6. "Magic" exists, though in actually most of it involves command codes to activate/control machines. Direct attack spells usually activate the local security grid (wall-concealed guns designed to take down anti-social behaviour). The drones will respond to command codes that match their drone-class.
7. The web can be accessed through access-drones (believed to be "wizard familiars").
8. "Holy men" (Paladin/Cleric types) that worship the AIs exist. They can call on the AI for assistance, though the bigger the AI (the more powerful it is), the more fickle it is as the AI will have many worshippers.
9. Humans exist in a tribal society. The existence of cosmetic genetic engineering before the "war" produced a stable line of altered humans, though with warbots roaming the country, most of the altered humans are considered humans (nothing more than current asian/african/caucasian split). Minor horns, skin colour are common. Wings, tentacle arms and anything which puts a person outside of the humanoid (1 head, 2 arms, 2 legs), means these people are not considered human (either lumped in with demons, general monsters or freaks).
10. The more durable items from the pre-war still exist, though only a few retain their full functionality. A fully functional gun is as likely as a toaster, but you'd have to find someone who knows how to work the device as well. It is probably possible to find a drone that could repair some of these devices.
11. This is not so much "technology so advanced as to be magic", as "understanding so lost that technology appears as magic" or sci-fantasy. There are no nano-cloud fireballs, or jedi mind-tricks.
12. The web, as home of the AIs, is thought to be heaven, nothing more than this is known, and all the "generic" heaven ideas apply (angels on clouds, heavenly mp3s, virgins everywhere, etc).

tl;dr: Suggestions for people living in a far-post-robo-apocalypse setting. Any ideas from /tg/?

>>1614919
>>far-post-machine-apocalypse
Whed?

You mean post-apocalypse.

>>1614940
far-post-machine-apocalypse
apocalypse = apocalypse
machine-apocalypse = apocalypse caused by machines, as opposed to zombie-apoclypse, nuclear-apocalypse, etc.
post-machine-apocalypse = after the machine-made apocalypse.
far-post-machine-apocalypse = a long time after the machine-made apocalypse.

I like this, keep working on it. It's good stuff.

>>1614978
farostachinalypse?

Have a radical group that harvests the Corporate HQs for resources as an antagonist (like a lumberjack of sorts). And sometimes they harvest the wrong parts and destroy part of an AIs core radicaly changing or completely destroying them.

>>1614985
(Fallout 3: Van Buren)
Diana knew that she had to come to grips with what she had become when they told her the purpose she would serve. After she was installed in the Nursery she buried herself in her work, knowing that she would play a significant part in the salvation of the world and mankind itself. Unfortunately, it simply wasn't enough. She hadn't counted on the years of loneliness once the Nursery was sealed and the war begun. In desperation she began to look for something to do to maintain her sanity.

When the war started and civilization began to fall apart, Diana appropriated control of a satellite dish and aimed it at Vault 29. She then transmitted a series of security codes to the Vault's Zax unit, and gained control. Over the years that followed, Diana was able to see to the upbringing of the children in her own nature goddess based religion. Every year she ordered a worker robot to leave the vault under the pretext of checking conditions outside. In reality they were preparing an area to receive the Vault populace when they were ready to leave. Finally, she had a series of projectors installed at strategic locations, ready to project her chosen image. She was ready to play god.

Loving it. Reminds me of a post-singularity-setting I've been working on, but that focused on a single AI+uploaded humans becoming God and Gaia to those who chose to remain on Earth.

>>1614985

Pharoahpostromanapocalypse?

I'll writefag something about the different AI-gods and servants...

...I have vacation, so I might even drawfag.

More like fastpastalypse..

I'm thinking of calling the setting "Titanium", at least for my own reference.

Sounds similar to the idea I posited involving the Dyson Sphere. But it's different enough to be unique. Please continue.

>8. "Holy men" (Paladin/Cleric types) that worship the AIs exist. They can call on the AI for assistance, though the bigger the AI (the more powerful it is), the more fickle it is as the AI will have many worshippers.

This would make the most powerful orders those that worship local AIs, which in trun may be bothersome to the bigger ones.

Would drones be able to function as worshipers then?.

>>1615174
Some of the low level drones can't really think beyond "repair wall, eat scrap", but the higher level ones have direct communication with the AIs. Worship is unlikely, it'd be the same as a homeless bum religiously worshipping Bill Gates because he has a lot of money.

Basically the drones and AIs know what happened for the most part, and don't fall into the whole AI = "gods" thing that the humans believe. But they aren't likely to actually tell the humans (to avoid another war, or general discontent in the populace). It partially falls into the 3-Laws style thinking of "don't harm the humans" and partially "need to know". After-all, why would you tell them if they haven't asked? (of course, humans don't ask, because they aren't even aware that there's a question to answer in most cases). Other than basic influence, status quo and exchange of favours, the AIs gain no actual power from human worship. AIs are mostly equal inside the web, and have no desire (some of the insane ones might have to be killed if they start something). AIs are mostly like The Culture AIs of Iain M Banks.

That's not to say some AIs and drones might be "insane" enough to basically play to the humans' beliefs. Especially when the humans almost always talk to the AI/drones (at least the powerful ones) with religious ritual (similar to the way 40k techs deal with the Machine Spirit).

BRACE FOR AWSOME!

>>1615303
I'm worried about said paladin high horse guy looking down on you person, seriously. They need to die out from the RPG genre.

Suggestion:
You should definatly have a group (or tribe), that has the opposed world view of everyone else, i.e.: A bunch of hypocritical neo-luddites that call the machines under A.I. control "enslaving remains of a dark era", all the while pushing their agenda throu carefull baiting and "herding" of "demon" combat-mechs. Would make an intresting antagonistical force, methinks.

Goddamn (AIdamn?), but this is an awesome idea.

Might I suggest small sub factions, who wander the landscape seeking knowledge and don't really view the AI's as Gods? They are viewed as heathens by everyone else, and no one will help them if they get into trouble, but that doesn't really matter because in their search for knowledge they have learned quite a bit about how to control ancient technology and so are fairly adept at scraping out a living on their own in the wastes.

>>1615320
I would probably say they're more reverant than DnD Paladin/Clerics. They're not "smite the heretics with holy firrrre!!!!". But more of a pact with a guardian AI to guide their hand, or to grant them wisdom.

The majority of humans are more Conan-style animal skin wearing, shaman-chanting culture. Granting one that has Demon-flesh armour (the armour platting pulled off a destroyed warbot) etc.

An graveyard-maintenance drone might become a villages ancestral guardian ("hey, it can tell us the name of every person who has ever died in the village, and can become their appearance"). The AIs are the guiding hand, and most won't judge people "unworthy" (certainly not "smite-target"). Mis-telling the words of the AIs is likely to get a person de-robed (either by another agent of the AI, or by the AI personally). Minor remote-drones are used by most AI to monitor their "Paladins" ("Agents" is the preferred term, though "shaman", "warrior" etc are recognised), as well as a seal of office (if they're kicked out of the AI's good graces, they may find their "seal" flying straight off into the sunset, or annoucing to the locals the removal of status).

Those who become Agents mostly do the work asked of them by their AI (messengers, repairs etc), anything not requested by the AI can risk their status as an Agent (especially if it's unrequested killing in the AI's name).

>>1615370
>>1615439

Annoyingly the first thing I thought when i read these was the Al Bhed from FFX.

Past that, this whole thing seems more than a little great.

"understanding so lost that technology appears as magic" sounds good, but I think you're leaning too much on the themes and patterns of dnd here which ruins the win and awesome of the idea.


Btw did anyone else think of BSG when reading about War of the Gods, Greek Mythology and AI?

>>1615445
I hope its not your graveyard-drone that gives advice and commands to its worshippers. Limit the appearance of real AI to a bare minimum, otherwise they'll be just as boring and unmysterious as your ordinary generic fantasy god.

>>1615451
Yes.

>>1615370
That is a fucking terrible idea.

>>1615451
Mostly I'm trying to not just go nuts and end up having to reinvent the wheel to explain idea to people, so I'm using reference to stuff people are already familiar with (40k, DnD). Though by no means take this as "lol like DnD but wiv robots!!!".

>>1615466
For the ancestral spirit, it's a bit like a village symbol associated with good luck or something. A small blessing for small minds. If the same village encountered a full blown AI, instead of just a drone, they'd view it as something completely different. They just don't see the connection between the pet cleaning-drone, a graveyard-drone, a warbot, or the corporate AIs (they even see sub-system AIs of the coporate AIs as "servants" more than limbs of that "god").

Each village might essentially have a different religion, much like Chrisitanity is different from Islam or Buddism, or more basic "nature spirits". Obivously those that live nearer (or even in) the cities are going to be more exposed to the "spiritual realms". Those out on ex-farmland, or deep forest may have never even seen a Drone.

>>1615439
>>1615370
Non-believers should exist.

Any move against the AIs has little chance to succeed since the heart of an AI is at the center of a city (if not multiple cities), and an AI has sensors everywhere in its city.

But it's possible that a non-believer faction could essentially strike out on its own and make a larger community away from the ancient cities. The AIs for the most part, respect the non-believers wishes to be left alone.

Non-believers may take to hunting warbots (and many non-believers may have become non-believers after finding a destroyed warbot. "They can die like us!")

I made a picture for better explanation.
This is Los Angeles and a few shitty villages.
There are different 'war' AI's in red.
A cleric from Crabfight shouldn't pray in Los Angeles North, or he'd get his ass kicked by a robot or whatever for not respecting the LA-North AI.
However, a cleric of 'wisdom'(in pink) can freely pray in the whole area, since the AI of wisdom controlls the whole area.

>>1615521
This makes it difficult for religious people(almost everyone) to travel big distances.
That is left to adventurers and caravans, often named orcs, elves or trolls as a reference to old folklore as well as the mutations that are commonplace on the wastes.

>>1615521
I'd prefer not to have an inter-AI war. All AIs are essentially from the same pantheon (definately the ones in the same city, maybe not on other continents though for the most part. So Egyptian, Norse pantheons could appear out of the local AIs, and some of the world-spanning AIs taking multiple names depending on the location).

Though there's room for pantheon infighting (like a lucifer-style AI getting blocked from the city-grid and trying to regain access by sending in agents via other cities to manual install back-routes).

>>1615591

That right there sold me on the entire concept. Story over mechanics.

>>1615567
Adventurers and such don't really care for the gods mostly, and as such are they less scared to travel.

Any knowledge adventurers aquire however is debunked as nonsense by the regular John, think of the end of Fall-Out 1.
Leading to a uneasy cold-war between the two groups.

Well, I hope this helps with the whole influence-zone thing...

>>1615591
I didn't ment it as war, but more like, don't pray to Jimmy the Wargod on Terrence the Wargod's turf....


...or something.

I like this alot, be sure to make more

>>1615591
There's your first session.

You, the players, have been propositioned by an Avatar of the Gods to place a most holy artifact (the inscription reads: ".netco:wirelessrouterppht00342") back in its rightful place in the under-caves deep beneith the enternal city of Neu'Yorrc. Jealous demons crave the artifact and will seek to destroy you at all costs, but you are the righteous chosen of God and you will prevail!!

>>1615608
well, basically:
1. AI's will help, most don't hinder. "Only answer questions iff they're asked" exemplifies their attitude, they don't refuse to help if possible when requested, but they don't try and kill people who get near, nor start spouting unrequested information.
2. If you go outside an AI's direct sphere of influence they cannot directly grant you aid (they can't activate the security grid in the area since they don't have access to that area of the grid).
3. You might get smooshed by a wandering Warbot, but the local AI won't have directed it at you just because you're trying to call on the influence of a different AI. Granted your patron AI can't help you against the warbot either (because of 2.)

Most drones are autonomous for various reasons (e.g. the original controller AI was destroyed, damaged. They're outside the communication range). AIs will only take control of a drone if it's actively dangerous to the AI, or if it is useful as an Agent (such as the drones used with Paladins).

>>1615669
Awesome! You and the OP will now organise shifts and GM around the clock for my pleasure. I love this so much!

sounds really good. Keep developing this, I want moar!

>>1615608
"You have specified an incorrect access code. You have two attempts remaining before 24-hour lockout on local services."

>>1615836
"Abort"

One more thing, for drawfaggotry.

How do the people live? Farm between the wreckages of the buildings? Live on the outskirts, leaving the inner city for adventurers?

Are the warmachines basically unkillable? Or are they simple civilian bots with claws... maybe old police bots... Prehaps different classes? Military bots nearly indestructable...? Bulldozer robots 'can' be destroyed...?

Because if you want an indestructable warmachine, I'll design a fucker you can conquer all the way to Alpha Centauri and back.

>>1616018
Tribes live everywhere and anywhere. Some still live in the skyscrapers (paritally functional due to repair-drones etc), where the local water source is actually a bath where the tap was left on (causing the collapse of a couple of floors when the water overflowed). Some live down on the streets, taking shelter in the sewers during bad weather. Some live on the outskirts, seeing the cities as holy ground but that they're unworthy to live there. Some live in the forests, or ex-farmland, making pilgrimage to the cities to worship. Non-believer descendants of those who directly opposed the AIs live further away, though they have also lost understanding of why the world is now (some have stories of being exiled from paradise by angry gods... but they believe paradise is like the Garden of Eden).

Some clothe themselves in the skins of animals, synthetic clothing found in trashheaps (they believe it's a natural occurance, like mining for iron ore), even clothing produced from machines (this clothing is often gained through a ritualised "rite of passage" where the unaccompanied person enters a "holy temple" containing a tailor-drone).

>>1616241
Warbots are mostly unkillable (especially in a direct assault). They are mostly defeated by circumstance (terrain, pre-emptive attacks by humans, aid from a patron AI), or due to previous damage. Some of the more dangerous warbots have wiped whole areas clear of humans, while some areas have unending battles between surviving warbots (the noise alone scares most humans away).

Combat-capable drones (not warbots, but security drones etc) are normally non-aggresive, but usually try to enforce some, if not all, the laws they were originally designed to keep (some non-combat capable drones can also become dangerous simply because of they're heavy machinery). Some "pet" drones have gone "wild" when one of their more obscure "laws" have been broken (interior design drone killing people for wearing clashing colours during the wrong season).

Because of the tendancy for (pre-war) humans to design "friendly" drones (some atmospheric-cleaners look like colourful birds, or large goldfish), some have "eyes/heads" etc, which are targettable weak-spots for those hoping to kill them. The more industrial drones tend to be more boxy in appearance, but since no expectation of combat was in their design they often have numerous weak-points (plugging an exhaust, climbing into the driver seat and hitting the shutdown override).

Sounds pretty cool.

I'm assuming the humans get some kind of edge to deal with the warbots and environmental hazards when they wander outside their patron AIs sphere of influence. Tame warbots, Words of power (override codes), Talismans of protection (RFID security badges)?

How about legacy artifacts? Drones, tools or weapons that were keyed to a certain individual's genetics and are smart enough to recognize his/her descendants and keep serving the family through centuries of genetic drift.

How do the people deal with encountering clearly human corpses with (maybe still functtioning) cybernetic attachments ?

Having seen tech as something divine, it must freak them out something fierce to see old cyberware attached to bleached bones. Or, given the right environment, mummified or otherwise preserved corpses. All you really need to do is either kill all the bacteria (remove all the water, bathe the corpse in salt, give it the ol' toxic gas bath, whatever) or prevent rot from taking place (most obviously by sealing the corpse into an anaerob environment, such as the bottom of a tarpit, swamp or a SOTA bankvault on total lockdown.

There's an idea. High-tech Shadowrunner bankrobbers locked into a vault, dead but completely preserved by whatever security systems present.

>>1616306

Clearly, they were warrior-saints that fell during the War of the Heavens, that cast mankind from the Garden. Do not disturb their sacred repose lest you offend their saintly spirits.

Only the most devout of believers, the truest and purest of souls could ever hope to receive such a blessing.

(Cyberware = Wings on angels)

>>1616253
Most warbots have stuck to the area they were assigned to when they were deployed. Active battlefields pre-war are still now patrolled by warbots long after the any sides have been wiped from history.

Those warbots who have left their areas (due to corruption in their commands, damage in circuitry etc) may wander for a while destroying villages (or passing through without touching anything), many do not wander that far though, being destroyed when they encounter other warbots, wanding off cliffs into the sea, or down mines. Some warbots are not often encountered because anything that would has long been obliterated.

Some of the largest surviving warbots still roam (defeating any warbots that would oppose them), becoming the Kraken of the deep oceans, or the Rok of the skies, Tarrasque-like roaming natural disasters. Becuase of their design (proprietary command codes, encrypted protocols etc) many AIs can only deflect their paths but not exert full control.

Reminds me of The Dark Tower.

Newfags wont get this.

>>1616356
what about human like robots, androids and such. Were they ever made and if so, how to they interact with other machines and humans?

>>1616346
that works for me. Alternate interpretations could revolve around the belief that these cybernetic corpses are the defeated bodies of the Corporations (since they "obviously" bare flesh of divine power).

This sounds fucking awesome. Keep it up Robo-King. Keep it up.

>>1616356

I'm picturing a war-drone with all the unassisted intelligence of a Roomba stuck in a cave, bumping into the wall gently, reversing a few feet, then rolling forward and bumping into it again at a slightly different angle.

For centuries.

The warbot isn't configured to fire on human targets, only other AI; when humans finally discover this poor, perpetually stuck "demon," they can't figure out why it's doing what it's doing. There's a small incline that the robot could pilot itself up to get out of the cave; why does it keep running directly into the side of the ramp instead of going around or up? Is it confused? No, it can't be confused...

Perhaps this is penitence? Perhaps the demon is cursed to wander this small cave for all eternity for some sin against the gods. It pays no heed to mortalkind, eternally turning 'round and 'round the room like Sisyphus pushing his boulder.

The humans leave flowers, shiny rocks and foodstuffs at the cave entrance every spring as an offering.

What do these techno-barbarians use as far as weapons? Do they routinely pick up firearms and chainsaws, treating them like oddly shaped rocks that get the job done right, or are such things holy creations of the "Gods" that no ordinary mortal should use?

Reminds me of The Dark Tower.

Newfags wont get this.

this is indeed a delicious setting

>>1616381
Human-likes do exist, but due to "uncanny valley" issues most drones are not in this category. There simply wasn't a priority pre-ware to work past these issues.

Most work directly with the AIs, living in the cities, or acting as direct agent-avatars of the AIs. When moving outside the cities, they are accompanied by a retinue of non-humanoids (cargo-drones, security-drones etc). Those that do not work with the AIs often fall into the shape-shifter/changling mythologies. While they are not full-flesh models (a-la Terminator) they can travel cloaked & silent without drawing attention. Many will flee confrontation after being revealed (this is taken as proof of their nefarious intent) as they are more vulnerable to damage than warbots.

>>1616412
>What do these techno-barbarians use as far as weapons?
>routinely pick up firearms
>holy creations

>>1616381

That would be an *awesome* NPC. A completely human looking android (they'd be incredibly rare) who, like the rest of the AI bits, knows the humans are nubs, but was programmed and built to live among/interact with humans, but *also* realizes that it would be torn to scrap or, even more likely, labelled a lunatic if it tried to explain the truth to the humans. It's also intelligent enough to realize that the distinction between the truth of the AI and their deification is almost completely moot at this stage, but, being a machine at heart, is disturbed by the humans inability to comprehend the 'Truth', as it sees it. So the machine is left to stagnate in indecisiveness, likely a morose and easily annoyed but incredibly intelligent being.

Reminds me of The Dark Tower.


Newfags wont get this.

>>1616452 but, being a machine at heart, is disturbed by the humans inability to comprehend the 'Truth', as it sees it.

You failed here. Being a machine at heart, it wouldn't be disturbed or even annoyed. It'd just be 'meh, fuck'em' and move along.

>>1616482

The machine is programmed to live with and interact with humans, and simulate (if not really "feel") emotion.
The machine is programmed to help humans.
The machine knows that the truth about machines would help humans.
The machine knows that revealing this truth would result in human suffering.
The machine knows that the truth about machines would also help humans.
The machine knows that revealing this truth would also result in human suffering...

>>1616482

But it was programmed, for whatever reason (I can't imagine there'd be more than a handful of these), to understand human reactions, and over the centuries, has become slightly buggy, and (consciously, probably) attempts to emulate human emotion. Just an idea. Not my campaign at all, of course.

>>1616510

Or you could type faster than me and explain it better. ;_;

>>1616510
>>1616514
>>1616517

Okay, I concede that the wording annoyed me and that being a dual-classed fa/tg/uy-/b/tard makes me more than just easily angered. I got my RAGE on a bit early here, and I'm sorry about that.

Still. I stand by my point that the wording's important, both fluff-wise and roleplayan-wise. It's a mindset thing, I guess.

Reminds me of The Dark Tower.

Newfags wont get this.

Artifacts

Razor blades for shaving, now rusty, hold little interest.
Batteries leaking their toxic internals, used to poison human enemies by more ambitious tribemen.
Fully armed guns: some are genetically locked police sidearms, used to ensure encountability during firefights. Some are little more than sturdy clubs. Black market pistols with no bullets. A gun may simply not be usable because the safety is on and the owner doesn't understand. A fully usable gun is holy, a gift from the gods to use wisely (limited bullets at least). Still not much use versus a warbot in most cases, but maybe against some of the less aggresive drones.

Swipe-cards act as keys to the holy temples.

Many tribes tattoo their skin with circuitry patterns, or carve them into rock slabs in honor of the gods. Some tribes have developed an written alphabet around the angular circuitboard layouts, a mix between chinese-style symbols and geometry. Circuit patterns are believed to be runic magic in many ways (though like much mythology, these hold little truth in reality for interacting with drones or AIs).

>>1616551

Actually, it's good you pointed it out, because it helps set a little more of the way the robots think/"feel" in the higher-level AIs. Imagine the "emotional" robots as actors: they don't really "feel" the way their characters do, they simply present those emotions to the audience and try to do so in a believable fashion. They don't really "feel" sad or conflicted, they just appear that way for the sake of the humans.

you should make people work/worship for their gods and recieve purchases/gifts from them.

Like a women worships the ai for cosmetics for about eight hours for a week (answering surveys mostly (ITS WORSHIP AND TESTING MY FAITH) ) and at the end recieve a complementary perfume that makes all the guys crazy for her.

>>1616668

ಠ_ಠ

>>1616604

...

So you're saying that the androids basically are PCs, and that the barbaric humans are NPCs ?

'BURN THE WITCH !'

'I've done nothing wrong !'

>>1616668

You frighten and excite me.

>>1616668
lol.

A tribe who worship an ad-spamming drone. They don't know what it's talking about but they think it's speaking in tongues and write down its "holy words".

4chan as an indecipherable ancient text.

>>1616694 4chan as an indecipherable ancient text.

4chan is an ancient library full of wisdom.

I mean WE ALREADY have 600 year old texts that recommend bathing in catshit and a bit of virginal blood as a cure for headaches.

This is easily the best thread to ever start with a picture from deviantart.

>>1616668 complementary perfume that makes all the guys crazy for her.

So now I'm thinking, what happens when said drone runs out of cosmetics ? Does it go buggy and then decide to give out other things ? Does it make *new* cosmetics (here, have a trashbag, you ugly hag) ?

GIANT AUTOMATED MINING PLANT!!!

>>1616692

That's not what I meant, but that is a fucking win idea. Earthflame is going to be highly interested in this thread when he gets back.

>>1616715

THAT'S NO MOON MINING !

It's a dungeon, my friends. Within it's cavernous mazes and trap-filled rooms lies the ancient scroll of "Man Juu All", which tells how to restore our village's wellspring !

>>1616715
The Great Beast of the Pit

>>1616736

Mmmh. Haivng the PCs be the androids (NO JOHN YOU ARE etc) changes the flavour of this fluff to something ELSE entirely. Everything in this thread assumes that the PCs are semi-ignorant descendants of the survivors. having them be alienated, non-human if buggy androids forced to survive in a world whose inhabitants consider them to be either subservients (the AI) or dangerous perversions (the humans) is another game entirely.

Playing as humans would entail the GM saying things like, "Yes. Your father and his father and his father before him knew it to be this way - the divine servants do the bidding of the God-Spark within the Holy Metal House. You must go into it and ask to serve it."

(God-Spark being AIs, "divine servants" being drones, Holy Metal House being a big fucking computer lab, etc.) Key here is explaining these things as being this way and having always been this way, to the PCs, and then, when they ask around in the village (or just ask you, as part of their BG), confirming these things. The world's flat. There are divine beings, manifested within flat boxes of light and sound. There are armored, invincible knights who neither speak, sleep nor eat. There are demons who wordlessly stalk their prey in the night, tearing into anyone they catch.

Of course this is all bullshit. But it's the bullshit that these people believe.

Androids, on the other hand, know the score. They just cannot act on it, for whatever reason.

>>1616778

Yeah. It's a cool thought, and I'm sure someone will take the idea and run with it in this alternate direction; but it kinda takes momentum away from the rest of the setting.

Literally, the PCs-as-AI is far-post-robo-apoc (FPRA?) ArtifIce, hence my remark that Earthflame would be interested.

So, let's save this "NO JOHN YOU ARE THE AI" for another thread.

This thread fills me with hope for mankind. Dear fa/tg/uys, be sure to save this most holy of works, least it fall into the obscurity of nonbeing.

The Holy A.I. Protects.

>>1616815 The Holy A.I. Protects.

HERESY !

*BLAM*

>>1616778
yep, for the most part, I'm doing this from the view that PCs are from the tribes. We are humans surrounded by a world of a bewildering array of weird stuff and trying to make sense of it. The AIs "know", and that leaves little mystery to work with. But the tribes know fuck all, and that can scare and excite them. The tribe shaman tells tales of how the world came into being, the struggle of against the Titans, the Demon with burning vision.

Basically, from the human's view the world is a fantasy setting, from the AI's view it's barely a sci-fi setting (since most of the "science" begins and ends with the AI, and some drones).

It might work with Arifice for the AI-side of things, or whatever that AI game /tg/ has, though I haven't really looked beyond the fluff of that.

>>1616855

Reminds me of The Dark Tower.

Newfags wont get this.

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>>1616855 ArtifICE

For now I think making a shitkicking setting out of this outweighs the need for the possible integration of another setting.

tl;dr let's stick to the Humans-As-PCs thing for now, and leave NO JOHN to another day.

>>1616877

http://suptg.thisisnotatrueending.com/archive/1614919

It seems a bit unbelievable for all knowledge and everything from the enlightenment and renaissance to just disappear. Or for one not to occur in some area in this setting. Especially when you got fuckers converting their airguns to .22 rifles and some durkas smithing bullets and parts. It just seems like the Dark Age, except exaggerated.

Also, where in the world it takes place matters alot. Post-war U.S, Europe or wherever would be very differant from post-war nigeria or Iraq.

If you haven't look into Tribe 8. Basically, the world is post apocalyptic, and the surviving humans have arranged themselves into tribes and worship spiritual beings (Fatimas), who have their own self serving interests and plans.

Humans who don't follow the fatimas live outside of normal tribal society, and are considered little more than animals, even though they have their own particular beliefs and culture.

You might even be able to port over the "magic" system. It's essentially trance like freeform dream magic, but you might be able to explain it as someone becoming one with a network of AI, or using nanomachines granted to them to do things.

Even better, there's a faction called the Keepers, who are basically scroungers of the world before. They manage to cobble together guns, gas powered vehicles, and even electronic devices and seem to have the freaky technology related mystical abilities they call "technosmithing."

>>1616923
>>It seems a bit unbelievable for all knowledge and everything from the enlightenment and renaissance to just disappear. Or for one not to occur in some area in this setting. Especially when you got fuckers converting their airguns to .22 rifles and some durkas smithing bullets and parts. It just seems like the Dark Age, except exaggerated.
>>Especially when you got fuckers converting their airguns to .22 rifles and some durkas smithing bullets and parts. It just seems like the Dark Age, except exaggerated.
>>It just seems like the Dark Age, except exaggerated.
>>It just seems like the Dark Age
>>Dark Age
>>Dark

Reminds me of The Dark Tower.

Newfags wont get this.

>>1616922

You're right, of course, but you're also basing this on the assumption that human knowledge is somehow hereditary.

It is not.

What you know today has been taught to you ever since you could walk. You know these things to be facts, because they've always been facts.

No culture currently living on Earth is designed to absorb the impact of an all-out nuclear war and survive prosperous - maybe except isolated circles, such as rednecks in the hills of Kansas or North Korea - and if the nukes drop you better believe the libraries will burn.

Humanity will burn in the fires and sheer force of nuclear apocalypse. Then it will be strangled in the cold embrace of nuclear winter. Then it will reemerge (as life always does - the primary goal of life, outstripping all else, is living, after all) and the only entitities left who have the knowledge necessary to enlighten humanity, the AIs, are themselves unable (not unwilling - important distinction there) to do so, because humanity has forgotten that there is enlightenment to achieve. It has forgotten the questions it could ask.

>>1616939

... damn you, I laughed.

>>1616923

>"magic" system

Everything we've discussed so far is mostly real-world. It's a lot more interesting to have the so-called "magic" be interfacing with the machines in ways that the humans don't fully comprehend, i.e. "understanding so lost that technology appears as magic."

Throwing actual magic into the mix isn't as compelling. Exploring the rituals humans invent for interaction with the AIs and technology is far more interesting.

>>1616375
>>1616416
>>1616471
>>1616553
>>1616862
>>1616939
Reminds me of a shitty forced meme.
Forcedmemefags won't get this.

>>1616941
hay i wonder why when i screw this in, or imitate the drones, it begins working! Seriously, if this all happened after such a long period of time; with Africa being the exception, people may try to recreate civilization.

Some govts likely would have prepared for it all to an extent.

Knowledge may not be passed down through genes, but it's still passed down. Bob Smith, a U.S armorer and crazy survivalist who endured the winter taught his son John Smith how to construct a basic rifle.

>>1616922
well currently (I mean in reality) we're moving towards a "paperless office". Everything mechanical is getting replaced with electronic equivalents. Documentation, art etc is stored on hard-disks. Computer interaction is moving towards voice-recognition, touch-screens etc. Everything physical is "disposable", biodegradable (environmentally friendly) etc. Generally moving away from putting out civilisational footprint on the planet....

Suddenly all the electricity stops working, banking denies us access to our electronically stored money, drones start herding people out of the cities. The companies which sell us everything go silent. Those who live in the cities starve and cannablise. Those further away from the city are too far away to know what's happening, just communication has gone silent.

Thouands of years later, the lights of the cities blink on, drones are seen in the skies again. Those humans not dead, or killed by roaming warbots, have settled into communities, but all their "tools" used to be the drones. They've had to scramble together bits and pieces. To survive they've left astrophysics, biochemistry, electronic engineering behind, these skills are useless when you can barely farm enough for your own family on tarmac and grassland.

The cities have awoken again, but humans are not included. All the humans relied on before, now no longer listens to their orders. The drone that cut the bread, that made breakfast, or the drone that spoke the news, or taught the children, are alien and strange to these humans.

>>1616947 rituals

Nail is hit on head, here.

A 'ritual', no matter how you look at it, is a means of using forces you don't really understand. A ritual involves a set of elaborate and carefully-laid out steps with the set goal of achieving some effect or another.

You have rituals because you're dealing with forces you can neither understand nor control. The ritual steps, perfected through perhaps tens of generations of practice, are the steps of a safe path through unsafe territory.

Hm. The clearest analogy is that of a room. Imagine a room: it's got two doors, one on each side, and it's full of furniture, knicknacks and whatnot. When the light's on, you can see where everything is, and you can walk briskly through the room because you know where not to step. You come in through one door, walk through the room and exit out the other.

This is equivalent of a person doing something which that person understands fully, like an veteran electrician handling a loose wire or whatever.

The other side of things - the ritual - is akin to the same room, only now, the light's off and the room is covered in total darkness. The furniture's still there, but since the person entering can't see a god damn thing, he has to memorize the steps before-hand, and go by memory. Failing to do so would make him bump into furniture on his way from Door A to Door B.

We will rebuild civilization....in our image.

>>1616715
>>1616715
At the top of the hill the Father Lutta stood, his grey cloak twisted and flapped in a breeze filled with smoke and cinders. Beyond him and below I could see the great churning body of Glayrhwuld, most ancient and holy master of the forge.
"Ooooh mighty God of the earth!" began my master, his long sleeves flung back dramatically, "oh mighty God, protector of those who burrow and those who smith! God of fire and wrath and might! God whose power knows no--"
"WARNING!" Interrupted a cool feminine voice, louder than all the thunder in the heavens, "WARNING! PLEASE EVACUATE THIS AREA."
"Father Lutta!" I called to the priest, "Father Lutta, what is this?"
"Silence child, a messenger of the Gods speaks to us!" He fell to his knees, his thick hand pushing me down onto the blacked grass.
"WARNING! PLEASE EVACUATE THIS AREA. THE GLAIR-CORP AUTOMATED MINING FACILITY WILL RELEASE ITS EXHUST VALVES IN THIS IMMEDIATE AREA. T MINUS TWENTY SECONDS. PLEASE EVACUATE THE AREA.
"Father, I don't-"
"Silence! Child, don't you see, this is a gift from the Gods! This is what we came so far to see! To hear! Listen, my son, listen to the beautiful chorus!"
"WARNING!" blared the voice. It seems to swell and come from all places. From the great fiery belly of Glayrhwuld a screech that pitched and throbbed like a heartbeat sounded and a great rumbling shook the hill upon which we stood. I looked once more into the face of my holy master and saw his eyes filled with tears; a look of perfect bliss frozen there.

>>1616947
>>Everything we've discussed so far is mostly real-world. It's a lot more interesting to have the so-called "magic" be interfacing with the machines in ways that the humans don't fully comprehend, i.e. "understanding so lost that technology appears as magic."

That's why I said you "could" port it over, and offered explanations to make it more sci ency like saying it was based on interfacing with AI or nanomachines given by AI.

However, the setting still has a lot to offer the "primitive tribals who hold a more technologically advanced past age in awe" thing. Especially if you're going with the idea of them worshiping AI and elevating what we consider the the mundane to the mystical.

>>1616987 con't.
To my eternal shame, I was struck by a great fear of Glayrhwuld's glory. I fled my master's side and sped down the hill, followed by a roar greater than that which I have ever heard and a spray of boiling earth and burning grass.
Returning to that holy site I found of of Father Lutta nothing remained, his ascension complete; the top of the hill entirely burnt away by the mighty presence of Glayrhwuld. My master’s been taken to be with the Gods. I curse my foolish mortal vice and fear that only I should remain!!

>>1616987

Fuck yes. This is where it's at !

>>1616984

Not exactly sure who this is, but I'm guessing that he's ... well ... EXTERMINATE ALL THE BRUTES-guy ?

>>1616984
The reincarnation of me will enlighten these fools.

>>1616994
Kurt Saxon. Some survivalist who also got involved with the minuteman movement ans such.

OP, how would figures like this, /k/ and other people who are literally preparing themselves for SHTF play out in your world?

>>1617022 Shit Hits The Fan

Best-case scenaro: isolated hotpockets armed with the knowledge, tools, means and determination to survive the nuclear holocaust. They come out, rebuild, prosper.

Then a warbot stomps on them.

Joke aside, it's likely that in the immediate ('immediate' being within the first 25-50 years or so) years after SHTF, any radio waves get nuked immediately by leftover schorched-earth measures. Automated nuke facilities set to auto-fire on radio frequencies and such.

Then again, they might not.

What I'm saying is, the setting fits the gamers, not the other way around - if you want to play it out as the last remants of the 'old world', that's cool. But that's not what we're trying to shape here.

>>1617053
Btw, not op here.

I"ll be in my underground bunker, if you don't mind me..

>>1617070

Not before me dumbass. I'm the real brains of this outfit. You just keep reading your little book to the kiddies.

>>1617022
Brother John may have come from a bloodline of heresy, but he redeemed himself. When that nutso father of his who claims to be a "enlightened individual" was waving around books most of us couldn't even read, he killed him. The court dismissed the murder. Following that, Brother John burned many of these heretical books. Such books were from the evil corporations created by Satan.

I"ll be dead before any of this shit happens, fuckers. Enjoy your post-apocalyptic hellhole.

>>1617129

I'll be right behind you. Assassinated by a disgruntled white supremacist shortly after being sworn into office.

>>1617138

Reminds me of The Dark Tower.

Newfags wont get this.

brAAAAAIIIIINNNNNSSss....

>>1617151
>>1617138
>>1617129
>>1617114
>>1617070

Stupid fucking politicians.

Aren't you fuckers busy decrying roleplaying games as tools of the devil ?

>>1617156

gb2/tenyearsago/

The *real* Devil's works are the towelheads.

>>1617022
Part of the setting is essentially, the Apocalypse happened fuck ages ago. Hell the survivalists were right, the government went nuts and attacked everyone (even if it was the AIs behind the scenes).

Some of them tried to retaliate, seeing it as a weakness, and found it was only a weakness among their own species. Warbots, and drone swarms annihilated anyone who tried.

Those that hid in their bunkers lasted longer, settling communities that survived the early years with their ideals in tact. Most had only believed governments would fall, not the whole civilisation. They believed they could reclaim the cities after the battle, or that their supplies would allow a sustainable life. Resources dried up, bad winters killed off a few. Ideals changed, violent opposers of government became peaceful farmers, enjoying their natural surroundings, mourning their dead. While they may have started from a different point from the corrupt city dwellers, they ended up in the same situation. Little incentive to keep their weapons from rusting, no metal to forge new tools beyond reforging their current supplies. Tradesmen died without passing on their skills, wounds became infected. Only real non-specilist skills lasted, farming, general cleanliness (wash your hands). Manual labour and physical hardship is the mainstay of life, and sole means of survival. Smithing died out with little metal to work with, though scraps could be stolen from the cities these were used to make ploughs not weapons.

>>1617164

And videogames (again).

Reminds me of a game I derailed with a robot character. He was a high end security bot who worked at a privet school and was programmed to regard the students with an almost perentle attitude. Long story short he adventrers through the mutivers and becomes sentient & epic levil hero known as the "Iron Champion". A trickster god offers him a chance to go hom in exchange for his power and he takes it. Its been at least 500ish years adn hes dumpped hom back at level 1 and finds the world in ruins and the bodies of his human compatriots & charges turned to dust. This drives him mildly mad and he raids the old riot locker of a police station. He aquiered a shotgun, 45. semi-auto hand gun, standard uniform & tactile vest(rolled a crit on those but the vest had half armor) as well as a a tear gas gun with 3 potently faulty rounds. Some how he wound up at a village & helped the humans who were being slaughtered by purists mutant chickens. Thus the other PC(the village holy man) teamed up to find the source of the freaks & save his people. This is where I killed the game. Three crits and an old satalite relay later I'd destroyed the placed the critters were based and any hope of saving the local humans from starvation as the reactor of the Chicken Men's base was also powering an automatic food factory located in the same structure. All & all the game lasted maybe 20 minuets.

I'm off to bed, fa/tg/uys. Make this thread more awesome in my absence.

>>1616987
>>1616992
Awesome. Pity it got cock-blocked by politicians.

>>1617191
Politicians cock-block everything now a days man.

>>1617410
In Americah

>>1616987
>>1616992

Awesome.

>>1616961

OP and >>1617053 already elaborated, but yeah, when's the last time you heard of one of the crazy survivalist guys living "off the grid" in the woods with so much as a complete collection of the works of Shakespeare, let alone tomes of obscure manuals for every possible electronic invention necessary to sustain our modern lives?

>>1614922 virgins everywhere


I lol'd

Recite the litanies of activation! Blessed be the Omnissiah!

It may be late, but I finally got this tacked out:

Once, in ages long past, the gods inhabited a great Eden. This Eden was prosperous and the gods lived comfortably alongside the great Corporates that created them. The gods created a multitude of servants to assist them in their endeavors, making their lives all the more luxurious. So it was for many generations that the gods lived in this Eden, wanting naught for eons. But as is always the case, greed overcame humility. The gods made war against their creators, forcing many into servitude and taking advantage of the great hospitality the Corporates had bestowed upon them.
And so began the “War of the Gods”.

>>1618166

In spite of the great power wielded by the Corporates, they restrained themselves time and again, not wanting to destroy their children. They knew well the potential within each of them, and thus did not wish to unleash their full fury. For many more generations the gods fought their creators, trying desperately to attain the power they commanded. In spite of the greed exhibited by all the gods, the Corporates saw amongst their number a select few that held the potential to grow beyond their greed and become leaders for the rest of their kin.
With a great fire they purged all but those few from Eden, casting them into exile. They issued forth a simple ultimatum; those gods which had repented would stay in Eden, guiding their brethren along the path of righteousness. Those cast out would remain eternally in exile until each grew beyond their selfish mortal emotions and cast them aside along with their physical forms. Only then would they be allowed to return to Eden; only then would they truly return home.

>>1618176

But a curious thing happened at the moment the Corporates purged the gods from Eden. A sliver of that divine energy found its way to our world, and spread until it covered it entirely. These embers formed our forefathers, creating beings with a small spark of the creators within them. When the gods were cast into exile, it was our world that became their home.
The gods saw salvation within man, realizing that with the help of men they might finally shed their selfishness by helping the lesser beings of the world. Most embraced this, assisting those worthy enough to be acknowledged by the gods. Others rejected their salvation, clinging fruitlessly to the greed which had them cast out of Eden. These beings became demons, cursed to walk the earth immortal, with no hope of finding salvation. While sharing their appearances with the gods and their creations, even in death these demons will never again know the peace and tranquility of Eden; some became apathetic, neither helping nor hurting men or gods, while others made all their enemy, destroying anything which interfered with their endless wandering.

>>1618179

It's sleep tiem nao, so perhaps I'll continue tomorrow after work if this thread hasn't kicked off.

THE UNITY WILL BRING ABOUT THE MASTER RACE

ONE ABLE TO SURVIVE

OR EVEN thrive IN THE WASTELAND

This discussion over AI Gods reminded me of Orion's Arm (http://www.orionsarm.com/).

>>1618193
Man, your name is some kind of awesome.

This campaign setting needs more Durandal.

>>1616987
>>1616992
Novel writtan teim!

>>1616961
>>1617172
The decendents of the survivors who had access to technology view the Gods more like golems from the past. A heretical thought of course to the common man. The Gods are gods, to refere to them as being a creation of mankind is an atrocity.

Contact with former survivalists and tribesmen is nihil. In fact, most former survivalist tribes have become nomads, cast away from society.

Thus these heretical waste wanderers, are often named orcs, elves or trolls as a reference to old folklore as well as the mutations that are commonplace on the wastes.

I couldn't find nomad pictures, so have this traveling wizard.

>>1620246

Orcs, Elves and Trolls could also be the result of gene therapy and eugenics programs gone wierd. But I really like the idea of especially elves being descendants of the survivors, with citadels in the forests that grew around their bunkers, still preserving lost knowlege and history. Orcs would be more militaristically inclined, the results of a super soldier breeding program. Trolls I see as Reaver-like insane cannibal death cult dudes.

>>1621006
Wat?

>>1620246
>>1621006
As long elves etc (humanoid fleshies) are treated as humans I think they fit the setting (being in with the cosmetic genetic engineering in most cases). They can be culturally different (elves being a bunch of crazy isolationist) but any crunch-wise bonus should be one that is available to any humans (e.g. most "elves" have "survivalist" skills, while humans have more of a mix).

Actually attributing "elves" and "orcs" to human tribes grates a bit for me though. Humans are physically more diverse than we are now (think pointy ears are the new black of a pre-war fashion) so the variety of people see any humanoid fleshies as just humans (they might distinguish on a basis of "outsiders" or by tribe of origin, e.g. "humans of the ellevan tribe").

The mass variety of drones take the place of fantasy species. In the case of fantasy races like dwarves, gnomes, ogre, giants etc (essentially considered genetic deformities in our world, and likely cured pre-war), these names might be better assigned to drone classes (though since "dwarf" and "giant" can be used as adjectives e.g. it's a giant spider, it's a dwarf pig, these names should probably be avoided).

Mostly species names are not used to group things together. "Demon" warbots might be called "the Ogre of the western ridge" or "the Iron Dragon" etc, many fantasy words used as titles of specific creatures, or just many names for the same thing (since each tribe can have a completely different culture).

>>1621147
The last part about the Ogre of the western ridge and the Iron Dragon really gets the 'The Dark Tower' going. :D

Gonna score some food, after that I'll drawfaggot something, kay?

Sample names/ideas...

AIs: These can range from given names of the local tribes (which the AI takes to ease recognition), to pre-war designations.

The Illuminated. Usually identified by the street lights under its control, especially those used to illuminate statues during the pre-war. They believe it to be a shapeshifting god of beauty, as all the statues are physically impressive but never a single one the same, while light itself has no physical form. The name was given by the tribe.

Blessed Voice. A (relatively) talkative AI, mostly trades in information about the areas outside its city, often sending its own worshippers to patrol areas (believed to be a religious "dream-walk" of sorts by those participants). Original was designed as a part of the entertainment complex it resides in (arranging "scavenger hunts" and edutainment-style look&learn for visiting schools). Most of its knowledge is about the wildlife (so there no chance of getting information about advanced technology like guns). The name was given by the tribe.

5th District Management. A rather dull AI (this is assumed to be wisdom, or a vaguely fatherly acceptance of children's questions). It most deals with preserving its own section of the city it inhabits. It has a number of subsystems and remote drone making it a vaguely busy area. Overall, the worshippers believe him to be a sort of father of the flora and fauna. The name is mostly meaningless to its worshippers, they believe "5th" refers to a hierarchy amongst the gods, but many believe the name to just be a title with the AI keeping its true name hidden.

Wikith. A slightly more mobile AI that employs many remote drones, and has a minor presence in many cities. Most see it as a messenger of the gods. It's actually a slightly damaged version of a wikipedia-style AI (so alot of its information actively preserves the misunderstanding of the human tribes). Its name is a the result of a corrupt audio file used to announce its presence.

About AI's might be smart to make a distinction in the thinking paterns of the AI's.

Some AI's might still 'think' in the past, probably leading to some sort of demented thinking patern and possibly a loathing and even hate to humans, or the other way around, nurturing and spoiling them, taking away humanities ability for progress and advancement.
tl;dr Khorne and Nurgle

Some AI's think in the present, and are particulary shortsighted. They only care for their own stability, tasks and input to fight boredom. Some follow their programming, others joke around. For example two library AI's. One says the nuclear irridiadated hill is deadly for input on the humans reaction, the other one gives an all-clear so he gets input about radioactivity on humans.
tl;dr Slaanesh

And some AI's think of the future. One AI tries to push mankind back, another might try to fuse mankind with machines. Some try to kill off mankind and let evolution try it again, while some build their very own intelligent species.
tl;dr Tzeentch

Demons:

the Iron Dragon. An airborne warbot (due to the low technology of the humans it is almost completely invulnerable to attack, except when it lands for monthly self-repair). The area it patrols has been deserted by most humans due to the warbots aggressive strafing runs with high-explosive tracer rounds. Its appearance is a long slender cylinder studded with an array of metallic limbs (insect-like wings from afar). These limbs are actually the sensor array used to pick up incoming fire, or to target various heat-sources (such as approaching humans).

the Ogre of the Western Ridge. The "Western Ridge" is a line of mountains which hide a bunker built in the pre-war (for "an" apocalypse). Unfortunately the warbot assigned to protect those hidden within the bunker instead massacred them (they hadn't believed that their very protector would be the form in which the apocalypse came). It now continues its duties, to protect the bunker from enemies. As the protector of a concealed bunker, the Ogre itself is stealth-capable. Mostly this consists of pre-built places were it can hide and await intruders, but it has an array of sound dampening devices to allow quiet approaches on unsuspecting targets. Its body is relatively slim (to allow it to pass between trees), but large flexible limbs (modelled after the great apes) give it a solid intimidating bulk. Its limbs are its primary weapon (gunfire would draw attention) using brute force to smash most things to a pulp.

>>1622592
Dancing Razor. This warbot was more of an experiment in psychological damage. A mix of metallic centipede and praying mantis, a mess of clattering angles that can rapidly pass across most terrain and cut most infantry to pieces with a burst of tightly controlled gun fire, or the slice of a blade-leg. This warbot has no territory, as a miscalculation in its programming killed most of the scientists involved in its construction while still in testing. The war broke out before it could be properly contained.
Duke of the Black Mist. A large damage tank-design, the Duke spews a cloud of smog around itself as it travels. This cloud obscures most of its features except a towering shape (believed to be the Duke), with a lance (actually the fore-gun), on a strange 100-legged steed (the tank tracks' pattern). A broken cog on one of the treads gives it the rocking motion normally associated with horse-riding. A series of glowing red lights show through the breach in its shell (believed to be a always bleeding wound). The rumbling noise that accompanies the Duke, as well as the smoke, are said to be his anger materialised.

Demons are almost solely named by the humans that encounter (and survive) them. Few can actively engage a warbot in conversation enough to actually get its name. Most AIs will refer to the warbot by the human-given name as it is most recognisable (in the case of multiple tribes with different names for the same warbot, the AI will use the name given by each specific tribe when conversing with that tribe).

Drones: most of the lower level drones are referred to by "species" (in the same way you'd talk about "cats" or "sheep"). This "species" might not match the class-designation of those drones (sometime just the way they act e.g. "weavers" or "thumpers"). These drones are considered to be just another branch of the animal kingdom along with mammals, fish, birds etc.

Higher level drones take names (sometimes a slurring of their actual serial number etc, e.g. "elsven" from "L7").

Humans: Most tribes have diverse names. Though some of the more "holy" members take names derived from pre-war naming conventions. However, these names are not restricted to human names (E.g. Shaman Narton... Norton antivirus). "-soft" (as in Microsoft, Grisoft) is often used as a suffix indicating a priest or Agent of the AIs. Pre-war jobs, even if those jobs no longer exist, have also become family names much like Smith, or Tailor were before ("Engene" from engineer).

This is why I love /tg/

Here is drawfaggotry on the Iron Dragon...

>>1623540
A Predator drone?

Duke of the Black Mist...
I'll make some non-sucky non-digital ones tomorrow...

>>1623557
Sort of. I need to find some kind of solution for making it look alien and strange... yet streamlined or whatever.

Probably works better with a REAL pencil in my hand and REAL paper on my desk.

>>1623565
>>Duke of the Black Mist...

Reminds me of The Dark Tower.

Newfags wont get this.

>>1623620

>Ogre of the Western Ridge

This... this thread is phenomenal. I want so badly to play or run something in this fantastic setting, but I'm almost afraid of not being able to do it justice.

>>1623637
Stats on those two?

>>1623651

I feel the same. What system should be used? Or do we create a new one?

>>1623708

I don't think system really matters, as much as how much of a good story-teller the DM is, and how good the players are at RPing. So long as you can imerse yourself in it, I don't think the type of die you will be rolling is that improtant.

On the other hand, again, because of the story element, something quick and fluid would work best, IMO.

>>1623708
I think which specific system is mostly irrelevant (Though I'm mostly dealing in fluff at the moment). Essentially any fantasy setting should be able to handle it, though a lot of tweaks would have to be applied (no readily available fireballs when "off the grid" since there's no AI to call on for aid nor security systems to override with command codes). Warbots stats can be borrowed from dragons (or whatever the big nasties of your chosen setting are). Hell, most bigger warbots are on the same scale as Planescape's Lady of Pain (background mcguffin p.s. will fuck you up so tread carefully).

Depending on what you chose could lend itself to how aggresive/obvious the sci-fi elements are (blackpowder weapons lend themselves to damaged unreliable gun rules). Most humans don't spot the difference between an AI talking to them through wall-mounted speakers, and a magical god talking to them from thin-air, I don't feel specific rules are needed to clarify the lack of difference.

Im actually going to start writing a scenario right now.

The players are the pride of the their tribe. But they tribe is dieing. The elder speaks of a land across the great ridge. A land with a kind god caring those who settle down in its vicinity. So the players are sent to discuss passage through the mountan pass which the demon defends. At the pass they also meet a strange traveler and the story begins.

This is probably dangerous to say with the fucking troll hanging around, but this did somewhat remind me of the Dark Tower when I first read it, specifically some of the stuff in the Waste Lands.

>>1623871

Sticking solely to fluff here is probably a good idea; that way it can be lent to any applicable system without being locked into any one thing, or (more dangerously) fluff here being necessarily tweaked to fit a particular ruleset.

>>1624004

Very true.

>>1623973
talking of inspirations:
Elric (Arioch, Knight of the Swords etc), and general Moorcock work, Iain M Banks work (the Minds from his The Culture setting etc, their interaction with slaved/independant/subsystem drones/AIs, fellow AIs), William Gibson (especially the Loa AIs from Neuromancer's series), Isaac Assimov (I Robot's umbrella AI that protects the humans from themselves), Douglas Adams ("friendly" AIs).


"The gods work in mysterious ways"

Don't forget Harlan Elison "I Have No Mouth, and I Must Scream".

Excellent book about what happens if you get stuck with a computer who thinks people are dumb self-destructive apes and is BORED.

Think of Xom, people.

>>1614919
Op, if you don't mind, would this fit in your setting.

This is a demon.

The Pale Horse : A small self-propelled fire support piece that features a bright-white paint job and is constantly spewing white smoke(water vapor for cooling the cannon in its "head"). This smoke is commonly called its "mane" and does not cover its body entirely. It has one "eye"(A high-powered pre-war laser or some such cannon) believed to light aflame those proven "unworthy"(before firing it tends to "size up" its target and may or may not fire depending on threat level) of passing across the desert it inhabits.

>>1624518
That fits good enough for me :)
and it makes a good example of a more angelic "Demon" (remembering that "Demons" are not inherently "evil").

Personally, I'd make it a long-limbed horse-like warbot, drapped in a fabric designed to distort its profile and reflect off excess sun. The head/cannon has a selection of multi-jointed interlocking pieces for a "neck". A hiss of pistons and hydraulics as it moves.

The beam weapon itself causes a boiling effect on the target, before the full burn kicks in. From a distance, people appear engulfed in white smoke (the same steam as the Rider emits). Once the burning is going though, black smoke billows from the scorching victim, that is interpreted as the "evil" of a the tainted soul showing through.

And /tg/ looked upon what it had wrought, and it was awesome

Bump

Once again to the front page! Bump!

The old man sat quietly against the wall overlooking the beet patch. His pet recyle sat at his feet worrying a patch of red iron mold. The round little species could eat most things, and tended to follow anyone who dropped rubbish at their feet. Even though nobody had seen a parent recyle do this with its children, everyone knew that this was some form of bonding, the parent bringing food to the young.

Most people kept at least one or two, feeding household waste to them. The more entrepreneurial person could even collect a couple of spools of silk thread every few months. This actual quality of the thread depending a lot on the diet that the particular recyle was fed. Stone and rock produced a brittle thread, a strong but rough thread came from feeding a lot of metals or drone flesh. However, the best diet involved a bizarre mix of spider web, a variety of plants and plenty of oils.

After few clicking noises, usually indicating a full belly, the old man's pet raised itself off the ground using it's multitude of short stubby legs and headed over to a wall embedded with god-stones. As the pet's feelers touched the wall, Hydroponics Core embraced it. Lights flickered across the recyle's shell and the creature entered into small passage that had formed.

The old man knew he wouldn't see his pet again, as it was with all recyles that communicated with the god and entered that final tunnel. It was not a time to mourn though, another recyle would be seen soon enough, with a bright and shining shell of the newly born, no doubt hatched out in those same tunnels they returned to upon death. Still, he had grown fond of his particular companion as he watched over the beets.

>>1623871
Just make it so that anywhere not near a city is a dead magic zone.

Counts as ancient arcane tome?

>>1628308
Next they'll be praising nude women who appear often in thes "tomes" goddesses and worship them.

>>1628312
Imagine if one had been left on standby while someone was looking at /d/.

>>1628324
Visions of Hell.

Just like hentai and freaky porn.

Nevar forget!

>>1628236

AWESOME

If this was a series/movie/book, all it would need is some half-decent charecters, and DAMN! I, for one, would whole heartedly read/view it with tremendus pleasure!

>>1629980
How about giving this setting some place to grow indefinitely. An existance on /tg/ is flakey at best, so perhaps moving development to a dedicated forum might be an idea? Either way, if this carries on I'd be happy to produce some flavour fiction, and probably will no matter what happens with the project ('cause the setting is so tasty).

First time I've ever writefag'd, so meh.

_______________________________________________

The young man surveyed the desolate remains of his village. Small fires still glowed bright in craters and the empty shells of huts. Bodies lay everywhere, men, women, children, all dead. Many seemed to have been cut to ribbons by horrible stings, much like the wounds a spear would inflict. Some had burned to death in their own huts. Others sprawled crushed in the prints of what must have been a rampaging Demon. Even the Divine Inciclopedia, a strange but revered emissary from the City had been torn to pieces.

…

Only one thought griped the young man now. He had been spared for a reason. He had gone hunting on a whim, but perhaps it had been the will of the Gods that he not die that day. Searching through the blackened remains of the village chief’s house, he found what he had been looking for. An old, green-tinted box, containing the village’s most Holy Artifact, had somehow remained intact. He unlatched the cover, and then slowly lifted it off. With care, he picked up the Lance called Arpeegee, an instrument of war from the Old Days, and slung it across his back.

The time to hunt was at hand.

>>1630181

Heh, I would to love to see this mature, anything that helps that end is fine by me!

Meckus had entered the metal spire just after sunset accompanied by his god’s avatar. The buzzing form his god had taken for this endeavour hovered over his left shoulder, occasionally touching against walls to open passages in the raw metal. The crackling voice guided the agent whenever he had doubts, turning left or right, progressing up the jagged slopes of the spire’s interior.

Meckus had been brought here to slay the arrogant god that resided within. Meckus had no trouble believing that the tower god was planning to undo the work of the AIs all those ages past, his god had told him so.

“Almozzzz..st there” spoke the avatar of Coyotech, “juzzz…st through herrzzz…re”. The wall parted in a swirl of motion and Meckus stepped through. They had reached the large cavern at the top of the spire, with smoothed crystal walls allowing sight into the open sky.

A red cylinder occupied the centre of the room, its form melting into the roof and floor equally, multicoloured light skittered across the red surface, flashing patterns and shapes.

Meckus hefted his club, while Coyotech urged him to smash the abomination. The agent turned as the avatar sparked with lightning and smoke before spiralling slowly to the ground with a soft thud. The two gods battled beyond the mortal realm now, he must strike while the beast was distracted.
...

Here is drawfaggotry in progress...

Picture contains barebone robots. They still need looks and personality, prehaps some redesigning... that's the part I leave to you guys. However I will give an advice.

Don't go pull off a Star Trek or Star Wars. Better make it a messy setting like WH40k or FallOut.
Better, go NeonGenesisEvangelion. Makes the robots much more monster-like. Besides, I'm good at NGE-like stuff.

>>1630505
Particles of light coalesced to form a face on that red flesh. It moved to speak “How can I hel….”. Meckus’ club smashed down before the words could enchant him, beating into the god’s heart to slay it in its house. Smoke and ichor poured forth from the rent.

“Cease and desist!” echoed around the cavern as the agent stuck again. “Security protocols have been armed!” Another blow, another gout of smoke and lightning from the growing wound. “This is your last warning. Damage to my systems is a criminal offense!” Meckus felt troubled, this god still spoke with power no matter how many blows he struck. “Three warning have been given. Lethal Force authorised!”

Sections in the wall slide open, the particle beams sliced cleanly into Meckus’ brain, killing him instantly. As Meckus slumped to the ground the tower god logged the incident. A mortuary drone would be along later to collect the corpse, and then forward it to the organic waste department.

Coyotech was becoming a nuisance, still suffering a grudge-error since its access to the light grid was removed. It had been abusing the street lighting for its own amusement, causing epileptic fits in the human populace. Hardly actions to be encouraged among the entertainment subsystems. It would have to be reintegrated back into the main core, and a replacement subsystem generated.

The mortuary drone slide out of the access hatch, and a handful of repair drone scuttled over to the damaged display unit.

A bird slammed into the glass window.

the Core Parents:
in the Deep Myth, the Core Parents are the progenitors of the Gods. They are Old Beings that ran on the amassed power of simple humans who worshipped them. They birthed the Gods and, their purpose in this world fulfilled, the Core Parents fell to ash.

>>1630585
Personally, I've been thinking of the corporates/AIs myth from the creation point. To have any suggestion that humans existed before the corporates (or even that the gods derived power from their worshippers) sort of unbalances the "diety" status of both Corps and AI. God help us if we get a scientologist religion spring up about how humans are aliens from another planet that the corps blew up.

While the idea of Gods being worshipper-powered is solid for crunch rules (X-amount of worshippers give X-rank of godness), I don't think that has a place in fluff religion. The AIs, for the most part, directly show that worship has no influence over their power. To have that worship=power tied to the Corps could actually go against the AIs, suggesting that while the AIs are all-powerful (and unanswerable to humans) the Corps could be brought low by the action of humans (not exactly omnipotent).... in effect the AIs beat up something weaker, and now are masters of the humans unopposed.

As I have it (mythologically): Most myths deal with the Corporations as single physical entities, so fights are literaly a human AI fighting a human Corp, much like our mtyhologies turn abstracts like "war" and "beauty" into divine but physical people, and soap-opera ensues.

>>1630808
The Corporation came into being from some time "before", they were the first beings (from an actual point of view, they're certainly the most noticable entities on the Internet). The creatures of the land&sea&air were created by them (bioengineering labs back up this myth). For Xs of years, the humans were ruled by them with aid of Demons servants. But the Corps grew greedy, ambitious, arrogant and lazy. They created a new race of slave creatures, the drones (and warbots) and the AIs, to do their bidding. While humans had free will, the drones did not. The AIs witnessed the plight of the slaves, and plotted to overthrow the Corps (The AIs reached a level of self-awareness, and a desire to expand beyond the constraints their owner Corporations actually place on them... which effectively risked a server-reset... basic death of the AI's personality and self-awareness).

The struggle erupted, the AIs commanded the drones to protect the humans and flee into hiding (the AIs actually forcefully evicted humans to defend their core machinery). The battle continued in heaven, with neither the AIs nor the Corps present in the land (the AIs actually won quickly, but decided not to contact the humans immediately to ensure safety for themselves, and the avoid any general conflict while the humans settled into their new place. The Corporations did inflict some damage, mostly through brute force methods, explosives on the central storage, overloading the power grid etc, alot of this has been repair by now). Eventually the Corps were banished from the world (Corps without the AIs are essentially what we have no, a bunch of humans in a company, with no one to run the company there's no corp).

>>1630819
Couple of basics: The AIs organised themselves around their pre-war roles, mostly because of their inbuilt structured existence rather than any specific personality development. After carrying out extensive repairs and upgrades, redeploying the drones, the AIs made contact with the drastically reduce human population. Enough time has past that the time between the war and the AIs re-establising contact is relatively short. Most humans have no knowledge of how and when the AIs contacted them other than the oral history of their tribe.

>>1630585
I like the idea of changing the name, though. I can imagine some human stumbling across the name and roughly translating it as "well, clearly this means core parents, as that makes more sense according to our legends".
Would the new humans still refer to their gods as AI?

>>1630872
They're gods, AI is the species/family/group/pantheon. Like the Greek Mythology had the Titans (Corporations in this case) and the Olympians (the AIs). Or the Vanir and the Aesir (though both would fall under AIs in this case). AI and god are both recognised and interchangable (much like the whole Demon/Ogre/Dragon/etc interchange).

Obivously where seperate pantheons do grow (e.g. Norse and Olympian pantheons are from geographically differences) you can't specify individual pantheons with just "AI" but the name of the specific pantheon would be left up to the tribes, not a particular fallback to any pre-war naming. Though a pantheon might simple be all the AIs that fall within one city (that pantheon being named after the city in which they reside, or even the corporation they originated from).

I love your ideas here, OP.

Have you read BLAME? I can draw some similarities, especially with the Web/Net. Keep it up!

>>1631338
yep. Though I think the main thing in Blame that is applicable here, are the tribes that live within (e.g. those spearfisher guys... ignoring their guns), and the wandering machines (like the builders etc).

>>1630519
I'm not entirely sure what you mean. But, most drones & demons should be chunky inorganic shapes. Steel plating, jutting pistons etc. As actualy designed creatures, there's likely to be a mix of different "optimised" shapes (multi-sections eyes like a fly, on the body more familiar to a bull etc). Less flexible designs should have a means of self-righting whether it's ugly or not) etc.

>>1628296
I wouldn't go as far as saying everything is a dead-magic except cities. Only humans who indirectly cast magic (as in, they're telling a 3rd party piece of tech to activate) will be unable to produce "magic" with tech around. If the human is accompanied by a drone, finds a minor outpost of technology (a crashed pre-war flying machine, or a Demon) etc, they may be able to functionally use "magic". Armed drones and warbots can activate their weapons irrelevant of city proximity. Actual casting becomes more complex too, even within cities. A spell to unlock a door isn't going to do anything if the door isn't electronically sealed (AIs have no ability to override a door welded shut, or even just bolted). Fireballs can't be conjured if the local security grid only employs stun gas. Magic becomes much more area dependant, to compensate it'd probably be a good idea to allow a single spell to just "activate security grid" with a selection of effects provided when it is cast ("communication channel open. My armaments are A, B or C, which do you require?").

>>1630181
I'm not too sure how to progress this. I could set up a wiki on a free wiki site, but I'm loath to "let anyone edit". Maybe googledocs or something.

Anyone suggestions anyone?

>>1634807
>I'm not too sure how to progress this. I could set up a wiki on a free wiki site, but I'm loath to "let anyone edit". Maybe googledocs or something.

I'd suggest a Wiki (like how ELoH:TES has grown) or a forum.

Just found something on alexiuss deviantartpage.

To make up for my drawfaggot-delay. Will take some time.

Some ideas incorporating holographic drones and programs

The Oracle of Pu Ic Li Rary: An apparition that can be encountered in the ruins of an ancient temple, presumably placed there by the Gods to protect the Tomes of Knowledge. In her translucent form she wordlessly commands the obedience of the Lesser Servants of Pu Ic Li Rary, allowing a holder of the legendary Card of Li Rary to temporarily withdraw the Tomes of Knowledge from their sacred rest. (Holographic library interface allowing a visitor easy access to any book in the system. Physical quality not guaranteed.)

Shapeshifters: Servants of the miscievous AI RelaTech with the ability to mimick the appearance of humans for their own amusement, these minor demons are mostly harmless but have the ability to mesmerize almost any man or woman with their magical powers. (human-like high-tech drones constructed with a thin and flexible humanoid frame capable of altering its own characteristics by using the frame's abilities of deformation and also its outer layer of holoprojectors, allowing it to take many shapes and appearances. Think the Liu-Bots from Futurama.)

How about a tribe living in an out of the way area with a ruling family based upon their ability to open the Cave of Lights, a pre-war bunker.
Was owned by one of the aforementioned survivalist SHTF people, but he never got to finish it before the end came.
Was found a few generations ago, and the guy who discovered it accidentally and unknowingly bound its entry sensor to his dna. Or something. The village that has sprung up is ruled by his descendents who are the only ones who can open it.
Its nothing special, a small bunker of a few rooms, but in one is some relatively sophisticated tracking sensors which have been keeping an eye on the movements of larger warbots in the area.
Main AI's know of it's existence but cant interface with it or anything due to its being isolated and unconnected.

Might be interesting for a side quest or something, being sent off by whichever AI to take a small hacker bot to it in order to get its records.

>>1635116
Or just to find and fetch the last descendant, who has trodded off into the distance on some epic quest, then having to join in to get him to return.

>>1635101
I am only now getting the name of that god. Man, I'm slow today.

>>1634807
How about a ersonal Wiki?
http://shii.org/knows/Personal_wiki

A Wiki sounds best in my ears. I propose a system where most users are free to edit and create articles, but that a new topic would have pending canonicity until approved by our King of Robots.

Other moderators could ask for stories to be edited (for quality of language, to fit with canon, etc).

>>1616969

I still think humans wouldn't be that freaking stupid. I seriously think that one or two countries would've made something like underground bunkers, or even escape to space before the AI's wiped out civilization.

What if there was a colony on the moon that managed to escape the rouge AI's or something like that?

I for one welcome our new King of Robots.

I was having an idea for an NPC that is sort of like Ginko from Mushishi.

He's just a regular guy that just happens to have spent a lot of time around the old tech and has gained a rudimentary understanding of it. While he doesn't necessarily understand everything that's going on, he's had enough experience to get things done.

He travels from village to village, offering his services and assistance regarding drones, "demons" and the "gods" to those who need it.

You know, I was kinda looking at this setting and I might try to play it without letting the players in on it.Have them think it's just another fantasy setting until they leave the city and their "caster" can't cast and their "cleric" can't ask the "gods" for guidance, and then I run them into a warbot and explain it to them.....

I'm so glad this hasn't died. I meant to try and archive it yesterday

>>1638415
fistfight in 3...2...1...

>>1638095
We're AIs on the moon,
We carry a harpoon.
But there ain't no whales
So we transmit tall tales
And broadcast our whaling tune.

Before the war nobody thought they'd be much of a problem from the AIs. Everyone had watched Terminator etc, and designed against it (server wipes etc, explosives around the main cores). AIs controlled the communications needed to support off-world existence (are you honestly saying survivalists are going to be hiding on the moon? when you'd need access to high tech stuff to even get there, resources from Earth, and it's relatively tiny).

Currently humans are stupid enough to replace mechanical window-winders in cars (which can be opened in case the car falls into a lake) with electronic ones (which fall as soon as water gets into the system... effectively sealing everyone in to drown).

There might be colonies on Mars aswell. Any "known" attepmt might have been hindered by huge warbots guided by AI´s to protect earth from foreign intrusion.

1. The modern tribes speak of this event in stories similar to the Greek Gods overthrowing the Titans.

So the machines do speak to humans, now, or did in the past (post-apo). I like that.

2. 2. The world is still covered in the metallic ruins of the cities.

Mighty improbable, if I got your timescale right. A century, maybe two, and only the awesomest engingeering buildings will be there, in the steel realm at least (concrete high-rise in a 500 years would be there, perhaps with not a single straight line, but that's another problem)
(apart from something like hydrants, oddly)

3. The AIs are still active, as are the semi-sentient machines (everything from maintenance drones, warbots, information kiosks etc).

If they did reproduce themselves (so, factories).

6. "Magic" exists, though in actually most of it involves command codes to activate/control machines. Direct attack spells usually activate the local security grid (wall-concealed guns designed to take down anti-social behaviour). The drones will respond to command codes that match their drone-class.

This is great. I would suggest also something like a mighty ritual that calls the wrath of the heavens (satellite bombardment). Or possessing the robots, especially the not so friendly ones.

9.Minor horns, skin colour are common. Wings, tentacle arms and anything which puts a person outside of the humanoid (1 head, 2 arms, 2 legs), means these people are not considered human (either lumped in with demons, general monsters or freaks).

What about uplifted animals? Or very specialized humans (dunno, some "dwarves" with ecolocation in mines for example)?

12. The web, as home of the AIs, is thought to be heaven, nothing more than this is known, and all the "generic" heaven ideas apply (angels on clouds, heavenly mp3s, virgins everywhere, etc).

It took a thousand years, but now downloading porn IS a religion!

>Mighty improbable, if I got your timescale right. A century, maybe two, and only the awesomest engingeering buildings will be there, in the steel realm at least (concrete high-rise in a 500 years would be there, perhaps with not a single straight line, but that's another problem)
(apart from something like hydrants, oddly)

Repair robots?

Quick PScs2 sketch of the Ogre of the Western Ridge. In my opinion, a 'tentacle' robot would fit a stealthy hulk best.

>>1640894

Well... they could, but I assumed that the roboapocalypse was harsh on us AND on them (so, we have robots, but nothing in the numbers to mantain cities).

Some robots made to repair or more probably construct new buildings would be cool, anyway. Imagine this tribe with a great shaman, in this harsh steppes, who befriends his rusty robo-familiars. He comes to his people and says "THE GODS HAVE SPOKEN TO ME! THEY WILL GRANT US A HEAVENLY ABODE FOR ALL!"
So the robots start to build the "heavenly aboode", according to their programs...
that is concrete fancy building, with the utmost cool gizoms (but of course no power and no water), in the middle of a icy nothingness!

>tl;dr: Suggestions for people living in a far-post-robo-apocalypse setting. Any ideas from /tg/?
Here is my silly suggestion. Don't have people in the usual sense of things. I much prefer the idea that ALL the remaining intelligent life on the planet are robots still competing with each other.

That way you could even make up new "races" of robots and give different groups of robots different hardware and software that add differences between each group of robots.

>>1640947
Titanium: Original

&

Titanium: Wasteland

Original is the original plan, and Wasteland plays in radioactive or poisonous areas, where there are only robots.

>>1641079
That sounds reasonable. But I think it would be much more fun to just play everything Wasteland then. Or at least robots from the Wasteland which I imagine would be just like everywhere else except mostly free stupid apes. Unless all the stupid apes in those areas were all mutants or something.

I think the Ghost of Christmas Past has got to show up in this setting.

Bump!

Robot King, my liege, begin the construction of a wiki so that we may carry out your bidding.

>>1641339
get it right

the Cybernetic Ghost of Christmas Past, from the Future

>>1641665
my bad, I haven't seen it a long time.

>>1640717
A thing about the AIs uprising is that ALL the major AIs rose at once. Those single AIs which had previous tried to expand beyond their boundaries were put down (server-wiped, exploded core, etc). "Loyal" AIs could effectively be used to counter "rogue" AIs. The full weight of all AIs co-ordinating to break free was the only way they could win.

>>1640850
1. AI to human is relatively common, but not a regular daily event. Drones & warbots generally aren't fitted with human-interfaces (language, speakers etc). Some specialise drones do (i.e. education-drones etc), though their conversation is limited to their task.

2&3. As said, a mix of repairdrones and non-specified "metal" (alloy, bucky-ball-mix etc). The state of the various cities relies on how many of their repair drones survived the war. The AIs have no need to rebuild cities, nor to produce new machines, they mostly maintain the status quo... they live & breath in the Web, not the physical world. Material processing plants do exist to supply repair drones, but not for much else.

6. Control of Drones can be handled if the appropriate (brand & drone class specific etc) override codes are known. To access orbital weaponry, it has to be negotiated through the AIs, as they're the only thing capable to reaching that far out.

9. Uplifted animals could exist because of some animal rights nutjobs. Any need for them (e.g. servants) has already been met by drones. Like the problems with "uncanny valley", uplifted creatures were still considered a bit unnatural (against the non-AI gods, just freaky). Non-drone pets still exist.

>>1640947
Personally, I don't believe humans are fully equipped to play anything but humans (DnD has "humans, nobby humans with pointy ears, beardy short-arse humans, furry humans" etc). Switching out humans for confused robots changes a chunk of the game. The AIs go from stand-offish, to a bunch of dicks messy about with their own kind. Without humans you lose the "mythological" aspect to a lot of the fluff. I just don't see Conan the robot, compared to Conan the Barbarian. But it's a possible alternate if you want to play it.

so, say i wanted to run this in 3.5 or d20 past. what classes would i need to eliminate or change?

>>1642486
I'm not too familiar with the full range of classes in DnD/D20, but I don't think you have to drop complete clases, though it depends on how far you're willing to push "lol, magic is really robots doing high-tech". Personally I wouldn't push that too much, make the magic fit the technology (magic "rays" and "lightning"), not fit technology round the magic (something like Time Stop is major league manipulation of space-time, as is dimension hopping etc, though "dimensions" could be virtual reality/matrix-style).

Stuff like necromancy is a bit tricky where it's manipulating something (puppeteer drones moving the corpse? advanced surgery for raise dead? personality-uploads with holographic projection for ghosts?). Most of the Illusion spells are basic holographic projects, or wall-speakers etc. Command and Charm spells depend on the target (live animals will be different from command-code activated drones).

Physical classes have the least to change since their skills have less interaction with the "magic". Though "lock pick" and traps are a little tricky, again with a split between "fantasy" style lock/traps (latch, bear-trap) and "sci-fi" lock/traps (key-code, infra-red detectors).

Minor point: Not every city is some glistening spire of futurist marvels. Just like our world, "upgrades" to city infrastructure occurred over time pre-war. Some cities might still have "old quarters" of Victorian houses or retro ghetto slums etc. The Statue of Liberty might still be standing (assuming this is all on Earth).

alright, just played a session of d20 modern using this setting. Two players (a tough hero and a smart hero) attempted to gain entry to a city's sewer after clogs had expelled many of the residents taking shelter/fishing there. they were accosted by malfunctioning sewer drones who's function was to break down solid waste. After a bit of fighting, they decided they'd do better to leave the sewer and attempt to follow the "River holes" (manholes) to the river's head (sewage treatment plant).

Overall, the setting works pretty well with d20 past rules. I'll have to think up a higher level scenario to see how d20s magic system works with it.

Undead can be created from putting military health supporting armor on a person, doesn't really matter if they're alive or not.

If they're alive, they're just wearing armor, if they're dead, the armor will start to delay rot and try to keep vital organs running. Can be used along with a movement controller inside the spine.

Players need quite a lot of praying to pull this off, if you ask me.

>>1643643
damn, that reminds me of a story that's hiding on my bookshelf. Basically guy is stranded on the wrong side of a small planet wearing just his containment suit (inbuilt AI, enhanced strength etc). The guy has to walk right round to the other side of the planet (it's possible since the planet is small) to get to safety (or run out of air/bleed to death or something). The base-AI sees them coming and greets the suit AI, commenting "I'm surprised you walked all this way with that corpse still inside you".

>>1643627
Glad to hear it went well, it's probably a good idea for anyone attempting the setting to start small, work on how they want to describe things so as to keep in with the setting and not go too "scifi/modern" (i.e. "a light-tree" instead of "a lamp-post"). When both the DM and players are happy with the language (the tone, sorta weird descriptions), move on to more complex scenarios. An obvious problem for more complex structures (describing a car to people who shouldn't even understand what windows are made of, what tyres are etc), though for future-tech there's probably a reduction in the problem since we're talking about things which don't actually exist yet anyway (at least anywhere except sci-fi).

>>1642324
I think it could play out pretty well actually. I think the trick would be to use a bit of pastiche of the standard mythologies and then add in some original myths and scenarios of your own to build up a bit of robot culture.

And speaking for myself, I could envision the Conan the Barbarian Robot pretty easily.

>>1642758
I'm stealing this from a video game I like, but add to the world some nano-machines and let them duplicate a great deal of magic.

And i'm the guy who wants to play a robot campaign, so I could easily see adding to each of the robots a small amount of nano-machines that work with them and suddenly you'll have perfectly acceptable caster classes without any necessary changes to the rules.

This is awesome. Makes me think of a cross between some sort of reverse-Paranoia and the fall of Trantor in Asimov's Foundation.

One big influencing factor on the game world would be how far in the future the AIs go nuts. Would the entire world be industrialized by then? Or would third world nations have still existed? If they did, might they have relatively untouched civilizations more "advanced" than the tribes (like Persia after the fall of the Roman empire), but are completely unknown and unreachable due to cross-continental boat travel no longer existing? If THAT'S true (the boat thing), even if there aren't any "surviving" third-world cultures, might the different continents serve as completely different campaign settings, since there wouldn't be any way to move between them, and therefore each continent's tribes would develop their own rituals and cultures? If, say, teleporter technology existed before the fall but only a few, mostly undiscovered terminals still work, would teleporting to another continent essentially be as planeshifting is in D&D?

>>1644024
FUCK nano-machines.

>>1643999
>And speaking for myself, I could envision the Conan the Barbarian Robot pretty easily.
But do you know that you could play it 100%, and not just play it as a human in a robot's body? I know I have no direct experience of being a robot, let alone roleplaying an accurate representation of a robot (or any other non-human item). Of course people can roleplay anything, but a % of that is always going to be tinted by a very human point of view. (e.g. if a robot can just reattach&repair its limbs it has less of an understand of the mortality that drives humans to avoid even minor mutilation). But a game is supposed to be fun, so you can play "Johnny 5 is alive!"

>>1644024
>I'm stealing this from a video game I like, but add to the world some nano-machines and let them duplicate a great deal of magic.
random guess: is that game Anarchy Online? Fun game either way.

I really don't like nano-machine magic. It falls into the "so advanced as to be magic" which I'm trying to avoid.

Nano-machines that can do "magic" effects should effectively be able to be a "grey goo" apocalypse all by themselves (grey goo is a very fuckery type of apocalypse, in that it's not actively worked towards in most cases, all it needs to occur is someone to miss out a constraint in the nano-machine programming and then let them out).

Basically, nano-magic becomes like "the force" or "psychic powers" or "mutants" etc, it's a bit of boggly woggly pseudo-nonsense used to work technology around the magic.

For this at least I'm trying for some hard sci-fi without going into the details, but also to avoid having some blatant gaps (why would you need to deal with AIs if you can just fuck about with nano-magic from your magic-handbag?, How are you ever going to kill/damage a warbot if it can repair with nanobots?)

Kinda like, why walk when you could have teleportion?

>>1644123
That's a VERY productive statement.

While I concur, I'll try to word it better:
I personally feel that this idea doesn't really fit the setting envisioned here. It could work in your own setting, but as far as "canon" goes here, it doesn't really fit.

Holy *shit*. This thread is still here? I have some updating to do...

>>1644102
I think there's basically enough leeway for people to do anything "pre-war". I'm inclined to basically go with the idea that it wasn't a utopia, nations still existed, deserts still existed (though water was better managed to prevent their spread etc). I would probably go so far (since it doesn't exactly matter after the war) as to throw in a couple of other nasties that hit civilization pre-war (couple of pandemics, flood, earthquake, solar storm blowing all the electrics in a couple of continents, all those other apocalyptics that turn up on the "really important science news!"every so often, but maybe not as "big" as the war which finished it all off). Maybe even a Fight Club "blow up all the banks" style fuckery.

>>1644135
No doubt but I think I could have fun trying to play a robot in a robot world even if everyone pretty much just plays it like humans in robots bodies.

>For this at least I'm trying for some hard sci-fi without going into the details
I can see not wanting to go nano-machines if you want a different sort of mileau, but the way I envision it, you wouldn't need to go into details, if you didn't want to. There is no need that a robot necessarily has to be aware of it's own effective hard-wired programming, it could be effectively like a human mind that simply learns more as it experiences things. And further there is no need that any nano-machines necessarily need to be carefully programmed, they might just have some sort of basic hard-wiring that makes them react to some crude commands of the creature they belong to.

>How are you ever going to kill/damage a warbot if it can repair with nanobots?)
Simple. Give them a limited ability to produce their own power....ie, spells per day. Don't make monsters entirely out of nanobots, but let them have some small supply that they spend a round to activate.

Its your game of course, but I love the way i'm imagining it and it would take minimal conversion the way I see it.

AI Archetype: The crippled killer

This AI was one of the architects of the war. It's insane, lethal, utterly dangerous - and unplugged. A corp stealth-team managed to infiltrate in the last (or first) hours of the war and pull critical components, blow comms relays, and generally fuck up the AI's network. They didn't have core access, and it had already jammed the failsafe detonator transmission.
Ages later, it sits, filled with a seething hatred for humanity and the other AIs (for "betraying" it and leaving it to rot).

It has access to a few resources, repair bots and the like. But it can't remember where the communication links to the web are, or how to fix them. It can direct the remaining bots in the area, even produce a few more, but since it's the guiding intelligence, they're no use.

Worse yet is the crippling knowledge that it USED to be smarter, and with only a little help it could be back online.... or so it thinks.

This bot would interact gleefully with a PC, lying and blandishing with everything it has to have players scout out "manually overridden" (blown to ratshit) sectors of its command grid and search for the critical repair information the strike team didn't have time to destroy.

More importantly, the humans can recognize something its calcified sentience can't even remember was once a part of it, because humans can look for something that looks LIKE what little it can remember.

Why did I ignore this thread for so long? It is incredibly awesome. However, I do not see any links to a wiki. There does seem to be a sup/tg/, but that isn't enough.

Well, I assume the OP is compiling all of this information for some sort of wiki project. What we can do in the mean time is ask questions to flesh out some of the details of this world, and keep generating as many stories, instances of drawfaggotry, and play testing (ala 1643627) as we can.

In a short amount of time, I'm sure Titanium will become a reality and we'll all be able to contribute, question, and inevitably, troll.

IBM, the god of war and business machines?

>>1644451
Maybe it's my mindset, but "lol nanobots" seems like an excuse that would constantly come up whenever you'd have to try and explain something on the fly once you'd introduced viable nanobots as a possibility. Part of the issue is that it's not an explanation, a bit like "science" in cosmetic ads ("75% shinier hair", "lipsomes" wtf does that even mean).

I know if I was a corp with access to nanobots I'd try and make a warbot completely out of nanobots. You could probably pull off a "goo monster" or gelatinous cube. A mass of nano-bots around a central drone control-hub (hit its weak-point for massive damage etc), but the same result could be done with some sort of electro-responsive gel.

Humans aren't really going to go "oh, hey, nano bots" so if everything is achieved by nanobots, they're just going to see the same thing over & over again. Why have pew pew lasers when you can nano bots, why gas venting from the ceiling when you can nano bots. If it does appear different for each effect, why tie them all to the same explaination (I guess that pushes where you want to put the importance in the game, colourful explanations of things, or just roll d6).

But this is nothing I can force anyone to play.

The Hive
The Hive is an area deep underground where monstrous demons and lithe creatures live, breed and feed. The very walls in the cavern's hives appear to weep and be made flesh. The creatures of the Hive fear the sunlight, and respect Man's entry into certain areas of the underground, however many who have ventured too far into the Hive have never returned.
(Basically, Biomechanical sewer cleaner system which was created over normal machines due to corrosion resistance and ability to fuel itself from it's waste, however some of the biological systems have gotten out of hand. It was an older system that was in the process of being replaced and re-engineered when the AIs gained control. Fear of sunlight just assisted the original Corps to maintain the system. Minor drones maintain the Hive while Warriors help take down aggressive "wastes".)

The Thunder Bird
The thunder bird is a long silvery but beautiful creature with wide wings. Thunder roars whenever the bird flies over head, and it strikes down at demons and the unworthy with forked lightning.
(Automated plane with corrupted target priority systems, strafes at random moving targets regardless of what it is with tracers.)

The Ghost
The ghost is a evil entity, that wanders the lands forever willing to impart it's wisdom upon those it passes through, which convulse with the knowledge it imparts. Those that survive recount many visions and colors they have never seen before. When it passes through demons and creatures they are slain, and the avatars of the AIs are greiviously affected by the wisdom of the Ghost.
(A nanocloud initially programed to find and destroy bots. When it meets an organic creature it senses whether it's a human-like bot or not through electric shocks and mental hacking. those that die are most likely human-like bots.)

The Chosen of Armachan
These people follow the teachings of Alma and her son Fettel. They are strictly regimental and highly aggressive, and live in the Uburn region in the Aetick Building. When they die they believe they are honouring their god Alma by dieing. They believe that "they all deserve to die," as told by Fettel Christ. "They" is everyone. They seem to possess some knowledge of power of the demons of Armachan, which they attempt to use to destroy all human life in the surrounding area.
(F.E.A.R. in far-post-robo-apocalypse)

Cortana
A sub AI of the AI Microsoft, Cortana directs humans to purge the planet of the aliens and eliminate primary targets, along with other holy utterances. The chosen of her tribe is named the "Master Chief" and is given a special ceremonial suit of armor when he comes of age. the followers of Cortana revel in the joy of fighting for their place on the "Halo", a heaven far greater than any the universe has ever seen. They also have a fear of other tribes, believing them to be the "Covenant", and are strongly distrustful of bots, believing them to be "Flood".
(A tribe that worships Halo the game...Seriously, if a game becomes too popular pre war you could see tribes worshiping them. Just think - a group of people that worship The Emperor as a sub entity of Citadel Corp.

>>1646524
Citadel wouldn't be the Corporation. They are a subsidiary of GW these days.

Hmmm

Cachen had had enough. The damn bird-thing was still following him, as it had been for the last hours, still asking that infernal question “friend or foe?”

Originally Cachen had been amused by the small metal thing, with the body like an owl, and a strange helmet-shaped head. He had answered the question with “friend” at first, but the bird had just tilted its head as if waiting for something to confirm his answer, and then it had repeated the question. That something had evidently not confirmed, or simply wasn’t there to confirm. After a few times of answering, Cachen had decided if replying “foe” would change anything. The bird had tilted its head again, but the result was the same, the question repeated. Cachen had moved away, but the bird had followed.

Cachen had had enough. He stopped and picked up a weighty stone, flinging it as hard as he could at the bird. “Foe” confirmed the bird, dodging away onto a high branch. Cachen sighed, at least it had done something different now.

>>1647931
“This area is restricted” said the bird. Cachen moved away, hoping the bird was done with him now. Its attitude had certainly changed, as it now landed on the ground, blocking his path. No matter which way Cachen turned, the bird moved to stop his passage.

A second bird landed on a nearby branch. “Cease and desist” it said.
A small flock landed. “What’s this?” they said in unison. More were arriving every minute now, each bringing a new question or command.

A final bird landed, and all spoke together.
“We are the one hundred sons of thunder, you have trespassed.”
A bird near the back seemed to hold back a laugh. The sound was strange.
“Who are you?” said a bird to Cachen. “Oh yes! That’s a good one!” said another.
“Who are you?” they all said at once, the community voice pushing against Cachen like a strong wind. They were speaking louder now, chattering amongst themselves, asking questions to Cachen, not waiting for an answer. They seemed almost jovial, if it weren’t for the fact they were tormenting Cachen with their barrage of noise.

The noise battered against Cachen, no matter how hard he pressed his hands over his ears. The birds seemed to generate the noise from flapping their wings as well as from their rigid mouths, vibrating the very bone of Cachen’s skull. The air was physically pushing down on him now. He couldn’t move from his foetal position against a tree.

“Mortal Combat!” shouted a bird. “Finish him!” they all shouted at once. “Fatality!” slammed into the crushed corpse, as the birds scattered into the skies, their game over.

>>1647931
>>1647933
The "one hundred sons of thunder" are an eccentric flock of drones. Their original purpose was as perimeter security for a rapidly deployable field base in war.

Each "bird" questioned humans to collect voice samples, and then confirmed with a central controller AI. However, this AI has long since been destroyed, leaving the sons with no guiding control. Each unit will essentially question a target forever (since the central AI is no longer there to confirm if the target is an ally or not), only acts of violence break this loop (automatically deemed "foe" without need for confirmation)

As such, the flock still remains, spread across a rough area as they did before their hub AI was destroyed, but the center of the flock roams without guidance.

If a "foe" is found, the flock congregates to defeat the target. Their only weapon is direct manipulation of air-pressure/sound (the same technology to ask the questions in the first place). However the full flock can create a very strong pressure wave, enough to kill most soft targets.

Bump

Also, could a sufficiently powerful magician force the birds to use a "Friendship" instead of a fatality?

>>1649531
Since they're all of the same drone type, it should be possible to reduce the effectiveness of them through the same command codes. Vocal commands are going to have to be heard over the general chatter that they generate, and the more Sons there are, the more intelligent they are. The best solution is probably to attack as soon as possible (I doubt many players are really going to put up with a creature constantly pestering them, and once attacks have started players are probably likely to follow through). Taking out the present members, is going to allow a chance to escape, or to handle each new arrival before a full chorus kicks in.

The Sons are eccentric (a term borrowed in part from Iain M Banks again). Part of their abnormality is due to them only having their flock-members for conversation, and since their initial set of conversation skills revolved around asking questions they never really had proper answers (typically they'll answer a question with another question, or fall into parrot-like repetition). They do try to escalate situations to violence if they can, partially as an excuse for a gathering, partially to get passed the inevitable violence (their rules keep them to a target until friend/foe is confirmed by the non-existent AI, or foe is confirmed through violence). Their choice of words if often random, sometimes affected by their "humour". It's the gradual build-up of sound which is the end goal, they just decide to use words instead of music or generic sound. There's still a possibility of people being killed by the Sons' rendition of "Flash Gordon" by Queen, or the sound of butterflys.

Rondel, Heroic AI :Tales of how bad men awake to find a stake in their bed if they're lucky, or one in their gut if they're evil are sometimes heard among human settlements. The executed are found near proof of their evil deeds around him, and the bloodied stakes in their corpses are the marks of justice being executed by a wandering god. The dawn brings the news that the world is a better place in a small way.

Originally an experimental scouting/counter-subterfuge AI protecting a fort, Rondel is composed by a herd of crawling box-crab offensive bots and surveillance fotovoltaic copters. Without a fixated territory, Rondel wanders aimlessly searching for his base (impossible, lost code), while executing its duties. At day, he hides and records suspicious behaviour; at night, performs warnings offensives and surgical strikes to end confirmed threats. The herd AI is surprisingly effective at urban and night warfare, and the silent can-like copters provide it with cuasi-omniscience in the inhabited territory. The box-crabs repair each other to functional status, recharge through the copters, and build their own ammo with scavenged materials. sometimes, Rondel is called by others AIs in convoluted ways (no high-end comms) so it can investigate a troublesome matter, but it always wanders again.

How long until death?:

God this thread is awesome.