How would you..

By Hoodlums, in Rogue Trader

Get ahold of a manufactorium as quickly as possible for the use of mass producing weapons to sell to other rogue traders, the navy, and any other would be customer.

Yes, I'm talking about gun running in the 41st milliennium.

I'm planning to propose this in my coming up mission but want an expedited process instead of having to build facilities for this purpose initially.

Get in good with the mechanicus. Ask for an explorator charter. Colonize planet. Profit.

Get in good with the mechanicus. Ask for an explorator charter. Colonize planet. Profit.

Doesn't seem like the quick way of doing that.

Find something valuable the Mechanicum or the Nobles that own large portions of Gunmetal city desire. Sell it to them in exchange for extremely profitable trade agreements. Buy a transport. Profit.

Or

Find a large manufactorum on a world in the expanse. Use troops to secure it in the glorious name of the Emperor. Negotiate with the Mechanicus for weapon patterns. Profit.

Guns are definitely not something that 40K is lacking in. Also you're going to need to exclude actual Imperial organisations from that because if word gets out to the Mechanicus that you're turning manufacturing into a privately run endeavour they are going to be super pissed at you. Also assuming you mean the ship component again it says a "small workshop", so it's not going to be churning out thousands of weapons. MAYBE one or two a day, but given 40K efficiency I would forbid that idea.

Instead what you should do is start couterfeiting Xenos weapons. They make technology far above 40K level, and are already super rare in the Imperium. Start making cheap knockoffs of them and sell them to nobles who don't know better with the strict warning that these are just collector items, not to be used in actual combat. Even if they discover your ruse, what are they going to do*? Complain? Then they'd have to publicly admit they tried to buy a real Xenos weapon.

*Probably visit their local Officio Assassinorium office, but I'm sure you can deal with that.

This gets brought up now and again on this forum. Look at the size of that ship component. It doesn't really take up that much space. How much space does a Hive take up? Get the picture?

Now let's talk about about economics. Locating a factory is always a cost-analysis decision. You want it near your market, to reduce your transportation costs. But, you want it near the source of your raw materials, to reduce transportation costs. Somewhere in between is the optimal location. That place is not your ship. What this means is that you can make a profit off your tiny manufactorum, IF you have no competition. If you have competition, and they aren't based on a starship like you, then chances are extremely high that they can sell for lower than you can, driving you out of the market.

I think OP meant planet based manufactorium and not a ship component*. The quickest way of getting something is usually to steal - or conquer - this. So, known manufactorums in Expanse are on:

1. Damaris

2. Zayth

3. Iniquity

4. Svard

5. probly Footfall

6. probly Breaking Yards

7. probly Explorator/Disciples of Thule Fleets

*In my games I house ruled that planet based manufactorums are called magnafactorums as it prevents confusion and IMO fits the setting.

Rather than going the mass production route, could you create high quality, intricate weapons in smaller numbers aboard the ship?

I think OP meant planet based manufactorium and not a ship component*. The quickest way of getting something is usually to steal - or conquer - this. So, known manufactorums in Expanse are on:

1. Damaris

2. Zayth

3. Iniquity

4. Svard

5. probly Footfall

6. probly Breaking Yards

7. probly Explorator/Disciples of Thule Fleets

*In my games I house ruled that planet based manufactorums are called magnafactorums as it prevents confusion and IMO fits the setting.

This is actually very helpful considering my ship is headed to svard currently, I've also been interested in visit Zayth recently so that will more than likely be our stop after svard.

Also assuming you mean the ship component again it says a "small workshop", so it's not going to be churning out thousands of weapons. MAYBE one or two a day, but given 40K efficiency I would forbid that idea.

Rather than going the mass production route, could you create high quality, intricate weapons in smaller numbers aboard the ship?

What book is this ship component in, and is what Xraysteve asking have any promise?

I think the Manufactorium was not assumed to allow for extremely high volume of production - for that, an industrial colony or a stake in, say, one of the Gunmetal Fanes (or grok that, you are a Rogue Trader - BUYING a Gunmetal Fane) is imo the way to go.

There are likely 100k star systems or stellar remnants in the Koronus Expanse (I've noticed some people like the 32k number...this could go as low as 8k depending on your favorite stellar density theory and ideas on dark matter). This "sector" was once colonized by humans. All the "forges" mentioned above were populated by various writers at FFG. Most were written ex post facto. There are undoubtedly many more. If FFG had decided to publish more modules, I'd bet there'd be one or more for every new module.

Personally, I'd recommend a mixture of infiltration, espionage, bribery and outright assassination to take control of whatever noble house or trade conglomerate controls an existing manufactorium franchise (preferably raising some local to the position of new leader, but making sure he or she remains "in your pocket" and thus does what they are being told), or alternatively using similar methods to acquire permission to enlist the local workforce in building and crewing a manufactorium anew.

Orlesian politics. ;)

Even quicker might be to just build an illegal workshop, like they exist in the thousands in the Underhive of Necromunda. Of course, the quality of the products may vary immensely depending on how exactly you're setting this up.

@Lynata

I love Orlesian Politics.

Also, what is the countdown for? It makes me nervous yet excited, and I don't even know what its for!

I love Orlesian Politics.

It'd fit right into a game of Rogue Trader, right? Even the clothing seems suitable! ;)

Also, what is the countdown for? It makes me nervous yet excited, and I don't even know what its for!

Hahah, I should go into marketing! :lol:

It's just a fan-made counter for the official launch of Elite Dangerous, a space game I'm rather hyped about (and which I've been playing since Alpha). It uses the game's Witchspace travel effect that occurs each time the player's ship jumps to the sun of another star system. * shameless plug *

Also, what is the countdown for? It makes me nervous yet excited, and I don't even know what its for!

Hahah, I should go into marketing! :lol:

It's just a fan-made counter for the official launch of Elite Dangerous, a space game I'm rather hyped about (and which I've been playing since Alpha). It uses the game's Witchspace travel effect that occurs each time the player's ship jumps to the sun of another star system. * shameless plug *

ELITE!!!!

Damm I remember way back in the day playing it on a C64, ahhh my misspent youth... Hell I still have a C64 to play it on.. Never made Elite.. but

Right on, Commander. ;)

The original Elite was my first PC game ever , and I daresay it inspired and shaped me - so I couldn't resist joining the kickstarter when David Braben finally announced that after all those years, he'd finally do another sequel.

And it's gorgeous. The entire Milky Way recreated 1:1 according to contemporary scientific data and theories (it's funny to read about stuff like " use the correct Harvard/temperature table for bright giants and super giants when finding the nearest Yerkes classification of generated stars " in the patch notes), the best and most immersive sound design I've heard in any game so far, a dynamic open world setting filled with factions that can be influenced by the online players (a bunch of players recently wanted to launch an experiment with the background sim and ended up throwing an entire star system into a civil war ), ship designs reminiscent of the original Elite geometric shapes, fully fleshed out 3D cockpits (a later expansion will add further ship interiors and the ability to walk around), a visual atmosphere inspired by classic movies such as Blade Runner or Alien ... ah, I could go on and on.

If you liked the original, and have not yet taken a look at ED, do yourself a favour and catch up on it! ;)

But enough about that, in case anyone still has something to add about the original topic. ^^'

If you should have any questions regarding ED, feel free to shoot me a PM, or check out the subreddit .

Ways I can think to do it

1. Found a colony and specialize in weapons manufacture (yawn)

2. Find an imperial world that is able to theoretically produce an excess of weapons but isn't for reasons (no available market, not enough resources, own need for produced weapons, etcetera, etcetera) solve problem and then profit....

3. Find an arms dump, either an old abandoned one (old transport wrecks are good) or one that is in an out of the way with a bribable staff.......

4. Find a lost world or minor xeno group who build sufficiently suitable weapons or who can be induced to build the patterns you want