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I have a question regarding warp gates. I scoured the lexicanum and wikis, but didn't find the answer.

Can warp gates be opened at will to any desired position? Is a psyker, device, or some ritual needed to open it?

Imagine a hypothetic scenario, where chaos Astartes invade a planet, along with hordes of cultists and they arrive in a fleet of ships. That gets destroyed by the imperial fleet, but I need the chaos lord to escape, along with his marines, leaving the cultists behind. They are the Flawless Host.

What do you mean by "warp gates". Are you talking about Webway gates? These are a network of safe tunnels through the warp that vary from infantry-sized right up to those capable of taking the largest capital ships. They are primarily used by the Eldar who inherited them from their creators, the Old Ones. Other races such as the Necrons and the Thousand Sons have found ways to break into portions of the webway but struggle to use it effectively.

I'm not talking about the webway in particular, but about something similar used by the Chaos.

Warp gate, chaos portal, whatever it's called.

I imagine it's easier or harder depending on how big and how permanent the portal needs to be.
Opening a permanent portal to the warp big enough to summon an army of daemons would require long rituals, lots of sacrifices, etc.
Opening a rift for a few seconds to get some guys into the warp shouldn't be too hard for a sorcerer. For someone who's not a sorcerer, it might be more complicated but I don't know if there's a good answer. Chaos doesn't work on strict rules.

There are several ways of getting "into" the warp:
- Imperial warp drives.
- Chaos portals, which are usually by causing enough sacrificing or betrayal or raw emotions to weaken the borders between real and warp space, so that things can come through. This can be done on smaller scales too for just a small number of people to travel. There is an instance of a guy called Marek who used a warp rift to travel to Macragge during the Horus Heresy

There are also several ways of avoiding it:
- Eldar Webways
- Tau "skimming"

There are other travel techniques too:
- teleportation (there is evidence this can happen across planets and star systems - Vulkan)
- the Pharos beacon.

I forget how the Tyranids travel? Also aren't there "dolman gates" which allow(ed) the Necrons to get into the webway or warp? Can't remember which.

There are probably other methods too, some xenos who developed some form of FTL... but that's a dangerous narrative to introduce because then you start to reduce the need to travel through the warp.

Tyranids have a weird bio ship called a Narvhal that messes with gravity to go FTL in a kind of corridor. But they can't get as close to the destination as others and IIRC it messes up the environment too.

Dolmen gates are the dumbassery that let Necrons into the Webway. Oldcrons had something called inertialess drive which was vague but fast and actually made sense.

Anyone know how teleportation works?

I've just read "Scars" and sometimes that indicated that teleportation used some form of warp... or at least warp energy was released. That was however on Prospero which is a bit of a warp-infused world.

TarkinLarson wrote:
Anyone know how teleportation works?

I've just read "Scars" and sometimes that indicated that teleportation used some form of warp... or at least warp energy was released. That was however on Prospero which is a bit of a warp-infused world.

It varies. The Imperium sends you into the Warp, moves you through there and you pop back into reality somewhere else. Eldar do a similar thing but better. Necrons use different dimensions I think.

I doubt anyone knows how ork tellyportas work, but if I had to guess, I'd say it's also by going through the warp. Or is it the waaaaaghrp?
Necrons seem to be the only ones who don't rely on the warp at all for teleportation.

pm713 wrote:

TarkinLarson wrote:
Anyone know how teleportation works?

I've just read "Scars" and sometimes that indicated that teleportation used some form of warp... or at least warp energy was released. That was however on Prospero which is a bit of a warp-infused world.

It varies. The Imperium sends you into the Warp, moves you through there and you pop back into reality somewhere else. Eldar do a similar thing but better. Necrons use different dimensions I think.

Exactly so. Based on the description in both the Lords of Mars series and Ciaphas Cain series, imperial teleporters (and presumably ork tellyportas) essentially create a sort of point-to-point gellar field 'straw' though the warp and fire you down it, otherwise unprotected.

This is why you really need to be in terminator armour (or custodes armour) to survive the experience, or else need a ridiculously good archeotech device. It's also why pariahs and properly trained psykers experience much less 'teleport shock' , which is why grey knights in power armour can use personal teleporters based on 'just' imperial technology.

Did they ever expand on the "subspace" teleportation method the Orks had during the War Of the Beast? That definitely didn't use the warp, the whole premise was that they could outmanoeuvre the imperial fleet and materialise directly over Terra...

 Hawky wrote:
I have a question regarding warp gates. I scoured the lexicanum and wikis, but didn't find the answer.

Can warp gates be opened at will to any desired position? Is a psyker, device, or some ritual needed to open it?

Imagine a hypothetic scenario, where chaos Astartes invade a planet, along with hordes of cultists and they arrive in a fleet of ships. That gets destroyed by the imperial fleet, but I need the chaos lord to escape, along with his marines, leaving the cultists behind. They are the Flawless Host.

The chaos lord and marines could escape if:

-They had a Sorceror perform a ritual to enable a temporary warp gate from 'point A to point B, probably requiring sacrifices
-or, there was already a warp gate somewhere on the planet, which they could find and use if it's operational, or find and temporarily activate:
--Dark Age of Technology warp gate
--Eldar warp gate
--Necron Dolmen gate
--Ork Tellyporta
--Imperium Teleportarium
--unknown other Xenos or Human relic

 ph34r wrote:

 Hawky wrote:
I have a question regarding warp gates. I scoured the lexicanum and wikis, but didn't find the answer.

Can warp gates be opened at will to any desired position? Is a psyker, device, or some ritual needed to open it?

Imagine a hypothetic scenario, where chaos Astartes invade a planet, along with hordes of cultists and they arrive in a fleet of ships. That gets destroyed by the imperial fleet, but I need the chaos lord to escape, along with his marines, leaving the cultists behind. They are the Flawless Host.

The chaos lord and marines could escape if:

-They had a Sorceror perform a ritual to enable a temporary warp gate from 'point A to point B, probably requiring sacrifices
-or, there was already a warp gate somewhere on the planet, which they could find and use if it's operational, or find and temporarily activate:
--Dark Age of Technology warp gate
--Eldar warp gate
--Necron Dolmen gate
--Ork Tellyporta
--Imperium Teleportarium
--unknown other Xenos or Human relic

adding onto this

- a traitor among the Imperium fleet smuggles them off world.

Thank you, gentlemen, this was most helpful.

I'll go with the sacrificial ritual, most probably, or abandoned Teleportarium.