Faction Wars

Named by Prince Maestro from his own stage: his family's Skull Clan has won six of the last ten Faction Wars, the Blood Sultanate is almost always the first of the nine eliminated, and he will be there this season as War Leader (ch. 43).

The ninth floor's war, filled in from three directions: Mordecai on the system-wide protection that lets the factions fight without dying (ch. 15); Carl's realisation that Prince Stalwart is on the ninth floor setting it up (ch. 19); and Odette on the Blood Sultanate, which only has a place because it bought a permanent spot early on (epilogue). Maggie's Legendary Skill potion would cost many million gold to buy; at the faction wars each clan fills a war chest with such potions and rings (ch. 2).

Mordecai, over the Ring of Divine Suffering: every Faction Wars winner's champion has one of these rings, the factions get idiots to hunt them on the sixth floor, and crawlers do not get involved — they ride the ninth floor 'like it’s a tornado passing by overhead' (ch. 30). The Cookbook's note on deities adds that the big gods are sponsored by rich players of a separate game on the twelfth floor (ch. 32).

Mordecai's full account over Katia's map: nine petals around Larracos, fifteen thousand troops each, gear bought from crawlers once the sixth floor opens, mercenaries hired deep in the city, no fighting until the crawlers arrive, tourists who respawn and NPCs who do not, the King's Point for the last winner (ch. 24). Seven factions sue over the Gate and lose (ch. 28); Priestly's account of the city's end (ch. 33); half the armies hidden in Larracos when Carl floods it (ch. 34).

The Dreadnoughts abandon their stake and nobody can fill the seat (ch. 1); the Gate is promised back on the ninth floor, to sow chaos in the faction wars (ch. 3); hunters here won places in faction armies at camp (ch. 22); the Burrowers, usually out second after the nagas (ch. 38); a franchised prince and a naga's brother (ch. 42). By the end the Burrowers have dropped out at the last minute and the Princess Posse has fielded troops in spot three, Carl and Donut are co-warlords, fifteen action items await votes, one of them contractual — Remove Safety Protections For Faction Sponsors — and the vote is two to seven (ch. 77). Leverage, Carl says, to get as many people to the tenth floor as possible.

Nine teams at a round table of ten, an adjutant defined, Larracos still drowned (ch. 21); a tenth team of NPCs proposed (ch. 22); emergency action items (ch. 35); the Baroness chosen (ch. 36); six teams try to quit and are held by quarantine (ch. 48); the votes handed to the audience: protections off at 98%, the Home Team under Juice Box and Sir Ferdinand, a bigger field (ch. 72); 150,000 mercenaries and a freighter of former crawlers on their way (epilogue).

The rules, read drunk by Cascadia: capture the castle; the city closed until four teams remain, then the Peeling; defenders win by holding a week, attackers by six hours in the throne room; a team dies with its warlords or its own throne room; 293 stairwells that open only at the end (ch. 1). Four phases, and a Ramp-Up of 180 hours with no offensive magic and no teleports (ch. 14). Everything else is exploit and loophole: craft magic that ignores protections (ch. 24), acid from a bar scroll (ch. 25), a fifth-floor bait shop as a back door (ch. 29), a mount through a teleport trap (ch. 63), a message log as illegal corroboration (ch. 64), a non-team entity (ch. 62), a hearing stalled on purpose (ch. 67). Agatha's action items restore the original rule — every soldier of a defeated team drops dead — and make it us or them (ch. 68). It is won by forfeit, when two warlords go to the twelfth floor with a city (ch. 85). 'This is war, I thought. This is war' (ch. 70, ch. 73, ch. 85).