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Warhammer Fantasy: Divided Loyalties - an Advisor's Quest

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DragonParadox said:
Culturally you are still human, all talk of 'cattle' and supposed vampiric superiority aside.
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NSMS said:
I'm not talking culturally or about the whole 'cattle' stupidity you sometimes see, I'm talking about you literally becoming a different species.
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NSMS said:
Mmm... I was starting from the basic assumption of vampires counting as a different species, but you're right that that is arguable. They're certainly no longer human, and neither are Liche Priests, but whether the difference counts as a change of species...

Honestly, not sure on that one?
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Yeah, I've never really understood the whole cattle thing, when they have to then go and live in crumbling castles because that attitude gets you kicked out of society. Vampires are humans, just humans with a lot of limitations turned off, and with a tendency to be forced to associate with people who've been practicing how to be maximally awful for centuries.

Nothing forces them to be evil, they just choose to be jerks. (Well, or they can say no and get locked in a box by all the other evil ones. My point is that it's not an inherent part of the powerset, just a cultural selection and socialization tendency.)
 
Mark Hyko said:
[ ] Speak honestly of everything not explicitly secret, including rifts within the Karaz Ankor

[ ] 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.
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Put Xs between the brackets for the vote to count.
Omegahugger said:
Wolf was also how many years old when he started talking?

... No really, I have legitimately forgotten. It feels like it was just yesterday...
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We taught him during T26 and acquired him on T18, so he was 4 years old when he began talking.
 
Mark Hyko said:
[ ] Speak honestly of everything not explicitly secret, including rifts within the Karaz Ankor

[ ] 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.
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your missing the X in the brackets.

e.g

[X] Speak honestly of everything not explicitly secret, including rifts within the Karaz Ankor

[X] 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.
[X] The Halflings are renowned chefs, and several restaurants have opened clustered around the base of Karag Nar. Share a meal with her.
 
Alliterate said:
It's probably already too late from a vote perspective, but could Mathilde plausibly (to their ears) deliver a pick list from the 'not secret' list?
Exclude, say, Economic matters- the canal (as much an EIC secret), the We/Silk, Belegars sources of wealth?
'Economy' being 'if you squint not matters of foreign diplomacy'.

Similarly with Religion, as a theological matter.
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You can write in a micromanagement if you want.
 
I am literally perpetually 3-4 pages behind in this thread. Constantly. I literally cannot catch back up to this thread. Even while doing (almost) nothing but reading it. Argh.
Karugus said:
As for spreading secrets- a faultline exists in the Karak Ankor so profound Belegar wasn't sure if what he was doing would start a civil war. And that's before K8P got denied aid. Tensions inside the Karak Ankor are high right now, and the easiest way for the Empire to set them off is to not realize those tensions exist. The fault line is there, and will probably be mended one way or another when Thorgrim passes on from High King, but there is a real risk the Empire accidentally escalates things if the Empire has no idea of the stakes or scope of the problem. I'm not saying tell the Chamberlain 'Thorgrim abandoned his fellow Dwarfs' I'm saying 'There's a lot of political tension that likely won't get resolved for at least a few decades- tread carefully, the Dwarfs are more circumspect about this than we were with the Middenland issue'. This is important, precisely because the only way the Imperials are going to have any context is if Mathilde gives it to them, and that that context is the best way the Imperials have of avoiding giving any offense or inflaming tensions in the Empire's oldest, most reliable ally.

There's nothing to be gained in exploiting the tensions the Karak Ankor is going through, and incalculable amounts to be lost if the alliance between Sigmar's Empire and Karak Ankor is undermined.
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...Huh. Well. If we talked to Belegar afterwards with that sort of mindset more in mind -- "I want to make sure the Empire can help the Dwarfs. And so that it can avoid fucking things up for them." -- rather than "Yes, some quasi-sensitive (but not fully secret) stuff was shared... but. Actually, that conversation helped you and would be to your benefit because... <insert the stuff I worried about the High King's powers and the Thorgrim-Belegar rift, and Belegar's monofocus and spite of Thorgrim>" like I feared and stressed over in my previous post, I'd feel a bit more comfortable about that...

... If only because, as I realized it, telling Belegar that this could be an opportunity to gain something at the expense of Thorgrim would be a lie. It'd be a lie that we would be telling him, because we would be afraid of how he would take it, and we would want to play into his 'this is quasi-dishonorable to flat-out-dishonorable, but it is for the sake of K8P...' in order to sell it. Like if we were hitting a panic button. Fuck that.

We'd tell him that we want the Empire to be able to understand and get along with Dwarfs better. Be able to help Dwarfs better. And to know what things and topics to avoid, so that they can avoid fucking it up.

Mmh. That'd be a bit more palatable, I guess. Or rather, that would hit less of my 'Oh god, Thorgrim and Belegar...' buttons.

... Gah. Frankly, the thing I want the most right now, is to heal -- or at least acknowledge and start to address -- the rift and spite and hard feelings between Belegar and Thorgrim.
 
[X] Conceal matters you know the Dwarves would prefer you conceal
[X] Though you both use your magic to cheat, you both have an interest in personal fitness. Work out with him
 
[X] Speak honestly of everything not explicitly secret, including rifts within the Karaz Ankor

[X] 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.
[X] The Halflings are renowned chefs, and several restaurants have opened clustered around the base of Karag Nar. Share a meal with her.

picklepikkl said:
Put Xs between the brackets for the vote to count.
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Jyn Ryvia said:
your missing the X in the brackets.
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Damn forgot again. Thank you.
 
[X] Speak honestly of everything not explicitly secret, including rifts within the Karaz Ankor.


[X] 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.

[X] 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.
 
[X] 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.
[X] Though you both use your magic to cheat, you both have an interest in personal fitness. Work out with him
 
Garlak said:
I am literally perpetually 3-4 pages behind in this thread. Constantly. I literally cannot catch back up to this thread. Even while doing (almost) nothing but reading it. Argh.

...Huh. Well. If we talked to Belegar afterwards with that sort of mindset more in mind -- "I want to make sure the Empire can help the Dwarfs. And so that it can avoid fucking things up for them." -- rather than "Yes, some quasi-sensitive (but not fully secret) stuff was shared... but. Actually, that conversation helped you and would be to your benefit because... <insert the stuff I worried about the High King's powers and the Thorgrim-Belegar rift, and Belegar's monofocus and spite of Thorgrim>" like I feared and stressed over in my previous post, I'd feel a bit more comfortable about that...

... If only because, as I realized it, telling Belegar that this could be an opportunity to gain something at the expense of Thorgrim would be a lie. It'd be a lie that we would be telling him, because we would be afraid of how he would take it, and we would want to play into his 'this is quasi-dishonorable to flat-out-dishonorable, but it is for the sake of K8P...' in order to sell it. Like if we were hitting a panic button. Fuck that.

We'd tell him that we want the Empire to be able to understand and get along with Dwarfs better. Be able to help Dwarfs better. And to know what things and topics to avoid, so that they can avoid fucking it up.

Mmh. That'd be a bit more palatable, I guess. Or rather, that would hit less of my 'Oh god, Thorgrim and Belegar...' buttons.

... Gah. Frankly, the thing I want the most right now, is to heal -- or at least acknowledge and start to address -- the rift and spite and hard feelings between Belegar and Thorgrim.
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Hence my write-in, which attempts to go "Here's the sensitive issue about this, and here are the details about how I can think it could go horribly wrong... and here's what I think would be a good way to avoid it going horribly wrong."

Because sometimes, making sure diplomats have the needed background to avoid stepping on landmines is a good thing.
 
[X] Conceal matters you know the Dwarves would prefer you conceal
[X] 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.
[X] The Halflings are renowned chefs, and several restaurants have opened clustered around the base of Karag Nar. Share a meal with her.

I'm not just doing this because Jyn Ryvia makes an excellent point about Mathilde's (lack of) experiance but also because these options are the most different from our normal interactions with Johann and Panoramia. They work better as signals that we want to deepen our relationship in my mind.
 
Early results. Option 2 is winning for the interview by a mile, but the date options are really not showing any strong leads; going to dinner is somewhat advantaged over the other Panoramia dates (24-15-11), but all three Johann options are doing well (22-19-18). It's really anyone's game there.
Adhoc vote count started by picklepikkl on Jul 7, 2020 at 4:52 PM, finished with 346 posts and 73 votes.
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[X] Speak honestly of everything not explicitly secret, including rifts within the Karaz Ankor
[X] You've got a puppy, he's got several. Easy. Spend time with him as your pup plays with his.
[X] The Halflings are renowned chefs, and several restaurants have opened clustered around the base of Karag Nar. Share a meal with her.
 
[X] Conceal matters you know the Dwarves would prefer you conceal

The thread might be called Divided Loyalties, but mine ain't really. I have a clear hirarchy and Dawi>the Empire. They at least gave us some decent help when an Elector Count initiated one of the most impactful campaigns in recent Imperial history. The dwarves you can trust.

[X] Though you both use your magic to cheat, you both have an interest in personal fitness. Work out with him.

We still don't know for sure if Johann is into ladies, but this way, the worst case scenario still gets us an eyeful of fully functional golden abs.

I may have lost a romance vote, BUT I AM NOT GIVING THIS UP!

[X] The Halflings are renowned chefs, and several restaurants have opened clustered around the base of Karag Nar. Share a meal with her.

And this just seems nice.
 
DragonParadox said:
The current Matriarch of the Amethyst order has been alive for centuries, long before the founding of the colleges. Some of Teclis' original sudents are still around as LM and they are more than two centuries old.
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None of the 2 wikis, or 1d4chan, or any of the excerpt quotes of the actual texts about her... ... ever say anything about centuries. (And the 1d4chan entry said that Elspeth has had like all of one appearance in any lore, and has only got a single paragraph about her. It's in the Tamurkhan book thing. SO. Her popularity and widespreadness... is due to fan popularity.)

Her lore: "For generations the name of Elspeth von Draken, Magisterix of the Amethyst College and arch-wizard of the Lore of Death, has been spoken of in hushed tones in the reeking tavern gutters and vaulted noble halls of Nuln alike. Yet despite these stories few have ever paused to think what exactly the admitted presence of von Draken in the city actually means, and fewer yet could guess at her true power or influence. Furthermore the few foolhardy or overenthusiastic witch hunters, unaware of her relationship to the governing powers of Nuln or too fanatically sure of their own righteousness to care, who have attempted to delve deeper into her business or storm her tower have been swallowed up so completely that they have never been able to share anything they have learned. "

(Death's Timekeeper) "This hourglass is an ancient and storied artefact, it is said to contain as its measuring sand the dusty remnants of a dead god of old, and Van Draken has spent much of her unnaturally long life studying its mysteries. With it she has perfected some limited measure of control over time and death itself. "

"For generations" means for-multiple-20-or-25-year-periods.

The closest thing you can get to immortal, is looking at the fluff text for the hourglass, and taking absolutely everything in it at its word (rather than rumor) and stretching it to assume that it definitely means she's immortal and centuries old.


And I actually had a bit about Melkoth written up some; talking about how "Yeah, this guy is old enough that he walks with a cane. He's visibly an old guy." "Plus, we're not 100% sure he's actually Melkoth; it could be he just got good enough at casting Melkoth's Miasma, that he then took the name." "Or any other appropriate Grey Wizard bullshit."

Plus plus, I was actually going to mention Teclis's students too... as a negative example. Because, how many of the Matriarchs and Patriarchs that were during Magnus's time, are still around now? Where is Volans? Probably dead, maybe.

And also -- even aside from all that... "1-3 centuries old" is not something that's in "longer lifespan than Dwarfs" range, really. Also also, even that much is for wizards that are powerful and notable and/or have a special circumstance for being able to get more time to live in.


Given how when I just now went to look for Elspeth's wiki entries I came across "several generations" rather than this "multiple centuries" thing, I'm even more convinced that this thing with wizard lifespan is just exaggeration or assumption on people's parts. It's an easy thing to make assumptions and exaggerations about. Easy to make a mistake about, and just assume.
 
[X] Speak honestly of everything not explicitly secret, including rifts within the Karaz Ankor

[X] 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.

[X] The Halflings are renowned chefs, and several restaurants have opened clustered around the base of Karag Nar. Share a meal with her.
 
On an entirely unrelated note - if we were to acquire relatively safe passage to Cathay, possibly by means of a flying dreadnought, I wonder if we could invite Dragomas along for the trip? There's a decent chance he can't afford to be out of the Empire for that long, but maybe we'd end up delivering some letters for him.
 
[X] Speak honestly of everything not explicitly secret, including rifts within the Karaz Ankor
[X] You've got a puppy, he's got several. Easy. Spend time with him as your pup plays with his.
[X] The Halflings are renowned chefs, and several restaurants have opened clustered around the base of Karag Nar. Share a meal with her.
 
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