ShyPerson
Guardian of the dead’s final rest.
- Location
- Sweden
- Pronouns
- Him/He
Something I noticed. Stirland does not border the Black Mountains, and the province Karak Hirn borders is Wissenland. Just thought I would put this up.
Warhammer Fantasy: Divided Loyalties - an Advisor's Quest
- Thread starter Boney
- Start date
- Fantasy Users' Choice!
Voted best in category in the Users' Choice awards.
Something I noticed. Stirland does not border the Black Mountains, and the province Karak Hirn borders is Wissenland. Just thought I would put this up.
[] Speak honestly of everything not explicitly secret, including rifts within the Karaz Ankor
this isn't a random noble looking for blackmail, this is The Chamberlain of the Seal. as THE rep for the emperor, this guy is almost as much our boss as the colleges. we should play ball as much as we can stomach.
you want to vote for hiding everything, that's fine, but that is very much siding with the dwarfs interests over the empires, and the consequences of that. if we continue down that road.
Lets try to remember that we are a grey wizard and a servant of the empire, and grey wizards get ganked if we seem to be going rogue.
this isn't a random noble looking for blackmail, this is The Chamberlain of the Seal. as THE rep for the emperor, this guy is almost as much our boss as the colleges. we should play ball as much as we can stomach.
you want to vote for hiding everything, that's fine, but that is very much siding with the dwarfs interests over the empires, and the consequences of that. if we continue down that road.
- Location
- his hidden lair
Damn, this update really makes me want to introduce Wolf to Mandred.
As for telling the Chamberlain things the Dwarfs aren't exactly fond of? A lot of that's rooted in shame as much as anything else, and so long as we don't reveal that Thorgrim left K8P to die it's not too polarizing. The Chamberlain is noted for his competency and straightforward and fair dealings with Imperial Allies. If ever there was a time we could trust the Empire with information that isn't explicit secrets now is the time.
As for telling the Chamberlain things the Dwarfs aren't exactly fond of? A lot of that's rooted in shame as much as anything else, and so long as we don't reveal that Thorgrim left K8P to die it's not too polarizing. The Chamberlain is noted for his competency and straightforward and fair dealings with Imperial Allies. If ever there was a time we could trust the Empire with information that isn't explicit secrets now is the time.
This is basically my feeling, sure there's some immediate extra value to the empire in being more forthcoming, but being a reliable conduit seems more valuable long term.
- Location
- Actually pretty lost
[ ] Speak honestly of everything not explicitly secret, including rifts within the Karaz Ankor
This doesn't really feel like a breach of trust to me, and it would help the Empire without really hurting the dwarves. Take Ulthar's scandalous past for example: the Dwarves consider it to be very embarrassing, but the Empire aren't going to use it against them, they'll just use the information to avoid any accidental diplomatic blunders. Belegar and Thorgrim not getting along is similarly quiet, whilst not being something they would really use against them.
And ultimately, I feel Mathilde is most loyal of all to the Colleges, who would side with the Empire over the Dwarves, were it ever to come to that.
And actually, you know what this looks like? This looks like the Empire wanting to know who we're more loyal to, the Empire or the Dwarves. I wonder what kind of possible promotion might be floating around that they'd want that information for, hmmm?
This doesn't really feel like a breach of trust to me, and it would help the Empire without really hurting the dwarves. Take Ulthar's scandalous past for example: the Dwarves consider it to be very embarrassing, but the Empire aren't going to use it against them, they'll just use the information to avoid any accidental diplomatic blunders. Belegar and Thorgrim not getting along is similarly quiet, whilst not being something they would really use against them.
And ultimately, I feel Mathilde is most loyal of all to the Colleges, who would side with the Empire over the Dwarves, were it ever to come to that.
And actually, you know what this looks like? This looks like the Empire wanting to know who we're more loyal to, the Empire or the Dwarves. I wonder what kind of possible promotion might be floating around that they'd want that information for, hmmm?
[] Though you both use your magic to cheat, you both have an interest in personal fitness. Work out with him.
Fit wizards being fit together.
[] Though you rarely think of those days, you did grow up on a farm and know something of the soil. Spend time with her as she goes about her work.
Dunno why, but this appeals the most to me.
[ ] Speak honestly of everything not explicitly secret, including rifts within the Karaz Ankor
His father must be a real piece of work though.
She should discuss her child related thoughts with Panoramia, and substantiate the opinion that she walked straight out of all the collected dreams and nightmares of the Grey College.
Fit wizards being fit together.
[] Though you rarely think of those days, you did grow up on a farm and know something of the soil. Spend time with her as she goes about her work.
Dunno why, but this appeals the most to me.
[ ] Speak honestly of everything not explicitly secret, including rifts within the Karaz Ankor
Wow, just wow. My first instinct is some external interference, Skaven for example, but they've got a surviving witness, and some physical evidence. It's not impossible that this is still a frame job, but I expect the dwarfs did a thorough investigation, and if fooling them was easy, a lot more people would try. Ulthar is also relatively sneaky.
His father must be a real piece of work though.
Reading stuff like this makes me pretty sure Mathilde has hit the first stage of familiar obsession. Or she's the sort of person to call her dog her furbaby, but frankly that's a much more unpleasant possibility. But she's clearly going to be a great parent
She should discuss her child related thoughts with Panoramia, and substantiate the opinion that she walked straight out of all the collected dreams and nightmares of the Grey College.
Guile
Having a really great time right now
Hard to say, between 'not explicitly secret' and 'conceal matters.' I mean, I wouldn't mind disclosing Ulthar's thing, and that would definitely be something the Dwarves would rather conceal. I'd lean towards
[ ] Speak honestly of everything not explicitly secret, including rifts within the Karaz Ankor
Johann:
[ ] There's a festival to Grungni coming up, and Johann has taken to observing the Holy Days of the Ancestor-God. Join him in this.
Sounds way interesting.
Panoramia:
[ ] The Halflings are renowned chefs, and several restaurants have opened clustered around the base of Karag Nar. Share a meal with her.
[ ] Panoramia currently calls a small cottage somewhere in the Eastern Valley home, help her expand it into a proper tower.
Either of these seem fine, or I'd really like to visit the Moot if a reason can be manufactured.
[ ] Speak honestly of everything not explicitly secret, including rifts within the Karaz Ankor
Johann:
[ ] There's a festival to Grungni coming up, and Johann has taken to observing the Holy Days of the Ancestor-God. Join him in this.
Sounds way interesting.
Panoramia:
[ ] The Halflings are renowned chefs, and several restaurants have opened clustered around the base of Karag Nar. Share a meal with her.
[ ] Panoramia currently calls a small cottage somewhere in the Eastern Valley home, help her expand it into a proper tower.
Either of these seem fine, or I'd really like to visit the Moot if a reason can be manufactured.
Yeah I'm sure they will 'gank' king Belegar's loremaster because she went rogue to dwarfs by not spilling their secrets. This will have no negative consequences for them whatsoever. Like say a failed assassination getting a dwarven throng and Kragg the Grim himself marching out against the Empire. Let's assume the Grey College has some sense of proportion, because if they are the kind of idiots who would attempt an assassination on the basis of 'going rogue' to dwarfs then we should absolutely go rogue because they are morons who will lead the Empire to ruin.
- Location
- Germany
And if that is true, I still much prefer staying true to the Dwarves that trust us, over getting a promotion.
chocolote12
A Penguin Flailing Against The Keyboard Of Life.
Okay. So, the crux of the idea is treating AV in the same sense as a liquid wind, because it can be converted from liquid AV to energy wind, and we can therefore posit a hypothetical 'solid AV'?
I'm still confused, but I guess more coherently now. My confusion now looks something like this: I believe that we can convert AV into the winds in the same way we can convert gasoline into fire. The process is one way, and a lot of energy is produced. We can also convert fire into fire gas, and then liquid fire, and then solid fire (because in this analogy we're still a wizard, and fire represents all magic).
I believe that I am confused for two reasons. The first is because, while we have a process for turning energy into progressively more stable forms, I do not believe that we could use this process on a substance that is already stable without magic, much less one that is destabilized by magic. To use a metaphor, we can use fire magic on fire to turn fire into progressively more stable solutions, because we are a fire wizard and fire is our domain (fire is representative of all magic in this analogy). However, gasoline cannot be compressed in this manner, because as a physical liquid rather than a magical one it will only be put under pressure; it cannot be woven like fire for the same reason we cannot weave a regular stone. (Also, we're using fire and it's gasoline, so it might explode.)
The second is that, if we could use this process on a liquid like AV, to produce solid AV, in the same sense that we can use the process on liquid magic to produce solid magic, I do not understand what the properties of this material are intended to be. If we apply the only transformation we know will occur (more density), it seems that it would just result in being able to fit more AV in the same volume.
If, as someone else said, one believes that AV is instead eight types of winds coexisting, rather than a single substance which is converted into the winds in certain circumstances, it would make sense that we could create a powerstone of AV, in the same sense that we can already create a powerstone of one kind of wind, simply folded eight times. If AV was composed in this manner, the idea would make sense to me, because it would change the qualities of AV from essentially physical matter to something more like the other winds that we know can already be worked with, and it would change the properties of the resulting product to something more like the properties of the other winds which have undergone this process.
Then we should choose to only not share the information the Dwarves would prefer we not share; if they're just wanting to keep the rift secret, then everything else would already come up.
[ ] Conceal matters you know the Dwarves would prefer you conceal
More broadly, I like and am loyal to the general idea of the Empire, but 'high level government officials' is a term I expect to come up more in our hit lists than in our lists of people we can trust with shattering diplomatic secrets like this. Maybe that is an issue, I guess, but if we don't tell them and we should have then they'll get annoyed and doubt our loyalties, and if we do tell them and we shouldn't have then a bunch of our friends might find themselves dying, and that's a pretty skewed risk/reward ratio.
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- Location
- florida
It sounds like what we most want is to help the empire navigate the cluster fuck of (little g) grudges and alliances that shape dwarven society without setting off any landmines.
But were ALSO concerned that somebody is going to yolo their way into the dwarfholds screaming obscenities and helicoptering their unmentionables because humans gonna human.
So... do we have anything in our toolkit we can use to resolve this?
Do we actually care about the empire using this info to... idk, get a better trade deal or something?
But were ALSO concerned that somebody is going to yolo their way into the dwarfholds screaming obscenities and helicoptering their unmentionables because humans gonna human.
So... do we have anything in our toolkit we can use to resolve this?
Do we actually care about the empire using this info to... idk, get a better trade deal or something?
CuttleFish2.0
Friendly neighborhood cuttlefish
- Location
- Seattle, Washington.
I mean I think it's worth considering a little more the thread is at the moment. Consider what are the actual risk and benefits of talking about things like the political rift between Belegar and Thorgrim.
Risk? If dwarfs find out we told they'll be upset. Enough for someone to grudge us? Maybe, but probably not. The more likely outcome for Mathilde personally would be suffering a hit to her reputation amongst the dwarfs, possibly a big one, though the overall effect is probably somewhat ameliorated by the fact that the rift itself is semi-secret even within dwarf society. Thorgrim is going to be angriest because he's the one who comes off the worst. Belegar probably won't like it, but at the same time he would likely be the one accruing any benefits. The real risk is in what the empire tries to do with the information which also sort of begins to get into the potential benefits; does it seek to leverage the rift for it's own benefit, or work to smooth it over, how widely is the information shared within the empire itself? A lot of that depends on the character of the chamberlain and the emperor.
Honestly there's not really any strong benefit to Mathilde herself, but there are potential upside for the empire as a whole. Maybe some preferential trade deals with K8P, or with KaK somehow (politics can be a funny business, and depending on what exact lessons Thorgrim took from the whole situation he might be looking for opportunities to ape Belegar's success or possibly send some for shinies his way)? But how competently and openly does that happen; so long as Bitternach is slightly competent it probably won't be a matter of out and out walking up to any dwarfen delegations and saying 'we know you're involved in a political feud with Belegar Ironhammer, give us stuff so that the exact reasons don't come out.' Of course that assumes that we tell them the reason in the first place, in detail, which Mathilde might not do.
Primarily the largest benefit I see to telling Bitternach, and through him the emperor, about the rift is that it will give them a better understanding of the internal dynamics of the Karaz Ankor, just understanding that there are political factions and that not every Hold feels the same way about all things and the Thorgrim can act stupidly at times might be very important.
Edit: which is not to say that I expect humans to be utterly ignorant of the possibilities of dwarf politics and factions, but giving them a better understanding of the exact shape that takes still has value.
Risk? If dwarfs find out we told they'll be upset. Enough for someone to grudge us? Maybe, but probably not. The more likely outcome for Mathilde personally would be suffering a hit to her reputation amongst the dwarfs, possibly a big one, though the overall effect is probably somewhat ameliorated by the fact that the rift itself is semi-secret even within dwarf society. Thorgrim is going to be angriest because he's the one who comes off the worst. Belegar probably won't like it, but at the same time he would likely be the one accruing any benefits. The real risk is in what the empire tries to do with the information which also sort of begins to get into the potential benefits; does it seek to leverage the rift for it's own benefit, or work to smooth it over, how widely is the information shared within the empire itself? A lot of that depends on the character of the chamberlain and the emperor.
Honestly there's not really any strong benefit to Mathilde herself, but there are potential upside for the empire as a whole. Maybe some preferential trade deals with K8P, or with KaK somehow (politics can be a funny business, and depending on what exact lessons Thorgrim took from the whole situation he might be looking for opportunities to ape Belegar's success or possibly send some for shinies his way)? But how competently and openly does that happen; so long as Bitternach is slightly competent it probably won't be a matter of out and out walking up to any dwarfen delegations and saying 'we know you're involved in a political feud with Belegar Ironhammer, give us stuff so that the exact reasons don't come out.' Of course that assumes that we tell them the reason in the first place, in detail, which Mathilde might not do.
Primarily the largest benefit I see to telling Bitternach, and through him the emperor, about the rift is that it will give them a better understanding of the internal dynamics of the Karaz Ankor, just understanding that there are political factions and that not every Hold feels the same way about all things and the Thorgrim can act stupidly at times might be very important.
Edit: which is not to say that I expect humans to be utterly ignorant of the possibilities of dwarf politics and factions, but giving them a better understanding of the exact shape that takes still has value.
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Arguably Mathilde has already proven to be more loyal to Karan Ankor, she trusted the dwarfs with the Mork possession and not the Collges or the Empire. I think that is a pretty good metric for who she considers most trustworthy.
look that maybe hyperbole.
but this still a chase that if we treat a meeting with the COL as if we are a dwarf diplomat and not a servant of the empire we are very, very clearly saying we have shifted our loyalties as far as politics go.
Asheram
Not quite altogether
- Location
- Δ Hidden Forbidden Holy Ground
I should point out that the Dawi isn't a hostile nation, nor is there a great rift between the Dawi and the Empire. The VAU has openly been trading with the empire for services, and the Karaz Ankor is currently building a great channel between their empires to grow closer. Our work to keep building trust and growing closer to the Dawi is a lot more worth than whatever tidbits of diplomatic embarrassments they can score from our spilling the beans on them.
That said, there's no reason why Mathilde can't give them hints and suggestions of what avenues to approach the Dawi.
Yes, but considering it is known that you would have those confidences, what you're not saying would be highlighted by what you are saying.
Yes and? The dwarfs are an age old ally of the Empire, that alliance it Sigmarite religious stricture. I think the Empire can bear to 'lose' one grey magister to Karaz Ankor given what that supposed loss has gained them
[ ] There's a festival to Grungni coming up, and Johann has taken to observing the Holy Days of the Ancestor-God. Join him in this.
[ ] The Halflings are renowned chefs, and several restaurants have opened clustered around the base of Karag Nar. Share a meal with her.
If we want to do a romance, these seem like the closest to something approaching an actual day/evening out. I'd be for them or anything similar.
[ ] The Halflings are renowned chefs, and several restaurants have opened clustered around the base of Karag Nar. Share a meal with her.
If we want to do a romance, these seem like the closest to something approaching an actual day/evening out. I'd be for them or anything similar.
- Location
- Actually pretty lost
We owe our loyalty to the Empire, and frankly we haven't been screwed over by the Empire at any point. The Dwarves liking us is nice, but don't kid yourselves that they're magically more deserving of our loyalty just because we've been here for a few years.
Frankly, I don't see revealing a few things they'd like to keep quiet about as betraying them. I see telling real secrets as a betrayal, and I also see stonewalling the Empire as a betrayal of the Empire, and by extension the Colleges.
Frankly, I don't see revealing a few things they'd like to keep quiet about as betraying them. I see telling real secrets as a betrayal, and I also see stonewalling the Empire as a betrayal of the Empire, and by extension the Colleges.
fictionfan
Please sir, may I have some Meows?
- Location
- Tempe, AZ
Basically include things that every dwarf knows but avoids talking about?
- Pronouns
- He/Him
Yeah, hard to beat "they tried to have me burned to death as a child for my magic".
Mathilde's completely broken standards extend to childrearing, apparently.
Yeah, we're good, but we're not Dragomas good. Even if having a friendly Supreme Matriarch would be convenient.
Cute kid. Wish this part was a bit longer, Mathilde can tell some amazing stories.
Yikes. My gut tells me to keep quiet, because they are allies and breaches of secrecy are utterly anathema to their culture. Plus, Belegar has firmly earned our loyalty and I do not want to break it. I don't care if this earns us a stink-eye, we still have plenty of insights to share.
Hrm, I like the puppy thing, buuuut working out with The Punch Wizard is also tempting.
Also thinking casual hangout.