Board Thread:The Last Sovereign Discussion/@comment-39332473-20190808194309/@comment-39332473-20190914104736

Sotter wrote: One must wonder what is going on the mind of the King of Aram. The official narative regarding the Doom King is that he has both the Fucklord's and the Incubus Emperor's shards. The army is way stronger, better equiped and more organized than the one Incubus Emperor had. During the 2nd Arclentian War, all Aram could do was to force a stalemate and it needed help to do that. Now Aram is isolated as almost everyone is looking out for themselves.

The only person whose decisions make some sense is Hester. A shiny new cathedral will calm some Ivalans out after Estaven's speech and it allows her to make preparations in a somewhat discreet way. Still, that must have costed her a significant amount of political capital, especially if the Church is helping Tak'Kan. Esmera and Aramite Ivalans must be fuming right now.

As for Annah and Mother, could someone fetch them some kool-aid please? Aram is isolated, but I suspect their logic is as follows:

1. Yhilin is on good terms with their neighbors, however: Ardoheim will not help the Doom King, the Elves are isolationists, Zirantia is in Chaos, and the fledgling Kingdoms of the West have barely had time to prepare themselves for self-rule, let alone war. Unlike in the 3AW, Yhilin will not have the assistance of all its neighbors.

2. Yhilin's foriegn allies are too weak to help, or too far to matter. Esthera is the exception, but she is still opposed by the Lustlord in the south, and cannot move large numbers of troops without inviting reprisal.

3.  If Aram does not act now, Yhilin will solidify its position as the premier state in Arclent, and it will be too late. Aram will lose its client states and its opportunity to offload the monetary debt it has incurred. Even now, Eustrin is steadily being pulled away by the Doom King's greedy claws.

There's also another imminent disaster to consider.

Someone mentioned above that large ecumenical councils aren't usually called because everything in the church is going great. Aram might know something that we don't - for example, that the Church is about to schism (due in no small part to temporal authorities meddling with Ivalan affairs).