Mnemon and the Empress's feeling toward each other ?

[Jen]

Big Red: Here's your lunch. I..It's not like I especially make it for you or anything. I...I just make too much. Geez ! Just take it already ! D...dummy !

What is the Empress's feeling toward her treacherous daughter I wonder ? Seeing what happen to house Manosque I'm surprise that she let Mnemon lives. Does this mean that her Redness kindaaaaa~ like Mnemon, just a little. What about the pinky princess herself ? Does she hate her mom for never hugging her ? Or is she a megalomaniac from birth and feel that she's clearly superior to her mom ?

[phalamir]

Obviously Saibok is a more interesting character in my eyes or I wouldn't be arguing that he is.

Alucard didn't ask if you found him more interesting. He asked do you find him more interesting because he is older. To wit, if there was a Drogon-blood exactly like Ragara in every particular - yet one day older - would he be more interesting than Ragara because of that non-mechanical stat.

I personally find Saibok rather flat. He's old and he's senile, and he putters around. If the highlight of his last 500 years is that he got his Depends changed once and he hadn't pooped himself, he isn't so hot. What is he good for? Any random Exalt can mutter random words as mystical koans while peeing himself - being a lifespan freak really doesn't add to that. I'mm not saying he should be whipping Solars with a birch branch for being on his lawn, but he can't even be considered a good mentor, since he's so random he can't even use Charms reliably, much less consciously impart wisdom. He's just there - which is a narrative space that could be just as easily held down by a rock.

[Isator Levi]

I actually misremembered; as of Realm year 768, Ragara is somewhere in the are of 629 years old.

the plants Saibok cultivates are entirely new sorts of fauna created by with lots of potential medical usage and the like

That's a result of what he's doing, but Gauto still does not seem like he's being presented as some kind of super horticulturalist; his works do not seem deliberate. He's just an old retiree who has a gardening hobby to keep his failing mind occupied; that they are so wondrous is an incidental result of the Age he lives in and how he is suffused with Wood Essence, I think. Ragara has the misfortune to live in a fallen Age. Even so, if he had anything like the write up Gauto has, one could probably detail him without undermining the core premise of him.

[Mizu]

Hissssss…

No, seriously, is the game improved by measuring peoples' age-dicks against each other? Is Saibok really a better character in your eyes for being such an aberration?

Obviously Saibok is a more interesting character in my eyes or I wouldn't be arguing that he is.

[Fata-Ku]

No, no, no. This is the Princess we should base Big Red Off.

Actually, yeah. PB is a pretty good example of what Big Red ought to look like. She's old and smart and full of herself and doesn't trust her subjects to do anything and thinks things would fall apart in five minutes without her around, and then goes about setting up things so that they DO fall apart in five minutes without her around because she's made everything depend on herself because she doesn't trust anyone.

Pretty sure her only heir (Goliad) is much more a Manosque than a Mnemon, though...

This is now my favorite head-canon.
"Yo Mnemon! You're FIRED! YOU BUTT!"
*cue Mnemon wailing like Lemongrab*

edit :

[TheCountAlucard]

Slightly older then I recalled, but he still has nothing on Saibok and his life span of several thousand years.

Hissssss…

No, seriously, is the game improved by measuring peoples' age-dicks against each other? Is Saibok really a better character in your eyes for being such an aberration?

[Mizu]

Slightly older then I recalled, but he still has nothing on Saibok and his life span of several thousand years.

[Isator Levi]

the regular upper age limit of what dragon bloods can generally achieve.

Ragara is almost six hundred years old.

[MaxAstro]

I've always thought the setting is much more fun if the Scarlet Empress is both an absolute badass and a magnificent bastard.

In my home games I more or less base her off of Vetinari from the Diskworld books.

Of course, in my home games Mnemon and the Empress have a... difficult... relationship on account of the Empress tricked Mnemon into taking her place re: Bride of the Ebon Dragon.

[Mizu]

While recalling some of my experiences with my grandmother, a question occured to me:

Has anybody ever complained about Saibok Gauto as a senile, infirm, retired Dragon Blood who does little more than sit around cultivating plants and having pleasant conversations over tea with people whose names he can barely remember?

Well, for starters Saibok has the honor of having lived well past a dragon blood's usual maximum life span purely through cultivation of his own essence without relying on a gem of immortality or something while Ragara is just a 'regular' old guy who is fast approaching the regular upper age limit of what dragon bloods can generally achieve. Also, the plants Saibok cultivates are entirely new sorts of fauna created by with lots of potential medical usage and the like (and it is made clear he is making new ones all the time, they aren't just something he invented thousands of years ago and happens to keep in his garden present day).

Yeah, my grandparents are also going senile. Conversations with them are kind of depressing, though they haven't yet gotten to the point that they forget who people are. Mostly it is just asking the same question over and over again and stuff like that.

[Isator Levi]

That Ragara isn't depicted like Saibok Gauto

I don't think Gauto would do very well if he just got about three lines describing him either.

[Howling Coyote]

While recalling some of my experiences with my grandmother, a question occured to me:

Has anybody ever complained about Saibok Gauto as a senile, infirm, retired Dragon Blood who does little more than sit around cultivating plants and having pleasant conversations over tea with people whose names he can barely remember?

I think the difference is that the write up for Saibok Gauto was sympathetic, noting he was a veteran of the Primordial War who'd achieved a lifespan (and implied wisdom) greater than any other Terrestrial. In contrast, while that might also be true for Ragara*, he's noted as just being old and senile. In a lot of ways, that they are old is really their only commonality in the way they are described. More accurately, they are depicted as opposites in terms of what an elderly Terrestrial may be like. That Ragara isn't depicted like Saibok Gauto, even though it would be very easy to do so, is the big reason, I think, that people look down on him.

*edit: true that Ragara was old and potentially wise despite senility, not that he was a veteran of the Primordial War.

[Wise Old Guru]

Actually, yeah. PB is a pretty good example of what Big Red ought to look like. She's old and smart and full of herself and doesn't trust her subjects to do anything and thinks things would fall apart in five minutes without her around, and then goes about setting up things so that they DO fall apart in five minutes without her around because she's made everything depend on herself because she doesn't trust anyone.

Pretty sure her only heir (Goliad) is much more a Manosque than a Mnemon, though...

[Asmodai]

No, no, no. This is the Princess we should base Big Red Off.

[Isator Levi]

While recalling some of my experiences with my grandmother, a question occured to me:

Has anybody ever complained about Saibok Gauto as a senile, infirm, retired Dragon Blood who does little more than sit around cultivating plants and having pleasant conversations over tea with people whose names he can barely remember?