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Warhammer Fantasy: Divided Loyalties - an Advisor's Quest

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What are Gnomi, by the way? Just a setting reskin of Dwarves?

Fun, though.
Dragonofelder said:
no MAGE should sit upon THE ETERNAL CHAIR! Led by the FORMIDIBLE UNDIG STEELGRIP, this DISSENTING FACTION demand that MAGDA ABDICATE after CHOOSING, OR BIRTHING, an HEIR!
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MAGDA contemplates the INTRIGUING LOGISTICAL CHALLENGE of PRODUCING the latter option while FORBIDDEN from RECLINING on ANY SURFACE but the ETERNAL CHAIR.

Dragonofelder said:
Turns out MAGDA WESSEN stories work better as spur-of-the-moment things, rather than planned. Fun.
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I have always found this to be the case.
 
rocketroland999 said:
To be fair to Thorgrim, his evidence was literally inarguable. At least until we argued it
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To be even more fair to everyone else, who was he to decide it could not be argued? I mean Thorgrim knew the reserves were being drained, but no one else did. Even within the framework of dwarf society with no radicalism involved this is a problem that should have had the attention of every single runelord day and night, it should have involved wide scale expeditions for lost lore and yes to recapture Old Holds because you cannot even hope to hook something back up if it is filled with Greenskins. Instead the runelords are over there trying to rediscover the Master Rune of Volcanoes and the like because they do not know everyone was on a timer to petrifaction while significant swaths of the populations were giving up on the Karaz Ankor as a political institution not knowing that they were just as doomed.

Thorgrim decided to give into despair when he heard that klaxon and then he decided to take away the choice to act with hope, forlorn as it may have been, from every single other dwarf in the Karaz Ankor. No doubt he thought he was doing a good thing, sparing them the burden of what he had learned as a king should, but personally I think that was still wrong.
 
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Boney said:
If you or @BurnNote can suggest a name for it, sure.
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SECRETS OF THE GOLDEN AGE: FIRES OF HAS-IT
Thats my idea, @BurnNote should probably choose it though.

Alliterate said:
What are Gnomi, by the way? Just a setting reskin of Dwarves?
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xamaplak said:
Looks like Gnomes, which don't exist in DL, in the place of Dwarves.
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Yeah, I didn't "just" want to do dwarfs, although they have appeared in other MW stories.

Gnomi are like dwai, but have big old eyes, mad hair, and use much more clockwork.

Alliterate said:
MAGDA contemplates the INTRIGUING LOGISTICAL CHALLENGE of PRODUCING the latter option while FORBIDDEN from RECLINING on ANY SURFACE but the ETERNAL CHAIR.
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Thankfully the Gnomi aren't as strict as the Dawi. Along with the ETERNAL CHAIR, there is the ENDLESS BED and the BOTTOMLESS BATHTUB, as well as a footstool. Nothing fancy, just a good honest footatool.

Wiggy said:
Not her loyal friend and vassal BELEGOR HAMMERWIELD?!?!?!

*angry shipper noises*
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FOOL! BELEGOR HAMMERWIELD is one of the STARTING SUITORS, in an unenviable situation where the POWER-BALANCE in their WORK RELATIONSHIP has shifted
 
DragonParadox said:
Thorgrim decided to give into despair when he heard that klaxon and then he decided to take away the choice to act with hope, forlorn as it may have been, from every single other dwarf in the Karaz Ankor. No doubt he thought he was doing a good thing, sparing them the burden of what he had learned as a king should, but personally I think that was still wrong.
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This is a philosophical question. Can it be considered worthy that Thorgrim decided to take solely upon himself the full weight of the realization of the doom of the dwarven race in order to preserve the illusion of hope for his fellows? Or should he have plunged them into despair by telling them that after the Great War against Chaos, their people were now doomed to perish at best, or to bow to the forces like Hashut? This is a question of idealism and cynicism. Can he be blamed for the fact that, from his point of view, other dwarves cannot stand the realization of the inevitability of their death? Or should he have hoped that they would stand the test of what seemed impossible to stop? There is no clear answer to this question.
 
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I mean, in theory every dwarf could have moved back to the old holds and had the runes on the new holds shut down to preserve power. I don't think the issue was the population of dwarves so much as trying to maintain all the new Karak's runes without getting any power from them.
 
Karlov said:
This is a philosophical question. Can it be considered worthy that Thorgrim decided to take solely upon himself the full weight of the realization of the doom of the dwarven race in order to preserve the illusion of hope for his fellows? Or should he have plunged them into despair by telling them that after the Great War against Chaos, their people were now doomed to perish at best, or to bow to the forces against Hashut? This is a question of idealism and cynicism. Can he be blamed for the fact that, from his point of view, other dwarves cannot stand the realization of the inevitability of their death? Or should he have hoped that they would stand the test of what seemed impossible to stop? There is no clear answer to this question.
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Adding to this, it is not just possible but likely that the very existence of the alarm function goes under the secrecy clause of High Kings with oaths sworn to never reveal those secrets to anyone who isn't the heir. So sharing that there even is an alarm, or that it is ringing, would require going against those oaths.
The High King of the dwarves, breaking age-old oaths. Not an easy thing to contemplate, much less do.

Adding to this, no one alive knows how the Throne Of Power actually functions, or that it was even theoretically possible to re-attach old holds back into the network.
It is entirely reasonable to assume that any required craft to do so has been lost to the ages, along with so many other secrets from the dawi Golden Age, never to be relearned because much lesser secrets have never been relearned.

Karaz Ankor was extremely lucky that reconnecting Karak Eight Peaks required nothing more than the completed crown being brought near the Throne after the reconquest.
 
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By the way, I have one question that I would like to get an answer to in the case of Waystones. Is Skavenblight connected to the Waystone system? I just have a feeling that the Skaven may have purposefully broken the system so that energy flows to their nexus from Tilea and the Border Princes, but then goes no further. This would give the Skaven a huge amount of Dhar that they could use for their needs. Perhaps they can even concentrate it into wyrdstone.
 
SakSak said:
Adding to this, it is not just possible but likely that the very existence of the alarm function goes under the secrecy clause of High Kings with oaths sworn to never reveal those secrets to anyone who isn't the heir. So sharing that there even is an alarm, or that it is ringing, would require going against those oaths.
The High King of the dwarves, breaking age-old oaths. Not an easy thing to contemplate, much less do.

Adding to this, no one alive knows how the Throne Of Power actually functions, or that it was even theoretically possible to re-attach old holds back into the network.
It is entirely reasonable to assume that any required craft to do so has been lost to the ages, along with so many other secrets from the dawi Golden Age, never to be relearned because much lesser secrets have never been relearned.

Karaz Ankor was extremely lucky that reconnecting Karak Eight Peaks required nothing more than the completed crown being brought near the Throne after the reconquest.
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Entirely reasonable is not a good standard of evidence for embracing species wide extinction as inevitable and tradition and oaths are not a good reason for refusing to act upon the information. This is my position on the morality of the matter. I make no claim to it being unassailable.
 
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It's easy to say he should have acted after the fact.
But we do have the benefit of hindsight, and none of the package that comes from millenia of cultural trauma.
Thorgrim did, famously, seek to rebuild, until it failed, and the seemingly inevitable destruction kept coming.

More interestingly, how would other dwarves react if they learned of the doom conter and Thorgrims actions?
Would it be broadly respected as a choice? Considered foolish? Would it be seen as sufficient reason to abandon tradition and/or oaths?
 
Valmond said:
It's easy to say he should have acted after the fact.
But we do have the benefit of hindsight, and none of the package that comes from millenia of cultural trauma.
Thorgrim did, famously, seek to rebuild, until it failed, and the seemingly inevitable destruction kept coming.

More interestingly, how would other dwarves react if they learned of the doom conter and Thorgrims actions?
Would it be broadly respected as a choice? Considered foolish? Would it be seen as sufficient reason to abandon tradition and/or oaths?
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Hence 'giving in to despair', I do not think that is a choice that should be taken away from people.

Further I do not think that the perception of his actions should enter the moral calculus given the stakes. He should have sacrificed his honor.

I recognize this is a very undwarfy sentiment, but if someone does a morally wrong action in part because of cultural expectation they still did the thing and are culpable. Culture is not mind control.
 
DragonParadox said:
I recognize this is a very undwarfy sentiment, but if someone does a morally wrong action in part because of cultural expectation they still did the thing and are culpable. Culture is not mind control.
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But what is morality if it is not culture? There is no objective morality to speak of in the structure of the universe. Morality is a cultural product, a kind of social contract that defines the scope of acceptable actions, and which changes over time.
 
Karlov said:
But what is morality if it is not culture? There is no objective morality to speak of in the structure of the universe. Morality is a cultural product, a kind of social contract that defines the scope of acceptable actions, and which changes over time.
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Well yeah, what I am saying is from the perspective of my moral outlook the extinction of a species with all but one of its members being kept in the dark and unable to do anything about it is wrong. This is the same way I can say an inquisitor in 40K is wrong to order a xenocide even as that is in perfect alignment with with their culture.

IC one could of course argue that every single dwarf would be fine with the High King keeping the secret making the decision for them, but we know that is not the truth as there are large numbers of dwarfs who have migrated away from the Karaz Ankor therefore by definition do not unreservedly trust its leader yet they too would turn to stone when the time comes.

Thorgrim knew this, he knew that he was making the choice to run out the clock and give in to despair for people who had sworn no oaths to him (not even accounting for those who have sworn, but would not be fine with being kept in the dark).
 
Again, easy to say when you are not juggling the fate of tens of thousands of individuals, and the choices you seem to have is keep silent and try to maximize everyones ability to get to heaven, or tell them we're all fucked and only way to not die is to go swear yourself to satan (aka Hashut).

I agree that, in general, people should be provided information to make informed choices about their lives.
But then sometimes giving out information is actively harmful, because people can panic, make short sighted decision, hoard limited supplies, etc...
I do not know what i would have done in Thorgrim's place, because i do not have all the information he had, and i would not have the information we now have (that the inevitable doom is actually evitable).
And frankly, the comparison to 40k inquisitor is kinda absurd.
 
If the wisdom of tens of cumulative generations of High Kings could not figure out (or did figure out and you just disagree with their conclusion which like, whew) a satisfactory solution to this, i doubt anyone here will.
 
pucflek said:
If the wisdom of tens of cumulative generations of High Kings could not figure out (or did figure out and you just disagree with their conclusion which like, whew) a satisfactory solution to this, i doubt anyone here will.
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We might actually. Mostly because we are operating on a different social, cultural etc paradigm, and we have meta knowledge. Whether or not our solution would be acceptable to some operating on dwarven paradigm, is a separate, difficult question.
 
Valmond said:
Again, easy to say when you are not juggling the fate of tens of thousands of individuals, and the choices you seem to have is keep silent and try to maximize everyones ability to get to heaven, or tell them we're all fucked and only way to not die is to go swear yourself to satan (aka Hashut).

I agree that, in general, people should be provided information to make informed choices about their lives.
But then sometimes giving out information is actively harmful, because people can panic, make short sighted decision, hoard limited supplies, etc...
I do not know what i would have done in Thorgrim's place, because i do not have all the information he had, and i would not have the information we now have (that the inevitable doom is actually evitable).
And frankly, the comparison to 40k inquisitor is kinda absurd.
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I'm not comfortable with that line of reasoning, being in power giving one the right to strip the agency to hundreds of thousands of unrelated people over their lives and the lives if their children in secret, not when we are talking about inevitable death on both sides. That is all I am going to say in the matter since it is very hard to argue this further without coming off too strong.
 
Altom said:
We might actually. Mostly because we are operating on a different social, cultural etc paradigm, and we have meta knowledge. Whether or not our solution would be acceptable to some operating on dwarven paradigm, is a separate, difficult question.
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I don´t think solutions in vacuum are solutions.
 
DragonParadox said:
I'm not comfortable with that line of reasoning, being in power giving one the right to strip the agency to hundreds of thousands of unrelated people over their lives and the lives if their children in secret, not when we are talking about inevitable death on both sides. That is all I am going to say in the matter since it is very hard to argue this further without coming off too strong.
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Note that i am not saying that Thorgrim made the absolute best decision ever.
Maybe he should have told everyone, maybe he should have told someone.
He probably should have told Kragg at least, or the top level Runesmith guild/priesthood.
And maybe that would have helped, or maybe it would have caused destruction of Karaz Ankor, i don't know.

But what i am saying, that we, with zero responsibility for consequences, not having to juggle the safety and well being of tens of thousands of lives, or the well being of their souls, or several thousands years of legacy left to our care, and with nice benefit of hindsight, have very easy time making statements on what should have been done.
 
DragonParadox said:
Instead the runelords are over there trying to rediscover the Master Rune of Volcanoes and the like because they do not know everyone was on a timer to petrifaction while significant swaths of the populations were giving up on the Karaz Ankor as a political institution not knowing that they were just as doomed.
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'Looks at Belegar's expedition'

It isn't that the Dawi didn't prepare expeditions - without Mathilde being in the right place at the right time again and again and again an expedition would have been a slug fest or would have failed entirely. Considering the pressures the Karaz Ankor is facing and the constant chipping down of its defences relying on 'standard' (as in primarily dwarf supported) expeditions wouldn't have necessarily altered the doom clock.
 
Valmond said:
Note that i am not saying that Thorgrim made the absolute best decision ever.
Maybe he should have told everyone, maybe he should have told someone.
He probably should have told Kragg at least, or the top level Runesmith guild/priesthood.
And maybe that would have helped, or maybe it would have caused destruction of Karaz Ankor, i don't know.

But what i am saying, that we, with zero responsibility for consequences, not having to juggle the safety and well being of tens of thousands of lives, or the well being of their souls, or several thousands years of legacy left to our care, and with nice benefit of hindsight, have very easy time making statements on what should have been done.
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Oh yeah, that I can agree with, it is easier to judge from where we are sitting.

Zero Gravitas said:
'Looks at Belegar's expedition'

It isn't that the Dawi didn't prepare expeditions - without Mathilde being in the right place at the right time again and again and again an expedition would have been a slug fest or would have failed entirely. Considering the pressures the Karaz Ankor is facing and the constant chipping down of its defences relying on 'standard' (as in primarily dwarf supported) expeditions wouldn't have necessarily altered the doom clock.
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It is the bolded part that is the most glaring aspect of the problem.

They could have prepared more. Every single imperial dwarf had an existential stake in those expeditions, yet they could not know and did not contribute because Thorgrim decided to hide that fact. Every single Radical Runesmith, the kind whose aid you cannot get with dwarf favor, had an existential stake in figuring out a rune mystery they knew nothing about. These are not Thorgrim's people, just his species and he made a choice for all of them.
 
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