[Nath]

It worth noting that the Down Hunt should have implied a number of Rite of Succession to be held as the dragons community learnt about the kills. However, the Rite of Survival of the Fittest seems to be the first "full" rite held with an indirect contest, instead of the direct physical contest usually held. On the other hand, dragons were a lot more discreet in the early years of the Awakening. Also, it would make sense most casualties of the Down were adult young or adult dragons, not great. So maybe most of the hoards weren't hotly disputed and most rites remained low-profiles, with only a few local dragons competing (especially, since, the more successful the Down Hunt, the less dragons remains to contest...).

However, Survival of the Fittest read "Long before he appeared to the people of the modern world, Dunkelzahn became Loremaster of the dragons, with the greatest store of draconic knowledge and the accumulated lore of untold millennia."
I guess "long before" doesn't refer to the 44 days between the Awakening Day and Dunkelzahn's arrival in Denver. To me, the expression "Loremaster of the dragons" and superlative "greatest store" is already suggesting an unified title at that point. But it's not like SR books are always super accurate in their wording, so, your guess is as god as mine... Simply unifying the title from two councils, Barsaive and, say, Americas (for the aforementioned reason), could have been enough to establish the largest store ever seen in draconic history.

[Kot]

The Earthdawn history ends in the early years after the Long Night (less than 150 years, IIRC), so there was a lot of time for the dragons to plot and conquer. Especially since the Therans managed to stabilize the mana level, and buy more time for the mid-cycle. Vasdenjas was indeed the Loremaster of Barsaive, but it was just one small province, even if it held the Elven Court. And he was younger and less ambitious than both Icewing (Ghostwalker; let's face it, the only Great Dragon with larger ambitions was Denairastas), and Mountainshadow (Dunkelzahn). And he only ate one city. Not much to brag about.
I just like that dragon a lot, as he was closer to metahumans (Namegivers) than even Mountainshadow/Dunkelzahn, and acted in a manner that made him sound human. He wasn't the plotting-behind-the-scenes type. More of a braggart-scholar, who interrupted his lecture on the creatures of Barsaive, because speaking about one of them made him hungry.

[Micawber]

Has the Tempo-Metaplot already been mentioned? Sure - it's slowly disappearing from the streets as supplies fade but the damage is already done. I dunno bout you but I'm psyched about the long term ramifications and the dark machinations behind all this =)

[Mirikon]

The long term ramifications of the tempo plot are the Az-Am war, and Sirrurg's attack on Cali sparking the Dragon Civil War.

Oh, and whatever spirit pacts remain after the fields were destroyed.

[Wakshaani]

Tempo is ... kinda derailed. The Troubles resulted in the writers that were behind it stepping away, the new people don't know where it was heading, and the ones still around who *do* know can't say much ... there are some legal issues as you might imagine. AFAIK, this means that the plotline is pretty much pruned unless someone wants to pick it up and reboot it. There might be nods to it now and again, but it's been clipped from a leading role.

It opened the doors for other stuff, however. (As Mirikon posts while I'm typing! Ninja'd!)

[Nath]

There was a first follow-up to the tempo plot in Vice, page 87. With the help of Graciela Riveiros, the David cartel has the know-how to produce tempo. They only wait for the supply to dry up and price to raise. There also a sinister implication that is not mentionned (obviously, since none on Jackpoint is aware of the fact). Only one spirit jumped ship from the Primeira Vaga to the David cartel. Thus, the David cartel may need to find other spirits to possess the trees they'll grow. Blood spirits? That would mean tempo user could become host to two opposing factions of spirits.

The other follow-up simply his, Ghost Cartels labelled the Primeira Vaga as bad guys. In War!, they appear to be, along with Greenwar, something like Sirrurg private army. However, it has never been stated if Sirrurg knew about Primeira Vaga trade with the Olaya cartel and the tempo effect. Or if Hualpa knew about it (to put that one another way, the question is, is the relationship between Primeira Vaga and Amazonia like, say, Hezbollah and Iran, where the group leaders would be invited to the presidential palace on a regular basis, or rather Al-Qaeda and Pakistan, with some mid-level case officer from the intelligence service regional office as their only contact).

[Crimsondude]

There's another followup.

[Micawber]

There's another followup.

Thats good to hear. I already feared the whole Tempo plot would be lumped together with all the other factors that lead to the Azzy-Amazon war. If it wasn't for getting worldwide support for Amazons war through possession ( ) it wouldn't do much (at least for me) progressing the spirit plot behind the whole tempo-stuff.

[Lacynth40]

Hate to perform thread necromancy, but since this is stickied to the top, I figured it was fair game. We got any updates to the metaplots from Storm Front, or are we all waiting to see what 5th Ed brings us? Cause I seriously wanna know what people think of the stuff in there. Especially the dragon stuff. Harley's gonna be out for a couple of years of brooding, as he does, so not interested in talking about him... I figure the new Matrix protocols will be covered in 5th Ed, so not worried about those. Pretty much everything after the section on Dodger is gearing up for 5th Ed, so it can wait. My question is, did Dodger do the designing of the new Matrix protocols? Since, you know, it's got an old school feel to it, and he's an old school decker/otaku/technomancer/whatever-he-is-now. So many questions... And so much to do with the gaming group to ramp up for some of this stuff.

[Mirikon]

All I can say about the dragons is that I REALLY want to see Hestaby on a runner team. Maybe as part of Jackpoint? That'd be AWESOME!

[Lacynth40]

Drek yeah, it would. I wanna see the Orange Queen posting again.

[Crimsondude]

She was only good when bantering with H, and he's persona non grata on JackPoint. So :/

[CanRay]

She was only good when bantering with H, and he's persona non grata on JackPoint. So :/

Frosty could pick up the habit. 

[Lacynth40]

And I'm sure there were others that wouldn't back down so easily to her, or else it's gonna be real hard for her to operate in the shadows. And she's gonna have to at the start, since she was left with nothing except the fact that she's a fraggin' great dragon. Which, mind you, is considerable in itself. But, she's got no horde, and the other dragons aren't talking to her much. She's gonna be one hell of a fixer, once she gets the ground back under her talons.

[Mirikon]

Well, we don't know that she has no hoard left. She may have a few secrets the rest of the dragons didn't know about. Certainly, Mt. Shasta is taken from her, and the vast majority of her wealth and power with it, but she didn't live this long by putting all her things in one place.

But yes, expect her to be a player in the shadows moving forward, since she's got to rebuild much. And I really would love to see her on the new Jackpoint. It would be interesting to see her opinions on things such as Ares and their bug problems, and so on. A conversation with Orange Queen, Cerberus, Frosty, Man-of-Many-Names, and Puck would be... interesting, to say the least.