Throne Mechanicum

[Cyndakill]

Howdy All,

 

Was interested by something I spotted across multiple wikis (I can only assume it's in the Imperial Knights Codex) that a Imperial Knight whose pilot was killed was taken over by the imprinted souls on the Throne Mechanicum in it and fought back.

 

Has anyone got any more information on this? As I want to use a Imperial Knight fluffwise in the fluff I'm creating for my Homebrew Chapter I was thinking of having the chapter find an Imperial Knight in a system that had been caught in a warp storm for centuries, guarding the entrance to an arcology which had been under attack from traitor forces. While the rest of the defenders had been killed the Knight kept fighting, took down two warlord titans (One by ramming it's assault cannon in to it, firing it's rounds and the arm literally being ripped off as it pulled back from it. The knight is just standing there, missing an arm, shot to :cuss and so charred and damaged you can't tell which house it came from. It's still functioning but as soon as they try to open the cockpit it starts up and kills a bunch of IG who were examining it. Techpriests blurt to it and calm it down, turns out that throne has imprinted souls from all pilots that have piloted it (think hundreds of pilots) and has become an amalgam of them.

 

Hence sentient Imperial Knight. Slightly Heretical (Okay very heretical but very cool) and a way for me to justify having an Imperial Knight in my fluff.

 

Thoughts?
Ideas?
Arguments against?

[jeffersonian000]

Yep. You just described how all Titans interfaces are, as depicted in virtually every fiction involving Titans in 40k. Even Chaos Titans are an amalgamation of their crews into the Titan interface. You could even go with the last pilot's mummified corpse still resting on his (or her) Throne, still connected to the interface despite being long death, and the Tech Priests sharing knowing glances.

 

SJ

[ElectricPaladin]

Several of the canonical freeblades are probably self-willed Knights. Its no departure at all.

[Cyndakill]

Am I right in thinking that these self-willed knights would get along with/be understood/understand dreadnoughts and their structure (after reading Know no fear and Telemarchus)

[ElectricPaladin]

Am I right in thinking that these self-willed knights would get along with/be understood/understand dreadnoughts and their structure (after reading Know no fear and Telemarchus)

 

Eh... I dunno. The self-willed Knights aren't human, really. They're basically what happens when you take something designed to help a human control a giant robot with his brain and put so many human personality imprints on it that it ends up assembling a personality for itself out of the bits and pieces of human thought processes. They may be dutiful, dedicated, honorable, maybe even humane, but they are alien intelligences. They aren't people.

 

Dreadnoughts are just damaged humans (well, Astartes, but close enough) packed into life support systems that happen to have guns attached.

 

Except for being big, armored, having guns, and being totally awesome, they don't really have a lot in common.

 

Honestly, there really isn't anyone in the Imperium who's likely to have a lot of understanding of/sympathy for these guys (except maybe for a misunderstood peasant boy a la the Iron Giant :p). Even tech-priests loathe artificial intelligences, like everyone in the Imperium does, in memory of the Men of Iron and the terrible destruction they wrought. The self-willed knights who fight on behalf of the Imperium are doomed to be hated and feared by the Imperium. It's pretty freaking metal.

[Cyndakill]

I don't know I mean if they're the combinations of previous souls and suddenly they're joined to become a single individual.

 

In Know No Fear the dreadnoughts seem to be alienated from who they once were, at the very least I think they could at least provide counsel.

[ElectricPaladin]

I don't know I mean if they're the combinations of previous souls and suddenly they're joined to become a single individual.

 

In Know No Fear the dreadnoughts seem to be alienated from who they once were, at the very least I think they could at least provide counsel.

 

I'll grant that it would be an interesting conversation to read someone write out. I just think that in writing the character of a free-willed Knight, I would err on the side of "heroic but not human," whereas a dreadnought is "transhuman and transformed." That said, in truth, I think that the fluff is ambiguous enough that both are interpretations fall under the umbrella of what has been revealed so far.

[CommodusXIII]

I don't think that Knights have quite as strong of a machine spirit, nor "ghosts of previous owners", as Titans - specifically, their depiction in Titanicus, which really goes into the psychology of Princeps and their machines.  The Knight machine spirit I see as being strong emotions, particularly anger and the "thrill of the hunt", rather than the personalities that Titans develop.  Likewise, I picture the ghosts of previous owners being more of an instinct, so strong at times of great stress that it almost calls out.  Not quite to the levels of Obi Wan in the Death Star trench, but strong enough that it makes its presence known.  The two work together to keep the Knight's pilot focused without distraction or driving him insane.

 

But that's just my take on it - your mileage will vary.

[ElectricPaladin]

I don't think that Knights have quite as strong of a machine spirit, nor "ghosts of previous owners", as Titans - specifically, their depiction in Titanicus, which really goes into the psychology of Princeps and their machines.  The Knight machine spirit I see as being strong emotions, particularly anger and the "thrill of the hunt", rather than the personalities that Titans develop.  Likewise, I picture the ghosts of previous owners being more of an instinct, so strong at times of great stress that it almost calls out.  Not quite to the levels of Obi Wan in the Death Star trench, but strong enough that it makes its presence known.  The two work together to keep the Knight's pilot focused without distraction or driving him insane.

 

But that's just my take on it - your mileage will vary.

 

We know there are free-willed knights. There are several freeblades who are described as mysteriously never leaving their Knights, or as operating completely without support on death worlds or in secluded locations with no access to food or water. At least once a Knight's pilot was killed by an Eldar sniper and the Knight is described as continuing to fight, eventually winning the battle with its pilot's corpse still inside it.

[jeffersonian000]

I see them more as haunted by a chorus of past pilots, all with a single minded focus to continue on. In the 40k universe, with battles lasting millennia, its easy to see a free-willed Knight literally walking into an Imperial supply depot, getting rearmed and refitted, with no one the wiser.

 

SJ

[Malus Trux]

Did research into old Knight fluff a while back & one of the things I remember could support this. The process in which the pilot calibrates with the Throne Mechanicum, known as the vigil, has an effect on the Knight. The dominant emotional state of the pilot at the moment of calibration with the Knight's machine spirit creates a "default" state. A frightened pilot resulted in a knight that's cautious or hesitant on the battlefield. A confident pilot would have a knight that tended to charge into battle more often than not. Anger at a person or faction, & the knight is always hostile to them. Pilots may become more experienced over time but the default state would still crop up.

 

I haven't read the new stuff but if its still the same then its possible that the Knight remembers past calibrations & forms a composite of past vigils which the machine spirit uses as its "logic engine."

[BassWave]

@malus- If what you say is true, the fluff hasn't been changed, according to the new codex.