Since we're not very sure when it's coming out, I decided to start this. What do you hope to see in The Lathe Worlds?

Personally, I want to see more on the Legio Cybernetica. Playable robots might be fun, if very stupid. Also rules for the Skitarii and who knows what else!

I'd love to see both more fluff on the various tech-heresies we've been told about as well as an indepth discussion on the relation between the Adeptus Mechanicus and the Inquisition. For a start.

Skitari for sure. Also looking forward to tech-assassins.

Also, Knight Titans.

Plushy said:

I think that'd be awesome to see make a comeback.

While I admit the Tech Assassins are really cool, I'm really hoping the book will touch on alternate career ranks for some of the other orders of Tech Priest like the Logis, the Rune Priests, and such. Maybe some of the higher levels of the priesthood for Rogue Trader and Deathwatch campaigns?

Plushy said:

I hope NOT to see pages of "filler words" with simple things being stretched to pages without some hard facts and new examples.

What I hope FOR is more inside to the structure fo the calixian mechanicus, the position, rights, does & don´ts of Technomants and their ilk and [sYSTEM WISE] good rules for the use of Trade(Technomant) with actual game impact.

nethru said:

As you wish…

Psion said:

Divine Light if Sollex ^^

Lots of alternate ranks, hopefully for Rank 0 fellas.

I'd kill for nice Skitarii Tech-Guard rules (new career? Guardsman alt rank?)

Legio Cybernetica robots are so cool looking.

Knight Titans need a comeback.

Lots of implants and bionics, too. Hopefully cheap.

I’ve seen it mentioned twice, so I thought I’d ask a question:

(Aside: Knights aren’t Titans. They’re Knights. )

What role would Knights, massive walkers that stride across the battlefield, play inside an investigation themed RPG?

BYE

H.B.M.C. said:

They're a piece of funny equipment that doesn't get much publicity in 40k at large. As a one-man craft, they would make an excellent "cinematic moment" in a more action-packed campaign. The weapon aren't too obscene - an Autocannon and a Chainsword - and they're not completely impenetrable in terms of armour.

I guess I'm just a sucker for the more obscure stuff getting a second shot in the RPGs. Really, this book just has me excited and I'm trying to dig up anything neat the Mechanicus could make the grave error of arming PCs with.

Autocannon and “chainsword”? You have grossly, grossly underestimated what a Knight is.

The standard pattern Knight, the Paladin, has a large Battlecannon and a chainblade longer than a Leman Russ. They’re the type thing a squad of Marines would struggle to fight, not a ‘boss monster’ for a group of acolytes.

They’re far and above simple walkers, and were around the level of Stompas (before Stompas became equivalents to Warhound Titans). If you brought one into regular 40K it would likely be a 2-3 Structure Point Super-Heavy Walker. They might fit in DW or Only War, but not in DH.

BYE

H.B.M.C. said:

Lexicanum has mislead me. Thank you for the insight, HBMC!

H.B.M.C. said:

Ah, are you sure about that, mate? I know Knights are pretty tough, but I didn't think they were a Super-Heavy. I had a look through my old Space Marine stuff (meaning the 6mm tabletop game, aka Epic). I wasn't able to find the complete rules, but I did find one unit card. A Knight household of 7 knights (2 units of 3, plus a command Knight) will set you back 550 points. By comparison, a Leman Russ company of 10 tanks (3 units of 3, plus a command tank) costs 600 points. Given that as a reference, they're a bit better than a Leman Russ, perhaps almost as 'ard as a Land Raider. So, Knights are good… but, neither of those tanks is a super-heavy. I can see a Knight absolutely flattening a sentinel 1 on 1, or being an even match for a Defiler or Dread, but I don't think they're in a Baneblade's weight class…

Oh, and you forgot the fore arc force shield.

In any case, a Knight is probably overkill for a Dark Heresy game. Deathwatch, sure, throw that daemon possessed Knight at the players. They don't need that many fate points, do they?

Cheers,

- V.

Yet we have Nemesis Dreadkinghts in Daemon Hunter.

My main hope for the Lathes Worlds is to see further development of Belacane, one of the minor forge worlds in the Calixis Sector.

Back in the day, Black Industries opened up the Calixis Sector for fans to write in with suggestions for individual worlds. I got in there fast with Reth and Belacane, and my write up formed the basis of the sector guide to both of these worlds. Ever since then, I've kind of thought of these worlds as "my" worlds. (This feeling is, of course, totally irrational - I recognise that they're not "my" worlds in any sense at all!)

I wrote up Belacane very much in the spirit of 5th ed. 40k, which introduced the "five minutes to midnight" feel of the failing Imperium. 5th ed, mentioned that the Golden Throne was failing, so I deliberately linked the Calixis Sector to that by making Belacane a centre for the production of Stasis fields… except that the Belacane Magi have lost the knowledge of how to manufacture them, and are desperately trying to cover this up to maintain their power and prestige.

My thinking was that Belacane was a microcosm for the failing Imperium - one of a number of key worlds whose knowledge was useful for keeping everything (especially the Golden Throne, which I reasoned would need some stasis tech) ticking over, and that for reasons of pride, the world's rulers are actually concealing information that the Imperium desperately needs to know.

I also gave a nod to the "Wizard of Oz" with the prideful Belacane Magi engaging in increasingly shameful and pathetic attempts to pretend that the most famous, ancient and powerful of their order is still alive.

It was really nice when Rogue Trader explicitly gave a shout out to my interpretation of Belacane when it talked about how Rogue Traders use the world's stasis vaults to store their warrants of trade and banners. There was also recent coverage of the world in an ocean-stealing scenario in (I think) the Book of Judgement, though the treatment of the forge world there was a bit more generic.

My main hope therefore for the Lathe Worlds is that Belacane gets some more love, and that we see more about its rulers' desperate attempts to conceal their own ignorance and maybe some interesting new stasis tech!

I hope they all rust, to make way for some real learning and progress in the name of the Emperor.

Interogator Z (rumored to be a Recongregator)

I don't want to sound like an ass, or complain, or anything- but… I don't see the problem with having a Knight, a Titan or even a Greater Daemon in a Dark Heresy Game.

Investigation is only one aspect of the game- and there's room for pretty much a lot of other things in there. Not everything has to be "Stat Appropriate"- Knights exist in the DH Universe as much as they exist in the Only War Universe, Death Watch Universe or Rogue Trader Universe. Which, Incidentally, is all the same universe. The 40k Universe. It is not inconceivable that Acolytes will run into a Knight, as much as its possible for them to end up owning a Space-ship (which happens a lot more often than I would have thought, if the Gm Boards are any indication) or even something as simple as driving a car or a tank.

With Grey Knights being introduced in Daemon-Hunter (serving as a bridge between Death Watch and Dark Heresy), it is not an unreasonable demand as to request some of the Mechanicus' bigger toys in a Mechanicus book.

Now, back to the Original Topic- I would love to hear more about Nomen Ryne, Amicus Tole and every single other Hereteck mentioned in any of the previous books There's quite a few- I would say at least five. So a "Mechanicus Most Wanted" List would be epic- even if they didn't have stats [Though it would be very cool if they did, what with Fate-Points solving the whole "If it has stats we can kill it problem ]

I'm hoping for details on a variety of Forge Worlds, not just the Lathes. I have a very hard time making 'Forge World A' seem different and distinct from 'Forge World B'…

Also, since my players are closing in on Ascention level, more high-level options/challenges- in this and any other upcoming DH supplements- would be appreciated.

Adeptus-B said:

I agree 100%! I love what Lightbringer was talking about with Belacane. That's character. The best I could ever do was-and I know this sounds simple but it worked-make sure they have sort of unusual but uniform names. In my case I pick a language like Finnish and look up common names. I think it helps them associate a group of people with a specific place.

Regarding Belacane, I noticed the following passage in the description: "The Forge World is the base for the Lightbringers, a small Titan Legion consisting of five Warhounds and a pair of Reaver Titans. It also operates a large contingent of cybernetic Skitari tech-guard." (emphasis mine)

Looks like somebody earned himself a wee shout-out. Congratulations.

Speaking of odd Forge Worlds, my Rogue Trader players once visited Percipre. They had an utterly heretekal AI cogitator core to sell, and thought they could find a buyer on a Forge World. Planetary briefing, the short version: this particular Forge World is run by the Magos Biologis. The terraforming engines have failed, so the surface conditions are now a frozen hell. But, the planet's surface is covered with city sized greenhouses, stocked with exotic flora from all over the galaxy. Since many of these flora are from death worlds, and aggressive use of herbicides over the millennia has turned natural selection up to 11, the plant life is… assertive. Many of the greenhouses are now completely out of the magos' control. The remaining productive greenhouses grow food by the megatonne as well as all manner of pharmaceuticals. (It's quite rare, but this is one Forge World that actually exports food.) If you want more info, well, there's always Lexicanum:

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

[For some reason, the Black Industries Guide to the Calixis Sector names this world as Prandium. No, I've no clue why the name changed, but the description is identical.]

Oh, and as for my players, a good session of roleplaying ensued. They managed to avoid being rendered down into servitors, and in fact made a tidy profit. You see, the Lathes really look down on Percipre due to it's excessive fondness for biology, and that's enough to breed a disaffected cadre of tech-priests who don't like being marginalized, and the players already had made a contact… So, they ended up leaving after acquiring a few very personal modifications to the Rogue Trader and his command staff, and Percipre now has a many millennia old A.I. jacked into a 'small' portion of the planetary datanet 'helping' to 'optimize' the harvesting and processing… Gee, I can't imagine any way that scenario could go ploin-shaped.

Cheers,

- V.

I'd like to read in greater detail about the influence that the phaenonite inquisitorial faction have had on the forge world of Idumea and the branch of the machine cult known as the Empyric Engineers. Apart from that I wouldn't be adverse if they included a named personality from the Logicians as part of the Mechanicus's Most Wanted.

blackwell said:

Seconded! And since the forum software doesn't like one word replies, let me add that I'd like to see more on the Tech-Witches of Ammicus Tole, or the False Men of Nomen Ryne. So many hereteks, so little time…

Cheers,

- V.