First, to my players: Brandt, Martin, Magnus, Jannich og Ani hvis i kan læse dette, skrid.

Sooo with that out of the way, I've run into a bit of a problem with one of my players in my Lure of the Expanse game and i would seek advice from the community. The void master of the group has been possessed by a Halo Device. He is still in the first stage and i am slowly giving him hints to what is happening by way of strange dreams, and sometime during the next few sessions I'm gonna slap him with an addiction to eyeballs.

As far that i can tell the central thing with is the gradual loss of humanity and a slow descent into madness. But my problem is that i am really having trouble with pacing the transformation. I have some scenes planned, like alcohol loosing all taste and a few where he dreams long dead civilizations, but i really dont have a clue as to when i should hit him with these scenes.

Would it be best to do it during "down time" as in when they are on the ship or should it try to integrate it more into the "main" adventure?


And on an unrelated note, do anyone have any advice for running the battle at the temple of farseeing at the end of the first act of the lure of the expanse adventure? In this case the group is rank 4. I am thinking of something along the lines of having the rivals arrive at approximately the same time to give the players an oppotunity for verbal combat, and then just as violence breaks out have an eldar army kick in the door. Then it would be up to the players to fight their way through an army of eldar aspect warriors in order to get to the top in time.

Well, if you throw in an Eldar army, the whole adventure is kinda over. The players have to stop the ritual in order to continue the adventure.

And...

Halo Artifacts are kinda "end of the line" artifacts. There are a couple in the published adventures and they transform the character into something completely unplayable, so unless you're running a Monte Haul snowflakey kinda campaign (we sure get our share of those in these forums) your Voidmaster is going to gain corruption until they get retired. They should probably consume a couple of the other players during this time. No fun will be had by all. But, they'll find out why those who trade in Halo artifacts are outlawed, and why those who purchase them disappear, and why they they become immortal....kinda.

Of course, you could always go for the "but wait, there's a quest you can perform for the Eldar Farseer for the miraculous cure" cheese.

RT isn't D&D, not AD&D, not 3.X, not 4.0, Next, or Pathfinder. It's more like Call of Cthulhu meets Alien.

Perhaps saying eldar army is overstating it, what i was intending was a detachment of pathfinders along with some aspect warriors for support and a farseer to lead the ritual. The reason for adding to the eldar presence at the temple is that my players have this annoying tendency to kill everything i send their way without much challenge, and on top of that i was intending that they were not the only ones attacking the temple. You know to add some tension and warlocks ain't stupid, they should know that they cant hold off the rogue traders coming for them alone and it makes no sense to me for them not to have brought some backup.

And as for the halo artifact, yeah i know its a trip down the slippery slope, but since he hasn't left the first stage there is still a chance for him to part himself from the device. For some background info, the device is the Psycharus Worm from Dark Frontier and Forsaken Bounty, and my reasoning for it not being a death sentence is that the device is broken-ish, with it having lost much of its power when the Yu'Vath construct it was connected to was destroyed. The Void master picked the thing up and put it in his pocket, a pocket that he had just filled with sharp crystals cutting into his leg, and then he forgot about it. Remember kids dont pick up strange alien devices.

But i havent spilled the beans on what excactly the device is to the players so its not too late for me to simply say that is not a halo device but some alien parasite.

I'm completely sympathetic to the party slaying everything in their way. My first two groups were like that. You can certainly throw some defenses around those warlocks. If I remember right, I put a couple hundred guardians there and narrated a mass combat for that scene, letting each PC engage with someone of relative equal value. There were other RTs there at the same time and it turned into a general melee. Keep in mind that there only needs to be 2 warlocks to complete the ritual and the other 4-5 can throw out some serious hurt if you use the rules available for warlocks in other books.

Having run that camaign once, I'm not overly fond of it, since so many things are capable of breaking it to pieces (Miloslav engines always come to mind). Still, it has a good flavor to it.

There's another published scenario with the Psycharus Worm (part deaux). It's actually a decent scenario that can be turned into something long-term (assuming you house-rule it). It also has the added benefit of deactivating the Psycharus Worm. You could let the Worm mutate your PC a couple times in an unholy kinda way before they get there as a warning to anyone in the future that wants to keep Halo Artifacts (or anything Yu'Vath). I know I would, but I'm mean like that.

Hmmm...

Halo Devices and the Psycharus Worm are two entirely different things. Yes, the Psycharus Worm is classified as a Halo Device, but given how it works, and how other Halo Devices work, they are not the same at all.

Halo Devices are fully fleshed out in Dark Heresy: Disciples of the Dark Gods (which I assume you're using, seeing as you mentioned stages), and they are vicious things. If he is in the Primary Phase, he is too far gone already. Per the fluff and mechanics, there is no coming back from that. Per the book however, it will take decades for him to reach the Tertiary Phase (unless he dies in the Secondary Phase and Resurrects), and it is at the Tertiary Phase that his character is removed from play (implying he can keep playing up until that point). If you never take him to the Tertiary Phase of transformation, he can continue on as a character, but he's going to get deadly powerful if you're playing by the official rules, and quick to outshine your other players in may ways.

If the player knew full well what was going to happen (or hazarded a guess at least) before having his character take the Halo Device, then I'd go over it with him to create the best dramatic effect for the other players. If you inflicted it on him as a GM without him knowing what was going to happen (or even having a clue), well, you got some 'splanin' mister. As far as I know, the Psycharus Worm ain't supposed to corrupt normal people, and he may not like knowing his character is now doomed.

As to the unnatural hungers, I wouldn't suddenly hit him with a craving for eyeballs immediately. If he's never tasted eyeballs, how would he know he craves them? I'd suggest getting him with something simpler, like blood. Everyone has tasted human blood at one point or another. If he indulges his craving, step it up from there. From blood, it's only a step up to flesh, and from flesh, to eyeballs.

My suggestions at least.

I just revealed to my players today (after the Seneschal spent a fate point to pass a Lore check) that the main big bad they're going to face off with is corrupted by a Halo Device, and is already in the Tertiary Phase. That fight (if it happens, and they don't just slag his ship from space into nothing) should be very interesting.

Egads! They have Halo Artifacts fleshed out in DH? I knew there were reasons I don't play that game. Just the same, I'll have to pick up my book and read that section now.

I don't have a basis to give much opinion on the Halo Artifact thing, but can put out a couple of ideas on the subject of the Eldar.

1) The Eldar need time, not victory. Their attacks should be done with this idea in mind. Eldar Rangers sniping from 500 yards more concerned about pinning then killing. If you want to bring in aspect warriors, you could have a Scorpion ambush, then fight defensively for a few rounds before breaking off.

2) Climbing the outside of a tower is the worst place to be when under attack by ranged weapons. Force them to clear out hidden snipers (or worse, dark reapers) or suffer continuous fire as they ascend.

3) Eldar are master manipulators. If they can, they'll use illusions, deals or misdirection to force different RT groups into running into each other prior to arriving at the tower.

4) Psychic Phenomena: I put psychically generated deflection field at the top of the tower to make conventional ranged combat almost difficult (-30) at the top, allowing the warlocks to use their powers and engage the generally ranged-focused party with their superior melee skill. They also often tried to push the people off the edge. Lastly, I added 2 extra warlocks. Depending on what kind of weaponry your party carries, considered increasing the AP of their wrathbone armor, or flipping it entirely to energy-shield rules.

Egads! They have Halo Artifacts fleshed out in DH? I knew there were reasons I don't play that game. Just the same, I'll have to pick up my book and read that section now.

They do, and they are frightening. They are essentially for Big Bads really, and are completely unplayable in Dark Heresy, Rogue Trader, Deathwatch, or Only War, but possible in mid-level+ Black Crusade, as that's the only game setting where one can be a hyper-dangerous alien-possessed murder-monster and have nobody around you bat an eye or see that as much out of the ordinary. One would have to do some minor tweaks to the RaW though, given how Unnaturals are in BC