runsforcelery wrote:Isilith wrote:It was absolutely an "I say it happens" moment. Even though it goes against common sense to let someone be walking around, UNGUARDED, with a briefcase full of state secrets.
I'm sorry this upsets you so.
I'd point out a few things, though.
First, I never said he wasn't guarded at all. He and the Siddarmarkians with him were all important to the industrialization of Siddarmark and, in a war in which assassination is part of the game, they had bodyguards. They didn't have an entire platoon of infantry along, however; only a relatively small number for what was supposed to be a short, routine walk to their destination.
Second, the decision had been made to avoid drawing attention to him and the Siddarmarkians he was with by assigning the aforementioned platoon of guards to him. Clearly, that didn't work out too well in this instance, but it was a Siddarmarkian decision (since they were in Siddar City), and on the face of it --- especially in a society which doesn't have photography to pass out pictures to hit men or cellphones to coordinate ambushes on the fly --- it actually made sense.
Third, neither Caleb nor Merlin were consulted when he set out on his final walk, and even Merlin (and Owl and Nahrmahn) can't be everywhere at once all the time. They didn't know he was going until he'd already gone and been killed. For that matter, I'm not sure Merlin was even in the city at the time! I'd have to consult my timeline notes to be positive he wasn't off being someone else at the fatal moment.
Fourth, the only reason the assassination and snatch were possible was because one of Clyntahn's top operatives --- a man who'd avoided detection by both Aivahand Owl/Narhmahn, at least to that point --- figured out who he was and set a mob on him and his companions. A mob big enough to overwhelm the bodyguards and get him close enough to personally kill the bearer of the plans and steal them. And he had no idea whatever what he was grabbing when he grabbed them; it was pure opportunism.
The increased purely Caharisian security laid on in the form of the Marines was added after the fact and is on top of the Siddarmarkian security, not instead of it.
I may not have spelled this out sufficiently in the novel for you, but it was always been part of my thinking/understanding of the scene, and I'd thought it was sufficiently obvious that there must have been some security in place that I chose to use wordcount (in what was already a really long book, writing about other things.
I will cheerfully admit that it was necessary to the story I'm telling for the Church to "get a leg up," but I deny that it was the result of a totally implausible decision on the good guys's part. Besides, sometimes, in that ancient and wise aphorism, shit happens, and this time it happened to the Allies. Indeed, to me it would be even more implausible if none of the unpredictable events which bedevil both sides in any conflict this grand broke in the Church's favor!
RFC... replied... to... my... post -passes out-
I am giddy now, even if the reply was to merely say that I was wrong.
I have been a RP gamer since the 4th grade, so I know there are times any GM has to do the "It's that way, because I say it's that way". I am sure that authors have to use that, at times, to facilitate their storyline. So I wasn't that upset, just annoyed. I was also served in the Army, in MI, so that played into my thinking about how well a courier would be guarded.
I will also admit that I was annoyed because you have made me care about the characters, and their nations/causes, with your storytelling. That means you have done your "job" and woven a tale that has drawn your readers into the world you have imagined and brought to life.
P.S. You can make it up to me/us by having the industrial "boom" happen to the church instead of Howsmyn.
