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Warhammer Fantasy: Divided Loyalties - an Advisor's Quest

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BeepSmile said:
I think that is a bad anology. The Channel Tunnel is underwater and exists in both nations
RoW-Road is more like a land road that terminates inside Eonir territory.

And it's not about the average Middenhimer being worried, they probably won't find out a thing[1]; look at how Eike set up the charcoal trade route.

It's about a relatively small number of political leaders who are much easier to be made aware that the road won't make the Eonir any more capable of moving forces through their forest, but that it will open up more opportunities for them to make money by facilitating trade.

[1]If there are any human traders allowed on the route they might learn of itover time, but as an easy concession to isolationists I could imagine that only Eonir traders might be allowed to traverse the road, it would just look to anyone picking up goods at the end of the RoW-Road that this is a thing the Eonir can do, that have chosen to start doing.


I don't have a head for remembering the geography of fiction, you might be engaging in this conversation with me under the belief that I have more specific knowledge on borders and geography than I actually do.

So, If one starts from the Schadensumpf [river?], in the direction away from Laurelorn, would one still have more swamp/forest to traverse? [Could a trader boat down the river from that point?] Because if that is the end of the forest/swamp, and the end of Eonir territory, then that looks like a good terminus for the RoW-Road
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As a pragmatic choice there is no difference between the Eonir having the only key to the road and it being shared, but one has to keep in mind that we are not dealing with perfectly rational people (TM) here, we are dealing with a feudal lord who has to sell this thing to the nobles under him, and so will do his best not to look weak. A split control would prevent the Eonir from keeping the road active despite Middleland yes, but at the same time the road leads to Middleland, if the Elector count should ever want to stop it he can just refuse all elven traders access to his land
 
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If the road closes, that means the Eonir will have to import everything they want by boat, probably from Erengard. It wouldn't hurt them much, and would actually empower the shipbuilding house.

Middenheim would be hurt, however, as they'd have no way to trade with Laurelorn at all without having to go through Nordland or Marienburg.

So Middenheim is very unlikely to close the road of their own accord. The Eonir might have reason to close the road.

Giving both states keys locks both sides into mutual obligations over the road, even though one side is more harmed by it's closure than the other. It would also prevent the Eonir from holding road access over Middenheim's head and extorting concessions from them.

It's about sharing the power dynamic, rather than putting one above the other.
 
The Schadensumpf is split in half by the Great North Road that runs east to west from Middenheim to Marienburg. On paper, Middenheim controls the Schadensumpf south of the road and about ten miles north of it and the rest belongs to Nordland. In practice, Laurelorn claims all of it, but only punishes trespassers if they go significantly north of the road. The Middenland village of Kammendun is built on the southeastern edge of the swamp and coexists peacefully with the Eonir, while the village of Vorbegwerk north of the road was a source of tension before it was abandoned on the Graf's order.

The trip from Middenheim to Marienburg is about 350 miles along a Dwarven highway. If the Eonir actually enforced their claim on the entirety of the Schadensumpf and prevented any travel through it, the detour would make it a 500 mile trip, half of which would be along human-made roads. It would also make the March of Deinste and the Drakwald Baronies significantly more isolated. So the Middenlanders are already benefiting quite a bit from Eonir forbearance, and likely wouldn't see a problem in giving Laurelorn complete control over a new magical road that exists entirely within the Schadensumpf.

Nerdasaurus Rex said:
Would it be possible to attach our Roiling Shadows mastery to a Nightbringer? Or is that a try it and find out moment?
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It might be a try it and find out moment if you had an apparition already caught and bound to try it on.
 
Boney said:
The trip from Middenheim to Marienburg is about 350 miles along a Dwarven highway. If the Eonir actually enforced their claim on the entirety of the Schadensumpf and prevented any travel through it, the detour would make it a 500 mile trip, half of which would be along human-made roads.
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And if the Eonir allow for the passage of goods though the RoW-road and through the River Schaukel that's a route to the sea that's hundreds of miles shorter and bypasses Marienburg... I think we should have a talk with the Chamberlain about dedicating effort towards improving relations with Laurelorn enough for them to allow this even if it'll take decades of work simply because it would help fulfill the Empire's number one foreign policy objective, Fuck Marienburg.
 
NexusEye said:
And if the Eonir allow for the passage of goods though the RoW-road and through the River Schaukel that's a route to the sea that's hundreds of miles shorter and bypasses Marienburg... I think we should have a talk with the Chamberlain about dedicating effort towards improving relations with Laurelorn enough for them to allow this even if it'll take decades of work simply because it would help fulfill the Empire's number one foreign policy objective, Fuck Marienburg.
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Routing all traffic that normally goes through Marienburg through laurelorn will be a certain impossibility. Some thing will be able to be shipped from there but there's a difference between a ocean facing port city and a river city surrounded by forests. Mostly in capacity and with laurelorn certainly a unwillingness to be the port of the empire while not being part of it, without at least a very hefty toll to make up for thousands of humans in their city.
 
NexusEye said:
And if the Eonir allow for the passage of goods though the RoW-road and through the River Schaukel that's a route to the sea that's hundreds of miles shorter and bypasses Marienburg... I think we should have a talk with the Chamberlain about dedicating effort towards improving relations with Laurelorn enough for them to allow this even if it'll take decades of work simply because it would help fulfill the Empire's number one foreign policy objective, Fuck Marienburg.
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It's come up in discussion.

Even if the Eonir are open to becoming an entrepôt to the Empire, I think it'll be a fairly lengthy transition period.
 
Tobtorp said:
Routing all traffic that normally goes through Marienburg through laurelorn will be a certain impossibility. Some thing will be able to be shipped from there but there's a difference between a ocean facing port city and a river city surrounded by forests. Mostly in capacity and with laurelorn certainly a unwillingness to be the port of the empire while not being part of it, without at least a very hefty toll to make up for thousands of humans in their city.
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There don't need to be thousands of humans in there city, they can do the transportation themselves, plus they're running up a trade deficit, when that deficit gets big enough they're going to need to start earning gold by providing goods or services to other polities and charging for ferrying goods through their territory is one way to do that. And lastly it doesn't matter if not all trade can got through them instead of Marienburg as long as some can, that undercuts Marienburg's monopoly and accomplishes the Empire's goal of Fuck Marienburg.
 
There is I think little chance that the Empire would even be open to exchanging a human entry port, even if it is of a rival power, with an elven entry point in the magical forest which its inhabitants can lock up at any moment. The only way I could see this working is if the Eonir integrated into the Empire as a province and that... what would be a hell of a kettle of fish. Not impossible maybe, but I think harder than just conquering Marienburg would be.
 
DragonParadox said:
There is I think little chance that the Empire would even be open to exchanging a human entry port, even if it is of a rival power, with an elven entry point in the magical forest which its inhabitants can lock up at any moment. The only way I could see this working is if the Eonir integrated into the Empire as a province and that... what would be a hell of a kettle of fish. Not impossible maybe, but I think harder than just conquering Marienburg would be.
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I think you see this wrong.

Both Marienburg and the Eonir are not part of the Empire.
Of course the Empire is interested in playing them against each other.

Whoever offers better service and taxes less gets to be the one to transport the goods.
 
NexusEye said:
There don't need to be thousands of humans in there city, they can do the transportation themselves, plus they're running up a trade deficit, when that deficit gets big enough they're going to need to start earning gold by providing goods or services to other polities and charging for ferrying goods through their territory is one way to do that. And lastly it doesn't matter if not all trade can got through them instead of Marienburg as long as some can, that undercuts Marienburg's monopoly and accomplishes the Empire's goal of Fuck Marienburg.
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Marienburg thought the canal was bad, we haven't even gotten started.
DragonParadox said:
There is I think little chance that the Empire would even be open to exchanging a human entry port, even if it is of a rival power, with an elven entry point in the magical forest which its inhabitants can lock up at any moment
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Aren't you describing the Marienburg status quo?
Yes the Empire would objectively prefer their own port, however without rerouting their many rivers to go north rather than east, that isn't an option. So having more ports is better because it reduces the chance all access is shut off.
 
NexusEye said:
There don't need to be thousands of humans in there city, they can do the transportation themselves, plus they're running up a trade deficit, when that deficit gets big enough they're going to need to start earning gold by providing goods or services to other polities and charging for ferrying goods through their territory is one way to do that. And lastly it doesn't matter if not all trade can got through them instead of Marienburg as long as some can, that undercuts Marienburg's monopoly and accomplishes the Empire's goal of Fuck Marienburg.
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Ferrying good to where? Because Marienburg is used as a port city to trade with a multitude of other nation, are you expecting the eonir and their relatively tiny population to take up sailing freight for the whole empire? If the empire would want to use it as a way to go around Marienburg it would need to accommodate empire trade ships and empire wolfships. I do not see that happening in the next century...
 
Dark as Silver said:
Aren't you describing the Marienburg status quo?
Yes the Empire would objectively prefer their own port, however without rerouting their many rivers to go north rather than east, that isn't an option. So having more ports is better because it reduces the chance all access is shut off.
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Sure with an addition of 'not human', 'magic is a lot more scary than boats' and 'we have to take significant economic pain in the changeover'.
 
Andres said:
This is the literary brilliance one builds up to from writing SV's most popular quest for five years.
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While the Nightbringer name does come from the QM I would personally prefer something based off our title as Dämmerlichtreiter or something referencing our time in Stirland or Abelhelm.
Tobtorp said:
Ferrying good to where? Because Marienburg is used as a port city to trade with a multitude of other nation, are you expecting the eonir and their relatively tiny population to take up sailing freight for the whole empire? If the empire would want to use it as a way to go around Marienburg it would need to accommodate empire trade ships and empire wolfships. I do not see that happening in the next century...
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To the places you would normally have to go through Marienburg for. The goal isn't to completely replace Marienburg, it's to supplement the Empire's non-Marienburg trade capacity and undercut their monopoly. Even if only a fraction of trade goes through Laurelorn that still fucks over Marienburg by however much trade that's going through Laurelorn instead of them.
 
NexusEye said:
To the places you would normally have to go through Marienburg for. The goal isn't to completely replace Marienburg, it's to supplement the Empire's non-Marienburg trade capacity and undercut their monopoly. Even if only a fraction of trade goes through Laurelorn that still fucks over Marienburg by however much trade that's going through Laurelorn instead of them.
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So you do actually expect the very tiny population of laurelorn to take over wast swathes of empire shipping to other nations... That's certainly ambitious. Good luck with that idea.
 
Boney said:
4. Getting her to lock horns with political opponents who have been honing their craft twenty times longer than she's been alive isn't so much throwing her in the deep end as it is throwing her in the Maelstrom.
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Wow. My calibration on the difficulty of a fairly surface-level investigation task (Who do we need to talk to, what do they want, how can we get it for them) is really, really skewed from the reality. Enough so that I think I've switched camps to keeping the exercises theoretical for Eike for at least a while longer. Cause damn.
 
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Gavin Prince said:
Wow. My calibration on the difficulty of a fairly surface-level investigation task is really, really skewed from the reality. Enough so that I think I've switched camps to keeping the exercises theoretical for Eike for at least a while longer.
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Maybe just don't try to throw her at the elf's? Infiltrating middenland with the hochlander is much easier while not having a great fallout if it happens.
 
DragonParadox said:
Sure with an addition of 'not human', 'magic is a lot more scary than boats' and 'we have to take significant economic pain in the changeover'.
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What changeover? If the Marienburg blockade is still up the economic pain cannot be worse, and if it isn't then the economic pain is the exact same as we were in several years ago.
And the empire isn't especially xenophobic I think? dunno that they're going to distrust elves for rascist reasons.
Tobtorp said:
Also with a asterisk of "we still need to use Marienburg because it's a big enough port city to actually accommodate our needs while the Schaukel alone is probably not big enough to handle the boat traffic easily."
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Now thats an interesting asterisk, it kinda highlights that one side of the argument are thinking of Schaukel as a replacement and the other are thinking of it as a new option. I don't think anyone is advocating totally abandoning going through Marienburg.
E:
Tobtorp said:
So you do actually expect the very tiny population of laurelorn to take over wast swathes of empire shipping to other nations... That's certainly ambitious. Good luck with that idea.
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How are you having trouble with the word supplement?
It doesn't have to be vast swathes. Any amount is an improvement.
 
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NexusEye said:
While the Nightbringer name does come from the QM I would personally prefer something based off our title as Dämmerlichtreiter or something referencing our time in Stirland or Abelhelm.

To the places you would normally have to go through Marienburg for. The goal isn't to completely replace Marienburg, it's to supplement the Empire's non-Marienburg trade capacity and undercut their monopoly. Even if only a fraction of trade goes through Laurelorn that still fucks over Marienburg by however much trade that's going through Laurelorn instead of them.
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That could and indeed I think would work, it is like the canal, a means of undercutting Marianburg, not breaking its hold. Still the difference in cost from the fact that the Eonir cannot service as much trade will mean Marienburg will still have the advantage. If they play thier cards right they can actually increase their prices for the people who for logistical reasons cannot move their trade through the other ports.
 
Tobtorp said:
So you do actually expect the very tiny population of laurelorn to take over wast swathes of empire shipping to other nations... That's certainly ambitious. Good luck with that idea.
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Not vast swathes, probably low single digit percents. But that's still significant since that's trade that doesn't have to suffer Marienburg's ruinous tolls.
 
Dark as Silver said:
What changeover? If the Marienburg blockade is still up the economic pain cannot be worse, and if it isn't then the economic pain is the exact same as we were in several years ago.
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There is currently no blockade, there was the threat of one but nothing came of it. If there was an actual blockade war might actually have been on the table. And building up eonir trade infrastructure would be a much heavier Initial cost then just using Marienburg further...
 
Dark as Silver said:
What changeover? If the Marienburg blockade is still up the economic pain cannot be worse, and if it isn't then the economic pain is the exact same as we were in several years ago.
And the empire isn't especially xenophobic I think? dunno that they're going to distrust elves for rascist reasons.
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Oh it is plenty xenophobic, pogroms of Imperial dwarfs are a thing, most elves in places outside the large cities would be well placed not to show their ears.
 
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