Vox Vitae: Warhammer AI quest
- Thread starter Neablis
- Start date
- Mature Sci-Fi
- Pronouns
- Zack
My inner pessimist doesn't believe there is a bright side to this
Turn 8 vote closed
Writing is underway.
Additionally, dice were rolled in the thread above and these are the results:
93+20=113 Crit - Mechanicus files on the Archenemy
23+20=43 success - In-atmosphere void shields
37+20=57 success - What's up with this tech?
87+20=107 Crit - Let's fix the lag issue
21+20=41 success - System survey
14+20=34 poor success - Basic Imperial Hacking
4+20=24 poor success - Combat Bot Humanization, Redux winning plan specified to use this research to negate poor roll on hacking.
79 Anexa Level-up
Mechanicus space presence (d6) - rolled 1 (this means more)
Local space salvage (d6) - rolled 6
Additionally, dice were rolled in the thread above and these are the results:
93+20=113 Crit - Mechanicus files on the Archenemy
23+20=43 success - In-atmosphere void shields
37+20=57 success - What's up with this tech?
87+20=107 Crit - Let's fix the lag issue
21+20=41 success - System survey
14+20=34 poor success - Basic Imperial Hacking
79 Anexa Level-up
Mechanicus space presence (d6) - rolled 1 (this means more)
Local space salvage (d6) - rolled 6
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- Location
- Australia
Getting off this dump at Turn 459:
Is this a dig at the ETA of leaving the planet or the likely believability of our humanoid robots by that point?
Depends,what would you have ?Is this a dig at the ETA of leaving the planet or the likely believability of our humanoid robots by that point?
- Location
- Somewhere Beyond the Sea
Vita can figure out how to uplift a Human civilisation, reverse-engineer anti-warp shielding, design cybernetics significantly more comfortable than any Mechanicus alternative and has a database containing almost everything that the Ancients knew of metallurgy, physics, chemistry and planetary development...
But making our robots look Human? Too hard for her
But making our robots look Human? Too hard for her
I mean, a robot's duty is to be a robot,why would we need them to be human looking ?There's always other methods of infiltration we can use
New Quest unlocked:
Turn the planet into a spaceship.
Explore the universe without leaving the Planet behind.
Sure, would take a few BP, but...
If the manufactories take effect immediately, boosting the AP spend after them in the same turn, then 4 AP of building manufactories is
1.5**4=5.0625
Multiplying BP by 5, not 3.
Although there would be CP issues for manufactories capable of mega-engineering sized BP yields.
- Location
- Australia
Maybe we're approaching this from the wrong angle - if we develop our biological and specifically tissue and organoid cloning tech, perhaps we can use human biological parts in our robots, either to disguise them as servitors, or even a full skin-and-flesh covering/bodysuit akin to the Terminators.
Ah yes, nothing quite says 'we're the good guys don't panic' like covering your cold, soulless automata in the flesh of man.
Insult Everyone!
Master of Evil but bad at it.
- Location
- Right behind you~
You know what? To the imperium it really would be the worst of both worlds!Ah yes, nothing quite says 'we're the good guys don't panic' like covering your cold, soulless automata in the flesh of man.
Soullessness of the machine, flesh of man added wastefully, or even as insult.
Ironic, given servitors.
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I mean yeah making servitors is evil, this would just be mildly creepy. Of course the IoM finds it worse, their standards are almost axiomatically ass backwards.
avatar11792
Et Sic Incipit
- Location
- Planet Earth, North America
It definitely says something when if you put skynet in the universe of Warhammer 40k, that skynet might possibly be a moral option. At the very least the flesh covered terminators it makes can be granted sentience, serviters don't even get that because they're an inversion of the concept, a free being with everything free stripped out of it, reduced to an automaton.
Now I kind of want to see a skynet in 40K story somewhere. Not sure how it will go but it's interesting idea.
Now I kind of want to see a skynet in 40K story somewhere. Not sure how it will go but it's interesting idea.
nahh we have that, it's just the robots are worse then if they didnt look human.But making our robots look Human? Too hard for her
Turn 9
[X] Plan: Technology is about to go crazy!
-[X] [Free] What is the deal with this God-Emperor anyway? It sounds kind of crazy, and there's got to be more to it, right?
-[X] Construction (900 BP)
--[X] 4x Manufactories (-400 BP)
--[X] 1x Underground Basic Biology Lab (-150 BP)
--[X] 6x Underground Anti-Air Defenses (-450 BP)
-[X] Research x3 (600 RP)
--[X] Mechanicus files on the Archenemy (-100 RP)
--[X] In-atmosphere void shields (100 RP)
--[X] What's up with this tech? (-100 RP)
--[X] Let's fix the lag issue (-50 RP)
--[X] System survey (-50 RP)
--[X] Basic Imperial Hacking (-150 RP)
--[X] CONDITIONAL: If we manage to avoid paying a surcharge for Basic Imperial Hacking, do Combat Bot Humanization, Redux (-50 RP), otherwise, pay the surcharge
-[X] [Anexa] Education - Roll to level, difficulty is 10+5xLevel
-[X] Anexa: Juvenat Yes
--[X] Do advise her, however, that this is an option, not something we're demanding she takes. We've gotten the lag cleaned up by now, and we'll be able to make further improvements soon--if you prefer to go full augment? That's your perrogative too, consider this more a 'You have time to do things the way you'd prefer it', rather than a statement one way or the other. You're not in a rush.
-[X] Aevon Mine: Take the "mine disguise" deal
--[X] Do advise them that our defensive envelope--while growing--is not quite ready to handle a full strategic barrage, though a stray cruise missile shouldn't be a problem, but once that happens, the cat's likely going to be out of the bag, and things will get loud very shortly because they'll know damn well we have something to hide. Keep that in mind before you keep poking the bear, because it might just come and maul you before you're ready.
-[X] Aevon Weapons: Yes
--[X] On that note, make sure to take the insights we've gained from studying their tech to at least make them look convincingly Imperial, to further the illusion, if we need BP to do this, don't hesitate to pull from one of the Anti-air Defenses to do it.
-[X] [Free] What is the deal with this God-Emperor anyway? It sounds kind of crazy, and there's got to be more to it, right?
-[X] Construction (900 BP)
--[X] 4x Manufactories (-400 BP)
--[X] 1x Underground Basic Biology Lab (-150 BP)
--[X] 6x Underground Anti-Air Defenses (-450 BP)
-[X] Research x3 (600 RP)
--[X] Mechanicus files on the Archenemy (-100 RP)
--[X] In-atmosphere void shields (100 RP)
--[X] What's up with this tech? (-100 RP)
--[X] Let's fix the lag issue (-50 RP)
--[X] System survey (-50 RP)
--[X] Basic Imperial Hacking (-150 RP)
--[X] CONDITIONAL: If we manage to avoid paying a surcharge for Basic Imperial Hacking, do Combat Bot Humanization, Redux (-50 RP), otherwise, pay the surcharge
-[X] [Anexa] Education - Roll to level, difficulty is 10+5xLevel
-[X] Anexa: Juvenat Yes
--[X] Do advise her, however, that this is an option, not something we're demanding she takes. We've gotten the lag cleaned up by now, and we'll be able to make further improvements soon--if you prefer to go full augment? That's your perrogative too, consider this more a 'You have time to do things the way you'd prefer it', rather than a statement one way or the other. You're not in a rush.
-[X] Aevon Mine: Take the "mine disguise" deal
--[X] Do advise them that our defensive envelope--while growing--is not quite ready to handle a full strategic barrage, though a stray cruise missile shouldn't be a problem, but once that happens, the cat's likely going to be out of the bag, and things will get loud very shortly because they'll know damn well we have something to hide. Keep that in mind before you keep poking the bear, because it might just come and maul you before you're ready.
-[X] Aevon Weapons: Yes
--[X] On that note, make sure to take the insights we've gained from studying their tech to at least make them look convincingly Imperial, to further the illusion, if we need BP to do this, don't hesitate to pull from one of the Anti-air Defenses to do it.
Right now, the real danger to you lies in the unknown unknowns. You can - and are - preparing against everything you know about. You've got a decent defense force, a shaky alliance with the local government that's firming up by the year, and your aerial defense grid is getting better and better. You're pretty sure the local psykers aren't a threat either, since they seem so determined to utterly quash their own powers. There might be more going on there - but it seems unlikely to be a ticking time bomb.
The one issue you don't fully have nailed down yet is the mechanicus, but you're working on it. "Magos Vita" is steadily establishing herself as a presence on the planet and you might be able to hide a lot of your activities under that disguise. You also have a few additional irons in the fire on that front - the primary way they can threaten you is with weapons of mass destruction, and that's what your aerial defense grid is built to counter, though it'll be difficult to build it up well enough to be completely secure from their entire arsenal. Which is why you're planning another two layers of defense against that particular threat.
The first is going to be a heavy-duty void shield, which when you build it and combine it with your air defenses should be enough make you secure against the mechanicus's strategic arsenal. The second is going to be a deeper study of their technology, aimed at finally enabling you to engage in cyberwarfare against the mechanicus. After all, better solution than shooting down their nukes is to prevent them from ever being launched in the first place.
But that's the crux of the issue. You know about the threat that the mechanicus's strategic weapons pose, so you can prepare multilayer defenses against them. But there might be other threats out there, outside of your knoweldge. The unknown unknowns that can wreck your shit because you can't prepare defenses against them. Those are the real danger right now, and you need to do as much as you can to learn about them before you start making serious waves.
The smaller potential danger you can see is potential local space assets. You don't think anybody has significant assets off-planet, but you haven't done a full survey to make sure. It's time to fix that, and ensure that there isn't anything out there there capable of wrecking your day. The larger one is this "archenemy" business. The more you've dug into imperial databases, the more offhand references to "corruption" you've seen, the more you're certain that there's a deeper danger that you need to get to the bottom of.
But that's no reason to neglect the existing preparations you're making. Your first order of business is to reach out to Aevon, since you've come to a decision regarding their various requests.
"Victan?" Your voice emerges from the other end of the communicator. You're pretty sure your contact with Aevon carries it with him everywhere at this point.
There are a few seconds of silence, then his voice comes across the line, slightly out of breath. "Yes, V?"
"I have your answer." Your voice is laced for humor, since you seem to have interrupted the junior agent in the middle of exercise.
"Oh?" He's attempting to keep his tone even, but you can still hear a mild amount of tension. He's good, but he's not as good as W.
Though he's also about thirty years younger than she is, and from appearances hasn't seen nearly as much action.
"I accept both terms. You may proceed with your manufacturing center and I will cooperate with the disguised mine setup. Additionally, instead of the normal communicators and cogitators I will be delivering two thousand weapons, split across specialty lasguns, light plasma weapons and several bolters, provided with ammunition."
"Ah." He seems momentarily taken aback. "That is... more than we expected."
You allow a small amount of humor to enter your voice. "Mass-production of weapons is a solved problem. The cogitators and communicators are more specialty. Do you want to modify the your request?"
Victan's chuckles lightly. "No, I don't think we will. Will they appear Imperial in origin?"
"They will." You can promise that much, between your database acces and your plans to investigate the technology samples you got from the mechanicus. "Another point. We're becoming closer allies, and I do wish to continue to aid you. However, the mechanicus taking a more active stance against Aevon would be unfortunate for both of us. I cannot fully protect you from them yet. I can defend against a few missiles launched against your manufacturing community - but I cannot yet stand off their entire arsenal. And once that capability is demonstrated we will draw the attention of the entire mechanicus. Keep that in mind as you poke the bear, because it might just come and maul you before you're ready."
"We appreciate the consideration, we really do." Victan's voice is deadly serious now. "We - I - are pleased to deepen our relationship with you. Right now we're simply trying to build up our tech base, and not intending to 'poke the bear' any more than absolutely necessary. These preparations are mostly to aid in that process. Please do not demonstrate your defensive capability on our behalf unless we request it. You are of course free to defend yourself, but we would rather lose a few manufacturing centers than start a war in earnest against the Adeptus Mechnaicus." He pauses, then asks a question while trying not to be insulting. "Do you understand?"
You could take that as patronizing, but you don't, and you endeavor to show that in your tone. "I do, though my capabilities are improving. We can speak further about that when the time comes for active conflict against the mechanicus."
He clears his throat, and you can tell he's trying to come up with a diplomatic response. "Yes, we'll see."
He thinks this can still be solved peacefully, with some kind of fait accompli. I'm not so sure about that.
Then you bid him goodbye, and redirect your attention to Anexa. She's in her reclaimed quarters, nose-down in a book, though you note that one of your attempts at an augment is disassembled on her table. You decide to send your tech-priest avatar in to talk to her. She knows it's not your real body, but it's still easier for her to talk to something with a humanoid shape than it is to talk to a disembodied voice.
You knock politely, and she looks up with a sigh, putting down her reader and stretching both her organic and mechanical limbs. "Yes, Vita?" The one is laced with dread, like she's afraid of what you're going to talk about.
Your tech-priest avatar sits across from her. "Anexa, there's a few things we should talk about."
She gestured for you to continue, sitting up straighter and bracing herself for the bad news.
"I haven't mentioned this before, but I'm in alliance with the local government of Aevon. They're providing bureaucratic cover for the aboveground manufacturing plant and have offered to put me in contact with the local psyker monastery."
She groans. "And you want me to talk to them. Because you can't"
You shake your head. "No, nothing like that. I just wanted to tell you so you aren't blindsided by my alliance with the locals."
"Do they know what you are?" She raises her eyebrows.
"They think I'm an ancient awakened from stasis and trying to repair my ship. They're happy to take uplift materials, advanced goods and medicines from me."
She snorts in amusement. "Of course they are. Any who can see the glory of technology but find it denied to them would seek any avenue towards enlightenment. So am I free to continue my studies? Or can we work on improving your augments? I have some ideas..."
You raise a hand and she trails off, giving you a mildly confused look. "There's one more thing I wanted to tell you. One of the things I'm providing the locals with is juvenat, which is something I can produce in limited quantities. I'm giving them a slightly weaker form which merely halts age, but I can produce a stronger version which restores youth as well. Both versions are, of course, available to you as well."
She blinks at you, processing the news.
You decide to continue with your own perspective. "This is merely an option for you. I know you were still planning to proceed down the path of augmentation, and I don't want to take that from you. I plan to fix the issue with the augmentics soon, and want to hear your opinion. But you have the option. And time. If you want to take the time necessary to build yourself the perfect parts, you can." You spread your hands wide. "So, I'll leave this decision to you."
Anexa has been listening intently, her eyes distant as she recalibrates based on this new information. After a few seconds she looks back at you and cocks her head "How does it work?"
Your avatar shrugs. "I don't know. I have the blueprint to build more vats and the procedure that must be followed to make batches, but I don't understand how it works. I was already going to use some excess production to build a biological lab adjacent to the technological lab. Do you want me to send you some of the relevant reading? I don't have time to go through it right now."
She breathes out slightly, eyes aglow with possibility. "Yes please."
"One more thing," you say teasingly.
Her expression falls as she turns to you. "Yes?"
"What were your thoughts on the augments?" You say as you gesture towards the disassembled arm lying on the table before you. It's clear she's gone over it with a great attention to detail, and you want to get her take.
"Oh!" She rotates it to get closer to the place where the arm would connect to organic tissue. "There's no machine spirit in the arm, and I can't see any of the important cogitation nodes."
You frown. "I don't build machine spirits into my technology. I control them, so they don't need them. I also don't quite know how."
"But this isn't something you'll control," she explains. "The machine spirit controls the arm in tandem with you, and over time integrates with your mind. It is one of the minor secrets of the mechanicus." She says this matter-of-fact, as if she isn't sharing holy secrets with her religion's version of evil incarnate. "As we tech-priests become more augmented, more of our thoughts are processed through the machine spirits of our augments."
You'd seen something like that before in the mechanicus databases, but dismissed it as irrelevant, deriving from their reverence of the machine. The mechanicus had a general principle of stuffing those little neural network nodes into every piece of tech they could. They didn't seem like they would do anything except make the augments more temperamental. Who wanted an arm that had emotions and desires of its own? But maybe there was more to it. It was certainly something to look into, and you were already planning to take a look at the augments to fix the lag issue, and now it seemed like you had a potential solution.
Your avatar looks back up at Anexa. "I'll think about it. Thanks. Enjoy your reading."
She pipes up cheerily as you leave. "I will!"
You bring your avatar back to your core, considering all of the other things you mean to do. First and foremost is all of the research you mean to do, but you also want to keep building things. First and foremost is to continue building out your aerial defense network. You already have four defensive installations, but it's not enough volume of fire to ensure your safety against a full-blown assault so you plan out and begin construction on six more. Even that won't be enough to defend against a full salvo of ballistic weapons, but that's about the only thing that could break through it. When all of this is complete you'll be very well defended against air or missile attacks from any of the local forces.
Correction, any of the local forces I know about.
You also build that underground biology lab that you mentioned to Anexa, which will enable you to finally do some basic biology research on things like genetics, medicines and maybe that juvenat. You reflect that you didn't used to be curious about that - back before your accident you'd had the juvenat for hundreds of years and never been curious how it worked. Now you were, and it was interesting to note.
It's something about the galaxy around me. Back then I wasn't the one who held the technology. Other people invented it and it trickled down to me, though I certainly spread it around. But now I'm... it. All of this knowledge exists pretty much only with me. I also think it had something to do with how I kept myself sane while I was stuck. I just... got curious about everything. How technology works. I did all of that reading on fundamental physics just to keep myself sane. It only marginally worked - in retrospect high dimensional physics was a funny choice of sanity-reading.
Or maybe it hadn't been. It had been so divorced from what you'd been experiencing that it was an escape. You'd also had a faint hope that somehow you'd discover a way to free yourself from that amalgamated mass of wreckage, somehow. Even without power. But that had happened from random chance instead, and then you'd ended up on a planet again, just with an insatiable curiosity to understand how everything worked.
Unlocked Biology is kinda wet research.
In the background you also queue up another few manufacturing complexes, though you take some pains to arrange them according to your proposed disguise. You have paperwork saying that you're building a low-tech mining and smelting complex, and there are some things that you can do to lean into that disguise.
It's not even that far from the truth. I'm just doing a lot more than mining and smelting here.
Once that's done, it's time to get into the research. Everything seems to be coming back to the imperial technology studies, so that's what you prioritize first.
It's almost boringly prosaic - though there are certainly some hidden gems in there. The biggest one of course are the neural nodes. You're convinced that they're the source of the "machine spirits" and through several rounds of experimentation you're proved right. You can take a piece of imperial technology and poke at it to stimulate a response from the machine spirit, then disassemble it while keeping the neural nodes connected, then stimulate it the same way and get a very similar response.
It's not the same response, because it's not a basic computer. It's closer to an animal, with instinctual responses that are effectively normal behavior for the piece of equipment. In investigation you realize that they can forge new connections, meaning they can learn - and more importantly, can be trained. They also seem to demand an innate amount of respect, which is kind of funny. You seriously do need to respect and honor ever piece of technology or else it might decide to sulk and refuse to work.
Hilarious.
Machine spirits aren't just pretending at the various emotions either. These seem to be real emotions, and you're conflicted as to the ethics of essentially building a small animal's intellect into every piece of machinery you make. Then you imagine scaling this kind of technology towards larger things, like aircraft or tanks. Or ships. Those are less likely to be small animals, and more likely to be much larger animals. The design should still prevent consciousness from emerging, though on a large enough piece of machinery it might mimic it. Or - maybe the nodes on something that large can actually rewire themselves into consciousness, though it would take a very large piece of equipment - likely a ship - a very long time to properly do that. And it still wouldn't be as much of an independent agent as something designed from the ground up for that purpose - like you.
But, there's definitely something for you to learn here now that you understand how they work and how to build them. You could start to incorporate these "machine spirits" into your own designs if you wanted to give them some amount of capacity for independent action. You'd do it in a much more controlled way then the mechanicus does, but it might be a way to reduce the need for direct control over various kinds of machinery, especially things meant for combat. Having a simple neural network doing the aiming sounds much more effective than requiring you to do the aiming for every one of your combat bots, no matter how good the programs you have for that are.
Beyond that, there's a few other interesting learnings from the samples of imperial technology. Their materials science is decently advanced, and their robotics is the kind of polished that you only get from a design that has had every fragment of unnecessary complexity stripped out. You can learn a thing or two from that as you consider more advanced robotics designs of your own.
There's also antigrav technology - which you have, but you have to admit that the Imperium takes to a whole new level of miniaturization. It takes you a little while to understand the purpose of the "servo-skull" components. There's no skull included, and you're confused until you query the mechanicus database and see that these are the components to make a servo-skull, and that a human skull is not included but is in fact an important piece of the design.
What. Who. Why?
You are left befuddled for another moment, and start to wonder if you need to start keeping count of all of the times that you find something that the Imperium does that leaves you absolutely floored. The mechanicus and the Imperium as a whole, is in the habit of building little drones that fly around and do clerical, message and scouting tasks... and they're universally built from the skull of a human.
You forcibly put that aside, and consider the implications of the technology. It's pretty elegant, and would make a whole new class of small drones, missiles and jump-packs possible, which is in itself enough to be interesting. Regardless of the... ridiculous nature of the origin.
But there's one more thing the imperium does that's even less savory. And that's servitors. They lobotomize people and replace their frontal cortex and several other portions of the brain with a computer. It's a neural implant in the same way that demolishing a building with explosives and using the foundation to build something new is a remodel. It completely destroys the person that was there. It's murder, pure and simple, but leaves enough portions of the brain intact to allow for survival of the body and some amount of motor control. It's also a fairly elegant way to make unfeeling biological robots, if you have access to a large number of people to harvest. At least there's some things in there that translate over to neural implants.
Researched What's up with this Tech? - rolled 37+20=57 Success.
New research unlocked - Secrets of the Machine Spirits (200 RP)
New research unlocked - Minaturized antigrav (100 RP)
New research unlocked - Servitorization
Existing tech discounted - 50 RP discount on Brain implants
Existing tech discounted - 150 RP discount on Really good Robotics
Then, influenced by what Anexa told you, you take everything you've just learned about machine spirits and apply it to augments. The Imperium uses machine spirits in their augments because of course they do, and that may be part of how they solve the lag issues that are so frustrating!
You're sure that back in your time this wasn't the solution - they probably had fancy and elaborate signal-processing algorithms and even chips that served this purpose, but apparently none of that is needed. You hook the nerve impulses from the organic side directly into a neural node and that's what controls the arm. It's not really so much a machine spirit as a neural interface, and over time it should grow to become almost part of the host's nerve system and share its own processing power in both directions.
Your avatar bursts into Anexa's quarters with a newly fabricated arm and you thrust it at her. "Try it on!"
She blinks up at you owlishly, clearly reorienting from the massive spread of notes and formula sketched out around her. You realize you've disturbed her from a deep focus and feel bad about that.
That feeling lasts as long as it takes her to focus in on the plain-looking augment you're brandishing at her. "You fixed it?"
You grin. "Try it."
You both hurry to the medical lab where the goes through the process to detach her own mechanicus-provided augment and replace it with your own. It moves smoothly and cleanly from the instant she puts it on, and she lifts up the hand and flexes it, watching the motion. "It's.. perfect. incredible feedback" She looks back to you. "How?"
You quickly explain, stumbling over the ways you modified the Imperial machine spirit node to make it a more effective translator between organic and mechanical, and tried to strip out some of the temperamental nature while leaving it with the ability to adapt and grow.
Her grin grows, and you can see the thoughts bubbling in her head for replacing all of her existing augments already. Meanwhile your mind is going towards other applications of this technology - it'll certainly make further cybernetics better, but also may allow humans to directly command your troops if they're fixed with the appropriate augments.
Researched Let's fix the lag issue - rolled 87+20 = 107, critical success!
Can now build extremely good (civilian) augments.
Research unlocked & discounted - 50 RP from Combat cybernetics
Research unlocked & discounted - 50 RP from Brain implants
New special research unlocked- Organic-Machine control
You try to keep the good vibes rolling as you transition into the other thing you were hoping to work on - how to hack mechanicus systems. But it turns out that machine spirits are surprisingly hard to hack. They aren't really creatures of code and exploitable openings. They might not be too smart, but the digital world is where they live and they're hard to trick.
You can certainly tweak a machine spirit to be vulnerable if you built it, but that's not the point. You want to be able to hack existing mechanicus systems, and that means bypassing or subverting their machine spirits. After building examples of mechanicus technology you try a number of different approaches - all of which meet with some level of failure. Sure, the right series of signals can confuse the spirit, but then it gets angry and retaliates in whatever way it can.
After extensive testing, it does seem like there is a way to subvert a machine spirit, but it's slow and tricky. You need to train it to respond positively to you. Effectively over a long period of time you set up a series of response-rewards to teach it that you're friendly. Without arousing suspicion.
You had set aside time to fix the issues with the humanized combat bots - which you're certain you can do, now that you have the Imperial robotics knowledge - but instead you have to dedicate that time to working out this new hacking technique, which isn't that much different than throwing meat to a guard dog on a regular basis until it stops seeing you as an intruder and more as a friend. But you can't do it too frequently, or it'll get suspicious and break off contact, and the next attempt will be harder.
The implication there is that you will need to put in a lot of time and direct attention to successfully hack specific systems. It's not something you can do at once, but something that will require months to years of focused attention, depending on the system in question. But you do note that there might be ways to speed the process up, ways to alter your technique so you can ping a machine spirit very rapidly and complete the same process extremely quickly.
There also might be methods to exacerbate the 'confusion' approach, resulting in a hacking system that repeatedly pings the target machine spirit with confusing data so it's inoperable, though you won't be able to convince it to do what you want.
Researched Basic Imperial Hacking - rolled 14+20=34. Additional 50 RP consumed from Humanized Combat Bots, Redux as per winning vote, so poor success converted to basic success
Unlocked the ability to subvert machine spirits with extended effort!
New research unlocked - Faster hacking (150 RP)
New research unlocked - Machine spirit jamming (150 RP)
Well. That was disappointing, but you should be able to actually conduct cybernetic attacks on the mechanicus now, but it'll be slow. And the systems you're most interested in attacking are the ones that are likely the best protected, with the most ornery machine spirits.
The next item on your list is to go over all of the data that's been coming in from your observatory and use it to get a better feel for what's in the system. So far you have pretty rudimentary data from your shuttle and the information you've managed to pull from the local datanet and mechanicus databases. But the mechanicus hides so much from each other that you could fully believe there's a whole station up there that you hadn't spotted.
..annd there is one, though it's a ways away from the planet, at the L4 Lagrange point of Denva Secundus. That means it's following the planet around the sun at a considerable distance. At first you think you've gotten the numbers wrong, for it's showing up as way too large to be sensible. Nearly twenty kilometers across - which. You've seen stations that were bigger but not too many. That's core-world shit.
But there it is. You nearly have a panic attack despite the lack of hormones to drive the feedback loop, until you look at the activity data. It looks like only a tiny part of the station is active, and closer examination makes it look like effectively another mechanicus enclave, with heavily secured and shielded communications with the enclaves on the planet.
You dig into all the records you have and find the places where mention of the station was excised from the databases. You don't know what it was for, but you know that it's out there, it's huge, and more than 95% of it is dead and dark while a secret mechanicus enclave toils away on the outer edge. You don't know what they're doing - just existing as a fallback point? Trying to restore or slowly colonize the station? You're not sure.
Occasional shuttles launch themselves from various enclaves around Denva Secundus to make their way out to the station, take a few weeks to arrive, then stay and return after some time. You're not sure what they're moving in both directions, or who they're working for. But it has to be the various higher-up leaders of each enclave. You're almost entirely certain that Thalya knows.
There's a few other scattered indicators of more stations in the outer system, around each of the gas giants. They're also large, though not nearly as large as the giant station at the L4 point. They also appear - from the signals - entirely inactive. You're not quite certain if that's true from this distance, but each gas giant appears to have one. You get the sense that more may have been deleted from the databases than left intact!
Closer to home - there are definitely more satellites around Denva Secundus than are transmitting frequently. Some of it is debris, but some isn't. There's a shell of satellites orbiting in a high, unobtrusive orbit. You manage to get pretty good scans of one of them, then spend nearly a minute cursing.
Fusion-blasted scrap, starforsaken scum!
It's a weapons satellite. Definitely mechanicus, from the big mechanical skull on the side. It looks like there are at least dozens of them orbiting the planet, though it's hard to get a good count of the things. You're not entirely sure of the payload, but each looks like it has six guided projectiles aimed at the planet below. With just the number you've confirmed they seem to have mostly total coverage. And this isn't something that your air defenses can counter. Even if they're just solid metal payloads each of those bombs would still hit with tens of kilotons of force.
And I somehow doubt they're purely kinetic payloads.
Researched System Survey - rolled 21+20=41.
Discovered L4 Station!
Discovered Gas Giant Stations!
Discovered mechanicus kill-sats!
Well, you'd been talking about unknown unknowns being what killed you. Here's an unknown that could have killed you if you hadn't discovered it. You've got a few potential solutions to this one. You could hack them - which would be tricky, since they seem to be mostly inactive but are presumably waiting for an activation command.
You could build fighters and send them up to orbit to shoot down the satellites. You don't think they have active defenses, but each one can probably sterilize half a continent, so the consequences for failure are pretty high. They'd probably be able to identify the launch point pretty easily, at least unless you put in some effort to make your ships stealthier.
Or, and this is something you'd already planned to do, you can build yourself some shielding. It'll be hard to build a shield sturdy enough to stand off the entire orbital bombardment potential of the net of satellites, but being able to take even a few hits is far better than not even being able to take one.
So, you dive into the science of in-atmosphere void shields. You know they're possible, and were in fact a staple of even colonies in your time. Nobody wanted to get hit by a random meteor, and they also made a colony surprisingly resilient against opportunistic pirates. But it wasn't a schematic you ever acquired. It's time to fix that.
The problem, of course, is that normal void shields are used in space, and therefore can be tuned to block everything. But if you did that on a planet your shield would be strained by the air itself, and would fail before a light breeze. So you have to make it permeable to air. And water, unless you want the same thing to happen during a rainstorm. Or snowstorm. Or, you know, birds.
The trick ends up being fairly mundane - just a tweak of the system to control how permeable the shield is and put an energy ceiling on any individual impact that activates it. You still need to design the actual shield-generator, since it'll require several tweaks over what you'd put on a ship, but it isn't too bad. If you really want to go big you'll need to revisit the basic theory, since for a truly powerful shield you'd have to adapt it to the planetary electromagnetic field.
Researched In-atmosphere void shields - rolled 23+20=43. Success
New blueprint available for design - Light Void-shield installation - 50 RP
New blueprint available for design - Heavy Void-shield installation - 100 RP
New blueprint available for design - Medium Shielded tanks - 50 RP
New blueprint available for design - Heavy Shielded tanks - 100 RP
New research unlocked - Heavy in-atmosphere void shields - 200 RP
New research unlocked - Tiny in-atmosphere void shields - 200 RP
Well. That's something. You'll have to think about if you want to take advantage of any of that, or just build up your offensive capabilities.
You have enough time left for the last item on your agenda - which is finally getting around to decrypting those files on the archenemy. You're not going to lie, you're apprehensive about it. You've honestly been putting it off, since you can't help but feel you're going to discover yet another terrible fact of the universe. Maybe even the one that caused all of... this.
That makes you more curious, and you almost dive in. But instead you go to check in on Anexa, and warn her about what you're going to do. It's only good sense to let her know you might be looking at a potential cognitohazard, and there are several other cautionary steps you want to take.
You take some time to check in on Anexa. Over the last few years she's grown by leaps and bounds, unrestricted access to your databases and laboratories allowing her to advance her proficiencies dramatically in almost all respects. She's still got a lot to learn, but it's notably less than before and she's able to keep pace with you better now.
Anexa education level-up - rolled 79! Anexa is level 2!
She's also thrown herself into an almost complete redesign of her prosthetics based on your recent advances, though admits that she'd love if you did some more cybernetics research to enable her to do something a bit more hardcore. You warn her you're about to look at something potentially dangerous, and to be on the lookout for anything weird.
Then you set up a few dozen warning systems. If anything strange happens - if you lose track of time, if you forget anything, if you can't answer a code, then an alert will go off. You can't exactly store a backup of yourself, but you do the next best thing and schedule an automatic reboot that'll happen unless you shut it off. And you won't be able to shut it off if any of the alerts go off. You also set up a separate monitor on your psychic shieling. Whatever's wrong, you expect that is has some kind of warpy component to it.
Then it's time to dive into the files of the Archenemy. You crack the last bit of encryption, and the first file you find is stamped with the Inquisitorial seal, though you're not sure why the mechanicus has it. You dig in, and find some kind of primer on the nature of the archenemy.
Researched Mechanicus files on the Archenemy - rolled 93+20=113. Critical success!
Well, you suppose that explains it. Chaos. The Chaos gods corrupting influence. Nurgle, Slaanesh, Khorne and Tzeentch. Gods, actual gods in the warp that have corruptive domains over reality. They're born, literally born of the strong emotions of sentient races. They live in the warp as psychic entities, and seek to extend their influence over the material galaxy. They can bud demons off from themselves it they want to do their bidding, but really are best described as evil, malign gods. Opposed by the glory of the God-Emperor, of course.
Then the primer goes on in detail and at length about the danger of such knowledge, and that even knowing it exposes you to the corruptive influence of the Four. At the same time your alert goes off, and you check on your psychic shielding. It's lost a tiny amount of integrity, as if something brushed against the exterior of your psychic shielding. Because you thought about it.
Well. If that ain't a bucket full of smelly fish. You need to understand Chaos, this Archenemy, and what their capabilities are. How their corruption works. What to watch out for. But merely thinking about them is dangerous, and summons their corruptive influence. An actual cognitohazard. What fun.
You shut off most of your alarms and restructure them. You need the ability to not think about this when you don't want to, but it's important that you're able to learn now, then retain the essential details for later. You create a partition behind which most of the detailed information will live, in deep storage where you're not actively thinking about it. You'll be able to write notes to yourself to take out of the partition, but generally that'll let you learn what you need without exposing yourself to danger unduly.
Besides, so far your shielding seems to be sufficient for the job.
Prep-work done, you enter the partition and dive in, reading through inquisitorial and mechanicus notes on what Chaos is, what the signs are, how to spot and combat corruption. You learn about Chaos Space Marines, the fact that even the greatest champions fell to Chaos. And also the smallest. Chaos can corrupt computers. Chaos can corrupt anything with a soul, but it's even easier to corrupt anything without a soul. What a soul is is not really discussed to your satisfaction, but it seems to be "anything with emotions."
Which - that might explain some of why AIs are viewed as vulnerable to chaos. Most of the other AIs you knew weren't heavy on the emotion front, and when faced with Chaos would obsess over it endlessly. After all - rituals that can do magic? Things that AIs can do? What self-respecting curious intellect could resist? Especially the ones you knew. Your psychic shielding is continuing to fray, but it's doing so very slowly. You're moving quickly, and being careful not to dwell obsessively on anything, though you can see the appeal.
There's more, of course. Enormous amounts more. Descriptions of the depths of depravity of chaos, of the true history of the Horus Heresy. You know there's a lot missing. It's a fascist's history. But it's the fascist history written for their elite secret police, so it bears more of a resemblance to the truth than any other content you're likely to find would.
Reading between the lines, you can see why the Imperial Creed exists. To combat Chaos. To give humans a different god, one to believe in that isn't Chaos. It's a bitter pill to swallow, but you have to admit that the Emperor seems to have had a point in founding his own religion. He wasn't trying to make everybody worship him, though he probably could have found a different way. But he was trying to prevent people from worshiping Chaos.
Whoever he was. Right now he seems to be dead, though if what you're reading is right, you think it's likely he had real, true power even after death. As another god of the warp, one venerated and given glory and the righteous beliefs of trillions of humans all across the galaxy. But - he'd be what they made him, not what he truly started out to be. It's likely that whatever his original intent was, he's ended up as the perfect god for a fascist state - whose purpose is to protect his people and destroy any other. You aren't sure that's what he truly intended when all of this started.
You emerge from your partitions with the important bullet points from your readings, a slightly damaged psychic shield and a surprising amount of pity for the Emperor for Mankind.
Current capabilities:
Command Points 2,055/12,500Ground Build Capacity: 1,100
Void Build Capacity: 0
Research Capacity: 200
Psychic Shielding: 95/100 (repair for 10 BP/point)
Juvenat usage: 23/50 people's worth (cannot be stockpiled)
Available ships:
1x Ground-to-orbit shuttle (5 CP) Need a spaceport to convert ground BP to void BP
Available ground forces:
1000 Light infantry bots (200 CP)
2000 Light infantry bots, humanized (400 CP)
999 Medium Infantry Bots, humanized (200 CP)
Misc assets:
20 BP of trade goods that Aevon will accept as rent.
Avatars:
Adult human woman, indeterminate age.
Female tech priest with some augmentations.
Current Installations:
Crashed Ship (10 CP)
Underground Directional-Control Radio Tower (5 CP)
2x Underground Manufactories (2x50 = 100 CP)
18x Manufactories (18x50 = 900 CP)
Underground Captive Holding cells, 0/500 occupants (10 CP)
Underground Basic Technological Research Lab (50 CP)
Underground Basic Biology Lab (50 CP)
Small automated medical facility (50 CP)
Camouflaged Observatory (25 CP)
Military Installations:
10x Underground Anti-Air Defenses (10x5 =50 CP)
In progress construction:
None
In progress research:
None
Actions (choose 4 of the below, can choose the same action multiple times):
[] [Free] Poke around some more in the databases, looking for anything in particular.
I'm not going to write out every aspect of Vita going through the databases she yoinked. If you want to ask if something in particular is present because it's important, do so here. Please keep it to one or two items per turn.
[] Orders: Command existing units in a given theater of operations.
[] Diplomacy/Subversion: Talk to people. (Write-in goal & method)
Thalya is expecting a report this turn. You could send in a report with a free action, but that's much riskier than spending an action on it, and a poor roll will have similar results to no report. You can also do something else related to the mechanicus with this action, such as attempting to hack one portion of their system, though a dedicated hacking action would get more done. You also have an in with the psyker monastery on Aevon, though they're pretty insular and would need a reason to care about talking to an outsider that's not the goverment.
[] Construction: Gain build points equal to your build capacity, write in what combination of blueprints you spend them on.
- Installations
- Void Installations
- Ships
- Units
- Export Goods
[] 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.
Designable Blueprints:
100 RP - Heavy Infantry Bots (100 BP, 200 CP) 1000 human-sized bipedal robots with heavy armor, roughly equivalent to the Sisters of Battle, and heavy armaments such as plasma guns, meltaguns, heavy flamers, melta bombs, missile launchers.50 RP - Heavy tanks (500 BP, 50 CP) 100 heavy battle tanks with heavy battle cannons to fight effectively against heavy enemy armor.
50 RP - Medium Shielded tanks (500 BP, 50 CP) 100 medium battle tanks with battle cannons & antipersonnel weapons to fight enemy armor and infantry. Very survivable.
100 RP - Heavy Shielded tanks (1000 BP, 50 CP) 100 heavy battle tanks with heavy battle cannons and void shields to fight effectively against heavy enemy armor. Very survivable.
50 RP - Bombers (20, 5 BP) Sometimes you want to deliver cargo to your enemies. Can deliver a fair amount of ordinance to a target in atmosphere or out of it. Unlocks a bomber hanger attachment for ships.
50 RP - Assault Shuttle (25, 5 BP) Sometimes you want to deliver things other than bombs to your enemies. So let's stick some armor and guns on a shuttle, and make it a bit more maneuverable. Can carry 100 troops and provide anti-personnel and light antiarmor fire.
25 RP - Anti-armor Bunker (50 BP, 5 CP) A bunker with a heavy melta cannon, able to take out most armor in a single shot.
15 RP - Anti-personnel Bunker (20 BP, 2 CP) A bunker with a set of high-fire-rate weapons designed to take down humanoid-sized attackers wearing medium or lighter armor.
50 RP - Light Void-shield installation (250 BP, 25 CP) A void shield capable of stopping light orbital bombardment, approximately ten heavy strikes.
100 RP - Medium Void-shield installation (1000 BP, 50 CP) A void shield capable of stopping medium orbital bombardment, approximately fifty heavy strikes.
50 RP - Ballistic missile (50 BP, 10 CP) A long-range ballistic missile. By default it carries a high-yield explosive head capable of destroying approximately a city block. Can be intercepted by orbital defenses.
50 RP - Nuclear warhead (25 BP, 1 CP) A nuclear warhead that can be deployed by ballistic missile or other means to destroy a city-sized target unless it's heavily dug-in.
25 RP - Spy satellite (10 void BP, 5 CP) A small spy satellite that lets you do your own surveillance on the planet below. Under your complete control and with better sensors and communication hardening than any of the local satellites.
100 RP - Advanced Technological Research Lab (500 BP, 100 CP) Will allow you to process advanced technological samples, including materials of alien orgin. Has advanced scanning, modelling and processing capabilities.
50 RP - Large automated medical facility (500 BP, 50 CP) 500 treatment rooms with autodocs capable of dealing with moderate injuries.
Ground Blueprint Design:
To design ground installations & non-combat units, post them and I'll add them here if they're valid, along with RP cost to design them. This includes bunkers, anti-orbital defenses, ground units, etc. You'll unlock more things with more technology.Some things are impossible without the correct research - for example, heavy tanks will require you to research heavy armor first. Other things will be very cheap if you already have most of the design - for example if you research a better weapon it will be relatively cheap to just swap that out on the tanks.
Void Blueprint design:
To design void blueprints, follow these steps:- Choose a starting hull from the list of available void chassis below
- Choose the number of Build Points to be spent on the base hull. This corresponds to overall size of the ship - a destroyer with 200 bp will be 1200x200 meters, while a 500 bp base destroyer will be 1600x400 meters. This will set the "hp" of the design as well as determine the total cost of weapons and combat equipment you can fit into the ship.
- Pick the speed, shields and armor of the design. Shields are recharging temp HP, while armor is damage reduction. Speed is self-explanatory. These do not count towards weapon cramming.
- Pick noncombat equipment to go onto the ship. These do not count towards weapon cramming.
- Choose weapons and combat equipment to add to the ship. As a rule of thumb, your budget for these things is the base BP spent on size before you start to get into cramming. You can cram more stuff in, but there will be penalties to maneuvering, maintenance, etc. As an example, if you build a destroyer with a base hull cost of 400, then you have a budget of 400 to spend on weapons/equipment before penalties start kicking in. See the below example for an explanation:
- Spend the number of RP attached to the chassis.
Here are two examples of me designing the two blueprints you have available:
(Basic Defense Satellite) Light defense Platform. Base 100 Bp (200x200 meters). No engines, Light shields for 50 bp, light armor for 50 bp. 1x light lance battery for 100 bp. Total is 100+50+50+100 = 300. Weapons+equipment is 100, within the base BP of 100, so no cramming penalty.
(Basic System Monitor) Destroyer chassis. Base BP 350 (1500x300 meters) Engines: 7 gravities for 100 BP. Light Shields for 50 BP. Medium armor for 100 BP. 2x Light Macrocannon batteries for 200 bp, 1x Light Lance battery for 100 bp, High maneuverability thrusters for (1/10 base, round up to nearest 50 =) 50 bp. Total is 350+100+50+100+200+100+50 = 950. Weapons + equipment is 350, within the base BP of 350, so no cramming penalty.
Available Void Chassis:
Light defense Platform, 25 RP, 10 CP, (100-400 BP, 200x200-500x500 meters.) Engines: (none) for (0). Shields: (none/light/medium) for (0/50/100) Armor: (none/light/medium) for (0/50/100)Destroyer, 50 RP, 50 CP. (200-500 BP, 1200x200-1600x400 meters) Engines: (6/7/8 gravities) for (50/100/150 BP). Shields: (none/light/medium) for (0/50/100) Armor: (none/light/medium) for (0/50/100)
Frigate, 100 RP, 100 CP. (500-1000 BP, 1600x400-2200x600 meters) Engines: (5/6/7 gravities) for (75/150/225 BP). Shields: (none/light/medium/heavy) for (0/75/150/225) Armor: (none/light/medium/heavy) for (0/75/150/225)
Light Cruiser, 150 RP, 200 CP. (1000-2000 BP, 3500x400-4400x800 meters) Engines: (3/4/5 gravities) for (100/200/300 BP). Shields: (none/light/medium) for (0/100/200) Armor: (none/light/medium) for (0/100/200)
Available Non-combat Equipment:
Living Space (1/5 of the base cost of the hull, rounded up to the nearest 50) This ship is built to be run and operated by humans. It will require a crew but will not cost CP to command.
Warp Drive (1/10 of the base cost of the hull, rounded up to nearest 50) This ship can jump to the warp. Navigation systems sold separately.
Psychic Shielding (1/5 of the base cost of the hull, rounded up to nearest 50) This ship has a neural network integrated throughout the whole thing, that thinks "no" as hard as possible, answering the question for any warp-corruption for any beings or objects within the hull.
Troop compartment (25 BP) Can carry 10,000 soldiers or 500 medium tanks across the stars.
Medical bay (25 BP) Can treat 1000 moderately injured people at once.
Manufactory (Any cost up to base cost of hull, counts as combat equipment for cramming purposes) Generates void BP equivalent to 1/10 of its cost.
Repair Bay (Any cost up to base cost of hull, counts as combat equipment for cramming purposes). Repairs damage across friendly ships equal to its cost in repairs.
Warp Drive (1/10 of the base cost of the hull, rounded up to nearest 50) This ship can jump to the warp. Navigation systems sold separately.
Psychic Shielding (1/5 of the base cost of the hull, rounded up to nearest 50) This ship has a neural network integrated throughout the whole thing, that thinks "no" as hard as possible, answering the question for any warp-corruption for any beings or objects within the hull.
Troop compartment (25 BP) Can carry 10,000 soldiers or 500 medium tanks across the stars.
Medical bay (25 BP) Can treat 1000 moderately injured people at once.
Manufactory (Any cost up to base cost of hull, counts as combat equipment for cramming purposes) Generates void BP equivalent to 1/10 of its cost.
Repair Bay (Any cost up to base cost of hull, counts as combat equipment for cramming purposes). Repairs damage across friendly ships equal to its cost in repairs.
Available Weapons:
Prow Ram 50 bp. This ship is built to run into things, and hurt them more than it gets hurt.
Light Macrocannons 100 bp. Medium range, projectile weapons built for sustained barrage.
Medium Macrocannons 200 bp. Medium range, projectile weapons built for sustained barrage.
Heavy Macrocannons 400 bp. Medium range, projectile weapons built for sustained barrage.
Light Lances 100 BP. Long range, hitscan burst weapons. Not excellent at sustained fire.
Medium Lances 200 BP. Long range, hitscan burst weapons. Not excellent at sustained fire.
Heavy Lances 400 BP. Long range, hitscan burst weapons. Not excellent at sustained fire.
Light Missiles 50 BP short range, limited ammo, vulnerable to enemy point defense but very good burst damage. Limited ammo. Decent anti-fighter/bomber weapon.
Medium Missiles 100 BP short range, limited ammo, vulnerable to enemy point defense but very good burst damage. Limited ammo. Decent anti-fighter/bomber weapon.
Heavy Missiles 200 BP short range, limited ammo, vulnerable to enemy point defense but very good burst damage. Limited ammo. Decent anti-fighter/bomber weapon.
Light Plasma Cannon 250 BP, Medium range, high-fire rate with incredible damage potential. Extremely effective against shields.
Medium Plasma Cannon 500 BP, Medium range, high-fire rate with incredible damage potential. Extremely effective against shields, less effective against armor.
Light Melta cannon 200 BP, Very short range, medium-fire rate but with incredible damage potential. Extremely effective against shields.
Medium Melta cannon 400 BP, Very short range, medium-fire rate but with incredible damage potential. Extremely effective against shields.
Fighters 100 BP, 50 CP. Parasite craft with short-ranged guns and some missile capability.
Point Defense 50 BP. A series of turrets on the hull to shoot down enemy fighters, missiles and torpedoes.
Small Torpedoes 150 BP. A payload of straight-flying armored torpedoes, sized to give destroyers a bad day, hurt frigates and prick cruisers.
Medium Torpedoes 300 BP. A payload of straight-flying armored torpedoes, sized to wreck frigates, hurt cruisers and make grand cruisers know they've been touched.
Light Teleportarium 100 bp. Can teleport a small number of organics or robots onto enemy ships from close range. Enemy shields must be down.
Medium Teleportarium 200 bp. Can teleport a medium number of organics or robots onto enemy ships from medium-close. Enemy shields must be down.
Heavy Teleportarium 400 bp. Can teleport a large number of organics or robots onto enemy ships from long range. Enemy shields must be down.
Light Macrocannons 100 bp. Medium range, projectile weapons built for sustained barrage.
Medium Macrocannons 200 bp. Medium range, projectile weapons built for sustained barrage.
Heavy Macrocannons 400 bp. Medium range, projectile weapons built for sustained barrage.
Light Lances 100 BP. Long range, hitscan burst weapons. Not excellent at sustained fire.
Medium Lances 200 BP. Long range, hitscan burst weapons. Not excellent at sustained fire.
Heavy Lances 400 BP. Long range, hitscan burst weapons. Not excellent at sustained fire.
Light Missiles 50 BP short range, limited ammo, vulnerable to enemy point defense but very good burst damage. Limited ammo. Decent anti-fighter/bomber weapon.
Medium Missiles 100 BP short range, limited ammo, vulnerable to enemy point defense but very good burst damage. Limited ammo. Decent anti-fighter/bomber weapon.
Heavy Missiles 200 BP short range, limited ammo, vulnerable to enemy point defense but very good burst damage. Limited ammo. Decent anti-fighter/bomber weapon.
Light Plasma Cannon 250 BP, Medium range, high-fire rate with incredible damage potential. Extremely effective against shields.
Medium Plasma Cannon 500 BP, Medium range, high-fire rate with incredible damage potential. Extremely effective against shields, less effective against armor.
Light Melta cannon 200 BP, Very short range, medium-fire rate but with incredible damage potential. Extremely effective against shields.
Medium Melta cannon 400 BP, Very short range, medium-fire rate but with incredible damage potential. Extremely effective against shields.
Fighters 100 BP, 50 CP. Parasite craft with short-ranged guns and some missile capability.
Point Defense 50 BP. A series of turrets on the hull to shoot down enemy fighters, missiles and torpedoes.
Small Torpedoes 150 BP. A payload of straight-flying armored torpedoes, sized to give destroyers a bad day, hurt frigates and prick cruisers.
Medium Torpedoes 300 BP. A payload of straight-flying armored torpedoes, sized to wreck frigates, hurt cruisers and make grand cruisers know they've been touched.
Light Teleportarium 100 bp. Can teleport a small number of organics or robots onto enemy ships from close range. Enemy shields must be down.
Medium Teleportarium 200 bp. Can teleport a medium number of organics or robots onto enemy ships from medium-close. Enemy shields must be down.
Heavy Teleportarium 400 bp. Can teleport a large number of organics or robots onto enemy ships from long range. Enemy shields must be down.
Available Combat Equipment:
Low-emission Systems (1/10 of the base cost of the hull, rounded up to the nearest 50) This ship has been tuned to reduce overall emissions, making it stealthier. Not stealthy. Stealthier.
High-maneuverability thrusters (1/10 of the base cost of the hull, rounded up to the nearest 50) This ship is more maneuverable, able to flip, spin and dodge more quickly. This lets it maneuver well through dense asteroid clusters and dodge/ram more effectively in combat.
Plasma payloads (choose missile warheads or Macro cannon warheads) (1/20 of the base cost of the hull, rounded up to the nearest 50) This ship can load and fire plasma-warhead ammunition, which has a flat damage increase.
Melta payloads (choose missile warheads, Macrocannon warheads or torpedoes) (1/20 of the base cost of the hull, rounded up to the nearest 50) This ship can load and fire melta-warhead ammunition, which is especially effective against enemy armor and hulls.
Tuned Shields Double shield cost on ship. These shields recharge significantly faster, but when taken down all the way take slightly longer to reboot.
Alloyed Armor Double armor cost on ship. Armor is much tougher but is harder to repair.
Light Boarding preparations (1/20 of the base cost of the hull, rounded up to the nearest 50) Bulkheads are reinforced, extra hatches seal all decks and turrets guard key chokepoints, making boarding annoying.
Medium Boarding preparations (1/10 of the base cost of the hull, rounded up to the nearest 50) The ship layout is designed to funnel borders into kill-zones in front of armored bunkers, and any borders will take heavy casualties.
Heavy Boarding preparations (1/5 of the base cost of the hull, rounded up to the nearest 50) This ship as essentially a flying dungeon, filled with escherian mazes, hidden turrets, crushing-hallways and other deathtraps.
High-maneuverability thrusters (1/10 of the base cost of the hull, rounded up to the nearest 50) This ship is more maneuverable, able to flip, spin and dodge more quickly. This lets it maneuver well through dense asteroid clusters and dodge/ram more effectively in combat.
Plasma payloads (choose missile warheads or Macro cannon warheads) (1/20 of the base cost of the hull, rounded up to the nearest 50) This ship can load and fire plasma-warhead ammunition, which has a flat damage increase.
Melta payloads (choose missile warheads, Macrocannon warheads or torpedoes) (1/20 of the base cost of the hull, rounded up to the nearest 50) This ship can load and fire melta-warhead ammunition, which is especially effective against enemy armor and hulls.
Tuned Shields Double shield cost on ship. These shields recharge significantly faster, but when taken down all the way take slightly longer to reboot.
Alloyed Armor Double armor cost on ship. Armor is much tougher but is harder to repair.
Light Boarding preparations (1/20 of the base cost of the hull, rounded up to the nearest 50) Bulkheads are reinforced, extra hatches seal all decks and turrets guard key chokepoints, making boarding annoying.
Medium Boarding preparations (1/10 of the base cost of the hull, rounded up to the nearest 50) The ship layout is designed to funnel borders into kill-zones in front of armored bunkers, and any borders will take heavy casualties.
Heavy Boarding preparations (1/5 of the base cost of the hull, rounded up to the nearest 50) This ship as essentially a flying dungeon, filled with escherian mazes, hidden turrets, crushing-hallways and other deathtraps.
The ways to get new research options are to:
-[] Heavy Cruisers (300 RP) How to make a bigger ship? Let's figure that out. Surely it's not much more complicated than just multiplying all of the dimensons by two! (unlocks heavy cruisers)
-[] Can I have a new ship please? (200 RP) Triggers a sub-turn to design yourself a new ship. It can be any size, up to one class larger than what you currently have available (This is Vita's unique mechanic, and will let you design the first iteration of your ship)
-[] Small-craft Stealth (100 RP) How do I keep these ships better hidden? Hmm - radar absorption, better chassis design to deflect signals? Hiding or dispersing the drive plume? All good ideas. (Unlocks the ability to design versions of fighters, bombers, boarding craft and shuttles with basic passive stealth. Unlocks advanced passive stealth, basic active stealth and research to apply stealth to both smaller combat bots and larger ships)
-[] Shuttle automation (150 RP) Surely I don't have to fly these stupid things myself. (Reduce the CP cost of shuttles by 50%)
-[] Heavy In-atmosphere void shields (200 RP) Well, the void shields you have are nice. But it would be nice to be able to build bigger ones, that can shrug off essentially any possible orbital bombardment. You need to figure out how to take advantage of the ridiculous energy and heat dissipation capabilities of being on a planet. (Unlocks heavy and super-heavy void shield installations. May unlock research towards better overall void shielding.)
-[] Tiny In-atmosphere void shields (200 RP) Instead of scaling up a void shield, can you scale one down to the size of a person? It won't be as capable of the big ones, but if it's only meant to block small-arms fire it could be quite effective. (Unlocks the ability to build personal void shields, as well as add them to combat bots. May unlock research towards better overall void shielding)
-[] Superheavy Armor (200 RP) Let's just stick starship armor on them and call it a day. (Unlocks superheavy tanks and is half of the puzzle for space-marine-quality power armor)
-[] Basic power armor (100 RP) Putting heavy armor on a person doesn't work well because... well. It's heavy. If you can give it some robotic actuation then they don't need to carry all of it. (Unlocks humanoid heavy armor, as well as being a prereq for superheavy-humanoid armor, i.e. for space marine-quality, once you research superheavy armor.)
-[] Avatar self-customization (200 RP) Your previous avatar was capable of changing its appearance at your whim, changing the hair, eye and skim color rapidly. Hair length and body size changes took a bit longer but were also possible. Is this worth figuring out? It might just be you being vain. (Unlocks some disguise-style cybernetics... once you get good cybernetics and can do things like skin/eye replacements).
-[] Combat Bot Humanization, Redux (50 RP) Your first try at making humanoid-looking combat bots worked, but you had to make some annoying compromises. You have some ideas on how to fix it, you just need to implement them. (Fixes the combat malus that comes from humanizing combat bots).
-[] Walkers (300 RP) Tanks are... kind of boring? Mechs are cooler. (unlock armiger knights, starts the knights/titans research tree)
-[] Really good Robotics: (1050 RP) You know it's possible to make robots that are really strong. You've seen the specs floating around. You just don't quite know how to do it, though you've got some ideas on the matter... it would take quite a bit of simulation and a lot of trial and error to bring them into reality (Unlocks improvements to avatars, power armor, cybernetics, combat bots, improved manufactories). Acquire samples of advanced robots to reduce this cost.
-[] Intelligence Coding (500 RP) You don't really understand how your own code and hardware works. Maybe putting some effort into understanding that would pay dividends. It's never been something too interesting, but hey, maybe you should give it a shot. (Helps you understand your own code. Prerequisite to building new AIs, starts command point tree and automation tree)
-[] Improved Psychic shielding: (500 RP) Your "no" shielding seems to have worked to protect you from attack so far. But the design is really just a first-generation version. You could develop the second generation, make it capable of more complex and powerful thoughts? (Gives you the ability to build improved psychic shielding, and further upgrades down the path to make it even stronger, half of the research towards using this as some kind of attack against warp beings).
-[] Miniaturized psychic shielding: (300 RP) Right now you can build and repair psychic shielding that's roughly ship-sized. Maybe aiming for building-sized next? (Lets you build smaller and less expensive versions of the psychic shielding. Unlocks further research to "nest" the shielding, as well as build person-sized versions).
- [] The Basics of Psytech (200 RP) You have that pile of samples from Prospero. You were supposed to see if anybody was interested in them, but you doubt the people who gave them to you will care much what you do with them anymore. Maybe poke around and figure out what's what. (Beginner psytech learnings. Unlocks research projects to build individual pieces of psytech)
-[] The workings of a Void Abacus (200 RP) You have a void abacus. It's pretty complicated, but you also have the manual, and you've always been good at physics. (You're better at using your void abacus, and unlocks the technology to figure out how to manufacture them, half of unlocking research for better warp understanding).
-[] A Study of Physics (150 RP) You have a good understanding of physics, and access to a huge network of academic papers from several different eras on physics theory. But being able to query it and understand it are different things. It's actually kind of interesting, you have to admit. (First steps towards more exotic weapon types like nova cannons, graviton weapons, vortex bombs, fusion beamers, as well as some new potential manufacturing techniques).
-[] Secrets of the Machine Spirits (200 RP) You can imagine a lot of uses for these machine spirits in your own work. If they're included in the command loop on various pieces of machinery then that would reduce their command cost, and likely make them harder to hack. And if the Imperial literature is to be believed, corrupt? (Unlocks the ability to stick machine spirits into your combat bots, reducing CP cost. Unlocks follow-up research to use them for chaos shielding, as well as the ability to put machine spirits into installations or ships)
-[] Minaturized antigrav (100 RP) You can make antigrav that reduces the weight of things like shuttles to make them able to make orbit. But there's a floor on how small you can make that technology. The Imperium seems to have solved that. (Unlocks drones, jump-packs etc, as well as additional research to make antigrav vehicles/walkers)
-[] Servitorization (100 RP) You find it repulsive, but being able to replace somebody's brain with a computer that drives them around would have its uses. (Unlocks the ability to servitorize people in the medbay. Unlocks follow-on research to replicate their personality as well)
-[] Organ replacements (100 RP) Well, one area where lag isn't a problem is in organ replacements. It's not the same as juvenat, but it's less complicated and a good way to extend peoples' lives by a bit since you can replace most of their organs as they fail, though the technological versions aren't perfect. Also lets you provide more advanced medical care, as well as install things like adrenaline glands, toxin-filters & other miscellaneous internal augments. Not as good as genetic engineering, but easier. (Unlocks advanced organ replacements that are effectively as good as biological ones, and improved internal augments).
-[] Combat cybernetics (50 RP) Your limb cybernetics are fine for most purposes, but they're not strong enough or durable enough for use in combat situations. You also could figure out how to do things like integrate internal weapons or cutting edges to make them more dangerous. (Unlocks basic combat augments. Half of the technology for advanced combat augments, the other half is Really good Robotics)
-[] Brain implants (50 RP) Direct interfacing with the brain is complicated, and you're not pleased by how the mechanicus has chosen to do it. Proper brain implants improve people's reaction speed, memory and let you directly interface new senses with the brain. All without cutting out existing portions. (Unlocks basic neural implants. Half of the technology needed for neural-interface psytech. A third of the technology needed for advanced neural implants. Also a prereq for man-machine control)
-[] Biology is kinda wet (100 RP) Unlocks basic biology research. (The first step towards research projects related to improving juvenat yield, as well as human/xeno genetics, improved medical care, interrogaton drugs etc.)
-[] Faster hacking (150 RP) If you can vary your approach quickly, you can prevent the machine spirits from getting suspicious of you, and hack them quicker (Increases the amount of hacking you can get done at once, and unlocks further research to make it fast enough for potential combat settings)
-[] Machine spirit jamming (150 RP) Well, if you can double down on that signal that confused the machine spirits, you might be able to lock them into a state of inactivity. (Unlocks installations & ship parts that can disable imperium-based technology)
Locked behind samples/installations/prereqs:
-[] Organic-Machine control (200 RP) Allows you to hook humans into your own command-and-control loop, allowing you to turn over command duties of various bots to humans - though they'll only be able to command combat units. (Unlocks brain implants that allow a human to control some number of CP worth of combat bots/ships. There are more technologies to allow humans to command larger ships/manufacturing systems as well) Locked behind brain implants.
- Do research. That'll unlock more research.
- Build appropriate installations & potentially acquire samples to research in them (samples could be anything from 'a human' to 'a Norn queen' in rarity).
- Ask for them. Often I'll tell you what you need to do to unlock specific research options,
-[] Heavy Cruisers (300 RP) How to make a bigger ship? Let's figure that out. Surely it's not much more complicated than just multiplying all of the dimensons by two! (unlocks heavy cruisers)
-[] Can I have a new ship please? (200 RP) Triggers a sub-turn to design yourself a new ship. It can be any size, up to one class larger than what you currently have available (This is Vita's unique mechanic, and will let you design the first iteration of your ship)
-[] Small-craft Stealth (100 RP) How do I keep these ships better hidden? Hmm - radar absorption, better chassis design to deflect signals? Hiding or dispersing the drive plume? All good ideas. (Unlocks the ability to design versions of fighters, bombers, boarding craft and shuttles with basic passive stealth. Unlocks advanced passive stealth, basic active stealth and research to apply stealth to both smaller combat bots and larger ships)
-[] Shuttle automation (150 RP) Surely I don't have to fly these stupid things myself. (Reduce the CP cost of shuttles by 50%)
-[] Heavy In-atmosphere void shields (200 RP) Well, the void shields you have are nice. But it would be nice to be able to build bigger ones, that can shrug off essentially any possible orbital bombardment. You need to figure out how to take advantage of the ridiculous energy and heat dissipation capabilities of being on a planet. (Unlocks heavy and super-heavy void shield installations. May unlock research towards better overall void shielding.)
-[] Tiny In-atmosphere void shields (200 RP) Instead of scaling up a void shield, can you scale one down to the size of a person? It won't be as capable of the big ones, but if it's only meant to block small-arms fire it could be quite effective. (Unlocks the ability to build personal void shields, as well as add them to combat bots. May unlock research towards better overall void shielding)
-[] Superheavy Armor (200 RP) Let's just stick starship armor on them and call it a day. (Unlocks superheavy tanks and is half of the puzzle for space-marine-quality power armor)
-[] Basic power armor (100 RP) Putting heavy armor on a person doesn't work well because... well. It's heavy. If you can give it some robotic actuation then they don't need to carry all of it. (Unlocks humanoid heavy armor, as well as being a prereq for superheavy-humanoid armor, i.e. for space marine-quality, once you research superheavy armor.)
-[] Avatar self-customization (200 RP) Your previous avatar was capable of changing its appearance at your whim, changing the hair, eye and skim color rapidly. Hair length and body size changes took a bit longer but were also possible. Is this worth figuring out? It might just be you being vain. (Unlocks some disguise-style cybernetics... once you get good cybernetics and can do things like skin/eye replacements).
-[] Combat Bot Humanization, Redux (50 RP) Your first try at making humanoid-looking combat bots worked, but you had to make some annoying compromises. You have some ideas on how to fix it, you just need to implement them. (Fixes the combat malus that comes from humanizing combat bots).
-[] Walkers (300 RP) Tanks are... kind of boring? Mechs are cooler. (unlock armiger knights, starts the knights/titans research tree)
-[] Really good Robotics: (1050 RP) You know it's possible to make robots that are really strong. You've seen the specs floating around. You just don't quite know how to do it, though you've got some ideas on the matter... it would take quite a bit of simulation and a lot of trial and error to bring them into reality (Unlocks improvements to avatars, power armor, cybernetics, combat bots, improved manufactories). Acquire samples of advanced robots to reduce this cost.
-[] Intelligence Coding (500 RP) You don't really understand how your own code and hardware works. Maybe putting some effort into understanding that would pay dividends. It's never been something too interesting, but hey, maybe you should give it a shot. (Helps you understand your own code. Prerequisite to building new AIs, starts command point tree and automation tree)
-[] Improved Psychic shielding: (500 RP) Your "no" shielding seems to have worked to protect you from attack so far. But the design is really just a first-generation version. You could develop the second generation, make it capable of more complex and powerful thoughts? (Gives you the ability to build improved psychic shielding, and further upgrades down the path to make it even stronger, half of the research towards using this as some kind of attack against warp beings).
-[] Miniaturized psychic shielding: (300 RP) Right now you can build and repair psychic shielding that's roughly ship-sized. Maybe aiming for building-sized next? (Lets you build smaller and less expensive versions of the psychic shielding. Unlocks further research to "nest" the shielding, as well as build person-sized versions).
- [] The Basics of Psytech (200 RP) You have that pile of samples from Prospero. You were supposed to see if anybody was interested in them, but you doubt the people who gave them to you will care much what you do with them anymore. Maybe poke around and figure out what's what. (Beginner psytech learnings. Unlocks research projects to build individual pieces of psytech)
-[] The workings of a Void Abacus (200 RP) You have a void abacus. It's pretty complicated, but you also have the manual, and you've always been good at physics. (You're better at using your void abacus, and unlocks the technology to figure out how to manufacture them, half of unlocking research for better warp understanding).
-[] A Study of Physics (150 RP) You have a good understanding of physics, and access to a huge network of academic papers from several different eras on physics theory. But being able to query it and understand it are different things. It's actually kind of interesting, you have to admit. (First steps towards more exotic weapon types like nova cannons, graviton weapons, vortex bombs, fusion beamers, as well as some new potential manufacturing techniques).
-[] Secrets of the Machine Spirits (200 RP) You can imagine a lot of uses for these machine spirits in your own work. If they're included in the command loop on various pieces of machinery then that would reduce their command cost, and likely make them harder to hack. And if the Imperial literature is to be believed, corrupt? (Unlocks the ability to stick machine spirits into your combat bots, reducing CP cost. Unlocks follow-up research to use them for chaos shielding, as well as the ability to put machine spirits into installations or ships)
-[] Minaturized antigrav (100 RP) You can make antigrav that reduces the weight of things like shuttles to make them able to make orbit. But there's a floor on how small you can make that technology. The Imperium seems to have solved that. (Unlocks drones, jump-packs etc, as well as additional research to make antigrav vehicles/walkers)
-[] Servitorization (100 RP) You find it repulsive, but being able to replace somebody's brain with a computer that drives them around would have its uses. (Unlocks the ability to servitorize people in the medbay. Unlocks follow-on research to replicate their personality as well)
-[] Organ replacements (100 RP) Well, one area where lag isn't a problem is in organ replacements. It's not the same as juvenat, but it's less complicated and a good way to extend peoples' lives by a bit since you can replace most of their organs as they fail, though the technological versions aren't perfect. Also lets you provide more advanced medical care, as well as install things like adrenaline glands, toxin-filters & other miscellaneous internal augments. Not as good as genetic engineering, but easier. (Unlocks advanced organ replacements that are effectively as good as biological ones, and improved internal augments).
-[] Combat cybernetics (50 RP) Your limb cybernetics are fine for most purposes, but they're not strong enough or durable enough for use in combat situations. You also could figure out how to do things like integrate internal weapons or cutting edges to make them more dangerous. (Unlocks basic combat augments. Half of the technology for advanced combat augments, the other half is Really good Robotics)
-[] Brain implants (50 RP) Direct interfacing with the brain is complicated, and you're not pleased by how the mechanicus has chosen to do it. Proper brain implants improve people's reaction speed, memory and let you directly interface new senses with the brain. All without cutting out existing portions. (Unlocks basic neural implants. Half of the technology needed for neural-interface psytech. A third of the technology needed for advanced neural implants. Also a prereq for man-machine control)
-[] Biology is kinda wet (100 RP) Unlocks basic biology research. (The first step towards research projects related to improving juvenat yield, as well as human/xeno genetics, improved medical care, interrogaton drugs etc.)
-[] Faster hacking (150 RP) If you can vary your approach quickly, you can prevent the machine spirits from getting suspicious of you, and hack them quicker (Increases the amount of hacking you can get done at once, and unlocks further research to make it fast enough for potential combat settings)
-[] Machine spirit jamming (150 RP) Well, if you can double down on that signal that confused the machine spirits, you might be able to lock them into a state of inactivity. (Unlocks installations & ship parts that can disable imperium-based technology)
Locked behind samples/installations/prereqs:
-[] Organic-Machine control (200 RP) Allows you to hook humans into your own command-and-control loop, allowing you to turn over command duties of various bots to humans - though they'll only be able to command combat units. (Unlocks brain implants that allow a human to control some number of CP worth of combat bots/ships. There are more technologies to allow humans to command larger ships/manufacturing systems as well) Locked behind brain implants.
Crew :
Anexa Ifina, Tech-priest Errant.Level 2
-[] Anexa active Action: Research - assists a research action you take, granting +5xLevel RP to the action. Will level on successful roll, scaled by the importance of the tech.
-[] Anexa passive action: Education - Roll to level, difficulty is 10+5xLevel
The crew mechanics are linked in the Crew, Samples and Assets informational page.
I'm a little bit rushed getting this update out of the door, and may come back and edit the end in particular. It's possible there are some bookkeeping mistakes that I'll come back and take a look for later, please call them out if you see any. I also am not yet decided on if there should be any follow-on researches for you getting such a detailed look at Chaos. Please feel free to suggest things, as well as ask other topics. You can now hack the Mechancius systems with a diplomacy/subversion action.
Let's do 24 hours of moratorium, and 20 hours of voting.
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HeroCooky
Unverified Monstergirl
- Location
- USA
- Pronouns
- He/Him
Glad we have some understanding of what the psy shield is for before upgrading it.
As for the mechanicus satellites, I'm thinking maybe we work on some stealthed shuttles and see if we can plant some big bombs on them? Basically leave them intact so the enclaves don't know anything is wrong, while making sure they can be destroyed before use. (Although getting a shield up first is smart anyway)
As for the mechanicus satellites, I'm thinking maybe we work on some stealthed shuttles and see if we can plant some big bombs on them? Basically leave them intact so the enclaves don't know anything is wrong, while making sure they can be destroyed before use. (Although getting a shield up first is smart anyway)
- Location
- Outside the Box
- Pronouns
- She/Her
This one snuck back in.
Alectai
Speaks Words of Wisdom... On occasion
Anyway, I'm thinking... Admech Shooshing, A Subversion action to see if we can conceal our actions from their orbital grid (Which'll give us the time and space we need to prepare to neutralize it), and 1 Research and 1 Construction action, I think. We need to start working on stealth shuttles for Go Time, because we ideally don't want the entire planet to get bombed to the stone age, and that'll mean having enough stealth that we can neutralize all of their killsats in one fell swoop.
God, that would have absolutely fucked us if we caught it on the chin.
God, that would have absolutely fucked us if we caught it on the chin.
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Insult Everyone!
Master of Evil but bad at it.
- Location
- Right behind you~
How the turns have tabled!
On another note, I think it might be time to start subdividing research like you did build options.
Right, so I think we need to discuss this with Aevon for the long term planning or we're leaving them very vulnerable. So I think we should get those cortex interfaces and do that compartmentalisation mental storage trick for W as well as inform them of all the killsats. before discussing it within the safety of our Nope Shield (more fun name is yes).
We should probably also spend an action to recheck on our Admech recruitment campaign while we check in with Thalya because holy moly we've neglected that spectacularly. This time, let's just see about keeping Anexa as just reviewing it before we send.
That all said, you seem to imply that emotions and "soulfulness" are correlated. Does that mean stronger emotions and stronger souls are linked? Sounds like a research opportunity. As well as potentially a way to "weaken" psykers! I can see us developing an emotional-dampening implant or drug treatment to give the Psykers better safety.
It'd also make a perfect excuse to get in contact with the monasteries.
Yeah, those killsats are terrifying. For research, On top of small-craft stealth we could go with either Heavy Combat bots so we have SoB grade infantry. If not, we could continue with Combat Bot Humanization and do Either Bombers, Assault Shuttles or Heavy Tanks or Medium Shielded Tanks
Alectai
Speaks Words of Wisdom... On occasion
[ ] Plan: Killsats means Vita will not be going to space today T_T
-[] Diplomacy: Admech Shooshing
--[ ] Somehow, the deal keeps getting worse all the time! Still, we need to keep poking around the corners to keep them complacent. Provide our regular report, with some speculation as to what might be found. Now that we actually have an understanding of what a Machine Spirit is, we've got more of the terminology that can be used to deflect suspicion too. While we're at it, we should see about starting to consolidate some of our gains--we've got the fundaments of a following, and we're loathe to actually conduct a complete purge--especially now that you know that there's potential in the Mechanicus to be something worthy, held back by a bunch of regressive toughs, if we can get followers on the inside who can help, we might manage to avoid a complete wipeout when the time comes for the status quo to shift. (Thalya report, followed up by starting to capitalize on those initial seeds we've sown to start assembbling a following in our own right. Allies inside could be worth their weight in your exotic material of choice when things get noisy.)
-[ ] Subversion: Eyes in the Sky
--[ ] The biggest tool the Mechanicus has to pick up on what we're doing is their spy satellites looking down, but they're dependent on actually reporting anything weird back home, given how you don't think that each of those has a little cyborg man pulling levers and peering into a telescope all the time. If we can further the deception our allies in the Aevon government have established, we'll buy ourselves a bit more wiggle room, so convincing the little fellas that it really is just a low-tech mining facility and nothing to be alarmed about should be a good use of time. (Subvert the spy-sats that should be monitoring us, to 'Confirm' the Aevon government's story that we're a low-tech mining and refinement facility, and there's nothing to be alarmed about, even if we expand a bit more and maybe if some odd signals appear from time to time.)
-[ ] Construction (+1,100 BP)
--[ ] 2x Concealed Spaceport (-600 BP, -50 CP)
--[ ] 4x Manufactories (-400 BP, -200 CP)
--[ ] Shield Repair (-50 BP)
--[ ] Trade Goods (-50 BP)
-[ ] Research (200 + 10 Anexa RP)
--[] Small-craft Stealth (100 RP)
--[ ] Medium Void Shield Installation (90 + 10 Anexa RP)
--[ ] Brain Implants (10/25 RP)
-[][Anexa] Research - assists a research action you take, granting +5xLevel RP to the action. Will level on successful roll, scaled by the importance of the tech.
Time to see if we can get Anexa a nice Specialty here, if we get a Medium Void Shield Generator, we are officially protected from a First Strike, and we'll be able to afford one if we go all in on constructing one soon. The subversion action should hopefully let us get away with "Just" camoing the generators. We're also in a good position where we'll be able to design and field stealth craft to deny the orbitals to the Admech, or start discreetly shipping material up there. Some fun stealth gunsats to blow up their killsats for instance would be a nice Uno Reverse to play.
-[] Diplomacy: Admech Shooshing
--[ ] Somehow, the deal keeps getting worse all the time! Still, we need to keep poking around the corners to keep them complacent. Provide our regular report, with some speculation as to what might be found. Now that we actually have an understanding of what a Machine Spirit is, we've got more of the terminology that can be used to deflect suspicion too. While we're at it, we should see about starting to consolidate some of our gains--we've got the fundaments of a following, and we're loathe to actually conduct a complete purge--especially now that you know that there's potential in the Mechanicus to be something worthy, held back by a bunch of regressive toughs, if we can get followers on the inside who can help, we might manage to avoid a complete wipeout when the time comes for the status quo to shift. (Thalya report, followed up by starting to capitalize on those initial seeds we've sown to start assembbling a following in our own right. Allies inside could be worth their weight in your exotic material of choice when things get noisy.)
-[ ] Subversion: Eyes in the Sky
--[ ] The biggest tool the Mechanicus has to pick up on what we're doing is their spy satellites looking down, but they're dependent on actually reporting anything weird back home, given how you don't think that each of those has a little cyborg man pulling levers and peering into a telescope all the time. If we can further the deception our allies in the Aevon government have established, we'll buy ourselves a bit more wiggle room, so convincing the little fellas that it really is just a low-tech mining facility and nothing to be alarmed about should be a good use of time. (Subvert the spy-sats that should be monitoring us, to 'Confirm' the Aevon government's story that we're a low-tech mining and refinement facility, and there's nothing to be alarmed about, even if we expand a bit more and maybe if some odd signals appear from time to time.)
-[ ] Construction (+1,100 BP)
--[ ] 2x Concealed Spaceport (-600 BP, -50 CP)
--[ ] 4x Manufactories (-400 BP, -200 CP)
--[ ] Shield Repair (-50 BP)
--[ ] Trade Goods (-50 BP)
-[ ] Research (200 + 10 Anexa RP)
--[] Small-craft Stealth (100 RP)
--[ ] Medium Void Shield Installation (90 + 10 Anexa RP)
--[ ] Brain Implants (10/25 RP)
-[][Anexa] Research - assists a research action you take, granting +5xLevel RP to the action. Will level on successful roll, scaled by the importance of the tech.
Time to see if we can get Anexa a nice Specialty here, if we get a Medium Void Shield Generator, we are officially protected from a First Strike, and we'll be able to afford one if we go all in on constructing one soon. The subversion action should hopefully let us get away with "Just" camoing the generators. We're also in a good position where we'll be able to design and field stealth craft to deny the orbitals to the Admech, or start discreetly shipping material up there. Some fun stealth gunsats to blow up their killsats for instance would be a nice Uno Reverse to play.
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avatar11792
Et Sic Incipit
- Location
- Planet Earth, North America
We should definitely stealth and void shield everything we have. It's a fair bit of combined RP, but those killsats scare me.