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Warhammer Fantasy: Divided Loyalties - an Advisor's Quest

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deathofrats0808 said:
That varies based on individual vamp IIRC.
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And Dracula could walk in sunlight while it's far from a given for war-vamps.

At the end of the day warhammer vampires don't have to be exactly like Dracula, they do a good enough job at the archetype and they interact perfectly fine with the setting. Are they bullshit strong? Fuck yeah, that's the whole point of vampires: to become the apex predator, above humanity but cursed with the inability to let go of it. Even in settings where vampires are used as mooks (BtVS & Angel), it's the weakest being pitted against supernatural warriors/elders of their race.

The niche for "shitty vampires" is filled by ghouls.

Edit : And let's not forget that the SIning King and Alda-whatsisname were not exactly randos.
You guard their bones because, in warhammer fantasy terms, they are hero/lord choices (the army of ghouls is a bit more impressive than just popping some blocks on a tabletop and the other got Mathilde an actual Great Deed so around the level of being a huge part of reconquering K8P), a stage of developpement Mathilde has only begun to enter. They are the sort of beings someone might actually deliberately seek, in the same way plenty of people would be glad to recruit Mathilde to their cause. Most vampires compare to those two in the same way Turn-1-Mathilde compare to Loremaster-of-K8P-Mathilde. Nobody is going through the trouble of resurrecting the sort of vampires that is going the get shanked by the first vampire hunter that bother to look into local disappearences.
 
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storryeater said:
It seems very likely to come up, seeing as they drink blood. It means they cannot drink the innocent, no?
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What Valmond said. My definition of innocence tends to mostly relate to like, small children. But hey, maybe your's is different.


Jeopardizer said:
And Dracula could walk in sunlight while it's far from a given for war-vamps.

At the end of the day warhammer vampires don't have to be exactly like Dracula, they do a good enough job at the archetype and they interact perfectly fine with the setting. Are they bullshit strong? Fuck yeah, that's the whole point of vampires: to become the apex predator, above humanity but cursed with the inability to let go of it. Even in settings where vampires are used as mooks (BtVS & Angel), it's the weakest being pitted against supernatural warriors/elders of their race.

The niche for "shitty vampires" is filled by ghouls.
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Dracula also had 0 powers during the day. He was weird that way.

No, they don't, but I think the idea that Dracula was stronger than Fantasy vamps is wrong.
 
veekie said:
Thats kind of how vampires worked back in Dracula though. Bastard kept coming back, had a hundred and one magical powers, was charming and seductive, and had the unholy strength of the dead.

Classical Vampires are supposed to be diminished in one major respect - they are damned, never to know God. In every other respect they're solidly superhuman.
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Dracula in particular was not merely damned, he was an antichrist. He recoils from a crucifix (not a generic "holy symbol"), he's hurt by a communion wafer (eucharist), the whole blood-drinking deal is an inversion of communion wine, when he goes undercover his fake name is "de Ville", his backstory features an academy run by Satan, and while Stoker is not explicit about it I strongly suspect Dracula's difficulty crossing water stems from Jesus walking on water.

Dracula the novel is also retrospectively hilarious in the way that only seminal works can be: as the epistolary protagonist is on his way to meet Count Dracula in his castle in the mountains of Transylvania, with peasants crossing themselves and wolves howling in the distance, he overhears the villagers muttering darkly about fiendish influence and foul creatures and vampires, and makes a note to himself: "I must ask the Count about these superstitions". :D
I want to mock him for having no sense of genre savvy, but that would be unfair when the genre wasn't invented yet. Still, going back and reading Dracula is instructive to see how much was cribbed from it, repeatedly and directly.
 
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deathofrats0808 said:
What Valmond said. My definition of innocence tends to mostly relate to like, small children. But hey, maybe your's is different.
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It is not about my definition, it is about its metaphyical definition. There are thousands of different metaphysical definition that could matter for blood drinking, whether the vampire agreed with them or not, it is about what the metaphysical definition that affected them was.

In olden times, innocence could also refer to virginity. In Christian times, it could be that someone absolved of sins by a Christ was considered innocent. From a legalistic point, it could mean someone who has never broken the law, and in thic case, there may be a metaphysical law in place that separates the innocent from the not innocent. From an utilitarian point, it could mean someone who has atoned from every evil they did by perfoming equivalent good deeds in atonement, thus reclaiming lack of sin aka innocence. From some idealist perspectives, a pure mind aka never intending to hurt others counts as innocence. It could also refer to not knowing certain things or being too optimistic, as the word is sometimes ued as synonymous to naive. From a more lenient standpoint, innocent=/= pure or sinless or perfect necessarilly, just not bad enough to be considered guilty. And it could even mean innocent of a very specific crime rather than generally innocent. Without knowing the hard metaphysical definition, one cannot really say how often it comes up, it could range from inconsequuential to debilitating.
 
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storryeater said:
It is not about my definition, it is about its metaphyical definition. There are thousands of different metaphysical definition that could matter for blood drinking, whether the vampire agreed with them or not, it is about what the metaphysical definition that affected them was.

In olden times, innocence could also refer to virginity. In Christian times, it could be that someone absolved of sins by a Christ was considered innocent. From a legalistic point, it could mean someone who has never broken the law, and in thic case, there may be a metaphysical law in place that separates the innocent from the not innocent. From an utilitarian point, it could mean someone who has atoned from every evil they did by perfoming equivalent good deeds in atonement, thus reclaiming lack of sin aka innocence. From some idealist perspectives, a pure mind aka never intending to hurt others counts as innocence. It could also refer to not knowing certain things or being too optimistic, as the word is sometimes ued as synonymous to naive. From a more lenient standpoint, innocent=/= pure or sinless or perfect necessarilly, just not bad enough to be considered guilty. And it could even mean innocent of a very specific crime rather than generally innocent. Without knowing the hard metaphysical definition, one cannot really say how often it comes up, it could range from inconsequuential to debilitating.
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That's exactly my point, innocence could easily be all but non existent, or everywhere, depending on the definition in use.
And more often than not the vampire could sidestep it by taking more than half a second to think about who to drink from instead of biting into every young maiden who happens to enter within a mile of their home.
 
Valmond said:
That's exactly my point, innocence could easily be all but non existent, or everywhere, depending on the definition in use.
And more often than not the vampire could sidestep it by taking more than half a second to think about who to drink from instead of biting into every young maiden who happens to enter within a mile of their home.
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For the easier definitions, yeah. For the harder definitions, it could require actual detective work.
 
A slight potential issue for next turn that I realized: with all "introductory" Romance scenes done, per Boney any further Romance social options will have indications of interest and be more like early proper dates. However, if people vote for whatever they like, then it's not unlikely we'll have more than one candidate in top 4 choices. At the same time the thread seems to be very much against two-timing, so that would be very awkward. How do we prevent that? Hold a subvote for if we are sure we want to do the non-leading Romance option(s) anyway?
 
tapkomet said:
A slight potential issue for next turn that I realized: with all "introductory" Romance scenes done, per Boney any further Romance social options will have indications of interest and be more like early proper dates. However, if people vote for whatever they like, then it's not unlikely we'll have more than one candidate in top 4 choices. At the same time the thread seems to be very much against two-timing, so that would be very awkward. How do we prevent that? Hold a subvote for if we are sure we want to do the non-leading Romance option(s) anyway?
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I strongly suspect Boney will let us hang ourselves if the vote goes that way, rather than do a subvote. That said, I think there's a reasonable chance only one romance makes it into the top four.
 
Ok, ignoring vampires because I kinda find them boring in the "Listen to this awesome super-powerful character I made!" sense. They are about as easy to pin down as dragons, as far as what they are and what they can do, and especially since my vampire head canon is more World of Darkness than Dracula I'm not real interested in how WH is being stupid about them. (Like it's stupid about Skaven, with numbers and society and culture, or dwarves with their impossibility of population growth, or elves with their... Lots of things.)

I wanted to ask instead for feedback on the tactical manuevering in my last omake. Did it make sense? Is it comprehensible? Is it plausibly effective?


Edit: Romance Preferences!

Ok, I think I'm torn between Roswita, Pan, or Johann. I'm leaning towards Johann at the moment, because he's both fun and enthusiastic, but also hurt and insecure, and he can keep up with us where we go. A lot like Mathilde, through a glass darkly.

Roswita I like for the way she is smart, kinda dorky on the same way we are, and just falls straight into the 'us against the world' vibe with Mathilde. And for the way she seems like she really *wants* to just be irreverent and have fun but is fighting the whole world to do it.

Pan I like because she is grounded, and kind, and really forces Mathilde to re-examine who she is and why she is like that, without being aggressive about it. I don't think any one else trigger self-reflection the way she does.

So I will be very happy voting for any or all of these choices.

Anton I love like a brother and want all the best for him, but he is found family and not a lover as I see it.

The dragon is amazing and way more engaging than I thought, but the engagement is all intellectual; I don't see any emotional support being forthcoming, and I suspect Mathilde's social mask would not get dropped even decades in: the dragon is just too much not to.

Oswald I'm warming up to slightly, ever since I reconcieved of him as 'cat-dad' rather than puffed-up self referential soldier type. But I though I might go for a fling, I don't think I see any thing to hold us for longer. He's a bit too... Traditional? In how he seems to see families, and I'm not interested in binding to a legacy.
 
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picklepikkl said:
I strongly suspect Boney will let us hang ourselves if the vote goes that way, rather than do a subvote. That said, I think there's a reasonable chance only one romance makes it into the top four.
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What I'd do is make sure that you vote for things that aren't romance votes, and try to get the romance winner to be 4th place.

Glau said:
I wanted to ask instead for feedback on the tactical manuevering in my last omake. Did it make sense? Is it comprehensible? Is it plausibly effective?
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Tactical manuevering in Warhammer (both of them) is going to be very different than IRL, as you aren't fighting humans. This seems plausible to me. The one issue I had was with Princess Edda making the spear circles, because I thought the boiling was most of the Caldera, and that doesn't seem surroundable.
 
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Abhorsen said:
What I'd do is make sure that you vote for things that aren't romance votes, and try to get the romance winner to be 4th place.


Tactical manuevering in Warhammer (both of them) is going to be very different than IRL, as you aren't fighting humans. This seems plausible to me. The one issue I had was with Princess Edda making the spear circles, because I thought the boiling was most of the Caldera, and that doesn't seem surroundable.
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There is also the three date rule, (no not that one)

Were your ok to have try it out dates up to three dates with more then one person.

It's just by the third you need to commit to that person.
 
If I had to guess, there will probably be a "do you want Mathilde to go with her top pick or try for poly" subvote, possibly specifying how large the poly pile might be, and then based on that result for the social turn Boney will go with "top X romance actions, X determined by subvote, then the remaining top non-romance actions".

Since that lets people vote for poly if they want, while still allowing for Romance Approval voting, without potentially causing major issues.
 
tapkomet said:
that would seem uncharacteristically vindictive of him tbh
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I wouldn't describe it as vindictive? And it would be in accordance with other times the thread has been able to vote for something sub-optimal.
BoneyM said:
Which of the Journeymanlings to recruit will be in plan format. Votes for individual Wizards will be considered votes to only hire that Wizard. This is because it would be optimal to have two or four without the trait, or three with it - unless you plan to hire more later.

[ ] Recruit Esbern and Seija
[ ] Recruit Panoramia
[ ] Recruit Maximilian
[ ] Recruit Johann
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jacobk said:
@BoneyM the wizard vote looks like it is turning into a bit of a mess - could we instead just approval vote for wizards and then vote on the actual number to recruit once traits have been determined? That would let us set our preferences now and then optimize later, and it kind of looks like that's how some people are voting.
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BoneyM said:
There's only so much hand-holding I've got time or patience for. If they end up having the wizards they want wander off, maybe that'll teach people to pay attention.
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This was the vote at the end of the initial K8P expedition. He was willing to let us hang ourselves. If, say, next social turn a ton of people vote for Johann, and a ton of people vote for Panoramia, and they're both in the Top 4, well, the expressed will of the thread is "we are interested in dating both Johann and Panoramia." If that leads to !!FUN!! consequences down the line, upon our own heads be it.
 
picklepikkl said:
This was the vote at the end of the initial K8P expedition. He was willing to let us hang ourselves. If, say, next social turn a ton of people vote for Johann, and a ton of people vote for Panoramia, and they're both in the Top 4, well, the expressed will of the thread is "we are interested in dating both Johann and Panoramia." If that leads to !!FUN!! consequences down the line, upon our own heads be it.
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That's just wrong though, it'd be like

Some voters: we want to date character A and no one else!
Other voters: we want to date character B and no one else!
Boney: fuck you, since you have different preferences, that means everyone loses, so you're now dating both, also, here: *rolls for if the characters discover you're two-timing and both dump you*

The above doesn't really... seem like him.

And in the example you linked voting was done by plan, but social turns are usually done by individual options. I suppose switching voting to plan format would be one way to deal with it.
 
I can see nuance between 'is there an attempt at romance' and 'you're definitely committing to this one particular person, and exclusivity is what they would expect of you from now on'. Dating around and going 'yeah, you were nice, but I like X more' could make somebody feel a little bad if they wanted to keep going, but there's a difference between the proverbial preliminaries and dating while being somebody else's official 'Mathildefriend'.

But if we're not willing to entertain somebody liking us and us not liking them back as much, we shouldn't choose more than one choice. Such are the tradeoffs of heartbreak safety.
 
Abhorsen said:
Tactical manuevering in Warhammer (both of them) is going to be very different than IRL, as you aren't fighting humans. This seems plausible to me. The one issue I had was with Princess Edda making the spear circles, because I thought the boiling was most of the Caldera, and that doesn't seem surroundable.
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That's fair- I wrote it out like that because the way it has been described seemed like a very long, methodical process, so I though small chunks in a grid pattern was more likely than boiling the entire caldera at once for hours. I might be mistaken.

@BoneyM ? Bit of a nitpick really, but I'll go back and re-write to comply with cannon. Was the cleansing of the caldera one big thing or a little bit at a time thing?
 
Glau said:
Edit: Romance Preferences!

Ok, I think I'm torn between Roswita, Pan, or Johann. I'm leaning towards Johann at the moment, because he's both fun and enthusiastic, but also hurt and insecure, and he can keep up with us where we go. A lot like Mathilde, through a glass darkly.

Roswita I like for the way she is smart, kinda dorky on the same way we are, and just falls straight into the 'us against the world' vibe with Mathilde. And for the way she seems like she really *wants* to just be irreverent and have fun but is fighting the whole world to do it.

Pan I like because she is grounded, and kind, and really forces Mathilde to re-examine who she is and why she is like that, without being aggressive about it. I don't think any one else trigger self-reflection the way she does.
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The "hurt and insecure" is a pretty big negative for me, i don't want a story of Mathilde swooping in and fixing Johann.
Other than that, he is kinda boring to me, but if not for his blindness and the thread fixation on saving him, he would not have any actual negatives to him.
Roswita is a potentially interesting option, but not really all that into it.
Love Pan, if there has to be a romance, i would prefer it be her, i love her interactions with Mathilde and want more of them, romance or not.

Other candidates are worse than Johann in many ways.
Oswalds most attractive feature is his cat, i am certain Mathilde is capable of acquiring a cat, or dozen, without having to take a boyfriend.
Anton is our friend and feels more like a brother, i want the best for him, and i don't think Mathilde is it.
Emperor dragon? No thanks, interesting character, not interesting romantic partner, great book buddy though.
 
Theres plenty of nuance available. Moving towards date-dates shouldn't be a killer obstacle to go with more than one at a time until lock in or the relationship develops to the point where we'd want to consider if it'd be exclusive.
 
Honestly I'm kinda puzzled by this specific criterion for romance that people use to dismiss Anton. As far as I can tell, he treats us like family and is great to be around in a family context, and that's considered... bad somehow? Way I see it, it's a preview of how we can expect Mathilde to be treated should she indeed romance him (except with added romanticism), whereas with every other candidate we're hoping that we get something as good (and this seems to be about as good as it gets, I think?) - and I am told that many people are great friends but insufferable to actually stay with. Is it that people want a challenge of building a familial relationship from scratch instead of already having a great one and adding love context to it? Like, I get if people don't like Anton because they prefer an adventuring buddy, or a great dragon, or someone who won't want heirs, etc., but it seems unreasonable to me to say that "this man is great family, therefore he is ineligible to become our family"
 
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