Gert wrote:

 Insectum7 wrote:
No, I'm saying that BL isn't a great source because it's brought us 12' tall Berzerkers, Marines marching at 60 mph, Chimeras being cut in half with Lughtning Claws and Imperial Assassins struggling to take down a Marine. So when I hear about loyalist dreadnoughts being chained up and only being able to scream, I toss it in the junk pile next to the rest of it.

Sounds a lot like "I don't like it so it doesn't count". I'm not picking single examples, I'm showing you multiple examples across a range of books set at different points in time and written years apart by different authors that all say the same thing.
At no point have I claimed that all Dreadnoughts are at the same level as the Carcharadon examples while you have claimed the concept of Dreadnoughts going senile or losing their mental faculties is non-existent. Even after you were shown a specific example from Index Astartes you're still claiming it doesn't exist.
You cherry pick examples that don't suit your narrative rather than taking them as a whole. You're a joke.

 Haighus wrote:

 Insectum7 wrote:

 Haighus wrote:
I mean, when Index Astartes states that Dreadnoughts start to lose their grip on reality and spend more and more time in stasis to slow this, I think it is pretty reasonable to assume that the stasis helps stop them from going insane.

The most basic definition for psychosis is losing touch with reality. For those that don't know, psychosis isn't just the bouncing off the wall type and certainly isn't just becoming a murderous individual (that is an exceptionally rare form).

Right, but the same article cites Bjorn as being exceptionally old, and we have a story where Bjorn is nowhere near insane either. It's more like he would just rather not be there. I think one could interpret "grip on the material world inevitably begins to slip" as a sort of disinterest, rather than a psychosis. We've also got a history where the Venerable Dreadnoughts have a higher WS and BS than the typical Dread. If they can do battle effectively, lead troops and take part in war councils, I question the validity of the term "psychosis".

I think there are a number of things at play here. Firstly, different individuals are almost certainly going to deteriorate at different rates, just like actual humans. Some humans are sharp at 100, others have dementia in their 50's. There is a spectrum. Bjorn is always noted as exceptional, the oldest known dreadnought.

Secondly, Bjorn is routinely woken once every thousand years. He is only woken otherwise for truly exceptional battles, like serious assaults on the Fang. He has essentially been stopped in time to prevent further deterioration, which suggests even he is on the cusp of serious degeneration. Bjorn served routinely as a dreadnought for just 300 years before he started spending more and more time in stasis. It isn't clear at which point a dreadnought is considered venerable and probably has no hard and fast rule, but I get the Impression any dreadnought >1000 years old is very rare, and Bjorn sleeps that long. He has probably only been awake a couple of dozen times in ~9000 years.

Thirdly, psychosis can occur from low mood states like severe depression, and I think that is a far more likely type for most chapters than the raging murderer type some dreadnoughts are prone to (particularly Blood Angels and successors). I suspect that without stasis sleep, most dreadnoughts would slip into a sort of irreversible catatonia eventually and fully withdraw from the real world. It seems that would likely be within a few centuries of continuous activity based on when dreadnoughts typically seem to withdraw from regular service and spend more time in stasis. To be clear, I think the time in stasis pauses this process and prevents it progressing, preserving these great heroes of the Chapter until they are needed.

 Insectum7 wrote:

Spoiler:

 Haighus wrote:

 Insectum7 wrote:

 Haighus wrote:
I mean, when Index Astartes states that Dreadnoughts start to lose their grip on reality and spend more and more time in stasis to slow this, I think it is pretty reasonable to assume that the stasis helps stop them from going insane.

The most basic definition for psychosis is losing touch with reality. For those that don't know, psychosis isn't just the bouncing off the wall type and certainly isn't just becoming a murderous individual (that is an exceptionally rare form).

Right, but the same article cites Bjorn as being exceptionally old, and we have a story where Bjorn is nowhere near insane either. It's more like he would just rather not be there. I think one could interpret "grip on the material world inevitably begins to slip" as a sort of disinterest, rather than a psychosis. We've also got a history where the Venerable Dreadnoughts have a higher WS and BS than the typical Dread. If they can do battle effectively, lead troops and take part in war councils, I question the validity of the term "psychosis".

I think there are a number of things at play here. Firstly, different individuals are almost certainly going to deteriorate at different rates, just like actual humans. Some humans are sharp at 100, others have dementia in their 50's. There is a spectrum. Bjorn is always noted as exceptional, the oldest known dreadnought.

Secondly, Bjorn is routinely woken once every thousand years. He is only woken otherwise for truly exceptional battles, like serious assaults on the Fang. He has essentially been stopped in time to prevent further deterioration, which suggests even he is on the cusp of serious degeneration. Bjorn served routinely as a dreadnought for just 300 years before he started spending more and more time in stasis. It isn't clear at which point a dreadnought is considered venerable and probably has no hard and fast rule, but I get the Impression any dreadnought >1000 years old is very rare, and Bjorn sleeps that long. He has probably only been awake a couple of dozen times in ~9000 years.

Thirdly, psychosis can occur from low mood states like severe depression, and I think that is a far more likely type for most chapters than the raging murderer type some dreadnoughts are prone to (particularly Blood Angels and successors). I suspect that without stasis sleep, most dreadnoughts would slip into a sort of irreversible catatonia eventually and fully withdraw from the real world. It seems that would likely be within a few centuries of continuous activity based on when dreadnoughts typically seem to withdraw from regular service and spend more time in stasis. To be clear, I think the time in stasis pauses this process and prevents it progressing, preserving these great heroes of the Chapter until they are needed.

So I don't think I ever disagreed with the idea of degradation, but I would humbly suggest that using the term "psychosis" is maybe not the best term. While it might be appropriate in the clinical sense, degeneration feels more apt and is less likely to recieve pushback, especially since the Chaos Dreadnoughts are described as "completely psychotic", in contrast with the often "wise, War Council appropriate" loyalist ones.

Can we introduce "Dreadnought abuse" as a concept here? Like, if a chapter isn't appropriately caring for their Dreadnoughts they might turn into raging lunatics. But given the more common descriptions of Dreadnoughts that scenario seems a very atypical outcome.

Edit: Out of curiosity I googled the relationship between dementia and psychosis:
"Some people with dementia may become aggressive at times and have trouble regulating their emotions. Psychosis can also be a complication of dementia. Psychosis refers to the mental state where someone is not sure what's real or not. It can include paranoid or delusional thoughts as well as hallucinations."

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:


We’ve all heard about instances of persons awake during surgery, yes? What if that happens to some Dreadnought occupants? Thought to be in stasis, but not fully, and with no way to communicate that?