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I really don't think we should buy the arm -- it's a large amount of money for something we won't be able to use -- but whatever, questers love shinies. Hopefully we don't turn out to need that money for anything in the future.
There's also the fact that we don't really spend our money on anything? It just accrues. Almost anything we'd spend it on, we can instead spend our massive reserve of dwarven favour to get a high-quality dwarven version, which we'd almost certainly go for anyway.
 
I think we have better things to do with our time than to screw over a relatively minor isolationist Chaos faction, no matter how morally offenseive we find them. There are equally morally offensive things closer to home

I don't know, I'd be pretty happy to come back with the Night Prowler and do our best to rob them blind. I imagine that the sorcerer prophets that run the place have acquired a pretty decent hoard of magical artifacts over the millennia.

It might be one of the most lucrative places for a stealing spree we can easily reach.
 
Mathilde is incapable of checking the 'entire network', and she can't confirm that Karak Vlag has reconnected 'properly' because she has no idea what properly is. The magic is going somewhere, that's the extent of Mathilde's ability to diagnose.
That's about what I meant to ask, sorry. Vlag's sending energy which is the best we can expect.
 
[X] HALL: No
[X] MEAT: Yes
[X] ARM: Yes
[X] NUT: Yes
[X] PAPERS: Yes

We can't rescue any slaves at this time. We could purchase a couple, but that's not the same thing - rescuing them hurts the slavers, and discourages slaving, purchasing them aids the slavers and encourages slaving.

On our way back maybe we could pull off something clever and take a few dozen away, or maybe we could come back another time and do so, but right now? No, if we try and rescue a bunch of slaves all we'll do is kill them and kill our expedition as the Chaos Dwarves react while we're heading deeper into the wastes.
 
There's also the fact that we don't really spend our money on anything? It just accrues. Almost anything we'd spend it on, we can instead spend our massive reserve of dwarven favour to get a high-quality dwarven version, which we'd almost certainly go for anyway.
We spend it on books. If we end up doing BOOKBOON, then probably that is going to be less of a factor, which is why I'm just kind of shrugging. But let's not forget that we owe the Staff of Mistery to @TotallyNotEvil's idea to just try to buy dragonbone with money.

The other reason I am shrugging is that our EIC loan got paid off a few turns ago and we are now rolling in cash money from that. We get 60gc a turn from our salary and 175gc a turn from EIC dividends.
 
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Not touching the hall. All morality debate aside, taking beaten down slaves into the wastes is a good way for chaos to get their grips on someone on the inside. We would need to not only feed them, but also supervise them in ways knights sworn to gods and experienced dwarfs don't need to be, while also keeping up morale (getting bought by a mage and brought further towards the wastes may make the less rational ones jumpy no matter what the dwarfs say).
Going where we are, there are simply too many ways someone whose will has been ground down by the dawi zharr for who knows how long to kill/damn themselves and others. We have to look after the needs of the many in this case.

[x] HALL: No
[x] MEAT: Yes
[x] NUT: Yes
[x] PAPERS: Yes
 
[X] HALL: No
I'm thinking there is little benefit and possibly serious harm for the expedition if we take a look through the slave halls. In addition to the cognitohazard worry someone mentioned, there's nothing we can really do to help them-- we are heading into the chaos wastes at a pace no slave could keep up with. I think our best bet is to look through it on the way back, and avoid heading into the chaos wastes while emotionally unbalanced. Grey wizards are good at accepting harsh realities, but we're in a situation where the help we could offer the slaves is limited, and possibly fatal to boot.

[X] MEAT: Yes
We specifically have a candle that can purify this meat, even if it is tainted. The big drain on the food reserves comes from the obligate carnivore mounts of the winter wolves and whatever other demigryphs or critters along with the expedition. They'd have stronger stomachs, and even then we can hit the meat with a purify food & drink effect. The downside to the meat is probably that we give the chaos dwarves a solid idea of where the expedition is, if they're not already aware.

[X] ARM: Yes
This is specifically untainted, and could be used by our allies. It might invite danger later, but it looks like a powerful bonus right now, when we most need it.
[X] NUT: Yes
This is expensive, but if it actually is what the thread thinks it is then I think it would be worth half again that price just to keep it out of evil hands. Im not thinking of this as a gift for Panoramia, but as denial of resources from the chaos dwarves, or whatever nefarious evildoer shows up with 1k in stolen gold. Plus, could lead to some highly interesting shenanigans while trying to return it to the elves without getting murderized.

[X] PAPERS: Yes
possible bonus to elfcation, definite interesting slann info that the colleges would probably appreciate. Plus it's cheap. I'm seeing no harm in this purchase.
 
[X] HALL: No
[X] MEAT: Yes
[X] ARM: Yes
[X] NUT: Yes
[X] PAPERS: Yes

Seeing miserable slavery at a time when we can't do anything about it is spiritually shooting ourselves in the foot at exactly the moment when we need to be at our best to ward off Chaos.

The meat is an easy win for us and the expedition, and justifies the trip by itself.

The arm is, in the very worst case, trading gold we don't spend for College favour, so I'm going with that after all. In the event that the lizardmen track us down for it somehow, they'll probably be up to negotiate for it, given historical precedent in canon.

The nut is only a problem if it's actually from the Oak of Ages - by no means guaranteed - and the Wood Elves show up to K8P to notice it. As forest-bound isolationists, they will never be visiting a Dawi Karak nowhere near a forest, and are entirely unable to do anything about it even if they were, due to said lack of forest. They're very scary on their home turf, and a bit nearby they can range out to, not so much elsewhere.

The papers are just an easy loredump and College Favour accrural, at a time when we want to be looking for low-risk AP sinks anyway, due to the overwork malus.
 
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You need Xs within the brackets to count your votes.

I really don't think we should buy the arm -- it's a large amount of money for something we won't be able to use -- but whatever, questers love shinies. Hopefully we don't turn out to need that money for anything in the future.

I'm voting to not buy the arm but this comes across as pretty disingenuous when you're voting to spend a 1000 GP on the acorn which is the same cost as both of the other items combined if you think the gold will be needed in the future then Surely you'd not be buying the acorn either? I mean it's of literally no known utility and isn't useful for potential lore/knowledge either. At least the arm via tale of metal can have some real information gleaned from it and the writings are admittedly a bit of a crap shoot but they're also relatively cheap.
 
Mathilde is a Grey. We're not going to be forced to commit suicide here and now because we see slavery.
Dude, Boney specifically warned us about the mental health risk:
- The phrase 'no harm in looking' should be avoided when debating the Hall of Slaves. Mathilde is a strongly moral person in her own way, and she follows the God of freedom from tyranny. What she sees could leave her unbalanced for some time. It could leave a permanent mark on her. It could put her in a position where she has to choose between choosing to do something risky and/or expensive and/or strategically unsound, or being unable to look at herself in a mirror.
 
(getting bought by a mage and brought further towards the wastes may make the less rational ones jumpy no matter what the dwarfs say).
The less rational ones, the more rational ones, the moderately rational ones, the ones that believe Mallum is a four-dimensional cube, even the ones that are convinced they're fictional characters.

Being purchased from a citadel full of evil dwarves and told by their new owner they're now part of a dwarven expedition into the depths of the chaos realm should make them jumpy. We can't even actually free them, because there's nowhere available for them to be free - we can tell them they're free, but they'll be subject to military discipline and confined to a location where they're surrounded by armed soldiers.
 
I'm voting to not buy the arm but this comes across as pretty disingenuous when you're voting to spend a 1000 GP on the acorn which is the same cost as both of the other items combined if you think the gold will be needed in the future then Surely you'd not be buying the acorn either? I mean it's of literally no known utility and isn't useful for potential lore/knowledge either. At least the arm via tale of metal can have some real information gleaned from it and the writings are admittedly a bit of a crap shoot but they're also relatively cheap.
We have a Ghyran user back home we can research it with and who might come up with cool applications for it. We don't even know where to start with the arm -- if it is what the thread thinks it is, it shoots Hysh at people, and in any event it's a magical prosthetic and not a gauntlet, so it requires an amputee to be used.

My thinking is that the barrier to researching the arm is higher than the seed and the potential use-value is lower.
 
Not actually sure what "gilded skulls made of black bone" are, more Nehekara stuff? Nagash?
Looked it up:
warhammerfantasy.fandom.com

Ebony Skulls

"Mine emissaries make gifts to greedsome strangers; the skulls of the unliving carry soul-scum skimmings, brine-song echoing still. These they accept, for bauble and toy is all. In doing acceptance they make abasement, for debt is eternal, beyond mortal-man’s ken." —Luthor Harkon[2a] The Ebony...
Luthor Harkon gives these out to people, break it and you become a discount necomancer but get conscripted into his war with the Lizardmen.
 
I'm voting to not buy the arm but this comes across as pretty disingenuous when you're voting to spend a 1000 GP on the acorn which is the same cost as both of the other items combined if you think the gold will be needed in the future then Surely you'd not be buying the acorn either? I mean it's of literally no known utility and isn't useful for potential lore/knowledge either. At least the arm via tale of metal can have some real information gleaned from it and the writings are admittedly a bit of a crap shoot but they're also relatively cheap.
You're being just as disingenuous, the acorn is utterly packed with magic, and has an insane amount of power if it is what we think it is.
 
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