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Warhammer Fantasy: Divided Loyalties - an Advisor's Quest

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Boney said:
Johann is a pinnacle of sensible, rational risk assessment. That's why he never poured molten gold in his eyes twice, never used a spell of magical insight on a Dwarven holy place, and never frontally assaulted a Skaven fortification. In fact, he never became a Wizard in the first place, because what kind of weirdo would allow poorly-understood and potentially dangerous magic into their body in the name of power and understanding?
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Those were all his own ideas and therefore axiomatically good. This damnfool suggestion comes from another wizard and is therefore a proper subject for scathing critique, careful risk assessment, and tendentious quibbling. After all, he knew exactly what he was doing when he poured molten gold into his eyes and knew even better the second time - it just happened not to work. He gained valuable insights though: 'Ow fuck that hurts!' and 'maybe I have enough body mods' for instance.

Accepting the prosthesis means not just allowing that it might be better than the arm that he gilded himself but believing that it very probably is so superior to his own work that it's worth cutting his own arm off at the shoulder*. Very Expensive untested flea market tat is still untested flea market tat.

*i.e. high enough that he will certainly die without magic he neither controls nor understands.
 
noliar said:
Those were all his own ideas and therefore axiomatically good. This damnfool suggestion comes from another wizard and is therefore a proper subject for scathing critique, careful risk assessment, and tendentious quibbling. After all, he knew exactly what he was doing when he poured molten gold into his eyes and knew even better the second time - it just happened not to work. He gained valuable insights though: 'Ow fuck that hurts!' and 'maybe I have enough body mods' for instance.

Accepting the prosthesis means not just allowing that it might be better than the arm that he gilded himself but believing that it very probably is so superior to his own work that it's worth cutting his own arm off at the shoulder*. Very Expensive untested flea market tat is still untested flea market tat.

*i.e. high enough that he will certainly die without magic he neither controls nor understands.
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You are arguing with the QM.
 
DragonParadox said:
@Guile we know it's lizards both because it is similar to one of their canon artifacts and because it has four fingers on the hand like the lizardmen.
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1) Yes but Egrimm and Mathilde don't know shit about lizardmen.
2) Even if it is lizards, do you think it's a good idea to stick some random lizard arm onto Johann? I don't know much anything about how Slann do business, but I bet it's pretty different from how humans do it.
 
Guile said:
1) Yes but Egrimm and Mathilde don't know shit about lizardmen.
2) Even if it is lizards, do you think it's a good idea to stick some random lizard arm onto Johann? I don't know much anything about how Slann do business, but I bet it's pretty different from how humans do it.
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Johann apparently thinks it is a great idea and I am not minded to second guess the man when it comes to his own body.
 
Guile said:
1) Yes but Egrimm and Mathilde don't know shit about lizardmen.
2) Even if it is lizards, do you think it's a good idea to stick some random lizard arm onto Johann? I don't know much anything about how Slann do business, but I bet it's pretty different from how humans do it.
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So this is a little meta-gamey on my part, but we know that the Old Ones taught both Elves and Lizardmen magic, which suggests that the two disciplines have similarities and overlaps between them, and I'm willing to bet the idea of tainting your body, soul and mind with raw wind magic is anathema to both groups.
 
DragonParadox said:
Johann apparently thinks it is a great idea and I am not minded to second guess the man when it comes to his own body.
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If I have to (watch Mathilde) stand there and watch Johann destroy himself for a third time, I'm going to be a little upset.
Nerdasaurus Rex said:
So this is a little meta-gamey on my part, but we know that the Old Ones taught both Elves and Lizardmen magic, which suggests that the two disciplines have similarities and overlaps between them, and I'm willing to bet the idea of tainting your body, soul and mind with raw wind magic is anathema to both groups.
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I feel like sticking some elven artifact (say, that acorn we found) inside Johann may also have negative consequences
 
noliar said:
Those were all his own ideas and therefore axiomatically good. This damnfool suggestion comes from another wizard and is therefore a proper subject for scathing critique, careful risk assessment, and tendentious quibbling. After all, he knew exactly what he was doing when he poured molten gold into his eyes and knew even better the second time - it just happened not to work. He gained valuable insights though: 'Ow fuck that hurts!' and 'maybe I have enough body mods' for instance.

Accepting the prosthesis means not just allowing that it might be better than the arm that he gilded himself but believing that it very probably is so superior to his own work that it's worth cutting his own arm off at the shoulder*. Very Expensive untested flea market tat is still untested flea market tat.

*i.e. high enough that he will certainly die without magic he neither controls nor understands.
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Are you arguing that the thread should vote against Johann doing it, or are you arguing that Johann shouldn't be willing to do it in the first place? Because if it's the former that's fine, but if it's the latter you're not really going to have a lot of success at convincing a writer that their understanding of their own character is inferior to yours.
 
Guile said:
If I have to (watch Mathilde) stand there and watch Johann destroy himself for a third time, I'm going to be a little upset.
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We would not have to stand there, we have the means to cut the arm off if something goes wrong and we have the skills to herd any Dhar out before it hits the brain.

At the end of the day though I refuse to limit what I vote for by what would 100% be comfortable to read. This is Warhammer.
 
[X] [THOREK] Both
[X] [ARM] Amputee

Disassembling the thing would be a waste, and I'm worried about the potential for Dhar. Also, a golden-armed witch hunter would be awesome.
 
[X] [THOREK] Both
[X] [ARM] Johann
[x] [ARM] Disassemble

Changing the arm to Johann since there does not seem to be much interest in taking it apart, but the second option is handing a thousand gold investment to a stranger.
 
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Nerdasaurus Rex said:
But we're not sticking the acorn in him. We're sticking a prosthetic designed to interface with flesh and blood in him. It wouldn't be very good at that if it tainted the wielder with Hysh.
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We're sticking a prosthetic on Johann that is designed to interface with a very different race that uses magic very differently to us. Or it was designed for someone who was a warrior, rather than someone who mainlines Chamon (and only Chamon) for a living.
DragonParadox said:
We would not have to stand there, we have the means to cut the arm off if something goes wrong and we have the skills to herd any Dhar out before it hits the brain.
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I assume you guys are basing the idea that Mathilde can herd Dhar with that time we dragged a miscast out of our Amethyst. But in that update, Mathilde credits that feat with having just read the Liber Mortis which has a lot to say about Dhar and Shyish specifically. There's probably room for other interpretations, but my read was that anything besides Shyish-based Dhar would be significantly harder for her to ground.

Assuming that we can herd Hysh-Chamon based Dhar out of our pal's brain without shoving our own magic (or more Dhar) in there seems optimistic.

I'm just saying, there's more than one point of failure here. I'm assuming sticking the magic arm on Johann will have a higher DC than on a non-magic knight or Hysh-user, and I don't really enjoy experimenting on a guy I like, even if he's like 'Fuck, hook me up to the Mystery Arm, let's see what happens!'
 
Guile said:
We're sticking a prosthetic on Johann that is designed to interface with a very different race that uses magic very differently to us. Or it was designed for someone who was a warrior, rather than someone who mainlines Chamon (and only Chamon) for a living.

I assume you guys are basing the idea that Mathilde can herd Dhar with that time we dragged a miscast out of our Amethyst. But in that update, Mathilde credits that feat with having just read the Liber Mortis which has a lot to say about Dhar and Shyish specifically. There's probably room for other interpretations, but my read was that anything besides Shyish-based Dhar would be significantly harder for her to ground.

Assuming that we can herd Hysh-Chamon based Dhar out of our pal's brain without shoving our own magic (or more Dhar) in there seems optimistic.

I'm just saying, there's more than one point of failure here. I'm assuming sticking the magic arm on Johann will have a higher DC than on a non-magic knight or Hysh-user, and I don't really enjoy experimenting on a guy I like, even if he's like 'Fuck, hook me up to the Mystery Arm, let's see what happens!'
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I do not think Johann needs a babysitter to tell him what he can and cannot put in his body. The fact is he does not know about any Dhar herding and he is still not just fine with it but enthusiastic.
 
[x] [ARM] Disassemble
Continuing to investigate seems good but not liking the lack of control in giving it to an amputee and giving it to Johaan seems unnecessarily messy.

[x] [THOREK] Both
Because he's worth it
 
Guile said:
but my read was that anything besides Shyish-based Dhar would be significantly harder for her to ground.

Assuming that we can herd Hysh-Chamon based Dhar out of our pal's brain without shoving our own magic (or more Dhar) in there seems optimistic.
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Does the wind that Dhar is corrupted from actually matter? It seems like from what we've seen Dhar is Dhar.
 
I will point out that giving it to Johann at all strikes me as meta knowledge. If no one figured out it was a lizard man artifact then our best guess would be "chaos artifact". I feel like "attach this random magic thing I found to my subordinate after cutting off their arm to make room" is not an idea we want to present as acceptable to Engrim or Max or Johann. It just feels like a bad lesson in Warhammer.

The Idea that it should be Johann's choice presumes we don't have a responsibility to his safty as his employer. The idea that this isn't our responsibility rings laughably false because it is a vote. Of Course, it is our decision. Of course we are responsible for our decisions.
 
thisisinsane said:
I will point out that giving it to Johann at all strikes me as meta knowledge. If no one figured out it was a lizard man artifact then our best guess would be "chaos artifact". I feel like "attach this random magic thing I found to my subordinate after cutting off their arm to make room" is not an idea we want to present as acceptable to Engrim or Max or Johann. It just feels like a bad lesson in Warhammer.

The Idea that it should be Johann's choice presumes we don't have a responsibility to his safty as his employer. The idea that this isn't our responsibility rings laughably false because it is a vote. Of Course, it is our decision. Of course we are responsible for our decisions.
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No it would not because Chaos looks like Chaos, it is recognizable under mage sight. Our best guess after lizardman would be elf or Nehekaran.

Also did you read the last update? The characters IC guessed lizardman.
 
If the Grey Lady Magister, the Light Magister, and the Gold Magister in question have all come to the conclusion that this is not a Chaos Artifact after careful examination, I'm comfortable saying that thinking it isn't a Chaos Artifact isn't metaknowledge.
 
thisisinsane said:
I will point out that giving it to Johann at all strikes me as meta knowledge. If no one figured out it was a lizard man artifact then our best guess would be "chaos artifact". I feel like "attach this random magic thing I found to my subordinate after cutting off their arm to make room" is not an idea we want to present as acceptable to Engrim or Max or Johann. It just feels like a bad lesson in Warhammer.

The Idea that it should be Johann's choice presumes we don't have a responsibility to his safty as his employer. The idea that this isn't our responsibility rings laughably false because it is a vote. Of Course, it is our decision. Of course we are responsible for our decisions.
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Why would it be a chaos artefact? There's no dhar in it, and Mathilde has had extensive training on recognising the signs and symbols of chaos, so she would have identified it if it was.

It's either Lustrain, Cathyian, or Nehekharan, and Egrimm confirmed it wasn't Tomb Kings. He's actually the one who suggested it's from the New World in the first place as well.

Edit: shadowmancered
 
One last post before I go to bed about the reason why giving that arm to Johann makes a lot more sense than giving it to some rando. Johann's primary drive is to improve himself, to go beyond the limitations of his stunted magic, of his weak body and of his relatively narrow field of academic magical interests.

If Johann did not have the drive to power and understanding above and beyond even most human wizards, we would never have met him, he would be a perpetual. Whether we like it or not he will continue to gild himself, with risks of maiming or death, our choice here is not to let Johann take a risk or stop him from taking risks, those risks define his life. It is if we allow him to take those risks with the rare artifact that cost 1000 Gold.

I am fine with taking the thing apart instead because that too is a motivation he can appreciate, but handing it to a random stranger, just feels naratively unsatisfying.
 
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