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Memento Mori (Exalted/40k)

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Maugan Ra said:
You will start out looking mostly mortal, save perhaps for your death wounds, and where things go from there will depend on how you choose to relate to your own (im)morality in quest.
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Ah so more like 3e style then 2e, where you are likely either maxed out or have 0 which is useful for bringing super scary.
Lord4StarCommand said:
"Kill your problems" way is a dime in a dozen in WH40k and as we saw it never works, so I go with something different also because I find the idea of looting those asshats at the top very funny.
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Honestly, the most important question is, can we keep ghosts around, and if that is the case? We can do a lot more because nothing beats an undead Scribe and Law Keepers.
 
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The Laurent said:
I will say that the Daybreak Anima is the most dramatic that doesn't kinda short-circuit a scene. Like, a warp portal's cool but, "Nah, I'd rather not be here" is more a scene ender than a dramatic inflection point.



Sure, sorta, but it should be noted that the Imperium did have an absurdly huge bureaucracy... it's just that it existed for the purpose of causing as much pointless misery as possible, and a level of fine-grained nonsense that'd need an even bigger bureaucracy than that to manage in the way they've decided to make things work.

Every option is kinda part of the problem because something something Ethical Consumption, but there's something to be said for the kind of direct experience with being shit on that comes from being a Hive-born person that's the sort who'd be in a gang, etc.
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I do not think the Administratum is designed to cause pain, it does more than any other branch, but an enormous swath of that is caused not by malice but incompetence. We hear about great imperial generals of all kinds, great imperial adminstrators far less so
 
DragonParadox said:
I do not think the Administratum is designed to cause pain, it does more than any other branch, but an enormous swath of that is caused not by malice but incompetence. We hear about great imperial generals of all kinds, great imperial administrators far less so
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I wouldn't call it fully incompetence, I would say it's due to the fact the Administratum is too big. And the human mind was never made to deal with something so big. Honestly, Big E should of known that he needed a superhuman administrator to help deal with something of the Administratum's size.
 
DragonParadox said:
I do not think the Administratum is designed to cause pain, it does more than any other branch, but an enormous swath of that is caused not by malice but incompetence. We hear about great imperial generals of all kinds, great imperial adminstrators far less so
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Well sure, but a lot of that is just about the anonymous nature of the work. IRL good administrators/bureaucrats[1] don't exactly get statues made about them either (or at least not often), but they exist.

[1] Good in the "seeing as a state" sense, moral judgements are another matter, I'm talking only about competence.
 
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The Laurent said:
Well sure, but a lot of that is just about the anonymous nature of the work. IRL good administrators/bureaucrats[1] don't exactly get statues made about them either, but they exist.

[1] Good in the seeing as a state sense, moral judgements are another matter, I'm talking only about competence.
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There is something to be said for that of course and for the fact that the game is called Warhammer, but I think it is not just that. The thing about going to war is the enemy isn't going to cut you any slack, a certain amount of competence is required and honed of the IoM's martial branches. The administratum is isolated from consequences so it can more easily do what comes naturally to totalitarian systems, fall apart into paranoia and infighting.
 
I feel it is important to note here that the Contemptuous Scribe isn't actually going to be very good at reforming the system, in the sense of, like, making it more efficient or better organised. Her power is less the idealised golden dream and more the totalitarian grasp of oblivion.

In the 3rd edition rulebook the Solar charm for treating bureaucratic corruption gives you uncanny insight into people and causes them to assume you hold some position of authority worth respecting. The Abyssal charm for treating bureaucratic corruption works by having a guy executed on trumped up charges and using the bone-deep terror this instils in the other workers to read and manipulate them.

Now you can still create meaningful change with this approach, I just want to make sure people understand what they're voting for here. "One letter and one corpse at a time" and all that.
 
Maugan Ra said:
I feel it is important to note here that the Contemptuous Scribe isn't actually going to be very good at reforming the system, in the sense of, like, making it more efficient or better organised. Her power is less the idealised golden dream and more the totalitarian grasp of oblivion.
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Important question, does that mean we can get access to ghosts or not with our path? To make that totalitarian grasp tighter?
 
Maugan Ra said:
I feel it is important to note here that the Contemptuous Scribe isn't actually going to be very good at reforming the system, in the sense of, like, making it more efficient or better organised. Her power is less the idealised golden dream and more the totalitarian grasp of oblivion.

In the 3rd edition rulebook the Solar charm for treating bureaucratic corruption gives you uncanny insight into people and causes them to assume you hold some position of authority worth respecting. The Abyssal charm for treating bureaucratic corruption works by having a guy executed on trumped up charges and using the bone-deep terror this instils in the other workers to read and manipulate them.

Now you can still create meaningful change with this approach, I just want to make sure people understand what they're voting for here. "One letter and one corpse at a time" and all that.
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Sounds good to me boss. There's a heck of a lot of assholes to point at and say Die.

Like I said, I'm here for the spite.

gale said:
Important question, does that mean we can get access to ghosts or not with our path? To make that totalitarian grasp tighter?
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There are some Abyssal charms to more easily generate ghosts, so I'd presume so. Plus with the existence of souls in 40k, its not that hard to generate ghosts the normal way.
 
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Hmm, there's something to be said with being naked about it, as it were.

[X] The Penitent Gunslinger

Honestly, any of them winning will be neat so I'll probably be swinging like a weather vane.
 
Maugan Ra said:
I feel it is important to note here that the Contemptuous Scribe isn't actually going to be very good at reforming the system, in the sense of, like, making it more efficient or better organised. Her power is less the idealised golden dream and more the totalitarian grasp of oblivion.

In the 3rd edition rulebook the Solar charm for treating bureaucratic corruption gives you uncanny insight into people and causes them to assume you hold some position of authority worth respecting. The Abyssal charm for treating bureaucratic corruption works by having a guy executed on trumped up charges and using the bone-deep terror this instils in the other workers to read and manipulate them.

Now you can still create meaningful change with this approach, I just want to make sure people understand what they're voting for here. "One letter and one corpse at a time" and all that.
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Can't say I wasn't expecting that. It is the IoM and we are an Abyssal, there is going to be friction to say the least wherever we go. I would rather go into the place that has the biggest pit of incompetence and use the leverage from applying some kind of fix to make the whole system less cartoonishly evil. On the scale of imperial evils that need fixing terrified administrators are rather far down
 
I mean, the Emperor is dying, so to a certain extent talking about making the system less cartoonishly evil ignores that in the medium-term (medium because it's a big galaxy) the whole thing is going to crash. Doesn't mean that there's not things to be done, but the Scribe seems less careful (if brutal) reforms and more violent purges and/or revolutionary tribunals.
 
Vote the Penitent Gunslinger so we can be a awesome cowboy with a gun.

Also the abilities to make things (even things that shouldn't be able to be) afraid of us and generally being a "astartes-level combatant" who can point at something and it will die is cool.

Oh wait. Brain just connected two dots and thought about how we can make astartes afraid of us.
Wonder how that would go down.
 
The Laurent said:
I mean, the Emperor is dying, so to a certain extent talking about making the system less cartoonishly evil ignores that in the medium-term (medium because it's a big galaxy) the whole thing is going to crash. Doesn't mean that there's not things to be done, but the Scribe seems less careful (if brutal) reforms and more violent purges and/or revolutionary tribunals.
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...admittedly this actually makes scribe more attractive in a way. Like she starts having been killed, she's "discredited/etc."
 
The Laurent said:
I mean, the Emperor is dying, so to a certain extent talking about making the system less cartoonishly evil ignores that in the medium-term (medium because it's a big galaxy) the whole thing is going to crash. Doesn't mean that there's not things to be done, but the Scribe seems less careful (if brutal) reforms and more violent purges and/or revolutionary tribunals.
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Make whatever piece of it we can carve off less evil then. Consider the kind of impact Rome had on the Middle Ages. Rome in the West existed as an empire for 800 years or so. The Imperium of Man has been around for more than 10K while being terminally fascist. Even when the thing falls it's going to fall into successor states and those will need administrators.
 
I just think it sounds interesting to be someone that just kills the 'problem,' whatever it might be, with little fuss. Especially given we're an Abyssal here.

And also it just feels like a lot of SV quests often go for some flavor of the bureaucratic/subtle approach.
 
gale said:
Important question, does that mean we can get access to ghosts or not with our path? To make that totalitarian grasp tighter?
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You can absolutely work your scribes to death and then bind their spirits to their workstations to toil for eternity.

DragonParadox said:
Can't say I wasn't expecting that. It is the IoM and we are an Abyssal, there is going to be friction to say the least wherever we go. I would rather go into the place that has the biggest pit of incompetence and use the leverage from applying some kind of fix to make the whole system less cartoonishly evil. On the scale of imperial evils that need fixing terrified administrators are rather far down
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On the contrary, really - the Imperium is actually one of the most Abyssal-friendly states around. Like if you told the average Imperial Governor that you could increase the annual throughput of his factories by having a skull-clad monstrosity execute a worker in every plant to terrify the rest into working themselves to death (and then enslaving their souls so now they don't even need food or sleep), you'd barely get to finish your sentence before he started throwing money at you.
 
That also brings up the fact that the Scribe just sounds like she'd be perpetuating the same sort of system as the Imperium, where the Gunslinger just ignores that question to follow his own path while putting bullets in people.
 
Maugan Ra said:
I feel it is important to note here that the Contemptuous Scribe isn't actually going to be very good at reforming the system, in the sense of, like, making it more efficient or better organised. Her power is less the idealised golden dream and more the totalitarian grasp of oblivion.

In the 3rd edition rulebook the Solar charm for treating bureaucratic corruption gives you uncanny insight into people and causes them to assume you hold some position of authority worth respecting. The Abyssal charm for treating bureaucratic corruption works by having a guy executed on trumped up charges and using the bone-deep terror this instils in the other workers to read and manipulate them.

Now you can still create meaningful change with this approach, I just want to make sure people understand what they're voting for here. "One letter and one corpse at a time" and all that.
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I don't vote much so if I change mine, how do I do it? Should I edit or delete my earlier one? Can't find if there's an etiquette.

Because that does change my calculus. I'm sure it won't be better, but I think I'd rather vote for:

[X] The Penitent Gunslinger

I'm Guinevere, the fastest draw,
My hand is fate,
My word is law,
And you will fear me.
 
DragonParadox said:
Putting bullets in people is the Imperial system.
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Sure, but it's also the Ork system, and the Aeldari system, and the Chaos system, and... you get the point.

40k involves a lot of shooting, it's part of the whole "war across the stars," but that doesn't mean we have to prop up the Imperium with awful-no-good-terribad things like what's being described by Maugan Ra.

edit; and why is that part being called out as terrible, but not everything we're being told the Scribe can/will do??
 
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