"We determine the guilty. We decide the punishment."
- Codex Arbites
"They live there in that great plascrete tower surrounded by walls and razor wire,
only emerging to seize some unfortunate who has transgressed against the Imperial Laws
or to patrol the city to prove that it belongs to them. There are crystal lenses and
sound wave detectors on that tower that can watch citizens and listen to their
conversations 100 leagues away, Imperial spy satellites watch what they can't see
directly and even the Governor fears them. They aren't from here and have nothing
to do with us, no more than Orks or Eldar, if they have families or children we don't
know about them and we don't care. They wouldn't so much as buy a glowbulb from us
and we would not sell it to them. It's ironic that they have the rather benevolent title of
Arbitrators."
- Vorkas Zolowski
The vast, galaxy-spanning Imperium of Mankind contains an untold number of worlds and an equally infinite number of cultures. The variety and flexibility of mankind is one of its greatest strengths and it has allowed the species to thrive in practically any environment. Even so, for the Imperium to be a single, cohesive entity, there must be a universal constant that binds the galaxy together. Many think that it is the God-Emperor and the Imperial Cult, that it is faith in our most holy Guardian that is what makes the Imperium what it is. And while it is certainly important, as faith inspires devotion more readily than any other cause, it is not what keeps the Imperium together. Belief in the Emperor takes many forms and expresses itself in many different ways. No, there is but one thing that is the same everywhere, unbending, unrelenting, unchanging. The Lex Imperialis. The rule of law.
And we are the law. The Adeptus Arbites is the galactic police force that keeps the entirety of the Imperial population in check, represented on every colonized world by a towering Precinct-Fortress inhabited by grim, faceless men and women in sinister black armor, strangers from off-world. Petty crimes like theft and murder are not what interest us, as those are investigated and punished by local enforcement agencies under the employ the planetary Governor and some of those are no better than hired thugs with a thin veil of legitimacy. We answer only to the Adeptus Terra and even the Governor is subject to our scrutiny. If the Holy Inquisition is the final line of defense against heresy, dissent and rebellion, the Adeptus Arbites are the first bulwark, poised and ready to strike against total subversion of Imperial law. We come when the local enforcers are out of their depth and we come without mercy.
That brings me to the Hive World of Aphrodus Primaris, a seething mass of industrial pollution and overpopulation. Its spires tower miles into the smog and delve even deeper into the darkness of the rotting earth. It is populated by billions of souls and is absolutely rife with corruption. It has been this way for hundreds (if not thousands) of years but the level of unrest among the population has been steadily increasing. Crime, always a problem, is severely on the rise and there are whispers on the street of something far more sinister happening in the shadows of the Underhive. It is our sworn duty to find the cause of this unrest, suppress any potential seeds of rebellion or rioting, and crush whatever insidious infection lingers in the dark.
Signed, in the name of the Emperor,
Judge Kaelon Catulo
Judge Kaelon Catulo
Welcome to Crime & Punishment and thank you for reading this far. This is a roleplay I will run with the cooperation of the renowned 40K veteran @Jbcool, who is probably a familiar name to many of you 40K fans on this site. There are plenty of active 40K roleplays right now but one can never have enough, I always say, and we certainly don't have a roleplay like this at the moment; a gothic-noir investigative action-adventure. I hope I can convince many of you to join!
The basic idea of this roleplay is to cross the premises of the movies Se7en, Dredd and The Raid and to pour the resulting mixture into a 40K-shaped mold. We shall be playing a squad of Arbitrators and associated support staff, designated as Strike Team Omicron, that has been formed to respond to the increased threat of societal upheaval on Aphrodus Primaris, as outlined in the fluff piece above. Omicron is one of several of such Strike Teams stationed around the globe and reports directly to Judge Catulo. It is sent to deal with unusual and exceptionally severe situations, and has been put together with the goal of being a self-containing investigative and tactical unit. As such, Omicron is a group of diverse specialists and will require more than just combat shotgun-toting, carapace armor-clad Arbitrators, so for those of you who like to play a more supporting role -- welcome. The OOC will contain more information about what kind of specialists are required.
As for the 'gameplay' itself, I'm working out a quest-based format where Omicron is sent on a mission, details of which are provided by either myself or Jbcool, and it is up to the players to determine how they wish to tackle the objective. If enough players join up we could have several missions (or mission sub-objectives) running simultaneously as Omicron splits up in response to the situation. After successfully completing a mission, Strike Team Omicron returns to the Precinct-Fortress and receives new orders from Judge Catulo. There will be an overarching plot that unfolds itself throughout these missions but this system allows for short, self-contained stories that will be easier to play.
All that remains, of course, is players. Who's in?
