We can rule out the Dwarves and the Empire to complain (well, someone might complain, but all of our bosses have our back and we're ahead of schedule anyway.) That only leaves Kislev and (maybe) Laurelorn. Both of those are candidates for first waystone, and I don't think the Elves will be an issue. Laurelorn already gets a lot of what they want just for hosting the project, they're not a triage location, and, well.
Betting on the pride of elves not being bruised at being snubbed is a poor bet. Laurelorn proposed the Project, Laurelorn hosted the Project, Laurelorn provided the most components to the Project, Laurelorn designed the majority of the waystone's components. There's a lot here that says they should be priority for deployment. And ultimately it'd only be a difference of six months for Kislev. Hell, we might even design a simpler waystone without the riverine component in that time. Boris is not expecting to get waystones first.
If we give Kislev waystones first, then Laurelorn will be
fourth in line of getting deployables from the Project. We deployed tributaries to Stirland first, then Kislev. Once is happenstance, twice is coincidence, three times is a pattern.
Edit: To be clear, I'm not saying that they would be annoyed
because they're elves.
Anyone would be annoyed because of this. But elves feel a lot more extremely than humans, so I'm using that to emphasize their annoyance.
I´m honestly still waiting on what Eltharion brings us for the waystone. He promised the phrase as the bare minimum, will we get something more stonks from him for delivering? Mucho anticipation.
On topic of price to extract, we need a lab. A country sized lab, if we eventually want to advance up to the waystone nexuses. So we will eventually need to amass armies to cull Badlands sufficiently enough to at least allow for the undisturbed existence of such a place.
You get more out of Ulthuan if they get goodies. So if we want more stuff out of Ulthuan, we probably should design a waystone that the Asur can procure themselves. It's not like they can get runes from the Karaz Ankor. So far they can only say that they have gotten a tributary design, which is much less useful for elves than it is for humans.
I have to ask. At this point, is there anything at all that the waystone project needs and lacks, which we could procure with sufficient favours?
Instructions of how to create nexuses. Bretonnia would be helpful for that. We also need more tributaries. The tributaries we have can't be used everywhere. We also probably need insight into Athel Loren.
High Magic capable enchanter hours, but thats it. As i understand it at least.
The capstone is pretty quick compared to the storage. The main thing is Archmage or Von Tarnus-equivalent labor hours. Bretonnia should have the latter.
Well, if we want to continue research (looking into Nexuses, improved Waystone designs, new Tributaries, connecting sub-Networks to each other, etc) we could use the help of different magical paradigms to provide insights. Right now, Elf and Human magic is (kinda) based on the same fundamental principles, or at least on the same understanding of magic, while everyone else's 'magic' is orthogonal to them and thus doesn't significantly challenge/contradict them; the closest thing we have to that is the Hedgewise... whatever-they-do, but they've been prosecuted since forever and a lot of the knowledge they once had has been lost. Getting someone like the Damsels or even the Liche Priests into the Project could give unexpected insights into the nature of magic, and incorporate unorthodox but still effective methods into our designs (like the 'bag of rocks + dead fish' tributary that so confused Eltharion).
Damsel magic is also probably based off of elf magic. The Lady of the Lake should remember the Golden Age and Athel Loren is right next door. Liche Priest magic is probably partially based off of Slann magic, which elf magic is based off.
I definitely want to see a Bretonnian equivalent of the Scythian tributaries though. We're also unlikely to get components out of Bretonnia. We would have to redo the component actions.
The placement of the first waystone is symbolic, The first mass deployment somewhat less so yet still something that sends a message.
At the very least, I'd like that first waystone to be in kislev to send the message that we're here to save the world, lol.
There is also message that you want to snub the host and greatest contributor of the Waystone Project.
Seriously, I really think deploying waystones anywhere other than Laurelorn is a poor choice. We've already ignored them for past deployment actions. We shouldn't do that again.
