Turn 127 - Hoodoo Voodoo Medicine Man
Parliament is absolutely livid about you shooting down their brilliant plan and then, to pile injury onto insult, used Imperial authority to implement it anyways and take full credit, while stripping out all of the lovely and oh so carefully crafted clauses intended to allow Parliament to use the legislation as a vehicle to eventually seize de facto, if not de jure, control over the Empire from you.
The Eldest is quite smug, and when you ask him he states that he’d warned them that you’d spot their traps and deal with them appropriately and that they had only themselves to blame for being so power hungry and greedy. They had not appreciated his bluntness, but since by seniority he’s still the head of the Senate there’s nothing that they can do about it beyond pouting and generally acting quite childish in the giant cat’s considered opinion.
The Opposition, meanwhile, is frantically attempting to spin the entire situation as being one great big misunderstanding on your part and that your actions are simply that of being a big meanie to their poor, misunderstood, selves. Why, you had forced them to react against you, if you hadn’t been so unwilling to cede power to Parliament then they’d never have been forced to try and sneak it past you, it’s all your fault!
Such protestations are met with the appropriate pointing, laughing, and mockery by everybody else.
Ironically one of your biggest supporters in pointing out the passive-aggressive nature of that response is a certain media conglomerate that used to be firmly in the Opposition camp. You pat yourself on the back for not overreacting years back when you first became aware of the current CEO of said companies actions on New Eden.
You receive both good and bad news from the preliminary recon mission against the Black Steel. The bad news is that the
Caravel jumpship was caught while still recharging by the Black Steel and destroyed with all hands. The overt
Omahas on their ‘naughty picture run’ are being pursued, but are sending back valuable data showing the state of repairs, disposition of enemy forces, and likely defensive stations. The covert pair are not, as planned, reporting in yet, but the overt vessels report no sign that the Black Steel even suspects that the covert ships are present.
Based on the data, Admiral Fisher is recommending a brief delay in Operation: Golden Truth to shuffle some forces around to address the discovery of those defensive stations. The eight
Potemkin-class vessels that aren’t the historic HMS Morristown will be used to transport a large contingent of parasite missile battleships to the operation. The delay would last into next year, putting the start date of the operation in February of 3058. Since it is a rather sensible solution you give your approval for the delay.
But now it is budget time, which you are quite looking forward to.
Amaunet opens things up like she usually does from her position at the front of the room. “Padrone, military morale continues to be strong, production levels are rising, and our forces are chomping at the bit for Operation: Golden Truth. General Bradley?”
The pugnacious general takes the podium. “The Army remains in a holding pattern, Your Majesty, focusing on training and maintaining readiness in the event we do run into an enemy that requires ground forces. I am pleased to report that the latest series of exercises are going very well and the Army should be ready if we are needed.”
- Imperial Griffon Army
- Procurement
- Garrison Forces
- 25 Garrison Divisions
- 25 Militia Divisions
General Perkins is up next. “Your Majesty, we wish to continue to expand our production capacity as rapidly as possible. We are also still attempting to recover our losses and are hoping that Operation: Golden Truth will not compound our difficulties but rather be as successful as we hope.” You can tell that, for all the confidence most have, General Perkins is more worn down.
- Imperial Griffon Aerospace Force
- Production
- New ASF Factory Complexes
- Glorreich
- Shin Tōkyō
- Kurortas
- Raj
- Pustina
- Platzregensburg
- Pryyemnyy
- Awha
- Bāṛi
- Bellaterra
- Procurement
- 25 Training Wings
- 35 CAP Wings
- 100 Carrier Wings
Admiral Fisher seems to be making it a habit to let Commodore Savić handle the actual briefs, while glowering from his seat. The young-looking officer takes the podium and smiles slightly. “Your Majesty,” she begins. “Your Navy is in solid shape across the board. We are wishing to start procurement of the
Nevada-class Heavy Cruiser as a close-in escort for the
Jean Bart-class Battlecruiser. The two ships share a nearly identical thrust profile and are highly complementary designs. We have sufficient medium warship production capacity to begin building such specialist designs. In addition, Fortress Command notes that the relative portability of the
Spartoi clusters will enable them to be deployed where needed.” She checks her notes and brings up the budget request displays as she continues to speak.
- Imperial Griffon Navy
- Production
- Orbital Shipyards
- Expand all Orbital Shipyards
- Refit & Repair Yards
- Expand all Refit & Repair Yards
- Escort Yards
- Nowy Szczecin
- Baddorando
- Sturmland
- Neubayern
- Neuhessen
- Nouvelle Bourgogne
- Nuova Lombardia
- Skala
- Stahlfurt
- Grand View
- Griff's Leap
- Kurortas
- Novolar
- Olej
- Pinball
- Pryyemnyy
- Pustina
- Steingarten
- The Hub
- Nuova Puglia
- Chuma
- Nuovo Abruzzo
- Stenen Tuin
- New Libertalia
- Nyū Shikoku
- Nuova Tripoli
- Catachan
- Feurstern
- Neuthüringen
- Nowe Mazowsze
- Nox
- Platzregensburg
- Porto Milano
- Landprettig
- New Algiers
- New Clew Bay
- Nubifragio
- Bellaterra
- Small Warship Yards
- Raj
- New Port Royal
- Nowa Warszawa
- Nowy Slask
- Chuma
- Awha
- Kaiyo
- Shin Tōkyō
- Iskra
- Griffon
- Bohren
- Medium Warship Yards
- New Pollux
- Calliope
- Pieklo
- Bari
- Edelsteine
- Large Warship Yards
- Glorreich
- New Phoenix
- New Castor
- Nowy Wrocław
- Procurement
- Standard Dropships
- 400 Artemis-class Planetary Defense Boat Flotillas
- 109 Wright-class Dockable ASF Platforms
- 109 Colt-class Defense Blisters
- Large Dropships
- 30 Saipan-class Parasite Carriers
- 296 Mikasa-class Parasite Battleships
- Escorts
- 170 Battle-class Destroyers
- 10 Skjold-class Missile Corvettes
- 10 Constellation-class Corvettes
- 50 Tarantul-class Missile Raiders
- 50 Asheville-class Raiders
- Small Warships
- 60 Belfast-class Light Cruisers
- 30 De Grasse-class Light Cruisers
- 10 Guiseppe Garibaldi-class Light Cruisers
- 8 Hosho-class Light Carriers
- Medium Warships
- 20 Prinz Eugen II-class Heavy Cruisers
- 10 Algerie-class Heavy Cruisers
- 5 Nevada-class Heavy Cruisers
- Large Warships
- 10 Kaiserin-class Battleships
- 10 Jean Bart-class Battlecruisers
- Fortress Command
- Black Towers
- Baddorando
- Sturmland
- Blár
- Nueva Chiapas
- New Kansas
- Spartoi
- 5 Spartoi-class Defense Clusters
Once the Commodore is seated, Elizabeth Lee speaks up from where she’s sitting. “Your Majesty, the economy is doing well, and our building projects are likewise proceeding well. The new contracts for strategic materials production are in place, to general satisfaction all around. I do have one problem.” She pauses, then grins a bit as people start to look nervous. “I have five idle DoME teams, and you saw what happens when DoME teams are idle.”
There’s general laughter at that.
“So we have the following proposals to keep those mad lads and lasses busy.”
- Department of Mega Engineering
- Planetary Optimization
- Terraforming
- Catachan
- Steingarten
- Nuova Tripoli
- Nuova Puglia
“I also now know that we need to keep the economic teams equally busy, or they collaborate a bit too well with DoME, as we saw last year.” More laughter at that.
- Economic Focus, Investment & Infrastructure
- Economic Focus
- Major Investment
- Investment
- Infrastructure & Industrial Zones
- Hot Mess
- Baddorando
- Salamander
- Nouvelle Bourgogne
- Nuova Puglia
Doctor Severino then speaks up from her place as Elizabeth wraps up her presentation. “Diplomatically speaking, we are hosting several diplomatic meetings with our allies as usual, however Cultural Affairs would like to host an Empire-wide German Cultural Festival. It’s been a while since we’ve held one of those, and they think it would be a good idea. I did, however, draw the line at lederhosen promotion.”
Tiberius isn’t present, due to an illness in the family. He’s left a memo for you recommending the continued expansion of the Civil Service ‘if you feel like it’.
Grace is present, however. “Your Majesty, I only have the one R&D team available this year, and while they’re the same Real Men Of Genius behind the entire ‘use lasers to vent heat’ idea, they are genuinely intelligent, usually. I’d like to put them to work at something a bit less ‘out there’ in the theoretical sense, but rather more in the… practical sense. Specifically, have them work on improvements to our orbital infrastructure management techniques and methods.”
- R&D
- Orbital Infrastructure lvl 10
Sina and Martina are in meetings with their NRR and NRI counterparts, respectively, and are not present in the Griffon system for this meeting. They’ve both left you memos stating that neither have any specific budget requests this year over and above their normal departmental budgets.