Sterbelicht - One Sacrifice At A Time Against The Galaxy (40K)

[frostgiant]

Rak'Gol? Rak'Gol?! Dark eldar Gave Rak'Gol Webway access?! The Fuck you coked up Bondage fanatics?! This is Stupid even for you?!

This is actually bad if they keep coming, Setting aside the Dangers that are Rak'Gol in ground/boarding combat (And the fact that almost every weapons we use is FUCKING ENERGY), Their vessels are legit exactly the doctrine I would pick if I wanted to bully a fleet like ours.

Their vessels tend heavily towards Incredibly fast firing macrocannons, WAY to many PD turrets that can almost literally turn the air space into metal space, and their own strike craft.
Essentially? Every Canon ship that has been seen is Brawler hybrids. Brawler hybrid noted for their surprising speed, if not maneuverability. Remember how in my analysis posts of the dictator how I was worried about Brawler hybrids that can essentially ignore/tie up our strike craft and then proceed to bully our line ships? The Rak'Gol are basically nothing BUT that.

That is really bad for us in a fight needless to say. Oh, and they have spinal Rad-Beams that is noted for cutting through even the toughest armour, Because your not allowed to be safe at lance ranges.

The worst part is in actual combat. Ability to run up, down and upside down on nearly any surface, 2.6 meters standing up and able to swap to using all 8 legs when they really need to motor, Shockingly energy resistant which render they well suited against weapons like the lasgun (Hence why bolters exist despite the logistical miracle that is sufficiently big lasguns), A love of Bionics, and weaponry that is either relatively primitive, or outputting enough radiation to slag metals. They are almost built from head to toes to be devastating boarders.

Also, They love their Mono-edge claw bionics. If this is the precursor to a larger wave of Rak'gol aggression? I think the research priority just became Ion shields, Better armour and such.
Notably, They seem to have a heavily ship raiding based culture, with information of actually Full sized ground attacks being limited, so if they do decide to actually deploy ground armies, we have no clue what their answers to Tanks are, but I don't want to take bets on them Not having them.

 

[The Laurent]

Honestly, we're fine? Like. We dealt with them easily enough. I'm not saying they're not a threat, but honestly we just need to make sure to send out a fleet whenever it's acting up.

 

[HeroCooky]

By the way, could you explain a bit what those categories mean? The update imply that they're where the inspiration for these melodies came from (so we got Kildrabi melodies because we were inspired by the Kildrabi), but then what do [Uncovered] and [Secret] mean?

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They are Categories of Psykana Melodies. Helpful, I know.

They, essentially, are groups based around similar themes. Like Kil'Drabi Melodies, or Star Child ones, or Secret Melodies that require things you don't know about to become available.

Oh yeah @HeroCooky , I see you've updated the Void Ship section. How many did we lose? Because those are some nice benefits.

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Your shipwrights were a bit zealous, so you lost 18 of your 29 Imperial Ships.

 

[frostgiant]

Honestly, we're fine? Like. We dealt with them easily enough. I'm not saying they're not a threat, but honestly we just need to make sure to send out a fleet whenever it's acting up.

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individual ships or even small packs? Perfectly fine, I am worried if we start getting warfleets. Not only do their doctrine stack up really well into ours, it implies REALLY bad things about whats happening with the webway. Hopefully this was a one off Rak'gol ship that got webway access because a Dark eldar pirate thinks it was funny, Worst case... IDK, The Rak'gol never really struck me as the type who could launch a full out war to contest eldar control of the webway, so unless they were hiding some really big guns or something REALLY fucked happened in commoragh, the worst case is they are now "infesting" The webway and will use the now galactic wide highway to continue their horrifying massacres on a galactic scale like Dark eldar but less spiky.


Unless the Numbers change, The biggest threat from the rak'Gol will hopefully remain "IF" But if the numbers are equalized, I am worried because Rak'gol ship design is stacked VERY heavily agaist our doctrine, and Their inherent energy resistance renders they quite the threat in "ground" Combat.

 

[Alectai]

They are Categories of Psykana Melodies. Helpful, I know.

They, essentially, are groups based around similar themes. Like Kil'Drabi Melodies, or Star Child ones, or Secret Melodies that require things you don't know about to become available.
Your shipwrights were a bit zealous, so you lost 18 of your 29 Imperial Ships.

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Well, that's an Ooof, but the fact is applies forward to Heavy Cruiser salves the burn.

 

[The Laurent]

They are Categories of Psykana Melodies. Helpful, I know.

They, essentially, are groups based around similar themes. Like Kil'Drabi Melodies, or Star Child ones, or Secret Melodies that require things you don't know about to become available.
Your shipwrights were a bit zealous, so you lost 18 of your 29 Imperial Ships.

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Did we keep any of the Light Cruisers?

 

[One Autumn Leaf]

Man, the Nova canon would have been nice for these fuckers. Have fun trying to get close with that monster knocking your teeth in...also yeah worst case scenario they have Webway access and the entire galaxy is getting the experience of getting Rak'Gol'd

 

[Alectai]

Man, the Nova canon would have been nice for these fuckers. Have fun trying to get close with that monster knocking your teeth in...also yeah worst case scenario they have Webway access and the entire galaxy is getting the experience of getting Rak'Gol'd

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Good news is that they're shitty at maneuver and while they have good burst speed (Orion Drives, yikes), they move like fat whales even by 40K standards, and aside from the Rad-Lance which is absurdly strong, their guns are kind of weak, mostly just there to rattle you and fish for chip damage than actually hurting you. The real problem is CONSTANT BOARDING ATTEMPTS by swarms of trans-space marine nigh invincible killing machines.

 

[HelioA]

[X] Investigate
[X] Plan: Five Bounds of Sacred Psykery

 

[Professor Vesca]

[X] Plan: Five Bounds of Sacred Psykery

 

[frostgiant]

Good news is that they're shitty at maneuver and while they have good burst speed (Orion Drives, yikes), they move like fat whales even by 40K standards, and aside from the Rad-Lance which is absurdly strong, their guns are kind of weak, mostly just there to rattle you and fish for chip damage than actually hurting you. The real problem is CONSTANT BOARDING ATTEMPTS by swarms of trans-space marine nigh invincible killing machines.

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Shit like the Rak'Gol is why the Bolter came into, and never went out of style despite the logistical problems that arise when a bolter shell is such a technologically complex little thing and a logistical burden in comparison to things like Lasguns.

The Bolter sacrifices Penetration, And maxes out on Post-pen DAMAGE, Because with shit like orks and Rak'gol running around, Blowing golfball sized chunks out of the target isn't enough.

 

[Alectai]

All that aside, the fact we pushed our Fighters so quickly is actually our biggest benefit here. Rak'Gol boarding attempts are almost purely from "Get in close and spam boarding craft and boarding torpedoes", and their insane PD net doesn't protect anything they shoot out of that bubble.

 

[BigBadBob7070]

Your shipwrights were a bit zealous, so you lost 18 of your 29 Imperial Ships.

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While their loss will be felt, I think it's worth it. We got a pretty big boost to the base stats of our ships that would make our future designs much more survivable and if we don't our ships to be big thicc chonkers, we can downgrade back to our old standard to get extra DP. I see this as an absolute win!

Now, we just need to fire up our shipyards to make up for the loss of so many ships…

 

[Alectai]

While their loss will be felt, I think it's worth it. We got a pretty big boost to the base stats of our ships that would make our future designs much more survivable and if we don't our ships to be big thicc chonkers, we can downgrade back to our old standard to get extra DP. I see this as an absolute win!

Now, we just need to fire up our shipyards to make up for the loss of so many ships…

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Still worth making ships into heckin' chonkers if we can, more HP and capacity is always good.

 

[BigBadBob7070]

Still worth making ships into heckin' chonkers if we can, more HP and capacity is always good.

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Indeed, but it depends on what exactly we want out of a ship. If it's a brawler like the Leo, Crux or the future Scorpio size is great, but for something we want in the backline like the Libra, Sagittarius or Andromeda we'd like to have better and shinier stuff instead.

 

[The Laurent]

Indeed, but it depends on what exactly we want out of a ship. If it's a brawler like the Leo, Crux or the future Scorpio size is great, but for something we want in the backline like the Libra, Sagittarius or Andromeda we'd like to have better and shinier stuff instead.

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Not really? Well for some of them, but for the Libra the size advantage helps with fitting everything in. And for those that don't need the size, that might as well read "Free DP."

 

[The Laurent]

Also mechanical thought, at some later point if we want to have a third "Infrastructure Turn" with that third Asharn bonus, then if we chose our cards right we could get to X in one of the other categories.

First Infra Thing: x2 each of something
Second Infra Thing: 3x of stuff to get to 5s, and one thing we want to raise to 6.
Third Infra Thing: x4, raise one thing from 6 to 10 all at once.

 

[Some_guy_161]

[X] Investigate
[X] Plan: Five Bounds of Sacred Psykery

 

[Pempelune]

Also mechanical thought, at some later point if we want to have a third "Infrastructure Turn" with that third Asharn bonus, then if we chose our cards right we could get to X in one of the other categories.

First Infra Thing: x2 each of something
Second Infra Thing: 3x of stuff to get to 5s, and one thing we want to raise to 6.
Third Infra Thing: x4, raise one thing from 6 to 10 all at once.

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Yeah. I argued that we should that Jolly on Civilian Infrastructure, because one of the bonuses we didn't take at Civ V is really really good:

We'll need 2 Jolly to get to All-V, leaving us with one last Jolly. I say we should use it on getting to Civilian Infrastructure X. First, because Civ Infra make our citizens' lives better, which we are strongly committed to, but also because here's one Civ V bonus we didn't take:



Incredibly powerful. Not only do we get free troops transports and faster growth, we also gain the equivalent of 3 mechanically powerful traits. More CI/HI per action in particular would be excellent, as it means that we can get Heavy Industry X (and thus more research) easier. Automatic colonization is also great. All combined, it's a game changer.

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[The Laurent]

Yeah. I argued that we should that Jolly on Civilian Infrastructure, because one of the bonuses we didn't take at Civ V is really really good:

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Maybe? I'm also kinda tempted by Heavy Industry X, tbh.

 

[Alectai]

We'll burn that bridge when we come to it. At least we should have a little time to breathe for now. Especially since it turns out that the Webway Gate changing wasn't--in fact--a sign that we were about to get swarmed by a fleet of Dark Space Elfs.

 

[frostgiant]

We'll burn that bridge when we come to it. At least we should have a little time to breathe for now. Especially since it turns out that the Webway Gate changing wasn't--in fact--a sign that we were about to get swarmed by a fleet of Dark Space Elfs.

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The rak'gol are worrying, But more through implication of the fact that they used the webway.
At worst, we will end up seeing a Rak'Gol warfleet come out, But as long as we maintain defenses are make sure to rotate a fleet back every time it acts weird, we should be able to at least reevaluate.
If we see a whole Warfleet come out, we will probably need to some changes to the gate defender fleet, Lances are the best bet vs Rak'gol given the macrocannon heavy nature, Brawlers to Brawl with their brawlers etc etc etc, but until we actually SEE a Rak'gol fleet and this becomes a reoccurring theme, This doesn't count as a fire we need to put out.

 

[Alectai]

[] Scorpio Class Light Cruiser
-[] Length - 4.000 Meters
-[] Width - 500
-[] Acceleration - 5 Gravities (-1 DP)
-[] Armor - Thick Double Hull (-2 DP)
-[] Shields - Three Arrays
-[] Weapons - 6x 100m Torpedoes/1x Medium Bomber Hangar/2x Heavy Missile Batteries (-10 DP)
-[] Equipment - Armored Life Pods/Ship Shrines/Strict Pilot Training/Veteran Pilot Gene-Lines/Missile Swarms/Internal Security Systems/Superior Gravimetric Engine Calculations/Lattice Hulls/Harsh Crew Training (-11 DP)

Revisited the Scorpio with our new advancements, and I think we got something pretty respectable here. Would I have liked to have a prow lance? Yeah, I would have, but the numbers don't really add up for that, but I was able to crowbar a missile/torpedo boat together with our new advancements, and at any rate, we had it confirmed that Point Defense Saturation is, in fact, a Thing that we can benefit from if we can fill the battlespace with enough Threats, and this facilitates that angle. At 5 Gravities of acceleration and Superior Gravimetric, this is a very agile starship for its size. With Lattice Hulls and a Thick Double Hull, it's also extremely well protected in a brawl against anything that punches through its shields and evasion. Harsh Crew Training and Strict Pilot Training means i's elite, and Internal Security Systems combined with that give it the ability to resist boarding attempts by factions that love doing that.

This isn't going to be swatting Eldar out of space, but it's a good design, basically our Dauntless equivalent. Solid as an individual combatant or a Crux Group Leader, though suffers against anything fast enough to stay at skirmish range with it. Fair is fair, there aren't a lot of things that can do that and resist a bomber strike with our veterancy. So it should serve us well.

 

[NotteBoy97]

I hope the Eldar will eventually come and help/tell us shit cause if we have to Deal with constant swarms coming from the Webway than it becomes all the more tempting IC to poke or even to try and destroy the Webway gate. So between desire to make sure we don't do anything stupid and themselves getting annoyed/angry at the Rakgols in the Webway I hope before things get too bad they'll approach us

 

[Alectai]

I hope the Eldar will eventually come and help/tell us shit cause if we have to Deal with constant swarms coming from the Webway than it becomes all the more tempting IC to poke or even to try and destroy the Webway gate. So between desire to make sure we don't do anything stupid and themselves getting annoyed/angry at the Rakgols in the Webway I hope before things get too bad they'll approach us

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I'd be surprised if they didn't approach us at this point. Inviting a hostile alien species into the webway breaks the unspoken NAP between Craftworlders and Cormorragh Space Elfs, and thus, them pushing back is "Free Game". This is the equivilant of your asshole next door neighbor failing to detonate a dirty bomb next door and being caught in the act. Unleashing the fucking Rak'Gol within three fucking jumps of what's apparently a planet of Extreme interest for at least one Craftworld?

If they Don't react to this, I'd be surprised. Us sitting tight here and containing them while not damaging the Gate is kind of the ideal position as far as they'd be concerned, and now that the genie's out of the bottle, they'd probably want to get in ahead of us deciding to try and damage the Gate.