Alright, so I am currently flushing out a campaign I am going to be running with my group, which I will gladly share upon request, and I was working on one of the session write-ups and I just realized something may not work. I would like to say that I am pretty knowledgable about the 40k universe and its fluff, but I am really not sure about this. Would Combat/Gun/Industrial/Any types of servitors be able to go "hay wire" and attack everyone they see? For example, the acolytes are on a rather large ship which was also transporting gun/combat/other servitors to a nearby planet. Somewhere along the trip, the servitors go "hay wire". Kinda a fight for their lives situation. Any input would be greatly appreciated.

Well, the logicians are listed in DotDG as having a device, a type of weapon that will effectively make any servitor it is used on short out and go absolutely berserk so, yes, I would definitely say that not only is it possible, but the guys writing the books have even thought of it already ;-) They can't be the only ones to have a way of doing that either...

In one of the Eisenhorn stories a psyker causes a pair of cargo loading servitors to go haywire and attack the protagonists, so I would say it is certainly possible. I should think anything which can effect the mind directly could possibly effect a servitor. (though it would be more difficult than with a normal human)

Yup, entirley possible If you have a combat servitor, he'll have a target recognition database or something, if that's disabled, everyone is an enemy, at least, everything it can detect Meintenance servitors too, I can't imagine them attackking someone, as in, using their weapons to kill. I always imagined they'd recognise their victim as a piece of machinery, and they would preform...meintenance on them.

++Target specified, meintenance required. Removing, engine covering *pulls targets chest off* Machine irreparable. Contact magos++

I was actually listening to an old Implant track this morning when it occurred to me, we all like a good "Machine Uprising" what about a servitor uprising, a whole bunch of new servitors wake up they can't remember jack of their former lives, but they are fully cognitive and sentient. So now of course something goes wrong as a minder **** something up, panic ensues and a combat servitor kills a ton of people, the local tech magi among them and now we have to find out what happened. Why wasn't these people wiped properly, its there a motive, what do you do with a few hundred frightened and basically "innocent" people who cannot remember anything of the past crimes or why this was done to them, of course if they get a whiff of the acolytes or anyone else wanting to turn them into servitors they will most likely also have a few words.

Apart from outside interference, there also comes the lack of knowledge about technology into play. Computers can develop errors and the human mind is not the most stable thing either. Now....a lobotomized human brain and a lot of technological implants thrown together, maybe poorly maintained...and voila, the thing short-circuits and goes on a rampage.

Jack of Tears said:

I wouldn't say "more difficult", but simply "more limited" instead. Due to the fact that servitors have had large portions of their brains cut out (leaving only the parts that provides the basics of motor functions). So a psyker using mind control on another human being, cannot only direct its motor actions, but also order the victim what to say and how to act and even how to feel, this would be impossible to do against a servitor due to them being unable to feel anything (whats the point in having a servitor that feels pain or sorrow? : /).

Does that sound reasonable?

Ways that could make servitors go haywire would include berserker thorns, sabotage, mind control, warp corruption. I do seem to recall an instance in Gaunts Ghosts, where a machine producing robots (mechanical robots, not cyborg servitors) had been corrupted by Chaos influence and so started producing equally corrupted "iron men" when it went online. If a piece of STC-techology can be corrupted by the ruinous powers, then a servitor would certainly be susceptible to it.

Thanks for all of the input gang. I am leaning towards the fact that maybe a rogue tech-priest is paid off to sneak on board and tamper with al of the servitors. Like I said, I plan on this being a ship loaded with them, that the Acolytes will have to fight their way through to the bridge, protecting some important crew that know how to fly the ship, and then protect them until they can get the ship landed. Basically, a whole lot of fun and AHHH HOLY CRAP THEY ARE ALL BAD! type deal. At this point in the story, they will already have killed several extremely dangerous xenos, and I am hoping that a break from the main story-line with this side info will be a nice break. Also, I plan on having it open up quite a few more scenarios.

Haha, you'll have to tell us what happens when the ship reaches the destination XD

"Where are all the servitors?"

"Erm..well, funny story really....."

cyclocius said:

I can tell you what happened in a campaign I ran (that also involved people sabotaging combat servitors). Basically the Acolytes were travelling with an Adeptus Mechanicus explorator fleet to a dead world whose name I will ommit here. What they found out on-board was that the fleet had been infiltrated by a heretical cult of Tech-adepts who were tampering with the combat servitors during warp travel. However the sevitors seemed fine until the explorator fleet arrived on site and started to get unloaded on the planets surface, when the heretics staged a mutiny on a massive scale. The acolytes not only had to face several corrupt combat servitors and heretical Skitarii hypaspist, but also the dormant NECRONS on the very same dead world , along with a Tzeentch Cult that had desperatly fought to stay alive against the awakening ancients before the fleet arrived.

I suspect that the Acolytes in question found the story being anything other than "funny", and the players thought that their GM was a bit extra evil at the time *whistles innocently* XD

In CA there is also a heretek style creation of silver needles that allows the taking over of Servitors, and I believe as well as version where servitors are being co-op'd by daemons in a hive world.

So yes very easy to make them go haywire, especially with Emperium influence.

Thanks again for all the input everyone. I will definately post results when I get a chance. Just as a heads up though, we have a campaign we just started that needs to be finished first. I am just writing my campaign while we play this one. I plan to have most if not all of the sessions written, along with back-up plans, NPC's, names, so forth. And even then I know I will end up writing half of this anyways, but at least I can get them back on track.

I can tell you what happened in a campaign I ran (that also involved people sabotaging combat servitors). Basically the Acolytes were travelling with an Adeptus Mechanicus explorator fleet to a dead world whose name I will ommit here. What they found out on-board was that the fleet had been infiltrated by a heretical cult of Tech-adepts who were tampering with the combat servitors during warp travel. However the sevitors seemed fine until the explorator fleet arrived on site and started to get unloaded on the planets surface, when the heretics staged a mutiny on a massive scale. The acolytes not only had to face several corrupt combat servitors and heretical Skitarii hypaspist, but also the dormant NECRONS on the very same dead world , along with a Tzeentch Cult that had desperatly fought to stay alive against the awakening ancients before the fleet arrived.

Sounds a little crowded to me. And by "a little" I mean "WoD-style five ancient conspiracies all in the same building without noticing each other". I'm sure you can pull it off successfully, but this scenario seems like it might easily devolve into a monster-of-the-week format.

Cifer said:

Well I did pull it off, actually.

And trust me, every aspect fell neatly into place, and all the concpiracies were connected to eachother in some way so none were particularly out of place. (suffice to say: A LOT of thought and preparation went down into this campaing on my part). Sure when I laid out the rough idea of the scenario in the first place, people told me I was mad, and that there were simply too many happenings and goings throughout the campaign. (it included the necron threat, Tzeentch vs C'Tan fighting, Inquisitorial in-fighting and Adeptus Mechanicus heretical cults, and all at the same time). But in the end I did somehow manage to pull it off.

I've often considered writing the entire thing down like a pre-written adventure for others to use, but I just dont have enough energy to convert my mad train of thought onto written text. : /