Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you: No adverts like this in the forums anymore. Times and dates in your local timezone. Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance. Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely. Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net. If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

This is the fluff I wrote for my new Guard army, the steampunk/Napoleonic Vernian Light Brigade. I'm posting it here as well as in my blog.

The planet of Vernia is an unusual case for an Imperial World. Situated to the galactic east of Terra, still well within reach of the Emperor’s Light, the planet sits on several warp routes, but as it is not a center of commerce or industry it is mostly ignored. The planet’s colonization appears to have occurred nearly a thousand years ago, though the identity of these colonists is unclear. A crash landing and a protracted war with the native Orks apparently resulted in the loss of most of the colonist’s STC banks and their tech-priest contingent, as well as most of the clerical delegation. Undeterred, the colonists began rebuilding from the technology available to them, reverse engineering the designs of two remaining technologies (a steam-powered sawmill and a small, mechanical logic engine) into a vast variety of technologies necessary for life in the colony.

The Ork infestation never truly left Vernia, but over the course of the next decade it was pushed to the northern mountain range of the primary continent, where they have remained every since. The Vernians adapted strategies to lure their enemy to them to be defeated, fighting in bright colours and accompanied by music and fluttering banners. Every year, the Ork tribes would gather on the great grassy plains and attempt to push south to take Vernia Prime, and every year the Vernians would gather opposite of them and defeat them with disciplined volleys of fire. With their only conflict a repeated, simple affair with low casualties and predictable results, war lost its edge, and became more about capturing glory on the field. The Plains Wars are still fought yearly, an unbroken string of battles stretching back nearly a millennium.

Two hundred years ago, the roving Tithe Enforcer Fleet rediscovered Vernia just as the population celebrated the launching of their space program. The planet was eager to rejoin the Imperium, but was shocked to hear that they could not become an Imperial Wolrd in their state. Vernia was pristine, hills, trees, lakes and beautiful mountain ranges undisturbed. The population was too low to simply be labeled a civilized world, and their industry’s lack of connections to the Adeptus Mechanicus precluded classification as an Artisan World. Colonist would be brought in, destruction of the natural resources would occur, they would be brought in line with a harsh and uncaring universe.

The Queen, the de facto planetary governess, of course, would not stand for it. She resorted to a strategy thought impossible, and bribed the Adeptus Terra. Living a solitary, work-driven existence, where money and wealth is meaningless unless it needs to be counted and distributed, it was believed that the Adeptus could not be bought off. When the Queen presented to the Secretary-General a simple clockwork devise, an auto-quill that would dictate his voice patterns alone, it was said he felt the first pangs of emotion in nearly a century. His personal work output was now 174.3% more efficient, even before the Vernians distributed the devices to the rest of his staff. Each machine was a work of mechanical art, “a priceless portrait that paints itself” as it was described. The Secretary-General was only too happy to mark down Vernia as exempt to Imperial Tithes, so long as there was a gift just as good next year. And there certainly was.

Vernia, with a population just below three million, is a small world noted for technological goods. Exotic steam and clockwork devices are created by their creative artisans and exported at a low rate in exchange, while STC patterns are imported slowly to bring up the general level of technology. To the Vernian, steam and spring are the only real ways to grant a machine-spirit life, one allowing it to breath and the other to think, and in their belief all other machines are inferior. As a result, STC pattern designs are heavily modified to change their internal systems and power sources.

Vernia is ruled by a succession of Queens, and their politics and society is unusually female-dominated. Men form the armies and women the politicians, though both can be found equally in the skill trades.. The population has an extremely high standard of living well compared to much of the Imperium, with cheap housing and food allowing for minimal working hours and a great deal of leisure time. Thus, sport is extremely popular and has a universal following. As well as football, a sport recognizable across the entire Imperium, Vernia’s unique culture has created other sports unique to the world. As warfare is considered to be the most glorious expression of a civilization’s power and culture, there are three popular sporting events relating direct to military tradition; dueling, mock warfare, and range shooting.
Dueling is something like open-category fencing, where competitors use a variety of melee weapons and fight each other to first blood, though the weapons are modified to be non-lethal. Popular weapons include chain-swords, broadswords and sabers, though single-shot las-pistols are acceptable in most events.
Mock Warfare is exactly how it sounds. Two actual military units are pitted against one another in a combination training exercise and sport. Non-lethal stun rounds from las-guns and fake blades on bayonets are used, but the combat is still intense, making the sport of the most exciting (non-lethal) sport in existence.
Range shooting is a simple test of marksmanship, conducted with dozens of competitors at a time, each trying to strike moving targets and be the first to do so. Competition is fierce because players are eliminated for shooting a target already struck by another player, so it requires calm nerves and fast reflexes in equal measure. It is extremely popular among soldiers.

The champions of these events are usually military officers, which makes many officers something of celebrities to the people of Vernia. This attitude is reflected in the personalized dress of officers, as those holding a rank higher than lieutenant can, as the army primer states, “…dress however they damn-well please!”

The Vernian people have just recently contributed their first soldiers to a nearby, ongoing campaign. Hopefully they will prove as effective on foreign battlefields as they have against the Orks of their native planet!