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Exactly what is going on with the Ethereals is something of a mystery but the circumstantial evidence points to the Eldar being responsible for some inexplicable reason and that the Ethereals are using pheromones to affect the mental state of the other Tau. Whether that is true, the whys and the hows are all unanswered questions. And of course the Tau themselves may be a Necrontyr offshoot, which makes the whole 'Eldar probably fixed the Tau up with the Ethereals and a tech dump' situation extra hilarious. e: With regards to the Tau it's also worth noting that it's not just their tech that is advancing: Their tactics and doctrine are advancing too. The Tau are slowly but steadily advancing away from WWI - II doctrine and towards more modern combined arms doctrine. If someone else does manage to break the bulk of the Tyranid fleets when they get here the Tau have a very good chance of being perfectly positioned for some seriously massive growth and development. Especially if the Imperium gets badly mauled by the Tyranids along the way. This is in contrast to the Imperium who are stuck in an odd mix of Napoleonic Era Space Battles and WWI Ground Battles Plus Space Marines, and all the other factions who have already perfected their type of warfare and have little further progress to make anyway. Neruz fucked around with this message at 08:31 on Sep 13, 2015 |
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Sep 13, 2015 08:00
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The old Xenology book featured the dissection of some kind of space bug hive creature. The scientists note that it has a diamond shaped crustal organ thing that gives is pheromone control of the rest of the hive, and it's identical to the one found in Tau Ethereals. The only thing is, the big alien is from a planet on the other side of the galaxy. Someone would have to have taken it and engineered it into a Tau... (Xenology was a great book. All the mysteries and secrets that it hinted at were so much more interesting that fifty examples of everything being poo poo, and then the author pulling more reasoning out their rear end about how it was all absolutely necessary and calling it a 'study'. Da_Higg posted:Don't worry they put one of those car air fresheners in their with him. It's in the shape of a tiny Ethereal This totally seems like something the Tau would have. Air caste flying around in shuttles stamped with AUN'O IS MY CO PILOT. 
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Sep 13, 2015 10:00
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Strategic Tea posted:The old Xenology book featured the dissection of some kind of space bug hive creature. The scientists note that it has a diamond shaped crustal organ thing that gives is pheromone control of the rest of the hive, and it's identical to the one found in Tau Ethereals. The only thing is, the big alien is from a planet on the other side of the galaxy. Someone would have to have taken it and engineered it into a Tau... Yeah Dissection 7 is of the Q'Orl, a species of giant space ants that have a diamond shaped crystalline organ same as the Tau. There's also another story that indicates that late in M37 some Eldar stole a Q'Orl queen. However the Ethereals supposedly appeared early M36 so it's up in the air as to whether the Eldar really did anything and GW are bad at dates or whether its just another abandoned plot thread.
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Sep 13, 2015 10:26
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Neruz posted:Yeah Dissection 7 is of the Q'Orl, a species of giant space ants that have a diamond shaped crystalline organ same as the Tau. There's also another story that indicates that late in M37 some Eldar stole a Q'Orl queen. Warp travel.
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Sep 13, 2015 10:30
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For the greater good!
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Sep 13, 2015 10:33
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Well, that's pretty awesome.Blind Sally posted:work has been busy. i may not have time to update everyday, but we'll find out the secret of Thule's fanfic soon. "Oh no, the war councils signal broke up right after/before all those Kroot Blitzkreig votes." Lord_Magmar posted:I personally think that 40k being grimdark has gotten to far, but at the same time actually improving the setting wouldn't work. What they need to do is highlight that even in this unmitigated hell-hole of a galaxy there are still good people trying to do the right thing. That said, I was a fan of the Blood Angels around...good god, 10 years ago, and still have this vague dyed in the wool determination to enjoy them, despite everything. Which turned into a coping mechanism which can be approximated as an odd mix of both buying into and ignoring stuff as propaganda. It makes a convenient out to ignore a fair bit of things that don't work for me, for example, some Matt Ward stuff as being from ultramarine perspective. So despite the stated stuff, everyone else is derisive of the "spiritual liege" and they are the same as they always were. But equally, there is the Sanguinator, kickass psuedo-primarch, and Guilleman is one of several Primarchs given a vague "Maybe could come back eventually?" element. Leman Russ got that too. Like...yeah, it's never happening and status quo is god. Same reason why despite it being mentioned, the Golden Throne will never actually break down. So I take the stance of, why feel that things are more hopeless due to one never-going-to-happen thing, but not feel better due to another equally never-going-to-happen thing? And in the meantime, there's always stuff like Ciaphas Cain. That said, nevermind the Margara Thacka level parody stuff, I always still quite enjoyed stuff like the werewolf vikings, vampire angels, the "not quite xenomorphs", the russian army tactics IG...and of course, Konrad Basically Batman Kurze. Those things were, through the grimdark, still fundamentally ridiculous or fun allusions/mashups to me. I think I somewhat lost my coherent point somewhere along the line. I think it was going to be about not getting too caught up in the parts of fluff that you don't like, that you could equally choose to interpret the bug pheromone thing as just parallel evolution, or just natural low level hive-like workings, rather than some big puppetmaster plot/eeeevil chemical coercion. Same reason as why the Lost Legions being a thing, making your own lore/world/"head-canon" is pretty reasonable. (And Orks love head kannons.)
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Sep 13, 2015 12:50
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So Space Marines basically cruise around the Galaxy looking for fights, right? Which is basically what Orks want to do. Are there any instances outside of Rogue Trader where Ork warbands decide to ignore the civilian humies and stomp the stinky Chaos boys instead?
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Sep 13, 2015 13:53
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Velius posted:So Space Marines basically cruise around the Galaxy looking for fights, right? Which is basically what Orks want to do. Are there any instances outside of Rogue Trader where Ork warbands decide to ignore the civilian humies and stomp the stinky Chaos boys instead? If given a choice, Orks will almost always go for the better fight... until that fight is over. Then they look for another one. So, yeah, they'd generally kill the Chaos gits first, but then the civvies are next on the chopping block.
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Sep 13, 2015 13:59
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quote:So Space Marines basically cruise around the Galaxy looking for fights, right? I'm...not sure on this. I know a bunch of them have entire areas of the Galaxy under their direct control and heavily fortified. And yet I also understand they're some kind of Elite Rapid Response Force, called in only at great need/in utter desperation. Could you cripple the landed Marines(Great, now it sounds like Crusader Kings) by striking their homelands? I don't know. Has this ever happened? Bloodly fucked around with this message at 14:11 on Sep 13, 2015 |
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Sep 13, 2015 14:07
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Bloodly posted:I'm...not sure on this. I know a bunch of them have entire areas of the Galaxy under their direct control and heavily fortified. And yet I also understand they're some kind of Elite Rapid Response Force. Could you cripple the landed Marines(Great, now it sounds like Crusader Kings) by striking their homelands? I don't know. Has this ever happened? It has! Several chapters have had to deal with their recruiting worlds and/or homeworlds being under siege. Notably, the Ultramarines faced tyranids at their door, as did the Blood Ravens. Granted, the Blood Ravens also had to deal with almost everything else as well. Striking the homeworld will generally force a recall of all forces to deal with that problem first, as losing access to a steady flow of new recruits is what generally kills chapters. However, there are many fleet-based chapters that have no homeworld.
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Sep 13, 2015 14:11
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apostateCourier posted:It has! Several chapters have had to deal with their recruiting worlds and/or homeworlds being under siege. Notably, the Ultramarines faced tyranids at their door, as did the Blood Ravens. Granted, the Blood Ravens also had to deal with almost everything else as well. Especially since the Imperium tends to look poorly upon a chapter who would attempt to claim a world as a recruiting world. That's the crippling process of the beaurocracy for you.
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Sep 13, 2015 14:52
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Velius posted:So Space Marines basically cruise around the Galaxy looking for fights, right? Which is basically what Orks want to do. Are there any instances outside of Rogue Trader where Ork warbands decide to ignore the civilian humies and stomp the stinky Chaos boys instead? The Deffwotch do it as well, though that's a rogue trader game that went so far off the rails it fell into super robot anime. Most of the time space marines just kinda....go wherever they want to either advance the cause of their chapter or to respond to distress calls from nearby systems (unless they get instructed to join up with Crusades). Fleet based chapters, iirc, recruit from whichever planets they roll through with the exception of other chapters' homeworlds. I recall them having a much lower overall success rate on their recruitment because their sources material for their marines isn't as constant and stable.
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Sep 13, 2015 14:54
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The Black Templars are unique as far as Space Marines go for exactly this reason. They don't just fly around looking for fights, they haven't stopped doing so since the Heresy as a method to ignore the new rules about numbers. Basically it's 1000 Marines to a chapter unless your chapter is currently on crusade, the Black Templars are always on crusade. However to count as being on crusade you have to fight in a specific amount of actual combat against the enemies of the Imperium, both within and without, so the Black Templars tend to just show up and wreck Chaos/Orks/Eldar/Tyranids when necessary and than bugger off to find more so they're never forced to fix their own chapter numbers by ending the crusade. Other Space Marine chapters do various things, generally though they're either set up as a special defence force for a large area of the Imperium or they move around as a fleet to wherever they're needed most.
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Sep 13, 2015 15:11
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A bunch of them just sit around the bigger warp rifts to beat down any emerging chaos forces.
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Sep 13, 2015 15:19
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Bahumat posted:Fleet based chapters, iirc, recruit from whichever planets they roll through with the exception of other chapters' homeworlds. I recall them having a much lower overall success rate on their recruitment because their sources material for their marines isn't as constant and stable. It helps that most fleet based chapters do have a steady turf they patrol and a set series of worlds they recruit from - the Blood Ravens would be an example, they have no known Fortress-Monastery and recruited from at least three different worlds. The Imperial Fists are another, though they do have a fortress-monastery, it's just a giant starship that would make the Death Star blush. However, there are a very few fleet based chapters that opt for what Warhammer calls the Nomadic-Predation strategy where the entire fleet is self-sufficient and wanders the galaxy in isolation, pausing only to identify targets that cross their path and recruiting warriors from young survivors of their assaults. The Carcharodons are the best known example, and even they are an enigma to the rest of the Imperium given their habit of secrecy and isolation that they only break to wreak havoc on unfortunate targets with their most prominent being the Badab War. They're also space Maori.
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Sep 13, 2015 16:21
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The Space Sharks are also one of the most evil Space Marine chapters around. For example their recruitment practices usually involve kidnapping a ton of teenage boys, locking them in a room and forcing them to fight to the death, the last one standing being made into a Marine. However you know on this topic, I know at some point the Tau had to fight Space Marines but I can't really think of what chapters they fought or what they thought about them. And I'd really love to see a bit where the Tau fight the Black Templar because I imagine it would start with the Tau chuckling at how the crazy humans just use melee weapons, and then turn to pants making GBS threads terror when they actually reach them. (This is partly why the Templars gave Rawbutt Girlyman the finger and keep their numbers up. Nothing like a zerg rush of 8 foot tall superhumans in power armor.)
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Sep 13, 2015 17:00
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The Tau response to Space Marines is primarily "Aagh! Shoot it with railguns!" Space Marines do not like railguns. Not even a little bit. Railguns are extra heresy.
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Sep 13, 2015 17:04
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They did fight the Black Templars in one war. I think they faced the Ultramarines 1st at some point in the same. Then in the other big war they fought a random handful of companies from assorted chapters.
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Sep 13, 2015 17:10
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And our glorious commander Kais has fought the Raptors chapter and killed several.
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Sep 13, 2015 17:14
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bunnyofdoom posted:And our glorious commander Kais has fought the Raptors chapter and killed several. Granted that's because Khorne was helping him out.
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Sep 13, 2015 17:44
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Cythereal posted:Granted that's because Khorne was helping him out. He still is, we have the Fury benefit, don't we? 
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Sep 13, 2015 17:56
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Onmi posted:Didn't this entire thread kick off with the illusion of choice? You can pull a veto if you think it'll be more interesting  That was before I had ferreted out all the filthy gue'las and alien sympathizers. I couldn't vote against my War Council now. It just wouldn't be right. Anyways, the vote was OVERWHELMINGLY in Gregory's favour, so you can take a guess where we'll be going first. I should have the next update done later today.
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Sep 13, 2015 18:07
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Blind Sally posted:
You only have yourself to blame, Shas'O. You just had to go and give him a name, didn't you? Of course everyone wants to unleash Gregory the Greater Knarlock, he's become the star of the show.
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Sep 13, 2015 18:30
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Blind Sally posted:
When you have a giant dinosaur that kills all your problems, the whole world starts to look like a lawyer hiding in a toilet.
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Sep 13, 2015 18:31
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I just wanted him to have a great quest is all 
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Sep 13, 2015 18:31
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Blind Sally posted:
What if we just happened to, purely in the process of getting Gregory you understand, send a massive force of kroot right into the enemies base which just happened to destroy it. Nothing you can do about that.
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Sep 13, 2015 18:42
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Blind Sally posted:
Wait a second. This.. This isn't about Thule's xenophile fanfiction at all. This entire thread is Shas'O's fanfiction!
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Sep 13, 2015 20:48
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Eimi posted:The Space Sharks are also one of the most evil Space Marine chapters around. For example their recruitment practices usually involve kidnapping a ton of teenage boys, locking them in a room and forcing them to fight to the death, the last one standing being made into a Marine. Eh... that's actually fairly standard for Space Marine chapters. The Ultramarines have a regimented system of gladiatorial combat in the worlds of Ultramar where preteen boys fight each other to the death in arenas and the Ultramarines take the strongest. At least that was Ultramarine recruiting practice before Ward, at any rate. The Carcharodons come into focus once you realize where they come from. Though the Imperium has almost wholly forgotten them outside the Badab War where they brought the campaign to a brutal and decisive end, they're a Second Founding chapter created from the Raven Guard. At the end of the Horus Heresy, Corax like most of the surviving loyalist Primarchs began dividing [what remained of] his Legion into thousand-man-strong Chapters. When doing so, Corax decided to excise the dark streak of ruthless brutality that he had never completely eradicated from his Legion. He took the one thousand most violent, aggressive, and ruthless warriors of his Legion, gave them a fleet, and exiled them to the darkness above the galactic ecliptic. For ten thousand years the Carcharodons have hunted in the void above the galaxy's horizon, battling Emperor only knows what in the intergalactic dark and only descending to the galaxy below to seize supplies and recruits. To make things even more fun, during the Badab War update, the Carcharodons were established to be Maori, and their chapter master Tyberos the Red Wake brings with him the unique warlord trait Savage Beyond Reason - in tabletop terms, they cause Fear, something no other loyalist chapter can do as a matter of course.
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Sep 13, 2015 22:55
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Vagon posted:Wait a second. 
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Sep 13, 2015 23:05
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Cythereal posted:Eh... that's actually fairly standard for Space Marine chapters. The Ultramarines have a regimented system of gladiatorial combat in the worlds of Ultramar where preteen boys fight each other to the death in arenas and the Ultramarines take the strongest. Isn't it typically non-lethal, though? Being the most 'civilised', for lack of a better term, among the Space Marines has always been the Ultramarines' shtick.
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Sep 13, 2015 23:09
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CommissarMega posted:Isn't it typically non-lethal, though? Being the most 'civilised', for lack of a better term, among the Space Marines has always been the Ultramarines' shtick. Fluff says it's usually non-lethal, though after the Horus Heresy the Ultramarines switched it up: preteen boys who think they have what it takes are instead pitted against a fully fledged Astartes, and that this does frequently end in the Aspirant's death. Even for the smurfs. The other type of Aspirant trial the Ultramarines employ usually doesn't kill the kid, though even then there are deaths. Making a Space Marine is a brutal process, and even for the nicest chapters like the Ultramarines, Salamanders, and Raven Guard the recruitment process alone is frequently fatal. Of all the First Founding chapters, the Raven Guard have the gentlest Aspirant trials in the fluff. They're not looking to test each Aspirant's strength, courage, or fortitude so much as they are their wits, agility, and sneakiness. Cythereal fucked around with this message at 23:42 on Sep 13, 2015 |
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Sep 13, 2015 23:39
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The Lone Badger posted:Go North-West, get Gregory on the field ASAP. chiasaur11 posted:Northwest. Kurieg posted:Kauyon and Gregory, get maximum Krootness to destroy the Space Marines. Okay, that's fine--Uh, I had a my save file corrupt. Good news is I had an extra save right before I started this fight, so we didn't lose much. Just a few small changes: all my Honour Guard survived the first attack--Thule didn't send all of his forces in for the first attack. Two, I took control of that bluff that has the Whirlwind artillery.   Our Shapers our ready.  Kroot Strike Force is ready, Shas'o. The Shapers will lead us. We're heading for the Relic. We found the remainders of Thule's first attack force. Krootox made short work of the Dreadnought.  They all went down fast. Minimal damage to our own forces. They have a forward base on that plateau. We need to loop around if we want to reach it. Probably a good idea. Our Plasma Guns can't hurt the Dreadnought armour fast enough to stop them from hitting the Kroot rank and file. Push forward! Crush the Space Marine opposition. Remember: whatever loot we take we get to keep, O'Kais' orders! Ahh, often overlooked in favour of the mighty Knarloc, I'd like to take a moment to point out how badass Krootox and Krootox Riders are. This particular Krootox suffered a direct hit from Thule's orbital bombardment lasers. It took little damage, and in fact kept on its merry way. While on fire. This is metal as all heck. Look at him, he's riding one-hand style.   https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7uVmhy3yDwg We've found the route to the plateau, Shaper. Good. Take out the Chapel-Barracks, don't let them reinforce. Meanwhile, I'm sending the Drone Squads to begin assaulting the Space Marine position at the Relic. They'll attack from the north, we'll take the Kroot and attack from the south. Lots of orbital laser fire! How goes the attack? Like clockwork. Thank goodness Thule's battle barge gunmen are bad shots! Hurry, take the Relic! On it. Yeah, haa!! It is ours, Shaper! You will not squelch our faith so easily, alien!The Tau Empire will respect your faith, human. If only you would see reason! Our faith is in the Emperor of Man, alien. To bow to you is heresy. Then you follow the path to destruction. Better destruction than bondage! So says the slave to the free man. Good work. Gregory is being dispatched to your location.Excellent job. I am joining you at the Relic ruins. The Space Marines were fools not to fortify it, but we won't make the same mistake. Teams, report! We lost two Drone Squads and two of our Shapers. Otherwise, the Kroot Strike Force suffered no major setbacks. We are being reinforced as we speak.  WE HAVE CAPTURED A SLAG DEPOSIT NEAR WHERE THE SPACE MARINE PLATEAU FORWARD BASE WAS LOCATED>>>>>>THULE KEEPS HITTING US WITH ORBITAL LASER????!!!! [  ]  Thule's Space Marines have been sending increasingly powerful units to assault the primary Cadre HQ, but so far we have been able to beat them all back with nothing more than a pair of Fire Warrior teams and a pair of Kroot Packs. Excellent. Let's review our assets before we plan our next attack. Of course. As I mentioned, we have two Fire Warrior teams and two Kroot Packs at the central base, which is fully upgraded and fortified. Thule won't take it without heavy losses of his own.  Since we took control of the Artillery Bluff, no Space Marines have bothered trying to retake the position from us. THE SLAG DEPOSIT STANDS====I SHALL REPAIR IT>>>BUT THULE"S SPACE LASERS KILLED MY FRIEND AND COMRADE, EARTH CASTE DRONE DESIGNATION BN-0117::::TRULY; THIS IS THE DARKEST OF ALL TIMELINES. The Kroot Strike Force currently consists of Gregory, two Krootox, two Kroot Hound Packs led by Shapers, our Kroot Alpha Pack led by a Shaper, your two Fire Warrior Bodyguard teams, and two Drone Squads. The Earth Caste have also fortified the position, so we will reinforce with Broadsides and Drone Squads before any further movement. Good work, everyone! I feel good about this mission. We're gonna totally embarrass Thule! I brought along some experts from the Earth Caste and Water Caste to decipher the codes at this temple. With any luck we'll be able to discover just exactly what was so important that the Blood Ravens had to come to Kronus. Leave it to us, Shas'o. We'll suss out whatever Thule was hiding. With that done, Shas'o, I'm convening the War Council. We need to decide whether we want to make the final push into the heart of the Blood Raven's base, or eliminate their support by capturing the Orbital Relay and cutting off their reinforcements.
Sally fucked around with this message at 17:22 on Sep 19, 2015 |
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Sep 14, 2015 00:46
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Take the Orbital Relay That way Thule can't trasmit his fanfics to the battle barge
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Sep 14, 2015 00:56
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Take the Relay. We must avenge our fallen comrade, EARTH CASTE DRONE DESIGNATION BN-0117, by hijacking his own machines for the glory of the GREATER GOOD.
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Sep 14, 2015 00:58
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Take the Relay EARTH CASTE DRONE DESIGNATION BN-0117 never forget.
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Sep 14, 2015 01:05
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Are we Relay going to do this? Think of the fanfiction!
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Sep 14, 2015 01:39
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bunnyofdoom posted:Take the Orbital Relay That way Thule can't trasmit his fanfics to the battle barge Dooky Dingo posted:Take the Relay. Veloxyll posted:Take the Relay Luhood posted:Are we Relay going to do this? Think of the fanfiction! This endless stream of cowardice must cease, end this.
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Sep 14, 2015 01:53
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In the name of EARTH CASTE DRONE DESIGNATION BN-0117, take the Relay and make Thule pay for the loss of our companion.
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Sep 14, 2015 02:23
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akulanization posted:This endless stream of cowardice must cease, end this. Cowardice? No, this is humiliation.
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Sep 14, 2015 03:01
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goatface posted:Cowardice? No, this is humiliation. Humiliation would have been disregarding their carefully planned defenses and simply running straight in and ending them anyway. We've now given them the undeserved respect of taking them seriously. First taking their relic like we care about their morale, now treating their orbital strikes like anything other than a minor annoyance to be shrugged off by the Tau war machine. You don't humiliate North Korea by acting like they matter.
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Sep 14, 2015 04:50
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