Vox Vitae: Warhammer AI quest

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We are in agreement that we need to develop the capacity to drop off fix-it kits of people and material, so we don't get bogged down too much in the future, right?

It seems like 'rely on Denva' and 'do it all ourselves' are both approaches with issues.
 
redpotato4 said:
That'd be cool if at some point all of our Crew has minions like Anexa. I'm mainly hoping that Cia gets a potential perk when she hits 10 that boosts our military rolls. Having no bonus to those in nerve-racking compared to our research or diplomacy ones.
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It might happen, but we'd probably want to start encouraging her to study tactics or something for that. Right now her track is very personal-combat focused AFAICT.

She's maxing out her ability to do things like what she just did.
 
Glau said:
We are in agreement that we need to develop the capacity to drop off fix-it kits of people and material, so we don't get bogged down too much in the future, right?

It seems like 'rely on Denva' and 'do it all ourselves' are both approaches with issues.
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We are- you and I at least. I'm not sure entirely how, though. Could we get a 'humanitarian' specialist who can organize things so a single action can effectively perform humanitarian aid to the best of what we are capable of without need for specialized. Specific efforts on our part?

And what technologies would we need to accomplish that most effectively? An STC knock-off?
 
ShadeFiende said:
We are- you and I at least. I'm not sure entirely how, though. Could we get a 'humanitarian' specialist who can organize things so a single action can effectively perform humanitarian aid to the best of what we are capable of without need for specialized. Specific efforts on our part?

And what technologies would we need to accomplish that most effectively? An STC knock-off?
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Since we'd be detaching them and leaving them for extended periods, we'd want it to be small-c crew. Probably a mixed team - tech priest equivalents are a vital part but the complete package would also have social specs.

Our tech suite is already just about all the STC knock off most people need for most problems. Maybe could use more depth in biomedical - we currently don't have anything too special for managing disease AFAIK.

The other thing they could use is security. Sure, they can bot army, but that only takes you so far.

Considering that, I think my suggested detachable team would be a light cruiser, maybe a frigate but I'd rather it be something that can reasonably drop-kick an escort that tries to start something or lance-strike a bandit base in addition to its humanitarian work. (Void OMC and remote OMC for this.) Some onboard factory capacity, some shuttles, assault shuttles, and medical and troop space. The humans stay safe aboard most of the time, operating remotely from on high, but for most problems they'll be building out a remotely operated ground station to do the heavy lifting.
 
In reality there's some ways to get this detach kit done, i feel the easiest one to setup is going to the robot improvement phat and creating machine spirit asisted androids. Not massive man of stone with a bunch of int but small human shaped robots that we can print loaded with the protocols to get what we want done it's probably locked behind the first AI reserch, avatar customization, and is still not have the same skill ceiling as humans but it would work with minimal effort

Aside from that we just would need do the craming and industrial research to actually have a strong industrial base to be able to plop industry on demand.
 
ShadeFiende said:
And what technologies would we need to accomplish that most effectively? An STC knock-off?
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I'll second Aineko on this, but I was thinking more a few ground based manufactories than a frigate. Also a medical center, an academy and a bunch of security. Maybe a few assault shuttles and an in-atmo void shield.

Ideally small-c crew or specialists raised and trained on an arc mechanicus equivalent, and capable of eventually building up to rejoin the stellar ascendancy without us needing to return.
 
Glau said:
Also a medical center, an academy and a bunch of security.
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Not necessary as a separate research.
Long story short vita do have the blueprints to establishing a colony, the same way she had the manufacturers. They aren't the best due long dead legislation and patent but they work. We just really the industry on hand to be able to plop some of these with one fabrication action and have the sentient (or semi-sentient wen it come to androids) resources available to able to the uplift be able to be done without Vita.
 
Glau said:
I'll second Aineko on this, but I was thinking more a few ground based manufactories than a frigate. Also a medical center, an academy and a bunch of security. Maybe a few assault shuttles and an in-atmo void shield.
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For that, you probably want a flight of cargo ships to take care of the material setup. Which seems likely to be generally good - combining cargo ships with (improved, general) automated factories seems very promising.

The reason I wanted such a mission to include a ship, though, is that otherwise they're trapped once Vita leaves. They can try to defend themselves, but they can't run away from dangers or declare the mission over and leave. Well, short of building themselves a shipyard, then a ship...


Do note that nothing about this setup is exclusive to Vita's direct authority. Once they have Void OMC so ships don't need significant crews, such ships become...well, not a small investment, they would cost close to the same as a warship, but cheap to operate. Really, they'd operate at a small profit when idle by running their onboard factories.
 
Glau said:
We are in agreement that we need to develop the capacity to drop off fix-it kits of people and material, so we don't get bogged down too much in the future, right?

It seems like 'rely on Denva' and 'do it all ourselves' are both approaches with issues.
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We were limited* by three factors here:
  1. Not enough BP
  2. Not enough personnel
  3. Too difficult to call in Denva on short notice
Ultimately, if we land in a system before Denva does that will mean we're doing first response. We solve 1 by improving our cramming and building more ships that can come with so we'll have more BP (or stored BP) on hand. We solve 2 with general recruitment, either via boons from Denva or through trade with other polities. And we solve 3 with warp comms.

I mean, both 1 and 3 presume we get void abacus manufacturing, but that goes without saying. Likewise, the better the abacus the quicker Denva can be called in to do long-term humanitarian response, and reap the rewards of expansion into a new system.

*not as limited as we thought in the end, but still were and in the future hypothetically could be.

Also, for those wondering why I'm roughly okay with not going back to Denva by the end of this turn despite my earlier discussion about scouting ships - while it's still my preference, the math I ran on how stupidly unlucky Vorthryn was made me re-evaluate how urgent it was.

Like, don't get me wrong, if this wasn't a work of fiction I would be bashing heads to make it happen, but I no longer think there's probably another megadeath in progress hiding behind door number whatever. Super shitty circumstances, definitely, lots of death and some of it probably easily preventable, but not... like, this.
 
Gavinfoxx said:
Hey @Neablis, what's the direction of research of reactionless gravitic stl drives, like a pitch drive or similar? That will incidentally also be stealthy? And, of course, not require reaction mass?
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It's not a guaranteed tech. There's a reason that even in Vita's time most ships used normal thrusters. It might be behind -[] High-energy Physics (300 RP) or -[] Gravity Weapons (200 RP), but if so it would require a crit and then another tech or two.

Probably the only guaranteed way to get it would be off finding and studying a bunch of necron tech, or maybe late-DaoT stuff.

Even if Vita is still specialized in research, this is still 40k and there's precedent for what kinds of wild and crazy is allowed, and most of it involves psychic shenanigans because that's the easiest way to break the laws of physics.

meianmaru said:
Aside from all the previously mentioned problems with manned manufactories... These aren't exactly Imperium's low-end manufactories. These are early DAoT manufactories, with the expectation that the people running them are not space cavemen. So you would actually need to negotiate for labour and uplift that labour and train the people to run them. At which point, might as well use the unmanned manufactories when you are going to putting in that much effort.

Well, that is my expectation anyway, so it might be better to ask. @Neablis, what is the minimum education/training level for running our very basic manned manufactories?
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High. Not tech-priest high, but tech-priest initiate high. So ~10 years of technical education, though probably closer to 15 for people who start out illiterate.

Running a OMC manufactory requires tech-priest levels of education, so ~20-30 years of total education. This shit isn't simple. This is part of why -[] Human Virtual OMC simulations (150 RP) is a tech.


Also - in my late night haze when posting I did not schedule the voting at a time that is convenient for me. So I will not be able to call for rolls until several hours after voting closes. Last time this happened the thread went insane and people got banned. Hold your horses and be patient, wait for me to call for rolls.
 
Neablis said:
It's not a guaranteed tech. There's a reason that even in Vita's time most ships used normal thrusters. It might be behind -[] High-energy Physics (300 RP) or -[] Gravity Weapons (200 RP), but if so it would require a crit and then another tech or two.

Probably the only guaranteed way to get it would be off finding and studying a bunch of necron tech, or maybe late-DaoT stuff.

Even if Vita is still specialized in research, this is still 40k and there's precedent for what kinds of wild and crazy is allowed, and most of it involves psychic shenanigans because that's the easiest way to break the laws of physics.
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Hey I didn't mention a Bias Drive that alters the gravitational constant around the ship! I'm more interested in just a Pitch Drive or a Diametric Drive. Find or make some stuff with some negative mass (a psyker could turn a large amount of lead into stable/permanent negative mass lead, and that would work fine too, but yea you might need a clarketech late-daot reactor to make the stuff otherwise), make sure you have the right negative mass to positive mass ratios in your ship, the negative mass chases the positive mass parts and you are good to go! You just pump the negative mass through pipes all around the ship to rotate, accelerate, decelerate, maneuver, etc. You don't even need to actively adjust the inertial mass of things like in Mass Effect, you just need a stable supply of the stuff, and it will work this way according to the laws of physics. Negative Mass is also useful for things like stabilizing or enlarging natural tiny wormholes, making FTL alcubierre drives, and the like, provided you can get a Jupiter mass of the stuff. Besides, the Casimir effect may indicate that negative mass particles do exist or can be created, as part of actual physics. Anyway, with this clarification for what I was asking about, does that change where things might be, or whether they would require a crit?
 
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Prime 2.0 said:
We solve 2 with general recruitment, either via boons from Denva or through trade with other polities. And we solve 3 with warp comms.
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I figured we'd solve 2 by having a population reservoir like the Auric following us around, and as far as 3 I really don't like working under the assumption that Denva is going to coming running every time we call.

I'd like to be able to take a 1 action "They need help! Drop a packet and put X in charge with Y mandate" thing, and not spend the time and resources integrating it with our other stuff.
 
Just remember we can always try to shuffle trough old people's belongings, necron tech is the holly grail and we have a option that allow Vita to steal shit from them.
 
MrRobot said:
Just remember we can always try to shuffle trough old people's belongings, necron tech is the holly grail and we have a option that allow Vita to steal shit from them.
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The trouble with stealing shit from the Necrons is that not very far away from here, the Necrons are using that shit.

Admittedly, that also means that stealing their stuff is definitely accessible, just perhaps problematic.
 
Glau said:
I figured we'd solve 2 by having a population reservoir like the Auric following us around, and as far as 3 I really don't like working under the assumption that Denva is going to coming running every time we call.

I'd like to be able to take a 1 action "They need help! Drop a packet and put X in charge with Y mandate" thing, and not spend the time and resources integrating it with our other stuff.
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I mean, strictly speaking the pop reservoir example would indeed be gotten through diplomacy/trade. Most others will too, unless we make it through cloning or abduction.

As for the second bit - ultimately, calling for somebody to delegate to is gonna be part of that, and the stellar ascendancy is basically always going to have more raw stuff to throw at the problem. If we accept that they're part of our response, then the requirements for a first responder "package" drop significantly.

That said, as Vita gets more powerful, the more kinds of problems become "easy" to solve, even as we work out how to make prior tiers of issues trivial. We're never going to have a push button solution for everyone we wanna save, and I kinda prefer it that way. Problem solving is fun!
 
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Aineko said:
The trouble with stealing shit from the Necrons is that not very far away from here, the Necrons are using that shit.

Admittedly, that also means that stealing their stuff is definitely accessible, just perhaps problematic.
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I mean for sure, Just saying because stealing from the druiichi (which are the other, lesser, source of material hypertech) is arguably harder due being purely random.

Maybe we can capture Vita's new "friend" ship when we cross phat with her again but that is faar from a guarantee.
 
If we could perhaps study necron ftl, I'd be super interested to study tyranid Narvhals, apparently warp free, if a little "slow", causes gravametic anomalies on target planets, so might be better to aim at worlds we somehow know are unpopulated, maybe better as a ftl system bridging settled star systems under our control? Maybe make "destination mass" stations built to capture energy from the grav anomalies?
 
Not the best of ideas, Nid bio bullshit just does things and when they sense someone messing with their things they can make a whole hive fleet move in that direction.

Nids are arguably bigger marry sues than chaos.
 
Hm.

Eh, I guess passive diplomacy might be good enough, with this much support. I'll take it.

[X] Plan: The Disciples of the Cogitare Exploratium
 
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