The Culture explores 40K II: Now With 100% more Fanfiction

[Selrahc]

Do the Necrons have any worthy data on Chaos besides their warp null fields?

They can probably tell the Culture about the time before the Warp became malignant.

Do the Orks have any data on Chaos worth anything at all?

No.

They have an instinctive dislike of it, and will ostracize or kill any Orks tainted by it. But that level of "knowledge" is far below what the Culture already knows.

Individual Big Meks or Weirdboyz might have some useful warp knowledge though.

[Gavinfoxx]

Originally Posted by jseah

Would the Eldar even want to know anything the Culture gives them on Chaos if it originates from the Necrons?

I... have no idea. Hmmm.

Originally Posted by jseah

What might the Tau react if the Culture offered an exchange of data on Chaos? (I really ought to start all first contacts with that)

Publicly? With stoicness and thanks for the exchange of information. Privately? With amazement and confusion and attempts to verify and double check it -- they have fought chaos, including Chaos Space Marines and Chaos Sorcerers, and they knew at least the names of the Chaos gods, but they never really had any much larger context in a meaningful way about what was going on and its implications. They knew what the Imperium thought of Chaos in general, and what their own reports had said, and what some of the psykers from their allied races have said -- but the gaps in their knowledge are quite enough to prevent them from seeing the whole/broader picture. Tau are described as innocent and naive, in a very profound way...

Originally Posted by jseah

Do the Orks have any data on Chaos worth anything at all?

"Dem Kaos boyz is good fightin!" (IE, no...) Also, I thought Orks tainted by Chaos was so rare as to essentially be unheard of?

[Forum Explorer]

Originally Posted by jseah

part 7.5 IoM

Do the Necrons have any worthy data on Chaos besides their warp null fields?

Would the Eldar even want to know anything the Culture gives them on Chaos if it originates from the Necrons? (I presume the Culture has already given them the IoM data and that Culture and Eldar regularly update each other on Chaos)


What might the Tau react if the Culture offered an exchange of data on Chaos? (I really ought to start all first contacts with that)

Do the Orks have any data on Chaos worth anything at all?


EDIT:
I find it interesting that the Culture might actually be unwittingly playing a role in the 40k verse as a mediator of information. Many sides don't wish to talk to each other, but the Culture is powerful enough to trade in information since the sides have to step warily around them (and therefore have to talk)

No Necrons have almost no useful Chaos information. It wasn't a problem back then and they aren't very sensitive to the warp anyways. They might have some useful warp information but nothing else.


The Necrons certainly wouldn't know anything that the Eldar don't know about Chaos already.

[Forrestfire]

However, while the Necrons probably have very little information about Chaos, the are likely to be very proficient in fighting warp-based entities in general, seeing as they fought the Old Ones.

[Gavinfoxx]

Yea, they probably have some information that would be relevant for a non-warp-sensitive entity to technologically fight the warp (though not well; they aren't that great of it, and the warp has trump cards in altering the laws of physics more easily and effectively than they can make them not matter by doing hyperspace like stuff and other MAD SCIENCE! physics stuff), from hard experience!

[Gavinfoxx]

Just wanted to add... there is quite a lot of technology (that isn't always sorcery) that enhances or focuses psyker abilities, or protects people from psykers, and several races have that sort of thing, for the purposes of interacting with their psykers. If The Culture looks at some of that tech, even without psykers to power them, they might be able to figure out some details about the warp and psyker abilities through this.

[Gavinfoxx]

Also, I've been reading 'State of the Art' ... and hoollyyyy @#$()*@ Culture Plasma Weapons outdoes Imperial, Eldar, Tau, or anyone else that you care to name. 10 km, with a near-instantaneous velocity, the ability to have the weapon shoot around corners, and do a crazy amount of options in how it fires, how quickly, how strong, whether it explodes on impact, etc. etc. On a hand weapon that is not considered military grade (ie, is civilian grade!) And it shot down a starship!

This is... wow. To get near equivalent in 40k, you'd have to go to Titan scale plasma weaponry, at least. Maybe anti-orbital emplacement or voidship macrocannon scale. And as far as I know, only Eldar and Humans use those 'really big scale' plasma stuff; Tau energy weapons at a large scale seem to be Ion Cannons, though they have some of the best small (ie, tank) scale plasma cannons out there .

[Tiki Snakes]

26 pages into the second or third thread at least on this general subject, and we're here again.
Yeah, the culture's civilian issue doomsday devices have come up before. I think they're an interesting indicator of the Culture's... uh, Cultureyness.

[Spamotron]

I haven't read the book myself but have heard of the gun. Isn't it not just that it's civilian issue it's that it's considered a quaint antique even by civilian weapon standards?

[Gavinfoxx]

Originally Posted by Spamotron

I haven't read the book myself but have heard of the gun. Isn't it not just that it's civilian issue it's that it's considered a quaint antique even by civilian weapon standards?

Yes. Yes it is.

[Gavinfoxx]

Oh god. Got a bit further into that book... I was pretty much right about the cannibalism bit, hahahahaha, oh man....

[Tavar]

Interestingly, I think a similar thing has happened in the real world: artificially grown meats, or something. Might have only been flavored and textured tofu, though.

[jseah]

Apparently, this place is more rural than it looks. It's not just my internet that's unreliable, my electricity is unreliable.

Writing nanowrimo with a pen and paper. =(

part 7.5 Necrons

Spoiler

The Necron lord continue to prevaricate but we think that he is brushing around the edges of agreeing to a technology trade. Interestingly, he has been subject to less bouts of insanity than expected in the last week. Why this might be so is unknown but we think that the Necron lord is learning to work around the errors in his system.

Week 3
The Necron ship has arrived at an uninhabited star and proceeded to refuel before leaving to go to another star, its new target has so far been unsurveyed and no IoM reports on it have been found.

We believe that the Necron Lord has agreed to the technology trade. He will provide an unspecified piece of technology, but related to the Warp, while we will provide details on intelligence engineering and our star maps of this galaxy (including those taken from other races).

A torchdrive-driven (this was specified in the negotiations) uncrewed shuttle landed on the Necron World's surface causing significant collateral damage and left the cache of information with an expert system and the agreed to library of information. Necron troops were detected bringing the installation underground.

Shortly after that, one of the Necron ships in orbit boosted into a fast closing vector on our shuttle as it left the surface and teleported a small group of Necron warriors and a monolith onboard. This 'boarding crew' was swiftly disabled by effector and the shuttle engaged its hyperdrive to be retreived without incident.

A few days later, another Necron ship left the system along the same path taken by the first ship. This is also being tailed by a remote drone.

The Culture "attacks" the Necron tomb world (torchdrives on a planet surface may as well be a weapon) and the cache is left behind when they retreat. The Necron "retaliation" is intercepted and then both sides return to their ceasefire.

I suppose I can continue to do this song and dance routine every time the Necrons want to talk. =D

[Forrestfire]

Am I reading it right that the exchange of information was obfuscated by the "attacks?"

[jseah]

Originally Posted by Forrestfire

Am I reading it right that the exchange of information was obfuscated by the "attacks?"

The Necron lord and the Culture are pretending to attack each other, but they're actually trading tech. A monolith and a few warriors for the Culture to study, against the political galatic map and intelligence engineering.

The Culture want to establish better relations, so they're willing to go along with a blind tech trade (they get something related to the warp).

The Necron Lord wants to study their intelligence engineering in hopes of finding a solution to their degradation problem. The ship that just left this week is following the first one to transmit the Culture's data on galactic politics to the core worlds of the empire he's with.
(the drone stuck in his world is being analyzed to work out effector and mirror shield principles)

[The Glyphstone]

Why a Monolith and not, say,a Night Scythe transport? Neither vehicle has much in the way of warp-related technology - Monoliths for certain don't have any such tech - and the Necron Lord probably has more Night Scythes in inventory than Monoliths.

[jseah]

Originally Posted by The Glyphstone

Why a Monolith and not, say,a Night Scythe transport? Neither vehicle has much in the way of warp-related technology - Monoliths for certain don't have any such tech - and the Necron Lord probably has more Night Scythes in inventory than Monoliths.

Monoliths have a triangular warp null field the Culture know about. (they used it on the Ork invasion)

[Fan]

Originally Posted by jseah

Monoliths have a triangular warp null field the Culture know about. (they used it on the Ork invasion)

That doesn't make much sense, why would the Necrons deploy that against Orks?

[Tavar]

Weirdboyz?

[Fan]

Originally Posted by Tavar

Weirdboyz?

Those are.. as said, pretty uncommon, and they have pariahs in number.

The only time Warp Null Fields come up are in mass deployments of psykers / daemons.

[Forrestfire]

Well, the Orks do have the waaagh field that makes a lot of their tech work. And the Necrons would know about that bit, because they fought the orks during the War in Heaven.

[Fan]

Originally Posted by Forrestfire

Well, the Orks do have the waaagh field that makes a lot of their tech work. And the Necrons would know about that bit, because they fought the orks during the War in Heaven.

But the WAAAGH! field being nullfied would only work if deployed inside enemy ranks.

This is all very weird.

[jseah]

Originally Posted by Fan

But the WAAAGH! field being nullfied would only work if deployed inside enemy ranks.

This is all very weird.

Non-gauss weaponry is dampened inside the field and the Necrons inside it regenerate faster. Psykers also can't do their thing.

http://wh40k.lexicanum.com/wiki/Mono...nolith_Phalanx

I'm referring to the Phalanx projector thingy.

[Fan]

Originally Posted by jseah

Non-gauss weaponry is dampened inside the field and the Necrons inside it regenerate faster. Psykers also can't do their thing.

http://wh40k.lexicanum.com/wiki/Mono...nolith_Phalanx

I'm referring to the Phalanx projector thingy.

Jesus Christ, what kind of engagement required a monolith phalanx?

[Tavar]

This was fighting on a Tomb World, was it not? And one where the Orks had some control over the upper levels? Sounds like a massive host for the orks, and time for the Necrons to pull out all the stops.

[jseah]

Originally Posted by Tavar

This was fighting on a Tomb World, was it not? And one where the Orks had some control over the upper levels? Sounds like a massive host for the orks, and time for the Necrons to pull out all the stops.

The Necrons were also of the insane variety and the Culture planted themselves right in the middle of the conflict (right on top of the entrance to the Tombs).

That was when the Necrons attacked with the monoliths. This was towards the end of part 6's chronology if I remember correctly.

[Forrestfire]

In the Ciaphas Cain books, the Necrons fought a Gargant with enough monoliths to surround it. I'm not sure what else they'd need that many for other than another titan.

[Tavar]

Well, for a single target? Nothing. But if you have a giant army, then having more might well be needed.

[jseah]

Originally Posted by Tavar

Well, for a single target? Nothing. But if you have a giant army, then having more might well be needed.

http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showp...&postcount=319

The post in question.

The Necrons attacked the Culture when the Culture stepped in between them and the Orks. The Necron Lord in question thought the Culture were the Eldar here to kill him.

[Brother Oni]

Originally Posted by Gavinfoxx

"Dem Kaos boyz is good fightin!" (IE, no...) Also, I thought Orks tainted by Chaos was so rare as to essentially be unheard of?

I remember a short vignette from Warhammer about an orc boar rider chief that was distinctly uneasy about fighting 'dem spiky boys' because there was something just simply wrong about them (he still fought them anyway).

I suspect Chaos tainted orks might have gone the same way as ork/stealer hybrids, ie ignored-con using your jargon, or simply obsoleted by updates to the fluff and lore.