The Next Step Forward

[Anastasia]

Make an Intimidate check.

[Iron Dragoon]

Intimidate/Cunning Knowledge:

[blockquote]Rolled 1d20+28 : 4 + 28, total 32[/blockquote]

[Anastasia]

Jyssi's gaze doesn't break, but she listens to your answers and when you stop, "Acceptable," she says, "Armored calvary is charging a prepared position you hold. Name five ways you would have prepared to repel the charge."

[Iron Dragoon]

"Pitfall and spike trap, Time Stop combined with Shape Earth and Delayed Blast Fireball, Chained Enlarge Person on a platoon of soldiers, Chain Lightning, Stone to Lava spells, Cloudkill, Bladewall, Black Tentacles followed with a Sphere of Ultimate Destruction..."

Alyssa gives her a look that says she can continue, and do so easily. Though she does note the rudeness is gone, if only replaced by matter-of-factly posing questions.

[Anastasia]

"Means without magic," The woman asks next, "Because yo udon't always have the specialists to manage all of that. Three of them."

[Iron Dragoon]

Alyssa raises an eyebrow.

"And how does a farm village have access to the specialists needed to break an armored cavalry charge? Plow the earth to soften it, stumble and break the horses' legs. Chain and rope traps for the same effect. Various detritus obstacles. Overturned wagons, plows in the way, logs, pulled up stumps. Anything like that would break their formation up. Archers. My own cavalry."

[Anastasia]

"Hmph." You get a look at that, "Name me magic that can cure a curse besides remove curse."

[Iron Dragoon]

"Arcane or Divine? Single effect or able to counter multiple curses? Single target or multiple or area? To what level of power? Break Enchantment is the most commonly used spell aside from Remove Curse. Dispel Magic and Greater Dispel Magic. Unbinding can remove certain curse effects. Then there's Limited Wish and Wish, along with Lesser Miracle and Miracle. If the curse has as built-in release condition, like a Geas, then meeting those conditions releases the curse using the spell's own magic, though that's a bit of closed-loop logic. Consecration dispels Desecration and thus removes the curse effects it imbues the area with, and vice-versa. Certain curse effects can be removed with Heal or Mass Heal. A spell like Anathema functions to mark the target as accursed, would such an effect fall within the same category for the purpose of this poorly constructed question? If so, then Atonement qualifies as well."

Alyssa gives Jyssi an icy look of boredom.

[Anastasia]

This look gets matched as your foe merely glares at you a few moments, Jarem chuckling to himself. As Emily watches, quietly scribbling away in the corner, Jyssi snaps off, "So you're more than one of Jarem's floozies," she says, "How do you heal cursed damage from evil sources? What about injuries from extreme cold that resist normal healing? How would you build a doctrine to deal with those if your opposition could inflict them?"

[Iron Dragoon]

"My my, she's got a temper. Would you happen to be on the unpleasant side of being one of those floozies? Which question would you like answered first?"

She turns to look at Jarem, "Aren't soldiers supposed to have discipline and control? Or is this one some sort of berserker?"

[Anastasia]

Jarem smirks a bit at this, "Yeah, Queen, you get the idea. She's used to people she doesn't know folding on up and getting thrown out. Tried it with me, but what's her routine after liberating an entire empire before I was 19?"

"All of them," Jyssi snaps, glaring and then adding, "Shut it, acolyte."

"See? All the personality of a heavy mace." Jarem doesn't blink, "Just answer her questions."

[Iron Dragoon]

"Acolyte? What's the ranking system here?

In any case, vile damage can only be healed in a consecrated or hallowed area by healing spells cast within that area, or by being present in any holy place and having healing magic cast on the injured. That type of cold damage is fairly easily dealt with. Once the damage is done, move the patient to a normal temperature environment and heal as normal. In a continued cold environment, simply overpower the damage with powerful enough healing magic--"

Alyssa gives Jyssi a speculative, then a slightly pitying but dismissive look,

"--if you can. A few clever ideas could be the application of an endure elements spell first, then use of healing magic or to simply avoid the damage with much the same line of spells or an energy immunity spell targeting cold damage. Though I suppose a spell like Transformation of the Deeps could be tweaked to work similarly... Or by simply wearing warm enough clothes and using insulated furs."

[Anastasia]

The glare you get is cold, before at last she says, "Fine, you're qualified. I taught Jarem the basics, once on a time."

"Yeah, and there's a reason you're here," Jarem fires right back, "So anyway, anything else? You can put Emily Aryn over there through it if you like, but I think we both know you'll be wasting your time doing it."

[Iron Dragoon]

"I'm not sure that'd be appropriate. This entire little... event... makes me quite concerned for the Red Knight's library. Your questions were horribly unstructured, loosely defined to the point of you manipulating them after the fact to place constraints for things you didn't like, the presentation of the questions changed in format, the questions had no preparatory subject to frame why they would be applicable to warfare, they were presented with the intention of intimidation instead of examination, and your attitude is very nearly entirely unacceptable. I'd give you... A seven out of ten rating. A bare seven out of ten. More likely a six, but I'm granting you an allowance for width and breadth of implied knowledge. If you were in my Order, I'm not sure I'd even allow you to do application examinations without supervision, and certainly no classes at all. Especially when I take into account that we were invited here as guests. I can't even imagine how you'd deal with a student presented to you by someone you don't like; I can't help but think you'd sabotage their examination."

[Anastasia]

Jyssi gives you a glare and says, "Well," she says, huffily, "I'm glad I'm not part of such a pathetic guild!" She turns on her heel and marches off, Jarem chuckling to himself all the while. "That was about right. Look, she's good at things and she's impressed the Red Knight, but she's never been a people person. Very much an unpolished stone, that one. Still, I learned a lot from her once I got passed all the brusqueness."

Looking up from her writing, "Isn't that a nice way of saying that she's a bitch?" Emily asks.

That gets Jarem to glance on over at Emily, "Princess!" he gasps, hand over his chest and grinning, "What would your mother say if she heard you saying that?"

"Good work?" Emily says, completely innocently. "Mom doesn't really put up with bitches like that."