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Warhammer Fantasy: Divided Loyalties - an Advisor's Quest

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DragonParadox said:
It was in no way critical that we get Thorek's aid for the Project, we just figured it would be useful and threw the Middleheim dwarfs under the runic bus. It was also no critical that we gave Boris his smoking gun against the boyars from Praag, we just wanted him to like us more.
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Middleheim dwarfs aren't some innocent victims of two power hungry villains.
I'm sorry, but with all our and Thorek's influence we still couldn't "threw the Middleheim dwarfs under the bus" only because we wanted so.
Many dwarfs oppose them because they think that it's right. You heard Thorek's reasons. He do it because it's right for his culture and morale. And we don't have many reasons to think that he is wrong.
We didn't made a final decision, we give Thorak ammo for his case.

And boyars in Praag needed to be investigated. Mathilde themselves thought so. Strong links to vampire, some shady deal that draw attention of evil forces.

Like Abel said, we deal death to the corrupt to prevent the suffering of the innocent.
 
DragonParadox said:
Both not in the sense that they are two groups present in the population, but rather that a large portion of them are latent vampire cultists who were beaten down by said vampires making rebellion in the absence of a vampire to rally behind very unlikely. All the vampires with armies are dead and all the rest are in hiding. These are people that believe a bunch of really problematic things about dark magic, necromancy, the undead and the advisability of lynching elves and dwarfs (in any and all combinations) who also believe that if you rebel on your own against the rulers with the armies and the magic they will deliver onto you a fate worse than death.
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Ok, then the first group will give us good PR and the second will find less fertile ground to recruit from in the future. Plus, an improvement in living conditions will change the underlying sentiment much faster.
 
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eternalpasserby said:
Middleheim dwarfs aren't some innocent victims of two power hungry villains.
I'm sorry, but with all our and Thorek's influence we still couldn't "threw the Middleheim dwarfs under the bus" only because we wanted so.
Many dwarfs oppose them because they think that it's right. You heard Thorek's reasons. He do it because it's right for his culture and morale. And we don't have many reasons to think that he is wrong.
We didn't made a final decision, we give Thorak ammo for his case.

And boyars in Praag needed to be investigated. Mathilde themselves thought so. Strong links to vampire, some shady deal that draw attention of evil forces.

Like Abel said, we deal death to the corrupt to prevent the suffering of the innocent.
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Thorek's reasoning is literally 'Sins of the Father', they were morally bankrupt. We most certainly did make the final decision, we sent a letter to the Graff saying 'pressure these dwarfs, it is useful to the Eonir, trust me'. The part with the amo was the Runesmith Guild, the other part of his price

We also have no idea how much investigating and how much purging Boris did and Mathilde in no way tried to figure that out before she framed them for murder.

storryeater said:
Ok, then the first group will give us good PR and the second will find less fertile ground to recruit from in the future. Plus, an improvement in living conditions will change the underlying sentiment much faster.
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There are no two groups in the argument, please read more carefully
 
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DragonParadox said:
Thorek's reasoning is literally 'Sins of the Father', they were morally bankrupt. We most certainly did make the final decision, we sent a letter to the Graff saying 'pressure these dwarfs, it is useful to the Eonir, trust me'. The part with the amo was the Runesmith Guild, the other part of his price

We also have no idea how much investigating and how much purging Boris did and Mathilde in no way tried to figure that out before she framed them for murder.



There are no two groups in the argument, please read more carefully
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There is a SPECTRUM of two groups that exists in varying levels of sympathy and fear.

Bad PR will shift the spectrum against us. Good PR will push it towards us. To argue that they are perfectly spherical in a way that lets our our strategy being utterly meaningless seems strange to me. They are fanatical and impossible to convince, only cowed, but at the same time, so fearful they'd never, ever do anything. That does not sound like any human group in history ever. If they were not human, maybe I'd buy it.
 
storryeater said:
There is a SPECTRUM of two groups that exists in varying levels of sympathy and fear.

Bad PR will shift the spectrum against us. Good PR will push it towards us. To argue that they are perfectly spherical in a way that lets our our strategy being utterly meaningless seems strange to me. They are fanatical and impossible to convince, only cowed, but at the same time, so fearful they'd never, ever do anything. That does not sound like any human group in history ever. If they were not human, maybe I'd buy it.
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They do not have to be perfectly spherical for my argument, they have to be hostile enough to require generations of deprogramming and cowed enough not to want to fight the Army of Stirland over magic rocks, that is it. Notice how they have not fought the Army of Stirland over battle mages being deployed.

I think that is the case and I gave the arguments for it previously, vote as seems best to you and we'll see the results

It is really late for me so I'll have to at least pause this here.
 
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Nerdasaurus Rex said:
If people are genuinely worried about retaliation from the inhabitants of New Town and how that might harm the citizens of Old Town, then you should probably be arguing to abandon the waystone project entirely. Where we place the first Waystone won't change the fact that a purge is coming to Praag. It's just a question of "does the war happen now, or in six months to a years time when the Z'ra imports more waystones".
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This argument is very messy. Yes, some of us don't want to start fights right away. So?

Maybe you think that Abel should have abandon his ambitions because he didn't go to castle on first turn?

Months of healing majority of people from corruption is a month of newborns, who doesn't mutate. A month of sick people, who have better chance because they don't need to fight dhar that much. It's people, who feels better, who becomes healthier, who becomes stronger. Who has more reasons and better morale, than weaken people who goes to war for a stone, that they aren't sure even works.

Six months can mean more than you might think.

Edit: or maybe they won't. Who knows? Not me, I'm not writer. :V:V:V
 
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DragonParadox said:
They do not have to be perfectly spherical for my argument, they have to be hostile enough to require generations of deprogramming and cowed enough not to want to fight the Army of Stirland over magic rocks, that is it. Notice how they have not fought the Army of Stirland over battle mages being deployed.

I think that is the case and I gave the arguments for it previously, vote as seems best to you and we'll see the results

It is really late for me so I'll have to at least pause this here.
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Fair enough, goodnight.

just to state my opinion on this for the thread, not intending to continue my argument with any single person in particular, though, I do not think anyone would take generations of deprogramming to deprogram.
 
The opinion of local Sylvanians is unlikely to matter for Sylvanian deployment, but ironically, the first 20ish waystones in Sylvania will likely be placed in towns anyway.

We know Sylvania has very few surviving waystones, and the closest nexus is Eischeschatten, in the Moot, so what's almost certainly going to happen here is that we'll be placing stones next to the Stir River and the Aver Reach. The Aver Reach leylines will probably end up in Eischeschatten, and the Stir River's in Altdorf, specifically the Jade College. Further waystones would presumably connect to these.

Now, obviously, we want those first river-leyline waystones to be well-protected, which means they have to be put in places that can be defended to some extent from gribblies, where you can reasonably place troops or vampire hunters to protect them. That means towns, and wouldn't you know it, all settlements in Sylvania that show up on the map except Mikalsdorf are directly next to rivers - and even Mikalsdorf is sufficiently close to the Stir that it'll still get connected, only later. So are the various bogs/fens/moors/swamps.
 
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storryeater said:
Wizards allready have arms and knowledge, they lack favorable perception. Thus, that must be covered.
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Not what I am arguing against. My argument is the (only) way to do that is go top down. Start from the King, Nobles and Churches then armies and finally masses will follow. They will have no choice since every could be leader is already sold on the Wizards. That is a workable plan

Grass roots bottom up approach on the other hand is doomed to failure in any feudal system. You will never convince every peasant and with some nobles or churches against wizards means a civil war minimum.

More to point we already started top down approach in Kislev by getting Tzar and Ice Witches. Next step is local nobles then once all of them secure you focus on masses. Skipping steps will just cause local nobles to sabotage everything which would be far more destructive than some peasants rioting in unorganized manner.
 
I'm just going to note again that I think top-down approaches get crossways with Ranald's hostility to tyrants.
 
Tasoli said:
Not what I am arguing against. My argument is the (only) way to do that is go top down. Start from the King, Nobles and Churches then armies and finally masses will follow. They will have no choice since every could be leader is already sold on the Wizards. That is a workable plan

Grass roots bottom up approach on the other hand is doomed to failure in any feudal system. You will never convince every peasant and with some nobles or churches against wizards means a civil war minimum.

More to point we already started top down approach in Kislev by getting Tzar and Ice Witches. Next step is local nobles then once all of them secure you focus on masses. Skipping steps will just cause local nobles to sabotage everything which would be far more destructive than some peasants rioting in unorganized manner.
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See, the thing is, I am not arguing for us to focus on grassroots to the exclusion of top down or vice versa. I am arguing for us to focus on what is most efficient in each instance.

Waystones will buy us the same amount of real goodwill from rulers regardless of what we do. The rest is transactional, and will only maybe affect Waystone reputation, NOT wizard reputation. Heck, I'd argue not ever Waystone reputation, really, as knowledgable actors will understand the benefits anyway. By contrast, going the peasant route will affect wizard reputation, and will only negligible consequences to deployment. Really, the major positive consequences such a strategy really has is for Mathilde as a person an her power base, not wizards or Waystones. The best longterm plan for wizards is to get the PR where it may actually work, cuz the Waystones are not gonna buy wizard credit with rulers or nobles, just Mathilde credit, but they sure as hell are gonna get it from peasants.

And peasants who like wizards make it harder to uproot them even if we get another Dieter. We know that, because the Hedgewise continue operating in spite of the church and Nobles and other wizards, mostly because their communities like them and won't cooperate with the law. Conversely, I am quite certain innocents still get burned because of the same reason, but the other way around.
 
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storryeater said:
See, the thing is, I am not arguing for us to focus on grassroots to the exclusion of top down or vice versa. I am arguing for us to focus on what is most efficient in each instance.

Waystones will buy us the same amount of real goodwill from rulers regardless of what we do. The rest is transactional, and will only maybe affect Waystone reputation, NOT wizard reputation. Heck, I'd argue not ever Waystone reputation, really, as knowledgable actors will understand the benefits anyway. By contrast, going the peasant route will affect wizard reputation, and will only negligible consequences to deployment. Really, the major positive consequences such a strategy really has is for Mathilde as a person an her power base, not wizards or Waystones. The best longterm plan for wizards is to get the PR where it may actually work, cuz the Waystones are not gonna buy wizard credit with rulers or nobles, just Mathilde credit, but they sure as hell are gonna get it from peasants.

And peasants who like wizards make it harder to uproot them even if we get another Dieter. We know that, because the Hedgewise continue operating in spite of the church and Nobles and other wizards, mostly because their communities like them and won't cooperate with the law. Conversely, I am quite certain innocents still get burned because of the same reason, but the other way around.
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We are in Kislev. Magic is respected by peasants here. It is nobles that have been hating magic users for long time now so getting them on board is more important than Kislev peasants who already sold on magic.
 
I think that as Mathilde we might not really care for most of the peasantry. They are Superstitious, and they Do Not Know What Is Good For Them -- case in point, the ones back in the Empire revere Sigmar.

They're seemingly universally happy to burn magic users unless a strong one is already breathing down their necks, but they object to small and reasonable measures like burning down their neighbor's homes while they're still inside for the crime of mutation and chaos worship.

Our cactus fief is a model fief because it doesn't need Mathilde to Come Over There. It is blameless and without sin, and that's definitely not because Mathilde is responsible for their well-being. :V
 
storryeater said:
But what we do here will affect deployment strategy everywhere.
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Deployment strategy is how we sell waystones.

The other places we're selling them this turn are Sylvania, notorious Bad Place, and the Black Water area under Zhufbar's jurisdiction, notoriously creepy place.

The places we were thinking of selling them after that were places like Mordheim and Mousilion, which are in the same vein.

As far as deployment strategies go, appealing to people who've found fire and steel to not be enough is a pretty solid one. Fire, Steel, and Stone will be the new watchwords for at least all of the rest of the main model's time in the limelight.

A near-zero magic model fit for true mass production, on cost scales a peasant could personally afford, would reasonably enjoy a different marketing scheme.
 
Parabola said:
Now, obviously, we want those first river-leyline waystones to be well-protected, which means they have to be put in places that can be defended to some extent from gribblies, where you can reasonably place troops or vampire hunters to protect them.
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It occurs to me that this is another thing that a small fleet of riverine Waystones configured to work on barges could do quite well. A barge, being its own transport, can carry the manpower and supplies needed to defend the Waystone (alternatively, those could be placed on secondary barges) as a self-contained unit moving with the Waystone itself. Individual barges could rely on local resupply and move around to lessen the burden on any given community; a greater concentration of them in trouble spots could be resupplied from larger cities or agricultural centres along the river as necessary for the given operation.

Moreover, by moving the barges around to the places they'd be needed the most, those accompanying the Waystone would be in a position to gain experience in negotiating with communities and in fighting threats to the Waystone more quickly than a static garrison would, as well as hopefully building up a positive reputation as banishers of Chaos rather than the burden (or potentially worse) that a garrison might come to be associated with. (This would work best, of course, with a properly vetted and dedicated professional force... Wonder if the EIC would be suited to getting something like that going - we'd just have to figure out how to make it all pay for itself!)
 
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chocolote12 said:
Deployment strategy is how we sell waystones.

The other places we're selling them this turn are Sylvania, notorious Bad Place, and the Black Water area under Zhufbar's jurisdiction, notoriously creepy place.

The places we were thinking of selling them after that were places like Mordheim and Mousilion, which are in the same vein.

As far as deployment strategies go, appealing to people who've found fire and steel to not be enough is a pretty solid one. Fire, Steel, and Stone will be the new watchwords for at least all of the rest of the main model's time in the limelight.

A near-zero magic model fit for true mass production, on cost scales a peasant could personally afford, would reasonably enjoy a different marketing scheme.
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I think these people would be even happier if they could feel safe for once in their lives, rather than by using the Waystones as a spear.

Then again, it is kind of an ice cream vote in that they'd prolly be happy enough either way.
 
I want Waystones to be deployed to the most dangerous locations of the darkest lores. So that Mathilde can deploy herself to those location and steal their books, Melkior's Library must be fucking amazing
 
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Take Me Home Silver Roads
  • Media
    • pucflek said:
    SILVER ROAAAADS, TAKE ME HOOOOOME!
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    Mopman43 said:
    To the Karak, I belong!
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    Alliterate said:
    West slope of Nar, mountain penthouse
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    BurnNote said:
    Take me home, Silver Roads
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    You did this.

    Take Me Home Silver Roads

    Towerin' peaks, Karaz Ankor
    World's Edge Mountains, Pillars of Grungni
    Life is old there, older than the trees
    Eternal like the mountains, grumblin' in the deeps

    Silver Roads, take me home
    To the Karak I belong
    Karaz Ankor, Valaya mama
    Take me home, Silver Roads

    All my Ancestors gather 'round her
    Miner's lady, stranger to blue water
    Dark and dusty, carved into these halls
    Bolsterin' taste of Bugman's, teardrop in my eye

    Silver Roads, take me home
    To the Karak I belong
    Karaz Ankor, Valaya mama
    Take me home, Silver Roads

    I hear her voice in the mornin' hour, she calls me
    The grumblin' reminds me of my Karak far away
    Trundlin' down the road, I get a feelin'
    That I should've been home yesterday, yesterday

    Silver Roads, take me home
    To the Karak I belong
    Karaz Ankor, Valaya mama
    Take me home, Silver Roads

    Silver roads, take me home
    To the Karak I belong
    Karaz Ankor, Valaya mama
    Take me home, Silver Roads

    Take me home, (down) Silver Roads
    Take me home, (down) Silver Roads​
     
  • Media
    • So, in a hundred years, when Praag is purified and rebuilt, and has weathered the next everchosen, what will it look like, do we think?

    Magnus gardens is probably still going to be there, and probably be holy ground for remaining untainted, or was the sight of the final heroic defense and is now recovering being tainted from the deaths of the demons there.

    Fire spire? I think maybe, but it would be so sensitive to the personal quirks of the person who refounded it.

    Ohhhh, wait.

    Our ice maiden. She'll be all grown up by then and hardened by a war, for which I have to imagine that she's likely to have survived. (My bet is that she's going to have been the dedicated Baba Z handler, since the ancient is a bit used to her following her around at this point.) She's got the resume with the waystone project and the international connections from it.

    I bet the Vlag masons and runepokers could set up sizable mono-wind towers for pretty cheap, call them the Fire Spires. Put up a central one, biggest of all, to serve as a giant waystone and node on the ice circuit, and make it an Ice tower. If the mono-wind towers are set up to have the waystone storage enchantments laid into their foundations, and the Ice tower the waystone base enchantments, then the whole thing really could serve as a waystone and link with the other ones.

    She could petition for a few tutors to get things started from the colleges and/or Laurelorn (which is probably going to want to be a little ostentatious about having a foreign policy independent of the empire's) and collect a small bunch of magic sensitive youth from the war vets, noble kids, and boys sent from the villages and towns where the ice witches have sway.

    I wonder if there's some city-wide magic that could be powered from the new waystones once the dhar is gone? Ghyran maybe, and convert a bunch of the reclaimed houses into green houses, so the city can grow it's own food through the next siege. Use aqshy for wall spells- have a bunch of big glyphs that launch fireballs to back up your bolt throwers and cannon. Maybe a city-wide shield of hysh against demons and dark magic?

    Anyways- run the controls through the towers, to give Praag as a whole some magical punch without needing a ton of trained wizards.

    I think it could be enough of a national asset that the czar would shell out- combination training local battle wizards and Magical Fortress Praag.

    ...so maybe this is me taking myself into another omake. We'll see
     
    DragonParadox said:
    Give it up for Electricity, weirder than literal magic. 👏👏 👏:V
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    Physics don't care about maintaining suspension of disbelief.

    DragonParadox said:
    @Boney odd question, has Kragg ever been to KAU? Because I find the notion of him interacting with the Librar-We adorable. They would not even know they are being scowled at, but less that there is anything special about this not-green-small-four-leg. On the other side of things I think he might find himself impressed with their diligence if he thought about it.
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    Once, to glare suspiciously at the Rune Magic section. Any Empire-published books on the subject spends an entire chapter making it clear that there are no secrets of Dwarven Runesmithing contained within and scrupulously cites everything as coming from legit sources, so he went away no more annoyed than he entered.
     
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