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Warhammer Fantasy: Divided Loyalties - an Advisor's Quest

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If we publish the apparition spells, we can basically undercut the one thing daemon summoning has going for it.

Of course, it should be noted that plenty of normal color spells are enough to convince normal people that you're a chaos daemon personally, but that doesn't usually stop wizards, except for all the times it does.

Also, the Liber Mathilde being an examination of how to violate chaos's daemon copyright with Ulgu would put our wind on the map as even more definitely the opposite of Hysh.
 
The hard part really is defining a proper victory condition for Mathilde the Supreme Evil Overlord. What does this hypothetical character actually want?
 
"Let's write the evil magic book" has two possible outcomes :
  1. Either we write something that tries to be "safe", that tries to teach the defensive theory and counterspells without all the actual dark magic lessons. This is very hard, and it's also well-trod ground that many other highly skilled people have already tried. We know the Witch Hunters already have an extremely redacted version of the Liber Mortis that gets handed out as a "how to kill monsters" guide !
  2. What's actually worth our time is the other strategy: writing "here's how you do Dark magic". Oh you'd word it as "here's how you counter it, here are the weakpoints in all these spells", but you definitely include all the theory and the spells. to give the biggest possible bonus to the reader. That's very important because the only circumstances in which we would want such a book to be released is if it was extremely necessary to fight some currently ongoing Dhar-based catastrophe.
    • Obviously "Here's you you do Dark Magic" would be suicide for Mathilde if it got out. Therefore the only option for publication is "released posthumously, and only released at a time of great need" (and it's convenient that ever since we got the Liber Mortis, we've spent our career befriending the faction best suited to safely storing the book and the least likely to send it to the College when it isn't absolutely 100% needed).
    • Posthumous emergency release is the only option we need to consider, because any scenario in which Mathilde is still alive doesn't require such a book to have been written. If the situation is so bad that the Colleges would consider allowing a highly trusted Lord Magister to learn Dhar theory to beat Nagash, then Mathilde can just do that herself.
    • Note that we cannot posthumously publish a "here's how Dhar works, I knew it the whole time!" book just to be smug. That would bring too much scrutiny on the important things we've built and on the people we care about. The only purpose of writing a Dark Magic Book is as an emergency "how to beat your current Dhar-wielding apocalypse", not to be smug or to widely disseminate everyday anti-Dhar knowledge.
 
Parabola said:
Personally, I prefer thread madness about what sort of Ulgu spells and rituals we could make, but I'll take this over other forms of thread madness.
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How about a spell that garbles/twists the orders given by one's superiors? Like, on a large scale, imagine a line of soldiers hearing "Charge!" instead of "Hold!" and so on.
 
Gavin Prince said:
Megalomania is a common foible of powerful wizards.

I think the primary mode of attack would be leveraging Mathilde's knowledge of the Waystone Network into disabling or destroying the handful of outflow nodes for the continent. That's something she could probably do with sufficient prep, and is a potential apocalypse. Plonk an army of the dead on top to keep Ulthuan from re-installing one of their few remaining replacement menhirs long enough for the accumulated magic to allow daemons to manifest and defend the spots themselves, and she can homebrew an End Times.
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I mean.... Boney told us a badly handled Nexus could oopsie a province. I feel Mathilde sabotaged herself somewhat in making the powers that be sign a treaty to liberate them if possible, but i am sure that with enough will, we could potentially explode entire Empire off the face of Malus.
 
Nerdasaurus Rex said:
The problem is that if we're throwing enough Ulgu around to affect an entire unit of soldiers, I'd rather just kill them outright than confuse them and make them misunderstand their orders.
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Mm, that was just the easiest example I could think of. It could work as a single target thing too, though it might need to be reimagined into a reinterpretation of recent orders as well to get some utility.
 
You know, if you all do desperately want to make a Dhar book to showcast Mathilde skill, we could all go the other direction.

There is already a wealth of books by master dhar user that have traps and purposeful mistakes to catch the unwary and unworthy trying to learn from them, We could have mathilde write such a book but without even the main directive of being useful, making it a trap from the very base. And with her knowledge she might be able to do a pretty goddamn good job of it.

I'm half sure the Grey already have a Dhar's user guide to dummies floating around, both to track who try to buy those and to teach those that do get one wrong, on purpose.

Imagine a book where the third practice ritual/spell is secretly a beacon or messenger spell to some device the Grey have around, which serve to catch any practicing mage when they are too ignorant to know what it does. That could be a viable thing Mathilde might be able to cook out.
 
Nerdasaurus Rex said:
The problem is that if we're throwing enough Ulgu around to affect an entire unit of soldiers, I'd rather just kill them outright than confuse them and make them misunderstand their orders.
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Not all spells are equal. A spell that outright kills one (1) Unit of soldiers is going to be far more difficult and/or limited than a spell that debuffs or manipulates that same number of soldiers. Especially for Ulgu. We don't have five flavors of fireball to play with here. And besides, the right trick in the wrong place could turn an entire battle around.
 
Derpmind said:
Not all spells are equal. A spell that outright kills one (1) Unit of soldiers is going to be far more difficult and/or limited than a spell that debuffs or manipulates that same number of soldiers. Especially for Ulgu. We don't have five flavors of fireball to play with here. And besides, the right trick in the wrong place could turn an entire battle around.
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I doubt that. It just depends on what you choose as your method. Burning Shadows are easier than Melkoths Mystifying Miasma and yet they have the potential that they do, even without enchantment.

Making someone mishear orders depends on medium that was misheard i think.

EDIT: But there is nothing about killing people or debuffing people that makes one inherently harder.
 
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Derpmind said:
Not all spells are equal. A spell that outright kills one (1) Unit of soldiers is going to be far more difficult and/or limited than a spell that debuffs or manipulates that same number of soldiers. Especially for Ulgu. We don't have five flavors of fireball to play with here. And besides, the right trick in the wrong place could turn an entire battle around.
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We might be better off trying to confuse a troop of soldiers about which side they are on.
 
Talon TigerDino said:
Eh, you have to actively hunt apparitions down, subdue them, then bind them. Daemon summoning brings the gribbly straight to you. Or more accurately, straight to your enemies. From anywhere, any time you got the right sacrifices.
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I mean, long term daemon summoning is more dangerous, since it plays around with instantly deadly warp portals (a one in ten chance, which means that even if you succeed at the ritual you've basically incurred a catastrophic miscast on purpose).

In comparison, all you have to do with apparitions is find them and hit them. Troublesome for the weak, but Magic Weapon is a simple spell for anybody with business employing our methods.
 
Arkio said:
Does Tzeench lose so much AP he gets to the point of integer overflow and has an unlimited supply of AP to spend on arguing with himself?
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No, Tzeentch sacrificed his place in a timeline to gain more AP, but that means that past and future tzeentch also make plots which he is (and neither are they of the other two) aware of, which is why he clashes so hard. He wishes he didn´t but now he can only put on a smug face and nod along, as every wizard does when they fuck up but don´t want to admit it.
 
Arkio said:
How about a spell that garbles/twists the orders given by one's superiors? Like, on a large scale, imagine a line of soldiers hearing "Charge!" instead of "Hold!" and so on.
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That might be doable, although at the level of entire armies it's almost certainly Battle Magic.

Personally, my wish-list for spell-creation is:
  1. Fog Bank Battle Magic (fog that you can make your own forces but not the enemies see through)
  2. Whispering Darkness apparition binding (a large-ish number that's mid-to-high-end Battle Magic so it has a lot of oomph with the staff)
  3. Xeno-affinity inspired spell that makes observers ignore that the caster is missing subconscious cultural cues (like accent or body language or hopefully even scent in the case of Skaven).
  4. Warriors of Fog (a fog around a friendly unit that makes enemies attacks inclined to miss or merely disperse the fog rather then hurt our allies)
(Shout-out to the Approved Spells threadmark for help in easily making this list.)

K von Carstein said:
What's the worst kind of thread madness you can think of?
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The problem here is that it's the sort of madness that invites itself into the thread if you name it. But I will name it anyway, under a spoiler:

Talking about the next turn's plan. It's not a bad thing, but turns nowadays last long enough that it always feels too premature to talk about them before the actual turn shows up - new actions can always show up, new factors can always affect pre-existing plans. At worst I'd prefer saving up such discussion until the very end of the turn - around the time that we're buying books/miscellaneous things.

seekingflame said:
You know, if you all do desperately want to make a Dhar book to showcast Mathilde skill, we could all go the other direction.

There is already a wealth of books by master dhar user that have traps and purposeful mistakes to catch the unwary and unworthy trying to learn from them, We could have mathilde write such a book but without even the main directive of being useful, making it a trap from the very base. And with her knowledge she might be able to do a pretty goddamn good job of it.

I'm half sure the Grey already have a Dhar's user guide to dummies floating around, both to track who try to buy those and to teach those that do get one wrong, on purpose.

Imagine a book where the third practice ritual/spell is secretly a beacon or messenger spell to some device the Grey have around, which serve to catch any practicing mage when they are too ignorant to know what it does. That could be a viable thing Mathilde might be able to cook out.
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...That's insidious. I could totally see it working, though it'd need to be realistic enough to a regular wizard or would-be dark lord for them to open it up and believe it.

pucflek said:
I doubt that. It just depends on what you choose as your method. Burning Shadows are easier than Melkoths Mystifying Miasma and yet they have the potential that they do, even without enchantment.

Making someone mishear orders depends on medium that was misheard i think.

EDIT: But there is nothing about killing people or debuffing people that makes one inherently harder.
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The Wind's nature is definitely a factor here, actually. We know it's easier for Ulgu to obfuscate or conceal than it is for it to completely hide something, and we know it's hard outside of Battle Magic for it to do direct damage. So it's quite possible that it's easier for Ulgu to obfuscate or confuse way more troops than, say, a Pit of Shades can.

chocolote12 said:
In comparison, all you have to do with apparitions is find them and hit them. Troublesome for the weak, but Magic Weapon is a simple spell for anybody with business employing our methods.
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It depends on the type of Magic Weapon - it won't work if it's based on the type of Wind that the Apparition eats:

Boney said:
The reason Apparitions are a threat is they target people whose instincts revert to defending themselves with a form of magic they eat. Anyone targeted by an Apparition that is armed with a weapon that utilizes another form of magic - like a rune weapon - and knows how to use it is a lot safer against them, though still vulnerable to surprise attacks.
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Rune weapons are safe, and so is stuff like a gilded punch to the face, as Johann has aptly demonstrated, but asides from things like that, there's a reason that Mathilde had to set a mirror-trap for her Asp rather than faced it head-on.
 
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Parabola said:
The Wind's nature is definitely a factor here, actually. We know it's easier for Ulgu to obfuscate or conceal than it is for it to completely hide something, and we know it's hard outside of Battle Magic for it to do direct damage. So it's quite possible that it's easier for Ulgu to obfuscate or confuse way more troops than, say, a Pit of Shades can.
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Oh definitely. Unless you somehow press them in, Pit of Shades will kill way less people than Melkoths Miasma cast on regiment in pitched combat. But there is degrees and such. If you are already casting a spell that will envelop entire military unit, you might as well kill the commanders instead. Sure, technically they could do way more damage if their orders were misheard, but quite frankly, if you just murder them instead, you risk no possible dispelling. ITs sorta eh.
 
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