[x] A digital eye
On the Shoulder of Martyrs (Black Templars 40K Quest)
- Thread starter ManInACandyVan
- Start date
- Sci-Fi
[X] A bionic arm.
[X] Bionic legs.
[X] To spit on her alien technology.
I'll take literally anything that isn't the eyelaser. It's the only one of the upgraded cybernetics that is going to be found our as xenotech, since digital weapons are only made by Jokaero.
That said, I'm not entirely comfortable with the wording of the refusal option. Sigismund seems more level-headed than that vote presents. That's the kind of reaction the more crusade-y Templars would have, for sure. But Sigismund swore first to protect the people, and that's the whole reason the Emperor gave the Rogue Traders their writs -- and the right to trade with the xenos that comes with them -- in the first place.
[X] Bionic legs.
[X] To spit on her alien technology.
I'll take literally anything that isn't the eyelaser. It's the only one of the upgraded cybernetics that is going to be found our as xenotech, since digital weapons are only made by Jokaero.
That said, I'm not entirely comfortable with the wording of the refusal option. Sigismund seems more level-headed than that vote presents. That's the kind of reaction the more crusade-y Templars would have, for sure. But Sigismund swore first to protect the people, and that's the whole reason the Emperor gave the Rogue Traders their writs -- and the right to trade with the xenos that comes with them -- in the first place.
- Location
- India
- Pronouns
- He/His
So if I am not wrong cybernetics dont allow us to grow. So we will be be forever restricted to neophyte size and will never ever get to the size of a full Astartes. Also we are going to miss out on a lot of the organs that are implanted later in the growth cycle and that makes an Astartes an Astartes in truth and not just in name. This decision was not worth it eapecially as people seem to be voting for rejecting powerful technology, thw only benefit that came from this fiasco.
- Location
- Lowton
Don't worry we only had the black carapace to go and that works with cybernetics
- Location
- Cagayan de Oro City, The Philippines
Yes, that is what she said.
You're right. I thought all the Fists and Templars were missing was the Betcher's Gland. Apparently though, Belisarius Cawl fixed their geneseed according to new fluff so they have them now - flimsy excuse, I know, but the sus-an thing's such a part of the recent updates that I can't handwave it.
You're more or less already there, save for the Black Carapace. Even if you did continue growing, techmarines and apothecaries could probably resize your cybernetics when needed.
- Location
- western US
@ManInACandyVan
somebody had a good point that I was kind of thinking myself.
why is the "refuse" option worded so harshly? why can't we say "no thanks"
somebody had a good point that I was kind of thinking myself.
why is the "refuse" option worded so harshly? why can't we say "no thanks"
- Location
- Cagayan de Oro City, The Philippines
You could, but I reason that Sigismund isn't in the best mood right now with his wounds and dead brother. You won't physically spit, though, so don't worry.
- Location
- NY
Eh, works for me.
- Location
- western US
hm....I understand that this is your quest mr DM, but I request that you consider giving us a little more control over what our votes actually do.
....if nothing else more information about what the vote-descriptions actually mean in the posts themselves....theres little point in voting if we don't know what we are voting for
in the first place after-all.
not to insult you or anything but people ended up confused about votes last time too.
- Location
- Cagayan de Oro City, The Philippines
That's understandable. A lot of people have already voted, though, so adding a new vote would be impractical. I'll keep it in mind for the next update.
- Location
- California
Brah, she literally stage-whispers to us how she's using top-tier Xeno-Tech that's been ordained to look like it's human-made by techpriest on her pay-roll/ loyal. This is in fact " being done in secret," and here we are deciding what exactly we want. We can't exactly refuse the one person who wants to keep us alive, but there are risks to accepting this tech.
Xantalos
Turtle-Speed Writing
There's not much that could've been done about that, the option we all voted for literally said 'you'll probably die or get maimed if you do this'.
- Location
- western US
I'm not referencing that...I'm referencing other confusions (I can't remember exactly to be honest...but I do recall reading other people commenting that it was not very clear --in other ways...not in it having bad consequences I mean---...and now that I think about it, older posts have seemed some-what ambiguous as well, I guess I'm mostly just hoping for vote-options with more then a partial sentence and a couple sentences attached to the block)
there is something to be said about the possibility that people just seem to be voting.......strangely, in this quest.
I am thinking its something that is a consequence of band-wagoning.
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laughableRogue
A rebel without a clue
- Location
- FInland
[x] To spit on her alien technology.
In normal circumstances I'd be all for a laser eye, but here I feel this is the only option.
I'm not making this choice out of fear of retribution from our chapter, because I shun rewards, or because I want to make a mess of the quest, but because we are part of a zealot group that makes other zealots go 'whoa maybe chill out just a little bit?!' I want to play a Black Templar, not another reformist chapter quest. Purge the xeno, the witch and the heretic all the way! We spent our brothers' lives saving this woman and now she wants to pollute our Emperor-given holy human flesh with xenos filth? For once, please let me be a spiteful, intolerant murder-hate-machine. I'm roleplaying here!
I mean yeah, Sigismund is pretty level-headed and stuff. The gear has been tested for abhorrent influence and the offer is being made with probably good intentions, and we don't need to get aggressive. But I am just so, so tired of damn near every story having the main space marines be tolerant of xenos/not honour-obsessed and homicidal/understanding and humane and whatnot. People want to make friends with everybody and that is fine, but I am left yearning for an armor of contempt thick enough to stop a vortex missile.
I am very likely incoherent and bad at explaining myself. Not attacking anyone here, just wishing to play a different kind of character sometimes.
In normal circumstances I'd be all for a laser eye, but here I feel this is the only option.
I'm not making this choice out of fear of retribution from our chapter, because I shun rewards, or because I want to make a mess of the quest, but because we are part of a zealot group that makes other zealots go 'whoa maybe chill out just a little bit?!' I want to play a Black Templar, not another reformist chapter quest. Purge the xeno, the witch and the heretic all the way! We spent our brothers' lives saving this woman and now she wants to pollute our Emperor-given holy human flesh with xenos filth? For once, please let me be a spiteful, intolerant murder-hate-machine. I'm roleplaying here!
I mean yeah, Sigismund is pretty level-headed and stuff. The gear has been tested for abhorrent influence and the offer is being made with probably good intentions, and we don't need to get aggressive. But I am just so, so tired of damn near every story having the main space marines be tolerant of xenos/not honour-obsessed and homicidal/understanding and humane and whatnot. People want to make friends with everybody and that is fine, but I am left yearning for an armor of contempt thick enough to stop a vortex missile.
I am very likely incoherent and bad at explaining myself. Not attacking anyone here, just wishing to play a different kind of character sometimes.
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- Location
- Cagayan de Oro City, The Philippines
I'll leave voting up for a few more hours. EDIT: Going to extend it until tomorrow morning, my time, which should be twelve hours.
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- Location
- Cagayan de Oro City, The Philippines
Voting's closed.
XVI: Mourning Hours
- Location
- Cagayan de Oro City, The Philippines
+THOUGHT FOR THE DAY+
The Emperor judges your worth not by your medals, but by your scars.
The Emperor judges your worth not by your medals, but by your scars.
You rested your arms on kneeling legs. Your left hand was warm against the adamantine, your right hand was as cold as the bionics it touched. With eyes both natural and synthetic, you read a name written on an honor scroll, a name nestled with all the sons of Dorn who had died since Sigismund declared his crusade eternal - Bayard.
You rose and put on your habit. The reclusiam was a cold place despite the thousands of candles. It was cold, quiet, solemn, the only sounds coming from the humming of the ship, the shuffling of the servitors, and the whirring of the augmetics that had replaced half of your face.
Reynauld entered as you turned to leave, his signature scowl now accentuated by a vicious scar.
"What do you want?" you asked him.
Your mentor turned to you, as if suddenly aware of your presence. "Leave me be, cur. You're not the only one who has lost his brothers."
It was hard to believe such a petty and spiteful being could care for anyone as a brother, but somehow he felt genuine. Reynauld knelt in front of the honor scrolls, and you knelt beside him.
"I told you to leave me be."
Your eyes lingered again on Bayard's name. "Would you lament my death?"
Reynauld scoffed. "I yearn for the day."
"And I yearn for yours," you replied. You pointed at Bayard's name. "But I mourn for his."
Your mentor regarded you, still scowling, still scarred. "Do not mourn. Never mourn. You disgrace him."
You tensed at the notion, but you understood. Mourning and remorse were weaknesses, and to mourn your brothers would be to dishonor them.
"Then what do you feel for your brothers? Don't you mourn them?"
"No," he said softly. "When I read their names, I remember how they died. I remember who killed them. And each name, each memory fills me with so much hatred that there is no room in either of my hearts for grief."
Reynauld turned to you. "You did as I ordered, down on Hierosolyma. You saved Theobald, and despite how I despise you, what you did honors our chapter."
You said nothing. Your eyes lingered on Bayard's name, but in your mind you saw your brother's killer. You saw your brother's severed head.
"I had intended to keep you from the Black Carapace, hopefully long enough for you to die." He looked at your bionics, scowl turning into a smirk. "But seeing as how you refuse to die, I've changed my mind."
"You're allowing me the Black Carapace?" you asked, perhaps a bit too loudly in the reclusiam.
"Eventually. No other neophyte has earned it yet. When this crusade is over," Reynauld paused, as if struggling to say it. "You will truly become Astartes."
You rose and put on your habit. The reclusiam was a cold place despite the thousands of candles. It was cold, quiet, solemn, the only sounds coming from the humming of the ship, the shuffling of the servitors, and the whirring of the augmetics that had replaced half of your face.
Reynauld entered as you turned to leave, his signature scowl now accentuated by a vicious scar.
"What do you want?" you asked him.
Your mentor turned to you, as if suddenly aware of your presence. "Leave me be, cur. You're not the only one who has lost his brothers."
It was hard to believe such a petty and spiteful being could care for anyone as a brother, but somehow he felt genuine. Reynauld knelt in front of the honor scrolls, and you knelt beside him.
"I told you to leave me be."
Your eyes lingered again on Bayard's name. "Would you lament my death?"
Reynauld scoffed. "I yearn for the day."
"And I yearn for yours," you replied. You pointed at Bayard's name. "But I mourn for his."
Your mentor regarded you, still scowling, still scarred. "Do not mourn. Never mourn. You disgrace him."
You tensed at the notion, but you understood. Mourning and remorse were weaknesses, and to mourn your brothers would be to dishonor them.
"Then what do you feel for your brothers? Don't you mourn them?"
"No," he said softly. "When I read their names, I remember how they died. I remember who killed them. And each name, each memory fills me with so much hatred that there is no room in either of my hearts for grief."
Reynauld turned to you. "You did as I ordered, down on Hierosolyma. You saved Theobald, and despite how I despise you, what you did honors our chapter."
You said nothing. Your eyes lingered on Bayard's name, but in your mind you saw your brother's killer. You saw your brother's severed head.
"I had intended to keep you from the Black Carapace, hopefully long enough for you to die." He looked at your bionics, scowl turning into a smirk. "But seeing as how you refuse to die, I've changed my mind."
"You're allowing me the Black Carapace?" you asked, perhaps a bit too loudly in the reclusiam.
"Eventually. No other neophyte has earned it yet. When this crusade is over," Reynauld paused, as if struggling to say it. "You will truly become Astartes."
---
"The Sonata's smaller than the Fury," Emmerich said, looking out the voidship's hololithic windows.
"The rogue trader assured the Marshal that its firepower more than made up for its size," you replied.
Emmerich looked at your half-bionic face. "Blow up the other half, you might stop being ugly."
"How can you jest, Emmerich?" Gottfried asked. "Bayard is dead!"
"Bayard wouldn't want us moping about when there's a crusade to be had. Nimrod's got the moping covered."
Nimrod, as usual, didn't answer. He was too busy looking at his bionic hand.
"This rogue trader, Anatoly, she truly offered her ship to the Marshal? And gave you those bionics?"
You recalled your private talk with Anastasia Anatoly, how you angrily refused her alien 'gifts' (though the vox-caster with which you used to speak hadn't conveyed the anger as you'd have liked). Money was something you cared nothing about, but even Astartes could appreciate the value of a voidship and the cost of bionic replacements. Even the apothecaries and techmarines didn't give out bionics on a whim - near total reconstruction, on a neophyte no less, was virtually unheard of on the Fury.
"Yes, brother. She was one of the mortals we saved while you were at the Governor's palace. She simply wishes to repay us."
Emmerich shrugged. "Perhaps she just wants to ingratiate herself to the Templars. She's new and alone, she needs friends like us."
"Politics and subtlety ill-suits you, brother," you said to Emmerich who shrugged again in response. "Her ship's firepower is lethal regardless of her motives."
"I'm surprised its untouched by the war."
"The war on the ground is far worse than here in the void. The rebels were dug in a long time ago, and their ships left before ours arrived."
"They don't plan on leaving."
You glared at the planet, hearts devoid of grief, bursting instead with zeal. "Believe me, brother. There won't be a single one of them alive to leave the planet."
"The rogue trader assured the Marshal that its firepower more than made up for its size," you replied.
Emmerich looked at your half-bionic face. "Blow up the other half, you might stop being ugly."
"How can you jest, Emmerich?" Gottfried asked. "Bayard is dead!"
"Bayard wouldn't want us moping about when there's a crusade to be had. Nimrod's got the moping covered."
Nimrod, as usual, didn't answer. He was too busy looking at his bionic hand.
"This rogue trader, Anatoly, she truly offered her ship to the Marshal? And gave you those bionics?"
You recalled your private talk with Anastasia Anatoly, how you angrily refused her alien 'gifts' (though the vox-caster with which you used to speak hadn't conveyed the anger as you'd have liked). Money was something you cared nothing about, but even Astartes could appreciate the value of a voidship and the cost of bionic replacements. Even the apothecaries and techmarines didn't give out bionics on a whim - near total reconstruction, on a neophyte no less, was virtually unheard of on the Fury.
"Yes, brother. She was one of the mortals we saved while you were at the Governor's palace. She simply wishes to repay us."
Emmerich shrugged. "Perhaps she just wants to ingratiate herself to the Templars. She's new and alone, she needs friends like us."
"Politics and subtlety ill-suits you, brother," you said to Emmerich who shrugged again in response. "Her ship's firepower is lethal regardless of her motives."
"I'm surprised its untouched by the war."
"The war on the ground is far worse than here in the void. The rebels were dug in a long time ago, and their ships left before ours arrived."
"They don't plan on leaving."
You glared at the planet, hearts devoid of grief, bursting instead with zeal. "Believe me, brother. There won't be a single one of them alive to leave the planet."
---
It had been a week since the bionic reconstruction. Sword Brother Theobald had recovered, himself now composed of cybernetics as much as you were. He had mustered together a new household and requested you and your brothers join him.
Reynauld, his closest brothers in Squad Theobald having died, had formed his own crusader squad. To your surprise, he extended his invitation as well. Could there be another motive? Or had he started to trust you?
Anastasia Anatoly, upon assuming command of her ship and crew, ordered them to take part in the crusade (where her father had commanded them to stay aboard the ship). With permission that she somehow obtained from the Marshal, she requested you and your brothers to accompany her fighting force.
Your brothers, out of loyalty and love, would follow you whichever choice you picked. You followed:
[ ] Theobald.
The newly replenished Squad Theobald would deploy once more into the fray, relieving the beleaguered Guard forces by breaking the enemy's own front line.
[ ] Reynauld.
Reynauld and many other Templars were on the search for vengeance. They would find enemy leadership, mortal or Astartes, and make them suffer. Cut the snake's head, and the body dies.
[ ] Anastasia.
The rogue trader laments the millions of other citizens on Hierosolyma being trapped. She needs you to accompany her crewmen on a mission to retake the void docks.
Reynauld, his closest brothers in Squad Theobald having died, had formed his own crusader squad. To your surprise, he extended his invitation as well. Could there be another motive? Or had he started to trust you?
Anastasia Anatoly, upon assuming command of her ship and crew, ordered them to take part in the crusade (where her father had commanded them to stay aboard the ship). With permission that she somehow obtained from the Marshal, she requested you and your brothers to accompany her fighting force.
Your brothers, out of loyalty and love, would follow you whichever choice you picked. You followed:
[ ] Theobald.
The newly replenished Squad Theobald would deploy once more into the fray, relieving the beleaguered Guard forces by breaking the enemy's own front line.
[ ] Reynauld.
Reynauld and many other Templars were on the search for vengeance. They would find enemy leadership, mortal or Astartes, and make them suffer. Cut the snake's head, and the body dies.
[ ] Anastasia.
The rogue trader laments the millions of other citizens on Hierosolyma being trapped. She needs you to accompany her crewmen on a mission to retake the void docks.
- Location
- Titan
[X] Anastasia.
They need some Astartes in orbit.
They need some Astartes in orbit.
- Location
- United Kingdom
[X] Reynauld
We're Astartes, we are not made for the grind of siege warfare or mass combat, that is the Imperial Guards due. Nor are we subject to the requests of mortals, we are created to crush and destroy the enemy elite, their champions, their priests and their masters, we bring them down and we end this war all the quicker.
We're Astartes, we are not made for the grind of siege warfare or mass combat, that is the Imperial Guards due. Nor are we subject to the requests of mortals, we are created to crush and destroy the enemy elite, their champions, their priests and their masters, we bring them down and we end this war all the quicker.
- Location
- NY
[X] Reynauld.
I'm sure they have more psykers hanging around. As always, geek the mage first.
I'm sure they have more psykers hanging around. As always, geek the mage first.
- Location
- Germany
[X] Theobald.
Into the Fires of Battle, unto the Anvil of War!
Wrong chapter but the principle works.
Support the Guard, help mortals help themselves, take steps to eventually save the entire planet.
That comes before personal revenge.
Into the Fires of Battle, unto the Anvil of War!
Wrong chapter but the principle works.
Support the Guard, help mortals help themselves, take steps to eventually save the entire planet.
That comes before personal revenge.
