I've always been confused by this question. Barring the obvious explanation "When a mummy Tech Priest and a daddy Tech Priest love each other very much..." where do they come from?

...How exactly would somebody go about getting inducted into the Machine Cult? It seems strange to me that (on non-Forge Worlds) people are taught to venerate The God-Emperor, yet they would willingly turn their back on this to join some secretive organisation.. I mean would they just walk up to a Mechanicum Temple and say "Oh hai, can I has join yoo guyz? Kthxbi!"

...Thats another question, what would a Mechanicus Temple look like? Do they even have temples, or do they just huddle together in Reactors/Factorums/Tech-Support Offices/Internet Cafes?

I'm so confused, please can somebody help me out?

If you were noticed to have a "Knack" or above average intelligence then you might be sequestered from what ever hab you live in.

Some might have that dreaded Curiosity thing going for them, and whilst that doesnt always bode well, a great many famous Explorators have the same imbalance..

Other than that, no idea the books remain very vague on it.

But if you were a lower hive gang boi who's always having to fix the guns or sharpen the knives you might be found out and face the choice of "join us or die for your sins" what would you choose?

Dibs on the metal body parts please!

Dartneis-Is-Back said:

I'm definitely no expert, but I'm gonna go out on a limb and say this is another... "it depends on the planet/sector/etc" questions ;-). Though, generally speaking, I would assume most high ranking priests (Magos and arch-magos) probably come from Forge Worlds where they're pretty much born to be a tech-priest. On Imperial and hive worlds, most tech-priests might be imported there from forge worlds. However, they would need a vast work-force of technomats pulled form the local population to preform their rites to the genetorum and other vital machines. These technomates, like many other people within the Imperium, would, more often then not, be a hereditary position. You do it because your parents did it and you'll like it because your parents liked it (and possibly because the Tech-Priests had done some tinkering with you or your line to insure you'd like it ;-) ).

On some rare instances, one of those technomates might display a more then keen mind for his or her type and station, a mind which the Tech-Priests feel would be wasted if allowed to continue simply being a technomate. These individuals are indoctrinated into the further mysteries of the cult and raised to the status of full Tech-Priest of what-ever sect those priests belong to. He or she would have never turned their backs on their beliefs because they, even on an imperial world, were born into the Cult Mechanicus and not the Imperial Cult.

On the topic of temples, you bet your sweet bippy they've got temples! Big massive temples where the machine-god is worshiped and his servants placated in amny different ways. Their exact design varies greatly depending on what kind of devotion and worship happens within their walls. There are the dangerous rites and prayers offered up to placate the fiery Plasma Engines housed in the awe-inspiring (and incredibly hot) plasmathedrals of the void-ships; the irradiated vaults of the generatums where hundreds of servitors, tech-priests in heavily shielded vestments, and technomates afflicted with the harsh burns of the generatums powerful machine spirit sing their binary hymnals and weave their maintenance-dances around the terminals of that most sacred of temples which supplies power to entire hives; there's the droning mantras of cogitation that fill the halls of the twisting, buzzing, and glowing labyrinthine corridors that weave around the data-stacks of the ancient info-temples in which vast amounts of precious sacred knowledge is stored and revered day in and day out...

In other words, if the act of maintaining a machine is a holy rite, the places these machines are housed would be a temple. Just take anything from our world today, make it 20 times more complex, add at least three layers of mysticism over it, then jam it in a catholic church designed by H.R. Giger and you'll be doing fine ;-) Also, grab two words, one dealing with the machine or function of the place, the other revolving around some kind of temple, hyphenate the two, and, prest-o, you have the name of the type of temple it is!

What follows is wild theory at best, total hot air at worst, but here are my thoughts...

The Mechanicus is supported of a number of menials, technomats, lay tech-adepts and other members who are not themselves tech-priests but who are essential to doing basic labor and maintainence of Imperial technology. Naturally, these personel must be trained to perform their particular functions. I would theorize that anyone who exhibited particular skill, intelligence or aptitude might be singled out for additional training and eventual ordination into the tech-priesthood. Add to that, noble houses and merchant guilds whose wealth is based on industry must have close ties to the Mechanicus. It would not be unreasonable for a 'second son' (an heir unlikely to inherit) to be trained within the tech-priesthood, in part to further cement those ties. Finally, I find it entirely reasonable that someone with an inclination toward technology might seek out the tech-priests for training.

It's also worth noteing that while the tech-priests are a mystery cult, it is commonly accepted among the laiety that the Omnisiah and the God Emperor are one and the same. So, a good Emperor-loving son of the Imperium would not necessarily consider joining the cult mechanicus as leaving the Emperor's grace.

Just my thoughts...

My initial impression (as an engineer) was to write something along the lines of aptitude and IQ tests being a pre-requisite for joining the red apron gang... then you've also got to bear in mind that the Ad-Mech are a bunch of annoying, stagnant, repressive pains in the arse as much as the ecclesiarchy.

So, my revised opinion is that anyone who can worship the omnissiah to the point that their superiors are confident they're not going to rock the boat overly much by sponsoring the initiate into the order, will get in and from there, progress through the Ad-Mech ranks. Actual technical knowledge is something which comes later. As players making up a tech priest they will actually dump some points into making them good as a tech priest by giving them a decent Int stat so they're actually competent at doing technical/knowledge things... as an actual ability in the Ad-Mech itself, its probably seconday to being able to remember lots of things and political at the higher levels. So, PC's who make up an actual Tech Priest that gets given to the Inquisition as an Acolyte are probably there because their overseer decided they where a threat to their position if they manage to stick around too long and its much easier to just give Tech Priest Bob to an someone that will get Bob killed in a violent, horrific fashion and be out of the way.

Dartneis-Is-Back said:

1. Forge world populations are quite large, essentially equivalent to Hives, and the population are raised in the credo of the Omnimessiah - the Techpriests likely cull from those large populations, since they are already conversant with the basic traits of the faith and show the proper reverance for the Machine Spirit. I would also imagine that laypeople from non-Forge Worlds who show a technical knack will be "invited" to join the Machine Cult.

2. According to the Powers That Be, the Omnimessiah is a manifestation of the God-Emperor. In that sense, it's not turning one's back on one's faith. Machine spirits are recognized by the Imperial Cult, so I imagine a congregant who told his parish Priests that the "Machine Spirits talk to him" would get a lecture that he should do his Duty To The Imperium by Increasing Production Levels as a Mechanicus initiate.

3. Mechanicus temples show up fairly regularly in the various novels and whatnot. In any factory, you're going to have basic shrines to the Omnimessiah in any significant area - the Generation Shrine, the Processing Shrine, etc. There are smaller devotional creches at power junctions and the like. Proper Temples, as opposed to the shrines that are necessary to the smooth running of ordinary production, tend to be rather massive things - the huge Hydroelectric Dam that Ciaphas Cain blows up in Death or Glory, a Volcano Forge on Mars, a Dataloom the size of a hab-block. If you've seen the movie Metropolis by Fritz Lang, you've seen what a Mechanicus temple looks like.

In my current game which is a really customized spinoff of the planet setting in Maggots in the meat (mission from the GM guide), i created an old Magos named Tiphos on the floating tech platform called the Island of The Emperor whose duty is to secure and repair the central engine empowering the platform. : named The Core.

There, he's recruiting young orphan from Acreage (feudal world) and use them as free labour on his work at The Core, providing them with shelter and food in exchange for their work. He care about them as if his own child and is truly a benevolent Magos, teaching them about the world amongst the star and the living-spirit of arcanotech. Amongst these Sons Of Mars, he's selecting the most potent candidate and elevate them with the higher teachings of the Omnissiah, sending them eventually off-world for further Tech-priest training on Mars.

What do you think of my story? Seems a good way for them to train them.

It's a cool idea. I could see that Magos getting dragged into the simmering underground conflict between Amalathian and Recongregator Inquisitors on Acreage. A Magos teaching the benighted citizens about tech and other worlds? A threat to be dealt with or a hero to be supported depending on the faction.

It's not exactly an answer, but the novels contained in the omnibus "Enforcer" by Matt Farrer give a fair insight into the look and feel of the cult mechanicus on a *very good* scale for use in Dark Heresy. Not titans and battle-ships but a small tech-shrine in a big hive world, a magos doing a spot of 'hitting bad things' and some other delightful aspects. Well recommended, though it's still not exactly an answer!

Overall, I think people are heading in the right direction. If you can simply stockpile sperm and eggs, even so far as introducing/screening for mutations in the appropriate order (don't keep 'tentacle' mutations but do keep 'population diversity' ones) then I don't see why they'd not do that. Cost effective artificial surrogacy/vat-growing embryos and gestating them to full term (or beyond)? Sure, why wouldn't they (if it's feasible)?

As an aside, I very like the idea (originally which I encountered in Tim Huckleberry's old 3rd Ed 'Adeptus Mechanicus' codex) of having roving 'Techpriest Pastors' who *actually tend to the flock*, who act much more like priests and teachers than scientists and technicians. I.e. the social-engineering side of techpriests.

The idea of a tech-priest who's not 'uber technical' but has all the correct 'flashy gimmicks' in place and can fix the odd mundane problems that most people can't/don't, someone who 'takes in' the early problem children (the 'curious') and sets them to 'proper, wholesome tasks', before they're eventually whisked off to tech-seminary...

Well, on lower-grade worlds, places where you don't have massive Mechanicus influence by way of infrastructure (i.e. in places with largely only smaller shrines) then I can easily see 'sending a child off to the Mechanicus' as a way for families to actually gain things. The techpriest might be above sharing knowledge, but they're not above pragmatic spending ('We'll tend this company's plumbing if the workers provide a tithe of one hundred viable supplicants to the priesthood every year') of some of their more mundane (but well hoarded) resources.

It's simple. Vindicare Assassins are from Venus, Tech Priests are from Mars. They get their babies delivered by "The Imperial Stork,", a massive cargo void ship also known as "The White Ship".

And lest we forget nobles, think of it like the middle ages. The oldest is groomed to take over the family, the second sent to the military, the third to religious. The rest would be at loose ends. With the Ad-Mech, you can get rid of another child by sending him there as well as developing your family connections. The Omnissiah and God Emperor are one for all practical and general knowledge purposes, unless you are going to start spreading heresy about the Mars gate and what will come out of it. In that case, you will be hunted down by both the Mechanicus and the Inquisition as both a Heretic and a Heretek.

Agreed. It always bothered me that Noble-born AdMech were not allowed according to the "official" rules. I had one who was sent to the AdMech after, an NPC Noble-born Tech Priest who was sent to the AdMech to become indoctrinated and recieve the rite of pure thought after she became suicidal.

The Boy Named Crow said:

To be fair, I don't think the Origin World -> Career matrch-ups on the random roll talbles are meant to be hard nad fast rules, just sugeastions aof the most common and archatypicval examples of folks from each origin. After all, if they were had and fast, please tell me who or what in the name of the Emperor is living on Prol IX... a hive world... full of adepts ;-)

Huh. I never noticed that. I was under the impression that they were actual restrictions, but have always house-ruled them out of my games. I like your explanation better.

Graver said:

Rules are mostly created for players/PC.

Especially, creating rules are designend to make fair playable characters.

In most games, NPC are never bound by creating rules.

Graver said:

Even a hive world "full of adepts" would have menials and maintenance personnel. There would also be PDF forces, Tech-priests and others. Just because it's a Hive-sized librarium doesn't mean it is any less a hive.

-=Brother Praetus=-

Brother Praetus said:

But it would still have a rather high percentage (higher then Hive worlds devoted to manufacture) of adepts who were, more then likely, born there as welle ;-)

My point: there's a whole set of hive worlds devoted to the recording and storage of records and housing the greatest source of knowledge and information in the Calixis Sector, yet, if one slavishly adheres to the the tables, it would be impossible* for a PC adept to come from such a place even though it sounds like it would be great recruitment ground for an acolyte. The only reason for the restrictions of what career comes from what world seems to be more to illustrate stereotypical characters to those not overly-familiar with the setting then any kind of attempt to prevent uber-combos that would break the game. I would also point to no clerics from a feral world even though I can clearly see a disciple of Seth the Voice** as good candidate for lay-preacher and a hundred other stories and origins for such a combination ;-). Thus, my thoughts and reasoning that such restrictions were more sugestions to inform those nerw to the setting about what is normal and stereotypical for such a place and not mandates that had to be adhered to doggedly.

* Impossible unless the GM rules that, for some reason, being an adept in such an environment would be an Imperial World origin as opposed to a Hive World Origin or some such...

** I realize that technically, Iocanthus is classed an Argiworld which would make it an Imperial World by the origins, but, lets face it, a Feral World origin would be more suited to those who are born and must survive in such an environment ...

Graver said:

Oh, I agree; actually with the each of the points of your post... I could see both Imperial and Feral World origins coming from the same worlds in some cases. Nobles from just about anywhere. It's really a matter of flavor and fitting a background to it. For instance, the Noble Adept I play currently is from Kulth; a war world. The seventh son of a seventh son, he is so far removed from likely ever being head of his family he was allowed to go off-world and study with the College of the Hetaeriae Lexis at the Lexis Maxima on Scintilla.

-=Brother Praetus=-

Isn't the Mechanicus responsible for the maintenance and screening of all Astartes gene seeds? It seems very likely that with the genetic knowledge they could 'clone'/grow their own ranks. I can also envision the feeble, mamed, and crippled flocking to cult of the machine god to be reborn in the 'true flesh'.

That being said, I personally believe it is one of the great mysteries that may be best left to the players to decide, allowing for unique background and developement.

Dartneis-Is-Back said:

Well, lets take the world we have most experience with ourselves... The modern western cilivization (assuming western since we write here in english and FFGs main marketing area is US/Europe). People are taught to belive in all sorts of things: Like human rights, individual freedom, free market economy, money and so on. Still great many people willingly turn their back on this to join some secretive organizations, whether it be gangs, criminal enterprices, hard-core environmentalists, christian cults, terrorist cells... In some situations they do this because they live in the right/wrong neighbourghood, in some cases they do this rebel against their parents or because their values on life have changed or someone persuaded them to join. There is pretty much as many ways as there are people.

Dartneis-Is-Back said:

Mechanicus temples, when they have been described in the fluff, seem to conform to the regular imperial-gothic architecture and they seem to be a sort of compromise between laboratory, factory and temple. They are temple in very real sense, because the operations inside are sacred rituals supervised by priests, but the difference is that these temples are not dedicated to unseen, emphemeral or outside gods which you contact only by prayer. The god of AdMech manifests in each technological devices so instead of statues, paintings and altars you are likely to find computers, robotic manufacturing units, automated laboratories and such. some of these do very mundane things (like produce the vaccines used to vaccinate all imperial adepts against local planetray diseases in the Ritual of Vaccianation when they arrive to the planet), some do very non-mundane things (like observer the cycles of the solar flares of the local star and compare the results with the electromagnetic frequencies of the power lines to calibrate circuit breakers) and some do things no-one really understands ("See, it has been there for at least 1200 years now and only once has that little indicator gone to red. No, we don't know what it really indicates, but when it did there was this huge famine across the system.")

Agent.0.Fortune said:

In this case, ABSOLUTELY NOT! Each Adeptus Astartes chapter maintains and cares for their prescious Geneseed. This is actually the primary mission of the Appothecaries: To maintain and recover the chapter's Geneseed. If there is time they also will treat the wounded. Depending on the chapter involved the offending Techpriest is likely about to disintergate in a hail of explosive bolts the instant the Progenoid Glands are not in the fire arc. The Adeptus Mechanicus would not even complain since doing something so inflammatory and stupid is illogical, and therefore flawed, and flaws must be corrected.

ZillaPrime said:

However, it has been mentioned in the past that the various chapters are tithed a small bit of gene seed (I'd hate to be the tithe collector for that one) which is analyzed, cataloged, and stored by the Mechanicus and it is from this tithe that the successor chapters were and still are formed. Is this true and, if so, this might be what Agent was referring to.

Yup Graver, that's still the case and mentioned in recent 40k rulebooks and codices.

Graver said:

Yes. This. Something I picked up on the web, not sure how accurate it is... warhammer40k.wikia.com/wiki/Adeptus_Mechanicus

but it indicates the 5% tithe for "All Space Marine Chapters are expected to pay a tithe of 5% of their gene-seed every year to the Adeptus Mechanicus so that the Mechanicus' tech-priests can monitor the health of each Chapter and facilitate the creation of new Chapters from existing gene-seed lines."

Of course, they must not scan too close for mutation since several chapters have 'issues' (Blood Angels).

ZillaPrime said:

I am sure if there was a Magos Biologis with enough interest, and influence, it would be a non-issue. The real battle would be convincing their peers of the value of frail flesh, the inconvenience of the Astarties a secondary cogitation at best. After all the survival of the Empire and Space Marines are at the whim of the Mechanicus, who fortunately continue to honor the Treaty of Mars (made with the Omnissiah).

Should things change.... I think grim-dark would inadequately describe the resulting paradigm shift.