E.G.J. Posted May 29, 2014 Share Posted May 29, 2014 It's been a long time coming, but flipping through Mechanicum again I couldn't help but be reminded of the scrap code and how much I dislike how it explains the corruption of the Mechanicum. I get it, since machines have computers it makes sense to make parts of the process appear like a virulent computer virus. But I feel it's just overdone. It's not just in Mechanicum. The scrap code has featured in other novels as well. Personally, I think it's a bit much. It's not a bad plot device by any means. It's just overused in my opinion. I'm also of the opinion that since technology in 30K (and 40K) blends the biological, mechanical, psychic, and supernatural there are so many opportunities for variation beyond the computer virus metaphor. Am I alone in thinking BL authors could expand on the nature of corruption, especially as it pertains to the Adeptus Mechanicus? Link to comment https://bolterandchainsword.com/topic/291614-scrap-the-code/ Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gripharius Posted May 29, 2014 Share Posted May 29, 2014 I agree that it felt a little too easy, too deus ex machina if you will, at certain points. I also felt like a thinly veiled "computer virus" broke the kayfabe of the Grimdark to some extent. It didn't feel very WH40K, if that makes any sense, at certain times. However, I will say that, at other times, the description of how it sounded over the vox was well done, even eerie sometimes. It has been used a few times to actually enhance the Grimdark, so I think it can be used well when it is done to stoke the atmosphere. Link to comment https://bolterandchainsword.com/topic/291614-scrap-the-code/#findComment-3700937 Share on other sites More sharing options...
malorn24 Posted May 29, 2014 Share Posted May 29, 2014 IIRC I thought I read that somewhere back before Dark Night there was some big Terminator ish thing were machines went rogue and that is why the imperium blends human with machines. I just find it ironic that even after they stopped using machines (robots) then there was still corruption. On a side note. If they weren't supposed to use robots then what was up with Purterabo and his Iron Circle?????? Link to comment https://bolterandchainsword.com/topic/291614-scrap-the-code/#findComment-3700942 Share on other sites More sharing options...
SteelPaladin Posted May 29, 2014 Share Posted May 29, 2014 The Men of Iron were fully machine artificial intelligences. All robots in 30k and 40k have human elements, such as the skull and central nervous systems of the Thallax. I assume that Perturabo's Iron Circle were similar. Link to comment https://bolterandchainsword.com/topic/291614-scrap-the-code/#findComment-3700957 Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gripharius Posted May 29, 2014 Share Posted May 29, 2014 IIRC I thought I read that somewhere back before Dark Night there was some big Terminator ish thing were machines went rogue and that is why the imperium blends human with machines. I just find it ironic that even after they stopped using machines (robots) then there was still corruption. On a side note. If they weren't supposed to use robots then what was up with Purterabo and his Iron Circle?????? You are talking about the Men of Iron. They were more than just robots, they had artificial intelligence. They weren't corrupted so much as they just decided they were better than the humans that basically used them as slaves. After that rebellion, AI was outlawed. Maybe the Iron Circle isn't full on AI? Link to comment https://bolterandchainsword.com/topic/291614-scrap-the-code/#findComment-3700962 Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jareddm Posted May 29, 2014 Share Posted May 29, 2014 The First Heretic mentioned the use of wetware, either in the form of direct brain and nervous tissue implants or some sort of biological gel that promoted signal pathways, in all legio cybernetica robots. I imagine the Iron Circle are no different. Link to comment https://bolterandchainsword.com/topic/291614-scrap-the-code/#findComment-3700981 Share on other sites More sharing options...
malorn24 Posted May 29, 2014 Share Posted May 29, 2014 still reaching a bit. Link to comment https://bolterandchainsword.com/topic/291614-scrap-the-code/#findComment-3701076 Share on other sites More sharing options...
Scribe Posted May 29, 2014 Share Posted May 29, 2014 I quite like the concept actually. Its more than a virus, its proof that the Warp can infect the inorganic, the inert, and that even a 'language' as simple as binary can be bent to the whims of Chaos. Link to comment https://bolterandchainsword.com/topic/291614-scrap-the-code/#findComment-3701226 Share on other sites More sharing options...
daveNYC Posted May 30, 2014 Share Posted May 30, 2014 I quite like the concept actually. Its more than a virus, its proof that the Warp can infect the inorganic, the inert, and that even a 'language' as simple as binary can be bent to the whims of Chaos. The concept is good, Chaos corruption seaping into everything and all that. Implementation can be a different matter. Having a Chaos computer virus that can potentially corrupt any machinery where crazy stuff can happen 'because Chaos!' and without any good writing to back things up. Link to comment https://bolterandchainsword.com/topic/291614-scrap-the-code/#findComment-3701950 Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gripharius Posted May 30, 2014 Share Posted May 30, 2014 The concept is good, Chaos corruption seaping into everything and all that. Implementation can be a different matter. Having a Chaos computer virus that can potentially corrupt any machinery where crazy stuff can happen 'because Chaos!' and without any good writing to back things up. This. Link to comment https://bolterandchainsword.com/topic/291614-scrap-the-code/#findComment-3701976 Share on other sites More sharing options...
Scribe Posted May 30, 2014 Share Posted May 30, 2014 I'm wondering if the BL author's know the in's and out's of Assembly, Binary, or any programming language and computer science well enough to describe what your looking for without it being a bit...dry. :p Link to comment https://bolterandchainsword.com/topic/291614-scrap-the-code/#findComment-3701994 Share on other sites More sharing options...
ElectricPaladin Posted May 30, 2014 Share Posted May 30, 2014 I've always liked the explanation that the "scrap code" is actually shreds of the Men of Iron's sentience still inhabiting everything complex enough to hold even a little programming. IT's a bit hand-wavy, but if you consider the current trend towards "smart everything" it's easy to imagine how the world of 40k could have smart APCs and smart guns and smart power swords and definitely smart battle tanks and smart space ships. If all these smart devices - all of them capable of holding at least a little programming to help them optimize their performance, some of them holding a lot of programming - were infested by pieces of a race of self-aware AIs that could potentially be swayed by ritual praise and obeisance, that could lead to the situation we have in modern 40k. In the 30k universe, some people kind of knew what was going on. There was the Cult Mechanicus, of course, but from what I've read most people were secular humanists and the machine priests were kind of their own weird thing, the only cult of the many that the Emperor had suppressed that was useful enough for the Emperor to allow to continue to exist. Nowadays, with the "lucky" confluence of their beliefs and the things you have to do to keep the Men of Iron shards from causing trouble, the Mechanicus's permanent influence will be hard to shake. Link to comment https://bolterandchainsword.com/topic/291614-scrap-the-code/#findComment-3702149 Share on other sites More sharing options...
Stonerhino Posted June 1, 2014 Share Posted June 1, 2014 In Know No Fear the AdMech admin talked about how every network produces some scrap code. In the form of useless random code. The Scrap Code in Mechanicus however was not random but "Chaos code". Lorgar, explained it best in Betrayer. How the sound of 1,000 blind men drowning compressed to a single sound. Is the name of a Daemon Prince and saying that name out loud effectivally breaks the material universe's laws. He then goes on to say how those types of words can be writen in any language or spoken by anyone. So I'm sure that would include any computer code. Link to comment https://bolterandchainsword.com/topic/291614-scrap-the-code/#findComment-3703396 Share on other sites More sharing options...
Yogi Posted June 1, 2014 Share Posted June 1, 2014 Scars describes Chaos computing as base-four rather then base-two (binary). I thought it was a nice touch. Link to comment https://bolterandchainsword.com/topic/291614-scrap-the-code/#findComment-3704046 Share on other sites More sharing options...
Augustus Posted June 2, 2014 Share Posted June 2, 2014 Scars describes Chaos computing as base-four rather then base-two (binary). I thought it was a nice touch. Unless your a follower of a single god. Then you use base 6, 7, 8, or 9 ;) Link to comment https://bolterandchainsword.com/topic/291614-scrap-the-code/#findComment-3704440 Share on other sites More sharing options...
Captain Idaho Posted June 2, 2014 Share Posted June 2, 2014 I liked the Scrap Code in the first book I read it, but then it kept coming up and the books would go the same way each time. "Unreachable Imperial bulwark gets shut down effortlessly by Chaos and the Imperial forces scramble to combat it to get the bulwark back online." Is it a lazy plot device or are the authors constrained by time and space (not physics but publisher)? Either way, I don't want to read another novel like that again. I'm bored of it. And my favourite Chapter has had the same device repeatedly used! AD-B; I implore you! Don't do it! Link to comment https://bolterandchainsword.com/topic/291614-scrap-the-code/#findComment-3704504 Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kol Saresk Posted June 9, 2014 Share Posted June 9, 2014 Scrap code is essentially a catch-all for computer malware. And in the age of the Imperium when so much runs on computers, it can be devastating. It should be devastating. If you want to see an example of scrapcode by A D-B, read Blood Reaver. "The Shriek". Even today, cyber warfare is a big deal and if a hacker wins, they can do anything from download top secret information to launching nukes to shutting down power grids. Why should the 30K/40K equivalent be any less devastating? And as for why we never see the Imperium doing anything, well its the Imperium that goes "There's a flashing red light! It must need oil! I'll poor this bucket of 10w-40 on it. No, maybe I'll massage it then. Still not working. Hmm, maybe if I sing to it. Oh hey, the light went off!" and never knows that the light was saying the brakes needed to be changed and that it turned off because the bulb blew. They're like little children from the 1500s playing with an iPhone 5. Meanwhile, Chaos is inventing the quantum computer by waving a screwdriver and telling it to make itself. And its working. Link to comment https://bolterandchainsword.com/topic/291614-scrap-the-code/#findComment-3713126 Share on other sites More sharing options...
ElectricPaladin Posted June 9, 2014 Share Posted June 9, 2014 Scrap code is essentially a catch-all for computer malware. And in the age of the Imperium when so much runs on computers, it can be devastating. It should be devastating. If you want to see an example of scrapcode by A D-B, read Blood Reaver. "The Shriek". Even today, cyber warfare is a big deal and if a hacker wins, they can do anything from download top secret information to launching nukes to shutting down power grids. Why should the 30K/40K equivalent be any less devastating? And as for why we never see the Imperium doing anything, well its the Imperium that goes "There's a flashing red light! It must need oil! I'll poor this bucket of 10w-40 on it. No, maybe I'll massage it then. Still not working. Hmm, maybe if I sing to it. Oh hey, the light went off!" and never knows that the light was saying the brakes needed to be changed and that it turned off because the bulb blew. They're like little children from the 1500s playing with an iPhone 5. Meanwhile, Chaos is inventing the quantum computer by waving a screwdriver and telling it to make itself. And its working. I think that you're overstating how dumb the Imperium is. They aren't morons, and a lot of what they do actually works. They add unnecessary ritual, but their tech priests are tech priests. They're competent engineers. Some of them are trying to do something to rediscover the principles behind the technology their society uses, it's just slow going because they're constantly distracted by the war. Little children from the 1500s playing with an iPhone 5? That's too much. Try that actually they're not that different from the average modern computer user - myself included. They have a vague sense of the principles the machine works on, but they don't really know exactly how those principles translate into the phenomenon they observe. They know how to troubleshoot the technology, and some of that troubleshooting is attached to actual knowledge of how the device works, and some of it is related to simple trial and error. And, they are extremely competent in some things, like the application of the technology they don't understand. Plus, there are other branches of technology - if we're comparing the Imperium to modern computer users, let's say "cars" and "can openers" - that they understand completely. And also they worship their macbooks. That's a different story. Link to comment https://bolterandchainsword.com/topic/291614-scrap-the-code/#findComment-3713266 Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kol Saresk Posted June 9, 2014 Share Posted June 9, 2014 Ignorance does not equal stupidity. The knowledge of how to operate technology has been forgotten by all but the Mechanicus and its myriad factions. And even then, their knowledge is so covered up in a myth tangled with an old wives' tale and bundled up with a Murphy's Law that they don't even know what is really knowledge and what is just superstition. They just know that it works. The Mechanicus, is the average computer person. The rest of the Imperium is, to go along with your analogy, the really really really old guy who says computers are too new an complicated for him to learn and refuses to change that fact not because he is stupid, but because his ignorance, his lack of knowledge, is so total that he cannot comprehend how the device is being used except in the most basic of fashions. Like typing on a keyboard with only one finger. Ignorance never has and never will equal stupidity. Just look at the Native Americans and how some of their tribes thought writing a letter and using it to communicate across great distances was magic because they had no concept of a written language. They weren't stupid, they just packed the proper knowledge. That's the 40K Imperium. They don't understand the technology. A good majority know that you point the barrel of a lasgun away and pull the trigger to shoot, but start trying to explain how the lasgun works and they start looking at you funny. And if you starting modifying it, better hide from the Mechanicus because they'll turn you into a servitor for screwing with their stuff. Link to comment https://bolterandchainsword.com/topic/291614-scrap-the-code/#findComment-3713287 Share on other sites More sharing options...
Stonerhino Posted June 9, 2014 Share Posted June 9, 2014 Not entirely true and Mechanicum actually directly address this idea. It is a shame that the Forge Master dies. If she would have become one of if not the head of Mars then the 40k Admech would be much changed. The main character is taken from Terra to join a special team on Mars because she was tampering with her technology. Link to comment https://bolterandchainsword.com/topic/291614-scrap-the-code/#findComment-3713711 Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kol Saresk Posted June 9, 2014 Share Posted June 9, 2014 Mechanicum is the 30K Imperium. I'm referring to the 40K Imperium, the Imperium that has spent the last ten thousand years degenerating into the Dark Ages to the infinite power. Link to comment https://bolterandchainsword.com/topic/291614-scrap-the-code/#findComment-3713726 Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gripharius Posted June 9, 2014 Share Posted June 9, 2014 Scrap code is essentially a catch-all for computer malware. And in the age of the Imperium when so much runs on computers, it can be devastating. It should be devastating. If you want to see an example of scrapcode by A D-B, read Blood Reaver. "The Shriek". The Shriek is "scrapcode" done right. I put "scrapecode" in quotes because I think A D-B's Shriek is something more than just the simpler, throwaway versions of scrapcode we've seen used a couple of time. As I said, there have been times when I've liked the use of scrapcode and its been used well -- like characters hearing it weaving in and out of vox static, building an eerie mood. What I don't like is when a dramatic plot point is suddenly wiped away because *poof* scrapcode. It's not the concept of scrapcode so much as the sometimes lazy use of it, I guess. Link to comment https://bolterandchainsword.com/topic/291614-scrap-the-code/#findComment-3713792 Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kilofix Posted June 9, 2014 Share Posted June 9, 2014 If I remember correctly, in Betrayer, Cultists input simple characters into Calth's network. It was explained that the characters themselves didn't pose a threat, and therefore would bypass security. But in combination, they spelled the names of some Chaos Entities that enabled corruption of the Calth network. That seems to imply Chaos Forces at work and not simple malware. My rationalization is that words have power, whether written down on paper, said out aloud or buried within network code. Edit - Ah right it was Know No Fear not Betrayer. Thanks Kol! Link to comment https://bolterandchainsword.com/topic/291614-scrap-the-code/#findComment-3713797 Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kol Saresk Posted June 9, 2014 Share Posted June 9, 2014 It was Know No Fear, and yes, 30K/40K relies on magic to function. Anything and everything that has ever been thought of concerning magic applies. Blood magic, written magic, sacrificial magic, magic through inscriptions, incantations and so on so forth. Even the idea of combining magic with technology. Which is a fundamental theme of the forces of Chaos. That's also why warp-infused scrapcode is so dangerous, because 1.)it does not necessarily follow the limitations of technology and 2.)it can very easily become sentient, as shown in Dark Adeptus. Link to comment https://bolterandchainsword.com/topic/291614-scrap-the-code/#findComment-3713807 Share on other sites More sharing options...
Brother-Librarian Haegl Posted June 9, 2014 Share Posted June 9, 2014 +++ Edit: Obsolete Post +++ Link to comment https://bolterandchainsword.com/topic/291614-scrap-the-code/#findComment-3713834 Share on other sites More sharing options...
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