Remove ads

Warhammer Fantasy: Divided Loyalties - an Advisor's Quest

Voted best in category in the Users' Choice awards.
Voting is open
Reader mode
To Mathilde, it's also entirely possible that the Runes of Valaya are powered by Valaya directly. Or that the Dawi magic resistance isn't an ongoing effect, but simply a one-off ceremony that changes the nature of their soul and makes them slightly magic-repellent, which would have no need for constant Wind supply to keep a spell going.

There are many other possibilities that she could consider before guessing that there's an entirely undetectable and super-important use for all that Waystone energy.

[X] Yes
 
picklepikkl said:
This is true for all Kingships.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
While there is a solid precedent of Slayer Kings, there's also this:
BoneyM said:
"Least favoured, hah. And then what happens once there were only two Princes left... there's something rotten in the foundations of that Clan, and I pray the Ancestors give Ulthar strength enough to root it out, and that Alrik manages to rediscover his honour long enough to shave his head and let the Throne pass to Ulthar.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
Belegar, as king and almost by definition well-versed in Dwarven law, isn't one to erroneously think that one can abdicate from kingship and go slayer, what means such thing is most likely possible under Dwarven law under certain circumstances. Maybe first Slayer-King didn't abdicate properly? Could this be elaborated on?
 
I think the when you take the slayer oath, you are not considered dead for all practical purposes, and you having to find something big and nasty to die at is just a formality.
 
picklepikkl said:
The quote in my last post was pretty specific. Do we have an example of a Dwarf king abdicating? If you're thinking of Karak Hirn, even that isn't an abdication situation:


It's not clear whether this is a "the throne will immediately pass from Alrik to Ulthar if Alrik takes the Slayer Oath situation" or if it's a "hopefully he would die quickly after becoming a Slayer" situation. The former would make sense, but the example of the Slayer Kings shows that the Slayer oath and the oath of Kingship are not mutually contradictory in Dwarf law. It is possible that that's only in the specific case of Karak Kadrin, though, and that for any other Dwarf monarch the throne would pass upon taking the Slayer Oath.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...

Oooops, you were talking about Dawi kingships, fair enough.
 
matvprok said:
Belegar, as king and almost by definition well-versed in Dwarven law, isn't one to erroneously think that one can abdicate from kingship and go slayer, what means such thing is most likely possible under Dwarven law under certain circumstances. Maybe first Slayer-King didn't abdicate properly? Could this be elaborated on?
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...

The circumstances surrounding the first Slayer-King are lost to history, ostensibly out of respect for him.
 
BoneyM said:
Mathilde has a mental category of 'Anvil Runes' that are a lot easier for her to understand because it's basically a spell given physical form: put Winds in, get magic out. The Tower is a separate thing that's a hybrid so it doesn't 'count'.

Another big problem with figuring out the Rune of Valaya IC is that she has only seen energy flowing one way. There's nothing she can see coming into Karak Eight Peaks, and when she shut off the flow from Karag Dum going south there was no mirroring flow going north. And even if you posit some sort of underground rune-magic flow that she can't detect because runes, that might explain how it connects to each of the Holds, but what about the individual protections? The Imperial Dwarves? Some go to the mountains to give their newborns the proper rites, but there are lineages that haven't seen a Dwarfhold since before the time of Sigmar. By her current understanding, even if the possibility did occur to her she couldn't come up with a way that it makes sense.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
All you're telling us that the Ancestors Great Works are so immensely chad that Mathilde cannot conceive of them being able to do that which they are able to do.

I have won either way.

 
Kingship is an oath, originally designed without a release clause, probably deliberately because who wants a king who needs one. Ergo the only way out is to become a Slayer.
 
The Waystones description was about what I expected (though I wasn't aware of the Eonir lore, of course). Lots of diplomacy, and eventually probably some adventure as well.

The specifics of the Border Princess job are interesting enough. Seems like unless we get really good at defending the place, we'll have to get used to retreating to Barak Varr if something real big moves in. It's an interesting challenge, and with Boney's previous comments on how the quest loop is likely to look, I am more and more coming around to the idea. Working to pacify the area should be quite exciting, and we're likely to see a lot more of Winter Wolves (and, consequently, Hubert).

I'm really hoping Boney gets around to writing the info about Loremaster-at-Large and Spymaster jobs. In particular, it'd be great to get a preview of the kind of jobs Loremaster-at-Large is likely to get involved in. Obviously his call though - so far, L-a-L doesn't look like it's gonna win, and I doubt anything can change that...
 
flotter said:
The only reason this a contest is because we have ooc information. Belegar deserves to know and he deserves trust.

[x] Yes
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
The only readon we are sure about this is also ooc information, ic we are speculating on one datapoint, based on hearsay of Thorgrimms arrival and our Math of the high kings traveling speed. Even disregarding ooc information, that is a very flimsy foundation to make any kind of claim on, let alone one that could have consequences as devastating as a dwarf king accusing the high king of theft.
tenchifew said:
I would add here "Belegar finds out that his spymistress held back information from him." The outcome of that would be quite bad.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
Remember from the bomb investigation that dwarves don't really do degrees of certainty. You either know what you are talking about or need to investigate more. If we make the claim to Belegar, there is no blunting it with maybes and probablies.
Conversely if he finds out by other means and he finds out we knew, we can truthfully say that we did not feel comfortable making that big an accusation on that little evidence.
 
BoneyM said:
Mathilde has a mental category of 'Anvil Runes' that are a lot easier for her to understand because it's basically a spell given physical form: put Winds in, get magic out. The Tower is a separate thing that's a hybrid so it doesn't 'count'.

Another big problem with figuring out the Rune of Valaya IC is that she has only seen energy flowing one way. There's nothing she can see coming into Karak Eight Peaks, and when she shut off the flow from Karag Dum going south there was no mirroring flow going north. And even if you posit some sort of underground rune-magic flow that she can't detect because runes, that might explain how it connects to each of the Holds, but what about the individual protections? The Imperial Dwarves? Some go to the mountains to give their newborns the proper rites, but there are lineages that haven't seen a Dwarfhold since before the time of Sigmar. By her current understanding, even if the possibility did occur to her she couldn't come up with a way that it makes sense.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
Pretty sure that runes are part divine magic and part regular magic, so I assume the flow is fed to Valaya then granted back as a miracle.
 
A big obstacle between Mathilde linking 'lots of magic gets sent to KaK' and 'that magic is used to power the runes of Valaya that keep all dwarves from turning to stone' is that as far as I know, Mathilde has no idea how the hell the rites of Valaya even work, or what they involve. That they're linked to the runes of Valaya isn't an impossible conclusion to come to, but it's certainly not the first or most obvious one.
 
Last edited:
[x] Yes

BoneyM said:
Mathilde has a mental category of 'Anvil Runes' that are a lot easier for her to understand because it's basically a spell given physical form: put Winds in, get magic out. The Tower is a separate thing that's a hybrid so it doesn't 'count'.

Another big problem with figuring out the Rune of Valaya IC is that she has only seen energy flowing one way. There's nothing she can see coming into Karak Eight Peaks, and when she shut off the flow from Karag Dum going south there was no mirroring flow going north. And even if you posit some sort of underground rune-magic flow that she can't detect because runes, that might explain how it connects to each of the Holds, but what about the individual protections? The Imperial Dwarves? Some go to the mountains to give their newborns the proper rites, but there are lineages that haven't seen a Dwarfhold since before the time of Sigmar. By her current understanding, even if the possibility did occur to her she couldn't come up with a way that it makes sense.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
I mean, Mat's a Grey. The possibility has probably occurred to her. They like thinking about the unlikely and the impossible, the confounding and the irritating. It's just that until some real evidence comes up it gets filed under "Interesting mental model" or "crazy hypothesis".

Like, a list of those for what happens to the magical energy of the Waystones probably includes stuff like:
-KaK also channels its power to Ulthuan, as part of some ancient deal, and the dwarves are still keeping it up, because OATHS!
-KaK uses it to power some super secret project that's... (massive long list of everything so much magic could be used for). Its secret, because DWARVES! Some examples below:

-KaK uses it to empower the High King. Mat saw Belegar get stronger when the Crown was complete, so its entirely possible to suggest that all that magic is being used to make the High King the best, most dwarvest dwarf, that ever dwarved!
-KaK uses it to siphon all the magic away, as it is inimnical to dwarves. Rather than stealing the magic, it is protecting dwarven kind from an energy that is poison to them. Kind of how like humans throw away their shit and piss, and Mat's folks pick it up, work it into niter, and sell it to Zulfbar. The Dwarves just have no idea what they are throwing away as its not like they know how to use it!
-KaK uses all that magic to carry the souls of departed dwarves to the under-earth, as it is a separate Aether realm, souls are aether, and they need to go down, not up somehow. Passing through the Gates of Gazul may be rather more literal for dwarves, and they may be in KaK.
-KaK uses it to reinforce local reality, as a kind of Vortex equivalent of their own. (Does Mat know about the Vortex? I think she does.)
-KaK uses it to empower dwarven Gods. How???
-KaK uses it to make new Runelords (Does Mat have any idea about the Bloodline rules for runes?) Maybe it takes some kind of special forge deep in KaK to turn a dwarf from a regular to Runelord aspirant, much like an overpowered Rite of Valaya.

And so on, and so on, the theories multiply.
 
Last edited:
Reader mode
You must login or register to reply here.
Voting is open
Remove ads
Back
Top