Character Spotlight: Scipio
Scipio is definitely the token good teammate on the Alliance side. I mean, they’re mostly varying shades of grey (except the unambiguously evil Akasame), but they tend to be on the darker side of the spectrum. I liked the idea of giving the Alliance a “conscience”, though his advice isn’t always followed. How much of a difference he made, it’s hard to say, but it’s more than what he would’ve accomplished if he stayed in that tower.
It was a newer development to have him infiltrate the mage conscripts. In an older version, he avoided conscription by casting a spell on the mages in question. In retrospect, even if this worked as well as I originally wrote it, there were bound to be problems later. Also, for his part in the capture of Castle Notos, it would be a lot more effective from the inside. Since we already had the precedent of Rowland infiltrating the militia, it fit with the MO of an Alliance operative. A much better solution if you ask me (probably why it’s the version I went with).
Scipio is pretty much the only person in the Alliance with an eye on the greater scope of things. Rowland’s only really interested in Notos, Simona only cares about what Rowland wants, Carpos is using the Alliance as a stepping stone for his own ambitions, Garm thinks of nothing but getting his people home, and though we haven’t gotten to them yet, Urgill has her own mission, Mab is simply biding her time until she can be free, and Akasame like Carpos is using the Alliance for the sake of his own ambition (and for the opportunity to kill people). He’s the only one to gives credence to the threat of the Darklands (except for Urgill, of course, given that she’s from there–Simona doesn’t count because due to her three hundred-year absence, she wasn’t quite up to date on current events over there), though he is somewhat skeptical. Had Rowland launched further attacks after the Battle of Kalonis, it’s likely that Aristides would’ve pushed for stomping the Alliance. Oh, the Alliance might have survived and carried on guerrilla attacks until the Zephyrians withdrew, but they wouldn’t be in any shape to form a government as quickly as they did and waylaying the Zephyrians may well have resulted in the Dominion being that much better positioned to receive them. Considering all this and factoring in the seal on the Darklands, it wouldn’t be incorrect to characterize Scipio as having saved the world. Things definitely would’ve been much worse without his hand in world events. Not a bad bit of work for a former hermit.
There’s an order of mages that’s founded after his death calling itself the Scions of Scipio that serves Notos for nearly six hundred years. It goes a long way toward keeping his name alive. It actually outlives the republic Rowland founded, though not by too much. That’s a story for another day, however.
And that does it for Old Scipio. Next time we’ll be discussing poor Urgill, who has the uncanny Goblin knack for getting the short end of the stick. Stay tuned.
Tags: Characters, Commentary, Tellus Arc, Trident War Chronicles, TTWC3
Characters, Commentary, Tellus Arc, Trident War Chronicles, TTWC3 | James Carmack | 30 November 2016 |
