Hi guys,

As part of my RT adventure I'm heading my crew of mighty characters to a place called the "Mad Worlds". In game legend accounts these worlds as a group of systems so off compared to regular reality that in olden times the rather normal Free Collonials(and btw yes I know how to spell colonial) fled from them, and erased all records of the way back.

Now while these worlds can't be warp touched(there's a reason for that), they have to be so wacked out as to either scare the living crud out of people or at least pull a severe wtf reaction. I have the three Mad Worlds I know of as examples.

Mad World 1:

A planet in which not only does a non imperial religion rule all, but they have absolute monopoly on what is considered truth. Things are either approved as true or not, and the people are not allowed to acknowledge anything not approved as true, no matter the circumstances. Anyone, even small children, found in any way interacting, reacting to or even noticing something that has not been approved is subject to summary execution by the local and omnipresent secret police the Codicers of Truth.

To make matters worse for any explorer, anyone not a local is usually not approved, along with space travel on the entirely orb-centered religion. Travellers however can be and usually are labeled heretic and subject to attack by the Codicers and their strike forces of genetically modified combat sub-humans.

Mad World 2:

A particular strain of medusa resides on this world. Rare but powerful, this strain, when latched onto the brain of a succeptable race, can generate an enormous psychic field capable of reshaping the beliefs and reactions of that same race in areas from the size of a large community to a small country. The creatures alteration of the prey speicies beliefs seems completely random. From "the left arm is only to be used for eating" to "walking to work everyday is accomplished only by jumping backwards" these ideas are forced upon the local populace by a creature which can hide itself from sight and usually takes on some significance in the society.

Notably these creatures do not seem to get along in any way and will willfully throw their controlled populations at each other in rediculous mockeries of war(where one side can only shoot the enemy while laying on their side, and the other side can only advance shouting "patchouli" very loudly or other random nonsense).

Mad World 3:

On this world an odd natural boundary between the warp and realspace prevents souls from passing to the other side. While this is generally harmless as the souls tend to only fixate on what they were doing at the moment of their death, it can become a problem when someone walks upon the place of their death and for a moment that soul's final urge is replayed by the unfortunate living being. This would be of little problem on a planet where no one ever lived but while time has reduced this world to a wilderness the planet was originally heavily populated, leaving the planet a literal minefield of sudden debilitating or harmful actions done at random without any warning.

Whether walking through a copse of trees and suddenly dropping to the ground screaming in stark terror, or taking a stroll through a grassy field and suddenly shooting the person next to you, any travel across the wilderness of this world is sure to be a wild ride.

With these three worlds as a general guide can you guys help me pull some more "Mad Worlds" out of the ether? Devious planets designed to confuse, debilitate and drive the minds of mortal men to madness are needed. Please dig deep into the depths of your darkest imaginations and toss me some ideas for more planets that will send the sane away screaming. It doesn't matter if the denizens of the world are insane or if the world has some effect that drives people there.

Time to giggle, rub our hands together, and unleash hells.

Well since just asking doesn't seem to help, I'll try enticing people. I appreciate the 80 or so people looking in on the topic but I guess it's just to out of the blue for anyone to just come up with an idea.

Here's a facet of the "Mad Worlds" a ship from one of the pocket empires therein.

I figure if I get people interested in stuff like this I might get the creative juices flowing better. The ship does have some "interesting" components and the name of the race might bring up some ideas and questions, at least I hope.

So I've added a few things. Maybe some comments on how the ship would do and what it's for would get people thinking. Maybe ideas on how to use it or even the race it's from would pique people's interest.

Anything I can do to get these "Mad Worlds" fleshed out.

Hope to hear from you,

SRO

SirRunOn said:

Here's what I would do as your RT Explorer: 1) Drop off a pile of missionaries, with the intent to convert key members of the population to return to the fold of Mankind. (I would probably even start with the attempting conversion of the Codicers of Truth). Drop by in a few months and have a "chat" with planetary leaders. If they are still unbending: then orbital bombardment. If that fails, then contact the Imp Guard for a full scale invasion. If that fails, call the Imperial Inquisition; what citizen wouldn't enjoy watching a few thousand of the Codicer-scum be burnt at the stake; instant popular revolution. If that fails ? Well, then, that's an Exterminatus.

If you wish to side-step this sort of thing, you may want to have a explanation as to why the Imperium has not yet invaded this world. Do they have superior technology? Is it a Mechanicus / Biologis behavioral experiment, and thus off limits to missionaries? Is it too resource poor for the Imperium to bother? if you don't want this sort of high-powered stomp; you might want to come up with a reason as to why the worlds must remain unharmed.

I'd probably just have the other two petitions for Exterminatus or never bother going back.

That's the power you wield as an RT.

Oh you can be sure the reaction of the Imperium to the mad worlds will be swift and severe. In the course of the campaign I'm running the path to these worlds will have just been discovered and the Imperium moving in to catalogue them(think Winterscale's first voyage into what would become his realm). Really the only reason they've survived is isolation.

However there should be able ten to fifteen totally "Mad" worlds and a few "Just on the edge of wtf" ones. Currently I only have three ideas and I've been asking the locals for their most crazy sounding places to visit. Planets of such wtf-osity to be considered part of the "Mad Worlds". I need about six or so but any amount of ideas will do.

I swear there's gotta be someone around here with a sick and twisted sense of humor.