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So, we've learnt from Codex: Grey Knights that one of Mars' moons (don't remember whether it was Phobos or Deimos) was relocated to Titan's orbit to serve as the Knights' private, secret forgeworld.

No clues as to how did they do it. Teleportation? Another Sigillite spell? Did they just strap some thrusters to it and let the thing fly?. Whatever the case, moving 1.072×10^16 kilograms of regolith rock (assuming it's Phobos) through the Solar System without causing some massive havoc, and keeping it in orbit around a body that has an almost negligible gravitational field (and is within the influence of Saturn's massive pull) is not an easy task, and suggests that the Imperium has astroengineering capabilities we didn't know of before.

Or did we? I vaguely recall that Necrons and Eldar had moved stars and built artificial worlds in the past... but this was the first time I had heard of the Imperium giving a shot at system-rearranging. Are there any other instances of astronomical engineering in the fluff?

And what about more complex engineering feats? Orbitals? Halos? Dyson Spheres?



Edit: It's Deimos, as Ascalam kindly pointed out in the planet-hiding device thread. That leaves us with "just" 1.48×10^15 kilograms of rock to move around the system without anyone noticing

Scout shunt before it was FAQ'd

This would be interesting to know, my guess is on giant thrusters, after all they are a forge world i wouldn't be suprised if they could jet about, don't know how you would miss a planet being moved though

It's grey knights, they killed all witnesses.
But it's a forge world, perhaps they put engines in it and flew it there.

Probably used some tech to alter the orbit at use gravity to fling it into the gravitic reach of Titan.

Well if we where talking realistic ways to move it, they would probably throw comets or other huge rocks through it's gravitational field to subtly shift it's ration over years. This is 40K though so I say rockets or some kind of gravity based hook. The tau use small ones to drag ships. The IoM could have some big ones that drag moons.

To be fair diemos isn't all that large, as astral bodies go.

it's about 15 km by 12 km x 10 km. More of a very large asteroid than a moon-sized moon.


It could be moved by conventional means (massive booster engines) but would be rather hard to steer, and even harder to stop, or insert smoothly into the orbit of a decent gravity well, let along another moon with little gravity of its own. It would be a huge, risky undertaking, but it is at least doable.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t7Z8w_unTU4 (yes i know its on the other thread, but i like it too much to let it languish there...)

Why though? It would be simpler to just build an orbital or free-floating space station to any size they like/need, and the IOM does that kind of thing all the time. They probably have an STC for it



Automatically Appended Next Post:
The more important point is that it would be impossible to hide moving something the size of Diemos across the system under power, and not all the witnesses are necessarily in-system

I think you are asking if the Imperium have tinkered with this stuff but there is a Dyson sphere that might be hiding a C'tan...

Also, there is 'The Ring' station in the Enforcer books that sits around the planet. Thats pretty cool. It's so complex and arcane that the Mechanicus can just about maintain it, let alone even begin to build another.

They didn't move Deimos, they moved the rest of space.

Well, the Nemesis knight is built (or at least rumoured, not sure) with alien technologie. What says they didn't get the technology from the eldar for *enter something juicy*

The Nemesis Dreadknight? Where did you get this from?

Somewhere in the GK Codex (German Version here), i think even on the Nemesis Dreadknight Page, something about cooperating with Xenos for certain technologies is mentioned iirc

edit: Quick search in the Fantasyflight forum and found this

Codex quite clearly says that such xeno-tech items like Empyream Brain mines, Psilencers and Nemesis dreadknight armor are not novelty items, but something that Grey Knights field as standard operating procedure (and proudly stick out a big finger to AdMech doing it).

Dreadknights are in no way Xenos technology, and it's unlikely that Psilencers are either.

Says who? I don't see a 'designed by the ad mech exclusively' sticker on them, and you have to admit that they look nothing like equivilent human tech

They may be all-human design, they may not. They have a design aesthetic that's closer to tau or eldar than IOM's usual look.

Ascalam wrote:Says who? I don't see a 'designed by the ad mech exclusively' sticker on them, and you have to admit that they look nothing like equivalent human tech

They may be all-human design, they may not. They have a design aesthetic that's closer to tau or eldar than IOM's usual look.

The fact that they're supposed to be designs from the Golden Age of Humanity means they're not going to necessarily look similar to the 'equivalent human tech'.

For all we know, it was a design for a utility vehicle that never reached full production and there were examples found that the Grey Knights confiscated. The fluff on the Dreadknight and its "mysterious origin" is stupid, but nothing hints at it being Xenos tech.

However they look nothing like any Xenos design we've seen, just like they look nothing like any Imperial design...which lends credence to the idea that it's a lost piece of tech that never reached production.

@Ascalam: Really, you think that the hulking peice of piston driven power-lifter inspired dreadknight is anywhere close to the smooth aesthetics of the Eldar constuction (something that is grown) or the compact, sleak onstruction of the Tau?

I'm very sorry but you are gonna have to point out some similaties for this, other than 'it is a big machine with two legs'.

People are assuming that the other "human technology" is actually human technology.

Most of it is well over 10,000 years old and comes from a kind of dark ages during which the humans overran most of the galaxy.. They could easily have pillaged all sorts of interesting alien technology, adapted it to human use and put the designs into the STC machines while they still had them. Alternatively they could have traded for alien designs.

Kilkrazy wrote:People are assuming that the other "human technology" is actually human technology.

Most of it is well over 10,000 years old and comes from a kind of dark ages during which the humans overran most of the galaxy.. They could easily have pillaged all sorts of interesting alien technology, adapted it to human use and put the designs into the STC machines while they still had them. Alternatively they could have traded for alien designs.

And alternatively, the aliens could have traded for human designs.

Seriously though, the Dreadknight is one of those things where claims of "xenos manufacture" make no sense. They bear a passing resemblance to Eldar Wraithlords in that they're bipedal and can carry weapons mounted on hands able to fine-manipulate other objects. They bear a passing resemblance to Tau Battlesuits because they're piloted by a conscious, living individual.

That doesn't mean that Ork Deff Dreds or Killa Kans and Astartes(all flavors) Dreadnoughts are clearly the same thing as Battlesuits or Wraithlords because they're piloted and bipedal, now does it?

Kanluwen wrote:Dreadknights are in no way Xenos technology, and it's unlikely that Psilencers are either.

> codex Gk , page 34. nemesis knight.
its origin put in question marks, so may or maybe not include xeno tech.

> codex GK, page 58 psilencer
is clearly xenotech, just how they aquired it is unknown.

1hadhq wrote:

Kanluwen wrote:Dreadknights are in no way Xenos technology, and it's unlikely that Psilencers are either.

> codex Gk , page 34. nemesis knight.
its origin put in question marks, so may or maybe not include xeno tech.

At best, it might be have been an attempt to make a squat joke. Which since Squats were abhumans and not Xenos(like the Demiurg) means unlikely.

> codex GK, page 58 psilencer
is clearly xenotech, just how they acquired it is unknown.

Thing about the psilencer is it sounds a lot like the Animus Speculum, which we also have no idea how that was acquired/developed.

So it's feasible I guess.

Kanluwen wrote:
Seriously though, the Dreadknight is one of those things where claims of "xenos manufacture" make no sense. They bear a passing resemblance to Eldar Wraithlords in that they're bipedal and can carry weapons mounted on hands able to fine-manipulate other objects. They bear a passing resemblance to Tau Battlesuits because they're piloted by a conscious, living individual.

Take a look at the feet. Them's Tau feet, right there. There's a bit more to it than just the feet, though. Remove the pilot and look at the model. The influences are subtle, but they are there. It looks like Tau technology reverse-engineered by Humans. So no, it won't look exactly like a Broadside. Because it isn't a Broadside. It's a Human interpretation of one, built with the closest tech they can manage. The Humans lack the full understanding of Tau tech and how it works, so while they can copy it, they can't do so with the same degree of skill, hence the larger size. Miniaturization of tech takes understanding, and the IoM doesn't have it yet. Which explains why the pilot is on the outside of the suit, an altogether ludicrous place to put him, even in Terminator armor. Simply put, the internal reactor is too large to fit both it and a pilot inside the suit. So, the GK gets a suit of Terminator armor on and stand on the front like those goofballs in the third Matrix movie (and we all know what a stellar design those suits were). Eventually, after a few thousand years the IoM will have proper Battlesuits that don't require a Terminator to pilot.

Okay, so your argument is that it looks like Tau technology reverse-engineered by humans...but it's been in the Grey Knights armory since before the Tau, as the technological 'powerhouse' they are now, were ever encountered?

Kanluwen wrote:Okay, so your argument is that it looks like Tau technology reverse-engineered by humans...but it's been in the Grey Knights armory since before the Tau, as the technological 'powerhouse' they are now, were ever encountered?

Does the GK codex actually say that? Does it give a definitive date for when they started fielding them? There is a definitive frist contact date for the IoM meeting the Tau, but I don't remember seeing one for "Dreadknight first fielded in combat M32". Or maybe I wasn't looking closely enough.

That codex hurt my eyes. I lost a D12 Sanity points to it.

What? Give actual dates for something useful?

Hah! Of course not.

These things happens when a Codex is full of "mysterious designs", "unknown technologies" "secret dealis with aliens" and the like.

It would be a little bit easier if Codexes (Codexi) were written in a more omniscient reader style, but anyway...

To me the Dreadknight looks like a human attempt at a combination of eldar war-walker and Tau battlesuit.

I don't recall anything that says they were designed int he Golden Age of Humanity. Page Reference?

All IOM tech (barring alien reverse engineered/stolen stuff like Ctan phase blades etc) is based on the STC from the GAOH. These STC have the current imperial designs, so it follows that human tech then looks a lot like human tech now. Blocky, ugly and squared off-looking (though the over-ornamentation is probably more recently added due to the IOM's love of religious looking bling).

The Dreadknight is smoother, rounder in it's designs, with a lot of similarity to a tau battlesuit in weapons positioning and body structure. The fact it was designed to carry TDA instead of a tau (1/3 the size or less) explains the size difference between the two, even if the tech was equal.

Look past the Gothic bling on the thing, and it doesn't look anything like the established look for human tech in the setting.

Look past the Gothic bling on the thing and it doesn't look anything like the established look for xenos tech in the setting either.
The 'weapon positioning' is the same as what the Wraithlord has too. Hell, it's what the Dreadnought has as well--just with dextrous manipulators as well.

As to it saying they were "designed in the Golden Age of Humanity", it hints towards them being "relics of humanity that survived the Dark Age of Humanity"...which means they're hinting towards them being from the Golden Age.

They might be, they might not. If they are then they were designed by someone other than the folk who designed EVERYTHING else for humanity at the time, on a completely different design aesthetic. Maybe it's earlier period retroengineered alien tech during the GAOH

As we have no actual out and out declaration that they are human tech i'm going to go with retroengineered xeno until i am actually proven wrong

Doesn't matter too much to me anyway, as i'm never going to buy one of the ugly looking things

But since so little is known about the Golden Age of Humanity, who's to say that the humans didn't acquire it from some aliens then? I don't recall reading anywhere that humans were always the xenophobic isolationists that the Imperium turned into. There is no reason that they couldn't have traded for alien tech, and then incorporated those designs into the STC computers. (Which, as a sum of all human technical knowledge, would theoretically have still included technical knowledge that was bought rather than discovered.)

I'm fine with them retroengineering stolen/bought alien tech and then putting it onto an STC. It seems odd that they'd not apply that tech to other vehicles/equipment however, unless it was right before the end of the GAOH. That'd be a possibility that would cover the different looking tech being on only a few models

Another possibility would be that the standard STC stuff that all IOM tech is based on was the common-use equipment across humanity's empire (as it is now) and the Dreadknight was recovered from the GAOH's R and D lab. The change in aesthetic could be a late period vs early period difference in look, or possibly the influence of alien advisors on the design staff.

Frankly, i'm open to reasonable arguments that humans invented it all on their tod. The utter difference in look from everything else human-designed does seem to throw that theory off a bit though.

There's no reason to assume they stole anything. Humans are one of the most advanced species to ever exist. They just had a bit of a backslide there.