Vox Vitae: Warhammer AI quest

MSH · 2025-02-24T13:16:25-0500

[] Plan: Hell Comes, And The Fleet To Meet Her
-[] [Repair Bay] 110 BP structural damage + 19 Hull HP
-[] Research x2 400 + 85 + 60 RP
--[] Superconductive Shenanigans (50 RP)
--[] The Taste of Chaos (100 RP)
--[] Immaterium Understanding (80 + 145/225 RP) (Anexa)
--[] Advanced Technological Research Lab (50 RP)
--[] Large-scale Void Manufacturing (100 RP)
--[] Intelligence Coding (20 -> 170/400 RP)
-[] Construction x1 600 + 5340 Void BP
--[] Repair 19 Machine Spirit Orbital Manufactories (1900 BP)
--[] Repair Large Shipyard (3000 BP)
--[] High-Energy Physics Research Lab (500 BP) (Void)
--[] Repair Basic Psychic Experimentation Lab (200 BP + 200 BP Shield) (Spark)
--[] 1000 Medium Machine-spirit Infantry Bots (75 BP)
--[] Add 65 BP shielding to warp research lab
-[] Subversion: Remove Cults on Denva Secundus (Victan)
-[] Anexa active Action: Research
-[] Victan active action: Diplomat-Spy
-[] Passive Psyker improvement

We now know that we are pincered between two Chaotic forces: Daemons on one side, offshoots of the Dark Imperium on another. The fleet must be built. There is no other rational act at this juncture. We have to lay down these ships, and the path towards that production is our focus now. Abacus and our next flagship begin next turn.

As for research, by god we need to get the second tier labs up and running. Outside of that, Anexa's special project is too much to pass up on. Otherwise, industrial improvements, industrial improvements, industrial improvements. The fleet demands it. We neglected this, and so it's being done now.

Victan finally has something to do in rooting out these cultists, which with Taste will hopefully take them down for a generation. Truly solving the problem is beyond our current scope.

Next turn: Begin building the fleets, Abacus production, improved ship design, press towards decanting Navibean. Mutations research. Check on Denva Primus, maybe. Void shields and defense platforms, maybe. Necron and Eldar research which will then be unlocked, maybe.

Angle · 2025-02-24T13:16:43-0500

Haganeko said:
No love for setting up Denva R&D? It is two actions, in a way (the diplomacy and the research of at least one of collab R&D or Lower Specs) but it will pay off in them getting back on their feet faster, our own on-board Cogitare yielding more juice (with collab R&D) and +1 boon.

Not this turn. I want to progress towards warp comms and wrapping up Bongo, and after that, cleaning up the chaos mess is the most important thing. Maybe next turn.

BigBadBob7070 said:
The thing is, having incredibly high resistance to Chaos is all well and good, but it means shit if we run into an enemy that we can't drown in bots and can actually outfight us.

I mean just look at last turn, we could have attacked Klyssar's Keep last turn if we had more bots before they had time to pull off a ritual.

Yeah, and that will be a priority for me - after we get Warp Comms.

Things for next turn, assuming my plan wins:

-[] Empathy at Range (200 RP) Your warp sensors work well on things that are nearby, but they're definitely not able to detect anything large beyond combat range, or smaller things beyond very close range. Maybe it's a matter of improving sensitivity, maybe you need to specifically build some parts of your psychic shield to extend range. (Makes your warp sensors active at longer range, unlocks further research to pinpoint psychic activities from across the solar system. Half of the prereq for basic warp-based FTL communication)
-[] Yelling into the Warp (150 RP) If you can receive signals from the warp, how do you send them? It probably involves modulating your psychic shielding somehow. Does that mean a new thought? Probably. (Unlocks the ability to cast signals into the warp, though that may attract attention. May allow you to signal psychically-sensitive allies... or enemies. Half of the prereq for basic warp-based FTL communication) Requires Alternative Shielding Meanings

The next two steps of warp comms. Very likely, unless something else jumps out really hard.

-[] Demonology (100 RP) Demons. They can be summoned, bound and banished. Preferably in that order. How? That knowledge could be powerful... and dangerous. (Allows you to do basic demonology to summon/bind/banish demons. Unlocks further technology around all of that, including potential better protection from demons.) Price will triple without the Scrapcode generator to experiment on.

Finally wrapping up Bongo. Just about guaranteed.

-[] Large-scale Machine spirits (75 RP) As it stands, you can integrate machine spirits into small things. Expanding that to military installations and ships is going to require designing even more complex networks and figuring out how to make them work. With Anexa's insights you think it's eminently possible thought (Unlocks machine-spirit equipped versions of frigate-sized or smaller ships and platforms, as well as most defensive installations. Unlocks more research for machine spirits for larger ships & platforms.)

Machine spirits for facilities and small void ships. Just about guaranteed.

-[] Immaterium Understanding (225 RP) Anexa believes she understands something fundamental about the warp. Do some experimements to see if she's right. (Further discounts on all warp-related research, potential to unlock a research from farther down a warp research tree while skipping prerequisites) Anexa must work on this action. Guaranteed level(s) for her. Requires Warp Research Lab.

Maybe? Depends on how much the price comes down, and on how much everything else's price comes down.

-[] Collaberative Computational R&D (250 RP) You've set it up so that humans can help you with research and development, but the gains are limited because there's only so much they can help you with before you get diminishing returns on team size. Figure out better ways to utilize your research teams and let bigger teams contribute to projects. (Increases size of research team before RP/turn limit is reached. May assign more technical staff to further reduce design costs.)

Maybe? Depends what else we have to worry about, not sure.

-[] Shards of Humming Gemstone (100 RP) The shards of crystal you recovered from the ritual don't carry an inherent chaos taint of their own, but they resonate with the warp somehow. The largest piece you have is the size of a human hand, maybe you can figure out what it is and how to use it? (May unlock new options for using, finding or synthesizing this warp-reactive substance, as well as discounts to technologies that involve resonance with the warp.)

Bit of a mystery box. Maybe, depending on what else we have available, and how much the price comes down, if it does at all.

-[] Large-scale Void Manufacturing (100 RP) Unlike ground factories, which have to deal with gravity and atmosphere, there's little stopping you from just... scaling up the principles of void manufacturing. Besides the annoying spaghetti of logistics, but that's a solvable problem. (Allows you to design large void manufactories that are more efficient, improves the manufactories on your ships to be 1/5 instead of 1/10 production. Potential for other void-based platform technologies).

-[] Ground Manufactory Efficiency Improvements (50 RP) You dramatically improved the efficiency of your void manufacturing by stripping out the dumb stuff that was required by stellar federation bureaucracy. There's probably some stuff like that in your ground manufactories too. (Reduces the CP cost but not BP cost of your ground manufactories. Unlocks follow-on tech to build ground manufactories in more challenging conditions such as extreme temp/pressure planetoids).

Manufacturing improvements. Maybe? Not sure about these.

Aineko · 2025-02-24T13:27:18-0500

Robinton said:
Then again, better idea: Get the Void Abacus research done, and build a fleet of flagships!

While I do favor the 'Spark will do, get a fleet' angle and keep saying so, note that Vita's flagship gets some unique qualities that other ships don't. Modular slots, at least. Possibly also the refit mechanic. EDIT: And we're only allowed to have one flagship, it's the ship that Vita directly operates.

MSH · 2025-02-24T13:30:26-0500

I realize I've been riding the Demonology train for over a hundred pages now, but it has to be delayed One More Turn now that Immaterium Understanding is available. Not for the discount, but because Anexa is mandatory for IU and very much wanted for Demonology's quality roll.

KyleDaScourge · 2025-02-24T13:32:22-0500

[] Plan: The Eye of Vita V2
-[] Repair Bay (997/1,000 BP)
--[] Fix all hull damage. (110 BP)
--[] Repair all damage to Outer Hull Psychic Shielding. (19 HP, 95 BP)
--[] Rebuild the Basic Psychic Experimentation (200 * 1.5 = 350 BP)
--[] Start rebuilding Psy-Lab Shields 59 HP (295 * 1.5 = 442 BP)
-[] Research 2x (400 + 85 + 50 = 535)
-[] Construction: Gain build points equal to your build capacity, write in what you spend them on. | 5,340 VBP (Aetherion Manufactories) + 1,100 VBP (Voidforge Miners) + 600 VBP (Spark Manufactories) = 7,040
--[] Finish Psy-Lab Shields +76 HP [135 HP total] (380 * 1.5 = 570 VBP)
--[] Replenish remaining Light Machine-spirit tanks up to 100 (150 BP)
--[] Replenish remaining Medium Machine-spirit tanks up to 100 (375 BP)
--[] Replenish remaining Specters back to 1,000 and then construct an additional batch of 1,000 (200 BP)
--[] Replenish remaining Heavy Machine-spirit humanized Infantry Bots with Machine Spirit Jammers back to 1,000 and then construct an additional batch of 1,000 (380 BP)
--[] Replenish remaining Medium Humanized Machine-spirit Infantry Bots back to 1,000 and then construct an additional batch of 1,000 (200 BP)
--[] Repair the 41 damaged manufactories around Aetherion into Machine Spirit Orbital Manufactories (4,100 VBP)
--[] Build stasis pods to contain the 500 captured chaos cultists. (1,000 BP at the previously mentioned 2 BP / Person rate)
--[] Build 13 Personal Void Shields (65 BP)
-[] x2 Research: Gain research points equal to your research capacity, to be spent designing new blueprints or researching projects. Write in what you spend them on. | 400 RP + 85 (Anexa) + 60 (Cogitare) = 545 RP
--[] The Taste of Chaos (Makes your warp sensors very sensitive to Chaos-associated markers. More useful in detecting cults than individuals, though will be able to detect chaos blessings. Like to unlock further research to screen for ever-smaller amounts of chaotic influence) (100 RP)
---[] Anexa active Action: Research - assists a research action you take, granting +5xLevel RP to the action. Will level on a successful roll, scaled by the importance of the tech.
--[] Empathy at Range (Makes your warp sensors active at longer range, unlocks further research to pinpoint psychic activities from across the solar system. Half of the prereq for basic warp-based FTL communication) (200 RP)
--[] Large-Scale organic-machine Control (Allows OMC implants to control any kind of industrial production, including shipyards and non-military megastructures. Leads to further technology to improve the amount of CP one person can control.) (75 RP)
--[] Superconductive Shenanigans (A flat production boost of 5-15% depending on rolls) (50 RP)
--[] Abacus Manufacturing (Unlocks the void abacus ship equipment) (50 -> 100/100 = 50 RP)
--[] Faith is My Shield (Understanding the benefits of Faith. May unlock further research to allow Vita to design a less objectionable faith optimized for warp protection, and help develop better psyker training programs. Likely to unlock further understanding of relics and their usage.) (15 -> 75/75 = 60 RP)
--[] Intelligence Coding (Helps you understand your own code. Prerequisite to building new AIs, starts command point tree and automation tree, also unlocks personality-checking research) (170 -> 180/400 = 10 RP)
-[] Diplomacy/Subversion: Talk to people. (Write-in goal & method)
--[] Talk to the Stellar Ascendancy government.
---[] Give them Abacus Manufacturing and Warp Drive technology.
---[] Give them Large-Scale organic-machine Control.
---[] Give them warp scanner technology incorporating Empathy at Range and The Taste of Chaos for detecting chaos cults.
---[] Give them our stasis technology for prisoner storage.
---[] Hand over 13 Personal Void Shields.
---[] Try to help them establish an organization for rooting out chaos. The Anti-Chaos Bureau?
----[] Victan active action: Diplomat-Spy - assists any diplomacy action you take, granting +Level to the dice to the action. Will level on a successful roll, scaled by the significance of the action.
----[] Cia: Assist the Stellar Ascendancy's new Anti-Chaos Bureau with initial field operations mopping up any chaos cults they find.

Rationale...

I hadn't realized we had quite so much to do with the repair bay, Credit to Nightlord256 I believe for pointing that out and giving specifics on what needs to be fixed.

Getting the psy-lab fully repaired involved taking out the two new orbital manufactories the original plan had us constructing.

Lastly, Cia has been retasked from passive training to actively assisting the Stellar Ascendancy as a temporary field agent helping their new anti-chaos organization stomp on any existing cults that the new scanners find, and then nip any new cults in the bud as soon as they become sufficiently established as to show up on the sensors or are otherwise found by more normal investigation.

Firstly, get the Spark fully repaired and the troop bay restocked to full capacity for the first time in quite awhile.

Secondly, get all of the remaining Aetherion Orbital Manufactories back online to maximize our available VBP for next turn.

Thirdly, build stasis pods for our captured cultists so that there is absolutely zero chance of them escaping or getting up to any mischief and also so that their constant chaos-thoughts won't be a constant drain on our psychic shielding. Our repair bay could probably easily keep up with that, but why put up with it at all?

The Taste of Chaos lets us detect cults with our warp sensors. As soon as we have the ability to detect cults, the Stellar Ascendancy Armed Forces can go stomp on them. As soon as all the cults are stomped on we get another boon from Denva and also have less to worry about when it comes to continuing to trust them with stuff. This won't detect individual chaos agents, but there will likely be follow-ups to do that, and lone chaos-gunmen aren't anywhere near as much of a threat anyway. Anexa gets to focus on this because detecting cults is by far the most important capability coming online this turn.

Empathy at Range lets us and the Stellar Ascendancy only need to build a single chaos cult detector to cover the entire system instead of, at minimum, one per planet / population center. It is also one of three pre-reqs for warp comms, and of the two that we could research this turn it's the more immediately useful.

Large-Scale organic-machine Control will significantly aid the Stellar Ascendancy with rebuilding their space forces by making it possible to build and run a shipyard with a couple of dozen people instead of tens of thousands. It will let the Cogitare do the same thing, which is important because the Cogitare won't have tens of thousands of members for around a hundred years, whereas they are projected to have single-digit thousands by the time we leave the system, and finishing this research early and making sure they're trained with it will mean that those single-digit thousands will be more than enough to operate the entire Aetherion Industrial Complex, including using the shipyard to construct and send us any ships that we ask for once we're back into exploration mode.

Superconductive Shenanigans is an extremely cheap boost to all of our industry that has been sitting in our tech tree for too long for lack of the RP to get to it. Next turn we'll have 7,800 VBP from the Aetherion Industrial Complex and even a 5% boost to that is nothing to sneeze at regardless of everything else.

Abacus Manufacturing has to get done to let us build more ships. It will also let the Stellar Ascendancy and Cogitare do the same and net us another boon from Denva.

Faith is My Shield is sitting partially complete in our tech-tree and is a pre-req for engineering our own anti-chaos religion. Hopefully we will be able to at least get started on actually doing that next turn, and doing so soon should allow us to both take best advantage of the current upheaval and trauma in the system and make use of a couple of boons we're likely to have at the time to maximize the adoption rate of our new religion.

Intelligence Coding gets the remainder because it's also sitting partially complete in our tech-tree and it's absolutely something we do need to finish eventually, it's just that more immediate priorities keep coming up.

Firstly, this consists of handing over a lot of technology.

Abacus and Warp Drive production nets us an immediate boon and was something we decided to do forever ago anyway. The Stellar Ascendancy absolutely needs to be able to design and build their own ships.

Large-Scale organic-machine Control, as discussed in the research section, will vastly simplify building those ships for them. I cannot understate how much easier I expect it will be for them to build and run OMC Shipyards as opposed to manual ones.

Giving them our new chaos detector technology will let them become the only human polity in existence that can immediately detect and step on any chaos cults as they form. I'd say it also has good odds of letting them detect and squash genestealer cults as well, which is a bonus.

Stasis technology will give them the safest possible option for long-term storage of captured cultists, which pairs nicely with the drug technology we already gave them for non-lethally capturing those cultists.

Lastly, we give Victan a handful of personal void shields in case he needs to totally-not-bribe some people or keep himself and some of his guys safe, then we send him to help the Stellar Ascendancy actually make use of all this new technology to establish an organization for rooting out chaos within their territory.

Cia goes along to be a temporary field agent with the new Anti-Chaos Bureau while they mop up any already established cults detected by the scanners and then stomp out any new ones as they arise for a bit, until hopefully we're confident that they're ready to operate fully independently at the end of the turn.

Fouredged Sword · 2025-02-24T13:35:02-0500

We must crack warp materials until we are an AI built from wraithbone that sings itself back into existence when destroyed.

More seriously something like wraithbone computers makes it conceivable to get psyker abilities as an AI.

Angle · 2025-02-24T13:37:33-0500

MSH said:
As for research, by god we need to get the second tier labs up and running. Outside of that, Anexa's special project is too much to pass up on. Otherwise, industrial improvements, industrial improvements, industrial improvements. The fleet demands it. We neglected this, and so it's being done now.

Not really! We have lots of other stuff we need to focus on first. Warp Comms and Bongo, mainly. And some cultist cleanup. The necrons can wait.

MSH · 2025-02-24T13:40:17-0500

Angle said:
Not really! We have lots of other stuff we need to focus on first. Warp Comms and Bongo, mainly. And some cultist cleanup. The necrons can wait.

Yes, really. Every turn this system gets a visitor roll. The fleet's time is now. We don't need warp comms for a damn thing since we're stuck here for the foreseeable future.

Fouredged Sword · 2025-02-24T13:41:06-0500

Angle said:
Not really! We have lots of other stuff we need to focus on first. Warp Comms and Bongo, mainly. And some cultist cleanup. The necrons can wait.

We need to stash those Necros somewhere not in our hull. We can dump them on a space rock and swing by to poke them anytime we need to.

Those things are 100% still active and the local necrons have started moving. The moment a necrons lord shows up those drones are going to turn right on, phase through our ship, and stab us directly in the brain.

Angle · 2025-02-24T13:43:52-0500

MSH said:
Yes, really. Every turn this system gets a visitor roll. The fleet's time is now. We don't need warp comms for a damn thing since we're stuck here for the foreseeable future.

We need warp comms so we can send out sensor ships. More ships for Denva would be nice, but we already have the spark here, so we'd need to spend, like, ten thousand BP to so much as double our combat power.

Fouredged Sword said:
We need to stash those Necros somewhere not in our hull. We can dump them on a space rock and swing by to poke them anytime we need to.

Those things are 100% still active and the local necrons have started moving. The moment a necrons lord shows up those drones are going to turn right on, phase through our ship, and stab us directly in the brain.

I think that's a bit of an exaggeration, but alright, write up an action for stashing them somewhere and I'll add it to my plan.

KyleDaScourge · 2025-02-24T13:44:43-0500

Fouredged Sword said:
The moment a necrons lord shows up those drones are going to turn right on, phase through our ship, and stab us directly in the brain.

While I generally agree with stashing the necrons somewhere, preferably Vothryn to minimize potential collateral damage, this particular bit is wild hyperbole. A dozen unarmed necron warriors waking up in our brig represent absolutely zero threat to us. At worst, their presence would prompt whatever lord or cryptek found us to immediately annihilate the Spark with their own vessel and then probably sterilize whatever star system we're in at the time for the affront.

MSH · 2025-02-24T13:45:19-0500

Angle said:
We need warp comms so we can send out sensor ships. More ships for Denva would be nice, but we already have the spark here, so we'd need to spend, like, ten thousand BP to so much as double our combat power.

We are not going to come to an agreement.

Glau · 2025-02-24T13:49:07-0500

I'd like the navigator, so they have time to grow up here a bit.

About demonology... If y'all can get a write in that says "will not summon demons" accepted cool, otherwise it seems pretty clear that leaning how to summon demons will involve summoning demons.

The rest... Honestly idk any more. Will vote for what seems good at the time.

Aineko · 2025-02-24T13:49:15-0500

Angle said:
We need warp comms so we can send out sensor ships. More ships for Denva would be nice, but we already have the spark here, so we'd need to spend, like, ten thousand BP to so much as double our combat power.

I mean...yes, we would. And we need to do that, soon. Because right now we could lose, existentially, to a two-cruiser squadron, and have basically no tools to avert that.

EDIT: And we could lose several decades of Denvan development to a pirate destroyer squadron, too, because we've got zero means of countering that.

Xon · 2025-02-24T13:51:25-0500

Neablis said:
Turns out, if you grab a psyker and let her train for a hundred years under safe conditions then she'll get pretty strong. Also - having a single elite combatant equipped with psy-shields was a big deal, it meant she could actually punch through the Chaos nonsense to get to the source.

Personal scale psy-shields are a huge deal as it lets a psyker not just tank hostile warp-attacks but them mis-casting from their own psyker abilities.

This is why I called Cia a 'hard carry', she needs time and equipment to level up enough that she doesn't cause more damage to our own side than the other side.

KyleDaScourge · 2025-02-24T13:52:18-0500

Aineko said:
I mean...yes, we would. And we need to do that, soon. Because right now we could lose, existentially, to a two-cruiser squadron, and have basically no tools to avert that.

Trying to work out general plans for the next few turns, have we had a ruling on whether we could start building ships with a shipyard the same turn the shipyard goes online?

Angle · 2025-02-24T13:55:45-0500

MSH said:
We are not going to come to an agreement.

We can try.

Aineko said:
I mean...yes, we would. And we need to do that, soon. Because right now we could lose, existentially, to a two-cruiser squadron, and have basically no tools to avert that.

And how likely is a two cruiser squadron? Two heavy cruisers or larger, no less, and relatively strong ones, too. Not to say I don't want to build more defenses, but it has to be balanced against other things, and I think we should do it with the tech we have available.

Neablis said:
All Warfare is based on deception. Know the enemy and know yourself; in a hundred battles you will never be defeated.

To quote: This is why I want to be able to send out sensor ships. So we're not operating blind in the universe beyond the single system we're in. Right now, there could be orks raiding Caldereth, or Druhkari raiding Vorthryn, or a necron fleet massing several system away in Red Harbor, and we'd have no idea. The sooner we have some mobile eyes to go out and check, the better.

Fouredged Sword · 2025-02-24T13:58:42-0500

KyleDaScourge said:
While I generally agree with stashing the necrons somewhere, preferably Vothryn to minimize potential collateral damage, this particular bit is wild hyperbole. A dozen unarmed necron warriors waking up in our brig represent absolutely zero threat to us. At worst, their presence would prompt whatever lord or cryptek found us to immediately annihilate the Spark with their own vessel and then probably sterilize whatever star system we're in at the time for the affront.

All it would take is one of the warriors to actually be a wraith. We need to study necrons, but their tech makes them largely an out of context problem for us in terms of defense, at least for the moment. They have tricks that we simply cannot stop.

KyleDaScourge · 2025-02-24T14:00:59-0500

Fouredged Sword said:
All it would take is one of the warriors to actually be a wraith. We need to study necrons, but their tech makes them largely an out of context problem for us in terms of defense, at least for the moment. They have tricks that we simply cannot stop.

Wraiths don't look remotely similar to warriors and are incapable of being "disarmed".

They do have tricks we can't stop, I wasn't joking in the slightest when I said running into a necron ship with them aboard (and quite possibly even without them aboard) was a likely end-game for us and whatever system we happen to be in, but these particular necrons are not a threat.

MSH · 2025-02-24T14:04:40-0500

Fouredged Sword said:
All it would take is one of the warriors to actually be a wraith. We need to study necrons, but their tech makes them largely an out of context problem for us in terms of defense, at least for the moment. They have tricks that we simply cannot stop.

Then prepare to start their research tree, as my plan does.

Angle · 2025-02-24T14:06:01-0500

Angle said:
[] Plan: Resisting Chaos, Prepping for Bongo & Warp Comms
-[] Repair Bay
--[] Fix 110 BP of hull damage
--[] Repair 19 HP of outer Psy-Shields (95 BP)
--[] Rebuild Psy-Lab (200 * 1.5 = 350 BP)
--[] Start rebuilding Psy-Lab Shields 59 HP (295 * 1.5 = 442 BP)
-[] Research 2x (400 Base RP + 85 Anexa RP + 60 Cogitare RP = 535)
--[] Faith is my shield? (60 RP -> complete)
--[] The Taste of Chaos (100 RP)
--[] Hardware Psychic Encryption (50 RP)
--[] Machine Spirit Chaos resistance (75 RP)
---[] Anexa Assists
--[] Machine Spirit-controlled Psychic Shields (50 RP)
--[] Alternative Shielding Meanings (150 RP)
--[] Superconductive Shenanigans (50 RP)
--[] Intelligence Coding (+10 RP)
-[] Construction (5340 + 1000 + 600 = 6,940 VBP)
--[] Repair 41 machine spirit orbital manufactories (4,100 VBP)
--[] Finish Psy-Lab Shields +76 HP [135 HP total] (380 * 1.5 = 570 VBP)
--[] 2543 Spectors [3000 total] (318 BP)
--[] 1730 Medium Humanized MS Bots [2000 total] (173 BP)
--[] 1216 Heavy Humanized MS Jammer Bots [2000 total] (231 BP)
--[] 63 Light MS Tanks [100 Total] (94 BP)
--[] 72 Medium MS Tanks [100 Total] (270 BP)
--[] 1000 Spectors (125 BP)
---[] Give to W for use in anti-cult activities
--[] 6 Void Shields (30 BP)
---[] Give to W for use in anti-cult activities
--[] Repair 1,000 BP of the Shipyard
-[] Orders: Help the Denvans sort out remaining chaos infiltrators.
-[] Cia Passive Development

All that said, I would actually like to change up my plan here to focus a bit more on building ships and orbital defenses. Anyone have any suggestions? My brain really does not want to do the math for reducing the bot number to free up RP, at the moment. XD

Prime 2.0 · 2025-02-24T14:08:53-0500

KyleDaScourge said:
Diplomacy - Give Denva a bunch more tech, including chaos-detectors, void abaci, and warp drives. The latter two immediately translate to one boon from Denva. Then have Victan try to help them set up an anti-chaos police force using all the anti-chaos tech we've given them, chiefly our new system-wide chaos detectors, to hopefully let them not only stomp all the existing cults but stay on top of preventing any new ones from forming. This hopefully gets us a second boon.

I guess a couple of things to note here:

First is that we don't actually need to spend a diplomacy action to do tech transfer. This dates back to the first time we were at Denva, but it's also applied over the last few updates. They also have our stasis tech already, and also our Drugs tech that lets them put prisoners in medically induced comas, so unless we want to spring for the unlisted 100RP "make stasis pods cheaper" tech, their ability to keep cultists locked up is well in hand.

The second is that we don't have as much latitude to split the focus of our diplomacy and command actions as we used to, per Neablis's claims about write-ins.

If we want to deal with the "Two Denva" problem, I suspect that we need an action dedicated to just the cultist cleanup and resolving the cultural rift, with no split in focus away from that. Per the author's note this is something that was going to take multiple such actions, but we're just within the ability to do it in one if we have taste of chaos.

Even under the old system, such an action split would have reduced the effectiveness. But as of now, I think we need to double down.

One of the benefits of a research plan like mine is that we are probably more able to lean on Denva to do the actual cleaning up with the tools we give them rather than having to do a command action to do it ourselves. This is most of the reason why I think it's even possible for us to clean up the cultists and clean up the cultural rift in a single diplomacy action, but I think we have to really commit to it to be reasonably certain of success.

And even if not for any of that... if we started setting up their R&D now, that would mean starting while Denva is still split between Aevon and Everyone Else. Until Denva is whole again, starting that project risks creating even greater geographic disparities in wealth and prosperity - because we can't start it somewhere we can't trust, and that means it would mostly only be in Aevon.

The only getting around that is if we finish clearing out chaos infiltration on Secondus first. So, I want to focus on that.

BigBadBob7070 said:
The thing is, having incredibly high resistance to Chaos is all well and good, but it means shit if we run into an enemy that we can't drown in bots and can actually outfight us.

I mean just look at last turn, we could have attacked Klyssar's Keep last turn if we had more bots before they had time to pull off a ritual.

By that same token, look at how much of our robotic force they invalidated just by using a single ritual, even though these were just apprentices.

We have chaos on three out of five sides of sub-sector Zantris. This is not going to stop being a problem. We have just witnessed what weight of numbers does against a sorcerous opponent, and the answer is that if we did not have Cia and her psychic shielding, we would have suffered a pyrrhic victory despite our overwhelming force advantage.

And... well, another thing:

Xon said:
Personal scale psy-shields are a huge deal as it lets a psyker not just tank hostile warp-attacks but them mis-casting from their own psyker abilities.

@Neablis, you've said that SSDIPS could be used to make houses with free psychic shielding. Could Denva also use it to make cheap personal psychic shielding suits? Asking because we've only ever done it as part of armor before, and our poor success there made each suit an expensive custom job.

I don't expect everyone to wear suits like that all the time, if nothing else that seems like it would be disruptive and inconvenient for everyday life without tiny psychic shielding, but I figure Psykers and people in yet-to-be-cleared areas would appreciate it.

Aineko · 2025-02-24T14:15:05-0500

Angle said:
And how likely is a two cruiser squadron? Two heavy cruisers or larger, no less, and relatively strong ones, too. Not to say I don't want to build more defenses, but it has to be balanced against other things, and I think we should do it with the tech we have available.

Most 40k cruisers are on about the same level, frankly. (Not Grand Cruisers, those are a different beast.) Even imperial battlecruisers aren't very different from the baseline models. Technically, that Styx-class is one of the higher-point cruisers around in tabletop BFG terms, but is actually quite weak in gun power - it's a very powerful carrier, but we were fortunately able to no-sell its carrier capability, leaving it with the same throw-weight as, say, a Lunar-class broadside, the most generic of 40k cruisers. It also has the same defenses. (An actual lunar also has prow torpedoes and can fire to both broadsides at once while the Styx doesn't have those qualities, but for purposes of our fight the single broadside is a fair enough comparison.)

As for the chance? Well, that's really entirely up to the QM, and I can't model the QM. It's entirely plausible for such elements to be moving around on recon-in-force operations from any of the powerful factions including the Chaos pocket empire. It might be somewhat rare for such an force to be seen as an essentially rogue element like the Echoes warband or probably that one ork we blew up over Caldereth, though not unheard of. We also might be seriously endangered if Echoes had had an escort squadron, and a warband with a cruiser also having an escort squadron wouldn't be rare at all.

KyleDaScourge · 2025-02-24T14:17:21-0500

Prime 2.0 said:
I guess a couple of things to note here:

First is that we don't actually need to spend a diplomacy action to do tech transfer. This dates back to the first time we were at Denva, but it's also applied over our last term. They have our stasis tech already, and also our Drugs tech that lets them put prisoners in medically induced comas, so unless we want to spring for the unlisted 100RP "make stasis pods cheaper" tech, cultist holding is handled.

The second is that we don't have as much latitude to split the focus of our diplomacy and command actions as we used to, per Neablis's claims about write-ins.

If we want to deal with the two Denva problem, I suspect that we need an action dedicated to just the cultist cleanup and resolving the cultural rift, with no split in focus away from that. This is something that was normally going to take multiple such actions, but we're just within the ability to do it in one if we have taste of chaos.

Even under the old system, such an action split would have reduced the effectiveness. But as of now, I think we need to double down.

One of the benefits of a research plan like mine is that we are probably more able to lean on Denva to do the actual cleaning up with the tools we give them rather than having to do a command action to do it ourselves. This is most of the reason why I think it's even possible for us to clean up the cultists and clean up the cultural rift in a single diplomacy action, But I think we have to commit to it to be reasonably certain of success.

And even if not for any of that... if we started setting up their R&D now, that would mean starting while Denva is still split between Aevon and Everyone Else. Until Denva is whole again, starting that project risks creating even greater geographic disparities in wealth and prosperity - because we can't start it somewhere we can't trust, and that means it would only be in Aevon.

The only getting around that is if we finish clearing out chaos infiltration on Secondus first. So, I want to focus on that.

Good to know that giving away tech is a free action but it does still need to be noted somewhere in the plan that we're doing so I imagine?

Other than that... Have you looked at the latest version of my plan? I'd say it's a fairly focused single action... Help Denva set up anti-chaos police, using the new technology to detect cults, with Victan helping on the organizational side and Cia helping with the "stomping on cultists" side.

Nowhere do I mention working on their R&D this turn, either in the post you're quoting (although that one does mention doing it next turn in the next paragraph) or in my plan itself.

Prime 2.0 · 2025-02-24T14:22:46-0500

KyleDaScourge said:
Good to know that giving away tech is a free action but it does still need to be noted somewhere in the plan that we're doing so I imagine?

Other than that... Have you looked at the latest version of my plan? I'd say it's a fairly focused single action... Help Denva set up anti-chaos police, using the new technology to detect cults, with Victan helping on the organizational side and Cia helping with the "stomping on cultists" side.

Nowhere do I mention working on their R&D this turn, either in the post you're quoting (although that one does mention doing it next turn in the next paragraph) or in my plan itself.

Oop, sorry.

As for tech transfers already done... we gave them everything but warp travel tech when we left the first time so that covers stasis, and we gave them Drugs last turn.

As for focus - I'm talking about research focus as well, to an extent. Taste of chaos is enough that the clear-out of cultists is very likely to succeed in a single Command action. But to do it in a single Diplomacy action where Denva takes on most of the work, and also expect to heal the Two Denvas rift? I expect that to take a lot of support, and it's not for nothing that I pitch SSDIPS -> Denva builds psychic shielded housing for everyone as being something that would help solve it through brute force universally available peace of mind.

The Denva of right now will jump on the ability to build and rebuild housing with free psychic shielding built in like a starving animal. I think we can count on them to play ball here, and with the Faith followup next turn plugged into a boon from, say, abacus manufacturing, we should be able to seal the deal on mitigating the cultural trauma.

Vox Vitae: Warhammer AI quest

Release Candidate Enby

Release Candidate Enby

Release Candidate Enby

Release Candidate Enby

Release Candidate Enby