Warhammer Fantasy: Divided Loyalties - an Advisor's Quest

[Derpmind]

1: One Less God.
2: Two Gods Notice.
3: Man In The Middle.
4: Split Four Ways.
5: A Fifth Aspect.
6: The Sacred Number.

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Waaaaaay back when we got the Coin, there was a 6-sided die rolled for the result of pitting Ranald against Mork, and the result was a 4. (Which got Mathilde the Coin and let Ranald guide Heidi into becoming Empress.) Many of us at the time speculated that a 5 would have resulted in a new aspect, that is, Ranald gaining a new fifth side to his divine portfolio. (Possibly one related to magic.) However, this update shows that Ranald had a fifth aspect all along: "The Father".

DL lore is deep.

 

[Mopman43]

The biggest difference is that priests don't really have an equivalent of Battle Magic spells.

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Warrior Priests do have Battle Prayers (Priests of Sigmar are the only ones given in the main Empire army books, but the Cult of Ulric army list gave Ulric priests some as well) which don't seem especially weaker in effect, mostly in the fact that they only affect the unit the Priest is attached to and (if applicable) the enemy units adjacent to it.

 

[Alratan]

ANY Cult is a widespread phenomenon. We don't need to know who specifically is a cultist - basically every Imperial is a polytheist anyway, so any organization of significant size will have some.

Whether they're in the right places to help...take it on faith?
And they won't reveal themselves unless they know they can trust us not to expose them.

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They're not. Many, perhaps the great majority of Cults are localised to a single province, city, town, or even single village.

The major gods have widespread Cults. The minor gods don't. Shallya and Ranald's daughters do not seem to be major gods, otherwise we'd already have heard of them, even if they don't have publicly known divine ancestry. You basically can't have a widespread Cult of gods no one has ever heard of, particularly where one of the leaders of a supernaturally empowered organisation whose mission it is to root out and destroy Cults infiltrating Imperial society.

It's a capital offence that they burn you at the stake for to worship a god or belong to a Cult that's not on the approved white list in the Empire.

The Witch Hunters, Grey and Light Colleges, and the clergy of all the other cults who compete for patronage and devotion would not have missed the existence of a pair of cults if they that widespread in Imperial society. Particularly given that one spellcasting priest can recognise another by looking at them.

 

[DragonParadox]

We do not even know if Ranald's daughters are worshiped in the Empire, for all we know they are only worshiped by elves (which might be the dark magic twins) or hell exist as an underground cult in Cathay.

 

[Zero Gravitas]

Waaaaaay back when we got the Coin, there was a 6-sided die rolled for the result of pitting Ranald against Mork, and the result was a 4. (Which got Mathilde the Coin and let Ranald guide Heidi into becoming Empress.) Many of us at the time speculated that a 5 would have resulted in a new aspect, that is, Ranald gaining a new fifth side to his divine portfolio. (Possibly one related to magic.) However, this update shows that Ranald had a fifth aspect all along: "The Father".

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That's probably not an aspect. There's rather well known relationships like Morr being Shalya's father yet fatherhood isn't part of Morr's domain.

 

[veekie]

Just take it on faith, its not like the option requires a specific action to be assigned, any time we interact with an organization, it can ping someone.
+20 is not all that impactful on diplomacy that we've seen. Its usually down to preexisting factors

 

[Boney]

It's a capital offence that they burn you at the stake for to worship a god or belong to a Cult that's not on the approved white list in the Empire.

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"If a new God is encountered in some unexplored backwater, priests do their best to classify a minor deity as an aspect of one of the nine primary Gods. Depending on the area and the temperament of the locals, this "inclusion" of their deity into the recognised pantheon may be wholly accepted, or decried as heresy and rejected."

Unapproved Gods are free_real_estate.gif, not an automatic grimdark purge.

 

[DragonParadox]

Just take it on faith, its not like the option requires a specific action to be assigned, any time we interact with an organization, it can ping someone.
+20 is not all that impactful on diplomacy that we've seen. Its usually down to preexisting factors

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We have seen the opposite, someone asked @Boney if the coin was relevant to the recruitment of Thorek and he said yes we would not have gotten those options otherwise. We just generally do not see diplomacy rolls.

 

[pucflek]

What does the Trust and Faith means. Trust is easy enough, but faith on top of that is strange and has at least two different meanings. Someone can be saying truth and you know they do but you don't believe they can pull the claim off, or is it faith of a more... godly kind? As in, are we on the path to Sainthood?

 

[reignonyrparade]

It's a capital offence that they burn you at the stake for to worship a god or belong to a Cult that's not on the approved white list in the Empire.

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No, it's a capital offense to worship a god that IS on the BLACKLIST. Unfamiliar gods are at risk of being assumed to secretly be a guise of a member of the blacklist but that doesn't make an unfamiliar god's worship strictly speaking illegal. There are way way way way WAY too many minor gods throughout the empire for things to work as you describe.

 

[ctulhuslp]

[New face of the Coin - The Father: Ranald's daughters, and Their followers, will recognize you as being worthy of trust and faith.]

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Ok, a question, @Boney : does "recognize you as being worthy of trust and faith" just mean "you are trustworthy to them", or is there anything more going on?

 

[Rafin]

He didn't explicitly say 'cut it out', but he did reward Mathilde sacrificing a way to know more about the Gods on her terms with learning more about the Gods on His terms. That does amount to the fingerprinting project being off the table.

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Okay, yeah. That is a bit disappointing.

Moving on,

[New face of the Coin - The Father: Ranald's daughters, and Their followers, will recognize you as being worthy of trust and faith.]

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Does "Their followers" include only the followers of the two daughters or also the followers of Ranald himself?

 

[Codex]

Warrior Priests do have Battle Prayers (Priests of Sigmar are the only ones given in the main Empire army books, but the Cult of Ulric army list gave Ulric priests some as well) which don't seem especially weaker in effect, mostly in the fact that they only affect the unit the Priest is attached to and (if applicable) the enemy units adjacent to it.

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I was about to say something, then I remembered that I was going to confuse 6th Edition Warrior Priests and 8th Edition ones together.

Like, just as a note, 6th Edition Warrior Priests had a heal spell, a Ward Save spell, Soulfire, and I think another buff spell I can't remember. I remember that the Heal and Ward Save prayers could only target a single model, and me thinking that the Warrior Priest kinda sucked.

 

[wildwill]

I suppose if Ranald is actually Leoc there's the possibility of his daughters being Elven goddesses that may have 'adherents' that we can gain assistance from.

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Perhaps there are Eonir who could aid the waystone project, might also be intersting for Elfcation.

Edit: I think we should have it on next turn, and hope some elves take notice.

 

[Boney]

Ok, a question, @Boney : does "recognize you as being worthy of trust and faith" just mean "you are trustworthy to them", or is there anything more going on?

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As intriguing an ambiguity it would be to leave that dangling, it does not mean faith in the 'worship' sense.

Does "Their followers" include only the followers of the two daughters or also the followers of Ranald himself?

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You don't really need a Coin face for that. If you need a referral, you can make it happen.

 

[Alratan]

Just take it on faith, its not like the option requires a specific action to be assigned, any time we interact with an organization, it can ping someone.
+20 is not all that impactful on diplomacy that we've seen. Its usually down to preexisting factors

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I disagree. Luck could have a big impact on diplomacy, whether you have a good or bad first impression because the person you're meeting as had a good or bad day before hand, or who happens to be assigned to speak with you could very well be influenced by luck.

Mathilde's diplomacy has historically been too low for us to see her Diplomacy rolls and results, but that doesn't mean those rolls didn't happen and that a +20 wouldn't have been very useful on them.

These are cults so hidden that we've never had a hint of their existence in the Empire previously. Given this level of secrecy recruitment would be incredibly hard, particularly given that it's a capital crime to join them. They're either foreign cults, which is quite possible as both Shallya and Ranald appear to be from the southern pantheon, so their cults may be localised to some places in Tilea or Estalia, or they're some form of tiny secret sub-order of the Shallyan and Ranaldite Cults, or they're elven goddesses, or they're worshiped by small isolated communities in the Empire.

What we can be confident about is that they're not widely and frequently found across Imperial society and institutions.

 

[Jreengus]

You don't really need a Coin face for that. If you need a referral, you can make it happen.

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I have to imagine for most Ranaldians the coin itself would acts as a referral. There can't be many people walking around with a major artifact of Ranald and it's not like the god of thieves is lacking in ways to retrieve it from someone unworthy.

These are cults so hidden that we've never had a hint of their existence in the Empire previously. Given this level of secrecy recruitment would be incredibly hard, particularly given that it's a capital crime to join them. They're either foreign cults, which is quite possible as both Shallya and Ranald appear to be from the southern pantheon, so their cults may be localised to some places in Tilea or Estalia, or they're some form of tiny secret sub-order of the Shallyan and Ranaldite Cults, or they're elven goddesses, or they're worshiped by small isolated communities in the Empire.

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This is pure supposition. The fact that Ranald has daughters is a secret, the daughters themselves we know nothing about. For all we know his daughters are relatively large well known gods like The Lady and Esmerelda.

 

[reignonyrparade]

These are cults so hidden that we've never had a hint of their existence in the Empire previously.

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Pure supposition. They could absolutely be open cults with no open tie to ranald.

 

[Alratan]

No, it's a capital offense to worship a god that IS on the BLACKLIST. Unfamiliar gods are at risk of being assumed to secretly be a guise of a member of the blacklist but that doesn't make an unfamiliar god's worship strictly speaking illegal. There are way way way way WAY too many minor gods throughout the empire for things to work as you describe.

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There's a big book of legal gods and venerated souls you're allowed to worship that is updated for new venerated souls every conclave. If you're not on that big white list then you're for the pyre.

Over the last few thousand years the Witch Hunters have in fact documented those minor gods and a judgement has been made whether to permit their worship or not.

There are certain cartel like elements to the major Cults of the Empire. They have defined themselves as a restricted oligopoly and no other cults are allowed in the marketplace for worship without them all agreeing to white list them.

Pure supposition. They could absolutely be open cults with no open tie to ranald.

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There aren't two goddesses widely worshipped in the Empire human whose divine family history out there who they can be.

 

[DragonParadox]

There's a big book of legal gods and venerated souls you're allowed to worship that is updated for new venerated souls every conclave. If you're not on that big white list then you're for the pyre.

Over the last few thousand years the Witch Hunters have in fact documented those minor gods and a judgement has been made whether to permit their worship or not.

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It comes down to the same thing, new gods are not automatically assumed to be evil.

"If a new God is encountered in some unexplored backwater, priests do their best to classify a minor deity as an aspect of one of the nine primary Gods. Depending on the area and the temperament of the locals, this "inclusion" of their deity into the recognised pantheon may be wholly accepted, or decried as heresy and rejected."

Unapproved Gods are free_real_estate.gif, not an automatic grimdark purge.

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[ctulhuslp]

As intriguing an ambiguity it would be to leave that dangling, it does not mean faith in the 'worship' sense.

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Ah, so as expected, I would be surprised if actual (demi?)gods started worshipping Mathilde because of this, specifically.
Thanks for clarification.

So, aside from intellectual curiousity (which is not nothing, Mathilde is extremely into asking questions about gods, and if it was not Personally Ranald Mathilde would 100% go Truth), we got an option to get some extremely niche but presumably start-as trusting and trustworthy contacts. If we can find them.
Finding them is going to be a chore, but it can have its uses.
We will find a way to ascend beyond human that is not potentially messing with Ranald's interests, that's all there is to it, no biggie.

 

[pucflek]

The obvious implications being either:

A: Ranald knew that Mathilde was going to recieve erotic pictures of Him for her shrine, and decided it would be funnier to let it happen.

Or B: Ranald actively changed the painting Mathilde ordered to be erotic before she got it, presumeably because the face she made when she found out was hilarious.

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I cannot believe Ranald sent Mathilde nudes.

 

[Tobtorp]

Ah, so as expected, I would be surprised if actual (demi?)gods started worshipping Mathilde because of this, specifically.
Thanks for clarification.

So, aside from intellectual curiousity (which is not nothing, Mathilde is extremely into asking questions about gods, and if it was not Personally Ranald Mathilde would 100% go Truth), we got an option to get some extremely niche but presumably start-as trusting and trustworthy contacts. If we can find them.
Finding them is going to be a chore, but it can have its uses.
We will find a way to ascend beyond human that is not potentially messing with Ranald's interests, that's all there is to it, no biggie.

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I don't try to be too bitter about the vote but one thing I would say, finding another way to research the divine might take another 20 in game years or 3 real time years...
Just don't bet on finding something...

 

[reignonyrparade]

There aren't two widely worshipped in the Empire human goddesses whose divine family history out there who they can be.

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Most gods have no listed family history at all and there's no reason they would both have to have the same reach. I guess we can quibble over exactly what counts as "widely worshipped" but there are a hell of a lot of regional gods and goddesses that while nowhere near as a big a deal as the true major ones are still not irrelevant secret nobodies like you're saying they'd have to be. Any one of those regional goddesses who do not have a know CONTRADICTORY family history could absolutely be a candidate for Ranald's daughter. Frankly if they're not elven goddesses that's absolutely where I expect them to be.

Honestly possibly if they are elven goddesses, still a very real possibility they're also regional empire goddesses.

 

[DragonParadox]

For the record I am not entirely opposed to looking into Ranald's kids, just to randomly spending AP and/or Coin use so for instance I will vote for Eonir books on the Twin goddesses for the next library post to see if we can find any hints of their parentage.