Warhammer Fantasy: Divided Loyalties - an Advisor's Quest

[Dark as Silver]

I'm going to propose a hypothesis on human spellmaking:

When Teclis taught magic to the college he only taught them a very bare bones, pared down version of the curriculum, being both light on theory and including many fewer spells than Hoeth actually had in their libraries. As he was concerned with making the colleges as effective as possible, he made the college spell list mostly out of spells that he thought were very good in terms of power, versatility or teachability, or preferably all three.

As a consequence of that, the results of most human attempts at spellmaking aren't as good as the spells that Teclis taught even if they potentially are as good as the average elven spell in general.

That could result in all sorts of downstream effects that cause the inherited spells from Teclis to have more prominence. It could mean that anyone going into spell creation with the plan of "I'll make an improved version of spell X by tweaking some of the details" quickly runs into the problem that all of the details have already been tweaked in very deliberate ways and most changes will be net downgrades. It could mean that there's a prevailing belief in the colleges that human made spells are less good in general and not worth the trouble to learn or make. It could mean that people who try out spellmaking will tend to have their attempts seem clearly less useful than the spells around them, leading to discouragement from the process. It could mean that when instructors are figuring out which spells they need to make sure to teach people to keep them in living memory and which to put on a scroll and shove into the back of the library they'll tend to choose the second for human spells much more often than elven ones.

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Mind if I count the unverified assumptions?

1. There is a single universal way to quantify how good a spell is.
2. That the elves had multiple redundant spells within the same wind that all solved the same problem of which Teclis could select 'the best'. (Sure I agree Teclis didn't teach all of them, but there are was probably never more than one Asqy spell to start a small campfire.)
3. Its easier to modify a spell than create a new one and that modified spells retain the same level of 'good'. The only example I can think of for this modification is that LM who made MAP not wind specific, whereas we know Mathilde created 3 spells (2 of which where inspired by other spells)
4. That the mages who are modifying spells are somehow unaware of the fact that previous mages where also doing this same thing. Or that they are incapable of critical thinking to observe these effects you are predicting.
5. That there is some inherent limit on how much a spells 'parameters' can be tweaked. And all spells can be tweaked within these parameters without reducing the level of 'good'.
6. That despite reaching a limit on how to modify spells it some still doesn't become more useful to make new spells.
7. That wizards interested in creating new spells are interested in reinventing the wheel rather than creating new spells for problems which Teclis didn't think he had the time to teach.
8. That somehow the Colleges are dwindling and there is a struggle to prevent spells from dwindling into existence, and that prioritising 'better' spells is somehow bad.

You've sure invented a lot of problems. I'm not sure any of them are real ones though.

 

[pucflek]

That... no? Teclis has hundreds of years on Melkoth and incredible magical proficiency. It doesn't matter if he knows the spell or not, he's probably better at teaching how to learn any spell from the eight winds. Particularly as humans learn instinctually and Boney has made it clear how hard it is to teach someone unless they're your master and they have the same paradigm. Teclis isn't a human wizard, he knows all the winds academically like the back of his hand. He's had the time to learn and hone that.

Until you get me something that says that Teclis learnt it first, I struggle to believe that statement means that Teclis somehow had Melkoth's before Melkoth.

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I mean, i disagree with DP but Boney has implied multiple times that there is something of a tradition for Wizards to repeat the names so to speak. Gehenna is probably not the first Gehenna to learn how to cast Golden hounds of Gehenna, and similarily this Melkoth might not be The Melkoth just a Melkoth.

Also, Teclis is like, maybe 200-250 years older than Melkoth, tops Likely less, actually.

 

[Mopman43]

Also, Teclis is like, maybe 200-250 years older than Melkoth, tops Likely less, actually.

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If we're going by the T&T trilogy (only source I'm aware of for the twin's ages) he was ~130 during the Great War Against Chaos. Which was 180 years ago. Melkoth is some indeterminate age that is at least triple digits.

I'd be on less than 200 years older, definitely.

 

[Rafin]

I don't remember that, could you give me the update?

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To defeat the inrushing of energies at the poles, we and the Gods and the Elves built the Great Vortex

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I guess one could say that they only helped build the Vortex and not the Waystones it relies on to be useful.

That mean we have to actually do the thing they require, which delay the update where we get to do the framework.

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That was not the case for the Light and Jade Orders. Maybe they are the exception due to already trusting us as a Lady Magister of a sister Order, but we don't know that. If someone makes a plan that attempts to recruit the Ice Witches in the same turn as doing the Foundation action then I'll probably vote for it.

Honestly, the more I think about it the more the Ice Witches become a priority in my mind. The chance that they have a piece of the puzzle that no current Waystone Project member has is more likely IMO than the chance that the Hekartine or Hoethians Houses in Laurelorn know something of note that the Grey Lords right next to them don't.

It isn't possible to take same action more than once,

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I didn't know that. Could someone confirm or give a citation?

From a pure Quest running/writing fun perspective it shouldn't be a problem because Boney can just merge the story sections like he does when we social teo people who share a place, like Asarnil and Deathfang for example.

Also, finalizing Rite of Way happened in an added Overwork action in the same turn as the second spell creation action iirc.

So here is a question for the thread

so far we have been looking at organations through the lens of 'do they know about waystones?' when it comes to making partners or allies for the project.

but what about other stuff that would be helpful, and how would we get them to help?

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We haven't talked about it much because till now we haven't encountered any problems that need money or politics thrown at them. That said, politics is why I want two Tor Lithanel Houses in the project simultaneously instead of just one. So that they can be our insight into local politics instead of us becoming a tool in one House's games.

Dude, im not involved in this argument, but now you are just being petty.

maybe you are right, but its more likely you are wrong until Boeny chimes in. thats ok.

but bloody live with it.

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He might be wrong and rash, but I don't see how that can be interpreted as "petty".

Oh yeah, that was the one. I guess one could split the hairs on what spell means but if he can replicate the effect.... well I would count that as knowing how to do it.

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Pretty sure Boney means he could replicate the spell after he has it explained or sees it in action.

The "Grey Wizard Spellbook" is an actual thing—Mathilde had both her Matrix and her Map added to it. It's just that there exist lots of spells, such as Rite of Way, that are not inscribed within the spellbook.

It's sort of the "core" spells that all grey wizards should aspire to learning, and then they can develop their individual idiosyncrasies based off the foundation the spellbook provides.

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I think the Official Spell Book should best be seen as a badge of honor. Spells like the hands free enchanting cantrips are also something many Magisters would benefit from, but for one reason or another they didn't make the list.

 

[DragonParadox]

Pretty sure Boney means he could replicate the spell after he has it explained or sees it in action.

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Er... I guess you could read it like that, but I think it is unlikely that Melkroth taught Teclis a spell after only a few years of training, there is also the small issue that Mystifying Miasma is not limited to Teclis and the Colleges of magic. It is used by everyone from the Druchi to the Asrai, the Slann, the Lahmians and the daemons and sorcerers of chaos. So what is going on here did they all learn from one human wizard? Do they all just not have the spell in spite of canon sources insisting they do ?

I think that is is most reasonable to resolve this as 'this battle magic was not in fact invented by a human and is available to all these factions that can cast Ulgu battle magic'.

It would take a lot more contorting of the source materiel to do it the other way IMO.

 

[Mopman43]

Er... I guess you could read it like that, but I think it is unlikely that Melkroth taught Teclis a spell after only a few years of training, there is also the small issue that Mystifying Miasma is not limited to Teclis and the Colleges of magic. It is used by everyone from the Druchi to the Asrai, the Slann, the Lahmians and the daemons and sorcerers of chaos. So what is going on here did they all learn from one human wizard? Do they all just not have the spell in spite of canon sources insisting they do ?

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"Every single faction having access to the exact same spell list" is abstraction, it can't be much else.

Because there's no way every faction learned the spell from elves, either. Chaos Dwarfs and Ogres use the standard spell list.

 

[Rafin]

Er... I guess you could read it like that, but I think it is unlikely that Melkroth taught Teclis a spell after only a few years of training, there is also the small issue that Mystifying Miasma is not limited to Teclis and the Colleges of magic. It is used by everyone from the Druchi to the Asrai, the Slann, the Lahmians and the daemons and sorcerers of chaos. So what is going on here did they all learn from one human wizard? Do they all just not have the spell in spite of canon sources insisting they do ?

I think that is is most reasonable to resolve this as 'this battle magic was not in fact invented by a human and is available to all these factions that can cast Ulgu battle magic'.

It would take a lot more contorting of the source materiel to do it the other way IMO.

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Honestly, the fact that every single faction uses the same list of Battle Magic spells if they have access to a Wind lore at all is already silly. There's not a single Aqshy or Chamon battle magic spell that gets taught in Ulthuan that the Chaos Dwarves haven't replicated? And the Nehekharans have full access to the Elven Hysh and Shyish list and vice versa? And everyone even calls all the spells by the same name, inventor credit included?

Nah. I'd rather chalk that down to game simplification.

As for Melkoth teaching Teclis, you still misunderstood me. I'm saying that by my reading of the quoted text Boney never confirmed that Teclis ever cast or even conceived if a spell with any similarity to Mystifying Miasma. He just implied that Teclis is such a genius that he'd instantly learn it and become capable of teaching it should events ever conspire to him getting his hands on it.

 

[BurnNote]

I'm going to propose a hypothesis on human spellmaking:

When Teclis taught magic to the college he only taught them a very bare bones, pared down version of the curriculum, being both light on theory and including many fewer spells than Hoeth actually had in their libraries. As he was concerned with making the colleges as effective as possible, he made the college spell list mostly out of spells that he thought were very good in terms of power, versatility or teachability, or preferably all three.

As a consequence of that, the results of most human attempts at spellmaking aren't as good as the spells that Teclis taught even if they potentially are as good as the average elven spell in general.

That could result in all sorts of downstream effects that cause the inherited spells from Teclis to have more prominence. It could mean that anyone going into spell creation with the plan of "I'll make an improved version of spell X by tweaking some of the details" quickly runs into the problem that all of the details have already been tweaked in very deliberate ways and most changes will be net downgrades. It could mean that there's a prevailing belief in the colleges that human made spells are less good in general and not worth the trouble to learn or make. It could mean that people who try out spellmaking will tend to have their attempts seem clearly less useful than the spells around them, leading to discouragement from the process. It could mean that when instructors are figuring out which spells they need to make sure to teach people to keep them in living memory and which to put on a scroll and shove into the back of the library they'll tend to choose the second for human spells much more often than elven ones.

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We know that the colleges have had to develop a lot of the theory on their own. Otherwise, that one Gold MP wouldn't be famous for writing the Modest Treatise, which is the work on magical theory where the colleges are concerned.

But I think there's actually a fair number of spells that have human origin. Specifically, the ones that sort of push the boundaries of what a wind "should" do. An elf, when making a new spell, is generally going to use a wind with a direct relation. There's no incentive to push what a wind can do. But humans only get one wind, and so they'll try to do as much as possible. Shadowhorse is a pretty out there effect for Ulgu. If an elf wanted to make some sort of transportation spell, they'd probably go with either Azyr (flying) or Ghur(if an actual pony is involved).

Rite of Way is another example. I would say an elf aiming for the effect would probably use Ghyran and just strengthen the ground (or Ghur again, if the wagon's weren't in the picture). Which is probably another reason elfen spellcrafting takes longer. You first have to decide what kind of wind you should be using.

 

[DragonParadox]

Yes obviously they would not all have the exact same spell list, but unless one wants to posit that we should just chuck out every single spell list and ask Boney to remake them for all factions I think it is more reasonable to assume that there are major similarities which manifest in broadly similar effects, either due to cross pollination, common ancestry of the behavior of the winds.

I do not think you can just handwave this aspect of the game any more than you can handwave monsters causing fear, it is a major aspect of the game that informs novels, lore etc... This is asking for a major overhall of the magic system on the battle magic scale... in the name of one spell with one character name.

To put this another way, when/if we get access to the Eonir Ulgu spell list do you guys expect us to find an whole new set of battle magic spells that we can just copy into papers and get 80 favor or something? Does that sound balanced or reasonable? Everyone using different spells would lead to that and then Max gets into the Gold spells and he gets 80 favor etc...

 

[ReImagined]

I didn't know that. Could someone confirm or give a citation?

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I provided a counter-example two posts below that.
Also, after some digging:

Plan for the worst, hope for the best. In this case, @BoneyM is it legal for us to spend multiple actions in the same turn on learning/developing a Battle Magic spell,

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Yes, albeit at the cost of more boring turns.

and is there any penalty for allocating extra AP if we succeed using only 1 action?

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Any extra AP spent on it is lost. There's no universe where I allow branching IF-THEN-ELSE statements in turn plans.

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[Saidoro]

Mind if I count the unverified assumptions?

1. There is a single universal way to quantify how good a spell is.
2. That the elves had multiple redundant spells within the same wind that all solved the same problem of which Teclis could select 'the best'. (Sure I agree Teclis didn't teach all of them, but there are was probably never more than one Asqy spell to start a small campfire.)
3. Its easier to modify a spell than create a new one and that modified spells retain the same level of 'good'. The only example I can think of for this modification is that LM who made MAP not wind specific, whereas we know Mathilde created 3 spells (2 of which where inspired by other spells)
4. That the mages who are modifying spells are somehow unaware of the fact that previous mages where also doing this same thing. Or that they are incapable of critical thinking to observe these effects you are predicting.
5. That there is some inherent limit on how much a spells 'parameters' can be tweaked. And all spells can be tweaked within these parameters without reducing the level of 'good'.
6. That despite reaching a limit on how to modify spells it some still doesn't become more useful to make new spells.
7. That wizards interested in creating new spells are interested in reinventing the wheel rather than creating new spells for problems which Teclis didn't think he had the time to teach.
8. That somehow the Colleges are dwindling and there is a struggle to prevent spells from dwindling into existence, and that prioritising 'better' spells is somehow bad.

You've sure invented a lot of problems. I'm not sure any of them are real ones though.

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I think the only one of those assumptions I actually made was 2, and even then not to the extent you're implying; I don't know that I'd expect every school to have a million spells for every imaginable task but the aqshy spellbook has like ten spells that can be summarized as "make a bunch of fire and put it over there where my enemy is", and while I'll admit this isn't a certainty, I don't really feel unsafe guessing the elves might have thirty of those and Teclis just picked the most consistently useful ones. 1 I explicitly disagreed with, listing a few different qualities that might be considered, and which different people would undoubtedly would weigh differently when evaluating spells. I'll grant I think that there will be some level of consensus between experts on which options are most useful in most cases given their balance of multiple desirable traits, but I don't expect it to be entirely objective or universal.

I'm honestly not even certain where you're getting the rest of those. Would you care to explain in more detail?

 

[Rafin]

Shadowhorse is a pretty out there effect for Ulgu. If an elf wanted to make some sort of transportation spell, they'd probably go with either Azyr (flying) or Ghur(if an actual pony is involved).

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Except that we've literally seen an Elf use Shadowhorsesteed.

After a moment he tears his gaze away and goes still as he focuses, and over a few seconds he draws in and shapes Ulgu into a textbook-perfect example of Shadowsteed, bearing none of the tweaks, shortcuts, adaptations or personalizations that every human Wizard develops.

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[Saidoro]

We know that the colleges have had to develop a lot of the theory on their own. Otherwise, that one Gold MP wouldn't be famous for writing the Modest Treatise, which is the work on magical theory where the colleges are concerned.

But I think there's actually a fair number of spells that have human origin. Specifically, the ones that sort of push the boundaries of what a wind "should" do. An elf, when making a new spell, is generally going to use a wind with a direct relation. There's no incentive to push what a wind can do. But humans only get one wind, and so they'll try to do as much as possible. Shadowhorse is a pretty out there effect for Ulgu. If an elf wanted to make some sort of transportation spell, they'd probably go with either Azyr (flying) or Ghur(if an actual pony is involved).

Rite of Way is another example. I would say an elf aiming for the effect would probably use Ghyran and just strengthen the ground (or Ghur again, if the wagon's weren't in the picture). Which is probably another reason elfen spellcrafting takes longer. You first have to decide what kind of wind you should be using.

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Yeah, I certainly wasn't meaning to imply that the spell list was entirely elven, just to give a possible explanation for why it's not almost entirely human given that there have been plenty of humans who could have invented new spells. And I agree that any spell which is a really weird fit for its wind was quite likely human.

 

[ReImagined]

Yes obviously they would not all have the exact same spell list

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Why not? Theory: All the spells ever and never made were invented by Tzeentch first, and the Winds conforming to those neat predictable patterns is all according to His plan, and why every Wind-based lore discovers the same spells with minor variations.

 

[BurnNote]

Except that we've literally seen an Elf use Shadowhorsesteed.

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I know, but it was what I could think of (I don't really have the spell list in my head. I guess the fear/terror spells might have been better). Though for all we know, a human did develop it. Human spellcasters have been around for a while (and some elves specialise). But yes, that one probably isn't the best example.

Yeah, I certainly wasn't meaning to imply that the spell list was entirely elven, just to give a possible explanation for why it's not almost entirely human given that there have been plenty of humans who could have invented new spells. And I agree that any spell which is a really weird fit for its wind was quite likely human.

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Not that many, actually. The colleges are small, young and busy.

I think there's around a hundred magister per college? So let's say a thousand who've got the skills to make spells at any given time. It's been about a hundred and fifty years, though the first few were probably busy with establishing and integrating the theory. And it's only about one or two wizard lifetimes. Finally, the Colleges are a military institution first, a social/political institution second, and only then academic. Wizards rarely get payed to make spells. It's more a hobby, or a step in solving another problem. There might be some internal ressources for spell development, but I kind of doubt it.

 

[ReImagined]

I think there's around a hundred magister per college? So let's say a thousand who've got the skills to make spells at any given time.

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Not far off, depends on if you count the Battle Wizards and the Journeymen. ~500 total for Magisters+, ~1500 for Journeyman+.

My back-of-the-envelope and currently unofficial breakdown is:

250 Minor Talents, Sealed, and Perpetual Apprentices
200 Apprentices
100 Journeymen, 25 Battle Wizards
50 Magisters, 5 Elite Battle Wizards
4 Wizard Lords, 1 'Graduated' Battle Wizard
1 Patriarch

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[BurnNote]

Not far off, depends on if you count the Battle Wizards and the Journeymen. ~500 total for Magisters+, ~1500 for Journeyman+.

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I don't think most Journeymen are at the point where they can invent spells. Maybe the senior ones that are already close to promotion. But for the most part, they'd still be busy learning the existing spells (though many magister are also missing much of the spellbook). Learning/inventing new things is something to boast about for your journey though, so there's probably a few that try every year (especially if you want to go for an academic career), and occaisonnaly one probably succeeds.

The Battle wizards are probably too busy not blowing up to publisie new spells, but I guess a lot of them create new variations in the process. And the stress and danger of battle is more likely to produce improvisations. IIRC, pretty much all the human Storm of Magic level spells came to be that way, can't exactly develop them outside such an event.

On the other wand, each LM probably counts for several magister, because their connection is so much deeper. So around 1000 magister-equivalents sounds like a good estimate.

 

[Redshirt Army]

To put this another way, when/if we get access to the Eonir Ulgu spell list do you guys expect us to find an whole new set of battle magic spells that we can just copy into papers and get 80 favor or something?

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Battle Magic, no. That would have been Teclis's main focus when founding the Colleges. But by the same token, I'd be pretty surprised if there wasn't a *single* Ulgu spell that the Eonir as a polity knew that the Grey College does not.

 

[Zero Gravitas]

I think there's around a hundred magister per college? So let's say a thousand who've got the skills to make spells at any given time. It's been about a hundred and fifty years, though the first few were probably busy with establishing and integrating the theory. And it's only about one or two wizard lifetimes. Finally, the Colleges are a military institution first, a social/political institution second, and only then academic. Wizards rarely get payed to make spells. It's more a hobby, or a step in solving another problem. There might be some internal ressources for spell development, but I kind of doubt it.

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1000 seems way too much. Even some Magisters don't fully master large portions of the standard curriculum (like Johann) let alone figure out something new.

There's probably a few top tier Journeymen and a good chunk of Magisters that could figure out new lesser magics or relatively simple spells of some utility if given enough time but anything beyond that is likely restricted to maybe a dozen or so senior Magisters, a handful of elite Battle Wizards and especially LMs.

Then there's taking the spell from a personalised paradigm and turning it into something generally usable; that's also bound to be hard.

Mathilde isn't a good example of a typical wizard; she's a divinely blessed prodigy.

 

[BurnNote]

1000 seems way too much. Even some Magisters don't fully master large portions of the standard curriculum (like Johann) let alone figure out something new.

There's probably a few top tier Journeymen and a good chunk of Magisters that could figure out new lesser magics or relatively simple spells of some utility if given enough time but anything beyond that is likely restricted to maybe a dozen or so senior Magisters, a handful of elite Battle Wizards and especially LMs.

Then there's taking the spell from a personalised paradigm and turning it into something generally usable; that's also bound to be hard.

Mathilde isn't a good example of a typical wizard; she's a divinely blessed prodigy.

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1000 is the number of people who have the ability to create new spells in principle. Most of those won't have the time/inclination to do so deliberately, and a good chunk that does get developed doesn't get written up as too niche.
New BM spells would obviously be restricted to the much smaller group that can actually cast such.

 

[LawsOfRobotics]

So I was going back and taking another look at the Approved Spells threadmark and I thought of 2 spell ideas to use Warrior of Fog and the Staff of Mistery. One is just a remix of several spell ideas already on that list and one I think is original. The intent of both spells is to be useful in situations like when we were scouting Karag Lhune or Karag Nar, or if we had personally gotten involved in stopping skaven scouts and communication under the Caldera. I imagine we might have to do similar activities in the future and in other environments such as forests.

Sensory Mist (BrewCrew version) spell idea. Creates and spreads a fine, almost imperceptible mist that spreads across a very large area around the caster. The mist allows the caster to sense the location and form of anything with a soul and hear anything spoken within it. The area covered scales with the amount of magic put into the spell. If the mist is flowing around or through large obstructions such as tunnels or buildings the caster can sense the rough path that the mist has used to spread but not sense details of the terrain.

Detect scout / scopaesthesia spell idea. A thin mist surrounds a target squad. The caster can tell the approximate direction of any other being with a soul that is directly observing the target squad.

@Boney are these spells viable and is there a good way to estimate the complexity of the spells? Not trying to make you commit to anything on complexity, just trying to understand your thought process on it so I can calibrate my expectations. Also open to feedback from the thread on the spell ideas.

 

[fanficfan]

[X] The Longshanks
[X] The Order of Light

 

[Boney]

Would there be any point to hiring Melkoth to help us codify the spell? Or is that a non-starter?

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None. The spell currently exists entirely within Mathilde's paradigm, which Melkoth does not share. You need to translate it to a more communicable form - which is what is meant by codifying it - before anyone could help you do anything with it, including Melkoth.

Can you add it to those fabled post-game question notes for us? I'm mostly curious if the dice played silly buggers with us again, seamlessly pretending that Alberich is a dedicated Slaanesh cultist without much input or intent from you.

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I'm going to shut the door shut on any further requests along these lines. I'm not comfortable with the idea of building a database of reasons for people to want the quest to end.

As for "going through the motions" that's not quite what I meant. Or at least I don't think so. I just thought that some kind of private yet formal thanks would be appropriate and feel right, given that these gods are actually real and roughly on our side. I am thinking of the equivalent of someone who usually favors other gods crossing their fingers and tossing a coin after a decent streak of luck.

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If Mathilde had prayed to Taal for help against the Cultist, then Taal's intervention would have been responding to her prayer and thanks would have been due. If Mathilde had been facing a foe that Taal had no strong opinions on, then Taal's intervention would have been solely to Mathilde's benefit and thanks would have been due. But Taal's intervention here was unasked for and to Taal's benefit, so no thanks are required. In this case, all Mathilde owed to Taal was doing her best to defeat Taal's enemy, which she did. She could give thanks anyway if Mathilde wanted to seek a deeper relationship with Taal, but she's already got a patron God.

The same would presumably apply to the other Gods who intervened, the identities of whom you are only assuming you know. There are other militant Gods with canine associations who might like to foil Slaanesh.

It wasn't an exclamation of disbelief. Or it was, but not towards you. Riding into battle without a helmet is just a really stupid thing to do. More so by far than eschewing a breast plate in favor of thick clothing. I get it if Ulric demands it from his clergy. Clergy often does mind boggling stuff as signs of devotion. But demanding it from the rank and file is extremely unreasonable. Especially when making your own helmet (even just a reinforced wood and leather one) is much easier than making those ranged weapons he just considers "cowardly". So it's not even about self reliance. Next Ulric is going to forbid woolen headwear in winter as well. Ah, who am I kidding. He probably already does. Protecting your ears from frostbite is playing god and encroaching on His domain.

How did these tribes even survive the pre-Imperial age? I guess purely through blessings and divine protection. Which is a good strategy for Ulric to bind them to himself. But kind of makes the whole "self reliance" thing a sham, at least on the civilizational level.

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I don't see why this would be so surprising. People doing unnecessarily dangerous things for reasons of religion and/or machismo is not exactly unknown in real life history, to put it lightly.

So I was going back and taking another look at the Approved Spells threadmark and I thought of 2 spell ideas to use Warrior of Fog and the Staff of Mistery. One is just a remix of several spell ideas already on that list and one I think is original. The intent of both spells is to be useful in situations like when we were scouting Karag Lhune or Karag Nar, or if we had personally gotten involved in stopping skaven scouts and communication under the Caldera. I imagine we might have to do similar activities in the future and in other environments such as forests.

Sensory Mist (BrewCrew version) spell idea. Creates and spreads a fine, almost imperceptible mist that spreads across a very large area around the caster. The mist allows the caster to sense the location and form of anything with a soul and hear anything spoken within it. The area covered scales with the amount of magic put into the spell. If the mist is flowing around or through large obstructions such as tunnels or buildings the caster can sense the rough path that the mist has used to spread but not sense details of the terrain.

Detect scout / scopaesthesia spell idea. A thin mist surrounds a target squad. The caster can tell the approximate direction of any other being with a soul that is directly observing the target squad.

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These would be better suited to Hysh or Azyr. Though you've given them Ulgu-y aesthetics, revealing information runs entirely opposite to Ulgu's themes.

and is there a good way to estimate the complexity of the spells?

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Generally by measuring how powerful it is (which, admittedly, is very subjective) and then bumping it up in difficulty if it's only a partial match for the themes of the Wind in question.

 

[LawsOfRobotics]

revealing information runs entirely opposite to Ulgu's themes

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Does the fact that Warrior of Fog specifically allows the creation of spells that reveal troop movements help counteract this enough that these spells are even worth considering or should I just work on other spell ideas focused on concealing information?

 

[Boney]

Does the fact that Warrior of Fog specifically allows the creation of spells that reveal troop movements help counteract this enough that these spells are even worth considering or should I just work on other spell ideas focused on concealing information?

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The right trait can let you do something that seems unrelated to the Wind in question, like how Shadowsteed has only a really tenuous connection to Ulgu in general, but it can't go completely against the nature of the Wind.

Unless you use Dhar, that is. Skiamancy might be capable of creating a nasty, bilious fog that sinks into the skin of anyone exposed to it and reveals their location to the caster.