avatar11792
Et Sic Incipit
- Location
- Planet Earth, North America
[X] The Chiselwards below.
Warhammer Fantasy: Divided Loyalties - an Advisor's Quest
- Thread starter Boney
- Start date
- Fantasy Users' Choice!
Voted best in category in the Users' Choice awards.
Sinsystems
Patron Librarian
Inserted tally
- Location
- Hawaii
[X] The Chiselwards below.
- Location
- Internet, The
The difference between those is that the Liber Mortis can be used for good. The danger is not in the book itself, but in who might get their hands on it. Agreed on the insulting part, though. I just could not think of a reason to wait so long without doubting the empire institutions. It's a highly hypothetical scenario anyway. I consider it far more likely that the book will either be stored indefinitely or read in secret.
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Kornet
Quite possibly a sloth abomination
- Location
- Mother Russia
I'm skeptical about the "could destroy" bit. It has been (most probably) in possession of a line of witch-hunters for centuries, I'm willing to bet somebody has already tried to destroy it. More than once. Creatively.
The book still exists.
Of course, it might have been only relatively recently discovered by our van Hal, but it being passed for safekeeping for many generations seems much more plausible.
Easy enough to check @BoneyM is the Liber Mortis in any way protected from being set on fire, or any other means of mundane destruction as far as Matilda's witchsight can determine?
DocMatoi
Theoretical Lover of Girls
- Location
- within 2 hours of the White House
- Pronouns
- They/Them
This is a pretty good idea, and should be considered.
This, not so much. Dwarven magical theory, also known as runesmithing, is extremely orthogonal to the elf derived magic used by humans. In fact, one of the underlying principles of rune magic is "doing it like the elves is stupid and dangerous."
The only dwarves who do practice direct magic are the Chaos Dwarf priests of hashut, and the way they have to force it through their system turns their limbs to stone.
- Location
- Earth
What book?
BungieONI
Seven gremlins in a trench coat
- Location
- Lickwidget
- Pronouns
- She/Her
What about the Skaven and Slayers who are already there, ripe targets for Dread Aspect. Those are readily and strongly affected by being able to see her on an open field. Particularly the Skaven.
Like, they ain't gonna be empty right now and driving sections of the Skaven and any Goblins away with fear and terror is a great way to reduce dorf attrition in a bigger more open battle.
oooo I rather like this idea, though I don't think teaching them Dwarf magical theory is of much use for the reasons DocMatoi lays out.
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Mopman43
Mountain-Hermit of Nitpeak
- Location
- Vermont
The biggest reason I want to take the highway early is because I want any potential incoming forces to run into a Dwarf-built stronghold, not for the Dwarfs to have to fight them Dawi-to-Grobi. If this expedition is going to last, we are going to need to build up as much defenses as possible.
DarkLight140
Credit to Team
- Location
- Lost in my thoughts
This reminds me that before the start of this campaign, Mathilde was one of the top three Imperials in dwarven eyes:
Now, we have no idea how much rep those two Elector Counts have. For all we know they've got two hundred for whatever reason. But I don't think there's any question that Mathilde is holding her third place position at absolute worst.
And it's worth remembering that the Grey College are trained as diplomats as well as mages and assassins/spies- though Mathilde has admittedly had that as her weakest area of their training, historically. Even after this campaign, they might well consider it important for her to do things like talk to dwarves and write up reports on analysis of dwarven politics, cultural trends, and so forth that they can then use as material in their "this is how dwarves think and act, and here's what's going on with them" classes. Advancing the Colleges' mastery of magic is very important, but the Greys are all about accomplishing stuff and being practical, and they have a keen appreciation for understanding others' attitudes and politics. Mathilde is talented but not outlandishly so as a mage, but to the dwarves she's quite possibly the most-liked human wizard who has ever existed and her superiors will want to exploit that.
On that note, there's also a good chance that if the Empire is embroiled in a major war Mathilde will be told that it's her job to get the dwarves on board with fighting alongside them in it. Or next time some Elector Count makes a horrible faux pas and gets grudged it's her job to sort it out without anyone dying. She's setting herself up to get a lot of Grey Wizard Diplomatic Corps jobs shoved onto her plate by becoming blatantly the best person for the job.
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BungieONI
Seven gremlins in a trench coat
- Location
- Lickwidget
- Pronouns
- She/Her
Huh, did not know that. Makes me think of Sidereals. Neat.
- Location
- Brazil
I'm not terribly enthused about "dwarf magic theory" either, and I think a lot of what's being floated about could be achieved by the simple means of diplomacy, and maybe a tiny bit of favor.
Let's see how much favor we accrue after the dust is settled. Hopefully, it's more than for Drakenhoff.
But what's undeniable is that Mathilde is rather lacking in offense, compared to her defense. And, from looking over the 8th Ed army books for Orc's, Goblins, Skaven and Chaos Warriors, a lot of what makes their Lords incredibly dangerous is their incredibly lethal murdersticks. They aren't huge daemons or monsters or anything.
A good weapon elevates one's killyness far more than many expect.
Let's see how much favor we accrue after the dust is settled. Hopefully, it's more than for Drakenhoff.
But what's undeniable is that Mathilde is rather lacking in offense, compared to her defense. And, from looking over the 8th Ed army books for Orc's, Goblins, Skaven and Chaos Warriors, a lot of what makes their Lords incredibly dangerous is their incredibly lethal murdersticks. They aren't huge daemons or monsters or anything.
A good weapon elevates one's killyness far more than many expect.
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RE: Studying magic stuff from Dorfs
Maybe less now, since having lots of rep gives discounts to stuff.
QM said:
Especially note that it is not necessary to involve a 12 favour runelord in our first foray into dorf magic philosphy. 4 favour range covers what we'd need to start learning from a dorf rune apprentice, I think.
Maybe less now, since having lots of rep gives discounts to stuff.
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Belated, but I really like the narrative created by both sides rolling well. It avoids making one side steamroll the other, and lets everyone look cool.
Would the entrance to the fortress be as good if the stone trolls didn't put as much of a fight versus the slayers? Or even Mathilde trying to sneak around with all those close calls to drive up the tension. I kinda had problems with thinking of warhammer goblins as credible enemies, and them showing off (either because of dice or because BoneyM wrote them so) proved me wrong.
Would the entrance to the fortress be as good if the stone trolls didn't put as much of a fight versus the slayers? Or even Mathilde trying to sneak around with all those close calls to drive up the tension. I kinda had problems with thinking of warhammer goblins as credible enemies, and them showing off (either because of dice or because BoneyM wrote them so) proved me wrong.
- Location
- United States of America
My fear isn't of a rapid response force coming, from who knows where, through the Underway. My fear is that the gobins and skaven that are already in-between the Expedition and the Underway will cause enough trouble that setting up proper defensive features at the Highway will be difficult.
Our greatest asset in this fight, in my opinion, is our ability to inspire fear and terror in any who fight us. Leveraging that to the best of our ability seems to be prudent, and the best place to leverage said fear and terror is an area which we don't care if the Goblins and Skaven flee. The Chiselwards don't provide that because we will have to hunt down the fleeing enemies and exterminate them. Which takes time and energy that we could be using to do something else. The Highway does provide the ability to leverage our terror and fear to the highest extreme because we don't particularly care if they flee the area and out of the Karag. As long as they are running away from us, we can march to the Highway and set up defenses.
Dwarven magical theory isn't not runesmithing. Dwarven magical practice is runesmithing, but their understanding on the nature of the Winds, the Aeythr, and their interaction with physical and mental reality is not. That theory is a way of describing and understanding observed phenomena, not an craft discipline designed to exploit them. They're very different, if complementary things.
Theoretical physics and mathematics may be used in engineering, but they aren't the same thing, and knowing the first two doesn't let you do the second.
The Slayers are in the Chiselwards, not in the Highways. If we want Slayers in the Highways, we need to clean up the Chiselwards without them all dying so they can redeploy.
Skaven in numbers formed up for battle are largely immune to terror anyway*, so it's mostly a waste against them. You need to hit them while they're disorganised to do anything to them. Anything resembling the open field will not give the opportunity.
There's also no reason to believe that the Highways aren't mostly empty. I'd expect them to be a no-man's-land continually fought over by the skaven clans and goblin tribes. Why would they be inhabited given that they're the front lines of the permanent war that's raging here?
* as they get +1 Leadership per rank of troops.
The goblins in the Highways should be rapidly running away, as we know we just broke the Crooked Moon and they ran. The skaven are lower down, beneath the goblins, and should be busy cleaning up those same goblins to enslave them.
Also, remember that while we dealt with the Hall of the Moon time didn't stop. The troops sent to seize the Highways will already have done so; and if they'd been having serious problems we'd know, because they'd have sent a messenger to Belegar and we were standing next to him.
It's arguably safer not to, to be honest, as that would reassure the dwarves that she's not trying to steal runesmithing.
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The styles, especially for trashy bodice rippers, are pretty much polar opposites yeah.
Trashy literature wants evocative, flamboyant language, you want to make a scene take as long as possible and whip up imagination, using only enough guidance to keep it in the right direction and give it structure.
Academic writing wants precise, clear and concise language. Mathilde is struggling to avoid using a half dozen synonyms out of sheer instinct.
Do keep in mind that such a tutoring might involve a bar on sharing it further.
Dwarfs big on coprrights.
The dwarf format hammers the magic down into rigid, intensely stable forms which reliably produce the same effect all the time no matter the environment. The elf format involves changing yourself to channel the natural flows of power, and to shift and transform it into each other, and requires constant adjustment for environmental factors.
There is likely something valuable to learn from comparing their fundamental theories, particularly for an enchanter to study how dwarfs do their binding of power and meaning to physical shapes.
Like, its pretty unlikely that either Dwarven Runecraft or Elven High Magic are actually well suited to humanity, they rely on traits which humans HAVE, but which they don't excel at.
The Empire HAS a copy of it, and its tightly controlled. The thing is that the empire, being a collective structure, is itself uniquely vulnerable to corruption from temptation of power, anyone in a position to obtain or deny their copy to people are ALSO the most devoted, ambitious people in the entire Empire, with the kind of personal spiritual power to REALLY wreak havoc if they were to try to.
I believe the Van Hals kept the original as a failsafe. Its passed down apprentice style, only to the ones you have time to personally vet over the course of years, and to develop their personal morality, and only when you are certain. Its more likely to be lost, but also less likely to fall into malign hands.
You can trust a person to do the right thing. You cannot trust people to always do the right thing. Not when the ones with access are the ones most easily tempted.
Night_stalker
Slava Ukraini!
- Pronouns
- He/Him
The Witch and her Hunter 1: Murder Most Foul.
Gotta make sure we can't accidentally destroy it.