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[x] Use Rite of Way to ease the ascent
[x] Scout the lands of the Iron Wolves
[x] Investigate the 'Windfall' with the Light Wizards
 
I think scouting is worth a lot more them talking too the journeyman honestly. Sure he might be dodgy, hell he might even be Chaos, but we know for a fact there's a whole army of Chaos worshipers out there. So who's the most pressing issue?
The interpersonal options are. Why? Because scouting the Iron Wolves is redundant. We've got outriders. This is why we brought them.

If Mathilde doesn't go scouting personally, the expedition will still have scouts checking for danger and warning of problems. But if Mathilde doesn't build connections with the expedition leadership or the wizards under her command, those connections don't get built.

I have yet to see anyone argue why the Iron Wolves would attack a heavily armed expedition with a giant fuck-off dragon as long as we don't make any hostile moves. And if the argument is "well, they're gonna attack us no matter what because they're evil jerks," then scouting is irrelevant. They'll attack us, and, again, we've already got scouts. Let them do their job.

"Scout the lands of the Iron Wolves" is not more important than the interpersonal options.
 
@BoneyM so before I get into the meat of this fucking huge replypost, because holy shit this thread moves fast, a spell idea: if/when we learn Pit of Shadows, could we then build a Battle Magic that fires a bolt of it? Like, anything in the path of the bolt just gets dragged out of reality unless they've learned to DODGE. Or at least something spiraling off from the Matrix where the bolt carries the Pit and then bursts when it hits something, improving targeting?

Always love negaverse omakes, and imagine this when they meet the We and see the doom tower. Would be amazing.
[] Get the lay of the land. What are these urk and grobi and thaggoraki to be spoken of with such hatred? What is the current military, economic, and political situation? Not to put too fine a point on it, what in the Ancestors' names is going on here!

Disappointed the whole "rescued Vlag from Chaos" thing hasn't happened yet in quest, but that's understandable considering that expedition hasn't finished yet. I look forward to this actual, for real, definitely 100% happening double spin-off crossover quest.
As far as the crossover negaverse goes, I want to see Belegar and Kragg's reactions to Mathilde pulling a Golden Age Runelord straight out of her ass. (There is a 110% chance that she would be blamed for this event, and you know it.)
Highly entertaining.

I would love to see Mr Golden Age Runelord running into Bok and the Eye of Gazul and being utterly stumped. His rune lore might be vastly better, but there are things that just outright cannot be done by runes alone.

I have big exams January 11th. After that, we'll see.

One: what is a "jump" in this context?
Two:
Snorri: "Thungni would weep to see this getting called the work of a master!"
Kragg, openly sobbing: "I KNOW!!!!"

I may steal those lines :V

A Jump is -

Jump as in Jumpchain, a connected series of CYOAs, which mostly involve the jumper entering a universe for a 10-year adventure, during which they gain powers appropriate to the worlds they visit. You may have seen some Jumpchain-inspired stories; there's more than 1200 published jumps so far, so there's a lot of material to work with. The incident that triggered that quest omake was the publishing of yet another 'Jump', this one focused around Warhammer Dwarves. The author decided to import some famed SV characters to add to his jump, which allows the jumper to (among other things) self-insert as King Belegar, hire Mathilde Weber to help reclaim Karak Eight Peaks, and then (on succeeding), drag the reclaimed Karak Eight Peaks across the multiverse along with its loyal population, including Mathilde herself and the Eye of Gazul.

- this, basically.

I too often think that Rhunrikki and DL would make a hella cool crossover.

To be fair to Kragg, the sword is actually really good. His Master Rune is a fireless MConduction from Rhunrikki Strollaz, which is damn good, the magic item turnoff is a variant from Thorek's rune but manages to be as effective as a Master Rune without needing to be one, which is damn smart, and Unknown is just plain exotic.

@edit: Mind, Snorri could absolutely whip up a straight up killier weapon. But I struggle to see a more wizardly one.

Spoilers~

It does make me wonder if our sword is going to last less than eternity.

Perhaps that's the big difference between Alaric's work and Kragg's own- Alaric's was able to last 2,500 very active years. Very active.
I wonder how Snorri's armor would react to getting pulled through to the Time of Woes. I imagine the connection to the Deep Magics would play merry hell with the transference.

Excellent questions! I'm sure Snorri could answer those.

By Golden Age standards? I expect Snorri would call Kragg's Master Rune a shoddy and half-formed knockoff, the Rune of Superior Skill a shockingly incompetent and unreliable piece of work, and call the Rune of the Unknown an interesting idea that utterly failed to be developed to even a modicum of its potential.

Yeah, that's about right :V

I think it'd be less about the effects as such and more about the sort of stuff only a Runelord could see or care about. Minor imperfections in the runes that have absolutely no actual impact, "20% less efficient use of energy than if you'd done it the proper way", that sort of thing. That's my thinking anyway.

The thing is though, if you're using 20% less energy to get the same effect, that's 20% you can put into a better effect. Less vulnerable to disruption, greater longevity (and yes, that is important, because heirlooms), better integrated combos - I bet that's something that's been all but lost over the years, properly integrated combos. Kragg and Thorek would weep to look upon Zharrgal, let alone Barak Amazar.

I'm always slightly amused by the idea of a crossover between the two quests, simply because of the different timescales. I can imagine Snorri showing up and immedately disappearing for twenty DL turns inside of his workshop.
But by the end of those 20 turns every dwarf would have a rune weapon and protective talisman.

This is something I'd have to think about how to balance if I actually did this Quest, but it's certainly a funny thought.

I think the We would be one of the least surprising things to him, given the integrated griffon population of his Kraka Drakk non-dwarf cohabitation is perfectly viable. The Eye would be a lot more remarkable (by the standards of a >1000-year old dwarf specializing in exotic things), though.

I really, really want to write Snorri investigating the Eye. But exams.

It's several updates after the fact, but I did a recent rereading, and I couldn't ignore it when I realized it.

Mathilde's good enough at magic for the dwarves to call her zhufokri. Teclis? Not so much.

Well, to be fair -

I mean, did Teclis bring back Karak Vlag? No? Well there you go.

(mitigating circumstances, is that something you eat? :V )

- yeah, this.

As far as the crossover negaverse goes, I want to see Belegar and Kragg's reactions to Mathilde pulling a Golden Age Runelord straight out of her ass. (There is a 110% chance that she would be blamed for this event, and you know it.)
Kragg: This is because of that lecture I gave her about her power not being under her control, isn't it. She needed someone around who could lecture me.

[laughs in Ranald]

An announcement from the Emergency Meeting of the Ancestor Cult Conclave of the Karaz Ankor, hosted in Karaz-a-Karak.

After certain confidential information was vouchsafed to this body by a source of undoubtable repute, a Grudge is hereby leveled against the being, spirit, force, ancestor, demiurge, and/or anthropomorphic personification commonly known as Ranald, believed to originate somewhere in our about the continent called The Old World, for the crime of theft of a disembodied Dwarven soul, which has subsequently been incarnated in the form of an Umgi.

Reparation or vengeance for said Grudge is to be postponed pending the full and proper evaluation of the consequences of those actions, which may be considered to mitigate, in whole or in part, those actions.

Witnessed and entered into the Book of Grudges by the High King.

What the fuck Mathilde

Also: [laughs harder in Ranald]

More titles for the first time Mathilde talks to Settra is always good.

Thank you for the mental image of Settra and Mathilde JoJo posing as they have a title-off.

Wait till Snorri hears about how Kragg has taken no apprentice ever and how he used to spend entire centuries in his workshop just tinkering around instead of being useful to his old...

He's gonna dunk him in a tub of particularly rancid troll fat, isn't he?

I can neither confirm nor deny.

Belegar's question: If you grab hold of the immaterium with your unprotected brainmeats and summon a super runelord, does that count as an insane zhuf superweapon or a properly dawi solution?

Why not -


- sigh. The perils of needing sleep.

Snorri's favorite modern Runelord would be Thorek, wouldn't it?

He might be a fraction less skilled, but darn it, he's giving the whole "Save the Karaz Ankor" thing 120%, including having an army of apprentices.

Kragg: audible grinding of gears

To be fair to Kragg he is six centuries Snorri''s senior and while he has a far lesser overall knowledge base to work with what he does have he has been obsessively honing for his entire life.

So while Snori will surpass Kragg in overall breadth of skill (and productivity, but that is the norm for everyone compared to Snori), Kragg is probably better when it comes to what runelore Kragg does happen to have.

Except the runelore he has is:


(that's a fantastic image by the way :V even with the wrong beard)

THE PAPER BACKLOG MUST GROW.

Snorri: "First time?"
 
I was talking about hand-held guns, if we're allowed artillery, cannonballs already exist.
If you ditched the drum and lightened it up... a person (much larger than Mathilde) could conceivably brace and fire it, especially given that it's a blackpowder weapon, which means a large projectile at a relatively low velocity (1000 feet per second, approximately). People are capable of shooting modern, smokeless 20mm from an upright position, and the standard in black powder elephant guns was 4bore, with 2bore occasionally being played with.
It's deceptively large looking without someone next to it for scale, though I will agree that it's beyond the bounds of what could be reasonably carried or fired. 4bore is totally doable though, and provides enough wiggle room for a square bullet; I've no idea whether that's enough room to fit a rune though, even if you could find a runesmith crazy enough.

Then again, if we get an apprentice I guess that opens the door to using a Jezail or Punt gun... :V
 
The interpersonal options are. Why? Because scouting the Iron Wolves is redundant. We've got outriders. This is why we brought them.

If Mathilde doesn't go scouting personally, the expedition will still have scouts checking for danger and warning of problems. But if Mathilde doesn't build connections with the expedition leadership or the wizards under her command, those connections don't get built.

I have yet to see anyone argue why the Iron Wolves would attack a heavily armed expedition with a giant fuck-off dragon as long as we don't make any hostile moves. And if the argument is "well, they're gonna attack us no matter what because they're evil jerks," then scouting is irrelevant. They'll attack us, and, again, we've already got scouts. Let them do their job.

"Scout the lands of the Iron Wolves" is not more important than the interpersonal options.
Thing is, its not redundant. The scout check the path ahead and the immerdiate vicinity of the expedition respectivly. We would scout out their lands to see what the general situation is and if theres a hungry band of ogres for example.
 
Thing is, its not redundant. The scout check the path ahead and the immerdiate vicinity of the expedition respectivly. We would scout out their lands to see what the general situation is and if theres a hungry band of ogres for example.
And? What's the point of doing so? What do we gain beyond general interest factor? We're not passing through their lands, we're passing along the edge. The "general situation" in their lands isn't relevant to us.

I could understand if it was the "go talk to them" option, so we could assure them that we're not there to fight and we will be passing through Dolgan and Yusak lands, not through theirs. But I legitimately don't understand how scouting them will cause an attack of theirs to not happen, or how it will cause an attack of theirs that would succeed to fail, or indeed how it would solve any situations that our existing scouts won't pick up on anyway.

Mathilde doesn't need to do everything herself. Let the nice men on the fuck-off monstrous cavalry feel important, too.
I voted for Cyrston this turn, but there is an argument to be made that it's most important to take care of them while actually in the Chaos Wastes, which we will be soon. And for that purpose one might want to strategically vote in such a way that they are the most interesting remaining options since we already visited all the fan favorites in the previous turns.
It would take much more confidence than I have to assert that we will have time to visit multiple people next week. I expect that we will be swamped, because next week we need to steal the cup, we'll be passing through Yusak lands and probably want to scout them out, and we might want to take a peek at Karag Dum itself. "Oh, we can talk to people next week" is more fantastical than the literal magical powers we've got.
 
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Thing is, its not redundant. The scout check the path ahead and the immerdiate vicinity of the expedition respectivly. We would scout out their lands to see what the general situation is and if theres a hungry band of ogres for example.

Vicinity is likely scouted by rangers (winter wolfs in dusk/nightime) and the more distant surroundings by Taalites.

Would Mathilde's scouting, in addition to rangers, ww and taalites, be useless? No.

Is Mathilde's scouting neccessary? Also no.

Thing is, there is no one else bar Mathilde to wrangle wizards.

That is her primary task from the start.

It's why wizards are even allowed in the Expedition, more or less.
 
[X] Journeyman Cyrston von Danling
[X] Sir Ruprecht Wulfhart the Younger
[X] Use Rite of Way to ease the ascent
[X] Investigate the 'Windfall' with the Light Wizards
 
This is the leg of the Expedition where the speed of the steam-wagons will reduce to a crawl and the convoy might be most vulnerable to attack
It's time to scouting.
But I don't sure where - near the convoy, or far ahead?
[X] Ranging far ahead of the convoy

I'm sure we need to do that, tho:
[X] Journeyman Cyrston von Danling
[X] Use Rite of Way to ease the ascent

Edit: Oh, yes, almost forgot about obligatory paranoid vote:
[X] Magister Egrimm van Horstmann
 
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We have trouble letting people do their jobs.
If Mathilde does not do it, it does not get done, or atleast not done right, seems to be often a strong undercurrent within the thread.
We can't leave talking to people to others, we are the only one who can cast Rite of Way, everything else is either not our job or already done by someone else.
 
The interpersonal options are. Why? Because scouting the Iron Wolves is redundant. We've got outriders. This is why we brought them.

As the Dwarfs would say, redundancy is the difference between shoddy and acceptable. We're going into exceptionally dangerous and unknown territory, against an enemy that's quite capable of outmaneuvering our outriders and mustering a force capable of challenging our convoy.

Besides, this is the same logic with the Rite of Way: Just as Mathilde only needs to use Rite of Way for the rough patches to greatly decrease the chances a steam wagon breaks down, so too does she only need to personally scout ahead for the most dangerous territory to greatly decrease the chance we run into a fight we don't want.
 
As the Dwarfs would say, redundancy is the difference between shoddy and acceptable. We're going into exceptionally dangerous and unknown territory, against an enemy that's quite capable of outmaneuvering our outriders and mustering a force capable of challenging our convoy.

Besides, this is the same logic with the Rite of Way: Just as Mathilde only needs to use Rite of Way for the rough patches to greatly decrease the chances a steam wagon breaks down, so too does she only need to personally scout ahead for the most dangerous territory to greatly decrease the chance we run into a fight we don't want.
We're not going into their territory, though.
Like, next week, I am entirely in favor of scouting the Yusak. We'll be passing through their territory and it will be important to provide redundancy there. But we're just going by the Iron Wolves. We're not invading their lands, we're a heavily armed small convoy traveling up the road where they usually prey on merchant caravans. A generalized sentiment of "oh, Mathilde could help the situation somehow" isn't enough to go on to make me think dropping one of our precious few remaining interpersonal actions is a good idea.
If we never have a social scene with Cyrston at any point during the expedition, probably nothing at all bad will happen.
It might be surprising to hear that I agree with you. However, what's important is that, unlike with the scouting, there is nobody hedging against the negative outcome. It's us to do that job, or that job doesn't get done.
Being fair for most people concerned with him it's not really a social scene, it's a 'make sure he's not a cultist' scene. As the GM pointed out these scenes can have real long term effects for the expedition.
Yeah, that's why I've been calling them "interpersonal" actions rather than "social" actions, because we're used to the term applying to turns where social actions are just for fluff and background character-building. That's not the case here on the expedition: the interpersonal actions do things. All of the ones we've had so far have done stuff and given information about what motivates those people that we wouldn't have had if we were just yoloing it. Now, for example, we know that trying to persuade Gotrek by appealing to the well-being of the Karaz Ankor in general is a lost cause: he cares about his immediate family, and that's as far as it goes.
 
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We have trouble letting people do their jobs.
If Mathilde does not do it, it does not get done, or atleast not done right, seems to be often a strong undercurrent within the thread.
We can't leave talking to people to others, we are the only one who can cast Rite of Way, everything else is either not our job or already done by someone else.

Well, currently the leaders are Rite of Way, Windfall, Ruprecht the Younger and Cyrston. Of those, only Windfall is something already covered by others, but it sounds really interesting, which is why I voted for it. Scouting the Iron Wolves is only nine votes behind Cyrston though, which I trust the Knights of Taal's Fury to handle well enough and don't think is something we really need to do.
 
There is absolutely one reason we should start taking actions to scout. We are a wizard, one with powerful windsight, and we are starting to get really close to the chaos wastes. We can scout for magic traps and ambushes. We can add our insight into anything weird the other scouts find and determine if we need to detour or prepare for battle.
 
Except the runelore he has is:
Except some of it can't possibly be. There are things so basic that, for them to be lost, runesmithing itself would be entirely lost. Things like the Rune of Stone.

So Kragg's obsessive honing of his skill should show in the runes that there just isn't much hidden knowledge to it. Things like Stone, Steel, Cutting, Speed. The barebones are still around. If they weren't, nothing else would be.
 
Welp I've been convinced. Let's do the talking and leave the Chaos worshipers to the nice men on hungry carnivores:

[X] Use Rite of Way to ease the ascent
[X] Investigate the 'Windfall' with the Light Wizards
[X] Sir Ruprecht Wulfhart the Younger
[X] Journeyman Cyrston von Danling
 
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