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The Long Night Part One: Embers in the Dusk: A Planetary Governor Quest (43k) Complete Sequel Up

Investigate the Sea?

  • Yes

    Votes: 593 80.4%

  • No

    Votes: 145 19.6%
  • Total voters
    738
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Dynamesmouse said:
High Council for permission to employ the Sirens as executioners, and then used soft diplomacy over hard bargaining to ask for a Rune to keep this arrangement going, it would have only been a diplomacy hit instead of a decades long malus and a negative trait.
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That...would not have changed anything.

The high council isn't stupid. Nor are the Sirens. Such a blatant attempt to muddle the issue would not have worked on either of them.

It only might have worked if we hadn't told the council about the runes...which we did.

Dynamesmouse said:
Another thing to keep in mind is: What would the Emperor think?
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Something something **** chaos.

I mean seriously in current canon emps created the Primarchs with the intent to either kill them (Angron, Lorgar) or slave them to specific purposes (trap Magnus on the golden throne to power the human webway).

He's pretty much the embodiment of utilitarian sacrifice anything for the survival of humanity kinda guy hence the 10,000 psyker children;s souls being destroyed to keep him running everyday for breakfast.
 
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PurposefulZephyr said:
So I'd like to make a point for catching those heretics.

1)Their fate is sealed, and it's not pretty. Their souls are warped beyond recovery. Killing them is a mercy, and destroying their souls is only doing a more thorough job. Either way they'll face suffering- we'll just offer them a short-term kind of pain, instead of an eternal one.
2)The souls we won't be tossing into Siren's maws are going to be nommed by demons or otherwise taken by chaos. While the numbers we'll take won't really make a significant difference in Abomination's power, it will be a good difference none the less.
3)While there will be further diplomatic costs, we already have paid the initial fees by getting Trust's permission to do so. Any further sacrifices are... more 'normal', even if still frowned upon.
4)There's no slippery slope here. Even if there were further unethical sacrifices to be made, they'll have to be massively beneficial in order to stand a chance against the current player consensus. And... frankly, unless we change our allegiance to chaos, I don't see any possible examples of that.
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1 & 2 are the only reason soul destruction of humans and trading them to Sirens are considered even a grey area from an ethical standpoint rather than pure cartoon-villain evil. That said, Lin (who is the foremost in-universe authority on such matters) views it as a grey area—it's not 'the right thing to do', at best it is one of the better of a large set of bad options.

3 is sunk cost falicy. Just because the cost of initial acceptance of the trade in any form was higher than feeding this batch is likely to be does not mean that the diplomatic costs here will not matter, nor does the normalization of such actions reducing the impact on further trades make the cost here any lower. Having the Sirens and Trolls helping us out solely because Fuck Chaos, for example, has a good chance of improving how Xenos are viewed within the Trust (likely alleviating some of the issues they have with the soul trade in the first place). Bribing the Xenos to help out with tasty human souls is literally how Chaos works—even if they agreed to help without compensation in that form doesn't stop people from spinning it after the fact.

I would also like to point out that if we lose Mar Sara (or take even more significant losses there), the optics on us having kept enough of our forces back to hunt down the remaining invaders to sell their souls to Xenos will be ugly, regardless of our actual goal or intention.

4 is blatant bullshit. We've had people arguing all sorts of massively unethical ideas on this thread. Hell, we just had another flare-up of the incredibly stupid 'let's just randomly exterminate a certain group of Xenos under our protection' argument. One of the core concepts of the universe for this quest is that the only way the galaxy for 40k is going to get dragged out of the grim-dark narrative is groups choosing not to make unethical sacrifices even when it's convenient. And the whole argument over the soul trade with the Sirens has had people constantly trying to push things just a bit further, with suggestions ranging from accepting a massive increase in law enforcement casualties to capture as many cultists alive as possible to even going full Dark Eldar and raiding other planets. Having the moral line being drawn at 'the most other people in the 40k universe will tolerate' is frankly way too far, and that's where the 'acceptable' line is drawn.
 
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Reynal said:
And the whole argument over the soul trade with the Sirens has had people constantly trying to push things just a bit further, with suggestions ranging from accepting a massive increase in law enforcement casualties to capture as many cultists alive as possible to even going full Dark Eldar and raiding other planets.
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Thankfully those have been a loud minority.
 
I honestly fail to to see how this is in any way worse than what we are already doing - if anything I would argue that selling just fallen cultist who once were our own people is noticeably worse than selling thoroughly corrupted invaders from Crusade who killed many millions of our people. This is climbing up the slippery slope rather than sliding down it.

As for "military aren't trained to disable" - I would agree if we weren't talking about Avernite soldiers vs. average guardmen. "Shooting enemies' weapons out of their hands then quickly overpowering them with superior CQC/strength" is perfectly doable against isolated groups.
 
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Reynal said:
4 is blatant bullshit. We've had people arguing all sorts of massively unethical ideas on this thread. Hell, we just had another flare-up of the incredibly stupid 'let's just randomly exterminate a certain group of Xenos under our protection' argument. One of the core concepts of the universe for this quest is that the only way the galaxy for 40k is going to get dragged out of the grim-dark narrative is groups choosing not to make unethical sacrifices even when it's convenient. And the whole argument over the soul trade with the Sirens has had people constantly trying to push things just a bit further, with suggestions ranging from accepting a massive increase in law enforcement casualties to capture as many cultists alive as possible to even going full Dark Eldar and raiding other planets. Having the moral line being drawn at 'the most other people in the 40k universe will tolerate' is frankly way too far, and that's where the 'acceptable' line is drawn.
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Okay, I forgot about the actual extremes people were suggesting. Still, the majority- both players and Trust, wouldn't allow such things.
Still, while it is still (somewhat) morally abhorrent to do, I don't think we are moving that much further from where we were.
We are still taking heretics to get their souls nommed. Only difference is taking more of them.
Reynal said:
I would also like to point out that if we lose Mar Sara (or take even more significant losses there), the optics on us having kept enough of our forces back to hunt down the remaining invaders to sell their souls to Xenos will be ugly, regardless of our actual goal or intention.
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Okay, that is a fair point.

Still, I don't think it's all that bad.
But, got to get some confirmation on things. Also sleep.

Actually, few more questions @Durin
1.Would capturing enemy soldiers to feed sirens negatively impact our forces' morale?
1a.Do we risk worsening the A Ruthless Reputation trait, or gaining a new one?
2.Would resorting to capture increase our own losses in battle?
2a.If yes, would the roll penalty be close to a -15, or more?
 
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Nianque said:
We'll take more casualties if we are deliberately trying to captures people.
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Hunt Them Down plan said:
However, be cautious and don't endanger our men. Focus on capturing targets of opportunity and isolated groups.
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I really doubt regular soldiers can seriuosly threaten our soldiers in small groups. Yes, if we try to capture enemies in open battle we would increase our casualties significantly. And while we likely capture only tiny fraction of the enemy this way it will still be a ton of. The only way the "Hunt Them Down" plan the could notoceably increase our casualties would probably be wildlife atracks from our forces spending more time outside the walls.
 
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PurposefulZephyr said:
Okay, I forgot about the actual extremes people were suggesting. Still, the majority- both players and Trust, wouldn't allow such things.
Still, while it is still (somewhat) morally abhorrent to do, I don't think we are moving that much further from where we were.
We are still taking heretics to get their souls nommed. Only difference is taking more of them.

Okay, that is a fair point.

Still, I don't think it's all that bad.
But, got to get some confirmation on things. Also sleep.

Actually, few more questions @Durin
1.Would capturing enemy soldiers to feed sirens negatively impact our forces' morale?
1a.Do we risk worsening the A Ruthless Reputation trait, or gaining a new one?
2.Would resorting to capture increase our own losses in battle?
2a.If yes, would the roll penalty be close to a -15, or more?
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1. it depends on how you do it. if you make it a major focus yes, if you attempt to capture any that seem easy a bit, if you keep alive those merely disabled in the course of battle and capture them not at all
1a. with the first suggestion above yes, if things go bad on Mar Sara with the second yes, with the third no
2. yes with suggestion 1, a bit with suggestion 2, not at all with suggestion 3
2a. -50, -15, 0
 
I honestly presumed we'd be taking in wounded enemies as prisoner by default, provided it didn't cause any difficulties.
Adhoc vote count started by Enjou on Feb 11, 2018 at 10:54 PM, finished with 332 posts and 40 votes.
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So, as I understand the current divide on whether to capture the abomination soldiers or just kill them seems to be a divide of max gains vs role play. If we capture them we will get some nice stuff, but it will influence Roberts character.

I personally do not support capturing abomination soldiers for siren chow. From what I have picked up from reading though the quest, the goal of the trust is to survive first and foremost, but its secondary goal, and I would say its asperation, is to be better than the Empire of man. Robert is not desperate for more power. He doesn't need to do this, and Avernus has a plethora of other ways to advance and become stronger.

This really is a question of who do we want Robert to be. Selling our own people that have betrayed Avernus and the Imperial Trust as a capital punishment is one thing. But going out of his way to capture enemy soldiers to sell, just because he is not patient enough to wait is another. And it really is being impatient, we will get those runes eventually whether we do this or not.

As for falling to chaos, this one act will not make Robert fall. But to make an analogy, someone that shoplifts is not granted to commit grater crimes, but someone who will not even shoplift will definitely not commit worse crimes.
 
Durin said:
1. it depends on how you do it. if you make it a major focus yes, if you attempt to capture any that seem easy a bit, if you keep alive those merely disabled in the course of battle and capture them not at all
1a. with the first suggestion above yes, if things go bad on Mar Sara with the second yes, with the third no
2. yes with suggestion 1, a bit with suggestion 2, not at all with suggestion 3
2a. -50, -15, 0
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So basically what Reynal said. Good to have it confirmed and clarified though.
'[] Hunt them down' seems to be the middle option- minor morale drop, a <30% risk of worsening a horrible diplo trait (1/3 chance of winning Mar Sara, and then whatever chance of a reputation hit), and a minor/medium penalty to current battles. All that in exchange for runes, except for worse than normal exchange rate.
...
Considering that we'll be getting souls either way (assuming that the leading plan will follow suggestion 3), and that we'll be dealing with influx of homegrown Abomination cults in coming decades, and that our diplo is shit while martial (which runes improve) is our biggest strength...
[X] Thin their numbers
Also, just for the sake of fully informing, here's the trait I was referring to:
Durin said:
A Ruthless Reputation (+1I, -2D, -1 Civilian Morale, -1 to relations with all newly met worlds, -2 relations with all newly met human worlds)- You have gained a reputation of being willing to do anything for victory, whether it is destroying your own cities or even feeding human souls to xenos for knowledge.
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Durin said:
1. it depends on how you do it. if you make it a major focus yes, if you attempt to capture any that seem easy a bit, if you keep alive those merely disabled in the course of battle and capture them not at all
1a. with the first suggestion above yes, if things go bad on Mar Sara with the second yes, with the third no
2. yes with suggestion 1, a bit with suggestion 2, not at all with suggestion 3
2a. -50, -15, 0
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Do we have an available vote for option 3 yet? If not, I can whip one up.
 
Enjou said:
Not really my plan though - it's Portec's.
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@Portec, could you add suggestion 3 to your plan, since it doesn't risk anything?
In case you don't want to do that, here's an alternative plan, identical to '[] Thin their numbers' save for the minimal cultist capturing:

[X] Contain and capture
-[X] Dis: Harass them- You will be able to cause major damage at a incredible exchange rate if you have your faster units hunt the fleeing enemy down, though if they regroup your harassers could suffer.
-[X] The Lonely Citadel: Harass them- You will be able to cause major damage at a incredible exchange rate if you have your faster units hunt the fleeing enemy down, though if they regroup your harassers could suffer.
-[X] Bombard it- If you have available ships bombard the shattered remains of the siege camp you will be able to inflict major damage over time, and prevent them shoring up their defences.
-[X] Void: Pursuit- Chase them to the edge of the system, losing some more of your lighter ships in exchange for destroying many of the enemy ships so that you can be sure that you will not encounter them in the future.
-[X] Capture soldiers disabled in the course of battle, then bring them to sirens for trading.
 
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