I think maybe I like the minor characters so much because they're just random and distinct, Not so good at characterization, everyone just sort of talks like me, but in the minor guys you can have a sort of Kuleshov effect where whatever character action can be ascribed to some aspect of their more distinct personality. cool, n'est-ce pas?
explaining the rules a bit
Poker is a game where hands are created from cards which make up certain combinations, some more powerful than others, and the highest most powerful combination of cards winning. Two aces was very powerful indeed, but its power paled in comparison to three of anything, even of the lowly two card. Players bet on how powerful their hands were in relative position to the other hands, though, and a skillful player could bluff a much more powerful hand than they possessed, causing someone with a hand that was in reality more powerful to back down. It's not about the hand itself; it's about other players' perception of the hand.
The way these combinations of cards were organized depended on what variant of poker was being played. In Texas hold 'em, the first game in the tournament, each player received two secret cards that were theirs alone, and combined those with three of the five communal cards to make a full hand. A player could drop out, or fold, earlier on, if it was clear that it wouldn't be worth it to pursue the particular hand they held; not all five community cards were revealed at once, which made holding on through the flop, turn, and river card reveal rounds an expensive prospect particularly against high-bidding opponents. Not folding is called holding, obviously where "hold 'em" got its name.
Seriously all of these poker explanations are actually going to be super important, later; there's going to be an incredibly elaborate metaphor involving these poker rules and Moone's magical boon, making it very important that you know these. Nah, just joshing with you. I just thought that it may help you follow the action a little bit better, is all. If you already know how to poke, or if you just don't care, feel free to skip ahead a little. You already bought this book, no skin off my nose if you don't read through it chronologically or not. Maybe you got it at a library or are borrowing it from a friend or stole it, and even the thievery option is fine as long as you plan on purchasing later.
auction 1
The first round of poker was complete. Now it was time to pool resources, and bid for the chance to go on to the master table. Money not spent bidding was what was brought as the starting values at the master table; there was no use spending all this time to get so far and not having any money to bid with at the high table. At the same time, underbidding was useless, with only the highest bidder getting to move on.
Unwin planned on bidding a little high to secure his place in the final table, confident that he be able to make up up the difference on the master table using the clew's increased cume of boon. Everyone else was also bidding a little high, confident that they'd just be able to pay only what the second highest bidder was paying, and taking the remainder with them. The margin was going to be a lot narrower than they thought, if everyone had the same thing in mind. And at Team Mothman's table, their were only four factions vying for power, only three of those factions approaching the game with any level of seriousness. Though in a sense that made the bid even more dangerous, as he could well have chosen this moment to extinguish himself like a dying star, go out in a blaze of money, bid all he had and gone to the master table flat broke.
The teammates and spies going from table to table were also acting as couriers and bribes, a corruption which the Tooth Fairy reveled in. Throw your poker game, throw your auction bid, and I or one of my people will pay you off in such-and-such a way, or give you such-and-such a deal in the future. You don't need the list yourself, do you, so long as the purpose for which you want it is fulfilled; you lose this for me and I'll be sure to save the particular operative you're trying to track down, hold onto them for you. This is the true reason the fallen angel had thrown the match. Everyone had a price.
Except for Team Mothman, and Team Punch. They were on the same side, with the same goal, where nothing but full victory over the NOC list would do it for them. And if Moone succeeded in finding Cloud, they would realize this. They could collude, just like many of the others in a sense, but they could use their agreements to realize they were on the same side, both trying to get the list back and keep the peace instead of destroy it. Team Dreaded Eye, not a team at all of course, shared a victory condition in common, but with the opposite goal in mind.
Maybe Unwin had the opportunity to bribe his opponents here? Should that be their condition, it would require rescinding on his promise of doing whatever harm to whatever personal agents his rivals had vendettas against. The breaking of a magical contract, while possible, left a spirit permanently damaged in some (usually ironic) aspect. All Unwin had to pay them in was money, and while it was true that the further things went on the more of it he would gain through the clew, making later payment a smart possibility on the surface, of course he would only have access to the clew and to the gradually mushrooming fortunes that accompanied it as long as he had access to the Tooth Fairy's boons, which would only last as long as the tournament and auction.
And so Unwin decided to bid high, extracting as much as he could from the clew for the fortune crosscheck, making the numbers vaguely consistent with the money represented by the poker chips he had but fudging a lot of it, leaning on Miracle's hacking prowess to prestidigitate away any auditing inconsistencies. The wild-eyed jetset mage could bid everything represented by his own chips, all of it, and Unwin would still be sitting secure. He'd just buy-in more chips at the master table if he transpired to be short on spending power.
The mage playboy bid, out of the options Unwin had given him in his head, the second of the two, nothing. Or lowest, at least. Just for kicks. The fallen angel was out of the game, and so technically was the lowest bidder, technically was the one who bid nothing, or rather technically didn't bid at all (and so how could it have technically bid nothing, that doesn't make any sense.) The half-gargoyle bid fairly strong; he had at least a working idea of the right price range value. The wicked stepmother may have been an expert on poker rules and strategy, but her game theory regarding auction strategy was woefully, just, woeful. Maybe she had in mind to make it to the high table sitting on the highest pile of chips? Thinking in poker strategy all the way to her coffin. So Unwin spent the amount of money that Quasigola had bid, and secured the seat at the master's table.
team punch underbids- mothman and moone convo
Team Punch had underbid.
Team Punch wasn't advancing to the master table, and Team Mothman was their last best hope against Himsters Keepses getting his hands on the Necronomicon. Moone explained his understanding of what had happened.
"Team Punch had held back a little, knowing they'd be needing some cash to bid with at the high table; just like Team Wicked Stepmother's strategy I guess. As such Gef was taken out. Their view was on the endgame; though maybe that foresight was too strong, too long term, maybe they should have thought about being outbid. Such reckless high bidding is irrational, and by all accounts they should have won, but, some people just really want to move onto the high table, and bid shortsightedly, while Team Punch was long term.
"And at the same time I guess not longterm enough; you two could have pooled your resources, right? But I couldn't, convince them, to trust us. Their Cloud, she's not..." Moone trailed off, and changed subjects.
"Their bid was, at least, the second place one, which requires the first place winner, an alchemist called Mary the Prophetess, to pay their bid amount for her advancement. So they are making it to the final table in that sense." He completed with a wry smile, that was really rather more of a frown.
Unwin nodded slowly, before being struck with surprise. "Wait, wait, waitwaitwait... Mary Poppins?"
"Mary the, Prophetess. Also known as Mary the Jewess. She's some alchemist lady; Team Punch would know more, they played against her. I don't know; I'm no expert in historical figures. She's like an O.G. original gangster philosopher's stone discoverer, I think."
Unwin nodded. He told Moone what he was going to do now, which was to win, and Moone told Unwin what he was planning on doing, which was to sulk, and they broke.
Moone stood alone again, the last purple of the sunset sending a single beam into the sky to jut perpendicularly into the green glow of the aurora. What would cause that? Increased magnetic activity due to the earth being newly formed? He turned his head back into the massive hall behind him, full of an unusual amount of activity now that it was time for 80% of the team bases to leave.
Moone exhaled a breath that he hadn't realized he'd been holding in. His quest the whole time had been pointless. Not just the quest to locate Cloud here, at the auction. But the entire throughline before that. Going to the Fountain of Youth, going back into the Defense Summit, attempting to contact Unwin in the first place, it was all for Cloud. Now there was no way of clearing his name, not really. It didn't matter if the shapeshifter version of Cloud trusted him; there was no connection there like he shared with the real deceased Mushroom.
The only way he could prove himself would be to take MacBeth down. And, really, he wasn't sure he was ready for that. For a whole host of reasons. He'd known the man too long, the reveal was too fresh, he'd felt too helpless lately, and of course on top of that it wasn't just MacBeth he had to expose; the man had a vast-seeming transdimensional conspiracy backing him up. Things were so difficult all the time.
But it was, for the time being, out of his hands. For now, the goal was the NOC list.
And Team Mothman was the last hope.
the pokermasters
Unwin stepped up to the master table, more drained internally than excited, but not showing it in the way he carried himself. He was the Mothman, he was the Flatwoods Monster, he was mysterious and powerful and desirable and a semi-champion, baby. His suit's wings beat majestically and rhythmically. Time to win this.
Everyone stood around the table, eyeing each other, sizing each other up before sitting down. Team Golem. Team Mothman. Team Maria Prophetess, the one to take Team Punch's table. Team Dee. And Team Dreaded Eye. Who wasn't a team at all, came with no backup, but had managed to take his table regardless. There was no official designator to anyone but teams, but Team Dreaded Eye, when he wasn't, wouldn't work. Not Team Dreaded Eye so much as, Lone Wolf Dreaded Eye? That fit.
And sounded exactly as dangerous as it was.
Unwin's men had given a rundown of each of his competitors, how they'd fared at the lower tables. Lone Wolf Dreaded Eye was a poker powerhouse, swooping over his table and winning far sooner than any of the other tables had finished. The four other teams at his table hadn't stood a chance against him in the bidding round; the second-highest bid was far under what he had, and as such he carried a lot of chips over to the master table.
Not quite as many chips as Team Dee, though. The alchemist warlord had played a slow, mounting game of poker against the opponents of his table, and seemed to be an expert at all five modes employed in this HORSE game. He whittled away the piles of those who stood against him until he had a veritable coffer of his own.
Team Golem, with the mathematician Kabbalah agents behind him, played a finely calculated hand. Its strategy was predictable, but reliable. The golem would not pull any punches, but wouldn't offer up any surprises, either. Using their skills in mathematics, Team Golem had managed to bid exactly one cent over the bid of the second highest bidder, and was entering the master table with the maximum amount of money that they could given the game they had just played, and as such had a little bit over what Team Mothman was bringing to the table.
With next to no money to her name, the second alchemist and second Jew of the table, Maria Prophetess, would not pose much of a threat at all. She would bid even more conservatively than the Golem would, if she wanted to hold on and merely subside; given the recklessness in bidding she had exhibited to make it to this table in the first place, though, there were also strong odds that once she had a good hand, she would go all in on it in the hopes of gaining back up some fortune to build her up to contender status again.
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