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Warhammer Fantasy: Divided Loyalties - an Advisor's Quest

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pucflek said:
I did clarify in another post that i don't think the potential issues are gonna be some big hurdle, but i definitely believe that there are people within Church of Sigmar or some of the Witch Hunter orders that view Wizards as unsavoury and detest the possibility/implication of one of them having undue influence on Roswita (who is currently on very friendly terms with us) and previously Abelhelm. Sigmarites because they want Roswita in their bag and Witch Hunters because they had her and are, to a point, losing their influence on her.

Its certainly something that could be used as possible platform for detractors to try and undermine her in certain specific circles. I think that its unlikely to go there but i think discounting it outright is unwise.
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Detractors who are willing to ignore that much circumstance to just spread defamatory bullshit are already plenty served by Roswita's willingness to pass Eastern Stirland from one evil (vampires) to another (battle mages).
Codex said:
I don't think I got a huge grasp on Elrisse, but I liked what I saw. Also, I have to question if Alric's goal really is for the Order to outgrow him, considering how heavily he's clinging on to his position like a leech and stealing the credit of his subordinate. Doesn't really paint a picture of someone who cares for anything but himself.
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Maybe he's waiting for Wizards to be all around better than him and doesn't think that anyone living to have actually achieved that according to his own judgement and criteria. We don't actually know how competent Mira is compared to Algard when it comes to stuff other than internal politics and administration. And even that's hearsay. She could in theory be worse than him in everything other than making friends with Wizards.
 
THe culinary world was far more interesting before all these food safety laws came around.
I mean, when was the last time you played a jolly round of "is there rat poison in this bread"?
 
Rafin said:
Detractors who are willing to ignore that much circumstance to just spread defamatory bullshit are already plenty served by Roswita's willingness to pass Eastern Stirland from one evil (vampires) to another (battle mages).
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Except that is sanctioned by Emperor himself. Every little bit counts somewhere.
 
Rafin said:
Detractors who are willing to ignore that much circumstance to just spread defamatory bullshit are already plenty served by Roswita's willingness to pass Eastern Stirland from one evil (vampires) to another (battle mages).

Maybe he's waiting for Wizards to be all around better than him and doesn't think that anyone living to have actually achieved that according to his own judgement and criteria. We don't actually know how competent Mira is compared to Algard when it comes to stuff other than internal politics and administration. And even that's hearsay. She could in theory be worse than him in everything other than making friends with Wizards.
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We know that Horstmann considers her a better leader than Alric, and he knows Alric and Mira far more than us, despite being biased. We also know that she never went on a Journey, upgrading from Journeywoman to Magister before she even left the Colleges because of her performance against the Tomb Kings. That is exceptional work.

Yes our sources are biased and we don't know exactly where she stands in comparison to Alric, but unless you just straight up don't trust Horstmann's opinion, I think she's probably a better choice. Considering most of the Light Order is currently supporting her, I don't see why we should believe otherwise.
 
Hmmm... I wonder, what would be an answer that talks about the fact that the whole Stirland business, including the Watch, was Mathilde's Journeying be called? Youth?

Basically emphasizes that since day 1 Mathy had big boots to fill, bigger than the average Journeywoman might have, then called upon to succeed and succeed with the fate of an entire province likely at stake and that the Watch thing was preceded by her biggest failure, though unarguably one not her fault, to date.
 
So I'm pretty sure we're all thinking it, but seeing as there hasn't been much discussion of it yet, we're all in agreement here that Stark is coming to us about this here and now because Alric was poking around and asking pointed questions about Stirland earlier, yeah? Especially as his early path seemed so close to Mathilde's past.

Related, thinking on it, I wonder if the cost/problem with Trauma to mirror the others is that there's no real internal logic to it. "Yeah I was making bad decisions" is perfectly reasonable, but does still have the looming question of "okay, but why those bad decisions?"
 
The Phoenixian said:
So I'm pretty sure we're all thinking it, but seeing as there hasn't been much discussion of it yet, we're all in agreement here that Stark is coming to us about this here and now because Alric was poking around and asking pointed questions about Stirland earlier, yeah? Especially as his early path seemed so close to Mathilde's past.

Related, thinking on it, I wonder if the cost/problem with Trauma to mirror the others is that there's no real internal logic to it. "Yeah I was making bad decisions" is perfectly reasonable, but does still have the looming question of "okay, but why those bad decisions?"
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Another possibility, but that would mean his position is much more secure than we are led to believe, since he has an informant who told him about our alliance with his opponent and that we are planning to investigate him.
 
The Phoenixian said:
So I'm pretty sure we're all thinking it, but seeing as there hasn't been much discussion of it yet, we're all in agreement here that Stark is coming to us about this here and now because Alric was poking around and asking pointed questions about Stirland earlier, yeah? Especially as his early path seemed so close to Mathilde's past.

Related, thinking on it, I wonder if the cost/problem with Trauma to mirror the others is that there's no real internal logic to it. "Yeah I was making bad decisions" is perfectly reasonable, but does still have the looming question of "okay, but why those bad decisions?"
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We only need to give an answer, not an answer to exactly what's being asked. I'm sure they can come up with all sorts of conclusions about why exactly Mathilde chose to make those specific bad decisions, but Mathilde wouldn't be giving them answers to it.

Prying into the trauma of a hero of the Empire isn't the smartest decision. If somebody keeps poking around after getting the answer of Trauma, I don't see them getting a lot of allies in the process.
 
The Phoenixian said:
So I'm pretty sure we're all thinking it, but seeing as there hasn't been much discussion of it yet, we're all in agreement here that Stark is coming to us about this here and now because Alric was poking around and asking pointed questions about Stirland earlier, yeah? Especially as his early path seemed so close to Mathilde's past.
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Really? I thought it was Elrisse doing the poking around:
Boney said:
She shifts onto her side to look directly at you, and you copy her movements with some awkwardness. These chairs go in and out of vogue every few years among the nobility, but your only encounters with them had been in books, and you'd much rather be upright and with a table between the two of you. "I am told we are to work together," she says, "in exchange for services performed for the good of the Order of Light. I am leery of a Grey Wizard having a part in our internal politics, but you have been vouched for at the highest levels."

"I am honoured by their trust in me," you say, wondering precisely which highest levels she's been talking to.
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Codex said:
I don't know if you realise this comment set off a chain reaction of memories in my mind that led me to search "sawdust" in the thread to find what I was looking for. Fun details:

Mathilde considers biscuits good if they don't contain sawdust, which indicates her time eating biscuits wasn't exactly the most pleasant. Filling out grain with sawdust is just something people do I guess.

Also, another neat detail. One of the grudges we settled from Drakenhof was mouldy grain cut with sawdust sold to Zhufbar.

People are going to remember the bad times more often than the good times, so I can understand people being miffed at millers for sawdust grain even if it happens less than proper grain.
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That's true. Though I think cutting with sawdust probably happens at least as often with the bakers. And in Mathilde's case, I think it wasn't that they were cheated. They were just poor peasants and put it in to stretch out supplies. Even if it doesn't nourish, it helps suppress hunger (I'm just waiting on the new diet product. Or actually, it's probably already a thing somewhere). The good biscuits without sawdust are for times of plenty (or village-rich people)
 
Raiseth said:
Another possibility, but that would mean his position is much more secure than we are led to believe, since he has an informant who told him about our alliance with his opponent and that we are planning to investigate him.
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I'll point out the the most likely "informant" here is, ah, the Light College Org Chart.

We did kinda steal his primary pupil away from him for our own project, thus kicking off the whole affair. Knowing what project Van Horstman went to shouldn't be a hard query to follow.
 
The more I think on it, the more I like pinning it on the Skaven. Partly because it matches wonderfully with a lot of the OOC reasoning that happened before, partly because it's very plausible and hard to disprove. We could've learned about them from any number of sources — The dwarves of Zhufbar, on campaign, who had right before and during Drakenhof faced a siege. The agents of the Lahmians, looking to play two enemy factions against each other. Regimand, who's covered for us on far worse.
 
BurnNote said:
That's true. Though I think cutting with sawdust probably happens at least as often with the bakers. And in Mathilde's case, I think it wasn't that they were cheated. They were just poor peasants and put it in to stretch out supplies. Even if it doesn't nourish, it helps suppress hunger (I'm just waiting on the new diet product. Or actually, it's probably already a thing somewhere). The good biscuits without sawdust are for times of plenty (or village-rich people)
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Mathilde spent 10 years a peasant, 10 years an apprentice, and 10 years a Journeywoman/Magister by that point, so I would imagiine her life experience by that point has outgrown her childhood. Unless they didn't offer biscuits at all in the Colleges, Eagle Castle, or Karak Eight Peaks, I imagine she would have gotten used to better biscuits if it wasn't common to cut with sawdust.
 
The Phoenixian said:
So I'm pretty sure we're all thinking it, but seeing as there hasn't been much discussion of it yet, we're all in agreement here that Stark is coming to us about this here and now because Alric was poking around and asking pointed questions about Stirland earlier, yeah? Especially as his early path seemed so close to Mathilde's past.

Related, thinking on it, I wonder if the cost/problem with Trauma to mirror the others is that there's no real internal logic to it. "Yeah I was making bad decisions" is perfectly reasonable, but does still have the looming question of "okay, but why those bad decisions?"
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To be honest no, I am not thinking that, mostly because this would be a terrible move on his part. Like yeah we agreed to investigate him but that was after he was driven out of Stirland. At that point all he would have to go on was that we asked for Horstman for the project. What would he have to gain by investigating Mathilde much less kicking it upstairs? I mean look at how this conversation is going, does this look like it could even mildly inconvenience us? No, does this look like it might piss off? Well maybe. Alric has little to gain and much to lose if h started this.
 
The Phoenixian said:
I'll point out the the most likely "informant" here is, ah, the Light College Org Chart.

We did kinda steal his primary pupil away from him for our own project, thus kicking off the whole affair. Knowing what project Van Horstman went to shouldn't be a hard query to follow.
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So you think he's salty we stole his pupil from him?
 
After staring at my ceiling for a bit, I think I've cracked it. Starke isn't asking about Mathilde's past failure with the Watch, not really. I think he's more concerned with the (possible) future failures Mathilde might have, most notably with the Waystone project. Journeywoman Mathilde failing in such a way is a footnote, but Lady Magister Mathilde? That's an Incident waiting to happen, at best.
 
TempestK said:
Check the label for parmesean cheese in stores. "Cellulose filler" is basically processed sawdust.
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Not that I eat parmesan (I hate cheese), but I gotta say that I love learning new stuff from the thread. I didn't know sawdust was so common.
NuclearConsensus said:
After staring at my ceiling for a bit, I think I've cracked it. Starke isn't asking about Mathilde's past failure with the Watch, not really. I think he's more concerned with the (possible) future failures Mathilde might have, most notably with the Waystone project. Journeywoman Mathilde failing in such a way is a footnote, but Lady Magister Mathilde? That's an Incident waiting to happen, at best.
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I don't think Starke is seriously thinking that a failure back when she was a Journeywoman is any sort of indicator that she might fail as a Lady Magister. He might be worried that it would be used against her to interfere with her accomplishments, but I don't think he's daft enough to think that 20 year old goofball Mathilde is the same as 37-8 year old Lady Magister Mathilde.
 
NuclearConsensus said:
After staring at my ceiling for a bit, I think I've cracked it. Starke isn't asking about Mathilde's past failure with the Watch, not really. I think he's more concerned with the (possible) future failures Mathilde might have, most notably with the Waystone project. Journeywoman Mathilde failing in such a way is a footnote, but Lady Magister Mathilde? That's an Incident waiting to happen, at best.
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He literally explains himself. I don't think searching for his motives is really necessary, his explanation is conscise and to the point.
 
BurnNote said:
That's true. Though I think cutting with sawdust probably happens at least as often with the bakers. And in Mathilde's case, I think it wasn't that they were cheated. They were just poor peasants and put it in to stretch out supplies. Even if it doesn't nourish, it helps suppress hunger (I'm just waiting on the new diet product. Or actually, it's probably already a thing somewhere). The good biscuits without sawdust are for times of plenty (or village-rich people)
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One crime that was apparently common-ish in medieval times was for bakers to have a hatch under the surfaces people would place their dough on; people would come in to get their bread baked, and someone would use the hatch to steal a handfull of dough from every loaf placed over it before it was baked.
 
Looking at the Grief option from an outside perspective, while it gives them a handle on Mathilde's character - her tendency to get very attached to employers/people she considers important - that's something that is probably already known. And while the Underwear Incident would be quite embarrassing if it were known, that's mostly in a personal sense.

Grey Order: "Oh no, she got over-attached to her liege, and the main result of that was... a whole lot of dead vampires and necromancers." *pulls out handy bottle of crocodile tears*

That said, this is largely a "what do I tell others who are less understanding", and for that the Skaven explanation does very well, because it allows him to whack them with a great big "classified, shut up" sign.

So I'd kinda like to combine Skaven with Grief, or maybe Trauma, but don't have the words for it.
 
The Phoenixian said:
So I'm pretty sure we're all thinking it, but seeing as there hasn't been much discussion of it yet, we're all in agreement here that Stark is coming to us about this here and now because Alric was poking around and asking pointed questions about Stirland earlier, yeah? Especially as his early path seemed so close to Mathilde's past.

Related, thinking on it, I wonder if the cost/problem with Trauma to mirror the others is that there's no real internal logic to it. "Yeah I was making bad decisions" is perfectly reasonable, but does still have the looming question of "okay, but why those bad decisions?"
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This is an excellent point, which I think hasn't been made enough. People generally operate under the assumption that other people have reasons for acting the way they do. Not playing along with that assumption makes us look like we're hiding the real reason, or as if we're something worse than impulsive and incompetent -- irrational.
 
Sir_Travelsalot said:
The argument can be made that their Under-Empire, and since it is the only power structure that doesn't have a vested interest in murdering them on sight, the Skaven themselves, is very much dependant on stocks of Warpstone.
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Oh, the Under-Empire 100% relies on Warpstone for literally everything- if all the Warpstone disappeared tomorrow, it'd be complete and utter chaos on a level never seen.

But I was fairly certain that DragonParadox was talking about a biological need.
 
I honestly have no idea why people think Trauma looks better than Grief here to a devout Sigmarite. If you try and deemphasize the Grief over Abelheim then Trauma just doesn't function as an explanation for why Mathilde was forcefully coverting a Sigmar organization to Ranald due to the vampire war. The Trauma leans itself to hating vampires more so why the hell would she be lashing out against the anti-vampire God to that extent? Grief at least can be played off as a temporary crisis of faith like Kasmir had since it emphasizes the place where Sigmar failed.
 
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