Halo Devices as Adeptus Mechanicum experiments gone bad

[Ironshield 0]

Hello people.

In a couple of weeks we are rebooting our DH campaign and this tme i will be DM'ing a longer campaign, but i am unsure as to what it should concern.

After having a look in DotDG i stumbled upon the "Halo Devices" and an idea started forming in my head. My group has in the past wished for a campaign with more AdMech involvement so i also want that to be a central part of the overall plot.

Suppose that when the halo stars were first explored by an Adeptus mechanicus explorator fleet the halo devices where found on a yet to be named, dead, planet (I say the halo devices because i want there to be a finite number of them, at least for the time being). The devices were brought back to the Lathe worlds where they where sealed away beneath layer upon layer of adamantine, plasteel and hexagramic wards.

The original discoverer of the Halo devices, Archmagos Khronus, an at the time aging magi, quickly embraced the power of the halo devices and hid them for himself. Slowly the corruption spread through his body, turning him to a monster of unspeakable horror, both physically, but most of all psychologically.

When the explorator fleet set sail for the Lathes Khronus was already well into the second stage of his transformation, and when the fleet finally returned and the authorities discovered what Khronus had become they instantly stripped him of all ranks and sentenced him to death for heresy against the Omnissiah and the Emperor of Mankind. Khronus, or whatever the thing he now had become was, followed the orders of his superior’s without question, until the day of his execution. Nothing could kill him, injections of the most powerful neurotoxins available to the mechanicum, powerful electric shocks, the armoury of the adeptus mechanicus, nothing could touch the obsidian coloured, carapace clad hulk.

After days of trying without success the thing finally became tired, or rather, it became hungry, breaking it's shackles with ease before going on a wild rampage through the prison facility, and on to the rest of (yet to be named world in the lathe system), before being utterly obliterated from orbit by the lance of a strike cruiser. When inquisition and AdMech investigation teams arrived at the scene following the orbital strike the discovered, not surprisingly, a large crater. What they did not expect was the small black piece of unidentified material lying in the centre of said crater. Slowly but surely it grew and started resembling what had just been destroyed. In all haste the still growing organism was transported to one of the mechaincus’ deep vaults on the lathes. Not being able to destroy it, the beast was sealed inside the deepest vault available, where the beast still lies, watching, waiting, getting hungry, very, very hungry.

The contents of Khronus’ vessel were examined and catalogued. Among them were several other halo devices like the one found in the impact crater, 14 to be exact. Seeing what they had done to a man they too were sealed away in the deepest vaults available, and there they rest, waiting for some poor soul to breach the sealed bulkheads and open the vault doors so that their eternal hunger can be satisfied…

That is the pitch for the backstory of the campaign.

In present time the campaign will begin with the acolytes investigation a smuggler cartel, moving from drugs and weapons to more serious stuff like forbidden tomes, arcotech, xeno weaponry & technology, and during this they will get on the trail of the missing Halo devices.

I plan on the acolytes visiting the lathes to find out more about the exact nature of the halo devices (the only information available to the layman inquisitor is rumors).

Furthermore I plan on them eventually visiting the Halo stars and the dead world where the devices were found.

My question is twofold: What are you guys’ opinion so far? Is this too far fetched or? And second, I need a villain, but I’m not sure how to play it, Khronus is an obvious boss fight (when they find out just how to kill the thing), but seeing that he is locked safely away, who should be the mastermind to begin with? I am thinking some sort of Magos obsessed with the halo stars (but who knows the danger of the devices) who studied them, but I am not sure how they would have gotten out that way, and a break in to a vault which is probably guarded by a substantial force of soldiers, skitarii, etc. seems weird and impossible.

Concerning the apperant immortality of Khronus: I plan on the 3^rd stage device to be (almost) immortal. It will have some sort of anathema, maybe found at the Halo stars?

[guest308838 122]

Nice. Perhaps I can provide some ideas.

 

How about a magos who has heard about the beast in the vaults and would like to acquire the same ´invulnerabilty´? Let’s assume he has a good reason for such a desire. Perhaps he wants to perform research & development and knows his fellows will try to kill him for it. Perhaps he belongs to some banned cult within the AdMech?

 

Anyway, he knows about the halo devices and has heard some rumours about their effect but can’t actually get his hands (or mechandrites) on them as they are stored in a vault, protected and guarded by skitarii, wards and the prohibition by the Lathe cog lords. Nor can he openly study them.

 

So he comes up with a plan, so cunning, it went to Oxford and became a case study used by the professor of cunning. He will let the inquisition do the donkey work so he can swoop in and steal them.

 

The magos already had some dealings through middlemen with a minor smuggling gang whom he supplied with weapons from the lathe forges. He now uses those middlemen to send the gang out to hunt down ‘xenotech’, especially the halo devices. He arranges for them to be noticed by the inquisition who will naturally want to know why these halo devices are so popular.

 

The villain hopes (and will try to arrange this) the inquisition will research the halo devices thus finding out what they actually can do and will try to scare the inquisition into believing they are not properly protected in the vaults of the AdMech. Only the inquisition has the power to force the AdMech to hand them over. Once out of the vault, he will attack the vessel transporting them back to the tricorne and steal them.

 

Obviously, the inquisition will suspect the beast from having a hand in this. But the beast is innocent and will use this opportunity to bargain for his own release and banishment from Imperial space in exchange for his help as he can actually track the halo devices (he feels them somehow). The beast can either be sincere in his desire to just leave the Imperium or he can try to double cross your players once they have located the halo devices, thus affording you a battle against a truly dangerous opponent. Or your players can try to double cross the beast (who is virtually indestructible).

 

And the villain will have his own lair on some abandoned moon mining facility, filled with murder & gun servitors (or cultists) where he has stashed the halo devices. Perhaps he has even bonded with one, increasing his abilities (stage 1).