I decided to start on the magic discussion channel. [Yamina, Ramon, what’s the best class, or upgrade to our team, to add the ability to shatter bones in an AE to our group, guard, guild or raid? Ballista bolts and crossbow bolts preferred as the missiles. Normal explosions rely on shrapnel to cause bleeding wounds, but that doesn’t work here no meat, no blood. So, we need a way to shatter them in one shot. Area Effect is preferred, but single target will work if we can’t have that.]

Ramon spoke first. [Fannon could do it eventually with rune carving, but she needs skills and levels. More than we can get by spending today. There is an advanced shaper spell that throws bigger objects than darts, large circles, sharp on the edge, then can hit multiple targets as you level them up. It’s got a really awful name, something like Torvil’s Torques. The name gives you no idea what it does. There is an even better one at master you basically shoot shields at people, but you need lvl 10 for that. ]

I quickly dug through my Advanced shaper spells, Advanced Shape, Advanced Concentrate, I’d gotten all of those for free by training the spells, so I hadn’t dug into the other spells. That was clearly a mistake. In the new spells was Bulk Shape, which was for mass producing simple shapes mana efficiently, be great for Brigandine, Lamellar and Chain armors. I found 2 other new ones, Torvil’s Terrible Torques, that I’m totally renaming Xena Blast or Chakram Chucker as soon as I play with it. There was also a spell or maybe a skill, Shape Mastery that made my shaping better all around, faster, more efficient and cover a larger area. Basically, free extra progress on shaping. Score!

Yamina had an idea as well [What about stone or ceramic heads on the bolts filled with River water. If you hit a bone it’s splashed with holy water. It’s not a blast attack, but it should be nasty when you hit.]

I found myself smiling at that one with her [It’s a good quick and dirty solution! Have the other shapers back at camp make a dozen to try and give them to Plums Ballista team, have them give feedback straight to the shapers, and iterate on the idea. Do either of you have good ideas to power up our troops for this fight. If I throw my points in, we have about 5k cp to do it.]

Ramon came back: [Instead of nerfing yourself 3 levels you’ve been carefully saving up, why not set the tax rate to 50% or even 90% for the duration of this combat. At the rate you are killing the dumb screamers, we can afford several upgrades pretty quickly.]

Yamina piled in as well, clearly upset from the tone and speed of her voice: [I know you tend to be the indispensable man bill, but sacrificing yourself to make yourself not the point source of failure isn’t really solving that issue, right? It’s just doing it more dramatically. Trading your mom points is one thing, but burning your CP will just get you killed later. I’m not comfortable with that trade.]

I thought about what they’d said. Why do I keep throwing us into situations half assed and just winging it? I need to do better. I needed to plan. I need to talk to my team before I go off halfcocked. I spoke to the officers and NCOs [Remind me to do formal pre combat planning before jumping into something like this next time. We’ve cracked off a tough foe, and sunk a lot of cost, when we could have just waited.]

After a chorus of ayes, with varying levels of sarcasm ranging from Thorbjorn to Sgt. Plum, I went on.

I shifted to guild and settlement [Everyone, we need to power up for this fight, I’m going to change the Guild CP tax to 90% for the rest of the wait before we fully engage, then down to 50% after that. We are spending these points to upgrade the combat power and survivability of the Guild and or the Guard as a whole. After the fight, we’ll go back to our regularly scheduled 5% on CP and 5% on gold swill stay the same the whole time. If this really bothers, drop the guild membership and just be members of the settlement, we can address your issues with the idea later.]

I pulled up the Defender Class, and looked for Group or Raid buffs. I couldn’t get any raid buffs till lvl 15, but if I bought a couple group skills I could add to health and mana regen, maybe add on a pure armor buff as well for the party, depending on how I spent.. I grabbed 1 level of each, and activated them. I thought about buying more levels, Put a pin in that for now.

I hopped back on officer’s chat [Granny, pull all the points from all the fountains and the settlement and put them in the guild bucket. Then I want you to get the guild a couple more levels of Iron Skin. Spend them as they come in and keep pumping it up. If you think putting levels in the two shield skills is better, do that. I don’t know how the costs are going to escalate. I want defense buffs to keep our folks alive fighting today and in the future. If you can figure out a better way to get costs to benefit, do that. Rene, it can’t help us today, But I would appreciate it if your father would recruit veterans who were drummed out due to disability. Also, craftsmen and farmers with similar health issues. We want to leverage Granny’s healing house for recruiting.]

[Anyone have any ideas to improve things, or scenarios we need to cover before we go back into combat proper?]

Jimin spoke up first [We could builds us a catapult and chuck barrels of holy water right through that door. That’d piss them off right and proper, you just knows there’s an evil boss fucker in there somewhere.]

After a bit of amused chuckling, I said, [That’s a great long-term idea. Anything short term?]

Thorbjorn said [We need to know if recalling here, lands us up here in the tower or down there in the fountain. Completely changes our timeline if we can defend this in shifts. We need a plan if the smart skeletons go over the fence and hit Sgt Plum’s group]

Olaf, who hadn’t spoken in officer chat before picked the ball up next. [Bill, Myself and One of Granny Healers are going up with Corporal Agrabi’s teams. I’m hoping to build them some more substantial defenses. Granny added me to the store as well. The boys are back there frantically making things we need. I wanted to you be aware if that changes your calculations. We made some more barrels too, just need to wait for them to be filled and rolled to the shop]

Sgt. Plum’s gravelly voice came next. [I saw a water mage in Istanballah, who wielded whips of water. shooting water balls too. Can Bill learn that Ramon?.]

Ramon came back on chat [Not in time for this battle, but we can grow a water mage of our own long term, that’s a really good idea for a river goddess.]

Orth’s idea was next [Orth here, First off, I’m in Portbo and I can both use chat, and pull up the Danu Shop inventory. That’s two successful experiments. Secondly what about making small fountains all the way around the fence. OR a small moat fountain? Then making fountains over lapping from the gate up to the door of the temple. If we don’t spend a lot of money powering each one up, that might work.

Also, someone on Rene’s father’s team alerted the Merchants that we are both sitting on a gold rush, and that we need things in a hurry today. They are jacking up the prices to extortion levels on us. Just wanted you to be aware. We’re walking around like we are just window shopping looking for the best items before we negotiate, trying to defuse it, but they are all smiling evil smiles at us.]

Dammit, that’s the last thing we need, I ground my teeth together [Understood If you find someone who can deliver multiple things we need, long and short term. Don’t be afraid to trade them access to the market on this side in exchange for better pricing. Also, you can offer a single long-term monopoly on Beer, wine or liquor but not more than 1 of those, for Dannister. We need to have options so they can’t bend us over later with it later.]

Stolen content alert: this content belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences.

Rene came up next, his voice clearly angry. [I’m going to go back over there and add my father to my party so I can talk to him. I think I can clear this up. But it will take time. Is it okay if I use one of my 5 guild invites on him as well? Most of the time he’d prefer to work through me, but it would let me talk to him from anywhere.]

Still angry myself I asked, [First up, how did the news of this battle get over to that side? The gold rush I can see, but nobody should have come through either way since we started this.]

Rene came back more humbly, [That I’m afraid is my fault, I sent a letter to my father using an amulet, which I’m am still supposed to be keeping secret by the way. I sent it just before I headed up here, updating them on the situation and asking if he could help us fight undead. Apparently, someone in his communications team is a rat for the merchants. I’m sending him news now of the rat, but I’m heading over there to drive the point home firmly.]

[Ok, Dad invite is good by me. If nothing else it lets you bypass the Rat. Add your mom too, and we’ll not count it against your 5. You still need to recruit a good team. Your parents being able to talk to you will be a big deal. Trust me I’m a parent. Use the 2 of the new barrels, see if you can dedicate a fountain on your father’s land and buy bind for it. Your parents stay probie until you talk to me. We are not done with this rat discussion. This invite is a favor to you, not to them. If we can go out of our way to burn the Rat and His Paymaster, I’m up for it.

Granny you and Bart make that gate travel happen, but shut it down asap. Some for Rene’s return trip.

Orth, make sure working against our interest is an instant termination clause in any agreement you negotiate in our behalf. That is non-negotiable. Rene his father and I are the arbiter committee.]

Rene answered first. [Understood, I intend to be a vehicle for consequences. I’m sure once I explain to my father, that I’m missing your, what did you call it? Power leveling? Which was set up explicitly to help to keep me alive, My mother will motivate my father’s team, I assure you. Frankly I expect him to be angry as well. But if not, my mother will not put up with petty merda against my chances to live.]

[To sum up I see the immediate plan as pump-up iron skin for the guild, water jar bolts for crossbows and ballistae, and pump up my shaping to get it closer to combat speeds. Any other bonuses for the combat we are in right now?]

When I got no additions, I picked up the Xena Blast, and Shape Mastery, then pumped the rest of my points into the mastery. If I can get shape fast enough to be used at combat speeds, it’d be pretty epic. It set my plan back for Level 10, but we needed to keep everyone alive. Even being able to shape large fields in a second or two is a big change. I can only use it in pauses, so I need to make them happen.

I moved back to the firing slits, and looked at how the ballista was set up. I added a horizontal slit pointed down at the gate. We’d have to tune things later as needed.

As I peered out the slit, I noticed that the smoke from the gate had decreased. There were very few screamers left. The Commander appeared to have a relay running on the ram, when the smart skeletons got too burned up, a new one ran forward and replaced in on the ram and the injured one fell back into the temple. The gate was mangled and twisted all to hell. Several of the Skeletons had Bolts stuck in them, but were still fighting. I strengthened the gate up again.

On Guild I said [Crossbow bodkin point appear to be ineffective]

Sgt Plums men were at formed in a shield wall and the end of the road we’d cut. Protected behind them I could see Olaf and others setting up a defensive wall to fight behind. I could see where they were planning to cover it on all sides. Looking at the length of the wooden logs driven into the ground, they were planning to raise it up and have the inside floor several feet higher than the outside. That would be huge if they got mobbed my melee mobs.

I looked at the handful of armor skeletons on the ram, and had a couple ideas. With my new masteries I could do a lot, but mana was still my weak point. I needed to use shape efficiently at my newly extended ranges. My shape fields kept breaking down if the log was moving. Using a small disk-shaped field, I was able to make a cut each time the Ram hit the fence and stopped. SNAP SNAP SNAP . If I had time I’d slit in lengthwise, ruining it in one cut, but I wasn’t that fast yet. Instead, I chopped a foot off the end each time it hit the gate. Pretty soon I was close enough to be able to chop it between the skeletons holding it, and instead of one big ram they had several smaller ones. I felt a grin break out on my face, they now looked like a bunch of skeletons carrying kegs.

I made a tiny circular shape field, only an inch around, and reached as far as I could. I couldn’t extend it past our bless field. But I was able to cut skeletons who were standing still off at the knees. Ones moving slowly enough, I could cut their feet off at the ankle. There was no way I could do it if I wasn’t snug and safe, but I was starting to get a feel for what a powerhouse shape was eventually going to be. Imagine reaching out and cutting tendons or major blood vessels of my enemies one by one.

The smart armored skeletons were falling back out of my range, and soon there were no screamers left at all. I tried using shape to move the fountain and the tower an inch forward, Imagining a tank with a Bless field moving forward, but my mana blinked out instantly just at the attempt. I sat back down to meditate.

I heard a Whoop from Fannon, and a thumping twang as the ballista fired for the first time. After a few more shots my mana was full and I got up to look at the damage.

Several skeletons were pinned to the ground by armor or shields the bolts had penetrated. But were clearly still alive. I pulled a bolt from the shop, there were a dozen or so there, and looked at the Bodkin point head. It was a small pyramid of metal designed to punch through the armored hide of demons. I converted one into a squat hunting broadhead and passed it up to Jimni to load for Fannon.

Thor was meditating having used his cone shaped Danu’s Touch attack several times during the meeting at the gate. I grabbed another bolt and changed it to a crescent moon shaped blade points toward the enemy. I converted 3rd to a Frog Crotch head. Which was a Y shaped head, with the inside sharp instead of the outside.

I hopped up to watch the bolt hit to see which worked best. The Broadhead was shot into a shield and did more damage, to the skeleton but it was still alive. I yelled “The other two are for non-armored areas.”

Fannon crouched over the Ballista and aimed carefully, using the crescent blade to cut a skeleton’s legs off, taking it out of the fight.

“That’s much better!”, I yelled. I got a wild-eyed grin back from both Fannon and Jimni., Fannon raised her voice to say back, “If we’re going aim that fine, we need better sights on these, a Pair of Pins, and some way to measure the range angles.”

[Granny write down somewhere that we need a post and ladder sights we can fix to the ballistae.]

I pulled out another Ballista bolt l, I put a Broad head bolt on with a 3rd blade in a point of a triangle shape and another with a pair of smaller edges like a modern hunting broadhead, giving each a chisel point . If we can combine penetration at this range with better bone damage, we’ll be in the butter zone for sure.

A familiar quiet voice came over the officer’s channel,

[Sir Bill, this Is Orth, Bart just dropped some mana potions, and some mana recharge amulets into the shop. Keep an eye out for more. Rene physically walked us into a shop, told the owner that’s he’d put the Heir of Portbo into danger. Next, he pulled down his “By appointment of the Count d Portbo” sign and stomped on it. Then he walked over and started pointing at items and telling us how much they cost yesterday. It was frankly impressive as hell. His father sent 2 cases of heal potions from the County Armory. I swear if he wasn’t so old, he’d have carried them himself. His guard are going door to door and bringing merchants over to speak to Rene personally. He had me dump our bankroll of all the gold nuggets we had at his feet. It was like 3 feet across and 6 inches tall. and Rene is literally standing on the pile berating them. I have to say, I’m so glad I got that gift of tongues. Missing this would have been truly tragic. If you could see their eyes gradually lowering to the gold, just in time for Rene to yell “Look at me when I’m talking to you.” Over and over again, It’s truly beautiful.]

[Great Job Orth, get us what you can. Officers, pass 1 amulet to each caster you have, and pass out the mana potions evenly. Tell the casters to save the mana potions for emergencies. I doubt these guys are just going to quit trying to break out.]

The mana increases may not seem like much, but Plum’s men were behind cover faster. Both Thorbjorn and I were putting out damage faster. Also, Plums healers were putting guards back into combat faster.

Slowly but surely, we were grinding them down, safe and sound behind our defenses. They were losing combat power, we were not.

So of course, that’s when shit went sideways.