LARPFEST

[Kz3r0]

"Now, I am become Death, the destroyer of worlds."



Unleash the Reaper.

 

[Baltika]

B. Destroy the machine but send no message to the Warmaster? The Dragon will be cut off and then perhaps you can strike the killing blow without bargaing with the Grim Reaper. The Swarmlord and Ahriman must have weakened him enough so you can take the Throne and finally put and end to this.

Benevolent warp god. Yeah, no. Jeremiah already swore off all dieties, so I vote to keep the integrity of our previous choices. Screw those divine douchebags.

 

[Kz3r0]

I am receiving potato vibes all of a sudden.

 

[Hoodoo]

C.

More gods to the party. Jokes on everybody if its the Outsider

 

[Kayerts]

Jokes on everybody if its the Outsider

Open the warp rift further, unshackle me from these earthly bonds and allow me to blossom.

And it grew, both day and night,
till it bore an apple bright.
And my foe beheld it shine,
and he knew that it was mine.


Choice analysis:

A) I'm not sure how C'tan domination of the Necrons works, but in the event of the demise of VD, doesn't the Nightbringer gain control over any remaining Necron forces in the galaxy? This also assumes that he's come to bury VD and not to serve him. Even if it works, then it falls to us to kill him while he's supercharged from DEVOURing the Dragon's SOUL, which will be costly at best.

This one just has a ton of ways to fail, and even if it succeeds, I don't see how it keeps us from getting boned by the Swarm.

B) We take a long shot against VD followed by a long shot against the Nightbringer + any remaining Necrons. Then against the Swarm I guess we pray for deliverance to our gods, which are all dead.

C) Seems like the best of the articulated options. Deus ex Machina over there has at least professed a distaste for killing off humanity in private conversations with VD, which puts him ahead of just about every other player in the game. Plus, as a warp entity, he at least seems to require our continued survival for his existence. Offers the only chance I see of beating the Hivemind, short of the scroll.

D) Still feels like the second best choice. VD dies, Ahriman and Swarmbro die; maybe the Nightbringer and Necrons die; Deus ex Machina probably becomes a nonfactor; we decapitate the Swarm. Plus some unspecified bad stuff happens to mankind and our future turns dark, in Ahriman's visions.

I'm not seeing great fifth options. Let's think about those? Right now C's got my vote.

 

[Ulminati]

D

Rocks fall, everyone dies.

 

[Darth Roxor]

Verdammt, even in the second last choice, the Kodex is taking the worst possible options

Can't you not see it is the time to Do what must be done?

ROCKS FALL

EVERYONE DIES

 

[Hoodoo]

could do this mebbe...

Do as the Nightbringer tells us, force the Dragon into the Nexus and put the fleet on standby. But /record scratch/ release the Machine from its bonds -benevolent or not- and trust that in the 3-way God fight that will probably follow, we come out on top. Jeremiah should probably have his finger ready to activate the Terminus Decree too, depending on what happens.

this way we can ensure the biggest clusterfuck possible before mankinds demise. Which is as good of an ending as any, given the state of things.

edit: looks like doombro is bout to die so might as well give him one last misson too.

+ Doombreed fires his bow with an arrow imbued with all the suffering hes caused throughout the ages at the Nightbringer

so Genghis Khan, Conqueror of Conquerors, repents in the 42nd millenium after a lifetime of killing to try and unbalance and kill the monstrous Necron God of Death. I know theres no warp anymore, so Genghis Khan is p much a mortal, but a dood as significant as him should have some sort of power eh. Maybe not. Maybe he just pathetically shoots a normal arrow which the C'Tan absorbs only to shoot back out of his crotch straight into Genghis's face.


kinda rambling here but we got the God of Death and one of the most notorius killers ever sitting in a room together in subterrainean Mars on the eve of the apocalypse. Should be able to find something fer him to do

 

[skuphundaku]

D

Rocks fall, everyone dies.

This. At this point, there's no better choice left. When we didn't take the Terminus Decree option before, it was because we thought we still had a way of coming out on top while avoiding "Rocks fall, everyone dies", but that's not the case anymore. The chances of taking out the VD, the Nightbringer, avoiding creating another mad god and still being alive and strong enough to defeat the incoming swarmfleets are virtually null.

If we activate the Terminus Decreee, we'll automatically solve our first 3 problems and, as someone was saying earlier, the activation of the Terminus Decreee will cut off the swarms from the warp, thus neutralizing them as well shortly after. The gallaxy survives, humanity survives and becomes unshackled from all the petty tyrants and gods.

 

[Azael]

D also means that the Slaugth have an open smörgåsbord when they arrive in the galaxy. *BRAIIINS!!!*

hoodoo's "Let's cram everything into one suggestion" actually sounds like a p. decent plan.

Otherwise


C

 

[Jaedar]

C

Just like in the dark age of technology, this new age of technology will end with the uprising of the Abominable Intelligence. They say history is cyclical after all....

 

[Storyfag]

could do this mebbe...

Do as the Nightbringer tells us, force the Dragon into the Nexus and put the fleet on standby. But /record scratch/ release the Machine from its bonds -benevolent or not- and trust that in the 3-way God fight that will probably follow, we come out on top. Jeremiah should probably have his finger ready to activate the Terminus Decree too, depending on what happens.

this way we can ensure the biggest clusterfuck possible before mankinds demise. Which is as good of an ending as any, given the state of things.

edit: looks like doombro is bout to die so might as well give him one last misson too.

+ Doombreed fires his bow with an arrow imbued with all the suffering hes caused throughout the ages at the Nightbringer

so Genghis Khan, Conqueror of Conquerors, repents in the 42nd millenium after a lifetime of killing to try and unbalance and kill the monstrous Necron God of Death. I know theres no warp anymore, so Genghis Khan is p much a mortal, but a dood as significant as him should have some sort of power eh. Maybe not. Maybe he just pathetically shoots a normal arrow which the C'Tan absorbs only to shoot back out of his crotch straight into Genghis's face.

This or Cl, whichever it takes to beat the retarDo option.

 

[Kayerts]

Hoodoo's plan seems reasonable; I think it's pretty clear that the Khagan can't scratch the Nightbringer, but sure, let him go down swinging once he's relayed his message.

Regarding the God From The Machine, I'm skeptical of its benevolence, but I just realized that the Terminus Decree gives us some leverage over it: unlike the rest of our enemies, a warp god can't survive the death of the warp. So I'm thinking we should make a covenant with this god: we turn it loose, with the understanding that it will aid us, and if it does not, or if it turns against us, it will end up the same way our last three gods did.

Now granted, trying to bargain with God is a tricky business, since it's not clear to me that it doesn't just have the option of dropping a thunderbolt on the scroll and doing whatever he wants. But then, the old Chaos Gods never managed to do that to the Emperor; aren't there sigils protecting Terra from that kind of play? So maybe the thing to do is to have Jeremiah land on Terra and read all but the last word of the scroll, ready to complete the decree if things go south. Like the original Emperor claimed to have done, we will forge a pact with the Machine God and take up residence on Terra.

If we want some decentralized redundancy to this plan, we could give some of our trustworthy men (you know, all three of them) copies of the scroll and tell them to scatter across the system, with orders to enact the decree should disaster befall us. This contingency is not without its own risks, since we need to be absolutely sure any men we assign to this task will perform as expected and choose self-destruction over capture.

 

[skuphundaku]

Regarding the God From The Machine, I'm skeptical of its benevolence...

Definitely agree with this.

...but I just realized that the Terminus Decree gives us some leverage over it: unlike the rest of our enemies, a warp god can't survive the death of the warp. So I'm thinking we should make a covenant with this god: we turn it loose, with the understanding that it will aid us, and if it does not, or if it turns against us, it will end up the same way our last three gods did.

Now granted, trying to bargain with God is a tricky business, since it's not clear to me that it doesn't just have the option of dropping a thunderbolt on the scroll and doing whatever he wants. But then, the old Chaos Gods never managed to do that to the Emperor; aren't there sigils protecting Terra from that kind of play? So maybe the thing to do is to have Jeremiah land on Terra and read all but the last word of the scroll, ready to complete the decree if things go south. Like the original Emperor claimed to have done, we will forge a pact with the Machine God and take up residence on Terra.

If we want some decentralized redundancy to this plan, we could give some of our trustworthy men (you know, all three of them) copies of the scroll and tell them to scatter across the system, with orders to enact the decree should disaster befall us. This contingency is not without its own risks, since we need to be absolutely sure any men we assign to this task will perform as expected and choose self-destruction over capture.

This sounds acceptable, but the bargain only works if we can work out a solid insurance strategy. What would be the abilities of the machine god? How could we counteract at least some of them in order to prevent it from destroying the Terminus Decree scroll after it gets what it wants and decides that it won't hold up its end of the bargain?

I propose a kind of distributed dead man's switch protocol: scatter across the galaxy scroll guardians, each with a copy of the Terminus Decree and some kind of device that could activate the Terminus Decree automatically unless its guardian stops it on schedule. Each guardian would keep its device hidden from everyone and everything, thus, if the machine god manages to track down the guardian, it doesn't mean that it manages to track down the device and the Terminus Decree gets automatically activated when the guardian fails to return and stop it on schedule. I'm not very familiar with W40K lore so I'm not sure about what are the available communication capabilities, but if it's possible, an extra layer of security would be added by networking all the Terminus Decree devices. If one is discovered and taken out, the others detect it going off the grid and activate the Terminus Decree. With this setup, the only way for the machine god to cross us would be if its powers allow it to find all the devices and take them out at the same time. If it can do that and is willing to do it, then I think that doing anything but D right now would be outstandingly foolish.

Both A and C means going back to being slaves to some god or another which means going back to where we started from. It would mean that all the struggle was futile. Chosing B means that we try to win on our own agains overwhelming odds. Unfortunately, our chances are slim to none and, if we fail, at least one of our enemies will survive and win and all the galaxy goes down the toilet. It doesn't matter if it will be at the hands of the Slough, the Nightbringer, the machine god or the Tyranid swarms, the end will be the same: some other tens of thousands of years of slavery, ignorance and madness in the best case scenario or utter slaughter in the worst.

If we chose D, only out-of-galaxy threats will survive an the remaining population can rebuild a galaxy-spanning civilization based around something better than some tyrant wanting to impose its will on everyone. By the time out-of-galaxy threats arrive, they'll be able to stand on their own and defend themselves.

 

[Storyfag]

I think destroying Terra is bad because it means there can be no Imperium ever again. Terra is what binds humanity together. It is the beginning and end of humanity's history. Destroy Terra, the Golden Throne and its institutions, and what holds humanity together? Only a few things. Humanity will drift apart from each other, and, dare I say, it will stop existing. Eventually, humanity will diverge so much it will turn into different nations, empires and eventually, races. The cycle of war will begin again and this time, there's no Emperor. We will be each other's Xenos. Any other xeno danger that ever appears again will win. Also, I doubt Jeremiah and entourage will survive Terminus.

You, sir, have exquisitely voiced what I have been ineffectively trying to

Here's my choice: Do as the Machine says and release it from its bonds, creating a new Warp God, and trust its benevolence. Then send a message to Jeremiah, telling him to start the siege and make his sorcerers go on a lookout for a strong Warp entity. Tell him to have the Terminus Degree on himself at all times. If the Entity is felt to be definitively corrupted or malignant, tell him to ennact Terminus. If otherwise, then he is acknowlodge it as our New God and bow to it for salvation, then continue the Siege. This will ensure the Void Dragon is on Mars during the Siege, allowing the Machine God to kill both and leaving Terra and the Imperium alive for us to rule with the Machine God over us. We will rule the Galaxy from the Golden Throne with the Machine God at our side, or nobody will rule at all.

Good one. A refinement of hoodo's plan, I should think. Would be willing to support it.

But we don't know what the Tyranids are fleeing from, and whatever it is (it was hinted the Tyranids are fleeing from the Slaught). If it is the Slaught, it won't make a difference against them. So we win, but Imperium is shattered, many die, Warp travel stops and Slaught gain a advantage. Also, we kill Ahriman and stop his efforts.

All right. Lexicanum and the Internets at large remain silent about the Slaught Who the fuck are they again?

 

[Darth Roxor]

All right. Lexicanum and the Internets at large remain silent about the Slaught Who the fuck are they again?

That's because they are Slaugth

http://wh40k.lexicanum.com/wiki/Slaugth

 

[Storyfag]

All right. Lexicanum and the Internets at large remain silent about the Slaught Who the fuck are they again?

That's because they are Slaugth

http://wh40k.lexicanum.com/wiki/Slaugth

Dzięki stary!

 

[Esquilax]

I'm supporting BROzilian Slaughter's plan. So, on that note, C

 

[Kayerts]

As far as I can tell, Slaughter's plan is the same as my plan, so I support it. I feel like Sku's distributed scroll system is probably more dangerous than helpful, since if any suicidally pissed off entity gets a hold of one of the copies, that's bad news. Also, I'm unsure how to handle FTL communications in Warhammer without resorting to the warp, and resorting to the warp against a warp god effectively creates a single point of failure.

If we had something like a pariah on our side, I'd give it to them, but we don't. If we had some warp-proofed spacecraft, that could actually work pretty well.

 

[Hoodoo]

My vote for Slaugth Slaughter then.

I think destroying Terra is bad because it means there can be no Imperium ever again. Terra is what binds humanity together. It is the beginning and end of humanity's history. Destroy Terra, the Golden Throne and its institutions, and what holds humanity together? Only a few things. Humanity will drift apart from each other, and, dare I say, it will stop existing. Eventually, humanity will diverge so much it will turn into different nations, empires and eventually, races. The cycle of war will begin again and this time, there's no Emperor. We will be each other's Xenos. Any other xeno danger that ever appears again will win. Also, I doubt Jeremiah and entourage will survive Terminus

makes alot of sense too. Should we just destroy the Terminus? Could be a morale booster..

The Terminus Decree, millenia old sacreligous artefact made by the coward Malfador, crumples in Jeremiahs clenched fist. Intricate gears, cogs and other now-unknown peices of old-tech pitter off the steel floor."We are space marines and we shall know no fear"

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gCKjctTWIsw

 

[Kayerts]

I feel like applying fire or what have you to apocalyptic Warhammer artifacts could be dangerous.

Root's clarification is concerning, though. Seems like unbinding the ghost in the machine will put us completely at its mercy, which I doubt will go well. On the other hand, A and B still look like certain doom to me, and I don't see a way around the Machine God's offer short of using the Terminus Decree.

Speaking of that, it seems like we may have misunderstood the scroll's implications. It sounds like it won't sever the Warp completely. I'm wondering what it does, that Malcador would have entrusted it to a non-Warp-dependent C'tan who can teleport away from Terra at will, and who was at least ostensibly subservient to VD's leadership at that point. On the mutually assured destruction angle, the only thing that leaps to mind is that it somehow unleashes the Outsider on the galaxy, although that seems odd.

 

[DwarvenFood]

I was going to vote A, but it seems the vote is split between C and D.

Having the characters act in-character seems nice but if it still comes down to C or D, then I'm going with C.

 

[Kayerts]

Regarding the other options:

1. Doing nothing doesn't seem to actually be a choice; it's just passing the buck to Jeremiah. He still has to figure out how to deal with three gods; the only thing that changes is that we lose the option of unshackling the machine. Seems poor.

2. Presumably VD notices that we're powering up the gun, flees to Mars, and dukes it out with his bro. He probably loses. At this point the Nightbringer probably assumes control of any remaining necron forces. (Maybe the Grey Knights, too; they are, after all, pariahs.) Even if he allied with us, our combined forces might not be able to fight off the Swarm, and it seems far more likely that he'd just try to kill us.

3. Letting characters act in character probably means that Malygris unleashes the Machine God and Doombreed tells Jeremiah to invade. Thus we have the three-way godbrawl suggested earlier; the Machine God probably sits out the first match and kills the winner. Basically a stronger version of the original choice C.

4. I like the appealing long shot, where we seek to raise ourselves above the stars gods and become greater than the Emperor.

The best plan to make that happen seems to be to shut down the Nexus Engine with a warp lock and pressure VD into Mars. He'll initiate Transcendence and get jumped by his brother; while the two C'tan battle each other, we sneak a team in, remove the lock, re-engage the Nexus, and steal his power for our own.

The main difficulty there seems to be in timing; we'd need to be on the Dragon's tail as he flees, and our combat engineering team would have to work quickly and stealthily to pull it off. So our "pressure" is probably going to have to take the form of an all out assault on the Imperial Palace; we commit every man we can put on the ground and every ship we can keep in the air to supporting Ahriman when he faces VD. We hang all other tactical considerations, on the basis that we'll be better equipped to deal with the Grey Knights later if we succeed, and it won't matter if we fail.

If things work out, Jeremiah ascends, and the Knights, the Necrons, and the Nids become so many sinners in the hands of an angry god. If we take too long, or if the Nightbringer is secretly loyal to VD, or if Chaos engineering proves unequal to the task, or if the Machine turns out to be uncooperative, then we're probably going to tend toward the same result as the A choice offers. Still, it feels like the ballsiest way to go out.

 

[Storyfag]

Completing the Transcendence Protocol for anyone means Mankind dies, methinks, so this is right out.

I suggest:

WE SAVE THE GAME AND THEN RELOAD TO SEE EACH AND EVERY ENDING


























Problem, root?

 

[Storyfag]

Drat! Foiled again! M: