Drunk Hierophant
Aspirant Archailect
- Pronouns
- He
I am misremembering or wasn't the Flayer Virus confirmed as a curse caused by a dead C'tan? (May be fanon)
Ahhh, good ol' fanatics embracing their way or the get executed way
The Galaxy is Flood, Not Food
- Thread starter Jackson Fox
- Start date
- Crossover Sci-Fi Horror
I am misremembering or wasn't the Flayer Virus confirmed as a curse caused by a dead C'tan? (May be fanon)
- Location
- colombia
Providing respirators for troops would be hard
They have to be provided by the factories across the hiveworld,factories that we know are not up to date in their IPES (individual protection equipments) or safety measures
So whatever factories are making the fabricator components is probably on a cloud of spores,their workers compromised
The PDF just operate side by side with the inquisitor teams wich clould very easily be a few hundreds guardsmen under a few dozens admech techpriests
Wounds on open air,respirators damaged or knocked off by combat,spores catching on clothes
So we have to go by the asumptions
>the goods and services that interact with the guardsmen are compromised
>the bulk of industy in the hive is also compromised
>the pdf and their officers (and with pretty much all sections of the hive) are compromised
>tide now has knowledge roughly on par with lower levels of the admech,but massively better polished and efficient
@Jackson Fox
On the "use explosives to sink the hive" from the outside
A hive is probably the size of luxemburg with height of the everest
The beirut port explosion was 2.7 kilotons, the biggest nuke used was 50 megatons
That means you need around 18k to 19k ports with their warehouses filled to the brim with explosives,somehow transport all that and set it up and detonate simultaneously
You would need around 20k of those to match a tzar bomb, thats around 49.5 million tons of material
Thats 4k to 5k trains filled to the brim (the US has 23k trains as reference)
And then you gotta put that into shells and fire them
Airforce alone would disrupt such operation without need of tide intervention,and even without airforce voidshields still a thing
You are massively overstimating how much damage traditional explosives can cause and how much you would need
I would reccomend instead for the genestealers trying to hijack stuff like lowyield nukes for the bombardment,there is nuclear artillery shells around the 2.5 kiloton yield and rockets with nuclear low yield warheads
At 50kg the shell,thats around a million kgs
Or a thousand tons worth of shells
Thats more than enough to carry in 20-ish train wagoons on a single train
Massively more feasible than "our zerg rush with improvosed explosives didnt work,lets pull years worth of stockpile of trafitional explosives out our asses,move it around,and barrage the hive for days,weeks or even months nonstop and hope for the best" (tho that could be a plan from the broodmind that has already lost and is grasping at straws)
The question is how to reach whatever silos has such weaponry
Intercepting military personeel,subvert them and use the info to target higher rankong officers?
Rinse and repeat untill you subvert someone that has useful info and then target the silos and key personeel for subversion?
They have to be provided by the factories across the hiveworld,factories that we know are not up to date in their IPES (individual protection equipments) or safety measures
So whatever factories are making the fabricator components is probably on a cloud of spores,their workers compromised
The PDF just operate side by side with the inquisitor teams wich clould very easily be a few hundreds guardsmen under a few dozens admech techpriests
Wounds on open air,respirators damaged or knocked off by combat,spores catching on clothes
So we have to go by the asumptions
>the goods and services that interact with the guardsmen are compromised
>the bulk of industy in the hive is also compromised
>the pdf and their officers (and with pretty much all sections of the hive) are compromised
>tide now has knowledge roughly on par with lower levels of the admech,but massively better polished and efficient
@Jackson Fox
On the "use explosives to sink the hive" from the outside
A hive is probably the size of luxemburg with height of the everest
The beirut port explosion was 2.7 kilotons, the biggest nuke used was 50 megatons
That means you need around 18k to 19k ports with their warehouses filled to the brim with explosives,somehow transport all that and set it up and detonate simultaneously
You would need around 20k of those to match a tzar bomb, thats around 49.5 million tons of material
Thats 4k to 5k trains filled to the brim (the US has 23k trains as reference)
And then you gotta put that into shells and fire them
Airforce alone would disrupt such operation without need of tide intervention,and even without airforce voidshields still a thing
You are massively overstimating how much damage traditional explosives can cause and how much you would need
I would reccomend instead for the genestealers trying to hijack stuff like lowyield nukes for the bombardment,there is nuclear artillery shells around the 2.5 kiloton yield and rockets with nuclear low yield warheads
At 50kg the shell,thats around a million kgs
Or a thousand tons worth of shells
Thats more than enough to carry in 20-ish train wagoons on a single train
Massively more feasible than "our zerg rush with improvosed explosives didnt work,lets pull years worth of stockpile of trafitional explosives out our asses,move it around,and barrage the hive for days,weeks or even months nonstop and hope for the best" (tho that could be a plan from the broodmind that has already lost and is grasping at straws)
The question is how to reach whatever silos has such weaponry
Intercepting military personeel,subvert them and use the info to target higher rankong officers?
Rinse and repeat untill you subvert someone that has useful info and then target the silos and key personeel for subversion?
Last edited:
The c'tan that did devour their siblings where implied to grow stronger if I remember correctly… it could be that they just take over that aspect of reality or c'tan killing each other is somehow a loophole but I find this less likely than the first explanation… I don't know when a shard isn't a danger anymore but I think as long as one shard is alive no matter how small the c'tan doesn't count as dead…
It was indeed. Khaine killing the nightbringer and taking on the aspect of the reaper was also implied to be a curse that made the downfall of the eldar a certainty…
Last edited:
- Location
- colombia
Also i must point it that going full war industry will definetly attract interest, factories aint energy cheap,and the admech will notice the increase on power comsuption and the activation of old infrastructure, if he wants to stay relatively low and dont give away the fact there is a guiding intelligence,this is a terrible way to do so
They migjt not know the details (how many and where),but "something is refurbishing and using our factories in the underhive" will stand out as a sore thumb after what just happened
Personally i would instead go with the altered smuggling pieces into the underhive
When the factory is 90% altered,overproducing by 1% to 3%,lying on the production reports and then moving the gear into the underhive is rather easy
Specoally after this event,it can be justified as "preparing against any new attack" with a surge on military industry
Last edited:
- Location
- Euclidean plane
This, combined with the knowledge that Malum has been unusually effective? I'm hoping Tide can have a conversation with her in the future. At least she seems like the type to listen once instead of BAM BAM the nearest mouthpiece immediately.
Though with the psycher around? Personally, I'd have a policy of staying away from the warp as much as possible. Sure, it's indirect, but you know, literal hell dimension.
Strunkriidiisk
THE LEGEND
- Location
- Canada
- Pronouns
- He/Him
I think you underestimate just how much free/abandoned real estate there is in the hive. Shit's constantly breaking and as the hive grows it's almost certainly easier to relocate critical industries to more advantageous positions than to bother repairing old equipment except for the most critical examples of such. And with the volume of active industry within the hive plus the probably constant fluctuations in available power as various reactors, factories, and the like are cycled into and out of maintenance, break down, and are repaired it could easily be lost in the 'noise,' especially for a smaller installation. The Imperium and Mechanicus are really quite bad at indirect surveillance, that's how things like genestealer cults can even get started.
That's also assuming Tide can't do something dumb like rig up some mechanical dynamos and section off some Flood to turn muscle power into electricity. Or cannibalize parts into various generators, or even get a defunct reactor back into working order.
Mr. Cloak
Orchestrator of Paradoxical Apocalypse
- Pronouns
- I
In general? Yes. But a literal hell dimension driven by the desires of the minds within?
A flood-controlled space might be fascinating to see.
Still don't think its a good idea, but that is what the scientific method is for! Also proper containment measures (something 40k is known for having forgotten about).
Where the flood in this fic already confirmed to have a presence in the warp? Otherwise it can't affect it that's why the necrons would have been fine if the parianexus where to be successful… they aren't connected to the warp anymore so they don't need it to sustain their sentience… at the cost of not having souls I guess…
Last edited:
CaramelTheMoo
Rat and Cow combined
- Pronouns
- She/Her
I believe it was mentioned he has a "stench" in the warp
Mr. Cloak
Orchestrator of Paradoxical Apocalypse
- Pronouns
- I
Which could be perceived like that because all of the Nurgle demons (the tiny ones that anchor themselves to plagues) are dying, cut off from their anchor colonies, and the stench is the miasma of unraveling demons.
It is not his presence in the warp, it is the denial of others.
...
Or I could be completely wrong. That is always an option.
So, the idea for the Broodmind wasn't just random bombardment but a precision strike targetting the supports that keep the hive spires from collapsing under their own weight. They were operating under the belief that the Flood was still taking time spreading and that they could just bumrush them, keeping them busy while the explosives teams went into the Underhive and started detonating supports. Still a lot of explosives, but used in a more intelligent and precise way. As for transportation, the trains that connect the hives are very, very big.
That said, at this point, the Broodmind is as much looking for other methods to defeat the Flood as it is still trying to get more explosives. I probably could have made that clearer in this chapter though.
So, I both agree and disagree with you here. Hive cities take insane amounts of power to function, so I doubt even a hundred large factories
producing lasguns and other equipment would be more than another drop. Something that, like you suggested, could be overlooked as just being because of the rush to prepare for war. That's assuming they're even able to monitor the entire hive's powerlines to the degree that they would notice something like that at all. There's also the fact that the Admech doesn't operate in the Underhive, they aren't really even aware of what's down in its depths. Its entirely possible that massive sections of the Underhive haven't had any actual humans in them for millennia.
Basically this. Tide's definitely going to replace mechanical stuff with more reliable Flood components basically wherever possible. While he doesn't have a Flood form that can produce flames capable of melting and forging ceramite or anything like that, he can definitely replace most kinds of moving mechanism with Flood tentacles or. As for muscle power... maybe?
Ah, 40k's scientific method. Where failure (or success) can result in you getting devoured by daemons!
I've confirmed previously that Tide does have a kind of presence, which will play a role in the future with how he interacts with everything. The Broodmind was able to sense his presence in the Warp. However, the stench that was mentioned was a literal, physical stench. Flood smell bad. Like, really, really bad.
So, there are two (three?) kinds of plagues and diseases in 40k. The first are mundane plagues that are the result of the natural process. These are not connected to Nurgle, though I guess its debatable whether he can affect them? The kinds of sicknesses that we in our world are able to get. Then there are daemon plagues that Nurgle creates and controls directly, which are the result of the aforementioned tiny Nurgle daemons. These are Warp-based in nature, not mundane. Finally, there are things like scrap-code and the Flayer Virus. These can be warp related, though explicitly not in the case of necron stuff I think.
The Flood would be a combination of at least the first and third kinds of plagues, though I won't say more for spoilers of next chapter, where we'll be exploring the Warp-side of things for Tide.
@Jackson Fox
"its tallest towers stretching nearly a hundred kilometers into the sky"
If the planet is near earth size 100km tall building would be so tall it would solidly be in low orbit, for earth 12km is average hight for atmosphere and 10km the height a plane flight is at
This part just stuck out as so over the top it was silly, like if the towers where that tall they could dock there ships on the upper levels
Maybe lower it down to being near 10km tall
Other then that great chapter
"its tallest towers stretching nearly a hundred kilometers into the sky"
If the planet is near earth size 100km tall building would be so tall it would solidly be in low orbit, for earth 12km is average hight for atmosphere and 10km the height a plane flight is at
This part just stuck out as so over the top it was silly, like if the towers where that tall they could dock there ships on the upper levels
Maybe lower it down to being near 10km tall
Other then that great chapter
TheAkashicRecord
The Library Of All Knowledge
- Location
- Somewhere~
- Pronouns
- He/Him
Hive cities are DAOT structures, if they wanted them that high, THEY WOULD MAKE THEM THAT HIGH PHYSICS BE DAMNED
- Location
- Euclidean plane
I never understood hive cities. Yeah, large centralized cities are efficient but being able to live on less than 1% of the planet seems like a poor tradeoff. Plus nature tends to renew some resources when you're not turning your planet into venus/mars.
Oooh, maybe replacing Titan leg actuators or space marine armor with muscles for improved movement could be a good idea. Maybe even use sphincter structures for loading ammo or handling liquids for versatility and tentacles/elephant trunks which could be used for grabbing and holding stuff more efficiently.
- Location
- united kingdom
If the flood does smell bad, can that be modified? It should be possible for the flood to modify the spores such that they do not bind to the nasal receptors that signal that smell, neutrlising its secent. or perhaps something more pleasant perhaps? Perhaps the smell of bitter herbs or someting medicinal rather than the smell of peutrifaction and decaying flesh.
I based that off of this image from Darktide of the Hive City Tertium
Hive City spires do stretch that high. Sense does not come into it.
Ancient Humanity's wild as fuck.
I've always believed that hive cities under DAOT humanity was vastly different. Ancient Humanity seems more than advanced enough that they could easily maintain the biosphere of a hive world while also having the hives, but that got fucked by the Age of Strife.
Oh, easily. Tide just hasn't really had a reason to do that kind of modification. Having them produce different scents would be simple, he just hasn't done anything like that. In fact, it would probably be safer to not make Flood smell like fresh-baked cookies or similar since he's currently in the Underhive and smelling flowers down there would be way more unsettling than rotting flesh.
Neruz
Rogue Spiderbanana
- Location
- The Land of Fire and Poison
Nah they have both now. Inertialess Drives are still canon and are the Necrons 'short range' FTL option, for when they're making small hops of only a few hundred or a thousand light years or so. Then, when they need to travel ten thousand or more light years, that's when they roll out the Dolmen Gates and hack the Webway.
For humans, probably, but T'au aren't humans. And the reason the T'au lack Warp travel despite Kroot Warspheres having Warp Drives is because the Kroot don't actually know how to build more, and nobody knows how the fuck Warspheres navigate the Warp without Navigators: The T'au actually do have Warp Drive technology, what they don't have is Warp Navigation technology.
It's also worth keeping in mind that the T'au Empire is tiny, here's a map of it at the end of the Third Sphere Expansion:
Yeah the T'au only have 16 starsystems. Official count is 20, so presumably there are 4 more that aren't on that map, or the records are just wrong as often happens in 40k.
Ork FTL is exactly the same Warp Travel that the Imperium uses (in fact often it's literally looted Imperial Warp Drives), with the exception that Orks do not bother with Gellar Fields, as something that prevents you from having to fight Daemons is entirely un-Orky. (Orks also do not usually bother with anything as banal as 'navigation' as they really do not give a damn where they end up as long as there's a fight to be had, and with Orks there's always a fight to be had.)
It's because, while it's never really outright stated, the lore very heavily implies that Hive Cities are built around (often long-defunct) space elevators.
At the very least the older DAoT era Hive Cities are definitely built around space elevators, most of which have long since ceased to work. Whether newer, Crusade-era Hive Cities are also built around space elevators is less clear, though it seems probable to me that at least some Crusade-era Hive Cities have space elevators too, albeit presumably far more primitive than the DAoT ones. We do also get the occasional mention of a Hive City with a working space elevator, especially on worlds that have significant orbital facilities, which is probably not a coincidence.
Last edited:
- Location
- Philippines
Sweet, an update.
I guess Tide will have to wait until he gets a higher ranked AdMech before he finds out about their misconception.
Regarding C'tan, I do wonder if it's possible to infect them with the Flood or maybe the Logic Plague given their necrodermis bodies.
Presumably yes, if they don't go all "living ball of plasma" to incinerate any spore before it comes into contact.
Tide getting even one C'tan Shard's power, with the Flood's processing power sidestepping the dementia-like symptoms of being shattered would be very big haha
I guess Tide will have to wait until he gets a higher ranked AdMech before he finds out about their misconception.
Regarding C'tan, I do wonder if it's possible to infect them with the Flood or maybe the Logic Plague given their necrodermis bodies.
Presumably yes, if they don't go all "living ball of plasma" to incinerate any spore before it comes into contact.
Tide getting even one C'tan Shard's power, with the Flood's processing power sidestepping the dementia-like symptoms of being shattered would be very big haha
- Location
- New Jersey
My own theories for the reason behind some Age of Strife hive cities.
1) Some were arcologies that grew out of control. A breathable planet but not really suited for colonization. but when the original colony landed, not much of a choice. And the arcology grew over time, with lower levels being abandoned.
2) A desperation play during the Age of Strife. People creating hives as a means of consolidating everything needed to survive a siege. Factories, hydroponics, water purification, energy production, air filtration, etc. Course a lot of the higher tech involved in making them defensible decayed over time.
3) Survivor growth. Basically planet fell apart and the hive cities were basically as suggested part of a greater complex of a space elevator. Several thousand years of construction.
4) Designed and built as a multi-level space elevator since some hives can have a ship dock in High altitude low orbit or even higher.
5) Age of Strife era fortification. Similar to number 2, but designed and built. A hive could feed, fuel, defend, and water itself, and with its sheer height, ensure that taking or destroying it was the only way to secure air/local space superiority. Can't get in range to accurately bombard, bomb, air-strike, or gun-run if getting shot at from below and potentially above.
1) Some were arcologies that grew out of control. A breathable planet but not really suited for colonization. but when the original colony landed, not much of a choice. And the arcology grew over time, with lower levels being abandoned.
2) A desperation play during the Age of Strife. People creating hives as a means of consolidating everything needed to survive a siege. Factories, hydroponics, water purification, energy production, air filtration, etc. Course a lot of the higher tech involved in making them defensible decayed over time.
3) Survivor growth. Basically planet fell apart and the hive cities were basically as suggested part of a greater complex of a space elevator. Several thousand years of construction.
4) Designed and built as a multi-level space elevator since some hives can have a ship dock in High altitude low orbit or even higher.
5) Age of Strife era fortification. Similar to number 2, but designed and built. A hive could feed, fuel, defend, and water itself, and with its sheer height, ensure that taking or destroying it was the only way to secure air/local space superiority. Can't get in range to accurately bombard, bomb, air-strike, or gun-run if getting shot at from below and potentially above.
Neruz
Rogue Spiderbanana
- Location
- The Land of Fire and Poison
All Hive cities were intended to be self-contained arcologies, or at least the ones that originate in the DAoT were:
So yeah, back during the DAoT when Hive cities were originally conceived, they were self-contained and did not ruin the planets they were built on.
Then the Age of Strife happened and that whole delicate balance went straight to shit.
e:
Whether the Logic Plague would work on them is debatable, and would depend on how Jackson Fox decides he wants the Logic Plague to work, but I would lean towards 'no' if only because the C'tan are so much more than just machines. It would probably work on Necrons though, or at least the lower ranked ones.
That said I wouldn't be surprised if old War in Heaven protocols exist to deal with something like the Logic Plague, as it's not like the 40K-verse is unfamiliar with similar weapons; Scrapcode is literally exactly the same thing as the Logic Plague except its Warp-powered and aligned with Chaos instead of Neural Physics-powered and aligned with the Flood. Similar attacks on the Necrons must have been tried in the past, and I find it implausible that they would have survived the War in Heaven if they could be easily subverted like that.
So yeah, back during the DAoT when Hive cities were originally conceived, they were self-contained and did not ruin the planets they were built on.
Then the Age of Strife happened and that whole delicate balance went straight to shit.
e:
The Flood definitely would not work on Necrons or C'tan; they have no biology for the Flood to hijack.
Whether the Logic Plague would work on them is debatable, and would depend on how Jackson Fox decides he wants the Logic Plague to work, but I would lean towards 'no' if only because the C'tan are so much more than just machines. It would probably work on Necrons though, or at least the lower ranked ones.
That said I wouldn't be surprised if old War in Heaven protocols exist to deal with something like the Logic Plague, as it's not like the 40K-verse is unfamiliar with similar weapons; Scrapcode is literally exactly the same thing as the Logic Plague except its Warp-powered and aligned with Chaos instead of Neural Physics-powered and aligned with the Flood. Similar attacks on the Necrons must have been tried in the past, and I find it implausible that they would have survived the War in Heaven if they could be easily subverted like that.
Last edited:
You can't. All humans are latent psykers. Most are very weak ones but psykers none the less. You can deal away with the soul and lose the warp connections but Necrons really didn't like the results even if they were survivable. Even Blanks have a soul if an inverted one.
- Location
- Euclidean plane
Fair, but there's a difference between a metaphorical candle in the warp and a spotlight.
- Location
- colombia
Yeah but hivemind means you are gathering thousands to billions souls
At wich point tide is a spotlight anyways
Tide will not have the option to hide from the warp