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Warhammer Fantasy: Divided Loyalties - an Advisor's Quest

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DragonParadox said:
It also depends on what you mean by ready. I personally think we are ready to cut and run if things get bad enough. Anything beyond that is up in the air and I'm assuming our visit to Ulthuan seeks more than just living through the experience.
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if all we wanted to be able to do was cut and run if things go to shit we were already there a long time ago. I wanted to aim for much more than that.

Alectai said:
I think the warning we just got here is that Old World politics are getting spicy, and we really don't want to be in a position where we're out of play when they all come to a head.

Remember, we'd have already been back here by the time this shit kicked off if we had left at the first opportunity, and we would have been able to commit our full focus to this investigation. As it stands, we're stuck with our preliminary findings--plus what our subordinates can figure out in our crash program before we get on our way.

Like, holy hell, the whole point of being recognized as a Lord Magister is a nod that "Yeah, you're a genuine badass on the world scale, not the top tier but enough that the top tier can't just casually disregard you." If a Lord Magister can't play a key role in an expedition not even into the heart of the Chaos Wastes, then how does anyone ever get anything done in this setting? On the spot it immediately says that Dragomas' backstory is bullshit because he'd have evaporated the moment he left the Old World kiddy pool because he'd have run into a random encounter that flattens him.

Except it didn't happen, he left as a Journeyman and came back as a Lord Magister equivilant. Clearly, the world beyond the Old World isn't a level 30 epic campaign setting that just agrees not to casually swallow the Old World as a prank, for fun.
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Yeeaaa, no.

Alectai, remind me again what is the colleges of magic view on their members, they'd rather lose the majority of them and have only the exceptional come back strengthen from their experience. Dragomas experience is literally evidence 100% counter to what you're saying. He left a journeyman and faced so many trials and tribulations he was able to overcome that they literally made him a lord magister on his return.

That speaks of him having an incredibly dangerous adventure and being put into a tonne of life or death situations. Any way lets put all that a side for a second, we're not talking about generic spot of normal other part of the world. We're talking about going to hell if you can't see the difference there isn't much point talking.

As for fighting Dark Elves if you think they're the same kind of threat level as normal bandits or a small beastman herd in the Empire you're being very silly. The enemies the Shadow Elves are fighting are more than a few tiers above the normal dangers within the empire as a whole.
 
adaer said:
And right after we blew through the college favor we might have used to pull someone to investigate, too. Honestly, "a Lord Magister pulled some strings to get Grey eyes on the investigation of an attack on a Dwarf ship, dropped some clues into your lap, then ran off to explode daemons or something" sounds like such a great staring point for a Grey Wizard quest that I'm disappointed not to get to set it up.
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We don't need to pull someone to investigate. This is a big enough deal that they'll do so anyway.
 
Alratan said:
I don't think a Lord Magister of a College is a genuine badass on the world scale. At all. You're one of the top what, fifty wizards in one of the many countries of the world, one that has one of the youngest formal magical traditions.

Generally, this is Warhammer. People don't get anything done in this setting if your scale involves doing anything successful in the Chaos Wastes.
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We're not going into the fucking depths of the Chaos Wastes though.

Unless you're saying that dark elven conscripts and slaves are stronger than Mathilde and that their big barrier in the shallows of the Wastes is a big prank. (And they are far from the best of the best that Naggaroth can put into play, as it is explicitly a punishment detail).

Like, at best, we're skimming the border here, which means most of our threats are going to be 'Whatever is at Dum' and 'Whatever are in the steppes'. Presumably, as the Steppes are not crawling with daemons from our initial check there. It is not a place a Lord Magister has no business being at.

Like, for goodness sake Alratan, what would it take for you to claim "Okay, maybe we can potentially risk extending a toe outside the Old World Kiddy Pool", because to hear your rhetoric, the setting is a big grand joke where all of these elder races and civilizations mutually agree to leave a kiddy pool for the rando germanics because they want to laugh at their antics. And the bare minimum to be allowed to endure outside it requires someone to have hundreds of years of hardened battle experience and sorcery capable of shaking the earth.

Which, somehow, never results in side effects that hurt the Old World out of mutual agreement, despite you pushing a narrative where "Magic 9 is a garbage joke and only impressive in the weakest, most pathetic part of the world".
 
Alectai said:
We're not going into the fucking depths of the Chaos Wastes though.

Unless you're saying that dark elven conscripts and slaves are stronger than Mathilde and that their big barrier in the shallows of the Wastes is a big prank. (And they are far from the best of the best that Naggaroth can put into play, as it is explicitly a punishment detail).
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We're going much deeper into the chaos wastes than the Dark elven barrier to the wastes is.
 
We are absolutely ready for the elf trip.

Like, the 'one more thing' arguments can least forever. We got e everything we need, and most of want we want.
 
Magic 9 is an abstraction, we don't hit people over the head with numbers. When looking at what Mathilde can and cannot do we have to look at the whole of her, canon sword, rune talisman, infiltrator skills the works.
 
Alectai said:
Like, for goodness sake Alratan, what would it take for you to claim "Okay, maybe we can potentially risk extending a toe outside the Old World Kiddy Pool", because to hear your rhetoric, the setting is a big grand joke where all of these elder races and civilizations mutually agree to leave a kiddy pool for the rando germanics because they want to laugh at their antics. And the bare minimum to be allowed to endure outside it requires someone to have hundreds of years of hardened battle experience and sorcery capable of shaking the earth.

Which, somehow, never results in side effects that hurt the Old World out of mutual agreement, despite you pushing a narrative where "Magic 9 is a garbage joke and only impressive in the weakest, most pathetic part of the world".
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I didn't say or imply anything like the strawmen you're presenting. The strength of the Empire isn't its wizards, it's famously it's halberdiers (and the incredible natural boundaries with dwarves living in that protect it from major threats from multiple directions). Its wizards are a nice to have that the Empire has recently gained. The provinces of the Empire survived for thousands of years before the Colleges, and it would probably survive if they disappeared tomorrow.

Magic 9 isn't a garbage joke. The Chaos Wastes actually are that dangerous. So are some other notoriously dangerous places. Not all the rest of the world is that dangerous, but parts of it certainly are. In some places Emperor dragons who have been using magic since magic first existed would tread carefully if at all. Individual wizards, no matter how strong, are not the be all and end all of the setting. Unless you're Lord Korak.
 
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SuperSonicSound said:
Yeeaaa, no.

Alectai, remind me again what is the colleges of magic view on their members, they'd rather lose the majority of them and have only the exceptional come back strengthen from their experience. Dragomas experience is literally evidence 100% counter to what you're saying. He left a journeyman and faced so many trials and tribulations he was able to overcome that they literally made him a lord magister on his return.

That speaks of him having an incredibly dangerous adventure and being put into a tonne of life or death situations. Any way lets put all that a side for a second, we're not talking about generic spot of normal other part of the world. We're talking about going to hell if you can't see the difference there isn't much point talking.

As for fighting Dark Elves if you think they're the same kind of threat level as normal bandits or a small beastman herd in the Empire you're being very silly. The enemies the Shadow Elves are fighting are more than a few tiers above the normal dangers within the empire as a whole.
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That's not the point I was making and you should bloody well know it.

The point I was making is "If the rest of the world is that hard that a heroic, Magic 9 character with multiple stats approaching the 30s range has no business adventuring outside of the kiddie pool. A Journeyman with magic 3/4 or so with stats that at best are approaching 20s is going to die instantly to a random encounter."

Your argument doesn't make sense. You say Mathilde is weak and pathetic and is taking an insane risk and will probably fail unless the setting is nice. But you're also saying that Dragomas succeeding is because he's good. When he started his journey far weaker than she is.

You're like, you and Alratan, are clinging so bloody tight to this narrative that "Humans are pathetic, and only the best in history have any business surviving outside of their convenient kiddy pool." And it's exhausting, especially as you two tend to tag team anyone who dares speak up against it, straight up ignoring the GM's own statements that "Yeah, your paradigm is different but that doesn't mean it's weaker, it's just less consistent." And "Elves look down on people who don't do things the way Elves do them", and treating that as "Then clearly everyone else is garbage".

It's frustrating to walk into the threads here and see a constant stream of "Mathilde is weak and has no business doing anything of importance" from a small but extremely vocal minority in the thread, and watching that influence the story when Already the story is suffering because--to be frank--Mathilde is too strong already and is working on a scale that has actually somewhat hurt the characterization. Because it's that kind of thing that leads to the power levels being raised up even further, and the problem getting exacerbated.

The story's still good, and I like a rags to riches story as much as anyone else. But come the hell on, if Magic 9 and multiple stats approaching 30 isn't enough to go on adventures outside of the kiddy pool, what is?
 
DragonParadox said:
Magic 9 is an abstraction, we don't hit people over the head with numbers. When looking at what Mathilde can and cannot do we have to look at the whole of her, canon sword, rune talisman, infiltrator skills the works.
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Magic 9 is nice, it's a sign she's very magically pusiant and understanding of her lore and powerful in fact, but it also means nothing on its own. A magic 9 person with no spells is useless.

Magic 9 with one battle magic spell that debuffs is useful, but it's like a pretty minor change to the battlefield, the big boy leagues have spells that cause mass casualties, that buff or debuff and can do more than one neat trick. In the novels battle mages essentially cast spell after spell in quick succession


Alectai said:
Your argument doesn't make sense. You say Mathilde is weak and pathetic and is taking an insane risk and will probably fail unless the setting is nice. But you're also saying that Dragomas succeeding is because he's good. When he started his journey far weaker than she is.
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Okay I deleted my last post because you didn't aim it at me on rereading but really you're doing it to me now as well.

Stop lying about what I'm saying.

Refute what I've said with out literally putting words into my mouth which I never said.
 
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Alectai said:
That's not the point I was making and you should bloody well know it.

The point I was making is "If the rest of the world is that hard that a heroic, Magic 9 character with multiple stats approaching the 30s range has no business adventuring outside of the kiddie pool. A Journeyman with magic 3/4 or so with stats that at best are approaching 20s is going to die instantly to a random encounter."

Your argument doesn't make sense. You say Mathilde is weak and pathetic and is taking an insane risk and will probably fail unless the setting is nice. But you're also saying that Dragomas succeeding is because he's good. When he started his journey far weaker than she is.

You're like, you and Alratan, are clinging so bloody tight to this narrative that "Humans are pathetic, and only the best in history have any business surviving outside of their convenient kiddy pool." And it's exhausting, especially as you two tend to tag team anyone who dares speak up against it, straight up ignoring the GM's own statements that "Yeah, your paradigm is different but that doesn't mean it's weaker, it's just less consistent." And "Elves look down on people who don't do things the way Elves do them", and treating that as "Then clearly everyone else is garbage".

It's frustrating to walk into the threads here and see a constant stream of "Mathilde is weak and has no business doing anything of importance" from a small but extremely vocal minority in the thread, and watching that influence the story when Already the story is suffering because--to be frank--Mathilde is too strong already and is working on a scale that has actually somewhat hurt the characterization. Because it's that kind of thing that leads to the power levels being raised up even further, and the problem getting exacerbated.

The story's still good, and I like a rags to riches story as much as anyone else. But come the hell on, if Magic 9 and multiple stats approaching 30 isn't enough to go on adventures outside of the kiddy pool, what is?
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No, this isn't about the kiddy pool. This is about wanting to go to literal hell, or places that are comparably dangerous. Not all the world outside the Old World is that bad, in fact, most of it isn't, certainly not the human inhabited parts which are probably roughly the same averaged over time. The very most dangerous places on the planet, however, are in fact that incredibly dangerous, and would be for anyone.

Particularly for anyone who rushes or treats those places casually and just assumes we'd be ready after a few short months of preparation, less than many people who spend on much safer things like ocean crossings and the like. The problem I see is incredible impatience and refusal to focus on things that should logically take significant investments of effort. How much effort, for example, the successful RL polar explorers spend preparing their expeditions? More than we have, that's for sure. And they didn't have to deal with a fraction of the problems we have to look forward to.
 
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SuperSonicSound said:
As for fighting Dark Elves if you think they're the same kind of threat level as normal bandits or a small beastman herd in the Empire you're being very silly. The enemies the Shadow Elves are fighting are more than a few tiers above the normal dangers within the empire as a whole.
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That is of course true, but it should also be pointed out that the Shadow Warriors largely successfully fight the Dark Elves, and I am pretty sure that not every one of them is a Master Swordself with a full Ulgu spellbook and some battlemagic under their belt. They absolutely do not have Mathildes veritable arsenal of top tier magic equipment. Mathilde is more than good enough to hang with the Shadow Warriors as she is right now, heck, she is probably good enough to keep up with their hero units.

I'm not worried about her going on the Elfcation, she'd probably do fine as she is right now. More preparation is always better, though, you won't catch me saying no to Elf Diplomacy or some more Battlemagic. This is strictly about getting the most we can out of the Nagarythi though, not about surviving the trip.
 
SuperSonicSound said:
Magic 9 is nice, it's a sign she's very magically pusiant and understanding of her lore and powerful in fact, but it also means nothing on its own. A magic 9 person with no spells is useless.

Magic 9 with one battle magic spell that debuffs is useful, but it's like a pretty minor change to the battlefield, the big boy leagues have spells that cause mass casualties, that buff or debuff and can do more than one neat trick. In the novels battle mages essentially cast spell after spell in quick succession




Okay I deleted my last post because you didn't aim it at me on rereading but really you're doing it to me now as well.

Stop lying about what I'm saying.

Refute what I've said with out literally putting words into my mouth which I never said.
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Do I really need to spaghetti quote here?

While you an Alratan are taking turns to bash me for saying "Oh that's not what I'm saying at all!" and any statements I make will be dismissed as "Well you're wrong because you aren't an authority here?"
 
Alectai said:
The story's still good, and I like a rags to riches story as much as anyone else. But come the hell on, if Magic 9 and multiple stats approaching 30 isn't enough to go on adventures outside of the kiddy pool, what is?
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I don't know where you get the 'kiddy pool' idea, humans make up most of the non-Chaos, non-Greenskin sentients in the world. Of course most of the world is not too dangerous for them to walk around in, but some places like the edge of screeming madness falling into the Aethyr or the front lines of an ancient shadow war between Druchi and their barely less sadistic foes are not most of the world.
 
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Chronic said:
That is of course true, but it should also be pointed out that the Shadow Warriors largely successfully fight the Dark Elves, and I am pretty sure that not every one of them is a Master Swordself with a full Ulgu spellbook and some battlemagic under their belt. They absolutely do not have Mathildes veritable arsenal of top tier magic equipment. Mathilde is more than good enough to hang with the Shadow Warriors as she is right now, heck, she is probably good enough to keep up with their hero units.

I'm not worried about her going on the Elfcation, she'd probably do fine as she is right now. More preparation is always better, though, you won't catch me saying no to Elf Diplomacy or some more Battlemagic. This is strictly about getting the most we can out of the Nagarythi though, not about surviving the trip.
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Well yes, absolutely! I'm not worried about surviving the trip! I think that's a given but I would hope you want more out of it than that, I want to be successful enough her that the Shadow Elves open up potential training in their broader scope of their magical tradition to learn the stuff about Ulgu that Teclis didn't share because it wasn't needed for the immediate creation of the colleges. I want to be able to kick so much ass they give us a permanent invitation to come back.

Absolutely none of that implies that I think Mathilde is weak and pathetic.


Alectai said:
Do I really need to spaghetti quote here?
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No you just need to stop literally lying about what I'm saying thank you.


Alectai said:
While you an Alratan are taking turns to bash me for saying
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It's not bashing you to ask you to stop injecting highly emotive statements that i've never said and act like they are a reasonable read of the situation.
 
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I'd say Mathilde is now fairly well prepared for the Elfcation. That being said there's no urgency to go and Mathilde would be representing the Imperial College as a Lord Magister so it would make sense to want to impress the Elves as much as possible.

Additionally the more Mathilde has learnt beforehand the further she can learn when she actually goes. Better to learn Shadow Warrior unique skills rather than just the basic stuff.

Personally I'd also want to get the Arcane Marks done first before we go, simply because I don't want Mathilde to look bad (or at least worse since from my understanding for an Elf any arcane marks are a sign of failure).
 
DragonParadox said:
I don't know where you get the 'kiddy pool' idea, humans make up most of the non-Chaos, non-Greenskin sentients in the world. Of course most of the world is not too dangerous for them to walk around in, but some places like the edge of screeming madness falling into the Aethyr or the front lines of an shadow war between Druchi and their barely less sadistic foes are not most of the world.
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Formally speaking, we are--at best--entering the bordermarches of the actual Chaos Wastes, it's just that the Imperial Perspective is "Anything north of the Sea of Claws" is the Chaos Wastes.

Karag Dum isn't much further north than Kislev is after all, so unless people are trying to say "Kislev is well into the middle of the Chaos Wastes..."
 
Alectai said:
Formally speaking, we are--at best--entering the bordermarches of the actual Chaos Wastes, it's just that the Imperial Perspective is "Anything north of the Sea of Claws" is the Chaos Wastes.

Karag Dum isn't much further north than Kislev is after all, so unless people are trying to say "Kislev is well into the middle of the Chaos Wastes..."
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Well we kind of are playing an Imperial so I don't feel like dismissing their idea of what the Wastes are out of hand. If we were playing an Arabayan Sorcerer I would not be casually dismissive of the notion that everything North of Aldorf is ridiculously dangerous and filled with monsters because it is. Our assessment of danger should be rooted in IC knowledge because the most dangerous things out there are the unknown. We are walking off the edge of the map going Hellward.
 
SuperSonicSound said:
Magic 9 with one battle magic spell that debuffs is useful, but it's like a pretty minor change to the battlefield, the big boy leagues have spells that cause mass casualties, that buff or debuff and can do more than one neat trick. In the novels battle mages essentially cast spell after spell in quick succession
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But not every meaningful encounter is a battlefield with two armies staring each other down. Splattering a regiment or twelve with battlemagic is a hell of a hammer, and the setting is quite generous in providing nails, but there's also no shortage of bolts and screws around to be dealt with. Mathilde so far has seemed more the jack-of-several-related-but-not-identical-trades type, not the "apply AOE until the problem is resolved" type. Not the first choice for assassin, general, duelist, or magical support, but able to do pretty well in those roles. Personally, I have very little interest in trying to match any of the top tier (or even penultimate) players in a single field, and a lot more in maintaining the ability to come at them obliquely.
 
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DragonParadox said:
The GM confirmed that by the standards of the Empire the place we have already visited the Chaos Wastes when we spoke to the Dolgan, Kislev thinks its borderline and the Dolgan themselves think it is normal and definitely not the Blessed Land. We are going to the edge of their Blessed Land.
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Alectai said:
Formally speaking, we are--at best--entering the bordermarches of the actual Chaos Wastes, it's just that the Imperial Perspective is "Anything north of the Sea of Claws" is the Chaos Wastes.

Karag Dum isn't much further north than Kislev is after all, so unless people are trying to say "Kislev is well into the middle of the Chaos Wastes..."
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By the standards of Araby, the Empire is a bordermarch of the Chaos Wastes. :V Look at all the chaotic shit that happens in the Empire, both large-C Chaos machinations and small-c chaotic magical disasters, like an apprentice magician being able to conjure a hostile djinni by accident. (cough cough) Down in nice, safe Araby where the Winds are calmer you need preparation and practice to be able to call djinn.
 
Alectai said:
Formally speaking, we are--at best--entering the bordermarches of the actual Chaos Wastes, it's just that the Imperial Perspective is "Anything north of the Sea of Claws" is the Chaos Wastes.

Karag Dum isn't much further north than Kislev is after all, so unless people are trying to say "Kislev is well into the middle of the Chaos Wastes..."
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With respect this is nonsense, a Kislevian would say Karak Dum is in the chaos wastes. A Dolgan would say it was on the border of the blessed lands and probably north of that border as well. An imperial would say the northen border of Kislev is the chaos wastes.

The kind of enemies we face here will be serious, even casting normal magic here will be significantly more dangerous. There's a serious risk of death for the expedition, Mathilde has a lot of cards she can play to survive but I'm hoping we want more than just that out of the expedition.

adaer said:
But not every meaningful encounter is a battlefield with two armies staring each other down. Splattering a regiment or twelve with battlemagic is a hell of a hammer, and the setting is quite generous in providing nails, but there's also no shortage of bolts and screws around to be dealt with. Mathilde so far has seemed more the jack-of-several-related-but-not-identical-trades type, not the "apply AOE until the problem is resolved" type. Not the first choice for assassin, general, duelist, or magical support, but able to do pretty well in those roles. Personally, I have very little interest in trying to match any of the top tier (or even penultimate) players in a single field, and a lot more in maintaining the ability to come at them obliquely.
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That's fair it's even one of Mathildes greatest strengths I'd say. I'd like to have the option to lay the smite down in a larger scale battle with a spell of our own making now that our staff makes doing so much much safer especially when combined with the fact that self made battle magic is also treated as much safer for the caster.
 
Alectai said:
Formally speaking, we are--at best--entering the bordermarches of the actual Chaos Wastes, it's just that the Imperial Perspective is "Anything north of the Sea of Claws" is the Chaos Wastes.

Karag Dum isn't much further north than Kislev is after all, so unless people are trying to say "Kislev is well into the middle of the Chaos Wastes..."
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Eh, we're certainly going in deep enough that "Surprise Daemon Army" is a real possibility. Probably not a likelihood, but a possibility. And yes, Karag Dum is pretty far north of Kislev.

I see it this way: There is no way we can guarantee the expeditions success on this trip. Even if we had 10 years more to prepare and gather forces, sometimes the dice just come up snake eyes and Tzeentch drops a Daemon Legion led by the Fateweaver on us or Krakanrok the Black sits on our steam wagons. Mathilde personally might be able to escape from something like that, but it would not be easy, and victory might well be out of the question. Those sorts of things just start to show up on the encounter table when you are this far up north.

But I feel we have a good shot, and can deal with 8/10 of the possible results of the encounter table just fine already.
 
The fact the we are a lady wizard means we are in the upper tier.

The elf trip was given to us as a regular wizard.

There is being prepared and then there is being ridiculous.

SuperSonicSound said:
What do you actually want from the trip? Like what's your goal? Saying we've got everything we need is highly dependant on what you actually want to do there.
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What was offered: stealth and a few bits of magic theory. Maybe a unique elf spell.

It's 6 months, we aren't going to learn everything thrown at us, the protector is the only thing that might get us more time and better stuff.

But that will be 'next time'.
 
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