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Warhammer Fantasy: Divided Loyalties - an Advisor's Quest

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Boney said:
Dwarves know exactly what Ithilmar is worth, and value it even higher for being part of their history. There still might be profit to be had here and there from arbitraging bits of it to Laurelorn, but it's a sad and gradual sort of profit to be had by spending a great deal of time building a relationship with ancient but impoverished Dwarven Clans until they agree to accept a massive amount of money for their ancestral relics and then immediately dumping it into a Laurelorn smelter for a slightly more massive amount of money.
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I think @Deathbybunnies wasn't trying to arbitrage here, but rather is genuinely interested in getting Mathilde a suit of ithilmar as an armor upgrade for her personal use; the mention of the EIC ithilmar action was a "wait, is the reason we didn't get any from them that they don't have any or that they don't give it up for anything absent favors, because in the latter case..." chain of reasoning.
 
picklepikkl said:
I think @Deathbybunnies wasn't trying to arbitrage here, but rather is genuinely interested in getting Mathilde a suit of ithilmar as an armor upgrade for her personal use; the mention of the EIC ithilmar action was a "wait, is the reason we didn't get any from them that they don't have any or that they don't give it up for anything absent favors, because in the latter case..." chain of reasoning.
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@Deathbybunnies

Oh, right, my mistake. Hmm, yes, I'd say that would be doable.
 
picklepikkl said:
I think @Deathbybunnies wasn't trying to arbitrage here, but rather is genuinely interested in getting Mathilde a suit of ithilmar as an armor upgrade for her personal use; the mention of the EIC ithilmar action was a "wait, is the reason we didn't get any from them that they don't have any or that they don't give it up for anything absent favors, because in the latter case..." chain of reasoning.
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Yes, that's right. The ithilmar trade was great, but I'm now looking at the fanciest suit of armour within reach that isn't Von Tarnus's, since that doesn't seem to be winning.

Boney said:
@Deathbybunnies

Oh, right, my mistake. Hmm, yes, I'd say that would be doable.
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Great! I think I'll be arguing for that in the next purchase turn.
 
OK, that's my favorite use of the Vlag boon that has yet been proposed, insofar as it gets Mathilde something she would genuinely want and which is actually worth a Transcendent Boon without meaningfully affecting Vlag's prosperity the way that, say, "divert a significant chunk of your labor or material resources to X" would -- the armor doesn't help Vlag sitting in a vault, after all. And I've got to say, the prospect of rolling up to Nagarythe in ithilmar armor that she got from her dwarf friends that they had sitting around from the War of the Ancients is pretty dope in terms of the messages it sends. I don't think it makes our combat numbers go up (since it doesn't stack with AA), but it increases the most important number of all: style points.
 
Hmmm, lol.

[ ] Plan : Wizards Don't Like Hands-Me Down
- [ ] Ithilmar armor (Karag Vlag boon)
- [ ] Unlimited help and materials to enchant the armor to the gills (Orbs boon)
 
Personally I don't want ilthimar armor from anyone but the elves. That might be unpopular but it feels right to me.
And empire wizard with a dwarven gromril sword and elven ilthimar armor feels like the most multicultural we could be and it would be awesome.
 
picklepikkl said:
OK, that's my favorite use of the Vlag boon that has yet been proposed, insofar as it gets Mathilde something she would genuinely want and which is actually worth a Transcendent Boon without meaningfully affecting Vlag's prosperity the way that, say, "divert a significant chunk of your labor or material resources to X" would -- the armor doesn't help Vlag sitting in a vault, after all. And I've got to say, the prospect of rolling up to Nagarythe in ithilmar armor that she got from her dwarf friends that they had sitting around from the War of the Ancients is pretty dope in terms of the messages it sends. I don't think it makes our combat numbers go up (since it doesn't stack with AA), but it increases the most important number of all: style points.
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It does cover the use-case of our robes' current enchantment - not having to worry about AA expiring in the middle of a frantic battle, as the inexhaustibility aspect isn't as time-sensitive in a crisis - without using up the enchantment slot. Admittedly we've just had a bunch of arguments about why that's not a huge deal in Mathilde's usual way of doing things, but I think it is still an upgrade.

But yes, a lot of it is the raw style points. Silk robes, ithilmar armour, a runed gromril greatsword, a giant gold necklace with the word "MONEY" stamped out across it - Mathilde Weber, Vow of Poverty adherent extraordinaire, it's all coming together.

EDIT: Typing on a phone, my greatest weakness
 
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picklepikkl said:
OK, that's my favorite use of the Vlag boon that has yet been proposed, insofar as it gets Mathilde something she would genuinely want and which is actually worth a Transcendent Boon without meaningfully affecting Vlag's prosperity the way that, say, "divert a significant chunk of your labor or material resources to X" would -- the armor doesn't help Vlag sitting in a vault, after all. And I've got to say, the prospect of rolling up to Nagarythe in ithilmar armor that she got from her dwarf friends that they had sitting around from the War of the Ancients is pretty dope in terms of the messages it sends. I don't think it makes our combat numbers go up (since it doesn't stack with AA), but it increases the most important number of all: style points.
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Would we be able to cast in ithilmar? I thought that had to be enchanted in a specific way to allow that?
 
picklepikkl said:
And I've got to say, the prospect of rolling up to Nagarythe in ithilmar armor that she got from her dwarf friends that they had sitting around from the War of the Ancients is pretty dope in terms of the messages it sends.
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That sounds equivalent to rocking up to a dwarf karak wearing gromril armour that was looted from dead dwarves by your elf friends during the War of the Beard. I don't think the message would be any amount of dope.

Also, elves are tall while Mathilde is short, so I'm not sure how well ithilmar armour would fit.
 
Actually, there could be a way to make the ithilmar armour idea work without offending Ulthuan: elves are tall while Mathilde is short. That means we could smelt down ithilmar armour, have some of the ithilmar made into new armour for Mathilde, and use the rest of the ithilmar as payment for the labour.
 
Andres said:
Actually, there could be a way to make the ithilmar armour idea work without offending Ulthuan: elves are tall while Mathilde is short. That means we could smelt down ithilmar armour, have some of the ithilmar made into new armour for Mathilde, and use the rest of the ithilmar as payment for the labour.
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Yeah, I was figuring we'd get Laurelorn to resize it for us.
 
Deathbybunnies said:
Yeah, I was figuring we'd get Laurelorn to resize it for us.
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We would ideally at least want any identifying marks removed, make it look Eonir-made. There was an emotional scene a year or so back in Dynastic Alcoholism where an elf father grieving for thousands of years finally got his daughter's wargear back, the last of what remains of her. I'd rather not intentionally flaunt looted armour.
 
Andres said:
We would ideally at least want any identifying marks removed, make it look Eonir-made. There was an emotional scene a year or so back in Dynastic Alcoholism where an elf father grieving for thousands of years finally got his daughter's wargear back, the last of what remains of her. I'd rather not intentionally flaunt looted armour.
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Yeah, fair enough.

Koguyra said:
Would putting a Master Rune combo on Ithilmar be within the remit of the Transcendant Boon?
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If not, we could afford that with our own Runesmith favour, I imagine. We'd have to choose between that and an enchantment, but I hadn't even thought of that as an option - that's certainly an advantage it has over the robes.

EDIT: Assuming it's possible, anyway - the dwarves can't generally work ithilmar, I don't know if that'd extend to adding on runes.
 
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BeepSmile said:
I disagree with this assessment quite strenuously.
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There would apparently have been (scant?) change out of our Ithilmar deal with the Eonir if we'd asked for an Ithilmar mail shirt in exchange instead of books.
Boney said:
DragonParadox said:
@Boney can we just ask for a bit of that Ithilmar in mail shirt form and the rest in gems/gold?
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That would be a valid option for the Barter (specify what). That said, the 'bit' hints you might have a different idea than they do about the price for one of their very few ancient irreplaceable Bilbo-vests, but they will pay out what change there is.
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Sparsebeard said:
[ ] Plan : Wizards Don't Like Hands-Me Down
- [ ] Ithilmar armor (Karag Vlag boon)
- [ ] Unlimited help and materials to enchant the armor to the gills (Orbs boon)
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This seems like a plan to acquire something that may- possibly with a lot of luck and good will- hope to approach the Von Tarnus armour and it's unique ability to stack with AA for nigh-invulnerability, but also paying extra in the Transcendent Boon?
 
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Alliterate said:
I'm in no way persuaded that even the very shiniest suit of ancient armour, Elven or otherwise, carries marginal value, utility or worth to Mathilde equivalent to an 'ask for anything, no really, anything' Transcendent Boon.
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I have to agree. Asking for a suit of armor just seems very anticlimatic. Like, that's all? Sure ithilmar is incredibly rare and this would be an incredibly valuable trophy, but saving a Karak for that? There's also the fact that we're using a Dwarf boon for elf magic armor. I don't like the fit of it. It makes sense to be an option, but it'd be boring for me to read.

Also for any elf who knows of Mathilde, loot from the War of the Beard would be one of the most likely sources for her to get a full suit of ithilmar armor. Laurelorn wouldn't sell it. I can think of a few other sources, like loot from greenskins or beastmen or whatever, but the dwarfs would be the answer. Elves aren't anywhere near as touchy about grudges as dwarves are, but ithilmar just rubs it in their face.
 
For people saying "this isn't worth Vlag's Boon" - well, it probably is. It's been discussed over the last few days, but ithilmar is apparently worth way more than Mathilde realised, and she got absolutely rinsed in the deal with Laurelorn (Read: Boney was working off of a vague source elsewhere for calculating value, and a more specific recent source he's taking as canon for the quest puts it at much more expensive.)

Spending a Transcendent Boon actually is quite possibly the only way we'd ever be able to afford a suit of ithilmar armour.

There's also the fact that no one's come up with any good ideas for using the Boon. We thought about using the Rhunkit for the Project, but it turns out dwarven Runesmiths aren't really a bottleneck on the Project the way we thought they might be. People have suggested getting them to help reinforce Kislev against the next Everchosen, but there's no way they aren't already going to be putting every effort into resisting Chaos in the most efficient way possible; it'd be robbing Peter to pay Paul. And, more than that - a Boon should be something for Mathilde, not on geopolitics.

The fact that we haven't spent Vlag's Boon eleven turns later demonstrates just how much Karak Vlag doesn't have anything we need, or even particularly want. Spending it to use its access to the greater Karaz Ankor to get the best suit of armour possible is a fine use for the boon. Heck, with the possibility of adding runes, I'm quite excited about what we might get.

Alliterate said:
There would apparently have been (scant?) change out of our Ithilmar deal with the Eonir if we'd asked for an Ithilmar mail shirt in exchange instead of books.
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That would also have been just a mail shirt, not a whole set of plate armour. All of the ithilmar we could gather in the Empire didn't amount to much more than that.

Alliterate said:
This seems like a plan to acquire something that may- possibly with a lot of luck and good will- hope to approach the Von Tarnus armour and it's unique ability to stack with AA for nigh-invulnerability, but also paying extra in the Transcendent Boon?
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I'm not looking to replicate Von Tarnus' stacking with AA, but having a different enchantment - or runes - is plenty valuable. And it's not paying "extra", Von Tarnus' armour would be paid for by two massive magical discoveries - and more to the point, it's not winning the vote, sadly. It's not on the table.
 
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picklepikkl said:
I don't think it makes our combat numbers go up (since it doesn't stack with AA), but it increases the most important number of all: style points.
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It does stack with AA. It does make our combat numbers go up.

Boney confirmed that during the Ithilmar vote since people were concerned about it back then, pretty sure. Library just won out anyways because "literally the whole thing, no scribing necessary, yes even the restricted stuff about old ones".
Tobtorp said:
Personally I don't want ilthimar armor from anyone but the elves. That might be unpopular but it feels right to me.
And empire wizard with a dwarven gromril sword and elven ilthimar armor feels like the most multicultural we could be and it would be awesome.
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We will be getting it from the elves, though. We're just providing the raw material in exchange...
French Cowboy said:
Would we be able to cast in ithilmar? I thought that had to be enchanted in a specific way to allow that?
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Which is also why we will be able to cast in it.

And, generally, why it doesn't have to be any kind of mood killer, because Mathilde isn't going to blab about the origin of this suit's metal.



As for whether or not that's worth the boon... what if we didn't stop at the armor, but rather, the armor was just the start? Vlag is as distant from the culture of the wider karaz ankor as you can be while still formally being a member of it. If we wanted to, say, try out rebuilding ties between the dawi and the elgi, this time with Laurelorn instead of Ulthuan?

Culturally, at least, Vlag wouldn't be a bad first foot forward to do it with at all. And you know Belebro will see that and back us, and them, up to the hilt.

Or you know, maybe we do that without the armor, that's cool too. The waystone project may as well be the trial period for healing relations, if you think about it. As Mathilde indicated to Belegar while the okral worked below - even rifts of stone can be filled in and buffed smooth.
 
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