We only need to absofuckinglutely assault the void forest if we actually aim for your plan specifically, which would require it to maintain course for 5 turns across multiple different coordinating actions. My plan only locks us in for a couple of individually high DC actions, which is comparatively way more stable and way more flexible given the unreliable nature of planmaking across multiple turns and the quest's own table-flipping tendencies.
If we build a second Calculation Heart, we can complete all four shields in two turns, if we dedicate our free Learning action and regular Personals to it, even before getting into wound actions. And four shields is assuming peak output and no other draw on Alloys. We'll probably end up going with fewer.
If all that's needed in this turn to get the shields ready with time to spare is doing the Assault and the Calculation Heart now, then I could just drop the PDF training and maybe Atraxas' role in the Fortifications for the Assault and then we get the best of both worlds since I'm already doing Calculation Heart, though I can't find where the DC for the void forest is so maybe it won't be doable in one turn anyway, which I suspect would throw a spanner in the works of your plan. However, that still doesn't resolve the question of this generating a ridiculous amount of Suspicion as I mentioned. I am willing to take some hits of that, but I don't like taking hits where we can't actually account for them. The actions to build all of these do not yet exist and that consequence can't be measured.
Also as a side note I do not approve of the use of Akiona for important envoy work, since her Prodigy trait swings both ways and makes her critical failures far worse just as much as it makes her critical successes far better. It's the same issue I have with Sunrise's plan
We only need to absofuckinglutely assault the void forest if we actually aim for your plan specifically, which would require it to maintain course for 5 turns across multiple different coordinating actions. My plan only locks us in for a couple of individually high DC actions, which is comparatively way more stable and way more flexible given the unreliable nature of planmaking across multiple turns and the quest's own table-flipping tendencies.
No? It would require us to maintain course for two turns, following this one. I said that. And having a steady supply of free Alloys will make many of our higher tech actions cheaper, even if we don't specifically go for maximum Shields.
If all that's needed in this turn to get the shields ready with time to spare is doing the Assault and the Calculation Heart now, then I could just drop the PDF training and maybe Atraxas' role in the Fortifications for the Assault and then we get the best of both worlds since I'm already doing Calculation Heart, though I can't find where the DC for the void forest is so maybe it won't be doable in one turn anyway. However, that still doesn't resolve the question of this generating a ridiculous amount of Suspicion as I mentioned. I am willing to take some hits of that, but I don't like taking hits where we can't actually account for them. The actions to build all of these do not yet exist and that consequence can't be measured.
Also as a side note I do not approve of the use of Akiona for important envoy work, since her Prodigy trait swings both ways and makes her critical failures far worse just as much as it makes her critical successes far better. It's the same issue I have with Sunrise's plan
Attacking a threat overtaking an entire system completely on our own without the army we got specifically for this kind of thing seems like a bad idea. And technically, what we need is the Forest to be cleared and the core built this turn, with the Chamber next turn (admittedly it'd be slightly better to get both Core and Chamber done this turn but rushing has a surcharge of one action). @Leon12431, I realize when you confirmed that it was viable, you made no mention of Suspicion cost. Since we're in the planning phase, can you give us actual costs for the following actions:
Get Blackmail on Balkavus
Construct Awakening Core (Black Hole ver)
@Leon12431, I realize when you confirmed that it was viable, you made no mention of Suspicion cost. Since we're in the planning phase, can you give us actual costs for the following actions:
Get Blackmail on Balkavus
Construct Awakening Core (Black Hole ver)
the blackmail is possible, but I have not yet rolled for the costs/suspicion/DCs. The suspicion cost of doing this now is higher than normal, but this is not something easily passable. The suspicion costs are not low right now, they would be lower past invasion or pre warning due to no one looking too closely at things.
Emps gave a warning that pretty much everyone noticed to some degree, Cadia is basically asking what the fuck because of that. All eyes are on Erimyst and Shogi in particular. The Planetary Governor rushing off world to a random black hole and building a complex facility is going to get Inquisitors and Archmagi crawling over it. Its unavoidable.
I generally refrain from providing more suspicion info due to it being sort of akin to wealth in that it's a common sense thing to a degree. What would the Imperium think of Atraxas doing X? Right now nothing good. The best option would be something along the lines of "using xenotech to prepare, get the interrogation tools ready" to "fuck everything, he is a Heretic and a slave of Chaos, everyone to Shogi NOW"
(In all seriousness, this is consistently my weakness in roleplaying games and such. If I have a list of enumerated options with clearly-defined rules, I can optimize to a slightly terrifying extent. But figuring out common sense in a fictional world (that I did not invent)... typically harder. I don't always have common sense in my own bloody world, after all...)
The QM said that this force is not gonna be one with Abaddon or those of his rough level, and we know that they're not packing a huge amount of chaff since they were rolled for being elite but small.
Attacking a threat overtaking an entire system completely on our own without the army we got specifically for this kind of thing seems like a bad idea.
Uh... that was why I said I'd drop training the PDF in my plan. Because that's what the Private Army is doing there. So it'd be Atraxas+Army doing this.
The Planetary Governor rushing off world to a random black hole and building a complex facility is going to get Inquisitors and Archmagi crawling over it. Its unavoidable.
I generally refrain from providing more suspicion info due to it being sort of akin to wealth in that it's a common sense thing to a degree. What would the Imperium think of Atraxas doing X? Right now nothing good. The best option would be something along the lines of "using xenotech to prepare, get the interrogation tools ready" to "fuck everything, he is a Heretic and a slave of Chaos, everyone to Shogi NOW"
Emps gave a warning that pretty much everyone noticed to some degree, Cadia is basically asking what the fuck because of that. All eyes are on Erimyst and Shogi in particular. The Planetary Governor rushing off world to a random black hole and building a complex facility is going to get Inquisitors and Archmagi crawling over it. Its unavoidable.
Well gee fucking willikers I'd have liked to have known that when I asked if it was viable and then spent two weeks planning it out when the answer was "yes".
I know it's not going to be enough, but I have been scrambling with regards to this whole black hole stuff. I knew that it would come up eventually, but I have had to rebalance most of the actions, figure out other subsystems, handle the sheer madness of the dice in turn 4 and before. I guess it's that I have been trying to juggle many things in this quest and I have been slipping back into bad old habits of mine where I assume that everyone is on my page.
I can't excuse my failings in this regard and I am not attempting too. Its just a matter of an ingrained pattern of thought where I assume that everyone understands my intent automatically, I know that is wrong, but I tend to miss obvious problems if not pointed out to me directly.
My only offering is that I believed that it was understood that suspicion was semi narrative, but now that I look back, I see that it's pretty much presented as a purely mechanical aspect of the quest. I should have mentioned the suspicion variance when the plan for the black hole core/chamber/forge was first presented. There is no denying that, all I can say is that somewhere I had assumed that the suspicion cost had already been accounted for.
In light of this absolute failing on my part, with no mitigating factors, I am setting and marking the suspicion of the core and chamber to be 20 and 25 respectively. I try to be a fair GM and this failing is on me, I can not negate the suspicion entirely due to the narrative implications of it, but I can mitigate the problem.
Edit: I somehow fucked up even more than I had thought by not realizing that I have somehow fucking forgot to explain the literal combat system. Ok, in brief the combat system is a semi narrative system where you have 3 levels of combat. The highest level is the overall commander, this can be anything from a planetary defense force to a sector command. They will roll against their opposing number directly and provide a direct bonus to the second layer. The second level would be the fronts or major battle points where sub admirals or generals are in command. They too roll against their counterparts and convey a bonus to their armies. Then the final level is the army level where armies roll directly against the other army with their bonuses from their Quality and command bonuses along with any inherited traits from command.
Assault actions use the Combat System and not the DC system due to being combat. I have zero fucking clue how I forgot to explain this basic concept. Scream at me all you want for that is never going to reach how dumb I feel right now.
I think we should go all in with Comprehensive Subterranean and Void Fortifications it will provide not only improved defenses but also the income to afford other upgrades to our navy and army.
Remember that we dont only need to survive the invasion but also repay the loan in 25 turns so the sooner we get more income the more we can afford to spend on improving our defenses.
@Leon12431 if we take 7 wound actions + 3 personal and 4 of those do not complete what happens to that 4th one?
Are we forced to take a wound next turn so it can continue or does it get paused till one of the other actions complete?
@Leon12431 if we take 7 wound actions + 3 personal and 4 of those do not complete what happens to that 4th one?
Are we forced to take a wound next turn so it can continue or does it get paused till one of the other actions complete?
Hmm so no is doing anything with the Sister Hospitaller Order this turn? getting the Militant Citadel and Schola would give us -10 suspicion to all actions
Replaced the pathfinders with building the Militant Citadel for the Adepta Sororitas, as that gives a long term reduction in Suspicion and provide us with a force of power armored troops on our world.
[X] Plan Comprehensive Subterranean and Void Fortifications, Pathfinders and Heart Forge
-[X][Military] Comprehensive Subterranean and Void Fortifications (Resource Cost: 2,200)(Atraxus)(Erana with Araahal)(Urma x2)(private army x6) 2,200R 0/1299 about 500 more income then upkeep
-[X][Military] Improve private army (Vehicles (Resources: 10. Upkeep: 1 Military Services. DC: 25), Armored Vehicles (Resources: 50. Upkeep: 10 Military Services. DC: 25), Light Armor (Resources: 25. Upkeep: 10 Military Services. DC: 25)) = 85R, DC 75 Upkeep: 21
--[X] Use AdMech Favor
-[X][Diplomacy] Contact Cadia (0/50)(Suspicion: -15)(Atraxas)(Atraxus personal)
-[X][Diplomacy] Create Diplomatic Corps (0/100)(Resource Cost: 10) (Upkeep (Social Services): 10)(Suspicion: 5)(Akiona)
-[X][Intrigue] Establish subsector spies (0/250) (Atraxus)(Nalka)(Suspicion: 20)
-[X][Stewardship] Militant Citadel: -10 suspicion, reduces suspicion of all actions by 5 as long as it exists, costs 500 Resources, and 200 DC (Atraxus Stewardship) (Atraxus wound) x2
-[X][Learning] Dig into planetary education system (0/50)(Resource Cost: 25)(Suspicion: 5) (Balkavus)
-[X][Learning] Study the Invoked Law (Resource Cost: 10) (0/100) (Atraxas)
-[X][Faith] Donate to the church (Suspicion: -10) (Resource Cost: 25) (DC: 20)(Atraxus)(Nameria)
-[X][Personal] Homeworld Mission: Noosphere (Suspicion: 20) (50 Mechanicus Favor) (DC: 0)
-[X][Personal] Homeworld Mission: Voidspace Info (Suspicion: 0) (Resource Cost: 0) (DC: 20)
-[X][Free] Contact Homeworld and attempt to purchase 110 Alloys (however much favor that would cost, up to our entire supply)
-[X][Wound] Heart Forge (Suspicion: 50) (Resource Cost: 150) (Upkeep (Infrastructure): 15) (0/170) (Atraxus) x3
-[X][Wound] Improve Relations with Moriya (Suspicion: -10) (Resource Cost: 5) (0/10)
-[X][Wound] Meet With Shezu(Suspicion: 5) (Resource Cost: 10) (0/40)
-[X][Personal]The Calculation Heart (Resource Cost: 1000, build with alloys if possible) DC 0
[X] Plan Comprehensive Subterranean and Void Fortifications, Pathfinders and Heart Forge
-[X][Military] Comprehensive Subterranean and Void Fortifications (Resource Cost: 2,200)(Atraxus with Araahal)(Erana)(Urma x2) 2,200R 0/1299 about 500 more income then upkeep
Why would you give Araahal to Atraxas instead of Erana? She's the one with the bonuses to Void construction. Also, you're not making full use of the Private Army here. You know how in my plan, I wrote "--[X] Private Army" 5 times? Because they can be used 5 times to give 5 extra progress dice. As it stands, this would risk not being completed in time for the invasion.
Once again I point you back to my plan from before. If we use AdMech Favor for this, it not only doesn't require an action, but is also doesn't even require Resources or even dice rolls. It's just automatically done. And since we have 100, we can easily drop 5 or 10 to make this happen to greater effect.
Like I mentioned with froggy, Akiona magnifies Critical FAILURES just as much as the magnifies Critical Successes. For something as important as diplomacy with Cadia, I do not want to risk it. Besides, forming a diplomatic corps would have vastly reduced ramifications if she managed to crit fail that one compared to the alternative.
-[X][Stewardship] Militant Citadel: -10 suspicion, reduces suspicion of all actions by 5 as long as it exists, costs 500 Resources, and 200 DC (Atraxus Stewardship) (Atraxus wound) x2
Where did you get this action from? I am not seeing it on the list anywhere. Also, this would take around 2 turns to complete assuming average rolls. I would be willing to edit my plan to include this though if what I'm seeing is accurate.
Edit 2: Nevermind, I see it now. And I am considering replacing the tax code action with this.
Araahal: Inverted Honored Khornate Daemon into a free deity of War/Solider/Honor, currently bound to a DAoT Adrathic pistol. Can be equipped by any person with a Martial above 20.
Like I mentioned with froggy, Akiona magnifies Critical FAILURES just as much as the magnifies Critical Successes. For something as important as diplomacy with Cadia, I do not want to risk it. Besides, forming a diplomatic corps would have vastly reduced ramifications if she managed to crit fail that one compared to the alternative.
--[X] Private Army" 5 times? Because they can be used 5 times to give 5 extra progress dice. As it stands, this would risk not being completed in time for the invasion.
Once again I point you back to my plan from before. If we use AdMech Favor for this, it not only doesn't require an action, but is also doesn't even require Resources or even dice rolls. It's just automatically done. And since we have 100, we can easily drop 5 or 10 to make this happen to greater effect.
Well it says it like this "Private Army - Can undertake martial actions when on planet with +5 currently, each action taken reduces the bonus to all actions by 1, can not take more actions than they have bonuses"
If you can use the Private Army with its normal bonus of +5, but then reduce the bonus by 1 for every additional action, that means you can have a total of 6 actions taken at a +0 bonus, but you still keep the dice
I would recommend that, yes. While you're at it, you could increase the quality of their gear to more like what I put for my plan, since there's no DC to worry about anyway.
Looking at our plans they have become almost the same, could you add the homeworld trade to your plan as that is a free action so we can get some alloys form them to build a awakening chamber next turn with a DC of 0?
And yes, I count the trade deals with the Homeworld as a free action mostly because it feels somewhat unfair to force you to spend an action on sending a few emails back and forth in effect.
I would like to see some fewer upgrades for our army as the upkeep will be very high:
25 Super Heavy Tanks,
10 Armored Vehicles,
50 Heavy Armor,
25 Aerospace Fighters,
50 Orbital Insertion Pods,
10 Bolters,
25 Plasma,
25 Grav,
30 Melta,
25 Power
277R per turn in upkeep
we can upgrade them more closer to turn 11 but doing that now will cause us to run out of money i fear
Looking at our plans they have become almost the same, could you add the homeworld trade to your plan as that is a free action so we can get some alloys form them to build a awakening chamber next turn with a DC of 0?
In light of this absolute failing on my part, with no mitigating factors, I am setting and marking the suspicion of the core and chamber to be 20 and 25 respectively. I try to be a fair GM and this failing is on me, I can not negate the suspicion entirely due to the narrative implications of it, but I can mitigate the problem.
@The Froggy Ninja I apologize for this fuck up on my part.
It's good man. I'm sorry too. I've been in similar positions and I was far from my best self either considering it was well into the AMs when all that went down.
As an aside, the reason I thought it would be around that range initially was that I thought the personal vessel could be piloted by Atraxas alone, meaning there wouldn't necessarily have been witnesses to the "constructing a xenotech orbital facility" part. Needing to clear out the Void Forest does put something of a kibosh on that though.
It's good man. I'm sorry too. I've been in similar positions and I was far from my best self either considering it was well into the AMs when all that went down.
As an aside, the reason I thought it would be around that range initially was that I thought the personal vessel could be piloted by Atraxas alone, meaning there wouldn't necessarily have been witnesses to the "constructing a xenotech orbital facility" part. Needing to clear out the Void Forest does put something of a kibosh on that though.
I can understand how you could have assumed that. I will be more careful going forward with explaining the various aspects of less fleshed out paths from this.
The combat system in this quest is a rather kiboshed at the moment as I have only tested it in relatively controlled situations and I have not fully figured out all the interactions yet. However, the bones are more or less solid at this juncture and as such it is information that is needed to be explained in a more comprehensive manner than my rushed edit above.
Basics
There are 3 or 4 levels of combat, the 4th level is most likely to never actually be used due to the rarity of beings that can actually activate it. However, the other 3 levels are more universal and will be used primarily in almost all fights.
Level 0: Galactic Commander - a person in effective or absolute command of a galactic military. This level is probably never going to be used in the quest as currently there is only 1 person that could fill this role and that is the Silent King of the Necrons. The other options would be the Void Dragon buried in Mars or another C'tan, an Incarnated Chaos God, The Reborn Emperor (if he gets healed) and other such beings. In short, this level is probably never going to be used or will be used when the dice decide to throw away any sense. If it is used it knocks the other layers down an effective level, IE: Overall Commanders become Front Commanders, Front Commanders become Local Commanders (basically the same job, only a new layer), Army/Fleets remain unchanged.
Level 1: Overall Commander - this is a more nebulous position due to it being more abstract than the above. It's equally possible to have an Overall Command be in charge of a single world as having one in charge of a Sector scale war. In short, this position is the person conducting the overall war/fight at the moment.
Level 2: Front Commander - a commander under the command of the Overall Commander. There is going to be on average a handful of these depending on the scale of the fight. They will command individual armies against the enemy, under the Overall Commander, representing commands of fronts/localities.
Level 3: Army/Fleet - the final rank where the bulk of the fighting happens. This is the final layer of battle where armies fight other armies under the command of the above layers.
The way this works is that Commanders roll against each other with their traits and bonuses, to set the narrative in a way. If your Overall Commander rolls better than your foe's Overall Commander by a degree of success, then that success continues down the line to the other layers. In short if your Overall Commander rolls 80 vs 60 of your foe's Overall Commander then your Front Commanders get 1 free degree of success as do your armies/fleets. This is how a lower rank force can outmatch a higher ranked force in certain cases, by stacking enough Commander victories to grind away at the foe.
In addition to the basic DoS aspect, winning on the commander layers provides bonuses to your forces such as better wound thresholds, better trait gain chances for commanders or even armies, and other such things.
The base degree of success is 20 difference between the final results of the rolled values, however, the closer the rolls are the less narrative impact results. In short a roll difference of 50 is worse than a roll difference of 40, even though they are still the same level of DoF in this case.
Tiers
Armies and Fleets both use a general quality tier system to determine their bonus outside of traits.
As stated in the spoiler these numbers are intended for Fortress/Forge world metrics, 99% of the Imperium is below this scale and would have around -100 at best.
Trash: -25
Terrible: -10
Miserable: -5
Poor: 0
----------------
Barely Passable: +3
Passable: +6
Skilled: +10
---------------------
Low PDF Grade: +20
Average PDF Grade: +25
High PDF Grade: +30
-------------------------
Intermediate Grade: +40
-------------------------
Low Imperial Guard: +60
Average Guard: +70
High Guard: +80
Peak Imperial Guard: +90
----------------------------
Bottom Solar Auxilia: +100
Solar Axillia Average: +120
High Solar Auxillia: +140
Peak Solar Auxillia: +160
-------------------------
Astartes Aspirant: +200
Astartes Neophtye: +240
Astartes Scout Marine: +280
------------------------
Low Astartes: +340
Average Astartes: +400
High Astartes: +460
Peak Astartes: +520
-------------------------
Low Primarch: +700
Mid Primarch: +880
High Primarch: +1060
Peak Primarch: +1240
-------------------------
Exalted: 2000
Special Units
There are special units that do not by default follow the same general pattern of quality due to having innate traits and other aspects that make them harder to evaluate. For example, the Salamanders and the Space Wolves are both top tier Astartes chapters, but beyond that aspect they are nearly entirely different. In short that is where this classification comes into play.
They act outside of the normal command layers unless their commanders are in charge. In that case they simply act as a normal army but with heavy modifiers, but outside of that case they act as individual units. They will choose their own overall direction based on personality/demeanor/tactics and then will roll a 1d100 for their performance with their quality and various trait modifiers attached. Their actions will possibly effect multiple layers at a time, for example a Farseer could affect the Overall Command, the Front Command and the Army at the same time due to what they are.
This section is very much still in the testing phase and subject to change and refinement as the quest goes on.
Narrative Duels
A rare subsystem that only becomes relevant within the Black Crusades or other cases where powerful Chaos champions of a higher level are fighting. In a narrative duel, the vast majority of bonuses and traits are nulled from working within the confines. In addition, the Duelers are protected on the narrative level from interruptions from others without extensive effort.
A Narrative Duel can happen on any level of command or army, but they all work fundamentally the same. In a duel the Degree of Success is 1 above your foe. In addition the wounds of the fighters are based not in their inherent strength but in their Narrative Strength or the value of their narrative to a degree. When a Narrative Duel is conducted the loser Loses, there is no recovery for them, not even the Chaos Gods working together perfectly could revive someone killed in such a duel. Cadia's Fall in canon was the ending of such a Duel as measured in this quest.
Duels
A more normal form of duels will occur fairly often with named characters and Champions or higher beings. In such a duel, traits are used along with the direct martial score. However, the following aspects are also taken into account.
1) Base stat difference in Physicality and Mentality provides +10 per stat difference to the being with the Higher stat and -10 per difference to the one with the lower stat.
2) Armies provide half their quality bonus to dueling individuals
2a) Duelers provide their own Quality bonus to duels in full
3) Wounds are calculated via base Physicality. A base of 4 with each level of physicality above 0 providing 2 wounds
4) Wound Threshold is calculated from the average of all the base stats multiplied by 20 with a min of 20
Neat. On an unrelated note, @Robinton, given the updated suspicion, I'm no longer recommending switching plans. 20 this turn and 25 next are solid hits but we can take them, especially combined with our diplomatic and faith reduction actions.
Any questions regarding the combat system? As said its in the testing phase still so any questions can help me close issues before they poke their heads up.
Any questions regarding the combat system? As said its in the testing phase still so any questions can help me close issues before they poke their heads up.
Is our private army's effective quality Passable or is their martial bonus distinct from their combat rating? Also, since the void forest is a somewhat known hazard, do we have a range estimate on its quality tier?
Is our private army's effective quality Passable or is their martial bonus distinct from their combat rating? Also, since the void forest is a somewhat known hazard, do we have a range estimate on its quality tier?
1) Your private army could with full gear reach Average Solar Aux, but due to gear limitations they are hard capped at High Imperial Guard. Once you buy up the current listing, and reach out beyond Erimyst you can start getting Solar Aux gear for them to bring them to Peak Solar Aux level.
2) The Void Forest is rather unknown for what it would do in an actual fight, but the reports Atraxas has suggests that its within the range of High Imperial Guard to Mid Solar Aux.
