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Warhammer Fantasy: Divided Loyalties - an Advisor's Quest

Voted best in category in the Users' Choice awards.
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[X] The death of the Warboss and the shattering of an Almost-Rogue Idol.
[X] You'd have done the same once. Tell her you understand, but treat her to a lecture on the risks and dangers of miscasts.
[X] The job is done. Ale and riches for everybody.
 
Lurker of Urk said:
How do we know Mork was hurt though? We only know he was because we had a direct connection to him and Ranald when it happened, so far mortals have only been aware of gods when they actually manifest.
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Because he was exerting his presence in the material to interfere with the ritual of Only Gork, and Mathilde felt his strength diminish in the moments after the ritual imploded. Mathilde is a wizard with magical senses, and feeling the divine power of a god pressing into reality isn't out of the question for her, in the same way that wizards can sense and see divine magic being cast.

Ganurath said:
Actually, Mork's response to the power theft was described as his presence fleeing the area, so that none of his power was around to be stolen. It's possible that Mork will remain absent until he's sure it's safe again.
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Well, we just saw the Fist of Mork, so he clearly didn't stay away for long. It would be slightly amusing if there's now a Mork aspected mouth in Mathilde's soul that consumes greenskin magic and feeds it to Ranald if its cast too close to her, but that seems rather unlikely as we didn't get a natural 100 or similar when channeling the energy.
 
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Ganurath said:
Actually, Mork's response to the power theft was described as his presence fleeing the area, so that none of his power was around to be stolen. It's possible that Mork will remain absent until he's sure it's safe again.
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The keyword there being, "Possible" and considering he was around to smack his own boyz in the same day I don't think it's strategically relevant.
 
I honestly don´t think we actually hurt Mork, and thinking so, as someone mentioned, is maybe a bit too much hubris. A true death of greater daemon doesn ´t really hurt chaos god either, despite permanently losing tiny fraction of its power. And we A) don´t know how much Mork lost and B)If the loss is permanent. Until such information is given to us, i think saying things like hurt is a bit overexaggerating.
 
PsyFarrow said:
The keyword there being, "Possible" and considering he was around to smack his own boyz in the same day I don't think it's strategically relevant.
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And this comes back to Mathilde not being competent to judge either way about applied theology so she should pass the matter up to people with a greater chance of making use of the information.

pucflek said:
I honestly don´t think we actually hurt Mork, and thinking so, as someone mentioned, is maybe a bit too much hubris. A true death of greater daemon doesn ´t really hurt chaos god either, despite permanently losing tiny fraction of its power. And we A) don´t know how much Mork lost and B)If the loss is permanent. Until such information is given to us, i think saying things like hurt is a bit overexaggerating.
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That's why the vote doesn't say hurt. It's a factual description of what Mathilde sensed, that he seemed to be weakened. Even so weakening someone can fairly described as hurting them. Warp gods probably can't feel pain unless that's partially what they're a warp god of anyway, so the only gods you can hurt are probably ones like Shallya.
 
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How secure is Thebes expedition truly? They've got good supply lines, but weak too decapitation strikes and without a meaningful reserve to pull from. If the remainder of the greenskins unite or coordinate its a nightmare. Is there a case To be made for a 6-month long deep infiltration, Intel gathering and sabotage mission for us? Turn the clans against each other, role up the shaven vs. greenskin conflict, etc?
 
Nix's Warden said:
jumping down the other voters throats
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Things have stayed pretty civil so far really, unless I missed something.

Alratan said:
Mathilde felt his strength diminish in the moments after the ritual imploded.
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How much of that is her direct connection to the event? I'm pretty sure (from a quick reread) that with only her magical senses, all she could see was the waagh energy from Gork/Mork leaving the temple, which is far from conclusive evidence.
 
Look, right now we have a huge number of 'we don't know' factors at play for the impact of doing some damage to Mork. Is the wound entirely trivial? We don't know. Will he hold a grudge? We don't know. Will it change his behavior/use of divine power going forward? We don't know. Will it have a short, medium, or long term impact on how the Greenskins respond to the expedition? We don't know. Is the power loss effectively permanent or is it something he will directly recover from? We don't know.

With all these and more uncertainties in play, I feel like not providing the information we do have is at the least irresponsible. We don't know what impact there will be, and it's unlikely that others will know much more, but not telling them denies them the possibility of making informed preparations and may cause others to reach incorrect conclusions about future actions. It's like the magic dart we knocked that knight with way back in Stirland during the infiltrator fiasco—even though it was something we didn't exactly want to own up to, we had a duty to speak up.
 
Lurker of Urk said:
How much of that is her direct connection to the event? I'm pretty sure (from a quick reread) that with only her magical senses, all she could see was the waagh energy from Gork/Mork leaving the temple, which is far from conclusive evidence.
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How does anyone she'd be talking to know how sensitive Mathilde's magical senses are, and to what, given they vary between Magisters, as seen by her Wind Reader trait?
 
Alratan said:
Well, we just saw the Fist of Mork, so he clearly didn't stay away for long.
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We saw a spell entitled the Fist of Mork. Was it his literal fist? A fist he considered his property? A fist created for the spell in dedication to him? Assuming an opportunity is absent can be as dangerous as assuming one is present.
 
Redshirt Army said:
If we're doing a meta argument...

Ranald rolled a 4. On a 5, which was a higher result, he would have gained a nascent new aspect - which is to say, a roughly 25% boost in power. (Which is being generous, since it assumes the new aspect starts out as powerful as the more established ones.)

I think it's safe to say that with the result that did happen, Ranald got boosted by less. Let's say 20%.

Ranald is a minor god in the human pantheon, who themselves are small compared to Gork and Mork. Those two are the single strongest divinities outside of the Chaos Gods.

Them "only" being 10x larger than Ranald is, again, being generous.

Ergo, at most, Gork/Mork have been weakened by ~2% - and likely significantly less than that, with the author personally providing a huge list of potential factors that would further reduce that number.

That's, frankly, negligible in the larger scale of things.

Edit: Ah, sorry about the OP alerts people. Looks like a bug with the new power given to councillors.
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BoneyM said:
The room was empty of magical energies now, apart from your own and a trickle of Shyish forming around the bodies. As if nothing had happened. But when you close your eyes and turn your attention towards a familiar presence, you almost stagger backwards before you manage to brace yourself. You'd felt Ranald's presence before, both when he acted and when he merely provided company. It hasn't changed, but it hasn't changed in the way that a candlelight doesn't change when you ignite a bonfire - it is still fire, just so much more of it.
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That sounds absolutely nothing like what you've just described. A 20% increase in size for a candle would just be a bigger candle. A candle going to a bonfire sounds like a hell of a lot more than that. So i think what you're saying is pretty much with out merit because you're making some serious assumptions with regards to how easy it is to add anew aspect to a god.

Your meta argument fails to take into account the IC description we have and so pretty much has to be wrong.
 
Ganurath said:
We saw a spell entitled the Fist of Mork. Was it his literal fist? A fist he considered his property? A fist created for the spell in dedication to him? Assuming an opportunity is absent can be as dangerous as assuming one is present.
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According to the last update literally Mathilde believes he manifested a fist from Waaagh energies and beat the crap out the orcs in front of the Citadel out of frustration. Whether that's accurate is secondary to the fact that she believes it.
 
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Reynal said:
snip
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True, I just dislike the half measure of just talking about Mork and not Ranald, IMO the best option is to tell the council about the shaman and the shrine, and take Belegar aside to tell him about everything else (not the chaos dwarves).

[X] To Belegar and Kragg, the weakening of Mork and strengthening of Ranald.
 
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Tally Post
Adhoc vote count started by Lupercal on Sep 22, 2019 at 6:43 PM, finished with 750 posts and 239 votes.
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SkirataClanLord said:
How secure is Thebes expedition truly? They've got good supply lines, but weak too decapitation strikes and without a meaningful reserve to pull from. If the remainder of the greenskins unite or coordinate its a nightmare. Is there a case To be made for a 6-month long deep infiltration, Intel gathering and sabotage mission for us? Turn the clans against each other, role up the shaven vs. greenskin conflict, etc?
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Depending on what is decided in the next couple of updates, the expedition is fairly secure. Decapitation is not a particular concern at the moment as even if Belegar Ironhammer were to fall, the expedition has been too successful to not fully support by other holds. The foothold gained is enormous, and it will be supported. This is a huge chance to avenge countless grudges, and the dwarves, as indicated by Karak Azul, aren't going to let that chance go easily.

There is a concern about the rest of the Greenskins uniting and coordinating, but we just brutally defeated a similarly united Greenskin Horde at the Battle of Karag Nar. The main concern for the expedition at this point is securing their supply line to Barak Varr, which should be done in 2-3 weeks. It won't be perfectly secure, mind you, but secure enough.

Should the expedition choose to push just a little bit more, we also might be able to take the Citadel, which will secure the Dwarven presence in Karak-Eight-Peaks. It will, should it be properly manned, allow nearly uncontested fire into the Greenskin town at the base of the caldera. If we don't take the citadel, the entire holdings of the expedition have been linked with the conquest of Karag Nar, meaning that it is reasonably secure from overland attack, and has only a couple of points for strong underground assaults.

The expedition is looking pretty good at the moment, and if the throng from Karak Azul makes it here in time, we might even be able to push for more success.

That being said, there is always a case that can be made to mess up Greenskins and Skaven.
 
And now for something completely different. Did anyone else notice this from the last update:

BoneyM said:
The battle is well and truly over, and a chuckle from Skaroki tells you he's realized the same, and he pats you on the back before heading downwards to let those standing ready against the possibility of invasion know to stand down.
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That's quite remarkable treatment of Mathilde by a dwarf thane, even the thane of a new hold. She may have made a new dwarven friend.
 
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The reason to mention the theology is because there might be implications for how the greenskins act going forward.
  • The black orks have an Only Gork cult
  • There may be an Only Mork cult forming among the night goblins for mystic balance
  • The caldera greenskins were most likely roused by Classic Mork and their ire was against the heresies as much as us
These are points with planning value.

  • Mork's reaction against Only Gork is the source of the visions that gave us the knowledge
  • And why the energies unleashed were so much greater than a "mere" 20' idol ritual would account for
  • And why we think Mork actually felt their loss
  • And why we needed a nap after getting rid of them
Are for interest and amusement.
 
It's unreasonable to assume that even if we're believed, even if we don't lose respect, that they'll act on something as nebulous as what we know of Mork being weakened.
 
[X] The death of the Warboss, the shattering of an Almost-Rogue Idol
[X] You'd have done the same once. Tell her you understand, but treat her to a lecture on the risks and dangers of miscasts.
[X] The residents are weakened, taking the Citadel is now a possibility.
 
SuperSonicSound said:
That sounds absolutely nothing like what you've just described. A 20% increase in size for a candle would just be a bigger candle. A candle going to a bonfire sounds like a hell of a lot more than that. So i think what you're saying is pretty much with out merit because you're making some serious assumptions with regards to how easy it is to add anew aspect to a god.

Your meta argument fails to take into account the IC description we have and so pretty much has to be wrong.
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That's misleading. It's much easier to interpret it as Mathilde having a closer connection to Ranald than as Ranald gaining a degree more worth of Power.
 
Thor's Twin said:
Depending on what is decided in the next couple of updates, the expedition is fairly secure. Decapitation is not a particular concern at the moment as even if Belegar Ironhammer were to fall, the expedition has been too successful to not fully support by other holds. The foothold gained is enormous, and it will be supported. This is a huge chance to avenge countless grudges, and the dwarves, as indicated by Karak Azul, aren't going to let that chance go easily.

There is a concern about the rest of the Greenskins uniting and coordinating, but we just brutally defeated a similarly united Greenskin Horde at the Battle of Karag Nar. The main concern for the expedition at this point is securing their supply line to Barak Varr, which should be done in 2-3 weeks. It won't be perfectly secure, mind you, but secure enough.
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I don't think we'll be able to judge how secure the Expedition is until we get good intelligence on what the threats are lurking in the other peaks and underground in the City of Pillars. For example if the warpgut trolls are an in progress Clan Moulder breeding/mutation program that a Master Moulder has a trigger to unleash that's very different to if they're 'naturally' occurring and uncontrollable.

EVA-Saiyajin said:
It's unreasonable to assume that even if we're believed, even if we don't lose respect, that they'll act on something as nebulous as what we know of Mork being weakened.
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The assertion that it will lose Mathilde respect is odd to me. They might, at worst think she's mistaken about what she sensed, but would they blame her for that? The dwarves don't fully understand ritual magic. either She risked her life to stop a massively powerful greenskin ritual with unknown but almost certainly bad effects for the expedition. Doing so had a possibly good, possibly bad side effect, but one almost certainly better than shrinking back in fear and indecision and letting the ritual complete. What is there for them not to like about what she did? Are you suggesting that they would have prefered that she'd let the ritual finish? Or let the ritual backlash manifest inside Karak Nar as it was being invaded?

Kornet said:
That's misleading. It's much easier to interpret it as Mathilde having a closer connection to Ranald than as Ranald gaining a degree more worth of Power.
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I'd say that would require BoneyM writing the scene as to be absolutely misleading. It doesn't say that she felt much closer to Ranald than she ever had before. It doesn't say the part of her soul that was connected to him felt larger or stronger. It says that he felt stronger.

noliar said:
The reason to mention the theology is because there might be implications for how the greenskins act going forward.
  • The black orks have an Only Gork cult
  • There may be an Only Mork cult forming among the night goblins for mystic balance
  • The caldera greenskins were most likely roused by Classic Mork and their ire was against the heresies as much as us
These are points with planning value.
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It's a good point. We don't know if the Only Gork cult is present elsewhere and they'll try this again somewhere or if this was Only Gork's only chance to manifest.
 
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Kornet said:
That's misleading. It's much easier to interpret it as Mathilde having a closer connection to Ranald than as Ranald gaining a degree more worth of Power.
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I disagree as it's immediately after he just stole power from Mork and more importantly we've felt his presence close to us before when the Elector count died. That was written to show that Ranald had gained power. I would argue reading that scene any other way requires torturous motivated reasoning to see it that way. The imagery is a fire growing in strength not that Mathilde is closer to it.
 
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