HotGO

[lorddemon]

Dauntless Class cruiser Divine Sight was cruising towards the base.
Ensign Williams was again on watch.Captain was sitting on his chair, observing the crew. However, they were far off the used paths, so odds of encounter were small. No-one was expecting any contacts before reaching outsrirts of base, so the contact alarm caught everyone by surprise.
"Energy transmission detected, bearing 292-132, extreme range, capital ship ."

Captain Naike was the first to recover.
"Ensign. Report."
Williams was hard at work.
"Unknown, sir. The logic engines have not yet recognized the ship. "
"Then what do we know?"
Williams glanced at the data.
"Tonnage somewhat greater then most Imperial or heretic cruisers. Reading heavy weaponry."
"Is it a hulked vessel?" Naike asked?
"Negative captain. Shields are operational. Reading life aboard. Engines..." A red light flashed aboard the screen.
"Captain! They are changing course to intercept."
"Change course, keep distance."
"Captain, we got incoming torpedoes!"
"Evasive manouvers! Ring battle klaxon."
Red lights started flashing, siren was sounding it's low long wail. Manouvers of the ship could be felt through the vibrations of the hull, and the increasing hum of the engines.
"Sir, we have more incoming, I don't think we can evade all of them!"
"How long till they hit us, ensign?"
"30 seconds. 25."
"Brace for Impact! Close blast doors!"
Defense turret fire could be heard through the hull. Everyone was itchy, and waiting. Things quieted down.
"Damage report."
"No damage on torpedoes captain. We made it."
Explosion rocked the ship. The wall of the command deck buckled first, then just shattered into pieces and send millions of steel fragments and molten drips spinning in the bridge. For a second, Williams could see the stars and nebulas with his bare eyes. They looked beautiful, now that there was nothing between him and them.

Divine Sight never returned into base. It was listed as missing in action, and 10 years later as having been destroyed in action. Hulk was never recovered, even though a rogue trader in the area later found smaller hull pieces that were traced back to ship. All pieces had blastmarks on them, seeming to confirm the fate ofDivine sight.

More to follow, Let the wild speculations begin. Let's just say that this DOES relate to game. ;D

[Yurrath (aka Rezzy)]

Hmmm, what are the clues...

They were far off the used paths - unlikely to be Imperial or Rogue Traders?

Capital ship

Tonnage somewhat greater then most Imperial or heretic cruisers. - Battleship? Necrons (do they even use torps?)? Demiurg?

Heavy weaponry. - Could be anything, but indicates abover cruiser size.

Shields are operational. Reading life aboard. Engines - Not Nids.

Incoming torpedoes (I don't think we can evade all of them!) - Tau? Missile Hell?

I'm stumped.

[lorddemon]

You will get rules information at the start of turn 4.

[Ravager Zero]

Necrons have no torps, so it rules them out.
Tau batteries are quite weak (relatively speaking), so they're out too.
Chaos, Tau, Eldar, Imperial and Ad Mech are already here, so they can be ruled out.
Nids have no engines, and their torp salvos are small, so it's not them.
The ships were large, which rules out Dark Eldar (also because they were detected easily)

To my mind, that leaves Orks.
Orks can have large torpedo salvos, they have some very heavy guns, and their rokks and space hulks outmass most other ships, as well as being hard to identify specifically as any class of ship.

[Wargamer]

Whatever it is, it sounds like valuable Arcanotech to me...

The Adeptus Mechanicus are in pursuit.

[Dom of Gears]

I'm thinking Demiurg. Large, lots of heavy weaponry, and they fit the rest of the description. The only problem there is that I can't imagine Demiurg being so aggressive...

Nicely written, by the way.

[lorddemon]

Administratum Scribe (third class) Augustus was doing his normal daily routines, checking data collected by Imperial long range observation bases. Thousands of reports passed through his hands daily. His task was simply to pick the important from the non important, and deliver them to his superior Theodore (Administratum Scribe, second class), who would in turn pick the important of those, and deliver them to his superior. After few more supervisers they would end in Imperial archives.

Augustus was quite happy. He had a quiet section of space to moinitor, and while there were many reports, very few turned out to be important. This saved him from having to work with his superiors. Unfortunately, the repot that had arrived was about to change it. It seemed real, and was marked extremely important. And it was three weeks old. Augustus considered for a moment "losing" the report, but decided not to. If the information of such act came out, he would be tortured to death for failing the emperor. He still might get executed, but atleast it would be fast and somewha painless. He decided to take the storm, and headed to Theodore's office with the report in hand. The maze like structure of the archive was filled with low level scribes and servitors, each doing their work. Augustus passed them without a glance, trying to hurry but at the same time trying to look as normal as possible. After a long walk he reached Theodore's office, and entered.

Office was small, but tidy. Theodore was reading some reports by his desk, when Augustus arrived. He raised his look to Augustus, and was about to say something, when Augustus simply interrupted him.

"Sir, I think you must see this at once. It is urgent."
Theodore seemed a bit surprised by such breac of protocol. For a long moment, he stared the report Augustus was offering to him. He grabbed it, and started to read silently. Augustus could see his face changing, but couldn't interpret the expression. Theodore finished reading the Report, and put the paper on his desk. His face was blank again, and when he spoke, his sound caused chills in Augustus' spine.
"Scribe third class Augustus, I couldn't help notice this report is dated over three weeks ago."
Augustus felt nauseous.
"well, Sir, it's ..."
Theodore waved him quiet with a simply hand gesture.
"Am I to assume you are heavily behind in your work? Swamped by tasks eh?"
"Sir, you see..."
Another hand wave.
"Well, Scribe third class Augustus." each word was said slowly, and clearly pronounced. This caused another shiver in Augustus' spine.
"As it seems you are way behind in your work, I won't be keeping you any longer. I suggest you get back to your work. This matter is closed."
"But sir..."
This time there was no wave. Simple glance from Theodore was enough. The words died in Augustus', before leaving his mouth.
"I said, this matter is closed."
Augustus could only nod, and hurried out of the door.

Theodore read the report again after Augustus had left. It was real. This required actions. He turned to the logic engine.
"Prepare a data transmission to Carelia sector, to all imperial forces. And get me all the information we have on code words "Green Orktober."

[lorddemon]

Hunt of the Green Orktober

Green Orktober is a Ork vessel, commanded by famous independent ork captain Mork-o Ram'us. This ship is responsible for atleast three confirmed kills on Imperial Capital ships, dozens of raids in imperial worlds and has been known to cripple Space marine battlebarge "Holy trident". The ship is independent, not recognizing any waaagh or warboss of Orks. Mork-o is wanted dead by pretty much every race he has come up against(or will come up against as he is such a charming personality). As for their purpose of action in the Carelia sector, it is unknown. Only sure thing is, that they are there for a while, for their own reasons, and in the end, they leave. What damages they leave in their wake is unknown. What is also known, is that whoever catches the Green Orktober is in for lots of fame.

Actual game effect
Green Orktober is now viable as Intel information (you may get information about it's whereabouts via intel in the beginning of the turn). It moves like other ships, it will cause battle if it is in same sector as any other ship, and it is independent. (I control it, or in a pinch relinquish the control to someone else for a turn or two. Anyone who Cripples the Green Orktober(but fails to do more) will get +3 to their renown. Anyone destroying the ship gets a +6. Anyone capturing the ship gets +10 to the renown. In engagements Mork-o is always assumed to be the captain with more renown. (for renown calculations afterwards)

Technical info
Green Orktober is a Ork Hammer class Battlekroozer (Can be found here)
With following upgrades:
It carries Ork warlord (Mork-o Ram'us)
-Mork-o Ram'us is LD 8 ork commander with 2 re-rolls.
The ship he is on is allowed to reroll the weapon strenght dice when shooting, but the second roll stands even if it is worse. The ship also counts as having "Excellent pilots" crew skill, allowing his fighter bombers to gain benefits of said skill (both the bomber and fighter part)
-Ship has Extra power shield.
-Ship has GPS

GPS stands for "Grot Propulsion System"
This is a new type of completely undetectable propulsion method the ship uses. They can cut normal engines, and via specially designed airlocks release thousands of grots into the vacuum in the thruster mounts. In the vacuum the Grots bodies expand and explode, causing thrust which propels the ship.

The method is not fast, but it leaves no energy trail, and causes any ship nearby to get get sensor distortions from the grot bodyparts that hit the sensors. There are not enough grots onboard to run only on this propulsion, but it can be used as a disengage tactic. Therefore, the ship with Grot Propulsion system gets +3 to first disengage roll they attempt. However, as they only have limited amount of grots, if they fail to disengage they must use normal methods, and don't get the +3 bonus anymore.

Green Orktober(with Mork-o) is priced at 400 pts for renown purposes