Remove ads

Warhammer Fantasy: Divided Loyalties - an Advisor's Quest

Voted best in category in the Users' Choice awards.
Voting is open
Reader mode
Apparitions seems like a good action to bring her on yeah.

More generally than just getting her combat experience though, I was impressed with her work this turn, and think we should generally aim to put her on actions that have a chance to let her save Mathilde time. More useful all around and we saw it has the chance to give time for more focused tutoring.
 
Last edited:
The Winter Wolves were intent on fighting stuff in the Border Princes, to keep their edge up, right? Maybe teach Eike Shadowsteed, then tag along with them?
 
Retrueno said:
I'd prefer some Skaven infiltration. Maybe we could even end up kidnapping another Skaven and assign Eike to extract information of him just like we did.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...

Two problems with the idea:
  1. We did it with the aid of an actual god via his no-kidding divine artifact of lying
  2. We also found one who could speak Khazalid, hers likely would not be so at the very least she would have to learn Queekish
 
I don't really feel comfortable bringing Eike to capture Red Ridders, besides it doesn't look like she would be able to contribute in any way and she would just be watching.

DragonParadox said:
Two problems with the idea:

We did it with the aid of an actual god via his no-kidding divine artifact of lying
We also found one who could speak Khazalid, hers likely would not be so at the very least she would have to learn Queekish
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...

For the first of your points, the idea is that it'd be practice, whether Eike fails or success wouldn't be very relevant.

For the second one well we could just have Woke study Queekish later on?

But in any case the extract information would be a stretch goal imo, with the main one being infiltrating some Skaven and kidnapping one without getting caught.
 
Last edited:
Retrueno said:
I don't really feel comfortable bringing Eike to capture Red Ridders, besides it doesn't look like she would be able to contribute in any way and she would just be watching.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...

She can hit it with a sword, shoot it with a pistol (I assume she owns a pistol), or hit it with a magic dart.

And besides, it's not really about how useful she is, but whether she keeps her cool and stands her ground, or freaks out and freezes/flees.

Better to test her against an apparition now, when she's got both Johann and Mathilde standing over her, than when she's the only thing between a beastman and a merchant cart.
 
Retrueno said:
For the first of your points, the idea is that it'd be practice, whether Eike fails or success wouldn't be very relevant.

For the second one well we could just have Woke study Queekish later on?

But in any case the extract information would be a stretch goal imo, with the main one being infiltrating some Skaven and kidnapping one without getting caught.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...

Giving someone what you suspect might be a task wholly beyond their ability is... not great teaching tactics. She does not even have the basic interrogation skill and her intrigue is in the low teens.
 
Nerdasaurus Rex said:
She can hit it with a sword, shoot it with a pistol (I assume she owns a pistol), or hit it with a magic dart.

And besides, it's not really about how useful she is, but whether she keeps her cool and stands her ground, or freaks out and freezes/flees.

Better to test her against an apparition now, when she's got both Johann and Mathilde standing over her, than when she's the only thing between a beastman and a merchant cart.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...

Sure I am all for letting her practice, I just don't think it's a good idea for her to do so vs a Red Rider, an apparition which we have no detailed information because people don't survive encounters with them.

Boney said:
No. The only Apparitions that Mathilde has detailed information of are those that people survive.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
 
Retrueno said:
I don't really feel comfortable bringing Eike to capture Red Ridders, besides it doesn't look like she would be able to contribute in any way and she would just be watching.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...

She's actually quite competent by any standard at this point, not just as an apprentice. More broadly speaking, I think this is basically not the right way to look at raising an apprentice.

There's quite a few Boney quotes that make it clear that risk is baked in to the process, and trying to avoid it is ultimately harmful to her development.

Boney said:
Teaching her personally would be the fastest and most reliable way to achieve this, but bringing her along on things where Mathilde is going to be using a lot of magic would help too.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...

DragonParadox said:
Maybe, but it would by necessity be a narrow class of research, that is safe for them. We can't very well go 'Hey Hans, good news, your teaching today will be in binding Not-Really-Daemons' :V
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
Boney said:
Why not? It's not like anyone else in the Grey College has that on their resume already, and there's no way of reaching journeyman without considerable risk.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...

Boney said:
There's not an Apprenticeship in the Empire that's 'safe'. Apprentice woodcutters are given something extremely sharp on day one. Apprentice bakers and weavers lose limbs to contraptions attached to waterwheels regularly. Apprentice engineers and miners can get particularly grim. And the less said about those that seek a military career and have a place on the battlefield as powder monkeys or messengers or drummer boys or squires, the better. All beginning at the tender age of ten. This is a brutal time period in a brutal world, and every career track has an attrition rate. Prioritizing the safety of an Apprentice at the expense of their opportunities to learn and grow would be seen as failing them.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
 
Nerdasaurus Rex said:
She can hit it with a sword, shoot it with a pistol (I assume she owns a pistol), or hit it with a magic dart.

And besides, it's not really about how useful she is, but whether she keeps her cool and stands her ground, or freaks out and freezes/flees.

Better to test her against an apparition now, when she's got both Johann and Mathilde standing over her, than when she's the only thing between a beastman and a merchant cart.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...

Apparitions are immune to non-magical weapons I'm pretty sure so we would have to get her a magic weapon and our CF budget it still tight.
maybe if we were willing to get her a more modest Runic Greatsword with AV (10 Favors or so)
 
DragonParadox said:
Apparitions are immune to non-magical weapons I'm pretty sure so we would have to get her a magic weapon and our CF budget it still tight.
maybe if we were willing to get her a more modest Runic Greatsword with AV (10 Favors or so)
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
Thomasfoolery said:
Or we could tell her we're going out hunting apparitions next month so best buckle down and learn blessed weapon.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
Our CF budget is not tight. We have 9 favours to spare, 4 if we insist on buying a new grey powerstone instead of using our existing one (which is pointless because we're definitely going to gain enough CF from the Morbing to buy a new one).

And there's no need to buy Eike an enchanted weapon anyway, Blessed Weapon lasts an hour and Mathilde can cast it on Eike's sword when she thinks they're getting close to the apparition.
 
We can take Eike along with Thorek to take a look at Bugman's, which I think is in enemy territory, so there should be opportunity for battle, and she can participate. I don't think Dawi will mind an apprentice coming along with their master, and she can just stand outiside the room if we need to discuss something really sensitive.
 
DragonParadox said:
We could but there is no guarantee she would manage it and it's not like a three rune weapon would hurt in the long run. We might even be able to swing the rune of the Unknown as one of them so we could eventually teach her our style.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...

Yes, there are indeed no guarantees, sounds like a good lesson for her to learn if she fails and thinks she's stuck plinking away with magic dart as opposed to learning that she'll always be bailed out by splashing out ludicrous sums on a blinged out weapon for her.

mathymancer said:
And there's no need to buy Eike an enchanted weapon anyway, Blessed Weapon lasts an hour and Mathilde can cast it on Eike's sword when she thinks they're getting close to the apparition.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...

Realistically yeah, Mathilde would cast it for her when the time came if she failed, letting her try to accomplish the prep herself first is still a good experience for her though.
 
While I agree that we shouldn't coddle Eike, that doesn't mean we need to throw her in at the deep end either. Having her accompany the Winter Wolves on a hunt seems like a good idea.
 
I'm up for exposing Eike to supervised combat risk at this point.
I just suspect that any plan including that is going to suffer disproportionately votewise from people who disagree, so I'd be loath to put one forward.
 
Thomasfoolery said:
Realistically yeah, Mathilde would cast it for her when the time came if she failed, letting her try to accomplish the prep herself first is still a good experience for her though.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
I suppose. I think learning Sounds and Blessed Weapon in one turn should be doable even if we put her on a bunch of other actions. And if she manages Sounds she'll go into her study of Blessed Weapon with 3 Magic, which is quite respectable for learning Lesser Magics. My point wasn't really that Eike shouldn't learn it or anything, it's more that there's really no need to go out of our way and buy her expensive enchanted weapons or whatever if all we want is for Eike to have magic weapons. Eike's non-magical sword can be made magical with a spell that Mathilde can cast in her sleep and which lasts for an hour, it's really not much of an issue.

Now that i think about it, putting Eike on the apparition action has another benefit. We already thought about putting The Gambler but some people said they think that's unnecessary, having Eike tag along neatly solves that debate, since we'll surely want our good friend watching over Eike's first combat.
 
Andrensath said:
While I agree that we shouldn't coddle Eike, that doesn't mean we need to throw her in at the deep end either. Having her accompany the Winter Wolves on a hunt seems like a good idea.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...

Being accompanied by two masterclass combatants against what at the end of the day is a relatively modest threat is not really the deep end. Quite shallow honestly.

Gavin Prince said:
I'm up for exposing Eike to supervised combat risk at this point.
I just suspect that any plan including that is going to suffer disproportionately votewise from people who disagree, so I'd be loath to put one forward.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...

I hope not, As I feel like that would be indicative that voters calibrations for expected competence are rather out of whack. Like this was Mathilde fighting at the burial crypt back in the day.

Boney said:
[YOU: Req 40, Martial, 87+7-10=84.]
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...

She was injured so was literally rocking -3 martial when she rolled up there, and hadn't even completed basic greatsword skill until the end of that turn. In comparison Eike is quite solidly ahead of her.
 
I note that with the +1 Magic from learning Sounds, she'd also be at the point where it's reasonable to consider teaching her Burning Shadows in addition to Blessed Weapon, though that would probably require her to not be doing much besides learning spells and coming to the fight (and is probably a case where we'd want to tutor her personally to avoid serious mishaps, but we want to do that regardless in hopes of getting her Blessed Hands).
 
Last edited:
Nerdasaurus Rex said:
Better to test her against an apparition now
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
What? No. What?

We blooded three full Journeyducklings against an understrength, pre-terrorised Skaven watchpost, not some insubstantial magical murder machine. And then moved on to a select few Orcs. I don't think Eike should be anywhere near Riders in Red or other Apparitions.

(Bound or otherwise, but that's a lost proposition).
 
Last edited:
picklepikkl said:
Here are a few of my scattered thoughts on topics of discussion that came up over the last fifteen-odd pages since last I showed up, insofar as anyone cares what I think:
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
I think there's nothing I don't agree with. Verbatim really. Depending on how much time I have, I might just go [ ] picklepikkl next turn.
Parabola said:
-[ ] Eike Actions: Lustrian books study, Windfall paper, EIC action, Aethyric Vitae book
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
I don't think we should divert Eike's time by making her witness us writing a book about an esoteric thing we've been working on for over a decade, which she neither knows anything about nor is allowed to talk to anyone about.

I also want to add my agreement to the sentiment that the Gambler should rather be applied to the Red Rider action. I am not at all worried that Mathilde can't take one or even multiple of them in combat, especially with Johann for backup. I am worried that she might not find a good way to defeat and imprison them or that something goes wrong during that process. Or hell, I think a crit in a relevant moment, even during looking for them or studying them, is much more valuable than a crit in Liminal Space creation. On the flip side I am not worried about a repeat of what happened last time. Liminal realm creation with AV is apparently pretty straightforward, now that Mathilde knows what she's doing. And honestly, I'm not even sure I really want whatever attention diverting weirdness a Ranald-induced crit in this particular field would reveal.
Or to put it in game mechanical terms, Red Rider hunting is likely to need more individual rolls than liminal space creation. More things to go wrong and more things to go exceptionally right. Also more things to learn from scratch. We shouldn't have to rely on Ranald for repeat actions that we want to put in a book.

Otherwise the plan looks pretty good.

Boney said:
I know people are reflexively risk-averse from anything that might endanger what they see as a child, but since she has Aethyric Armour now's the time to start thinking about pointing her at actual threats instead of continuing to play pretend. If she's not blooded under careful supervision now, then it's going to be when she's on her own. If you want her to learn to dismantle, then find something that needs dismantling, point Mathilde or one of her employees at it, and sent Eike along on the adventure.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
Is bloodying your apprentice normal? I'm pretty sure it didn't happen to Mathilde, Panoramia, or any of the Ducklings. Maybe that's all the more reason to do it for Eike, I'm just curious how unusual it would be.
 
Andrensath said:
We have no idea how much of a threat Red Riders are, because nobody's ever fought one and lived.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...

That wasn't exactly what that quote was getting at, here's a more in depth expansion Boney gave afterwards.

Boney said:
It's not that they're so incredibly deadly that there's not much data about them, it's more like... imagine if you researched people getting hit by trucks, and found that every single first-person account of what it's like to be hit by a truck has something in common: that the person survived. If you don't account for survivorship bias, you could come to the conclusion that it is literally impossible to die from being hit by a truck, or that trucks only ever move slowly or that they only ever hit people glancingly, never head-on.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
 
Rafin said:
Is bloodying your apprentice normal? I'm pretty sure it didn't happen to Mathilde, Panoramia, or any of the Ducklings. Maybe that's all the more reason to do it for Eike, I'm just curious how unusual it would be.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...

It depends on the Master. Some bring their Apprentice along on everything they do so they get blooded incidentally, some send theirs off on solo adventures, some keep them sheltered until their Journeying.
 
For a more reasonable first combat action, we do have this:

[ ] Involve yourself in current affairs: specify what and how.
- Eastern Stirland pacification
- Marienburg Affair

Those seem like things Eike could contribute to without it being either over-deadly or complete make-work. The first being a martial action, the latter an intrigue one.

It would mean taking an action out of a fairly busy schedule, but I'm honestly kinda surprised that the thread hasn't set aside a single dedicated action for Eike to this point, instead riding on her freebies.
 
Reader mode
You must login or register to reply here.
Voting is open
Remove ads
Back
Top