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Does a leman russ have machine spirit?

Possibly though it has never been confirmed.

But in my opinion no.

I think all machines have a machine spirit. Guardsmen have to perform rituals on their lasguns to appease the machine spirit. If a lasgun has one, I'm sure a Russ does.

They do, as it says about Techpriests that they must tend to the machine spirit of all vehicles, which of course, includes russ's. As far as I know, all vehicles have machine spirits.

I've always thought of the machine spirits as just a way to show how backwards the people in the Imperium are.

For example: why does a light switch work? You flip a switch and the spirit inside allows the light to function.

A spirit being "angered" is merely poor upkeep of the weapon/device

Landraiders and such have a lesser form of AI that allows some control of the vehicle.

Russes have personality, yes.
But the whole 'machine spirit' is just misunderstood tech, using rituals and oils instead of RTFM and a toolbox.
The PotMS, as a different thing. Its the closest to an AI that the IoM accepts and only to be found in ancient designs like Land Raiders, Baneblades,....
It is also too expensive to be put into every basic standard pattern tank.
So usually vehicles are run by crew, be it humans or servitors.

too expensive? I think that the machine spirit is so poorly understood that they couldn't replicate it even if they tried.

I mean, really it's just a computer that shoots a gun for you (or even just helps you shoot the gun, like an auto-stabilizer), but people understand computers so poorly in the far future that they just assume it's sorcery.

...which, to be fair, it kind of already is...

The Land Raider release didn't say they cannot make new PoTMS to fit in, instead claimed it as rare.

Ailaros wrote:
really it's just a computer ....snip.... but people understand computers so poorly in the far future that they just assume it's sorcery.

...which, to be fair, it kind of already is...

In the far future? IMO its already this way....now. We just accept tech and can research the basics.
But still computers are seen as magic today too.

The Guardsmen probably think it has a Machine Spirit....I mean, they think the lasgun has a machine spirit which they must appease while loading and unloading their weapon. So yeah....does it have a Machine Spirit? Probably yes in the way you 'have' a soul. People say and believe you do, but it's really a non-question.

So don't expect any awesome Guard fluff where a Leman Russ destroys an Ork invasion without a crew.

Yes and it's probably moody and very aggressive.

1hadhq wrote:But the whole 'machine spirit' is just misunderstood tech, using rituals and oils instead of RTFM and a toolbox.

This.

Machine spirits are just the mythology surrounding machines that humanity no longer understands.

No, machine spirits are actually the psychic aspect of technology. Check out the Land Raider MkIII poster that GW released back in 3rd edition: The M32 "Cyclops' Class Machine Spirit isn't a misunderstood computer, it's a device for interpolating between the Land Raider's soul and its physical systems.

It's probably helpful to differentiate between machine spirits, or the souls of machinery, and the Machine Spirit devices that are used instead of electro-mechanical computing machinery. Every machine has a spirit or soul, which is a fragment or aspect of the Machine God. If not properly consecrated and propeciated, this soul, like all souls, can be corrupted by the Dark Powers and their servants.

As we know, psychic corruption spills over into reality. You don't just have to worry about corrosion and other mechanical defects that have a natural origin, but also the defects that even a perfectly maintained piece of machinery would incur as the power of Chaos erodes its quantum matrix. The Psychic Power "Machine Curse" actively attacks a piece of machinery through its soul, for example. While a human might not be terribly inconvenienced by the growth of an extra set of eyes, or perhaps toes in interesting places, precision machinery will succumb to fair more subtle mutations.

Psychic devices like the matrix of a Force Weapon and the Machine Spirit of a Land Raider use their connection to the Warp to expedite their function: A Force Weapon channels a psycker's power as force, multiplying the strength of their blows, and even inflicting them upon the souls of their victims, a Machine Spirit channels information. Similar psychic interfaces include the Mind-Impulse Units used in Titans and Dreadnoughts, psychically actuated writing devices, and so on.

One presumes that off-loading informational tasks to associated psychic entities rather than having them performed electro-mechanically has the same sorts of advantages that electro-mechanical equipment has over purely mechanical devices: a micro-chip is more compact than the Colossus, a soul has no mass or dimension at all. Similarly the less thinking machinery carried on board the less risk of daemonic influence and outright possession. Thought begets heresy, and thinking machines are just asking for trouble. If a machine's soul has effective instincts, it's better to use those instead.

In Gunheads, it mentions that the russ's have a machine spirit, so yes.

Nurglitch wrote:No, machine spirits are actually the psychic aspect of technology. Check out the Land Raider MkIII poster that GW released back in 3rd edition: The M32 "Cyclops' Class Machine Spirit isn't a misunderstood computer, it's a device for interpolating between the Land Raider's soul and its physical systems.

See, its a thread about Leman Russ, which do not have 'cyclops class machine spirits'.

So, i dont know where you get the psychic part of a 'spirit' and a 'soul' into this, because the LR poster/Index astartes article didn't claim this.
OTOH, Chaos Land raiders had no '? class machine spirit' as they had to get rid of them to corrupt the Tank.

IMO a 'Machine spirit' of a vehicle and the 'machine spirit' beleived to be in every machine aren't the same.
The Land Raider explicitly states the MS as a device of that Tank. The Baneblades had also a tidbit of 'original Mars built ones' having a 'Machine spirit' and copies
of other FW maybe not.

The machine spirit in every piece of tech is a question of faith, nothing you can prove.
The Machine spirit of a Land Raider is there, shown on a technical drawing and part of the rules.

The Leman russ still has to rely upon crew to drive, load , fire , aim , repair,....

1hadhq:

See, this is a thread about the Leman Russ, which has a machine spirit, not a Machine Spirit like the Land Raider.

I pointed out the difference between the soul or spirit that every machine has, including the Leman Russ, and the device that the Land Raider has to use its soul instead of a computer.

The Chaos Land Raider indeed has no Machine Spirit. It still has a machine spirit, and that spirit can even be the victim of Daemonic Possession.

The M32 Cyclops on the poster has the following components: Aetheric stabiliser rods, Aetheric feed coils, Phlogiston feed coils, Alembic Shielding, Pseudo-Synaptic Relays, and an External Sensory Interface Cortex. I don't think the Rite of Awakening Purity Markings are strictly a component. It has a cogitation speed of 30,000 co/second, with a Maximum Contemplation Capacity of 8,000 kilobrains.

The Aether is a common name for the Warp. Phlogiston is an immaterial liquid once theorized to be the source of heat, and discarded in favour of the kinetic theory of heat after a relatively famous critical experiment, so again a code-word for Warp-energy. An alembic is an obsolete term for a cup or flask used in alchemy, the mystical transmutation of substances, the superstitious precursor to modern chemistry, again alluding to the spiritual nature of the device by evoking mysticism.

The machine itself does not process information, it thinks. That's what cogitation means, to be able to cogitate is to have the capacity for thought. Thought is a characteristic of minds or souls, which are themselves curiously immaterial substances or objects despite all the best efforts of modern neuroscience to support the Mind-Brain Identity Theory that underlies the project. Indeed, the poster tells us that it has the same capacity for contemplation as 8,000,000 'brains', which with its prefix of "kilo" indicates a unit of measurement rather than an identity.

The presence of machine spirits in 40k is easily proven, thanks to it being a canonical aspect of the ficton (which is a fancy word for the universe of a piece of fiction, by the way), and therefore actually amenable to appeals to authority. The canonical books tell us that machines have spirits, and the Leman Russ is a machine. Q.E.Duh.

So thanks for playing, but as the kids say: fail.

Nurglitch wrote:1hadhq:

See, this is a thread about the Leman Russ, which has a machine spirit, not a Machine Spirit like the Land Raider.

...snip....
lenghty paragraph about the Land Raiders machine spirit
.../snip...

The presence of machine spirits in 40k is easily proven, thanks to it being a canonical aspect of the ficton (which is a fancy word for the universe of a piece of fiction, by the way), and therefore actually amenable to appeals to authority. The canonical books tell us that machines have spirits, and the Leman Russ is a machine. Q.E.Duh.

So thanks for playing, but as the kids say: fail.

yep, you fail to point out the Machine Spirit of the Leman Russ.
Come on, we know the Machine Spirit of the Land Raider so maybe a source of a Machine Spirit of a Leman Russ would get you far.

The machine spirit you think of, is a much a 'spirit' of a 'machine' as it is in the Imperial Tank company crew mans personal weapon.
Again, Leman Russ ( and other variants of it ) have no Machine Spirit ( able to act on its own as it 'cogitates'...), but a believed machine spirit ( which like
any other superstitious belief may increase the confidence of the crew ).
Thus pointing out a 'general' machine spirit which is believed inherent in every machine like the 2nd and 3rd post in this thread said seems compliant with the
official stance of the IoM on tech.
But sometimes people ( imperial citizens ) follow a doctrine ( omnissiah ) without knowing the truth. And the 'machine spirit' is a lie.
The Machine Spirit, is a 'real' existant fact in the 40k verse tough.

Maybe a belief in a machine spirit and its anger keeps a Tank treated fairly well so the IG can issue even the roughest of its members with LR without loosing too many
to technical failure...

1hadhq wrote:

Nurglitch wrote:1hadhq:

See, this is a thread about the Leman Russ, which has a machine spirit, not a Machine Spirit like the Land Raider.

...snip....
lenghty paragraph about the Land Raiders machine spirit
.../snip...

The presence of machine spirits in 40k is easily proven, thanks to it being a canonical aspect of the ficton (which is a fancy word for the universe of a piece of fiction, by the way), and therefore actually amenable to appeals to authority. The canonical books tell us that machines have spirits, and the Leman Russ is a machine. Q.E.Duh.

So thanks for playing, but as the kids say: fail.

yep, you fail to point out the Machine Spirit of the Leman Russ.
Come on, we know the Machine Spirit of the Land Raider so maybe a source of a Machine Spirit of a Leman Russ would get you far.

The machine spirit you think of, is a much a 'spirit' of a 'machine' as it is in the Imperial Tank company crew mans personal weapon.
Again, Leman Russ ( and other variants of it ) have no Machine Spirit ( able to act on its own as it 'cogitates'...), but a believed machine spirit ( which like
any other superstitious belief may increase the confidence of the crew ).
Thus pointing out a 'general' machine spirit which is believed inherent in every machine like the 2nd and 3rd post in this thread said seems compliant with the
official stance of the IoM on tech.
But sometimes people ( imperial citizens ) follow a doctrine ( omnissiah ) without knowing the truth. And the 'machine spirit' is a lie.
The Machine Spirit, is a 'real' existant fact in the 40k verse tough.

Maybe a belief in a machine spirit and its anger keeps a Tank treated fairly well so the IG can issue even the roughest of its members with LR without loosing too many
to technical failure...

Ah well. It's not like my German is any good.

@Nurglitch: Why does it have to be good?

No I am worried my post was unreadable...



Maybe I shall try it differently:

- the machine spirit = the Mechanicums view of Tech which has to be followed since the IoM agreed to a joint venture.
- appeasing the machine spirit = ritualized behaviour, including useful regular service and useless 'show effects'.


*hides before anyone may call my post tech heresy*

Well, I can't make myself understood in English, so I'm assuming that there's some sort of language barrier at work. As I understand it German has very different rules of capitalization than English and your English isn't particularly well written, so I'm guessing that you're not able to understand what I'm writing rather than just ignoring it. There's no point in continuing this conversation.

I had always read it as being both of the above, but generally not regarding the same things.

Which is to say there are bona fide spirits for some of the machines, but most folks can't tell the difference and so treat them all in the same ritualistic manner.

But now that I started thinking about it, I want to read more. . . .