Ringworld found by Adaptus Mechanicus

[Aaron]

That, or he's hopelessly ignorant of 40K's back story. Seems to be common theme with people who are fans of other franchises that they don't get why the Imperium and the Xenos can't get along.

[andrewgpaul]

It'll be interesting to see if this concept is picked up on in the background, now that Tyranids don't use warp immersion for their FTL travel.

Off-topic:

Huh? Is this in the new 5th ed Codex? I was under the impression that the hive fleets did travel via the Warp, and apparently, are following the Astronomican to Earth.

[Raxmei]

Huh? Is this in the new 5th ed Codex? I was under the impression that the hive fleets did travel via the Warp, and apparently, are following the Astronomican to Earth.

It is in the new codex. There's a specialist bioship called a Narvhal that uses gravity in some way to create compressed space corridors. This method is slower than warp travel and frequently forces the hive fleet to drop to sublight months or even years out from the target system.

The same book also confirms that the Tyranids can detect the Astronomican and are moving towards it. Clearly the Tyranids have some sort of connection to the Warp even if that isn't how they travel.

[NecronLord]

It'll be interesting to see if this concept is picked up on in the background, now that Tyranids don't use warp immersion for their FTL travel.

Are we sure this thing doesn't use the warp? So much as drawing on it differently? The webway, after all, is also not warp immersion, but it's definately based on warp engineering.

[Gil Hamilton]

I think the fact that it represents a shit ton of engineering and technology that they don't have in addition to the fact that they can't really destroy it would lead me to think that the AM would rather study it. I also think NecronLord is right. While the Ringworld is enormous, if they notice the fact their are maps of various local planets, including Earth and Mars, and that its populated with things that are close enough to human if somewhat jacked up, they will probably come to the conclusion that it is a human construction.

I wonder if eventually if they determine the location of the control room (this was not trivial when Louis Wu did it and he had more direct help), they are going to encounter a certain problem. That is, them stumbling on the "Tree-of-Life" and turning themselves into Pak Protectors. I'm not sure how the Imperium would respond to that happening, given that's a pretty sick mutation. Of course, a mutation that turns someone into a hyper-intelligent super strong murder machine with a daddy/mommy complex isn't something too weird for WH40k.

[Simon_Jester]

Huh? Is this in the new 5th ed Codex? I was under the impression that the hive fleets did travel via the Warp, and apparently, are following the Astronomican to Earth.

It is in the new codex. There's a specialist bioship called a Narvhal that uses gravity in some way to create compressed space corridors. This method is slower than warp travel and frequently forces the hive fleet to drop to sublight months or even years out from the target system.

The same book also confirms that the Tyranids can detect the Astronomican and are moving towards it. Clearly the Tyranids have some sort of connection to the Warp even if that isn't how they travel.

Well, they definitely affect the Warp (the Shadow in the Warp is one of the mian reasons they're such a serious threat); it's no surprise that the Warp can affect them.

I wonder if eventually if they determine the location of the control room (this was not trivial when Louis Wu did it and he had more direct help), they are going to encounter a certain problem. That is, them stumbling on the "Tree-of-Life" and turning themselves into Pak Protectors. I'm not sure how the Imperium would respond to that happening, given that's a pretty sick mutation. Of course, a mutation that turns someone into a hyper-intelligent super strong murder machine with a daddy/mommy complex isn't something too weird for WH40k.

Mechanicus might not survive the transition to a Pak Protector; they've replaced so much of their body with machinery.

Hmm... Pak Protectors vs. Space Marines. Now that would be a fight to see.

[Bakustra]

I think the fact that it represents a shit ton of engineering and technology that they don't have in addition to the fact that they can't really destroy it would lead me to think that the AM would rather study it. I also think NecronLord is right. While the Ringworld is enormous, if they notice the fact their are maps of various local planets, including Earth and Mars, and that its populated with things that are close enough to human if somewhat jacked up, they will probably come to the conclusion that it is a human construction.

I wonder if eventually if they determine the location of the control room (this was not trivial when Louis Wu did it and he had more direct help), they are going to encounter a certain problem. That is, them stumbling on the "Tree-of-Life" and turning themselves into Pak Protectors. I'm not sure how the Imperium would respond to that happening, given that's a pretty sick mutation. Of course, a mutation that turns someone into a hyper-intelligent super strong murder machine with a daddy/mommy complex isn't something too weird for WH40k.

Most, if not all, Mechanicus higher-ups are too old to undergo the tree-of-life transformation, and the heavy cyborging common amongst all the members would likely severely mess with the transformation as well. They're likely, then, to classify tree-of-life as a defensive measure against primitives entering the control room, assuming that one of them eats it. This is pretty unlikely since many higher-ups prefer weekly nutrient intakes to eating regularly, and so are likely to realize something's up when they start getting cravings around the plant. Of course, if they discover its mutagenic effects, well, I don't know what they'll do with it. It's pretty distant from their own ideal of improving the self through machinery.

The real interesting part is when they find the various aliens, especially the Martians. They may well wonder why the control center is on the map of Mars, too. I suspect that the heavily mutated hominids will be chalked up to a nearby Warp storm in the distant past or other Warp phenomena, since that allows for rapid speciation while keeping its age to within known Human history. Some of the species might be useful to the Imperium, as well, particularly once it becomes obvious that they are genetically stable.

[Gil Hamilton]

If they are too old or can't complete the transformation, then they'll die. Niven was explicit that Tree-of-Life is lethal to people past breeding age. Of course, it still strongly affected Louis Wu, who was a couple centuries old at the time, but that's because Known Space geriatric medicine is so good that for all intents and purposes, he was middle aged. The AM folks not only should start craving it, but will have a similar effect to being withdrawn from heroin. Louis Wu got away with not immediately gorging himself on Tree-of-Life because he himself was a recoving addict and knew how to stop the cravings long enough to defeat Teela and get out of there.

However, are their grunts cyborgs too? Cause the first ones in the room with Tree-of-Life will start gorging themselves unless they are wearing protection against chemicals and they may end up with some Human Protector.

Hmm... Pak Protectors vs. Space Marines. Now that would be a fight to see.

Not Pak Protectors, human Protectors. The impression that Protector and the later Ringworld books gave me is that Human Protectors are somewhat more wily than Pak Protectors, plus they more readily can accept all of humanity as their family, in addition to their ridiculous physical and mental prowess. They don't state it in the book, but the Human Protectors that are made when Brennon infects Home with Tree-of-Life via Truesdale are clearly successful in defeating the Pak Protectors that were about to invade human space.

It would be interesting through if they brought Tree-of-Life back to the Imperium. They can likely cultivate the stuff and if they can successfully convince the resulting Protectors that loyal service to the Emperor is the best way to protect humanity as a whole, then they can cultivate an army of Imperial Protectors who've got all the nasty that comes with both Protectors and WH40k weaponry. The downside is that Protectors just don't work well in groups, so they'd have to be made commanders and supersoldiers unless the Imperium can find a way to make them work together for longer than a single crisis.

Protectors, after all, ARE extremely xenophobic to aliens. Brennon murdered every Martian on Mars in revenge because they killed a single human expedition. That is 40k cred right there.

[Bakustra]

If they are too old or can't complete the transformation, then they'll die. Niven was explicit that Tree-of-Life is lethal to people past breeding age. Of course, it still strongly affected Louis Wu, who was a couple centuries old at the time, but that's because Known Space geriatric medicine is so good that for all intents and purposes, he was middle aged. The AM folks not only should start craving it, but will have a similar effect to being withdrawn from heroin. Louis Wu got away with not immediately gorging himself on Tree-of-Life because he himself was a recoving addict and knew how to stop the cravings long enough to defeat Teela and get out of there.

However, are their grunts cyborgs too? Cause the first ones in the room with Tree-of-Life will start gorging themselves unless they are wearing protection against chemicals and they may end up with some Human Protector.

Their grunts are almost entirely cyborged, while lower-ranking members (the lowest ranks) at the very least will have an implanted robo-tentacle hooked up to their nervous system. Anyone likely to be exploring the Ringworld would be even more heavily cyborged. A number of higher-ranking members have their brains enhanced cybernetically, and almost all of them have had their lives extended via rejuvenation treatments. Further, even mid-ranking members often opt to have nutrients injected directly into their stomach/bloodstream weekly rather than eat, and don't seem to suffer from hunger pangs. That's why I think at least some of them would be resistant to tree-of-life, particularly if they have built-in gas masks as part of their facial cybernetics (or had them replaced with electronic olfactory sensors.

Given the high level of cyborging, I think that most AM personnel who eat tree-of-life will die, either as the virus is unable to cope with the cyborging, or as the person is too old. Initially, they'll presume it to be a mutagenic poison, designed as a defense against any of the primitives or aliens on the surface sneaking in, or at least I guess. If one of them does become a protector, they tend to be celibate from what I recall, so he/she may starve to death from lack of motivation, though I think they could easily adopt the AM or Imperium as a whole.

Hmm... Pak Protectors vs. Space Marines. Now that would be a fight to see.

Not Pak Protectors, human Protectors. The impression that Protector and the later Ringworld books gave me is that Human Protectors are somewhat more wily than Pak Protectors, plus they more readily can accept all of humanity as their family, in addition to their ridiculous physical and mental prowess. They don't state it in the book, but the Human Protectors that are made when Brennon infects Home with Tree-of-Life via Truesdale are clearly successful in defeating the Pak Protectors that were about to invade human space.

It would be interesting through if they brought Tree-of-Life back to the Imperium. They can likely cultivate the stuff and if they can successfully convince the resulting Protectors that loyal service to the Emperor is the best way to protect humanity as a whole, then they can cultivate an army of Imperial Protectors who've got all the nasty that comes with both Protectors and WH40k weaponry. The downside is that Protectors just don't work well in groups, so they'd have to be made commanders and supersoldiers unless the Imperium can find a way to make them work together for longer than a single crisis.

Protectors, after all, ARE extremely xenophobic to aliens. Brennon murdered every Martian on Mars in revenge because they killed a single human expedition. That is 40k cred right there.

On the other hand, if they do discover the benefits of tree-of-life, I predict that they'll begin trying to alter the virus to suit their needs. They might start using protectors in limited numbers as strategists or supersoldiers, but the sterility and other side-effects are likely to prevent any large-scale use, along with the fact that the AM and Space Marines begin cyborging/alteration years before tree-of-life can kick in.

Human protectors are definitely more intelligent, thanks to the advantage of being smarter than Pak breeders to begin with. On the other hand, the most recent book apparently retcons Protector by saying that Truesdale and the Home protectors didn't actually wipe out all the Pak fleets. They left one behind for Sigismund Ausfaller, hero of Known Space, to destroy, after he escaped the Puppeteer home planet and messed around with Beowulf Shaeffer for a while.

Also, did you manage to find enjoyment out of Ringworld's Children or The Ringworld Throne? If so, I must ask, how?

[[R_H]]

What are the "Protectors"?

[Bakustra]

What are the "Protectors"?

They look like this.

They are hominids (primarily humans and a precursor species called the Pak) that have eaten a sweet potato-like plant called "tree-of-life" that houses a retrovirus. The retrovirus replaces gonadal tissue with a backup heart, thickens and strengthens the skin and bones, causes elongation in the limbs, swells the joints while burning off fat in the limbs and body, fuses gums and lips into a beak after the teeth fall out, and increases the size of the frontal lobes drastically. The end result is a superintelligent, incredibly strong, fast, and tough, highly xenophobic creature called a protector.

Protectors tend to be incredibly family- and gene-oriented, taking actions to protect or strengthen their family at the expense of others, and falling into depression and starving themselves if their family dies off, within the Pak. Human protectors tend to be better at displacing familial concerns onto ideological concepts and larger social groups, but both are incredibly xenophobic (one of the initial actions of the first human protector was to wipe out an entire alien species on Mars for murdering a human expedition and a crashlanded smuggler).

They feature in Larry Niven's novel Protector, which is part of his Known Space universe. Ringworld is a part of this universe, and Spoiler

the Pak built the Ringworld originally.

[Junghalli]

Hmm... Pak Protectors vs. Space Marines. Now that would be a fight to see.

A human Protector in WH40K would make an interesting discussion in itself.

[Gil Hamilton]

Human protectors are definitely more intelligent, thanks to the advantage of being smarter than Pak breeders to begin with. On the other hand, the most recent book apparently retcons Protector by saying that Truesdale and the Home protectors didn't actually wipe out all the Pak fleets. They left one behind for Sigismund Ausfaller, hero of Known Space, to destroy, after he escaped the Puppeteer home planet and messed around with Beowulf Shaeffer for a while.

Really? Huh. I haven't read alot of recent Known Space; for example, I didn't read Ringworld's Children and was dismayed to find out that the reason ships can't use hyperdrives in gravity wells is that things eat them. Mor erecent Known Space has been unfortunate. I miss Lucas Garner.

They feature in Larry Niven's novel Protector, which is part of his Known Space universe. Ringworld is a part of this universe, and Spoiler

the Pak built the Ringworld originally.

Spoiler

It was my impression that the Pak didn't build the Ringworld, but colonized it after its Builders abandoned it. Ringworld Throne stated as much. After all, there is absolutely no way that the Pak would bring aliens like proto-Kzin to their colony. That would be threatening to their families. The only interaction the Pak would have given the Kzinti would be death of their species.

[Samuel]

Spoiler

It was my impression that the Pak didn't build the Ringworld, but colonized it after its Builders abandoned it. Ringworld Throne stated as much.

Why would anyone abandon Ringworld? How could you abandon it- just producing enough ships to move everyone off would be a massive project.

[Bakustra]

Human protectors are definitely more intelligent, thanks to the advantage of being smarter than Pak breeders to begin with. On the other hand, the most recent book apparently retcons Protector by saying that Truesdale and the Home protectors didn't actually wipe out all the Pak fleets. They left one behind for Sigismund Ausfaller, hero of Known Space, to destroy, after he escaped the Puppeteer home planet and messed around with Beowulf Shaeffer for a while.

Really? Huh. I haven't read alot of recent Known Space; for example, I didn't read Ringworld's Children and was dismayed to find out that the reason ships can't use hyperdrives in gravity wells is that things eat them. Mor erecent Known Space has been unfortunate. I miss Lucas Garner.

Yeah, recent Known Space sucks out loud. For that matter, Niven seems to have jumped the shark with the coming of the 1990s, if not earlier. A shame.

They feature in Larry Niven's novel Protector, which is part of his Known Space universe. Ringworld is a part of this universe, and Spoiler

the Pak built the Ringworld originally.

Spoiler

It was my impression that the Pak didn't build the Ringworld, but colonized it after its Builders abandoned it. Ringworld Throne stated as much. After all, there is absolutely no way that the Pak would bring aliens like proto-Kzin to their colony. That would be threatening to their families. The only interaction the Pak would have given the Kzinti would be death of their species.

That makes a little more sense. I had forgotten that part of Ringworld Throne, mainly because I found it dull and overlong. However, two things: Spoiler

1. Ringworld's Children contradicts that, because they find a Pak Protector alive in the other Great Ocean, who is one of the original builders. 2. Why did the Pak let the proto-Kzin live? Or the other intelligent species, especially the Grogs?

When you get down to it, none of the explanations for the Ringworld make that much sense, though. I have a theory, but it doesn't make sense either.

[Samuel]

No theory for Ringworld makes much sense. If you can build a Ringworld, you can build an equal number of orbitals and unlike a Ringworld, orbitals are alot safer, easier to construct and do not suffer from ecological collapse or bacteriological warfare as easily.

A ringworld is a more reasonable Dyson sphere, but that is still is incredibly efficient. The only reason something like it could be built it to simply prove that you can.

When you get down to it, none of the explanations for the Ringworld make that much sense, though. I have a theory, but it doesn't make sense either.

Share. It can't be a worse mess than canon.

[Ford Prefect]

A ringworld is a more reasonable Dyson sphere, but that is still is incredibly efficient.

It's more reasonable than a Dyson sphere as a habitat (though Louis actually muses on that idea in Ringworld). A Ringworld would be terrible for the actual job of a Dyson wphere, which is to capture energy from a star.

[Bakustra]

No theory for Ringworld makes much sense. If you can build a Ringworld, you can build an equal number of orbitals and unlike a Ringworld, orbitals are alot safer, easier to construct and do not suffer from ecological collapse or bacteriological warfare as easily.

A ringworld is a more reasonable Dyson sphere, but that is still is incredibly efficient. The only reason something like it could be built it to simply prove that you can.

When you get down to it, none of the explanations for the Ringworld make that much sense, though. I have a theory, but it doesn't make sense either.

Share. It can't be a worse mess than canon.

Spoiler

My theory is somewhat similar to Gil's, but my belief is that the Pak were themselves imported, rather than settling on their own. The Ringworld itself was built by an unknown precursor species, that nevertheless was terrestrial and active about a million years ago. This group (it may even be a singular entity building via von Neumann machines) built the Ringworld as a scientific research lab. The maps contain various alien intelligences, with appropriate atmospheres available for each. The control center has tree-of-life, sure, but that may have been planted later and cultivated (this was implied in Ringworld Engineers). This group placed these intelligences on the various maps, and throughout the Ringworld proper (thus explaining the existence of Bandersnatchi on the "mainland"), as a test to see how they would react to this environment, and who would become dominant amongst them. The two groups that did so are the Pak and the Kzinti, whereupon this intelligence deemed them the largest threat to their species and began planning means to neutralize these threats, peacefully if possible. (The reason why there aren't any Kzin left on the "mainland", nor Kdatlyno, Pierin, Grogs, or other species is that the Pak- and Pak-derivatives wiped them out. At one point, tree-of-life was common on the Ringworld. The precursors annihilated it via biological warfare, or tried to, to prevent the Pak from developing space travel.)

This means, since we do not wish to introduce unnecessary precursors, that the Puppeteers built the Ringworld, as an experiment to see which species were the greatest threat. In the case of humanity, their "domestication" on the Map of Earth led to the puppeteers realizing human genetic malleability. Once one species developed space travel, the Puppeteers panicked, and triggered a technological collapse on the Ringworld (getting back into canon territory here). The reason that the Hindmost is so convinced of finding the magic transmutation engine is that a) he may be a little delusional and b) he's credulous because he doesn't know that the City Builders dismounted the attitude engines. He's willing to believe anything of a species that can make starships with what they had on the Ringworld. He does seem oddly familiar with that planet with communal intelligences...

This theory is a little crazy, and happily ignores Ringworld's Children and the Ringworld Throne (or, parts of it). It also addresses, partially, the reason for a Ringworld. It was never intended as a home for a technological species, and needed the room to hopefully keep population pressures down to an absolute minimum.

[Gil Hamilton]

That makes a little more sense. I had forgotten that part of Ringworld Throne, mainly because I found it dull and overlong. However, two things: Spoiler

1. Ringworld's Children contradicts that, because they find a Pak Protector alive in the other Great Ocean, who is one of the original builders. 2. Why did the Pak let the proto-Kzin live? Or the other intelligent species, especially the Grogs?

When you get down to it, none of the explanations for the Ringworld make that much sense, though. I have a theory, but it doesn't make sense either.

I haven't read Ringworld's Children. Niven must have decided that the Pak must have constructed the Ringworld, even though Throne givens the distinct impression that they merely colonized it. Given previous knowledge of Pak, I have two problems with this.

1) The Ringworld is a SERIOUS engineering problem that would have involved alot of Pak. The problem is that Pak Protectors DON'T do well in groups and thus have trouble working well together on big projects. This is why the Pak Library on their homeworld in the Core was such a big deal, because it represented organization that the Pak has alot of trouble achieving. Getting enough Pak to work well together for long enough to build the Ringworld stretches credibility.

2) Pak Protectors don't work well with each other and the certainly don't deal with aliens. Them deliberately settling aliens on Pak territory is completely out of character, because that would cause some risk to them and theirs. I can't see the Pak scouting out the Kzinti homeworld and seeding a scale map of it with Kzinti would be a good idea. The Kzinti should count themselves as lucky none of the Protectors got the notion to pre-emptively exterminate them on the off-chance they grow up and get spaceships.

Further, the Pak never had hyperdrive and likely neither did the Ringworld Engineers. The Ringworld Engineers must have gone out of their way to cart out Kzin, Kdatlyno, et cetera to the Ringworld to perserve them from the Core explosion. I don't see Pak Protectors making this sort of effort.

[Bakustra]

That makes a little more sense. I had forgotten that part of Ringworld Throne, mainly because I found it dull and overlong. However, two things: Spoiler

1. Ringworld's Children contradicts that, because they find a Pak Protector alive in the other Great Ocean, who is one of the original builders. 2. Why did the Pak let the proto-Kzin live? Or the other intelligent species, especially the Grogs?

When you get down to it, none of the explanations for the Ringworld make that much sense, though. I have a theory, but it doesn't make sense either.

I haven't read Ringworld's Children. Niven must have decided that the Pak must have constructed the Ringworld, even though Throne givens the distinct impression that they merely colonized it. Given previous knowledge of Pak, I have two problems with this.

1) The Ringworld is a SERIOUS engineering problem that would have involved alot of Pak. The problem is that Pak Protectors DON'T do well in groups and thus have trouble working well together on big projects. This is why the Pak Library on their homeworld in the Core was such a big deal, because it represented organization that the Pak has alot of trouble achieving. Getting enough Pak to work well together for long enough to build the Ringworld stretches credibility.

2) Pak Protectors don't work well with each other and the certainly don't deal with aliens. Them deliberately settling aliens on Pak territory is completely out of character, because that would cause some risk to them and theirs. I can't see the Pak scouting out the Kzinti homeworld and seeding a scale map of it with Kzinti would be a good idea. The Kzinti should count themselves as lucky none of the Protectors got the notion to pre-emptively exterminate them on the off-chance they grow up and get spaceships.

Further, the Pak never had hyperdrive and likely neither did the Ringworld Engineers. The Ringworld Engineers must have gone out of their way to cart out Kzin, Kdatlyno, et cetera to the Ringworld to perserve them from the Core explosion. I don't see Pak Protectors making this sort of effort.

I agree totally. For that matter, why would the Pak settle on the map of Earth? Why would they know what Earth looked like? What did the Engineers settle on the Map of Earth? (Louis wonders about whether it's homo habilus or Pak breeders, but it's never resolved. Even if the Pak settled the Ringworld, why did they let the Grogs live, let alone the Kzinti or Trinocs or Kdatlyno? Did they crashland on the Ringworld? Where did the tree-of-life in the Control Center come from? There are an incredible number of questions one way or another, no matter whether you go with the official idea or alternate Engineers. I disagree about the motives of the Engineers, but that's just my crackpot theory about their true nature. On the other hand, must we introduce another precursor race to Known Space? Alternately, we could say that the Outsiders built the Ringworld, since they don't use hyperdrive. But why would they do that? They were in the area, assuming that starseeds orbit at the same velocity relative to nearby stars, so we at least can confirm their presence.

In short, people talk about how stories migrated into Known Space, creating an inconsistent universe, but the inconsistencies don't seem to have stopped at any point.

[Jackmojo]

I always assumed the most likely creators of the Ringworld were the Tnuctipun, since they seem to be the most advanced race we've seen and were certainly around long enough ago to be responsible. Not sure if they would still be around to import species but they seem the type (since they seemed to view all other species as playthings to a certain degree) and if it was survivors of the Slaver Rebellion they would have had a large reason to keep an eye on things.

Jack

[Swindle1984]

My theory has always been that, since the Ringworld has plenty of living room and is protected from the core explosion, some advanced race created it as a means of preserving the various races of Known Space and beyond. The Pak Protectors simply advanced enough to take it over, or at least large parts of it. Then, for reasons unknown, they more or less died out and the breeders evolved into the various hominids on the Ringworld surface. It's happened before.

As for not exterminating the other species on the Ringworld, none of them ever made it to the mainland, so why bother? They could study them from a distance and determine what sort of threat their cousins back on the homeworlds could pose in the future.