Warhammer Fantasy: Divided Loyalties - an Advisor's Quest
- Thread starter Boney
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- Fantasy Users' Choice!
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- warhammer warhammer fantasy fantasy be gay do crimes (gay) female protagonist pansexual protagonist ck2 quest divided loyalties mountain vietnam ranald is real this is a dwarf quest (dwarfs) this is maybe an elf quest this is not a vampire quest this is not an empire quest try it and find out open voting
Voted best in category in the Users' Choice awards.
- Location
- North Wales
- Pronouns
- He/Him/His
If Windherding just isn't your jam, we can also do the paper-writing with Egrimm's WEBMAT slot and use Serenity to instead do the first half of the AV book this turn, immediately after the Liminal Realms action. This would have the advantage of being able to drop the finished thing off next turn alongside the orbs without having to use a personal action (or giving us some leeway in case of a terrible roll on one of the two halves necessitating a re-write)
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- Location
- Chicago
- Pronouns
- She/They
Not interested in Nazgul, but here for spiders. Let's do this.
Highly recommend making an omake if you want people fired up and interested for them.
Makes me think that Hoeth didn't originally have a sword, but Verena did, and the belief migrated back to Ulathan because all the elves thought Verena was just a face of Hoeth's.
So she might actually have the sword of ulgu.
Boooooo! BOOOOOOO! No spending AP on useless perfectionism! (Ymmv)
Silver-bae! And thanks to the passion actually doing the image. This is what I thought of too.
Um. I *really* don't think a foreign port where one doesn't know the laws, doesn't have a safehouse, and can't even reliablely identify who is an actual authority and who is pretending is a very good place for an apprentice solo adventure.
I remember that the first AP we spent was several mindnumbing months of staring at a pebble in a dark basement until we finally got it turn slightly translucent.
I got the impression from it that even if you have the talent, enchantment is the sort of process that can burn you out on spellcasting. I don't really want to put Eike through that. It seems like a lot of work to try and make her a bit more of a mini me, and I think there are lots of more interesting and more fun things to do.
Highly recommend making an omake if you want people fired up and interested for them.
Makes me think that Hoeth didn't originally have a sword, but Verena did, and the belief migrated back to Ulathan because all the elves thought Verena was just a face of Hoeth's.
So she might actually have the sword of ulgu.
Boooooo! BOOOOOOO! No spending AP on useless perfectionism! (Ymmv)
Silver-bae! And thanks to the passion actually doing the image. This is what I thought of too.
Um. I *really* don't think a foreign port where one doesn't know the laws, doesn't have a safehouse, and can't even reliablely identify who is an actual authority and who is pretending is a very good place for an apprentice solo adventure.
I remember that the first AP we spent was several mindnumbing months of staring at a pebble in a dark basement until we finally got it turn slightly translucent.
I got the impression from it that even if you have the talent, enchantment is the sort of process that can burn you out on spellcasting. I don't really want to put Eike through that. It seems like a lot of work to try and make her a bit more of a mini me, and I think there are lots of more interesting and more fun things to do.
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Going back to the Apparition; the reason they're valuable is to do things that you can't otherwise do with your Wind. Either because your Wind isn't good at it or because you need something with a mind to supervise the spell effect.
Now, just about everything the Whispering Darkenss can do, we can do with Ulgu already. We've had selectively targeted spells OKed based on the Burning Shadows precedent, and we've had corrosive mist and selectively opaque mist banks approved. The person who mentioned diminishing marginal utility seems to have got it right to my mind.
That's not the case for a Red Rider. They can be solid, which seems to be a thing Ulgu would otherwise struggle with, so they can do things like be a physical meat shield or hold a choke point while we run away, fight someone else, cast a spell or do something else important. The mass of a charging knight also opens up options like breaking up formations of enemies
The other important thing is that Red Riders should have hands with opposable thumbs and it seems very plausible, that being based on Knights, they'll be able to manifest with saddlebags. That would hopefully make them able to do a whole variety of tasks a lot easier, such as carrying other people behind them, picking up and carrying things, reaching down and opening sufficiently large doors, etc.
I also think that Riders can leverage having minds a lot better thanks to having the above capabilities. Mathidle can send a Red Rider off to autonomously do something, to intercept a particular enemy on the battlefield, or to got to a dangerous location and collect something, or carry a written message. Generally, a Red Rider makes a much better summoned minion, particularly on the battlefield.
Red Riders are also able, it seems to communicate, as they can laugh at their opponents. If this is the case that opens up quite a lot more options.
As a last thing, the Red Rider can generate smoke and create sparks. Smoke is conventionally within Ulgu I think, but the sparks may be something that we can use to extend our range of things we can do with it.
Most of these advantages are specifically for summoning them as knights. Reskinning them as spiders seems like a serious waste of their potential.
Now, just about everything the Whispering Darkenss can do, we can do with Ulgu already. We've had selectively targeted spells OKed based on the Burning Shadows precedent, and we've had corrosive mist and selectively opaque mist banks approved. The person who mentioned diminishing marginal utility seems to have got it right to my mind.
That's not the case for a Red Rider. They can be solid, which seems to be a thing Ulgu would otherwise struggle with, so they can do things like be a physical meat shield or hold a choke point while we run away, fight someone else, cast a spell or do something else important. The mass of a charging knight also opens up options like breaking up formations of enemies
The other important thing is that Red Riders should have hands with opposable thumbs and it seems very plausible, that being based on Knights, they'll be able to manifest with saddlebags. That would hopefully make them able to do a whole variety of tasks a lot easier, such as carrying other people behind them, picking up and carrying things, reaching down and opening sufficiently large doors, etc.
I also think that Riders can leverage having minds a lot better thanks to having the above capabilities. Mathidle can send a Red Rider off to autonomously do something, to intercept a particular enemy on the battlefield, or to got to a dangerous location and collect something, or carry a written message. Generally, a Red Rider makes a much better summoned minion, particularly on the battlefield.
Red Riders are also able, it seems to communicate, as they can laugh at their opponents. If this is the case that opens up quite a lot more options.
As a last thing, the Red Rider can generate smoke and create sparks. Smoke is conventionally within Ulgu I think, but the sparks may be something that we can use to extend our range of things we can do with it.
Most of these advantages are specifically for summoning them as knights. Reskinning them as spiders seems like a serious waste of their potential.
I once again reiterate that this is not Pigbarter? I'm a bit baffled that you think the elves running this place just leave it in such anarchy that it's not trivial to find out who the authorities are, what the laws are, and where the inns are.
In this case wouldn't the actions in which the coin would have more influence be Kislev tributaries and the EIC fog path (and maybe the Foundation action)?
- Location
- North Wales
- Pronouns
- He/Him/His
I think there's a crowd who, if it had been known ahead of time that involving Eike in the charcoal trade action meant leaving her to her own devices going back and forth to Nordland alone, would have vetoed it in case she fell face first into the swamp and drowned in two inches of water.
Lothern is fine.
Lothern is fine.
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- Location
- Chicago
- Pronouns
- She/They
Because we have literally no in universe information on its civil order or lack thereof, so I'm using Marienburg as my closest comparable, and no: I'm not willing to let Eike go on a solo adventure in Marienburg, because it's too dangerous imho. Doesn't need to be pigbarter to get a young girl killed or kidnapped.
Just last turn she was swanning around in Erengard. Which I would rate as quite likely to be worse than lothern. We also had no idea she was there.
I think this level of concern about her hanging about in a well maintained city is extraordinarily overprotective and a great way to cripple her future prospects if that's the standard of risk we hold her to.
- Pronouns
- He/Him
It's a thesis I agree with - and to which I'd add that Red Riders by comparison don't do well in the situations where Mathilde has had the most trouble, namely those where her mobility is shut down. Cavalry can't do shit if it's already in the tarpit.
Using the apparition as a trump card isn't the only utility of having one of course, but nobody knows ulgu users can even do that yet, so it has the potential to be especially potent as one... and in the next adventure we've got eyes on, we'll be working with armies so while red riders provides Mathilde with new capabilities in a vaccuum, it'll just be more swords on horses to the already extant forces we're working with... constrasted with an anti-dhar apparition pointed at dhar specialists.
Others have pointed out that many of the effects of a Whispering Darkness are things our existing spells can do - but it seems more lame than Boney would put up with for those things to not stack, and being that it's an apparition rather than a spell it can do the business while we're doing something else at the same time on top. Combined with our build synergies, I feel it's a clear pick for our next adventure which is why I think we should pick it for our first apparition.
This on the other hand...
I get your thesis, red, I really do, but just because Ranald has more room to act on a strategic level doesn't mean he doesn't still also has the ability to stop us from dying in a short burst of violence. That hasn't actually stopped being the case, and this is a rather dangerous beastie we're trying to tame.
It won't stop me from voting for your plan, but I would be more comfortable with gambler on Apparitions, personally.
Lastly - I want that sweet sweet dosh and I'm sad that the second EIC action is being dropped rather than swapped to it. Even if the opportunity isn't gone after this turn, once Laurelorn is open for business the profit margin is going to go way down as word spreads that there are elves you can now bring a cart of goods to.
Alas. Can you commit to supporting it next turn if not this one?
This seems like very flawed reasoning to me. Boney has always been very clear it's on the voters to judge the respective value of actions.
Roads are bidirectional just like wires are bidirectional for electrical power. I think It would be a difficult engineering problem to solve, but is not impossible to handle.
'It seems lame' does not seem like a good counter to the argument. The GM is under no obligation to make our choices 'not lame' anymore than he is to make them 'not dangerous'. Making value judgements on things like that is on us. Hell the only reason we even have the option to bind apparitions at all is because of a write in that was hoping for some kind of magical AI we could plug into spells. That fell though therefore from that perspective the whole field of study is 'lame'. All in all I do not think we should lean on the GM like this, it is a great way to be dissapointed with no one but ourselves to blame
- Location
- North Wales
- Pronouns
- He/Him/His
Assuming the "Elfcation NOW" plans don't win, the main option for going to Naggarythe is on Turn 44 or 45. By that point, Eike will be sixteen years old or so and just a year or two from her Journey. If she can't be trusted alone in the major trade port of a friendly nation by then, we should probably be encouraging her to go back to the College and sign up as a Perpetual.
Fair, but that just means that we're at 80 - 90% of the research done: we just have to collect the spoils and until we do so the true potential of all the AV actions we did so far is locked.
Until we produce tangible results for the Teclisean system we're left with only the peripheral benefits from the Rune power up and giving the research to Ranald - which are sweet but useless for Elfcation.
- Location
- The Surface Of A Hostile Planet
If you're really worried about Eike in Lothern, take Max along. I'm sure we can give him a useful task to do in Ulthuan, and he's an adult wizard Eike can go to if she feels like she's in over her head.
Personally I think that taking her along is a great idea. She's super interested in boats, she speaks the language, Lothern is a perfectly reasonable trading port for her to poke around in, and when's the next time she's going to get a chance to visit Ulthuan?
In-universe randomness has direct influence on in-universe research, as we've seen time and again.
A lucky insight, a particular event which gives you an idea, a fortunate turn of phrase which makes you rethink things from another angle... we've had bonuses from the Gambler on our research for many, many turns.
And in a project with as many moving parts and people as the Waystone foundation, that's only going to be amplified - a lucky break where a concept gets cleanly communicated across paradigms, someone just happening to have access to a treatise on something relevant, one of the other Grey Lords getting bored and providing their own insight, and so on.
I don't see any reason to think that the Gambler wouldn't be effective on the Waystone Foundation action. It won't pull extra knowledge out of thin air, but it can help make sure that we smoothly and easily apply the knowledge we already have access to.
Personally I think that taking her along is a great idea. She's super interested in boats, she speaks the language, Lothern is a perfectly reasonable trading port for her to poke around in, and when's the next time she's going to get a chance to visit Ulthuan?
In-universe randomness has direct influence on in-universe research, as we've seen time and again.
A lucky insight, a particular event which gives you an idea, a fortunate turn of phrase which makes you rethink things from another angle... we've had bonuses from the Gambler on our research for many, many turns.
And in a project with as many moving parts and people as the Waystone foundation, that's only going to be amplified - a lucky break where a concept gets cleanly communicated across paradigms, someone just happening to have access to a treatise on something relevant, one of the other Grey Lords getting bored and providing their own insight, and so on.
I don't see any reason to think that the Gambler wouldn't be effective on the Waystone Foundation action. It won't pull extra knowledge out of thin air, but it can help make sure that we smoothly and easily apply the knowledge we already have access to.
'Might be funny' doesn't sound like you yourself are all that convinced.
Here are alternate less-ambitious suggestions while I am bored:
Moderate Hysh - Radiant Sentinel: A ball of light floats around you and can parry for you.
Moderate Ulgu - Burning Shadows
Applied to a coat so the shadow cast by it thanks to the floating light causes damage. Likely a nightmare for allies, but a great panic-button for Eike.
Moderate Hysh - Inspiration: Large bonus to a Knowledge test. Long casting time.
Simple Ulgu - Take No Heed: Makes you very easy to ignore
Applied to something to fidget with, so you can have that big think in peace. Note that Inspiration should cause trouble with non-Hysh infused people, so we would likely be giving this away.
- Location
- Chicago
- Pronouns
- She/They
And I'm really not interested in repeating that irresponsiblility. She's an apprentice, not a journeyman. We should not be sending her or on her own.
I don't think you are taking the possibility of our apprentice getting killed off screen at all seriously. It would take like two guys with some militia training and knives. So call me overprotective if you want, but I'm going to be crowing 'I told you so' if this gets pushed through and goes badly.
Use the pull of Dhar towards the vortex. We'd need full Waystones, but sending the winds in packets should work.
- Location
- Outside the Box
- Pronouns
- She/Her
We've used the Gambler to little or no visible effect many times before, and often we get an effect rather different to what we expected or wanted. We have, essentially, misused or outright failed to use the Gamber multiple times now. But we keep treating it like a universal, fits-all-sizes buff when we've so often been shown in-story and told OOC that it really, really isn't.
...I feel like there was a lot of discussion and ideas leading up to this turn that's suddenly evaporated into thin air. I swear I must be misremembering things because so much stuff that I remember was talked about as really important suddenly isn't being even mentioned by anyone at all. And I just do not have the effort in me to try to re-argue a half dozen points against everyone.
...I feel like there was a lot of discussion and ideas leading up to this turn that's suddenly evaporated into thin air. I swear I must be misremembering things because so much stuff that I remember was talked about as really important suddenly isn't being even mentioned by anyone at all. And I just do not have the effort in me to try to re-argue a half dozen points against everyone.
- Location
- New Brunswick, NJ
- Pronouns
- He/Him/His
There was a lot of pushback to writing the first half of the book with the research unfinished, because depending on what we find in the second AV action, we might need to rewrite a bunch, which would impose a penalty.
If she comes back from the Enchanting class without success, then OK, whatever, she doesn't have to be an enchanter, we don't need to push her on it. But it seems obvious that Mathilde should try to pass on her unique skill in Windherding to her Apprentice: that's part of the point of Apprenticeship, to make sure that a wizard's unique insights from their paradigm and skills are preserved rather than lost.
I think it could apply to a bunch of places! The question is where what Ranald can do for us matches up with what we most want done, and I think the Apparitions (does Mathilde happen to find a monster fast enough to be able to experiment with it at her leisure?) and the liminal realm research (does Mathilde happen to pick a day to do it where there aren't any daemons around and she can observe the process more carefully?) seem like the frontrunners to me.
Wait, how do you figure? The Apprenticeship usually lasts about ten years in total; she spent 2.5-3 years as a Junior Apprentice depending on how you count and the precise months involved, so we should expect to have her for around seven years. Her Journey is likely to begin ca. T54, not T46-49.
For calibration, we went into the College at ten and emerged a Journeywoman at twenty. Eike went in at eleven and is currently fifteenish.
I generally agree that putting the gambler on Waystone foundations could work out great.
Similar actions for other portions of a Waystone have benefited from random lucky breaks, from ancient elven archmages taking interest to Niedzwenka revealing Ice Witch secrets to show off.
Making that sort of stuff more likely can be a pretty big boost to research.
Similar actions for other portions of a Waystone have benefited from random lucky breaks, from ancient elven archmages taking interest to Niedzwenka revealing Ice Witch secrets to show off.
Making that sort of stuff more likely can be a pretty big boost to research.
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Aliya
Someone I might become
- Location
- Kazakhstan
- Pronouns
- They/She/It
I quite like Redshirt's plan, especially due to the stat swap mirror and whispering darkness, but I do agree that putting gambler on waystone research is just sub-optimal, especially compared to, say, liminal research or apparition hunting. In liminal research, applications are straightforward: nothing distracts us, Ranald has our back on the other side. On apapritiona hunting, it is about opportunities lining up just so for us. Meanwhile, Waystone resewrch is mostly dependant on knowledge of participants, which does not depend on luck.
- Location
- North Wales
- Pronouns
- He/Him/His
I'm mostly going by "When will she be ready"? It's an entirely subjective judgement.
Stats-wise, she's already mostly on par with Mathilde at the start of the quest. Magically, she's ahead. She needs more years than she's had so far, for certain. A decade, though, seems like coddling.
Just a quick comment to mention that I've been confusing the Whispering Darkness with the Black Essence, and I just want to highlight the differences in case I've accidentally mislead people.
The Whispering Darkness is a shadow that screams with a thousand silent voices, seeking out users of Dhar in order to envelope them and drag them into the darkness, driving them mad in the process. The Jades have reflavoured it to be a bunch of thorny vines that envelope foes and drag them underground.
The Black Essence is an oily fog that can only be seen by the victim. It gathers into foul pools that cling to people and objects, forcing the victim to perceive everything touched by the oil as rapidly decaying, again resulting in madness.
The Whispering Darkness is a shadow that screams with a thousand silent voices, seeking out users of Dhar in order to envelope them and drag them into the darkness, driving them mad in the process. The Jades have reflavoured it to be a bunch of thorny vines that envelope foes and drag them underground.
The Black Essence is an oily fog that can only be seen by the victim. It gathers into foul pools that cling to people and objects, forcing the victim to perceive everything touched by the oil as rapidly decaying, again resulting in madness.
- Location
- Argentina
The coin worked in developing the tributaries. It could work here in the Foundation too.