Voted best in category in the Users' Choice awards.
Voting is open
So the story goes that Teclis showed up to the druids, showed them they were worshipping Ghyran, and then two thirds joined up with the Colleges while the rest went back into the woods, where they presumably still exist to this day.

But there were non-Ghyran druids, weren't there? The ones in White Dwarf 311 get the choice of Lore of Death and Lore of Ulgu. (No Lore of Life, but that might just be because they're undead, or because they're in an undead army and that lore is mechanically useless to them). What happened to them? Did they join the Colleges too? If they were non-woodlands type druids, maybe they got almost entirely wiped out by the cults by the time Teclis showed up.

If I remember what the Jade college said in the quest (I think it was Tochter) only when the druids stood firm on drawing energies from the waystones did he show them how to draw Ghyran out, and only Ghyran. This may be reading into it but this says to me that the faith was heavily changed from this split. We do have to remember that they believed they were worshipping the earth mother and a great deal of lore was likely lost from Teclis's actions. The most faithful (and presumably most knowledgable) would have been the ones to reject the interloper, this likely included the ones who didn't fit into the order that Teclis was trying to create, so the ones who drew on different winds. I imagine some joined the hedgewise, but that is more of a pet theory based purely off of the statement in the quest of the Grey being accepted more in eastern provinces from Egrimm.

According to the thread canonical map listed in the Collection of Important Information Threadmark, it's about ~75 miles from Tor Lithanel to Kor Immarmor, and then another ~75 miles from Kor Immarmor to Salzenmund. Oldenlitz is between the latter two, around ~50 miles east of Kor Immarmor and ~25 miles west of Salzenmund.
I was honestly just guessing based off of very hazy memories of the map and no measurements. Still 75 miles from the sole remaining ruined tower of Kor Immarmor and seeing that the Eonir seem to prefer to spread wide rather than tall... Well within let's not piss off the humans even more range in addition to the do we want to live that close to people who hate us that badly in the best and only visible target.
 
I was honestly just guessing based off of very hazy memories of the map and no measurements. Still 75 miles from the sole remaining ruined tower of Kor Immarmor and seeing that the Eonir seem to prefer to spread wide rather than tall... Well within let's not piss off the humans even more range in addition to the do we want to live that close to people who hate us that badly in the best and only visible target.
With Odenlitz now being abandoned ruins settled by Vicereine, Kor Immarmor would still be comfortably far from Nordland proper. Not nearly as secure as Tor Lithanel, but that's kind of a really high standard to begin with and any Nordland forces would still need to cross dozens of miles of heavily fortified and patrolled magical forest. Kor Immarmor's proximity to Tor Lithanel also means that any assault on the former would allow the latter to send reinforcements promptly.

Not that Nordland is likely to try anything with Middenland's alliance with Laurelorn and the Empire as a whole being very unlikely to side with Nordland against long-established treaty showing the borders are where Laurelorn says they are--particularly with the Colleges of Magic definitely not supporting such an action. Without magical support, Nordland's forces would be a lot easier to deal with.
 
Last edited:
So the story goes that Teclis showed up to the druids, showed them they were worshipping Ghyran, and then two thirds joined up with the Colleges while the rest went back into the woods, where they presumably still exist to this day.

But there were non-Ghyran druids, weren't there? The ones in White Dwarf 311 get the choice of Lore of Death and Lore of Ulgu. (No Lore of Life, but that might just be because they're undead, or because they're in an undead army and that lore is mechanically useless to them). What happened to them? Did they join the Colleges too? If they were non-woodlands type druids, maybe they got almost entirely wiped out by the cults by the time Teclis showed up.

I think there was one large group that rallied to Teclis and for official purposes is considered 'the' Druids, while all the other groups were either absorbed into it or never showed themselves at all. One purpose would be to keep from putting all the magic-using eggs in the Altdorf-shaped basket, but another might be that the Druids might not have been a single group any more. The very distinct nature of the different forests of the Empire means there would have been a lot of room and reason for the Druids to have schismed over the millennia, and there might have been ones in forests where winds other than Ghyran dominated that would have had their magical doctrine adapt accordingly over the years. Maybe they got absorbed into other Orders - might some of the Shamans have come from Drakwaldian Druids, for example - or maybe they're still out there.
 
I think there was one large group that rallied to Teclis and for official purposes is considered 'the' Druids, while all the other groups were either absorbed into it or never showed themselves at all. One purpose would be to keep from putting all the magic-using eggs in the Altdorf-shaped basket, but another might be that the Druids might not have been a single group any more. The very distinct nature of the different forests of the Empire means there would have been a lot of room and reason for the Druids to have schismed over the millennia, and there might have been ones in forests where winds other than Ghyran dominated that would have had their magical doctrine adapt accordingly over the years. Maybe they got absorbed into other Orders - might some of the Shamans have come from Drakwaldian Druids, for example - or maybe they're still out there.

Adding to this people don't need magical reasons to schism over thousands of years, they can just do it for the regular old ideological and political reasons they do all the time. Hell simple isolation would do it in the wake of them being driven underground by the coming on the Imperial Tribes.
 
But there were non-Ghyran druids, weren't there? The ones in White Dwarf 311 get the choice of Lore of Death and Lore of Ulgu.
Those guys are from Bretonnia. Like, the story is Kemmler invading Athel Loren after raising an army from barrows in the area. There's no real reason to assume a shared tradition with the Empire, nor that such a tradition survived (much less recognizably) the millennia of change, immigration and warfare that occurred afterwards.
 
Also, I firmly belive there are writer elves who think the modern language is debased and should be brought closer to the older, "purer" version. Who then proceed to make the spelling a complete mess, which sometimes but not always affects how it's pronounced, sometimes creates new words, and also sometimes they just get the etymology wrong.
IIRC the Everqueen and her court should limit this particular issue, on the account of the Queen herself having the memories of her predecessors and thus being effectively a native speaker of that older and purer version.
 
The timeline for Nehekhara's furthest expansion south lines up with when the Scythians would have had their presence within the Reik basin. It's not impossible that some Scythians might have encountered the legions of Nehekhara and decided to join up as auxiliaries, a role that the Nehekharan military definitely had an open slot for from the desert tribes but might not have been able to recruit for in some time. Or they might have opposed the Nehekharan expansion and been defeated and had their women and children and infirm taken as prisoners. Then the Scythians might have come south, either as migrants or as recruits or as prisoners, and become the Scythans, in the same way that that Chinese village that claims to be descended from prisoners taken during Marcus Lucinius Crassus' ill-fated expedition supposedly did.

Or a branch of the Scythians tried to expand south into the Badlands, found it to suck on account of being the Badlands, and then stubbornly pushed forward until they encountered non-greenskin neighbours.

Or it's two writers independently naming a horse nomad population after the same historical population.

Or it's just a coincidence.
 
Last edited:
With Odenlitz now being abandoned ruins settled by Vicereine, Kor Immarmor would still be comfortably far from Nordland proper. Not nearly as secure as Tor Lithanel, but that's kind of a really high standard to begin with and any Nordland forces would still need to cross dozens of miles of heavily fortified and patrolled magical forest. Kor Immarmor's proximity to Tor Lithanel also means that any assault on the former would allow the latter to send reinforcements promptly.

Not that Nordland is likely to try anything with Middenland's alliance with Laurelorn and the Empire as a whole being very unlikely to side with Nordland against long-established treaty showing the borders are where Laurelorn says they are--particularly with the Colleges of Magic definitely not supporting such an action. Without magical support, Nordland's forces would be a lot easier to deal with.
All fair points, and in all honesty what I'm about to state is more argument for discussions sake than a true defense

A. The Eonir are described are set up for attritional skirmishing to death. As shown in the battle of the Shrikojj (spelling?) If a force is willing to take casualties it's possible to simply change the terrain to favor you. Call it a 4-5 day easy march (I know it'd be slower in combat but rule of thumbing a ten mile march a day without it) with a very short supply chain.

B. The city born are described as needed prodding into action and the city itself is pretty divided internally, im not going to try to describe the political situation inside but considering it was described as a zero sum game I have a feeling there will be plenty who don't care so don't want to risk themselves.

C. They can follow the rivers to raid if they really wanted to Tor lithenal, they are home to the 2nd fleet.

D. It's extremely politically fraught simply because of economics, the Nordland economy is at a standstill right now, it's easy to say they won't risk it. But if elector counts didn't make decisions that hurt the Empire the time of the Three emperors wouldn't have happened. When your treasury is empty, entire (start of K8P I think it was 10,000 nordlanders) villages dissappear because Middenland were going to kill them for new allies, families and your province suffer. You don't care about some words written on a piece of paper 800 years ago, you care about your broke, starving populace and be damned the Empire who said you're on your own.

E. Slightly a side point but they seem to know they would get stomped by the Empire if it came to war, hence the forays into religion that we have been seeing in the background. It's a really ugly situation where everyone shares some level of blame and no one wants to take the fall. Considering the amount of middenlanders who joined K8P and the entirety of the winter wolves the only way I see the situation being resolved is really old issues being dug up that many consider dead and buried. Not a fun time for any political or religous organization.
 
Couldn't refugees from Kor Immarmor or the Forestborn independently decide to rebuild it?
It's against Laurelorn's law for structures to be built within the realm without the approval of the High Council. It probably is that by the time Laurelorn had stabilized enough in the aftermath of the War of the Beard, the political structure had calcified too much. The people in charge had based their power around Tor Lithanel and didn't want to risk upstarts in a second city.

I don't think there is a canonical answer, I would guess it to be similar to why Kor Immarmor wasn't ever rebuilt. Though canon doesn't have Cityborn status being revoked by leaving Tor Lithanel for a night: it's just a matter of birth. Canonically there is a group of cityborn that dwell in Kor Immarmor, but they're sexist and opposed to Queen Marrisith. Forest of Hate can be silly like that.

Related to this, you mentioned that Toriour and Faniour used to be terms for peasantry and low nobility. Do you know what terms Laurelorn uses for those social positions? There's peasant cityborn and there's noble forestborn.

Also, considering the rumors, I'm excited to see how The Old World retcons Laurelorn. There's rumors from a credible source that the Eonir are going to be a Wood Elf Army of Infamy. :V

No structures can be built in Laurelorn without the express approval of the High Council, and they tend to not give it.
 
Last edited:
It's a really ugly situation where everyone shares some level of blame and no one wants to take the fall.
Why is the Eonir have blame in this case? Seriously, I can't recall them being mentioned as the aggressors even once in the quest before. They were following the original treaty, never tried to invade Nordland's borders and never declared war when their borders were invaded and tried diplomacy several times (whether this is because an invasion would cause the rest of the empire to join against them is beside the point).

It could be said that the current Elector Count is not to blame for the various invasions or does not recognize the treaty made because it was not made by his family but these excuses do not apply when your state makes agreements with its immortal neighbor next door to ensure peace and you are the one who breaks it.

All of this indicates to me that the blame is entirely Nordland's, even if spread out over the centuries.
 
A combination of factors lead me to the conclusion that the Eonir share some blame.
1. The discussion Mathilde had with Pan about when they should have responded, for understanding humans they clearly didn't understand that they can be just as duplicitous as elves in politics (justification: Eonir and Asur political discussions)
2. The disappearances, instead of negotiating with middenland on their side they chose to seal the deal in blood. Not even using political tools but religious, causing quite the Ulrician schism that is forming.
3. Every elf so far met seems to not value iindividual human lives. (This one is very mucb a me deal take it with a grain of salt) Casual slaying of poachers in the schadensumpf whereas technically as a foreign power they should turn them over to Middenland, now granted that type of stuff is in no way strange to a HRE-esque organization but they do buckled together when outsiders threaten them.

The Eonir by no means share the majority, personally I rate them at about a 15-20% blame game with the majority on Nordland, but they are by no means innocent of it all. The coastal villages being left alone was probably meant as a sign of "we are open to renegotiation but we are taking back the majority" but they don't seem to understand humans well enough to have taken such a hard liner stance right out the gate.
 
There's also the fact that the Eonir were facing an existential threat. Having a hostile foreign power days away from your capital is bad enough, but they were also loosing more and more lornalins and thus the ability to clear their lands of Dhar.
 
Fuck that, they have seen what negotiation with Nordland is worth.
Congrats, that's how you end up with a border like north Korea and an entire population taught for generations about how you are their enemy. Considering Nordland was practically destroyed 1-3 times between the original treaty and now I would be surprised if they still had their copy. Would you trust a thousand year old elf coming out of the trees saying your great-great-great-great grandfather promised not to settle here? By the way we killed your great-great-great grandfather for doing so.

There's also the fact that the Eonir were facing an existential threat. Having a hostile foreign power days away from your capital is bad enough, but they were also loosing more and more lornalins and thus the ability to clear their lands of Dhar.

Counter point of did they spill their ancient secrets of magic to the humans or just say these very valuable woods are mine? Considering how secretive everyone was being and the sheer condescension that has been shown I highly doubt that humans were ever told the trees kept bad magic away and we both kind of need that to live here.
 
Congrats, that's how you end up with a border like north Korea and an entire population taught for generations about how you are their enemy. Considering Nordland was practically destroyed 1-3 times between the original treaty and now I would be surprised if they still had their copy. Would you trust a thousand year old elf coming out of the trees saying your great-great-great-great grandfather promised not to settle here? By the way we killed your great-great-great grandfather for doing so.
This contradicts what the QM has told us about how things went down:
About eight hundred years ago, Laurelorn and Nordland signed a treaty allowing limited human settlement between the Salz and Demst, with each individual one needing Eonir approval and strict population limits. Each human generation nudged those limits a little bit more. The closest thing to an outright breach was the establishment of Schlaghugel on the far side of the Demst, but even that was gradual - it started as a regular pilgrimage to a stone circle thought to be sacred to Rhya, and that turned into a small shrine which turned into a larger shrine with an attendant which turned into a temple which turned into an entire village. That's a big part of what makes the situation so tricky, no one person has broken the treaty so egregiously as to make a military response seem reasonable, but the cumulative effect of all of those tiny breaches is a massive encroachment onto the lands of the Eonir.
It bothered. It checked. It complained, as the treaty required it to do. It got nothing but platitudes in response. It realized that actually enforcing the treaty would be an act of war, and the rest of Laurelorn did not want a war it thought it could not win.
The Elves were bound by treaty to leave enforcement to Nordland. Nordland enforced it a little bit less each century. At no point was any one act egregious enough to justify tearing apart the treaty, and by the time the cumulative effects were serious enough to be felt, there were enough humans living west of the Salz that were significant enough to the economy of Nordland that their destruction or displacement would be an act of war, and they would have lost that war. With perfect hindsight you can say that pre-emptive murder would have been the path of least overall suffering, but the Elector Count of Nordland at the time wouldn't have a crystal ball to see that in eight hundred years the cumulative effects of all these tiny breaches would be the endangerment of Tor Lithanel, he'd just see that the Elves of Laurelorn had breached the term of their treaty and were murdering people for the crime of chopping down one extra tree or building one extra hut. And then we're at Laurelorn losing a war again, because Laurelorn would have just justified their own extinction in the eyes of the Empire.
They did not start killing people until they had might on their side via the alliance with Middenland. Before that, they seem to have done a lot of diplomacy and gotten a lot of passive-aggression in response.

Like, I don't love what ended up happening, obviously. But it's not like they went knives out at the first incursion. These aren't the Llanowar Elves from Dominaria. They tried really hard for eight hundred years to get Nordland to just do what they promised they'd do.
 
3. Every elf so far met seems to not value iindividual human lives. (This one is very mucb a me deal take it with a grain of salt) Casual slaying of poachers in the schadensumpf whereas technically as a foreign power they should turn them over to Middenland, now granted that type of stuff is in no way strange to a HRE-esque organization but they do buckled together when outsiders threaten them.
pickle has already pointed out how you were wrong elsewhere, but this is also wrong. The Schadensumpf is Laurelorn's territory. Extra-territoriality is typically something that only happens when you have foreign empires doing imperialism at you. They commit crimes on Laurelorn's lands, so they get punished under Laurelorn's laws.

Furthermore it's not like that Middenland minds poachers getting executed.

There is absolutely zero reason to be this hostile about the Eonir in general. Cadaeth even mentioned in her introduction interludes that if they had only waited a few years there was another option, that would have been less bloody.

Hanging. Some Middenlanders still try to hunt in the Schadensumpf and end up dead, and Middenland doesn't have a problem with that because they recognize Laurelorn's claim to the area and consider death to be the proper punishment for poaching.
 
Almost every interaction we've had with the Eonir has been friendly, and they've been nothing but civil to us. Sarvoi is the best of them, of course, but the Queen definitely wants good relations with humans, and she isn't like secretly a Druchii who wants to enslave humans just for the sake of cruelty.

Even the shut-in Grey Lords have gone from being mildly befuddled that the Empire doesn't burn their mages anymore to happily contributing to a big project that involves important magical secrets.
 
Last edited:
This contradicts what the QM has told us about how things went down:



They did not start killing people until they had might on their side via the alliance with Middenland. Before that, they seem to have done a lot of diplomacy and gotten a lot of passive-aggression in response.

Like, I don't love what ended up happening, obviously. But it's not like they went knives out at the first incursion. These aren't the Llanowar Elves from Dominaria. They tried really hard for eight hundred years to get Nordland to just do what they promised they'd do.
Fair points, I didn't know Boney had an explanation already. I was mainly focused on how I really doubt anyone bothered explaining this type of stuff to the peasants and woodsmen who were actually trespassing. The religious leaders and baron had the responsibility but the ones being punished aren't them, it's the ordinary people stuck in the middle. Also while I understand the point made their response in the swamp and along the wasteland border is stated to be killing.

I was more focused on the future with that point of not ever negotiating again. The Nordlanders who fled or died had family who definitely want revenge for what they perceive as unprovoked, Nordland nobility who wants their economy functional aren't going to go out of their way to correct that presumption.

In no way am I saying that Nordland isn't the main contributor to the tensions. They do need to take their lumps and move on but considering how easily knowledge gets lost/hidden it isn't exactly a stretch to say the majority of people effected don't exaclty know their own history, only what they were told by their lords.
pickle has already pointed out how you were wrong elsewhere, but this is also wrong. The Schadensumpf is Laurelorn's territory. Extra-territoriality is typically something that only happens when you have foreign empires doing imperialism at you. They commit crimes on Laurelorn's lands, so they get punished under Laurelorn's laws.

Furthermore it's not like that Middenland minds poachers getting executed.

There is absolutely zero reason to be this hostile about the Eonir in general. Cadaeth even mentioned in her introduction interludes that if they had only waited a few years there was another option, that would have been less bloody.

A. the schadensumpf stuff was mainly as an example of if the Empire is taken as a whole, that is why I specified HRE who were never really a whole unless forced to be. The Empire is based of the HRE and it's pretty explicitly stated that Nordland was trying to make it an Elf vs. Human thing until Middenland, hence the example of infighting and an attempt to make it into a Empire v Eonir conflict.

B. I'm not hostile towards the Eonir? Cadaeth says it could have been less bloody, that's great and all but doesn't change the fact that it was bloody. Again it's not like they told the humans why they needed the woods and silver where it was. They can regret the fact that they took what they saw as their only option all they want, it really doesn't matter to the people stuck in the middle. Mathilde even makes a point of thinking about how they had no regard for the peasants and villages who would have died under Middenlander blades to seal their alliance.

C. As far as general Elf attitude towards humans, there is a reason I specified that it was a personal view. It is exactly that, personal. Prince Eltharion treats everyone except kings as a social inferior who's expertise makes them worth listening to, granted he is a king in his own right but still. The general attitude of the higher up elves like the grey lords and the queen SEEM like they treat us as clever children who surprised them with their maturity. We have only gotten detailed account of Eonir human interaction from mages and field experts, we have no idea how an Eonir will interact with Karl grussman, the peasant who spends his days spreading manure in his fields. It is a personal view that the seem to default to a slightly benevolent condescension based off current interactions detailed, not a hard and fast rule of the quest
 
A. the schadensumpf stuff was mainly as an example of if the Empire is taken as a whole, that is why I specified HRE who were never really a whole unless forced to be. The Empire is based of the HRE and it's pretty explicitly stated that Nordland was trying to make it an Elf vs. Human thing until Middenland, hence the example of infighting and an attempt to make it into a Empire v Eonir conflict.

B. I'm not hostile towards the Eonir? Cadaeth says it could have been less bloody, that's great and all but doesn't change the fact that it was bloody. Again it's not like they told the humans why they needed the woods and silver where it was. They can regret the fact that they took what they saw as their only option all they want, it really doesn't matter to the people stuck in the middle. Mathilde even makes a point of thinking about how they had no regard for the peasants and villages who would have died under Middenlander blades to seal their alliance.

C. As far as general Elf attitude towards humans, there is a reason I specified that it was a personal view. It is exactly that, personal. Prince Eltharion treats everyone except kings as a social inferior who's expertise makes them worth listening to, granted he is a king in his own right but still. The general attitude of the higher up elves like the grey lords and the queen SEEM like they treat us as clever children who surprised them with their maturity. We have only gotten detailed account of Eonir human interaction from mages and field experts, we have no idea how an Eonir will interact with Karl grussman, the peasant who spends his days spreading manure in his fields. It is a personal view that the seem to default to a slightly benevolent condescension based off current interactions detailed, not a hard and fast rule of the quest
The Empire as a whole punishes poaching with death. The Eonir are not being aggressive or 'not value iindividual human lives' when they also punish poaching with death. Why do you expect the Eonir to recognize extra-territoriality? There is no 'technicality' about any of this. Those peasants committed a crime in Laurelorn's territory, so they get punished according to Laurelorn's laws.

I would say you are being hostile towards the Eonir, you were justifying the actions of Nordland and applying double standards that hold elves guilty for doing things human powers do. You haven't investigated or interrogated the details of the circumstances very well, see what pickle cited to you (and note how several of those citations were around the one you based the poaching statement on). But how do you think Nordlander peasants would react to being told that the trees with gold and silver buried beneath them are critical for maintaining the flow of magic? The notoriously magophobic Imperial peasants? The trees that are necessary for ensuring that Laurelorn can fight Nordland? Laurelorn was already losing more trees than it could afford!

Yes, it is a personal view; I am explaining why it is wrong. You said that elves, implied to be as a whole, do not value individual human lives. For one, elves are very fractious. The Eonir and the Asur are not the same. There's similarity, but you can't just transpose experiences with one to the other. You were citing the Eonir executing poachers to claim that elves as a whole do not give a damn about individual human lives. What is the logical basis of that leap in logic? If you're going to make claims like that, at least base it off of things common to the species rather than basically government on the planet.

You would be right about the elves having psychological differences from humans though, it's just you have an entirely wrong conclusion and evidence. Elves seem to be more tribalistic than humans and right now the Eonir probably see Middenlanders as being more people than the Asur. Boney has written before about trying to drive a hard line between individual species. You also haven't cited any of this.
 
Last edited:
The most hostile elves we have met in Laurelorn so far have been of the "get of my lawn" or "leave me alone" types.
I suspect empire side would not be quite as reasonable if the situation was reversed.
 
Counter point of did they spill their ancient secrets of magic to the humans or just say these very valuable woods are mine? Considering how secretive everyone was being and the sheer condescension that has been shown I highly doubt that humans were ever told the trees kept bad magic away and we both kind of need that to live here.
Imagine you're the average Imperial peasant. He has been taught all his life that magic is bad, and should be destroyed. You also really like gold and silver, because it allows you to buy extra food when the harvest is bad, acquire better tools and generally makes your life better. Then elves come to them and said "don't touch those magic trees full of easily accessible precious metals, they keep magic away". What are you going to do? Just take the elves at their word, or think "well, it sure looks like those knife-ears want to keep all that gold and silver for them, they can go hang"? People are really good at ignoring inconvenient facts even when they have proof it's true, and here the Nordlanders wouldn't even have that.
 
Rather than the eonir having done what they did through lack of understanding of humans, I think more likely than not they do in fact understand the psychology of a human being told 'we would like to negotiate over 1/3 to 1/4 of your recognized territory not actually being your territory.'

Because I do not think the result of that would have been a peaceful transfer of territory, it would've been Nordland pretending to negotiate while scrambling for backup.
 
The most hostile elves we have met in Laurelorn so far have been of the "get of my lawn" or "leave me alone" types.
I suspect empire side would not be quite as reasonable if the situation was reversed.
I mean, no, one of them very funnily describing befeathering human heads by way of arrows.

It's just, you know. As has been mentioned. Poachers usually get death sentence, its really not in any way out of the norm.
 
Voting is open
Back
Top