Warhammer Fantasy: Divided Loyalties - an Advisor's Quest

[Codex]

I understand that this is from End Times, but I do not believe for a second that what Nagash did to Zacharias the "Ever-Living" wouldn't be easily replicable if he was brought back to his full potential. To those who might be wondering what he did, the instant Zacharias refused to serve Nagash, Nagash trapped Zacharias in a ball of unending agony. One of the wisps surrounding Nagash is Zacharias, cursed to forever be used as a power source for Nagash.

People can talk all they want about Nagash' elixir being "inferior", but fact of the matter is that he's the strongest Necromancer on the planet and he could enslave or torture every Vampire in the planet with the snap of a finger.

 

[BurnNote]

I am pretty sure at least some of Nagash's megalomania, the thing that lost him two wars, is due to Dhar exposure so I would say that yes it does impact everyone even if some people may not realize the impact.

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Nah, I'm pretty sure Nagash really is immune to the mental effects of Dhar exposure, because he was already off his rocker, and he'd be like this even if Dhar encouraged pacifistic humility.

 

[Codex]

It should also be noted that the official explanation for why Nagash's revival is the way it is, is because of the Fellblade. It cursed him and made him weaker everytime he revived, such that the last time he was revived, which was the Night of the Living Dead, he was a phantasm that lasted for one day before he dissipated. The Nagash that Sigmar defeated was weaker than the Nagash that conquered Nehekhara.

Yes this is End Times lore. Thing is, it was implied earlier on. The Night of the Living Dead existed before the End Times, and it's justification is that Nagash was revived which caused the surge in Necromantic power. And yet, he didn't pop up after that. End Times only explained the discrepancy.

Honestly I just think the authors were too scared to bring back Nagash in his full power without there being an endgame scenario.

 

[Alratan]

I'm not aware of anything saying that? Like, Necromancers can use Dhar without needing Warpstone, we saw an Eshin Sorcerer produce Dhar from surrounding Winds.

And he didn't get access to Warpstone until his exile to Nagashizzar, he was using Necromancy and Dark Magic before that.

He used Warpstone for the same reason everyone else, including vampires, use it- it's a hefty power boost if you don't mind the risks or side effects.

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Nagash originally used the Black Pyramid to suck in the Winds of Magic and manufacture Dhar to use for large scale Necromany. When he no longer had access to that he needed the Warpstone mines of Cripple Peak.

Sure, minor personal scale spellcasting seems to be something you can do solo, but for raising undead armies you need massive amount of Warpstone or a Dhar factory. Vampires have the advantage that they have one built into their soul. Other necromancers don't.

 

[Mopman43]

Sure, minor personal scale spellcasting seems to be something you can do solo, but for raising undead armies you need massive amount of Warpstone or a Dhar factory. Vampires have the advantage that they have one built into their soul. Other necromancers don't.

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For raising an undead army in Sylvania, Vlad also used Warpstone.

I think you're making a distinction that isn't there.

 

[Alratan]

It should also be noted that the official explanation for why Nagash's revival is the way it is, is because of the Fellblade. It cursed him and made him weaker everytime he revived, such that the last time he was revived, which was the Night of the Living Dead, he was a phantasm that lasted for one day before he dissipated. The Nagash that Sigmar defeated was weaker than the Nagash that conquered Nehekhara.

Yes this is End Times lore. Thing is, it was implied earlier on. The Night of the Living Dead existed before the End Times, and it's justification is that Nagash was revived which caused the surge in Necromantic power. And yet, he didn't pop up after that. End Times only explained the discrepancy.

Honestly I just think the authors were too scared to bring back Nagash in his full power without there being an endgame scenario.

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I'm pretty sure the pre-End Times reason was that Nagash was missing pieces of himself when he came back, like his hand, and the pieces of him in his Crown and Nine Books, and that it was hinted that if he recovered them he'd regain his complete powers.

I'm not surprised they forgot that in End Times.

 

[Codex]

Nagash originally used the Black Pyramid to suck in the Winds of Magic and manufacture Dhar to use for large scale Necromany. When he no longer had access to that he needed the Warpstone mines of Cripple Peak.

Sure, minor personal scale spellcasting seems to be something you can do solo, but for raising undead armies you need massive amount of Warpstone or a Dhar factory. Vampires have the advantage that they have one built into their soul. Other necromancers don't.

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Vlad did the exact same thing for his Vampire War by harvesting Mordheim's Warpstone. And his army wasn't anywhere near Nagash's level either, because it didn't defeat the Empire which was split three ways and infighting. Nagash had to be defeated by Nehekhara in its prime.

 

[Alratan]

For raising an undead army in Sylvania, Vlad also used Warpstone.

I think you're making a distinction that isn't there.

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Van Hal used Warpstone to raise his undead armies, but when the likes of Mannfred raised his I thought that the Warpstone reserves had already been used up by Van Hal?

 

[Mopman43]

Van Hal used Warpstone to raise his undead armies, but when the likes of Mannfred raised his I thought that the Warpstone reserves had already been used up by Van Hal?

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Vlad smuggled Warpstone out of Mordheim. The meteor hit not long before he started the first Vampire War.

 

[Blackout]

I mean, every description of Neferata's elixir in the lore I've seen directly state that it's inferior to Nagash's.

Even if you want to argue against those statements, for one while he used Warpstone to fuel his big necromantic rituals, those rituals also achieved feats never seen since by any Necromancer, Lich or Vampire. Even Vlad's ritual across Sylvania pales in comparison, and he also used Warpstone to do it. For another, he has none of the weaknesses of Vampires. Not sunlight, not bloodthirst, not ithilmar, not stakes, not sawdust, not crossing running water, not doorways, none of it. You can argue that (depending on source) those are curses put on them by outside sources, but in that case it points towards the vampires' susceptibility to curses. You'll note that nobody has ever been able to put similar curses on Nagash.

 

[Codex]

You'll note that nobody has ever been able to put similar curses on Nagash.

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The Fellblade might have laid a curse on him, but if so then the blade made out of Warpstone Gromril forged by the Council of Thirteen and their Grey Seers working together in the hopes of defeating a world ending threat enchanted with the greatest and most vile curses imaginable is the one thing to do it.

"In the utmost secrecy, the council's Lords of Decay forged a sword with Warpstone traded from Nagashizzar and gromril stolen from Karak Varn. They cast spells of the most terrible power into the molten metal, and tempered the brilliant blade in acid bile and magical poisons, engraving in it runes so deadly that they were capable of killing the one who read them. Anyone with arcane knowledge could see the aura of power and misery that enveloped the sinister artefact. In the blade's hilt they placed a brilliant orb of Warpstone through which they would be able to see through the eyes of the weapon's bearer and channel defensive magic through it to protect its wielder from the terrible spells of Nagash."

 

[Shine]

I don't mean to start shit again, but isn't the reason why vampires have a zero tolerance policy three fold:

A. At varying rates, some quicker or slower, their dark-magic sustained nature drives them (typically dangerously) mad unless they fulfill extremely unlikely categories (dragon blood, Genevieve's very lengthy questline, others I do not know of, etc.)
B. Vampires fall in with other vampires, because sires have direct control over thralls that only fades with, by human reckoning, substantial time.
C. Related to A and B, they eat people.

Ergo, if Mathilde is turned even assuming we're not then executed, or we don't successfully off ourself, we'd be spending decades serving whatever (very powerful) vampire sired us with only some wiggle room, while slowly going insane at a rate dependent on lifestyle and bloodline, and thus will almost certainly not be aiding the sane factions.

Or, so my explosure to Warhammer and reading the entry level official fictions has lead me to believe.

 

[Alratan]

I hadn't seen those Mordheim references before.

However, I have found references which make it clear that Nagash's Elixir is inferior. Page 16 of Liber Necris claims to be a translation of Nagash's own words, where he says that his Elixir didn't bestow true immortality, that he died and went to the afterworld, then escaped, returned to, and possessed his dead body, which he was at risk of losing hold of and going back to the afterlife if he didn't concentrate. It then goes in to describe how he did gain true immortality, irrevocably binding his soul to his body. Previous pages describe what his Elixir does. It's a simple upgrade of the Mortuary Cult's processes, making you not age as well as not die of old age.

We know that Neferata's Elixir of Life does grant true immortality, with the binding of soul to body.

As a result, we know Neferata's Elixir is superior.

As a side note, we're also told that Nagash records that he only truly developed Necromancy in Cripple Peak, what he was using before then was some immature precursor. Notably; he only developed the process of raising the bodies of the dead after going to Cripple Peak. Previously he'd used corrupted versions of the Mortuary Cult's ubshanti.

 

[T_of_A]

Ah yes, I remember the showdown between Vlad and Nagash.

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dy2zB8bLSpk

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This is the funniest post I've seen all week.

Also, I never noticed but that scene will age weirdly now that Elizabeth II is six feet under.

 

[BurnNote]

I mean, every description of Neferata's elixir in the lore I've seen directly state that it's inferior to Nagash's.

Even if you want to argue against those statements, for one while he used Warpstone to fuel his big necromantic rituals, those rituals also achieved feats never seen since by any Necromancer, Lich or Vampire. Even Vlad's ritual across Sylvania pales in comparison, and he also used Warpstone to do it. For another, he has none of the weaknesses of Vampires. Not sunlight, not bloodthirst, not ithilmar, not stakes, not sawdust, not crossing running water, not doorways, none of it. You can argue that (depending on source) those are curses put on them by outside sources, but in that case it points towards the vampires' susceptibility to curses. You'll note that nobody has ever been able to put similar curses on Nagash.

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I'm pretty sure the curses on the Vampires are the result of pissing off Nagash (by running from battle IIRC). Initially, the flawed Elixir of Life Nefi made only produced the bloodthirst (and possibly gave Nagash a magical backdoor to their soul).

 

[Xepheria]

If Nagash were a hot villainess rather than an angry skeleton nerd he wouldn't have been given swirlies by a barely-clothed jock with a hammer.

QED.

 

[Altom]

I'm pretty sure the pre-End Times reason was that Nagash was missing pieces of himself when he came back, like his hand, and the pieces of him in his Crown and Nine Books, and that it was hinted that if he recovered them he'd regain his complete powers.

I'm not surprised they forgot that in End Times.

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Surprisingly, they didn't. The entire first ark of the first book is Mannfrad and Arkhan collecting these items, plus some extra to revive Nagash properly. Well, those they didn't have already in any case .

 

[Dheer]

I don't mean to start shit again, but isn't the reason why vampires have a zero tolerance policy three fold:

A. At varying rates, some quicker or slower, their dark-magic sustained nature drives them (typically dangerously) mad unless they fulfill extremely unlikely categories (dragon blood, Genevieve's very lengthy questline, others I do not know of, etc.)
B. Vampires fall in with other vampires, because sires have direct control over thralls that only fades with, by human reckoning, substantial time.
C. Related to A and B, they eat people.

Ergo, if Mathilde is turned even assuming we're not then executed, or we don't successfully off ourself, we'd be spending decades serving whatever (very powerful) vampire sired us with only some wiggle room, while slowly going insane at a rate dependent on lifestyle and bloodline, and thus will almost certainly not be aiding the sane factions.

Or, so my explosure to Warhammer and reading the entry level official fictions has lead me to believe.

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I would say not exactly, I think part of the reasoning for why vampires have zero tolerance policy on them ranges from the factions, for the Empire mainly because major factions of vampires keep on trying to conquer it, for the Druchi mainly because they do not like them because who made them in the first place, the Dawi because of again major factions continuously pissing them off as noted by Boney and the elves from what I can find it is because of the magic being loathsame either because of its design or because of it deriving from the Druchi.

"Only men, with their short lives and shorter vision, could have imagined such a loathsome use for magic." —Ithilweil, Elf enchantress

As for the rest of the points,

For point A, not precisely, so long as they feed on Sekhem of other beings according to the Liber Necris, they do not degenerate mentally from their nature except off course the influence of the the thirst on their mind, the gradual movement of time and the outside factors of the world. Along with the fact it is warned that they should not feed on dhar as it has numerous dangers if they saturate in it for too long.
For point B, from what I can find on the Night"s Dark Masters and the Liber Necris, there is no mentioning whatsoever of Sires having direct control over who they Sire but more they are responsible for managing the vampire with the sins of the sired being consider the sins of the sire by other vampires unless there is some source beyond them which supports it.

Essentially speaking, if Mathilde is ever turned, there is nothing which the vampire can do to make her listen and obey them along with that insanity is only guaranteed you follow the Necrach method of feeding while for the other bloodlines, it is not, In actually going insane from the hunger or dhar feeding is considered to be a failure state in the Liber Necris.

From my understanding of the material at least.

I'm pretty sure the curses on the Vampires are the result of pissing off Nagash (by running from battle IIRC). Initially, the flawed Elixir of Life Nefi made only produced the bloodthirst (and possibly gave Nagash a magical backdoor to their soul).

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Pretty much, there is a reason why it is called the Curse of Nagash.

 

[Shine]

For point B, from what I can find on the Night"s Dark Masters and the Liber Necris, there is no mentioning whatsoever of Sires having direct control over who they Sire but more they are responsible for managing the vampire with the sins of the sired being consider the sins of the sire by other vampires unless there is some source beyond them which supports it.

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IC.
That must just be misremembering off other RPGs then.
Thanks.

 

[Orbmorb]

Speaking of this, I have a question if you don"t mind me asking since this is something which comes up often about vampires, do we have any idea on how Nagash was able to curse the entirety of the vampire species?

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It might be a logistical issue. I don't know how many vampires there were when Nagash cursed them all, but it was definitely orders of magnitude than there were humans alive. So a curse on any other entire species might be theoretically possible but require more power than Nagash had access to.

 

[Dheer]

IC.
That must just be misremembering off other RPGs then.
Thanks.

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It is no problem, admittedly though I could have skimmed past it as reading and searching for the terms of this is not easy.

I mean, every description of Neferata's elixir in the lore I've seen directly state that it's inferior to Nagash's.

Even if you want to argue against those statements, for one while he used Warpstone to fuel his big necromantic rituals, those rituals also achieved feats never seen since by any Necromancer, Lich or Vampire. Even Vlad's ritual across Sylvania pales in comparison, and he also used Warpstone to do it. For another, he has none of the weaknesses of Vampires. Not sunlight, not bloodthirst, not ithilmar, not stakes, not sawdust, not crossing running water, not doorways, none of it. You can argue that (depending on source) those are curses put on them by outside sources, but in that case it points towards the vampires' susceptibility to curses. You'll note that nobody has ever been able to put similar curses on Nagash.

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Uh Question from where you find it in the lore it is stated it is inferior then his version.

For the second part, the argumentation that vampires are susceptible to curses from outside sources is a bit suspect, when considering the only one who has ever cursed them in such a manner was Nagash himself possibly due to them deriving alongside the same research path as him. As for nobody ever putting a similar curse to Nagash, one he is possibly cursed by the Fellblade of the Skaven and alongside that nobody else in his vicinity during his times of activity is as capable as inflicting curses as Nagash unless he somehow encounters Morathi out of nowhere.

 

[Codex]

It is no problem, admittedly though I could have skimmed past it as reading and searching for the terms of this is not easy.



Uh Question from where you find it in the lore it is stated it is inferior then his version.

For the second part, the argumentation that vampires are susceptible to curses from outside sources is a bit suspect, when considering the only one who has ever cursed them in such a manner was Nagash himself possibly due to them deriving alongside the same research path as him. As for nobody ever putting a similar curse to Nagash, one he is possibly cursed by the Fellblade of the Skaven and alongside that nobody else in his vicinity during his times of activity is as capable as inflicting curses as Nagash unless he somehow encounters Morathi out of nowhere.

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Page 8 of 8th Edition Vampire Counts Army Book:

"In defiance of the laws imposed by the Priest Kings, Neferata, the Queen of Lahmia stole the most potent of Nagash's books and pursued her own studies in the dark arts. She attempted to replicate the Elixir of Life, and eventually she had a small measure of success."

 

[Glau]

Personally I don't want immortality for Mathilde. I want her to die of old age, as a mortal, with Ranald in debt to her.

Anything else seems like signing up for an eternity of pain, struggle, and loss, and it's the privilege of mortals to be able to walk away from that.

For point A, not precisely, so long as they feed on Sekhem of other beings according to the Liber Necris, they do not degenerate mentally from their nature except off course the influence of the the thirst on their mind, the gradual movement of time and the outside factors of the world. Along with the fact it is warned that they should not feed on dhar as it has numerous dangers if they saturate in it for too long.

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A one way rachet is still a problem, because the destination is still fixed, it's just the travel time that varies.

 

[Dheer]

Page 8 of 8th Edition Vampire Counts Army Book:

"In defiance of the laws imposed by the Priest Kings, Neferata, the Queen of Lahmia stole the most potent of Nagash's books and pursued her own studies in the dark arts. She attempted to replicate the Elixir of Life, and eventually she had a small measure of success."

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Hmm, on Page 28 of Night"s Dark Masters this what is said on about the Elixir.

"With their aid, he and Neferatem continued their studies, focussing on one ritual above all others: the creation of the Elixir of Life that had granted Nagash his immortality. They eventually found success but in an unexpected form. The version of the Elixir they created gave them immortality, but it also fundamentally changed the nature of their beings. They became the first Vampires."

And from the Liber Necris, On page 29. The section on the Elixir of Life was the following.

"Neferatan had gone further in her experimentations with Nagash"s Work and with W"Soran"s aid had recreated all of Nagash"s macabre experiments and dark rituals, including the Elixir of Immortality. W"Soran had made subtle changes to the Elixir, making it even more wonderous than Nagash"s original, for this new elixir granted all who supped it true immortality - total immunity of death - and also took the entirety of the drinker"s soul far beyond the reach of all Gods or Daemons in a way Nagash himself only achieved having consumed prodigious amounts of raw warpstone."

It seems to be presenting it in a different manner than what is stated in your quote. That is interesting to know. Along with that from reading further on what"s Nagash version done to him, the effects and side effects were quite different.

 

[Codex]

Hmm, on Page 28 of Night"s Dark Masters this what is said on about the Elixir.

"With their aid, he and Neferatem continued their studies, focussing on one ritual above all others: the creation of the Elixir of Life that had granted Nagash his immortality. They eventually found success but in an unexpected form. The version of the Elixir they created gave them immortality, but it also fundamentally changed the nature of their beings. They became the first Vampires."

And from the Liber Necris, On page 29. The section on the Elixir of Life was the following.

"Neferatan had gone further in her experimentations with Nagash"s Work and with W"Soran"s aid had recreated all of Nagash"s macabre experiments and dark rituals, including the Elixir of Immortality. W"Soran had made subtle changes to the Elixir, making it even more wonderous than Nagash"s original, for this new elixir granted all who supped it true immortality - total immunity of death - and also took the entirety of the drinker"s soul far beyond the reach of all Gods or Daemons in a way Nagash himself only achieved having consumed prodigious amounts of raw warpstone."

It seems to be presenting it in a different manner than what is stated in your quote. That is interesting to know. Along with that from reading further on what"s Nagash version done to him, the effects and side effects were quite different.

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Night's Dark Masters was published by Black Industries. Liber Necris by Black Library. And beyond that Liber Necris is written from the PoV of Mannfred von Carstein.

Yes, Mannfred von Carstein. Notoriously insane and overconfident Mannfred von Carstein. I'm sure he's an unbiased source.

8th Edition is written and published by GW. It should also be noted that 2nd Edition was released around 6th Edition Warhammer. All of this explains the discrepancies in a neat fashion.