The build-up to the rise of Magnus the Pious explicitly has each divided electoral province in of itself besieged by decentralized anarchy with free cities and knightly orders and noble fiefdoms struggling to handle the onslaught of Chaotic cults, necromancers and vampires, and dhar-using witches. Real "end of the world" stuff as the lands themaelves shook at the coming of the Everchosen. Absolutist territories these are not.
The time of Magnus the Pious is still a century away and this is only 70 years after the last Vampire Wars. While I dont doubt that some decentralization of authority has happened since the great efforts necessary to defeat the Carsteins, there is still a century's time for things to reach the anarchy of Great Chaos War.
 
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The time of Magnus the Pious is still a century away and this is only 70 years after the last Vampire Wars. While I dont doubt that some decentralization of authority has happened since the great efforts necessary to defeat the Carsteins, there is still a century's time for things to reach the anarchy of Great Chaos War.
Fair enough, that's true too. But still centrifugal forces can work very quickly.
 
Right, so my character for my claim for Averland:

Grand Count Francis Ludwig von Ellinbach


"My grandfather rode a camel, my father rode a camel, I drive a Mercedes, my son drives a Land Rover, his son will drive a Land Rover, but his son will ride a camel"

The von Ellinbach dynasty has maintained relatively stable rule over Averland in the century since the end of the Vampire Wars, largely by committing to a stance of cautious neutrality in the succession crisies that have torn Sigmar's Empire apart and into conflict. Never declaring their own Emperor nor supporting any one claimant with excessive zeal, the Grand Counts of Averland have thus kept the peace within their own realm, which in the absence of either civil conflict or any major greenskin invasions in the past hundred of so years have grown quite wealthy. Averland's fertile river valleys and rolling grasslands provide for an abundant supply of food, meat, and wool, and the province's position as a nexus of trade between the dwarf kingdoms to the south and the powerful realms of Reikland and Wissenland to the north. As one of the most stable agriculturally secure provinces of the Empire, many refugees from war-torn lands elsewhere have flocked to the province, further expanding its prosperity. All this has been made possible by the pragmatic leadership of two generations of von Ellinbach electors, who have in defiance of the typical Averlander stereotype pursued a prudent and pragmatic policy which has allowed the province to come to where it is now.

Grand Count Francis Ludwig is about to burn that all to the ground.

Raised in wealth and privilege surpassed perhaps only by the Grand Princes of Reikland, the young Grand Count Francis Ludwig fancies himself as a chivalric hero right out of his beloved Tilean operas. Idolizing both the elite culture of Reikland to the north (an area which he would like nothing more than to reform the rustic Averlandish plains into the likeness of) and the knights of Bretonnia, Francis carries himself as a sort of noble warrior-poet, pouring vast sums his state's coffers into lavish court luxuries, sponsorship of the arts, and his beloved cavalry divisions alike. Where his father--Albrecht Siegsmund the Old--was cautious, humble, and temperate, Francis is rash, vain, extravagant. Where the previous von Ellinbach Counts preferred to reserve their strength and improve the wealth of their domains through realpolitik, Francis is eager to jump into conflict, show his power, and commit all of Averland's resources to doing what he perceives to be the right thing. His earnestness is matched only by his self-righteousness, and his courage only by his constant failure to consider the consequences his actions. As he sees it, it's high time that Averland's shameful shirking from its duty to Sigmar's legacy be brought to an end, and he will ride at the forefront of a glorious reunification of the Empire as it was meant to be. With him in a suitably high position at the top of it, of course.
 
Count Luciano Malasangre of Sylvania

Late of of Luccini, formerly Captain-General of the Company of the Tiger, BEING the eldest trueborn male of the Malasangre family, said family line descending from the union of Stefan von Drak and one Peronella of Tobaro during the reign of Emperor Gustav the Black, therefore upon the passing of the Countess Isabella Von Drak with no issue of her body RIGHTFUL AND TRUE INHERITOR of all titles, estates, and honors formerly held by the family of Von Drak and thus COUNT OF THE PROVINCE OF SYLVANIA AND LORD OF CASTLE DRAKENHOPF, his antecedents sworn and vouchsafed by we the undersigned, at this the Five Hundredth Convocation of the Theater of Ravens BEFORE THE EYES OF LORD MORR HIMSELF
 
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No non-humans means no playing as the Moot, sadly. I have a few ideas for characters though, assuming there's room.

Also, is there a Discord either up or planned?
 
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Staadholder-Count Luccinanto Yjsbraant van Hoogmans-Palutano, Baron of Marienburg and Elector Count of the Westerland

The chaotic nature of Marienburger politicking means that very few dynasties last longer than a few generations, so it is a miracle that the Hoogmans dynasty has just entered its third generation. Technically speaking, the Hoogmans dynasty all but ended with the death of the late Matteus van Hoogmans, but by some miracle, the Stadsraad traced its way to an heir through a Tilean cadet branch. The man who arrived in Marienburg was exactly as questionably fit for it as expected; having studied in both the Universities of Miragliano and Altdorf, he was, to be frank, a dandy. Foppish and given to affairs, unsuited for the life of court, completely unprepared for the machinations of the merchant houses, a serial alcoholic and worst of all, Tilean to his bone, he made a sorry excuse for the ruler of the Empire's richest port. In just the first month, he spent most of his time chasing the skirts of merchant daughters, when he didn't endanger himself in nonsensical and seemingly unwinnable duels against two or three at a time, which he somehow kept winning. An utter catastrophe, he spent more of his time impressing his friends from university with his immunity from consequences. He had everything.

And then Marienburg began taking it away. Merchant sons and daughters found more reliable matches and lovers, courtiers whispered behind his back, the merchant houses made noises about loans and the less scrupulous began to prepare for hidden knives. He found that his dueling partners had poisoned blades and that crossbowmen lurked in the shadows. The Rijskammer and Stadsraad began delegating his powers and assuming control of his princely offices. Slowly, the man who had dominated the court with his flamboyant and scandalous nature became something even worse than a target for assassination; he became old news. When a poisoned bolt struck him in the back and he was informed upon his miraculous recovery that luckily nothing had been jeopardized due to the Stadsraad assuming power, it was too much. He locked himself in, he cut contacts, he studied commerce and governance, he apprenticed with merchant houses and stopped chasing skirts - at least publically - and began leading the Stadsraad. In a year, he had turned into a harder man, a stronger man, a savvier man. Marienburg's man.

Today, the young Count and Baron remains a divisive figure. Having taken up rulership of the Westerland proper, he has become a skillful ruler, albeit one with an affinity towards the ambitious merchant houses rather than the Stadsraad. Assassins and old enemies still shadow him from those years ago, which he has stopped bothering about; there's no way to know if they were sent by a lover or an enemy after all. It's not uncommon to hear Marienburgers self-deprecatingly joke that others may conquer them, but the Count has already conquered them in the bedroom. Even now, he has not dropped his sense of Tilean honour, something that still causes problems as he duels for the honour of random women all over the Empire, Kislev and further yet. It is rumoured that Luccinanto Yjsbrant's expenditures on personal cosmetics and his honour guard exceed those of some state budgets, but there is a method to the madness now.

And perhaps, that is just what these mad times need.
 
Elector Countess Theophaneia Ysmay Gloriana Hochen, Grand Baroness of Hochland

The old count wanted a son.

It was no fault of young Theophaneia that she didn't satisfy this wish--and no matter to her father. He raised her as a true Hochlander lad, chilling his already fraught marriage to her mother (a well bred Morrite out of Gruyden), and making her a crack shot, formidable swordswoman, and excellent rider. The old count also made her a brother six years her junior, a bastard son two years her senior, several more byblow sons between herself and Albrecht, and in his final moments alive in the hills of his beloved county knocked up three young women from Esk and blew up his heart, ending a reign characterized by generosity, cheer, and very little forward planning or impulse control.

As the old folk say, the Count did extend that famous Hochland hospitality long, loud, and with impressive frequency.

For Theo it was not quite so amusing. Mother spent all the time she wasn't locked away in her tower locked away in the cellars, Albrecht had ideas about who should inherit, and who knew what her father's baker's dozen of bastard sons was getting up to. It set the tone for her first few years of leadership when at eighteen her brother Albrecht popped her head off from the steeple of Hergig's chapel of Sigmar as she approached it for her investiture. Theo returned the favor a few heartbeats later from a rooftop blind, regretting the loss of a jolly decent stand in for portrait posing and a generally tolerable younger sib. The next few years, called the War of Thirteen Sons by people who didn't like having tongues in their heads for very long, passed in similar fashion. Another fellow tried to kill her, she shot them. They brought friends, her men shot them, she shot some as well. By the time she was nearing thirty there were three six year old threats to her rule left playing on a bearskin her hunting lodge, while she dodged her creepy old mother with hunting expeditions, shooting people, and throwing lavish parties she didn't quite have the money for.

Today she has an easy charm, a killer's eyes, and the appetites of her father (thankfully without the dangers of too much firing from the hip). She might even have a husband around somewhere if this gets accepted and I can finagle it with another player or just pluck a beard out of the gentry of Hochland to secure the dynasty.
 
The Elector of Middenland
Elector Frederich Wilhelm von Bildhofen is a man of a great pious faith in Ulric, a soldierly disposition, and a dream... A dream to finally knock the damn Reiklanders out of contention for the throne, and restore his patron to his rightful place atop the Imperial Pantheon.

The Elector of Hochland (Black Forest, Oorah!)
Eberhard III von Auerbach, The Forester-King as he is known to his people, is a man of simple pleasures. Under his reign Hochland has avoided entanglements in the web of power struggles tearing the empire apart, and instead focused on the creation and retention of the Waldjaegers, crack shots with the infamous Long Rifle. His son, Eberhard IV, wishes to see these troops put to use. The struggle is coming to a head, and Hochland should use every means at it's disposal to come out, if not on top, as kingmaker and close second to the Emperor.

The Elector of Wissenland/Freistadt Nuln
Heinrich Karl von Stirlitz is a man with three things. Pyromania, Tinnitus, and a drive for invention. Working closely with the Dwarves, he seeks to develop the greatest weapons the world has ever seen! And if the Civil War happens to be a perfect place to test these weapons, then so much the better.
 
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Konstantin Rannulf Engel I, Grand Prince of the Reikland.

"Worship the mercy that outshines sick truths."

He is every inch the literal incarnation of the Reikland, more a gilded image of a young man than a man in his own right. His hair so gold it hurts, his eyes the green of Dawi-cut emeralds, with features like a Sigmarite saint in his moment of martyrdom. Wretchedly beautiful and mercilessly hatable and so dangerously likable all at once. He is a man who is languid in affect, slothful and lazy (but ah have you heard the rumors of what that handsome princeling gets up to, they speak to a certain kind of energy). A man who has learned his letters, his histories, his martial arts and his wine with the same half-amused, faux-ironic edge, as if life was a mildly entertaining melodrama upon the stage and perhaps, perhaps, he'd turn away in time but for now, at least, he'd watch and hum along. A man who never thought he'd have the throne he sits upon now and who has never wanted the greater seat that is offered to him still.

The story is a simple one really. His father dreamed of Empire. His father dreamed of his throne. His father snarled and spat in the face of old age and grey hair and weak limbs, glaring hate at a land that would not heed him and lords beyond his borders who would not bow. His father was beloved of his brother and his father shaped the elder Engel, his heir, into his spitting image while Konstantin was off at the University of Altdorf, indulging his taste for rampant criminality and idle hedonism. And one rainy evening, when the sky was the color of lead and the winds blew Kaspar Engel spoke out of turn to his drunken, bitter Prince and was struck once, too hard. And then again, harder still. And thrice and more but it didn't matter because poor Kaspar hit his head on cold stone by the fifth, his handsome face a bloody red ruin. His father's favorite, his chance at immortal youth, laying dead on the floor in his own filth.

What was that foolish, bold, melancholy boy thinking, it was said. To go riding in such wet weather?

No wonder he fell from his horse.

And so dear Konstantin came home to a quiet, shadowed estate and so soon, dear Father Engel took ill in turn and oh, what piety, what tender love and dutiful affection, it was said, for his wife the lady Margareta, to care for him in his sickness. To wipe his brow and change his sheets and bring him strong tea when he was too weak to eat.

And what a shame, what a shame, that in the end it was all for naught and the man of twenty seven was crowned by Midwinter, a golden coronet set on his head as he knelt in the snow, his mother watching on with sober pride. But, ah...

He was always her favorite.
 
Kaspar Engel spoke out of turn to his drunken, bitter Prince and was struck once, too hard. And then again, harder still. And thrice and more but it didn't matter because poor Kaspar hit his head on cold stone by the fifth, his handsome face a bloody red ruin. His father's favorite, his chance at immortal youth, laying dead on the floor in his own filth.
 
1) The cult of Ulric
-Kriestov Ar-Ulric: High priest and notable warrior. Known to be flanked by a pair of large white wolves at all times. A symbol or Ulrics blessing and protection.
Kriestov is currently seeking to to improve the lives of the faithful, seeking to more deeply entrench the church with the people. He plans to do this by building walls, more formalized armies of the faith and getting more involved.

2) The cult of Sigmar
- Grand Theogonist Reuben Wrolfgar: Currently seeking to expand ties with the Dwarves, the skill of their craft could be of great use to the empire. He seeks to more formalize the loyalties and ties to the dwarves Ideally getting some under full time employment of some sort forging great weapons and armor for the empire.

3) What ever the GM wants
-No really, It will take me quite some time to write a third.
 
Konstantin Rannulf Engel I, Grand Prince of the Reikland.

"Worship the mercy that outshines sick truths."

He is every inch the literal incarnation of the Reikland, more a gilded image of a young man than a man in his own right. His hair so gold it hurts, his eyes the green of Dawi-cut emeralds, with features like a Sigmarite saint in his moment of martyrdom. Wretchedly beautiful and mercilessly hatable and so dangerously likable all at once. He is a man who is languid in affect, slothful and lazy (but ah have you heard the rumors of what that handsome princeling gets up to, they speak to a certain kind of energy). A man who has learned his letters, his histories, his martial arts and his wine with the same half-amused, faux-ironic edge, as if life was a mildly entertaining melodrama upon the stage and perhaps, perhaps, he'd turn away in time but for now, at least, he'd watch and hum along. A man who never thought he'd have the throne he sits upon now and who has never wanted the greater seat that is offered to him still.

The story is a simple one really. His father dreamed of Empire. His father dreamed of his throne. His father snarled and spat in the face of old age and grey hair and weak limbs, glaring hate at a land that would not heed him and lords beyond his borders who would not bow. His father was beloved of his brother and his father shaped the elder Engel, his heir, into his spitting image while Konstantin was off at the University of Altdorf, indulging his taste for rampant criminality and idle hedonism. And one rainy evening, when the sky was the color of lead and the winds blew Kaspar Engel spoke out of turn to his drunken, bitter Prince and was struck once, too hard. And then again, harder still. And thrice and more but it didn't matter because poor Kaspar hit his head on cold stone by the fifth, his handsome face a bloody red ruin. His father's favorite, his chance at immortal youth, laying dead on the floor in his own filth.

What was that foolish, bold, melancholy boy thinking, it was said. To go riding in such wet weather?

No wonder he fell from his horse.

And so dear Konstantin came home to a quiet, shadowed estate and so soon, dear Father Engel took ill in turn and oh, what piety, what tender love and dutiful affection, it was said, for his wife the lady Margareta, to care for him in his sickness. To wipe his brow and change his sheets and bring him strong tea when he was too weak to eat.

And what a shame, what a shame, that in the end it was all for naught and the man of twenty seven was crowned by Midwinter, a golden coronet set on his head as he knelt in the snow, his mother watching on with sober pride. But, ah...

He was always her favorite.

I didn't expect something this horrifying and beautiful in this thread.

Glorious.
 
OK then so, I've got Uni today, but after I'm done in like six hours I'll make final decisions for the players of the major factions and then open the application process up to those who are interested in playing more minor ones as well (we already have applications for Sylvania and the Moot).

As a general note - if you don't provide me with any kind of actual character to go with your claim, you're not getting it. Every major role has at least one claim with an actual name and general description attached so far, so... you know, fair warning there.

Hochland and Nordland are going to be interesting choices, since they've both got four separate applications for them, and Wissenland isn't far behind with three. I'll need to pick carefully here, and I'm pretty gratified that we've got a bunch of interest being expressed.

Also, to reiterate, I'll be looking for people to help me write reports and such, generally PCs who can be trusted to write stuff for areas that their own state doesn't have an immediate interest in - @Havocfett already volunteered to write stuff with an emphasis on far-off lands, which helps, but I'll need more than just that if I want the report cycle to go at any kind of reasonable pace.
 
Also, to reiterate, I'll be looking for people to help me write reports and such, generally PCs who can be trusted to write stuff for areas that their own state doesn't have an immediate interest in - @Havocfett already volunteered to write stuff with an emphasis on far-off lands, which helps, but I'll need more than just that if I want the report cycle to go at any kind of reasonable pace.

I mean, I <3 Warhammer Fantasy, so I'd certainly be up for that.
 
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