Warhammer 40,000: Imperial Knights

[HairyHeretic]

*sighs wistfully*  Oh, to be young and have a lifetime of roleplaying ahead of me!

Yeah, that's it. 

In many ways, 40K back then was simpler, not having had decades of accumulated work - but there was also a lot more nuance in much of what was there.

It also had Inquisitor Obiwan Sherlock Clouseau 

If you remember the Sensei, I'll definitely be impressed :)

[ThisOneGal]

I remember the Sensei.

Even allowing that all the characters are of equal rank, a Knight force would have someone in charge of any given mission, even if who that was might change from mission to mission. If the group gets into a discussion on a given course of action, someone has to be able to break any deadlocks

Consensus is definitely preferable, but isn't always possible.  If a tie-breaking vote is required, then something like a rotating "your faction arranged this particular mission, so you have final responsibility" role could make sense.  Every mission, someone new gets the casting vote, should one be required.

Or there could be formal ranks within a clear command structure.  Or the less-certain ranks of a social structure.  Or all three systems at once, to make RP as complicated as possible....

Honestly I do like going all matrix management on them and having social ranks, military ranks and mission ranks, just to get them in the headspace of being part of a thousand years of nobility with all its traditions and nonsense.

[Outcast]

I dimly recalled the Sensei - but had to look them up to check.  I see that my garbled memories arose in part from the wildly garbled original source material.    Those Realm of Chaos books always seemed like they could really have done with another few months of editing....

Honestly I do like going all matrix management on them and having social ranks, military ranks and mission ranks, just to get them in the headspace of being part of a thousand years of nobility with all its traditions and nonsense.

I am seriously tempted to try to convert you to the One True Faith that is Fading Suns: a science-fantasy setting that stood at odds with pretty much everything Games Workshop had fallen into by the time that it was published.    In summary, it's been described as "like the good bits of Dune" - guilds, neo-feudal aristocrats, religious sects, and more.

But what put me in mind of it at this point is that the first edition had a very detailed system of benefits you could buy for your character, including noble ranks... which could then be modified for bastardy, being a black sheep, the title being only nominal (because your family had lost all associated lands), and so on.  And wealth, of course, did not necessarily go with rank...

Ahem.  Anyway: it'd be simple enough to list ranks of Knightly operators in whatever degree of detail you wanted to make available to PCs (from squires up to varying degrees of Knights-Banneret, or the like), perhaps with the addition of modifiers like "bastard, but the only child who was available to bond with the Knight in an emergency" or whatever you want to add as ways to even things out between PCs.

[Sludgewave]

Hmmmmm, this is really tempting.  
I've been a bit Knight-brained since reading Assassinorum: Kingmaker not too long ago.

[HairyHeretic]

I dimly recalled the Sensei - but had to look them up to check.  I see that my garbled memories arose in part from the wildly garbled original source material.    Those Realm of Chaos books always seemed like they could really have done with another few months of editing....

I am seriously tempted to try to convert you to the One True Faith that is Fading Suns: a science-fantasy setting that stood at odds with pretty much everything Games Workshop had fallen into by the time that it was published.    In summary, it's been described as "like the good bits of Dune" - guilds, neo-feudal aristocrats, religious sects, and more.

But what put me in mind of it at this point is that the first edition had a very detailed system of benefits you could buy for your character, including noble ranks... which could then be modified for bastardy, being a black sheep, the title being only nominal (because your family had lost all associated lands), and so on.  And wealth, of course, did not necessarily go with rank...

RoC were broken as hell, but so much fun   The only fair fight for a RoC chaos army was another RoC chaos army. 

Funniest reward I ever rolled was for a champion of Khorne who got Fear of Blood. For every wound done within 2" he had to make a Cool check or pass out. He'd rock up with his 14 or so attacks, berserk frenzy into the enemy, slaughter all round him, scream like a little girl and faint for the next few turns.

Fading Suns I remember, though I never played it. I do recall it had a pretty solid background though.

[Outcast]

RoC were broken as hell, but so much fun  The only fair fight for a RoC chaos army was another RoC chaos army.

I've wondered if the warband mechanics from RoC could be adapted to a forum game: a clear primary PC for people to focus on for RP, with simple(ish) systems for the successes and failures of their band of followers...

But if I remember right, the Senseis weren't the only things to have utterly-contradictory descriptions in the two halves of RoC.  It wasn't just the balance that was out of whack, it was the internal lack of any apparent attempt at consistency....

Funniest reward I ever rolled was for a champion of Khorne who got Fear of Blood. For every wound done within 2" he had to make a Cool check or pass out. He'd rock up with his 14 or so attacks, berserk frenzy into the enemy, slaughter all round him, scream like a little girl and faint for the next few turns.

*laughs*  That is really quite impressive. 

Fading Suns I remember, though I never played it. I do recall it had a pretty solid background though.

Created by some of White Wolf's (former) leading lights, it was even more historically-rooted than WFRP had originally been.  They put serious effort into every bit of the original setting, and tried to do something fairly new in RP (the 'passion play' concept).

Back in the day, the Yahoo fans' mailing list could be dominated by discussions of the nature of different forms of serfdom and the differences in monasticism between Orthodoxy and Rome, as often as it featured debates on how inter-stellar communication was handled and how queues to use a jumpgate would be organised.

As someone dabbling in academia alongside my roleplaying, I absolutely adored it.

There's a new edition out now (courtesy of Ulisses Spiele), with Bill Bridges once again on board - so we might at long last get to learn what he had in mind for the overarching metaplot - but as with most such things, it's been made more accessible and has thus lost some of the nuance and complexity that so delighted the uber-nerds on that old mailing list. 

[ThisOneGal]

Hmmmmm, this is really tempting. 
I've been a bit Knight-brained since reading Assassinorum: Kingmaker not too long ago.

Give in to temptation~

[Krayz]

You can put me down as interested 

If you end up with too many players, I don't mind giving up my spot, but I think that this could be fun. Will need to brush up on Knights and such a little bit, but I understand the premise.

[TheRambler]

Huge 40k nerd, and I have built and painted some knights myself. I think they are just super cool. 

Would we all be from the same Grandhouse? Or would this be something where each of us is trying to prove ourselves? 

[ThisOneGal]

You can put me down as interested 

If you end up with too many players, I don't mind giving up my spot, but I think that this could be fun. Will need to brush up on Knights and such a little bit, but I understand the premise.

Glad to have your interest. ^_^

Huge 40k nerd, and I have built and painted some knights myself. I think they are just super cool.

Would we all be from the same Grandhouse? Or would this be something where each of us is trying to prove ourselves?

More akin to the latter. Players can be from the same house if they want, but I was going to leave the details of each Knight's house to the players. You're all part of the same country and serve the same hegemon. The scale of the house you serve is up to you. You are currently serving on the frontier, so you need a plausible reason to be there, but you could be part of a house with dozens of Knight machines or the last Knight pilot and machine left.

[Outcast]

I am woefully short of spoons and time and...

...so of course I am trying to work out coats of arms and possible house histories and....

 

[ThisOneGal]

Even if you don't have the spoons/time to join, you'd make a wonderful advisor/observer.

[Outcast]

Even if you don't have the spoons/time to join, you'd make a wonderful advisor/observer.

       

Awwwww!

       


Though the vast majority of material on it will be irrelevant (since the world isn't part of the Empire, and has no idea whether any such political entity might exist), are the Knight-specific pages on the 40K Fandom wiki suitable sources of information?  In particular, the page on the Throne Mechanicum and its impact on scions who survive the bonding process, stands out.

Something that not only haunts you with elements of every past pilot's persona, but amplifies what you felt at the time you underwent the rite of bonding, and modifies you to be an honour-bound protector... that's going to have an impact on character creation and RP. 

[ThisOneGal]

Yeah, the wiki should be fine as a source of info. I prefer Lexicanum, but while the entries there are better sourced, they are shorter. 1d6chan (NSFW) is also useful, though of dubious accuracy.

Something that not only haunts you with elements of every past pilot's persona, but amplifies what you felt at the time you underwent the rite of bonding, and modifies you to be an honour-bound protector... that's going to have an impact on character creation and RP

Yeah, I'm really interested in seeing people go with that aspect.