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I mean, the problem with theorizing about sane Chaos cultists in the Empire/Old World is that you run into the simple question; why would a sane, non-desperate person worship a Chaos God, when the socially approved ones cover the same domains and don't bring the threat of mutation, Spawnhood or discovery and subsequent burning at the stake? If, like in your example, there's a band of warriors who feel the need to pray before a battle against Beastmen, they could just as well pray to Sigmar, Ulric or Taal, perhaps even Verena, since she's a god of justice and simple logistics make it very difficult to be the aggressor against Beastmen in any capacity.

The closest thing that comes to mind in the vein of what you're talking about is the Brotherhood of the Axe, who are a Khornate cult that has infiltrated and entirely subverted an Ulrican knightly order. Only, they chose an intelligent course of action, and refused Archaon's command to cast off their disguise and start wreaking havoc inside the walls at the siege of Middenheim (during the original Storm of Chaos), instead choosing to fight against him so as not to blow their cover. But even they don't have a long-term goal of just hanging around, their plan is to use their increased influence and reputation in the Cult of Ulric alongside false-flag ops to trigger a holy war between all Ulricans and Sigmarites in the Empire.

Being a Chaos cultist, whatever your methods, is utterly antithetical to notions like 'keeping your head down' and 'not making a fuss'.

You said sane non-desperate, as though the only way to be desperate is to act insane, what is a bunch of people started out desperate for some reason (there are plenty of causes for that) and then they just got over it and decided to keep up the chaos worship out of gratitude to their patron or perhaps expecting that the hard times would come again and they need stronger gods (which the Chaos gods definitely are). The reason why even comparatively sane people inside the Empire might worship chaos is because chaos hands out its gifts far more generously than any order god, save perhaps the Lady of the Lake. Of course they hand out those gifts almost at random and often with a healthy helping of insanity.

I think you would need too many things to break just right to get a stable chaos worshiping cult that manages to both maintain secrecy and stay away from the crazy juice long term. I mean if they are in it for the power the crazy has more power.

Maybe if you had a traditionally chaos worshiping group, like say the Norscans who gave rise to Oswald and company, except these ones would not get rid of all their old ways. Of course they would be under intense scrutiny so they would have to be very sneaky and very lucky to keep up the worship until everyone forgot their origins.

Indeed if something like this happens they too might have forgotten what those raven headed talismans they carve for their kids really are...

Fun speculation all around and plenty of grey areas that would fit this quest, but we are not likely to meet many human cults in the depths of the elf forest.
 
The closest thing that comes to mind in the vein of what you're talking about is the Brotherhood of the Axe, who are a Khornate cult that has infiltrated and entirely subverted an Ulrican knightly order. Only, they chose an intelligent course of action, and refused Archaon's command to cast off their disguise and start wreaking havoc inside the walls at the siege of Middenheim (during the original Storm of Chaos), instead choosing to fight against him so as not to blow their cover. But even they don't have a long-term goal of just hanging around, their plan is to use their increased influence and reputation in the Cult of Ulric alongside false-flag ops to trigger a holy war between all Ulricans and Sigmarites in the Empire.
Correction: Brotherhood of the Axe is a legitimate part of Teutogen Guard, the most elite of them in fact. They are however infiltrated by a Khornate Cult, called Crimson Skull.
 
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I cannot help but wonder, if there a cult of mostly sane Chaos worshipers somewhere in the Empire? You know, they keep their head down and don't make a fuss, prey to Khorne when they need to smash some heads because the local beastmen are acting out.
Sadly the answer is no on the account of Chaos Gods themselves taking an interest and ordering them directly to do either do crazy shit or help other do crazy shit thereby putting them in to the crosspurposes of Empire.

Only way to be a Chaos cultist without going too far would be if you are too boring for Chaos Gods to act on your behalf. Which Fimir has done at some point but at that point Chaos gives you nothing so why would you bother?

Empire on the other hand is interesting because it is resisisting so Cults in the Empire get valuable quickly so they draw interest and they either have to go all the way or they get forsaken in turn.
 
You know there's a thought, what would happen if one of the Black Arks captains decided do just sail away and tell the Once and Future Asshole to fuck off? You know go do their own thing corner some other corner of the world. There are probably parts of Norsca that would welcome them with open arms for one. Would an ark have enough elf population to sustain a splinter state I wonder?

The discussion has moved on and I skipped some pages in-between, but the obvious spot for this would be WH!gulf coast. Maximum distance to "home", multiple potential slaving allies around and GW never bothered to put something interesting there.
 
This is an interesting discussion, but I wish the people using canon to squeltch the ideas bubbling up would be a bit more careful of their "it works like this, because that's how the book said it works" blanket statements. It seems like missing the entire point of the discussion. This isn't a real world, so how much reality matters in terms of things IS the point of taking about it- and I think we can all agree that GW doesn't really care about their fluff being self-consistent much less vaguely plausible.

So, for example, the druuchi need to be very different than they are depicted, or they do need portals of infinite population replacement hidden just off screen. Trying to treat the books as if they are plausible feels a lot like insisting you CAN have your cake and eat it too.
 
So, for example, the druuchi need to be very different than they are depicted, or they do need portals of infinite population replacement hidden just off screen. Trying to treat the books as if they are plausible feels a lot like insisting you CAN have your cake and eat it too.
People aren't trying to have their cake and eat it too, they just disagree with you.
 
And it seems you miss the point as well.
To make an appeal to expertise, the books really do appear plausible to me as an acredited sociologist and psychologist as well as an amature historian. The idea that states cannot survive with large amounts of internal violence is simply a comforting lie we tell ourselves in this era of strong state monopolies on violence. As to the claim that they need supernatural or metatextual sources of manpower to accomplish their military activities and maintain their population in the face of rampant violance? I really do just simply disagree with you. We never get truely solid figures from GW but what we do get is plausible to me considering my own studies.

These are not Dothraki from GoT with no method of producing food and killing multiple breeding adults per wedding. We know where they get their food from and intercine violence is restricted to: attempts to climb the hierarchy, the brutilisation of slaves and a yearly purge which is noted to lopsidedly impact the poorest and most desperate of the society. These are not just survivable in a state, we have an example of a state which performed [strike]all[/strike] two of these things and lasted for multiple hundreds of years in Sparta. Now Sparta was a truely terrible place to live and was not powerful for its entire existance (though the idea that the city state that controlled the entire Aegean Sea was never powerful is flawed) but it did *last* and sustain itself which is what's actually being debated by your side.

Other states have been equiviantly evil and violent with shorter lifespans as well. Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan for example. I'm not going to mention others as they are likely to provoke an irl politics argument and derail the thread but those three are far from the only examples of states like Naggaroth that existed and, in some cases, thrived in the real world.

Edit: Okay I got away from myself here. Sparta didn't have institutionalised "kill your superior to get his job" that was me typing quicker then my brain. Again its not unheard off for a long lasting state to have that as a rule though which is my actual thesis statement which I think still holds up.
 
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These are not just survivable in a state, we have an example of a state which performed all of these things and lasted for multiple hundreds of years in Sparta.

Ok. My degrees are BS political science, BS economics, BS philosophy, and a masters in business administration. I've learned a lot about how governance systems break and why.


Sparta was one city. Nazi Germany didn't even last a decade. There are problems of scale here.

First, the scaling up required to go from a few cities and a small fraction of the elven population to a nation with multiple cities, fleets, and a territory that it holds (against chaos given their northern border) about the size of Canada. There's a required ...tripling? At least? Needed.

Second, the scaling required to go from a decade or a century up to several millennia without major changes to a society, it's leadership, it's aesthetics, it's alliances, and it's enemies.

Third, the scaling required to go from a poisonous palace intrigue style system of governance (which tends to breed resentment for the governing class even as it reinforces the power of the autocrat) to an entire society valorizing backstabbing and promotion over the dead bodies of your predecessors.

As a side note- you said we know where they get their food from. Where?

And unmentioned items:
- large families with no chance of advancement for the kids is an unstable situation.
- large families with no intensive program to teach/train/indoctrinate those kids (because dad lives for 1000s of years and isn't about to give up any power any time soon) isn't going to retain it's population: the young will correctly see that the only future they have is at cannon fodder and leave.
- who is doing the manufacturing? Either we have a large crafting class that is somehow culturally seperate from, subordinate to, and invisible from the perspective of the military/religious culture, or they are training slaves to make stuff to elf quality, or equipment/ships/clothing just appear from nowhere.
- how are they getting enough slaves? Short hit-and-run jobs on scattered villages does not get you more than a few hundred people at a pop, more likely a dozen or two. Even doing this all over the world- coastlines are known to be dangerous so there will always be a fight, and few people live in villages on the coasts. The north Atlantic slave trade got the numbers by setting up kingdoms in Africa that did the capturing and initial selling- is there any equivalent here?
- most people taken as slaves died in transport. Either the druuchi are much kinder to their new chattel than the Europeans were, or you can reduce the already tiny number of slaves by 1/2-3/4.
- who did the basic work of setting up agriculture in the druuchi's new kingdom? Getting plants that will grow, setting up a crop rotation, working out preservation and safety margins and seeds for the next year?


Ultimately though, a lot of my issues come down to the fact that tyrant-dominated palace politics destroys competence and truth, as competence makes you a threat and the "truth" becomes whatever makes you look best to your superiors. This makes governing well impossible, eventually, and leads to the a state where the leaders routinely issue proclaimations with zero beating on reality. Think Trump...


So, I am interested in disagreement. And seeing why my theories are or might be wrong. It's the people who deny that there is even an issue to be resolved that my previous post was directed at.
 
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Ok. My degrees are BS political science, BS economics, BS philosophy, and a masters in business administration. I've learned a lot about how governance systems break and why.


Sparta was one city. Nazi Germany didn't even last a decade. There are problems of scale here.

First, the scaling up required to go from a few cities and a small fraction of the elven population to a nation with multiple cities, fleets, and a territory that it holds (against chaos given their northern border) about the size of Canada. There's a required ...tripling? At least? Needed.

Second, the scaling required to go from a decade or a century up to several millennia without major changes to a society, it's leadership, it's aesthetics, it's alliances, and it's enemies.

Third, the scaling required to go from a poisonous palace intrigue style system of governance (which tends to breed resentment for the governing class even as it reinforces the power of the autocrat) to an entire society valorizing backstabbing and promotion over the dead bodies of your predecessors.

As a side note- you said we know where they get their food from. Where?

And unmentioned items:
- large families with no chance of advancement for the kids is an unstable situation.
- large families with no intensive program to teach/train/indoctrinate those kids (because dad lives for 1000s of years and isn't about to give up any power any time soon) isn't going to retain it's population: the young will correctly see that the only future they have is at cannon fodder and leave.
- who is doing the manufacturing? Either we have a large crafting class that is somehow culturally seperate from, subordinate to, and invisible from the perspective of the military/religious culture, or they are training slaves to make stuff to elf quality, or equipment/ships/clothing just appear from nowhere.
- how are they getting enough slaves? Short hit-and-run jobs on scattered villages does not get you more than a few hundred people at a pop, more likely a dozen or two. Even doing this all over the world- coastlines are known to be dangerous so there will always be a fight, and few people live in villages on the coasts. The north Atlantic slave trade got the numbers by setting up kingdoms in Africa that did the capturing and initial selling- is there any equivalent here?
- most people taken as slaves died in transport. Either the druuchi are much kinder to their new chattel than the Europeans were, or you can reduce the already tiny number of slaves by 1/2-3/4.
- who did the basic work of setting up agriculture in the druuchi's new kingdom? Getting plants that will grow, setting up a crop rotation, working out preservation and safety margins and seeds for the next year?


Ultimately though, a lot of my issues come down to the fact that tyrant-dominated palace politics destroys competence and truth, as competence makes you a threat and the "truth" becomes whatever makes you look best to your superiors. This makes governing well impossible, eventually, and leads to the a state where the leaders routinely issue proclaimations with zero beating on reality. Think Trump...


So, I am interested in disagreement. And seeing why my theories are or might be wrong. It's the people who deny that there is even an issue to be resolved that my previous post was directed at.
I was going to answer all of these in full but its half 1 in the morning here now and my mistake in my last post shows I'm probably too tired to answer these fully. Instead I'll go rapid fire bullet points if that's okay.

Rapidfire answers are:
  1. Its mentioned in multiple places that the druchii have both freeborn framing communities aroudn their city states and large nobility owned plantations to the southern side of they territory.
  2. They do have a hope for advancement via Malekith, the temples, the citizen armies, leaving the cities and becoming shades and via joining the Black Arc fleets or other raiding fleets
  3. Ditto here for leaving to become Shades or Reavers. Groups not under the Naggarothi state's full control but associated with it and used as military auxilliaries.
  4. Both slaves making items of "sub elven" make and freeborn artisans in the cities. Like most pre-modern states they are not industrialised.
  5. Aside from raiding the Druchii also participate in the slave trade, of which the only polities that have made slavery iilegal we hear of in canon are Bretonnia, the Empire and the Karaz Ankor. Notiably all polities with economic systems which already discourage chattle slavery. Ulthuan, Kislev and Athel Loren don't have chattle slavery but do have domestic slaves which show up in novels and are mentioned off hand in the wood elf army books. The Estalian Kingdoms, Tilean City States, Arabyan City States and Desert Tribes, Zharnagrud Empire, Norsca, Hung (chaos tribes north of Naggarond), Ind and Cathay all do have chattle Slavery (though with the exception of the Dawi Zharr are less reliant on it then the Druchii) and participate in the slave trade like the Cruchii. What little we know about the southland humans south of Araby also includes them participating in the slave trade.
  6. No the Druchii aren't particularly any nicer but as I hopefully illustrated they still get plenty of slaves. In addition to slaves from overseas raiding and trade they also enslave Hung humans and Naggarothi Beastmen, Greenskins and Skaven and also conduct trade with all of those non-state peoples.
  7. Originally the Druchii. It wasn't until centuries after they first landed and settled there they started shifting to a slave economy in full. THis ties into this question "Second, the scaling required to go from a decade or a century up to several millennia without major changes to a society, it's leadership, it's aesthetics, it's alliances, and it's enemies." they did have major changes. Its been 5000 years since the state of Naggaroth was founded and its has go through exapansion and contraction during that time and changed its economy, social structure and even government for the short time after the Battle of Finuval Plains where Malekith was absent.
  8. The fact that they have an immortal autocrat is that has been socially engineering them for 5000 years is also a big factor in their plausibilty to me. Really the its been 5000 years thing is very important to my SoD here. Yeah they more then tripled their population. In 5000 years as a settler colony society with land "up for grabs" and enslaved natives for labour.
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Technically, it wasn't even that. The polis of Sparta had no actual cities within it.
Depends how you count cities :V By definition the polis of Sparta was a city (polis) in the context of time even though it never got beyond what we would call a large town. But again that large town at one point (about 50 years in length? I dunno it's early in the morning and I should be in bed...) was the hegemon of the Aegean Sea. I don't like overhyping or lionising the spartiaes or Sparta anymore then the next anarchist-communist but they where not exactly without their political and military victories.
 
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I think the simplest way to make the Druchii make sense is to posit that the canon materials make the classic error when studying their society by focusing entirely on the ruling classes without paying any attention to the teeming masses. If you make a play for genuine power you're entering into a Thunderdome of treachery and murder, but if you keep your head down and do your job and remember that Death Night isn't the best time to pop down to the corner shop for a carton of milk, you'll be pretty safe. There'd probably be the trappings of backstabbing and ambition in day to day life, but it would be like IRL ritual endemic warfare - conflict resolution and a bonding exercise where everyone gets a thrill but usually only results in minor injuries that result in cool scars. With Naggaroth framed by mountains to the west, ocean to the east, a chain of heavily-garrisoned watch towers to the north, and a perpetually besieged Ulthuan colony to the south, it would be one of the safest places for a civilian population in the world, especially with all the dangerous jobs being done by slaves. Throw in a general societal appreciation for boinking and it starts to make sense that they'd have a healthy birthrate.
 
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Edit: eshin'ed by boney, who makes a much more concise point than my rambling below, even if they are in large part agreement.

I was going to answer all of these in full but its half 1 in the morning here now and my mistake in my last post shows I'm probably too tired to answer these fully. Instead I'll go rapid fire bullet points if that's okay.

Rapidfire answers are:
  1. Its mentioned in multiple places that the druchii have both freeborn framing communities aroudn their city states and large nobility owned plantatio the southern side of they territory.
  2. They do have a hope for advancement via Malekith, the temples, the citizen armies, leaving the cities and becoming shades and via joining the Black Arc fleets or other raiding fleets
  3. Ditto here for leaving to become Shades or Reavers. Groups not under the Naggarothi state's full control but associated with it and used as military auxilliaries.
  4. Both slaves making items of "sub elven" make and freeborn artisans in the cities. Like most pre-modern states they are not industrialised.
  5. Aside from raiding the Druchii also participate in the slave trade, of which the only polities that have made slavery iilegal we hear of in canon are Bretonnia, the Empire and the Karaz Ankor. Notiably all polities with economic systems which already discourage chattle slavery. Ulthuan, Kislev and Athel Loren don't have chattle slavery but do have domestic slaves which show up in novels and are mentioned off hand in the wood elf army books. The Estalian Kingdoms, Tilean City States, Arabyan City States and Desert Tribes, Zharnagrud Empire, Norsca, Hung (chaos tribes north of Naggarond), Ind and Cathay all do have chattle Slavery (though with the exception of the Dawi Zharr are less reliant on it then the Druchii) and participate in the slave trade like the Cruchii. What little we know about the southland humans south of Araby also includes them participating in the slave trade.
  6. No the Druchii aren't particularly any nicer but as I hopefully illustrated they still get plenty of slaves. In addition to slaves from overseas raiding and trade they also enslave Hung humans and Naggarothi Beastmen, Greenskins and Skaven and also conduct trade with all of those non-state peoples.
  7. Originally the Druchii. It wasn't until centuries after they first landed and settled there they started shifting to a slave economy in full. THis ties into this question "Second, the scaling required to go from a decade or a century up to several millennia without major changes to a society, it's leadership, it's aesthetics, it's alliances, and it's enemies." they did have major changes. Its been 5000 years since the state of Naggaroth was founded and its has go through exapansion and contraction during that time and changed its economy, social structure and even government for the short time after the Battle of Finuval Plains where Malekith was absent.
  8. The fact that they have an immortal autocrat is that has been socially engineering them for 5000 years is also a big factor in their plausibilty to me. Really the its been 5000 years thing is very important to my SoD here. Yeah they more then tripled their population. In 5000 years as a settler colony society with land "up for grabs" and enslaved natives for labour.
Edit:

Depends how you count cities :V By definition the polis of Sparta was a city (polis) in the context of time even though it never got beyond what we would call a large town. But again that large town at one point (about 50 years in length) was the hegemon of the Aegean Sea. I don't like overhyping or lionising the spartiaes or Sparta anymore then the next anarchist-communist but they where not exactly without their political and military victories.

The impression you are giving is of a population that largely consists of freeborn farmers, merchants, and artisans with one culture- that needed for the creation of communities and the raising of families- and another, smaller population of extremely decadent and bloodthirsty nobles who live forever and maintain their power through naked force?

That's plausible, and I think that if we accept the dark elf descriptions in the books to apply to like the aristocratic 5% with everyone else running on different patterns, it would solve most of the issues I have. It also fits in with the 'not industrialized' bit, requiring most of the population to be doing primary production. (Food, raw materials)

The trick is, then, we need to agree that the books only describe the top fraction of druuchi society.

I do disagree with you fundementally about possible advancement through armies, churches, Malekith's personal service, Black Arc fleets... All of it, really.

We know that elves live a REALLY long time unless they are killed. We also know that most of the people who die in wars in this sort of era are the front-line grunts: get promoted a few times and your chance of death in battle nosedives. Combine these two things and you've got the hick county elves joining for a few years, realizing ambition has no path that isn't already occupied by paranoid elves scheming to create empty slots above them, and take what they've made back to the county.

And this actually makes the sheer poisonesness of druuchi politics make sense- IF you are playing the game then the only way to open up slots above you is murder or exile. Like playing musical chairs. Malekith just needs to enforce a chain of command with himself at the top, not caring who fills what slot underneath as long as it is filled, and the rest kinda takes care of itself...

Which also solves the issue of "How does an immortal warrior-magus actually know anything about social engineering?" I dislike solutions that require villains to be vastly competent in all areas. Sculpting a society to your whims is not something that I think is at all simple or straightforward, or even amenable to experimentation. It's heavily path-dependent and driven by second or third-level derivative effects of your actions, not by your intent.

I'd note that anything not under the state's full control (shades, reavers, etc) is probably going to be harshly and regularly purged. It's possible that the purge night grew out of Malekith winnowing through the druuchi he didn't fully control in search of the ones he didn't think he could trust? Seems like the sort of thing a paranoid King would do, plus a few thousand years of all his actions getting sanctified?

But ultimately, again, this is me assuming that the farms and estates make up most of the population and get basically no attention, the crafters only a tiny bit more, and the few soldiers, priests, and aristocrats are almost alien to those underneath them despite defining the entire civilisation to everyone else.

Which, writing it out, sounds ENORMOUSLY plausible.

But it also means that the vast majority of dark elves are probably decent, hardworking people. And the only really odd thing about the dark elves then is the way that they'd never have had a chance of a revolution succeeding, so we'd see a society that evolved to basically form a cyst around it's toxic rulers.


So the open question is what the slave/freeborn elf population ratio looks like. I'm still, despite your arguments above, very skeptical that there could actually be that many slaves in Naggaroth, mostly based on how fragile people are and how mind boggling horrific the death tolls were for the middle passage in reality- most people, the vast majority of people, die to the kind of treatment that happened in reality, much less the caricatured extreme version of it the druuchi do. I figure for every hundred thousand captives taken, maybe a few thousand make it to Naggaroth? Enough to fill pits and mansions in a few cities, but past that... And farm labour under harsh conditions kills quickly too.

As a side note, given that the only thing the druuchi seem to really have to buy slaves with is... more slaves? I'm not sure how they would make up for the low numbers available from raiding with buying them from other polities, even if most of the polities in the world practice slavery. (And somehow set aside their hatred of dark elves to do business.) What do dark elves export?

...I'm going to ignore the claims about dark elves changing over the years unless you've got examples. I don't think eight years of Malekith being gone out of five thousand counts as any sort of dynamism.
 
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In Grungni's name, High King Thorgrim Grudgebearer summons the Kings of the Karaz Ankor to a Council of Kings at Karaz-a-Karak to discuss and decide matters of great import to the realm...

King Belegar frowns in thought as he and his brother-kings and sister-queen are led on a long, winding path through the halls of Karaz-a-Karak. He lived his childhood in this mountain, and never before had he stepped foot in these passages. He was quite certain that they, like most of the Karak, had been sealed at some point in the prior generations as the population of the Karak had dwindled.

As was so often the case in recent years, Belegar's mind drifts to the question of Karaz-a-Karak. Ever since his ever-reliable Loremaster had uncovered the matter of the siphoned energy, he had wondered what purpose Karaz-a-Karak had been putting it to. Was this part of the answer? Was it somehow needed to reopen sealed portions of the Karak? Was the High King planning to take a page from his own book and start trying to lure in settlers from other Holds? It was hard enough to convince a Clan to uproot themselves to build a new life from scratch already, it would only become more so if Everpeak itself started pursuing the very same goal. Perhaps he should have brought Mathilde along on this, so that her keen senses could have assayed whatever it was the High King was up to in these long-abandoned halls.

At last the courtier leads the monarchs through a set of double doors, and despite having travelled throughout the Karaz Ankor and having seen most of the wonders it had to offer, Belegar could not prevent his eyes from growing wide. The hall they entered was larger than his own Clan Hall and every wall was lined with four rows of large and seemingly identical clear jewels. In the middle of the room stood the High King, and Belegar felt his stomach churn. Once he had looked up to the High King, but time and circumstance had revealed to him the true nature of the Dwarf he had once so admired.

Thorgrim surveys the array of crowns before him, a veritable mountain range of precious metals studded with the finest of jewels. "I have been your High King for one hundred and eighty-three years," he intones, "and I was chosen to be that King by the Council of Kings of that time for the promises I made, of reclamation and retribution. In doing so I claimed a crown that would otherwise have gone to King Ungrim or to King Belegar's grandfather. To fulfil those promises, the first act I performed with the Dragon Crown atop my brow was to lead the Throng of Karaz-a-Karak against the greenskins of Black Fire Pass alongside the Throng of Karak Hirn, and on that day we struck out several old and bitter Grudges. But Black Fire Pass has significance beyond being a place where the hated enemy dwelled, and beyond the trade that has passed through it ever since. It was the place where High King Kurgan fought alongside a human Chieftain by the name of Sigmar, and in doing so forever entwined the fates of our two peoples. And while there's many a time that Sigmar's heirs have fallen short of the example their ancestor set, I would call a liar any Dawi who would claim that we have not failed the example set by our own forebears.

"In the time since the battle in Black Fire Pass, I have spilled much blood to strike out many old Grudges, but never since have I done so much to fulfil the other half of the promise I made. In my focus on thinning the Dammaz Kron I have turned my 'Age of Reckoning' into a Slayer Oath for our entire people. But as I sought a noble doom for the Karaz Ankor, its Kings proved beyond any doubt that the honour of the Dawi still lives. With hope and bravery did Karak Norn, Karak Izor, Karak Hirn, and Barak Varr lend Clan Angrund all the might and materiel they could spare, and Karak Eight Peaks is now reclaimed and redeemed, and Karak Azul reconnected to the rest of the realm. With cunning and ingenuity did Zhufbar and Karak Kadrin devise a way to send an expedition to investigate the fate of fallen Karag Dum, and in doing so found a way to rescue Karak Vlag from the clutches of Chaos. And even as I speak great canals are being dug to link the waters of Zhufbar and Barak Varr with the rivers of the Empire. I sing the death-song for an Empire that has not been so large and interconnected since the Time of Woes. I act as Grimnir striking out alone into the northern wastes, when I should be Grungni leading his people into a golden future!

"No more. For the first time in three thousand years, there is a Dwarfhold anchoring four of the five navigable passes through our mountains. If we had all five, we would be in a position to reach agreements with the Umgi nations to guarantee the safety of travellers and the vigilance against threats from the east, in exchange for a portion of the wealth that passes through our mountains and promises of mutual support against significant threats. But we cannot yet claim to rule the mountains that our Ancestors left to us. So in the coming years, mercenary forces from Barak Varr will work to secure the western approach to Mad Dog Pass, while Watchtower-Clans who have been living in the Grey Mountains for millennia will re-establish themselves in their ancient homes with every assistance from Karaz-a-Karak. And when sufficient forces have been gathered, I will personally lead an attack to retake Mount Silverspear and return it to the control of Clan Gunnisson. As we all know, it fell to the greenskins during the early centuries of the Time of Woes in what is now known as the Silver Road Wars. What few remember is that part of the reason it was lost is that an ancient wonder from the time of the Ancestor Gods that watched over the Silver Road was blinded by those tumultuous times.

"But now..." High King Thorgrim Grudgebearer spreads his arms, and each of the jewels inset on the walls begins to glow. "The Eyes of Grimnir will open once more." With a wave of illumination, an image projects from each one of the thousands of jewels, each showing a different part of a long, rocky road through the mountains. The images change after a few seconds, and then there's a low tone as one becomes framed in red light, and the image grows until it centers on a band of Goblins riding wolves along the road. Another tone sounds, and another image is framed in red, this time warning of a small group of Orcs on a mountainside peering over a rocky barrier at the road below. As more tones sound, the High King's smile grows. "That which is wrong with the world that we cannot fix with the blades of our axes, we shall surely rebuild."
@Boney On rereading, I want to say thank you for writing this, even if Mathilde never could have witnessed it.

It feels similar to her visit to Abelhelm's tomb right before the Karak Eight Peaks Expedition set out. A dramatic resolution to an era of her life, and a fitting capstone to all the effort put into helping the Dwarves. Regardless of whether we choose to remain involved in Dwarf affairs, or head out on some new and faraway adventure.

...the former in this case, since we're building a Great Library and are entering a partnership with one of the most renowned Runelords in the world.

But if we'd chosen to drop off the edge of the world and go to Swamp Town, it would have made an amazing send-off as well.
 
I've been looking through a lot of Warhammer maps lately, primarily official ones and preferably ones from the latest editions, but sometimes I'm stuck having to look at ones they made in the 1990's or so. Two examples of this are the Araby and Southlands maps I've had to consult because I have no other alternatives.

I was initially under the assumption that Araby's trade ports would be on the northern edge of the peninsula. It made sense to me because it would be the fastest and most convenient way to trade with the northern realms, and there aren't many "southern realms" to trade with south of Araby. What confused me is that there's only one port city in the north in Araby, Al-Haikk. The remaining major port cities of Copher and Lashiek are in the West, and the colonies of Antoch and Sudenberg belonging to Bretonnia and the Empire, which I believe Boney said were prosperous, are built around the Gulf of Medes to the south of Araby.

What I'm questioning is who goes to the south of Araby to trade? The only forces I can think of that can conveniently trade with southern Araby is whatever lives in the Southlands (Pestilens Skaven, Savage Orc Tribes, Beastmen, Lizardmen), the Tomb Kings of Nehekhara, the Chaos Dwarfs (and they would have to sail around the south of the Southlands and around an Elf outpost to get there), and people from Lustria, which aren't known for being "traders". None of these seem like a viable option.

Dark Elves can get there, but "trade" isn't what I think they want. High Elves can get there relatively easily, but they have plenty of other places they could trade with and they can't be the only customers. Who the hell goes to Sudenberg for trade? It's horrifyingly close to Tomb King territory too.

And why aren't there more northern port cities in Araby? why are they mostly concentrated around the west?
 
I've been looking through a lot of Warhammer maps lately, primarily official ones and preferably ones from the latest editions, but sometimes I'm stuck having to look at ones they made in the 1990's or so. Two examples of this are the Araby and Southlands maps I've had to consult because I have no other alternatives.

I was initially under the assumption that Araby's trade ports would be on the northern edge of the peninsula. It made sense to me because it would be the fastest and most convenient way to trade with the northern realms, and there aren't many "southern realms" to trade with south of Araby. What confused me is that there's only one port city in the north in Araby, Al-Haikk. The remaining major port cities of Copher and Lashiek are in the West, and the colonies of Antoch and Sudenberg belonging to Bretonnia and the Empire, which I believe Boney said were prosperous, are built around the Gulf of Medes to the south of Araby.

What I'm questioning is who goes to the south of Araby to trade? The only forces I can think of that can conveniently trade with southern Araby is whatever lives in the Southlands (Pestilens Skaven, Savage Orc Tribes, Beastmen, Lizardmen), the Tomb Kings of Nehekhara, the Chaos Dwarfs (and they would have to sail around the south of the Southlands and around an Elf outpost to get there), and people from Lustria, which aren't known for being "traders". None of these seem like a viable option.

Dark Elves can get there, but "trade" isn't what I think they want. High Elves can get there relatively easily, but they have plenty of other places they could trade with and they can't be the only customers. Who the hell goes to Sudenberg for trade? It's horrifyingly close to Tomb King territory too.

And why aren't there more northern port cities in Araby? why are they mostly concentrated around the west?
My suggestion would be that it's probably cause by the material conditions, most likely one of:
1. Most of Araby's population is there
2. All the good harbors are there

One of the biggest reasons people send things by water is that it's cheaper to ship things by sea than by land. This was even more true back before the invention of freight rail lines and trucking roads. If Araby's cities are in the south, it doesn't do you much good to have a port in the north. Unloading them at the north will save you a few dozen gold coins on reduced ship wear and tear and lowered sailor wages, and then lose you many times that paying for a caravan. If you outsource the caravan costs, that price instead comes out of your selling price - and your buying price for any local goods, since they'll also need to be caravaned over. Something similar is probably true if Araby's best harbors are in the south, since you can't base a trading city out of just anywhere. There's a reason cities like London and Shanghai have such a big advantage, or New York and Boston, to give American examples. If this one is true, there's probably also bigger cities in the south, but it'll be dependant on the coastline rather than the inland conditions.
 
My suggestion would be that it's probably cause by the material conditions, most likely one of:
1. Most of Araby's population is there
2. All the good harbors are there

One of the biggest reasons people send things by water is that it's cheaper to ship things by sea than by land. This was even more true back before the invention of freight rail lines and trucking roads. If Araby's cities are in the south, it doesn't do you much good to have a port in the north. Unloading them at the north will save you a few dozen gold coins on reduced ship wear and tear and lowered sailor wages, and then lose you many times that paying for a caravan. If you outsource the caravan costs, that price instead comes out of your selling price - and your buying price for any local goods, since they'll also need to be caravaned over. Something similar is probably true if Araby's best harbors are in the south, since you can't base a trading city out of just anywhere. There's a reason cities like London and Shanghai have such a big advantage, or New York and Boston, to give American examples. If this one is true, there's probably also bigger cities in the south, but it'll be dependant on the coastline rather than the inland conditions.
I should clarify that Copher and Lashiek, Araby's major ports are in the west, specifically the northern side of West, close to Araby's mountain range. It might make sense then that that's where they concentrate, because south of the mountain range is the "Palace of the Wizard Caliph".

The problem is that the ports in the south aren't Arabyan. They're the Imperial/Bretonnian colonies. The only settlement close to these colonies is El-Kalabad, which I'm not sure if it's Arabyan or Nehekharan.

EDIT: OK, so I read up on El Kalabad's wiki page. It's info from 6th editon. Apparently, they trade with Ind and Cathay.

I somehow find it hard to believe a significant contingent of ships manage to survive the incredibly perilous journey, but that's the reason apparently.
 
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My suggestion would be that it's probably cause by the material conditions, most likely one of:
1. Most of Araby's population is there
2. All the good harbors are there

One of the biggest reasons people send things by water is that it's cheaper to ship things by sea than by land. This was even more true back before the invention of freight rail lines and trucking roads. If Araby's cities are in the south, it doesn't do you much good to have a port in the north. Unloading them at the north will save you a few dozen gold coins on reduced ship wear and tear and lowered sailor wages, and then lose you many times that paying for a caravan. If you outsource the caravan costs, that price instead comes out of your selling price - and your buying price for any local goods, since they'll also need to be caravaned over. Something similar is probably true if Araby's best harbors are in the south, since you can't base a trading city out of just anywhere. There's a reason cities like London and Shanghai have such a big advantage, or New York and Boston, to give American examples. If this one is true, there's probably also bigger cities in the south, but it'll be dependant on the coastline rather than the inland conditions.

Also, most trade isnt being done by humans, but the Asur.

The Asur who we should remember once tried to colonize fucking everywhere.

While many of these are now abandoned or have an issue with edge as of late...Many of them are still theres. A lot of trade is flowing to Ulthuan from the East simply because Ulthuan Rules the Waves, with the Druchi needing all shit they have just to be able to not get pushed out by the Asur going down their Asur Main.

I should clarify that Copher and Lashiek, Araby's major ports are in the west, specifically the northern side of West, close to Araby's mountain range. It might make sense then that that's where they concentrate, because south of the mountain range is the "Palace of the Wizard Caliph".

The problem is that the ports in the south aren't Arabyan. They're the Imperial/Bretonnian colonies. The only settlement close to these colonies is El-Kalabad, which I'm not sure if it's Arabyan or Nehekharan.
Oh, they absolutely tried to have ports on all shores of Araby.

The plan had one major flaw: Neither the ports or any Arabyians argeed to the idea. More importantly, the Magic wielding Arabyians disargeed. And it was a time before Magnus.

Needless to say, the invading Bretonnian and Imperial Holy Orders got bitchslapped for trying to invade. The Colonies in the south survive because thats what they were able to secure.
 
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Also, most trade isnt being done by humans, but the Asur.

The Asur who we should remember once tried to colonize fucking everywhere.

While many of these are now abandoned or have an issue with edge as of late...Many of them are still theres. A lot of trade is flowing to Ulthuan from the East simply because Ulthuan Rules the Waves, with the Druchi needing all shit they have just to be able to not get pushed out by the Asur going down their Asur Main.


Oh, they absolutely tried to have ports on all shores of Araby.

The plan had one major flaw: Neither the ports or any Arabyians argeed to the idea. More importantly, the Magic wielding Arabyians disargeed. And it was a time before Magnus.

Needless to say, the invading Bretonnian and Imperial Holy Orders got bitchslapped for trying to invade. The Colonies in the south survive because thats what they were able to secure.
Just a note, Boney already debunked the whole "the Asur rule the waves" thing:
Ocean travel
Despite their claims, Ulthuan's prominence does not quite reach all the seas. They have the home field advantage in the Great Ocean, but even there they can't quite suppress the Norscans, Sartosans, Corsairs, and Zombie Pirates. In the Dread Sea between the Southlands and Ind, the Chaos Dwarves are the most dominant presence and almost constantly on the search for slaves and wealth, with Ulthuan seemingly content to focus on containment, blocking their access to other seas with the Fortress of Dawn in the west and the Gates of Calith in the east - though this quarantine is largely symbolic ever since the tunnel to Uzkulak gave the Chaos Dwarves access to the the Great Ocean via the seas north of Norsca. The final ocean is the Far Sea, which is either that of the far east or the far west depending on your perspective, lying between the New World and Cathay. Though the fleets of Cathay and Nippon largely control their coasts, the majority of the waters are dominated by Naggarothi fleets who sail via an underground ocean beneath their continent and into the Far Sea. With Ulthuan's ships having to sail all the way around Lustria just to reach Naggaroth's backyard, the Dark Elves are largely free to reave as they wish. So though ocean voyages have a much larger payoff if they succeed, they also have a much greater initial cost and face just as much danger as the overland routes, if not more.
The Asur like to claim that, but they very much don't rule the seas. I also heavily doubt "most" trade is done by them because only Cothique and Eataine are mentioned to be active traders, the rest don't care. Most of the Asur realm is generally self sufficient. Even if the entirety of the Asur realm were trading, they wouldn't outnumber the humans, who have vastly more people and through sheer probability would end up dominating trade at least in terms of numbers.

The Asur are a significant presence don't get me wrong, but they're not the ultimate traders some would have you believe.
 
Oh, they absolutely tried to have ports on all shores of Araby.

The plan had one major flaw: Neither the ports or any Arabyians argeed to the idea. More importantly, the Magic wielding Arabyians disargeed. And it was a time before Magnus.

Needless to say, the invading Bretonnian and Imperial Holy Orders got bitchslapped for trying to invade. The Colonies in the south survive because thats what they were able to secure
I feel compelled to point out that despite Teclis' grandiose claims of teaching the humans magic, he only taught the Empire. "Before Magnus" works as a potential reason for why imperial efforts failed, but it doesn't work as a broader explanation for the other human nation that invaded.
 
I really like the name "Land of Chill", though i suspect because the picture that forms in my mind when hearing it is very different from what the people who came up with it intended.
 
Alright, to bring us back to the update since it's been a while since we talked about it, I want to mention something from a reread:
"Well," says Egrimm, looking down at the golden arm. "My first thought is the New World. Infamously full of strange golden artefacts, and said to be filled with lizard-men who guard them. If those lizard-men are approximately the size of a man, that would fit."

"Are we sure it's gold?" you ask.

He considers that. "Good point," he concludes.

You summon a Shadowchisel, frown at it, then dismiss it. Better not to introduce unnecessary magic. "Do you have a blade?"

He pats his robes. "Ritual or regular?"

"Regular, just need to take some scratchings to assay."

He frowns as he draws a plain steel dagger from inside his robes and leans over the arm. "It does look pretty battered, so it shouldn't be a problem. If surface damage would discharge the enchantment, it would already have happened." He carefully scratches at part of the arm far from the joints, and then his frown deepens as he puts some force into it. "Must be an alloy," he grunts. "I'm just blunting my knife."
You reconvene several days later with the result of Max's careful assaying of a few chiselled-off slivers: mostly gold, but whatever else is in there isn't identifiable from a few slivers, and testing any more than that would risk endangering the enchantment within. With that initial assumption successfully identified, excised, and tested, you resume the examination of the arm.
With a series of very careful isolation tests, you expose the arm to a spectrum of mono-wind environments to see how it reacts to each, and how each reacts to it. It exhibits a mild repellent effect on every Wind but Hysh, leading you to conclude that the magic stored within must be Hysh. But the exterior Hysh is not outright attracted to or absorbed by the arm, likely because of the insulating effect of the exterior gold alloy, but Egrimm's careful testing with a minute sliver of light on his fingertip confirms that the secondary material is conductive to it.
The arm is confirmed to be mostly made out of Gold, but it's a gold alloy. I'm pretty sure Gold is relatively soft metal, and Horstmann was blunting his knife on it. They couldn't identify what the other material was from the slivers they could extract, but I have a theory. Someone who's more knowledgable on metals can correct me if I'm wrong (which I very well might be).

As we can see, the arm has a repellant effect on all winds except Hysh, and even Hysh can't enter the arm due to the insulation of the exterior gold alloy. I thought to myself, that's weird isn't it? Chamon is attracted to dense metals, the denser the better. Chamon has a very strong resonance with Gold. Whatever the alloy is, it somehow negates the attraction of Chamon to Gold and serves as a seeimingly magical insulator. Some magical insulators we know of already are stone, lead and obsidian. Well I think Lead has a connection to Chamon but Mathilde used it to contain warpstone before, so I assume it has some magical insulation properties.

So what alloy with gold could be made from material that's available to the New World (since we're pretty sure it's from them IC and OOC), which would give it strength, structure and resistance to wear, and have insulative properties?

My guess is platinum. From my rudimentary research, Platinum seems to be largely found in Africa and South America, areas that Lustria is clearly based on, and I hear that Gold/Platinum alloys are incredibly wear resistant. I don't know how tough a Gold/Platinum alloy is though, and I'm not sure how platinum would react to magic. It's not like the Old World has access to it right now, and while it's described as an "unreactive" metal it's also a pretty dense one. Am I off base here?

Also, yes I realise that all of this could be in vain as we find out that it's a magical element and everything is being done with supernatural stuff that we'd never be able to guess at, but I think it's more fun to assume that it's something we could predict from the clues we've been given.
 
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