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Warhammer Fantasy: Divided Loyalties - an Advisor's Quest

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Thinking about it… I hate the 'research institute' even more than the library.
The Library's main virtue is that it is something Belegar can do by just throwing gold around until he feels the debt is paid. No time, effort or existential worry involved. A research institute would be a mega-project.

More than this however I feel it is a project that would not actually improve things. All it would do is concentrate the research currently scattered across the Old World into one location. There would be no new researchers because they all come from the same very limited pool of educated workers.
Everyone remember back in Stirland when we tried to get the army to record things? And how our main stumbling block was simply the fact that there weren't enough people in the entire province with basic literacy to do the paperwork for both the EIC and the army? And that was just scribes. More than likely the only way to actually populate this 'University of Eight Peaks' would be to cannibalise multiple other universities.

There is also the meta reason: I do not want to make BoneyM responsible for trying to simulate a continent's worth of R&D. Or to add a research 'phase' to the turn.


A literacy uplift is a benefit to civilisation. It solves problems rather than exacerbating them. And it doesn't put extra work on the author.
 
storryeater said:
Why do you think we never meet his father? Because it would give it away.

Why do you think he never seems to grow up? because he grows up at the dwarf rate of aging, and as such, he seems to be forever 10, when in fact its just that not enough years have passed to advance an age category.
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He is so crimanally yong. He doesn't even have a beard yet.
 
storryeater said:
since trancedental is "I owe you everything, as long as you do not disgrace my honour",
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"I owe you everything, as long as you do not disgrace my honour",
One of the complications with this boon is that for Belegar, by his lights, he owes us so much the second clause doesn't really apply.

His honour- bound up with K8P, which he feels he owes to Mathilde- would demand he fulfills such a dishonourable boon request, and that probably leads down the road of brittle-goop-orange-dye-hair.
 
Angelform said:
More than this however I feel it is a project that would not actually improve things. All it would do is concentrate the research currently scattered across the Old World into one location. There would be no new researchers because they all come from the same very limited pool of educated workers.
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Network effects are extraordinarily powerful for innovation. A dozen researchers in one place working together with major funding could easily be hundreds or thousands as times as productive as those same researchers scattered across a continent.
 
Right, the boon is "ask anything, and Belegar will do everything he can to get it done".
There are no limits, Belegar will break himself, his Karak, his clan, the dwarf empire, the empire, the world if that's what it takes, to fulfill whatever we ask of him.
 
When it comes to the Institute idea of the boon I desire only B O O K S. That's about it :V. Live that best Sprawling Library life and equip Wolf to be the best librarian he can be.

The only other big thing I'd be tempted by at this point would be like the Karak stocked enchanting lab.

Belegar just has to wade into the hellish depths of Wizard Chic(with a handwavey vast shopping list from Mathilde preferably) and pick out all the bits of gribblies mundane and fantastical, magical rocks, and shimmering wondrous plants we could ever ask for our various whimsies down the road.
 
Valmond said:
Right, the boon is "ask anything, and Belegar will do everything he can to get it done".
There are no limits, Belegar will break himself, his Karak, his clan, the dwarf empire, the empire, the world if that's what it takes, to fulfill whatever we ask of him.
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Well, aside from the Dwarven pressure-release of Slayerhood.
That exists for Dwarves who can't fulfill their oaths, which is what not being able to deliver the boon request would be to Belegar.
 
Hold on. This may have been addressed in the 35 pages since the vote went up, but why are

[ ] [BOON] Save it until the Karak is wealthy enough to afford my ambition.
[ ] [BOON] Save it as a trump card to exploit an opportunity or address an emergency.
[ ] [BOON] I have no idea what to spend it on. Put the matter aside for now.

Three separate options when they are all fundamentally votes for not yet spending the boon? If using the boon generates a subvote, shouldn't not using the boon also generate a subvote on why we're not spending the boon in order to make the vote between using and not using the boon occur on even ground?
 
Alliterate said:
Well, aside from the Dwarven pressure-release of Slayerhood.
That exists for Dwarves who can't fulfill their oaths, which is what not being able to deliver the boon request would be to Belegar.
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You really think Belegar is going to stop trying to fulfill the boon as long as he exists?
Sure, if it is a time limited thing, and he fails, then it's slayer time, but anything that might in theory be doable (including conquering Ulthuan alone while naked with nothing but a wet noodle), he will keep on trying until he, or the world, dies (and i would not make any bets on Belegar dying stopping him).
 
eraserman said:
Hold on. This may have been addressed in the 35 pages since the vote went up, but why are

[ ] [BOON] Save it until the Karak is wealthy enough to afford my ambition.
[ ] [BOON] Save it as a trump card to exploit an opportunity or address an emergency.
[ ] [BOON] I have no idea what to spend it on. Put the matter aside for now.

Three separate options when they are all fundamentally votes for not yet spending the boon? If using the boon generates a subvote, shouldn't not using the boon also generate a subvote on why we're not spending the boon in order to make the vote between using and not using the boon occur on even ground?
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3 options to not use it, but with different connotations on when the boon option will come up.
And you can vote for all 3 if you are absolutely against using the boon now, but voting for a trump card can mean it will not come up as an option most of the time, while waiting until Karak is wealthy could force a vote in few turns.
 
Alratan said:
I would expect that a Royal Academy style idea with reasonably generous funding would start producing returns within single digit years, as we start attracting and funding, for example engineers from the Empire with an interest in labour saving devices that the College of Engineering currently suppresses. That alone, having a place where engineering for human civilian purposes isn't banned would make a huge difference.

The royal society isn't there to be a backup to existing institutions. It's there to be a revolutionary change in the way that innovation and invention is supported and so happens. Royal patronage and funding on this scale is something that doesn't exist anywhere outside Hoeth. The shallow imitations that are the Empire's institutions are much more limited.
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For one, some proff that College of Engineering suppresses labour saving devices would be nice. I've seen no evidence that human civilian purposes are banned for Engineers. My understanding is that there isn't enough of them, and all are occupied making guns and devices for the military and working for the nobility.

And where the hell will this "to be a revolutionary change in the way that innovation and invention is supported and so happens. Royal patronage and funding on this scale is something that doesn't exist anywhere outside Hoeth." line from? There are Universities and Academies all over the Old World. What's the difference, scale? You think this one will be better funded? Any boon it gains from such will be lost in how far it is from people. Sure as hell, Umgi engeneering is not going to impress dwarves, and for anything else, you have to travel all the way from K8Ps back to Human civilization.

That's affordable for silk and spices. I doubt it's ability to compete with already entrenched local Universities and Engineering Guilds.
 
Valmond said:
You really think Belegar is going to stop trying to fulfill the boon as long as he exists?
Sure, if it is a time limited thing, and he fails, then it's slayer time, but anything that might in theory be doable (including conquering Ulthuan alone while naked with nothing but a wet noodle), he will keep on trying until he, or the world, dies (and i would not make any bets on Belegar dying stopping him).
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While his debt to Mathilde is complete, total and absolute, so are his obligations to clan and honour and the Karak.

It's not only a dishonourable boon which could cause disaster, I suspect an impossible boon could likewise break Belegar.
 
Alliterate said:
While his debt to Mathilde is complete, total and absolute, so are his obligations to clan and honour and the Karak.

It's not only a dishonourable boon which could cause disaster, I suspect an impossible boon could likewise break Belegar.
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Impossible, dishonorable, and possibly something that over rides his own opinions on important enough situation.
Let's say Belegar wants to X, but Mathilde forces him to do Y with the boon.
How will it affect Belegar? The amount of mental stress, self doubt, etc, are potentially enormous.
That's one of the reasons i don't want to see the boon as a trump card. Like people have suggested using the boon to try to fix the elf/dwarf relations (lol nope), that would break Belegar. But i think trying to force Belegar into the waystone project if he is strongly against it could do the same in the long run, or trying to patch the situation with Thorgrim.

The boon is dangerous, we ask too little and Belegar might take that as an insult, we ask too much and Belegar will destroy everything he loves trying to accomplish this, we ask the wrong thing and Belegar might tear himself apart out of cognitive disonance and/or shame.
And if used as a trump card in an emergency, the odds of us using it badly go up.
 
Valmond said:
Recruit enough magisters who bring journeymen, hire some dwarf scholars/engineers, and then set them working on projects.
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One issue with this train of thought is that we already have recruited some minions, and each one requires half of an AP to use. Scaling that up to dozens of researchers is not feasible. Part of having Belegar help fund and construct an actual organization would be establishing the bureaucracy necessary to efficiently manage the research minions.

Another is that hiring a bunch of wizards, dwarf engineers, and whatever else we needed (maybe some Verenan priests for scientific divine casting?) would be expensive, and we are not made of money. We would need a significant budget increase to finance this.
 
Valmond said:
3 options to not use it, but with different connotations on when the boon option will come up.
And you can vote for all 3 if you are absolutely against using the boon now, but voting for a trump card can mean it will not come up as an option most of the time, while waiting until Karak is wealthy could force a vote in few turns.
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Yes, but that also applied to the vote to use the boon, as seen by the discussions on what exactly the Royal library is. Which is why I asked why this want a straight yes/no vote first, and THEN a second vote. If use wins, a vote for what to use the boon on. If use lost, a vote on why we aren't using the boon. That way the don't use the boon vote doesn't get split. Because right now it is. I'm highly doubtful the people voting to save for an emergency would be too against any of the other putting it off options because it gives time for the emergency to appear.

And I know approval voting is a thing, but a lot of questers don't for some odd reason.

Right now anyone who wants to use the boon has one choice, no matter what use they want for the boon. But everyone that doesn't is split by three choices. The vote is unfairly set up, in the same way that if the use boon vote required people to also put what they're going to use it on right now would have been.
 
primemountain said:
For one, some proff that College of Engineering suppresses labour saving devices would be nice. I've seen no evidence that human civilian purposes are banned for Engineers. My understanding is that there isn't enough of them, and all are occupied making guns and devices for the military and working for the nobility.

And where the hell will this "to be a revolutionary change in the way that innovation and invention is supported and so happens. Royal patronage and funding on this scale is something that doesn't exist anywhere outside Hoeth." line from? There are Universities and Academies all over the Old World. What's the difference, scale? You think this one will be better funded? Any boon it gains from such will be lost in how far it is from people. Sure as hell, Umgi engeneering is not going to impress dwarves, and for anything else, you have to travel all the way from K8Ps back to Human civilization.

That's affordable for silk and spices. I doubt it's ability to compete with already entrenched local Universities and Engineering Guilds.
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Look up the Imperial suppression of Mickelbach's work.

There are universities and such in the Old World. They're generally not very good.

Having engineers and natural philosophers in the same Karak as an engineers guild lead by an extremely radical guildmaster is also a lot more likely to produce tech diffusion than those same scholars being based in human cities. Just look at the repeater.

I believe that Belegar literally has more money than he can spend, if he wanted he's probably able to collapse the Old World economy through hyper-inflation. If he wants to attract the best; he can afford it.
 
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Alratan said:
Look up the Imperial suppression of Mickelbach's work.

There are universities and such in the Old World. They're generally not very good.

Having engineers and natural philosophers in the same Karak as an engineers guild lead by an extremely radical guildmaster is also a lot more likely to produce tech diffusion than those same scholars being based in human cities. Just look at the repeater.

I believe that Belegar has functionally infinite money, he can probably spend enough to collapse the Old World economy through hyper-inflation. If he wants to attract the best; he can afford it.
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Sure, and rampart radicalism through tech diffusion in a hold held by a King who has issues with the High King is likely to lead to Grudges and a Dwarven Civil War.
 
primemountain said:
Sure, and rampart radicalism through tech diffusion in a hold held by a King who has issues with the High King is likely to lead to Grudges and a Dwarven Civil War.
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As already stated, it's not anyone else's business what the Engineers Guild of Karak Eight Peaks wants to share or not.

Remember, the dwarves already shared an enormous number of secrets with humanity, such as how to smelt iron, forge steel, and build in stone. The dwarves uplifted the Empire from being Bronze Age nomadic pastoralists to being at least high medieval, if not later.
 
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eraserman said:
Yes, but that also applied to the vote to use the boon, as seen by the discussions on what exactly the Royal library is. Which is why I asked why this want a straight yes/no vote first, and THEN a second vote. If use wins, a vote for what to use the boon on. If use lost, a vote on why we aren't using the boon. That way the don't use the boon vote doesn't get split. Because right now it is. I'm highly doubtful the people voting to save for an emergency would be too against any of the other putting it off options because it gives time for the emergency to appear.

And I know approval voting is a thing, but a lot of questers don't for some odd reason.

Right now anyone who wants to use the boon has one choice, no matter what use they want for the boon. But everyone that doesn't is split by three choices. The vote is unfairly set up, in the same way that if the use boon vote required people to also put what they're going to use it on right now would have been.
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I could argue the other way, where the use voters only have one vote, while the not use voters have three and the most extreme side (save for a rainy day) can piggyback off of the more moderate (wait for more money) to slow things down for another chance latter despite not actually knowing what they want while the other side does.

at the end of the day this is how boeny did it.
 
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Use the boon has only one option because trying to parse what to use the boon for would take forever and have dozens of different vote options.
If the use wins, i guess there will be series of ever more specific subvotes until one boon is decided.
 
Just got finished reading through the quest and it was utterly amazing Boney.

Out of curiosity, has it been said at all yet what Kragg's reaction to KEP, and himself, being abandoned by Thorgrim and then his subsequent flood of 'support'? I'm assuming Belegar hasn't yet told him about the Karaz-Ankor waystone network, but at the same time I'd guess that he would be one of the few to already know about it.
 
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