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Warhammer Fantasy: Divided Loyalties - an Advisor's Quest

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DragonParadox said:
Fair point, but there is sort of a unity of expectation between worshipers of 'Handrich'; in Bretonnia 'Affairiche', in Tilea, like they are just translating the name, but then you do have cases where the gods are starting to branch off and various heresies.

My theory is that one Norscan tribe can worship 'the Hound' and another one worships 'the Brass Warrior' and both of them will agree that they worship the same thing, but at the same time if you were to show them some of the more extreme acts of Khorne worship they practice up in the wastes they would lose their lunch and not recognize their god in that. The masks would thus be more similar to each other and to southern gods than to the daemon god at the end of the path of skulls.
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My view is that they would recognise it, and respect it those behaviours as holy acts in devotion to their gods, but also think they were extreme acts of devotion, like how a middle age Orthodox Christian might think of a stylite sitting on their pillar, which they would never contemplate doing themselves as they lack the required level of dedication.

I mean, the Aztecs literally did build pillars of the skulls of the people they sacrificed, and they didn't even get supernatural powers out of the deal.
 
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Alratan said:
My view is that they would recognise it, and respect it those behaviours as holy acts in devotion to their gods, but also think they were extreme acts of devotion, like how a middle age Orthodox Christian might think of a stylite sitting on their pillar, which they would never contemplate doing themselves as they lack the required level of dedication.

I mean, the Aztecs literally did build pillars of the skulls of the people they sacrificed, and they didn't even get supernatural powers out of the deal.
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Maybe, but as the GM pointed out Norscans have secular rules against 'murderocracy' which means at some level the various tribes reject both the behaviors and those who enact them, which applies for Khorne yes, but I imagine they are just as down on spreading plagues freely with the community in the name of Papa Nurgle. It is not the specifics of showing off the pyramid of skulls that is the issue, it is the self-destructive behaviors that went into making it that I think normal lay Norscans would not recognize.
 
Alratan said:
That doesn't seem to matter though. They all know who they're worshipping.
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I mean canonically they're frequently worshipping Daemon intermediaries instead of the Four directly, with a smattering of the more warlike non-chaotic gods as well, so in a very real sense they don't know who they're worshipping. If you're say a marienburg trader showing up to buy furs from a norscan tribe, figuring out whether their war spirit King Of Wolves is Khorne, a daemon of Khorne, Ulric or even just some local nature spirit would be a not insignificant amount of hard work.

They're not exactly being tricked which is really the important bit, but the fact that they often genuinely couldn't tell you for sure whether they're worshipping the dark gods is a significant factor in how they can just like, show up to see if anyone wants to hire norscan bodyguards.
 
I'm continuing the process of reading Storm of Magic and it's a very enjoyable book. Lots of neat stuff and I can see a lot of things that Boney picked up from the book for the quest. Namely Paranoth and Algard.

A few things:

"Many of the Order's trappings, titles and rituals seem to echo the magical practices of lands far to the south." Storm of Magic Pg. 36.

This is in relation to the Light Order, so it seems that Mathilde's suspicions about the Light Order's decision to make a Pyramid aren't unfounded.

"You seek my counsel? Then I shall give it. You cannot trust your generals, for they crave your rank. You cannot trust your troops, for they are cowards. And you most certainly cannot trust me- I'm on your side only until justice is done. Sometimes, my lord, it is better to not know the truth" Magister Algard to Elector Count Theoderic Gausser. Storm of Magic Pg. 40.

This is just a neat character moment from the book for Algard. Boney's done a pretty good job fleshing him out in a way that I can perfectly visualise the character who said this line to be the same as the one in DL.

Pg 41 of the book also mentions that "Amethyst Magisters typically speak in telepathy" which is why their voices tend to be so hoarse since they don't talk with their own voice much. That seems... weird. I've seen telepathy as an ability/mutation for Chaos, and Karitamen had it in Lure of the Liche Lord, but I don't think it's ever mentioned as a thing Magisters can just do? I'm not sure if Amethysts using telepathy is DL canon.

There's also a funny mention in the book about Paranoth, mainly that the only time he's mentioned is in reference to the magic item he made. Paranoth's Piquet Fence. He literally made it as a security measure for all his travels.

The book does mention that he "trod all the roads twixt Cathay and Naggarond", but Boney said that he was rumored to have "only" trod all the paths of the Old World and Ind. I'm assuming within the next 40 years or so Paranoth is going to be doing quite a bit more wandering to fulfill his canon reputation.
 
Telepathy is something I could see being associated with Morr—it loosely fits with the dreams and prophecy thing, but Morr is quite clearly distinct from Shyish, and I see no reason why Amethyst wizards should share that ability?
 
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Amethyst wizards aren't using what you're probably picturing when you think "telepathy". What they're doing is talking in the way ghosts and spirits can talk. Without physically moving air around or creating vibrations in the atmosphere, just projecting their meaning in the same way a ghost can project the horrific images of its final passing without, you know, verbally explaining them to you.
 
Briefvoice said:
Amethyst wizards aren't using what you're probably picturing when you think "telepathy". What they're doing is talking in the way ghosts and spirits can talk. Without physically moving air around or creating vibrations in the atmosphere, just projecting their meaning in the same way a ghost can project the horrific images of its final passing without, you know, verbally explaining them to you.
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I doubt it. Ghosts and spirits are not Shysh aligned, they are Dhar, unnatural. The Wind of Death is the wind of endings so anything that delays or defies that end is anathema to it.
 
Briefvoice said:
Amethyst wizards aren't using what you're probably picturing when you think "telepathy". What they're doing is talking in the way ghosts and spirits can talk. Without physically moving air around or creating vibrations in the atmosphere, just projecting their meaning in the same way a ghost can project the horrific images of its final passing without, you know, verbally explaining them to you.
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Mathilde: "So how does that telepathy thing work, anyway?"

Gretel: "Oh, it's really easy. It's more like writing a letter in your head than actually talking. Basically, the spell kills us for a split second, and our mental state at that moment is communicated via haunting to all the other Amethysts nearby as part of our traumatic near-death experience."

Mathilde: "Huh, clever."

Panoramia: "NO IT ISN'T SHUT UP STOP GIVING HER IDEAS AAAAAAAH!!!"
 
DragonParadox said:
I doubt it. Ghosts and spirits are not Shysh aligned, they are Dhar, unnatural. The Wind of Death is the wind of endings so anything that delays or defies that end is anathema to it.
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I'm not sure that ghosts or spirits have anything to do with Dhar. They're natural parts of the world just as much as embodied souls are, naked souls or bits of souls that haven't been drawn into the Aethyr.

You can use Dhar to make ghosts manifest and able to interact with the living, but ghosts themselves aren't anything to do with the Winds of Magic.
 
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Codex said:
Pg 41 of the book also mentions that "Amethyst Magisters typically speak in telepathy" which is why their voices tend to be so hoarse since they don't talk with their own voice much. That seems... weird. I've seen telepathy as an ability/mutation for Chaos, and Karitamen had it in Lure of the Liche Lord, but I don't think it's ever mentioned as a thing Magisters can just do? I'm not sure if Amethysts using telepathy is DL canon.
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There's currently a Harry Potter/Warhammer crossover quest about an Amethyst Apprentice stuck in Hogwarts after a Warp mishap. Being used to talking in telepathy is part of his characterization.
Briefvoice said:
Amethyst wizards aren't using what you're probably picturing when you think "telepathy". What they're doing is talking in the way ghosts and spirits can talk. Without physically moving air around or creating vibrations in the atmosphere, just projecting their meaning in the same way a ghost can project the horrific images of its final passing without, you know, verbally explaining them to you.
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Where's that from?
 
Nerdasaurus Rex said:
Telepathy is something I could see being associated with Morr—it loosely fits with the dreams and prophecy thing, but Morr is quite clearly distinct from Shysh, and I see no reason why Amethyst wizards should share that ability?
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Well, if the original Amethyst wizards were from the Cult of Morr, and some of their traditions were maintained, telepathy would definitely be one of the more useful candidates to keep.
 
Alratan said:
I'm not sure that ghosts or spirits have anything to do with Dhar. They're natural parts of the world, souls or bits of souls that haven't been drawn into the Aethyr.

You can use Dhar to make ghosts manifest and able to interact with the living, but ghosts themselves aren't anything to do with the Winds of Magic.
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They congregate under the green moon and generally act malignant. I'm pretty sure they are not supposed to be around if there was no magic floating in the air.
 
ReImagined said:
Well, if the original Amethyst wizards were from the Cult of Morr, and some of their traditions were maintained, telepathy would definitely be one of the more useful candidates to keep.
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Has Boney said they were? Realms of Sorcery says that Teclis explicitly didn't recruit from the established legal Cults, as those with magical talent could already usefully (and legally) cast spells from the divine lores:

Teclis left alone the priests and clerics of the Empire's cults, despite his sensing a great aptitude for magic in many. The holy men and women of the Empire were adamant that they had no power or wish to manipulate magic, insisting any miracles their prayers might bring came directly from the deity they worshipped. It is said Loremasters Yrtle and Finreir were amused by these claims, but Teclis merely nodded and allowed the issue to drop. The priests he had approached could already work magic with faith and rituals without learning the arcane spellcraft that Teclis offered. The great archmage saw no reason to inject doubt into their hearts by pressing his point.​

DragonParadox said:
They congregate under the green moon and generally act malignant. I'm pretty sure they are not supposed to be around if there was no magic floating in the air.
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I'm not sure there's any supposed here. Strong magic such as storms of magic weakens reality so spirits can act more freely, but that doesn't meant ghosts are aligned with any of the winds that forms a storm of magic, or with Dhar.
 
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DragonParadox said:
Ulgu is not really about getting anything clear secret or no, it is the wind of confusion, unless you wanted to project pure babble into someone's head... which come to think of it might be a good telepathy defense if one was ever needed.
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What if we used a similar idea as rite of way? Ulgu can be used to sense confusion and discontinuity I assume both physical and mental so a Gray wizard gives a person a meaningfully look that they would normally not understand at all, but lots of (very) tiny ghost sounds fill in the gaps, like a sort of sublimatal message. So the least possible sound is used to communicate your message to the person well leaving anyone else watching the exchange in the dark.
 
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