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Warhammer Fantasy: Divided Loyalties - an Advisor's Quest

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Alratan said:
It could have done that anyway, and could make up anything it wanted at any time. The fact that this event actually happened is irrelevant.

1) |Mathilde has exceptional Intrigue. If she choses, no one will know this happened. Just as she shrugged off literal divine possession and none of her colleagues she didn't tell noticed. That was a much bigger deal.
2) Would exist whether or not the daemon spoke to us. We don't have to hide our creation and destruction of a liminal realm, just the daemon contacting Mathilde
3) Could probably always have happened anyway at any time to any wizard if Tzeentch felt like it. It's not something that can or needs to be explained, just Tzeentch being Tzeentch.
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I'll not bat at the first point here further but...
RE, 2:
I'll note this is in response to someone arguing to say absolutely nothing. It being defeated as you propose requires a vote for saying so to Belegar.
RE, 3:
We are talking about something that will stick with Mathilde not in the fickle moment but potentially for years, if not decades. This is not about one singular roll that is about to be made, but what is, by the context of the update where it started, a long term influence plot.

If once is accident, twice is coincidence, and three times is enemy action, then eight is a Chaos plot. If that is, indeed, the trick, then this is something that can be brought to bear whenever the Smug Bird arranges it to.
 
Nerdasaurus Rex said:
Also, saying it "downloaded a monologue into our head" makes it sound a lot worse that it is. It used magic to create speech that didn't need air or ears to be heard, but I feel saying it was thrust into our mind like a computer virus grossly exaggerates the situation.
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*Pops head up*

Point of correction: It made it so that we had retroactively heard it.

Which sounds less like a mind thing and more like time/timeline fuckery.

*lurks again*
 
WhiteNights said:
Anyways, it seems like Mathilde got hit less hard with the infohazard than the thread did.
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I love that her response to this is basically the same as Alkaseltzer offering to teach us necromancy. Vaguely insulted and with the sure knowledge that she could do better at evil then these weak sauce hacks.

I kinda like the idea of her signing onto a druchii ship for a season on the proviso that they sack the crap out of the vampire coast.

[X] [BELEGAR] Greater Daemon
[X] [COLLEGE] Incoming Everchosen
 
The3rdCorinthian said:
Nah, mathilde just immediately has a perfect poker face and says it lied, and because it's a daemon everyone immediately agrees because All daemons lie.
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Well daemons lying and generally not being something you take heed of is kind of an article of faith in all the religions of the Empire. As for the poker face:

Intrigue: 19+2+2+2+1+1=27

I think we can say: 'the demon is lying' with a straight face given that this would be the base assumption of any onlooker... I was going to say 'not sworn to chaos' but the smarter cultists probably also assume all daemons lie all the time. :V
 
AzrielIlluminare said:
So Tzeentch just randomly offers power ups now? Plus, if Tzeentch loves doing random shit, then sending one of his Greater Daemons to fuck with a troublesome Wizard would obviously be waved off like your saying Mathilde having Tzeenchtian Sorcery like her would be. So, having a Greater Daemon pop up is a problem that means everyone is going to suddenly see us as untrustworthy, but having magical benefits when around Tzeenchtian stuff is dismissible as Tzeentch just being a troll? Riiiiight.
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Tzeentch/random magical effects happening around Tzeentchian magic and one of Tzeentch's greater daemons downloading information into your mind are very different things.

And no, I'm not saying Mathilde having Tzeentchian sorcery would be waved off. She doesn't have Tzeentchian sorcery though. Tzeentchian sorcery just behaves differently in her presence.
 
Nerdasaurus Rex said:
Baba Niedzwenka of Erengrad
-Has even fewer fucks than Hatalath. Actually, I'm still not sure why she's even here? Doesn't she have better things to be doing? Chance of withdrawal: MEDIUM
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Niedzwenka definitely can help for the Scythian tributaries, and there's a chance she could be instrumental in the Rivers Leylines option: We've be investigating the Tarn of Tears, and we know from first arriving at Laurelorn that there's a spirit guarding it. And Niedzwenka is quite possibly the spirit specialist of the Old World.

Alratan said:
It literally did download a monologue into Mathilde's mind, and neither she nor anyone she tells has any way of knowing that it didn't download anything else.
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Downloaded into the past, not her mind.

Boney said:
This stops the tendrils, but it cannot stop the last whisper already planted in the past.
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Boney said:
How do you ignore words you never heard in a present tense?
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Boney said:
The past was simply changed so that the words had been heard.
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Parabola said:
Downloaded into the past, not her mind.
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But still never spoken aloud, even in the past:

Boney said:
"Do you know what tickles me most about all of this?" The thought arrives in your brain packaged and labelled as sound, but never existed as something so ludicrously inefficient as vibrating air. The past was simply changed so that the words had been heard.
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It doesn't seem like the words time travelled into the past and were spoken into the air, but that they were timetravelled into the past and inserted into Mathilde's brain as thoughts back then.
 
NSMS said:
Worth noting that result 41 - 50 on one of the miscast tables is almost exactly what happened to us:

Yes, this is for a demon prince, not a greater demon, but the difference between the two is honestly minimal in this context. Point is, this is far from unprecedented.
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I don't think the thread can afford to take 1D10 Insanity Points, considering the base level of thread madness that already goes on.
 
[X] [BELEGAR] Nothing
[X] [BELEGAR] Greater Daemon
[X] [COLLEGE] Nothing

According to Mathilde, the "weakening of reality", as scary as that sounds, is actually easily fixable (and I think it falls into the scope of things considered a possible hazard when the tower/lab was designed). Don't think there is any need to worry Belegar about that. The argument about "warning the dwarves that use AV" is interesting, but so far there's been no complaints, and they are obviously not doing the same experiment.
Considerign the demon did nothing but talk in Mathilde's head, I don't think it's necessary to reveal it either. But if, hypothetically, the Tzeentch takeover plotline continues (and, say, Mathilde suddenly disappears while investigating some scary magicks), it could be helpful for Mathilde for someone to know she's been hunted by a Tzeentch Greater Daemon, and thus try to help her on that front. Belegar is one of the few people that could be trusted with that.

I don't see what can the Colleges do with the information about Mathilde's demon contract in short-term, outside of giving Mathilde a time-out and researching if everything is alright with her. And, well, there is the matter of that new trait. I think they shouldn't be contacted for now, not until the Orbs and other projects are complete, but on a future turn Mathilde should pick an action to look into possible corruption considering that new trait with question marks.
The demon's "revelation" about the Everchosen (and especially Mathilde being a candidate) sounds like misdirection to me.
 
Alratan said:
Tzeentch/random magical effects happening around Tzeentchian magic and one of Tzeentch's greater daemons downloading information into your mind are very different things.

And no, I'm not saying Mathilde having Tzeentchian sorcery would be waved off. She doesn't have Tzeentchian sorcery though. Tzeentchian sorcery just behaves differently in her presence.
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As mentioned here:
The3rdCorinthian said:
Point of correction: It made it so that we had retroactively heard it.

Which sounds less like a mind thing and more like time/timeline fuckery.
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It's never outright stated that it shoved said message into her head.

I never said Mathilde would have Tzeenchtian Sorcery either, but having it help her rather than oppose her? That's not the normal 'weird/random things happen' that's something that people would find suspicious without any form of explanation.

Edit: Okay so it is my bad.
 
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The Phoenixian said:
I'll not bat at the first point here further but...
RE, 2:
I'll note this is in response to someone arguing to say absolutely nothing. It being defeated as you propose requires a vote for saying so to Belegar.
RE, 3:
We are talking about something that will stick with Mathilde not in the fickle moment but potentially for years, if not decades. This is not about one singular roll that is about to be made, but what is, by the context of the update where it started, a long term influence plot.

If once is accident, twice is coincidence, and three times is enemy action, then eight is a Chaos plot. If that is, indeed, the trick, then this is something that can be brought to bear whenever the Smug Bird arranges it to.
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Saying absolutely nothing about the daemon contacting Mathilde does not mean saying nothing about creating and then destroying the liminal realm after we tested it. That's exactly what we'd do if the daemon never contacted us, which I think is exactly how we should behave.
 
NSMS said:
unprecedented
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Neither is becoming everchosen (has happened 12 times) or cheating on taxes, or full blown waaagh. Being with precedent doesnt mean dealing with said precedent has to be good. Asi said before, Mathilde is not squeaky clean enough. Lot of our bullshit comes from abusing loopholes that will, with this, suddenly not be loopholes, because thats the result of losing the goodwill that made them loose enough for us to cross in the first place. And thats hoping they don't tighten while our neck is in them.
 
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AzrielIlluminare said:
As mentioned here:

It's never outright stated that it shoved said message into her head.

I never said Mathilde would have Tzeenchtian Sorcery either, but having it help her rather than oppose her? That's not the normal 'weird/random things happen' that's something that people would find suspicious without any form of explanation.
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The part I quoted above says it arrived in her mind as a thought as if it had been heard but never actually passed through air. It did go right into her head rather than passing through the air at any point, even back in time.

Magic does all sorts of random things, and you're also assuming that Tzeentch, the God of Change, will keep how his magic reacts to Mathilde predictable and standardised.
 
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Alratan said:
The part I quoted above says it arrived in her mind as a thought as if it had ben heard but never actually passed through air. It did go right into her head rather than passing through the air at any point, even back in time.

Magic does all sorts of random things, and you're also assuming that Tzeentch, the God of Change, will keep how his magic reacts to Mathilde predictable and standardised.
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And that most wizards would even be able to comprehend what they are seeing, Mathilde does, but Mathilde has Avatar, a rather rare trait I imagine given how we got it.
 
I am sure that others have already looked back at the Mork reveal, but I decided to go take a look.

Though it has been mere days since the capture of Karag Lhune, it has already begun its transformation. When last you saw the Hall of the Moon it had been strewn with corpses and wreckage and hovels, and even the floor had been caved in to form a crude slave pit. But the hard work of hundreds of Dwarves had cleared away all signs of greenskin habitation and begun the process of rebuilding the floor, block by block. It was not quite a throne room fit for a King, but it did make a suitable place to confer privately with King Belegar and Kragg.
[Telling Belegar and Kragg: Diplomacy, 25+10=35.]
The two are fixing you with looks, one curious and one disapproving. You take a deep breath and plunge right in. "The Black Orc Priests were trying to separate Gork and Mork - Gork for Brutality, Mork for Cunning, and no crossover. Mork ended up using me to kill the Boss. In the sort of... possession or avatar kind of sense."
[Belegar's reaction: 49+15(Benefit of the doubt)=64.]
[Kragg's reaction: 20-10(Disapproval)=10.]
Kragg's reaction is instant, taking a step to the side to interpose himself between you and King Belegar, his hand moving to the hammer on his belt. You're very careful not to move, and after a long, tense moment, he un-tenses only very slightly. For his part, King Belegar remains unmoved, his gaze on you thoughtful.
"You thought I'd tell you all about it and then attack?"
"Aye. It's the sort of thing they'd do." Though he no longer seems to be on the verge of attacking, he's still very much ready to defend, and remains in place between you and King Belegar.
You consider that. "Okay, granted. But I'm not, though."
[...]
[Belegar's reaction: 63+10=73.]
"Somewhat like a God of Rangers. Or a human Grombrindal, in a way," he decides.
[...]
[Cleric Gunnars: 100.]
He shakes his head firmly. "Not a possession in the conventional sense. Circumstance and affinity..." he thinks for a moment. "Like jumping from one chariot to another. Impossible, unless they're going the same way at the same speed. No long-term damage, no risk of relapse."

So.

Revealing the matter was a diplo roll that went pretty poorly. Belegar's reaction was shaped by a couple of relatively average rolls, while Kragg had a relatively hostile reaction based on a bad one. The situation was neatly salvaged by the natural 100 involving Gunnars.

Five rolls in total.

I imagine that there also be rolls here. Sufficiently good ones will probably result in relatively minor consequences, sufficiently bad ones will totally result in reputational hits, although I am not quite sure how bad we are talking here. Mathilde has better modifiers now than she did in the early quest, which may help a bit.
 
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[X] [COLLEGE] Incoming Everchosen

Meh, I don't really buy the fear that we're going to get irrevocably screwed, but I also don't buy that we get an important enough advantage for even that risk. So I choose to just ignore the Daemon problem entirely and stick to the shit they actually need to know.
 
Alratan said:
Presumably when one of their Lady Magisters goes to the Grey College to warn them that she's potentially been mentally compromised by a Greater Daemon of Tzeentch and that they need to intervene, one of the action the Grey Patriarch may take is to warn his peers in the other Colleges that requests from and information supplied by said Lady Magister should now be treated with caution.
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I think that would be wildly out of character for the Grey College. They're not that dumb. Immediately acting to isolate Mathilde from all the Colleges and sabotaging her projects after realizing that a Greater Daemon is trying to subvert Mathilde is like... decisionmaking on the level of one of those Dark!Independent!Harry Potter fanfics where everyone on Manipulative!Dumbledore's side inexplicably betrays Harry's trust and then he joins Voldemort who is actually nice to him for some reason.

[x] [COLLEGE] Everchosen, Daemon, and Mathilde's candidacy
[x] [BELEGAR] Greater Daemon
 
DragonParadox said:
Rolling a middling result on the Catastrophic Miscast table is not minor, a minor miscast is things like 'you sour nearby milk'.

Edit: Mathilde'd
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Okay, cool, I didn't have my copy the rulebook open in front of me at the time, so I had to go off my own definitions, where "Verbal only interaction with a demon that's on the other side of a planar rift"=minor and "exploding into white fire"=major. Which I explained in the comment you quoted. We weren't killed or crippled or mutated or sent insane by the interaction, so I called it a minor miscast, and honestly, I still don't think I was wrong to do so.

Parabola said:
Niedzwenka definitely can help for the Scythian tributaries, and there's a chance she could be instrumental in the Rivers Leylines option: We've be investigating the Tarn of Tears, and we know from first arriving at Laurelorn that there's a spirit guarding it. And Niedzwenka is quite possibly the spirit specialist of the Old World.
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I meant more in the sense of "why is she still choosing to work with us, there's nothing stopping her from leaving". I know she can still be useful for a lot of things, but I just don't see how we're useful to her.
 
The other thing is saying we've been in contact with a Greater Daemon of Tzeentch might mean people draw worse conclusions from Tzeentchian sorcery behaving strangely to help Mathilde than if we haven't already given them good reason to be suspicious and on guard for such things.

We can't proved we haven't been compromised in some way against our will or knowledge, and the combination of both is much more damning than just the odd behaviour of sorcery alone.

Ericwinter said:
Meh, I don't really buy the fear that we're going to get irrevocably screwed, but I also don't buy that we get an important enough advantage for even that risk. So I choose to just ignore the Daemon problem entirely and stick to the shit they actually need to know.
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Being irrevocably less trusted is only a possibility that Mathilde raises, the only certainty is that she'll be trusted less right now and that this may jeopardise the Waystone Project.

That isn't us being screwed. It just makes our life harder and makes doing our job and making the world a better place harder, which is probably part of the daemons' agenda.

LadyLynn said:
I think that would be wildly out of character for the Grey College. They're not that dumb. Immediately acting to isolate Mathilde from all the Colleges and sabotaging her projects after realizing that a Greater Daemon is trying to subvert Mathilde is like... decisionmaking on the level of one of those Dark!Independent!Harry Potter fanfics where everyone on Manipulative!Dumbledore's side inexplicably betrays Harry's trust and then he joins Voldemort who is actually nice to him for some reason.
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Mathilde literally says in the update that this is a reasonably foreseeable possibility, that the Colleges and dwarves will pull back their support of the Waystone project. The Colleges doing so can pretty much only happen if the Grey College tells the others to do so.

It's not out of character at all for the Grey College if one of the leaders of that College believes they may well do so.

And if Mathilde is concerned enough that she's compromised to escalate this to the Grey College, the rest of the College leadership may well trust her judgement on her own state to share those concerns with the other Colleges.
 
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Alratan said:
Saying absolutely nothing about the daemon contacting Mathilde does not mean saying nothing about creating and then destroying the liminal realm after we tested it. That's exactly what we'd do if the daemon never contacted us, which I think is exactly how we should behave.
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Okay, I'm just going to be matter-of-fact and say I'm getting frustrated here and try again at greater length. I said what I did because it was in response to an argument to Chocolate who was voting and arguing for [] Belegar - Nothing.

You are arguing with me by telling me, literally what I told you, in more words, and in doing so eliding the point we actually have differences on.

It is somewhat infuriating.
 
The Phoenixian said:
Okay, going over the things in this incident in the ones that come to mind.

1: There is Mathilde's current emotional turmoil and the question of what happened to cause said turmoil.
2: There is a verifiable and potentially exploitable weak spot in reality in Mathilde's house.
Most of all though....
3: There is Mathilde's sudden and unexplained trait of being notably more competent when near Tzeentchian sorcery. Especially if it turns out Tzeentchian sorcery... likes her, in ways that another wizard could see. Let alone ways that made themselves deliberately obvious to said wizard.

#3, in retrospect, also being a thing that I don't think can be explained in a good way by anything, and Being Scouted For Everchosen at least sounds like the Least Bad way.
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We have a poker face worthy of a hero character, miscasts do stuff like that all the time, and nobody has ever seen us cast in the presence of Chaos Sorcery (and if they did, nobody is going to consider for a second that maybe it's the Magical Daemon God rooting for us that gave us the final push to kill whoever they saw casting Chaos Sorcery near us).

Like, all of that is non-existent.

I'll take a tone break here; I disagree with you, but do not feel anyone is a bad person for being on the other side of the argument, and I apologize if I'm coming off that way.
 
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