Roleplay / Warhammer Fantasy Divided Loyalties

Within the borders of the Empire of Man, the Elector Counts are among the highest of nobility, second only to the Emperor and - arguably, very arguably - the High Priests. Their word is all but law over the countless thousands of souls within their province.

You are not an Elector Count. But you are the next best thing.

You have secured a position in the Privy Council of a newly-arisen Elector Count, an instrument for their will in a specific domain. But also an instrument for your own will; because like all people, you have your own ambitions. The way you present information, the solutions you present, the options you put towards them and how you explain them; all of these will allow you a great deal of leeway in how you go about your business, and to pursue your own private goals.

— Opening blurb

The Elector-Count of Stirland has died, the last of his family line. The position now lies empty, so the powers that be have selected a new Elector to hold it. With him comes his council of advisors - including the protagonist, Mathilde Weber, freshly-promoted Journeywoman of the Grey Order, selected to his council not by him, but by a mysterious conspiracy that holds power over her.

Divided Loyalties is a Warhammer Fantasy quest hosted by Sufficient Velocity.com and run by Boney.

A fan of earlier Warhammer quests centered around the ruler of a realm with a council of advisors based on the set-up of the Crusader Kings series, Boney began to consider: what were the lives of these advisors like? Did they have their own agendas? Did they put forward ideas they favored and hold others back? Were their loyalties divided between the ruler they advised and their own ambitions?

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Divided Loyalties contains examples of:

• Absurdly Sharp Blade: Branulhune, the greatsword that Mathilde commissions from Kragg the Grim, has his personal Master Rune, which causes the blade to hit with force up to a cannonball. It's not conventionally absurdly sharp, but it always hits with the exact force to perfectly cut something, so the end result is a blade that cuts through almost anything with zero wasted effort.
  • In his station as Elector Count of Stirland, Abelhelm Van Hal wields the Stirland Runefang Orc Hewer, which like all Runefangs was created by the master-Runelord Alaric the Mad to cut through anything. Mathilde also briefly wields Orc Hewer when Abelhelm falls in battle, to defend him.
  • The Ithilmar sword wielded by Asarnil the Dragonlord has been noted in-story that it would seem almost too thin to be practical if it wasn't made from one of the strongest materials on the planet. He uses it to great effect in battle, and in a challenge against a Norscan who made the mistake of asking if he was a Druchii.
• Academy of Evil: Stalking the base of a vampire who had repeatedly attempted to assassinate Roswita Van Hal, Mathilde discovers he has set up an entire college devoted to teaching necromancy, complete with the students wearing black robes to ape the colored robes of the official Colleges. After infiltrating and clearing out the "college", she takes the legers and records and presents them to the Supreme Patriarch of the Orders of Magic, which gets the Battle Wizards of the Empire deployed to Sylvania.
• Achievements in Ignorance: During the Battle of Karag Nar, Mathilde interrupts an ongoing ritual done by several Black Orc Priests by assassinating them in increasingly brutal ways. Their ritual was attempting to separate the worship of Gork and Mork (Gods of Brutality and Cunning, respectively) to create or assert the worship of Only Gork, so Mathilde starting off with assassination (cunning) and then becoming increasingly less subtle as she went on (brutality) essentially caused a counter-ritual of sorts - asserting the nature of Gork and Mork as Brutality and Cunning working together instead of Mork’s Only Cunning.
• Action Girl: Given the state of the world of Warhammer Fantasy, it's rarer to find a female character who isn't one of these.
  • Mathilde herself began to her journey towards becoming one upon happening across a zombie in Eagle Castle by frantically stabbing it with a dagger until it died, After that embarrassing display, Mathilde approached the Stirland Greatswords, bodyguards to the Elector-Count, to be taught in swordfighting, and has constantly been involved in combat and danger since.
  • Ljiljana, Ice Crone of Kislev, dealt with a hostile encampment of Kul Chaos tribesman by assaulting it from the front with an ice storm and bear-hurricane, and broke a Chaos Champion of Khorne's neck with her bare hands.
  • Elector Countess Roswita Van Hal also counts, having become very experienced fighting vampires out of Sylvania over the years.
• Activation Sequence: The Eye of Gazul gets two. The first during the test firing with King Kazador using the control panel, and the second when Mathilde takes manual control to use it against Waaagh Birdmuncha.
• Animal Motifs: Ranald is frequently associated with cats. Particularly when He uses them to communicate with Mathilde in the most obtuse way possible.
  • Ulric is frequently associated with wolves, and the Knight Order dedicated to Him ride giant wolves into battle.
  • The Kislev God Ursun is a literal bear.
• Anyone Can Die: Regardless of their canonical status in Warhammer Fantasy or importance to the quest itself, Boney has made clear to the audience that if it is sufficiently plausible, anyone can die, particularly due to the Quest taking place decades before Warhammer Fantasy's 'present day'.
  • Of canonical characters, Viggo Hexensohn, Magister Patriarch of the Amethyst Order dies under somewhat unclear circumstances while pursuing his own agenda in the catacombs during the Battle of Drakenhof.
  • Another canonical character, Magister Jovi Sunscryer of the Light Order, suffers a miscast and explodes during the same battle. Mathilde later uses him as a cautionary tale after she catches Panoramia participating in a battle after Mathilde told her to sit it out because she was tired.
  • Due to the butterflies resulting from in-quest events, Karl Franz is never born in the first place, and Skarsnik is killed by his subordinates before truly rising to power.
  • Much to the horror of many questers, Gotrek Gurnisson dies an anticlimactic and sudden death to a freak accident from a series of unlucky dice rolls during the expedition to Karag Dum, preventing him from finding ever finding Grimnir's Axe and becoming the worst Slayer. Ironically this could actually be considered a significantly happier fate for him than Canon, especially since it also averted the fate of his family.
  • The beastman warherd of Khazrak One-Eye is mentioned to have been cornered by the forces of Middenland and the Eonir of Laurelorn and wiped out offscreen. This provides the foundation for the Eonir to ally with Middenland as protection against encroachment into Laurelorn Forest by Nordland.
  • With Clan Mors annihilated during the battles in and around Karak Eight Peaks, Queek Headtaker will likely never exist.
  • Of quest-original characters, the most stand-out example is Elector Count Abelhelm Van Hal, who died in circumstances that could have been salvaged had there not been a string of bad rolls involved in his fate.
  • Mathilde herself has no Plot Armor from being the protagonist. There have been several times where she has been explicitly close to death, and on one occasion Boney noted a roll of "1" would have ended the quest instantly.
• Artificial Limbs Are Stronger: During the Karag Dum expedition, Mathilde purchases a golden arm with talons instead of fingers from Uzkulak. Some time later, after studying it with Egrimm, the two conclude it's a magical prosthetic of some sort. Johann enthusiastically consents to trying it out even if it means cutting his current arm off (the prosthetic could be removed and his arm reattached via magic in case he changes his mind). The arm shows itself to be an overall upgrade over Johann's gilded arm, as it is incredible tough and its claws sharp, and can release a spell of Shem's Burning Gaze from its palm.
• Asskicking Leads to Leadership: Par for the course for the Orcs, where the Biggest and Strongest becomes the Boss, and any Orc wishing to ursup that position can do so similarly.
  • As in canon, the same applies for the position of Supreme Patriarch over the Empire's Orders of Magic: every eight years the Lord and Lady Magisters convene in a special obsidian arena, where any Lord or Lady Magisters may step forth in a one-to-one duel for the position of Supreme Patriarch/Matriarch. This is because the Orders were formed after the Great War Against Chaos, and in the event of another such war, the Supreme Patriarch will be the one to lead the Orders against the armies of Chaos - such a leader needs to have the strength to do so, not just good management skills. As Mathilde gets to see for herself, the current Supreme Patriarch, Dragomas of the Amber Order, has won against all challenges partially thanks to his ability to transform into a Cathayan dragon.
• Attack Reflector: Mathilde's Runic belt contains the Rune of Rancour, which grants the fortitude to withstand attacks and returns all strikes she takes two-fold to her attacker.
  • It also contains the Spellburner Rune, which can counter a spell targeted at her and literally burn the knowledge of how to cast it from the caster's mind.
• Badass Family: Abelhelm and Roswita are part of the Van Hals, who descend from the necromancer Frederick Van Hal, known as Vanhel, who introduced wide-scale use of necromancy to the Empire. The family since then has been inexorably tied to Witch Hunters, with members frequently being Witch-Hunters themselves. The average noble line in the Empire lasts a few centuries at best, but the Van Hal line has lasted for well over a millennia while being tied to the most dangerous profession in the Empire.
• BFS: Mathilde’s weapon of choice is a greatsword.
  • After the reclamation of Karak Eight Peaks Mathilde commissions a runic sword from Kragg the Grim. Branulhune ("the art of cleverness in moonlight" or “Moonlit Wit”) is a Runic Gromril Greatsword capable of cutting with as much strength as the wielder needs (up to the power of a cannonball), disables the enchantments and spells empowering those it manages to strike, and may simply disappear and reappear at will, freeing up space and ensuring the wielder is never disarmed. It is one of the mightiest weapons of the modern age and arguably rivals even the ancient wonders such as the Runefangs.
• Big Eater: Warboss Birdmuncha the Really Zoggin' Big, Warlord of Black Crag adjacent to Karak Eight Peaks, launches his attack on the Karak solely to try to eat the dragon Cython.
• Bizarrchitecture: Each of the Colleges of Magic is much Bigger on the Inside, and they each have their own crazy architectural quirks, from the Bright College's intense heat to the Light College's gigantic light maze. Mathilde discovers the Grey College has a pocket dimension created by Teclis when she is promoted to Lady Magister.
• Bling of War: Johann, Gold Wizard. While as a wizard he generally can't wear armor, his skin has been magically gilded to be harder to pierce than many armors... while also being completely gold.
  "Got the arms done while I was in Altdorf," [Johann] tells you in between raids. "Last outside part I had left, except for the head, which, yeah. 'Don't gild your head until you can take on arbitrary amounts of hungry peasants' is what they say."
• Body-Count Competition: Mathilde winds up in a competition with King Kazador Thunderhorn of Karak Azul over who can kill more Warbosses during the fighting for Karak Eight Peaks. The two of them rack up quite the tally, much to each other's amusement.
• Breath Weapon: Cython, the Emperor Ice Dragon that made their home in Karag Ziflin of Karak Eight Peaks, breathes ice, and makes their surroundings so cold that the frost line on Ziflin is lower than the adjacent peaks.
• Bunny-Ears Lawyer: Anton Kiesinger II, at first glance, seemed wholly unsuited for the role of Diplomat on the council of Stirland, acting more like an enthusiastic puppy than a political wheeler and dealer. And then he pulls off such amazing feats as untangling a massive bureaucratic mess in a way that leaves everyone satisfied, going off to hire a few mercenaries and coming back with Asarnil the Dragonlord, and getting Nuln and Zhufbar to compete as to who can supply more cannon for the campaign against Drakenhof. Mathilde eventually concludes that, by being so genuinely non-threatening, people can't help but take Anton's words at face value rather than searching them for hidden hooks or barbs.
• Call-Back: In Turn 1, Mathilde explores Eagle Castle, attempting to find some sort of Secret Room or passage by prodding wall sconces and protruding bricks, like in some of the adventure novels she’s read before. Eventually, she does find a hidden passage behind a Concealing Canvas, but all it holds is a barred-up door with some manner of unidentified undead creature behind it, which she has to dispatch. Much, much later, in Turn 39, Mathilde manages to find an actual secret room revealed by a wall sconce.

  Behind it, you find not the sort of thing that you were hoping for, but perhaps the kind of thing the you of twenty years ago might have expected to find behind a hidden door.

  • In the results of Turn 22, Mathilde visits Algard, the Magister Patriarch of the Grey Order. When he asks what brings her to Altdorf, she replies, "the best kind of good news", which Algard quips would either be Malekith's death or a full-blown Skaven civil war. Mathilde says it's "The kind that would have been very bad news, except it ends with 'and I took care of it'," and presents him with proof of the College of Necromancy. During the social of the next turn, however, she visits him again bringing "the best kind of good news", and when Algard wryly asks if it's "the kind that would be very bad news except [Mathilde] took care of it", she replies that it is in fact a full-blown Skaven civil war.
• Casting a Shadow: Being a Grey Wizard, Mathilde can only safely use the Grey Wind of Ulgu, the Lore of Shadows.
• Citadel City: Nuln is a very well defended city. There's the hilltop palace that used to house the emperor, two major temples dedicated to martial gods (Sigmar and the Goddess of War Myrmidia) that are built to match Their domains, The College of Engineering which is dedicated to teaching how to build defences and is built to show off those skills, and the Imperial Gunnery School which is absolutely bristling with artillery. To top it off the whole city is surrounded by 20 foot walls patrolled by professional soldiers. Unfortunately, none of this is able to prevent the Skaven from opening a massive sinkhole that swallows up the Town Hall, Hall of Archives, and the Imperial Gunnery School. Luckily the Gunnery School had just finished opening a branch in Karak Eight Peaks, which involved copying over all of their material to the Dwarves...
• Combat Pragmatist: Mathilde has been noted a number of times to favor simple yet effective solutions over flashy or exciting ones.
  • During her tests to graduate as a Magister, Mathilde starts the duel test by drawing a pistol and shooting her opponent in the chest.
  • While scouting Karag Lhune for Belegar's Expedition, Mathilde sees a number of Doom Diver catapults and is presented with various ways of sabatoging them. She elects instead to set fire to the wings worn by the catapults' ammunition. The sight of the typically feared Doom Divers launching, immediately plummeting, and landing over a hundred yards away from them causes Belegar, Kragg the Grim, and Ulthar to debate if maybe the manlings legalizing their Zhufokri wasn't such a bad idea after all.
  • As noted in Magic Misfire below, Mathilde nudges a spell by Orc shamans just enough to cause a catastrophic miscast. When the survivors try to connect their magic to the Waaagh energy of the Orcs fighting at the front, Mathilde waits until the connection is formed and then pokes a hole in it, sucking all the Waaagh energy out of the fighting front and leaving them easy pickings, while filling the shamans with so much Waaagh energy that they cut each other down in their frenzy.
• Conflicting Loyalty: The Central Theme of the quest. Mathilde starts out the quest torn between her association with the Grey Order, loyalty to the Empire, worship of Ranald (a borderline-forbidden god of thieves), her own personal desires and needing to follow the orders of the mysterious conspiracy that put her in the position of Spymistress.
  Boney: [...] So now it's time to put you in that role and see how you do. It's not that you're disloyal, exactly. In fact, you're very loyal. It's just that not all that loyalty is to the same person.
  • However, as time went on and the voter base consistently voted to prioritize the well-being of the Empire and the Empire's allies over her own personal gain, the more blatant options to benefit Mathilde over the Empire or its allies were gradually phased out, because it was felt that they no longer would be in-character for her to do.
• Consummate Liar: Mathilde and most of the rest of the Grey College is made up of people who use the Wind of shadow and deception, and as such they are institutionally trained to lie and obfuscate the truth in all manner of ways.
  • In Turn 40, Mathilde is monologued at by a Lord of Change. Being what it is, it is completely unknown how much of what it says is truth and how much lies. And being that Mathilde is a Grey Wizard, it takes full advantage of this to inflict paranoia on Mathilde (and the thread).
    "Do you know how much effort it normally takes to craft a platter of truth and lies that will so haunt a mortal that they will spend the rest of their days trying their best to decorticate it? But you and yours who have so wonderfully usurped the Sword of Tlanxla have so twisted your own minds that I could say anything or nothing and you will dwell obligingly on it forever. If I said 'I like your hat' - and I really, really do - you will wonder, is this an example of the pettiest of statements for you to nevertheless obsess over, to demonstrate that I can command your mind through only your ears? Or am I making a deeper statement about how truly it pleases the Lord of Sorcery for a witch to wear the garb of those that would hunt her? Am I masking truth in lies, or lies in truth? Would it only be a truth if you decide it a lie, or only a lie if you decide it a truth? Or is eternal indecision that which I seek?"
• Cool Chair: One of the rewards Mathilde got for dismantling the College of Necromancy was a dragon skull that could only be used for aesthetic purposes. Mathilde has the skull turned into a fantastic reading chair.
• Critical Failure: The Quest Master Boney tends to roll for most incidents, with results of a 'natural 1' typically being disastrous or drastically shifting a given situation for the worst.
  • Frequent during the Sieges of the Drakenhof: Due to these, the charge of Stirland's army fails where Mathilde's and Abelhelm's succeeds, leaving them completely surrounded by undead; in the subsequent melee, Abelhelm fell in combat, leaving him with a terrible stomach wound that he would eventually die from; Magister Jovi Sunscryer died from a horrific miscast, and was subsequently unable to heal Abelhelm; and Magister Patriarch Hexensohn died from undisclosed circumstances from touching something, leaving Stirland's army with no wizards other than Mathilde herself.
  • While trying to learn more of intrigue while preparing for her Magister exams, a natural 1 heralded not failure on Mathilde's part but a terrible set of circumstances that meant her master would be too busy to actually teach her anything. Much later, he revealed that the circumstances in question were that the conspiracy that ensnared him and Mathilde had suborned the Empress herself, and that he had to kill her. Had he not found an Amethyst Magister to help cover up the truth and pass it off as natural circumstances, the Empire could have found itself in very hot waters.
  • While Roswita continues the Sylvanian campaign, she finds incredible in destroying the Hunger Woods Strigoi due to one of these, as they had been at each others' throats and the army of Stirland only needs to wipe out the remaining and tired victor.
  • During the Karag Dum expedition, one of these is responsible for one of the monitors to be completely devastated, killing a good number of dwarves and also the head engineer, canon character Gotrek Gurnisson.
  • In Turn 40, while studying more of Aethyric Vitae, Mathilde is unlucky enough to attract the attention of a Lord of Change, who proceeds to deliver her an incredible monologue into the past, filling her (and the thread) full of incredible paranoia, while also inviting her to the Everchosen Tournament.
• Cunning Linguist: A subverted example: Asarnil the Dragonlord agrees to Anton's suggestion to dictate his memoirs, but only if the account could be written in Eltharin. A scholar from the University of Altdorf arrives to do so, but the man's understanding of Eltharin is stilted and formal and Asarnil sends the scholar away in disgust. The University of Altdorf having a rivalry with the Colleges of Magic, Mathilde can't help a feeling of schadenfreude watching the humiliated scholar flee back to Altdorf.
  • Fortunately, a straight example follows right afterward: Mathilde herself learned Eltharin at the Grey College, and steps in to offer her own services. The memoir is hugely successful and Asarnil himself is so grateful to finally converse in his native language that he develops an appreciation for Mathilde (even if he is so supremely arrogant that there are no humans he sees as peers).
• Cut the Juice: In order to dispel the spell keeping Karak Vlag in the Aether Mathilde first thought she would need months and an expert team, but then she realized she could just go to the next waystone upstream on the leyline powering the spell and block it. So instead it just took three days of waiting for the power to run out.
  • In a meta sense, this was a wonderful example of the thread Taking a Third Option, as the choices presented by Boney would have either scuttled the Karag Dum Expedition to save Vlag, or abandoned Vlag to its fate to continue to Dum. Boney has pointed to the "Cut the Juice" decision as a specific example of how write-in votes can be surprisingly good.
• Dawn of an Era: Some characters have joked that with the amount of positive changes Mathilde has done for the Karaz Ankor, it should be the Mathilde Age now.
• Did You Just Scam Cthulhu?: Happens almost literally after Mathilde interrupts the Black Orc Priests’ ritual. Of the many options presented on how to survive the ensuing maelstrom of energies, the voter base decided on praying to Ranald for help. Being a god of luck and cunning, associated with theft and trickery, he literally steals Mork and Gork's energies, empowering himself in the process, and sharing some of that newfound power with Mathilde in the form of a divine relic.
• Die or Fly: An important part of learning for magic users. Many peoples awakenings to magic are in response to danger, and human spellcasters sometimes spontaneously invent spells or gain spell masteries in life threatening situations. The Colleges of Magic's Journeying is basically a more controlled version of this.
• Divide and Conquer: A non-villianous example. The changed timeline means Belegar's Expedition arrives in Karak Eight Peaks during a Skaven civil war, and Clans Eshin, Skryre, and Moulder have all gathered in the Karak to hunt Clan Mors... as well as fighting each other to be the one who succeeds against Mors. Keeping the Skaven balanced against each other and the Orcs, so that none of them either win or unite against the Expedition, is a major challenge of the reconquest arc.
  • Which makes it darkly funny when Mathilde accidentally kicks the whole thing off after she and Johann steal a gas mask from a Clan Skryre laboratory. For good reason does Mathilde decide never to admit she knows what made the dragon suddenly attack Skryre.
• Divine Conflict: Just like everyone else in Warhammer, the gods often get into fights. Some examples we see on screen are:
  • After finding a shine to Stromfels in the Sunken Palace, Mathilde has two priests of Ranald resanctify it. This causes a small duel between the two Gods
  • While scouting Karak Nar, Mathilde encounters an attempt to split Gork and Mork. Thanks to her interruption this doesn't work, but the two still have a fight, which allows Ranald to fleece them both in the aftermath.
  • Several Gods have their attention on Karak Eight Peaks as Mathilde uses the Eye of Gazul against Waaagh Birdmuncha:
  In the instant before a half a million deaths, the Karak suddenly seems very, very small, and you can feel the attention of immense powers upon it. One is as familiar to you as your own soul, and you can feel His amusement and anticipation. Another has just thrummed through your soul, and His attention is already moving on. A third eyes the Karak dubiously, and nudges His brother to go deal with it, who nudges back, no, you go deal with it, and the two fall to bickering. Ranald, Gazul, and Gork and Mork, respectively
  (one, encompassed within a single body but no less powerful for it, moves through halls of stone long remembered, a pat on a shoulder here, a gruff word of encouragement there) Grombrindal
  (one, brooding and angry and indecisive, has a fraction of His attention here, but in the same way that a fraction of your attention might linger on the throb of an old scar) The Horned Rat
  • During a raid on a Kul encampment several gods end up fighting, specifically the gods of Kislev and Ranald against Khorne.
• Divine Intervention: The Gods are fairly active in this world, and Mathilde specifically often gets some help from Ranald to tip the scales. Other characters have had help from their own Gods as well, including Ljiljana from the Kislev Gods and Kasmir from Sigmar. Villianous examples also apply, however, as the Chaos Gods are just as happy to lend their assistance to their followers.
• Double Meaning: Eltharin is an entire language of double, triple, and even quadruple meanings, which bedevils anyone trying to use it to speak clearly. Mathilde manages.
  "Harathoi lalinoi horinar-enthlai, caladai-indrion," is your reply, and it's one you've been working on since Nordland. A simple translation would be 'I bring a better offer,' but it also has connotations of enjoyability, splendor, the inducement of jealousy, a hint at what that offer might be, and a double meaning of 'herald' that you're quite proud of. Eltharin is that kind of language.
• The Dreaded: Mathilde's tenure as Spymistress of Stirland involved a fair amount of traveling about on her Ulgu spell "Shadowsteed", usually with very unhappy results for her targets. She is shocked to discover that her activities have gained her quite the reputation amongst Stirland's citizenry.
  "The Dämmerlichtreiter," the man breathes.

  You blink in surprise at him. "The what now?" You had been prepared for all sorts of reactions, but not calling you that.

  He stares, wild-eyed, pointing accusingly. "You! The Rider of Dusk! The woman who rides the coming of night across Stirland, bringing ruin to the enemies of the Hunter-Count!"
  • Later on it becomes a little more literal when Mathilde learns the spell "Dread Aspect", which projects a supernaturally terrifying aura around her. Mathilde uses it to great effect when causing chaos behind enemy lines.
• Elaborate Underground Base: The Dwarves are a master of making these. They have to live in them because too much magic makes a dwarf turn into stone, so they have to make use of stone's excellent magic insulation properties.
• Eternal English: While languages in Warhammer do still change, they do it much slower than in real life. Boney's explanation for this is that almost all languages are descended from either the Old One's tongue, or from Daemonic, which means words have some genuine conceptual resonance with the concepts they represent rather than just being a collection of semi-random sounds.
• Exact Words: Khazalid is an entire language of Exact Words, and the extreme precision of that language has proven both helpful and harmful to Mathilde during and after the expedition to Karag Dum.
  • On the helpful side, Mathilde is able to precisely relay to Belegar the exact words Borek said regarding the leylines connecting Karak Eight Peaks to Karaz-A-Karak and avert a growing schism between Belegar and High King Thorgrim Grudgebearer.
  • On the harmful side, when Mathilde asks her trade partner from the Yusak Tribe regarding the state of "The Dum", the precision of Khazalid leaves Mathilde unaware that "the Dum" the Yusak shaman refers to is not Karag Dum, the expedition's objective, but Cor-Dum, the Khazalid name for Morghur the Shadowgave.
• Familiar: Somewhat common among wizards. They can either be natural animals with the special potential for it, or strange creatures created by magic for the propose of being one. Mathilde has one of her own named Wolf, who is The Bestest Boy.
  • Humorously, Wolf's playful nature is later cited by Panoramia as the reason why she stops falling for Mathilde's "Terrifying Magister" front.
  Panoramia: "Familiars are tricky, but he's a dog, and dogs are what their masters make them. You could have made him sneaky and sly, or you could have made him vicious and intimidating. But you didn't. Even after he was fully grown, he stayed a happy, playful puppy."
• Fantastic Fighting Style:
  • Mathilde makes one based off of the unique property presented by Branulhune's ability to disappear into nothingness and reappear in her hands at a thought. The result is a very effective style that denies human-sized opponents all or most of their defensive capacities when Mathilde attacks them, making her far more deadly than she previously was.
  • The followers of Grungni, the Dwarven god of mining, have a style of unarmed fighting called The Way of the Pick that relies on durability. Its training involves punching boulders. Johann has no problem learning this style, as he has transformed most of his body to have the conceptual properties of gold, making it extremely hard.
• Fantastic Naming Convention: It is not uncommon for colligate wizards to have a mononym, such as with Johann or Panoramia.
• Fantastic Slurs: "Magister" is pretty much the only commonly-used word in Reikspiel for a magic user than doesn't have a negative connotation.
• Farm Girl: Mathilde was born to a peasant family on a farm in the Stirlandian town of Kelham, and probably would have stayed there had she not made a wooden toy horse neigh with nascent magic. Her own family and the entire town attempted to burn her at the stake before she was saved by the town watchman, who kept her for a few days until a Grey Wizard named Regimand arrived to bring her to the College. Mathilde has mused that without magic, she'd likely be married and on her fifth or sixth child if she hadn't died to sickness or some gribbly out of Sylvania.
• Fighting for a Homeland: Alongside Belegar Ironhammer and Clan Angrund (see For Want Of A Nail below), this is the reason why the Halflings join Belegar's Expedition. Several times over the preceding years the Moot has been razed by invading armies and the Halflings almost wiped out. By supporting Belegar's Expedition the Halflings aim to win a second home in the most secure place imaginable: the heart of a Dwarfhold.
• Food God: Some humans insult the Halflings for having a god of food as the head of their pantheon. The Halfling response is that they must be very sure they know where their next meal is coming from.
• For Want Of A Nail: The ripples of Mathilde’s actions and the larger events of the quest leave deep impacts on the world of Warhammer Fantasy, especially when compared to how many events played out in WHF canon.
  • Thanks to Mathilde's efforts as Spymaster of Stirland, a major Lahmian conspiracy is unraveled and Stirland united quite firmly under its Elector Count Abelhelm Van Hal.
  • With a Stirland united against the vampire threat, Abelheim is able to go on the offensive into Sylvania, which culminates in large swathes of the haunted land cleared out, the occupation of many of Sylvania's larger towns, and even leveling Castle Drakenhof.
  • After the success of the campaign against Drakenhof, Elector Countess Roswita Van Hal attempts to replace Stirland's common crossbows with firearms and fires Mathilde from the council of Stirland. Because of this, large amounts of crossbow troops leave Stirland looking for work, while Mathilde returns to Altdorf to graduate as a Magister and figure out what to do next.
  • Meanwhile, Belegar Ironhammer has petitioned the Empire for assistance to help him reclaim his ancestral home of Karak Eight Peaks. In WHF canon after Belegar failed to gain support at the Elector Count meeting he returned to the Karaz Ankor in disgust before striking out with Clan Angrund alone. In-quest, on the other hand, even though the Elector's meeting went as it did, the large amount of Stirlandian forces wishing to join the expedition surprises the Dwarf, and rather than leave immediately Belegar decides to stay in the Empire a little longer to see if he can drum up more forces. It succeeds incredibly, allowing Belegar to recruit not just the Stirlanders, but also a force of halflings from The Moot, two orders of Empire Knights, and several wizards including Mathilde herself.
  • Belegar's fantastic success recruiting in the Empire in turn leads the various Dwarfholds to reevaluate his expedition and devote much more support to it than they would otherwise. The end result is Belegar's expedition is much greater than it is in WHF canon, and instead of becoming a revanchist outpost like in canon successfully reclaims the entirety of Karak Eight Peaks, which in turn has yet more branching impacts whose effects are still being seen.
  • The ritual to separate Gork and Mork in canon created two avatars of the Orc Gods: one of Only Cunning (Skarsnik) and one of Only Brutality (Grimgor Ironhide). By accidentally performing the counter-ritual Mathilde prevents this split from happening, and soon afterward a half-grown Skarsnik is shanked by one of his subordinates. What effects (if any) it has for Grimgor are still unknown.
  • Canon Karak Azul suffered substantial casualties to a sneak-attack by heavily armored Greenskins; the larger Karaz Ankor had developed gunpowder weapons specifically to deal with them, but Karak Azul, cut off for generations, never acquired them. Thanks to the aforementioned successful conquest of Karak Eight Peaks, Karak Azul is now reconnected to the larger Dwarven empire, and several times have been explicitly noted to be purchasing gunpowder weapons.
  • With Karak Eight Peaks fully retaken, Belegar Ironhammer assembles his full ancestral crown and dons it, which activates the Waystone Network of the Karak to begin sending power on to Karaz-A-Karak. Unbeknownst to Belegar, Mathilde, or almost any other character, Thorgrim Grudgebearer had been literally forced to watch as the runic power of the Karaz Ankor fail little by little the whole time he was on the throne, knowing it was only a matter of time before the last Runes would fail and the Dwarves as a race would be doomed. The sudden influx of power from Karak Eight Peaks stabilizes the failing power reserves, complete with one of the quest's biggest Wham Line's:
  "And in a sudden, deafening silence, the complaint klaxon of the falling power reserves that only Thorgrim could hear went silent for the first time in eighteen decades."
• From a Single Cell: Vampires will eventually regenerate from whatever is the largest piece of them, even if its just a tiny piece of them. This makes permanently dealing with them very hard. Currently the best solution the Empire's institutions have is keeping their skulls in a big vault together and keeping watch to stop them whenever one starts to regenerate.
• God Couple: Ranald and Shallya. While how good or bad Their relationship is, or if it was at one point also Divine Date may vary among storytellers, we do know that at the very least They have two daughters together.
• God Is Flawed: Just like all the characters Boney writes, gods are people too, even if they are very different to humans. For Ranald specifically, even though He is good overall and Mathilde has mostly only had positive interactions with Him, He is still a god of thieves, liars, gamblers, and revolutionaries.
• God Is Inept: Mathilde loses almost any respect she has for Sigmar after He fails (or declines!) to save Abelhelm Van Hal at Drakenhof.
• Gondor Calls for Aid: When the fighting in Karak Eight Peaks goes sideways very quickly and kickstarts the Battle of the Caldera (see Nice Job Breaking It, Hero below), Mathilde calls for Karaz-a-Karak's aid, knowing that there's a massive Waaagh on the way and that they could use all the help they can get. Unfortunately, she gets a very blunt Cavalry Refusal.
  The Khazalid [the message] contains is brusque, and centres on a single point: 25,000 Dwarves. 500,000 greenskins.
  Die well, it closes, and bears the signature of High King Thorgrim Grudgebearer.
  Die well.
  You stare at the gyrocopter as it approaches. Today you've made contact with an Emperor Dragon and hunted down a Clan Eshin sorcerer, and you'd rather do both all over again than face the next few minutes, and have to watch what it will do to your King when he reads the message from his.
• Henotheistic Society: The common style of worship in the Old World among both Humans and Dwarves.
• Humanity Is Insane: Kragg the Grim expresses this opinion shortly after Mathilde reveals to him and Belegar the circumstances of how she interrupted the Black Orc Priests' ritual (detailed above under Achievements in Ignorance).
  “The only thing manlings are better at than finding stupid new ways to die is somehow surviving them. As long as she doesn't jump into the middle of any other godly squabbles, she'll be fine. So I fully expect her to do it again by the end of the week.”
• Human Weapon: The Empire's Battle Wizards are people who have sacrificed everything else to learn and master the most powerful and battle-shaping spells.
• Incredibly Inconvenient Deity: Ranald is fully capable of just talking with Mathilde, but has decided its more entertaining to instead only communicate with her via coincidences and omens.
• In Spite of a Nail: For all the changes Mathilde made to the Warhammer world, some things still proceed as before.
  • Word of God is that the Chaos Gods are searching for their thirteenth Everchosen, a position won by Archaon in WHF canon. Mathilde herself has already slain one of the candidates, former Elector Count of Stirland Albrecht Haupt-Anderssen, whose disappearance kicked off the events of the quest in the first place, but others including Archaon himself remain out there.
  • Despite the death of Gotrek Gurnisson, Grimnir's Axe is still found by a different new Slayer, Borek Forkbeard, the former leader of the Karag Dum Expedition.
  • The Ogre Tribes of the Mountains of Mourn have been said to be uniting under a new Overtyrant, who seems to be more interested in taxing the various caravans traveling through their lands than raiding them. Based on the timing vis-a-vis canon, this is almost certainly Greasus Goldtooth.
• Lady Luck: One of Ranald's facets is being the god of luck, which is the main reason He is a Major God, as everyone needs a little extra luck sometimes.
• Living Relic: "Bok", an Earth Elemental made with five runes (for context, general wisdom amongst the Runelords is that it's impossible to have more than three active runes on any object) found in Karak Eight Peaks striking down Skaven. It got its name by approaching nearby humans and dwarves, informing them that there is danger within the Karak (during the fighting within), and asking them to proceed to safety at, inform Runelord, and inform Archmage "Bok: Not Found", all in Khazalid, Eltharin, Classical, Nehekaran, and another language Mathilde doesn't recognize. The fact that it automatically informs "visitors" of "danger within the Karak" means that it predates the fall of Karak Eight Peaks over three thousand years ago, but the fact that it asks people to inform Archmage, an Elven title, means that Bok was made during the age of Dwarven and Elvish cooperation, many thousands of years before that.
• Living Shadow: Following a particularly good roll after casting Dread Aspect (a spell for appearing utterly terrifying to foes), Mathilde's shadow gains a mind of its own, independently moving around and inspecting things around her; under the effects of this spell, it becomes empowered enough to harm foes around her.
• Magic Misfire: As in canon, miscasting is a common threat for all magic-users. Mathilde starts the quest having miscast something so badly in the past that she accidentally summoned a Wisdom Asp, an Apparition (hostile warp entity that technically isn't a daemon) which hungered to kill her. Many other miscasts happen throughout the quest, but due to luck and circumstance, Mathilde has been able to escape suffering most of the damaging ones.
  • During the Battle for Drakenhof, a Magister of the Light Order fumbles a spell and literally explodes.
  • During the Battle of the Caldera in Karak Eight Peaks, Mathilde sees several Orc Shamans preparing a spell that would be child's play to dispel, and one of Journeymen accompanying the campaign starts to do exactly that. But Mathilde stops him, allows the spell to form, and then reaches out with her own magic and nudges it just enough to induce a catastrophic miscast.
• Malicious Misnaming: An OOC case with Alkharad the Necrarch vampire, who is hardly ever referred to by his proper name in thread discussions. He'll just get assigned some random moniker starting with A, with "Alkaseltzer" being particularly popular.
• Mass "Oh, Crap!": An OOC example: with the situation in Karak Eight Peaks suddenly turning very hot (see Nice Job Breaking It, Hero below), Boney rolls to see which of the Karak's three military leaders are present. A six would mean everyone, a five Belegar and Dreng, a four Belegar and Gotri, a three Dreng and Gotri, a two just Gotri, and a one would mean nobody. The dice lands on one, and the thread's reaction is this.
  • Happens numerous times during the Karag Dum expedition. First, during the Battle of High Pass, Mathilde destroys an enemy illusion overlaid on top of their enemy troops, revealing a group of Slaaneshi-corrupted Slayers. It is noted that basically everyone stops and stares in incomprehension at what they see. Later, a freak accident takes down one of the steam wagons, in the process killing Gotrek Gurnisson, lead engineer of the Expedition. This was doubly shocking OOC because Gotrek in canon survives beyond the End Times themselves, partly because he found the Axe of Grimnir; but Gotrek within the quest never shamed himself so much that he ever became a Slayer and found that Axe. Then finally and the biggest example, upon arriving at Karag Dum, the entire expedition is shocked to discover that it is surrounded by a primeval forest that was definitely not there before, and also protected by Morghur the Shadowgave, a Beastman of such power that he is generally considered a demigod.
• Master Swordsman: Following the initial Karak Eight Peaks expedition, Mathilde develops a trait representing this after training with Gunnars in Karak Eight Peaks, mixing the skills of the Greatswords (the group of bodyguards that accompany any Elector) and the Order of Guardians (the dwarf witch-hunter organization), making her a much better fighter when fighting an enraged or unthinking foe, or when holding a choke point such as a door or a cramped tunnel.
  • Later, Mathilde supplements this by developing a unique martial style that can only be used with her blade (see Fantastic Fighting Style).
  • During the Karag Dum expedition, Lord Asarnil shows off his own incredibly impressive personal martial skill in a duel against a Norscan, fighting less skillfully than he normally in what would normally be a duel to the death just so he could kill his opponent in a particularly impressive way, blinding and crippling him.
• Miraculous Malfunction: A significant amount of Spell Masteries are made by someone messing up when casting a spell and getting a different or improved spell effect instead of a miscast.
• Mook Horror Show: Every so often the narration will switch perspective to show how Mathilde's actions are being perceived, and especially when Mathilde is doing Wizard Things the lay perspective tends to be rather terrified. Examples include the professional thief who broke into a house to find Mathilde sitting in a chair waiting for him (see the quote under The Dreaded above), or a Clan Mors warlord faced with Mathilde in her full Dread Aspect terror.
  The realization that the scout was suffocating would have come far too late if there had been anything he could have done to stop it, but as it was, it came just in time for him to witness the tendrils of darkness release their grip on the dead scout's throat. Then he saw the darkness seem to part to reveal a man-thing, but this man-thing was wreathed in shadows and the Chieftain knew that it had come to feed on his soul.
  There are few things more demoralizing to a force than the death of their commander, but their commander fleeing into the darkness shrieking is one of them.
• More Dakka: A rare Warhammer example that does not involve 40k. During the Sieges of the Drakenhof, the Army of Stirland and its allied forces had a cumulative 110 cannons, 20 mortars, and 30 catapults at their disposal. Afterwards, it is referred to as the greatest concentration of cannon in history.
• Multicultural Alien Planet: Boney has done a great job building off of the base given by Games Workshop to make every race and culture feel real and diverse. Elves have the varied kingdoms of Ulthuan, the Dark Elves, Athel Loren, Laurelorn (who are then spit into city and forest born, then into Major Houses). Dwarves also have the chaos and Norse dwarfs, and even within the seemingly monolithic Karaz Ankor there is diversity among the Karaks. Even orcs and goblins have differences among the tribes.
• Multistage Teleport: Regimand has developed a chain casting technique for Smoke and Mirrors and Skywalk that allows him much greater mobility than most Grey Wizards.
• Mundane Utility: Dwarves believe that every weapon should also be able to be used as a tool. Even the legendary ones.
  • Thus when Mathilde was trying to get the trust of a logging village she used Branulhune to cut down trees.
• My Skull Runneth Over: A danger when improperly using knowledge granting spells. The Gold College has a wing at the local asylum dedicated to those who are recovering from such incidents.
• Neuro-Vault: Grey Wizards get messages about various topics sealed in their memories. They range from telling all about the Skaven, to warning not to steal from the Tomb Kings or Lustria, to warnings about the capabilities of any Black Magisters they encounter.
• Nice Job Breaking It, Hero: With five of the Eight Peaks occupied by various nasties, Mathilde and Johann team up to raid a Clan Skryre poison laboratory in Karag Zilfin to steal a globadier's gas mask, smashing large globes of poison to cover their escape in the chaos. Several days later, everyone in Karak Eight Peaks is alarmed when the ice dragon occupying the top third of Karag Zilfin suddenly roars in fury, because the poison released by Mathilde and Johann drifted up through the mountain enough to disturb it. The result is a multi-way brouhaha where the Ice Dragon attacks Clan Skryre, Clan Mors attacks Clan Eshin, the cut-off Orcs attack everyone, and the Orcs of Black Crag/Karak Drazh launch a full-blown WAAAGH against Karak Eight Peaks. Oh, and the three main military leaders of the expedition are all elsewhere, meaning Mathilde is in charge.
• Odd Name Out: During the Karag Dum expedition, five of the six steam-wagons used for transporting people are named after important people responsible for winning the Great War Against Chaos: Alriksson (High King of the Dwarves), Magnus (Emperor), Kriestov (Ar-Ulric), Alexis (Tzar), and Volans (Magister Patriarch). This is fitting, given that the expedition’s objective is to ascertain the situation of a Dwarf Hold thought lost during said war. The sixth and largest, however, is named Urmskaladrak, after the legendary ‘Father of Dragons’ slain by Grimnir. Mathilde considers that it may have been named as a warning, as the dragon Deathfang joined the expedition alongside Prince Asarnil. She also considers that they may have wished to call it Grimnir but reconsidered because the aforementioned dragon would be perched atop it the whole trip.
  • Taking the above into consideration, it is darkly ironic that during the ascent to the Chaos Wastes, the Urmskaladrak is the one steam wagon that succumbs to a freak landslide and is utterly destroyed, while Deathfang is quick to react and fly off with Asarnil, both unharmed.
• Only Known by Their Nickname: Mathilde's spy network is managed by a junior Grey Wizard referred to only as The Hochlander. Mathilde knows his name, she just thinks it sounds much more impressive to only refer to him as The Hochlander.
  • Mathilde is shocked to discover that this applies to herself as well during her time as Spymaster of Stirland: due to her habit of traveling to and fro via Shadowsteed (an Ulgu spell), she has gained the nickname "Dämmerlichtreiter", or "Dusk Rider".
• Pals with Jesus: Mathilde's holistic worship of Ranald is highly unusual, as most tend to choose only one of His four aspects rather than pay due to the Night Prowler, the Gambler, the Deceiver, and the Protector all together. But Ranald seems to agree with that, and later on is basically always watching what she is doing.
  Heidi: "He's quite taken with you, our mutual friend. At first because you were entertaining, then because you were interesting. More than a few Grey Wizards direct prayers His way but few actually believe as strongly as you do."
• Paranormal Gambling Advantage: There are several ways magic can assist when gambling, especially for Celestials and Greys. Or you could just get in the favor of the God of Luck.
• Parental Substitute: Magister Regimand Speiseschrank is the Grey Wizard who comes to collect Mathilde from Kelham to bring her to the Colleges. Mathilde considers him her true father, which wasn't a hard decision considering her biological parents and her entire hometown tried to burn her at the stake for being "cursed" with magic.
• Person of Mass Destruction: A properly trained and skilled magic user can be very powerful. This fact is the reason for the major "unofficial" duty of the Grey Order: to hunt down magic users who have fallen to Chaos or Necromancy. This facet of the Grey Order's duties is alluded to in several conversations, and it's been implied that many wizards interacting with Mathilde the first time have this in the back of their minds.
  • Part of why the Liber Mortis is so feared is that the knowledge inside it can give even a person with barely any magic potential the ability to fight an entire province on their own.
• Phlebotinum Bomb: In Turn 23, Mathilde organizes the creation of a tower that can unleash a massively upscaled Burning Shadows spell from one of Karak Eight Peaks' titular peaks. With Algard and Kragg's help, the end result is a superweapon that channels the power of the dwarven underworld to burn away the souls of designated victims and turn their bodies to ash from the inside out - the Eye of Gazul. Turns into a Chekhov's Gun when the Eye is used against WAAAGH Birdmuncha.
• Plot-Triggering Death: The Roleplay begins with Stirland's Elector Count having died under suspicious circumstances, and Mathilde Weber having been plucked away from her Wizard's Journeying to serve as the province's Spymaster. It's later revealed that those circumstances were heretical, too.
• Portal Cut: An interesting variation, The Ulgu Battle Magic spell Pit of Shades sends things to another realm as its supposed to, but that realm is the border between reality and the Aether, a 2D world, so the things sent there are vaporized upon entry.
• The Power of Acting: The Grey College teaches its members from the time that they are Apprentices to develop a very strong poker face - for the average wizard, pretending you know what is happening when you don't is an important skill, but for a Shadowmancer it is an essential one. On several occasions, it serves Mathilde quite well to simply nod and imply she understands what someone is saying.
• Power-Upgrading Deformation: Because of their overall malleability, humans develop Arcane Marks when using large amounts of their Winds. They deepen the caster's connection to a wind, but also change their bodies and minds in usually unsettling or inconvenient ways. Elves, being capable of using all of the winds and never committing to a single one, never develop them, for better or worse.
• Private Military Contractors: During Mathilde's time in Stirland, Abelhelm asks Anton to seek out some mercenary companies for the campaign against the Haunted Hills. By a miracle of luck, he manages to convince not some generic mercenary companies, but among the most notable of the Old World (the Regiments of Renown). Then by a second miracle of luck, he manages to snag easily the most dangerous of the bunch: Asarnil the Dragonlord, an exiled Elven prince of Caledor who roams the Old World atop his dragon mount Deathfang. The rest of the council is flabbergasted, and this amount of firepower is one of the factors convinces Abelhelm to extend the campaign to include attacking into Sylvania.
  • Later, during Mathilde's time in Karak Eight Peaks, Anton tries and fails to convince Asarnil to join King Belegar's forces, but he does manage to sway Braganza's Besiegers, a Tilean group of heavily-armored pavise crossbowmen. It is noted that for the particular circumstances of Karak Eight Peaks (being involved in warfare both above and below ground against multiple enemy factions that hate each other), perhaps the Besiegers would make more difference than a dragon (who could possibly attract too much attention and have every single faction direct their forces towards Belegar's).
• Properly Paranoid: The Grey Order encourages this mindset due to its secondary duty of hunting down Black Magisters.
• Psychic Link: One of the powers a familiar can have is Link of Psyche, which connects the minds of the master and familiar.
• Random Number God: Being a God of Luck, Ranald tends to also be associated with this trope, and rolls are occasionally interpreted to be caused due to His whims of what He thinks would be more interesting for the story.
• Rare Money: Upon rediscovering the vaults of the Grand Urbaz Bank, King Belegar reveals to Mathilde its sealed contents: the stored wealth of numerous polities that across the centuries fell before Karak Eight Peaks did. Mathilde is not so much impressed by the quantity of money so much as its rarity: among the stored wealth there are complete sets of coins from Tylos, Strygos, and from all the post-Nagash dynasties of Nehekhara. As these were of historical value, Mathilde saves examples of these and records them for posterity, while the rest are smelted by Belegar with no one being the wiser as to their provenance, as there is no true party upon which the wealth would be returned (though there would undoubtedly be criticism).
• Running Gag: A somewhat unintentional example. Due to Mathilde's efforts, Karak Eight Peaks is in a long process of trying to create their own silk from their resident population of sentient giant spiders, the We. Because of this, she decided to hold out on buying silk from the caravans that stop at Karak Eight Peaks (it being one of the stops along a route of the Warhammer world's (Old) Silk Road). But ironically, in many of her adventures she has found several enemies that have at some point had silken sheets, a true sign of luxury. Each time, she has had the opportunity to take them, and each time she has decided to pass on them, as their provenance is doubtful and We-silk would presumably be better. It is a constant source of narrative amusement.
  • Another example is Mathilde's internal thoughts talking smack about the other Colleges of Magic, particularly the Light or Celestial Colleges. The reason for this is the Grey Order tends to deal very much in hidden realpolitik with the occasional messy example, while the Light Order is more about open and overt actions, and the Celestial Order their ethereal prophesies. Mathilde once winds up glaring at the Light College when she realizes its magic is sending her internal thoughts into Purple Prose.
• Spared by the Adaptation: During the Social section for Turn 40, Mathilde meets the new Markgraf of Sylvania, a man named Nyklaus Schurz, who credits Mathilde and Abelheim Van Hal with saving his life, by distracting the various nasties of the area from an ill-advised trip he took. In canon, he would not just be killed but turned by the Vampires, becoming Nyklaus von Carstein, alias Count Noctilus, one of the dreaded Vampire pirates of the Dreadfleet.
  • During Turn 41, Panoramia is assigned an Apprentice when she finally graduates to Magister: a woman named Sofia de Siernos, who was found wandering Sylvania shortly after Mathilde destroyed Alkharad's College of Necromancy. In canon, Sofia, the elder sister of Sienna Fuegonasus, did become a necromancer, implying that Mathilde's intervention prevented her from learning at Alkharad's school.
• Summon Magic: In exchange for a giant haul of Skaven technology and weaponry, Mathilde negotiates with the Patriarch of the Gold Order to obtain the secret behind one of its Battle Magic spells, the Golden Hounds of Gehenna, in the hopes that she may be able to use it to create her own spells that seemingly function based off of artificial intelligence. She and the thread are thus surprised to learn that the Golden Hounds are actually Dark Hounds (an Apparition, an aethyric entity or spirit thought to be born of the fears of wizards) covered in Chamon and bound to the user's soul. Though it takes several years of being busy with other things, she eventually applies this knowledge to create her own kind of summoned monster, by covering a Rider in Red (another type of Apparition, resembling a knight atop a steed) in Ulgu, binding it to her soul and then training it to appear when someone attacks her during her spell's duration.
• Teleport Spam: When fighting the Kul encampment, Mathilde teleported to a knot of resistance, broke it up, and then teleported to the next one before anyone could respond.
  • Outside of Karak Vlag, she attempted to teleport and decapitate a Greater Daemon of Slaanesh that was grappling with Asarnil and Deathfang. The Daemon intercepted the attack, but thankfully it provided enough distraction for the spell from the Light Order Choir to hit and do it in.
• Tempting Ranald: A meta example - it is a running joke in the quest that whenever Boney would least expect or prefer it, the dice used to determine the results of actions will come up as the highest possible (and thus usually positive) result. Several of Mathilde's more outlandish feats and coincidences surrounding her are a result of natural 100s, or rolling straight sixes.
• The Necrocracy: The eventual goal of most vampires, and the general situation in Sylvania until recently.
• There Is No Kill Like Overkill: After Abelhelm's death in the Sieges of the Drakenhof, Mathilde is presented with increasingly brutal ways to take the town of Drakenhof proper, such as treating all people in an area as enemies, even civilians; leveling the town hall and other pockets of resistance with cannons; setting fire to the entire town to "pacify" it, and entirely razing it via dragon-fire. Leveling the town hall won out, as it presented plenty of damage to the town without intentionally killing any innocents.
  • Similarly, when tackling Castle Drakenhof itself, the proposed possible goals to consider the battle 'won' ranged from "The confirmed death of the Elector Countess" to "The complete destruction of the mountain that Castle Drakenhof is built upon". There was a further option of "The excavation of a pit on the site where the mountain that Castle Drakenhof was built upon used to stand", but it was crossed-out, presumably because it simply was not feasible.
• This Is Gonna Suck: This is the reaction Milica, a Kislevian Ice Witch who met Mathilde during the preparation for the expedition to Karag Dum, has when Mathilde and Johann suddenly appear at the border settlement where Milica is investigating a disturbance in the nearby woods and offer their assistance. As she groans to the Boyar translating between them:
  "She says it is like if you hoped the Tzar would send an extra rota, and then three pulks and the Kreml Guard arrive."
• Tome of Eldritch Lore: The Liber Mortis, arguably the most infamous tome of necromancy, is mentioned in passing early on when Mathilde seeks to inform herself better on how to fight undead forces, given that Abelhelm Van Hal is descended from one of the men who wrote it, Frederick Van Hal, and also given that there is an 'Extremely Redacted Version' that is safe to read. Abelhelm's mention of it, and of the Grand Theogonist who used its power to end the Third Vampire War, ends up being Foreshadowing that he himself held possession of the original copy, which he passes on to Mathilde upon his death.
• Took a Level in Badass: Mathilde starts the quest an inexperienced Journeywoman thrust into a position which should be far above her paygrade, and occasionally fumbles a few rolls with what could be almost considered carelessness or naivete. Several turns of training and self-improvement later, she becomes a more rounded-out individual who can handle almost any situation she faces, and repeatedly gains the respect of her peers and direct superior. She never really stops self-improving thereafter.
• Tournament Arc: As in canon, the gods of Chaos are still looking for a new Everchosen to try to destroy the world. Unlike in canon, Archaon is not necessarily the one who will become this age's Everchosen. As was first revealed OOC and then eventually IC, he is only one candidate of many, as this time the gods of Chaos are deciding who is to be Everchosen via a tournament. What exactly the rules are (single-elimination brackets; all-for-all; what counts as disqualification) is unknown. The two truly confirmed candidates of the Tournament at the time of this writing are Mathilde herself, surprisingly enough, and former Elector-Count Alberich Haupt-Anderssen. And though unconfirmed (as it comes from an IC source known to be a liar), it is likely that Drycha, Alric and Egrimm were all formerly candidates. If so, that would ironically make Mathilde the one person who has eliminated most candidates.
• Translation Convention: The characters are all actually speaking Reikspiel or Khazalid or Eltharin, but Boney helpfully translates it for the readers most of the time.
• Turned Against Their Masters: As in canon, the Black Orcs were engineered by the Chaos Dwarves as laborers and later rose up against their masters. Mathilde gets a vision revealing this after interrupting the ritual by the Cult of Only Gork, that also reveals the making of the Black Orcs was orchestrated by Tzeentch.
• Vagueness Is Coming: Common among Celestial Wizards and other fortune tellers. One of the reasons why is that trying to get too much detail lock those events in place instead of just giving information to change things.
• World Tour: Mathilde's adventures have taken her across the Old World of Warhammer Fantasy, from Stirland to Sylvania to Karak Eight Peaks to Karak Vlag and Karag Dum, and in the latest arc to Laurelorn.
• Worshipped for Great Deeds: Mathilde becomes a folk legend in Eastern Stirland after she led the destruction of Drakenhof. Now some make figures of her that are claimed to have anti-undead properties.
  • It's been implied that Elector Countess Roswita Van Hal has been using the legend of the Dämerlichtreiter to keep more rebellious elements in line. And it's confirmed by other wizards that the local population of Stirland and Sylvania firmly believe that Mathilde never left the area and has been acting against the vampires in the shadows.
• You Are Better Than You Think You Are: In Turn 11, Abelhelm notes that Mathilde lacks confidence in herself despite essentially being the second most powerful person in Stirland (in terms of authority) and having by this point proven herself as an individual.
  Abelhelm: "I wish I had words to instill that confidence in you, but all I can do is tell you that if you allow self-doubt to erode your resolve, you will fail in the duty to Stirland we share. And while I would not hesitate to stand alone and die against all the evils of Sylvania, I would rather have you by my side and win.
  Abelhelm: "So stop thinking like a journeywoman, and start thinking like the Knight I know you are."
  • Much later, in the social section of Turn 36, Mathilde turns around and gives the same advice to Belegar Ironhammer when he confesses to her that he's scared to marry and have children he could potentially fail.
  Mathilde: "Nothing we've achieved here has been simple, but we've achieved it anyway. It would be good to have some little Princes or Princesses Ironhammer running around the place. If you truly don't want to then by all means let the crown pass to a nephew or something, but don't let fear be the only reason you don't."
• You Are in Command Now: After Abelhelm falls in the opening stages of the Battle for Drakenhof, Mathilde takes command of the combined Stirland and Zhufbar force to finish the seige and then continue to Castle Drakenhof.
  • She falls into the command seat again when Karak Eight Peaks kicks off (see Nice Job Breaking It, Hero above) while Belegar is out dealing with pirates amongst the Border Princes and Dreng and Gotri are away at Karak Azul.
• You Are the New Trend: During Mathilde's time as Spymaster of Stirland, she had constantly battled against "Wizard Chic", where the children of local nobles have taken to trying to look magical, often sucking up the market of actual useful materials Mathilde needed. After being knighted for her actions against the Stirlandian League, Mathilde discovers to her horror that Wizard Chic has actually gotten even worse, because the youth have taken to idolizing her.