Nostradamus
Lord
- Location
- sweden
okay that makes more sense still seems like a self fulfilling prophecy at this point though.
A Different Breed (Warhammer 29K)
okay that makes more sense still seems like a self fulfilling prophecy at this point though.
What do you think about this superheavy? It has Fatesheer for dealing with other superheavies and Knight-equivalents, Starlances for tanks and heavies, Fateshredders for infantry, Screamer grenade launchers and flamers for area control, and a compartment for a Seeing Circle squad or some other kind of elite squad.
[] Banewind Heavy Tank
- [][Chassis] Heavy Grav-vehicle
- [][Superheavy] Fatesheer Cannon
- [][Vehicle] 2xStarlance, 2xFateshredder cannon
- [][Heavy] 2xScreamer Grenade launcher
- []Ranged] 3xFlamer
- [][Wargear] 1xHolo-Field, 3xGrav-Field, 6xEnclosed Infantry Capacity
That's why it's important that we talk about distributions of possible futures, not about single ones. One Craftworld could decide that a 10% risk of something happening is too high so take steps to prevent it at the cost of a 5% chance of something worse; and another make a different call. This is where conflicts can arise as even if they see the same distribution of possible futures they can disagree about the relative importance of them.
Our seers will have told us about one, probably likely, possible future. We don't currently know what the steps that would lead to that particular future are, probably because our best seers have just had their god die and are busy reinventing how their precognition is performed.
We're also in a context where up until very recently, horrendously complicated deeply nested precognition games and quasi-bluffs was probably how politics was done, where you have gambits and reactions based around a penumbra of a distribution of events that never actually happens as the seers of the various sides would forecast the possibilities and make decisions and other seers' forecasts would incorporate that, and vice versa.
You quickly turn into something resembling a higher order Keynesian beauty contest.
As a result, leaders on all sides are working in a completely different paradigm. A genuine, and so credible decision to attack someone unless something changes about their policy could once have been a complete normal way of signalling your displeasure and performing negotiations, as they'd forecast that, forecast what would be required to change that, and so both sides could negotiate and mutually change their plans without anyone ever speaking to each other until the possibility of conflict was reduced to an acceptably level.
Just to go back to the what I was saying above, I think it's important to remember that, I think, there are no Khainite craftworlds. They all hate Khaine. They hate him a lot. They're not Wych Cults. That was part of what the Craftworlds fled from. The example of Eldanesh; who heroically fought and died against Khaine, and founded one of the most important lines of Eldar nobility, is instructive here. He is, I think, the icon of the more militant Eldar, representing as I think he does the resistance of the Eldar people against their worst instincts to do harm.
There are just some Craftworlds that are more willing to make the sacrifice and do Khainite things, like go to war; than others.
I think you can make a strong argument that as we've gone to war against the orks already so far we're just as Khainite as any other Craftworld, as that's what being Khainite is. If Biel Tan hasn't gone to war yet, they've been less Khainite than us.
Being peaceful means we have a lower propensity to be Khainite, but in the face of events we might end up being Khainite more than an initially more naturally aggressive society that is more isolated.
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- Location
- Somewhere Beyond the Sea
That actually sounds like a really cool idea of negotiation between two craftworlds, not gonna lie
[X] Razorwind Jetbike
[X] Steelswan Troop Barge
[X] Steelswan Troop Barge
Vau-Vaulkesh Sword master have an interesting tradition with their swords. A perspective Sword master will make their own sword. This gives them the advantage of Knowing their sword or swords much better then other Sword Masters
Power Maul
Force Stave
I want this to happen also I wanted to post this yesterday but stuff happened
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The issue is we have no reason to think that our prophecy is a diplomatic statement. We know Biel-Tan hates us to the point of being willing to send armed forces. We know that sooner or later they will come, unless mollified or stopped. And we have no intention of mollifying them. From our perspective, Biel-Tan shouting "We will come if you don't stop!" elicits response of "Yes, and?". If the prophesized attack was a diplo-bluff, good, we have more time to scale. But if it is genuine action, then we will need all hands on the deck. A warning like this has to be assumed true unless counter-proof is obtained.
And who gives a damn about 'traditional politics' anyway? Probably not us.
Whose to say we have no intention of mollifying them?
We have literally no idea what the critical issue they're willing to go to war over is: so we don't know if it's something we could compromise on or not, or even if it's something that we care about at all and so could agree to without a qualm.
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- Location
- Germany
Proud—arrogant, whisper some even now—Beil-Tan calls you coward and perhaps nigh-traitorous, for so thoroughly rejecting the notion that the Empire will yet rise again. They do not, yet, muster their Tempest of Blades against you, but any effort to humble you, they will make.
Default Relationship: Hostile
That was the default, so we do have a pretty good idea why for the baseline.
Hateful just seems to mean that the rejection got them heated enough that they went, we will make you help if you want or not.
Edit:
The answer is that there is nothing to compromise here.
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Professor Vesca
Good News Everyone!
Well at the very least we could ask their allies whats got them so upset. We should keep tabs, if only so we will have some idea of when they decide to move on us.
- Location
- Germany
Will be interesting when we get to this part when we get to the diplomacy with the Exodites.
Mostly what can we offer them for their help (and that they want) and what exactly we can get from them in return.
Let me suggest a scenario.
Bier-Tan hates us because we're peaceful and artistic, and they're worried that we might squander our great potential on such fripperies like 'having a decent quality of life' and 'not having to adopt a profoundly alien and psychologically damaging regimen of immense self-discipline and intense self-denial' aka 'the Paths', rather than on what they think are more important matters like taking advantage of the brief window before other galactic powers arise to lay the foundations for a future Eldar renaissance, for by example, strangling any potential rivals for hegemony in the cradle.
Now, one way of doing that is to ensure that during these very formative and important years for our culture we spend a huge amount of effort frantically militarising as fast as possible to the detriment of other things we could be doing.
This accomplishes a few things. It gets us into the habit of devoting a lot of effort to the military. It means we're better able to protect ourselves and project power to protect other survivors of the Fall. And it gives us a big (war) hammer and as everyone knows when what you have is a big hammer and fewer other tools there's a strong tendency for all sorts of problems to start appearing very nail shaped when looked at from your perspective. And once you start making successful military interventions, there's a tendency for mission creep and precedents and expectations to be set that lead to you to keep on doing so, and doing so in a wider scale.
All these could well sound like great things from their perspective, in the long run it probably shapes our society into one that's one that's more likely to be helpful to their ambitions to re-establish Eldar hegemony, and in the short run it probably makes us more likely to do specific things they're also likely to favour.
The question then comes as to how they can persuade a peaceful artistic society to us prioritise rapidly militarising.
They could ask, but we might well say no. We probably would. However, if they decide to attack us unless we militarise, knowing we'll have seers who can forecast the potential attack, that seems like a very effective way to get there way without probably having to actually end up doing anything. They'd need to actually commit to attack if we'd chosen not to militarise, but they can also likely foresee what we'd do in response to foreseeing their potential attack, so know that's a low risk.
In this way, they could successfully get their way and make it more likely that our society develops in a way they favour, becoming a place and doing things they'd hate less than they otherwise would, very cheaply, the only thing they're spending is the risk that we don't respond in the way they want in which case they need to attack. Likely they don't have to, so it ends up costing them nothing.
Now, let's say we know all that as well, and make the same calculus.
Our seers make the same set of predictions, and the same set of judgements as above. However, what can we do? Biel Tan has put us in a tails they win heads we lose scenario. If we militarise to protect ourselves from the potential assault, Biel Tan has moved the distribution of potential future states of how our Craftworld acts and is in their favour. If we do nothing we get punched in the face by Biel Tan.
Some of this is based on my assumption that although they hate the way our society looks like it's going and want us to change, they don't want us to die, and they want to do so in the probability adjusted cheapest manner for them. In that case, the 'compromise' is that by building the strength required to fight them we've inherently doing what they want'.
If this is what's happened it's a wonderful example of how to use and manipulate precognition and I applaud our QM for it,
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- Location
- Germany
And this here fall already apart.
We know why they are hostile to us at default, we have in written in the description from character creation.
It's because we reject the notion that the Eldar Dominion will return.
The hateful relationship just means they will attack and try to murder us over that, no other goal her but to kill us (and likely steal our shit).
The ones that got prissy because we don't follow the paths is Alaitoc.
Overall, you seem to try and make a case so that Biel-Tan has a reason about being worried about us instead of being assholes, that will pretty much cross the entire galaxy to get to us and kill us while their own shit is still on fire.
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I made a spreadsheet for vehicle design, complete with reverse-engineered base platform costs. Duplicate to edit.
Interesting that skimmer is only slightly more expensive than a heavy jetbike,
Interesting that skimmer is only slightly more expensive than a heavy jetbike,
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Professor Vesca
Good News Everyone!
We could probably create a library of formulas depending on the platform you pick so you can track in real time whether or not the vehicle your designing is in budget.
The Vision of Biel-Tans Agression has angered the Followers of Vaul greatly. We invoke the Dread Ritual of the Spreadsheet!
I'm not sure what's the best software for this. Spreadsheets are very cumbersome to program.
They can be hostile to us and hate us and disagree with our politics without wanting to destroy us. If they want to re-establish the Eldar Dominion trying to destroy us is worse than pointless. It's deeply stupid and counterproductive. It wastes their assets they can use to advance rather than retard their goals which would be destroyed in the conflict, wastes assets of potential third party Eldar allies who would be destroyed if we can't help them, alienates yet other third parties who would be horrified by them Kinslaying, and, indeed, and perhaps most critically wastes our assets that would potentially be used to help them if they get us to change our mind.
If we assume that these are actually intelligent precognitives with possibly order of magnitudes longer experience in politics than the human race has existed for, then I think we should work on the basis that our opposition are not tremendous fools and are actually basically competent at trying to advance their own agendas when we try to examine and predict their actions.
It's not as if we're going to fight to stop them re-establishing the Dominion or do anything whatsoever to get in their way. If they somehow miraculously managed it I think our leaders and population would probably be ecstatic beyond reason. We just don't think it's currently feasible, if ever.
As a result, I think we should be looking at what they're tying to do through the lens of what actually would benefit them, rather than treating them as if they're orks.
What benefits them is if we continue to exist but that our cultural identity and policies shift in a way that's more aligned with their own. That's the kind of 'threat' we should look out for, being manipulated into becoming who they want us to be.
And this doesn't mean I think they're looking out for us, although they genuinely could be materially. I strongly doubt they'd want our population or infrastructure further reduced, as it's too valuable for their long term ambitions.
I mean; even the Dark Eldar and the Craftworlds don't even want to destroy each other, they trade and collaborate when they have to on a grand strategic scale. What they are more interested in is poaching each other's people, I think this is that but on a much larger scale, given we'r still in the traumatic aftermath of the Fall when cultures are presumably relatively fluid.
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Professor Vesca
Good News Everyone!
Not program, its just a vlookup table with the lookup table being the platform list.
- Location
- Germany
They are very much going to attack us, and are going to try and fuck us up.
They are also pretty much beelining to us, just take some time with the webway changing and us being on the other fucking side of the galaxy.
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Mechanis
Confirmed Techpriest
- Location
- Deep Net
Equipment for the crew will be a separate section, because crew size can vary significantly and sometimes you will want mixed equipment because some of them are in enclosed spaces and some of them aren't.
The thing is though, Biel-Tan is explicitly that stupid about achieving their stated goal---they're constantly picking every fight they can, throwing good money after bad because their reaction to getting defeated is "try again with a bigger warhost, repeat until victory is achieved", and acting like total assholes even to the people who are supposed to be their allies or whose goals would, on even a second's consideration, make them natural allies.because Biel-Tan did not eat the serving of Humble Pie that everyone else did, but threw it on the ground and demanded to see the manager for daring to serve them such, while angerly waving a Tacticool gun around. And randomly shooting people who weren't previously involved.
You know sincerely hope we keep beating them. The situation doesn't turn to war because of are allies. But when we meat True Drukari or Dark Eldar there is no convincing us. We are not committing genocide in that case no we are simply reminding them a lesson. A lesson True Dark Eldar should have learned with the fall.