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Warhammer Fantasy: Divided Loyalties - an Advisor's Quest

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Jyn Ryvia said:
There is no such thing as an non-subjective rule in writing.
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Okay sure but there are degrees. Like..."show, don't tell," while not quite truly universal, is pretty uncontroversial. Whereas this...

Like, I 100% agree that excessive description in writing can be an issue. But in my view that's a matter of the negative impact on the flow of the work (taking half a page to describe a new character rather distracts from whatever was going on when they got introduced). Ambiguity regarding appearances isn't an intrinsic good, it's a functional shortcut. In a format like this where the author can easily answer questions outside the main body of the work, these concerns no longer apply.
 
Klaus said:
I don't really like the idea of slowing down the story more with multiple sidequest updates and shopping votes. Delaying our rescue of a dwarf hold (Dum) to investigate and possibly return a hold (Vlag) is fine, but the rest of these just aren't as important. I want to get on with Karak Dum.
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These are not side quests. No more than the social options are. Both are places where we can gather intelligence that may prove very relevant for the success of the expedition. They are part of the main branch of the quest.
 
Another reason to raid/loot/steal from Quech old home is that we can find information on the Skaven civil war. Which seems to have died down. I would like to know the fallout from it.
 
I don't believe them to be sidequests as well. Karak Vlag was just a culmination of fortuitous circumstances. I mean, what are the chances that the one living human mage with advanced enough magesight to perceive whats going on is there, paranoid enough and knows about dwarfen waystone shenanigans?
I'd rather say these are scouting options. I know we go there for more personal reasons (shiny books), but at the same time we're about to enter enemy territory and I'd rather know beforehand if the major factions there are up to something that could impact us. Its in my and I think also the grey orders and mathildes preference to know as much as we can get away with and then some more before it gets to bite us in the back.

[x] Citharus, Barbitus, and Timpania
[x] Visit Uzkulak, the Chaos Dwarf equivalent to Barak Varr
[x] Visit the combes that Qrech told you about
[x] Head Engineer Gotrek Gurnisson
[x] Head Ranger Snorri Farstrider
 
I think these are definitely sidequests; I do not expect to find much of direct impact on the expedition at either Uzkulak or the combes. We might be able to buy food at Uzkulak, or steal a local tactical map at the combes, but beyond that I think it will all be side stuff (like cool purchase opportunities or info about skaven geopolitics). My expectation is that any information on what the Tzeentch gang is up to will come from the Knights of Taal's Fury scouting ahead and possibly picking up their trail.

At the same time, I don't expect these to be deathtraps or disasters in the making or anything like that. Just time spent pursuing secondary objectives. We can catch up with the knights and poke at sus green next week, I guess.
 
[x] Visit Uzkulak, the Chaos Dwarf equivalent to Barak Varr
[x] Visit the combes that Qrech told you about
[x] Thane Borek Forkbeard
[x] Head Engineer Gotrek Gurnisson
[x] Head Ranger Snorri Farstrider

I'd be interested in socialing Ruprecht in any other circumstance, buuuuut.
 
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Adhoc vote count started by Burned_Cookie on Dec 23, 2020 at 11:12 AM, finished with 1583 posts and 283 votes.
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I love how close it remains.

Even if I really want to get a basline on Ruprecht.
 
Burned_Cookie said:
Adhoc vote count started by Burned_Cookie on Dec 23, 2020 at 11:12 AM, finished with 1583 posts and 283 votes.
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I love how close it remains.

Even if I really want to get a basline on Ruprecht.
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Something seems wrong with my vote for Uzkulak... Well redoing my vote

[x] Visit Uzkulak, the Chaos Dwarf equivalent to Barak Varr
[x] Visit the combes that Qrech told you about
[x] Thane Borek Forkbeard
[x] Head Engineer Gotrek Gurnisson
[x] Head Ranger Snorri Farstrider
 
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Hmm, doesn't seem likely that Ruprecht will overtake either of the trips. And I don't want him knocking off Borek...

[x] Thane Borek Forkbeard
 
And the pass is all like "what snow we don't do snow" wich also really answers where the caravan is going.
 
Alratan said:
These are not side quests. No more than the social options are. Both are places where we can gather intelligence that may prove very relevant for the success of the expedition. They are part of the main branch of the quest.
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For someone that wants to get through the Karak Dum story faster in real time they do kind of count as side quests more so than the more social options because they are much more likely to trigger extra chapters with votes and word count.

Personally I don't care about that though. As long as nothing is drawn out to boring levels then I'm always in favor with filling IC timespans with more reading material.
 
Burned_Cookie said:
And the pass is all like "what snow we don't do snow" wich also really answers where the caravan is going.
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It's not just the absence of snow, it's also that Clan Moulder has its Harbingers of Mutation and the Chaos Dwarves have their Sorcerers and Daemonsmiths who can probably sense the outlay of magic required to clear the pass, which will have been followed by feeling the magical shockwave associated with the return of Karak Vlag.

As a side note, it's not just the Expedition and the daemon warband that the skaven, Chaos Dwarves, and other parties may be mobilising to investigate, but also the return of Karak Vlag. If anyone hostile is sending there own expedition there, we may either want to intervene ourselves or send a messenger back to drop off a warning.
Rafin said:
For someone that wants to get through the Karak Dum story faster in real time they do kind of count as side quests more so than the more social options because they are much more likely to trigger extra chapters with votes and word count.

Personally I don't care about that though. As long as nothing is drawn out to boring levels then I'm always in favor with filling IC timespans with more reading material.
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The thing is, if we find out something relevant about one of the other characters there might be voting and subsequent updates in which we deal with it. If we don't expect to find out something that requires use to take action or make a choice, that tells us something in itself.
 
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Alratan said:
Boney has already made it pretty clear that the Expedition is not subtle and everyone will already know that it's coming through.
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There's a difference between knowing there's an expedition somewhere vs. Knowing exactly where the expedition is and that it's nearby. How do you expect that much food to be transported to the expedition without making it damn obvious exactly where they are? It's not a place we can get food safely in any meaningful quantity.

Also, with the death of the slayers, our food suddenly stretches slightly further.
Omegahugger said:
Chances are they know.

Even if they didn't notice the not-subtle caravan, there was a giant Daemonhost that exploded out of nowhere and probably drew a few eyeballs.
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That info takes time to travel, and it was noted that they don't pay much attention to the above ground stuff.
IronFist said:
I want books from Uzkulak about things we can't get anywhere else.

B O O K black market :)
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I'm definitely hoping to get books as well. Its the food I dont think we can get.
 
Alratan said:
As a side note, it's not just the Expedition and the daemon warband that the skaven, Chaos Dwarves, and other parties may be mobilising to investigate, but also the return of Karak Vlag. If anyone hostile is sending there own expedition there, we may either want to intervene ourselves or send a messenger back to drop off a warning.
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KARAK VLAG DWARF 1: Hey, we got a message warning that enemies are coming for us.
KARAK VLAG DWARF 2: (laugh and laughs and laughs)
KARAK VLAG DWARF 1: Yeah, got a chuckle out of that one meself.
 
Abhorsen said:
There's a difference between knowing there's an expedition somewhere vs. Knowing exactly where the expedition is and that it's nearby. How do you expect that much food to be transported to the expedition without making it damn obvious exactly where they are? It's not a place we can get food in any meaningful quantity.

Also, with the death of the slayers, our food suddenly stretches slightly further.
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BoneyM said, IIRC, that there were two sets of eyes on us at the moment, by implication skaven and chaos dwarf, so they probably already know exactly where we are.

We can also, if we choose, hire one of the caravans that's passing through Uzukulak and see if they'll transport supplies to a drop off point, or even if we see some deserving candidates buy some slaves to free them on condition that they crew some wagons we purchase and load with food to transport to a rendezvous point at which point they can take the wagons on to Kislev.
Briefvoice said:
KARAK VLAG DWARF 1: Hey, we got a message warning that enemies are coming for us.
KARAK VLAG DWARF 2: (laugh and laughs and laughs)
KARAK VLAG DWARF 1: Yeah, got a chuckle out of that one meself.
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If you're expecting and have optimised your defences against daemonettes and other Slaneeshi forces a skaven or chaos dwarf strike force might be a very, very nasty surprise as they have totally different capabilities. Knowing who is coming, and potentially even the details of what they're bringing could make an enormous difference to how expensive it would be to repel them.
 
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Alratan said:
BoneyM said, IIRC, that there were two sets of eyes on us at the moment, by implication skaven and chaos dwarf, so they probably already know exactly where we are.
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I'm pretty confident one of those eyes was Slaaneshi something, who tried to unleash the deamonettes at us.

Could you link the post?

As for the idea of having a caravan drop the supplies of, that caravan would be followed, and at the least, the supplies would be destroyed once dripped off. But following a Lady Magister of the Grey Order is a different matter.
 
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picklepikkl said:
I think these are definitely sidequests; I do not expect to find much of direct impact on the expedition at either Uzkulak or the combes.
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I've argued for Wulfhart against those who saw speaking with him as pointless - now let me do the same for Uzkulak and the Moulder Combes.

During this entire next stretch of the expedition, our most likely foes are Clan Moulder and the Chaos Dwarves. Being able to intercept any Skaven plans to attack the expedition will be a massive boon, and there's unlikely to be a better chance to see what the Chaos Dwarves are planning for us than listening to the scuttlebutt in the Uzkulak markets.

With the Keeper of Secrets having headed east, the priority for checking on these areas only goes up - if we can find confirmation that the Skaven or Chaos Dwarves killed the KoS, that's valuable, and if instead the KoS has linked up with one of those faction it's even more valuable.

Dismissing them as "side quests" is deeply misguided, in my opinion - this is one of the best information gathering opportunities we'll get for quite some time, and both of them are directly relevant to the expeditions interests.
 
Would they even know what a 'chaos dwarf' is? They won't open the doors but it kinda poisons the discourse late with the other dwarf delegations.
 
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