Recently one of the PCs, in my Honor+Intrigue game, Father Signoret the swashbuckling Jesuit priest, physically attacked a noble client of the Prince de Condé (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Henri,_Prince_of_Cond%C3%A9_(1588%E2%80%931646)) at the theatre. As it turns out, this incident has created a political complication for the patron of a second PC, Guy de Bourges. Guy is a courtier and spy who works for the mysterious, wealthy, and enigmatic masked nobleman, the Duke DeMainz. As a result, DeMainz has given Guy the assignment of restoring the political balance. Leaving the method open to Guy.
The meeting between Guy and DeMainz is recounted here (http://honorandintrigue.blogspot.com/2015/06/what-to-do-about-prince.html).
The player is stuck for next steps and I'd like some ideas about how Guy could try to weaken the Prince de Condé to try to reestablish the political balance.
- Guy is a master of disguise and an expert spy and graceful courtier.
- Socially he is a chevalier (SR 9) so he is not on the same level as a Prince (SR 17).
- Guy controls two experienced NPC spies one of whom is a lady in waiting to the Prince's wife.
- He also controls a network of average spies.
- He can access some funds, though not enough to come close to matching the Prince's wealth. Guy may also call in favors from other PCs.
I'd like something swashbuckling or maybe a 17th century version of some Mission Impossible style antics. What are some suggestions for how Guy should proceed?
The more ideas the better. Guaranteed (or even likely) success not required.
In the conversation this bit puzzles me:
"And remember, the Baron St. Giron is also a client of the Prince and Villemorin’s captain. If you are caught acting against St. Giron I won’t protect you."
What is the significance of Baron St. Giron that he brings specific mention? Is he particularly tempting as a target to Guy or is there something else?
Quote from: Simlasa;838388In the conversation this bit puzzles me:
"And remember, the Baron St. Giron is also a client of the Prince and Villemorin’s captain. If you are caught acting against St. Giron I won’t protect you."
What is the significance of Baron St. Giron that he brings specific mention? Is he particularly tempting as a target to Guy or is there something else?
Good question. It is always difficult to know how much information is too much.
- St. Giron is an enemy of Guy's. He hates Guy but was forced into a truce with Guy by DeMainz after a previous adventure. "Curse you Guy de Bourges!" is St. Giron's tag line.
- St. Giron is a member of the Prince of Conde's faction. He is a Colonel and Baron who commands the Prince's private regiment.
- DeMainz is reminding Guy of the enforced truce which binds Guy as a client of DeMainz and binds St. Giron, essentially based on the Baron's fear of DeMainz. DeMainz is an equivocal, self-made man of mystery with contacts throughout all levels of society in multiple countries.
Effectively, unless Guy wants to act very covertly through cutouts he can't act against St. Giron. So far Guy has been loyal to his Patron and Guy's player has said she doesn't want Guy to break the truce or go after St. Giron.
Easiest way is to shame (noble client) Villemorin obliquely by going beyond the pale. Something like having Jesuit Priest PC assaulted on the street successfully, put into the hospital — and breaking the legs of an actor publicly during a performance (which gives you that mission impossible feel). Then with a whisper campaign insinuating such petty vengeance on the part of Villemorin.
The damage to entertainers, and more important to noble entertainment, should spread infamy far and quickly. The rumor mill then should impugn Prince de Condé to knowingly associate with ill-tempered blackguards. Taking advantage of Villemorin's boorish behavior can justifiably be twisted into toxic.
It would also be useful to know more about the prince... is he clever or a dullard? What vices might he have that can be preyed upon? Where are his attentions and blind spots?
Quote from: Opaopajr;838390Easiest way is to shame (noble client) Villemorin obliquely by going beyond the pale.
But would shame to Villemorin necessarily backdraft onto the Prince, whose reputation is the target of the mission?
If he can take a little time about doing so, perhaps Guy could start the spread of scandalous rumors. By himself, in disguise or thru his spy network, he could spread convincing rumors that the adversary duke is involved in some kind of shocking shenanigans: devil worship, child sacrifice, bathing in the blood of virgins, whatever. Kind of like Cluracan did in that Sandman story. Perhaps he can foment a revolt of the duke's subjects, or an investigation by the authorities or other concerned nobles, who may ultimately break alliances and withdraw support on the basis of what the investigation uncovers. Which would of course be stuff Guy planted just before they stormed the Duke's Castle Keep. hard to trace back to Guy and even harder to trace back to his patron (unless he gets caught), and accomplishes the goal of tipping the balance of power without resorting to bloodshed.
I'm thinking something that brings the Prince to some degree of desperation that will drive him to adopt and recommend a dubious investment scheme to his fellow nobles... which turns out to be a pyramid scheme or somesuch. Leaving the Prince poorer and embarrassed.
Double-plus good if St. Giron gets indirectly caught up in the wake somehow.
One of his trusted agents is the lady-in-waiting to the Prince's wife?
Hell, that's easy. Said L-I-W spreads the word around how her mistress is weeping with misery half the time because the only time her husband will deign to lay with her is if she wears boy's clothing and lies on her belly. If there are any 11-12 year old boys who've gone missing within 10 miles of the Prince's hunting lodge in the last year, put out the rumor that they really suffered a shameful death, but that it was all covered up.
Ravenswing's is good, but I was thinking the lady-in-waiting might plant evidence that the Prince's wife and Saint-Giron are having an affair.
Lots of great comments. Thanks all.
Quote from: Opaopajr;838390Easiest way is to shame (noble client) Villemorin obliquely by going beyond the pale.
That happened, though differently.
Villemorin kidnapped the nieces of another PC, Gaston, who he hated. He threatened to kill the nieces to force Gaston into an unfair duel. Going so far as to tie the youngest girl to the top of a tower with orders to his men to drop her to the pavement below at his order and tied her sister to a stake in the castle moat, which was in disrepair and only half filled with water, then had the water gate opened to flood the moat and drown that girl - to lend a sense of urgency to the duel.
That didn't turn out well for Villemorin. He is dead now. (I'll eventually post the session on my blog.) Afterward, the Sword Nobles refused to disavow him -"while his actions were extreme he was provoked by that commoner." (Truly he was provoked.) The Robe Nobles, on the other hand, applaud his defeat and death. Sadly for Guy though, this disgrace was not enough to weaken the Prince since he derives his support from the Sword Nobles, especially those of the highest rank.
The PCs may be able to get some mileage out of a whisper campaign though. Though the Baron's peers refused to disavow him or approve of his death, he has become an embarrassment to them. Especially since he lost the unfair duel that he went to such extremes to set up. Worse yet, Villemorin lost the unfair duel to a commoner.
Quote from: Simlasa;838391It would also be useful to know more about the prince... is he clever or a dullard? What vices might he have that can be preyed upon? Where are his attentions and blind spots?
But would shame to Villemorin necessarily backdraft onto the Prince, whose reputation is the target of the mission?
I posted some additional information on my blog on the Prince de Condé and his wife (http://honorandintrigue.blogspot.com/2015/06/the-prince-de-conde.html). Shame to Villemorin is not enough to effect the Prince’s reputation or influence.
Quote from: IggytheBorg;838392
That sounds like a high risk, high reward strategy to me. I like it. Guy would need to be careful which PCs he had help him since some of them are pretty devout Catholics and might object to this on religious grounds. Guy is himself devout, so I don't know if the player will see that as something Guy would do, but I'll pitch it and see. It sounds sneaky and sinister enough that one of his spies (Le Serpent) might suggest it.
Quote from: Simlasa;838394I'm thinking something that brings the Prince to some degree of desperation that will drive him to adopt and recommend a dubious investment scheme to his fellow nobles... which turns out to be a pyramid scheme or somesuch. Leaving the Prince poorer and embarrassed.
Double-plus good if St. Giron gets indirectly caught up in the wake somehow.
Guy doesn’t have the financial resources or career and contacts to rig an economic scheme. That means he would need to really work at this one. But Guy likes a challenge and a complicated scheme.
Quote from: Ravenswing;838413One of his trusted agents is the lady-in-waiting to the Prince's wife?
Hell, that's easy. Said L-I-W spreads the word around how her mistress is weeping with misery half the time because the only time her husband will deign to lay with her is if she wears boy's clothing and lies on her belly. If there are any 11-12 year old boys who've gone missing within 10 miles of the Prince's hunting lodge in the last year, put out the rumor that they really suffered a shameful death, but that it was all covered up.
You are an evil, evil man. :D That is a brilliant plan and in line with one of the player's early suggestions, though much, much more wicked.
Quote from: The Butcher;838431Ravenswing's is good, but I was thinking the lady-in-waiting might plant evidence that the Prince's wife and Saint-Giron are having an affair.
As long as he doesn't get caught that could work. I'll pitch that too. I love tempting players to misbehave.
If I were Guy I would try to win the favour of the Prince through an act of service.
I would try and create a situation through which the Prince came to me in desperation to "clean up" a matter of gravest import that could be most detrimental to his position at court. You would need to set up the situation, feed the Prince the idea that Guy is the one to sort it out, then with his trust and sort out that issue and ingratiate yourself as one who was both trustworthy and had great knowledge of The Game.
Depending on Guy's morals
i) Get the Prince drunk and drug him.
ii) Have him wake up in bed next to a dead girl of noble heritage (she can either actually be dead or be a shill, dead is much simpler)
iii) have the spy on the inside there at the awakening and in the panic offer the solution of a man he knows who can deal with these issues with aplomb (obviously waking at night is the easiest as less fuss but needs to be played cleverly, I heard screams my lord and rushed in ... etc)
iv) Guy arrives ala Winston Wolfe and clears up the mess.
v) Guy refuses any offer of reward instead insisting that what he did is for the Good of France.
vi) Guy suggests that the Prince should take a trip to his estates in <...> for a while until things cool down
This should mean the Prince is out of town and thus out of direct influence, it could set up the possibility of a rumour by which the noble woman in question is linked to the Prince thus spreading gossip, it ingratiates the Prince to Guy for future manipulation and even sets him up as a possibly future patron should he current patron prove troublesome in the future.
Other options would
i) Have him implicated in a plot against another powerful figure (The Cardinal perhaps)
ii) Call out his honour over a perceived slight against the most dangerous man at court
iii) Have him named as a co-conspirator by a group of Jansenists, perhaps by attending some of their meetings in disguise as the Prince. (The Jansenist Heresy has to be post 1650 but you could any one of many others)
iv) Have him called away on other business to his estates
Quote from: Bren;838436You are an evil, evil man. :D That is a brilliant plan and in line with one of the player's early suggestions, though much, much more wicked.
As long as he doesn't get caught that could work. I'll pitch that too. I love tempting players to misbehave.
I liked Ravenswing's plan best, too, for its practicality:).
In practice, I avoid suggesting the best plans to players. This is their job, not mine, and they're too prone to follow suggestions anyway;).
OTOH, the affair is what I was thinking about. You just need to plant some evidence, like a masked man roughly similar to Saint Giron being seen to leave the Prince's wife's residence.
Bonus points for half the PCs making sure that Saint Giron is having the time of his life in a nearby villa, and the other half assisting the seduction attempt of the wife, or at least her nicest lady in waiting:D!
Quote from: AsenRG;838476I liked Ravenswing's plan best, too, for its practicality:).
In practice, I avoid suggesting the best plans to players. This is their job, not mine, and they're too prone to follow suggestions anyway;).
OTOH, the affair is what I was thinking about. You just need to plant some evidence, like a masked man roughly similar to Saint Giron being seen to leave the Prince's wife's residence.
Bonus points for half the PCs making sure that Saint Giron is having the time of his life in a nearby villa, and the other half assisting the seduction attempt of the wife, or at least her nicest lady in waiting:D!
I don't mind suggesting a good plan. The PC is extremely smart (Savvy-3) and has used romance for other spy plans in the past and he has a network of spies that he spend game time and Advancement Points building. So there is no reason all those spy brains might not come up with some good ideas. Though I won't present only one plan. I'll present all the ones that sound entertaining to me as the GM. (If I'm not entertained, ain't nobody having fun.) And let the player(s) sort out what they want to do. Besides the players often complicated any plan they are given. Sometimes for the better. Sometimes just making it more complicated.
I'll enjoy deciding which spy suggests which plan to their chief (Guy) though.
As the GM I don't care if the PCs succeed, fail, make an important enemy of the Prince, materially affect game events in the future by messing up the status of the (historical) Prince de Conde, or even get him killed,. I also don't care if Guy is fired by his current (fictional) patron the Duke DeMainz. So I'm fine with whatever plan they choose. They just needed some help coming up with a plan in this case.
And you folks came through like champions with great, interesting ideas. :)
Currently the group is running a different set of PCs on their way down the River Rhone to Marseille, so I have time before we switch scenes back to the PCs in Paris. That is when I need to get Guy's player to get off the dime and execute a plan...any plan. So it's not too late to submit your suggestions. I'll post the plan that the PCs do select and let you know the outcome afterwards.
Quote from: Bren;838509I don't mind suggesting a good plan.
Neither do I. I just avoid suggesting the best plan, because I don't want to play against myself, and it's not a hard rule:).
Still, the plan I did suggest is a good one, just not the
best one;).
I don't know, the blackguard part is about ruining nobility's fun at the opera. Doing horrible things to commoners and having perverse (read: "classical" and/or "noble") tastes should in fact do little to nothing. Juicy gossip is fun, but honestly, half that crew of noble elites likely already sanctioned or participated in such things. Buggering or killing off commoner children for fun and profit is par for the course, and nothing counter-spin cannot handle.
(I am used to pederasty, rape, incest, et al among nobility past times being just a pro forma for the title, throughout the world. Even now, who'd be surprised at such rumored behavior. And if caught, in how much *real trouble* they'd be in besides a few mea culpas and a genuflection? Power doesn't operate on similar bourgeois rules.)
Publicly interrupting the breads and circuses among themselves, however, is unpardonable. Think petty. Really fucking petty.
Quote from: The Butcher;838431Ravenswing's is good, but I was thinking the lady-in-waiting might plant evidence that the Prince's wife and Saint-Giron are having an affair.
Yeah, but in 17th century France and depending on his faction, that may well not cause the guy any political problems at all.
Quote from: Ravenswing;838653Yeah, but in 17th century France and depending on his faction, that may well not cause the guy any political problems at all.
So you plant evidence that the
Prince and Saint-Giron are having an affair.... and let his wife find it.
I agree with everyone who said that important nobles got away with lots of stuff. Non of the approaches are a slam dunk. The Prince may be able to withstand any one of the various plots.
Ideally the attack needs to drive a wedge between the Prince and some of his supporters. His main supporters are the Grands the great Sword Nobles of France, like the other Princes, Dukes, and important Marquises. These are the heads of major noble families of great power and influence. His secondary supporters are the lesser Sword Nobles. Both groups of Sword Nobles are worried about the erosion of their ancient rights, privileges, and wealth and the growth of royal power, the state bureaucracy, and the new Robe Nobles who are part of both.
One thing to remember is that Guy doesn't actually need to ruin the Prince, he just needs to decrease his current influence (which has increased) or his status. Any attack that can drive a wedge between the Prince and some of his supporters will probably do the trick. Also anything that would effect his status, though that is probably harder to mess with. One example would be the birth of a new heir to the throne. Historically that doesn't happen for a more than a decade.
Quote from: jibbajibba;838681So you plant evidence that the Prince and Saint-Giron are having an affair.... and let his wife find it.
This has the advantage of driving a wedge between the Prince and his wife. They have a long history together and her family is a big supporter of the Prince so that would not be easy, but...
Quote from: Ravenswing;838653Yeah, but in 17th century France and depending on his faction, that may well not cause the guy any political problems at all.
People got away with sleeping with the boss' wife? :eek:
I do admit to not being particularly familiar with C17 France beyond, well, swashbuckling movies.
Quote from: Ravenswing;838653Yeah, but in 17th century France and depending on his faction, that may well not cause the guy any political problems at all.
True, but it gives his opponents fuel for a mocking campaign.
Quote from: The Butcher;838706People got away with sleeping with the boss' wife? :eek:
I do admit to not being particularly familiar with C17 France beyond, well, swashbuckling movies.
Oh, simple. See, everyone was having an affair.
Everyone was having an affair. The notion that you could possibly be faithful to your own spouse -- never mind
loving that spouse -- was excused only for the adolescent, the idiot and the holier-than-thou camps. I'm sure it was the case that certain powerful men might prefer that if their wives had lovers, those lovers be men they could control, or at the least from whose hands they weren't too afraid of betrayal.
IIRC one of the key points of the French nobility of that time was that while could lose property, they most definitely could not lose face. What about going the Cyrano de Bergerac route and hire a poet to craft a devastating piece which the PCs spread about? When revenge is taken against the poet, the PCs may lie in wait and use the poet as bait before ambushing the attackers. Of course, the poet writes of this as well, furthering the disrepute of the noble, and the PCs must secret him out of Paris.
Quote from: Ravenswing;838713Oh, simple. See, everyone was having an affair. Everyone was having an affair. The notion that you could possibly be faithful to your own spouse -- never mind loving that spouse -- was excused only for the adolescent, the idiot and the holier-than-thou camps. I'm sure it was the case that certain powerful men might prefer that if their wives had lovers, those lovers be men they could control, or at the least from whose hands they weren't too afraid of betrayal.
I had a long post responding, but I deleted it. Damn user error!
While affairs were very common and even expected to some extent, not everyone had them. There were a number of devout nobles male and female who took holy orders after the death of their only spouse. Absent evidence to the contrary, it's reasonable to assume those folks didn't have affairs.
Quote from: jeff37923;838717IIRC one of the key points of the French nobility of that time was that while could lose property, they most definitely could not lose face. What about going the Cyrano de Bergerac route and hire a poet to craft a devastating piece which the PCs spread about? When revenge is taken against the poet, the PCs may lie in wait and use the poet as bait before ambushing the attackers. Of course, the poet writes of this as well, furthering the disrepute of the noble, and the PCs must secret him out of Paris.
Yes. Not being seen to lose honor was very important. Lying, exaggerating, and the most ridiculous flattery was common. Being caught in a lie or admitting to a lie was very bad. Accusing someone of lying were a pretty common way to end up with a duel on one's hands.
They have used a version of this already. One of the PCs, Gaston Thibeault, is a poet and playwright and he used that skill to bait the Baron Villemorin. In one sense that is what drove the Baron to the extreme of kidnapping and threatening to murder children to arrange the duel he wanted. They would want to be careful not to be connected to the poet and possibly to have the verses published anonymously so as not to earn the wrath of the Prince. His reach is longer than three feet of steel.
This is additional information (http://honorandintrigue.blogspot.com/2015/06/more-about-prince-and-princess-de-conde.html) about the Prince and Princess that Guy obtains from spies, contacts, and rumors at court.
Given that information, and that you are better off leaving assets within the house for later (instead of burning them for rather weak rumormongering), looking at his associations at noblesse d'epee seems the better bet. And again, the big thing is to question their judgment amid the eyes of their peers. Gossip of amoral things that are likely de rigueur among peers will likely not do much face damage. Doing it in public and getting caught, shaming hosts and guests alike, will however.
The trick is making the jaded care. The fastest way to do that is shake them from their comforts. And the fastest way to do that is bring the scandal indoors where they think they are "safe" among like-minded predators at play. Nothing like a public display flaunting indecency to challenge the honor and respect of the assemblage.