[mainline][merged] - Timeline tweaks/additions (761-829)

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Bitron
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[mainline][merged] - Timeline tweaks/additions (761-829)

Post by Bitron »

This is the following Idea threat from this discussion. There were a few more words on discord #general on this topic.

What are the odds?

Timeline says:
761-816: Legacy of Black Eye Karun

Orc race description says:
The oldest known orcs have been around 50 to 60 years of age, but very few individuals ever live to see over two or three decades before meeting their end either in war or by the hand of one of their kin. The oldest orcs are often shamans, which are perhaps the only ones most of their kind sees as being trustworthy and neutral.

Doing little of little math, we can see that Karuns Legacy remains 55 which would already be decent age for an orc. But there is more on it. I am pretty sure that the Legacy of Karun did not start with Karuns birth, but his claim of leadership. He must have been alive for some time. Even if orcs are concidered mature very early, lets say at the age of 13, since they usually do not live that long, and Karun claimed leadership at around that age, he would die at the age of 73, and not even by infirmity of old age, but by an ambush. 73 Years is way to old for an orc, even for a legend like Karun.

Same goes for his son, the well known Kapou'e from SotBE. The fact that Karun died in the year 816 YW implies that Kapou'e must be born latest at 817 YW. Which would mean that Karun would have begotten an orcish woman at the age of round about 73 years. It is not impossible, but it would be more likely if Kapou'e was born in Karuns best ages, say, early/mid twenties or even earlier. But even with Kapou'e born in the latest possible year, 817 YW, he would be 41 years old at the end of SotBE (858YW). Not impossible, but still.

So, my suggestion is to tweak the timeline as follows (without notes):
Timeline 786 - 858 YW
Note: changed years are underlined.

786-826 YW: Legacy of Black-Eye Karun
After decades of struggle, Black-Eye Karun becomes the first warlord since the assassination of Great Chief Brurbar in 20 YW to unite all the different squabbling orcish tribes under his banner. Among his many accomplishments as a Sovereign, his most famous is the creation of the Great Council.
Karun was a far-sighted individual and he knew that after his death the orcish tribes would once again turn to fighting among themselves, with little he could do to prevent that and consequent peril from the Wesnothians and elves.
Consequently, Karun selected from among all the different tribes six of the most sober and wisest orcs and thus created the Great Council. It was the Great Council's job to stay aloof from any tribal or territorial squabbling amongst the orcs, but yet always remain there to give advice to whomever came to seek it. In order to preserve the orcish race in the event of an emergency, he invested in them the power to call up The Great Horde. It was established that every orc, no matter what tribe he came from, must obey the summons of The Great Horde and follow wholeheartedly the leader that the Great Council put at the head of The Great Horde.

Note: Only the timespan changed from 761-816 to 786-826. Text remains the same.

786 YW
  • Karun is born
805 YW
  • Karun devised the formation of the Great Council
811 YW
  • A border dispute between Karun and a human enclave aligned with the Northern Alliance leaves several men and orcs dead and begins a feud that will grow into a fifteen-year war.
812 YW
  • Rahul I becomes Lord Protector of the Northern Alliance
816 YW
  • Kapou'e is born.
Note: Karun is 30 years old at this point, which seems like a better age to me to get a son than at the age of 73.

826 YW
  • Rahul I (Lord Protector of the Northern Alliance) and Black Eye Karun sign a peace treaty ending a 15 year war between the humans and the orcs. Soon after this Karun, is ambushed and killed in mysterious circumstances.
Note: Karun dies at the age of 40. The (Introductory) Story of Son of the Black Eye would need to be changed a little, since it would be the 14th year of Rahul I as Lord Protector, not the 4th.

829 YW
  • Frustrated with the fallout of Karun's supposed assassination, Rahul I resigns, and Howgarth III takes his place as Lord Protector.
Note: The text ist tweaked a little to clear out why he resigned. It could remain as given in the timeline, though.

Note: From here, it remains the same

842 YW
  • Famine in the Northlands. Famine led humans to colonize some orcish lands and push orcs into desolated hill country. The few orcish tribes who had remained part of the Alliance, feeling the pressure, either left Alliance territory or revolted and were destroyed.
  • Retaliating, the orcs systematically slaughtered human colonies and villages on their lands. Then, Earl Lanbec'h — the most powerful human warlord of the North — determined to abolish the orcish menace raised an army and conferred leadership of it to his son-in-law Baron Alber.
  • In response, the Great Council set up by the Black Eye Karun calls upon The Great Horde and bestows leadership of it upon Kapou’e; Son of the Black Eye begins.
Note: Kapou’e is about 26 years old at this point.

843 YW
  • Half of the Great Council is treacherously slain by the allied human forces and orcish unity disintegrates. Faced with the extermination of all the orcs on the Great Continent, Kapou’e forcibly asserts his control over the orcish territories and defeats the enemy forces. The Northern Alliance arrives on the scene in time for the final battle and helps Kapou’e defeat the forces of the northern earldoms, who had broken the treaty. Kapou’e then assumes the position of Sovereign over the northern tribes, and his rule ushers in an unprecedented era of unity and prosperity for the orcs.
  • After 843: Portions of Kapou'e's army act as mercenaries in foreign struggles with other races which keeps them from attacking their nearest neighbors.

852 YW
  • Kapou’e repels a large elvish invasion.
858 YW
  • The humans once again stage an invasion but prove to be no match for the united orcish forces under the leadership of Kapou’e. Son of the Black Eye ends.
Note: Kapou’e is about 42 years old at this point.
Cons are the changes that must be made in Son of the Black Eye and maybe other campaigns which refer to those happenings with specific years.

Well, thats it I guess. I hope it doesn't cause too much changes and can be changed easily. I think it really would conduce to a more cohesive timeline.
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Re: [mainline] - Timeline tweaks/additions (761-829)

Post by zookeeper »

Seems good to me. Some notes:

The fact that the era/age is called "The Legacy of Black-Eye Karun" doesn't really mean he had to have been born before. If in a historical timeline you name an era/age after a particularly influential individual, then it's not illogical to start counting from their birth. In any case, the original starting date of 761 YW was likely arbitrary so moving it forward to 786 is fine.

So, I think it makes more sense to name the section "786-858 YW: The Legacy of Black-Eye Karun" and thus have it actually cover the whole era/age, with maybe an added year mark on when the Great Council was actually formed (or re-instated, if it wasn't actually invented by Karun but had some kind of precedent in history). Some elaboration on that:

It's unclear when the formation of the Great Council happened, and even whether the Great Horde was ever called up in Karun's time. Now, it would initially seem to make sense to assume that Karun was actually in charge of a Great Horde at some point, but there might have simply been no need. The Great Horde would be a temporary blitzkrieg machine in a time of need, and will probably run out of steam pretty quickly, so it can't have been something that was engaged at the beginning of the 15-year war. There's a few options:

1. The orcs were losing the war, so near the end of it, Karun devised the formation of the Great Council, the Great Horde was called up, and that enabled Karun to force the humans into a reasonably fair peace treaty.

2. The Great Council was formed earlier, before the war, and it was never called up during Karun's reign because the situation wasn't bad enough.

3. The Great Council was formed earlier, before the war, and Karun had the Great Horde called up near the end of the war as a means of putting an end to it, or used the possibility of calling it up as a bargaining chip in negotiating the peace treaty.
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Bitron
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Re: [mainline] - Timeline tweaks/additions (761-829)

Post by Bitron »

zookeeper wrote:I think it makes more sense to name the section "786-858 YW: The Legacy of Black-Eye Karun"
No objections on that.
zookeeper wrote:There's a few options:
I think the 3. option would be good. I'd set the creation of the Great Council somewhere between 802 and 806, I guess. The actual call might stay unknown, in case someone what to make a umc campaign of that.
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Re: [mainline][merged] - Timeline tweaks/additions (761-829)

Post by Bitron »

Changes to the SotBE dialoques have been merged and the wiki is updated accordingly.
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