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Warhammer Fantasy: Divided Loyalties - an Advisor's Quest

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Magic might be magic but it still follows rules, dhar in contact with magic turns that magic into dhar. You would need to insulate the dhar from other magic, at which point it's no longer touching the magic and not turning it into dhar.

Sinsystems said:
So if Mathilde was to write a famous spellbook that includes all her unique stuff, some journal entries and all her papers, what would she call it?
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Mathildes Mystical Memorandum of Magical Might.
 
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Tobtorp said:
Magic might be magic but it still follows rules, dhar in contact with magic turns that magic into dhar. You would need to insulate the dhar from other magic, at which point it's no longer touching the magic and not turning it into dhar.
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At which point it would not be able to serve as an orb and probably look strange to mage-sight. I'm sure Kairos for instance would still be able to pull it off, I'm also sure he has more important things to do.
 
Boney said:
"Yes, that's part of what makes the seafarers to the north a problem," he says, effortlessly switching onto an entirely different topic as he begins to carefully unravel energies from around a shoulder joint. "At the larger scale they have all the ruthlessness typical of the worshippers of the Four, but on the level of individual villages and ships they're very strongly intersupporting, very able to work towards the collective good even at the cost of individual gain. It also might be what makes it possible to chip them away from the influence of the Four, as our cousins in the west seem to be doing through Marienburg. It challenged a great deal of our assumptions when the influx of Norscans were successfully integrated into Nordland instead of proving its downfall, but in the end it gets woven back into the overall tapestry of evil's self-sabotage."

"It's a reminder too rarely heeded," Sarumar chimes in. "Evil whispers that the power is free and it's the jealous that wish you not to take it, and too often those in power simply emphasize how strongly the 'jealous' will crush you if you take, when they need to also be challenging the core premise. The Other Path will cost those who follow it everything, even when that cost isn't being extracted by the arrows of the Ghost Striders."

"Or the teeth of the Wolf," Seilph says playfully. Sarumar just smiles.
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So, rereading this... Any ideas on who or what the 'teeth of the Wolf' refer to? The most obvious read for that is that it's referring to the followers of Ulric and how they're very active in fighting Chaos, but it seems odd for a Grey Lord to refer to them given how isolationist they are. It's also odd that Seilph seems like he's teasing Sarumar.

...Maybe they had something to do with the Flame of Ulric, back when Middenheim was still an elf colony, before the War of the Beard?

Sinsystems said:
So if Mathilde was to write a famous spellbook that includes all her unique stuff, some journal entries and all her papers, what would she call it?
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To give a non-meme answer, Liber Crepusculum sounds neat enough for it.
 
Parabola said:
So, rereading this... Any ideas on who or what the 'teeth of the Wolf' refer to? The most obvious read for that is that it's referring to the followers of Ulric and how they're very active in fighting Chaos, but it seems odd for a Grey Lord to refer to them given how isolationist they are. It's also odd that Seilph seems like he's teasing Sarumar.

...Maybe they had something to do with the Flame of Ulric, back when Middenheim was still an elf colony, before the War of the Beard?
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I think it's more a comment about how the Eonir have adopted the worship of Ulric, so the "teeth of the wolf" are another weapon they can use against chaos.
 
Parabola said:
So, rereading this... Any ideas on who or what the 'teeth of the Wolf' refer to? The most obvious read for that is that it's referring to the followers of Ulric and how they're very active in fighting Chaos, but it seems odd for a Grey Lord to refer to them given how isolationist they are. It's also odd that Seilph seems like he's teasing Sarumar.

...Maybe they had something to do with the Flame of Ulric, back when Middenheim was still an elf colony, before the War of the Beard?
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Much easier answer, the elfs are now partly ulrican and as such the grey lords have probably started at least gaining some interest about what's happening out there.
 
[X] Plan: The Prismatic Wanderer

#GiveQrechASkyTour

I love the idea of a flying ship, I look forward to getting into the details of what exactly it'll involve, and I anticipate the role it may play in the story.

I imagine it'll bring us reknown, have great impact with any diplomatic visits, be useful militarily and logistically in adventures and campaigns, open new narrative doors - and best of all has the potential to let us argue endlessly about convincing this or that party to build airships.

  • Maybe the EIC would buy a small unarmed sky boat to transport news, I think Wilhelmina has griped about not being able to get the dwarves to sell access to to that capability. A small unarmed craft ought to be cheaper/easier, right?
  • Maybe king Brynneroth would partner up to make it work - gyrocopters seem to transport mail within the KaK, but that won't extend across the canals and rivers he now has access to in the Empire. Information isn't just power - it's money!
  • Maybe Laurelorn/The Grey Lords can be goaded into building their own - maybe they don't want to be shown up, maybe they want trade/dilplomatic links less dependant on Empire infrastructure, maybe a House can be guided into tourism (cruises for the tourier - sky boats count as Laurelorn territory, and you're not stepping out of the city), maybe they just want to visit the best library on the continent.
  • Maybe Belegar will see the light and buy the Library a boat to move scribes, books, and shuttle visitors to and from the Colleges or elsewhere... And also remind the world K8P once was an air hub, and prod Thorgrim into making reactivation of the gas forges a priority, if only for pride.
  • Maybe Sky-We! The We might be about to become filthy rich after all, and how else can they (or their split-we) travel and see the world of the karaz-we and the empire-we?
  • Eike likes ships, right?

But maybe all of these may take AP to investigate, and have further costs to be paid, and have dubious value for that investment. But it sure is fun to think and read about, even if we never pick the option.


Joking aside, I do think the airship has a lot to offer other than just a new flavour of transport
  • Qrech has been locked away for so long for understandable security reasons... But we could take him on a sky-tour, no?
  • Eike likes ships and travelling, right? I'm sure she'd love to helm the ship when we're busy. Lay the groundwork for her sky-trade-empire.
  • Those in our social/work circles may take advantage to travel places they wouldn't - like our Library
  • Arrival by wizardly sky ship has great impact! Maximum diplomatic points
  • New social things might be available (use your sky ship to pick up all your friends for your birthday party)
  • Makes things like mapping/exploration easier. Do you really want to try using surveying equipment from a gyrocopter? Good luck with that
  • Really cool lore - what does it take for magical flight anyway? Is it present in the empire but obscure? Is it newish and untested, or are there sufficient risks to make it a non-starter in most cases...
  • We may be prompted with new calls to adventure based on our new abilities
  • The narrative flow of events may take us to different and better places when doing group things if we have better group travel, adventure, and support capabilities. There are no dice rolls for this, and no stats. But outcomes might be better, or better regarded.
Anyway, I look forward to it.
 
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Mopman43 said:
Was Middenheim ever an Elf colony? The main mention of pre-human inhabitants is of Dwarfs.
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Parabola said:
I was under the impression it might have been, given that it's the location of a nexus.
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Middenheim was carved out of a mountain, which makes me doubt it was an Elf colony, but it could have been Dwarven. Mathilde knows the origin as the Teutogens enlisting displaced Dwarves to settle it, and it wouldn't be the first time the Dwarves had to sneakily resettle a nexus that was previously lost (see: Bugman's Brewery, which was a resettlement of Kazad Thar)
 
Natch said:
Middenheim was carved out of a mountain, which makes me doubt it was an Elf colony, but it could have been Dwarven. Mathilde knows the origin as the Teutogens enlisting displaced Dwarves to settle it, and it wouldn't be the first time the Dwarves had to sneakily resettle a nexus that was previously lost (see: Bugman's Brewery, which was a resettlement of Kazad Thar)
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Maybe! But at the very least we know that because it's not connected to any other mountains, and it still works without a dwarf population, it has to be an elven nexus, not a Karak-waystone.

Maybe Middenheim was a joint project of some kind between the elves and dwarfs? It certainly doesn't seem like a place that dwarfs would normally live in.
 
Parabola said:
Maybe! But at the very least we know that because it's not connected to any other mountains, and it still works without a dwarf population, it has to be an elven nexus, not a Karak-waystone.

Maybe Middenheim was a joint project of some kind between the elves and dwarfs? It certainly doesn't seem like a place that dwarfs would normally live in.
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It is the southern tip of the Middle Mountains, a place we know Dwarves settled and then abandoned and refuse to talk about why.

It was the dwarven kingdom of Karaz Ghumzul, and interestingly enough broke off from the rest of the dwarves and refused to participate in the War of the Beard.

Middenheim was likely a dwarven surface settlement that elves built a waystone in during the golden age when elves and dwarves cooperated. It wasn't a Karak because all the Karaks in the middle mountains got sealed when the dwarves fled.

It is also noteworthy that the dwarves fled the middle mountains in the year -200, just a scant 150 years before Middenheim was settled.
 
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When Boney dropped the lore on the Kingdom of Elthin-Arvan (the Old World colonies of Ulthuan declaring themselves the 11th Kingdom), Kislev City, Altdorf, Marienburg, Talabheim, and Castle L'Anguille were all mentioned, but Middenheim wasn't. Those other locations are also major port cities or situated on rivers, which makes sense with the idea that the elves were colonizing by water, while I believe Middenheim is landlocked and just to the west of the Middle Mountains, which we know contained dwarf settlements at the time.

For reference:
Boney said:
The first piece of the puzzle: the Eonir. Most Imperial accounts describe them as fae woodland spirits of which little is known for sure, but Dwarven ones go back considerably further, all the way to a research expedition sent by the Everqueen into Laurelorn during the reign of the second Phoenix King, Bel Shanaar the Explorer. In time it sprouted into the two cities of Tor Lithanel and Kor Immarmor, and at first they were simply outposts of the Kingdoms of Ulthuan. Then during the civil war when Malekith and Caledor I tore Ulthuan apart over who was the rightful third Phoenix King, the Old World colonies declared themselves Elthin-Arvan, the eleventh Kingdom of Ulthuan. After Malekith was expelled and Caledor I was slain by assassins, the newly-crowned fourth Phoenix King, Caledor II, quite firmly suppressed this attempt at independence and brought the High Council of Elthin-Arvan back under the direct control of Ulthuan, breeding quite a bit of resentment amongst the Old World Elves who chafed under the rule of an island that many of them had not seen for centuries.

Then Caledor II shaved the Dwarven Ambassador and began the War of Vengeance, and the full force of the Karaz Ankor fell upon the Old World colonies.

By the time Caledor II fell during the Battle of Three Towers, slain by High King Gotrek Starbreaker, the devastation of the Elthin-Arvan was almost complete. Athel Numiel was destroyed, later to be rebuilt as Pelzburg, then Dorogo, then Kislev City. Kor Vanaeth was destroyed, leaving a single standing tower that humans would build around, first as Reichsdorf, then Reikdorf, and finally Altdorf, and College rumour has it that the central tower of the Celestial College is that same tower. Athel Maraya was destroyed, though its existence is firmly rejected by the Cult of Taal who insist that their ancestors were the first to build a city within the great crater that surrounds modern Talabheim. Tor Alessi was besieged fourteen times by the Dwarves, and the final time became the final battle of the War of Vengeance, and the buildings that survived later formed the core of Castle L'Anguille in Bretonnia. Only three significant Elven population centers remained in the Old World: the port-city of Sith-Rionnasc'namishathir, the scattered settlements of Loren Faen, and Tor Lithanel of Loren Lauroi.

Sith Rionnasc is easy to explain, because a river delta surrounded by swamps and supplied by sea is not the easiest nut to crack. It was later abandoned anyway after the fifth Phoenix King, Caradryel the Peacemaker, ordered all Elves to return to Ulthuan to participate in its defence against a renewed assault by Malekith and his followers. The ruins they left behind were settled by either the Jutones as the capital of the Jutonsryk or the Endals as the capital of Weysterland, depending on which version of history you read, and it is now known as Marienburg. The Elves of Loren Faen survived by joining with the forest itself, entering into strange pacts with the tree spirits native to the area and over time becoming known as the Asrai of Athel Loren. But Tor Lithanel survived by turning to the 'Grey Lords', the organization founded by the original research expedition and bolstered by Archmages exiled from Ulthuan for unsavoury experiments. When a Dwarven Throng destroyed Kor Immarmor and were on their way to do the same to Tor Lithanel, the leaders of the city called upon the Grey Lords, and the Throng never emerged from the forest they were marching through. As a bastion of safety in a sea of angry Dwarves it swelled with Elven refugees from across the Old World, and that immigration formed the basis for their modern society consisting of the aristocratic 'Cityborn' descendants of the pre-War settlers and the 'Forestborn' underclass that live in treetop dwellings. And presumably the Grey Lords still fit into there somewhere, enjoying the protections and privileges that their defence of Tor Lithanel bought them.
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That said, given the presence of an elven archmage in Karak Eight Peaks in DL canon, I'd assume there's plenty of room for elves to be there regardless of who settled and claimed it.
 
Mopman43 said:
It's a mountain.
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A carved-out mountain. It's open-air and would have exposed any dwarfs not living underground to the Winds. It's closer to Talabheim than to a regular dwarf Karak.

Unless you assume that Ulric really did fucking bring down his fist to flatten out Middenheim as his myths say (edit: or possibly an elven superweapon did it), it's a bad fit for dwarfs to actually live in.

Fouredged Sword said:
It is the southern tip of the Middle Mountains, a place we know Dwarves settled and then abandoned and refuse to talk about why.

It was the dwarven kingdom of Karaz Ghumzul, and interestingly enough broke off from the rest of the dwarves and refused to participate in the War of the Beard.
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I was under the impression that Ghumzul was composed of one specific mountain and not the whole of the Middle Mountains.

And, again, Middenheim's nexus still works and transmits energy to Tor Lithanel, when we know that Karak-Waystones a) need a chain of mountains to transmit their energy and b) need a population of dwarfs to keep the mechanisms functioning long-term.
 
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Parabola said:
Maybe! But at the very least we know that because it's not connected to any other mountains, and it still works without a dwarf population, it has to be an elven nexus, not a Karak-waystone.

Maybe Middenheim was a joint project of some kind between the elves and dwarfs? It certainly doesn't seem like a place that dwarfs would normally live in.
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Are you assuming only elves could build nexuses? Because the Jade college has a very distinctly Belthani nexus, we know Albion had theirs online before the elves did, and that's not even mentioning the Old Ones.
 
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