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Warhammer Fantasy: Divided Loyalties - an Advisor's Quest

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Alric just got shouted down. That is just embarassing. I hope the hit to his reputation will force the transition and maybe finally show us what the heckin deal is with him (ie, if he tries to force the issue). Because if Horstman is clean, there is still the possibility that the Changer has it's hooks on Alric. Knowingly or not.
 
GrimTheMad said:
The biggest reason remains that we don't actually want the job, nor will we for the foreseeable future.

Like, we already have three jobs, people.

And honestly the waystone project is both more important (if successful) and something literally only Mathilde is in a position to do.
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A few turns ago I thought the same about Mathilde getting an apprentice and well... Now that miracle looks within arms reach nothing's impossible for me anymore.

Post-waystone (if successful) means a very important and shiny feather in Mathilde's cap. Might be just the kind of thing to get consideration as an actually worthy candidate (battle skills aside).
 
NSMS said:
It's a potentially lethal duel where the accepted/preferred approach is to avoid doing anything fatal or permanent to your opponent (see the reactions to someone trying Final Transmutation). The belt breaks that because it's an automatic effect.
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I don't get where you're coming from. It's an automatic effect, but it's an automatic effect that doesn't kill anyone. The alternative is getting hit by whatever they're trying to do, which seems like a much worse idea in terms of avoiding terrible damage.

And frankly, if you're not willing to risk horrible injury, then you wouldn't be a Lord Magister, never mind one challenging for the Supreme Boss position.
Thebigpieman said:
Seeing the other Grey Lord/Lady Magisters in a social setting was great. Honestly my favorite part of the update.

As for Dragomas he really is one hell of a combatant huh. No wonder he's managed it for what is now 4 terms in a row.
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Let's also not forget that, as a journeyman, he walked to Cathay, impressed them enough to sign a peace treaty, and then walked back.
 
BurnNote said:
I don't get where you're coming from. It's an automatic effect, but it's an automatic effect that doesn't kill anyone. The alternative is getting hit by whatever they're trying to do, which seems like a much worse idea in terms of avoiding terrible damage.

And frankly, if you're not willing to risk horrible injury, then you wouldn't be a Lord Magister, never mind one challenging for the Supreme Boss position.
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The point of the duel is to defeat the opponent, not kill or maim them. Yes, both of those things are a risk that you accept when you step up to challenge, but they're not a certainty. The belt is, and it's one that leaves a form of permanent damage on its victim- they can no longer cast a spell that they probably put a lot of time and effort into mastering. That's a decidedly non-trivial loss of capability that will take them significant time to recover from (relearning the spell and pushing it to their previous skill level), and that harms the Empire by reducing their capabilities in the meantime. Basically, I view it as similar to going into the duel having decided in advance that no matter what you're going to cut the opponent's hand off, rather than that simply being a risk of high-level combat.

Essentially, I see the 'we're all actually on the same side' part of the duel as being extremely important, and thus deliberately going for attacks or defences that have long-term consequences as both being in rather bad taste and also being a bad idea just pragmatically.
 
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NuclearConsensus said:
Post-waystone (if successful) means a very important and shiny feather in Mathilde's cap. Might be just the kind of thing to get consideration as an actually worthy candidate (battle skills aside).
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While the Waystone project succeeding would be a major achievement, I feel like it would naturally make her more of a shoo-in for the more academic positions in the grey order rather than anything else, since the other positions rely more on being able to wave magic around on a battlefield. It would make her the natural successor to the position of Dean, Senior Fellow, Editor-In-Chief, Archivist, or Librarian.
 
NuclearConsensus said:
A few turns ago I thought the same about Mathilde getting an apprentice and well... Now that miracle looks within arms reach nothing's impossible for me anymore.

Post-waystone (if successful) means a very important and shiny feather in Mathilde's cap. Might be just the kind of thing to get consideration as an actually worthy candidate (battle skills aside).
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I'd say Nagarythe-trip first, or perhaps if we can get something useful Ulgu-wise from the Eonir. Something Dragomas hasn't seen before.
 
BurnNote said:
It's potentially lethal duels. And a (induced) misscast can be much more awful and permanent consequences. After all, the belt doesn't prevent you from relearning the spell. As far as negative consequences go, that's fairly tame.
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That's kind of why I'd rather Mathilde didn't take part in those. Being Magister Patriarch could be fun, but not fun enough to risk quest end or the death of Dragomas, one of the best wizards of the empire.
 
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BaseDeltaZero said:
It can. Penumbral Pendulum is rather nasty (at least as game mechanics go), and Pit of Shades is as well... also totally lethal, so points against it there. But using debuffs like Mystifying Miasma to weaken the enemy such that they know they can't beat us also works. I think that with Branallhune we just might be able to defeat a dragon that was fighting at half speed. And we're actually good at casting Mystifying Miasma.
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I mean in comparison to the other lores and for dueling. Vortexes and line spells are great, but suffer from the problems of not being suited to a duel. Debuffs are good for setting up the killing blow, but do nothing to counter the enemy attacking you, as the Jade with Throne of Vines demonstrated. Ulgu is great for supporting armies, but not so much for dealing direct damage.
 
Pempelune said:
That's kind of why I'd rather Mathilde didn't take part in those. Being Magister Patriarch could be fun, but not fun enough to risk quest end or the death of Dragomas, one of the best wizards of the empire.
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There are Jade Battle Wizards on standby who are capable of casting Regrowth, which revives recently dead. The scenarios in which actual permanent death can occur is one of the high tier instadeath spells like Dwellers or Pit of Shades, a miscast so bad it sucks you into the realm of chaos, or a complete implosion/explosion preventing you from being pieced together. All of those are possibilities, but not very likely ones.
 
BoneyM said:
Intentional. It strengthens the Order of the rightful Supreme Patriarch and provides a strong incentive for the Colleges to stick to the approved method of transferring power.
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Ironic, considering the current ruling order is the one that barely makes use of Altdorf... :V
 
So: What we've seen here, rough guesstimates

Whatever the Fuck Alric Was Doing: While it seems Alric didn't do anything, he also did have a chance of winning on the rolls, so we know he wasn't just throwing for... some reason.
I stick with my theory that he was hoping to counter Dragomas' transformation spell. However, Dragomas knew this and outwitted him by casting a much simpler, harder to counter spell to transfix him long enough to get the staff - which would make it hard to impossible for the counterspell plan to work.
Anburg: Casts Throne Of Vines, to make subsequent magic easier to cast. (Possibly something like Regeneration, possibly Dwellers Below/Awakening of the Wood?) Dragomas defeats her by dragoning over to her throne, she casts Stoneskin but calculates it will not protect her sufficiently for whatever her plan was to work, and yields.
Gold Wizard: Final Transformation, maybe? Gets counterspelled and shamed out of the arena, basically.
Celestial Wizard: Seemingly, layering on All The Self Buffs in the effort to self-buff even harder than Dragomas... which he counters by instead i
Interestingly, no one seemed to be attempting the Go For Staff Immediately gambit.

NSMS said:
It's more the 'burn the knowledge of the spell out of their mind' aspect that concerns me. And we did see several people here open with targeted battlemagic (massive thorn onrush, Dragomas using Amber Spear).
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No, I mean, 'burn the knowledge of the spell out of your mind' is a possible miscast effect.

MonkeyTypewriter said:
Dragon did occasionally cast spells, he might do so on us. The real issue is that it has a 12 hour recharge rate. Its much better for punking an unacceptable challenger than actually holding the position.
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Sure, but his One Neat Trick is a self-cast, frying one of the spells he casts on us isn't nearly as good. I mean, if it's Amber Spear that's... helpful? Do magic missiles count?

Nerdasaurus Rex said:
The only strategy I can think off is to go invisible, teleport and then apply a shadow knife to the kidneys whilst trying to counterspell everything thrown at us. And I'm not sure that would work against a dragon.
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Where are a dragon's kidneys, anyways?

Nerdasaurus Rex said:
If we assume that we're roughly around the same strength as Arburg (who's an experianced battlewizard, by the way), then that means we'd have to double our strength just to get even odds against Dagomas, and considering Arburg's opening gambit was to make a battle altar, I'm not sure we are in the same power bracket at all.
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Yeah, but Ghyran has a 'make a battle altar' spell, Throne of Vines. Ulgu doesn't. It's comparing apples to knives.

GrimTheMad said:
The biggest reason remains that we don't actually want the job, nor will we for the foreseeable future.
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Heh. I suspect a sizable minority of Supreme Patriarchs have been 'OKAY SO I'M GONNA FIGHT AND IT'S GONNA BE AWESOME! ... shit I actually won and have responsibilities now." (Wanderer guy sounds like a good example)

nixter said:
Would it be wrong to turn off the Staff of Volans with our sword?
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Is that temporary? If so, probably not morally but probably a bad move tactically. Also it might not work, the Staff of Volans is Serious Business.

Codex said:
The scenarios in which actual permanent death can occur is one of the high tier instadeath spells like Dwellers
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Dwellers Below is more a 'insta-dragged underground by evil trees' spell. This is generally fatal but not definitively so to the extent of like, Final Transmutation or Pit of Shades. Or Spirit Drain.
 
Omegahugger said:
I like Arburg's moxie. She, a newly graduated Lord Magister, just saw Dragomas beat down the Patriarch of an entire College without casting a single spell, and her immediate thought was "Yeah, I can take him".

This is the sort of initiative we need to see in young Lord Magisters in these trying times.
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Admit it, you just want a powerfull corpse when they inevitably puch the wrong dragon.

Angelform said:
Well that was fun.

Interesting that the position has explicit impact on the local arcane meteorology. Wonder if that was intentional or unavoidable.

Nice to see Mathilde hanging with peers. People she is comfortable not putting on a show for.

Probably why he tried in the first place. Securing the top job would have made his position nigh-unassailable. And failure probably hasn't changed much about his odds of holding his seat, compared to doing nothing.
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Yea, it did seem like a desperation play on his part.

NSMS said:
Ironic, considering the current ruling order is the one that barely makes use of Altdorf... :V
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But if fighting started, they would already have the upper hand.
 
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BaseDeltaZero said:
Is that temporary? If so, probably not morally but probably a bad move tactically. Also it might not work, the Staff of Volans is Serious Business.
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[Rune of Superior Skill: any foe struck by this sword has all magical weapons, armour, items, and positive magical effects cease working for several minutes. Though an original rune, the effect is very similar to Thorek Ironbrow's prototype rune. Knowing Kragg, this is almost certainly deliberate.]

It's temporary. Not sure if it gets contested by sheer dint of how cool the staff is, could see it go either way there.
BaseDeltaZero said:
Yeah, but Ghyran has a 'make a battle altar' spell, Throne of Vines. Ulgu doesn't.
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Spell idea? Maybe a bit too ostentatious for the grey order, but something like Shadowcloak that also buffs casting could maybe work
 
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BaseDeltaZero said:
Dwellers Below is more a 'insta-dragged underground by evil trees' spell. This is generally fatal but not definitively so to the extent of like, Final Transmutation or Pit of Shades. Or Spirit Drain.
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In the table top, Dwellers below is a Strength Save or Die spell. No Saves allowed. So yeah it's an instadeath spell, which is balanced out by it being the spell with possibly the highest casting value in the game, hardest spell you could cast.
 
NSMS said:
No, but we'd probably get a few funny looks and some grumbling.
Hmm... what would the reaction be to just shooting Dragomas the second the duel starts?
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Seriously?
I expect Dragomas will have a counter measure to that. Its a common enough problem for battle wizards and I don't remember if he was one of them rather than just a rights advocate but I expect he's had to consider the question before.
 
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