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Warhammer Fantasy: Divided Loyalties - an Advisor's Quest

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Derpmind said:
@BoneyM Is it possible to get a multi-use enchanted item, rather than an item that can only cast the spell once? Because a multi-use item raises questions. Questions like "why isn't the Empire constantly making multiple humans-turned-dragons?" or "why can't these items be stockpiled as an emergency response to enemy armies?" We see that Dragomas has spent many years and a considerable part of the Empire's bank raising just one dragon, but if it's feasible to enchant an item with a reusable Transformation of Kadon then that would effectively be a much cheaper and more powerful+versatile method instead.

The Eye of Gazul is an epic item, and it fits in the setting because while it's powerful it's also a one-of-a-kind megaproject, and it took us multiple actions to create. But while the tower can kill an entire army and is nearly un-replicable, a reusable dragon-transformation item can also kill entire armies without nearly as many restrictions as the tower has. If the Amber College could just make multiple dragons, even temporarily for battle, then the Empire would quickly become the most powerful country in the entire world. And it just completely breaks my suspension of disbelief (in multiple ways) if we can just order this kind of thing off the shelf, favor costs be damned.
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You forget, this can only be used on amber wizards, wizards who don't have an affiliation yet, and normal humans.

Wizards are pretty fucking rare, let alone any specific type of wizard.

and normal humans be scared of magic because the cult of sigmar and the cult of ulric are a cancer upon humanities progression as a species

Also GW does not think things through.
 
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BurnNote said:
I think it's hilarious that Belegar wanted to give Mathilde a nice easy assignment while she finishes her dictionary. And then she goes "BUT what if we made ANOTHER SUPERWEAPON?"
And when he mentions that she brought her unfinished plan to completion, she just goes "Nah, just thought of this one".
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The part I love most is that we realized that we had a cultural mismatch, scaled way back, for a while the low-key conventional plan was winning... and then we had a better idea and superweapons were right back on the menu, full speed ahead.
 
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[X] Plan: Fight Dragon with Dragon

For a crazy plan, this one is surprisingly plausible. But then desperate times do call for desperate measures. I like it.
 
Redshirt Army said:
The rationale ("can't case because can't speak") won't apply, but I could see Boney coming up with some other Watsonian reason why you can't cast while under a Ghur transformation. Could be as simple as it risking a major transformation malfunction.
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Oh I absolutly expect that. I think it's as simple as "completely untrained in magic use".
Sinsystems said:
I can just imagine a future conflict and one of the decisions being deciding which of Mathilde's doomsday weapons they should deploy.
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I hope in future conflict, Mathilde will count as a doomsday weapon.

Also, if the proposed university idea was instead "School for Magical Superweapons", then I'd be a lot more hyped for that. We just need to get Panoramia of her ass.
Derpmind said:
@BoneyM Is it possible to get a multi-use enchanted item, rather than an item that can only cast the spell once? Because a multi-use item raises questions. Questions like "why isn't the Empire constantly making multiple humans-turned-dragons?" or "why can't these items be stockpiled as an emergency response to enemy armies?" We see that Dragomas has spent many years and a considerable part of the Empire's bank raising just one dragon, but if it's feasible to enchant an item with a reusable Transformation of Kadon then that would effectively be a much cheaper and more powerful+versatile method instead.

The Eye of Gazul is an epic item, and it fits in the setting because while it's powerful it's also a one-of-a-kind megaproject, and it took us multiple actions to create. But while the tower can kill an entire army and is nearly un-replicable, a reusable dragon-transformation item can also kill entire armies without nearly as many restrictions as the tower has. If the Amber College could just make multiple dragons, even temporarily for battle, then the Empire would quickly become the most powerful country in the entire world. And it just completely breaks my suspension of disbelief (in multiple ways) if we can just order this kind of thing off the shelf, favor costs be damned.
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I discussed reasons why the empire hasn't been using it earlier in the thread. Basically, wizards haven't been around long enough, so not enough knowledge, trust and resources before. We're getting bankrolled by a major polity here.

Now, why have elves not been using it? I suggest it's because humans are uniquely malleable.
EDIT: Also, they already have dragons with companions who are notoriously prickly, so there's some plausible cultural reasoning there.
 
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Lupercal said:
We already have better armour and its strength is enough to bypass all but a 1+ anyway. We would be best served getting a Master Rune of Adamant to raise our toughness to 10. Then our attacks have the same chance to wound each other.

Three Runes of Warding would give us a 4+ save that it couldn't avoid.

For attack we would want the Master Rune of Dragon Slaying (all our attacks would wound on a 2+ and each on would do 2 wounds. Add two Runes of Striking so we are more likely to hit the ice dragon and it is less likely to hit us.

With these Runes combined Oswald Oswaldson would have a slight advantage of the Ice Dragon. 9I am convinced that he would be our first volunteer.

I made the same assumption for both cases because I'm tired and didn't want to math out the casting and dispelling chances. If I included them then i'd need to acount for the fact that the spells can fail as well. Even before the dragon attempts to dispell them.

I also didn't include the Ice Dragons own magic. That completely changes the game. The Runelords and Wizards should be on hand for dispelling anything it does and artillery and ranged infantry should support Oswald.
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So... even assuming bare minimum caster support which remains purely defensive—to nullify the enemy's magic advantage—we could theoretically make a dragon capable of outclassing the ice dragon In combat. That's... that's scary. Very very scary. Also absolutely amazing. Combine that with the actual other support we can give, and this sounds like an army killer. Assuming, at least, that Boney remains somewhere in the area of this comparison, even if not exactly the same.


Vebyast said:
The part I love most is that we realized that we had a cultural mismatch, scaled way back, for a while the low-key conventional plan was winning... and then we had a better idea and superweapons are right back on the menu, full speed ahead.
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And the new one is even better, because Mathilde just loves to completely destroy people's expectations of her.
 
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ninjafish said:
Also GW does not think things through.
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BurnNote said:
I discussed reasons why the empire hasn't been using it earlier in the thread. Basically, wizards haven't been around long enough, so not enough knowledge, trust and resources before. We're getting bankrolled by a major polity here.

Now, why have elves not been using it? I suggest it's because humans are uniquely malleable.
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My argument is that the kind of item the thread wants would completely break the setting simply by being viable at all. If we're getting a one-use item, that I can understand. But otherwise the ability to effectively summon dragons on your side of battle when needed is stupidly powerful in a way that trivializes Battle Wizards or our own Eye of Gazul. It'd turn the setting from Warhammer to Dragonhammer. Regardless of how difficult and risky and expensive it might be to make a multi-use enchanted item of whatever-the-spell's-called, it would be completely worth it to do so over and over again to create a stockpile of the damn things.
 
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Well I imagine, at the very least, it would have a significant recharge time. As in, you're not doing it more then once a day, or once a month.

Alternatively, maybe the altar can only support one dragon at a time.

There's all kinds of restrictions Boney can put on it so we can't just spam dragons.
 
Derpmind said:
My argument is that the kind of item the thread wants would completely break the setting simply by being viable at all. If we're getting a one-use item, that I can understand. But otherwise the ability to effectively summon dragons on your side of battle when needed is stupidly powerful in a way that trivializes Battle Wizards or our own Eye of Gazul. It'd turn the setting from Warhammer to Dragonhammer. Regardless of how difficult and risky and expensive it might be to make a multi-use enchanted item of whatever-the-spell's-called, it would be completely worth it to do so over and over again to create a stockpile of the damn things.
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I expect the long term mental effects of turning into a dragon aren't conducive to someone being a productive member of society.

This is less of a concern when someone can only do it for a few hours.
 
Derpmind said:
My argument is that the kind of item the thread wants would completely break the setting simply by being viable at all. If we're getting a one-use item, that I can understand. But otherwise the ability to effectively summon dragons on your side of battle when needed is stupidly powerful in a way that trivializes Battle Wizards or our own Eye of Gazul. It'd turn the setting from Warhammer to Dragonhammer. Regardless of how difficult and risky and expensive it might be to make a multi-use enchanted item of whatever-the-spell's-called, it would be completely worth it to do so over and over again to create a stockpile of the damn things.
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[joking]That was my goal all along[/joking]
One answer is that Warhammer is full of things that break the setting (vampirism, for example), and then don't, but that's not exactly helpful.
The better answer is that one (well, Boney) can always find a reason why widespread use isn't possible. For example, using too many of these at the same time just fucks up the local magic, which is obviously a huge problem.
 
Derpmind said:
My argument is that the kind of item the thread wants would completely break the setting simply by being viable at all. If we're getting a one-use item, that I can understand. But otherwise the ability to effectively summon dragons on your side of battle when needed is stupidly powerful in a way that trivializes Battle Wizards or our own Eye of Gazul. It'd turn the setting from Warhammer to Dragonhammer. Regardless of how difficult and risky and expensive it might be to make a multi-use enchanted item of whatever-the-spell's-called, it would be completely worth it to do so over and over again to create a stockpile of the damn things.
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Keep in mind that to make battle magic grade enchanting you have to cast battle magic in this case overcast the strongest battlemagic in the lore. Every time you make one of these there's a chance your Lord Magister (or even Lords Magister depending on how much power you put into it) blow up.
 
Mopman43 said:
I expect the long term mental effects of turning into a dragon aren't conducive to someone being a productive member of society.

This is less of a concern when someone can only do it for a few hours.
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Doesn't actually change much, if long-term being a dragon makes people crazy, then you just don't make them for long term
 
Personally I expect the wizard lord involved to go "holy fuck no, i'm not making this shit" because yea the chance of him exploding is way to high and a big bags of gold aren't going to be enough to get that to happen.
 
BurnNote said:
[joking]That was my goal all along[/joking]
One answer is that Warhammer is full of things that break the setting (vampirism, for example), and then don't, but that's not exactly helpful.
The better answer is that one (well, Boney) can always find a reason why widespread use isn't possible. For example, using too many of these at the same time just fucks up the local magic, which is obviously a huge problem.
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Could also be balanced by a really long charge time between uses, coupled with it likely depleting a lot of the Beast wind in the area meaning using more than one at a time would be impossible except in places saturated by the stuff.
 
Derpmind said:
@BoneyM Is it possible to get a multi-use enchanted item, rather than an item that can only cast the spell once? Because a multi-use item raises questions. Questions like "why isn't the Empire constantly making multiple humans-turned-dragons?" or "why can't these items be stockpiled as an emergency response to enemy armies?" We see that Dragomas has spent many years and a considerable part of the Empire's bank raising just one dragon, but if it's feasible to enchant an item with a reusable Transformation of Kadon then that would effectively be a much cheaper and more powerful+versatile method instead.

The Eye of Gazul is an epic item, and it fits in the setting because while it's powerful it's also a one-of-a-kind megaproject, and it took us multiple actions to create. But while the tower can kill an entire army and is nearly un-replicable, a reusable dragon-transformation item can also kill entire armies without nearly as many restrictions as the tower has. If the Amber College could just make multiple dragons, even temporarily for battle, then the Empire would quickly become the most powerful country in the entire world. And it just completely breaks my suspension of disbelief (in multiple ways) if we can just order this kind of thing off the shelf, favor costs be damned.
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Battle Altars, such as the Celestial Hurricanum and the Luminark of Hysh, do exist and are stockpiled as emergency responses to enemy armies. This variation, however, would be even less palatable to a magic-fearing populace than most, so magical resources are spent elsewhere.
 
DragonParadox said:
Keep in mind that to make battle magic grade enchanting you have to cast battle magic in this case overcast the strongest battlemagic in the lore. Every time you make one of these there's a chance your Lord Magister (or even Lords Magister depending on how much power you put into it) blow up.
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Ohh, offer our tower of Oh Dear for the construction. It's probably not better (though it might be the same, given Kragg), but it removes the transport, and it means the maker (quite possibly Dragomas) comes to K8Ps.
Sinsystems said:
Could also be balanced by a really long charge time between uses, coupled with it likely depleting a lot of the Beast wind in the area meaning using more than one at a time would be impossible except in places saturated by the stuff.
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Like Ancestor Runes. And if the AV research in that direction pans out...
 
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Ericwinter said:
So... even assuming bare minimum caster support which remains purely defensive—to nullify the enemy's magic advantage—we could theoretically make a dragon capable of outclassing the ice dragon In combat. That's... that's scary. Very very scary. Also absolutely amazing. Combine that with the actual other support we can give, and this sounds like an army killer. Assuming, at least, that Boney remains somewhere in the area of this comparison, even if not exactly the same.
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I mean, that's in a White Room. The Ice Dragon gets off Speed of Light before the battle and that calculus changes pretty massively.

But, generally speaking, if an entire polity gets together and combines magical resources from across the continent into a single being, it should probably beat one being that just got really old, if they stand around and wait for them to get everything ready. Similar entities go down all the time in similar situations.
Derpmind said:
My argument is that the kind of item the thread wants would completely break the setting simply by being viable at all. If we're getting a one-use item, that I can understand. But otherwise the ability to effectively summon dragons on your side of battle when needed is stupidly powerful in a way that trivializes Battle Wizards or our own Eye of Gazul. It'd turn the setting from Warhammer to Dragonhammer. Regardless of how difficult and risky and expensive it might be to make a multi-use enchanted item of whatever-the-spell's-called, it would be completely worth it to do so over and over again to create a stockpile of the damn things.
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Everybody already can. It's called Transformation of Kadon, and it's just a spell that people can cast without any prep time. Prep time helps, but you don't need it. We could accomplish a similar effect to this magical item by putting a Ghur battlemage on the payroll and hoping they don't blow up. The only difference is that if the item breaks while trying to cast it less people will die.
 
A simple Talisman of Warding that'd grant a 4+ Ward save could be slipped on by the transformed dragon in seconds and outrageously tip the odds in its favor, especially as it would also protect against magic. If could take the form of a torc that fits over the forearm or neck, for example. That's a very basic runic item, just Rune of Warding three times.



@BoneyM Have we heard rumblings about possibly retaking Drazh as it lies probably as empty as it will get for a long time?
 
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BoneyM said:
Battle Altars, such as the Celestial Hurricanum and the Luminark of Hysh, do exist and are stockpiled as emergency responses to enemy armies. This variation, however, would be even less palatable to a magic-fearing populace than most, so magical resources are spent elsewhere.
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So really Mathilde's advantages are twofold:
  1. The vast wealth of an old Dawi Karak
  2. A population that is vastly more accepting of magic
You know I think there are quite a few wizards nursing Mathilde envy.
 
Sinsystems said:
Could also be balanced by a really long charge time between uses, coupled with it likely depleting a lot of the Beast wind in the area meaning using more than one at a time would be impossible except in places saturated by the stuff.
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It won't deplete the winds here. The level of the Winds of Magic stays the same no matter what in Karak Eight Peaks.
 
TotallyNotEvil said:
A simple Talisman of Warding that'd grant a 4+ Ward save could be slipped on by the transformed dragon in seconds and outrageously tip the odds in its favor, especially as it would also protect against magic. If could take the form of a torc that fits over the forearm or neck, for example.



@BoneyM Have we heard rumblings about possibly retaking Drazh as it lies probably as empty as it will get for a long time?
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Yep. 4+ ward saves are outragous.

For example:

3+ to hit, 3+ to wound, 4+ save = 27

27/216 = 0.125% chance of a wound

instantly turning the battle in our favour.

Like I and others have said though the Ice Dragons own magic and any buffs, items or abilities that BoneyM chooses to give it could tip the scales the other way again. And again, BoneyM doesn't use this system to game out battles.
 
so scary thought. Rune-geared dragon backed by Kragg with infinite-use Ancestor Runes ala AV and Mathilde running at full tilt. Think of the things we could do.
 
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