Warhammer Fantasy: A Dynasty of Dynamic Alcoholism

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The bombs have been/are in the process of being used. Every day since she first brought up the pyramids, until most recently, she's been spending a lot of time in there planting them in various places. As well as playing the game of intrigue and politics so that the Druchii paranoia of each other is heightened, or lowered, or whatever is required for her to get to different areas of the pyramid and plant explosives to go off later. The more time she spends there, the more time she would have been able to get higher offices, more important places, more important Druchii. It's essentially been a meter that you've been building up for a while, and it's a matter of your choice of how high the meter goes for when it finally goes off.

Some explosives may well accompany you to the Auction, yes, but the majority have gone to the pyramid.

Until recently, when she was only able to perform cursory work there while busy elsewhere, mostly just making sure that the bombs are not yet discovered.
 
spudman said:
What was the point of making all those bombs if we aren't going to use them? Especially where they can do the most damage to Alyssa's credibility and hold on things.
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I think meta wise we got told there wasn't enough time to make enough bombs to actually destroy a pyramid. The benefit of the bombs is as a distraction, and to serve as a way to put non-magical bombs through the magic detecting wards by way of Hultressa's authority.

The bombs themselves were something for Freddy to do while he was cooped up in the Tor.

I think part of the plan is to also use bombs at the auction? That might have been a thing, where it won't be Hultressa using magic, but settting bombs into places as party favors or something, the pyramid bombs go off, Alyssa Voidreaper hopefully splits her forces, then the auction bombs that got set up during aucion time go off.

I may be misreading the scenario.
 
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torroar said:
The more time she spends there, the more time she would have been able to get higher offices, more important places, more important Druchii. It's essentially been a meter that you've been building up for a while, and it's a matter of your choice of how high the meter goes for when it finally goes off.
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Ah. That settles it for me, then. These aren't just infrastructure hits.

They're assassination tools, too.

That's huge

[X] Pyramid - The more bombs, the more confusion amongst the overseers, the more manipulation, the greater the effect when the trigger is finally pulled. The greater the effect, the worse of Alyssa's position on the Ark will be, and the worse the food crisis would become. Hultressa will already be spending time with this, and has done so already, but the more she does, the better the end result - or worse, if you are Alyssa Voidreaper. The kind of destruction that could occur if properly focused upon could be quite effective if triggered at the right time, even if it is just to force Alyssa to send away some of her strength at the Auction to investigate.

If Hultressa uses them to gank the middle manager ranks of Voidreapers faction, that'll fuck everything and give us the cover we need to mount an escape.

And given the info Hultressa just picked up, she'll be able to make the best possible use of planting those bombs in the leadup to the auction itself.

As far as Assassination prep goes, this is the critical moment before go time. And the more middle managers die in the detonation, the more trusted subordinates Voidreaper will have to dispatch for damage control

Which means fewer Witches and Hags at the Temple when we make our move
 
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[X] Pyramid - The more bombs, the more confusion amongst the overseers, the more manipulation, the greater the effect when the trigger is finally pulled. The greater the effect, the worse of Alyssa's position on the Ark will be, and the worse the food crisis would become. Hultressa will already be spending time with this, and has done so already, but the more she does, the better the end result - or worse, if you are Alyssa Voidreaper. The kind of destruction that could occur if properly focused upon could be quite effective if triggered at the right time, even if it is just to force Alyssa to send away some of her strength at the Auction to investigate.

WAAAGGGGHHHHHH
 
[X] Conserving Strength - Spending time running about may well end up being less valuable than Hultressa focusing purely on conserving her strength and building her focus and power for what is to come. Also, apparently, something about scrolls, possibly something about potions. Either way, it would mean no effort put behind anything else but ensuring that Hultressa is able to bring her full focus and power to bear when it comes to the Auction proper.
 
[X] Conserving Strength - Spending time running about may well end up being less valuable than Hultressa focusing purely on conserving her strength and building her focus and power for what is to come. Also, apparently, something about scrolls, possibly something about potions. Either way, it would mean no effort put behind anything else but ensuring that Hultressa is able to bring her full focus and power to bear when it comes to the Auction proper.

Consumables! short lived boosts are a thing. need every advanteage for the raid.

[] Retinue

As nice as having our big oaf would be, we need Hultressa operational more. Also, he can still be on the outside, and I rather have him with Natasha in reactionary.
 
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[X] Pyramid - The more bombs, the more confusion amongst the overseers, the more manipulation, the greater the effect when the trigger is finally pulled. The greater the effect, the worse of Alyssa's position on the Ark will be, and the worse the food crisis would become. Hultressa will already be spending time with this, and has done so already, but the more she does, the better the end result - or worse, if you are Alyssa Voidreaper. The kind of destruction that could occur if properly focused upon could be quite effective if triggered at the right time, even if it is just to force Alyssa to send away some of her strength at the Auction to investigate.
 
Pyramid being the one to gut out Voidreapers ability to keep the Auction staffed shouldn't be discounted. Freddy plus Johanna plus Hultressas normal retinue are gonna be sufficient to gank any single force on the Ark with the Dragons gone, so long as Voidreapers own retinue are split up putting out fires

Pipe bomb based assassination puts that on the table for us now, especially after all this Buildup. Now Hultressa can deliberately target the fault points for maximum effect

The setup she goes for now is going to be disproportionately effective

For real, guys:

Every random normie Druchii in an office that dies is an explosion is one that has to get followed up on by a trusted asset of Voidreapers that can survive a potential ambush. That's literally a mission kill for us with the fact that chaos is inevitably going to erupt from the perceived weakness that distraction represents.

If Hultressa manages to kill three Druchii middle managers in the attack, that's three fewer Coven Witches or Death Hags between us and the prisoners we're out to rescue. That's an insane return on investment. As a baseline.

We won't need Consumables then.
 
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watcheye456 said:
[] Conserving Strength - Spending time running about may well end up being less valuable than Hultressa focusing purely on conserving her strength and building her focus and power for what is to come. Also, apparently, something about scrolls, possibly something about potions. Either way, it would mean no effort put behind anything else but ensuring that Hultressa is able to bring her full focus and power to bear when it comes to the Auction proper.

Consumables! short lived boosts are a thing. need every advanteage for the raid.
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You forgot to put an X between the brackets.
 
TehChron said:
Pyramid being the one to gut out Voidreapers ability to keep the Auction staffed shouldn't be discounted. Freddy plus Johanna plus Hultressas normal retinue are gonna be sufficient to gank any single force on the Ark with the Dragons gone, so long as Voidreapers own retinue are split up putting out fires

Pipe bomb based assassination puts that on the table for us now, especially after all this Buildup. Now Hultressa can deliberately target the fault points for maximum effect

The setup she goes for now is going to be disproportionately effective

For real, guys:

Every random normie Druchii in an office that dies is an explosion is one that has to get followed up on by a trusted asset of Voidreapers that can survive a potential ambush. That's literally a mission kill for us with the fact that chaos is inevitably going to erupt from the perceived weakness that distraction represents.

If Hultressa manages to kill three Druchii middle managers in the attack, that's three fewer Coven Witches or Death Hags between us and the prisoners we're out to rescue. That's an insane return on investment. As a baseline.

We won't need Consumables then.
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See while that may be true, its not a big enough shift to me compared to a fully rested and equipped Hultressa.
 
Valerian said:
See while that may be true, its not a big enough shift to me compared to a fully rested and equipped Hultressa.
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A fully equipped Hultressa is happening regardless, and fully rested won't be as relevant when she literally treats all her Terrors as expendable chaff - including any that Voidreaper has in her own retinue. So long as Voidreaper is encountered alone or nearly so, she's getting ganked by everyone. And if Voidreapers getting ganked, that's Hultressas peer threats dying with her in the crossfire.

Don't forget, the Claw of Dominions hero unit contingent just got decimated at Sakalken between the fighting and then Voidreapers following coup. Combined with the fact that Druchii replacement rate for such individuals is at a pace of centuries, we can unironically count how many Witches Voidreaper has to work with. In fact, I'm going to check the update in question just to be sure.
 
I don't remember if it was referenced before, IIRC I said it in the thread at some point earlier but the current High Overseer of the Pyramid she's been spending a lot of her time at is childless, loverless, and friendless. He's maintained his position out of sheer ruthlessness, and takes a similar effort as a certain Tyrant of Hag Graef in the future to remain sleepless due to the sheer amount of enemies he has thanks to the sheer wealth and power that being the commander of one of the pyramids can bring him over time. He, therefore, is one of those sorts of bureaucratic entities who is incredibly important, and also is a fault line because if he goes down he has made no bones about having any successors or chosen heirs or the like. His secrets would either die with him, or get released as revenge for his death, that sort of thing. Plenty of lesser overseers would like his position, would certainly say they could do the job as well as him, but whether or not that is true is another thing all together.

So yes, the pyramid is important.

Though, I would caution and say that she is in fact focusing on said pyramid, she's not sprinting across the entire ark setting up bombs at different Tors and Manses. She's been focusing very much on this pyramid that is going to go off and to make it a big enough issue that the people at the Temple of Khaine and the Auction would do the very natural thing of turning to look. And, as a result of the damage to the two previous Aquafarms, damaging one of the pyramids is in turn going to very much accelerate threats, anger, issues, etc. Because it's not even so much the food loss that's as much an issue as the loss of prestige and prominence that losing yet another food source to sabotage that hasn't had the culprits caught yet.

Hultressa has quite heavily alluded to trying to time the bombs to go off so that it fucks over whatever theater and mystique that Alyssa might be trying to conjure at the Auction, and also to force her and others to expend troops to go investigate or otherwise try and lockdown/secure other vital locations/services after a third facility has gone to smoke and/or rubble.

However, at the same time, the explosives going off is already planned to be a thing. How high that meters goes, who might end up drawn away, that is something to consider. But also something to consider is if you want Roland to be present at the Auction. Your wife will have Jaqueline and the rest of the rescued Bretonnian slaves, as well as a pegasus and gryphon that may well be woken up in preparation. But Roland could end up being useful in whatever might happen if you do, in fact, manage to cause significant chaos at the Auction. And, also, Hultressa has made basically no bones about whether or not she's going to be going full bore. She has to. This is her only chance, she believes, and she's been honest about it. But if she has more time spent purely on preparing, that could also have benefits to her preparing things that she otherwise would not have had time for. Bound spells, brewing some potions, this or that, it depends on what this powerful sorceress might be able to do with some prep time.

The choice, however, is yours, as the players.
 
[X] Pyramid - The more bombs, the more confusion amongst the overseers, the more manipulation, the greater the effect when the trigger is finally pulled. The greater the effect, the worse of Alyssa's position on the Ark will be, and the worse the food crisis would become. Hultressa will already be spending time with this, and has done so already, but the more she does, the better the end result - or worse, if you are Alyssa Voidreaper. The kind of destruction that could occur if properly focused upon could be quite effective if triggered at the right time, even if it is just to force Alyssa to send away some of her strength at the Auction to investigate.
 
TehChron said:
Pyramid being the one to gut out Voidreapers ability to keep the Auction staffed shouldn't be discounted. Freddy plus Johanna plus Hultressas normal retinue are gonna be sufficient to gank any single force on the Ark with the Dragons gone, so long as Voidreapers own retinue are split up putting out fires

Pipe bomb based assassination puts that on the table for us now, especially after all this Buildup. Now Hultressa can deliberately target the fault points for maximum effect

The setup she goes for now is going to be disproportionately effective

For real, guys:

Every random normie Druchii in an office that dies is an explosion is one that has to get followed up on by a trusted asset of Voidreapers that can survive a potential ambush. That's literally a mission kill for us with the fact that chaos is inevitably going to erupt from the perceived weakness that distraction represents.

If Hultressa manages to kill three Druchii middle managers in the attack, that's three fewer Coven Witches or Death Hags between us and the prisoners we're out to rescue. That's an insane return on investment. As a baseline.

We won't need Consumables then.
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Yep. There are plenty of other factions plotting and such, but it's Alyssa's control over things that matters most and could strangle our efforts.

But anything that weakens her grip on things at the auction pays off by decreasing security of hers, which gives us and others more room to operate.

We want to set off that avalanche of crisis as much as possible at the right moment. More crisis at the start, more to build off from.
 
[X] Pyramid - The more bombs, the more confusion amongst the overseers, the more manipulation, the greater the effect when the trigger is finally pulled. The greater the effect, the worse of Alyssa's position on the Ark will be, and the worse the food crisis would become. Hultressa will already be spending time with this, and has done so already, but the more she does, the better the end result - or worse, if you are Alyssa Voidreaper. The kind of destruction that could occur if properly focused upon could be quite effective if triggered at the right time, even if it is just to force Alyssa to send away some of her strength at the Auction to investigate.
 
torroar said:
More than a dozen sorceresses raise their own staffs as well.
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Here we go. At least thirteen, less than two dozen Sorceresses remaining to Voidreapers little coven.

One of which may have been Hultressa herself.

Assuming one or two are managing the Arks own systems during the Auction, then imagine how many Voidreaper will have to send away on damage control and investigating the explosions directly, especially to calm down not only Voidreapers own allies but the potential other forces in play as well

Assume one subordinate on Voidreapers coalition. One on each of the relevant Cults. One to monitor the Slaaneshi worshippers. One to keep an eye on Hultressa herself. One or two to investigate the Pyramid. One to guard the prisoners for the auction. However many on investigating or fire control in the immediate chaos.

One to keep the deep dwellers in check. One to keep an eye on the naval yards. However many others on suspicious independent actors, or were investigating the ongoing sabotage already taking place.

Voidreaper doesn't have the numbers. The more well placed Druchii die, the more diffuse her force allocation becomes. Meaning the strongest Druchii on the Ark can be defeated in detail.

There is an extremely high chance that at that point Hultressa + Freddy + Johanna will represent the highest force concentration on the Ark...period.
 
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[X] Conserving Strength - Spending time running about may well end up being less valuable than Hultressa focusing purely on conserving her strength and building her focus and power for what is to come. Also, apparently, something about scrolls, possibly something about potions. Either way, it would mean no effort put behind anything else but ensuring that Hultressa is able to bring her full focus and power to bear when it comes to the Auction proper.
 
[X] Conserving Strength - Spending time running about may well end up being less valuable than Hultressa focusing purely on conserving her strength and building her focus and power for what is to come. Also, apparently, something about scrolls, possibly something about potions. Either way, it would mean no effort put behind anything else but ensuring that Hultressa is able to bring her full focus and power to bear when it comes to the Auction proper.
TehChron said:
A fully equipped Hultressa is happening regardless,
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"Also, apparently, something about scrolls, possibly something about potions."
Fully equipped for Hultressa involves single use stuff that needs to be prepared in advance. Wizards with prep time and all that.
 
[X] Conserving Strength - Spending time running about may well end up being less valuable than Hultressa focusing purely on conserving her strength and building her focus and power for what is to come. Also, apparently, something about scrolls, possibly something about potions. Either way, it would mean no effort put behind anything else but ensuring that Hultressa is able to bring her full focus and power to bear when it comes to the Auction proper.
 
[X] Pyramid - The more bombs, the more confusion amongst the overseers, the more manipulation, the greater the effect when the trigger is finally pulled. The greater the effect, the worse of Alyssa's position on the Ark will be, and the worse the food crisis would become. Hultressa will already be spending time with this, and has done so already, but the more she does, the better the end result - or worse, if you are Alyssa Voidreaper. The kind of destruction that could occur if properly focused upon could be quite effective if triggered at the right time, even if it is just to force Alyssa to send away some of her strength at the Auction to investigate.
 
I mean, it's an axiom we as geeks and nerds know well. In depth, from high fantasy to low, from the distant past to the modern era, from D&D to the World Of Darkness.

Never let the Mage prepare.
 
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