The fundamental problem is that she does not understand why Aroden does anything. She keeps horrifying people with plans that rely on His personal intervention or assistance, and it's not actually that she thinks less of Him than they do, or imagines herself more entitled to His aid, it's that if she were a god she'd want to be a god who people could figure out how to use to accomplish her priorities.

If in fact the people at the front lines being devoted and virtuous and obedient will make it easier for Aroden to aid them, then she can probably make Canorate the most virtuous and devoted city that has ever endured.  She is followed by a small flock of people whenever she goes out. They linger in the aura of safety, and listen to her speak, and ask for her to pray for them. She just isn't sure why this is expected to be the best way to get Aroden to help. Is it bribery? Gods like being obeyed, so they come to the aid of obedient people? Is it easier for Aroden to alter their course, if they've wedded their wills to His? Does it directly give Him power?

She would ideally just directly ask these questions but the Crusade is not casual with Communes and she gets one question, maybe two, each month, if there is space going spare on the Commune. So she has to find the single question that alters her course the most, rather than use the Commune to rule out all the possibilities that have occurred to her. 

....or she has to convince Arnisant it's worth the cinnamon. After a great deal of reflection and three months and two questions ('is there attainable proof we can offer the Emperor that would change the course of the war', NO, 'is there aid outside the Empire we should be figuring out how to call on', YES') she's pretty sure she should do that, actually.

"Or I could feed and equip a hundred men."

"I know, sir. But feeding and equipping a hundred men will not save us and this might."

"Might it? How?"

"The thing I want to understand is why Aroden came Himself last time, and if He's going to have to do it this time, and what - makes that risky to him, or costly to him, or makes it compete with His other interests, and if there is some thing less than that which can lead us to victory - why He hasn't just told us of that, which has to touch on why He doesn't tell us things in general. If the only way in which we triumph is by being worthy of aid then I want to know what makes us worthy so that we can be as worthy as possible. If there is some other constraint I want to know it so that in Aroden's service I can address it. I have taken to heart the point you made to me, that Communes may be costly to the gods. If things are costly to the gods, then it is very important which are the least costly. We would serve the Emperor very poorly if we had no idea at all how much soldiers cost and how much horses cost and how much wizards cost and yet had to submit to him demands for so many horses and so many soldiers and so many wizards. In that fashion we presently serve Aroden. I need to straighten it out. 

I could instead with your permission write to the Church and ask the answers, if you think they know."

"If they do and haven't published it they probably haven't published it on the strength of considerations which would also inveigh against telling you. I am not sure if they have. Your attitudes are unorthodox."

"It is only with respect to divine intervention that there is this distaste for - communication, and planning. If we rely on a miracle then we should ensure we are equipped to make use of it, and to be worthy of it. When I understand what it pleases Aroden for me to understand of what moves the gods, I will set myself wholly to it. Maybe He desires that we set ourselves on some otherwise-suicidal course He'll salvage for us. I observe that He does not readily tell us unless we ask and one of my questions is whether that is because He does not wish us to know, or whether it is because the asking is itself important... we have both of us contemplated the possibility that He will arrive here to fight Himself and save us. Don't you want to be ready, if that might happen?"

"I do not think there is a meaningful account of what it is to be ready for that." 

"Well, I'd want a plan to verify that it's Him, and to communicate this situation immediately to the Church in Oppara in the expectation it inspires some changes of policy there -"

"He would have that. Because He's Aroden."

"If we would start obeying someone because he showed up and it was magically obvious to us that he was Aroden, and we would follow his own proposed verification procedures to test this, we are vulnerable to being hijacked by Tar-Baphon."

They are vulnerable to being hijacked by Tar-Baphon. He doesn't say it. You can build a command structure that checks for Dominates; you can't build a command structure that checks for all the things an archmage can do. The second army is probably already in the enemy's service; his army isn't, but only because you don't need to compromise the leadership to ensure Canorate falls soon. If Tar-Baphon shows up impersonating Aroden, he and the Knight-Commander will be Dominated; if Aroden shows up, they'll be - in the direct and immediate service of a god which is probably identical to being Dominated except that it is a righteous and not an evil use of you. 

The Knight Commander does not need to know any of that and he does not say it. "You may have the Commune with it understood that it, and obeying Aroden's instructions from it, are the last experiment I intend to entertain."

So figure it all out in nine questions or set the matter aside and prepare to die here. 

"Thank you, sir."

"May your steps be in Aroden's service."

The thing is that General Arnisant is right, and Aroden could just send a vision if the thing they need to do is 'talk to the Church of Sarenrae'. He's done things like that before. If this were a problem that could be solved with solutions of that character it would have been solved.

And it's not worth asking her way down a list of entities that might be worth talking to - the empires on other continents? The Churches of other gods? Other gods themselves? Empyreal lords? Arodenite saints? Evil enemies of Tar-Baphon?

- not with nine questions. 

....except they're not nine questions, right, because she can write for each question what she asks next in response to a 'yes', or in response to a 'no'. Two possibilities after the first question. Four after the second. Eight after the third. Sixteen after the fourth. Thirty two after the fifth. Sixty four after the sixth. One hundred twenty eight after the seventh. Two hundred fifty six after the eighth.

...that's probably enough. If she lists two hundred fifty six entities that might save them and none of them actually can then she isn't sure what more she could possibly do. So, one question for clarifying whether 'get the attention and aid of some entity' is the right approach at all. If it is, then learn which of the two hundred fifty six entities is worth talking to. If it's 'no', then she can ask her planned series of questions about how to make it less costly for Aroden to aid them.

Now there's just the research project of identifying two hundred and fifty six powers it might be worth contacting for aid.

"Every god we've ever heard of, every empyreal lord we've heard of, every empire that stands, every archmage known to history, if that doesn't fill out the list I'll think about what else we can ask."

"You're going to run twenty Communes?"

"No, I'm going to run one, but in a clever way that occurred to me when I was agonizing over what to put in the one. We have been told we only get the one shot so I expect we might as well be comprehensive with it."

"And say it says we should ask Nex for aid, how do we do that."

"I guess a Sending. - no, no, you're entirely right, the more specific my intentions the more usefully Aroden can evaluate the options and make sure that the course he's recommending is the one I'll actually do with the recommendation. ...for the empyreal lords and powers of the outer planes, the intention should be to call them through a Gate; for the archmages research while you're researching them what if any method of contact is suspected to work."

"Is the Church going to agree to call an empyreal lord through a Gate on your say-so? Aren't they mad at you?"

"I should probably confirm this hypothesis with someone more knowledgeable about the Church first but I believe that their major problem is that most things they can do in Oppara cost them credibility in Oppara. And 'Aroden has commanded that we call Ragathiel through a Gate to our aid'...doesn't. It gives them credibility. I think they will be enormously relieved...if they can be persuaded it's true at all. But I think I could have gotten a Commune, when I went to Oppara, if I'd been willing to pay for it and known what I was doing and if I'd wanted something that would make the Church's life easier instead of harder."

"Wouldn't we be calling Ragathiel away from the war on Hell, in which he recently slew the Lord of the First? Is that ...worth it?"

"I don't know. I trust Aroden to. And - it is a cost, that we are asking Aroden to bear for us, a cost He must pay if he wants to save the Empire. I wish we could save it without Him. But it is not a pure cost. It's about time for a third person to follow Him to godhood, and any power that leads us to triumph in the Shining Crusade would be in a good position to do it."

"Ragathiel being a full god would be good. Baba Yaga..."