Dreanaught (40K) question

[Sarevok]

Would it be possible to entomb a normal human soldier in a dreadnaught ? Or is the process only intended for individuals with spacemarine augmentations ?

[Imperial Overlord]

Would it be possible to entomb a normal human soldier in a dreadnaught ? Or is the process only intended for individuals with spacemarine augmentations ?

Yes you can encase a normal human in a Dreadnought, but for obvious reasons awesome Space Marine veterans make better Dreadnought pilots than mere mortals even if you get away from the little issue that Space Marines are the only guys with Dreadnought suits and they aren't giving them up. A renegade master of the Callidus Temple did steal a suit and had himself entombed inside it.

[Sarevok]

Well will humans get the same longevity boost ? So say if you want to keep someone alive for a few millennium you turn them into a dreadnaught ?

[Imperial Overlord]

Well will humans get the same longevity boost ? So say if you want to keep someone alive for a few millennium you turn them into a dreadnaught ?

That's why the renegade Assassin jacked the Dreadnought. However he already had access to advanced anti-aging treatment and Space Marines don't age normally so exactly how much it would boost a human (and an Assassin isn't exactly a baseline human) isn't known.

[NecronLord]

I believe there's also a rogue trader said to have had one in some novel, though I've not read the relevant books.

[andrewgpaul]

From the same era as the Callidus Assassin-Dreadnought that Imperial Overlord mentions, Dreadnoughts came with a variety of control methods - from simple physical controls through Mind Impulse Units similar to those used in Titans all the way up to the full neural link that's the current norm. The Chapter Approved: Dreadnoughts article in WD 100 mentioned that they were used by Space Marines and Imperial Army units (of the four sample colour schemes, two are from Rogue Traders' private armies, one is an Imperial Army machine and one is a Space Marine Dreadnought). By the time the Imperial Guard army list turned up nine months later, they'd become unique to Space Marine armies.

With the current trend for portraying early Rogue Trader background as being "Heresy-era", I would suggest that you can stuff pretty much anyone into a Dreadnought suit, and that this was indeed done during the Great Crusade.

[Hawkwings]

The sarcophagus that the body is actually entombed in is separate from the dreadnaught chassis itself. This means that you can stick someone in there to prolong their life, but they aren't necessarily a walking death machine.

Incidentally, it's used as a form of turture in one short story I read. Someone stuck a renegade Astral Claw in there to get rid of a problem, and the story ends as he realizes he's going to be alive and stuck forever.

[Shroom Man 777]

The big thing is that those Dreadnought armors are pretty much sacred artifacts according to Space Marine traditions, right? Don't they go on holy kill-missions just to recover Dread armors in forsaken planets?

[Elheru Aran]

They do indeed. In-universe, probably early Dreadnoughts did have options for using human pilots without the whole sticking-them-in-a-sarcophagus thing. Now, given their scarcity, the Marines aren't handing over any of the ones they have anytime soon, so it doesn't really make sense. Now, if we're talking something along the lines of a Knight, then that's a little different...

[Imperial Overlord]

The big thing is that those Dreadnought armors are pretty much sacred artifacts according to Space Marine traditions, right? Don't they go on holy kill-missions just to recover Dread armors in forsaken planets?

Thus the "renegade" in the renegade Master of Assassins. He's in deep, deep shit if Imperial authorities catch up with him and the chapter he swiped it from (which included dumping out the pilot like garbage to die) will most definitely want his ass. That's a lot trouble, even for a dude who is Omega Dan.

[evilsoup]

Aren't the assassins actually more modified than space marines? So, that shouldn't be taken as evidence that normal humans can pilot Dreadnoughts.

[Black Admiral]

I believe there's also a rogue trader said to have had one in some novel, though I've not read the relevant books.

Lucian Gerrit (from Andy Hoare's Damocles Gulf trilogy - Rogue Star, Star of Damocles (both of dubious quality) & Savage Scars (hell of a lot better)) has been told one of his ancestors was placed within a Dreadnought, yes. Of course, Lucian is both full of himself and has a massively overinflated sense of his dynasty's importance, so I'm not convinced he can be considered reliable.

The big thing is that those Dreadnought armors are pretty much sacred artifacts according to Space Marine traditions, right? Don't they go on holy kill-missions just to recover Dread armors in forsaken planets?

Yeah, they're big on retrieving kit like Dreadnoughts and Terminator armour whenever possible. And if anyone were to, hypothetically, pinch a Dreadnought (which would necessitate killing the current occupant) and the Chapter who the Dread was part of found out, they'd descend on the thief like the wrath of the Emperor personified the instant they figured out where thon thief was hiding.

[Simon_Jester]

That said, the technology to build them isn't completely lost- it's just immensely difficult to do. Stealing a dreadnought from an existing Marine chapter would be very difficult; getting the Adeptus Mechanicus to build a new one might actually be more practical. Still very difficult, but not nearly so much risk of having hundreds of superhuman killing machines make it their personal ambition to hunt you down and rip you from the looted cybernetic chassis you stole from them.

[Elheru Aran]

I believe that's what Lucian Gerritt's ancestor did; went to Mars and had the AdMech build him a Dreadnought body. Leaves open the question of just what they did with the chassis after the ancestor passed on... or is the ancestor *still* roaming the stars, hmm?

[Sarevok]

Being stuck in a Dreadnaught for all eternity does not seem like very comfortable even if Space Marines don't kill you. If a healthy individual placed themselves inside a Dreanaught, can they ever get out and return to normal human form ?

[Black Admiral]

I believe that's what Lucian Gerritt's ancestor did; went to Mars and had the AdMech build him a Dreadnought body. Leaves open the question of just what they did with the chassis after the ancestor passed on... or is the ancestor *still* roaming the stars, hmm?

The Arcadius clan might have lost the thing during one of their periods of decline; as far as I'm aware Lucian himself has no clue what became of it.

Being stuck in a Dreadnaught for all eternity does not seem like very comfortable even if Space Marines don't kill you. If a healthy individual placed themselves inside a Dreanaught, can they ever get out and return to normal human form ?

Presumably, yes. If the interface is anything similar to the amniotic tank used in modern (relatively speaking) Battle Titans, and it does seem to be, then it's quite possible to unplug someone, if you're careful about it (rapid unplugging tends to be .. traumatic for a Titan Princeps, to say the least, and I can't imagine it being too pleasant for a Dreadnought occupant).

Also "not very comfortable" is rather a pale shadow of what being stuck in a Dreadnought sarcophagus is like. Bjorn the Fell-Handed, for one, utterly hates being stuck in one, even though he knows why Russ had him so interred (specifically, to make sure the Wolves were never without a defender).

[Ugolino]

Which story had the Assassin-Dread?

[Imperial Overlord]

Which story had the Assassin-Dread?

Harlequin by Ian Watson.

Assassins are augmented humans, but they aren't augmented in the same way Space Marines are. As Space Marines have specific augmentations increasing their ability to interface with armour and Assassins don't, it's likely that if an Assassin could use the Dreadnought so could an ordinary human. Of course, some augmentation work might have to be done but that's pretty damn easy compared to getting your hands on a Dreadnought.

[Whiskey144]

Assassins are augmented humans, but they aren't augmented in the same way Space Marines are. As Space Marines have specific augmentations increasing their ability to interface with armour and Assassins don't, it's likely that if an Assassin could use the Dreadnought so could an ordinary human. Of course, some augmentation work might have to be done but that's pretty damn easy compared to getting your hands on a Dreadnought.

I'll note that most of what makes Assassins "assassins", is the training, rather than the augmentations. At least half of what makes an Astartes an Astartes is likely the augmentations and implants. In Temple Assassins, it tends to be more "training" than "augmentation".

OTOH, they certainly don't skimp, if the Eversor, and the statline in the new GK 'dex is at least moderately representative.

[fgalkin]

Uh....wha? You can train yourself into mimicing a genestealer or an Ork?

Have a very nice day.
-fgalkin

[Whiskey144]

Uh....wha? You can train yourself into mimicing a genestealer or an Ork?

Which is why I said "tends" towards heavy training. However, I didn't say that that excluded augmentation entirely.

I'll also note that impersonating Orks or genestealers (particularly the latter) was actually more of a one-off mission that has only been performed (albeit successfully, heh) once.

However, WRT the mimicry Temple, the current iteration of the Callidus seems to be "genderless, blank tapestry-person-thing". This is mostly from info gained from Flight of the Eisenstein, wherein a Callidus assassin is presented as a genderless individual that has been heavily modified, primarily by drugs.

Ironically, just hazarding a guess, 60% of all Assassin personnel (by Temple, not by population) tend to be more training>augmentation than the reverse; the Eversor and Culexus I'd argue would be augmentation>training, though the Culexus likely receives some hefty training.

With the training-heavy temples, you've got the Vindicare, the Callidus (they predominantly use polymorphine rather than augmentations) and the Vanus. Venenum is also another temple that's training heavy (so that'd actually be closer to 67%).

[Ahriman238]

These are not mutually exclusive. Assasins are both highly trained and augmented, the key difference (besides tactics, equipment, mindset, etc.) is that Assasins tend to be highly specialized. Almost a third of a Space Marine's artificial organs are designed to increase survivability in a wide variety of enviroments. Space Marines tend to specialize over time through training, but all of a Vindicare's training, augmentation and kit is geared to making him a better sniper, just so a Callidus with infiltration, an Eversor and frenzied close combat, a Culexu and anti-psyker ops, with Death Cult assains being sort of an odd Temple out, but even they generally do very different things than Astartes.

[Whiskey144]

These are not mutually exclusive. Assasins are both highly trained and augmented, the key difference (besides tactics, equipment, mindset, etc.) is that Assasins tend to be highly specialized. Almost a third of a Space Marine's artificial organs are designed to increase survivability in a wide variety of enviroments. Space Marines tend to specialize over time through training, but all of a Vindicare's training, augmentation and kit is geared to making him a better sniper, just so a Callidus with infiltration, an Eversor and frenzied close combat, a Culexu and anti-psyker ops, with Death Cult assains being sort of an odd Temple out, but even they generally do very different things than Astartes.

I wasn't suggesting that training and augmentation are mutually excluvise in the slightest, just that certain Temples make heavier use of training over augmentation and vice versa.

I'll further note that Death Cult Assassins are not associated with a particular Assassin Temple; they're actually a hodge-podge of various kill-xenos/-heretics offshoots of the Imperial faith. The term is pretty much a catch-all for the myriad cults that tend to glorify the idea that killing for the Emperor is the highest form of worship.

I'll also note that:

Venenum assassins receive no augmentation whatsoever (ref: Flight of the Eisenstein), while Vanus assassins are minimally augmentated with improved datahandling/parsing capabilities and intelligence gathering apparatus.

[Kojiro]

Uh....wha? You can train yourself into mimicing a genestealer or an Ork?

Have a very nice day.
-fgalkin

There was an assassin, Meh'Lindi, a Callidus who was specifically augmented to mimic a 3rd generation genestealer hybrid (I'm not sure the genestealer cults still officially exist). She had implants that would extrude and reshape to make her passable as a hybrid, though at the cost of being able to mimic anything else. She could only do the 'stealer.

Presumably similar implants could be made for an ork on a suitably sized human. Remember also this comes from an era when orks weren't the lumbering hulks they are now, but far smaller.

As for dreadnoughts, presumably you're talking about current Imperial dreadnoughts only. Originally as someone said there were many control types for dreads because originally dreads were just a step up the armour scale. They weren't life supporting war machines but merely extremely large armour, bordering on mecha. Historically anyone can go in one.

But then dreadnoughts are odd- they exist on the tech tree somewhere above power armour and cybernetics yet below knights and titans. For some reason they're exceptionally difficult to produce though.

[[R_H]]

Presumably similar implants could be made for an ork on a suitably sized human. Remember also this comes from an era when orks weren't the lumbering hulks they are now, but far smaller.

Why are they larger?