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RHUNRIKKI STROLLAR (Warhammer Fantasy Golden Age Dwarf Runelord Quest)

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I'm not going to weigh in on the logic of either side's arguments, but I will ask that everyone read over what they write and really consider if the words they used are polite and won't be inflammatory intentionally or not. You cant account for people's tolerances perfectly but at least try to say your piece without saying things that can be easily construed as overly dismissive of the other side of the argument, thank you.

Please endeavour to be cordial. :^)
 
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aceraptor said:
Butterfly his existence away? Uh, you do realize that Malekith is already born right? He was born decades before the Vortex was created. He's centuries old by now basically.
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His specific actions may have already changed. I don't think he's friending dwarfs like he did canonically and so may lack the necessary insights to bait the dwarfs as easily.
 
Foreign politics in fantasy worlds are always weird. They can be summarized as total war, total indifference or cooperation to fight a greater evil. Granted there isn't much friction between Elves and Dwarfs because of culture, habitat and distance, but it would be interesting to see individual dwarfs starting a tariff ring and enrage elven nobles or Elves trying to buy Dwarven heirlooms only to get rejected and act out in revenge.

This is all very unlikely to happen because of one simple fact: lifespan. Both races live ridiculously long lifes and are therefore content to feel each other out for several decades or centuries, thereby drastically reducing the chance of diplomatic fuck ups.

Combine this with the fact that there is nothing to fight for and you get the diplomatic status "indifferent". The moment when the tension rises to high, both factions could simply solve the problem by stopping all interactions with the other faction for a few decades or centuries.

Without a diplomatic situation that forces one of the two factions, if not both, to war, there is little chance for one to happen. I'm really not too bothered about the War of Vengeance, because we can always stop diplomatic relations the moment things get too hot. There is no need to interfere and act to prevent it because doing nothing solves the problem.

By that point Snorri is probably old enough to have enough influence to bring that point forwards. A relationship of total indifference towards a realm an ocean away is really easy to pull of, especially if there is no contest for land, resources, religion, identity or ideology.
 
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Czes said:
This is all very unlikely to happen because of one simple fact: lifespan. Both races live ridiculously long lifes and are therefore content to feel each other out for several decades or centuries, thereby drastically reducing the chance of diplomatic fuck ups.
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You realise canonically Elves and Dwarves had long lives and that obviously didn't prevent the war?
Technically this all happened at the start of Caeldor II's reign so perhaps we could argue that they hadn't had that time, however the insult was so extreme its better to say that the big danger is that at some point they won't care enough to be reasonable or careful.
It doesn't take years of experience to know that shaving all the dwarf ambassadors who are seeking reparations in the hope of avoiding having to declare a grudge is a massive diplomatic fuck up. But the war still happened.
 
Tbh it is not as if Malekith' plan was super complex or that he was some kind of mastermind.

IIRC he raided dwarf settlements leaving arrow wounds and spear wounds on the bodies of the slain dwarfs and raided elf settlements leaving the corpses with height appropriate axe and hammer wounds.

You don't need to be an expert in dwarf psychology to predict their reaction when the rangers investigate a settlement that has fallen silent and find dozens of beardlings and literal children strung up by by their wrists like pinatas and then peppered with dozens of arrows with arrowheads in the ulthuani style, shafts made from ulthuani wood and fletching made from feathers of species native to ulthuan.

As soon as elven craftsmanship and the materials they use become known to the dwarfs, a process that has already started, the deception works.

I think Malekith' insight into elf psychology is more important than his knowlegdge of the dwarfen one. He correctly deduced that the ulthuani elves would do their best to cover up the civil war and would never admit to it happening in their glorious kingdom when outsiders come barging in and start demanding answers in a pointed manner. He deduced that they would especially refuse to admit that after the perpetrators of the coup failed in their plan, they were able to rip out the black arks from the ulthuan mainland and drown a province while escaping, remaining strong enough to launch raiding forces and hold teritory. This means that the dwarfs wouldn't know that there is a group on the loose that has defied the phoenixking and the entire ulthuani social structure.

The elven reaction to the dwarven demands for reparation would seal the deal as even if Malekith had not raided elven settlements and framed the dwarfs, the ulthuani elves would not have been able to stomach paying reparations for murders committed by the dark elves and would have refused to point the dwarfs to the actual culprits. This makes the dwarven response inevitable.

Malekith did not so much play the dwarfs as he played the elves and by this point in time he already has centuries of political and social experience on the highest rungs of elven society.
 
Kian said:
Malekith did not so much play the dwarfs as he played the elves and by this point in time he already has centuries of political and social experience on the highest rungs of elven society.
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He presumably knew how to provoke the dwarves into precipitously attacking and massacring elven settlements before their ambassador had even reached Ulthuan to demand recompense.

From what we know he launched false flag attacks on the dwarves, the dwarves responded by locally retaliating against elven civilians, even while the High King was trying to find a diplomatic solution that then backfired as a result of the later.
 
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Alratan said:
He presumably knew how to provoke the dwarves into precipitously attacking and massacring elven settlements before their ambassador had even reached Ulthuan to demand recompense.
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I think Kian is absolutely correct here
Kian said:
You don't need to be an expert in dwarf psychology to predict their reaction when the rangers investigate a settlement that has fallen silent and find dozens of beardlings and literal children strung up by by their wrists like pinatas and then peppered with dozens of arrows with arrowheads in the ulthuani style, shafts made from ulthuani wood and fletching made from feathers of species native to ulthuan.
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It doesn't have to be particularly subtle.
 
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Dark as Silver said:
I think Kian is absolutely correct here
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Pushing them into committing atrocities of their own rather than simply attacking 'legitimate' targets may well be harder though.

Also, if the proto-dark elves were using Ulthuani equipment in false flags that would make attacking elven colonists that wouldn't be using Ulthuani equipment in response look even less proportionate.
 
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Alratan said:
He presumably knew how to provoke the dwarves into precipitously attacking and massacring elven settlements before their ambassador had even reached Ulthuan to demand recompense.
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That is something that a lot of Warhammer's fans don't accept, since it was clearly a retcon (there was no mention of ANYTHING similar in 30 years of canon, from both the Dwarfs or the Ashur materials) done in the War of the Beard novels to try to portray Caledor II and the rest of the elven race somehow less Too Dumb To Live by vilifying the Dwarfs.

And since it has never been mentioned before or after those novels ever again it is extremely easy to ignore it.
 
Fanhunter696 said:
That is something that a lot of Warhammer's fans don't accept, since it was clearly a retcon (there was no mention of ANYTHING similar in 30 years of canon, from both the Dwarfs or the Ashur materials) done in the War of the Beard novels to try to portray Caledor II and the rest of the elven race somehow less Too Dumb To Live by vilifying the Dwarfs.

And since it has never been mentioned before or after those novels ever again it is extremely easy to ignore it.
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Well, it's not technically a retcon. It doesn't take contradict anything that had been stated before, it just adds another piece of historical information that changes the context in which those previously described events happened if it's accurate.

It's the type of detail that might also have been missed out of dwarven historical accounts, or even not been recorded, for a polity without fast communications when the perpetrators and their holds might not have survived the War or subsequent disasters to pass on their own records. The modern dwarves and the humans historians they told their history to may well be completely unaware of that detail.
 
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Alratan said:
It's the type of detail that might also have been missed out of dwarven historical accounts, or even not been recorded, for a polity without fast communications when the perpetrators and their holds might not have survived the War or subsequent disasters to pass on their own records.
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But it is TOTALLY the kind of detail that you would have added to the High Elves army books, novels or supplemental materials to give some sort of justification to Caledor II actions, and make the entire faction of the High Elves less "too dumb to live" and the reaction of the fandom to the War less of a "you got what you deserved for your idiocy"

And since they did not have any mention of that or anything similar in, literally, decades of canon... It is very easy to see how much of an asspull the actions of the prince on the War of the Beard novels were...
 
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Alratan said:
Pushing them into committing atrocities of their own rather than simply attacking 'legitimate' targets may well be harder though.

Also, if the proto-dark elves were using Ulthuani equipment in false flags that would make attacking elven colonists that wouldn't be using Ulthuani equipment in response look even less proportionate.
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Not really? That is exactly the kind of thing that would induce almost anyone to retaliate in kind, much less the dwarfs. No one is saying he wasn't familiar with them at all. And being colonists rather than soldiers of Ulthuan proper doesn't really make it any more or less proportionate. They're still politically and culturally part of the Asur at this point.
 
Does somebody know how Snorri's anti-magic capabilities stack up in comparison to Runemaster, other Runelords and Runelords older than him? Meaning passive resistance against magic, the ability to suppress magic winds passively and actively and the countering of magical spells.
 
Czes said:
Does somebody know how Snorri's anti-magic capabilities stack up in comparison to Runemaster, other Runelords and Runelords older than him? Meaning passive resistance against magic, the ability to suppress magic winds passively and actively and the countering of magical spells.
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At this point he seems to be pretty up there. Able to no-sell the high priest of Hashut continuously for the entire fight. So top 20% (of runelords), maybe?
 
Pretty sure only Runelords who have specialties in Anti Chaos, Anti Magic, and/or Anti Dragon stuff, as well as the entirety of the Burudin, could surpass Snorri in his anti-magic bullshit.
 
Honestly, if Elves learn of Great Dwarven Shame (of Hashut) or suspect that Bad Things Got Down, they may ask Dwarves to help with little civil war against agents of Chaos.
Imagine team of Priests of Gazul and hanger-ons with fine anti-magic equipment just shutting down Ancient Slaaneshi Whore and her Tantrum Prince at critical moments, and then leaving with Oath to keep this shameful stuff secret.
 
Czes said:
Does somebody know how Snorri's anti-magic capabilities stack up in comparison to Runemaster, other Runelords and Runelords older than him? Meaning passive resistance against magic, the ability to suppress magic winds passively and actively and the countering of magical spells.
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Well, we're still using an old anti-magic talisman from before the quest even started, and i don't really see any reason we'd be exceptional in this area other than a fair bit of practice against some fairly powerful enemy spellcasters. I'd say we're a bit above average but not exceptionally so... compared to the average 1000 year old Runelord, so that's still pretty good at anti-magic.
 
Mortis said:
Well, we're still using an old anti-magic talisman from before the quest even started, and i don't really see any reason we'd be exceptional in this area other than a fair bit of practice against some fairly powerful enemy spellcasters. I'd say we're a bit above average but not exceptionally so... compared to the average 1000 year old Runelord, so that's still pretty good at anti-magic.
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IIRC we are kind of waiting until we get our hands on the Rune of Spellspite to upgrade our amulet, so we either wait until Snerra can teach us the rune, or until we buy it on a trade...
 
Fanhunter696 said:
IIRC we are kind of waiting until we get our hands on the Rune of Spellspite to upgrade our amulet, so we either wait until Snerra can teach us the rune, or until we buy it on a trade...
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Kinda, but we have something that's a straight upgrade for our current thing in the Master Rune of Valaya Talisman version and Spellspite is a master rune as well. And it just hasn't been a priority at the moment.
 
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On the subject of Snorri's antimagic abilities he's noticeably more powerful than the runelords of Ravensvake:
soulcake said:
Myrion can feel her magic deaden and grow ever more sluggish as she nears the otherwise unassuming Dwarf, the winds simply refusing to heed her call with as much ease as she was used to this far north.

Her time in Lord Dawnseeker's embassy had meant she'd already met several of these Dwarfen Runesmiths, even once speaking with the Twin Runelords of Ravnsvake, and yet never had she felt her magic act as it had here and now. Yet here it flits out of her hands like water, and by her best estimation it would require a greater deal of effort than she'd needed in centuries to cast even the most simple of spells, let alone weave Qhaysh with any degree of certainty.
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It is a specialty for him so he's probably up there among the best runesmiths for it, there's a reason one of his Branakroki titles is about how good he is at it.
 
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