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Warhammer Fantasy: Divided Loyalties - an Advisor's Quest

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GrimTheMad said:
I mean. We don't have time travel so we can absolutely do that. :V

'Never came here in the first place' is not an option.

(Also we, obviously, have a lot more information on the general situation now. What was once the 'smart' choice may no longer be. Knowing everything I would still have voted for the expedition because Vlag makes it all worth it, easily. I'd also argue that the chances of accomplishing anything here is not worth the risk.)
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But thats the thing we never got all the information until the events have passed and maybe not even then.

So you can judge it's safer to leave right now. And that's fair.

but if safety is all that mattered we would have never killed a college of necromancy by ourselves or gone alone hunting orc warbosses...

You get the idea.
DragonParadox said:
I don't have to prove a negative. What proof do you have that it is a ticking time bomb and more importantly one that can influence anything we care about?
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I am not asking you to prove a negative, but to prove that the action is the smart thing.

Sure is safer, but smarter? Like hell we know. We don't have enought info.
 
wrecksalot said:
The fate I was referring to was moulder pit or chaos dwarf sacrifice, as noted in the post I quoted.
practically, no. But dwarves are not very practical about their grudges. If Dum has a grudge declared upon them, then the only way the dwarves will stop pursuing vengence is actually marching a massive army up here for decades to siege it or there being no more dwarves. Being able to clear up matter might avoid them having a grudge declared on them, which is why I advocate doing literally anything except running away or sitting on our hands for a day and then running away.
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That is flanderizing the dwarfs. They have not suicided against the Dawi Zhar yet and this is beyond even them.
 
[X] Attempt to infiltrate the Karak with magic
[X] Attempt to scout the forest at the base of the Karak
[X] Approach the Kvellige camp peacefully and attempt to discuss the Karak with them
[X] Attempt to intercept a Kurgan war-party en route to attack the Karag and the Beastmen
[X] Approach the Kul camp peacefully and attempt to discuss the Karak with them
[x] Attempt to infiltrate the Karak without magic
[X] Attempt to approach Morghur to see if he can be communicated with
[X] This is clearly some Divine non-Chaos effect. And it's fighting Chaos and the Chaos Wastes. So you are obligated to try to help, but no more. Go the the edge of the forest and set up a table to wait till nightfall. Have a Dwarf either/and or carve the name, rank and station of Loremaster of K8Ps and the Karaz Ankor, or announce you(or whatever else the procedure is for a formal envoy approaching a friendly Karak in Karaz Ankor). If anyone does show up, thank them for their service against Chaos and ask what message/assistance they require and see what knowledge they might be willing to give back, to be preserved. Do not step one foot inside the forest without an invitation.
 
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D.Rockstar said:
But thats the thing we never got all the information until the events have passed and maybe not even then.

So you can judge it's safer to leave right now. And that's fair.

but if safety is all that mattered we would have never killed a college of necromancy by ourselves or gone alone hunting orc warbosses...

You get the idea.


I am not asking you to prove a negative, but to prove that the action is the smart thing.

Sure is safer, but smarter? Like hell we know. We don't have enought info.
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Safe and Smart go hand in hand.

Atleast when the unsafe has no real payout.

We have enough information for KA to think on and decide its own course of action.

Our job here is done.
 
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ninjafish said:
The reason leave isn't winning because a bunch of people are showing absurd levels of hubris and overconfidence and think sitting here in the chaos wastes for another day or two trying to pointlessly figure this out is a good idea.

They are wrong.
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ninjafish said:
We already have done everything in our power.

doing anything else has to much fucking risk to it.

Give it up.
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Didn't you just get warned for a post pretty similar to this a day or two ago?
When engaging in a quest like this, I find that asking myself 'how would I phrase my current thoughts if I was sitting at a table, in public, with 10 strangers?' helps me center myself, and to maintain an appropriate attitude when posting.
 
DragonParadox said:
It's making and area of 'slightly less Chaos' in the Wstes. Still not seeing the time bomb, much less one we should care about.
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I wouldn't call it a time bomb, but 'non-Chaos god expanding a space of their own domain 14 miles plus in diameter in the middle of the Chaos Wastes' sounds pretty important. It kinda looks, a bit, like some other god is pushing out the Four in their own backyard.

Something we should look into. It might just be the most important discovery Mathilde's ever run across, and that's saying something, given her track record.
 
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D.Rockstar said:
I am not asking you to prove a negative, but to prove that the action is the smart thing.

Sure is safer, but smarter? Like hell we know. We don't have enought info.
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We are in a highly unsafe place, leaving the unsafe place at maximum speed is thus the smartest course of action all other things being equal. I'm not seeing how they are not equal. There needs to be more than general uncertainty to prove that leaving is not smart.
 
wrecksalot said:
The fate I was referring to was moulder pit or chaos dwarf sacrifice, as noted in the post I quoted.
practically, no. But dwarves are not very practical about their grudges. If Dum has a grudge declared upon them, then the only way the dwarves will stop pursuing vengence is actually marching a massive army up here for decades to siege it or there being no more dwarves. Being able to clear up matter might avoid them having a grudge declared on them, which is why I advocate doing literally anything except running away or sitting on our hands for a day and then running away.
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Right, but what I mean is the Karaz Ankor can't (and won't) do that. We've seen this with the Dawi-Zharr, who were much worse, from a Grudge-y point of view, who the Dawi do not in fact habitually send armies at, despite the fact that grudge has lasted for literally millennia. Also the grudge against the Greenskins, or Chaos, or what have you. The sad truth of the matter is that the Dwarves can't (and thus don't) seek to pursue all the vengeance they can. There are just too many grudges, and in this instance Dum is way too far away and way too in-the-chaos-wastes to ever send an army at it.

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Fayhem said:
Something I've been thinking about. Does meat really go bad that quickly, especially this far north? Meaning, if worst came to worst and Mathilde's spellcasting abilities were unavailable for any reason, would it be possible for the Expedition to replace Mockery of Death with regular actual death for the cows and just stack their bodies on the steam tanks that way? I mean, I doubt the humans or even the famously hardy dwarves would be all that stoked to eat week-old meat or whatever, but AFAIK obligate carnivores like wolves tend to have fairly strong stomachs for this kind of thing - they're not necessarily above eating some carrion in the wild. And the carnivorous mounts are a huge percentage of the expedition's food requirements IIRC. I did some quick google-fu and this page from the International Wolf Center, which is apparently a thing, says:
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I think a big part of the issue is that there's a whole bunch of Dhar raining around everywhere (this far north). Exposing meat to that can go very bad very quickly, particularly if you then ingest it.
 
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BoneyM said:
With a tiny fizzle of Divine energy, a tiny piece of rock disappears from the lip of the crater, replaced by a few grains of sand that tumble down to join the rest of the desert.
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Hmm. Chaos Dwarven Sorcerers turn to stone from forcing magic through their magic-resistant bodies - presumably something to do with their still having the blessing of stone, even though they've turned from the ancestors? Does Hashut upkeep that instead?
So is Karag Dum still getting their blessing from the ancestors, and if not does the draining magic and crumbling stone play a part?

Has Karag Dum developed runes that run on Dhar, perhaps only as a method of draining it from the environment, perhaps as another source of power?
That would seem to indicate great skill and innovation, and also heresy - fitting for their reputation.

BoneyM said:
"It's like the busiest, noisiest shepherd's tone I've ever heard," he says eventually. "Always falling, but never getting any lower. Or at least not fast enough to be detectable to me."
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...sheperd's tone? Like, from a sheperd's bell, used to summon herd animals?
Was this originally intended to entice beastmen herds for ablative armour, or gather Dhar for draining/converting, and which was the metaphysical side-effect?



Wonder if we could join/shadow a Kurgan war-party and see what happens with their shaman.
But even if that is Cor-Dum, does any credible story about him say he can affect spellcasting from several miles away?

[x] Approach the Kul camp peacefully and attempt to discuss the Karak with them
[x] Approach the Kvellige camp peacefully and attempt to discuss the Karak with them
[x] Fortify here and see if anything interesting happens over the next day
[x] Attempt to scout the forest at the base of the Karak
[x] Attempt to infiltrate the Karak with magic
[x] Attempt to infiltrate the Karak without magic
[x] Attempt to intercept a Kurgan war-party en route to attack the Karag and the Beastmen
 
So... theory time.

Boney said that 3 theories combined put us with putting distance.

1 theory is that the beastmen got cleansed.

1 theory is that the Dawi allied with wood elves

I think those 2 can go well together, if we assume a wood elf god is using divine energy here.

Wonder what the third would be tho.
 
DragonParadox said:
It's making and area of 'slightly less Chaos' in the Wstes. Still not seeing the time bomb, much less one we should care about.
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Not ticking bomb. But that they're pushing off the Wastes or making them less Chaotic is something we should care about, in a good way.

Like, if they're managing to do that here imagine what could they do if they did it in Sylvanaia.
 
Guile said:
I wouldn't call it a time bomb, but 'non-Chaos god expanding a space of their own domain 14 miles plus in diameter in the middle of the Chaos Wastes' sounds pretty important. It kinda looks, a bit, like some other god is pushing out the Four in their own backyard.

Something we should look into.
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Good for them, not my monkey not my circus. We are not in the business of pushing back the Wastes, trying to get into it would be overreaching to and almost comical degree.

Retrueno said:
Not ticking bomb. But that they're pushing off the Wastes or making them less Chaotic is something we should care about, in a good way.

Like, if they're managing to do that here imagine what could they do if they did it in Sylvanaia.
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They are using a Karak Waystone somehow. There is no such thing in Silvania.
 
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ninjafish said:
We already have done everything in our power.

doing anything else has to much fucking risk to it.

Give it up.
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People weight risks differently. If things are absolute worst case, and this is the birth of a new faction like the bell ringing over whatever the town that became skaven was called, then that shoots the scale up massively, and means that any scraps of information we can gather are, on the large scale probably worth all but one of the expedition dying to secure that info and bring it home. From that viewpoint, you could argue that leaving without confirming this isn't an existential threat is an even greater risk. I don't think things are that bad, but that's just an example of how the risk:reward ratio can be skewed by your take on what's going on here.
 
WAIT A MINUTE.

WAIT A GODDAMN MINUTE.

I JUST WENT WIKIDIVING FOR ELVEN GODS, AND ASYRYAN, THE BIGGEST CHEESE ...

IS ASSOSIATED WITH SPREADING HEAT FROM A CENTRAL POSITION.

@BoneyM can Asarnil recognise Asyryan influence?
 
adaer said:
People weight risks differently. If things are absolute worst case, and this is the birth of a new faction like the bell ringing over whatever the town that became skaven was called, then that shoots the scale up massively, and means that any scraps of information we can gather are, on the large scale probably worth all but one of the expedition dying to secure that info and bring it home. From that viewpoint, you could argue that leaving without confirming this isn't an existential threat is an even greater risk. I don't think things are that bad, but that's just an example of how the risk:reward ratio can be skewed by your take on what's going on here.
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I agree with many of the points above, but I must contest that we cannot meaningfully prove a negative. This could be or become an existential threat as could any thousand things in this blasted hellscape. This is where apocalypses crawl up to sleep.
 
ninjafish said:
Safe and Smart go hand in hand.

Atleast when the unsafe has no real payout.

We have enough information for KA to think on and decide its own course of action.

Our job here is done.
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DragonParadox said:
We are in a highly unsafe place, leaving the unsafe place at maximum speed is thus the smartest course of action all other things being equal. I'm not seeing how they are not equal. There needs to be more than general uncertainty to prove that leaving is not smart.
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Safety isn't the same as smart.
Plenty of short term safety options could carry long term problems and danger.

I want to know if this is one of those.
 
[x] Approach the Kul camp peacefully and attempt to discuss the Karak with them
[x] Approach the Kvellige camp peacefully and attempt to discuss the Karak with them
[x] Fortify here and see if anything interesting happens over the next day
[x] Attempt to scout the forest at the base of the Karak
[x] Attempt to intercept a Kurgan war-party en route to attack the Karag and the Beastmen
[X] Attempt to scout the forest at the base of the Karak
[X] Attempt to infiltrate the Karak with magic
 
Guile said:
So while I dislike the 'Leave' option, at least that's decisive. What are people expecting to accomplish with the 'Stay and fortify' option?
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Wait and see what happens when the tribes take their next shot at the defences.

killfr3nzy said:
crumbling stone play a part?
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I think, to my understanding, it's specifically not crumbling stone. We noted a lack of crumbling around the border. It appears it's instead being directly translocated elsewhere - position swapped, with matter from elsewhere.

storryeater said:
I JUST WENT WIKIDIVING FOR ELVEN GODS, AND ASYRYAN, THE BIGGEST CHEESE ...

IS ASSOSIATED WITH SPREADING HEAT FROM A CENTRAL POSITION.
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Got a page handy? That sounds very promising, and if true, that's a point in favor of an actual Elf connection.
 
Back from my wikiwalk and we have three more pages, yay.

Went checking which Gods it might be that would explain what happens, came upon three candidates.
Some explain more than others.

Lady of the Lake - purity, nobility, and courage in the face of danger

Has purity as an aspect and Cor-Dum was last seen around brettonnia.

Khsar - Nehekharan God of the Desert
We do have a desert.

Halétha - Protector Goddess of the Hedgefolk
Is worshipped in the Forest of Shadows which is one of the possibilities for the forest we see.
@BoneyM what does Mathilde know about the Hedgefolk or Halétha? She did grow up in the Grey College after all.
 
I don't want to leave until we at least witness the Kurgan fighting the beastmen. If that happens, we should be able to see if Morghur has/can control his mutation ability. If he does have it, we run, because we are out of our league. If he doesn't, or he can selectively use it, then several options involving him become a lot less riskier.

Because to me, it seems like most of the objections to staying are based upon a powerset we haven't confirmed that this Morghur has yet, and the Kurgan are the only people nearby that I won't cry over if they get mutant spawned.

[x] Fortify here and see if anything interesting happens over the next day
 
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