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Warhammer Fantasy: Divided Loyalties - an Advisor's Quest

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Ericwinter said:
…Man, I sure hope Karak Vlag never catches even the faintest hint of that mess, or any like it.
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I do not think Vlag would decide to grudge random peasants in Stirland, at the end of the day Mathilde is to the understanding of the Karaz Ankor a dwarf, which means she can decide on her own what her grudges are. Any sort of clear eyed analyses would conclude that she does not want to declare a grudge on the basis of what happened to her as a child. I think that they would respect that as they would for any other dawi.

Now what you might see is Vlag finding out about that and choosing to look more kindly on those who deal in magic close to their homeland, particularly when they have been cast off by their families. Vlag is after all a dwarf hold and that means they have vast amounts of money in their vaults which they could use to say help Kislevite male wizards to get to the Empire and join the Colleges (some of their appreciation for Mathy may well spill over onto them)
 
Burned_Cookie said:
Urgh, canon is such a confusing mess that it can be very hard to remember what was made up, I really thought that one was another icky thing GW put in.
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Speaking as someone who's read a lot of GW material, trans people are never mentioned aside from the problematic not really trans Slaanesh and his Daemons. You could make an entire essay about Slaanesh and everything wrong about him, but in terms of actual humans, I never got the feeling that GW even knew that trans people existed back then.

Like, don't get me wrong, I am trans. If there was anything transphobic in the text about actual humans, I would zoom in on it like a hawk. I haven't found anything in 6th-8th or 2E. There are some problematic stuff, but you can at least cross out that part. I'm pretty sure the people writing the books didn't know we existed back then.

More recent GW writings are moderately more progressive. For example, Rhya is explicitly LGBT positive in 4E WFRP with her explicitly telling people to not judge whom another loves. I'm also quite certain there are characters who use they/them pronouns in those books. It's getting marginally better.
 
There are a lot of people who would be theoretically mortally offended by the project if they knew of it.

The list would change if the project had successfully achieved something, and their being offended would result in them missing out.
 
Sinsystems said:
Random thought, with how Stirlanders value bloodlines and the like how likely do you think it is that despite almost burning her at the stake as a child that those closely related to her are using the blood connection for prestige?
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Mathilde's 38 now? The character sheet has DoB but no age, probably to not pin down any specific action in time.

Is there a canonical life expectancy in Warhammer? Or are we basing it on irl history?

If the life expectancy is around google, like how 50 years told me in 1400-1600, then it's probably around the time the new generation hits right? Close to every adult who either participated in it dead or just plain sedentary. Or I guess not, she was 8 right?

veekie said:
There are a lot of people who would be theoretically mortally offended by the project if they knew of it.
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Morally or mortally?

If it's morally why? Traditionalists who hold the belief that the ones who created the waystones are the peak of civilization and that any tampering would only tarnish it?

Mortally I'm guessing people who survive on the fringe of the empire dying since the empire would probably expand and assimilate their way of life?
 
Swantree said:
Mathilde's 38 now? The character sheet has DoB but no age, probably to not pin down any specific action in time.

Is there a canonical life expectancy in Warhammer? Or are we basing it on irl history?

If the life expectancy is around google, like how 50 years told me in 1400-1600, then it's probably around the time the new generation hits right? Close to every adult who either participated in it dead or just plain sedentary. Or I guess not, she was 8 right?


Morally or mortally?

If it's morally why? Traditionalists who hold the belief that the ones who created the waystones are the peak of civilization and that any tampering would only tarnish it?

Mortally I'm guessing people who survive on the fringe of the empire dying since the empire would probably expand and assimilate their way of life?
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Mortally as in offended enough to go kill people
 
Codex said:
Speaking as someone who's read a lot of GW material, trans people are never mentioned aside from the problematic not really trans Slaanesh and his Daemons. You could make an entire essay about Slaanesh and everything wrong about him, but in terms of actual humans, I never got the feeling that GW even knew that trans people existed back then.

Like, don't get me wrong, I am trans. If there was anything transphobic in the text about actual humans, I would zoom in on it like a hawk. I haven't found anything in 6th-8th or 2E. There are some problematic stuff, but you can at least cross out that part. I'm pretty sure the people writing the books didn't know we existed back then.

More recent GW writings are moderately more progressive. For example, Rhya is explicitly LGBT positive in 4E WFRP with her explicitly telling people to not judge whom another loves. I'm also quite certain there are characters who use they/them pronouns in those books. It's getting marginally better.
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Thanks, that's good to know. I mean, "doesn't know we exist" isn't all that great either, but at least it's not actively hostile.

I know very little about Rhya actually, who was she again? Goddess of farming I vaguely remember? Also pretty curious who the characters with they/them pronouns are.

Swantree said:
Is there a canonical life expectancy in Warhammer? Or are we basing it on irl history?
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Whatever it is it used to be waaaay lower im Stirland. Unless unlife counts.
 
I'm mostly thinking about those we directly know about, less so about all potential groups that would take issue.

Namely, my primary concern is the Cult of Thungni, and then immediately after them, the city-dwarfs that Thorek wanted secrets from. We haven't heard anything relating to that from Thorek's decision about what is to be done with either one so far. Though, thinking on it, I suspect that he might decide to work on the cult after the project reaches its conclusion, so it might be a non-issue. I think the secrets he wants from the city dwarfs are waystone project relevant, so that might be the avenue of interference we might be seeing.
 
Burned_Cookie said:
Thanks, that's good to know. I mean, "doesn't know we exist" isn't all that great either, but at least it's not actively hostile.

I know very little about Rhya actually, who was she again? Goddess of farming I vaguely remember? Also pretty curious who the characters with they/them pronouns are.
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Goddess of Fertility, Farming, Love, Motherhood etc. Things that fall in that vein. She's the counterpart to Taal's wild side with the more cultivated aspects of nature.

If you remember, Boney has already mentioned her LGBT positive side with this section:
Boney said:
By the time you take her across the Caldera, up through the Citadel, and into the Eastern Valley, her questions have died down. "While you're here, I want you to meet the Halflings," you say. She is growing up a Stirlander after all, and you want to make sure she doesn't internalize the prejudices against the Mootlanders many Stirlanders hold. "As well as a Wizard who works with them who's very special to me."

"The tall golden one?" she guesses.

"No, she's a Jade Wizard."

She thinks about that. "She's a friend of Rhya?"

You spend a moment thinking she's commenting on the internal religious conflict of the Jade Order before you remember the euphemism for someone who prefers the company of the same gender. "Yes, I suppose we both are," you say.
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Friend of Rhya being an equivalent to the real life "Friend of Dorothy".

In terms of the character with they/them pronouns, I couldn't find them with a cursory look. I distinctly remember seeing them in this thread and thinking it was neat, probably in a post by @Andres who reads far more 4E than I do. They probably know who I'm talking about, because I certainly don't remember their name. Something about an Eonir who has something something spiders and spies/informants. My memory is fuzzy.
 
Amantalado said:
I'm mostly thinking about those we directly know about, less so about all potential groups that would take issue.

Namely, my primary concern is the Cult of Thungni, and then immediately after them, the city-dwarfs that Thorek wanted secrets from. We haven't heard anything relating to that from Thorek's decision about what is to be done with either one so far. Though, thinking on it, I suspect that he might decide to work on the cult after the project reaches its conclusion, so it might be a non-issue. I think the secrets he wants from the city dwarfs are waystone project relevant, so that might be the avenue of interference we might be seeing.
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I think that we don't need to be too worried about the Cult of Thungi: atleast with regards to them going after us. At worse I could see them refusing to do service.
 
Codex said:
Goddess of Fertility, Farming, Love, Motherhood etc. Things that fall in that vein. She's the counterpart to Taal's wild side with the more cultivated aspects of nature.

If you remember, Boney has already mentioned her LGBT positive side with this section:

Friend of Rhya being an equivalent to the real life "Friend of Dorothy".
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Interestingly, in earlier editions there was a theory that the Empire would have homophobia because there would be a societal expectation that relationships and especially marriages would mirror that of Taal and Rhya. I always suspected this theory was starting at the homophobia and working backwards to a justification for it after it was pointed out that historical European homophobia arose from a specific set of cultural and religious circumstances that didn't exist in the Warhammer setting, and I like to think that Rhya acquiring the stricture 'do not judge whom another loves' in 4e is a direct repudiation of that.
 
Codex said:
Goddess of Fertility, Farming, Love, Motherhood etc. Things that fall in that vein. She's the counterpart to Taal's wild side with the more cultivated aspects of nature.

If you remember, Boney has already mentioned her LGBT positive side with this section:

Friend of Rhya being an equivalent to the real life "Friend of Dorothy".

In terms of the character with they/them pronouns, I couldn't find them with a cursory look. I distinctly remember seeing them in this thread and thinking it was neat, probably in a post by @Andres who reads far more 4E than I do. They probably know who I'm talking about, because I certainly don't remember their name. Something about an Eonir who has something something spiders and spies/informants. My memory is fuzzy.
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Nayadaryn 'BONEMONGER' Frostweald?

I don't think I remember if anything outright says that they are trans, but I've not read her(their?) bio in a while.

could be talking about Liriwen Amberbloom, but I've refused to buy Hirelings.
 
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Jyn Ryvia said:
Nayadaryn 'BONEMONGER' Frostweald?

I don't think I remember if anything outright says that they are trans, but I've not read her(their?) bio in a while.

could be talking about Liriwen Amberbloom, but I've refused to buy Hirelings.
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They/them pronouns are used for Nayadaryn, so that's what I mean. It doesn't matter if they're mentioned to be trans or not, we're talking about pronouns. They use they/them apparently, because that's what the text that Andres quoted says.

Also, love the Bonemonger nickname. Very metal.
 
Codex said:
They/them pronouns are used for Nayadaryn, so that's what I mean. It doesn't matter if they're mentioned to be trans or not, we're talking about pronouns. They use they/them apparently, because that's what the text that Andres quoted says.

Also, love the Bonemonger nickname. Very metal.
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that's something that my eyes tend to scan over, kind of good from C7, its there for those that it matters to rather than the poorly thought out neon sign saying 'we be progressive, give money' you are seeing more of each day.

also, its not metal, it's Ivry :)
 
Swantree said:
If the life expectancy is around google, like how 50 years told me in 1400-1600, then it's probably around the time the new generation hits right? Close to every adult who either participated in it dead or just plain sedentary. Or I guess not, she was 8 right?
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Life expectancy is low because its dragged by enormous amount of children dying between the ages of 1 hour old and 15 years old. If you survived till 20ties, you have about as good odds of surviving past 60 as does anyone in this thread. (that is slight exaggeration but not far from truth).

EDIT: In Empire, there would be also attrition from other means, but they probably don't apply in a village in ass end of nowhere thats about as likely to get something interesting to happen as our Fief is.
 
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Jyn Ryvia said:
that's something that my eyes tend to scan over, kind of good from C7, its there for those that it matters to rather than the poorly thought out neon sign saying 'we be progressive, give money' you are seeing more of each day.

also, its not metal, it's Ivry :)
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'We are progressive, give us money' may be cynical, but it is still a good sign, because it means companies are hedging their bets against an ever more progressive consumer base. Once you make that bet you cannot really back-paddle because the people who will be drawn to consume, and for that matter to create your product are ever more progressive. Of course that is more true of 'idea heavy product' like RPGs and not... Coke or whatever. I am feeling good about the direction that GW are going in recently not because I think the company management are saints, but because they have real incentives to be better than they were.
 
Potential baggage list. (not necessarily enemies of the project, but groups members might have different degrees of 'we don't get long with them. from: 'we just prefer to set at different sides of the table at meetings' to 'stab on sight' )

Colleges=
-Elementalist, Witch hunters.
Thorek
- elves (war of the beard is a trigger word and is not going away, can only work around it), foolish humans, city dwarfs, conservative Runelords, radical Runelords, Runelords that won't take a bloody side, whoever is in the BOOK etc etc...
Lord Hatalath of the Grey Lords
- Nordland, White tower of hoeth, ???
Vicereine Cadaeth
- Nordland, conservative elfs?
Baba Niedzwenka
-???
Ice Maiden Zlata
- Whoever is benefitting from the ice witches being on the out with the boss?
 
pucflek said:
Life expectancy is low because its dragged by enormous amount of children dying between the ages of 1 hour old and 15 years old. If you survived till 20ties, you have about as good odds of surviving past 60 as does anyone in this thread. (that is slight exaggeration but not far from truth).
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What's the practical answer then? If it's skewed lower because of higher mortality rates for the youth. Are you just saying it's the same with modern averages but skewed lower because of more people dying early?

Assuming that Mathilde was had when her mother was around 20, her mother would now be around 58. Since Mathilde was put on the stake as a child, we can infer that her parents were young adults for the village. Authority is usually skewed towards the elderly and usually you'd assume there are more adults than there are children at the time. Even if you were a child at the time, you would now be at Mathilde's age in her late thirties. I doubt the former children even remember her burning.

Thing I'm not sure of is when old people become infirm way back when. I can be convinced either way even if it was false tbh.

I mean, the scene where her parents forgot her was a main threadmark right? This tangent was inspired by that.

Or maybe Mathilde's parents were the exact age for adults since generations came in more dense batches back then? Idk, reading back this theory is based entirely on suppositions.
 
Let's see... this is what I think the opposition looks like, and just to be clear this is opposition not enemies, things like Chaos and Vampires are counted automatically if they get wind of what we are doing

Active Members:
Lady Magister Mathilde Weber of the Grey Order

I think we may have opponents among the more conservative elements of dawi society for our deeds and the way it has raised us to provenience. I mean for Grungi's sake we were proclaimed a dwarf. No one is going to say in so many words that the priests were wrong, much less that they made it up, but I am betting many of them think it. As well as that any revanchist elements that do not like elves and do not distinguish one elf from another might be opposed to sharing runelore with them. I

Lady Magister Elrisse of the Order of Light
Lord Magister Egrimm van Horstmann of the Order of Light

Internal divisions as part of the Colege may drive some of them to oppose us especially if it comes out how we got Mira's support. Other than that I do not think the anti-Chaos wizards are going to have many internal enemies that are not shared among all wizards.

Magister Tochter Grunfeld of the Order of Life

Internal issues from both sides, you have the secularists upset that the Druids are getting a breath of political air and you probably have some druids thinking that they should not share the holy lore. Also the Jades are more involved in things like improving the land and healing so they probably have more enemies than the Lights among the nobility of the empire, if only from sour grapes

Lord Hatalath of the Grey Lords

Old enough to have pre-War of the Beard beef with Ulthuan, though I have no idea what their politics look like so I would not want to make any bets on where any equally old grudge holders might have power.

Vicereine Cadaeth of the Ward of Frost

I doubt the Elector count of Norland even knows what a Grey Lord is so this is as good a place as any to mark down Norland's opposition as well as that of any Imperial supremacists out there. Until their emerging from isolation Laurelorn was a hazard like many of the Empire's forests, but it was not really a state, you could color that in as part of Norland and feel good about yourself, not so now. There are also the economic interests in everything from lumber to gold 'prospectors'

Runelord Thorek Ironbrow of Karak Azul

He made quite a few waves and ruffled quite a few beards by treating the Runelords as either children or fools n their treatmant of Karak Dum. On the other hand they would not dare attack him on this directly so the project is the target. There are also those city dwarfs whose ancestral secrets he wants, we do not know when he is going to trigger that and it is already well out of our hands. For all we know they are rioting in the streets as we speak

Baba Niedzwenka of Erengrad

Probably not a lot of political enemies we would care about, hags tend to be local and not make many waves in the politics of the nobility, that said if she is skilled enough and important enough she might have gathered some anyway. Who knows she might even be old enough to have visited the Fire Spire, one of the last inheritors of their many grudges

Ice Maiden Zlata of the Hromada Ledyanoy Ved'ma

General opposition to a return of the Ice court of prominence, although I imagine those politics are more likely to take place in Kislev and we would not even notice them unless something goes deeply wrong
 
Swantree said:
What's the practical answer then? If it's skewed lower because of higher mortality rates for the youth. Are you just saying it's the same with modern averages but skewed lower because of more people dying early?

Assuming that Mathilde was had when her mother was around 20, her mother would now be around 58. Since Mathilde was put on the stake as a child, we can infer that her parents were young adults for the village. Authority is usually skewed towards the elderly and usually you'd assume there are more adults than there are children at the time. Even if you were a child at the time, you would now be at Mathilde's age in her late thirties. I doubt the former children even remember her burning.

Thing I'm not sure of is when old people become infirm way back when. I can be convinced either way even if it was false tbh.

I mean, the scene where her parents forgot her was a main threadmark right? This tangent was inspired by that.

Or maybe Mathilde's parents were the exact age for adults since generations came in more dense batches back then? Idk, reading back this theory is based entirely on suppositions.
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Not puflek, but I think the answer is, that if you consider only the people above a certain age such as 20, the mortality graph is of a similar shape to today. However it has a very large spike at the early ages and so the similarity only applies after that spike is, for lack of a better term, ended.
 
Swantree said:
What's the practical answer then? If it's skewed lower because of higher mortality rates for the youth. Are you just saying it's the same with modern averages but skewed lower because of more people dying early?

Assuming that Mathilde was had when her mother was around 20, her mother would now be around 58. Since Mathilde was put on the stake as a child, we can infer that her parents were young adults for the village. Authority is usually skewed towards the elderly and usually you'd assume there are more adults than there are children at the time. Even if you were a child at the time, you would now be at Mathilde's age in her late thirties. I doubt the former children even remember her burning.

Thing I'm not sure of is when old people become infirm way back when. I can be convinced either way even if it was false tbh.

I mean, the scene where her parents forgot her was a main threadmark right? This tangent was inspired by that.

Or maybe Mathilde's parents were the exact age for adults since generations came in more dense batches back then? Idk, reading back this theory is based entirely on suppositions.
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She had some siblings and her parents have a decent shot of actually being alive is what i am trying to say. People survived till sixties all the time. I am not sure if the graph Jyn posted is accurate, but if it is, then the age distribution is pretty close to modern era, since people aged 65+ are currently about 9% of europes population. If you do extremely rough and unscientific division, then people are about three times as likely to reach 65 as they were in middle ages, but ultimately, considering the population, it was still pretty common to reach that age even then.
 
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Boney said:
I'm having trouble imagining anything more completely antithetical to everything Ghur represents than a library.
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Boney said:
Converting subjective experiences into immortal, static, and endlessly transmissible written words so that information can be gleaned about something by those who have never experienced it is extremely anti-Ghur.
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Well, you established that they do write papers. So they gotta store and disseminate them somewhere. Or at least I vaguely remember you saying that Esbern and Seija aren't an anomaly back when it came up.
Sinsystems said:
Random thought, with how Stirlanders value bloodlines and the like how likely do you think it is that despite almost burning her at the stake as a child that those closely related to her are using the blood connection for prestige?
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What I could see though, is Mathilde's younger siblings or ones that are only a year older than her trying to do this. Since they can truthfully claim to have been innocent in her prosecution.
Amantalado said:
Well shit, that's what, the Cult of Thungni as the highest power that could take issue with us, with all the crap rolling downhill from there.

How many people did we offend so far in getting these groups? How many people have the people we've gotten been offending as well for that matter?

I'll do a re-read of the waystone arc and see what trouble we might have been brewing for it so far.
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We stepped on the toes of:
  • Nordland
  • Any potential internal rivals of the Wards and Houses of Laurelorn that we recruit.
  • Staunchly Anti-Dum Dwarves.
  • Anti-Thorek Runesmiths.
  • The Dwarves of Middenheim and their political and economic allies.
  • Other politically active Expat Dwarves that don't like Karaz Ankor meddling on principle.
  • Alric and his remaining followers within the Light Order.
  • Slaanesh
  • Some of the more fanatic Jade secularists.
  • Drycha.
  • Maybe Boyar Kalashinivik.

DragonParadox said:
No one is going to say in so many words that the priests were wrong, much less that they made it
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Belegar kinda did just that.
 
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Regarding the topic of Mathilde's family, previous WoB is that they would have no reason to associate the girl that was almost burnt at the stake with the Grey Wizard.
 
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