Vox Vitae: Warhammer AI quest

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My main concern with the focusing hard on the Warp Research is the assumption that it'll be a "Normal" RP project, somewhere between 100 and 200 or so, when it feels to me to be a reasonably high end one with 500+ required--given how unlocking it in the first place required two "Tech Samples" in our starting build (Warp Abacus + Psychic Shielding). I don't want to hard commit to something that's going to devour all of our RP, because sunk costs will force us to push harder on it in the future. Remember how expensive the next tier of robotics fundamental technology was before we had samples? How expensive it still is after getting a large number of them? Yeah, that's my worst case scenario here.

My focus is getting the rest of our pre-requisite tech projects out of the way to build a proper Grand Cruiser scale Hero Ship, while also pushing the Genetics and Machine Spirits option, the latter which is confirmed to be a path to better warp resistance as well, and the former being likely to help us with our other biology projects, especially with our navibean, who'll need a fair amount of care if we don't want them to turn into a puking blob. We'll be able to push up Warp Abacus fairly easily next turn. Hell, I'm not unwilling to shuffle things around to get it right now if this is a red line in the sand for people. I could squeeze it in by swapping the genetic research out for a 50 RP project like the organ replacement surcharge and putting it on Void Abacus instead of Psytech Introduction.

EDIT: In fact, let me go and do that. If that's the big red line in the sand, I'm willing to meet you folks half way.

EDIT 2: Done, Organ Replacement Redux replaced Genetic Introduction, which freed up the RP to get Void Abacus. At least we can see what the Fundamental tech will look like now, instead of hard committing to it sight unseen.
 
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Let's iterate up? We are in a frigate, let's build another or a destroyer to explore the system. We can maybe reactivate the resource gathering platforms or toss a few metallic astroids sunward while we research up to Grand Cruiser. We don't need void or warp to do in-system and it lets us stretch our legs a bit while working through the research and construction backlog needed to leave the system.

What does an in-system hero ship look like?
 
Alectai said:
My main concern with the focusing hard on the Warp Research is the assumption that it'll be a "Normal" RP project, somewhere between 100 and 200 or so, when it feels to me to be a reasonably high end one with 500+ required--given how unlocking it in the first place required two "Tech Samples" in our starting build (Warp Abacus + Psychic Shielding). I don't want to hard commit to something that's going to devour all of our RP, because sunk costs will force us to push harder on it in the future. Remember how expensive the next tier of robotics fundamental technology was before we had samples? How expensive it still is after getting a large number of them? Yeah, that's my worst case scenario here.

My focus is getting the rest of our pre-requisite tech projects out of the way to build a proper Grand Cruiser scale Hero Ship, while also pushing the Genetics and Machine Spirits option, the latter which is confirmed to be a path to better warp resistance as well, and the former being likely to help us with our other biology projects, especially with our navibean, who'll need a fair amount of care if we don't want them to turn into a puking blob. We'll be able to push up Warp Abacus fairly easily next turn. Hell, I'm not unwilling to shuffle things around to get it right now if this is a red line in the sand for people. I could squeeze it in by swapping the genetic research out for a 50 RP project like the organ replacement surcharge and putting it on Void Abacus instead of Psytech Introduction.

EDIT: In fact, let me go and do that. If that's the big red line in the sand, I'm willing to meet you folks half way.
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I don't think it's going to be more than 500 RP, and I'm willing to spend that for warp understanding. That said, if we think it's likely to be more than that, then we should just toss the scrapcode into the sun and focus our efforts elsewhere - we do have plenty of other avenues for warp research, after all.
 
Hey @Neablis :
1. What's the Denva station population looking like it'll shake out to be during next turn by the time a roll would take effect?
2. Would a good roll on The Basics of Psytech discount Warp Understanding or psy shield techs?
3. Are you willing to give a rough price range for the warp understanding research? Ballpark is fine, I know it'll vary based on the prereq roll, but with concerns about it maybe costing something wild like Really Good Robotics did I figured I'd check. Sorry if someone already asked!

I'm going to bed, but in the morning I may update my plan's research order to pay for psytech beginnings before warptech based on the answer to 2. If 3 turns out to be "yeah the price is xbox huge lol" I'll just make a new plan entirely, probably.
 
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Prime 2.0 said:
Hey @Neablis :
1. What's the Denva station population looking like it'll shake out to be during next turn by the time a roll would take effect?
2. Would a good roll on The Basics of Psytech discount Warp Understanding or psy shield techs?
3. Are you willing to give a rough price range for the warp understanding research? Ballpark is fine, I know it'll vary based on the prereq roll, but with concerns about it maybe costing something wild like Really Good Robotics did I figured I'd check. Sorry if someone already asked!

I'm going to bed, but in the morning I may update my plan's research order to pay for psytech beginnings before warptech based on the answer to 2. If 3 turns out to be "yeah the price is xbox huge lol" I'll just make a new plan entirely, probably.
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I think warp understanding is more likely to discount psytech beginnings, but probably it could go either way depending on the rolls involved.
 
Angle said:
I think warp understanding is more likely to discount psytech beginnings, but probably it could go either way depending on the rolls involved.
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The argument I could see is that even attempting basic warp understanding required some really primo samples - it is evidently something enabled primarily by things which already interact with the warp.

But the flip side is maybe that psytech would only really have that effect if we had a psyker use some of it for experiments, since the big dividing line between it and our other warp tech is that it needs psykers to use.

What build order is preferable depends on a lot tbh. Thinking on it, if psytech beginnings can discount miniaturized shields AND warp beginnings is too expensive, I wouldn't rule out swapping the latter with the former and putting psytech first on my existing plan... but I'll still probably just make a new one by then.
 
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[X] Plan: Trust the People of Denva

decided to switch to alectai's plan. still prefer throwing the scrap code generator down a hole rather than putting it in space but meh. I like the spaceship stuff and my biggest objection was not doing Void Abacus which has been changed.
 
Prime 2.0 said:
Hey @Neablis :
1. What's the Denva station population looking like it'll shake out to be during next turn by the time a roll would take effect?
2. Would a good roll on The Basics of Psytech discount Warp Understanding or psy shield techs?
3. Are you willing to give a rough price range for the warp understanding research? Ballpark is fine, I know it'll vary based on the prereq roll, but with concerns about it maybe costing something wild like Really Good Robotics did I figured I'd check. Sorry if someone already asked!
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Thanks for formatting these for easy answers
1. If the first dice fails I might roll a second die for casualties, with a crit being a hundred, good being a thousand, normal being ten thousand, poor a hundred thousand, crit fail a million. Though note that this is being treated as a binary, they won't quite be a binary. A roll of 9 might see people successfully fleeing the station, a roll of 12 might see people getting poisoned by bad atmosphere but not quite to a lethal level. But then again, a roll of 91 will see them develop a very responsible and effective culture of space-responsibility where even children are taught from a young age which codes mean what, which will accelerate their spread across space.
2. Yes, but more for psychic shielding than warp understanding. I've been trying to hint that the best way to discount psychic shielding would be to go study the monastery domes, but even just studying the psytech you have access to would kind of be a prereq and would do something for your own psychic shielding understanding.
3. Eh like 200-500 based on other rolls. 200 if you crit on the warp understanding, 500 if you get a poor success. Can be reduced by further psychic shielding research, further void abacus research, a little bit by psytech research. Don't expect a full map of discounts because it's variable and depends on rolls.

Side note - if you want better anti-chaos-corruption tools, the psychic shielding techs & machine spirit techs are right there. Warp understanding is about understanding the warp for purposes of travel and communicatoin, not really for defending yourself from demonic stuff. If that's what you want, just do the psychic shielding research, or doing one of the things that will discount it.

Edit: Though warp understanding probably will make your research of scrapcode more fruitful, now that I think about it.
 
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Hmmmm. Well, warp understanding making scrapcode research more fruitful is good, and it seems the price isn't too high. I was really hoping it would give us a better map of the dangers and how to go about addressing them though, so thats siappointing to learn. I might prefer to just chuck the thing then, if we don't have any clear path to dealing with it...

Would warp understanding at least unlock scrapcode research? Or would we need to go elsewhere for that?
 
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Angle said:
Hmmmm. Well, warp understanding making scrapcode research more fruitful is good, and it seems the price isn't too high. I was really hoping it would give us a better map of the dangers and how to go about addressing them though, so thats siappointing to learn. I might prefer to just chuck the thing then, if we don't have any clear path to dealing with it...
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I mean, we do have clear paths to reducing the risks, and both psytech and warp understanding can discount them. We just chuck the scrapcode generator after we're done is all.

Incidentally, I've updated Plan: Trust but Verify to complete psytech before investing in Warp Understanding. As far as I'm concerned with the upper bound on WU placed, the confirmation that it could offer psy shield discounts, and the note about it enhancing research results, the choice about whether or not to commit to WU is synonymous with the choice to keep the scrapcode generator for research later. If we're going to take the risk, we should get the most out of it.

We also have like, 4 different psy shield techs we're likely to research. Miniaturization, nested, personal (for monstary trade and convincing them to let psykers just... live out there in society), and upgraded if the discounts are good. That's a lot of places for a discount to the tree to add up, so if we do WU, it should be done first.
Neablis said:
Oh that's unlocked by you hanging onto the generator.

And to some extent warp understanding will help. Just not directly.
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If it's not too OOC to say - is it the kind of help that needs us to have WU while we're doing the research on the generator? I'd assume so, but if we knew for sure one way or the other it could help resolve one of the bigger points of contention.
 
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Prime 2.0 said:
It's the most obvious thing to research and we're going to get data on it whether we like it or not from escape attempts, probably, so it's hard to imagine how we wouldn't.

But actually taking it next turn seems unwise, lol.
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No, I meant, do we get to see the option, with its description. Actually researching it is a separate thing.

Anyway, warp understanding isn't quite as good as I thought... I'm tryijg to go to bed right now though. I might trdy and do some more thorough cost benefit analysis in the morning, maybe? I dunno though, no promises.
 
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[X] Plan: Trust the People of Denva

I feel like people are focusing a bit too hard on the warp part of things and we are going to get bitten by Wayfarer if we try to hard focus psychic research. That might well end up with going off half cocked in a weaker ship than we prefer. The Chaos bug is dangerous, it is not the only danger.
 
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Alectai said:
Haven't really read the discussion and I'm sore all over thanks to taking a tumble earlier today due to two strategically placed dog toys, so I'm just going to do a gutfeel plan.
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@Alectai
One part of the discussion (between me and Neablis) I think is very worth knowing about, for this turn or next:

With 1 diplo Action (and after "some" BP to get them labs) we can get the governments of Devon Secundus to chip in for research.

+10 to +50 RP/turn at the start (depending on roll), only activates when we research too, only paying for tech they care about, slowly growing passively or.
(Plus narratively increasing their techbase)

And there is a bunch of stuff they'd want that we probably want to Research.

See last Neablis quote for answers on my speculation on tech they'd want (only stuff I guess we'd like to research and would be okay with them having, but your estimates on that May vary, of course).

If we roll well it would pay for itself in 4 turns. And would be a cheap diplo win for unity by having more stuff to do together with them.
Neablis said:
Diplo action to come to the agreement and help them get set up for some serious research, likely some BP to give out some research labs of whatever kind of thing you want to research. They're not... great technologically but are improving. Depending on the roll they'll probably produce +10 to +50 RP/turn (but only on turns you do research) at the start, and only want to work on techs that directly benefit them. You could take additional diplomatic actions to further educate them to improve the RP number and what they're willing to work on. It'll also help improve their overall technology base.
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Toboe said:
Ah, at +50/turn its 4 Turns to break even, probably worth it.
+10/turn its 20 turns. If I suggest staying 20 Turns here I'll be stoned to death.

@Neablis
Do they have any growth chance without paying AP for it?
Like after the "only on turns you do research" getting triggered a few times or having a backlog of x techs interesting to them it changing to "per Vita research action"?
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Neablis said:
Yeah, they would. It'd be a bit slow though. Of the techs you mention:
Ground Manufactory Efficiency Improvements - only good for automated manufactories. They'd only like it if you did OMC.
The workings of a Void Abacus - probably, but a bit far-future. Depends on the roll you did to set it up.
Superconductive Shenanigans - yeah, almost certainly.
An Introduction to Human Genetics - yup.
You don't need no stinkin' medical school - yup.
Organic-Machine control - 100% interested.
Organ replacements, Redux - yup.
Advanced Neural Implants - maybe. Depends on the roll but probably.
If you rolled well you could also "trade" them. Convince them to work on whatever you wanted and pay them in techs you alrady have.
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Angle said:
I'd be down to try and do this with the same action we use to teach them to run the station reliably. Seems worthwhile.
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Time to get people on board then.
 
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I'm noticing a lot of the proposed plans are leaving out the free database query action. It would probably be best if we use it to learn more about scrapcode or start looking into what the local subsectors and sector look like.
 
Aura Dragon said:
I'm noticing a lot of the proposed plans are leaving out the free database query action. It would probably be best if we use it to learn more about scrapcode or start looking into what the local subsectors and sector look like.
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I don't think there would be a lot of insight about scrap code in these files, at least not the sort you mean. The Ad Mech calls everything that makes the machine spirits not work right scrap code and the deep Chaos shit stuff... is covered under deep Chaos and thus probably not here. We are not exactly hacking a Lord Inquisitor's fortress here.
 
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DragonParadox said:
I don't think there would be a lot of insight about scrap code in these files, at least not the sort you mean. The Ad Mech calls everything that makes the machine spirits not work right scrap code and the deep Chaos shit stuff... is covered under deep Chaos and this probably not here. We are not exactly hacking a Lord Inquisitor's fortress here.
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Yeah, the mechanic is mainly meant for basic OOC knowledge into IC knowledge, even if it has some other fringe benefits sometimes. So things like "what do psykers do nowdays, actually?"
 
DragonParadox said:
I don't think there would be a lot of insight about scrap code in these files, at least not the sort you mean. The Ad Mech calls everything that makes the machine spirits not work right scrap code and the deep Chaos shit stuff... is covered under deep Chaos and this probably not here. We are not exactly hacking a Lord Inquisitor's fortress here.
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Well in that case then we should be looking into the local sector maps then. Even if there isn't any star charts, we can get a lot of information from shipping lists and records of astropathic communications. We should be able to get a basic idea of where the important things in the sector are. For example there is a confirmed Space Marine presence in the sector and I doubt that they would have lost their Chapter home world.
 
[x] Plan: Trust but Verify

I'm a bit more ambivalent on the RP between this and the other Trust plan, but I'd really rather minimise the chance of a failure setting the Denvan's progress back.

@Prime 2.0 it doesn't change much but Anexa gives 30 RP now, not 25.
 
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