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Warhammer Fantasy: Divided Loyalties - an Advisor's Quest

Voted best in category in the Users' Choice awards.
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Mathilde has had one such reaction from a fellow wizard, a long time ago...
Boney said:
She stares at you wide-eyed, somehow giving the impression of looking up at you despite being an inch taller. "Is it true that when the Elector Count fell, you seized command of the Army and forced them to continue? That with magic and sword you toppled the Castle of Drakenhof from the mountain it perched upon and fell to the floor below?"

"Artillery deserves a significant part of the credit," you admit, "but apart from that, yes, that's how it happened."

She squeals, and breathlessly quizzes you about the campaign, and when Asarnil is mentioned she dashes off to her bags and comes back with a copy of his memoirs and you reluctantly sign it. You manage to squeeze a few questions in directed back at her, and she gives her name as Panoramia, apparently named after one of the most skilled potion-makers of her order.
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shepsquared said:
One day we'll get to see a Grey Journeyman freaking out about meeting Mathilde and running through a mental list of her accomplishments like we did when we first met the Bursar.
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Greys are literally trained to have poker faces. I cannot emphasize this enough.

Not reacting overtly is part of the curriculum in multiple ways and in multiple contexts. They are trained to act like they know what's going on even when they have no clue, they are trained to look like they know what they're doing even when they don't, they are trained to look unsurprised even when shocked, they are trained to school their reactions and not give away their true thoughts unless it is better to do so.

We appeared behind Eike when she was told to wait in the entrance to the Grey College and she reacted like the living legend she'd come to be fascinated by being her master was business as usual.

They might be freaking out internally, but their outward reactions will be schooled and controlled the moment their instincts-borne-of-training kick in.

Besides, Grey Wizard training probably instills courage by the nature of what you're trained to do even beyond the magic stuff. You don't practice sneaking into a noble's home to find their secrets or outright assassinate them without getting good at confronting the fear of getting caught or being discovered alone in enemy territory. You don't teach someone to be a spy or be constantly aware of the threat of subversion/assassination/espionage without instilling a sense of confronting and overcoming the fear. Freaking out (and showing it) is a practice that gets thoroughly trained out of them, and this has been consistent across every Grey Wizard that we've seen thus far, down to Eike.
 
SaltyWaffles said:
Greys are literally trained to have poker faces. I cannot emphasize this enough.

Not reacting overtly is part of the curriculum in multiple ways and in multiple contexts. They are trained to act like they know what's going on even when they have no clue, they are trained to look like they know what they're doing even when they don't, they are trained to look unsurprised even when shocked, they are trained to school their reactions and not give away their true thoughts unless it is better to do so.

We appeared behind Eike when she was told to wait in the entrance to the Grey College and she reacted like the living legend she'd come to be fascinated by being her master was business as usual.

They might be freaking out internally, but their outward reactions will be schooled and controlled the moment their instincts-borne-of-training kick in.

Besides, Grey Wizard training probably instills courage by the nature of what you're trained to do even beyond the magic stuff. You don't practice sneaking into a noble's home to find their secrets or outright assassinate them without getting good at confronting the fear of getting caught or being discovered alone in enemy territory. You don't teach someone to be a spy or be constantly aware of the threat of subversion/assassination/espionage without instilling a sense of confronting and overcoming the fear. Freaking out (and showing it) is a practice that gets thoroughly trained out of them, and this has been consistent across every Grey Wizard that we've seen thus far, down to Eike.
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Yes, I was thinking we'd see the scene from their POV, just like we did with that one nobleman who was asking questions about the EIC. I didn't forget any of that.
 
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SaltyWaffles said:
Greys are literally trained to have poker faces. I cannot emphasize this enough.

Not reacting overtly is part of the curriculum in multiple ways and in multiple contexts. They are trained to act like they know what's going on even when they have no clue, they are trained to look like they know what they're doing even when they don't, they are trained to look unsurprised even when shocked, they are trained to school their reactions and not give away their true thoughts unless it is better to do so.

We appeared behind Eike when she was told to wait in the entrance to the Grey College and she reacted like the living legend she'd come to be fascinated by being her master was business as usual.

They might be freaking out internally, but their outward reactions will be schooled and controlled the moment their instincts-borne-of-training kick in.

Besides, Grey Wizard training probably instills courage by the nature of what you're trained to do even beyond the magic stuff. You don't practice sneaking into a noble's home to find their secrets or outright assassinate them without getting good at confronting the fear of getting caught or being discovered alone in enemy territory. You don't teach someone to be a spy or be constantly aware of the threat of subversion/assassination/espionage without instilling a sense of confronting and overcoming the fear. Freaking out (and showing it) is a practice that gets thoroughly trained out of them, and this has been consistent across every Grey Wizard that we've seen thus far, down to Eike.
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In this context, "We" is presumably the thread, and Boney has written from perspectives other than Mathilde's before.
 
Bucolic said:
Another Day

For the first dawn in three thousand years, an airship is docked at Karag Eight Peaks.

It is a strange thing, a zhuf thing, if there is anything in this world that it is, and that should cause grumbling. And it would, if it was not the ship of a thane and loremaster, gifted to her in recognition that she could make some sense of out of all their nonsense.

So as a good and proper gyrocopter (or a newfangled deathtrap) briefly flashes by as it crosses before the sun, hidden here and there, there are quick and satisfied smiles. Something wrong has been made right.

For some this is bittersweet, for it means a friend, a lover, a confidant is leaving. Not forever, but for now. For some this is right, this is their wizard doing her thing, arriving in places unexpected. Should they begrudge others that happy (though sometimes smug) surprise? Another heart is soothed to see competence rewarded, to know that for the Colleges the reward for hard work is not always more work.

If you were to watch the 'copter carefully, you would see it make a lazy circuit. You'd see it circle the fields, cross by the wizard's tower, zip past the library, and linger by the Tree until finally, finally touching down before a small group of waiting figures. One person disembarks, two pistols on hip, a large hat on head.

"So" Mathilde says, smiling, "ready to go on an adventure?"
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I was heavily considering switching my vote away from airship but this propaganda has brought me back. The Armor of von Tarnus and Requests could never (but I am willing to be swayed by more user created propaganda for those too 🥺)
 
Eisenhelm said:
so if the ship becomes a thing who would crew it long term?, another instance of the We?
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While I fucking love that idea, I assume it'd be a mixed crew of Perpetuals and sailors who are willing to entertain wizard shenaniganry for a higher pay. Perpetuals to maintain whatever spells need maintaining, and sailors to keep the boat going in the right direction and all that. Probably not as many as would be on a mundane ship, though, given how many things enchantments could cover for and how much less maintainence you'd need to do on a ship not constantly soaking in seawater.
 
Execute/Dumbo said:
While I fucking love that idea, I assume it'd be a mixed crew of Perpetuals and sailors who are willing to entertain wizard shenaniganry for a higher pay. Perpetuals to maintain whatever spells need maintaining, and sailors to keep the boat going in the right direction and all that. Probably not as many as would be on a mundane ship, though, given how many things enchantments could cover for and how much less maintainence you'd need to do on a ship not constantly soaking in seawater.
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Could you not hire a few sailors to teach a We how to operate a ship? Needing the Perpetuals to maintain the magical elements of the ship is one thing, sure, but I don't see why intelligent spiders would have difficulty with the mundane tasks...

Okay, maybe with the knots. That'd probably be difficult without opposable thumbs. But even so!

(They might even have the advantage over a regular crew in the long run. At risk of revealing an ignorance of naval matters, my understanding is that a ship's crew typically has a number of specialist roles. Certain such roles would be easily filled by the Perpetuals - an Azyr Perpetual and Jade Perpetual would be ideal picks for navigating and medical work, for example - but for those that wouldn't be, a We would be able to maintain the knowledge and skills that those specialisms require across the entire population, allowing for greater redundancy and, at times, potentially faster completion of priority tasks.)
 
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As the plan notes, the ship might be crewed by Perpetuals. The thing with the We sounds very funny but realistically speaking, not only do giant subterranean spiders have zero experience with ships and flying (and lack opposable thumbs), they also need an Egg-Layer to remain, well, the collective intelligence that they are. And Egg-Layers are the size of houses. Maybe it'd have been possible if we'd gone with the flying castle option?

But I'm not sure the world is ready to accept the existence of a flying castle full of spiders.
 
Parabola said:
As the plan notes, the ship might be crewed by Perpetuals. The thing with the We sounds very funny but realistically speaking, not only do giant subterranean spiders have zero experience with ships and flying (and lack opposable thumbs), they also need an Egg-Layer to remain, well, the collective intelligence that they are. And Egg-Layers are the size of houses. Maybe it'd have been possible if we'd gone with the flying castle option?

But I'm not sure the world is ready to accept the existence of a flying castle full of spiders.
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"We could handle a flying castle full of spiders, but not a flying castle full of radical spiders," said Algard, watching his youngest lord-magister chase after a flying castle stealing the Imperial Palace and throwing down flyers.

"Arachno-Communists. Who would have thought?" said Regimand, looking at one of the flyers.
A dumb joke inspired by a dumb joke. Thank you to Weekly Roll, a wonderful webcomic.
 
Eisenhelm said:
so if the ship becomes a thing who would crew it long term?, another instance of the We?
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@Boney you better not rule this out, I will cry.


Parabola said:
As the plan notes, the ship might be crewed by Perpetuals. The thing with the We sounds very funny but realistically speaking, not only do giant subterranean spiders have zero experience with ships and flying (and lack opposable thumbs), they also need an Egg-Layer to remain, well, the collective intelligence that they are. And Egg-Layers are the size of houses. Maybe it'd have been possible if we'd gone with the flying castle option?

But I'm not sure the world is ready to accept the existence of a flying castle full of spiders.
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Most people start without such experience! However, a creature that is naturally inclined to moving in 3D space would have amazing potential for this, even before you get into things like "can rappel off of the ship with their own thread" and "are a self-replenishing army".

Like, did I mention that this would mean our ship comes with a self-replenishing army of air droppable monsters? Because that would be disgustingly powerful. Expensive, but that just means we can justify more income to the Bursar.

The world may not be ready to accept the existence of a flying ship (which will have to be appropriately large) full of spiders, but it is unquestionably in the best interests of the empire and her grey magisterial duties that Mathilde have and operate it.

Yesssssssss.
 
Prime 2.0 said:
However, a creature that is naturally inclined to moving in 3D space would have amazing potential for this,
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Keep in mind, however, that they're used to living underground. That one time we had to march a whole colony through K8P, they were anxious about being under the open sky the entire time, and I'm not sure how well their vision would work with bright light and long distances, as opposed to underground tunnels.
 
Somic said:
Keep in mind, however, that they're used to living underground. That one time we had to march a whole colony through K8P, they were anxious about being under the open sky the entire time, and I'm not sure how well their vision would work with bright light and long distances, as opposed to underground tunnels.
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I mean, unlike the library there IS reason to have other employees this time around, and considering how much magical might is going to be packed into this thing, if we DO need to use spiders for things they are biologically disadvantaged for, there's probably a ghur spell or likewise that can be added in. Think "battle altars of Enhance Spider", at whatever scale is appropriate for the task.

Because for real, our ship is already going to be loaded to the gills with stuff like that anyways, and we just made making more waaaaaaay easier.

Boney said that we'll be able to expand and upgrade any of the flying X's, after all.

Is that a lot of effort? Yes. But a regenerating army of airdroppable monster spiders for the ship to deploy wherever and whenever the fuck it wants is also a lot of payoff.

Just, worth repeating. Airdroppable monster army with skaven-like ability to recoup losses. That's a fucking superweapon even before the ship's ability to provide fire support comes into play!
 
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The omake convinced me.

[X] Plan: The Prismatic Wanderer
-[X] A flying warship, suited for both exploration and warfare
-[X] Comfortable for small groups of people to live in for extended periods of time, and capable in an emergency of transporting a medium-sized groups of elite forces from one place to another (e.g. Empire Knights, Dwarf Ironbreakers, Eonir Ghost Striders, KAU scribes)
-[X] Wizardy aesthetic - dragon figurehead on the prow, living tree serving as central mast, bottom possibly wreathed in fog, etc.
-[X] Has magical weaponry and/or defenses (e.g. Dragon figurehead on the prow might fill enemy forces with the fear of death, ballistas on the sides might shoot out fireballs, a Flock of Doom might emerge from a literal crow's nest, etc)
-[X] Possibly needs to be crewed by Perpetuals
-[X] Possibly flat-bottomed to allow for landing on firm ground, if that makes sense vibes-wise
 
Prime 2.0 said:
I mean, unlike the library there IS reason to have other employees this time around, and considering how much magical might is going to be packed into this thing, if we DO need to use spiders for things they are biologically disadvantaged for, there's probably a ghur spell or likewise that can be added in.
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Yeah, I was just responding to the argument about them being advantaged specifically.
 
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