An Evil Overlord Is You!

Not getting magitech right away is much more fixable than not being personally awesome. Inheritance not only means we rule through the power of nepotism (bah!), but also that we have comparatively crappy personal stats.

To actually then be weak, we'd have to commit epic fail.

"A little" and also "a while". Yeah, sure. I can see absolutely nothing going wrong... at all. Yeah, right.

And being handed it means you have to earn it. As opposed to just building it.

For a given definition of crappy. Conquest means we have to constantly watch our backs for odd/chance or else risk being assassinated by actual assassins.

Actually, I imagine it is possible to fix not being awesome much more quickly than infrastructure. We have an entire state under us, we can get more magic tutoring, etc. . .

We start out weak as a leader, and our nation is still small.

For one, any real progress will take us awhile, so it's no big loss to my mind

and you're ASSUMING we earned it, instead of us being his favorite orphan or whatever. Conquest is us literally earning it, with blood and iron, taking it from someone undeserving.

All of the options allow for assassination. Conquest means we'd have to worry about loyalists and those seeking to usurp us, except we're powerful. Inheritance has us start weak, certain groups in our empire will see our weakness and try to kill us, and certain groups outside us will see the same. We're still in danger of assassination.

Then start working on self improvement without others prodding. Plus, initiative. It's easier to do a lot then to show that we're not that weak, and are trying to make up for it.

Not really. It pushes it back even further.

Not really. You don't get it quite do you? Starting out weak but completely not responsible for previous person's death, is better. Why? Assassination danger stems from how we act/react/deal with things at the start. Aka relies on SB to not be stupid/commit epic fail.

I could just as easily say 'then work on improving the nation without others prodding' to the broken nation from conquest. I don't even really know what you mean to say with the rest of this.

I don't think it being pushed back a bit further is worth trading the ability to make our kingdom from the ground up, and being weak.

No, YOU don't quite get it, in conquest the previous leader was both incompetent AND a jackass, we have a reputation from how we acted, and according to the OP, it's RESPECT, and not hatred. Whereas with inheritance, our previous leader was ALREADY assassinated, by people called heroes elsewhere. Clearly our nation and its leadership aren't necessarily well regarded, just because we didn't kill the guy doesn't mean people will like us. We aren't a paladin nation amidst other paladin nations that are all lawful good, some people might dislike us for deposing the old leader, and other people will like us more for it, and in inheritance there are clearly people who don't like us or our nation enough that they would kill/assassinate the previous leader, what's to say they won't try it with us?

[x] Inheritance

Yes and work on improving nation at expense of... everything else a fight is not necessarily a politician amongst other things.

Molding an existing kingdom and less worry about being invaded near the beginning. Said invasion would cause extra setbacks amongst other things.

Conquest means we're liable to get invaded much much earlier. Which also means assassinations and Heroes coming after us. This is not a good thing. And to be fair, killing the worst guy around can, in effect, end up making you accepted if only because you're slightly better than said person. Likely of being invaded, attacked, assassins, Heroes coming after you... and pretty much jack squat to work with is not worth it.

With inheritance we won't have to build the basic essentials.

We'd have the army, the roads, the supplies, the castles, the factories (if we have clockwork), and the population isn't reduced by a ton.

With Conquest, all of that, possibly excluding army, is shot to hell.

With Conquest, the army is also shot to hell. We effectively have nothing but... public support (and not all of it) and... a strong personal self. Which doesn't necessarily include politics/etc. Plus we're at much higher risk of being invaded/attacked/etc... everything bad (of exterior origins) much earlier on.

With Inheritance we just have to avoid epic fails and remember to make consistent effort to improve ourselves.

No where in the OP does it imply our nation is completely in ruins, it states only our command structure and army are damaged. Our entire nation isn't ruined in conquest, the 3 opening things I'm assuming are at least somewhat equal, it's not like conquest leaves us in complete and utter ruins and inheritance leaves us great and powerful as a kingdom, in conquest we have to rebuild our command structure and build up our army but people like us inside and outside of our nation, and we have personal strength, and with inheritance we have the command structure and army, but the people don't know who we are, we are weak and regarded as weak by those inside and outside the nation, and our previous leader was himself assassinated. They both have pros and cons, you keep making it sound like conquest means we're going to have no nation at all pretty, but in inheritance we have everything but ourself, but that's not true.

[x] Inheritence
because magitech

Read. -_-

They aren't equal. Deception has best start but instant lose condition if found out. Inheritance has no self basis to start with, but kingdom in good shape/etc. Conquest = personal ability only.

YOU fucking read. That's what I've been goddamn saying. Our ARMY and our COMMAND structure is in tatters for conquest, not the land, not the people, the army, and our logistics are out of wack because of our bad command structure. Our position as a leader is in question, leaving you open to invasion and assassination.

With inheritance, you are assumed to be weak, and you in fact are weak! Which can also invite invasion and assassination, maybe not as much but the threat is there.

Dissenters and loyalists doesn't mean our whole nation is in ruins, it means we have internal opposition. It's like, you read the words and interpret them to mean damn well anything you please

Conquest doesn't mean we won't have magitech, and inheritance won't give us magitech, it's just that conquest means we'd be set back for it a bit. Picking inheritence won't hand it to us and other options don't preclude it.

Besides, we should follow an important rule on the Evil Overlord list.

Only ride out to battle if we expressly need to.

So personal ability won't matter so much if we do this intelligently.

@Asmodeus We still have a chance on getting invaded! By ourselves we are weak, but we have a friggin army! Just don't challenge every random joe we come across to a duel and we'll be fine! Our army means we can't do shit if we get invaded!

Well, according to Mizuki groups WITHIN our empire will dislike us for being weak and may either be disloyal or actively working against us. We don't need to ride out into battle for the threat to our lives to be very real if we are weak. I mean, just look at the inheritance thing. The last guy didn't die because he rode out to challenge people to duels, he died because he was assassinated. The weaker we are, the more easily assassinated we will be, and the more other nations will think it might be easy to have us assassinated, which could just invite that sort of thing.

Resorting to swearing/cursing now?

Think of implications of repeated losses/etc. And a amoral and incompetent leader would have caused his nation.

Highest risk is assassination from ones that want their own puppet in office. Of course, being new gives the same opportunity for them to influence/etc. Which balances it out. And competence + ability to learn/etc. while in office helps.

I'm not interpreting it how I please. You, are. Sabotage and assassinations are two very liable possibilities from loyalists. Dissenters make getting things fixed/done/etc. much more painful than necessary.

Pick inheritance technically does hand it to us. Conquest will take much longer due to all the stuff that's liable to come up. And if somehow they don't, then maybe 'soon'.

He never said actively against. Only that they won't follow unless we're 'strong'.

Killed by a Hero, which we call an assassin.

You didn't even read it... wow.

We have the same possibility of outsiders sending assassins if we take conquest.

Except with Inheritance, we have a good enough army to make a bodyguard corps.

One that will be able to shred any assassins that try to mess with us.

Said assassins will be weak because they know we are personally weak, but our bodyguards will be strong.

Uh, Necron, that wasn't an assassin for Inheritance. It was a Hero.

Ack, I hate my brain.

It's not your fault.

I swear a couple of times and it means I'm 'resorting to it', then what does being snide about me swearing mean you've resorted to?

See, later you say you don't interpret it to mean what you want, but right here you're doing exactly that, it is nowhere implied our whole nations in tatters because the leader was incompetent, it just as easily implies it means the nation was just going nowhere in particular. We're an up and coming evil overlord, not a paladin.

I can't figure out what you're trying to say here, there are like five different incomplete statements sort of snipped together without context.

Yes, those are possibilities, GOING FORWARD, neither of those things imply the CURRENT state of our nation besides the fact that some people don't like us, others do, and our army and command structure is in tetters.

Inheritance is just as likely to have things 'liable to go wrong' that could hinder our ability to get magitech, it's not like one is a paved road to magitech and the other is just filled with disasters waiting to happen, in either instance if we play things right we could get it fairly soon, or if things go wrong it could be delayed, conquest is just more delayed than normal, but things could still go wrong if we go inheritance.

It was heroes, assassinating the leader. And who the hell sends weak assassins just because the target isn't super powerful? I'm thinking if they're going to send assassins, they're going to send ones that they think will be able to handle whatever might come at them. I mean, you think they haven't thought that maybe a guy with a strong army will have bodyguards?

Context of application.

I didn't state how bad, only it's likely in worse condition that you're thinking. Do note the kingdom isn't very particularly impressive in scale/etc. as noted in the OP (with better phrasing).

Simple: A new person with nothing to back them up would need support then no? Said person being dissappeared/dead early on will be an obvious power grab, so why not 'bribe' said person or manipulate them into being a puppet for them? Of course, there are ones that don't want to do that or wait, those are the ones most liable to assassinate or try... anyways. Being competent and a learner helps avoid pinning a 'please kill me' sign.

It is very much apart of our current state until we get rid of them.

Look at it this way: Conquest = Personal Power. Inheritance = Intact Army/etc.. Deception = Both... but instant lose condition gained.

They won't send an army of assassins, we have an army of elite bodyguards.