I have a player interested in making a character from a Fortress World, and he's asking what Fortress Worlds exist in the neighboring Calixis Sector and what enemies they were fortified to defend against. This also got me wondering what enemies fortress worlds are typically useful against.

Orks - Orks hold areas of space and thus it is sometimes possible to predict their likely paths of attack. Just as likely, by placing a Fortress World in their sights, Orks may alter their path to attack it. The Fortress World also makes a fine staging point for attacks against the Orks. This seems like a solid choice.

Eldar - Eldar are difficult to find and pretty rare. They attack unpredictably, so the only real time I see a Fortress World being built up against the Eldar would be if it's actually a Maiden World that the Imperium was (un)fortunate enough to fortify before the Eldar came to reclaim it. This seems an unlikely choice.

Tau/Tyranids/Necrons - Not really present on this side of the warp gate or in this time, so not a viable choice.

Pirates - A fortified bastion from which to defend against piracy might work. It would primarily exist for launching raids against pirates since it would be pretty foolish for most pirate bands to attack a fortress world.

Chaos - A broad category. Should this be more limited, like Chaos Space Marines vs Chaos Renegades vs Chaos Cultists, or is just Chaos enough? Regardless, we know these exist along the Eye of Terror, and it's quite possible that some exist along the local Warp Storms too. Another solid choice.

Mutants - I'm not really seeing an entire Fortress World devoted to anti-mutant activities. The fact that mutants are everywhere and yet don't (typically) organize to fight in set areas makes this a real longshot. However, see the next one (Criminals) and it could develop from the same lines...

Criminals - An Adeptus Arbites Fortress World? Maybe one with nearby Penal Worlds under its jurisdiction? Hope you can take Common Lore (Adeptus Arbites) and perhaps even Scholastic Lore (Judgement) as elite advances if you really want to take this route.

Psykers - A really outside choice. An entire world devoted to anti-psykers? Is it an Inquisition-run planet?

Rogue Trader (specific) - Not really seeing this myself. A renegade Rogue Trader is likely either a Pirate or Chaos (by the renegade path), so those are likely better options.

Xenos (specific) - Are there other lesser xenos that require Fortress Worlds to be developed to counter them?

Calixis doesn't seem to have a recognized threat coming from a recognized direction such as for Cadia. The one possibility for a major threat has fortress worlds at the other end. The other reason for creating a fortress world seems to be because there's an active crusade in the sector, which Calixis doesn't have (although it's sending troops to the "Margin" Crusade, that's not the same as having an active crusade in sector).

I imagine creating a fortress world basically turns the world into a net importer, so the Imperium would not want to simply create fortresses as a sector IG headquarters. That's just my impression and others will probably disagree.

Nothing stopping a GM from doing so though. It's their campaign after all.

The neighbouring sectors might be a good choice. One in particular (I can't look it up as i'm not within reach of my books) is noted for problems with orks. Fortress worlds could also be built at points where the warp currents create a trade route worth protecting or to stop them being used as invasion routes. While calixis has few fortress worlds the margin crusade ships veterans back so that might be a route for the player to take.

He's currently planning on going with Orks. He's also taking The Hand of War and swapping out the redundant 'second helping' of Hatred (Orks) with either Talented (Dodge) or Talented (Medicae). Seems fine to me.

I still don't like Hatred (Chaos) - it seems way too broad, but then so too does Hatred (Criminals).

You could always leave it an open ended mystery; once the Imperium's gone to the expense of creating a Fortress World, I can't see them decommissioning it in a hurry. Maybe the expected enemy is a long forgotton secret, or the exact enemy was never known and the fortress created in accordance with Strategic Prognostication, against some threat that hasn't yet appeared. Or hasn't yet been noticed. Or was beaten off too easily.

All you'd need to do is swap out the Hatred Talent for a Forbidden Lore, and drop the occassional plot hook.

I've noticed that Rogue Trader seems to have dropped Hatred (Cult) and Hatred (Heretics). It's possible that these have been folded into Hatred (Criminals). if this is the case then perhaps an Ecclesiarchy-sponsored Fortress World where Hatred (Criminals) is nutured at an early age.

Also, Hatred (Ciminals) would seem to include everything that Hatred (Pirates) does and more (since a pirate is just one of many types of criminals).

Right now I'm coming up with an interesting (to me) idea.

I want a hybrid world. The world will be both a Fortress World and a Penal World. Characters coming from the world may select either Home World option, depending on whether they are one of the keepers or one of the condemned. The planet will be a massive military prison that is used to draw up and train (to the minimum standard necessary) Penal Legions. The purpose of the Fortess World function is not to defend from an outside threat, but to defend against escapes and/or uprisings of the criminals held there. Those that are part of the keepers will take Hatred (Criminals) as part of the Fortress World package.

I considered having this all on one world, but I might have the Fortress World be a moon that orbits the Penal World (or vice versa). This ups the scale and might be a little more in-setting.

Opinions?

HappyDaze said:

Remember, the Imperium commonly views the Eldar as a whole to be a singular threat, mainly because distinguishing between individual groups can be tricky at times. While the activities of the Craftworlds can be inexplicable, bands of raiders (Corsairs and Dark Eldar alike) may choose to raid a particular region over a protracted period of time, often because they have relatively easy access to that region from their home base.

That said, the Calixis Sector tends to have a relatively low Eldar presence - there are several groups active within the Koronus Expanse, but the Eldar tend to regard the Calixis Sector as a place to avoid.

N0-1_H3r3 said:

Since you write for the line, how would you view Fortress Worlds devoted to anti-mutant or anti-criminal purposes?

Your explanation on why Fortress Worlds intended to counter Eldar exist may also work fine for Fortress Worlds arrayed against Pirates.

I like plasmafest's idea that a fortress world might not exist for a current purpose but for a historical purpose.

How about a war world set up to fight the Yu'Vath? Established some 5,000 years ago on a populous planet, it provided hordes of troops for the crusade that conquered the Calixis Sector. Now however the Yu'Vath are gone and there is little war. But the people still have a very martial tendency and the Imperial authorities can still use this. Maybe the navy have extensive facilities in orbit. The planet still plays its tithe in imperial guard regiments and such is the martial fervour of these troops that they are exported across the imperium in the same way cadians are.

Also don't forget that there are still wars, rebellions and so on going on within the Calixis sector and given the choice between recruiting a guard regiment from a fortress world and a guard regiment from a hive world, the discipline and training of fortress worlders might make their continued existence more attractive.

Of course, this makes the world less of a fortess and more of a military recruitment and response point. But thats pretty much academic for the player character concerned. As far as the worlds citizens are concerned, they are born and raised as warriors for the god of man.

The imperial authorities might even make it a point of shipping back imp guard regiments from that world back to that world if it isn't too time consuming (i.e. if hey are used in sector) thus guaranteing that the world has a ready supply of veterans returning to raise and train the next generation of warriors.

HappyDaze said:

Broadly speaking, both in much the same way - the world is fortified, but not against an external threat. Instead, the fortresses act to divide the loyal (and heavily-armed) minority from the vile traitorous masses outside the walls. This probably exists to protect some vital resource that the Imperium is unwilling to relinquish on a world which has not yet, or cannot be pacified.

The players in my campaign mostly opted to be from a Fortress World, and between us we hammered out the recent history of Merates Null 5, a rogue planet that Lord-Captain Ibrahim van Baroque conquered during the Meritech Wars, at huge expense, and claimed as compensation.

It's a small, lifeless, airless rogue world, drifting far from any of the stars of the Merates cluster, and further yet from any of the civilised planets of the Calixis Sector, but the Meritech Clans made heavy use of its secret locale and mineral deposits, and the battle to take it eventually descended into years of tunnel fighting, draining the van Baroque accounts to an almost unconscionable degree, and subsequent decades of repeated Ork attacks haven't helped.

But the current inhabitants of Merates Null 5 have persevered, mostly due to sheer bloody-mindedness, and have become so good at fighting Orks and especially fighting Orks in tunnels, that the now heavily fortified planet is informally nicknamed 'Goffmorgue' , and the Guard Tithe forms the Merates Tunnel Rats, and see heavy use on the ongoing war on Kulth.

N0-1_H3r3 said:

From your description came to mind old Judge Dredd comics with it's Mega-Cities and outside areas of Cursed Earth.

Routa-maa said:

Only one of the many places GW took "inspiration" from.

Well, they used to do Judge Dredd games and miniatures