Vox Vitae: Warhammer AI quest

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[] Plan: Let's learn then talk!
-[] Research 3x.
--[] Understand local culture (50 RP).
--[] The workings of a Void Abacus (200 RP).
--[] Better robotics (150 RP).
-- [] The Basics of Psytech (200 RP).
-[] Construction.
--[] Directional-control Radio tower (-25 BP, -5 CP).
 
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Liking the tone of the quest thus far. With especially in mind the clash in the tone to that of 40k, which is almost guaranteed to happen when our somewhat dorky protagonist runs into the grimdarkness of the setting for the first time.

Anyway, first things first: getting our bearings is important, but so is some damn additional manufacturing capacity. I know that the cost of even basic stealth seems steep when it comes to the manufactory, with 200 BP paying itself back only after four turns... But that is only if we spend just one action there. Spend two actions in construction for two turns, and it has already paid itself back.

Four actions, and we do that in one turn. Which might be actually worth it in these turns in the beginning. Research, for example, is nice in upgrading the tools that we have or getting more options, but will be of more limited use if we cannot make enough of the things that we need. But we will have to see what the next turn brings, as I think we are quite likely to spend at least one action in the diplomacy after we have a better picture of things.

A sidenote: Was thinking first starting by building the manufactory underground, but that seems way too costly at this point. Basic stealth is a nice middleground, as one installation is probably less likely to be noticed than ten of them, I assume. (Can I get a clarification on the mechanics of this, @Neablis?)

We can then pivot from this to more open (cost-effective) collaboration with the locals, or alternatively full paranoia with building everything we can underground based on what we find, maybe even deconstructing any above-ground installations later at some point if we truly need. But regardless, manufacturing capacity is the kind of thing that builds up exponentially. So we really shouldn't ignore it at this point.

Also, should fit the how Vita seems to be thinking. As far as I can tell, she is cautious due to the trauma of what happened to her, her currently crippled state and some of the local weirdness, but not in total paranoia-mode yet.

Anyway, based on these thought, here is my plan:

[ ] Plan: First the Foundations, Then the Stars
-[] Research (200 RC x1)
--[] Understand local culture (50 RP)
--[] Better robotics (150 RP)
-[] Construction (100 GBC x3)
--[] Manufactory, basic stealth (200 BP, 50 CP)
--[] Underground Directional-Control Radio Tower (-75 BP, -5 CP)
--[] Light infantry bots (-25 BP, -200 CP)
 
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I think we really should consider not bothering with stealth. We are going to have to reveal our presence eventually anyway, so the most important thing is that we have enough troops to defend ourselves in case the locals turn hostile and I think a few thousand robots should be enough for self-defense. Going loud right off the bat is a bit of a risk but the potential rewards of faster industry and friends feel worth it to me.
 
meianmaru said:
A sidenote: Was thinking first starting by building the manufactory underground, but that seems way too costly at this point. Basic stealth is a nice middleground, as one installation is probably less likely to be noticed than ten of them, I assume. (Can I get a clarification on the mechanics of this, @Neablis?)
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You're talking about building a manufacturing facility in the woods - all sorts of things can find you, from satellites overhead to people hunting or whatever. The shielding decreases that chance pretty significantly, but doesn't remove it entirely - you can shield against orbital imaging more easily than you can ward off a dude wandering around the forest. The risk isn't linear, but it definitely goes up the more facilities you build. If I were forced to plot it I'd say the first facility is a big jump in risk, then after that it's a steady increase but smaller than the first jump.

I will say that you can depend on Vita to be pretty rational, and condition actions on other actions in ways that make sense. If you say "attempt to make contact with the local government in a way that seems safest after studying local culture without giving away her location," then that's what will happen. If she can't figure out a way to do that, the action won't be wasted. Instead she'll spend it laying the groundwork towards making productive contact along the lines you lay out in the vote.

(I also don't mean to say that's the right action. There's multiple successful paths here. But if you sit in your hole and do research for too many turns I'm going to wap you with the Wayfarer trait and lock the research action until you've made some progress towards building a ship.)

My intention here is to interpret the spirit of your votes, not hold you to the exact letter if things don't perfectly align.
 
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Questwolf said:
I think we really should consider not bothering with stealth. We are going to have to reveal our presence eventually anyway, so the most important thing is that we have enough troops to defend ourselves in case the locals turn hostile and I think a few thousand robots should be enough for self-defense. Going loud right off the bat is a bit of a risk but the potential rewards of faster industry and friends feel worth it to me.
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The civilization is as friendly as can be. No Mechanicus. Emperor worship is more cultural tradition than honest faith. No major conflicts going on the planet. I really don't see any practical logic in arming ourselves, nor does it make sense in-character.

I agree with you that trying to hide is rather pointless, but if we want to prepare ourselves, building killer robots is time we should spend on learning the local cultures and general mindset of the planet civilization, so that we understand them and don't make any mistakes when talking to them and also building radio tower installation so that we can talk with them.
 
Neablis said:
You're talking about building a manufacturing facility in the woods - all sorts of things can find you, from satellites overhead to people hunting or whatever. The shielding decreases that chance pretty significantly, but doesn't remove it entirely - you can shield against orbital imaging more easily than you can ward off a dude wandering around the forest. The risk isn't linear, but it definitely goes up the more facilities you build. If I were forced to plot it I'd say the first facility is a big jump in risk, then after that it's a steady increase but smaller than the first jump.
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Hmmm. Was hoping that the stealth would be enough as a total counter against the satellites, at least. Well, we don't have any specific advanced stealth technology, so its understandable. Full stealth might still be worth it, then. Adjusting my plan to have everything underground, and some of the wording, because I copied the base from Alectai's plan. Mostly just the part about the stealth/underground to be more cohesive with the format:

[ ] Plan: First the Foundations, Then the Stars
-[] Research (200 RC x1)
--[] Understand local culture (50 RP)
--[] Better robotics (150 RP)
-[] Construction (100 GBC x3)
--[] Manufactory, underground (200/300 BP, 50 CP)
--[] Directional-Control Radio Tower, underground (75 BP, 5 CP)
--[] Light infantry bots (25 BP, 200 CP)

A little slower than I would prefer, but our existence becoming a known fact cannot be taken back. Better to take a careful peek first before committing to an action in our current extremely vulnerable state.
Dlan the Wizard said:
The civilization is as friendly as can be. No Mechanicus. Emperor worship is more cultural tradition than honest faith. No major conflicts going on the planet. I really don't see any practical logic in arming ourselves, nor does it make sense in-character.

I agree with you that trying to hide is rather pointless, but if we want to prepare ourselves, building killer robots is time we should spend on learning the local cultures and general mindset of the planet civilization, so that we understand them and don't make any mistakes when talking to them and also building radio tower installation so that we can talk with them.
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I'm more worried about something else than the local cultures coming for a visit before we have any ability to defend ourselves if our existence is known and our base visible to the orbit. Vita should know about the Orks, the pests they are, at the very least. And regardless of that: Vita herself, in the update, mentions some degree of caution being necessary to make sure she isn't just captured and then exploited by the locals.

Besides, your plan doesn't take full advantage of the Ground Build Capacity. You could use the spare even for just some trade goods. So its not really appealling to me.
 
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Now that the voting is open:

[X] Plan: First the Foundations, Then the Stars
-[X] Research (200 RC x1)
--[X] Understand local culture (50 RP)
--[X] Better robotics (150 RP)
-[X] Construction (100 GBC x3)
--[X] Manufactory, underground (200/300 BP, 50 CP)
--[X] Directional-Control Radio Tower, underground (75 BP, 5 CP)
--[X] Light infantry bots (25 BP, 200 CP)
 
[X] Plan: Let's learn then talk!
-[X] Research 3x.
--[X] Understand local culture (50 RP).
--[X] The workings of a Void Abacus (200 RP).
--[X] Better robotics (150 RP).
-- [X] The Basics of Psytech (200 RP).
-[X] Construction.
--[X] Directional-control Radio tower (-25 BP, -5 CP).

[X] Plan: I'm a Space Rock stuck in a cave, Ask Me Anything!
 
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[X] Plan: Open Communication
-[X] Research
--[X] Understand local culture (50 RP)
--[X] Better robotics (150 RP)
-[X] Construction x2
--[X] Manufactory (100 BP, 50 CP)
--[X] Light infantry bots (-25 BP, -200 CP) x2
--[X] Medium Infantry Bots (50 BP, 200 CP)
-[X] Diplomacy: Talk to people.
After analyzing the local culture and making sure there's nothing obviously sinister going on hit up the local government to explain your accidental crash landing. Your sure they will be understanding, and if they aren't you have your robot army to protect you.
 
Dlan the Wizard said:
The civilization is as friendly as can be. No Mechanicus. Emperor worship is more cultural tradition than honest faith. No major conflicts going on the planet. I really don't see any practical logic in arming ourselves, nor does it make sense in-character.

I agree with you that trying to hide is rather pointless, but if we want to prepare ourselves, building killer robots is time we should spend on learning the local cultures and general mindset of the planet civilization, so that we understand them and don't make any mistakes when talking to them and also building radio tower installation so that we can talk with them.
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You are joking right?We are in warhammer this was an Imperium world at some time furthermore my mate we are an eglatarian society would you greet us as an ai without weapons and protection no? Got it so let ourselves be controlled by the goverment!
 
Lord Bane said:
You are joking right?We are in warhammer this was an Imperium world at some time furthermore my mate we are an eglatarian society would you greet us as an ai without weapons and protection no? Got it so let ourselves be controlled by the goverment!
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And? You want to tell me, we wasted those two points for nothing and should have just chosen Heretical Humans or something? There's just no reason to think the Humans are hostile or have anything in common with typical Imperial culture. The whole sector we are in was isolated from the rest of Galaxy for some time, the very worship of the Emperor on this planet is more a tradition than any serious religion.

So, yes. We just have no reason to think the Humans will be afraid of us, most likely they don't know what AI even is, let alone that they should destroy it, according to interstellar policy they don't belong to anymore.

Also, I would agree with weaponizing, if not for the fact that we have Diplomatic suit, we have quite good chances of talking this out and making simple agreements, they allow us to take resources, they get technological knowledge from us. Again, if we didn't have character that is very good at diplomacy, sure, but we have it, so I don't see any reason why we should be afraid as if suddenly Chaos Astartes will start falling from the sky.

We need to prepare, but just learning what makes local people tick and communicate using radio tower so they can't find out where we are should be enough. They hardly can control us, if they don't even know where to find us in the first place.

Again, if our character didn't have maxed out diplomacy, sure, let's arm ourselves, but we just have very good chance to just talk this out and make a deal with them. I much rather research tons of stuff this turn and have that done than build robots and if we have to build them, diplomatic robots to make a deal would be far more useful than fucking light infrantry that we, again, don't have to use and can just talk this out.
 
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[X] Plan: I'm a Space Rock stuck in a cave, Ask Me Anything!
-[X] Research x2
--[X] Understand local culture (50 RP)
--[X] Better robotics (150 RP)
--[X] The Basics of Psytech (200 RP)
-[X] Construction:
--[X] Underground Directional-Control Radio Tower (-75 BP, -5 CP)
--[X] Light infantry bots (-25 BP, -200 CP)
-[X] Diplomacy: Talk to people.
--[X] Once you've managed to get an idea of what the local culture is--any red flags or whatnot to tailor your approach, you should be able to get away with making First Contact! Proper communication solves all kinds of problems after all, use your very cleverly hidden radio tower (Tree? Are you going to build it into a tree? Details to be worked out later), to establish a line of connection in an appropriate fashion. The folks here seem pretty on the ball, and you could do with some more friends so you're not constantly worried about anyone getting the wrong idea. Just make sure you avoid any identified red flags from your initial survey, you're pretty sure you can cut some kind of amicable deal once you're certain that there's no latent taboo you might trip over. (Contact the Local Government unless we've identified any major red flags suggesting this would be a bad idea. If so, adjust to any potential allies we can find)
 
meianmaru said:
[ ] Plan: First the Foundations, Then the Stars
-[] Research (200 RC x1)
--[] Understand local culture (50 RP)
--[] Better robotics (150 RP)
-[] Construction (100 GBC x3)
--[] Manufactory, basic stealth (200 BP, 50 CP)
--[] Underground Directional-Control Radio Tower (-75 BP, -5 CP)
--[] Light infantry bots (-25 BP, -200 CP)
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This is the exact same plan I was thinking of. This has my vote

[x] [X] Plan: First the Foundations, Then the Stars
- [x] Research (200 RC x1)
-- [x] Understand local culture (50 RP)
-- [x] Better robotics (150 RP)
- [x] Construction (100 GBC x3)
-- [x] Manufactory, underground (200/300 BP, 50 CP)
-- [x] Directional-Control Radio Tower, underground (75 BP, 5 CP)
-- [x] Light infantry bots (25 BP, 200 CP)
 
Dlan the Wizard said:
[X] Plan: Let's learn then talk!
-[X] Research 3x.
--[X] Understand local culture (50 RP).
--[X] The workings of a Void Abacus (200 RP).
--[X] Better robotics (150 RP).
-- [X] The Basics of Psytech (200 RP).
-[X] Construction.
--[X] Directional-control Radio tower (-25 BP, -5 CP).

[X] Plan: I'm a Space Rock stuck in a cave, Ask Me Anything!
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I just want to point out that while I understand where you're going with your plan, you're not making full use of your BP. I'd make it so the radio tower was underground and build some light infantry robots
 
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