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The Long Night Part One: Embers in the Dusk: A Planetary Governor Quest (43k) Complete Sequel Up

Investigate the Sea?

  • Yes

    Votes: 593 80.4%

  • No

    Votes: 145 19.6%
  • Total voters
    738
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@Durin, missed omake needs threadmarking

thatguy said:
Avernus' Spine Storm Drop troops

'We don't need to be called any name other than storm, because we are one'

Founded as a response to the need for highly mobile troops to counter new Tyranid bio forms, the Storm Drop troops are built around a core of highly skilled and mobile elites that have remained nearly untapped since the founding of Avernus.
It is hoped that with more mobile elites Tyranid maneuvers will be easier to counter.

Recruited from the Avernus' Spine region of Avernus, they already have experience with air mobile warfare, given past deployments against the wildlife. Similarly they are familiar with the use of Grav chutes to avoid risking their dropships to hostile psykers, a tactic likely to see some use against the new Tyranids. Their new duties have seen them gaining the augmentations and training to make full use of orbital drop pods as well. Many of them have even been trained in the art of jump pack use, a mobility enhancer almost unheard of outside of Astartes and Sororitas formations in the era of the Imperium, for it needs to be attached to Power Armor for a user to operate such a device safely.
In all cases these troops are trained to react well to the unpredictable environment of a drop, where units and individuals can become cut off within the assigned areas of completely separate commands with incredible regularity. They are exemplars of the Avernite virtue of improvised teamwork, military coordination, and orderly resilience under pressure.

The unit organization emulates other great Avernite formations such as the Black Irons by incorporating less skilled soldiers into their organizational tables and coordinated training exercises. Troops who lack the combat prowess to be considered a core part of elite grenadier unit who nonetheless have the basic skills and mentality for highly mobile combat that allows them to keep up and be deployed in the same combat zone as the core Storm Drop Troops. The hope is that by training alongside these elites they be able to avoid worsening coordination in the already confused conditions of a drop should tactical necessity require sending large numbers of less skilled soldiers to support an attack.

The best portions of their unit are equipped purely with volkite weapons, as their mobile role should allow them to pick and choose their fights to better engage hordes of enemies especially vulnerable to the devices, such as Orkish Boyz, Lightly armoured Tyranid Units, or Chaos cultists. The lesser troops they train alongside and often recruit from from are only a bit better than the average drop regiments, and as such are not worth the expense of equipping with vast numbers of volkite weaponry, instead preferring other equipment known to be effective against Tyranids, like kinetics, especially the easily supplied Impaler series.

The root of their name as 'Storm' troops is threefold. Firstly, it calls to mind the elite Imperial Guard formations of the bygone Imperium, called stormtroopers, likely for their ability to sweep through a weak point like a storm across the landscape. The word has fallen out of use on Avernus in favor of more modern alternates like 'Helguard', but the stories of old glories never completely passed from the minds of a people as rich in military tradition as the Avernites.
Secondly, it speaks of their commanding officer Kane Forst's anticipation of frequently working with the new Thunder Warriors, the Emperor's own work. For drop operations the regiment will often have to leave large amounts of equipment behind, or have it come in on a following wave, thus the quality of the soldiers who go in first to break any enemy air defences is critical, a task Forst sees his better soldiers as being likely to perform alongside the Thunder Warriors. After all, they are dangerous, relatively expendable, and unlike other elites most of their ability comes from their enhancements, rather than their skill, so it is not as great a loss if they are not able to bring along the heavier equipment more skilled elites use to amplify their effect on the battlefield. First thunder, then storm will strike the enemy positions in planetary assault.
Thirdly, and most importantly, it was said that upon seeing the effects of their weapons all together for the first time in a live fire exercise, the varied kinetic weapons falling like raindrops, matched alongside the lightning-like flashing of the volkite guns striking down from the sky, commander Forst remarked that it was "like seeing a storm in action". Like the troopers were themselves elements of the storm.

"Bring the storm, men!"

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@Durin a Grenadiers regiment idea.
I added the less skilled less equipped troops purely to make the 'raindrops' comparison, but it isn't a terrible idea, especially considering how uncontrolled a drop can be, and if they're cut off from resupply having cross training in Impalers could come in handy.
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I say we should optimize the rune-purchase towards fighting nid's as they are clearly the current major threat (followed by abom-invasion by a fairly large margin then by a similar margin the continuous rouge psykers and cultists and then again the animal invasions)...once we have dealt with the nids we will have had more time to build up credit with the rune-crafters

So!:
blue=minor priority, red=medium, green=very important/all-the-yes-please
2 Cr base- Runes of Piercing - Boosts weapon AP. Apprentice
I would say that against the nid's this is unlikely to help...either their psykic powers stop it entirely somehow (dodging, deflecting, phasing, space-warping etc) or they fail to stop it (likely due to needing to focus on something more important at the time) and our weapons kill them as they are optimized away from armor since cron's can insta-kill.
1 Cr base-Runes of Damage- Boosts Weapon Damage. Apprentice
see runes of piercing but more so as at least the piercing would mean lower-tier stuff could at least touch hero-type/heavy-type units
3 Cr base-Runes of Channeling- Boosts Weapons ability to channel Psychic Power. Journeyman
yes, this will be helpful...obviously only needed for psykers however.
1 Cr base-Runes of Banishment - Boosts weapons ability to damage deamons. Apprentice
Ignore these for the most part, the nid's don't use deamons and we are unlikely (relatively speaking) to need to fight deamons...plus its not like the runes would grant insta-victory even against deamons

3 Cr base- Runes of Toughness- Boosts armour. Apprentice
helpful, generally helpful (not sure how much since +5 armor vs +50 is obviously a very different choice)
4 Cr base-Runes of Warding-Provides wards. Apprentice
YES, give journeyman or even master level versions to our heros and maybe throw them on important units too. we NEED THESE to ensure that the nid's cannot long-range insta-kill our hero units using a upgraded version of our scry-n-fry technique.
20 Cr base-Runes of Luck- Provides occasional re-rolls. Master
YES, same thing as above with the wards, but probably focus more for our hero-units.

whatever is leftover after this, I don't really care since after this battle is over we can decide how much to purchase towards new enemys that comes up and we will likely have earned more credit with them too.

we might want to throw some banishment (and more extra-warding/MORE LUCK after this battle cas WHY NOT!) on our stuff after the battle since they will come in handy over time. but I would prioritize anti-nid stuff for now (as said in beginning).

-edit-...hmm...in hindsight maybe the colors were a bit much...maybe next time I will color the things themselves instead of my responce if I feel the need to empinize stuff.

I will keep this lesson in mind.
 
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@Durin would the rune of luck allow Lin to potentially re-roll and survive a death roll?

Edit: To make it a bit clearer I'm referring to the rolls we'll start having in a few turns for if Lin is going to die of old age. Being able to re-roll one of those would be utterly fantastic.
 
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[X] Plan Shard Runeplan

Budget 139,000

Heroes (*1)
*Master Runes (Piercing, Damage, Channeling, Banishment)
*Master Runes (Toughness, Warding, Luck)

(2+1+1.5+1)*100*4+27*100 = 4900
4900*1 = 4,900 Credits

Last Hunters (*15)
*Master Runes (Piercing, Damage, Banishment)
*Master Runes (Warding)
*Apprentice Runes (Toughness)

(400*3+400+3) = 1603
1603*15 = 24,045

Grandmaster Psyker and Witch Hunters (*25)
Master Runes (Banishment)
Master Runes (Toughness, Warding)

100+700 = 800
800*25 = 20,000 Credits

Primaris and Grandmaster Battle Psykers (*100)
*Master Rune (Channeling)
*Journeyman Runes (Toughness, Warding)

300+70 = 370
370*100 = 37,000 Credits

Life Guard (*200)
Journeyman Runes (Piercing, Damage, Banishment)
Journeyman Runes (Toughness, Warding)

(10+20+10)*3+70 = 190
190*200 = 38,000

Master Battle Psyker and Witch Hunter (*500)
Journeyman Runes (Banishment)
Apprentice Runes (Warding, Toughness)

10+3+4 = 17
17*500 = 8,500

Helguard Regimental Champions (*600)
Apprentice Runes (Piercing, Damage)
Apprentice Runes (Toughness)

(2+1)*2+3 = 9
9*600 = 5,400

Master Battle Psykers (*1000)
*Apprentice Runes (Banishment)

1*1000 = 1,000 Credits

4,900+24,045+20,000+37,000+38,000+8,500+5,400+1,000 = 138,845
 
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Ptolemy said:
@Durin would the rune of luck allow Lin to potentially re-roll and survive a death roll?
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depends on the source...if its the sea then no cas that superceds the warp-stuff the runes work off of.

else yeah

on another note, how does the re-roll given by the runes stack with the ones given by rid? do the runes allow for 1+ reroll or even...o_O....give a reroll for the reroll TOO. (IE: 4 rerolls withh 2 having +15 as per rid's secondary effect?)
 
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Dragon_352 said:
depends on the source...if its the sea then no cas that superceds the warp-stuff the runes work off of.

else yeah

on another note, how does the re-roll given by the runes stack with the ones given by rid? do the runes allow for 1+ reroll or even...o_O....give a reroll for the reroll TOO. (IE: 4 rerolls withh 2 having +15 as per rid's secondary effect?)
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I'll edit my post to make it clearer, but I was thinking about when we'll start having rolls for Lin to die from old age, which should start happening in a few turns.
 
Doubt the Siren Rune of Luck gives those kinds of rerolls.

Anyway I've written up a hopefully much more readable and thus critique-able plan.
 
@Shard
Shard said:
Heroes (*1)
*Master Runes (Piercing, Damage, Channeling, Banishment)
*Master Runes (Toughness, Warding, Luck)

7*100*4+27*100 = 5500
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I believe that the armour runes need to be multiplied according to quantity as well, since I believe the multiplication is to represent the extra work needed to make sure the runes work well in conjunction with each other.

Shard said:
Master Battle Psykers (*1000)
Apprentice Runes (Banishment)

1*1000 = 1000 Credits
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I think you should swap to channelling if you can, which you may be able to depending on if armour quantity multiplication is a thing and if you make savings from the changes I'm recommending below.

Shard said:
Grandmaster Psyker and Witch Hunters (*25)
Master Runes (Piercing, Banishment)
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I believe that you should skimp out on the piercing. The targets of our witch hunters are newly-developed rogue psykers, who are characteristically physically squishy. In most cases they're just militia, whose armour can easily be pierced by the grandmasters' weaponry, and their bodies are ordinary human bodies so extra damage isn't much help either. The challenge in killing them is to survive their psychic powers and summoned daemons, not in penetrating them with the shots you land.

Shard said:
Master Battle Psyker and Witch Hunter (*500)
Apprentice Runes (Piercing, Banishment)
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See above for my opinion on giving piercing runes to witch hunters.

Shard said:
Helguard Regimental Champions (*600)
Apprentice Runes (Piercing, Damage)
Apprentice Runes (Warding)
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I think you should replace warding with toughness. Helguard are the guys who fight mundane enemies, so better armour will improve their lifespan and increase their battle effectiveness more than warded armour.
 
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Andres110 said:
I believe that the armour runes need to be multiplied according to quantity as well, since I believe the multiplication is to represent the extra work needed to make sure the runes work well in conjunction with each other.
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They don't appear to require multiplication, which does make sense. Luck Rune might not require inscription on armor, for example, and Warding might be overlayed to armor, whereas the weapon runes obviously all have to be stacked on the same weapon. Certainly there isn't any reason for armor rune to interfere with weapon runes.

Of course if Durin clarifies to the contrary rebudgeting would be needed.

Your other suggestions have merit, and I'm adjusting the plan.
 
I would say getting all runes at Master level for the heroes of avernus is a no-brainer. That's 34 base cost *100 master multiplier *1 (the heroes of avernus) = 3400 points. Sometimes rerolls on 'blink spider you died' is in itself so worth it, all the extra bonuses are extras.
 
@Durin
1. How potent is the mastercrafted luck rune? As in is there an average DC for it to trigger what I assume is a reroll.
2. When you say combat only is that personal combat only, or can it apply to the strategic scale?
 
@Durin
1. Does the Luck Rune allow a sniper to occasionally reroll missed shots?
Andres110 said:
I think you should replace warding with toughness. Helguard are the guys who fight mundane enemies, so better armour will improve their lifespan and increase their battle effectiveness more than warded armour.
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The reason why I am not replacing Warding with Toughness are because:
1. I want an elegant '10' multiplier to make it easier to square the budget to maximum capacity
2. Helguard Champions are probably prime targets for psychic domination pyromancy, etc.
 
@Durin
1.can we use runes to improve our Neo-Astropaths ?
stuff like the focus , power ,bridge and Stability runes seem kinda of perfect for the job
1a.can we do the same for our navigators ?
every boost to our FTL speed is worth it , especially if it can spar the Relic Material
2.can we use or create Alkahestry potions to improve or at least reduce the attrition of our Neo-Astropaths ?
2a.can we use or create Alkahestry potions to improve our navigators ?
 
Shard said:
The reason why I am not replacing Warding with Toughness are because:
1. I want an elegant '10' multiplier to make it easier to square the budget to maximum capacity
2. Helguard Champions are probably prime targets for psychic domination pyromancy, etc.
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1. That sounds irrational. I mean, picking one thing over another because you think it'll have a greater effect sure, but just because it gets closer to maxing out our budget?
2. You're not wrong, but I still don't think that psykers are their biggest issue. They're duellists and front line fighters, so the great majority of the threats to the lives of themselves and their comrades will be enemy champions and mundane troops. The Helguard Champions' gear and training is optimised for that and not for psychic defence for good reason. Psykers targeting them will be a thing, just nowhere near as much a thing as champions and grunts targeting them.
 
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Ok, so.

Lets keep in mind that apprentice/journeyman/masterwork are 1/2/4 in effectiveness, while cost is 1/10/100. Don't overdo it with masterworks, outside of our best elites its not worth it.

*1- Heroes of Avernus
We are giving these all the masterwork defensive runes. That much is clear. 2 700 cr.

Weapon Runes are tricky though. Taking all of them would be hella expensive, and most of our heroes have no need for, say, the Channeling Rune.

Edit: After realizing how cheap adding all the weapon runes is, and Durin discounting Channeling by half, I am adding all of them. It costs 2 200 cr. This is deduced from cr total on the end, am not redoing this whole thing again.

@Durin could we have an option of "One masterwork weapon rune for each hero of their choice" please?

If not, I say we take the Damage Rune (100cr). Because it's universal. There is such a thing as too much AP, channeling is only useful for psykers, and banishment is useless against Tyranids and Orcs.

So, minimum cost of 2 800 cr. 136 200 cr left.

*15- Last Hunters
Just a step behind our heroes, we rely on these for the most critical of missions. Masterworks.

Masterwork Toughness and Warding for certain. This makes for 10 500 cr.

For Weapon Runes, I say Damage again. Last Hunters are not psykers or anti-daemon specialists, and their absurdly advanced equipment lacks not for AP. 1 500 cr

Now, the question is. Luck rune or not? It would cost 30 000 cr, which is a lot. They could certainly make a good use of it, but its about one quarter of our budget. We will see how much cr we are left with.

Thus, 12 000 cr. 124 200 cr left.

*25- Grandmaster Psyker and Witch Hunters
Simple enough, this. Weapon? Masterwork Banishment (2 500 cr).

Defense? Masterwork Warding for certain, and Toughness too because of how important they are (and rogue psykers tend to mind control our militia and such, against which Warding does not help) (17 500 cr).

Total of 20 000 cr. 104 200 cr left.

*100- Primaris and Grandmaster Battle Psykers
Channeling Rune. Masterwork would cost 30 000 cr, same as Luck for Last hunters, so probably a no go. Journeyman is (3 000 cr.).

Also journeyman Toughness and Warding, to keep them alive because they are so damn valuable (7 000cr).

10 000 cr total, 94 200 cr left. See how the costs drop greatly when we stop using Masterworks?

*200- Life Guard
Damage for weapons for again the same reason. They are not psykers, we can not specialize them against daemons, and they have lots of AP already. Journeyman quality (2 000 cr).

For defense, journeyman both Toughness and Warding (14 000 cr)

16 000 cr total, 78 200 cr left.

*500- Master Psyker and Witch Hunters
Journeyman Banishment and Warding would cost 25 000 cr. This is a lot, but we really really want to get better at psyker hunting, so I say go for it. We should also take Apprentice Toughness (1 500 cr), because it is pretty cheap and also needed during psyker hunts.

Total 26 500 cr. 51 700 cr left.

*600- Helguard Regimental Champions
Here I would take the AP rune for weapons. Champions job is to take on the tough guys, and their weapons are good but not our very best. Apprentice, because *600 is a lot (1 200 cr).

For defense, I say apprentice both. They meet both psyker and mundane foes (4 200 cr).

Total of 5 300 cr. 46 400 cr left. Seems like we are spending too little on them? Well, upgrading the cheapest (AP rune) to journeyman would cost additional 10 800 cr. Toughness 16 800 cr. Upgrading the AP is possible if we have spare cr, but our Champions already have good AP and there are probably better options to spend cr on (Luck rune, masterwork channeling). High grade runes are expensive.

*1,000- Master Battle Psykers
Channeling. Journeyman would cost 30 000 cr, so no go. Apprentice it is (3 000 cr). Edit: Channeling Runes are Journeyman minimum unfortunately. Giving them Damage Runes instead because why not, they are universally useful and damn cheap (1 000 cr). Both defense runes are also affordable (7 000 cr) to protect such rare and potent assets.

10 000 cr total. 36 400 cr left. Edit: 8 000 cr total, 38 400 cr left.

*5,000- Elite Battle Psykers
With this kind of multiplier, only one apprentice rune is viable. Channeling it is (15 000 cr). Edit: Channeling is Journeyman+ only. Damage would be of less use to psykers, prevent us from giving Last Hunters Luck, and defense runes are unafordable.

So they get nothing, unfortunately. 38 400 cr left.

*6,000- Helguard Battalion Champions
Damage Rune to save up for Lucky Last Hunters.

6000 cr total, 32 400 cr left.

*15,000- Veteran Battle Psykers
We can not afford anything for them, with a multiplier this high.

Managed to save up 32 400 cr! We could use this for either Last Hunter Luck Runes, or Masterwork Channeling for our best psykers. Last Hunter Luck is my choice, stack those multipliers! Also, they tend to do the missions which we really really don't want to fail.

2 400 cr left.

Edit: Thanks to @Fanhunter696 I have realized that I can use this to give our heroes all the weapon runes. This costs 2 200 cr with the half Channeling rune cost discount. 200 cr left over.

So!

[X] Plan Rune Up!
-[X] *1- Heroes of Avernus (5 000 cr)
--[X] Masterwork Runes of Toughness
--[X] Masterwork Runes of Warding
--[X] Masterwork Runes of Luck
--[X] Masterwork Runes of Piercing
--[X] Masterwork Runes of Damage
--[X] Masterwork Runes of Channeling
--[X] Masterwork Runes of Banishment
-[X] *15- Last Hunters (42 000 cr)
--[X] Masterwork Runes of Toughness
--[X] Masterwork Runes of Warding
--[X] Masterwork Runes of Luck
--[X] Masterwork Runes of Damage
-[X] *25- Grandmaster Psyker and Witch Hunters (20 000 cr)
--[X] Masterwork Runes of Toughness
--[X] Masterwork Runes of Warding
--[X] Masterwork Runes of Banishment
-[X] *100- Primaris and Grandmaster Battle Psykers (10 000 cr)
--[X] Journeyman Runes of Toughness
--[X] Journeyman Runes of Warding
--[X] Journeyman Runes of Channeling
-[X] *200- Life Guard (16 000 cr)
--[X] Journeyman Runes of Toughness
--[X] Journeyman Runes of Warding
--[X] Journeyman Runes of Damage
-[X] *500- Master Psyker and Witch Hunters (26 500 cr)
--[X] Apprentice Runes of Toughness
--[X] Apprentice Runes of Warding
--[X] Journeyman Runes of Banishment
-[X] *600- Helguard Regimental Champions (5 300 cr)
--[X] Apprentice Runes of Toughness
--[X] Apprentice Runes of Warding
--[X] Journeyman Runes of Piercing
-[X] *1,000- Master Battle Psykers (7 000 cr)
--[X] Apprentice Runes of Toughness
--[X] Apprentice Runes of Warding
--[X] Apprentice Runes of Damage
-[X] *6,000- Helguard Battalion Champions (6 000 cr)
--[X] Apprentice Runes of Damage

Edit: Found some errors, fixed.

Edit2: Damn, I forgot that Channeling is Journeyman minimum. Adjustments in progress...

Adjustments finished!

Edit3: Took away Apprentice Damage from Master Battle Psykers to pay for all the Masterwork Weapon runes for our heroes.

Edit4: Durin gave half discount to Channeling for heroes, which freed up enough cr to give Master Battle Psykers Apprentice Damage again.
 
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Durin said:
Siren Trade
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I knew our local Sirens were holding out on us but I didn't think it was to quite that extent.

Weapon runes should be avoided. Defences are significantly more cost-effective.

Andres110 said:
Imagine Gravity's Bite with a master rune of armour piercing.
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Ok.
I'm imagining something rather wasteful. That thing can already carve its way through super-heavy vehicles fairly easily. Unless he wants to go hit capital warships with his sword more AP is largely redundant.


[X] Plan Rune Up!
 
@Enerael A fair bit of our most powerful heroes are psykers or at least possess some psychic power, along with them being the most powerful psykers in the Trust, so I would strongly advise getting them masterwork channeling runes. If I got it right then it costs just 700 extra credits accounting for the cost multipliers and multiple weapon runes when taken together with damage, which I would think is more than worth it for what you get in return.
 
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Enerael said:
Local Sirens sell us Rune knowledge, not runes themselves. Its like technology or technological devices.

What Runes they are willing to sell us are very very basic to them.
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Yeah, but they likely don't know all of the runes, due to differing specialities if nothing else.

Same reason they don't just sell us hundreds of runes, these guys are set up or doing that the Azure sirens are not.
 
Finished adjusting my plan, noticed that Channeling Runes need to be Journeyman+. Managed to free up enough for Last Hunters Luck Runes!
 
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