The Order of the Stick

Presumably not all decisions he made affected all clans, and he only needed to consult them on ones that did.

Quick reply. For reference, I was wondering why Dvalin bound himself to obey the will of his council; you can't be a very effective king if you can't make your own decisions, even against your counselors' advice once in a while.

I wondered this in the context of some speculation that I shortly afterward decided was stupid, so I deleted most of my post.

It seems that he does have the power to go against their wishes (and probably did so in life, too), he just refuses to do it. I'd imagine it's similar to misers who are perpetually "saving money for a rainy day" but never spending it — the ruler institutes a policy of saving up political capital by doing what the majority of the elders want, so that if he ever does need to go against them he can justify it with a reputation for fairness. But when it comes down to it, he never has the guts to actually make that call, and makes the popular decision every time even when an urgent decision is needed.

IIRC Dvalin was merely the first king of the dwarves, not the best. If high-kingship was a new concept, maybe it was particularly important for him not to overstep his authority.

Dvalin seems very, very Lawful Neutral. He swore this oath and refuses to break it under any circumstances. He forgot to make it nuanced enough for a situation like this.

He may not have been the best dwarven king, but he was well-regarded enough to be deified. Even as a minor demigod, that's a rare event that requires a lot of mortal Worship (and sponsorship from other gods).

Man she can complain

It's honestly kinda impressive

Clearly Dvalin and Shojo need to share notes; I can totally imagine that Dvalin's relationship with the leaders of the Clans was similar to Shojo's relationship with the Azure City nobles.

Edited by thok on Feb 12th 2019 at 4:56:01 AM

I'd imagine it's the the kind of oath you need to take to unify a large number of disparate clans in the first place. You need to get these people's loyalty to even have a council, rather than a perpetual state of civil war.

That was my point about his being the first king rather than (necessarily) the best: he doesn't need to have been a particularly brilliant ruler to be worshipped if creating the very institution of kingship is widely credited to him, and that's the kind of role where an inveterate conciliator and compromise-candidate can be more attractive than someone who stirs up strong allegiances and enmities.

Whether or not such a person is particularly respected in his day, he'd be a shoe-in as a historical Folk Hero just for being the forerunner of every great Dwarf king who followed in his footsteps.

I dunno about that. You got to be pretty politically savvy and charismatic if you want to get all the divided clans to agree set aside their differences, unify under a single banner and crown you king. Dvalin probably wasn't the first king of Dwarves, but the first king of all Dwarves.

He'll be the last one if he isnt careful.

Honestly, the talk of Dvalin not having nuances seems a bit misplaced.

Yeah, you could say he could just end this now because how they'll vote is obvious, but by the same taken letting the Council decide normally wouldn't carry any risks. Yeah, it's tedious, but ultimately that's not particularly important.

I'll start calling Dvalin Lawful Stupid if it turns out that he can both figure out the Council is dominated (we don't actually know how they get the question, or how he gets their votes) but still would go along with it anyway because technically it's the Council or something stupid like that.

Although I think it's unlikely, I would be amused if this ended with Dvalin going 'So the Council has voted to destroy the world. Welp, it's a good thing I only took an oath to consult the council, and still have the ability to go against their decision if they're being a pack of idiots.'

I hope that's how it goes. Boy would Hel feel silly.

Edited by DatLonerGirl on Feb 14th 2019 at 5:21:01 AM

He specifically said he'd obey the will of the Council.

And while I see why that would be funny, it would also be kind of terrible - "Oh, the main characters didn't actually have to waste time on this at all. Great." Yeah, there's getting Durkon back, but the idea that this threat to the world never actually had any teeth is not satisfying.

Edited by LSBK on Feb 14th 2019 at 5:41:35 AM

Flipside, the Exarch mentions their plan is specifically to "dominate" the Dwarven elders. Which means there's still a loophole for him to point out that it wouldn't be their wills he's obeying if they're under mind control.

Edited by Daremo on Feb 14th 2019 at 9:07:45 AM

Yeah, I said pretty much exactly what Gilphon said in the last page. Then LBSK's point (that we've wasted a ton of time on this if Dvalin just votes the way he wants anyway) occurred to me, so I deleted it.

I was wondering if they'll win, but the Elders will then just vote for world destruction on their own accord, but I can't imagine why they'd do that.

It's not clear to me who does and doesn't know about the vampire plot. Is there a reason why no one who was present at the fight with the vampires couldn't have warned the Dwarves what was happening?

I think they have to be sequestered because archaic rules.

That's exactly what the Order is trying to do

If you're asking why High Priestess Rubyrock didn't just Send to whichever elder or priest she knows best in Firmament, the sequestration spell blocks communication magic. Vaarsuvius doesn't know any dwarves to Send to, and it's too late now for Durkon to warn anyone.

Not that Durkon knows any of the elders himself.

If we're being picky, a good old emergency telephone tree might have been an option. V sends to the 5+ people the Order knows who're most likely to know a dwarven clan chieftain, and so on. Unless there's some reason "vampires are planning to dominate the council of clans" is a message that needs to be kept on the down-low?

Edited by johnnye on Feb 15th 2019 at 4:09:47 PM

Who would they possibly know that knows of a Dwarf clan leader? It's the first time any of them have gone to the Dwarven lands (excluding Durkon, but he wasn't in the group when it happened).

Edited by Resileafs on Feb 15th 2019 at 2:37:44 PM