I'm all for the fleshing out and doing a write up of Prince Yriel of Iyanden.

So far we got

- Rogue Trader bordering on outright Corsair
- Annoys the human Rogue Traders because he can use the webway
- Received Writ of Trade for saving Iyanden from 'Nids.
- Saved ~15,000 people from Tanith during the infamous Chaos invasion. Then nuked the planet from orbit because the place was unsalvageable.
- Gave the Maiden World to the Tanith Survivors to piss off Bail-Tan (and also now the Tanith First and Only owe him an eternal debt)
- Has something of an Ahab going on with Kaptin Badrukk and his Flash Gitz
- Has a harem of at least a dozen women, not all of them eldar.
- It is also craftworld and gutter media rumour that he is having scandalous relations with Spiritseer Iyanna Arienal. He absolutely is.
- On an eternal quest for the snazziet of hats, the reason why he got into this business in the first place
- Drinks Space Rum. Lots of Space Rum. The sort with mushrooms floating in it.
- Considered quite mad by even other Rogue Traders.

File: IMG_0307.jpg (163 KB, 1024x514)

163 KB JPG

>++3rd Black Crusade++
>+005.M33+
Lady Malys promised Daemon Prince Tallomin the slaughter of millions of warriors if he and some daemons killed the population of Cadia. Starting the 3rd Black Crusade with the attack on Cadia, the Crone Eldar avoid fighting on the planet as they collected the millions slain by daemons. Barging with Ork clans for "great fights with the humies" and some shiny hats, Lady Malys was able to launch a campaign of extermination on some surrounding sub-sectors while the fighting on Cadia stall. Marines in Omega armor arrived onto Caida in time to rush for the defense of a fortress city. Tricking the local Guardsmen that they were "Vanguard for more Inquisitorial required troops" the marines managed to grind the daemons to halt on multiple fronts. Unknown to the Imperials, Orkz, or Tallomin however, the entire Black Crusade was a distraction to allow the first phase of the Long War to finish. Lady Malys had planned to kill hundreds of millions to collect their corpses to be used in dark rituals. The Warpcraft invoked would allow certain individuals to raise the dead with just a hand wave or cause outbreaks of the Rot with their mind. Chanting Nurgle's prayers in forbidden tongues while crushing millions of bodies to become fertilizer then flushing it down into the ground or sewer system was done on many worlds. The arrive of the Gray Knights prompted Lady Malys to order her human agents with being gifted such power over the dead, to share their Warpcraft or knowledge to a parasitic immortal race already infiltrating Imperial society. Magnus along with the Thousand Sons, Space Wolves, and Gray Knights arrived on Cadia to finally force Tallomin's daemons to flee. The Omega Marines were long gone from Cadia. Lady Malys learned how to trick the Imperials into giving wrong priorities, like if they held Cadia the Black Crusade would retreat. She indeed ordered a fighting-retreat after daemons were driven from Cadia but her objectives were done.

File: IMG_0308.jpg (121 KB, 682x1100)

121 KB JPG

>>51834752
Changed the writing to be more clear about intent, got rid of the Daemon Breakers because they didn't exist during early M.33.

>>51834776
It definitely fits better now.

File: IMG_0312.jpg (270 KB, 1200x950)

270 KB JPG

>>51833698
He sounds like he's straight out of OldHammer lore, I love it.

>>51833468
>Evil twins?

The evil twin thing was a joke.

There was a whole bunch of Cronedar shock troops last thread and we started to get into what Lady Malys has been actually doing the last few millenia.

Hard to write for tyranids since we've been keeping them deliberately faceless, same with 'crons of the Silent King because it's hard to write a post-singularity society. I liked the "individuality is only another tool for furthering the Silent King's goals" kind of things.

>>51835129
Evil Twin was the title of plans put forth in one of Lord Guilliman's contingencies.

Early on in the Great Crusade they had little idea of what was out there and there was a small possibility that there would be some big and awful Super Empire out there that would try to kill them all. An Evil Twin of the Imperium.

Then never found such an empire. True they hadn't discover absolutely everything by the end of the Great Crusade but the gaps in the map weren't big enough to hold an entire Evil Twin Imperium.

>>51833468
>The shitposters a few threads back were kinda right, this is really, really, human-centric, particularly around the people at the top
while that is mostly the fault of our focus, I imagine a connection between themes of nobility and literal Nobility of all sorts will be kinda inevitable. The concept we've wedded the setting to is the finding of value in elevated civil custom as a way to face horror and a bleak, antagonistic universe, and so save when we set out to write the exceptions to this it tends to be the guiding principle of the work.

>>51835129
>it's hard to write a post-singularity society
I've meant to do a writeup for the Necron Star Empire, and have them fall somewhere between Plato's Republic, the Borg, and the culture, hopefully retaining their original flavor too. Brainstorming would be much appreciated. So far we have Trazyn, Zandrek, and one of the major crypteks (vampire sympathizer) as independent, but otherwise all big names among the Necrons are loyal to the silent king.

>>51836418
>have them fall somewhere between Plato's Republic, the Borg, and the culture, hopefully retaining their original flavor too

I really like where this is going.

There was a little bit written about Imotekh in a previous thread. The Silent King likes to use him as his enforcer. However, he has a sense of mercy and foul play, and is willing to spare a planet if their nominated champion can defeat him in single combat. He tends not to lose.

Anrakyr the Traveller was also mentioned. He's said to be travelling around waking up all the old Tomb Worlds so the Star Empire will be ready to go when the Silent Unlike many of the order. Unlike a lot of the Silent King's lords, he's perfectly friendly and willing to chat with the locals (because they are not part of his orders), unless he thinks they're standing in the way of him doing his job.

All of the Silent King's Necrons are like that. Many of the sentient Necron lords might act perfectly friendly to you, until you stand in the way of them completing their orders (or their orders change) and they bust out the gauss weaponry.

I think Orikan the Diviner is around, but like in canon is implied to have something to do with the C'tan (in this case, either a shard vamp, a C'tan shard in disguise, or something else entirely).

Had an idea for Szerakh. Szerakh came to the throne at a relatively young age for a Necrontyr, kind of like Tutankhamun, after his father was assasinated. Everyone assumed he would be a pushover. He ended up being the greatest leader in Necron history and the one to drag the gods from their thrones.

>>51833468
What major orks are there besides Ghazghull and the Beast?

IIRC, The Beast in this timeline was Urlakk Urg, a.k.a. the Ullanor ork, due to...revelations...in The Beast Arises series. Got his shit kicked in by the Imperium and swore bloody vengeance from whatever rock he escaped to. Chaos Gods smile, they know they've found the perfect pawn to get revenge on the Imperium. Unlike most of his successors, who are rather ambivalent about Chaos, and Ghazghull, who is all "fuck Chaos", the Beast was said to be the only major warboss was an outright Chaos worshipper, pledging his devotion to "gods who actually do something for their worshippers" and got a shitload of blessings in return.

>>51837151
Wazzdakka. Only ork to be able to into webway.

>>51836970
I'm down. I recall the Outsider was being set up as a self-aware entity predicated on the rejection of it's own self awareness, trying to again become a perfectly responsive robot. Szerakh could have probably played on its overt desire to follow orders and its deeper, suppressed intention to get rid of its own sentience to prompt its attack on the other C'tan. The Deceiver was described in the pantheon segment as entrenched in Necron high society before it lost favor and was eventually obliterated, and the Nightbringer was either less omnicidal before the long rest or kept on the Empire's periphery. The Void Dragon might have already been entombed during his reign, and now that he's returned VD might either ignore him or be deeply interested, or both just for the mixed messages.

>>51837151
there is a persistent argument in the academies of Tzeentch, scattered through the tattered web around the eye. Prominent Tzeentchian wyrds hold that Gork and Mork, apart or together, are bigger, meaner, and rougher than Khorne, while Crone witches and Sorcerers among the fallen hold the reverse true. In essence, it is a debate as to which godhead is a mote in the eye of which, and while few outsiders pay any mind, the implication for Chaos' use of orks is vast.

File: fc564d024257825f21ae3c986(...).jpg (35 KB, 493x820)

35 KB JPG

>>51833468
>More bugs
>More Nobledark battles

How about we kill two birds with one stone and make the Doom of Malantai more doom-y? Tyranids track down Malantai and send a fuck huge fleet there. The Eldar fight valiantly, and call in every ally that can respond, but eventually it is determined that while the Eldar were busy fighting the bioforms on the surface, the tyranids had sent other lifeforms below the Craftworld's surface and sucked the Infinity Circuit dry. No matter if the Eldar managed to clean the Craftworld of tyranids or not, the biggest thing of value on the Craftsworld was lost. Not sure if the Imperium would stay to fight for Craftworld while the tyranids leave, the biomass being exhausted, or if the Imperium would realize that they were fighting a battle in a war that had already been lost and leave (but Shadow in the Warp).

>>51837236
Void Dragon was taken out of commission early by Cegorach as a test run of getting the C'tan to kill each other off.

Nightbringer was the de facto leader of the C'tan in canon, and was one of the major powers ordering them around. In canon, Szerakh waited until the Nightbringer and Deciever were weakened after killing all the other C'tan (Outsider ran off crying), and then ordered the Necrons to shoot them before the two could countermand his orders. I don't remember or not if the C'tan gave Szarekh complete independence and control over the other Necrons as long as they weren't using them as some sick parody of gratitude, akin to Hohenheim being granted immortality by Homunculus at the cost of billions of people in FMA.

Szarekh wants to reverse the biotransference, which would conflict with the Outsider's goals, but it would be interesting to see him manipulating the C'tan to do his bidding.
"You'll lose Szarekh. We have a Star God on our side"
"What a coincidence. So do I."

File: 1487580051854.jpg (153 KB, 875x1200)

153 KB JPG

With the inclusion of the Hub-World Engineers and the less unified nature of the Mechanicus are there more variations of Power armour?

I get that there would still be the Mk1 to Mk8 mainstream suits but would there it also be reasonable for there to be off shoot designs built by lesser forges?

>>51837236
The only issue is that the C'tan aren't robots, so to speak, as energy beings inhabiting robotic bodies. Void Dragon just has a technology and machinery fetish, as can be seen by the more organic-looking bodies of the Deciever and Nightbringer.

The Outsider could still work this way, though, being a C'tan who just wants to go back to being a sentient gas cloud floating around a star. But he just can't seem to make himself numb to higher thought, especially with the other C'tan in his head.

File: alternate sororitas armour.jpg (185 KB, 1000x1317)

185 KB JPG

>>51840173
Outsider is basically wanting to die but can't kill himself. He has a godly soul and is therefore possibly immortal. Next best thing is to achieve eternal unconsciousness so as to no longer be self aware or really aware of anything.

Only way to do that is to stop fools from thinking about it. This requires now not just the death of anyone that has met the demented git which is not that many but also the removal of any data concerning it so that it becomes truly forgotten.

To this end it built a big Pokéball and and became an insufferable bitch hermit. But still people think about it indirectly. Mostly they think shit like "whats in the ball" or "what killed all those archeologists who were researching references to the ball". If nothing else the Dragon and the Nightbringer have souls now so even if all life was exterminated those two cunts would remember him for the rest of time and keep him pinned to being eternally awake.

Needless to say there are no Shard Vampires of the Outsider. He wants everything to die, last thing he needs is people to become immortal.

Presumably everyone forgot about him for vast amounts of time after the Necrontyr vs C'tan war or in the reign of the eldar empire because he doesn't seem to have been active. Possibly the Mechnicus, after discovering the Dragon and getting an idea of it's nature, started to look for more of it's kind and that lead them to investigate shit they shouldn't have in the old fairy tales of the eldar.

This time it wasn't prodding old ruins that unleashed the eons old monsters it was prodding old knowledge best left forgotten.

The moment that this happened the Outsider sparked back into self awareness and instantly hated it and wanted to go back into the non-self it had known. All attempts to get people to stop thinking about it just made them think about it more and as of ~750M39 has decided that the only way for long term death is to kill absolutely fucking everything.

File: f339e1a2d4eb0a8df1bddb224(...).jpg (44 KB, 736x552)

44 KB JPG

>>51841027
To this end it is willing to form temporary allegiances with Chaos or just about anything else if it means more genocide.

It is also like the Deceiver in that there is no main shard. Unless it's still in the Dyson Pokéball holding a pillow over its head and screaming.

Alliances with Chaos and the Outsider never last very long as Chaos is very loud and Chaos is usually smart enough to not want everything everywhere ever to die because they need that shit to live. It does have "Necrons" sort of. They are basically empty necron bodies with a bit of programing in them. They have no personality, sapience, sentience or soul and remain only killing tools.

It is unsure if Outsider built the Dyson Sphere. Possibly he built it as a refuge and possibly the Old Ones built it as a prison.

>>51841134
Outsider was never shattered. In vanilla fluff, he went into hiding before the Silent King ordered the shattering of the C'tan, and escaped intact.

It was mentioned in a previous thread that the Void Dragon doesn't know his sibling still exists, because he only knows what he can get from spying on the Mechanicus and not many people know the Outsider exists. The Lyrixian mega-structure has been discovered, but it's seen as just another weird xenos ruin and no one knows how significant it really is. That's why the Void Dragon keeps referring to itself as the last of the C'tan. Of course, he could be thinking of his sibling in the past tense, which could be bad enough. Nightbringer knows Outsider is still out there somewhere too. Just those two alone with their warp signature would be like floodlights in the Outsider's face.

One question, how to we distinguish between the Outsider and Nightbringer? I get that their goals are different but it seems like the only difference between their methods is "kill everybody" versus "kill almost everybody".

>>51841758
Nightbringer wants to build a world in his image, himself the one true god, the adoration and fear of the masses and his rule eternal.

Outsider wants everyone to STFU.

File: 1350280389367.jpg (362 KB, 1152x1080)

362 KB JPG

>>51834839
I'm going to suggest that that is a picture of the Colchis PDF

>>51837151
I thought it was more an alliance of convenience, and the Chaos gods dumped buffs on him because he was the best shot they had at bringing down the Imperium?

>>51838674
Perhaps, but probably not to a huge extent given the logistical benefits of having a few simple, interchangeable versions. Going by the fact that old suits of power armor hundreds or thousands of years old can be salvaged and mix and matched with new armor, it seems Imperial design philosophy centers very much on simplicity and compatibility. Which makes sense, can you imagine if every planet had its own kind of electrical outlet?

>>51842711
Probably browner than green. Colchis is supposed to be a semi-arid to desert world. Of course, it could be on the coast where things are greener like Australia.

>>51841855
I've been thinking of the Nightbringer's personality as Alucard stripped of redeeming qualities, and possibly surrounded by a light year diameter warp aura of elevated fatality. He and his warp reflection are in pretty perfect sync, and the sire is not so much a shard as the Nightbringer himself, battered enough to be restrained. He is unabashedly sentient, takes pleasure in his infamy, and seeks to enhance it through the seeding of scaled down slivers of his own fractal-machine flesh in amusing opponents. Nosferatu are all made this way, and as they or their subsequent progeny wax they take on the appearance and persona of their sire. Through this likeness and their sliver they feed their master's shadow with their deeds and devoured soul-stuff, and in turn become more able to express this shadow's presence. Over time this has dispersed the Nightbringer's (or at least its reflection's) appetite, and he has become just a bit more arrogant as he has emerged as chief among contenders for the title "God of Death". His endgame involves enough resistance left in a galaxy firmly in his grip to still make good sport, and maybe even a pantheon of petty gods beneath him to provide real amusement, but his sadistic, violent, neutral/lawful evil is just as horrific a prospect as Khorne becoming king of the galaxy. Another apt comparison to describe his personality is if a T-800 were to slowly be taken over by Skeletor, over centuries, until it eventually realized that it had been mechanically cackling for the last three decades and just shredded an entire solar system, star included, with a shipping grade teleporter array and a scythe.

>>51843845
I think that was supposed to be what was so weird about it. The Beast got the Orks in bed with Chaos long-term, even though the vast majority of them give zero shits about it.

It's likely that in the scenario that the Beast successfully destroyed Old Earth and the Steward, the Orks would have turned on him due to him turning his back on the Gorkamorka (or, at the very least, accepting the gifts of something other than Gork and Mork). The adrenaline rush of going to war with the Imperium and the fact that the Beast died before he had to deal with the consequences means it never came up.

All of the later interactions between the Orks and Chaos have been alliances of convenience, increasingly less so once the Brain Boys showed up and the Orks have started to become more brutally cunnin'.

>>51843896
In canon, it's said that even being in the presence of Nightbringer brings visions of death and extinction.

Indeed, one could argue the Nightbringer is even more undead than your average undead cybernetic space god because he's mostly shattered and exists through his warp reflection being tethered to the husk of his regenerating physical form.

>>51843896
On the other hand, the Outsider loathes the feeling of self-awareness, and seems to be either fundamentally at odds with its warp reflection's nature or inherently self erasing. It's been described as trying to return to a state of perfect automation or complete responsiveness. I'm not sure what this really amounts to as a concept, and reckon its naturally an unattainable state for a sentient being, but I'm sure it bars anything like shard vampires made in its own image. The Outsider actively suppresses its imprint on the warp, but is itself so leery of willfulness that it will not plan or intrigue to achieve this goal if it can help it, and is in denial that it has a self-appointed goal in the first place. If anything, the Outsider is distinct because it would be a nonentity if it had its way, and as its minor warp reflection grows and shrinks it might drift between being an invincible faction of one and dedicated to becoming an invincible faction of zero, and trying to subsume its will in the execution of the orders of recognized authority figures. In any case, on the rare occasion the outsider leaves the sphere it's warp presence has become too influential to ignore and the imprint must be expunged, and it will be intent on a short, precise mission to efficiently do that and return without anyone knowing anything. On the way out it's heightened willfulness also might lead it to single-mindedly obliterate some fools that were thinking about that weird thing that just flew by, and get into a loop of making more people vanish to extinguish awareness of the void its made. In such a mood it might even single out other C'tan or vamps. On the way back it can usually return to the sphere without incident, having reduced itself to fairly abstract prime directives unperturbed by its warp reflection, but if anybody with enough necrodermis and no soul tracks it down and gives it orders it is prone to obey.

>>51844356
The few that could utilize the Outsider this way, a handful of Phaerons and an even shorter list of extremely tricky Strigoi, are well enough informed as to the Outsider's nature to take great pains to conceal the knowledge and limit the scope of the tasks they might give it. The latter point is of great importance, because while the Outsider is ridiculously capable, any mission that expands its warp influence above a nebulous threshold will see it resume its mission to expunge all knowledge of it, starting with its most recent commander. In theory one could tell it directly to go anywhere, get anything, or kill anyone short of a warp god, and it will likely succeed at the task before re-realizing its own consciousness, but using the Outsider to shake the galaxy invariably means you wake it. Anything that touches the upper levels of its physical power, like teleporting to and assaulting Oscar in the imperial palace or personally holding the Cadian gate against a Black Crusade are so significant to the galaxy's collective unconscious they might irrevocably awaken the Outsider as an actor on the galactic stage, and turn the slightly conspicuous void left by its self excision into a full portfolio of warp power as the Outsider reconciles its conquest of the other C'tan with the agency projected onto it by warp affecting beings.

>>51844679
So how does it deal with the fact that the other C'tan shards that it ate are in its body, still conscious, aware of the Outsider, and still screaming in its brain? That's a lot of beings aware of its existence.

>>51833698
Reminder that he saved Iyanden by leading half a million Kriegers through the Webway. It was ridiculously risky for so many reasons, and part of the reason he received the Writ of Trade was to get him away from places where he could do more damage.

File: warhammer_40k_black_crusa(...).jpg (255 KB, 800x1354)

255 KB JPG

>>51813529
Something to address the concept of having BC with multiple oobjectives. Each phase of the Long War is planned to weaken the Imperium in some manner permanently. Every phase has 3 BC to achieve an overarching goal. They are all done to prepare to topple the Imperium in the 13th BC or at least allow others to do it.
>Phase 1 is to sow the seeds of decay and prevent the Imperium from being at their apex. Testing Imperial strength while poisoning the enemy. Just so happen to have worrying amounts of cults and vampires.
>Phase 2 is to weaken the Imperial Army by stretching them across the Imperium using raids and elongated campaigns in the soft under bellies. Just so happen to occur around the Great Civil War Era. Cults are curbed by Ordo Securitas and vampires hunted by Ordo Xenos.
>Phase 3 is to send offensive campaigns to maximize Imperial losses while targeting enemy industry. Shadow Wars are also used to have the Imperials struggle to deal with Chaos. Just so happens to see separatist are on the rise. Imperium recovers from the civil war.
>Phase 4 is to drown the Imperium worth enemies both internal and external. Both the military and economy will be stressed beyond belief. Imperial Army now becomes very good at killing separatist.
13th BC is the final gamble proposed by Lady Malys to topple the Imperium. Being the largest and deadliest BC of all, it is made to roll to Terra then decapitate the government, kill Oscar, and recapture Ishe. For if the Imperium falls, civilization falls along with it to bring about another Age of Strife longer than before or worst, all life dies.

>>51845418
Might be a good idea to call them something other than vampires to distinguish them from the C'tan ones. Like necromancers or liches or something? Something that commands the dead while already being dead?

>>51844722
It might have just killed them fucking dead, and not eaten them. That seems much more in character for our Outsider, just as eating them is in character for canon. Canon Outsider seems just nebulously, violently insane, hence the cannibalism and subsequent eternal remorse, nobledark Outsider seems to be a more remorseless, untheatrical threat, tragic in that it's in constant turmoil trying to negate its nature, but unrepentant and monomaniacal. It might have obliterated the C'tan for the Silent King and formed its own motive in the act from the reception of its sudden, unprompted attack, achieving acute self awareness only as it's essentially autonomous material-self clashed with the warp reflection, drawn from its perceived intention to become the only C'tan. If not, it freely decided to wipe all of its ilk from the Galaxy as a function of its fundamental nature, and having done that in coincidence with the desires of the Necrotyr shifted the agency to them and elsewhere due to a fundamental denial of its own, and then of its own will constructed a dyson sphere to brood in, adrift and still in denial.

Speaking of xenos, here's something I had been working on for the Diasporex.

http://pastebin.com/nXvTpqYB

>>51845705
Wait, are we actually changing the fluff for the War in Heaven? As in actually changing it, not just filling in the huge gaps that are left vague in vanilla?

>>51845705
>>51845751
As a compromise between the background lore and the high concept of "an idea trying to delete itself", how about the following:

Outsider goes on his binge-eating spree like in canon. Runs off to his Dyson sphere where he spends the next few million years calming himself and getting the C'tan shards stuck inside him to act as a cohesive whole. After a while gets to the point where the energy released from the turmoil is about as notable as the galactic background radiation.

Thing is, he's really unstable. So unstable, that just about anything is likely to set him off. Like too many people thinking about him at once, or another galaxy-wide war, or heaven forbid, someone actually finding his dyson sphere and opening it up. Like what's about to happen now.

Outsider wants to calm his mind by becoming so inactive and zen he becomes one with the universe. No problem with multiple people in your mind if your mind ceases to exist. Problem is people keep coming by and WAKING HIM UP. FUCK.

>>51833468
So in the case of this Nobledark AU where the Imperium is alot ore civilized and less barbaric than in canon, let me ask this.

How would the Nobledark Imperium deal with human worlds, settlements and colonies in that are not part of the Imperium of Man? As in independent worlds or colonial systems with their own governing bodies? And what if said independent worlds would choose to remain in their own sovereignty and choose to not join the imperium and its eldar allies.

>Formal letter/message from an independent human world to an Imperium Expeditionary Force

And how'd it turn out?:

>"Attention Imperial emissaries/envoys, this is a message from the Felicity Colonial Systems. We have considered your offer in joining your 'Imperium of Man' but we formally decline your offer of assimilation. The Felicity Colonial System has its own independent governing body, but we can still, however, continue any fair trade between our governing bodies including tourism if needed be. So please consider honoring our decision of remaining independent from your rule. If however you do not honor our decision for us to remain in own sovereignty and independence and that you will initiate acts of hostility to take us over. We will be prepared to and are willing to defend our homes, planets, territories, sovereignty and independence at all costs. Again we wish to remain in good terms for trade deals and to also welcome you as foreign guests. So please do consider."
>Signed: -Jeremy Johnson, Councilor of the Felicity Colonial Systems

###
Also is it me or is 4chan having trouble uploading photos right now?

File: wight_lord_by_ralphhorsley.jpg (40 KB, 389x350)

40 KB JPG

>>51845489
I don't know phantoms or wight lords might be different names. I just stole wight lords from WH Fantasy Things that should be dead are reanimated to command undead armies that shouldn't be able to move, much less fight. Yet they can move and fight thanks to Nurgle's gift. Using a small sliver of power being them back to the almost living.

When I say vampire, I do mean C'tan vampires. At least other than Nosferatu can have the possibility to gain the super secret power over the undead. You might be thinking "But vampires don't use magic" true, for them the bodies are made to function by biological and gravitational manipulation. This is rather draining on a vampire who has to constently control every movement of the undead.

Compared to the witchs and sorcerers who take the easier path by magical manipulation. With magic and psyker power, mortal necromancer have a less tiring time commanding undead armies. Wights are just conduits for Nurgle's will and use his strength as such. These skeleton generals may have something resembling a mind but all their motivations are fabrications of the plague father.

>>51846551
If the world is worthless, the Imperium will keep asking if they want to join the Imperium but that's it. Normally the Imperium shows off military muscles and trading deals for certain goods that only exist within the Imperium to convince the worlds it's a good idea to join. If the world is in a strategic location or have rich assets, Terra would have no qualms subverting the world's government to intall a pro-Imperial puppet. When the world is a threat or about to fall to the enemies of the Imperium, the Imperial Army would launch a preemptive strike to annex it.

>>51847283
>the Imperial Army would launch a preemptive strike to annex it.
Seems more likely to me that they would wait for the attack to be well underway, then show up to rescue it. More in line with the 'noble' part of 'nobledark', and less likely to generate resentment and revolution if the Army just... doesn't leave, as opposed to outright invasion.

>>51833468
>Nobledark 40k
Isn't this basically the direction that official 40K's going at the moment?

>>51846551
Imperium would not trade with them. Part of the whole thing about the Imperium is free internal trade but you have to join to get it.

I have a question.

Ceggers, Isha and Khine are the surviving eldar gods. All three are currently hiding in the mortal world. Ceggers has his traveling party, Isha went into politics and Khine sleeps in his temples waiting for the next good fight.

Are they or were they ever true warp gods? Or were the eldar gods always walking amongst their followers?

>>51849178
This one is actually explained in canon. Asuryan, the head Eldar god, forbid any physical interaction between the gods and their followers after Khaine started being a team-killing asshole from a combination of Lileath and the Nightbringer.

Asuryan ain't around to make the rules anymore. Also, I'm not sure if Ceggers permanently manifests. Isha does because she has a permanent avatar, and Khaine though shattered into shards, has an avatar in the form of either the Young King or the stone statue (it's kind of ambiguous as to which).

File: Spoiler Image (96 KB, 924x905)

96 KB PNG

>>51847554
>generate resentment and revolution if the Army just... doesn't leave

(pic related)

>>51849949
Then it's also possible that they are still upholding the great divide. They don't tread across the divide between the two worlds.

All three of them ended up here through no desire of their own.

Ceggers was hounded here.

Khine was dead and his pieces landed here.

Isha was carried here by mortals.

Since then they have never returned. The law is unbroken.

File: rtb-01_space_marine_beakie.jpg (61 KB, 426x318)

61 KB JPG

9th page bump

So what's Cherubael doing this time around?

Given his apparent Undivided leanings I'm going to suggest that he's one of Be'lakor's dipshits.

Either that or a Tzneetchian renegade.

File: Picture 5.png (1.2 MB, 1020x651)

1.2 MB PNG

back when 40k was good

>>51852447
I would say shit like daemonhost are totally banned by the Imperium and only radical Inquisitors or renegades use them. If he was actually Chaos Undivided, he wouldn't be working for Be'lakor at least not anymore. Most likely either working for Luther or Malys because they don't believe in worshipping any one god.

>>51837320
Tyranids can't nom souls, only biomass. Even if they could nom souls they wouldn't because metaphysical energy can't be used to make 'gaunts

>>51853483
http://wh40k.lexicanum.com/wiki/Doom_of_Malan'tai


Slaaneshii 'Nids when?

>>51847283
Seems a little grim, didn't we say joining is very much voluntary? Otherwise the Tau had rich worlds and the Imperium could have stomped them back in M37 or whenever first contact was. I think trade with outsiders would be fine as well, membership in the Imperium just removes cross border restrictions, and more importantly brings you under the aegis of the massive Imperial war machine for when the next waaagh or hive fleet rolls around. In fact there are probably quite a few petty confederations lobbying for entry at any point in time.

>>51847739
Yeah, we actually joked about this AU losing its reason for existence when the Gorillaman revival was announced, but this started early summer last year so it's been around before that.

>>51850325
Or they use "prophets" (discounting Macha-Isha) to let things be known.
We do know that plenty of humans worship Isha.
I can't help but wonder... Would Eldar convert to human religions in this au?

>>51853646
I can't think of a reason why not.

>>51853483
>>51853519
Yeah, tyranids eating an Infinity Circuit (actually an Infinity Circuit and a World Spirit or two) is actually canon in vanilla. 'Nids can't use souls metaphysically but they can use them as an energy source.

The only difference with this proposal is you'd get a nobledark battle (fighting valiantly despite ultimately losing) and you'd keep the tyranids as faceless rather than having one super snowflake zoanthrope.

Unfortunately, the sheer strength of the Hive Mind's presence prevents daemons from possessing tyranids. In order to do so you would have to pull an All Guardsmen Party and get a live zoanthrope far enough away from the Hive Mind for a daemon to find it.

>>51852447
>>51852885
Be'lakor is Chaos Undivided. In the thread where we talked about the major "mortal" players (or at least some of them) of Chaos it was said that Be'lakor set up shop in the Chaos Wastes and most of his followers tend to be Chaos Undivided and also comparatively stable.

>>51854466
Remember that our Slaanesh is extra thirsty for eldar souls and obsessed with realspace power on a level the older gods aren't, so there might be impetus in the crone eldar camp to experiment on tyranids hopped up on a devoured infinity circuit.

File: black-caribbean-pirate-hat.jpg (23 KB, 350x245)

23 KB JPG

>>51845133
>part of the reason he received the Writ of Trade was to get him away from places where he could do more damage.

There is no such place.

I'm thinking about writing up Prince Yriel properly. It will be tomorrow afternoon though because it's late and Have work.

Any advice or things that should be in it beyond the rather sad little bit on the 1d4chan page and the bit at the top of this thread?

Hats will be included, obviously.

>>51856919
>There is no such place.
Shhh. Just let them cling to their little bit of hope, anon.

>>51853833
The only reason would be the Eldar know their gods exist, as opposed to other religions that

>>51853602
It has been mentioned repeatedly that trade outside Imperial borders is highly restricted with the intent to get outside empires to want to join the Imperium and prevent Imperial worlds from accidentally getting infected by gene-stealers or Chaos. Trade across international borders requires express permission from the Imperial government itself and is the exception rather than the rule. The only people who get to freely trade across international borders are Rogue Traders.

For the Imperium to consider outright annexing a world, it has to be pretty damn important in terms of resources or strategic position. Like Cadia or "the only world that can reliably allow passage between two sectors" important. AdMech might be a more hawkish (if not outright moving independently) if they think a world has STCs.

>>51846893
>wight lords
Sounds pretty cool. And of course, when in doubt, steal liberally from Fantasy.

File: IMG_0313.png (416 KB, 2048x1536)

416 KB PNG

>be Fallen Dark Angle
>comes back to the Imperium after 2,000 years
>didn't leave the Eye of Terror since fleeing there
>see Eldar helping humans
what.jpg
>see other xenos join the Imperium
WUT.jpg
>some humans even worship Isha
[autistic screeching]
(pic related)

>>51858079
You seriously didn't know about the Watchers in the Dark, brother? I swear, was your head in a bucket on the Rock the whole time?

File: parrotfish skull.jpg (56 KB, 649x700)

56 KB JPG

Guy who wrote the Diasporex stuff in this post >>51845707 here.

I also did a brief write up of the kinebrach from the stuff mentioned in the previous thread (was the one who did the Drach'nyen thing). Wrote this up as a base we can add more ideas to if people come up with more.

http://pastebin.com/d08tXeZ7

Bump

Are there still Jokaero?

Is this the end?

>>51863131
In the kinebrach write-up I was going to suggest that there was some debate as so whether the jokaero and kinebrach were related, given that both were ape-like and Horus Rising has kinebrach weapons that look a lot like digital weapons, but realized that would conflict with the fluff of the jokaero being Old One creations and kinebrach being only a few thousand years older than humanity.

File: Spoiler Image (123 KB, 720x860)

123 KB JPG

>>51865690
Maybe?

>>51866574
Also they look at least as different from each other as we do from them. It could be an in-universe folk belief among humans and eldar that they are both from the same tree.

A common kinebrach belief is that humans are an eldar sub-species.

>>51865690
I'm still around, but will be a week or so again before I can finish my primarch. Also still down to draw stuff if I can ever make time.

File: 1340730051202s.jpg (2 KB, 125x125)

2 KB JPG

>>51868132
>A common kinebrach belief is that humans are an eldar sub-species.
See related pic for my reaction for ants, I'm sorry

On another note, does anyone have any thoughts on the kinebrach and Diasporex thing? Yea, nay, or meh? Was kind of worried they seem to be floating in limbo now.

>>51868259
It's pretty good.

File: 7a6.gif (686 KB, 299x299)

686 KB GIF

>>51868132
>>51868259
This raises the question, in this timeline, is Inquisitor Coteaz Torquemada's retinue composed of a bunch of kinebrach with masterwork power swords and raygun gothic lazweapons?

>>51868366
Absolutely. Also a often seen with a few Jokaero messing with their gear.

The Jokaero go where they want as they want and there is nothing anyone can do about it. Inquisitor Torquemada always has a crate of fresh fruit to ensure that he always has at least one or two of them around.

On one hand the Kinebrach do not like the Jokaero because they mess with their gear and that shit is taken very seriously. On the other hand they do very good, if unpredictable, work.

>>51856919
The story of prince Yriel begins in the dockyards of Craftworld Iyanden in 248M37. This is not to say that that wads the day or the place of his birth or, as many detractors have claimed, that his mother was a whore who spent her nights with dock worker. It is merely that this is the first time he appeared on any official records. His craftworld of origin has never been reliably determined but given the possession of a soulstone it is probable that he has one.

Despite intentionally covering his tracks "Prince" Yriel claims to be a descendant of the folk hero Ulthanash and thus permited to take his aristocratic title. The authenticity of this claim is dubious at best.

Circumstances that led him to Iyanden in that year, how he obtained the aptly named ship Hoec's Grace or the origins of his motley crew is also unknown.

What is known is that since that day the mad bastard has cut a swathe of mayhem a light year wide down the millennia from one end of the Imperium to the other. His name is spoken with detestation by dockyard official on a hundred thousand worlds and reverence on at least as many others. His antics have been a bane to the Imperium down the ages saved from disgrace and condemnation only by the times his antics have been a boon to the Imperium. All he claims in search of the snazziest hat, as befits the heir of Ulthanash.

Of all his deeds the most brazen and greatest was the supply of aid in the defense Iyanden during the war of the Great Kraken. It was he who marched at the head of a half million strong host of Krieger soldiery, each eager to stick a bayonet in his back and held in safety only by an official commissars hat and a document form the Emperor himself with a genuinely forged signature upon it.

Best not to mention that he may or may not have had something to do with the agri-futures fiasco of the Ulthran Cartel.

File: Xeno Week.jpg (69 KB, 315x242)

69 KB JPG

>>51865690
I’ve been putting anything human-related on the backburner so we can try to focus on this “Xeno Week, no humies allowed” theme we have going for this thread and develop the non-human parts of the galaxy more.

Speaking of which, a while back it was asked what the Phoenix Lords are doing and how the non-Eldar parts of the Imperium view them. I wasn’t able to say anything because the thread crashed before I could respond. But after doing research on the Phoenix Lords, I can say the following. How the human inhabitants of the Imperium see the Phoenix Lords is simple: they are the Eldar equivalent of Primarchs. Eldar see the Primarchs as the human’s Phoenix Lords, although unlike the Phoenix Lords the primarchs can’t reincarnate, which the Eldar see as a point in their favor.

Are we keeping the canon origin of “Asurmen brought together the most talented students from across the Craftworlds to train at the Shrine of Asur” for the Phoenix Lords? Such an origin of “students from across the galaxy who trained in the same dojo” would provide a good compare and contrast with the origin of the primarchs in this timeline as well as reinforce some of eastern themes in Eldar culture as to how the origin of their “primarchs” differ from the human ones.

During the Raid on Nurgle’s Mansion, all of the Phoenix Lords except Asurmen were in their original bodies. As of M41, all of the Phoenix Lords have either died in combat or gone missing, just like the primarchs. Jain Zar, Karandas, and Drastana have all died. Maugan Ra disappeared into the Webway (though he’s probably still around, given that every once in a while there are reports of a super-Dark Reaper showing up and kicking ass then disappearing). I was going to suggest Irilyth got flung into the future like was suggested on 1d4chan, but I think the fluff on Myrmeara has him dying. Thankfully, with the exception of the few who have gone missing, their armor is still around.

>>51870295
Of the Prince himself little is known. Rumors abound that he maintains a harem of the most exiting beauties upon Hoec's Grace, now flagship of the Eldritch Raiders "Trader" fleet. Some say that his holds are stuffed to the rafters with rare metals, or bound and tortured captives, a small pocket dimension of Necrontyr manufacture, the preserved and still living brain of a Tyranid hive ship and a hundred other somehow even less plausible things. The one about a surviving member of the original Ordo Chronos admittedly turned out to be true, but only by complete coincidence.

Actual witnesses who have seen, for whatever reason, the inside of his ship tell a very different story. They tell of meticulous order, neatness and professional conduct that would seem no out of place in the old Void Born Navy families and completely at odds with the character of the Prince. Every item in the hold accounted for and noted, ever speck of dirt expunged and every crew member busy and happy about their duties. Possibly this is more in part to do with Kasahkrv the First Mate. He is of the demiurg people and they are known to love orderly conduct. How or why he is present on the Hoec's Grace is unknown, maybe it was a penance.

The other incident that lands squarely at the feet of the Prince is the loss of the planet Tanith.

In the harrowing time of the 12th Black Crusade great fleets and armies were mobilized and war was done on a scale seldom seen. What is remembered less are the more insidious assaults upon the Imperium. The words and deeds that slipped in sideways with smiles upon their friendly faces that infected worlds and stole the souls of the people from the light of civility and lead them down the paths of barbarity and selfish indulgence. On of the worlds afflicted was Tanith, that strange and verdant paradise.

>>51870943
The exact events leading up to the loss of the world are not easy to decipher and many accounts are contradictory in nature. When a world is on fire and neighbors turn on friends and kin in cannibalistic abandon documentation of social and political trends tends to be less of a priority than staying alive.

What was known is that the election of the Governor was called into question and numerous claimants arose although it is unknown who many if any were unclean. A strange new fad for very modest habits arose in the population, primarily at Tanith Magna and spreading out wards from there, a fashion among the aristocracy of wearing as little as possible became evident and then what appeared to be a military coup happened. Society more or less broke down at that point. When it became clear beyond reasonable doubt that the military was not marching to the same drum as the rest of the Imperium a not insignificant chunk of it broke away and mostly hunted down in the forests one unit at a time.

Into this shitstorm came the Eldritch Raiders "Trader" fleet. It was clear from the radio transmissions, encoded with subliminal (to baseline humans) Dark Hymnal Choirs as they were, that something was a little off. Also the fleet of warships in orbit bearing the blasphemous Marks.

Eldritch Raiders were officially a trader fleet and as such any identification broadcasts automatically sent out from the fleet would have identified them as such and been completely genuine. Which is not to say that they were entirely true. At least half the ships in the fleet, Hoec's Grace among them, were armed to the teeth. As pirate deterrents they would often claim. Hoec's Grace tore from the ranks of the fleet at full burn, shield up and glowing red, weapons crash charged and a fleet of almost equally mad ships trailing behind it. Prince Yriel, never the most stable of creatures, was out for blood.

>>51871413
This reckless course of action was questioned by his demiurg First Mate and long time accomplice/friend as this was well outside what he deemed wisdom;

"WISDOM! We have gone well beyond the bounds of wisdom! I say no more. They attack and we hold the line. They invade and we fall back. They take whole sectors and we fall back. Their type took our whole [untranslatable profanity] Empire and we fell back. No more! No more. Here I am drawing [untranslatable profanity] line in the stars! Here, I say! Here! No Further!"

Hoec's Grace slammed into the lead ship at a truly excessive relative velocity, all weapons firing at any available target and it's armored prow plowed through the marauder ship and emerged from the inferno dragging hellfire behind it. Still firing, still killing, scarp and flame and bodies coating it's hull, boarders on half the decks, the control room knee deep in dead chaos... creatures and The Prince himself down to one good eye and more tragically having to resort to only his second snazziest hat.

For what it was worth the attack on the marauder fleet was never meant to destroy them, though it effectively broke their backs, so much as it was a diversion.

The cargo haulers had slipped round the other side of the planet and with the help of mercenary warlocks were scanning the surface for pockets of corrupted people. Using the extremely rare (and unlicensed) imperial telelporters a little over fifteen thousand of the helpless were snatched from certain death. By the time what was left of the Marauder fleet realized what was happening it was too late, the hauler fleet was already too far away and accelerating to the systems edge, all they could do was scatter before the boot of The Prince got shoved even further up their collective arse.

>>51871922
But of Tanith there was nothing more that could be done. Nuclear warheads were detonated in sequence to cause vast firestorms that scoured the planet clean of the taint of Chaos. Sadly also of most complex life. They say, the men in robes or reds and of dark greens, they say that one day it may bloom again. The Great Nalwood trees might be resurrected to wander again. Tanith Magna might be rebuilt in all it's glory. The children might return home. One day.

The surviving Tanith, such a ragged bunch as they were, were ferried to the unsettled maiden world known is the High Speech as Lileath's Briar Patch but soon became known as New Tanith. The world had been the property of the Biel-tan, who had been intending to start colonization any century soon and had been for at least five thousand years. Their complaints were met with a curt response that boiled down to; It's a big planet. It's a small number of humans. Find another island.

There were a few soldiers that were saved, slightly more than a regiments worth. The nearest they had to a commanding officer was Commissar Gaunt, later Colonel-Commissar. From the remnants of the military of a dead world enough were left behind to form a PDF adequate to the meager population and an undersized regiment that could be used as the core upon which to build with offworld recruits and taught the Tanith way of war. Colonel-Commissar Ibram Gaunt never forgot what Prince Yriel had done for his adopted people and swore an eternal oath to the Corsair Prince. An oath the Corsair Prince was mostly indifferent to.

For this service to the Imperium Prince Yriel received an official Writ of Trade, hand signed by the Emperor himself and presented to him by a senior priestess of Isha. What more, they gave him a new hat and it was a good day.

File: 1441568913615.jpg (81 KB, 600x703)

81 KB JPG

>>51872340
Any better?

>>51870650
I like the concept of the Phoenix lords being the eldar equivalent of the primarchs.

But one question. Why not have them be lost and dead like the primarchs? The current crop of Aspect warriors could be running on their old teachings, unsure if they fit into the changing galaxy but keeping the faith all the same. Their armour is inherited by the next top Exarch but their souls now reside in the Infinity Circuit.

>>51872540
They are lost and dead. They can "reincarnate" the same way as canon, but it's not the same as having alive and around.

>>51872540
To clarify (am >>51873374), as to why they just aren't dead and in the Infinity Circuit? Eldar can commune with the spirits in the Infinity Circuit. And they can also pull souls out of it to make wraithguards. If the Phoenix Lords were in the Infinity Circuit, you can bet your ass the Eldar would be dialing them up all the time for advice and the first thing they would do would probably be to build some super-wraithguard bodies to stick them in. The Phoenix Lords themselves might insist on it if they were anything as driven as Asurmen.

With the soulstones in the armor, the only people who ever get to talk to the Phoenix Lords are the ones who wear the armor itself (which is kind of a moot point), which has the same effect of cutting them off from most of their disciples as dying does for the primarchs. You might get the Phoenix Lords sticking around until the day is saved, but you never really get the chance to sit down with them and pump them for info.

Or possibly, since we are adding a sense of groundedness and reduced powerlevels in this timeline (Oscar being a Man of Gold instead of Super Shaman, primarchs being extraordinary humans instead of demigods, etc.) in exchange for common sense which I kind of like about this timeline, gives it a different feel, you could have the creation of a new Phoenix Lord be something like the regeneration of a new Doctor on Doctor Who. Yeah you have *a* Phoenix Lord around, and they have a good deal of the memories of the original, but they're never quite the same as they use the soul of the autarch as the base, and none quite match up to the originals. The Rhana Dandra in this case could be the prophecy where the original Phoenix Lords come back in the Eldar's darkest hour for one last battle.

>>51870943
>>51871413
Seems good so far. The only thing is that in the original writeup Tanith was being outright attacked by a splinter fleet of the Black Crusade. Here it sounds like the world was just corrupted by Chaos in general, which sounds particularly less impressive, though perhaps I am reading that wrong.

Part of the reason Yriel's actions were so ballsy is that he charged the Chaos fleet despite being heavily outnumbered in order to distract them from him vacuuming up civilians. Like a mad honey badger charging at a pride of lions.

>>51874752
I've been thinking about how to describe the different feel you mention. One apt seeming way to put it would be increasing the ratio of Dune to Judge Dredd that composes the base Imperium. Another part is the core conflict is more nuanced and coherent. As opposed to canon's really blunt, almost farcical Order vs Chaos with two orbiting flavors of impending doom, we have what seems like an idealized post-enlightenment, classical-esque empire in opposition against an antithetical ideal of a declined, decadent empire in the style of Requiem Vampire Knight (crones, with their ork auxiliaries). So while the Imperium is noble in dark times, the Crone eldar are grimbright at their best, gladly doing fucked up shit in the name of the glorious transcendent future of fucked up shit. Necrons and Tyranids coming in as respective double negatives to the first pair. Necrons are, from their own perspective, an empire of perfect accord and unerring comprehension, of such refinement and vision as to be the preeminent civilization in the galaxy. The hivemind is bloated, metamorphosing, bloody, endless appetite, but a few posts have gotten at its odd naivety, possibly being no more extraordinary than a predator of enormous scale, or a pack of such, descending on a burrow. Admittedly, a few of these have been me, but I just really like the idea of the tyranids as massive, clever, but still sensical predators within an intergalactic ecosystem, which means hunting can be risky. Hell, warp active galaxies might be massive camouflage predators that eat tyranids.

>>51875262
I'll change it when it gets to the 1d4chan page.

Unless someone beats me to it.

>>51875648
>. Hell, warp active galaxies might be massive camouflage predators that eat tyranids.

I think it's more like that Chaos itself is more of an ambush predator and they are fighting over food.

>>51875262
I was going for showing the more infections nature of Chaos. Evidently I didn't do it well.

File: lolcron.jpg (263 KB, 1423x1222)

263 KB JPG

Why do the necrons keep kidnapping eldar children?

>>51880598
>"These space elf shotas are worth alot of money to be sold to lonely adult women. That there is why we of ten acquire them."

File: 457px-1227858843066.jpg (48 KB, 457x599)

48 KB JPG

>>51880598

>>51837434
>I don't remember or not if the C'tan gave Szarekh complete independence and control over the other Necrons as long as they weren't using them as some sick parody of gratitude, akin to Hohenheim being granted immortality by Homunculus at the cost of billions of people in FMA.

You know, thinking about this, maybe we should make this canon for this AU even if it turns out it's not present in vanilla so long as it doesn't conflict with the general War in Heaven fluff. It was mentioned in previous threads that one possible difference from canon is Szarekh might not know or want to cut off the command protocols (or at least not until he's cleaned up the mess the Necrons made) and this could be one reason why.

File: IMG_0309.jpg (51 KB, 480x360)

51 KB JPG

Quick question, should the Black Crusades be moved to under 'Forces of Chaos' or get it's own page but maybe not moving it at all. If we decide to write every single Black Crusade then the Draft page is going to be expanded by at least 24 paragraphs. With the amount of 2 paragraphs or more per Crusade, it will definitely slow down the Draft page. Just a thought.

>>51883901
I think that all of the important historical events, such as the Unification Wars, War of the Beast, Black Crusade, etc., along with important sociology things like Remembering Old Earth should probably get their own page under history, and the main page focuses more on the state of the galaxy in M41.

I mean, even back when the Drafts page was a bloated mess, we had two major sections; Imperium: Then (referring to U-Wars and history) and Imperium: Now (which was everything else).

>>51870295
So, quick question. Was Yriel always calling himself "Prince" even before he became a corsair/unofficial Rogue Trader?

One thing I noticed though, how does Yriel get the Kriegers to even hear him out before shanking him. On the other hand, tricking a bunch of xenophobic Kriegers to do his bidding is 100% pure undistillated Yriel.

Maybe the Imperium was planning a response, but Yriel thought they were too slow, decided "fuck that", decided to take more...dramatic action. Krieg knew they might get deployed, and that they might have to go through the Webway to do it. When Yriel showed up with his forged signature the Kriegers shrugged and grumbled "let's get this over with".

>>51884331
He wore the right sort of that, had documents, transmitted the right codes and never actually set foot on that irradiated mud ball.

Presumably the Kriegers were being deployed and he merely diverted them to a faster road.

>>51884636
>He wore the right sort of that

Right sort of hat.

Not sure what happened there.

Unfortunately I don't know enough of any of the non human races of 40k to actually contribute. Something about GW not releasing very much info on their culture.
On the other hand, this might be the perfect time to talk about Rommel.
I was looking at some changes to his origin.
So, home world was a colony world. Tau needed more settlers to get a new world up to self-sufficiency, Mymeara and humans responded with a lot of people. This was mid to late m39. Settlers discovered an archeocultural database from the original human settlers of the planet, circa m19. A large effort was dedicated to translating and understanding it, because when you have a database of ancient human culture (later discovered to be a reconstruction of a few human cultures from m1-2), you might as well play it up and snag the tourists, and watch as your kids start taking it seriously (thus making their culture a reinterpreted reconstruction of a reconstruction of an idealized cultural fusion that never existed).
This is what the Eldar who would later be known as Rommel was born to: a jointly settled tourist trap that took itself seriously and actually never had that many tourists to begin with.

>>51885637
Still not sold on the idea of him being called Rommel because of ancient Earth history.

He could be called Rommel because it's genuine human name in reasonably common usage on the Eastern Fringe in mid to late M39.

If from Mymeara he will be used to interacting with tau and humans and as such if outcast will almost certainly start soaking up influences from them for no other reason than why not.

>>51885735
Well, I was thinking of this: one of his best friends was named Rommel. Rommel died in an accident in their youth. Mymeara Eldar don't have what humans recognize as last names: you have a first name, a middle name, and then a long description of your ancestry. When he signs up for the guard after his apparently useless farseer training, the recruiter went "you have a shorter last name?". He answered with Rommel.
I like Rommel being a semi-common human name. Its just not a normal last name.
"He's not outcast - he's on the Path of The Tanker." -Rommel's mother, tongue firmly in cheek.

>>51885637
That's the other problem with Xeno Week. GW wanks over Imperium and Astartes so much that there's comparatively little on Xenos races, and what little there is tends to be contradictory.

>>51885637
>>51885735
Again, it could be that he was an Alaitoc ranger who found his calling on Myrmeara. Alaitoc rangers are supposed to give themselves all sorts of crazy names that are a mishmash of multiple cultures and to some degree are outright xenophiles in a way that would horrify the other Eldar.

So Rommel (who was not Rommel at this point) gets disgrunted with his seer training on Alaitoc (Myrmeara could work too) and goes looking to find himself. Finds this colony world being set up in Tau space within spitting distance of Myrmeara. Because of the combination of human, Tau, and Eldar cultural influences, planet ends up becoming a potpourri of different cultures. Just like Rommel. Dude thinks he's found the promised land. So what if it's a bit of a tourist trap.

>>51886064
Nah, I want him born there. Of course, not very many people can tell the difference between these Eldar and a society of Alaitoc rangers, because they're just as crazy.
Seer training is because his local seer insisted: he's useless for anything that doesn't involve him, but he gets a very high level of detail, and his foresight was just not that strong. He goes off to the Guard because teacher insists ( and his parents support said seer). Discovers that his training focused specifically on combat prediction. Still almost useless for the strategic level from the fact that he can still only see events he will be there for. Unit goes to home world to defend it. He meets his destiny in the form of a scraped together unit of tanks built from mixed salvage by civilians.
Like his mom.
Now he combat predicts all the time, and he sees a lot clearer. Can also burn up his lifespan and soul to force fate to certain configurations - small shit, like the enemy minefield setting itself off because a small local mammal and conveniently placed rocks.

I've added the Prince Yriel stuff to the 1d4chan page. I've edited it slightly to make it seem a more desperate fight rather than The Prince having an outright victory.

https://1d4chan.org/wiki/Nobledark_Imperium_Notable_People#Prince_Yriel

>>51880598
That's Lofn you putz.

File: lofn.jpg (148 KB, 818x1157)

148 KB JPG

>>51880598
>>51887158
The "now" date is 999M41. At this time Lofn is still unborn.

If we are to assume that this and all the other shit we have written, seen and speculated on Lofn is visions of some potential future by Eldrad, Taldeer or another precognitive then what we know or know is possible of Lofn's life is

Going to be born healthy and not deformed
Going to train like her mother on the path of Seer but also like her father take at some point a more Khine orientated path. Possibly not this way around.
Going to develop passive gift of constantly generating a non-aggression field that works on anything living and connected to the warp.
Going to get kidnapped/rescued from something horrific by a Necron.
Going to use this gift to go into politics and act as the representative of the Throne to the Craftworlds.
Going to be the subject of multiple assassination attempts by both human and eldar purity groups.
Going to usher in, her and the Impossible Child, a new golden age of peace and joy.

None of this is set in stone. Especially the golden age. Golden Age is the future Eldrad has been working towards and increasing the odds of happening since he first convinced the human's pet golem to spearhead rescue mission into the Mansion of Entropy.

The Necrons are one of the few things that would be immune to the Peace Aura. But it doesn't automatically follow that they would all be hostile to Lofn. Imperium has allies among the animate dead. As one of the few things capable of bringing the pain train in her presence they would be the only things practical to use as her bodyguard, Nemesor Zahndrekh would consider it a singular honour if one of his renowned fighting men were appointed that most august of missions. What would they be defending her against? Other Necrons and Slaugth if nothing else.

But all this is reflections from the future. Shadow puppets of what could be onto the wall of what is now. All of it or none of it could come to pass.

>>51887441
The ironic thing in this universe is despite hating each other's guts with a passion, the Eldar and Necrons seem to have pretty similar feelings about the War in Heaven. Both the Eldar and the Silent King think the war was a huge mistake, and both seek to restore things to the way they were before the War in Heaven. Both want to destroy Chaos and turn the Warp back into the Realm of Souls, and both want to reverse the curse that plagues their people (Slaanesh for the Eldar, the biotransference for the Silent King).

The only difference is the Silent King thinks things are so out of control the only way to fix things is to burn it all down and start anew, whereas the Eldar don't have that luxury because they have souls too. If the Eldar would let go of old prejudices and hollow pride and the Silent King would stop being such a dickbag even by Eldar standards, they would find that their old enemies share more of their beliefs than they think. But of course this is unlikely to happen, because mortals are flawed (nobleDARK, after all).

>>51887080
Added some of the original blurb as bits and pieces into the Prince Yriel write-up, mostly the parts of the original that had really memorable wording. Also added the earlier Diasporex and kinebrach writing so it didn't disappear.

>>51833698
You know, if we need more Eldar heroes of the Imperium, Iyanna Arienal is definitely at the top of the list. From what I can tell from the previous threads, the suggestion for her is she is involved in the Imperial Navy because of the mess with Iyanden in addition to being a spiritseer, like a cross between Horatio Nelson and a necromancer.

It might also be likely that she's a lot more self-possessed than the average spiritseer, because she's working with Iyanden dead, who are less "I've lived a full life, let me rest" and more "fuck death it's time for round two".

>>51887441
Speaking of which, having trawled through the threads we have three Lofn/LCB related things (one involving the general write-up on how things went in this timeline plus that crazed inquisitor losing SAN points over the idea that Lofn might turn out to be the equivalent of a synapse creature for Eldar/humanity, and two [maybe three] on general reactions to it).

Do any of these need to go on the writing section?

File: 1469227645101.png (186 KB, 457x303)

186 KB PNG

>>51888888

File: Wraithguard_Attack.jpg (202 KB, 1049x739)

202 KB JPG

>>51888819
Thank you for enhancing the Prince Yriel thing.

>a cross between Horatio Nelson and a necromancer.

That sounds unimaginably badass.

Also if the Nids ever come back to Iyanden they are going to be in for a little bit of a shock because the dead are awake and quite cantankerous when provoked. And are about 8 - 9 foot tall on average and habitually carry anti-tank weapons.

>>51888888
>Do any of these need to go on the writing section?

I was intending to start back tracking the threads to look for that inquisitor report to do just that. Was going to make Taldeer section and just copy/paste it there. If you would be wanting to do it then all is brilliant.

>>51889001
It's said that Arienal hates being referred to as a Lady High Admiral (the older generation of Iyanden aren't too fond of humans), but I think at this point she's just gone "fuck it" and gone with it at this point.

>Iyanden wraithguards
Also, visitors to Iyanden please do not point out the similarities between the wraithguards of Iyanden and the Necrons. The locals don't like it and the Imperium will not be held responsible if they kick you in the shins.

I meant to post a gif of that tourist getting BTFO after taunting the Queen's Guard with iyandenwraithguards.gif, but unfortunately it is too large to upload. Forgive me.

>>51888997
>>51889001

As to the LIIVI and Taldeer stuff, I would personally put that in writing and then have links to it from the main section, since they are in-universe writings as opposed to codex entries.

The only thing is there are a couple things I don't know if we decided were canon. Like Sreta Uthran being dead and Taldeer and LIIVI being a little strange compared to how we have been depicting them (though that could just be because the person writing the report is crazy).

Also not sure of what to call them.

File: 4941553_heres-what-happen(...).gif (1.24 MB, 477x270)

1.24 MB GIF

>>51889503
I would have Sreta not be dead. She's just too good of a shady bitch to be dead. She is an excellent Dogaressa or whatever the correct female version of Doge is.

Altansar

The cursed Craftworld. The doomed Craftworld.

Altansar had the misfortune of being just far enough from the Eldar Crone Worlds to escape being instantly destroyed by the birth of Slaanesh yet not far enough away to avoid being sucked into the newly formed Eye of Terror. In those days there were no Phoenix Lords, no great armies or warriors that could protect the Craftworld from harm. The Craftworld was almost immediately besieged by the followers of Chaos following the birth of Slaanesh. Despite fighting valiantly, the walls failed, and the siege was broken. Nearly every living soul there and half of the souls in the Infinity Circuit were sacrificed to the Dark Gods, chief among them She Who Thirsts.

A couple thousand Eldar managed to escape the destruction of Altansar, including the future Phoenix Lord Maugan Ra, but by and large the Craftworld was lost.

A few years after the fall of Altansar a number of Eldar appeared on the doorstep of several Craftworlds, claiming to be refugees from the lost Altansar. The Craftworlders for their part were suspicious, but eventually decided to let the refugees in. Kin were kin, after all, and allies were few and far between in the Old Night. It proved to be a disastrous mistake. The purported refugees were really Crone Worlders, who corrupted the Craftworlds from within and made them vulnerable to attack from daemons and Chaos Eldar. The Craftworlders struck back, and although they were able to keep the corrupted Craftworlds from becoming as twisted as Altansar, they were still far too corrupted to be salvaged. In the end, the Craftworlds had to be destroyed by flying them into the nearest stars.

Today Altansar is the Craftworld of the Crone Eldar. It is their breeding ground. The shard of Khaine now channels Khorne through thrice-cursed blasphemous rituals and the Infinity Circuit is little more than a playground for Daemons. To this day, to even mention the name of that accursed place is said to bring bad luck.

Same guy as >>51889806. Noticed that we didn't have a write-up of our ideas for Altansar for the 1d4chan page and tried to fix that posthaste. Not as good as Assassinbro at the Craftworld stuff, but hopefully it will do.

Hey Khanfag, don't know if you're around but you mentioned in your Taranis fluff that you weren't happy with the fight with Zarakynel, so I took the liberty of doing a rewrite (since it's been like a month or two since I've contributed OC). Let me know if this fits what you were thinking.

---

As Taranis crushed a Chaos Eldar’s head with his gladius, its flawlessly beautiful features exploding into a bloody paste, a flash of silver in the corner of his vision caught his attention. He had only the slightest moment to spin away from the attack as two blades whistled past, sparks flying as they tore gauges into his golden breastplate. The Blood Angel veteran beside him was not so fortunate: locked in combat with a Bloodletter, the twin blades sliced through the two combatants with only the slightest of resistance, daemon and Astartes alike falling into three neat pieces.

Taranis looked up at his attacker. Before him stood a lithe monstrosity surrounded by screeching Daemonettes, a looming figure of purple skin and whipcord flesh. Its features were male and female, animal and human, beautiful and grotesque, all at once, and at the end of its four slender arms wicked swords and claws gleamed malevolently as they spun and danced in the daemon’s hands.

As the battle raged around them, the Keeper of Secrets looked down at him and grinned, wet purple lips splitting to reveal rows of black teeth. “I have heard of you, Arik Taranis. The old custodian. The cripple. The freak. Trying so hard to reach perfection as you watch the rest of the world leave you in the dust. Take heart, though, for to die at my hands will be a beautiful death.”

>>51889927
Behind Taranis, several Custodes stepped forward to join him, fanning out in an arc beside their Lord Commander. “Perhaps you’re right,” said Taranis. “Perhaps I am only a old mass of mismatched parts and refuse stitched together.” His hand tightened around his gladius, and beside him six halberds rose in unison. “Still, better to die a freak than to live as filth such as you.”

The Keeper of Secrets screeched with rage, and as one the Custodes charged, two splitting off to hold off the Daemonettes and four joining Taranis against the greater daemon. Immediately the daemon’s arms sprang into deadly motion, its blades and claws quicksilver flashes as the four arms attacked, parried, and riposted the attacks of the Custodes. Taranis had never faced an opponent so fast; fighting the daemon felt like fighting ten opponents, as its blows rained down from all sides. Slowed by the great banner in his left hand, it took all his skill and cunning to defend himself from the daemon’s attacks, and for the hundredth time that day he envied the augmentations of the younger Custodes around him.

Yet they were not faring much better. For all their speed and strength, the Custodes could not seem to find a gap in the daemon’s defenses, leaving only glancing blows even when their halberds managed to connect. All the while, the Keeper of Secrets arms were a blur of motion, blades whirling around its body in an impenetrable defense and lashing out in blindingly quick strikes. The daemon’s attacks eventually found their mark. One Custodes fell, his head cleanly decapitated from his body, and then another fell, cut in two from shoulder to hip as he reeled backwards from the loss of an arm.

>>51889947
Taranis glanced down at their corpses. Taleos, Karwenn. Two boys he had personally picked from a crowd of aspirants. He had placed their first practice swords in their hands and taught them how to swing a blade, lectured them on the meaning of loyalty and duty, and placed the golden, crested helms upon their heads when they were inducted in the ranks of the Custodes. Two more corpses among mountains. -Perhaps Oscar is right,- he mused. -I have grown old and worn from battle, my heart hardened and blasted smooth by war and death. My time is over. He deserves a better man at his side.-

As they fought, Taranis noticed the daemon was slowing its attacks as they neared him, giving him just a hairsbreadth of room to parry or dodge away from its slashes. -It is taunting me, showing me just how much faster it is,- he realized. Beneath his helm he smiled grimly. -Perhaps we are more alike than I thought. I can work with that.-

Taranis feinted backwards, feigning a stumble, and the Keeper charged, shrieking exultantly as it smelled victory. However, its greed and bloodlust left it overextended and the other two Custodes pressed the attack, forcing the daemon to throw out its arms to both sides to fend off assault. In that moment, Taranis saw his chance. Digging in his back foot, he reversed his momentum and charged the greater daemon with a burst of speed, closing the gap in the blink of an eye. Caught without time to prepare a proper defense, the daemon could only howl as it desperately stabbed forward with its two free arms towards Taranis’ chest.

>>51889962
There was no way to block both attacks, the daemon was two close and too swift. So Taranis chose. His sword arm swept up, knocking aside one of the daemon’s silver swords. The other sank deep into the left side of his chest, grinding and scraping as it pierced first his breastplate and then his interlocking ribcage. Taranis grunted and lurched forward, blood spilling forth from the wound. The daemon laughed once again, for it knew that it had just pierced the Custodes’ primary heart, and it would be a trivial matter to finish the weakened human.

Or so it thought. Taranis savored the flash of surprise on the daemon’s face as his charge continued unslowed, its gloating pleasure becoming shock. Who would have known that the last ditch surgery that moved his heart to his right side and saved his life on the operating table would save him once again. And now he was within the daemon’s guard. It could not defend, it could not run.

The Banner of Unification clenched firmly in his left hand, he hacked down at the monster’s leg, severing it at the first joint, and as the Keeper of Secrets fell forward screaming Taranis spun and lifted his gladius to meet it in a great, flashing arc. The power sword sparked and crackled as it bisected the daemon at the waist. Purple blood and steaming ichor spattering Taranis’ helm as the top half of the daemon sailed past, its soul sent back to the Immaterium to grovel before the Prince of Pleasure and explain how his greatest champion had fallen against a freak.

>FIN

File: 1475641807868.jpg (29 KB, 147x292)

29 KB JPG

>>51889806
Now that is suitably dark.

I have an idea regarding the Phoenix Lords.

In this AU maybe the Khine chunks don't need sacrifices to awaken because they are being piloted by the Phoenix Lords.

In a manner to how the ancient city states of Greece and Mesopotamia had a particular god that they had as their favorite whilst still acknowledging the others maybe the Aspect Warriors, and to a lesser extent their craftworlds, have a similar thing going with their avatars.

Arhra now inhabits the Altansar shard of Khine, in the name of Khorne.

>>51889983
>Wrote the fight with the lowered power level we agreed on for Taranis but still respects his badassery, which comes more from his cunning and experience now rather than raw power
>Also tried to touch on some of the characterization you introduced

>>51890042
It's good, really gives the Impression that the Old Custodian is a patched up relic of another era, full of cunning and guile and aches and pains.

>>51890042
I like it. Leagues better than what I had. My idea was that Taranis killed Zarakynel by goading it into getting overexcited by the fight (as is typical of Slaaneshis) and then cutting it down when it got overconfident and let its guard down as it went in for the kill, but I felt like I didn't get that across well enough. You did much better. I salute you.

Taranis may have liked a good fight just as much as Zarakynel, but unlike Zarakynel he had the self-control to his head out of the thrill of combat and think. Taranis' story comes full circle as he wins by his brains rather than brawn.

>>51890126
>>51890274
Thanks homies, glad you enjoyed it.

Now time to drop this name tag and go back to lurking.

>>51889999
To top it off, have it so none of the corrupted Craftworlds were Kher-Ys. That one's fall was entirely separate. Young eldar falls in love, but whose love is kidnapped by the Crone Eldar/Daemons. Chaos says they will let boyfriend go if she deactivates the defenses. Young, foolish eldar does, only for boyfriend to turn out to be daemons.

>>51889806
>It is their breeding ground
Only reason I'd object to this line is that the crone eldar also have their nested shellworld imperial capital, the Shah-Dome, somewhere in the eye, and it outclasses Altansar by a long shot. Actually, I think I'll write something up about it.

>>51891388
The breeding ground thing was in the original fluff, which has changed a lot since that was written. I don't think we had even thought of the Shah-Dome at that time.

Though I think the breeding ground thing is supposed to be a bit more literal. Though I'd imagine the other Crone Worlds would be better breeding grounds for them. Altansar is, at best, *a* breeding ground.

Though I wonder how safe the Shah-Dome is for raising Cronedar children. The planet is hollow and literally right next door to Slaanesh, who despite knowing they need their cult's power may not be able to stop themself from snacking on a child or two.

>Actually, I think I'll write something up about it.

Do it faggot. No seriously, it's Xeno Week and we need more writing on the Cronedar and their worlds and that would be fantastic.

>>51888888
>we have three Lofn/LCB related things (one involving the general write-up on how things went in this timeline plus that crazed inquisitor losing SAN points over the idea that Lofn might turn out to be the equivalent of a synapse creature for Eldar/humanity

Mind showing me those posts please? I think I might have missed them.

>>51892550
Interrogator Garden's Report can be found in this thread, with the first post of it here:
http://archive.4plebs.org/tg/thread/51105718/#q51150465

Sorry it's unlabeled, just follow the big text chunks. Written on a whim, shatposted out when I felt the thread was dying. I might should revise Sreta's fate- I wrote her in a while back, felt she was clashing with the setting/wasn't finding purchase with the regulars, so I thought she'd be a good candidate to bump off in a Sapiens Supremis attack for When Shit Gets Real, but maybe I jumped the gun a bit.

And it's worth noting that the report is written from the perspective of a paranoid, if dedicated interrogator that is desperately trying to get promoted to inquisitor by finding something big. So, he has a pretty good summation of the essential facts and timeline of events, he interprets them in the most negative possible fashion.

>>51892616
I thought that the link would jump down to the first post, but after testing I've found I'm wrong. Ctrl+F "LIIVI" and you'll find it. Sorry about that. If you're still having trouble, let me know and I'll just pastebin it up.

>>51892550
The report by the crazy inquisitor is up on 1d4chan, as is one of the Taldeer related ones. Though the Taldeer related one might need some tweaking since it was written before we decided human IG regiments (especially Cadia, which the characters are from) regularly work with Eldar Guardian auxillaries. So seeing an Eldar might not be notable, but seeing a farseer might.

I completely agree with >>51889609 that Sreta is just too good of a shady bitch to be dead by M41. So I changed the mention to it just hospitalized her (retconned from death, she's a member of the house of Ulthran for sure).

Here's the pastebin of the other two. They are actually really similar in tone, and it might be easier to just merge them into a single story than have them separate.

http://pastebin.com/Hy3tbyUt

Also put up Altansar (noting it's not the breeding ground for Cronedar as mentioned by >>51891388 and >>51892379) and Sangy's additions to Taranis.

Also, is Eldar capitalized or not? Not sure if Eldar, Tau, and Necron are regularly capitalized or not, since human, ork, and tyranid aren't.

>>51892616
Sreta doesn't clash with the setting at all. It's nobledark after all. Even though there are heroes, there are also plenty of shady people on the nominal side of good. Sreta fits in great being an all-new flavor of eldar dickishness.

Indeed, with the overall civilization versus barbarity theme, the battle lines kind of remind me of Egyptian Mythology. Like how despite the fact that Set was an asshole, he's still on the side of Ma'at, and so despite being an asshole he's our asshole.

I was writing up some intro blurbs on Survivor civilizations and the "minor xenos races" to put on the 1d4chan page, and given the xeno theme of the current thread I thought I'd put the section on "minor xenos races" here to see if it sounded okay to people before it went up.

"Although the Imperium is best known as the grand alliance of humanity and Eldar, there are also numerous other minor Xenos races that also call the Imperium home. The Imperium first began officially admitting other races into the Imperium in M36, as a token of gratitude after receiving significant assistance from the Demiurg in the Imperial Civil War. Since then numerous other species, including Tau, kinebrach, the Watchers in the Dark, kroot, Tarrellians, even a few Necron Lords, have all been united under the Imperium’s aegis. These races are often known as “minor Xenos races” not because they are unimportant per se, but because they make up such a small proportion of the Imperium’s total population, even compared to the depleted Eldar. Even the Tau, the most numerous of the minor xenos races, are still outnumbered by the Eldar by an order of magnitude. Like Eldar Craftworlds and Survivor civilizations, minor Xenos races are often given a high degree of autonomy in the Imperium, so long as they follow the few universal rules. In some cases (e.g., Necron lords) inclusion into the Imperium is more like a mutual non-aggression pact than anything else, the Imperium pledging to keep its other citizens from antagonizing its signatories so long as those signatories in turn do not antagonize the citizens of the Imperium."

>>51893022 (cont.)
The arrangement between the two dominant races of the Imperium and the minor xenos races is kind of like that between the Council and non-Council races in Mass Effect. Like the Council, the two dominant races make most of the decisions, and the others often get the hose. Is this fair? Who can say. It's one of the grayer areas of this Imperium's morality. The Imperium is often a human and Eldar show because 98% of the population is human and Eldar and so the Imperium's decisions are primarily going to affect those people. At the same time, the Imperium doesn't butt into the business of the minor races unless they're stirring up trouble, so it's not like they're dictating things to other races.

As was mentioned in a previous thread (I think), this is one of the reasons the Tau seem so ambitious. They know that they're third in line in terms of population, and they know if things go good for the Tau and bad for the humans and Eldar there might be three races making all the decisions, rather than two.

The population thing about Eldar versus Tau is actually based on canon. According to what I can find, Tau are at best in the hundreds of billions. Craftworld and Exodite Eldar together are at least a few trillion. Despite being a dying race in canon, there are surprisingly a lot of Eldar in the galaxy. Even with the Tau empire being larger than in canon and the Eldar not dying so much, the Eldar still massively outnumber the Tau.

This doesn’t even get into humans, which are so numerous that the Administratum in both timelines just plain gave up trying. There are some species of abhumans that are more numerous than many minor xenos races.

>>51892647
The Taldeer report is brilliant.

So, I was contemplating non-Croneworld Chaos Eldar, and came up with this.

The story of the Tyrant Star begins with Archon Darumache Zharr, and his Kabal of the Venomed Breath. After a plot to destroy a more powerful rival backfired on him, Archon Zharr and his Kabal chose to flee into the Webway rather than stick around for the inevitable overwhelming retaliation. After wandering the Webway for decades, raiding Imperial worlds and rival raiders for supplies, they found something incredible- a proto-craftworld in orbit around a warp rift, crew slaughtered in the Fall but otherwise untouched. Archon Zharr instantly declared this their new base, and named it 'Port Razor'.
The millennium that followed was good for the Venomed Breath. Port Razor gradually attracted other outcast Kabals and lone Dark Eldar, mercenary bands, Ork Freebootas, xenos pirates and Chaos marauders, until it had become a city in its own right. Commorragh in miniature. Constantly on the move and equipped with the finest cloaking fields, it provided all the scum of the galaxy with an inviolate base to strike at civilization from.
Until the Imperium finally tracked Port Razor down, and assembled a Crusade to destroy it.
Unwilling to abandon his domain twice, Lord Zharr committed to a vicious defence. However, deprived of their usual advantage of mobility with the need to defend a mostly-static position, his fleets were slowly destroyed or simply deserted. Port Razor itself was forced deeper and deeper into the warp storm, fleeing into the depths where Gellar fields failed, beyond the reach of the Imperium.
It was assumed to be destroyed, and centuries passed without further sign of Port Razor and the Venomed Breath.
(cont.)

>>51889999
I’m torn. On the one hand it explains why the Phoenix Lords aren’t around except for a battle or two anymore. On the other hand it boosts the Phoenix Lords into literal demigod warriors on par with the canon primarchs, which seems to be kind of the opposite of the “more grounded in exchange for more sanity” theme we’ve been going with. And does this make the Avatar of Khaine obsolete?

That said, I think the "favored god like in Greece" thing is actually even in Vanilla canon. In vanilla, each Craftworld favors a different aspect or interpretation of Khaine and a different type of Aspect Warrior, as represented by the various Phoenix Lords, much the way in which Theseus was the personal favorite demi-god of Athens, Achilles at Leuce, etc. Dire Avengers are the most generic aspect warriors (given the prevalence of Asurmen's teachings, kind of like how Heracles was the hero for much of Greece rather than a specific city-state) and the ones that are widespread across every Craftworld, after the particular aspect the Craftworld venerates.

>>51894380
Then the Tyrant Star emerged. Outer hull encrusted with the hulks of thousands of ships, the outline of what was once Port Razor was still visible, having been transformed into a Space Hulk in the terrible depths of the warp storm. The old inhabitants had been likewise transformed. Archon Zharr and the Venomed Breath had sold their souls to Chaos in exchange for survival- and power.
The Tyrant Star ripped its way through an entire sector before it was finally damaged enough to drive it away. Before, Port Razor had been a base, a port; now the Venomed Breath operated it as a warship, a super-dreadnaught of horrendous power. They had fallen primarily to Khorne and Nurgle (and Slaanesh not at all- they take particular pleasure in killing Crone-worlders), and their behavior reflected that; much more willing to assault the enemy head on, much more willing to stand and fight- and much more capable of doing both. Now capable of true warp travel thanks to the thousands of daemons bound into its hull, the Tyrant Star blazes bloody paths through the Imperium, only stopping when grievous injury forces it to withdraw and recover. It licks its wounds for decades, or centuries, loitering beyond the reach of any foe in the Warp- then it comes in again.

Over the millennia of its operation, Port Razor and the Tyrant Star are estimated to have killed trillions of Imperial citizens. Its every appearance is met with furious force- but each time, it manages to slip away, leaving burning ships and worlds in its wake.

Thoughts?

>>51894468
I don't know, having the Tyrant Star as the peephole for the Retconnian was pretty good, but the Tyrant Star sounds an awful lot like a Necron World Engine, but Chaos-oriented instead.

On an unrelated note, I need some sleep.

>>51894758
Oh, I hadn't realized the name was already being used by something else. I can think of another one. Tyrant's Crown, perhaps?

>>51894773
Asuryan's Lament?
Khorne's Tooth?
Pain's Imperator?
Isha's Leash?
Romero's Daikatana?

>>51894838
>Romero's Daikatana
I'm half tempted to use that just for the gonzo factor. I'm imagining some Inquisitor trawling through ancient records trying to find out what a 'Romero' or 'Daikatana' is. Eventually, he will learn that a Daikatana was a type of primitive power sword used against tanks and heavy cavalry and that Romero was somehow associated with zombies.

>>51894892
"Apparently, it was spoken of with such dread that at the dawn of the 3rd millenium, there was an attempt to obliterate all records of its terrible existence... Also, something about soldiers making sure to shoot the bearers of the katana first out of fear of its killing power?" I freaking hate you John Romero why did young me have to be susceptible to shitty advertising

But anyway, Tyrant Star is a term from Fantasy Flight Games's Dark Heresy series if you were unaware. Though, I don't know if we have a Calixis sector equivalent in the Nobledark quite yet.

http://warhammer40k.wikia.com/wiki/Tyrant_Star

What have we got on orks thus far?

>>51896309
Brain Boyz are returning

Gazzy is taking up the mantle of The Beast.

Some orks in the Occtavius sector are farming Nids.

Wazzdakka has managed to gain access to the webway and some how navigates it.

We are up to 5th or 6th Great War for Armageddon.

Oblitorator Boyz are a thing

Bug Boyz are very much a thing

Chaos orks are uncommon but not so much that people are surprised by them.

>>51896748
What are Bug Boyz?

>>51896309
Also, there's been a big argument as to whether Ghazzy's a Brain Boy or not. As well as what a Brain Boy is. The current consensus seems to be to agree to disagree and that he's insanely clever for an ork even if he's not a Brain Boy.

Orks are also starting to break off from Chaos. While they were never really under it as much as guided by it because Cronedar know where the best fights are, now because of the Brain Boyz the Orks are starting to think long term and they don't like how Chaos has been using them as cannon fodder. Thankfully, the Orks seem more interested in going after the Imperium than them. For now.

>>51897583
Bug Boyz are gene-stealer/ork hybrids.

The ones that either can't hear the Hive Mind or inherit enough innate orkyness to tell it to zog off get recruited into the ranks of the orks. They are no bigger or smarter then regular orks but they do have built in carapace armour and astoundingly good reflexes. And sometimes 4 sets of arms ending in big choppy claws.

War of the Beast era orks weren't duped into being cannon fodder. The Crone Eldar invited them to a big fight. That was the payment. The service they bought was not attacking the Chaos forces.

Orks don't give much of a shit about history so it's doubtful that any would even know about the War of the Beast save badass stories about how they stomped half the galaxy flat.

They are going their own way this time because attacking the Imperium under their own steam is the most fun option. If it becomes more fun to slap Chaos around then that's exactly what they will do. If it becomes more fun to intentionally do stuff to assist Chaos then they do that. If it becomes more fun to split into two orky camps and start killing each other then they kill each other.

Orks go where the fun is.

One of the suggestions was that Makari the Banna Wayva, the lucky grot that sits upon Gazzy's shoulder is the Brain Boy. Gazzy is super smart even by warboss standards, Makari is his advisor. He advises what to do for maximum fun. Sometimes Gazzy listens, sometimes he doesn't.

>>51894466
It does admittedly bring the Phoenix Lords up to demi-god status but it also removes the Khine avatars as things in their own right and so overall eldar power levels are maintained where they are.

It also gives the Eldar their rare super heavy hitters. Humanity has Oscar, the Apex Twins the Custards and Grey Knights and a such and the eldar have their war-god iron.

It's not unlike the way that Macha is Isha in that the Phoenix Lords are at one and the same time Khine. They are murder incarnate. But unlike in the old days of Khine unbounded they are murder harnessed and directed by mortal will.

File: 1485503114612.png (3.41 MB, 1500x1500)

3.41 MB PNG

Bump

>>51897716
>War of the Beast era orks weren't duped into being cannon fodder. The Crone Eldar invited them to a big fight. That was the payment. The service they bought was not attacking the Chaos forces.

I guess the "cannon fodder" thing is more from the Cronedar's perspective. Cronedar saw themselves as manipulating the Orks into being the high casualty cannon fodder that they would never be. Like vanilla Eldar do to humans all the time. They may not have realized or cared the orks got as much out of it.

Now the issue is the Cronedar have to use a higher quality of logic to convince the orks that what would normally be a strategically important but militarily unfun fight is worth fighting, and they can't buy the protection of their forces from the Orks like before.

Also War of the Beast era orks (at least a good chunk of them) also wanted revenge for Ullanor. That was recent enough that they remembered it, even if its little more than forgotten by the later orks.

>>51900319
Fireworks wanting to fight the people that ruined your shit is not about revenge. It's about having found something worth fighting.

Also Lady Malys has the Dark Eldar for the heavy lifting now. All those slaves, vat-grown, mercenaries and the monsters made by mad scientists. Also Dr Bile could have been mass producing Astartes and New Men. They could have a Space Marine Legion of new Fallen by now.

>>51900445
The issue is less Chaos losing the orks, and more the prospect of fighting a two-front war. Indeed, it was suggested the DEldar alliance was started because Malys was noticing the Orks were starting to slip the leash. The plan was always to unify the Cronedar and DEldar, but the timetable had to be sped up because the Orks were getting unpredictable.

Also revenge for Ullanor was the canon motivation of the Beast. It just so happened that revenge happened to take the form that was fun for orks and the Beast got to mix business with pleasure. The fact that the Beast acted so different from the short-term thinking, "don't care who we're fighting as long as fight" orks is what made him so dangerous.

>>51900445
>Fireworks
For orks

WTF autocorrect?

The vanilla fluff heavily implies that the Imperium in canon set out at just the right time to keep the orks from reaching critorkal mass. The orks at places like Gorro and Ullanor were starting to get really big and oddly advanced for orks, and actually had star-spanning empires (compare to "modern" warbosses, which typically struggle to control one planet), were building sturdier buildings, and whose mekboys were building worriyingly advanced tech. The Imperium burns down Ullanor, which is a borderline ork civilization, and considers the problem solved.

Fast forward two millenia. The Beast shows up on Ullanor, advances ork civilization past the Crusade era by building actual organized cities, and starts busting out horrifying technology like starship-sized gravity whips (effective, yet orky), fully functional teleporters as an alternative to warp travel, and diplomats. If there were anything like Brain Boyz in canon, one could easily argue they were on the verge of showing up at Ullanor and Garro and the canon beasts could even be argued to be Brain Boyz in a sense, even though they are imagined differently than what we have here

>>51900983 (cont.)
That's in vanilla. Now imagine the situation for the Imperials here. For the WotB, the orks are just short of the point where Brain Boyz would have started appearing and the orks apparently took points in INT and their terrifying technology is starting to show up for the first time. And they're being backed by Cronedar, DEldar (who are just kind of there like vultures following wolves), daemons, and the Fallen. This isn't the Horus Heresy where the prime issue was the Imperium's limited manpower after nine legions turned traitor, three more were butchered at Istvaan, and several others were isolated in the Ruinstorm. This was a veritable tsunami hitting the Imperium. Even though the Imperium had nineteen primarchs on their side (Eldar being more aloof allies than actually unified at this point), it was still a miracle they even survived.

To be honest, Urlakk Urg did everyone a favor, rushing off to get hinself killed because of his revengeboner before the Brain Boyz could actually arise and the Orks could consolidate and pull out all of their big guns (though for all we know this may have been a side objective of the Crones). Now think of the situation in M41. With the Brain Boyz, the Orks are starting to surpass the point they were at during the WotB, and their advanced technology is starting to show up again. Technology that most Imperials remember only as abominable nightmares through lurid details in their history books. And the Orks have learned from the WotB.

File: IMG_0321.jpg (131 KB, 736x981)

131 KB JPG

>>51900445
>mass producing Fallen Marines by Dr.Bile
I'm guessing that's what the 7th Black Crusade was for in both timelines.

File: 1477227036303.gif (2.17 MB, 280x358)

2.17 MB GIF

>>51888888
That's a big number

>>51901015
Got to get that gene-seed from somewhere. Sure you can try growing it in a tube from already existing stocks but it's never as good as the properly grown stuff. Without the facilities available to the Throne of Earth you just got to make do with what you can take.

He didn't want to rely too much on the shit donated by the original Fallen because he could never be sure it was untainted and his own stuff was imperfect.

Lady Malys says she will pay his rent if he cultivates a shit load of gene-seed? That is always a good deal.

Also Dr Bile's biology went wrong a long time ago in both this AU and Vanilla (unless Fulgrimfag says otherwise). He kept getting multiple cancers and could never manage to correct the problem. Had to keep making clones and transferring to the clone. It's how he's lived for so long without making deals with anything from Beyond. Down side is that he has to keep in the good graces of a lord or lady with high grade medical facilities.

So far he's not managed to get the Mk3 Snowflake gene-seed work properly, so as of yet no Fallen Grey Knights. So far.

>>51901001
With Farseer support, the Imperium has almost certainly been using precog to try and smack down Warbosses as fast as they arise with assassinations and surgical strikes. This presumably works fairly well at preventing WAAAAAGHs but is less good at culling the general Ork population. So those Warbosses that do manage to dodge Eversors and D-Cannons long enough to get a WAAAAGH going are proportionally more dangerous because they can rally more Orks to their banner faster with less competition from other Warbosses. Less Warbosses, but individually more powerful.

File: The Orks are getting thei(...).jpg (64 KB, 809x585)

64 KB JPG

>>51901198
>>51901272
>>51901001
>>51900983
Also any orks that can avoid the assassins are either too 'ard to kill or worse still full of kunnin' and orky know-whats.

And then the Brain Boyz turn up.

>>51867050
I'm going to be really disappointed if he doesn't at least express regret over how the administratum has destroyed the Emperor's vision.

File: 1487707502840.jpg (34 KB, 460x416)

34 KB JPG

>>51901306
http://suptg.thisisnotatrueending.com/archive/51833468/

All this talk of Orks has inspired me.

>++Excerpt from a lecture series given by Sky Marshal Nigel Iger at Bakka Naval Officers' Acadamy, 867.M41++
>++"How to kill an Assault Moon"++

"Now, the most important thing to have when assaulting an Assault Moon- the thing you must have above all else- is sufficient numbers."
"Yes, that sounds obvious, here in this room at the Naval Academy. Nearly tautological. But out there in the void, things will seem different. You will see merchant convoys shattered, planets burning, billions dying. You will be tempted to follow the examples of Ollanius Pius or the Astral Knights, to cry 'damn the torpedoes' and hope that determination and hate will fill in for your lack of guns and steel."
"DO. NOT. DO. THIS."
"Because I tell you now, it will not. The best possible scenario is simply that you will get tens of thousands of the Emperor's astronauts killed to no purpose. At worst, it will take that much longer to assemble sufficient weight of metal to take it down- and planets will die in that time."
"We are the Imperial Navy. We are the first and greatest line of defense. And billions die for our mistakes. So, if you do not have sufficient numbers to win- do not engage. Even if that means leaving worlds to burn."

"So what does constitute numbers, then? It varies, of course, but the general rule of thumb is at least one-third of the Assault Moon's mass. I've done it with one-quarter, but I've been doing this longer than any of you have been alive."
"This may seem low, which brings me to another rule of thumb: firepower is, loosely, a function of surface area, while durability is loosely a function of volume. You're limited in firepower by how many guns you can physically mount on a ship, while durability is limited by the mass you have to absorb hits. And anyone who has even glanced at a naval engineering textbook knows that volume increases faster than surface area."

(cont.)

>>51902141
"Therefore, an Assault Moon has less firepower for its mass than, say, a battleship or frigate does. Which is still an absolutely tremendous amount, but it means physically smaller forces can win without overwhelming tactical genius."
"As for specific mix of forces, you will need a lot of nova cannons, a strong carrier force, a strong gunline, and preferably guided torpedoes, although those aren't entirely necessary."

"So, how do you kill an Assault Moon? Well, I'm about to walk you through it. Keep in mind this is a 'white-room' exercise, which assumes the Assault Moon is without a meaningful escort fleet and there are no nearby celestial or planetary bodies to complicate things. How those change the picture I will cover in later lectures."

"The first step is to prevent it from launching fighters, bombers, and torpedoes. This is where the nova cannons come in. The Power Fields of the average Assault Moon can withstand even direct nova cannon hits, so bringing them down isn't the point at the moment. The point is to use the area-of-effect to fry the bombers and torpedoes as they launch. You will want to use shells optimized for area effects for this. Set up a continuous barrage, each nova-cannon carrier firing in a steady sequence. You do not want to allow the Assault Moon to launch its entire strike-craft complement; the amount of fighters a carrier can carry is a function of volume, so if you let the Moon launch you will drown in bombers. The continuous explosions will also, hopefully, blind the ork gunners and sensors, making their fire even less accurate than it normally is."
"While this is happening, your gun-line should bombard the Moon from long range. Assault Moons are very large, slow-moving targets, and at the moment the goal is not precision strikes but simply to batter the Power Fields down. You want the range to be as long as possible, to prevent the enemy from getting hits."
(cont.)

>>51902414
"Now, DO NOT englobe the enemy. This will simply allow all of its guns to fire at you simultaneously. You want to focus your forces against a single hemisphere- preferably the aft, where the guns are usually least numerous."
"Once the Power Fields are down, you can begin strikes against individual components. This is where your carriers and torpedo destroyers come in, using bombers and guided torpedoes to hit pinpoint targets. First priority is engines, to prevent it from rolling undamaged faces to meet you. Second is heavy weapons, to allow your battleships and grand cruisers to move in."
"The nova cannon come in handy again here; while the armor is heavy enough to resist even direct hits, the flash and blast is excellent at suppressing and destroying the lighter point-defense turrets, making it more likely that your bombers will actually survive to deliver their payloads. You want to cut it as close as possible without accidentally destroying your own bombers. How close that is depends on how coordinated your gunners are; you should know that before engaging in battle. You'll want a simultaneous strike, with as many cannon as you can spare from continued fighter-suppression."
"This will not render the Assault Moon helpless. However, it should suppress the defenses enough that you can move your gun-line in close enough for it to begin precision targeting with its broadsides as well."

"From there, you simply continue to destroy surface gun emplacements and suppress fighter launches with the nova cannon. Continue until its guns on the targeted hemisphere are gone and the Assault Moon is immobile. Total destruction will still be difficult. You have basically two options- focus the fire of your entire fleet onto a single point, and drill into the Moon's core until you find something explosive, or land Astartes boarding, demolition, and sabotage teams to blow it apart from the inside."

(cont.)

>>51902693
"And there you go- you have destroyed an Assault Moon, with only minimum losses if all has gone according to plan."

"Of course, things rarely go according to plan. Many things have been omitted from this 'white-room' demonstration, from enemy escorts to the likely countermoves of the Assault Moon itself. Orks are nothing if not inventive, if rarely competent. So, one last thing I left out of my description- you'll also need a strong reserve, and to be ready for anything."

"Thank you, and see you tomorrow, where I will begin discussion of how to deal with an Assault Moon's inevitable escorting fleets."

>++Conclude excerpt++

Thoughts?

>>51902774
Is good.

Plz add to 1d4chan page.

It's not really funny but given the subject matter and presumed context of the lecture it's not meant to be so it fits perfectly.

So we going with Primarchs 2 and 11 being Jenetia Krole of the Sisters of Silence) and Uxor Honen Mu of the Geno Five-Two Chiliad?

It was discussed late last thread and I don't think we ever got around to deciding yay or nay on the subject.

>>51894468
>>51894758
>>51894773
>>51894892
>>51894961

I like it. It kind of reminds me of a Chaos Eldar version of the Flying Dutchman. It’s like a Dark Eldar raiding party on steroids, like a Craftworld that someone rammed into a Space Hulk. When a normal Dark Eldar raiding party shows up to a planet, it’s a fair bet that you can eventually fight them off before they do too much damage. When this thing shows up around any world that isn’t a Fortress World or a Space Marine Homeworld, you’d better hope that someone else noticed and is sending backup ASAP. As opposed to the World Engines, which are ponderous juggernauts, this thing can just pop up any time in your system. Though maybe make it not as outright big, tanky, or powerful as the World Engines to balance out the maneuverability.

However, I agree on using a different name than Tyrant Star. Canon Tyrant Star showing up and causing everyone to go crazy and turn on their allies sounds exactly like the sort of dipshittery Malal would do, even if he’s not stuck in the Retconnian in this universe. Romero's Daikana also feels like a bit of a reference too far. Sword of Damocles (because it can show up in your system at any time and fuck up your day) or some Eldar equivalent? Or is that just as bad? Also, don't feel like everything has to have a canon counterpart. As long as it fits within the feel of the universe, go for it.

The other thing to consider too is that Crone Eldar aren’t all Slaaneshi worshippers. True, the two largest denominations of Crone Eldar follow Slaaneshi and Chaos Undivided, but there are plenty of Khornate, Tzeentchian, and Nurglite ones too. Some of what they're like was discussed in the previous threads (yet another thing that needs to go on the notes section of the wiki).

>>51903139
I think we said nay a long time ago (back in like thread 9 or 10). We decided Oscar didn't nominate any women because his traditionalist upbringing and influence from Malcador, and by that time Oscar hadn't softened enough that he was okay with women being the tip of the spear like Space Marines were being expected to do. Also Krole dying in the WotB takes away from Sanguinius' big sacrifice at the Battle of Terra.

Krole and the Uxor were among Oscar's greatest generals, but they never got the official title of primarch. Whoever did was gone by the end of the War of the Beast, if not early in Unification.

Either that or Omegon counts as one and we only have one missing.

>>51902806
Glad to hear you like it. I'm considering continuing with the rest of the lecture series.

File: ork logic.jpg (92 KB, 460x974)

92 KB JPG

>>51902774
You know, this makes me realize just how orky an Assault Moon is.

The thing has ridiculously low firepower-to-mass ratio, so like a flesh-and-blood ork the purpose of it is to be so tanky that it can survive blows that would cripple any other ship.

On top of that, it has guns pointing in almost every direction, with at best the front half being more heavily armed than the back. Almost like they're expecting the enemy to try and surround them from every direction and unleash dakka, because that's what they would do in their situation.

File: Imperial Guard enough dakka.jpg (605 KB, 1089x2066)

605 KB JPG

>>51903395
We have hit Fractal Orky.

At every scale of resolution every observable section is equally as orky as the whole of the thing.

This is the nearest I have to an appropriate image.

>>51901198
Not Fulgrimfag, and so will defer to him on this, but doesn't seem to be any intrinsic reason Bile would have cancer in this timeline. Bile got cancer in vanilla because of the sabotage to the Emperor's Children's gene-seed, which couldn't happen in this timeline because the gene-seeds aren't primarch-specific and all of the legions are using the same stuff. However, this doesn't mean something could have happened to Bile that could have put him in the exact same position he is in canon (again, why I am deferring to Fulgrimfag).

Of course, given that Bile is even less Chaos-aligned than in vanilla (to quote another anon: "Dude went full Dark Eldar"), he would have had to do the clone-and-paste a few times in order to be around by M41. Even a Mark III S Astartes would have died of old age by then.

>>51903466
By the fucking gods man, why do you keep making clone bodies with hair loss? Baldy, baldy, baldy, baldy, baldy, baldy! - Sliscus

>>51903195
>>51903263
I like the idea of promoting some canon characters who were high-tier and highly competent to primarch level, but I thought I'd throw out a few other possibilities.

It could be that Taranis and another person were be "shadow primarchs," equal in authority to a primarch but never given the title or a legion. So in actuality there were only 18 true primarchs and legions. The idea of 20 primarchs was coined in universe by a historian because 20 is a nice round number and sounds better than 18, and the term stuck (though this would kinda screw up legion numbering).

Another possibility is that they did something shitty like is implied in canon and got butt blasted.

Another is that it's a possibility for OC if someone has an idea they're dying to tell, but I'm somewhat against this one since we're trying to stick close to canon.

>>51898546
The issue with bringing the Phoenix Lords up to demigod status means that the Eldar no longer have their series of extraordinary mortals that existed during the early days of the Imperium. It removes their status of being the equivalent of primarchs in Eldar culture. The only mortal Craftworld Eldar of note from the early days is Eldrad, which gives the Eldar way too little focus during this time period.

It also raises the question of why Eldrad even bothered inviting humanity along for the raid on Nurgle's Mansion when the Phoenix Lords were there. Nine or more Avatars of Khaine should have been able to handle a smash-and-grab.

Additionally, like you pointed out, humans have several heavy hitters, Oscar, the Custodes, and Grey Knights (Apex twins are kind of rogue at the moment). Eldar in vanilla really have three major heavy hitters, Eldrad, the Avatar of Khaine, and the Phoenix Lords. Merging the Avatar with the Phoenix Lords drastically reduces their number of heavy hitters.

There's also the question of what to do with some of the previously mentioned characterization of Khaine. There was some discussion that the Bloody Handed one is no longer Worfed all the time, only being woken up if shit gets really bad due to a Black Crusade or whatnot. There was also the suggestion that Khaine approves of the alliance because Khaine likes humanity's lack of restraint and ability for war and there's none of that bad history between them over one getting the other killed (Thread 7).

Altansar's Khaine shard being replaced also means you have a short window in which an Avatar of Khorne is walking around. Which increases the Cronedar's power.

>>51903697
I deliberately tried to set things up so Taranis would never even be in the position to be a primarch. It felt to me like that would be crossing a line. Even though Taranis won lots and lots of battles (seriously, just look at his list of titles in canon), he didn't have the latitude of movement that any of the primarchs did due to his job.

I deliberately had his body crap out before unification and the naming of the primarchs to make absolutely sure he would not even be on the preliminary list for primarch. Not only that, but Oscar would have tried to avoid naming Taranis primarch because he was from Terrawatt, and that would open up accusations of favoritism.

Krole would honestly be a better choice relative to Taranis because the Sisters of Silence already existed in canon and it wouldn't require creating any OC, but in the thread where the idea of Krole being a primarch was first brought up the consensus seemed to be no.

>>51903864
Agreed, I think keeping the Avatars and Phoenix Lords makes more sense and gives variety to the heavy hitters at the Eldar's disposal. I'm a fan of the canon fluff that the Phoenix Lords are essentially hive minds formed from all the previous holders of the title and that to become a PL is to lose your individuality and personality since you get absorbed into the greater consciousness.

Also, are we forgetting the Harlequins? Those crazy bastards went toe to toe with Custodes in canon, though the 7 v 12 numbers for the fight in Throneworld are a bit Eldar-wanky. In this AU I think it makes sense for the average Harlequin to be roughly equal to the average Custodes or Grey Knight, though with a drastically different fighting style.

Autarchs and Exarchs are also tough, probably ranging anywhere from Space Marine Veteran Sergeant to Chapter Master.

>>51903425
It's orks all the way down.

Also does anyone have that gif of the spaceship with the whip-hammer that was in a filename thread a few days ago? That is what I assume an ork gravity-whip looks like.

The inspiration just does not stop.
>>51902774

>++Excerpt from a lecture series given by Sky Marshal Nigel Iger at Bakka Naval Officers' Acadamy, 867.M41++
>++"How to kill an Assault Moon"++

"Some of you have noted that my description of taking down an Assault Moon is strongly reminiscent of suppressing planetary defenses, and there are indeed strong similarities. There are differences- using nova cannon to suppress point defense against a planet is strongly advised against unless you want to turn said planet into molten vacuum desert- but the core principles are the same. Use of superior mobility and precision to achieve local superiority against an overall superior and more durable opponent, create a gap, and then use that gap to roll the whole thing up."
"Another similarity is that both operations become much harder when the target is supported by more mobile forces."
"Think back to the operation I described last lecture. Imagine all the ways a supporting Ork fleet could fuck it entirely up."

"Ork carriers could counter and intercept your own defense-suppression strikes, leaving the Moon fully maneuverable and with its heavy guns. The early phases require that you keep your gunline widely dispersed, to give them room to evade the Moon's super-heavy guns- this creates gaps that enemy wolfpacks can slip into and overwhelm isolated ships. Opposing battleships could protect the Moon from your torpedo destroyers. Your nova cannon carriers could be forced to re-target to protect themselves, allowing the Moon to launch its immense fighter swarms. The list goes on. And, of course, any attempts to deal with these things in the usual manner are complicated by the looming presence of the Assault Moon."

"And if you try to carry on with the plan, and can't- well, best case is that you are forced to retreat. Worst case is that you get stuck in bogged down, and then the Assault Moon annihilates you."

(cont.)

File: Farsight.jpg (83 KB, 511x898)

83 KB JPG

I wrote up the idea of the Tau trying to figure out how to engage in Glorious Melee Combat by going the Farsight method and building reactive armor that was suggested several threads ago.

http://pastebin.com/4ueVkqdZ

>>51906204
"Let me be very clear on this point. An Assault Moon may have less of a firepower-to-mass ratio than one of our battleships. This does not mean it lacks effective firepower. Because, just as Speed can be Armor, Defense can be Offence."
"What do I mean? It's quite simple. In a brawl between one of our fleets and an Assault Moon of equal mass, our own fleet with have greater overall firepower. But the Assault Moon will be more durable, and most importantly- our fleet will get attritioned down faster. Because each volley from our fleet will have to get through its Power Field to even begin to do damage, while each of its volleys will wreck ships, kill men- and reduce the overall power of the fleet. By the time the Power Fields come down, the fleet will have been savaged."
"This was very well demonstrated in the First Battle of Mors Galea, in 282.M37. One of the first Assault Moons built since the Beast. The techniques we use today hadn't been developed yet. The commanding sector admiral decided to go for close-range, high-velocity firing passes, with the entire fleet at his disposal, roughly the entire sector fleet."
"The attacking fleet was reduced by three-quarters, and the Assault Moon was barely even scratched."

"So, how do you fight an Assault Moon with its attending fleet?"
"The first option is simply to take even more forces than you normally would. Try and fend off the attacking fleets at the same time as you take down the Moon. Very risky, requiring much greater forces than otherwise and with more potential for things to go wrong."
"If you do this, you should try to bring enough forces to take down the Assault Moon in a straight assault. More than the combined mass of the escort fleet and the Moon itself is the general rule of thumb, but you may find yourself forced to make do with less.Probably will."
(cont.)

>>51906364
"In that sort of fight, the most important thing is to maintain cohesion and coordination. It's easy for things to dissolve into a swirling melee, with each captain and squadron focusing on whatever threat is getting in their face and neglecting the overall battle plan."
"If you let that happen, you will all die. Because a swirling melee, with targets in every direction and no chance of coordinated strikes, is where an Assault Moon /thrives/."
"More detailed coverage of this scenario will have to wait for the Case Studies part of the lecture series. For now, let us move on to the second option."

"That is to destroy the supporting fleet before engaging the Assault Moon itself."
"This is usually something to be done over the course of a campaign, not a battle. Hit-and-run raids. Ambushing parts of the supporting fleet while they're off raiding other things away from the Moon itself. Decoying the fleet into minefields and other traps. There are dozens of ways to do it, but the idea is to whittle down the supporting fleet in dozens of small engagements before moving in for the kill."

"Eldar ships are very useful for this purpose. With great stealth, high mobility, and the ability to use the Webway are ideal for this. In addition, Orks tend to hate Eldar for their refusal to be lured into chaotic brawls, and offering illusory chances to catch an Eldar ship in close combat or boarding action will often cause Ork fleets to fall out of formation as they race to close. The potential for ambush is obvious."
"Again, exact implementation is dependant on exact circumstances, so further discussion must wait for the Case Studies section."

"Either way, the ultimate takeaway is this: an Assault Moon with support is an order of magnitude more dangerous than an Assault Moon without. When setting out to kill one, therefore, your first move must be to remove this support."

(just barely cont.)

>>51906871
"Thank you, and see you tomorrow, where I will discuss all the horrible, horrible surprises the Assault Moon itself will have for you."

>++Conclude excerpt++

>>51906335
Pretty good. Throw it up on the wiki somewhere.

>>51906882
Looking damn fine.

>>51904122
I think it could be interesting if the Pheonix Lord hiveminds were slowly coalescing from collectives to more coherent identities over the course of Eldar, and then Imperial history. They would start off as in canon, but over millennia it seems reasonable that the persistent personalities within would cohere, and take on an almost folkloric life of their own after so many centuries of epic deeds across the galaxy. By the end of the dark millennium they could be pushing demigod power level, existing as a mantle of power that grew with the additions of new incarnations.

>>51903697
I also would steer away from adding donut steels into this AU.

Also Apharius and Omegon should not be confirmed as 2 Primarchs. Their nature should remain a mystery.

Steward never numbered the primarchs. Other people did that it's possible that the missing 2 and 11 are a paperwork error.

>>51909815
Maybe 2 and 11 literally got erased from history by an attack. Killed so hard they fell out of reality.

>>51904122
I would say that the main virtue of the Harlequins that should elevate their performance is the blessing of their god. They are unnaturally lucky.

Don't misunderstand. Even with out that they are still Space Marine levels of deadly but good ol' Ceggers dishes out the blessings to all of his disciples.

It's partly also how Ceggers stays in the mortal world and how he can remain hidden from the Chaos gods.

The less powerful he is the less effort it takes to remain in the real world. In the real world he is relatively safe because the big 4 can't just roll up to him in person and wreck his shit. Also operating at a much lower power level he doesn't shine out that brightly into the warp. Navigators, high level sanctioned psykers and the lens flare from the astronomican are all things he can now hide behind.

Khine is bound to the hearts of the craftworlds and encased in some sort of iron like substance. This gives him protection and he hides because none of the pieces are too big on the god scale of things.

Isha also dishes out the blessings quite generously to her servants and also has a husband who will, and has, gone to hell and back for her and can dish out a godly beating. Also the Custodian bodyguards.

Point is the Harlequins are devastating in battle because they keep getting gut feelings about when to duck, dive, dodge and dash that makes them dance around incoming fire.

Add to this eldar reflexes and ninja training.

>>51909527
And that might be where the Rhanda Dandra comes in. The point where the Phoenix Lords go from being nutters with a hive mind to having a stable personality developed from the perfect fusion of all the Eldar that have gone into their making. Just in time for the final battle and their possible last stand. That might be one reason why the Autarchs are so unconcerned about becoming Phoenix Lords, they know that something of their personality is going to be spat back up eventually.

>>51909815
>>51909877
That's why Krole and the Uxor would be the best candidates if we did have to name them. Plus, they at least have excuses for why Oscar would name them despite being women (Krole was a blank and there weren't too many of those around, the Uxor was more of a tactician than a front-line fighter and all her soldiers were men).

Alternatively, Oscar named 20 primarchs in his official announcement speech, but Malcador went "no, no, no, try again" until he removed the two Malcador didn't approve of. But that would be a fast ticket to resentment on the un-primarch's part and easy targets for Chaos.

>>51911357
In the case of both Krole and the Uxor it is the case that they both had talents that couldn't be duplicated or found in equivalent men either at all or without unreasonable effort.

The PLs might feature in one of the Starchild Prophesies. The Impossible Child is born, lives a life and at the end of it ascends to become a warp-god in his own right.

There are now 4 elder gods.

Impossible Child / Ynnead - The god of death and restraint and the antithesis of Slaanesh but both of eldar creation

Isha - Her connection as the healer binds her to Nurgle but where as he is all about holding something still in stagnation to preserve it she is about life and birth and death and rebirth.

Khine - The demi-god level PLs drag his broken metal asses to the forge of Mars, the Vaul-moon, and dump his pieces in a furnace and bash them together into their true shape and take back the Dawn Blade and shove it into his hand and point him at the warp and Khine goes to challenge Khorne for his throne of brass and bone. PLs are his demi-god children.

Ceggers - The Dark Carnival assembles, him and all of the Harlequins and his darker and stranger disciples and the deamons who switched sides. He's coming for Tzneetch. As a fellow schemer and prankster and librarian he knows all too well that the old snake can't be allowed to keep on pissing in the well of knowledge.

Malal is on nobodies side and will lash out at both if they try and touch him or get too close. Be'lakor is just going to sit this one out because he has no love for either side.

But that's just one prophesy. One among hundreds, all contradictory.

>>51894773
>>51894838
How about Ghost's Hand?

>>51911873
http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=ghost%20hand

Only if you want masturbation jokes.

>>51911501
Actually, a few threads back, I was going to mention that the way things seem to be going we seem to be setting up a 4 on 4 match of the "gods" of the Imperium versus their evil opposites for the End Times.

Emperor/Khorne - The Lord of War against the guy who was once literally known only as the Warlord. However, the difference between the two is like the one between Ares and Athena in Greek mythology. Although the Emperor has waged war more than any other mortal, he represents justice, moral righteousness, and fighting for a noble cause, traits that Khorne discarded long ago in the name of mindless slaughter.

Cegorach/Slaanesh - Both gods of pleasure in a sense, but one represents mindless hedonism and sensation versus the more "noble" ideals of happiness (base sensation does not necessarily equal happiness) and fun (pleasure for one versus pleasure for all). Not to mention out of all the gods Cegorach has the biggest desire for revenge against Slaanesh for what they did to the Eldar.

Isha/Nurgle - This one should be obvious. Both nature deities, one the goddess of fertility and growth and the other of pestilence and decay. Plus 60+ million years of payback. A battle between these two less resembles a convention fight and more resembles two ecosystems going to war.

Void Dragon/Tzeentch - Two gods of creation, one of unchecked, purposeless mutation, the other of directed, purposeful innovation. Both bat-shit insane and deceptive (even if they're on your side) and about as trustworthy as you can throw them.

It also fits with the theme we have goint of the remnants of three broken pantheons coming together to make their own little makshift family, one whose bonds are cemented by the coming of the literal god of rebirth to mark the beginnings of a new pantheon and age.

>>51902414
>Keep in mind this is a 'white-room' exercise
Assuming a spherical Assault Moon in a vacuum...

>>51911899
TAKE THE KNOT!

so i was thinking about getting back into the hobby after a long long time
how do allied detachments work??
and more precisely, could i put together an army of eldars, dark eldars and harlequins??

>>51913946
You do know this is the wrong thread to ask this.

>>51913946
In current canon, yes. In this AU, no.

File: download (1).jpg (15 KB, 186x271)

15 KB JPG

Wrote up a first draft of the Doom of Malan'tai following the idea outlined here >>51837320. Was wondering what people thought.

http://pastebin.com/BFQDP3h4

>>51914208
Before the Vect and Malys wedding there were a few Craftworlds that had dealings with the DEs.

Harlequins visited both.

So you could earlier in the timeline

>>51910224
Harlequins do sound a lot like agility is one of their main features. Not that they aren't powerful in their own right, but their ability to avoid getting hit means they can take on foes far above their power level and survive or even win. Kind of like Spider-Man in the Marvel Universe.

Wrote this up in relation to something else, thought I'd post it before starting in on Shah-Dome.

Scions of the Old Helm, Khorne's elite military cult of pre-fall Eldar warriors and guardians turned to him in its wake. They earned their place in his favor when in the fall he watched them turn their ships inward to the great debauchery and slaughter their kin as the writhed together in the filth of Slaanesh, cut down mad sorcerous seers as they exalted the ever changing glory of the expanding eye, and harried and hounded the clinging sycophants all about Isha as Nurgle dragged her down into the garden. They warred through the Shah-dome's upper surfaces, brought continent shattering climax to the mounting hells on the empire's worlds as the washed in immaterial miasma, and shredded the webway within the Eye, spilling pocket universal redoubs into the eye's cloying nebula. He granted them his mark and blessing, and in time since they have proven their worthiness of his esteem as terrors among even the worst heavies of Chaos. The forces of this ancient military cult have made particular efforts to drag the remains of Khaine into Khorne's domain, but their legacy of horrific, bloody war has been felt in every corner of the Galaxy.

>>51914721
Sweet. Also adds some much needed division into the forces of the Chaos Elder itself

>>51914427
That's pretty fucking awesome and a great introduction to the first sighting of the zoanthropes.

My only quibble is that the Shadow in the Warp doesn't seem to do much to the Webway. Prince Yriel managed to march half a million soldier through the webway during a 'Nid invasion.

>>51915657
Isn't that the point of the Webway? It's insulated and walled off from the rest of the Warp so you're shielded from all the nastiness and shenanigans usually associated with Warp travel.

>>51916240
My point was that in the story reinforcements were cut off from the webway due to the Shadow in the Warp

>>51915657
>>51916240
>>51917048
Writefag here, I goofed up with the SITW and the Webway. I tried to look up what the canonical interactions between the Shadow in the Warp and Webway in canon, and there was a bunch of debate that suggested it did shut it down, but no canonical statement either way. I'm glad we have canon precedent for Webway within the Shadow in the Warp in this AU, as it makes the flow of the story much more sensible (i.e. where did reinforcements and the possibility of escape come from).

Honestly, if any FTL is going to work with the Shadow in the Warp, it's going to be the Webway or the Necron's inertialess drive, followed by those shitty Diasporex engines. Despite being metaphysical Webway is supposed to be at least partly technological, whereas activating Warp drive seems to involve bullying your way past the hive mind.

>>51917352
The inertialess drives of the necrons should be limited to only the FUCK HUEJ of their ships. The whole true FTL thing is a big brown trousers moment in 40k because it's not just a thing that should not be, they already have enough of that, but that it is a mundane thing that should not be.

Smaller ships can use dolman gates and breach the webway. But because of their shitty ability to navigate it it's slow as shit because they have to keep coming to the surface to see if they are going in right direction.

FTL ship turns up and it's bad news. For a grasp of the scale Nemensor Zahndrehk, the Imperium's most reliable ally among the Necrons, has 1 ship capable of FTL.

>>51917722
>For a grasp of the scale Nemensor Zahndrehk, the Imperium's most reliable ally among the Necrons, has 1 ship capable of FTL.
On the other hand, their second best Necron contact is Trayzn, and its hard to evaluate how many FTL capable vehicles he might have.

>>51844679
I bet this is how Trayzn gets into the Ganymede vaults

>>51918052
Trazyn controls literally one habitable planet. Of course how many FTL ships do you have is not the same thing as how many FTL ships you can reliably steal in a short period of time.

And yes, I agree with only capital ships having inertialess drives. Everyone else either has to hitch a ride or use a Dolmen Gate.

>>51918104
Trayzn has not got into the Ganymede vaults. Yet.

He want to but if he does anything too brazen and obvious then the Imperium will loose patience with him and nuke his planet. Some of the shit in the Ganymede Vaults is holy shit Forgotten Apocalypse high end Keter class levels of but fuckery.

War against Trayzn would be overly costly but if the alternative is letting him pilfer the ohgodwhat box then he would have to die and damn the expense.

Added Mont'kau Battlesuits, How to Kill an Attack Moon (Episode II: The Orks Strike Back), Scions of the Old Heml, and the Doom of Malan'tai (changed to account for Tar-Etenil to account for Halathel being too damn important for the rest of the Imperium to ignore, and Webway gates working in the Shadow in the Warp) to the wiki.

Can add minor xenos races blurb from >>51893022 if people think it's okay and Cronedar's Flying Dutchman from >>51894380 once we get the power levels straightened out and think of a good name for it that isn't a straight reference or a masturbation joke.

>>51908963
Thank you!

>>51906882
>++Excerpt from a lecture series given by Sky Marshal Nigel Iger at Bakka Naval Officers' Acadamy, 867.M41++
>++"How to kill an Assault Moon"++

"Even once you've cleared out the attending fleets, an Assault Moon will hardly sit passively while you destroy it. A counter-attack of some sort is inevitable, and you must be prepared to weather it."

"First, consider the Moon's fighter complement. The previous white-room exercise presumed it did not launch any of its small craft before nova cannon range was achieved; this is almost never the actual case."
"This is not an insurmountable problem. While frying the enemy fighters as they launch is the ideal, they do not magically become immune to nova cannon once in open space. Further, the rate at which an Assault Moon can prepare and launch fighters is often limited, so enemy fighter strikes will naturally separate into staggered waves that can be taken one at a time."
"Make no mistake, once the fighters have launched the nova cannon will not kill all of them. Maybe not even most of them, depending on how fast and far they disperse. However, if they want to survive they will have to disperse widely, meaning they will attack piecemeal in small, ragged groups. Such attacks can be easily dealt with by adopting a tight, mutually-supporting defense formation."
"But- and there is always another wrinkle- adopting such a formation will leave you vulnerable to the Moon's super-heavy guns, while the open formation and independent maneuvering needed to evade those guns exposes individual ships to getting swarmed under, even by a disorganized and ragged attack."
"You can use your carriers to defend the fleet while still keeping an open formation. But, deck space dedicated to interceptors and space-superiority fighters is deck space not dedicated to bombers that can strike at the Moon itself."
(cont.)

>>51920221
"Frigate and destroyer squadrons can also be used to defend other ships while remaining mobile enough to not be hit by the big guns, but can be vulnerable to being swarmed under themselves."
"Ultimately, there are no perfect solutions. You just have to decide what tradeoffs you want to make, and accept that no matter what you do, people are going to do."

"Beyond that, the exact capabilities of Assault Moons vary widely, according to the personal tastes of the Big Meks constructing it. However, one thing they all have in common is teleporters. And that means teleporter assaults."
"Defending against a teleporter assault is different from other aspects of naval warfare, because it's not really naval combat, it's ground combat. Success or failure is determined by the quality of armsmen and layout of internal defenses, both of which are determined before battle is joined. As naval officers, there's not a whole lot you can do, unless you happen to be on the Internal Security track."
"Not much, however, is not nothing. The key here is to identify which ships are most important to your battle plan, which ships the Orks are most likely to attack, and to shift your armsmen around to defend those most heavily. Be prepared to launch counter-boarding actions in support of attacked ships at a moment's notice. Everybody in the fleet should know that teleporter assault is virtually inevitable, and be prepared for it. Close coordination with Astartes elements is vital here."
"Now, the ships that are most vital to the plan will most often be the nova cannon carriers. Why should be obvious from all the different contexts they've popped up in through these lectures. Fighter suppression, defense suppression; these are the difference between victory and death, and while it's not actually impossible without nova cannon, it becomes much harder."
(cont.)

>>51920530
*people are going to die
not do

"And no Warboss with an Assault Moon at his disposal is stupid. Most often, it is the nova cannons that will come under heaviest attack. Reinforce the armsmen on those ships heavily."

"Third, psychic attack. This is less inevitable than teleporter assault, but still common. Any Waaagh with an Assault Moon will be very large, and consequently have a lot of psychic power behind it- which can be channeled into psychic attacks. And while it is possible their weirdboys will get it catastrophically wrong and the Moon will immolate itself in green fire- don't bet on it."
"Ork psykery is less about weird headfuckery and more about raw, destructive power, a fact that should surprise absolutely nobody. True fleet-killing magics is thankfully orders of magnitude rarer than even Assault Moons, but you can still expect green lightning to periodically destroy individual ships or, sometimes, entire squadrons. Fortunately, psykers are hard to aim, so targeting is semi-random. You will not see them singling out flagships, nova cannons, carriers, or whatever ships are most vital to your battle plan at the moment."
"Mostly. Orks. Expect variation, if nothing else."

"Defense against psychic attack occurs on the psychic plane, so the defense is simple- bring lots of combat psykers. If you are fortunate enough to have a selection, brings ones specialized in counterspelling. I'm informed that, if you're subtle and skilled enough, you can disrupt a psychic attack with much less energy than it takes to launch it, even kill a psyker through his own workings. Eldar are supposed to be good at this."
"Again, once battle is joined there's not much you can do to affect the outcome in this arena. Either what you've brought is sufficient or it isn't, and all you can do is hope."

(cont.)

>>51920823
"Even in the hands of a genius, Assault Moons are not terribly capable of tactical subtlety. Past what I've already discussed, most surprises are going to be matters of mechanical variation. Aside from the normal variations in weapons, armor, engines, etc. many have some sort of unique specialist system or weapon."
"My personal experience includes a lightning-field point defense system that destroyed any fighters or torpedoes within its area of effect. Completely prevented the usual first wave of pinpoint strikes until a teleport assault by Astartes was able to sabotage the weapon- which took a week and delayed the attack long enough for the Moon to be reinforced and launch its own assault on a nearby planet."
"Other examples in the historical record include an engine turbocharge system that enabled brief spurts of acceleration on par with a frigate, a set of massively oversized Power Klaws apparently intended for close combat with tyranid Hive Ships, a spinal weapon similar to a nova cannon of utterly staggering size, and more."
"A full accounting of all the odd customizations made to Assault Moons would occupy an entire lecture by itself. Giving general advice on how to counter these unique weapons would be impossible- as each one is unique, each one requires unique tactics to counter."
"These devices are usually large and distinctive enough to be obvious, so the fact that they have /something/ up there sleeve is not itself a surprise. Exact function and power can be guessed at. Ultimately, however, in order to know exact capabilities you must see the device in action."
"This is not difficult. Any Ork in control of such a weapon will use it at every possible opportunity; goading them into demonstrating it for you is often trivial."

"From there- well. Given the variety of enemies we face, an officer of the Imperial Navy must be flexible."

(just barely cont. again)

>>51921227
"Thank you, and see you tomorrow, where I will discuss ways of killing Assault Moons that do not consist of throwing more nova cannon at them."

>++Conclude excerpt++

>>51921253
Good stuff so far, I like the lecture style of the entries and they seem well thought out. Some thoughts below:

One thing that seems to be missing is the discussion of range. In most depictions of 40k naval combat, such as Battlefleet Gothic, ork ship weapons are extremely short ranged, but since the idea of an arbitrary range in a vacuum is pretty silly, it could be that "range" is really referring to the shot variance for a given weapon determined by its inherent attributes such as accuracy of machining. So as a target moves towards the end of a weapon's effective range, the margin of error grows until its essentially randomly flinging attacks in the target's general direction, where we would say the target is "out of range."

This way, we can be faithful to canon depictions of naval combat but still have have good reason for orks to have short range weapons, since their guns are shoddily and inconsistently constructed whereas Imperial armaments are much better quality.

Given this, it seems that an Imperial fleet would really want to exploit the range and mobility advantage of their ships to kite ork fleets, perhaps taking advantage of ork captains' blood thirstiness and preference for ramming to draw them out of position and them destroy them piecemeal. Also, since orks weapons are so inaccurate and rely of volume of fire, Imperials could probably try to draw ork ships into their own fields of fire.

As a secondary point, teleporters are blocked by Void Shields, so it seems like it would be pretty easy to prioritize armsmen reinforcements mid-battle, keep a running list of ships with shields down and divert troops to the most important ones.

File: IMG_0322.jpg (51 KB, 540x386)

51 KB JPG

>>51920169
>Crone Eldar
>not masturbation joke
They are mainly Slanneshi you know? Hack even GW got away with shit like Nobz and Gargent.

>>51921663
>teleporters are blocked by Void Shields
Forgot about that. Anyway, I did talk about range in the first lecture; ships remain at long range, beyond Ork ability to effectively target, while battering down the Power Fields, then move in closer once the guns are mostly suppressed to be able to target individual subsystems and specific weak points.

>>51920169
I thought the power level was nicely vague when I was writing it.

>>51922388
Some were suggesting it sounded like it was Necron World Engine level power. Vagueness is all well and good (particularly when writing a phantom ship), and it's a good idea, but having as powerful as one of the big guns of the major four factions seems a bit overkill.

Though going back and reading it, it doesn't quite sound Necron World Engine-y in terms of power.

>>51922595
I was envisioning it as a sector-level threat, capable of trashing planets in days and taking on entire fleets. Not World Engine level, but it's something the Emperor is briefed on every time it shows back up.
Actually, I was thinking of the closest analogue being an Assault Moon, inverted. Precise, long-range weaponry to a Moon's wild sprays of fire, fast to its slow, (relatively) fragile to its ludicrously tanky. Maybe worth two or three Assault Moons.

>>51922262
Ah, you did mention range a couple times, my mistake. Not necessarily disagreeing with your points, just adding a bit of detail.

Though, it seemed to me that there was the implication that the Assault Moon would be shooting back, and while that's certainly the case, my point is that the Imperial forces should be (optimally) be at a range where the probability of being hit is miniscule, given the vastness of the engagement ranges. Even if every surface of an Assault Moon is covered in guns, you're engaging at distances in the tens or hundreds of thousands of kilometers, where an individual ship would be a pinprick.

Couple that with the facts that an Assault Moon is a huge target, orks use pretty much exclusively kinetic weapons where travel time needs to be accounted for, and Imperials get the benefit of lance weapons that are instantaneous, a well coordinated Imperial fleet should be able to bombard an isolated Assault Moon with impunity, no moving close and its associated risk required.

>>51922762
The way I envision it, they do start off at ranges where Ork hits are nearly impossible. However, dealing serious damage to an Assault Moon, the sort of damage you need to actually kill it, requires /precision/, not just hits. Time-on-target barrages to the seams between hull plates, placing shots straight down fighter launch bays, full broadsides concentrated at a single square meter. And doing that means getting in close (at least by Imperial standards), to ranges where Ork weapons can start hitting. You will note the emphasis I give to suppressing the enemy's weapons- the first thing targeted is the enemy's weapons, stop them from shooting back as soon as possible.
Besides, if I recall correctly, don't the Orks (at least, Orks at the level of having an Assault Moon) have some sort of lance-equivalent gravity weapon? I vaguely recall that.
Also, some projectile weapons do get very, very fast; I think nova cannon are like 90% lightspeed.
So Orks can have weapons that match Imperial ships in range, and an Assault Moon definitely would. So 'long range' is in relation to /those/ weapons, and they start moving in closer after those weapons have been suppressed.

>>51922747
Me gusta. I like this idea.

>>51922991
Yeah. Gravity whips. Not sure how they exactly work (Are they some kind of beam or are they a literal whip that distorts gravity as it passes through space? The latter seems orkier but I dunno) but they can hit outright kill multiple ships in a single shot. Thing is either if they use them too much they burn out the void shield or they have to drop them before throwing the gravity around.

Gravity manipulation and teleportation seem to be the Orks' hat when they decide to get serious. Like gauss weapons and the Necrons or mono-molecular structures and the Eldar.

File: tumblr_nlrir3GYiX1tm4rvqo(...).jpg (333 KB, 1080x1920)

333 KB JPG

>>51887441
>>51888888
>>51892550

>Lofn/LCB related things


>next pics

>aco/thread/1203194#p1211537
>aco/thread/1203194#p1211537
>aco/thread/1203194#p1211604
>aco/thread/1203194#p1211610

>>51923906
Orks take a look at what everyone else is doing and try to make one of those, but orkier.

So I'm seeing the Assault Moons as something that very rarely turns up as in one or two per Black Crusade level event but they have to keep training people how to kill them because when they do turn up their destructive capability makes up for their scarcity.

They should be the Ork answer to Erebus' Planet Killer. Obviously nowhere near as stupidly powerful but they can build more of them.

Page 9 bump with filk

Also if there are no limits to the chapters in terms of numbers then they would, and it seems are, divided mostly due to distance and isolation rather than for legal reasons.

But with no hard numbers cap the only thing stopping the ones with Hive worlds from recruiting tens of thousands strong Chapters is the cost in equipping and arming them all.

So my question is this.

As a whole are there more or less Space Marines in this Nobledarkness?

>>51928408
And like a retard I forgot the filk.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=424ZIx-mx_U

>>51927131
I think the idea is also that attack moons were around during the WotB, disappeared for a few millenia, and now have started gradually cropping back up in greater numbers. Like there was the first re-emergence of them in M37, and since then more have been showing up. Not a lot, because it requires converting a literal planetoid, but enough that it's getting worrisome by M41.

>>51928408
Dunno. Grey Knights have 3000-7000 Astartes. Templars have quite a bit but they don't follow the codex. The Imperium isn't picking stupid fights in this timeline so like the Eldae there's quite a bit less attrition. On the other hand marines can and do get shuffled between chapters when necessary. We've never even discussed how closely Guilliman's codex follows the original, and beyond some limit on chapter size (having seen what happened to the Dark Angels, as well as what happened after the WotB when Lion gave Chapter Masters more power), nothing is really in stone.

>>51928717
So we still going with the ~1,000 battle-brother per chapter? In universe reasons could be "Guilliman's Big Book of War said it was an optimal amount", "Lion El Jonson broke what was left of his Legion into groups of this size based on the old Franjic knightly orders" and it just seems to hit an optimal balance of numbers and supply limits.

This does though beg the question

Can there be more than one chapter housed and drawing from a particularly populous and prosperous world? Could lead to many in-universe friendships and rivalries. Iron Warrior garrison on Hive Secundus of Necromunda is both with the Imperial Fists fortress of Hive Primus. They have inter-chapter contests

On the subject of which with the Iron Cage incindent not happening to the Imperial Fists and the Empire's/Terra's Children not having a the right mentality to found it the Feast of Blades is still looking for a chapter to adopt it as a celebration.

I'm going to suggest the Dark Angels and associated Knightly Orders. Dark Angels are all about remaining in touch (and observed and accountable) so the Feast of Blades could be one of their gatherings.

Unlike the Vanilla where it is a solemn and dour event full of joyless children of Dorn this time it has television crews broadcasting it across whatever system it is being housed on live but for light speed delays to the general populace and recordings of the proceedings made and shipped on disc across the Imperium.

Also it was made a more open event back in late M33. The Dark Angels are all about transparency and some of the more radical/puritan/arseholeish Inquisitors were suspecting them of some sort of Khornate ritual. Now other chapters outside of the Dark Angels progeny are invited to spectate and take part. There's even someone selling hotdogs. It's Cypher.

>>51929237
Knowing Guilliman in this timeline, it's probably more "1,000 is the number you should aim for. It doesn't have to be that, but it should be close. If you get close to 2,000 you should probably think about making a successor chapter".

Also, closer ties between brother chapters (ala the canon Dark Angels, only not heretical) and Last Wall-esque policies are near universal. No legions entirely turned to Chaos in the War of the Beast (one could argue the Dark Angels, but in retrospect the reasons why were obvious), so the Imperium isn't nearly as paranoid about Space Marines, Space Marines don't see themselves as ubermensch, chapter split was more for reasons of logistics than anything else. Codex was designed for periods of relative peace when threats were spread out, when something big threatens the Imperium like another War of the Beast Guilliman probably wrote throw the Codex out the window, join up with your brother chapters, figure out whose going to be in charge, and march as a legion once more. Dorn could have even suggested the idea.

>Can there be more than one chapter housed and drawing from a particularly populous and prosperous world? Could lead to many in-universe friendships and rivalries. Iron Warrior garrison on Hive Secundus of Necromunda is both with the Imperial Fists fortress of Hive Primus. They have inter-chapter contests

I like this idea. I also like the idea below that at least some of the contests were started by the heavily knight-inspired Dark Angels.

>>51927131
>>51928717
I was thinking that by 999.M41 they've grown to be about a once-a-century occurrence on average, with frequency slowly growing over time. Total of twenty to thirty since the WotB.

>>51930171
Yeah, it was suggested last thread that because the breaking of the legions was voluntary, the First Founding Chapter Masters have the right to call for a Reformation of the Legion where the successors fight under the banner of the united legion. It's all voluntary, but it would be a pretty huge dick move for a successor not to answer the call, since it only happens during Black Crusade level events.

>>51931276
that growth would go along with the reemergence of interstellar Ork civilizations with sufficient industrial capacity to make them, and then the appearance of brain boyz.

>>51928408
>>51928717
>>51929237
>>51930171
>>51931309
fwiw, I mostly remember the splitting of the legions to be for logistical reasons more than anything else. Nobody other than the Primarchs really had sufficient skill, knowledge or standing in each legion to run the thing, and it's likely that even the would-be Chapter Masters would've seen themselves unworthy to do so. I'd imagine there was this brief period of relative anarchy and chaos, where chapter size varied from "basically a legion" to "a strike cruiser with a skeleton crew", before girlyman in his infinite quartermasterliness stepped forward and wrote the Codex "Stop Being Fucking Retardstes" to standardise things.

>>51929237
Speaking of Dark Angels, it dawned on me the other day why the Dark Angels changed their chapter/legion colors after the War of the Beast. Some legions changed their colors for a variety of reasons. For example, the War Hounds changed their color scheme early on from white and blue to red and gold (NOT BRASS) when they realized that having a legion that prefers close combat dress primarily in white made them look stupid, as their armor inevitably got blood-spattered and it made them look like bloodthirsty maniacs instead of the professional soldiers they were.

The Dark Angels changed their colors from solid black to very dark green and black because after the War of the Beast the majority of the Dark Angels had sided with the Ruinous Powers, and the first instinct for most people upon seeing someone dressed in the old Dark Angels livery would be to think it’s a Fallen and shoot them on sight. Some legions changed their colors out of pride, practice, or practicality. Loyalist Dark Angels did it to avoid being team-killed.

There’s also a bit of symbolism in there. Lion gave the Dark Angels their color after a national hero of Franj. After the War of the Beast, he probably didn’t think he and his legion deserved to wear those colors anymore.

So with all that said are there more than the Vanilla ~1,000,000 space marine in total?

Given the increased threats to the Imperium, the increased internal stability, the lack of stupid unreasonable little wars, the Codex being a helpful guide rather than hard brakes and the lack of religious reverence of the astartes I can see there being a shit load more than 1 million of them in the entire Imperium. Also with a million worlds GW can not into numbers.

10 million at least maybe?

Compared to the double digit quadrillions of Imperial citizens it's still a vanishingly small number.

>>51934270
I think there were something like 3 million Astartes in the Great Crusade, but then the Heresy happened and the Imperium was left with its current numbers of around 1 million. So, with that not happening and assuming Mk. III MP is easier to produce than canon geneseed, 10 million seems like a reasonable number.

>>51933169
The previous threads had the Codex written before splitting the legions became common. Guilliman wrote the Codex as a thought exercise as to how the legions could be organized in a galaxy at relative peace, but never tried to cram it down people's throats. Though I can imagine he probably told the panicking primarchless chapters "you know, I thought about some guidelines that might help".

Actually, who would be in a position to have to deal with splitting the legions before the Codex Astartes. Kharn and Abbadon kept their legions together until they died. Lion already split his into chapters. Blood Angels maybe, but the 1d4chan page says they already decided among themselves to split up.

Maybe move the date of the Codex. It would have to be after WotB but before first Black Crusade (when Lion and Dorn went).

>>51934331
Or maybe the reams and reams of notes and helpful suggestions that Guilliman wrote down over his lifetime were never codified until after his death.

There was in the early days no single codex to adhere to, just various notes and ever changing but helpful suggestions.

File: this is sparta.gif (3.76 MB, 480x270)

3.76 MB GIF

>>51932421
And better teleporters. Orkimedes was probably born much earlier in this timeline. The Imperials first clue the Brain Boyz existed was probably something like when a kill team of nobs reliably teleported a solid kilometer within the Imperium's back lines like a Terminator squad and wreaked havoc.

Speaking of which, since this is the War of the Beast, is the Beast still going to try to send fake diplomats to Earth to try to torment Oscar (possibly taunting him over his "civilizedness" and how "civilized people don't touch diplomats"). Because I would love to see an Ork diplomat try to shit-talk Oscar "Mouth of Sauron" style with false diplomacy and get to see Oscar's famous "turn an ambassador into a form whose contents could easily fit into a paper cup" party trick.

>>51934547
It was said in previous threads he did write one codex for general organization, the one that became that Codex, but at the time it was nothing special.

Guilliman also died after the death or disappearance of Sanguinius, Dorn, Horus and Abbadon, Lorgar, Lion, and Russ at the very least (he also outlived Angron, but Kharn probably survived Guilliman). That's one-third of the legions existing without a primarch or equivalent, in some cases for more than a millennium. Someone would have had to step in.

To try to get the thread back on the topic of xenos and other non-human beings, I was writing some blurbs for the three major "mortal" players of Chaos for the 1d4chan page since they don't have full entries yet. Here is the one for Be'lakor, which turned out a bit longer than I'd hoped.

Be'lakor - The last of the Old Ones. The result of early Old One experimentation into the apotheosis of physical beings in the Warp, he is incensed that he "merely" reached daemon princedom, making him subservient to the Chaos Gods, who he sees as experimental artificial constructs akin to A.I. that have gone far beyond their station. Be'lakor serves the Chaos Gods, but he is not loyal to them, and has his own goals in mind. Be'lakor is old, one of the oldest beings in the galaxy, older than even the Chaos Gods. He remembers when Earth was inhabited by beings like him, and the forefathers of mankind were little more than rats that scurried beneath their toes. He remembers the Eldar before they were uplifted, and their pitched battles against the original Mon-Keigh. A great many mysteries of the galaxy could be solved if Be'lakor shared his wisdom. However, he does not, because he is cruel and capricious, and because his knowledge of things everyone else has forgotten is his greatest asset. Indeed, the fact that Be'lakor even exists was only discovered by the Imperium after much blood, sweat, and tears. Be’lakor’s followers almost universally worship Chaos Undivided or come from the Chaos Wastes. Although his followers tend to be fewer in number, they tend to make up for it by being more stable.

>>51934738
So who owns the Soul Forge in the Nobledarkness?

It was mentioned that the god and godlike entities are squaring off against their nearest counterparts. Void Dragon should be the one who takes on the Forge. To the horror of Bonesinger and Tech-priest alike he become the Omnissiah/Vaul.

Now they can NOPE.jpg together rather than REEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!!!!!ing.

>>51934316
So are there still 3 million marines maintained into the Nobledark M41 or more or less?

File: Void Dragon's reaction to Vaul.jpg (201 KB, 382x400)

201 KB JPG

>>51936251
Believe it or not, I had actually put some thought into how a freed (assumedly pro-Imperium) Void Dragon might be able to exist in a post-End Times without the Eldar starting the War in Heaven 3.0. And the answer is surprising simple: Vaul. The Void Dragon doesn’t hold any intrinsic ill will towards the Eldar and their gods (indeed, that seems to be more a Necron thing than a C’tan thing), and that’s largely due to Cegorach and Vaul. The Void Dragon is all about creation, invention, and innovation for its own sake, with little thought to the consequences. The reason it likes Vaul? It saw their famous battle less as a duel to the death, and more as two fellow inventor deities showing off and testing out their creations on one another, and wants to do it again.

Keep in mind that Vaul did not share the same sentiment about this (taking the battle as serious as it was). Nor was this a case of the Void Dragon being so powerful Vaul could not hurt him. Despite officially being a draw, the Void Dragon was beaten bloody by the encounter, and it was the closest he ever came to death before his brethren ganged up on him. The fact that he is actually excited about the prospect of doing this again should tell you volumes about the Void Dragon’s mindset.

If the Void Dragon ever saw the Eldar again, it would probably be giddy to see “Vaul’s People”, and excitedly ask where Vaul is. He would be devastated to find out what happened. Also mentioning the whole “chained to an anvil” thing would be a bad idea. Despite the fact that Vaul had no love for the Void Dragon, his actions may have won the Eldar a new (unwanted) replacement. Even though the AdMech may be his favorites, the Void Dragon doesn’t mind expanding his worshipper base.

Just a heads up, Angron's bio is currently pretty much just a shell even with the assorted related writefaggotry that's been done, so I intend to do a write up in the coming days when I have time.

>>51921253
>++Excerpt from a lecture series given by Sky Marshal Nigel Iger at Bakka Naval Officers' Acadamy, 867.M41++
>++"How to kill an Assault Moon"++

"An Assault Moon is many things. It is massive. It is massively shielded. It is massively armored. It is massively armed. It carries massive amounts of troops, and the means to deploy them. It often has massive manufacturing capabilities, to support those massive amounts of troops, as well as its massive fighter wings and massive escort fleets. Some of them are even capable of acting as full shipyards. All of this requires massive energy generation- which it also has."
"An Assault Moon is also Ork construction, which means if you hit it right, all of these things can be induced to explode. Massively."

"Beyond the full-dress naval assault the previous lectures have described, methods of killing an Assault Moon mainly resolve into various types of boarding action. This is almost invariably a teleport assault, as trying to attack an Assault Moon with boarding pods is an exercise in futility. Eldar assault forces can be sufficiently stealthy to board in such a manner, but not human ones. There are two recorded instances of that being attempted in the War of the Beast; both were entirely unsuccessful."
"The obvious choice for such an assault is Astartes, but Assassins and Sisters of Battle have also been used."
"Whatever the force, more is better. Full Chapter strength or better is recommended; Assault Moons are massive targets with massive crews, and sometimes have formidable internal defenses. This is most common on Assault Moons which anticipate fighting with Tyranids."

"Once the assault is launched, your ability to influence its success or failure is limited. What you can do is stack the deck as far as you possibly can before you strike."
(cont.)

>>51939342
"One thing you should try to do in this scenario is attack the Assault Moon while it is in the process of assaulting a planet. Then, the vast majority of its crew will be on the ground participating in the attack, leaving the decks relatively clear."

"Before the attack begins, every effort should also be made to obtain as much information about the interior layout of the Moon as possible. Of course, 'as much as possible' often winds up being 'nothing,' but there are ways. The Mechanicus has a few gravimetric sensors capable of resolving major structural features; combined with the specialized sensor/anti-stealth shells some nova cannon can be equipped with, a surprisingly detailed internal map can be assembled."
"Psychic interrogation is another possibility; abduct an Ork who has been on board the Moon and rip his brains out. Done repeatedly, and a complete map can be assembled. This is an Inquisitorial operation, specifically Ordo Xenos; although there are other organizations hypothetically capable of doing so, none have better chances of success."

"Inserting infiltrators ahead of the main assault group is another possible strategy, but has its own problems. First, unless you have some other means of getting them on board, you'll have to use teleporters, which means your plan just expanded to having two separate teleporter assaults, separated in time. Then there's the problem of how they'll report their findings; having them rendevous with the main assault team when they teleport aboard is possible, but not ideal. Psychic communication is possible, there are a few uncommon pieces of technosorcery the Mechanicus has, but as usual there are no perfect solutions."
"The ideal operative for this is an Imperial Assassin. They often have access to stealth shuttles that can get them in, or can sneak about the Ork's own transport shuttles."

(cont.)

>>51939820
"The capabilities of the teleporters available to you must also be considered. Range can vary dramatically depending on any number of factors, as can capacity. Obviously, you want long-range high-capacity teleporters. The shorter the possible range, the further into the Assault Moon's fire envelope it has to go before you can launch the assault. The smaller the capacity, the longer it takes to get the entire assault force over. If possible, get vehicle-scale teleporters; Assault Moons are large enough to warrant the use of tanks in the corridors."
"If you don't have teleporters capable of projecting the assault force over from outside the Moon's range entirely, the next best thing is generally to use reflex-shielded vessels which are capable of avoiding detection."

"Once the attack is underway, you can still use the teleporters to provide support and mobility. Evacuating squads that are about to be overwhelmed, moving forces past obstructions and bottlenecks, that sort of thing. There are risks involved, as there are with all warp technology, but they can be mitigated by skilled operators and a knowledge of the limits of the technology. And Assault Moons are dangerous enough to justify the risk."

"It is unlikely that even a full Chapter assault force, armed with demolition atomics, will be able to completely destroy an Assault Moon. They're simply too big, too heavily armored, too many internal partitions, too many redundancies. It's certainly /possible/, if a catastrophic reactor containment failure can be arranged, but unlikely. What they can do is cripple it. Destroy engines, destroy guns, destroy magazines, destroy reactors, destroy hangars, destroy shield generators. Leave it drifting, defenseless, unable to defend itself or strike back. Then its final destruction will be trivial."

(cont.)

>>51940379
"There are a few other options, but these are highly situational and dependent on exact circumstances. The acts of a tactical genius, rather than standard operating procedure. Thus, these shall be covered in the case studies."

"A final word: Exterminatus weapons. An Assault Moon certainly seems a worthy target for them. However, there are countervailing factors."
"First: Exterminatus weapons are rare and expensive."
"Second: Exterminatus weapons are generally intended for use against planets, and are optimized for this task. Incineratus torpedoes work by generating massive volcanic and tectonic activity, while Cyclonic torpedoes operate by superheating the atmosphere until it is blown entirely off. Against an Assault Moon, both would certainly do damage, but not enough to justify the cost. Virus bombs are occasionally used in boarding actions, but the compartmentalized and redundant nature of Assault Moons limits the effect. Also, it makes any breach in the armor instantly fatal, so most Astartes chapters really, really don't like it."

"Ultimately, there's just really no ideal way to kill an Assault Moon. Just less bad ones."

"Thank you, and see you tomorrow, where I will talk about the strategic implications of Assault Moons."

>++Conclude excerpt++

>>51937310
Possibly more. I assume Mk. III MP is easier to produce than canon geneseed, because it's not tied to the Primarchs.

>>51937429
Pretty interesting. I feel that the Void Dragon is developing into an almost trickster-figure; he certainly seems to enjoy screwing with the Mechanicus. My mental image of him is actually a lot like Coyote from Gunnerkrigg Court when he's being expansive; massive and coiling and cackling like a madman.

>>51941306
I actually have a lot of ideas on the Void Dragon's design and rather blue and orange morality and thought process. I just don't post them because people wouldn't enjoy a bunch of Void Dragon shitposting and because the ambiguity surrounding the Void Dragon is a big part of his character.

Contra canon, where he's not even talking, Void Dragon is definitely among the top ten Biggest Dicks in the Universe in this timeline, along with the likes of Eldrad, Cegorach, Tzeentch, Vect, CREEEED, and the Deciever. However, given that he got tricked by Cegorach, he's automatically disqualified from the top spot by default. Though tricking a bunch of short-tempered Mechanicus adepts is different from the kind of trickery the others pull off.

File: death star briefing.jpg (202 KB, 1437x612)

202 KB JPG

>>51939342
>How to Destroy an Attack Moon
>How to Destroy an Attack Moon: The Orks Strike Back
>How to Destroy an Attack Moon: Revenge of the Orks
>How to Destroy an Attack Moon: The Orks Awaken

Goddamnit man, I'm running out of tasteful ork-based Star Wars-themed subtitles to append to these sections (since this is all about a lecture on how to destroy a heavily armed pseudo-planet).

File: Nightbringer in action.gif (7.05 MB, 480x270)

7.05 MB GIF

>>51841758
>>51841855

You know, another good way to distinguish them is that the Nightbringer might still be looking for his scythe, which IIRC Khaine threw into the Warp during the War in Heaven.

IIRC, the Nightbringer's scythe was a pretty important part of him (either as a damn good weapon or a shard). The Nightbringer might have a general idea where his scythe might be, but he's not as good as using the warp as a pure warp god like the four usual suspects or the Eldar gods, so he's bumbling around a bit trying to find it. This may be one reason he's acting mostly through vampires rather than picking up the deathstick and doing the job himself like he wants to.

Though I've heard other fluff say the scythe thing is more symbolic, and he does have it when his mega-shard gets released in Nightbringer.

>>51940864
>strategic implications of Assault Moons
Does this ultimately depend on the state of wider Orkdom? I imagine this discussion would have to hinge on understanding the wider war-making capacity the Ork dominion in opposition, even in trying to deal with just the use of the assault moon.

>>51941692
Don't worry, just two more to go. Unless I think of another idea while I'm writing.

>>51943558
I was thinking more on the sector/theater level, but now that you mention it I'll think of something to say on the matter.

>>51938045
As the one that did the Angron shell I say go for it.

>>51942636
Or the Scythe might have been his pimped out flag ship.

>>51937429
>If the Void Dragon ever saw the Eldar again, it would probably be giddy to see “Vaul’s People”, and excitedly ask where Vaul is. He would be devastated to find out what happened.

Oh fuck that's brilliant.

Mag'ladroth get free of his chains, ascended from the surface of mars as a big silver reptilian humanoid with dragon wings, slips sideways through space to the nearest craftworld and lands in the Khine Shrine.

>Khine, my old friend! It's been too long. You wouldn't believe how long I was stuck in that shallow grave. We really need to get reacquainted over drinks and some sammiches but first things first how's our old friend the blacksmith doing?

And then Khine rumbles into half-life and looks at him with two eyes like smouldering coals, the molten iron in his veins oozes sluggishly around is warming form and with a voice like a shifting scrap heap he tell him what happened to Vaul at the end.

And that's how the ante got well and truly upped in the Great Game. It's not a shadow war of mortal proxies when that happens, it's not a game of poker with souls and influence as chips. Now it's a bar knuckle cage fight. Two enter both leave but at least one in a body bag. Slaanesh has killed The Dragon's best friend. It's not going to be Ceggers or Emperor or Ynnead that lands the first punch on Slaanesh it's going to be Mag'ladroth marring that pretty face.

That's going to be the first shot fired that makes the Cold War go hot and then incandescent.

He is Void Dragon and he is Omnissiah and he has just picked up the mantle of Vaul. He is the devil in chrome.

Page 9 bump

Also Nightbringers scythe could be the necrodermis corruption in Khines blood.

>>51945513
>Get Void Dragon to fight on behalf of the Eldar and Imperium
>Doesn't even have to use up his favor the Void Dragon owes him to do so

Truly, Cegorach is the master troll

>>51947344
>Look, I know this is going to sound really weird, especially coming from me but...I need your blood.

Though wasn't the corruption in Khaine's blood the Nightbringer's final "fuck you" to the bloody-handed one for getting his scythe lost?

>>51941555
>Void Dragon shitposting

Void Dragon has some limited access to the Mars Noosphere. So far the identity of +++/L33TH3R3T3KHAX0R\+++ has not been realized. Trolling his priesthood is one of the way he passes the time. It is a art form.

Hey, didn't know if everyone knew this, but there's some neat biopunk thread that has a lot of pictures that could provide some really good inspiration for the Cronedar

>51885663

Half the designs look like tattered, corrupted wraithbone, and look exactly like the sort of thing the Cronedar would build.

>>51949563
Is looking good shit. Meat Weaver are exactly the tailors who would make those suits.

>>51930171
So is it reasonable to assume that every hive on Armageddon has it's own Chapter?

I really like the idea of that.

Given the way that each hive has a population bigger than many planets and all the industry to match they should be capable of supporting a chapter each.

Also the Administartum would almost certainly have taken great pains to ensure that the chapters that are present are derived from as wide a selection of origins as possible so as not to allow any one group monopoly over an entire Hiveworld.

Thus massive inter-city/chapter rivalry.

>>51936251
The Soul Forge is probably still Chaos Undivided. Indeed, keeping the Soul Forge from being the property of any one Chaos God is probably even more important to the Dark Gods in this timeline, because the common enemy of Chaos is still around and Chaos needs Daemon Engines more than ever because it doesn’t have the traitor legions.

Actually, what are the relationships between the gods in this timeline? It’s been mentioned the Chaos Gods are still on a cooperative war footing like they were during the Horus Heresy, since they never managed to remove the Anathema that is the Imperium, but are they still playing the Great Game against each other? Slaanesh is being a conniving he-bitch who wants to ultimately overthrow the other three, but that’s always been the case. In canon, Chaos essentially lost interest in the material realm when Horus struck down the Emperor and their détente dissolved, but here their common enemy is still around.

You know, it was actually kind of a smart thing Eldrad did having both the Imperium and the Eldar go all in to rescue Isha. Compare this to what happened to other people who tried to take on Chaos by themselves in vanilla. The Seers of Lugganath got turned into wailing trees bearing Nurgling fruit. There was that one planet that rejected the Adeptus Mechanicus and advanced in science so fast that they cured all diseases on the planet, which Nurgle took as an insult and had the planet wiped out in retaliation. But these are all small groups, a single group or planet at best. The Imperium, especially with the Eldar, is huge. Chaos may be furious at the Imperium, but the Imperium is so big the forces of Chaos are spread out and they can’t bring the hammer down like they could with a small group. Chaos is already going full throttle against the Imperium. What are they going to do, Black Crusade against the Imperium harder?

>>51952556
>The hives on Armageddon all have their own chapter
>The locals take great pride in their local chapter and argue with those of other hives that their team is the best like they're a bunch of sports teams

That said, how big is a hive? More Space Marines is fine, but we don't want them to the point that they can drown the Imperium's enemies in numbers. Would almost rather up the numbers for a chapter to 1-3,000 (the same as later Roman legions), especially given that the Grey Knights are allowed to number several thousand, than have every planet have a hundred chapters.

Actually, how did Armageddon get where it is in this timeline since it turns out Armageddon is actually a misplaced Ullanor that in canon the Beast turned into a giant Attack Moon to attack Terra, and the AdMech teleported it out of Sol so the system wasn't torn apart by the resulting gravitational reorganization of having another planet in the system.

>++Excerpt from a lecture series given by Sky Marshal Nigel Iger at Bakka Naval Officers' Acadamy, 867.M41++
>++"How to kill an Assault Moon"++

"The problems caused by the presence of an Assault Moon extend beyond the merely tactical. They do not spring up, fully-formed, out of the vacuum, but are merely part of a larger Waaagh. While each one is a massive catastrophe, they are merely part of another, even larger catastrophe."
"And the presence of an Assault Moon changes the way we must respond to that catastrophe."

"First, an Assault Moon complicates strategies of naval attrition. Typically, a force that finds itself outnumbered by an oncoming Orkish Waaagh will use superior range, organization, and mobility to fight a series of hit-and-run battles, wearing down the enemy for minimum risk, until a single smashing blow can be prepared."
"However, an Assault Moon's incredible resilience makes such strategies futile; any force insufficient to kill it outright will simply bounce off, doing no harm at all. Further, an Assault Moon can extend protection to any fleets accompanying it through the massive range of its gravity whips and fighter wings. Any ships under this protective umbrella of firepower will also have to go unmolested until sufficient force can be assembled to challenge it."
"Depending on the vagaries of the Warp and whatever other wars are going on, this could take years. Until then- barring uncommon tactical genius- the Assault Moon and its battle group will be free to rampage across the Imperium largely unopposed."

"Of course, an Ork Waaagh is unlikely to concentrate /all/ of its forces in a single place. This brings me to the second point: concentration versus dispersal, on both the Imperial and Ork sides."
(cont.)

>>51934270
>>51934316
I think 10 million is a good number since this gives us about 10,000 chapters. Given the million worlds of the Imperium only 1% of worlds could have an SM presence which is sufficiently sparse, and this doesn't consider the fact many chapters are fleet based or constantly crusading. So SMs aren't quite as mythically rare as in canon, but still rare enough that's it's a story to tell the grandkids (if you survive the nastiness that brought them there in the first place).

>>51953089
From what I can see on the wiki, it looks like Armageddon has 8 major hives, so I'd agree that 8 chapters is a bit much when one properly supported chapter is considered a planetary level force. Obviously Armageddon gets Waagh'd a lot and needs a higher garrison, so maybe 3 chapters there sounds reasonable?

>>51953365
"A Waaagh of any size will consist of multiple prongs of attack, under the command of a single Warboss but otherwise only loosely coordinated with each other. This holds true of Waaaghs in possesion of an Attack Moon. Collectively, these tendrils are often as dangerous overall as the Assault Moon is; a Moon can only attack one target at a time, after all."
"Since attacking an Assault Moon is a task that demands all available resources, this leaves the Imperial commander with a choice to make; does he disperse his task force to take out the lesser fleets first, allowing the Assault Moon free reign while he does that? Or does he concentrate on the Moon first, allowing the other fleets to continue blazing their individual trails of destruction across the Imperium?"
"The right choice to make depends on exact strategic circumstances, and sometimes a compromise is possible. Ork fleets not accompanied by the Attack Moon naturally do not benefit from its protection from attrition; local forces can damage and destroy them while the Moon-killing fleet is still being assembled."

"Third, an Assault Moon often makes a mockery of pre-existing fixed defenses, on both the tactical and strategic scales."
"Classical Ork defense strategies center around belts of fortress worlds surrounding Ork territories. These worlds serve as bases for pre-emptive strikes into Ork territory, bulwarks against Ork attacks, and 'lightning rods'; as Orks seek out good fights, they are attracted to fortress worlds to the exclusion of other targets."
(cont.)

>>51953630
>So SMs aren't quite as mythically rare as in canon, but still rare enough that's it's a story to tell the grandkids (if you survive the nastiness that brought them there in the first place).

Sounds good. Seems a bit more reasonable than in canon, especially given the more grounded nature of this timeline. Probably the proportion is higher on an actual Space Marine homeworld like Nocturne, like how the chances of seeing an Eldar are probably higher on a hive world due to sheer population.

Didn't know hives were that big. Had thought there were usually hundreds of them on a planet.

Also, wrote up the ideas we had for inter-chapter relationships that were discussed in previous threads and mentioned by >>51930171 and >>51931309 for the wiki. Was going to just paste it but didn't want to put thread over bump limit and it was too many characters, so it went on Pastebin.

http://pastebin.com/N0entRCY

>>51953991
It looks good. Only problem I can see is that the Inquisition has no Ordo Astartes. It does have an Ordo Militum that is responsible for overseeing military organizations. They are the ones who watch the Commissairiant also.

>>51953819
"Since the emergence of the Brain-Boy caste, the lightning-rod strategy has become less and less useful, but the other components of the strategy still hold. However, an Assault Moon is capable of rapidly reducing the defenses of the average Fortress-World. Its immense size, durability, and teleporters allow it to transport billions of Ork warriors past orbital and aerial defenses unmolested and commit surgical-ish Kommando strikes on vital infrastructure."
"Once the defenses are destroyed, the Orks can flood into the relatively defenseless interior. In many cases, sectors bordering Ork territory rely on these fortress belts for protection and pour all military resources into them; leaving them unprepared for defense-in-depth should these outer defenses fail."

"While an Assault Moon is incapable of much tactical subtlety, strategic subtlety is limited only by the mind of the commanding Warboss. While most Warbosses are content to use their Attack Moons as simple bludgeoning instruments, some are smarter."
"One example of this is what I call the 'Moon-in-Being' strategy; rather than using the Moon in an assault role, it is used as a reserve and reinforcement unit. When one of the satellite raiding fleets is attacked, the Moon is used to ambush the Imperial force, destroying it. Meanwhile, engagement with the assembled might of the fleet is avoided."
"The effect of such a strategy is to force the Imperial fleet to concentrate, while allowing Ork forces to disperse. Any Imperial forces below Moon-killing level are liable to be attacked and destroyed, compelling consolidation, while the Orks labor under no such constraint, and can pursue offensives on multiple fronts simultaneously. Defeating this strategy is usually a matter of luring the Moon into a confrontation with an apparently-inferior force, then ambushing it with the full might of the fleet."

(cont.)

>>51954217
"Another observed strategy is the 'Deep Strike', where the Assault Moon is used to go tearing off deep into Imperial space in a series of hit-and-run strikes, never remaining in one place long enough for a force capable of killing it to be assembled. This spree of near-random destruction draws Imperial forces away from other theaters in an increasingly large area until it is finally either destroyed or escaped back into non-Imperial space."
"Defeat of this strategy largely relies on primarily Eldar forces or internal sabotage, infiltration, and boarding action, for the simple reason that these assets are more 'portable' than a full-dress naval assault."

"Finally, a word on Assault Moons as a whole."
"Since the initial re-emergence in M37, the rate at which the Imperium fights Assault Moons has grown to about once a century."
"This is not the same as Assault Moons being /built/ at a rate of one per century. Nearly all Assault Moon construction occurs deep in Ork space, where our ability to gather information is spotty at best. It is estimated that for every Assault Moon sent against the Imperium, there is /at least/ one more deployed against other opponents like the Tyranids, Necrons, and other Orks. Many Assault Moons we've encountered have had adaptations specifically for fighting Tyranids, or exotic weaponry looted from the Necrons."
"And that's not including the Assault Moons that were destroyed while under construction. Any time we become aware of a new Assault Moon being readied, plans are made to destroy it before it launches. These are usually Inquisition operations, using Eldar and reflex-shielded vessels to infiltrate deep into enemy space."

(cont.)

>>51954787
"The point is: the threat posed by Assault Moons, by the Orks in general, is likely only going to increase in the millennia to come. We will need tactics, weapons, and ships optimized to destroy these threats. And we will need Naval Officers of skill, courage, and determination to command them."
"Hopefully, you will be those officers, to ensure the light of the Imperium will continue to shine into the far future."

"Thank you, and goodnight."
>++Conclude excerpt++
>++End file++

Thoughts? Anything you think is left unaddressed that needs to be?

>>51954820
I think that was absolutely well covered and excellently written.

Hey, quick question. Compiling some of the stuff from previous threads for the notes page, and I distinctly remember there was something about there being numerous individuals over the course of the Imperium claiming to be surviving Men of Gold. The hostile ones were terminated with extreme prejudice and to this day their nature remains inconclusive (due to being blown to bits). The friendly ones were tested and their claims were all found to be false in one way or another. The problem is I can't find the thread where this was stated. The closest I can find is the mention of the Man of Gold corpse that was found on Cthonia and is now in Ganymede. Does anyone know which thread this was?

>>51953089
I'd suggest that Armageddon got where it is more or less according to canon, but then we'd have to figure out what the AdMech did with that sweet sweet planetary-scale interstellar teleport tech.
I mean, in canon I'm sure they lost it in some retarded and contrived accident, but that won't fly here.

>>51956090
In canon it was literal heresy on the part of the AdMech. The AdMech tried to teleport Mars out of the Solar System using the tech-heresy of reverse engineered Ork tech, but that didn't work.

Then, after the beast was defeated, the AdMech lusted after Ork technology and so used secret reverse-engineered Ork teleporters to teleport Ullanor/Armageddon into its current location, which the AdMech then forgot about (I feel dumber just for having written that sentence).

File: tumblr_mc3ov8s5ug1qk8ni7.gif (420 KB, 225x236)

420 KB GIF

>>51956236
So wait, the AdMech has planet teleportation tech that they just forgot about?
This AU has ruined me, I can't laugh at the grimdark for grimdarkness' sake of canon anymore.

>>51956751
They forgot about the technology AND the planet they got it from. In canon, mind you. We can come up with something less stupid for this universe.

>>51956850
Idea:
Ullanor is the Beast's personal Assault Moon, which he attempts to ram into Terra because smashing a planet with another planet is ded Orky. As per previously established lore, Ollanius Pius saves Terra by ramming it; doesn't destroy it, it's an entire planet, but the near-c impact throws it off course and damages the engines, sending it hurtling outward where it cannot participate in the battle further. After the Battle, either the surviving Orks on its surface activate the (damaged) teleporters to try and avoid the oncoming Steward rape-train, or the Mechanicus finds the big red button and hits it just to get it out of the system.
Some time passes, the Imperium comes across it again, crawling with Feral Orks worshipping the massive machines. A military expedition is launched to clear them out before they can figure out how to turn the thing back on, it turns into a permanent outpost to keep them down, which turns into the hive-world we all know and love because holy shit there is a lot of metal here time to start strip-mining.

>>51956751
The thing is, there's a couple of kinds of grimdark in the canon universe.

There is the "You tried your best but the universe shits on you in elaborate and amusing ways" (Lamenters).

There is the "Pants on head retarded/crazy but in an amusing way" (Ecclesiarchy and "everything is heresy!", also Astral Knights)

Then there is the "Pants on head retarded/crazy but in a contrived way for the sole purpose of grimdark" (Grey Knights killing Sisters, this Ullanor teleportation shit, too many other examples to count).

The first two make the universe fun, but sadly there's more and more of the third since 40k has switched to taking itself increasingly SOOPER SERIOUS, which is a shame.

>>51957969
Sounds good, and it gives us a major post-WotB offensive besides the Black Crusades (hey, the Imperium has to hold Armageddon before there can be a First War for Armageddon, right?).

It was also mentioned in a previous thread the Imperium really, really wants to keep the Orks off Armageddon (or keep the Ork population to a minimum) because it's close enough to Earth that it would give the Orks a back door to Terra.

>>51949388
Meant shitposting about the Void Dragon but touche, you got me there.

>>51951065
>Uh, I think this suit is molesting me.
>Mmmm...yes. It's supposed to do that. At first.

>>51958520
Well now we've got a second reason to keep the Orks of Armageddon: even after 10,000 years of neglect and deliberate destruction/strip-mining, there's still a possibility they might be able to get the Assault Planet up and running again.
That's probably a motive for all the Ork attacks; they're at least dimly aware of what Armaggeddon once was, and want to make it be that again.
Which, harkening back to earlier discussion, might justify having eight entire Astartes chapters stationed on-planet.

>>51960173
Still, 8,000 marines would be a ridiculous concentration probably bordering on a minor crusade. According to the Lexicanum, something like 16,000-20,000 marines participated in the 3rd War for Armageddon, so having 8,000 garrisoned in peace time would be a massive waste. If you had them out and about when Armageddon isn't under attack and then recalled them when the orks start acting up again, that's pretty much just the same as calling in off world Astartes, and that would have the benefit of a more diverse and spread out recruiting pool.

>>51960796
You're probably right.

>>51960796
so if orks can get their shit together enough to regularly produce planetoid sized battlestations how is it that the imperium isn't, and can't salvage its ringworld?

>>51960173
I thing the whole or Armageddon being a derelict super Assault Moon is taking it a bit far.

How about having The Beasts pimpmobile be one of the moon's of Armageddon. Does Armageddon have a moon? It does now. It's also haunted. Beast was balls deep in Chaos and the moon's travel through the warp didn't exactly improve matters.

When Ollanius Pius slammed his ship into the moon to divert its course something inside it was triggered and the whole thing got sucked into the warp. Due to the favourable currents between Earth and Armageddon it was not unlikely it would end up there.

With the loss of his moon the Beast is forced to land on Earth with a lesser rok some distance from the Palace.

Because it's drifting rather than flying under it's own power it's takes 80 years for the weaponized planetoid to surface into real space. And of course it surfaces on a collision course with Armageddon. Boarding action from a combination of Luna Wolves and Iron Hands manage to fire up one of the boostaz and nudge it into an elliptical orbit. They also found deamons and shit and seems to get more distorted the further in you get. It is massive and seems to be even massiver the further in you go. Possibly there is no centre anymore, just an infinitely deep pool of awful.

Further exploration was called off. Whole thing quarantined indefinitely, anything found going to or coming from is shot down.

If the Space Marines can access the webway it brings into question how much access they have.

To walk the webway you need a guide. How many guides per chapter probably depends on what sort of terms they are on with the local eldar communities.

Given the tech-priest vs bonesinger REEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!!!ing I can imagine the Iron Hands and descendants not making much use of it at all.

For a chapter to be able to long term fully mobilize in the webway they would need a guide per company assuming that they go out in companies with the potential to be answering a call for aid per company. This is unlikely given the rarity of reliable guides.

Do we need a list of chapters that are on the best terms with the eldar?

Also it opens the possibility of 100% nomadic chapters. No ships, or permanent bases just shit loads of walking/driving from one end of the galaxy to the other. I can see some spawn of Khan doing this. It would make them extremely feared and unpredictable rapid response force but the webway doesn't go everywhere reliably.

In Vanilla the Silver Skulls were founded from Iron Warrior loyalists and were known for their precognitive abilities in their librarians. In this AU I suggest that they also be Iron Warrior splinter faction that have taken up the responsibility of protecting the webway intersections and patrolling it for intruders.

Nobody is quite sure how many of them there are but it's estimated to be somewhere between 2,000 - 2,500. Due to thir wide spread and diffused nature they can draw guides from many eldar enclaves and craftworlds as well as recruit lightly from across half the Imperium. Their only drawback, that they can see, is that they can't get fresh gear all that easily due to the problems of trying to get a delivery in the webway and every bunch of men they send out to pick stuff up is one less doing the patrol. So they resupply rarely.