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the term STC is so wildy used in 40k who knows what a "Full" STC is. I myself brake them up. Into classes and Types. My class are


Class 1: Base plan- a single plan
Class 2: Small packet of plans - 2 to maybe 6 linked plans
Class 3: Large plan database
Class 4: Interactive database, Most likely A.I driven can offer "help" files on what to us
Class 5: Inter active A.I driven can craft plans on the fly.


And then ya have types
Type A: Data base only
Type B: Factory, must be supplied with the correct materials.
Type C: Nano Factory, just needs some type of raw materials.

So to me what Most find are Type A-1's Just a single data plan or blue print, while a "full" STC would be a Type C-5 and heresy.

Its not an AI, otherwise they'd have been destroyed along with all other AIs after the rebelling Men of Iron were defeated. Closer or probably similar to the semi-sapient Machine Spirits of the Land Raider or Titan war machines. As for the STC classifications, I have three personal understandings:

1) STC transcript - basically just a schematic or written plans/information.

2) Standard Template Construct - the logic engine containing an STC database, and probably contains data for more than one piece of technology.

3) Standard Template Constructor - the same as the second one, but already linked to an automated manufactorum capable of building everything in the database at once as opposed to simply printing out/giving out information on a piece of technology.

EDIT: IMHO, it would be very bad for the Imperium's enemies if the Imperium got hold of either the latter two, since an STC is designed to be simple and easy to understand, and therefore replicate, which the post-Heresy Adeptus Mechanicus does very well.

More or less what I said man. From some of the things they could do. I am betting a full STC is A.I driven and a nano fabber. They seemed to have been mostly small, adapted easily to whatever they had on hand to use and could crank stuff out even on the most primitive worlds.

 Hunterindarkness wrote:
More or less what I said man. From some of the things they could do. I am betting a full STC is A.I driven and a nano fabber. They seemed to have been mostly small, adapted easily to whatever they had on hand to use and could crank stuff out even on the most primitive worlds.

Well, technically a Titan's Machine Spirit is a very rudimentary AI, but not sapient enough to rebel unless influenced from the outside (such as a machine curse or by the Princeps/operator). So maybe an STC might be AI-operated, but in such a way that it wouldn't be considered as such by the Adeptus Mechanicus.

The way I see it is there is a reason Full STC are so rare. That being after the Iron of man issue most were destroyed, being A.I driven and all. You can forget much in a few thousand years of isolation, including why items are so rare.

 Hunterindarkness wrote:
The way I see it is there is a reason Full STC are so rare. That being after the Iron of man issue most were destroyed, being A.I driven and all. You can forget much in a few thousand years of isolation, including why items are so rare.

Actually, the fluff is clear as to why STCs are so rare; they were either lost or destroyed in the anarchy of the Old Night.

Yes, I know this..But why try to destroy them? I think it is because of the fear that the A.I's on full STC would "go bad". In the HH we see the IoM only found 1 civ with a fully working STC and they seemed to have been a technocracy. Prob A.I lead honestly.

Lore is to contradictory( Due mostly to poor setting management) to ever know the "truth" ya have to make your choices with 40k.

 Hunterindarkness wrote:
Yes, I know this..But why try to destroy them? I think it is because of the fear that the A.I's on full STC would "go bad". In the HH we see the IoM only found 1 civ with a fully working STC and they seemed to have been a technocracy. Prob A.I lead honestly.

Lore is to contradictory( Due mostly to poor setting management) to ever know the "truth" ya have to make your choices with 40k.

They probably weren't destroyed intentionally. Collateral damage, destroyed to prevent them from falling into enemy hands, that kind of thing.

I do not buy that. You had at lest 1 per colony, maybe more. Even during the crusade they found one and finding of that single one lead the admech into the HH. Collateral damage alone does not explain the lose of all of them.

 Hunterindarkness wrote:
I do not buy that. You had at lest 1 per colony, maybe more. Even during the crusade they found one and finding of that single one lead the admech into the HH. Collateral damage alone does not explain the lose of all of them.

Alternatively, there's also the fact that being an anarchic time, an STC would be of strategic value during the Old Night. It would be carefully hidden, known only to few...but what if those few were killed? There could be many STCs out there, waiting to be discovered in vaults on lost colonies/Imperial worlds, or even in the Martian Labyrinth (or under other Forge Worlds) or the semi-mythical Ark Mechanicus vessels.

As I said man, I do not buy that theory. To me it simply is to thin and does not really fit.

 Hunterindarkness wrote:
As I said man, I do not buy that theory. To me it simply is to thin and does not really fit.

Actually, it does. Earth alone was incredibly devastated during the Old Night. The Last Church in particular implied much of the oceans were vaporized in the fighting.

No it does not. You can't not go from a few million to 1 without trying to do so. You will not find a full STC as mankind made sure you would not.

 Hunterindarkness wrote:
No it does not. You can't not go from a few million to 1 without trying to do so. You will not find a full STC as mankind made sure you would not.

What? Wait a minute, what are you talking about? I was trying to reason that STCs being destroyed/lost in the Old Night is perfectly plausible when you suddenly jumped into 'not finding a complete STC'.

The same thing you are. It simply is not plausible not to find them, unless mankind moved to make sure non where left.

 Hunterindarkness wrote:
The same thing you are. It simply is not plausible not to find them, unless mankind moved to make sure non where left.

Finding them is gonna be hard to do...the Martian labyrinth alone is infested with mutants and worse. Although the fluff is clear that a complete STC will be all but impossible to find, just fragments or maybe a complete schematic or something along that line.

Yes, hard to find as mankind destoryied or disassembled them after the man of iron issue. As I said, I think they are A.I driven nano fabbers, which keeps with what we know of them from the dark age. They were the pinnacle of mankind's technology.

 Hunterindarkness wrote:
Yes, hard to find as mankind destoryied or disassembled them after the man of iron issue. As I said, I think they are A.I driven nano fabbers, which keeps with what we know of them from the dark age. They were the pinnacle of mankind's technology.

The Iron Men were the pinnacle of Human technology, probably just a step below true Necron Warriors (oldcrons). If they had achieved exceedingly-efficient FTL...the Eldar Empire would probably have been destroyed by the Humans. Somehow, they failed to get that part from the Void Dragon.

I disagree, nothing says a FULL STC is not cable of making Men or iron, at lest one BL book has an STC making them in fact. The First Gaunts Ghost book has a Men of Iron STC "factory". I also disagree that the Dark age mankind could have done anything with the Eldar. The Eldar at that time had not fallen, and while they more or less kept to themselves they were at full power. If they could have pulled themselves away from the Orgy that had become their culture they could have annihilated mankind.

No STC's remain because as a simple GW plot device to explain the dystopian Imperium. Nothing more, which is unfortunate, because some very cool fluff could be generated around that subject, because what little has shown up in the fluff is very cool.

-The Imperium getting all exited because they found a fully functional STC fabricator that makes...... knives!

-As Hunter mentioned, there was the full manufactory in Gaunt's Ghosts that actually made fully functional Men of Iron, but was corrupted by Chaos.

I know that one was before the Oldcron codex, and cave me the fleeting hope that Necrons would be in some way linked to the Men of Iron still existing and coming back to haunt the Imperium.

I agree that full STC's wouldn't exist because they were either dismantled during the Dark Age after fears of AI rebellion probably caused humans to outright fear any technology, or they have fallen to dust because existing ones would be nearly 20 thousand years old!

Call me stupid, but i dont fully understand what an STC is, i get the idea that they are plans for things but what im missing is their importance, i know that they are but why seems to elude me. why not make more after already existing knowledge? would that be considered tech heresy? if someone could explain it would be much appreciated.

gh05tdemon wrote:
Call me stupid, but i dont fully understand what an STC is, i get the idea that they are plans for things but what im missing is their importance, i know that they are but why seems to elude me. why not make more after already existing knowledge? would that be considered tech heresy? if someone could explain it would be much appreciated.

An STC is simply put the data regarding the technologies Mankind had achieved during the Golden Age of Technology. All STC data is easy to understand and replicate, which is actually paradoxical to the surprising high-level of technology the data actually represents. The Land Raider, the Rhino, basically all of the Imperium's technology but the Titans are based on STC data. Let me put it this way: despite having recovered only 'fragments' of the lost technological legacy of the Golden Age of Technology, those same 'fragments' provide the technological base that has helped keep the Imperium standing for ten thousand years and more. A complete STC would include data on more than one device, and its always been given that should the Imperium recover a complete STC, then together with its military might, nothing could stand against it.

Oh. Oh wow. i see why that's important now. What exactly broke up the STC though? was it humans fearing the rise of the AI or something? And thanks for the info by the way.

gh05tdemon wrote:
Oh. Oh wow. i see why that's important now. What exactly broke up the STC though? was it humans fearing the rise of the AI or something? And thanks for the info by the way.

No problem. Perhaps it was that, but unlikely. You see, fully-sapient AIs have been forbidden since the Men of Iron revolted, but actually semi-sapient AIs remain in use. The Titan war machines in particular, have rudimentary AI systems that develop their own personalities and actually bond with the Titan's Princeps. Land Raiders also have something similar, so I doubt the STCs which weren't involved with the Men of Iron and other associated technology were destroyed. Most likely, they were either destroyed in the anarchy of the Old Night, or were hidden away and were forgotten when those who hid them either forgot about them or were killed.

EDIT: Oh, and a new STC could be made, but you would another STC to do so, and complete one at that.

That and many of the STC's would be about 20 thousand years old, long enough to fall to dust if not in some sort of highly advanced crypt for protection.

Which is exactly what the Imperium (especially the Adeptus Mechanicus) looks for as their "holy grails". Because most of what they have found are merely blueprint fragments that they can then reverse engineer to use normal manufacturing methods to reproduce. The complete STC's from the Dark Age were everything from the blueprint to the factory in one highly advanced unit for using on-site at colonies.

 Admiral Valerian wrote:

 Hunterindarkness wrote:
Well both eldar are starting with the same tech base. However Dark Eldar simply went another way as they lost the Pskyer powers. But given as the Eldar race as been around 60 million years I do not think the Dark Eldar made anything new, just fell back on stuff they had long ago stopped using.

Whether its Dark Eldar or the Craftworld Eldar, they're both as stagnant as the Imperium. No real progress, just living in memory of the past.

Dark Eldar are in my experiance from reading their fluff actually moving forward in odd ways. Mostly they move forward just to enhance pain and not all technology would be considered good.

An STC does sound very valuable and seems like it could shoot a race forward very very quickly. could that be how the tau got so advanced. i mean they where what was basically blue cavemen, then warp storm, then pulse rifles intergalactic battle battle suits anti grav and all that. tech that for us to reach that point would be a while (from modern day and i mean to the extent they have). simplified version, could the tau have found an STC? and if they did would they be able to understand it?

gh05tdemon wrote:
An STC does sound very valuable and seems like it could shoot a race forward very very quickly. could that be how the tau got so advanced. i mean they where what was basically blue cavemen, then warp storm, then pulse rifles intergalactic battle battle suits anti grav and all that. tech that for us to reach that point would be a while (from modern day and i mean to the extent they have). simplified version, could the tau have found an STC? and if they did would they be able to understand it?

Eldar took some guys, made the Ethereals, sent them back and the unified Tau in their individual castes moved forward at a rapid pace, all aimed in one direction.

SkyD wrote:

gh05tdemon wrote:
An STC does sound very valuable and seems like it could shoot a race forward very very quickly. could that be how the tau got so advanced. i mean they where what was basically blue cavemen, then warp storm, then pulse rifles intergalactic battle battle suits anti grav and all that. tech that for us to reach that point would be a while (from modern day and i mean to the extent they have). simplified version, could the tau have found an STC? and if they did would they be able to understand it?

Eldar took some guys, made the Ethereals, sent them back and the unified Tau in their individual castes moved forward at a rapid pace, all aimed in one direction.

I like the necrons did it theory myself. Tau are unlikely to have a SCT. A admech ship visited their planet before the aun came.

gh05tdemon wrote:
An STC does sound very valuable and seems like it could shoot a race forward very very quickly. could that be how the tau got so advanced. i mean they where what was basically blue cavemen, then warp storm, then pulse rifles intergalactic battle battle suits anti grav and all that. tech that for us to reach that point would be a while (from modern day and i mean to the extent they have). simplified version, could the tau have found an STC? and if they did would they be able to understand it?

No. Its impossible for another race to use another STC. The Dark Eldar managed to steal an incomplete but functional medical STC, but they never managed to use it. My guess is, its keyed for use by Humans for some reason.