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Massil
Apr 9, 2004 11:15:26 GMT -5
Post by Tynesh on Apr 9, 2004 11:15:26 GMT -5
What I am trying to say is that there is only one true inherited instinct in humans, that is the nipple reaction. In arctic seabirds, the young have an instinct to peck at a spot on the parents throat to make them regurgatate food. This is instinctive as even a fake bird head with the spot was pecked by a human-reared chick. These are scientific facts that I have recently learnt at uni, so in my opinion are correct. I still don't like the ork memory thing, it is too good. Nerve synapses are formed by protein interactions with the cell membranes of the nerve cell ganglion, these proteins are made from DNA. However every single person has a differently wired brain. It is each personal experience that makes these connections. Ok I apologise for the Irwin reference Can we get back to the planet now.
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Massil
Apr 9, 2004 11:32:11 GMT -5
Post by CELS on Apr 9, 2004 11:32:11 GMT -5
Well, to summarize... you're right that the common view is that humans only have one 'instinct' though, but to say that "genetic memory" (granted, a bad term for it) such as the fear of spiders and snakes is non-existant, and that such a fear is taught, is not in accordance with recent scientific findings. In other words, humans have "genetic memory", animals certainly do, and that means orks can have it too! In other words, we're both right and wrong Right... back to the planet... I'm still waiting for the Standard Representation, which you said would follow within the day... almost ten days ago ;D I'm not complaining or anything, I'm just saying... if you finish that, we'll have a lot more to talk about, and we can get this thread back on topic!
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Massil
Apr 10, 2004 10:16:16 GMT -5
Post by Tynesh on Apr 10, 2004 10:16:16 GMT -5
That is quite true I better get something up soon!
Goes off to ponder on things.
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Massil
Apr 10, 2004 10:52:06 GMT -5
Post by Tynesh on Apr 10, 2004 10:52:06 GMT -5
Okay here is the Map of the planet done on the hex map. Just a note that I added a white colour to the legend to represent sea ice, ala North Pole icecap rather than land covering icecap like the South Pole.
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Massil
Apr 10, 2004 10:53:47 GMT -5
Post by Tynesh on Apr 10, 2004 10:53:47 GMT -5
Okay and here is the start of the Std Rep for the planet, got to Relgion so far.
ENJOY!Planetary Name: Massil World Class: Civilised – Fortified Population: 226,000,000 Tech Level: 7 - Imperial Standard Tithe Grade: Aestimare: D476
Orbital Distance: 1.2 AU Equatorial Diameter: 13900 Gravity: 1.6 Orbital Period: 485 days Length of Day: 21hrs 49mins Atmosphere: Standard Surface Atmosphere Pressure: 1.2 Average Surface Temperature: 11.5 Hydrosphere: 57% Life Forms: Transplanted Terran Moons: 3 Planet Description
The major landmasses of Massil are to south of the equator, while the northern hemisphere is principally ocean with a single ice-bound continent. Long mountain ranges cross the southern uplands, following the line of the old tectonic plates. These are remnants of the planets’ geological past, a time when the crust was more dynamic and the land frequently rent asunder. Now the only areas of seismic activity are in the far north where island volcanoes periodically erupt into a steaming sea. Expansive pine forests and vast sweeping steppes cover the inland plateaus of the southern continents. Towards the equator nearer the ocean, the land falls down onto great coastal prairies. It is in these more temperate regions that the majority of the human settlements are located. Plentiful sunlight and regular rainfall ensure bountiful harvests of staple crops and the virtual absence of the planets axial tilt allow for several plantings with each cycle around the planets’ star. From the coastal cities fleets of ocean-going vessels voyage in search of vast shoals of aquatic fauna and to harvest the kelp beds on the equatorial sea plains. The interior is just as bountiful as the coastal regions, with vast areas of virgin lands waiting for contractors to exploit the abundant resources. Felling companies search the vast forests for giant redwood pines, sold to order for the markets of Meksum and Anargo. Mineral crawlers prowl across the mountain foothills and the polar wastes gathering mineral deposits for the machine shops of the planets cities. Game hunters can also be found aplenty, tracking the forest cudbears or giant elk; trading furs, teeth and antlers for a handsome profit. In M36. an Ork Waaagh! Kay siege to Massil and destroyed many of the original settlements. The invaders were finally destroyed at a great cost in human life, both the local defence forces and Guard Imperial regiments. In the aftermath, during the period known locally as the Reconstruction, the Adeptus Terra declared that Massil should become a fortress world capable of acting as a defensive line against future ork incursions. Massive engineering projects were undertaken, construction lasting several hundred years. The population of the planet was re-housed; vast fortress cities, replaced the open plan urbanisations that had fallen to the xenos invasion. Protected by rockcrete walls and designed to confuse and disorientate invaders, the cities range in size from hundreds of thousands to over 15 million citizens in the planetary capital New Town. Each city-fort contains manufacturing plants, food stores and militia muster-stations ready for a siege. At the time of the Ork invasion, Massil had been a prosperous and continually expanding planet and had held the prestigious title of sub-sector capital. Following the defeat of Waaagh! Tuskragga the Adeptus Terra relocated the administration of the sub-sector to the world of Parcellum, later renamed along with the sub-sector as Castellan. Massil is now a heavily defended planet, located at a nexus of several important warp conduits. It has the capacity to support large transient populations and many Imperial Guard regiments are billeted on the planet before being transported to other war zones in the sub.
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Massil
Apr 10, 2004 10:54:16 GMT -5
Post by Tynesh on Apr 10, 2004 10:54:16 GMT -5
Government:
An Imperial Governor, who ensures that the planetary organisations follow the rule of the Emperor, rules the planet. The position is hereditary, handed down from father to son since the founding of the planet in M32. Only once has the chain been broken, when the 134th Governor died during the ork invasion of Waaagh! Tuskragga in M36, he was replaced by his nephew, the son of his second sister. The primary government of the planet is a legislative body formed by the mayors of each of the planets 35 city-states. Collectively known as the High Council, the body is presided over by a chairperson chosen from one of the eight principle cities. A Council led by a mayor similarly governs each city-state; these may vary in size depending on the size of the population. Although most of the Massilian city-states follow a unified world law, each often has unique traditions and customs that have endured and passed on into bylaws and regulations. The main function of the Councils is to ensure the continuing operation of the cities and to oversee new civil engineering works and to pass contacts for the exploitation of locally found resources. The Judicial Council has existed since the planets founding, although reforms changed its organisation after the Reconstruction. The wrongdoer’s social group normally deals with many petty issues concerning unlawful behaviour and misconduct; punishments are based upon penitent work for the local community, which vary greatly in length and description. Higher crimes are referred to the Judicial Council where representatives from the Law-readers Guild explain the infringement and the relevant law to the accused and an assembly of nine jurors drawn at random from the city’s population. Exceptional cases may pass to the Judges’ Council, where the accused stands before the Council of Nine, represented by eight of the planets’ most senior Law-readers; the Imperial Governor traditionally makes up the ninth position, however a Proxy is nominated from the Imperial Social if the governor is unable to attend Council. The Planetary Executive is fulfilled as always by the Adeptus Arbites, who also are responsible for upholding the Imperial Law as well as providing a standing policing force for the planet.
Religion
The population of Massil are fully aware of the heroic deeds and great sacrifices the Immortal God-Emperor made as described in the edicts of the Imperial Creed. He is honoured with group prayer after mealtimes, a ritual not missed by even front line soldiers. Every month the population must visit one of the many city shrines to show piety before a member of the priesthood and pay reverence to Him-Almighty. Group meditation and thought sessions are popular practices of all social groups, led by a social elder or teenager intent on studying the Holy Texts. Although a part of everyday life the Imperial Creed is taken as a set of guidelines for everyday life and social betterment, rather than a zealous dictation. Many citizens will happily listen to the interpretations of various other Imperial denominations often spoken in public by visiting Ecclesiastical members.
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Massil
Apr 10, 2004 11:03:49 GMT -5
Post by Tynesh on Apr 10, 2004 11:03:49 GMT -5
Okay just a few things... 11,37,10 - M-V - D986876-2 S 201 Im 460 I had to change the star type to F-V as I could get no sensible habitable planet out of the system without doing so. I upped the tech to 7 - Standard Imperial I dropped the atmosphere to standard (6) as it really screwed with the temperature, however it is still denser than Terra. otherwise it is still an interesting planet
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Massil
Apr 10, 2004 14:50:40 GMT -5
Post by CELS on Apr 10, 2004 14:50:40 GMT -5
Brilliant! And you used my standard mapping template! I could just cry... ;D Good point about the frozen seas vs ice-covered lands though. I shall have to make a new version of the template. But perhaps the teal colour would be better for frozen seas, and white for ice-covered lands? Anyway, here are my comments on what you have so far; 1) Fortress worlds would be a specific subcategory of Civilised worlds. 2) Massil is an ancient Imperial world which has always been rich on resources. This makes it quite plausible that there has been atmospheric terraforming, making the atmosphere thinner than it previously was, in my opinion. In the future though, members should check with the subsector leader and/or Kage before modifying physical data. 3) The planet description is meant to be mostly a physical description, and a place to briefly describe the concept of the planet. It's not really a place to write about history. There's a seperate History section for that 4) "Virgin lands"... I thought this was an ancient world, with most of the lands either populated and well-defended, or covered with agri-culture... 5) I assume the title of Imperial Commander is only inherited by males? Why such sex discrimination? 6) Arbites are never supposed to act as a standing policing force. As Codex Imperialis says, they're only concerned with Imperial law, and care not for the petty crimes of the individual citizens, which means they would not function as a standard police force, since they would ignore simple theft and violence, for example. The thing that do concern the Arbites are hostility against the Imperial rule on Imperial worlds (especially against the property and personell of the Adeptus Terra), and heresy. Well, nice work. Looking forward to reading the rest of it
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Massil
Apr 11, 2004 4:04:59 GMT -5
Post by Tynesh on Apr 11, 2004 4:04:59 GMT -5
I had the though that the world had indeed been subject to terraforming during the Golden Age maybe, but traces of the first human settlements were long lost. Maybe it was terraformed but never actually settled.
As for the virgin areas of planet, Mostly the coasts are settled and farmed, the planet does have a small population, that is still recovering from the Invasion. I see the vast pine forests as being undisturbed apart from sustainable logging etc.
Cheers on the headup for the Arbites I wasn't too sure on them!
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Massil
Apr 11, 2004 4:44:34 GMT -5
Post by CELS on Apr 11, 2004 4:44:34 GMT -5
I had the though that the world had indeed been subject to terraforming during the Golden Age maybe, but traces of the first human settlements were long lost. Maybe it was terraformed but never actually settled. No need to explain it with Golden/Dark Age. If you do explain it by that though, you'll need to explain why it wasn't settled. Sure, humans were powerful at that age, but they didn't go around terraforming planets just for the hell of it As for the virgin areas of planet, Mostly the coasts are settled and farmed, the planet does have a small population, that is still recovering from the Invasion. I see the vast pine forests as being undisturbed apart from sustainable logging etc. Well, fair enough, but "vast areas of virgin lands" makes it sound like the world is largely untouched. Besides, I thought one of the reasons this world was an Imperial rally-point was that it had so large agri-cultural areas that it could not only feed its own people, but also millions if not billions of Imperial Guardsmen. Personally, I would put more emphasis on the agri-culture of the planet, as well as the old (and to some degree, ruined) cities of Massil.
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Massil
Apr 12, 2004 13:21:51 GMT -5
Post by Kage2020 on Apr 12, 2004 13:21:51 GMT -5
Changing the star-type is fine though you might want to open it up earlier for discussion. As I've stated before, though, it is a last choice which I'm fine with since I was unable to locate the sectors in the fashion that I originally wanted to. The 'standard Imperial' tech level is not strictly 7, but there we go. I'm very uncomfortable with this. The physical categories were there to guide interpretation rather than be changed because they didn't make sense. In doing so you've essentially taken the route - which is reasonable in some regard - that you might as well disregard the generated UWP stats and create the world that you want. Thank you. Except on worlds which show 'full' integration into the Imperium, where such a thing is possible and plausible. Kage
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Massil
Apr 13, 2004 0:52:55 GMT -5
Post by CELS on Apr 13, 2004 0:52:55 GMT -5
Well, as long as he's changed it, and presumably already made the temperature sheet and map to match, I'll just repeat my point in the terraforming thread in the world-building forum. Some worlds are more likely to have a complete atmospheric terraforming (making it 100% breathable) than others. Massil seems like one of the worlds that is likely to have such complete terraforming, since it has lots of agri-cultural exports and since it's long been a staging point for Imperial counter-invasions and invasions. If you're putting millions and millions of soldiers on a world, you don't want to worry about supplying fresh oxygen tanks every few hours
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Massil
Apr 13, 2004 7:27:49 GMT -5
Post by Tynesh on Apr 13, 2004 7:27:49 GMT -5
Not too much of a problem if you want me to change stats etc, as I did the entire world generation on Microsoft Excel, so I can easily edit any figures. Massil is located further from Terra, but my making the atmosphere even denser it makes the conditions more comparable to Terra.
EDIT: just a little though...
...many of us have had some really great ideas for planets, myself included. In my case I had a really interesting idea a planet with great open steppes and to have one of the themes of the planet as being stubborn defenders against the ork invaders, resorting to trench warfare and heavy fortifications to protect themselves. The UWP I chose seemed sensible enough, a fair population etc, and near standard conditions. However when the world-building got under way the planetary conditions became really different and the idea not as workable, hence changing a few of the stats.
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Massil
Apr 13, 2004 9:28:02 GMT -5
Post by Sikkukkut on Apr 13, 2004 9:28:02 GMT -5
Tynesh, a little twist that you might be interested in adding in to the planet's history. In the draft Frost Bringers IA I've been working on the early history of the Chapter, including the fact that their initial choice for a homeworld was Massil. They flew there to conduct their founding ceremonies and ordered the building of a huge fortress-monastery in one of the more deolate areas (up to you where that is). This did not end happily. Firstly, the FBs did take in two large waves of recruits from Massil, but rather than arranging this amicably with the Massilians they simply conducted several very heavy-handed sweeps through the larger cities, backed up by the Arbites and their own serfs, and carried off large numbers of boys for the savage induction trials. (It's up to you whether you want the Massilians to still be scarred by this, or have romanticised it and made it the subject of pride, or something else.) Secondly, there were certain tensions present in the Chapter at its founding that emerged in the so-called "Massilian Schism" within two decades. There was never any open infighting, but the Chapter sought to remake itself with a long campaign into the Cruciatine Sector and when it returned the new Chapter Master was following guidance he had seen in a vision and ordered the Massil fortress abandoned. The Chapter upped stakes and moved to Adliden and have never looked back. So somewhere on Massil you have a vast fortress, built for a Space Marine Chapter to control and defend, that was abandined for the taking. What Massil has done with this is up to you, but be aware that if the Lord Militant Protector feels it's being under-utilised he'll have no compunction about requisitioning it for the use of the subsector military command
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Massil
Apr 13, 2004 11:14:38 GMT -5
Post by Kage2020 on Apr 13, 2004 11:14:38 GMT -5
...many of us have had some really great ideas for planets, myself included. In my case I had a really interesting idea a planet with great open steppes and to have one of the themes of the planet as being stubborn defenders against the ork invaders, resorting to trench warfare and heavy fortifications to protect themselves. The UWP I chose seemed sensible enough, a fair population etc, and near standard conditions. However when the world-building got under way the planetary conditions became really different and the idea not as workable, hence changing a few of the stats. The whole point of the statistics is that they are meant to work hand in hand with the concept, rather the concept imposing the form of a world. With the caveat that the 'social data' was always seen as changeable, the physical statistics were seen as immuteable. If you wanted a world of a certain size, find a world of that size in the subsector. If you wanted a specific atmosphere then find that atmosphere... If you found a world and then realised that you wanted a denser atmosphere because it makes things 'easier' then, well, that's a bit on the tough side. I'm not saying changing things, but if everyone goes around changing the UWP statistics of the worlds within the subsector then it defeats the point of there being statistics there in the first place! The ASP would then have been of the form (making it that much easier): - Subsector leader determines how many worlds they want and the composition (agriworld, civilised, fortress, whatever).
- Individuals generate the worlds and the UWP statistics. Unsurprisingly the majority of the planets show the same kind of conditions as Terra: this is the GW standard.
Erm, and that's basically it. There would be little discussion since the forms of the subsectors at present both limit and suggest interaction in terms of economy, etc. When the ASP was first envisaged it was also a means of stimulating discussion on what was, then, a flagging Portent. (Now it's mostly flagging.) Leave things how they are, however. I'll look over the world and get back to you when I can. But if you create another world then try not to change the physical statistics. It will make me much happier! Oh yes, and again one thing is missing in every single 'standard representation' that I've seen. Where is the rest of the system? Kage
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