Intrigueing concept, that walking city of Ambulon. I was wondering:

1) where does it come from? Pre-Imperial xenos technology, ancient Terra-forming machine from the Dark Age of Technology or something else, something sinister?

2) how do you envision it ... somehow I can't shake off the visual of a giant snail walking on four squat legs, but Ambulon could just as well look like an AT-AT walker from The Empire Strikes Back or even like Howl's Moving Castle

Curious to your ideas.

There is a map of it, and it looks beetle shaped, it is described as having "pillars" going from the front to the back along the spine(the upper hive lives here, most stable). So i think it more looks like a giant beetle in shape. But if you come closer to it it would just look like a walking hive.

I'd go with more of a howl's moving castle look. Somewhere underneath it there is probably a coherent looking machine. But as I understand it has a huge ungainly pile of crap on the top (aka: the city of Ambulon)

Anonymus said:

Map? map? where?

purge the unclean "rejoice for you are true" iirc

Malkith said:

Page 44.

And it's Not a map, just a shaded outline of an oval with some "buildings" around it.

Bit naff really.

How about something like this?

Our group has taken a lot of inspiration from the hungry city chronicles. Prety much anything in that series could be applied to Ambulon.

Very caste-oriented society, every has to have a job and must perform it well for the city to survive. The lower portions of the city would be dedicated to the processing and refinement of the ores, oils, and gems that the city scoops up. Anyone living in Amublon has very little personal space; since its quite possible that your hab acts as walkway for hundreds of other workers most habbers have learned to keep the stuiff they care about locked up. All available space is used for something and it would be crowded even for a hive.

When it's time for speculation, I speculate that Ambulon was originally a massive strip mining platform that crawled along the planet's surface, laying low the mountains and stripping the world bare of it's mineral wealth. By the time the hive cities rose up there was little mineral wealth left for Ambulon to devour. But by then, generations of miners and engineers making constant repairs and modifications to the city had caused it to become a hive all it's own and the citizens had to turn to other ways to generate income to keep the spare parts coming.

ps

When I first envisioned Ambulon I fealt it should look like a massive ape-like lumbering robot bristling with structures, the whole thing easily dwarfing an Imperator Titan.

Theres a remark in the background telling of the rusting remains of other mobile cities very much like ambulon. There was a thriving culture of walking cities on the planet, and ambulon is just the last example of such a city.

In my opinion, the creator of this piece of fluff took the novel "Absolution Gap" by Alastair Reynolds (which is a nice piece of fiction, but rather unfinished) and had a go with it. It has some pretty strong images, like a culture of rolling/walking cathedral-cities wandering around the equator of a planet, constantly on the move, so that church officials always have a certain moon in view....and dissappearances of said moon is considered a sign of holy importance. Mechanical defects (god forbid) resulting in a city falling behind the pace lowers the respect for said city. Rather bizarre but read-worthy.

Ikkaan said:

Absolution Gap was the first thing I thought of when I read about Ambulon for the first time.

Hyperpigs FTW!

I wonder how many levels of Unnatural Strength Ambulon has.

Weapons: City-block-sized foot (1d10 + 150 I; Pen 20; Unwieldy)*

*Notes: Cannot be Parried.

I like the whole idea of massive mining machines turned cities.

Ambulon has been the funnest setting that I have used so far. I can't wait to think up an excuse to send my acolytes back!

Nice pic Scary!

bogi_khaosa said:

I parry it with my sheild.

I wonder wether or not the other old cities could be restored or maybe used as a titan.

Well, they are ancient....dating before the imperial colonization of the sector. Possibly built by a pre-imperial society for whatever reason (hey, what reason could one have to build walking cities ?).

Personally i found the spiritual idea of building something that big bizarre. A space station would be better suited to such a task. Either someone does it for fun, prestige or out of basic requirements (like scorching heat, but there are stationary settlements which makes this choice rather unlikely).

Why would you need your city to walk away at a constant trot ?

EDIT: Well...they are titans in a way. Not combat titans, but still....but the text reminded me more of corroded wrecks than jsut defunct cities.

Personally i found the spiritual idea of building something that big bizarre.

You're not very familiar with the three guiding principles of Imperial Architecture and Engineering, are you?

-Gothic style (gothic as in high arches, not as in "Oh my life doeth verily suck!")

-Lots of skulls (ok... perhaps a little of the other kind of gothic)

-BIG

Cifer said:

You already answered your question. These are the three principles (nicely formulated) ;-)

Throughout imperial architecture, the fourth principle is missing ("Your big, badass cathedral has to be able to move on legs or otherwise the emperor will smite thee.").

So, why the hell should it be moving? Its not like it would be convenient or safe (ambulon is not known for these attributes).

Ambulon probably didn't start as a walking city. It likely started as a massive mobile +++classified+++ with a sizable crew. But after generations of people breeding within Ambulon, and it's original purpose being forgotten, it just became the wandering city we know today.

Well, judging by the fact that the "Oracle" could tap into the city itself and that the Serrated Query could utilize its power conduits, I'd say that it was built by man. Though for what purposes none can say... except maybe the guy who wrote Absolution Gap (and maybe a few guys who read it )

A story hook just occurred to me.

Heretics, terrorists, enemies of the Imperium, or just enemies of the ruling Govorner attempt to seize control of Ambulon as it passes close to Hive Sibellus. Their plan, should they succeed, is to use the city to "trample" the hive and cripple two of Scintilla's most important cities in one attack. Ideally the climax of the game would take place as Ambulon is beginning to climb over the lower hives of Sibillus, the entire city tilting at extreem angles, the Acolytes having to fight their way to the control center as the city pitches and weaves in all directions.

I like it!

As long as your group is not overly sensitive to 9/11 references, this could be a real blast.

Darth Smeg said:

I would agree, that is a smashing (tehehehehe) idea for a game and makes me wish my game hadn't lost Scintella for a bit, but 9/11 references? Really? If they're that messed up, they need to stop playing pretend and get some help. Honestly, it's a damned odd thing to even bring up in this discussion. Might as well bring up the Iraq debacle/war when talking about the IG... although we have worked Vietnam into the IG...

Terrorists hijacking Really Big Tranport(sorta) with lotsa people on it, and crashing intro Really Big building with even more lotsa people in it, with aim of bringin everything down in flames.

There is a resemblance. Personally, I think that just ads flavour, but then I was never very PC

Darth Smeg said:

ah, I see it now! Hah, 40k always has to do it bigger ;-)

Attila-IV said:

Can you immagine the effects a Berzerker Thorn could have on Ambulon if applied in the right place?

Wow, I have a new story thread.