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@Boney Would it be a good idea for Eike to spend the three months of Mathilde's Nagarythe internship in Lothern, or would she quickly run out of things to do?
My strong suspicion is that the answer is "if we, the thread, come up with stuff for Eike to do that we think justifies it, then sure, but Boney isn't going to let us gesture vaguely at 'Eike does cool shit in Lothern' and respond by coming up with an enriching three-month course of study himself."

But also we don't need to be arguing about this now, because none of the plans I've seen get serious traction in the thread are "go on Elfternship right now" plans, so we've got a full turn cycle before we have to worry.
 
That Catch-22 is in fact in my favor, not yours.

Like. The two arguments being presented for why Eike can't come are mutually exclusive.

Either going to Lothern is useful to the heiress of the EIC (in which case great, she should come), or going to Lothern is not useful to Eike (in which case great, she has an opportunity to travel there before she gets tied down to one project or another and can no longer justify doing things that aren't immediately useful).
The main idea is that the Vow of Poverty is not a restriction in whether or not Eike should go to Lothern—it shouldn't be a relevant factor at all, but it's something that those arguing for sending Eike have brought up.
 
I strongly disagree, and have heard no arguments supporting that claim. Do you have any?
It will be fun and/or productive in a unique way that would otherwise be more difficult - if otherwise possible at all - than a trip to Barak Varr.

Also there have been arguments supporting this claim before and I don't know how you didn't see them.
 
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It will be fun and/or productive in a unique way that would otherwise be more difficult - if possible at all - than a trip to Barak Varr.

Also there have been arguments supporting this claim before and I don't know how you didn't see them.
I know Boney's said that bumming around in Lothern for months would be a very not-fun action.

I suppose I should be more specific and say I haven't heard any compelling reasons as to why it would be productive - I've heard people try to justify it afterwards by saying she could do something for the EIC, but I've not actually heard what that something is. How is an intra-Eastern-Empire trading company with no ties to international shipping going to circumvent Marienburg's (admittedly dubious) monopoly on Asur traders?
 
Aaaand we're here. Didn't quite have this pointed out on the exact first post of Page 15,000, but hey.
This thread is insanely large. On the eighteenth of this month, it'll be six years old. An average of 2500 pages a year for six years is astronomically beyond my idea of what a normal popular quest is supposed to look like.
 
I mean, whether or not it's good for her, if we trust her enough we could have her stay in lothern for a few months and keep an eye on their markets for interesting research opportunities. Leave her lots of gold and some vague instructions and see what she does when given more leeway than normal.

I think that would be a challenge she is well suited for, and it will give her a taste of both a very different mercantile culture and let her spread her wings a bit and manage herself and some of the gold we trust her with.
 
This thread is insanely large. On the eighteenth of this month, it'll be six years old. An average of 2500 pages a year for six years is astronomically beyond my idea of what a normal popular quest is supposed to look like.
The initial hiatus before the thread exploded on Boney's return was on page 745, with the return being on August 30th of 2019.

So it's been 14255 pages in 4 years, 4 months, and 2 days, or 1585 days, for an average of 9 pages a day, or 225 posts a day.
 
You're quite right.

So, going to Lothern and bumming around is a solidly un-fun plan. If you have a clear plan of what exactly Eike's going to be doing for the EIC, which I'm still very unclear on, then... well, I still won't be voting for it, but it'd probably be fine.
That's talking about something completely different. Boney wouldn't have fun writing about Mathilde going about Lothern with no specific course of action, but that absolutely does not mean Eike cannot have fun for three months in Lothern while the camera is pointed somewhere else.
 
That's talking about something completely different. Boney wouldn't have fun writing about Mathilde going about Lothern with no specific course of action, but that absolutely does not mean Eike cannot have fun for three months in Lothern while the camera is pointed somewhere else.
I don't think Boney'll be cool with just dropping Eike off without a clear plan either, but I suppose we'll see next turn when it comes up.
 
I'd totally vote for a plan with the first month of Elfternship in it that sends Eike to Lothern to "investigate opportunities for EIC expansion" whether in terms of a trading outpost or hiring people to help with expanding its navy later (if it's applicable at all), or even just give her some money and see if she can find cool stuff to buy for herself. If she has nothing else to do after a month, it's very easy to say "go home then and take classes" next turn.
 
Giving Eike something to do in Lothern besides "have fun" has never needed mentioning. Giving her a task or tasks to do is obvious and sensible.

Get acquainted with Lothern and write up a report on the culture and people.
Let her chuck a Kaiba: give her a bunch of money, let her spend it as she pleases, but tell her to multiply it by a certain amount by the time we get back.
Specifically get her to work on EIC expansion.
Gather intelligence on the city and beyond to submit to the grey order.
Set her up with tutors and/or a curriculum so she can continue her normal education, but in a foreign, cosmopolitan city with all sorts of unique, enjoyable, and enriching experiences.

EDIT: Leisure can be the main goal, but I don't think she can switch off entirely for a quarter of the year like jade wizards can, so gotta provide something to do in addition to having fun and experiencing the greatest city in the world.

EDIT2: Could echo our advisor days by giving her a spread of options to do and letting her pick one. She's at the age where self-directed education is good.
 
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I can't find the Boney quote but IIRC Vlag is THE one example of dwarfs being interested in magic because of the whole "being trapped in the Warp" issue.
Found the quote here.
Barak Varr to Erengrad is about five thousand miles by sea, which is something like Helsinki to Rome or London to Miami. And Erengrad has a fairly significant Elven presence. So Barak Varr is probably not the answer here. Considering how long ago the Fire Spire fell and how much the Colleges have come to prominence since then, you'd need some theoretical Dwarven Karak very close to Praag who would have had some need to preserve every insight into the nature of magic they could get for the past two centuries and no opportunity to trade those books away to the Colleges...
 
So, I was re-reading our progress on the library, because I find that a soothing and relaxing pastime that helps lull me to a pleasant sleep, and started contemplating what our endgame should be.

Over the next few years, we're very likely to finish up hoovering the various Nuln libraries/Mootland Library, at which point LK8P/KAU will be a legitimate world-class contender.

But that's not the limit of my ambitions. Using our existing scope as leverage, once that's complete, I'd like to negotiate a full reciprocal exchange agreement with Tsar Boris, the Laurelorn Library of Mournings, the Altdorf Cult of Verena, and the University of Altdorf - and as a "gesture of goodwill", offering the same to each of the Nuln libraries we already copied.

Tsar Boris won't have the same kind of "GET ME EVERY BOOK IN KISLEV" impetus to play along as he would if we called it in as a debt, but the general idea of having a backup copy of Kislev's most important knowledge and literature in case it gets lost remains something I'm fairly certain we can sell him on, especially if we start copying it on our own (or rather Belegar's) dime.

The Library of Mournings has been explicitly called out by Boney as having spent centuries considering itself effectively the only library remaining in the world, and as such doesn't really have an inclination to see other libraries as potential "competitors" - a good faith reciprocal offer has every possibility of being accepted.

At that point, we'd be basically going to Altdorf's Libraries and offering them a deal they can't refuse - they can either agree to sharing their books and getting access to the books of a, by that point, outright larger library - or they can get left behind if their competitors do agree.

From that point on, it's in theory possible to just kinda sorta... Katamari Damacy our way across the Old World picking up more and more libraries willing to join our Library Voltron pact to get literary superpowers - since the more Libraries that have a reciprocal agreement with LK8P, the more powerful such an agreement becomes. Eventually the deal will get sweet enough that even Marienburg's Libraries will probably want to sign on.

We would have to spend a bunch of time working with the Cult of Verena to make certain we didn't make too many significant enemies in the process of doing this, of course, since we'd kinda be making massive waves in the library circuit and would basically be empowering the "spread knowledge" Verenan factions against the "hoard knowledge" factions, but that's part of the fun.

The final boss, of course, is trying to convince the White Tower of Hoeth to sign up as a member of our network. :V
 
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Makes me kinda want to spend AP on the library rather than waiting for turn after turn for it to move along on its own, not gonna lie.

Also, kinda neat that we hit page 15,000 on New Year's day.
 
I strongly disagree, and have heard no arguments supporting that claim. Do you have any?
If someone's life is solely about accumulating power then there's very little reason for them to refuse the temptations of chaos or dhar. If you want someone to be loyal to you, or to an ideal, you have to give them reasons for that loyalty. So it behooves any apprentices', but especially a Grey Wizards', teacher(s) to give them opportunities to develop a liking for, and find joy in, their life, so that they have a reason to be loyal to the life the Empire makes possible

i.e. Taking the kid on fun vacations is good from a utilitarian perspective even neglecting other perspectives.
 
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I went with Unnatural Shadow for two reasons. First, it already acts independently from us so I want to see if we can get it to do useful things like it does with our Roiling Shadows mastery on Dread Aspect, not just get it to hold still. Second, it is explicitly called out as our most unnerving arcane mark, so being able to dial that up or down depending on the situation seems like it could be useful for a lot of situations.

Additionally I highly doubt Mantle of Mist is affected by Warrior of Fog. That trait is about metaphorical fog, not literal. Our Staff of Mistery helps with spells that use literal fog, but I don't think that is going to help with our Arcane Mark. While Mantle of Mist is a potential liability against gas attacks, we have the Candle of Cleansing Radiance and are not likely fighting Skaven (and especially Clan Skryre) soon, so it is not a high priority to address.

Picklepikkl already addressed why I want the scribes. We already have a lot of libraries in Nuln to copy, so getting more libraries to partner when we haven't copied the ones we already have just seems like rushing, especially if we can't even copy any Fire Spire books we might find in Karak Vlag without training our scribes.
Solid reasoning.

Personally I'd still prioritize building our book stock by copying libraries rather than improving scribes but I can't say I really care that much either way.


I am curious what you opinion is on the Eike Study action. I am currently inclined to leave in on the Intrigue training because there aren't any Enchanting actions in the rest of Plan Pondering Orbs and Nuts, but I would make or vote for a variant that does Enchantment classes if there is notable demand for it.
I think it would be better to have her finish getting her spell basics down (learning sounds then other magic). I'm think that might net her another +1 magic and it'll be good to have her magic be better for when Mathilde is away in Ulthuan and can't give her as much oversight for a while.

I'd send her to Intrigue training after her magic has been buffed.
 
Happy 15k! A nice accompaniment to the new year.

@Boney, I have questions about Magisters in the articles. Firstly, do the articles only apply to wizards that hold the rank of Magister or also journeymen and apprentices?

There's legal arguments to be made that it applies to everyone, or the restrictions apply to everyone but the privileges only to full Magisters, or that it entirely only applies to Magisters but Journeymen and Apprentices are bound by the rules of their Order, including rules identical to those that the Articles impose.

Secondly, how can they mention Magisters? I thought the term Magister was only invented later by nobles who wanted to curtail the power of burghers.

Perhaps it was created in the time of Magnus rather than later, perhaps the word predates the feudal structure associated with it, perhaps the law was edited with new terminology, perhaps it's a plot hole.

Only if it is actually productive or particularly fun, which isn't guaranteed. You know what, might as well ask.

@Boney Would it be a good idea for Eike to spend the three months of Mathilde's Nagarythe internship in Lothern, or would she quickly run out of things to do?

If you send her there with purpose, she will do her utmost to fulfill that purpose. If you send her there with absolutely nothing in mind, you can do that, but it may or may not turn out fun for her, and it may or may not turn out educational for her, and it may or may not turn out to be entertaining or satisfying for the audience. If you send her there with nothing in mind but thinking I'm going to invent a maximal utility itinerary for her, no.
 
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Makes me kinda want to spend AP on the library rather than waiting for turn after turn for it to move along on its own, not gonna lie.

Also, kinda neat that we hit page 15,000 on New Year's day.
Probably for the best if we take our time. It let's our librarians make sure everything is properly organized and that they don't get overwhelmed. Also we might even get libraries approaching us as we get bigger.
 
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Small detail I just noticed while looking at Ulthuan's map in Parabola's post: each shrine belonging to a God that is in the inner ring of the Asur Pantheonic Mandala has an Eltharin rune over it. For most of those Gods there's a canonical rune with a meaning that's explicitly associated with them, like the shrine of Asur has the Mark of Asuryan over it and the shrine of Vaul has the mark of Vaul and so on, but Mathlann and Loec don't have such a rune. Instead, the runes over the shrines of Mathlann and Loec are respectively Ytha and Issth, which are the runes incorporated in their mandala sigils. I was pretty sure Loec's rune had Issth in it rather than something else like Arhain, I think this pretty much confirms this.

There's also something called the "Shrine of Remembrance", which is denoted with the rune Nastirr. Not sure what that's about.
 
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