some point but I have no idea how it works as I've never played a country with floods. But basically you need to invest money in flood infrastructure and the more you invest the less floods rape your infrastructure and drown your people. Floods also cause a lot of province trauma which can lead to lovely famines.

Oh fuck, the siege of La Rochelle is progressing faster than our siege because the enemy commander has one siege pip and my fort for some reason has -63% defensiveness penalty.

Damn. Only took the Aragonese 54 days.

Meanwhile our siege took 117 days. Dammit, Loïc, why you so incompetent?

I wish you could make your male consorts generals. I'm sure Duke Louis would show Louis how it's done.

Yes, Loïc is how a drunken person or a Breton says "Louis".

We got 23 ducats from that, which will over time be hauled back home. Or if I remember right everything will instantly be unloaded once you enter your own province, although I might just be talking out of my ass. I probably am. If you have a fuck load of loot your army will slow down and neighbouring countries will lose relations as they're scared shitless by your barbarism.

Loïc, receiving advice from Louis, leads his army south to retake La Rochelle and the rest of Aunis. Our fleet will follow, although they won't be of much use as even Aunis has too much pop for them to blockade.

Because our army might eventually need to fight the Aragonese, Louis writes a letter to Jane (Loïc can't write) requesting reinforcements. She in turn requests them from nobles. With her persuasion skills she manages to get one regiment of levied infantry and one regiment of mounted soldiers.

They'll gather at Rennes before heading out to support the army. Both regiments. It's fun when this happens instead of the regiments being spread out a bit more.

The plague is slowly crawling across Iberia, into Aragon and Aquitaine. It's pretty weak and might not go much further, unless it's rejuvenated by some large city along the way.

Once again Transylvania is saved from the plague. Remember, a garlic a day not only keeps the vampires away but also the plague.

When our army besieges Aunis it only gets a -42% defensiveness penalty. What steroids were the aragonese using? I should've checked. Thankfully the enemy left behind a tiny garrison of 150 soldiers so the siege should be quick.

For a moment I thought Aragon was fighting someone in southern France, but it was actually Foix fighting Auvergne. Dammit, why weren't people back then more creative with banners, symbols and sigils? More than once I've gotten really confused because Frankfurt, Bremen and the Papal States all have similar flags, for example.

The nobility of Brittany is not happy about the war. The memories of the Hundred Years' War are still fresh in the minds of most of them and once again many noble families had to send their young boys to war to distant lands. And why are women leading the war? The business of Maria and Jane should be in the kitchen and the bedroom, not the war room.

RNGesus giveth, RNGesus taketh away. Thankfully we lost no stability. The loyalty of nobles is dangerously low. Without random loyalty loss mechanics, there'd be no reason to do anything as long as the loyalty was above 30%, but with them you must be extra careful and not let it drop too low. After the war, we might need to rub noble cocks a little.

La Rochelle falls quickly, but we still didn't beat the Aragonese record despite having better odds. Good job Loïc&Louis.

Now that heretics have been punished and a lost province retaken, Jane considers what orders she should give to her commander next. Her husband writes that they should invade Navarre and support their ally so they'll owe them a favor in the future, so Jane can get more from the enemy during peace negotiations and so they can get sweet loot to fund the expansion of the navy. Jane agrees with the first two arguments and sends a letter ordering them to march south. In the letter she also asks Loïc to keep the soldiers from harming any innocent catholics or touching their property.

Loïc rolled his eyes when he read that and his headache worsened.

Aaaand fuck. The plague got a boost from Bordeaux like I feared. Brittany is now less likely to be spared.

The plague has spread to Naples but unlike in Aquitaine it doesn't get a boost and even peters out. Meanwhile in Transylvania the plague approaches from the south again and this time the garlic didn't save the locals. Just like apples won't save you from doctors.

Why do people keep repeating idioms if they're dumb and wrong?

Cairo got spared from the plague as it fails to cross Sinai and doesn't spread much to Arabia. It might still follow the river and come from south but this time it's less likely.

Our army arrives in northern Navarre and the Spanish catch the elusive Aragonese army. The Navarrese don't really know what they're doing.

Suddenly Maria dies and is succeeded by Felipe, who only seems to know war and not much else. He happily continues the fight against Aragon.

Maria's husband was from the house of Blois so the royal ties are severed with her death. Jane sends a letter to Felipe asking for a wife for her heir Francois who is currently studying in the University of Angers.

The plague coming from the south is weak, but it seems to have hopped from Bordeaux to Paris and is now spreading from there as well with more strength.

The defensiveness penalty from plague will help both us and our enemy in the war.

While the army of Didac has better discipline and morale, it's severly outnumbered and acts as the attacker. All these tiny forts everywhere mean that the defender can get a big advantage: because Aragon was technically besieging Soria they act as an attacker when Castile attacks them. All the tiny forts also mean good old carpet sieges are back. M&T team sure knows how to make a mod fun!!!

kill me

A delegation of peasants from Bro Dreger arrives in Nantes and request an audience with the Duchess. They whine "help help we're being repressed" and say their lord confiscated much of the hemp they were growing, saying it was extra tax and that the hemp was needed for "personal use". On the following day puffs of smoke come out of his manor's windows.

Fun fact: France is the world's second largest producer of hemp. The industrial variety, that is.

Jane, as a good christian, of course has her sympathies lie with the poor repressed peasants. But as a Duchess she can't ignore realpolitik. Both her prestige and legitimacy are regarded as fairly low and her reputation is poor as a result. If she listens to mud-covered peasants and punishes the noble lord in any way, her reputation will be even poorer.

I'd like to keep legitimacy as high as possible as it reduces autonomy, which is a great thing. But we loose a bunch every year thanks to our asshole religious head and low prestige.

So, hesitantly and praying for forgiveness, she denies the petition and does nothing about the lord who would regularly browse /r/trees if he lived today. When the peasants return home to tell the news the peasants are outraged. A cliche crowd with pitchforks and torches gathers around the lord's manor and threatens to fuck him up. Tensions rise within the province to the point of disrupting ducal administration a little.

+15 unrest with 0 stability and 40 centralization yet I only have 2.5 unrest in this province. Plz buff unrest penalties.

Loïc has finished the siege and Louis suggests he should march his army south to ambush the Navarrese army discovered by his scouts. Jane has no idea what's going on as letters take many days to arrive in Nantes.

We've taken quite heavy casualties from siege attrition, by the way, and it has cost us a lot of money. That's the thing with M&T, you have to weigh cost with profit when sieging provinces with forts. Is the loot really worth it if you get hit by a big plague and lose half your army?

shame my resolution is so garbage i only get to see these pretty terrain images in battles

The battle is going well for us but Hermendildo decides to be a dildo and comes to help us.

And he takes the credit for victory. Thanks, I guess. The remnants of the Navarrese army surrender and are taken prisoner.

The plague did not reach Nantes from the south but it looks like it will reach it from the east.

Loïc lets the larger and better equipped Castilian army besiege Navarre and heads for Tudela, a small town without walls begging to be looted.

The plague also adds attrition, so it's not purely a good thing for besiegers. Thankfully La Ribera only got hit by a mild plague.

more stability yay

La Ribera falls quickly and hundreds die in the looting of Tudela. Not only christians perish but also members of the small local muslim and jewish minorities. Which for some reason aren't included in Dei Gratia.

Loïc and Louis do not wait to receive orders from Jane and decide to head to the wealthy city Zaragoza. Jane would never approve of besieging an archbishopric, but she's not leading the army.

Didac and his men return to Aunis and besiege it again, however.

Loïc's army is unable to come and attack them as the fort movement system stops making sense again. I hate it when it does that. Thanks, Paradox.

So Loïc resigns to his "miserable" fate and goes loot the ever loving shit out of innocent aragonese civilians and get himself drunk on any alcohol he can find. Maybe that will make his headache go away for a while.

Didac beats his previous record and takes Aunis in 30 days. I think he wants to get in the guinness world records or something.

Instead of going north and assaulting the walls of either Nantes or Rennes, Didac leads his army back south, satisfied with his new achievment.

Most of Portugal got mild province trauma from the plague. What god do I pray to so they get a famine and I can finally cover the mechanic?

Mesopotamia is even more ripe for a famine, just look at all that sexy devastation.

The Aragonese army is in Barcelona, still recovering. They outnumber our army and if they attack us the Castilians will take a while to come and help thanks to the fort. I need to be careful.

Hungary has many powerful allies: Poland, Bulgaria and now, Corfu. With two provinces and over 30,000 people, Corfu is indeed a power rivaling their new ally.

it's fucking great to be looking for allies and seeing a great power already having its alliance slots filled with nations like Corfu. For fuck's sake.

A sixth of my army died of a plague outbreak. I'm pretty sure that cost more than the loot we will get from the province.

Aragon retakes a tiny Navarrese province instead of attacking us. The AI never ceases to impress me.

Great, we're going bankrupt because of disease. We can't cut military spending either as the Aragonese might come back soon and attack us.

Zaragoza is about to fall, its tiny garrison unable to resist much longer, when the Aragonese army arrives and...

...stands in place.

Well that would've made The Two Towers anticlimactic.

The plague did indeed reach us from the east, but only Nantes and Bro Dreger had epidemics that weren't mild. The damage from the plague is minimal.

Jane is certain all her praying saved her duchy from worse damage and thanks Jesus for being a real bro.

Both Zaragoza and Navarre have fallen. Louis would like to support the Castilians and Loïc would like to loot more crap but a letter arrives from the north, ordering them to return home. The ducal coffer is running empty and no more sieges can be afforded without going into debt.

Loïc indeed soon has no money to pay his soldiers with. Jane sends some cash but says she has no money either. Loïc can only afford to buy supplies from the towns they pass by and pay the wages of his officers. The common soldiers get a bit grumpy about this.

Navarra tries to retake Constentin, but they only have an army of two thousand so even with depleted morale Loïc's army should be able to defeat it. That is, if they make it in time before the province is retaken by the enemy.

With it the army is bringing lots of loot, which is the only reason why soldiers haven't completely deserted the army yet.

Remember that in the end we will only be able to take a small portion of this. The war so far seems like a waste of money.

The Aragonese try to retake La Manchuela which surprisingly still hasn't transferred back to Castile via war dynamism while the Castilians besiege Tarracona. Their fleet can barely blockade the coastal ports.

Shit, we didn't make it in time and the Navarrese have retaken Constentin. Let's see what they do next.

Some of the soldiers in Loïc's army feel a bit awkward when their commander buys supplies from an Aquitainian town which they looted during John's war.

Thankfully the nobles pay their soldiers out of their own pockets so we don't need to worry about them, at least.

The Navarrese army is fucking around in the French countryside. Loïc and Louis arrive in Nantes and immediately ask Jane to give them money so they can pay the troops so they'll be willing to fight against the enemy.

A province can only be looted once but the more it changes hands and is occupied the more province trauma it gets. Constentin got mild trauma from just two sieges and lost 20,000 people.

Hermendildo besieges Barcelona for a while before giving up for some reason.

OOOPS I forgot to reduce army maintenance and took a loan as a result. Dangit.

uuh what's the fluff explanation for this...

Despite already receiving some money, Loïc asks for more as his soldiers threatened with mutiny and desertion. Jane has no other option than to take a loan.

The Mamluk war against the Hafsids is not going well at all. They've gone bankrupt and Cairo is down to 210,000 urban population.

I've yet to see a game where Mamluks and Cairo don't get absolutely decimated.

Shocking news in the court of Brittany: Jane's advisor Gwenneg de Boisguehenneuc (good luck pronouncing that) has been caught taking bribes from nobles and bishops. He was a pious man who had earned Jane's trust so she was so greatly shocked you'd think she had seen Gwenneg and Louis in bed together.

Anger followed shock but she couldn't bring herself to execute him, despite Louis asking her to do so in a letter. Jesus wasn't exactly pro-death penalty, even if the most common symbol of christianity is him being executed. Instead, Gwenneg is forced to go into retirement and stay locked inside his home for the rest of his life.

Because the Navarrese homeland has fallen, the army retreats to the French holdings of the Navarrese king -- who also happens to be the King of Aragon. Loïc and Louis depart towards Constantine as soon as Louis' scouts report that the foes are heading north, and when the enemy arrives so does their army.

The Navarrese are taken by surprise, surrounded and forced to surrender. Loïc and Louis win a great victory, having only taken 155 casualties. They did outnumber the enemy three to one but that didn't stop their egos from inflating.

The Castilians apparently abandoned the siege of Barcelona so they could chase the Aragonese army. They eventually catch and defeat the enemy. We already have 78% warscore so let's hope they take Barcelona next and end the war.

Holy fuck those are harsh terms. 391 ducats from an already bankrupt nation? Sheesh. Poor Mamluks.

Auvergne and Bourbonnais make peace as well, and Bourbonnais is gone. I guess there won't be a Bourbon dynasty on the French throne in this timeline. Press F to pay respects.

COME ON HERPESDILDO YOU DUMB FUCK BESIEGE BARCELONA

NO IDIOT DON'T RETAKE A PROVINCE WITH 3 POP AND LOSE A BUNCH OF MANPOWER TO ATTRITION WHEN YOU CAN ONLY USE 1 REGIMENT TO OCCUPY IT

The AI sure makes my heart pound faster. Not because it's an exciting opponent to fight against but because I lose my nerves with it every time.

Well, I guess it could be worse. At least it's not as bad as the AI of Rome 2 Total War.

eat shit /u/ForEurope

The Aragonese army uses the amazing tactic of staying in place as the enemy approaches and promptly get fucked.

The Castilians did take heavy casualties, though. Good on Aragon, I guess.

oh god the rape train doesn't stop once it gets moving

The remnants of Didac's army retreat to Aunis. Loïc, Louis and their army march south to wipe them out once and for all.

The enemy actually has just as much infantry as we do but barely any cavalry. The horsemen of Brittany, lead by Louis, easily outflank the enemy and charge their rear, making them rout, and cut men down in droves.

Loïc wins the greatest victory of his career as a commander. Although he didn't do much leading during the battle due to a severe headache followed by an epileptic seizure. Louis and the officers did most of the work but Loïc received the credit as he was the official commander. Jane grants him an honorary title and some ducal land after hearing the news of his victory. Abroad, Jane gets some recognition for the success in the war against Aragon, even if Castile has done most of the heavy lifting.

There's no justice in this world. Not that I'm complaining.

Fucking finally. The war will end soon.

While ultimately all strategic decision making is Jane's responsibility and Loïc is the official leader of the army, Duke Louis is in many ways the mastermind behind Breton war efforts and their victories. A veteran leader of the Hundred Years' War who successfully defended Bar from invaders, he'd gladly lead the army personally. But Johan says no, consorts can't lead armies, so he just acts as an advisor to Loïc.

Our army follows the meagre remains of the Aragonese army to Constentin.

Man I love this province. The enemy just keeps retreating here and dying.

Like the Navarrese, the Aragonese surrender and are taken prisoner. Didac and some officers are soon ransomed for a sum of gold, but the rest of the army remain in Brittany until the end of the war, which is coming very soon.

Barcelona has fallen! Finally the war will end.

M A J O R V I C T O R Y
A J O R M I C T O R Y V
J O R M A C T O R Y V I
O R M A J T O R Y V I C
R M A J O O R Y V I C T
M A J O R R Y V I C T O

Here is Ry Victo's facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/ry.victo. If he was a major in the Vietnamese army it'd be perfect.

We got 8 ducats and 1 prestige from this war.

...I need to lie down.

Well, the good news is that we also got a fuckload of power projection from defeating our rival and Castile owes us 15 favors.

Note how we took three times as many casualties as the enemy. Attrition is a bitch in this mod. R E A L I S M

King Felipe Trastamara now claims the title of King of Navarre and seizes many Aragonese lands. Most of the provinces are pretty trash however, except for Navarre, Valencia and Xativa.

The peace treaty demanded the Aragonese to withdraw their forces from Aunis, and that they did. They leave behind a tattered county and pass by many burnt farmsteads as they march back home.

A fifth of the war spoils are confiscated by the ducal crown, with the rest going to officers and soldiers. Mostly the former. The levy regiments and noble cavalry return home, largely intact.

Soon after the peace Duke Guillaume sends a letter to Jane. On it is written "Can we be friends again? Pretty please." Jane approves the friend request. King Louis of France still hasn't guaranteed their independence but might do it soon now that we've done it.

jesus christ aquitaine has 25 corruption i didn't even notice

Neat little bonuses from power projection. Sadly we have no other rivals except for Aragon so bumping that up to 50 will be near impossible.

And that's the last image. Phew, that took a while. Turns out this part is extra long so I hope you "enjoyed" that, I guess. Not sure how exactly my writing can be enjoyed but whatever.

Next part: expect a lot of mechanic explanations.