The First Elections of Liscor refer to the elections that took over Liscor in Volume 6 which almost entirely replaced the previous council.
Background[edit | edit source]
Krshia first voiced her issues with the council as it stood to Selys. She noticed that Liscor's Dungeon was not making nearly as much money as it should, and that there was an ongoing housing crisis in the city that could be resolved by expanding Liscor's walls. The issue was that the current council was slow to act and unlikely to make any drastic changes. It just so happened that this year was the year that the council would choose new members, so Krshia suggested the idea of an election to decide these council seats.[1]
Chronology[edit | edit source]
Krshia and Selys brought the idea to Zevara who was also in favor of the elections especially after Selys offered her a few weeks with the Heartflame Breastplate as compensation.[1] The idea gained steam as Krshia started speaking to the people of Market Street about the idea of elections. A group of gnolls even pressured Councilmember Stales into agreeing to them. They relied on the racism of never having any gnolls on the council to get him to agree. One of Krshia's earlier speeches was interrupted by Lism who also talked about running for a seat on the council. He used the principle of keeping the city safe as his initial platform. He also tried to get the Liscorian Army involved by directly contacting High Command, but did not have much success.[2]
One of the major issues with the platforms of both Krshia and Lism - besides getting an election in the first place - was funding. They both had radical plans to expand the adventurer's guild and the watch with Krshia taking on the additional platform of expanding the city walls. This all took money which was why Krshia's group approached Klbkch as a representative of Liscor's Free Hive. He offered them a 20% discount on building contracts and 2000 gold pieces annually in exchange for allowing more antinium on the city watch and guaranteed citizenship for a few select antinium individuals. Klbkch also wanted the rights to further expand the hive and to allow antinium from other hives to visit the Free Hive. Lism got his funding from High Command who did eventually agree to talk to him. They promised funding for the watch and guild as well as an increased military presence to keep the city safe. His major platform though was to keep the antinium and humans as separated from the city as possible.[3]
After days of pressure, the people managed to pressure or convince 6 councilmembers to say they were in favor of an election and Market Street was abuzz with talk about the upcoming - now mostly confirmed - elections. Lism was losing popularity as his platform kept changing. What he needed was a proper strategy. Luckily for him, he had a nephew, Olesm, who was the [Strategist] of Liscor. Olesm led him to the idea that Krshia's ideas were popular, but the methods were the sticking point for many people. He agreed to expand the walls, but he got funding from the army and also many of the walled cities. The construction would be done by gnolls and drakes instead of antinium.[4] Erin got involved as a response to this as she involved some of her acquaintances from Pallass and to show them around Liscor comparing them to Liscor itself as well as showing the citizens of Liscor what Pallass had to offer.[5] All of this was to dredge up pride for what Liscor had and to drive a wedge in Pallass' support for Lism.[6]
Finally, after everyone had made their plays, election day came. The council counted the votes and found that Lism had lost and a total of four gnolls made it onto the council. Finding this result unacceptable, the council altered the process slightly to count the votes not in terms of districts, but as a purely popular vote. The election results therefore brought the following people to Liscor's Council:[7]
- Rakea Silversmith - Gnoll
- Elirr Fultpar - Gnoll
- Krshia Silverfang - Gnoll
- Lism Swifttail - Drake
- Alonna Swiftwing - Drake
- Jeiss Sielmark - Drake
- Tismel Lischscale - Drake + deferential towards old council
- Zalaiss Holmfyre - Drake + deferential towards old council
Aftermath[edit | edit source]
Despite the last minute changes, both sides were happy with the results. This was the first time in city history that any gnoll had made it onto the council, and now they had three. The new council was also able to make drastic changes to the city. The original councilmembers were in favor of traditional ideas, but were quickly overruled and often left out of meetings thereafter. Beyond their disagreements on how funding should occur, the new council found common ground in that they generally came from less affluent backgrounds and could therefore understand the plight of common people. Thus, the new council was able to make changes much quicker than the original one.[7]