# Machine Spirit? What is it and why is it only in some vehicles?



## Stephen_Newman (Jul 14, 2009)

A thing that has bugged me a lot is about the Power of the Machine Spirit rule on Land Raiders. I suppose my quries could be summed as:

1. What is a Machine Spirit?

2. Why do Chaos Land Raiders not get a Machine Spirit?

3. Why does a Stormraven have a Machine Spirit but not other vehicles?

4. Where did Machine Spirits came from?

Any help out there?


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## normtheunsavoury (Mar 20, 2008)

As far as I know the Machine Spirit exists within all machinery to some degree or another.
You have to keep in mind that even something as simple as a calculator is, to the Ad Mech at least, a sacred and holy object.


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## aboytervigon (Jul 6, 2010)

1.Theres no such thing as a machine spirit The admech are just confused on how it works.
2.There circuitry is probably modified
3.Its just got more advanced protocols every vehicle has the "machine spirirt"
4.Its just confusion, the Admech dont know how it works so the believe its a god the closest thing to the machine spirit is the void dragon.


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## Giant Fossil Penguin (Apr 11, 2009)

As far as I'm aware, a Machine Spirit is a type of, but not actually a, Artificial Intelligence.
The deep past of the Age of Strife talks about a conflict which many take to mean Humanity's sentient machines turning on their masters and going to war. Humanity won, but the legacy is that in all the time since there is a ban on creating what have become known as 'Abomanible Intelligence'.
However, such a machine is incredibly useful, so the AdMech have created a sort of 'half-way house'. They grow organic neural tissue and, basically put a 'brain' into the macjine. It's like a more complex version of a Servitor, the belief being that the organic parts providing the machine's intelligence is safer than making itn truly concious. The Spirit is programmable and helps to govern the orking of the machine, sometimes autonomously depending on the complexity of said machine.
As for in-game appearances, they aren't always such good indicators of fluff. Certain vehicles will have it or not for game play reasons. In 'reality' every Imperialvehicle, especially Astartes, and just about every piece of Imperial tech has a Machine Spirit.
I think I'm right about at least some of that!

GFP


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## Stella Cadente (Dec 25, 2006)

Giant Fossil Penguin said:


> The deep past of the Age of Strife talks about a conflict which many take to mean Humanity's sentient machines turning on their masters and going to war. Humanity won


why does that storyline sound so damn familiar I wonder.


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## Djinn24 (Jan 12, 2008)

Imperium does not like to think anything has AI (Tales of Heresy) but basically that is what the Imperium LR has with its machine spirit so they either call it a machine spirit to keep with doctrine or they are clueless. 

Remember man has went from technological wizards to over religious zealots who don't know how to repair half the stuff they have.


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## Malkuth (Feb 2, 2011)

It doesnt even have to be a machine..the books always talk about marines performing rites to soothe the machine spirits of their bolt guns and armor so that they wouldnt jam/malfunction. 

I think that the psuedo-spiritual culture in the Imperium assumes that all tech items have a resident spirit in them which need to be appeased or cajoled for it to function properly.


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## normtheunsavoury (Mar 20, 2008)

Malkuth said:


> It doesnt even have to be a machine..the books always talk about marines performing rites to soothe the machine spirits of their bolt guns and armor so that they wouldnt jam/malfunction.
> 
> I think that the psuedo-spiritual culture in the Imperium assumes that all tech items have a resident spirit in them which need to be appeased or cajoled for it to function properly.


A gun is still a machine. 
I think it is just a case of not really knowing how things work, the basics of cause and effect.
If a computer stops working properly it's down to something inside the computer not doing what it should be, so you go through the process of de bugging until you get to the root of the problem and can put it right.
Over thousands of years the stages of: 
Tap on Windows logo to open Start menu.
Go to Control Panel
Go to My Computer etc.

Have become wrapped up in superstition and ritual. Maybe one time that an early admech adept managed to get a data slate working he happened to be wearing blue socks, he now assumes that to appease the machine spirit of an Apple data slate you must be wearing blue socks. 
Over thousands of years more and more gets added to the ritual until it becomes more important than actually knowing how the bloody thing worked in the first place. 
So, cleaning and maintaining a Bolter isn't done because it will keep the gun clean and clear of obstuctions, meaning it's less likely to jam. It's done because that's what the machine spirit demands, it's just a touch of luck that the ritual and process includes cleaning the barrel and action. 

In other cases I wonder if there is a slight amount of Orkiness going on, they have absolute belief that the rituals and rites they observe will work so, in an Orky sort of way, they do.


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## HorusReborn (Nov 19, 2008)

machine spirits are in every piece of tech the Imperium uses. The IG has the Tech Priests pacify the spirits of the mightiest Titan, to the lowliest pict viewer or sensor array (read Ciaphas Cain: Traitors Hand). Rules wise the LR gets it only because of the Dawn of War game. Chaos definately gets a Machine spirit because they are posessed by the powers of the warp! Stella... you say that it sounds like GW copied the Terminator series, but machinery destroying man idea has been around since the Industrial Revolution.


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## Hooobit (Dec 5, 2010)

HorusReborn said:


> Rules wise the LR gets it only because of the Dawn of War game.


Please tell me you don't believe that.......

The machine spirit was just a clever way for the Landraider to be worth the 250 points. seeing as, originally, it was something like "if you get crew stunned or crew shaken you can keep driving in a straight line or shhot with a bs of 2" so, hmmmm..... a transport that has great armour and can carry alot of good units that keeps moving forward regardless of the state of the crew.

Machine spirit is the 40k version of people talking to object in the hope that they will work if you just ask nicely.

Also, Battlestar was around before terminator, so i'd guess it would be closser to that seeing as in Terminator the humans get it handed to them.
Where as in Battlestar, the humans won the first time around.


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## Stella Cadente (Dec 25, 2006)

HorusReborn said:


> Stella... you say that it sounds like GW copied the Terminator series


 when did I say that?


Stella Cadente said:


> why does that storyline sound so damn familiar I wonder.


no mention of terminator there.


HorusReborn said:


> Rules wise the LR gets it only because of the Dawn of War game.


I'm afraid machine spirit was around long before dawn of war


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## HorusReborn (Nov 19, 2008)

first of all, I was speaking of the rules for the Land Raider... there was no "power of the machine spirit rule" yes it was around in fluff, but not in rules! Second, I made a guess, care to elaborate on your comment, "why does the storyline so damn familiar I wonder"? tell us why and don't leave me biting my nails in anticipation making wrong guesses.


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## Giant Fossil Penguin (Apr 11, 2009)

I imagine the story sounds similar to Dune. PotMs has been in two C:SM as far as I know. Maybe we can drop it now?
As for the Machine Spirit, Imperial tech all has a remnant AI. AI in itself would be incredibly useful, but Humanity knows how dangerous. So, the AdMech outlaw the AI whilst building organic systems to take their place, systems that will be able to do some AI stuff but not enough to become dangerous to its Human users. The nascent DarkMech started such forbidden research on Mars in the lead-up to the HH. One of their reasons for following Horus was that he gave them permission to study/use AI when he was in charge, as well as giving them access to sealed data on Mars that had to do with mixing the warp and machines.
The AdMech has a law that all machines must be goverened by organic systems. Now, it might be that only tech above a certain level has these systems and that talking about guns having them is just part of the mystification of these matters. It might be that _everything_ has a Spirit of some sort.

GFP


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## Azkaellon (Jun 23, 2009)

HorusReborn said:


> first of all, I was speaking of the rules for the Land Raider... there was no "power of the machine spirit rule" yes it was around in fluff, but not in rules! Second, I made a guess, care to elaborate on your comment, "why does the storyline so damn familiar I wonder"? tell us why and don't leave me biting my nails in anticipation making wrong guesses.


........Really?....i mean really?

First off stella is right POWER OF THE MACHINE SPIRIT has been in the codex for AGE'S! Also as for the story please google "terminator movies" to find out what he is talking about.

Wait...you say theres no rule? have you READ the marine codex at all? even a weeeeee bit? maybe open a few pages?

God im going to go kick a baby now well burning things.


p.s.

I take it power of the machine spirit is the reason calling your computer a piece of shit tends to make it end up not working...and why threating to throw it out the window provides results?

Oh and to address the main issue its only on the landraider due to balance issues how screwed up would it be for a razorback, rhino or predator to use that ability on your poor little guard?


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## Lucio (Aug 10, 2009)

Dune was the first thing I thought of. 

2. All of chaos's stuff is really old right? Maybe in that length of time it 'died'? Can a machine spirit die/crash/blue screen o' death? Perhaps the warp destroyed the tech. 

There is a story somewhere about a Land Raider that was pretty much AI that kills a bunch of xenos after its crew is dead so they do think for themselves. Apologies, I have no idea where I read that though.


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## Gromrir Silverblade (Sep 21, 2010)

Giant Fossil Penguin said:


> I imagine the story sounds similar to Dune. PotMs has been in two C:SM as far as I know. Maybe we can drop it now?
> As for the Machine Spirit, Imperial tech all has a remnant AI. AI in itself would be incredibly useful, but Humanity knows how dangerous. So, the AdMech outlaw the AI whilst building organic systems to take their place, systems that will be able to do some AI stuff but not enough to become dangerous to its Human users. The nascent DarkMech started such forbidden research on Mars in the lead-up to the HH. One of their reasons for following Horus was that he gave them permission to study/use AI when he was in charge, as well as giving them access to sealed data on Mars that had to do with mixing the warp and machines.
> The AdMech has a law that all machines must be goverened by organic systems. Now, it might be that only tech above a certain level has these systems and that talking about guns having them is just part of the mystification of these matters. It might be that _everything_ has a Spirit of some sort.
> 
> GFP


I'm so glad you mentioned Dune, although I expect there are literary works that have machines turning on human wars predating Dune, Frank Herbert made that genre cool. Suggesting that terminator got it's ideas from BSG is a little but off the mark.


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## Hooobit (Dec 5, 2010)

HorusReborn said:


> first of all, I was speaking of the rules for the Land Raider... there was no "power of the machine spirit rule" yes it was around in fluff, but not in rules! Second, I made a guess, care to elaborate on your comment, "why does the storyline so damn familiar I wonder"? tell us why and don't leave me biting my nails in anticipation making wrong guesses.



Please *read* the codex, looking at the pretty pictures and going "derp, that loooks pretty" doesn't count.

As I said to you before, Litterally straight after you posted this idea of "only in the rules cos of DoW", The machine spirit has been in the rules since at least 3rd ED space marines codex (Crimson fist's last stand) the rules were even in a White Dwarf around the early 2000's and they had machine spirit then.


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## TheSpore (Oct 15, 2009)

The whole idea that man can create something that could destroy us came from Mary Shelly's "Frankenstein" Which was written as a bet with a few friends on who could write the scariest story. Hence forth later on down the road we began to contemplate the notion that machines could turn on us and take over. Certain movies and books all have built upon this concept including Terminator, Matrix, Battle Star Galactica, even Stephen King's Maximum Overdrive(terrible movie) and Christine. Remember when back in the day when machines were a fairly new creation they were looked as somewhat strange and many people did mot understand them. Same reason why many were killed for being wiccans and werewolves the old times.

Anyway The Machine Spirit literily is nothing more than a man made entity to explain how the machine works. The Mechanicum understands how to operate and maintain machines and tech. and it is there way of ensureing there will always be a need for them. Now I may be wrong to some degree if you listen to Throne of Lies in the beginning when the navigator is navigating through the warp the ship does speak to her, but yet this said ship is a CSM Night Lord vessel as well. Also note that the theory also goes that the Void Dragon controling the Mechanicum too so this might also have a lil to do with the whole machine spirit thing too. 
Heres a thought say the Void Dragon is tellin the Mechanicium what to do is it possible that he is transfering the souls of the tech priests into machines sorta like what happens with the necrons. This is just another possibility to explain the machine spirit.


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## drz196 (Feb 4, 2011)

I think the concept of the Machine spirit is different depending on the author of the novel.

For example, in the 1st Soul drinkers novel, iirc (at work, novel is not on hand), the techmarine basically hooks himself up to the systems of the space hulk directly and communes with the Machine spirit directly, in which it responds. 

I cannot quote a specific page, but there is a section in the HH novel Mechanicum that it is strongly implied that the tech priests of Mars truly don't understand machines, hence all the religous aspect to it. The impression is given by the protagonist female and her group of junior tech priests who are all recruited because they understand, at least in part, how machines actually work. Working together they are able to build outside the rigid confines of the Mechanicum and also build a prototype in record time because they specifically do not do the typical rituals to "appease the Machine spirit", and yet the machine worked.


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