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Warhammer Fantasy: Divided Loyalties - an Advisor's Quest

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BoneyM said:
And as I said earlier, there's a real danger in trying to get these veterans to spy on Gustav. As you reported to Van Hal, he's universally beloved by his men, and these are peasants suspicious of sneaky business in general and wizards in particular, so he'd be very likely to un-suborn the suborned men you send to him without even trying.
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BoneyM said:
Explaining why you implicitly impugned his honour in such a way that you explicitly impugn his honour is an interesting strategy.
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Okay, here's a new possible take: Attempt to compliment his honor by being open about what we're doing.
Go up to Gustav and tell him that 1) we already did a job for the Elector Count of looking into the new candidates for the post of Marshal, as is standard practice, and 2) we found Gustav to be a brave and honorable man.
Thus, we would like him to participate in the equivalent of sparring-practice-for-espionage, where people don't risk getting killed in training if they ask the wrong question.
Tell whatever veteran we hire the same thing - Gustav is friendly, you don't have spycraft experience, so just get used to observing someone and reporting what you see.
That way there should hopefully be less "suborning" since we stress that we're on the same side and there's no conflict of loyalties.

Does this seem plausible to the thread?
(It runs the risk of Gustav not actually being honorable and then we've cemented a false assumption, but I suppose them's the breaks.)

Also, should Gustav perhaps be added to Dramatis Personae?
 
Exmorri said:
Okay, here's a new possible take: Attempt to compliment his honor by being open about what we're doing.
Go up to Gustav and tell him that 1) we already did a job for the Elector Count of looking into the new candidates for the post of Marshal, as is standard practice, and 2) we found Gustav to be a brave and honorable man.
Thus, we would like him to participate in the equivalent of sparring-practice-for-espionage, where people don't risk getting killed in training if they ask the wrong question.
Tell whatever veteran we hire the same thing - Gustav is friendly, you don't have spycraft experience, so just get used to observing someone and reporting what you see.
That way there should hopefully be less "suborning" since we stress that we're on the same side and there's no conflict of loyalties.

Does this seem plausible to the thread?
(It runs the risk of Gustav not actually being honorable and then we've cemented a false assumption, but I suppose them's the breaks.)

Also, should Gustav perhaps be added to Dramatis Personae?
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Hard to guess how Gustav would take it, but it does seem in line with the way Weber does things.
 
As a full half of the people who are voting for my plan have requested that I remove the Gustav retinue veteran bit, I am doing so. This will leave us with less to tell our mysterious masters, but I doubt that will be a problem- we did, after all, get a fairly good background investigation done on him already, and even the single remaining military infiltrator will be able to tell us things like "several months in, the troops seem enthused by his leadership and there are widespread rumors amongst the army that he is pushing for a raid into Sylvania as soon as Van Hal lets him off the leash". Admittedly we could probably get that with a "[ ] Introduce yourself to Gustav and spend a few minutes chatting about his plans as Marshal (no action)" kind of result, but eh.

... @BoneyM, can we actually introduce ourselves, spend a few minutes chatting, and see if he says anything interesting enough to throw in the report?

veekie said:
Nope! That was the trigger for the "get some subordinates" action. Because the whole network currently relies on Mathilda riding around the country to maintain, so she can't expand it any further. Her free time is fully taken up on a riding circuit.
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This... does not align with my understanding of how this works.
BoneyM said:
Yeah, the way you're hooked into them is for them to send you news of anything unusual, but so far none of them have picked up on anything - it's the only way to manage things since it's still a one-woman operation. If you had an underling with the ability to manage it, you could set it up so they start sending more mundane news.
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It doesn't seem to be how the GM has communicated how it works, either. It appears to me that our contacts send us news when they believe something important enough to catch our attention, and there is no Mathilde riding around the countryside involved.
 
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BoneyM said:
Gustav will be added to Dramatis Personae when he makes an appearance as more than a topic of discussion.
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I consider my write-in for the veteran-Marshal report very low risk: @BoneyM do you agree, or do you see essentially no difference to the other plans?
--[ ] One of our not-quite-yet but soon-to-retire recruits is to provide a report on the new Martial advisor. Theres a lot to be learned from how he addresses the men, who he surrounds himself with, what if anything he changes in army drills, organisation, etc. Add (some of?) this to our report. (free?)

All he has to do is listen to the speeches, report who he picks as subordinates, how he drills, tell us what the barrack gossip about the new boss guy is, and then he retires with our 20g/year supplement. He's not in the inner circle.
 
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BoneyM said:
Stirland has a postal service.
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....and now I'm reminded on an RP I played where I was controling Stirland, another player was playing Vlad and we IC kept sending each other letters insulting one another which had me joking about the postal service being really good in the empire. It all came to a head when we eventually challenged each other to a 1 vs 1 duel, which I leverage to take place at midday, in front of the Emporer and other elector counts, no magical items allowed and finally being allowed to choose the weapons.

I chose Great Cannons.
 
Alliterate said:
--[ ] One of our not-quite-yet but soon-to-retire recruits is to provide a report on the new Martial advisor. Theres a lot to be learned from how he addresses the men, who he surrounds himself with, what if anything he changes in army drills, organisation, etc. Add (some of?) this to our report. (free?)
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These men aren't 'recruited' until they retire - an army the size of Stirland would have a few hundred men retiring each year, and Van Hal can put word out that a few loyal men looking to make a little extra money to supplement their retirement careers should look to you. They won't be reporting to you while still in active service.

Edit: Unless you mean you just ask him what his impression was of the new boss was after he's retired, but there's not really much contact between one of an army's twenty thousand spearmen and the leader of the entire Province's military. I suppose you can get a 'view on the ground' from him and include that in the report.
 
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BoneyM said:
These men aren't 'recruited' until they retire - an army the size of Stirland would have a few hundred men retiring each year, and Van Hal can put word out that a few loyal men looking to make a little extra money to supplement their retirement careers should look to you. They won't be reporting to you while still in active service.

Edit: Unless you mean you just ask him what his impression was of the new boss was after he's retired, but there's not really much contact between one of an army's twenty thousand spearmen and the leader of the entire Province's military. I suppose you can get a 'view on the ground' from him and include that in the report.
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Anything is better than nothing. And 'the new boss' will be a hot gossip topic in the barracks and bars.
 
Exmorri said:
Okay, here's a new possible take: Attempt to compliment his honor by being open about what we're doing.
Go up to Gustav and tell him that 1) we already did a job for the Elector Count of looking into the new candidates for the post of Marshal, as is standard practice, and 2) we found Gustav to be a brave and honorable man.
Thus, we would like him to participate in the equivalent of sparring-practice-for-espionage, where people don't risk getting killed in training if they ask the wrong question.
Tell whatever veteran we hire the same thing - Gustav is friendly, you don't have spycraft experience, so just get used to observing someone and reporting what you see.
That way there should hopefully be less "suborning" since we stress that we're on the same side and there's no conflict of loyalties.

Does this seem plausible to the thread?
(It runs the risk of Gustav not actually being honorable and then we've cemented a false assumption, but I suppose them's the breaks.)

Also, should Gustav perhaps be added to Dramatis Personae?
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Hmm, well, that sounds PLAUSIBLE...but keep in mind that soldiers trust him, don't trust us(most people don't trust wizards or spies, and we're both), and as such are going to be papering over most things anyway.

If you want to spy on Gustav I'd personally suggest we just bribe a maidservant to report on everything he does. Not in his chain of command, someone who gets to see him in private and most likely dismissed.

Thats how you generally get intel on councillors anyways. Short of rummaging through their desks.
 
veekie said:
-[X] Get five.
---[X] Assign one to Bidenhof, Tarshof and Julbach each. Preferably someone who comes from those villages. Their job is to keep you up to date with the village rumors and point out what's just local custom, and whats unusual for those villages, as well as to acquire more gossips/informants from the village outlying farms in their own time.
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What, exactly, do you expect to accomplish with this.
 
[x] Plan Turn This Castle Upside Down And Shake It

Decided against moving forward with backer plot line. Let sleeping dog as is since we need to get the house in order first. Really need to find a way to off the influence of the faithful dummies.:facepalm:
 
TotallyNotEvil said:
What, exactly, do you expect to accomplish with this.
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These unimaginative but loyal blokes take the news and gossip from their fellow unimaginative but questionably loyal blokes, and relay them to us.

Instead of the highly imaginative wizard keeping up a stream of letters and personal visits to unimaginative village/city watch blokes.

Which frees up her time to do things like expand thieves guilds, or set up more spy cells.

Networks consisting of more sophisticated Burghers and Nobles should be assigned someone other than a retired soldier, preferably a sufficiently vetted noble or merchant. This will take time. And probably a fair chunk of money.

Networks consisting of more imaginative types like servants and thieves should be assigned someone other than a retired soldier, preferably a sufficiently vetted Ranald priest, or other lowlife which can be trusted to STAY bought after being bought. This will take time and a fair chunk of luck.
 
Does the witch hunters have people they report to? And are they all of Sigma faith? Because getting Van to sponsor a hunter for the zombie border would be a good alternative to our eventual expansion, more direct too.

Also i feel our mysterious backer might ward off some political pressure from Sigma cult if said backer feels his compliant wizard investment is in danger. :V
 
Exmorri said:
Okay, here's a new possible take: Attempt to compliment his honor by being open about what we're doing.
Go up to Gustav and tell him that 1) we already did a job for the Elector Count of looking into the new candidates for the post of Marshal, as is standard practice, and 2) we found Gustav to be a brave and honorable man.
Thus, we would like him to participate in the equivalent of sparring-practice-for-espionage, where people don't risk getting killed in training if they ask the wrong question.
Tell whatever veteran we hire the same thing - Gustav is friendly, you don't have spycraft experience, so just get used to observing someone and reporting what you see.
That way there should hopefully be less "suborning" since we stress that we're on the same side and there's no conflict of loyalties.

Does this seem plausible to the thread?
(It runs the risk of Gustav not actually being honorable and then we've cemented a false assumption, but I suppose them's the breaks.)

Also, should Gustav perhaps be added to Dramatis Personae?
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Apart from the risk you mentioned, there's the fact that we don't know much about him and him us. Personally, considering that the person we are sending isn't a spy in training but rather a loyal bloke who is superstitious and uneducated, it's trying to be too smart with a dumb tool. Then there's the whole problem of observation spoiling causing changes in behaviour (be it conscious or subconscious).
 
VoidZero said:
Does the witch hunters have people they report to? And are they all of Sigma faith? Because getting Van to sponsor a hunter for the zombie border would be a good alternative to our eventual expansion, more direct too.

Also i feel our mysterious backer might ward off some political pressure from Sigma cult if said backer feels his compliant wizard investment is in danger. :V
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The more official name of the Witch-hunters is the Templars of Sigmar.

EDIT: Actually, I am wrong, there are other witch-hunters (Myrmidia, Taal) but Sigmar's are the most numerous.
 
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BoneyM said:
"If we lent out books, the archives would be empty within a generation."
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One time I lent a book to a friend. I went to get it... finding out that he lent it to another friend, who lent it to another friend, who lent it to my cousin, who lent it to a more distant relative, who lent it to a friend who left the country...
I never managed to get it back.
BoneyM said:
Wizard Chic, you discover, is in fashion among every spoiled rich youth in Altdorf that wants to outrage their peasants. All over the city the damn brats are using genuine components to craft absolutely useless monuments to their own foolishness, and have sucked up everything that looks like it might be magically useful, and then commissioned more on top of that, so that every glassblower in the city is too busy catering to the whims of Altdorf's feckless youth to craft you the enchanting components you need.
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hahahahaahahahah... I love this quest's humor so much
 
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@Alliterate your plan is getting broken up in the voting tally. You should update it so it only has one top-level [] and everything below that is indented with -[] or more dashes.

Also, man, 25-30 items marked on the two leading plans.
 
BoneyM said:
You hesitate for a moment, and then press on with what you had decided you were going to say. "I would have appreciated Brother Kasmir's assistance in this matter, but when asked he declined to give it." The man shoots you a dark look at that, but the one Van Hal gives him is much darker still.
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WTF... why would you guys do this thing? I only went away for a few days and you manage to do this?

----

So in regards to the magic swords. If I understand it correctly:
- Swords were enchanted by some primitives who misunderstood both magic and religion. Enchantment was meant to devour souls of those killed to empower the sword. In actually constantly absorbs the winds of magic. inevitably being tainted with dhar and needing to be disposed in the nearest volcano.
- These have been sitting for so long in a shysh sink, soaking up only that wind. Thus the two we checked were free of dhar. But overloaded with the wind of death
- Potentially deadly 1 use items against hard to kill monsters. at the risk of potentially killing the wielder too when discharged. Don't actually do this.
- Potentially possible to make something useful and safe out of them. Will require additional research. Either on your own or by letting the college get their hands on them and hoping they return a few to us once they figure out how to use them correctly.
 
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