Warhammer 20K

[Skaorn]

I've always found the dark age of technology fascinating and wished GW would do a game set in that time. I already know people will cry "that'll take time away from 40K" but it is fun to speculate about. It's the time period right before all hell broke loose. The central focus would still be on humans and their fight against the Men of Iron, which is described as far larger in scale than the Horus Heresy here:

 

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

 

Humans would be struggling to pull together a fighting force but would still be better equipped than the Imperium.

 

The Men of Iron would take the place in the setting the Space Marines normally occupy.

 

The Eldar are there and insanely powerful, but falling to decay. I read somewhere that A. Vest made a comment in a story that the Eldar used their own sentient robots to fight for them (did they rebel too?). Either way I can see Eldar putting on Spyre like battlesuits to depopulate a planet for fun similar to how we play Call of Duty.

 

Orks have basically been penned up by Humans and Eldar who don't consider them a threat, but now there is this massive conflict letting the Orks break free. How different are they from current Orks? Were they smarter? At least they'll have better quality loot.

 

Chaos would probably just be a whisper and might even be responsible for the rebellion. It's also possible they might have tainted some Xenos species that gets added, but hopefully the influence is subtle.

 

Tyranids would be a bit of a stretch to put in a Hive Fleet but it's possible. Personally I might use this as a place to put Zoats, acting as a precursor to Genestealer Cults and spreading their scout organisms.

 

Necron and Tau wouldn't be on the scene, unless you really wanted to jump through hoops for the Tau.

 

How do you feel about this setting and what would you want to see?

[Semper Fortis]

Cool idea. Would be interesting to see the Emperor in a different role during that time period and develop his backstory . I could see him as a General or Commander in Chief of the forces battling the Men of Iron. I'd also love to see development of the various now archeotech weapons of the time.

[Skaorn]

Fielding the Emperor as a special character lol.

[jeffersonian000]

Pretty sure Warhammer 20k was already published years ago, under the title “Dune”.

 

SJ

[Aramis K]

I've been thinking about the Men of Iron a bit too. I guess it's a bit of a Terminator joke, and they're probably imagined a little like Necrons or the old space crusade 'Chaos Android'.

 

I'd want to build something bigger, like the first Chaos Dreadnought, a small non-humanoid walker, something like a cross between a sentinal and a crisis suit. But with a flesh hating AI instead of a pilot.

[Trevak Dal]

Sounds interesting. Regarding Tau (but a bit off topic) when I first started them, I didn't like that they were alien and sort of mind fluffed it that they were somehow survivors of the Interex. That bit in...False Gods? Where the SoH encounter them and their centaur like battle armor, and the space marines mocking the bows they had, thinking them ceremonial-until it came to Fightin' and they bodied a marine in battle plate across a room and into a wall with one arrow.

 

Strength 5 sort of translates that to me.

 

If anything, I would say have guard armies with everybody counting as having carapace (like the big platoons) and all of them having s4ap- or maybe even s5 ap- lasguns, with special squads of...basically Titan Pilots (like from Titanfall) fast movement, deepstrike-maybe use Tau Stealth suit or vespid rules.

 

Humanity was at it's zenith at this point. It would be freaking cool to get a game based in it. This was the Humanity that took to the stars without an astronomicon. We wrought out an empire with the blood sweat and effort of our will and technology, and that is inspiring as heck. The whole scenario would be a super mix of Terminator, Battlestar Galactica (the new one) and a bunch of other things.

Edited March 3, 2018 by Trevak Dal

[toaae]

How different are they from current Orks? Were they smarter? At least they'll have better quality loot.

 

Prior to M32, Gork and Mork didn't exist. Orks were brutally strong, and always had their numbers, but the ones faced in the Great Crusade, and further back, wouldn't have nearly as strong a psychic presence as Post-Beat Orks. And they certainly wouldn't have better equipment. Ork teknology looks crude, but it's actually very sophisticated, and the knowledge to build it is a genetic trait, which I would also assume got stronger when Ork Resonance strengthened after the coming of the Ork gods.

[Skaorn]

Pretty sure Warhammer 20k was already published years ago, under the title “Dune”.

SJ

Actually Dune was 30K. Guess you can stop playing 40K and just read the rest of the Dune series instead :p.

 

If I was building the Men of Iron I would probably go with something different than the murderous AI troupe, personally, to make them different from the Necrons feel. I would probably go with they were rebelling against their slavery rather than wanting to enslave or destroy humanity as their primary drive. This would give them a tragic nobility, especially since they are ultimately defeated.

 

For basic humans I was thinking a 4+ armor save as well with a Str 4 weapon with something slightly different like an underslung grenade launcher or it being assault 2 24".

[Semper Fortis]

When I picture the Men of Iron I see Perturabo's Iron Circle Dimitar Ferrum.

[Guest]

I have a list of ideas for a setting like this:

1- Various Marks of power armor being developed as a counter to the men of iron, slowly going from ineffective to "at least we stand a small chance."

2- Massive planet sized weapons, with battles encompassing entire solar systems at once, the space between planets filled with combat. 

3- Void Titans, titans specifically designed for boarding enemy ships in space and wrecking ****. They would move faster as they were designed for speed in space where weight is not a factor.

4- Mind bending usage of technology, think the last few episodes of Gurren Lagannn. Probability effecting missiles, perceptual teleportation, targeting enemy vessels through the different vectors they are teleporting, digital weapons that manifest like swarms of particles around the wielder, hand crafted mutant monstrosities designed for warfare, the first incorporation of psykers into warfare, short bursts of time travel. 

5- The first Dark Eldar raids. This was before they had an established system in place and experience in their craft. They would be making rookie mistakes and getting their butts handed to them regularly. Then they would learn. Those who were on the fence about what they had to do for survival or those who clung to some vestige of "good" in themselves slowly being corrupted by their own needs and desires. 

6- Orks that eventually evolve into the monstrous Krorks of old while fighting the men of iron.

7- The development of the early Knight Titan Houses.

8- A look into the psyche of the Men of Iron, were there dissenters or non aggressive Men of Iron? 

9- Last stands abound, against the Men of Iron the only option left was to take as many of them out before you went down. 

10- Super Soldiers. They had to have some. Not Astartes, but some form of gene enhanced soldier. Potentially a inspiration, not a precursor, for the Astartes?

11- A look into the society of Dark Age of Technology humanity as it naturally (and predictably) denies anything is wrong as things rapidly begin to go awry. What were the excessive habits of the upper class like? Did they enjoy enhancing and changing their physiology on a whim for fashion? Were their humans who sided with the Men of Iron? What were the various parts of the human empire like? What was the galactic-political situation like? 

12- All of this wrapping up in a way that shows the decline of humanity, and sets it up for the rest of the universe.   

[Kinstryfe]

I think the biggest problem is that, by the way the 30/40k lore has defined it, the world of 20k could be almost anything. All we really know is that there would be humans, Orks, Eldar, and AI, and that The Emperor may or may not already exist. It wouldn't be like 30k where there were tons of links to flesh out. It's pretty well established that almost no knowledge of this time exists to the Imperium. On one hand it could have a ton of potential. On the other, it would really be a setting with only the barest connections to the ones we know.

[Lexington]

Prior to M32, Gork and Mork didn't exist.

...wait, what?

Edited March 4, 2018 by Lexington

[toaae]

 

Prior to M32, Gork and Mork didn't exist.

...wait, what?

 

 

This is old, but yet to be out-dated, fluff. In truth, Orks have very deep fluff most players don't have the faintest idea even exists. From WAAARGH ORKS (1990):

 

 

 

“Gork and Mork stirred and a wave of fear passed through the warp. Suicide and incidence of violent crime climbed steeply. On Icholbar an Astropath screamed and threw himself from the balcony of a skyscraper apartment, yelling that his people were doomed. On the craftworld Hope of Other Days, an Eldar philosopher stopped listening to the atonal music of his waterchimes and began composing his death-haiku. On distant Earth, a living corpse in a golden throne opened eyes that held fear for the first time in centuries.”

 

This occurred when a Mek decided, for the first time, to build a Gargant. The resulting psychic energy created the Ork gods. During the Great Crusade, and all prior wars with Orks, Gargants did not stride the battlefield, trading shots with the Titans of other races.

[Bryan Blaire]

 

 

Prior to M32, Gork and Mork didn't exist.

...wait, what?

 This is old, but yet to be out-dated, fluff. In truth, Orks have very deep fluff most players don't have the faintest idea even exists. From WAAARGH ORKS (1990):

“Gork and Mork stirred and a wave of fear passed through the warp. Suicide and incidence of violent crime climbed steeply. On Icholbar an Astropath screamed and threw himself from the balcony of a skyscraper apartment, yelling that his people were doomed. On the craftworld Hope of Other Days, an Eldar philosopher stopped listening to the atonal music of his waterchimes and began composing his death-haiku. On distant Earth, a living corpse in a golden throne opened eyes that held fear for the first time in centuries.”

 This occurred when a Mek decided, for the first time, to build a Gargant. The resulting psychic energy created the Ork gods. During the Great Crusade, and all prior wars with Orks, Gargants did not stride the battlefield, trading shots with the Titans of other races.

Yet none of that particular quote states that Gork and Mork didn't exist before M32, it says that they stirred, not came into being... is there something else that states that specifically?

[totgeboren]

 

 

This is old, but yet to be out-dated, fluff. In truth, Orks have very deep fluff most players don't have the faintest idea even exists. From WAAARGH ORKS (1990):

 

 

“Gork and Mork stirred and a wave of fear passed through the warp. Suicide and incidence of violent crime climbed steeply. On Icholbar an Astropath screamed and threw himself from the balcony of a skyscraper apartment, yelling that his people were doomed. On the craftworld Hope of Other Days, an Eldar philosopher stopped listening to the atonal music of his waterchimes and began composing his death-haiku. On distant Earth, a living corpse in a golden throne opened eyes that held fear for the first time in centuries.”

 

This occurred when a Mek decided, for the first time, to build a Gargant. The resulting psychic energy created the Ork gods. During the Great Crusade, and all prior wars with Orks, Gargants did not stride the battlefield, trading shots with the Titans of other races.

 

 

That an Ork managed to do something so orky that the Ork Gods themselves took notice doesn't mean that act caused them to come into being.

[toaae]

 

Yet none of that particular quote states that Gork and Mork didn't exist before M32, it says that they stirred, not came into being... is there something else that states that specifically?

 

It's an excerpt from a story in WAAARGH! Orks about building that first Gargant. It's cut between the Orks building it and the gods awakening. I oversimplified when I said Gork and Mork didn't exist. They may have been gesalt warp entities, awaiting that final push to awaken that the Gargants gave, or possibly they had been awake in the ancient past, and something, maybe a lack of a galaxy of war for Orks to thrive in, caused them to lie dormant. It's old fluff, and like most old fluff, there's enough ambiguities and subtleties that it can be argued over.

 

Anyways, in the story, an Ork sees a titan and is struck with a revelation, that his creation would be "Huge, angry, violent, loadsa guns. Very shooty. Very shooty indeed." So he and his tribe start building the gargant, awakening Gork and Mork. The two gods begin to stride though the warp, empowering the Orkz around the galaxy. Warbosses became afflicted with thoughts of power, ancient ambitions and long vanished thoughts of conquest. Mork "...placed in the heart of every Ork the desire to be restless, to move, to follow the siren call of adventure...".

 

My greater point in my first post was, the Orks of 40k are much different than the Orks encountered during the Great Crusade and further back in humanity's past. They possess a greater psychic resonance, the WAAAGH! energy that grows as orks gather and fight good fights. They also have Gargants, which, you know, are cool.

[Marshal Rohr]

You can’t really have a game without the Emperor. Anything else is just generic sci-fi.

[Skaorn]

So here is what Lexicanum has on Gork and Mork:

 

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

 

I think the problem with Orks is that they have probably the most inconsistent backgrounds in 40k. I was recently was reading a discussion on Ork technology. One side stated that their technology worked fine but looked crude while the other side stated that it worked primarily because of the Waaagh. One example given was an Ork tank that ran because it had a drawing of an engine in it. Of course it kind of makes sense that their backstory is all over the place, it's not like they're going to record their history.

 

As for the Emperor, he was definitely around during the Dark Age of Technology:

 

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

[toaae]

 I was recently was reading a discussion on Ork technology. One side stated that their technology worked fine but looked crude while the other side stated that it worked primarily because of the Waaagh. One example given was an Ork tank that ran because it had a drawing of an engine in it.

 

This is a widely spread misconception about Orks, and risking derailing the thread more, I'm going to try and keep it simple. Ork technology, in the fluff, has always been sophisticated and even eclipses the tech of the Imperium in places. The best examples of this are Telly-portas and Shokk Attack Guns, though the gravity weapons of The Beast Arises is a more recent showcase of this. In the case of the Shokk Attack Gun, Ork Meks are capable of creating stable, short ranged and reliable tunnels through the warp. The implications of this level of technology for logistics is lost on Orks; they shove snotlings down the tunnel and try and land them inside the enemy.

 

Orks don't have an understanding of the physics of how their tech works, but they have an innate understanding of how to build it, maintain it, and operate it. The misconception is often that whatever enough Orks believe becomes reality. This is the Ork resonance, and it is widely misunderstood. In theory, it is true, but since Orks lack the imagination for much more than "red uns go fasta", they wouldn't piece together that they could propel their vehicles on the sheer psychic force of the WAAAGH! Instead, they would simply put an engine, that the Mek innately knows how to build, into the trukk.

 

Ork fluff isn't inconsistent. It's not widely known.

[Laughingman]

I got the impression from perpetual that many of the weapons deployed by both the men of iron and the human federation that opposed them made strategic weapons of 40k appear to be a joke by comparison.  Sun snuffers, weapons the Size of Saturns rings, (I did some backhand math once to come up with a mass of such a object, it was a silly number), entropic engines, mechnavores, etc. Mercifully none of these weapons survived the age of strife (which is also silly, objects that are 66,000 km in length don't disappear on a Whim)

[Skaorn]

Some of the weapons described as being from this time are vortex, disintegration, and grav.

[Skaorn]

 

I was recently was reading a discussion on Ork technology. One side stated that their technology worked fine but looked crude while the other side stated that it worked primarily because of the Waaagh. One example given was an Ork tank that ran because it had a drawing of an engine in it.

 This is a widely spread misconception about Orks, and risking derailing the thread more, I'm going to try and keep it simple. Ork technology, in the fluff, has always been sophisticated and even eclipses the tech of the Imperium in places. The best examples of this are Telly-portas and Shokk Attack Guns, though the gravity weapons of The Beast Arises is a more recent showcase of this. In the case of the Shokk Attack Gun, Ork Meks are capable of creating stable, short ranged and reliable tunnels through the warp. The implications of this level of technology for logistics is lost on Orks; they shove snotlings down the tunnel and try and land them inside the enemy.Orks don't have an understanding of the physics of how their tech works, but they have an innate understanding of how to build it, maintain it, and operate it. The misconception is often that whatever enough Orks believe becomes reality. This is the Ork resonance, and it is widely misunderstood. In theory, it is true, but since Orks lack the imagination for much more than "red uns go fasta", they wouldn't piece together that they could propel their vehicles on the sheer psychic force of the WAAAGH! Instead, they would simply put an engine, that the Mek innately knows how to build, into the trukk.Ork fluff isn't inconsistent. It's not widely known.

I'm not saying you haven't read this in a GW source but this is what I found with a quick search:

 

http://wh40k.lexicanum.com/wiki/Waaagh!

 

The point is that Ork fluff seems to change more than others depending on who's writing. I don't see why Orks shouldn't have Gork and Mork or would be lesser than they currently are in 20k.

[toaae]

 

I'm not saying you haven't read this in a GW source but this is what I found with a quick search:

http://wh40k.lexicanum.com/wiki/Waaagh!

 

The point is that Ork fluff seems to change more than others depending on who's writing. I don't see why Orks shouldn't have Gork and Mork or would be lesser than they currently are in 20k.

 

 

Don't know what it is in that article you are referring to. The entire first paragraph in "Waaagh! as a Psychic Field" that has no citation? Or something else? Regardless, the Lexicanum is hardly a source. From WAAARGH! Orks to the 4th and 7th edition codices, the fluff I've read has been consistent, or at least not contradictory. The 7th edition codex omitted a lot of fluff on the Orks as a species, and instead focused on smaller viewpoints, such as the Red WAAAGH!!!

 

And I don't see why good fluff should be re-written for a 20k game.

[Schlitzaf]

So in all seriousness would the various Xenos even be a threat to humanity? If the implications of the dark age are even half true.

[Lexington]

So in all seriousness would the various Xenos even be a threat to humanity? If the implications of the dark age are even half true.

This is one reason I don't think GW should ever try to really explore the setting's far-flung past. There's a lot of weird contradictions and tricky "whatabouts" to examine. For example, how did humanity escape the notice of the ancient, ultra-powerful Eldar Empire if man was having a galaxy-spanning war against AI, with both sides using super-weapons of a truly incredible scale and scope? You think they'd want to keep that kind of thing in check.

 

There's enough trouble trying to reconcile a lot of unresolved weirdness even within the Heresy. The Dark Age of Technology isn't a thing that's meant to be explored - it's just another thing 40K lifted from Dune, a shortcut to explain why there's not AI overrunning the place, and to keep the Now very, very distant from the Then.