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Warhammer Fantasy: Divided Loyalties - an Advisor's Quest

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I like the mix of honouring Wolf the priest, the lack of imagination in naming a wolf ''Wolf" and how the banality of such a name hiding a deeper, personal meaning.

Did Ranald send the soul of Wolf back in the form of a wolf? Who knows? Mathilde doesn't, we don't, Ranald does. And might get a chuckle whatever the facts of the matter are :)
 
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Voting closed, writing has begun

Slamu said:
@BoneyM Would it be overreaching to try and create a 'fight in the shade' spell that drastically increases the efficacy of spells like Burning Shadows, or would we be better served just investing in a hot air balloon and trying to get the ungainly thing to shade the portion of the battlefield we're interested in?
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My current thinking is that spellcrafting will only be possible as a result of major traits like Warrior of Fog.
 
Guile said:
I know that 'socialize with Stirland', 'socialize with journeymanlings' and 'run messages to the Colleges' are all pretty neck and neck, but can we talk about how bonkers the Regrowth Seed is for a minute?

Like wow. That thing is absurd. Who needs the Liber Mortis?

Dame Weber: "Bring me the prisoner."
Dame Weber, /holding out glowing hand.
>Vines feast upon the screaming, sobbing mutant.
>The screaming quiets.
Dame Weber, /holding out glowing hand.
"All right! Who wants healing?!"

What a way to grow the legend.
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Dame Weber: I've found a way to make Orks useful to the Empire!
 
racnor said:
And personally, I'm less interested in the reaction posts about how amazing Mathilde is,since those often feel like someone trying to artificially inflate the character's reputation.
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Yeah. The point of negaverse omakes isn't to talk about how awesome we are, it's to harvest delicious salt from alternate universes.
 
Im still for Shadoggow but Wolf is starting to grow on me. Ranald would certainly approve of the name, and we are nothing if not pious.
 
I vote we stop using the exclamation mark as a hyphen. Let the apostrophe have a turn. Shadowhorse'chicken even looks like a bad fantasy name of sorts!
 
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The March to Karak Eight Peaks - Week 1 - Setting Off
  • Threadmarks
    • [*] Accept as the most senior Wizard present (commanding two Amber Journeymen and one Gold Journeyman).

    [*] Deliver last-minute messages for Belegar, trying to scrape together any remaining support to be had before leaving.
    - [*] To the Colleges of Magic.
    - [*] To Dwarfholds of the Grey and Black Mountains.
    [*] Spend time with your wolf pup, trying to develop a famliar bond.

    You accept, after much thought, as the most senior wizard present. It was tempting to place yourself in command over the ten thousand Stirlandians that had joined the muster, but in the end there were a great many people who could lead the Stirlandians effectively and very few that could connect the wizards to the highest echelons of command so they can be of most use - and with so little artillery and no Dwarven Runepriests to counter enemy magics, the force will need to get as much mileage as possible out of the four wizards it has.

    As a de facto general, you're given a room in the Skratitrogg tavern instead of being left to find lodgings elsewhere in the town or outside it, but you spend very little time in it after you volunteer your services as the fastest rider in the Empire. Hurried missives are penned and off you go.

    Your first stop is Altdorf; you deliver eight near-identical letters to eight gatekeepers and await replies.

    [Rolling...]

    In the end, the sole response at such short notice is two more journeymen are enticed into joining, one from the Gold Order and one from the Jade; disappointing, but better than nothing. You don't even have time to greet said journeymen before you're on your way to your next destination. The army leaves in days, and every hour could count.

    You ride through Wissenland to Karak Norn, the largest hold in the Grey Mountains, built atop a plateau of a wooded mountain overlooking the forbidding Loren Forest. Word from King Ironhammer gets you through the gates and into an antechamber to the throne room, where you wait for several anxious hours. When you're finally asked in to see the Queen, to your surprise it's not to pass on apologies but to ask the best roads for a heavy artillery train through the Empire. Whatever was in the missive you delivered, it worked, and you watch as an unexpected artillery force assembles. Unlike any dwarven artillery you've ever seen, Karak Norn makes wide use of wood for their grudge and bolt throwers. You give your thanks to the Queen who brushes it off in favour of bustling off to see to some detail or another, and then you're on the road again to your next stop.

    [Karak Norn Contribution: 84]

    Next is Karak Izor in the Vaults, the towering peaks where the Black Mountains meet the Grey, to deliver a much more polite missive thanking them for what they've contributed and asking in as polite a way as possible if they could spare anything further. Once more you're left stewing in an antechamber, and then a dwarf courtier quizzes you at length about the forces that have gathered. It seems that Karak Izor is reassessing the Karak Eight Peaks as more than a possibility of grudges avenged; they're starting to see it as a recolonization. For the second time in your life you clap eyes on a Dwarf woman, and it's still slightly disappointing to you that the rumours you've heard are false: they lack beards. A guarding force of Longbeards, Hammerers, and still more Warriors swirls around them in a protective swarm, and within hours they're on the march.

    [Contribution: 75]

    The Hornhold of Karak Hirn is next, named for enormous natural passages enhanced by dwarven artifice that sound deep notes when the wind blows just right. Another prolonged wait in an antechamber, another careful questioning of the gathered forces, an array of raised eyebrows and then more forces are shaken loose to add to those gathered, this time in the force of the Rangers, the dwarves as at home aboveground as they are below who have mastered the arts of ambush and asymmetric warfare.

    [Contribution: 70]

    Your final visits, just as the Expedition is due to leave, is to Karak Gantuk and Karak Angazhar, the dwarfholds built into the Black Mountains adjoining Averland who contribute to the eternal watch over Black Fire Pass. Just as the other holds you visited are pale shadows of the great holds of the World's Edge Mountains, these holds are pale shadows of the others in the Black and Grey Mountains. Again, you're closely questioned regarding the gathered forces, and again reassessments are made. None, it seems, want to be left out of the ever-growing Expedition, and what the small holds lack in raw dwarfpower they make up for in their ironworking prowess. Cannon are rolled out of vaults and unbolted from their positions on the hold walls and crate after crate of well-made axes and hammers and shields are sent off to arm the expatriates who have answered Belegar's call to arms despite lacking the ancestral weapons that hold-dwelling warriors are armed with.

    [Contribution: 65]
    [Contribution: 73]

    As you return to the Expedition as it prepares to march, you're shocked by just how much those last-minute letters grew it. Success breeds success, you suppose; none want to be the first to contribute but none want to be the last, either.

    Through every spare moment - most of them while waiting impatiently in antechambers - you spent time playing with and examining the wolf pup. You knew as soon as you clapped eyes on him that he had the potential to be a familiar within him, both from your magical senses and your familiarity with how Ranald likes to play with the world.

    You don't think that the wolf is a reincarnated Wolf. You showed it some dice and after a brief sniff to check whether they were edible he ignored them, and he has the manic energy and bright-eyed innocence of a genuine youth instead of the cynical humour of a retired bandit. So it's either a dog born as a genetic throwback to its wolf ancestors - the chances of it happening are slim, but, well, Ranald - or it's an orphaned wolf puppy that Ranald guided out of the woods and through the town to your door. Either way, in tribute to the lost Wolf and as, you suppose, a thank you to you for his victory over Stromfels, you give him the fallen Priest's name.

    Reassured that the wolf pup isn't actually a man twice your age, you relax and play with him. Though easily distracted, he watches you as you try to give him instructions and certainly tries his best to follow them, and by the end of the week he's learned to follow and stay when ordered, and to sit still and secure in your backpack with his head peeking out over your shoulder as you ride. And, with shocking abruptness, one morning he answers your command before you actually give it, and you peer at him through tired eyes and see the thick strands of magical energy that flow from you into him, and then flow with redoubled potency back into you.

    [The All-Important Roll To Play With Your Puppy: 99]
    [Rolling for Familiar Ability: 49 - Magic Power]

    ---

    Additional Contributions:

    Colleges of Magic
    1 Journeyman Gold Wizard
    1 Journeyman Jade Wizard

    Karak Norn
    Durin Wutokri, Engineer
    30 Bolt Throwers (Siege)
    100 Bolt Throwers (Personal)
    20 Grudge Throwers

    Karak Izor
    2,000 Warriors
    2,000 Longbeards
    1,000 Hammerers
    10,000 Camp Followers

    Karak Hirn
    2,000 Rangers

    Karak Gantuk and Angazhar
    30 Cannon
    Quality weaponry for the adventurers and vagabonds

    Dwarf Rep +1 - joined the campaign
    Dwarf Rep +2 - Delivered the Call to Arms (with fantastic results)

    ---

    You return to an army on the march, and though only the forces from Karak Gantuk and Karak Azgaraz have reached you, the others will catch up and have sent messengers ahead. Belegar thanks you in that gruff and understated way that dwarves have: quietly, but with steel in his voice.

    The Expedition marches less in a day than you ride in an hour; this gives you copious free time. The next week should see it pass through Black Fire Pass and emerge into the area of the Border Princes flanking the Forest of Gloom; the goal is to be making camp in one week's time on the fork between the South Road to Barak Varr and the Old Dwarf Road to Karaz-a-Karak.


    You will have time to perform THREE of the below; those with the most votes will be chosen.

    Campaign Contributions:
    [ ] Open a correspondence between Belegar and Karaz-a-Karak to see if the Dwarven capital can contribute any further to the campaign.
    [ ] Work with Head Ranger Ulthar Alriksson to scout the road ahead as you pass by the Forest of Gloom.
    [ ] Work with Grand Master Sigwald Kriegersen and the demigryph knights to ensure the road ahead remains clear.
    [ ] Work with Marksman Codrin Petrescu, who has emerged as leader of the Stirlandian forces, to supplement provisions by hunting the Forest of Gloom.

    Spend time with the Council of War:
    [ ] Thane Skaroki Grimbrow
    [ ] Head Ranger Ulthar Alriksson
    [ ] Master Engineer Durin Wutokri
    [ ] Grand Master Sigwald Kriegersen
    [ ] Grand Master Ruprecht Wulfhart
    [ ] Marksman Codrin Petrescu
    [ ] Marshal Titus Muggins

    Spend time with your Journeymanlings:
    [ ] The Amber Wizard journeymanlings.
    [ ] The Gold Wizard journeymanlings.
    [ ] The Jade Wizard journeymanling.


    - What is with your dice?
    - I've added an informational threadmark containing the full forces of the Expedition and who is responsible for what.
    - You're not the only one who can open communications with Karaz-a-Karak - the Expedition has cavalry that can make the return trip, and Karaz-a-Karak has gyrocopters. But you would be the best at it.
     
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  • Threadmarks
    • Oh by the ancestors Huzzah!

    We Need to take the action to help Belegar open up communications with Karaz-A-Karak. We're literally the Only one who can.

    Huh. We might genuinely be the fastest rider in the Empire at this point. Glorious! And Wolf is our amazing pup!
     
    Well, we got another magic point. We can do fiendishly complex grey spells reliably and we can begin learning battle magic. The Dwarf Holds have responded to the call, and the forces are gathering.

    Let's go on an adventure!
     
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