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Warhammer Fantasy: Divided Loyalties - an Advisor's Quest

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BoneyM said:
Incoming Transport, said a third readout, passed on by a lookout that did not question why procedures demanded they note observations aloud. Azril-Vala-Ungol colours.

Thorgrim fought back a sigh, wondering what new Grudges the doomed attempt to turn back the clock would bring now.
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Aside from the really big new, this is also an interesting detail.
Thorgrim can notice Grudges being created, even if there are no regular messages from the grudge-producing Dawi.

I wonder if that allows for more information exchange over long ranges, or if it's limited to Grudges only. Would be immensly useful for the Holds to have a direct line of communication to KaK.
 
Eeeeyyy. Ancient Dwarven Works now added to the Loot Possibilities.

Wonder what the High King will make of Bok? Since they seem to have an Interface available, they just might be able to best study or make use of poor Bok.
 
Wow, yeah, that does add a flavor of... something, to Thorgrim. To be reminded, every single minute of every single day for 180 years that the Karaz Ankor is failing... And then, suddenly, all was silent.

Because the largest of all the lost Karaks, save Karak Drazh and Karak-a-Karaz itself, suddenly... wasn't. And every one of the old Karaks was also a massive powerstone, powering some great Working of the Ancestors.

A new power, a new Great Rune, has been added to succor all the Karaz Ankor that has not been felt in 3,000 years.
 
BoneyM said:
Azril-bez-az. Silver Control Object.
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Thank you.

(The wiki seems to lack both the words for Silver and for Control. Is there another source you're using?)
Artemis1992 said:
Aside from the really big new, this is also an interesting detail.
Thorgrim can notice Grudges being created, even if there are no regular messages from the grudge-producing Dawi.

I wonder if that allows for more information exchange over long ranges, or if it's limited to Grudges only. Would be immensly useful for the Holds to have a direct line of communication to KaK.
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I think you're misinterpreting this passage. I read it as "Thorgrim believes that the incoming transport is the last survivors of K8P and is wearily wondering what new grudges they're going to report, adding to the list of shit he wants to do before the dwarves go extinct."
 
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whelp things are going to be nuts soon enough...especially when the dwarves learn about the super weapon...heck getting more mountains of shadowy flame up and running might end up turning dwarf holds into things that NO one sane (or mostly insane) would want to fight...besides orks...maybe...
 
Artemis1992 said:
Aside from the really big new, this is also an interesting detail.
Thorgrim can notice Grudges being created, even if there are no regular messages from the grudge-producing Dawi.

I wonder if that allows for more information exchange over long ranges, or if it's limited to Grudges only. Would be immensly useful for the Holds to have a direct line of communication to KaK.
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I think it's more that he can predict that this doomed expedition will generate Grudges, not any special Grudge-sensing power. Could be wrong.
 
BoneyM said:
The answer: not all the redirected leylines flowed towards Ulthuan. Each Karak was transformed into an enormous Waystone, and all magic, whether ambient and benign or the shaped power of the spellcasters of other races, would be absorbed into the leylines and redirected to the mighty and ancient Runic arrays at the heart of Karaz-a-Karak would shackle and transform the magic into the energy of Runecraft. Which in turn would power the Great Works left behind by the Ancestor-Gods.

But now, it powered much less than it once did.
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Wow. Astounding worldbuilding across this piece, Boney. Very impressed.
Rockeye said:
I think it's more that he can predict that this doomed expedition will generate Grudges
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Yeah. By Belegar, on him. :V
 
Also: Everyone else in Warhammer Fantasy thinks they're in a swords and sorcery flavored tabletop war game.

Little did they know the Dwarf High King was playing a 4x strategy game the whole time.
 
BoneyM said:
Thorgrim brooded over the Runic readout that heralded the coming end of the Karaz Ankor, ignoring the Karak Norn ambassador for now, since the Throne of Power also recorded, transcribed and displayed the ambassador's words.
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For extra depression points, this means every high king since Karak Ungor would have had a front seat to each Karak falling in real time.
 
Redshirt Army said:
I'm just massively proud that our tower matches the naming conventions of the other great dwarven works. Our tower, that we built. Fucking sweet.
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Sure, but it's like the Young Holds: it has the style of the thing, but it's something else entirely.

Fine, in their own way.

But they ain't the Good Old Shit from the Good Old Days.

On the upside... new longterm goal for Mathilde: Establish new Waystones across the Karaz Ankor. No big deal, right? I guess we should take that College class on Waystones, tho
 
BoneyM said:
The answer: not all the redirected leylines flowed towards Ulthuan. Each Karak was transformed into an enormous Waystone, and all magic, whether ambient and benign or the shaped power of the spellcasters of other races, would be absorbed into the leylines and redirected to the mighty and ancient Runic arrays at the heart of Karaz-a-Karak would shackle and transform the magic into the energy of Runecraft. Which in turn would power the Great Works left behind by the Ancestor-Gods.
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BoneyM said:
The Great Runes of Valaya, the mighty Karak-Runes that had protected the Karaz Ankor from the Wind of Magic since Chaos first came to the world, and the last of the Great Works connected to the Rune of Azamar, were faltering. And when they fell, no Hold could hope to survive even the gentlest Storm of Chaos.

Thorgrim Grudgebearer had come to rule an Empire just in time to watch it crumble.

Thorgrim brooded over the Runic readout that heralded the coming end of the Karaz Ankor, ignoring the Karak Norn ambassador for now, since the Throne of Power also recorded, transcribed and displayed the ambassador's words. Zhufbar, functional, the readout told him. Karak Kadrin, functional. Barak Varr, Karak Azul, and of course Karaz-a-Karak, functional.

No power from Karak Norn, or any of the other Young Holds founded after the War of Vengeance. All they represented to the Rune of Azamar was a constant drain to sustain their protections.
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BoneyM said:
Azrilbezaz in range, said... something? Thorgrim had never seen that part of the readout used before. Synchronising. And in a sudden, deafening silence, the complaint klaxon of the falling power reserves that only Thorgrim could hear went silent for the first time in eighteen decades.
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Holy shit
Holy shit

The Karaz Ankor has been steadily declining in ways beyond the obvious in this quest, they are dependent on the Waystone network to power their greatest and most sacred works
Including the Runes of Valaya that shelter them from the Winds of Magic and even the Rune of Eternity in the Throne of power
The network which has been crippled since the Age of Woe, even worse expanding by building new holds is actually a burden on the system, they cost more power than they funnel back in return
No wonder Thorgrim thinks everything is doomed, the Dwarves are slowly draining their remaining battery life and attempts to expand merely quicken the inevitable

And then 8 Peaks comes back online, an old hold that rivaled Karaz-a-Karak in it's prime, with enough power to actually put the system back into the green again

This is shattering
 
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Guile said:
Sure, but it's like the Young Holds: it has the style of the thing, but it's something else entirely.

Fine, in their own way.

But they ain't the Good Old Shit from the Good Old Days.
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It is about on the same scale, though. It's pretty much the only thing that's been built since then that one could say that about.
 
BoneyM said:
Azrilbezaz in range, said... something? Thorgrim had never seen that part of the readout used before. Synchronising. And in a sudden, deafening silence, the complaint klaxon of the falling power reserves that only Thorgrim could hear went silent for the first time in eighteen decades.
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Imagine living with the stress of a low cell phone battery for 180 years. Truly Thorgrim suffers for his people.
 
BoneyM said:
Azrilbezaz in range, said... something? Thorgrim had never seen that part of the readout used before. Synchronising. And in a sudden, deafening silence, the complaint klaxon of the falling power reserves that only Thorgrim could hear went silent for the first time in eighteen decades.
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This is probably referring to belegar's crown, given how it syncs with the high Kings crown.
Also- HOLY MOLY YES. YES. YES.
 
BoneyM said:
But those were the oldest wounds. Still fresh and bloody was the loss of Karag Dum and Karak Vlag in the Great War Against Chaos, and the first time a freshly-crowned Thorgrim day upon the Throne of Power and had the information it held flood into his mind, he understood why his uncle, High King Alriksson, had been carried off to the Ancestors by wounds he should have recovered from, and not a day went passed when he longed for the same escape for the same reason.

The Great Runes of Valaya, the mighty Karak-Runes that had protected the Karaz Ankor from the Wind of Magic since Chaos first came to the world, and the last of the Great Works connected to the Rune of Azamar, were faltering. And when they fell, no Hold could hope to survive even the gentlest Storm of Chaos.

Thorgrim Grudgebearer had come to rule an Empire just in time to watch it crumble.
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The Throne of Power is a fucking Grand Strategy game HUD. Thorgim's literally took over the last dude's save file, realized it was utterly fucked, and there's no Legend Of Total War to unfuck the campaign. It's official: The ancient Elves and Dwarfs were giant nerds.

And the whole "Golden Throne is failing" reference is a nice touch too.
 
BoneyM said:
But as the centuries passed, they became more and more a source of dread to the High Kings themselves, because of the most guarded secret of a very guarded race, never known to more than two living Dawi.
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So if one of the two Dawi who know is the High King, who's the other one? Grombrindal, if he is indeed a former High King?
 
chocolote12 said:
It is about on the same scale, though. It's pretty much the only thing that's been built since then that one could say that about.
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What I'm saying is, Great Old Works::Eye of Gazul as Old Holds::Young Holds

They're unquestionably a good thing, but because they aren't linked into the old Waystone network they aren't the same thing at all, and never can be. They're also a very good thing, of course, but it's not the same. Gives some credence to the grumblings of old dwarves, that's all I'm saying.
TaliesinSkye said:
So if one of the two Dawi who know is the High King, who's the other one? Grombrindal, if he is indeed a former High King?
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Old High King and New High King, was my guess.
 
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