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Warhammer Fantasy: Divided Loyalties - an Advisor's Quest

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Jyn Ryvia said:
Depends on how good the elf boat is.

A) they haven't been keeping up with shipbuilding developments.

B) they're very out of practice, there might not be a single elf left alive that has actually built a boat not meant for river transport/fishing. Let along one of the old warship designs covered in dust.

Both of those things means we shouldn't be surprised if the Elve boats are both a bit dated and not as masterfully made as would be expected.
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Oh absolutely, but a rich altdorf noble still would want a elf boat and would have no goddamn clue about it's quality. Hell riverine ships for altdorf would probably be a great market.
 
Tobtorp said:
Ok, but for the Kislev trade they only need a few ships that can traverse the Schaukel or demtz... And after the boatbuilders can very easily sell their new boats to anyone else. Because their elven boats...

It's really quite hard to start oversea trading when you haven't left your Forrest in the last 3000 years...
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If the selling point is 'elven boats' to non-elves, that's still trade, which would be counterproductive to the argument that they wouldn't trade. It also seems fairly unrealistic, given that ships can be used as military assets, and the Eonir aren't at a stage where they'd be exporting that kind of thing.

And even if they did want to sell their ships, consider this: Which action would gain more advantage, selling ships for a one-time gain, minus all the efforts you put into building up infrastructure, or continuing to trade for a continual stream of gains? There's always piracy or storms and whatnot, but the reason trade routes exist in spite of that is that it's still going to be worth more to keep going.
 
ReImagined said:
If the selling point is 'elven boats' to non-elves, that's still trade, which would be counterproductive to the argument that they wouldn't trade. It also seems fairly unrealistic, given that ships can be used as military assets, and the Eonir aren't at a stage where they'd be exporting that kind of thing.

And even if they did want to sell their ships, consider this: Which action would gain more advantage, selling ships for a one-time gain, minus all the efforts you put into building up infrastructure, or continuing to trade for a continual stream of gains? There's always piracy or storms and whatnot, but the reason trade routes exist in spite of that is that it's still going to be worth more to keep going.
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My point isn't that they are not going to trade... My point is that I seriously doubt the eonir are going to build their first ships and then suddenly decided they need to imitate their Asur cousins and start up a oceanic trading empire.
Thomasfoolery said:
I'm not really sure what you're getting at? That something starts small does not mean it will stay small. If it makes economic sense for it to grow it will grow until it no longer makes economic sense to do so.

Oftentimes the starting of a thing is the most difficult part, and they've already committed to starting.
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That's the modern business doctrine of growth at all costs. It was not always that way, more often it was growth until self sustainment.
What I'm saying, not everything that starts small had to grow, or that people want it to grow.

The jump from heavy isolation to oversea trade would so large you could use it to get from altdorf to lothern in one leap...
 
Tobtorp said:
My point is that I seriously doubt the eonir are going to build their first ships and then suddenly decided they need to imitate their Asur cousins and start up a oceanic trading empire.
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They don't really need to?

They only really need a good port at the mouth of the Schaukel.

Which could be the work of centuries to get to that point, of course, but they don't need to send a ship past the mouth to benefit from trade.
 
I guess I'm curious why they'd want the cash. Raw materials are cheap, and can be paid for with the products you turn them into. Pretty much everything that isn't raw materials is better to have an elf make than trade outside for. They had a big stock of precious metals just sitting around, after all, and status among other elves (the personal motivation) isn't something you get from being super chummy with humans.
 
Mopman43 said:
They don't really need to?

They only really need a good port at the mouth of the Schaukel.

Which could be the work of centuries to get to that point, of course, but they don't need to send a ship past the mouth to benefit from trade.
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No they would just need to allow thousands of humans in that port and make part of their people very vulnerable to coastal raids.
A port at the mouth of the Schaukel would need substantial protections from the norscans and (maybe) pirates suspiciously well supplied coming from Marienburg. and the forest wouldn't help them anymore...
 
Tobtorp said:
That's the modern business doctrine of growth at all costs. It was not always that way, more often it was growth until self sustainment.
What I'm saying, not everything that starts small had to grow, or that people want it to grow.
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Laurelorn is in some ways even more ruthlessly business oriented than the modern world. If there's any way for the commoners to rise up to success, the Houses will go to great lengths to monopolize that way and kick the ladder down behind them.

Tobtorp said:
The jump from heavy isolation to oversea trade would so large you could use it to get from altdorf to lothern in one leap...
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I feel like you keep ignoring the fact they've already committed to making that jump.
 
Thomasfoolery said:
Laurelorn is in some ways even more ruthlessly business oriented than the modern world. If there's any way for the commoners to rise up to success, the Houses will go to great lengths to monopolize that way and kick the ladder down behind them.



I feel like you keep ignoring the fact they've already committed to making that jump.
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For the first part, that's politics not business.
For your second part, no they have not. They have decided that if they do not want to die they have to open up a bit. They have not decided to become a trade empire will to make deals with everyone and their mother. And even now they only barely made the decision to open up...
 
Glau said:
I guess I'm curious why they'd want the cash. Raw materials are cheap, and can be paid for with the products you turn them into. Pretty much everything that isn't raw materials is better to have an elf make than trade outside for. They had a big stock of precious metals just sitting around, after all, and status among other elves (the personal motivation) isn't something you get from being super chummy with humans.
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Money can be traded for goods and services?
But more seriously, they don't need to go out and trade themselves, having a harbour and things to sell/buy means the trade comes to them.
And no doubt few elves will find themselves enjoying sailing.
 
You know, we never did that 'create a division to check the EIC books' action.
Could Eike get the task to (covertly) investigate the EIC books? It is both a spycraft and an admin exercise, and if she fails/gets discovered, her position should ensure that the backlash wont be that bad
 
Tobtorp said:
For the first part, that's politics not business.
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It's politics that demand they undertake business ventures.

Tobtorp said:
For your second part, no they have not. They have decided that if they do not want to die they have to open up a bit. They have not decided to become a trade empire will to make deals with everyone and their mother. And even now they only barely made the decision to open up...
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What you said was "heavy isolation to oversea trade" which is exactly what they are doing. I didn't say they committed to becoming a world spanning trade empire. But they 100% have committed to overseas trade.
 
Tobtorp said:
His point was that overland trade would probably be plenty for what the eonir might want.
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Only if all they want is easily transported by land, and is worth overland transport through the empire instead of, say, shipping it from Kislev.
And i seriously doubt any but the most isolationist of the elves are going to go "well, we could have more, but i'd rather have less." on wealth, and over seas trade is going to be more profitable because it is faster, takes fewer people, and involves less taxes.
 
Boney said:
Is a boatyard still a boatyard if it has not been used as such for four thousand years? If you put enough effort into it, yes. Internal walls older than the Empire that had turned the vast emptiness into living spaces are knocked down and ancient schematics are consulted to restore the framework that will support the weight of the ship as it is constructed. The ship would look like a narrower and more streamlined version of the Wargalleys of the Empire's navy if it weren't for the addition of an 'outrigger', a smaller, secondary hull parallel to the main one. This, you are told, allows it to maintain stability despite the narrowness of the hulls, making them faster and nimbler than the single-hulled ships of the Empire without being any more susceptible to capsizing. If there is a downside to this design, it's that it can't cope with quite as narrow a river as a single-hulled ship can, and that it can't be portaged by the brute strength of the crew alone.
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It sounds like the Eonir are imitating Empire designs for their boats, with only a few differences. Which is interesting. I guess the blueprints for elven ships didn't survive four thousand years of isolation? Although that said, the outrigger is a feature on High Elf ships in Man O'War, so maybe it's more of a fusion of an elf Eagleship and an Empire Wolfship?

Or it could just be convergent design—Eagleships and Wolfships are designed for similar environments, after all.
 
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Valmond said:
Money can be traded for goods and services?
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But which goods and what services?

Like I said, services and goods from elves are going to be preferred for the quality, and raw materials imports are only really needed to produce marginal goods and services internally. So what is their incentive to really expand and exploit?
 
Glau said:
But which goods and what services?

Like I said, services and goods from elves are going to be preferred for the quality, and raw materials imports are only really needed to produce marginal goods and services internally. So what is their incentive to really expand and exploit?
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I feel like we already did in character actions to investigate that, so apart from the spices, charcoal, marble, dwarven ingots, and possibly other dwarven goods which meet their quality requirements (and possibly silk?), fortunately money can also purchase elven goods and services.
 
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naths said:
You know, we never did that 'create a division to check the EIC books' action.
Could Eike get the task to (covertly) investigate the EIC books? It is both a spycraft and an admin exercise, and if she fails/gets discovered, her position should ensure that the backlash wont be that bad
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Auditing the entirety of an organization like the EIC is a huge job, one she's not trained for (which matters; seriously, I took an accounting elective in college to fill out my schedule, figuring it would be an easy A because I was already many courses deep in finance and math, and it was remarkably challenging). If we take the "found an auditor division" action, sure, absolutely assign Eike to it, and then I guess maybe we can assign a followup Eike Study to do an audit if we don't have ideas, but we've been pretty resistant to that particular action because we already have an Internal Affairs division to investigate actual misconduct, so policing purely financial crimes seems like less of a priority than either using the EIC to accomplish diplomatic goals or using the EIC to do spy shit. I personally don't actually care if Hans Meyer is skimming off the top to line his pockets so long as he's not consorting with vampires or cults, which is what the Internal Affairs is presumably watching out for. If he's just embezzling for the sake of a nicer house, whatever.
 
Glau said:
But which goods and what services?

Like I said, services and goods from elves are going to be preferred for the quality, and raw materials imports are only really needed to produce marginal goods and services internally. So what is their incentive to really expand and exploit?
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The only thing we actually know they can't do themselves (yet) and that the empire is going to supply is guns. But how long that one will last is dependent on how fast the eonir get behind the secret of gunpowder...
 
Glau said:
But which goods and what services?

Like I said, services and goods from elves are going to be preferred for the quality, and raw materials imports are only really needed to produce marginal goods and services internally. So what is their incentive to really expand and exploit?
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To have more thanthe next guy for the really rich.
To have any for the not.

The expansion of the city is going to cause some major changes, even beyond the current research project and tentative trade.
That means not only opportunity, but also demand for new things.
 
Nerdasaurus Rex said:
It sounds like the Eonir are imitating Empire designs for their boats, with only a few differences. Which is interesting. I guess the blueprints for elven ships didn't survive four thousand years of isolation? Although that said, the outrigger is a feature on High Elf ships in Man O'War, so maybe it's more of a fusion of an elf Eagleship and an Empire Wolfship?

Or if could just be convergent design—Eagleships and Wolfships are designed for similar environments, after all.
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The High Elf ships have double outriggers in Man O'War. Except the Dragonships which have double outriggers and are also full on catamarans.

Tobtorp said:
The only thing we actually know they can't do themselves (yet) and that the empire is going to supply is guns. But how long that one will last is dependent on how fast the eonir get behind the secret of gunpowder...
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You're assuming even if they know the ingredients (which is probably pretty trivial to find out) they have the ability to manufacture it. We already know for example they have little to no supply of charcoal.
 
Dark as Silver said:
I feel like we already did in character actions to investigate that, so apart from the spices, charcoal, marble, dwarven ingots, and possibly other dwarven goods which meet their quality requirements (and possibly silk?), fortunately money can also purchase elven goods and services.
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The Eonir would also like to purchase ores, and that is uneconomical to do by land. Maybe dwarven ingots are enough to satisfy the Eonir's demand for metals, but maybe not, and also dwarven ingots are very expensive so for at least some Eonir buyers ore might be preferable.
 
Tobtorp said:
And now they do? Like we literally solved that problem last update... It's even independent from the empire...
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No they don't? They import it. They import it at no cost because Eike has tricked a bunch of villagers into giving it away for free, but they still import it, and it's still a limited scale (also that was three updates ago). It's currently a luxury good they use to make it easier for them to make better metal goods. It's also not even slightly independent from the Empire.
 
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