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Warhammer Fantasy: Divided Loyalties - an Advisor's Quest

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Doomed Wombat said:
1) From our best observation Boris Bokhah is not behaving unusually compared to all our prior interactions with him which would indicate he's a servant of the ruinous powers.
2) To our knowledge Boris Bokhah has good faith reasons to want to do this which we can easily understand.
3) We are aware that Boris Bokhah has equal reasons to be highly suspicious of us that are at least equal to what we have to be suspicious of him.
4) We can reasonably suspect that Boris Bokhah has been exposed to at least as strenuous vetting procedures as we'd see in the empire.
5) Therefore Boris Bokhah is what he appears to be.
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Wow, again, 'reasonably sure' that he's had decent vetting. Sounds a lot like 'most likely'. Great, it's almost like I've addressed this before. We can improve certainty to "we're sure he's had decent vetting, we did it ourselves". All that we know Kislev checks for seems to be Vamps. Who does the Chaos checks? How good are they? Etc. We don't know.

Also, stop shouting about fallacy when you aptly demonstrated the fallacy of the excluded middle time and time again.

ReImagined said:
Most Greys don't have windsight as good as ours. Mathilde being able to see his emotions makes a big difference on making judgement calls; chaos cultists generally don't feel resolve and grief upon ordering an assassination. There's ways to fool windsight, of course, but there's a point where paranoia becomes counterproductive. A lot of that insitutional paranoia manifests as what Mathilde already does naturally as part of her below-abstraction-level thoughts and actions, like that meeting with Thorek on Turn 35 which was unusual enough that she thought it might've been an assassination attempt by an imposter. I think any due-diligence that needs to be met would be part of that, if necessary.
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If he can't cast divine spell and hasn't been mutated, then he'd look normal. Just like the Kurgans who weren't blessed but still worshipped the Four looked normal, we just knew to be suspicious. We need to do vetting ourselves here.
 
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GrimTheMad said:
It's actually pretty interesting that Boris has, across three meetings, pegged Mathilde's character enough to make this proprosal.

Namely, that while she's a terrifying magical assassin, she's a terrifying magical assassin with principles, and those principles align at least in part with his own.

And, unlike, Mathilde, he doesn't have the advantage of soft-mindreading level Windsight.

I guess she made as much an impression on him as he did on her.
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Though the Drycha business probably solidifed his opinion on Mathilde, Boris already thought well of her when she met him regarding the Waystone project, and he said why: because he spoke to the Vlag dwarves about her. So those saying Protector actually aren't entirely wrong, though it would be more accurate to say that it was protector-by-proxy.
EDIT: Eshin'd.
 
thisisinsane said:
Sorry, it was Night prowler. For some reason I thought it was protector.
That actually makes me really uneasy that he would ask someone who he worked with once to assassinate his dad with no other testament to our character.

[X] No

Edit: Ninja
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Mathilde's first really good impression on Kislev was when she stuck around to help Ice Granny during the bearzzard. She could've fled, but she stuck around, risked her live, and saved the equivalent of a LM. She also saved a whole bunch of dwarves, adding protection to one of Kislev's borders, and she didn't just take the convenient option of letting the daemons search out some Kislev peasants, instead facing them in battle. Later, she came to tell of a brewing problem, then stood by his side in battle to face it. She saved many lives during this, both by delivering the information, by getting massive amounts of reinforcement, and by fighting and killing the enemy leader in battle (preventing an attack on Ice Granny again). And of course, in between those two things, she's working on pushing back Za, something he really, really wants, and also proofs she share his view for the long term, and actually making things better. And she's succeeded at it. And she offered it to Kislev, nearly as soon as it was developed. I rather doubt there's another Imperial who has done so much for Kislev in so little time. She has, on multiple occasions, taken risks for the betterment of Kislev. For a country that expects to stand alone, that matters.

And you know, she's proven a steadfast ally to not only Kislev, but the dwarfs. Dwarfs have standards about integrity, yet they think Mathilde is the best thing since Sigmar. That's a pretty solid attestation of character right there, and it also means that Mathilde can be trusted to work for allies of the Empire and produce excellence.

Hell, even her early career of fucking over vampires and freeing an country from their grip would resonate, given Kislev's own recent past.

No doubt it was still a difficult decision. But it's based on more than just a single interaction. It's based on twenty years of success and making the world better.
 
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Abhorsen said:
If he can't cast divine spell and hasn't been mutated, then he'd look normal. Just like the Kurgans who weren't blessed but still worshipped the Four looked normal, we just knew to be suspicious. We need to do vetting ourselves here.
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To reiterate and expand on a previous point, Hag Witches have an actual subtle spell for detecting followers of Chaos and Boris hangs around with them. If he was Chaos Tainted they'd have noticed and disposed of him by now...Hag Witches don't mess around.

He's probably less likely to be a Chaos follower than any other leader in the Old World. Okay, maybe not the Emperor, but anyone else.
 
Codex said:
Some people may remember my ill-fated End Times thread that I never finished, and in there I did a read through of a good portion of the first book. Interestingly enough, the Changeling plays a big part in it.

It's End Times, so take this with a grain of salt, but the only person who could determine who was the Changeling and who could not wasn't some divine entity. It was Deathclaw, Karl Franz' Griffon. The Changeling was tussling with Valten and had transformed into Valten himself, and while Karl Franz couldn't tell who was who, Deathclaw tackled the Changeling successfully.

The entire section of the book was chock full of plotholes and ridiculous contrivances, so I don't really take this with any seriousness, but it's a brainworm I had from the current discussion.
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This recent talk brought to my attention that the Master of the Meteor Wind short story from Total Warhammer (on the Total War site, it's free if you have an account) has Yuan Bo figuring out that the Changeling is disguised as his sister Miao Ying, because they slipped up minutely in their behavior:

Master of the Meteor Wind said:
As Miao Ying finished refilling his teacup, Yuan Bo tapped a finger on the table to indicate his thanks. She cupped her own teacup in both hands and raised it to her lips, the hint of a smile in her changing, storm-white eyes.

Keeping his own expression blank, Yuan Bo sipped calmly at his tea.

He had been starting to suspect, but now he was certain.

He set down his teacup, smoothing dry his black moustache under his fingers.

'You are not Miao Ying.'

She glared at him in cold fury but then, in place of a denial, her lips parted for a bitter half-smile. An iridescent shimmer rolled ahead of it, turning the cold, alabaster skin of her face to chromatic feathers and then back again. 'It was that insufferable tea ceremony wasn't it?' The voice was that of Miao Ying, but in every other aspect of her tone and demeanour she had become a stranger wearing her skin. 'A tea leaf out of place? Inadequate solemnity in returning the pitcher to its place on the table?'

Yuan Bo shook his head.

'Then what?'

'Your performance was perfect, but you neglected to attend to mine.' Yuan Bo tapped his middle and index fingers together on the table. 'This is how I thanked you for the first cup of tea. And this…' He curled in his middle finger and repeated the gesture with just one, 'is how I thanked you just now. This is how one thanks a tea host of lower station to oneself. The real Storm Dragon of Nan-Gau would never allow such an insult to her pride.'

The thing that had been Miao Ying sighed.

'I was bored of this shape anyway.'
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It was a matter of inconsistency with her character - he started suspecting something when realizing she was oddly calm at the prospect of facing a Tzeentchian cult in her own lands.

Incidentally, I've mentioned it before, but it's kinda hilarious how Yuan Bo has some similarities to Mathilde herself - he's a bureaucrat-spymaster, a sorcerer (albeit of Azyr) and warrior with a very large sword. Furthermore, he is known for executing not just the Jade Emperor's wishes, but also literal enemies.

The short story ends with him noting that his sword is useful for reminding his siblings that not only is he watching, but also that he and his sword might visit his siblings from time to time. Though there's a world of difference in how he and the Grey Order do things, "dont make me come over there" is a strong point of similarity.
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GrimTheMad said:
It's actually pretty interesting that Boris has, across three meetings, pegged Mathilde's character enough to make this proprosal.

Namely, that while she's a terrifying magical assassin, she's a terrifying magical assassin with principles, and those principles align at least in part with his own.

And, unlike, Mathilde, he doesn't have the advantage of soft-mindreading level Windsight.

I guess she made as much an impression on him as he did on her.
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It's Vlag. He said in our first meeting with him that he went to see them, and that they told him she didn't give up on them after they gave up on themselves. Then afterwards Mathilde mused to herself that she got exactly what she was hoping for when wearing the Protector side of the coin - it's just that she wasn't expecting Boris to have such strong expectations.
 
DeadmanwalkingXI said:
To reiterate and expand on a previous point, Hag Witches have an actual subtle spell for detecting followers of Chaos and Boris hangs around with them. If he was Chaos Tainted they'd have noticed and disposed of him by now...Hag Witches don't mess around.

He's probably less likely to be a Chaos follower than any other leader in the Old World. Okay, maybe not the Emperor, but anyone else.
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Okay, this is actually evidence, thanks for pointing it out. If we know about the spell IC, then I'd be fine not double checking. I don't think we know about it though?
 
[X] Yes

As much as I hate it... this is preferable to an alternative that will likely end in civilian casualties as a whole host of things need to go just right to avoid a civil war.
 
Abhorsen said:
Okay, this is actually evidence, thanks for pointing it out. If we know about the spell IC, then I'd be fine not double checking. I don't think we know about it though?
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I'm not sure we need to know about the specific spell. We know that Kislev's magical traditions guard Kislev from infiltration by Chaos (you can tell by how it doesn't get infiltrated often, only invaded), we know that Boris is in tight with those same magical traditions just in general, and we know from our own interactions with them that the traditions as a whole have not been compromised.

Those three things together make it pretty hard to believe that Boris is corrupted by Chaos here. We know he's being checked for that by professionals...not knowing their methodology doesn't really change that.
 
Abhorsen said:
Okay, this is actually evidence, thanks for pointing it out. If we know about the spell IC, then I'd be fine not double checking. I don't think we know about it though?
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Boney said:
Mopman43 said:
Well, I suppose there's the first question to ask:

@BoneyM, did the Kislev books talk about the Ungol Hags? Is Mathilde aware of them and their unique strengths in the realm of curing people with bear piss and fish guts?
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Yes, the founders of the Colleges documented their time in Kislev quite well, so Mathilde would have a general idea of who they are and what they do.
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I'd assume it's part of knowing their general capabilities.
 
 
Okay, leaving aside the pragmatic argument of why we should do this since that has been better said by people more articulate in English than me, I am going to put my two cents in part as to why I already voted YES.

Because I think it'll be fun to read Honestly it sounds like a good adventure even if it's still short We get to see Mathilde have another one since it's been a while and watch her plan and execute another nation's head of state as the super spy The killer that she is sounds great and I would like to read that.

So I do want to do this because it sounds really fun to read how Boney writes it.
 
Woltaire said:
Well looks like we are murdering another head of state!
Adhoc vote count started by mcclay on Sep 11, 2023 at 1:52 PM, finished with 908 posts and 141 votes.
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Ftfy

The Warboss of the Crooked Moon Tribe was the head of a Morktocracy.
 
BurnNote said:
I rather doubt there's another Imperial who has done so much for Kislev in so little time. She has, on multiple occasions, taken risks for the betterment of Kislev. For a country that expects to stand alone, that matters.
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…Goddamit, it's the dwarves all over again. Mathilde has got to stop being the best Imperial diplomat to foreign nations somehow. Diplomacy is literally her weakest stat!
Woltaire said:
Well looks like we are murdering a head of state!
Adhoc vote count started by mcclay on Sep 11, 2023 at 1:52 PM, finished with 908 posts and 141 votes.
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The sheer disparity in votes really makes me wonder what Mathilde's thought process will be like. For all that a lot of the yes votes recognize that this is a really shitty prospect, she still seems to have very little doubt about its necessity.
 
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