Have read through Forsaken Bounty, I had a couple of thoughts...

First, I would have liked to have known more about the PCs ship the Sovereign Venture . Apart for the casual notes that it's a cruiser with enough firepower to destroy whole cities and has a crew of 100,000, we don't know much about it. I think that's a big oversight, especially for players who may be unfamiliar with 40K starships.

Second, the Sovereign Venture's got enough firepower to level a city but her void shields appear to be on the blink? Shouldn't the Venture shields be able to deflect most of the debris field (especially if she turns that firepower to blast a path wide enough to pass through herself)? I know the idea is to force the PCs to take a little ship across to the Bounty but it seems a lame way to do it.

... and about the guncutter. It's explicately described as being about to carry up to 30 people in the cargo hold, but we can only bring 3 of the salvage crew (who we hired specially for this job)? Again, a lame way to limit the number of red-shirts along for the ride, especially given the contradiction.

Otherwise, it looks like an interesting short adventure. Some real potential but those couple of oddities just leap out at me. I'd have to find a way around them if I was going to run the adventure myself.

Anyone know when and where it's going to be made downloadable? I'm supposed to run it this weekend for friends and I still have to actually lay eyes on the module.

dvang said:

Actually, I haven't run the campaign with anyone yet. I might try to con my old Dark Heresy group to do a play by post game with it. Although granted, I'd definitely have to change the main antagonist around with something from Dark Heresy since there are a few guys I wouldn't put it past to read ahead. Still, certainly easy enough to make the Brass Worm a ornate paperweight and sic something else on them.

LuciusT said:

AFAIK void shields are only of help against rapidly moving things. If the initial kinetic is too low though (like drifting debris and most ordnance) it bypasses the void shield completely.

That Nathin Tsanthos guy, swinging on a cable with a quill in his teeth and dataslate in hand reminds me so much of the beginning of "Monty Python's the meaning of life". Which is a good thing.

While the adventure has its downsides, the art is superb quality so far!

I've just read it. That was a short read, actually

Well, the adventure and the glimpse at the rules leave more questions, than gives answer regarding the nature of RT. All I can see that roughly 99 percent of the mechanics are the same as in DH, and some newer concepts are introduced (like Profit).

BTW, I cannot but cite an article from Encyclopedia Dramatica on "Profit" ( http://encyclopediadramatica.com/Profit )

"PROFIT! - usually seen alongside its partner ???? - comes from South Parks preachy lesson about how 1337 capitalism is. In the episode, the "Underpants Gnomes" are sneaking into South Park homes in the middle of the night to steal peoples' underwear drawers. After getting busted by the gang, the gnomes use a highly advanced mathematical formula to explain how they turn stolen underwear into profit. The formula was as follows:

Collect underpants
?
Profit
The ultimate goal in life is to gain as much profit as is possible. Jews learn this at an early age. Profit can come in a wide variety of forms and the achievement of any type of profit makes you a winnar. Gaining of profit is the only way to make your miserable excuse for a life worthwhile. By its very nature, all profit is delicious..."

In any case, I suppose, before I come up with some kind of a definite assessment of the game, I will have to take a look at the RT core rulebook. Any time before that - it's impossible.

And no, the adventure didn't impress me to a least extent: reasoniing with computers ain't fun; fighting with lots of zombies is neither... I believe one could come up with a more intriguing adventure, given the word limit. So I'm not GMing it, unless that's an intro to some bigger campaign (hopefully, not, though).

The adventure dealt with some nice concepts, many core to the scope of the game, but it was very basic. There's room for a GM to expand and adapt it, of course. Bring more redshirts along (surely the Sovereign Venture has a security force to keep those thousands of crew in line), write more interesting things for the crew to encounter inside of the wreck and so on.

My thoughts on the matter... It's all very nice standard stuff, but I was hoping for a tiny glimpse into the world of Ship to Ship combat. As it happens I haven't really learned anything much that I didn't already know or couldn't have done in DH.

Ah well. My wait for the main rulebook goes on...

Idaan said:

For some reason he reminded me of Indiana Jones. Still, good artwork.

Honestly I like it mostly because it feels like 40k and at the same time it also feel in my opinion like shadowrun or other similar games. While DH is a solid game I like the idea of the characters have a little more option in what they do with themselves. DH missions almost always started with my players being told you will go here and take care of this. RT looks like it will offer players a chance to say no what else have you got and not have to worry about it. RT gives a reason for the players to loot the crap out of everything they come across ("I take the rusted swords and armor so I can sell them for scrap metal.") which is common from players in just about every RPG I have ever seen.

For this scenario it was simple enough for new people to run the game and left plenty of open areas for anyone experienced with 40k RPG to expand it and make it work with a more experienced group. The characters I doubt were supposed to be starting out characters and were specifically tailored to meet the scenario which worked out well. If for some reason I let my DH players run this they would run through the mission within about 20 minutes because they are much better geared and skilled than the RT premades.There are some interesting talent or class abilities in the RT characters. I am hoping to see some interesting new additions for the 40k RPG rules.

Overall it was a good introduction to a new line off adventures and a new way to play 40k RPG.

Yes, the adventure was fairly basic. Nothing was particularly fleshed out. About the only 'new' things were Profit and information about the Halo Devices. The point of the adventure, though, is to give the basic idea of an RT session. It explains the 'Why' they do it (Profit), and gives a simple scenario (find the derelict, explore the derelict, encounter/overcome the opposition, retrieve the derelict). This is the most basic of RT missions, for new players and GMs, without bogging everyone down with too many rules.

I would've liked a bit more detail on the ships and how they function, and a few other details for the GM to get a handle on how things work. Still, with a bit of creativity on my part, it was easy enough to run for a group of new players with a 2-2.5 hour time limit to play. For my regular group, when I run it next week, I'll have it a bit more fleshed out to make it a fuller adventure.

The artwork and quality of the booklet are exceptional. The rules that were there were well written and complete enough for new players (and GMs) to use and run/play the adventure easily. The adventure iteslf, thematically and detail-wise, it was ... adequate. Bare-bones and not a particularly new concept, but sufficient for players/GM new to DH/RT, although a GM unfamiliar with WH40k and/or DH would have some difficulties due to the minimal details provided to the GM.

All-in-all, though, it was still fun to run and play. I hope they'll add a sixth PC that we can use, since the guncutter can hold 6.

Speaking of the guncutter, I know someone was asking about the cargo hold and red-shirts:

1. The cargo hold is needed for salvage. The more bodies in the cargo hold, the less salvage can be taken.

2. The cargo hold has no seats or restraints. It is not a safe place to be in any sort of turbulence ... like zipping around an asteroid/debris field.

3. The cargo hold has no accomodations. There are no chairs, beds, toilets. Not a good place for a trip of any significant duration.

In essence, putting people into the cargo hold is a matter for emergencies only. In the case of the adventure, there is no reason for the captain to risk crew injuries, and reduce potential cargo holding space, by exceeding the standard passenger limit of 6 in the gun cutter.

I just read the old dev diary linked previously and found this.

My personal favorite, however, is the Sovereign Venture. The Venture is a cruiser, a truly gigantic ship usually found amongst the ranks of the Imperial Navy. There are cities with a smaller population than the Venture. Needless to say, only the most affluent Rogue Traders will be able to afford her.

However, for those willing to commit the resources to own her, the Sovereign Venture will not disappoint. Her armoured prow and multiple void shields mean she is all but impervious to lesser foes, and her macrocannon broadsides can devastate an opponent in a few well-aimed salvoes. However, the Sovereign Venture is more than just a warship—she is a five plus kilometer long emissary of the Imperium to the Expanse. Her hull is covered in statues and engravings of the God-Emperor a hundred metres high, so that all who see her knows where her captain’s allegiance lies. Alongside her cargo holds are Ministorum temples and barracks capable of transporting an entire regiment. When the Sovereign Venture arrives over a heathen world, its rulers are left with a stark choice: submit to the rule of the Imperium, or be destroyed.

Something tells me that they toned down the Venture a bit for Forsaken Bounty. Multiple void shields and macrocannons would make the debris field inconsequential and the talk of space for an entire regiment onboard makes me think there should be a wealth of redshirts to use, along with the craft to transport them.

dvang said:

Supposedly you can just up the numbers by creating an additional Arch-Militant. It would be nice if suddenly we find one more pregen for the campaign, doubly so if it's of a class we haven't heard much about yet (such as a character that helps end the debate about Explorators as PCs or one based around one of the psychic classes,) but given how close the product is to launch I don't think we should hold our collective breath.

And yes, there's really not that much point in fitting any more then six into a Guncutter. Besides, where's the fun in hiding behind a crew of red shirts?

I know it says you can just include another Militant ... but it would bug me to have an exact clone of another character. I don't care if FFG provides another arch militant class or repeats a different one or gives a new one. I would like to see one with a few different stats, skills, and special ability. After all, is the only special ability that the militants get the +2 damage/init wielding a Basic Weapon? If not, throw a different one in there.

Sure, I could fudge a character up, tweaking stats and skills using DH, including spending time finding and photoshopping a new PC picture in place of Lorayne. However, it would be easier, and look much nicer on paper, if FFG could provide just one more. This way the PC is sure to be in line with the RT character rules and have a nice background and nifty gear, and not be the same as one of the other PCs.

Alternately, they could PM/email me the RT character generation rules so I could make a 6th PC that would be legal and on par with the others.

I turned up on FRPGD and collected my copy of FB (along with a copy of everything else, I'll write a review once I've read through it all). I then went to work an hour later (no gaming) before a ten hour shift (village fête). The next day (Fathers Day) I had a nine hour shift. Monday, my IT course, an exam and a six hour shift. Today (Tuesday) I managed to read it (FB), squeezing it in before a six hour shift. HOWEVER, it looks good. Rant over.

I'd be interested to know if the introductory adventure continues in the core rulebook when it's released. If it does, I suspect this is the best bet for a sixth pre-gen character (either a Navigator or an Astropath, maybe both), go on FFG you know you want too...

Did not played it yet, but just read through it.

Anyhow, I am little dismayed. It is not very different to a DH adventure, despite the "round up" of profit at the end of the game.
A nice hint AND a difference in motivation. In a DH mission, my players wouldn´t have cared nothing about some damage to a cutter they will a) never ever see again b) will have repaired/substituted by =I= founds in downtimen.

BUT I hoped to get some taste for "playing interstellar travel" with the journey "through the maw" being part of it. An adventue where the "main port" was about getting "there" (with some of the hinted dangers of warp travel from the RT design diaries) would have been a lot more interesting to me.

So, the only perceived difference between this RT "start up game" and DH is that you "total up" your profit in the end (instead of seeing how much your =I= approves fo you / how much furhter hints and info you got & how much heretic you actually got scorched out)

Although I'm very much looking forward to RT release and I think FFG has done a smashing job with its W40k license so far, after reading through FB, I am a bit concerned about a few things:

- how do you get to motivate players to do anything personally when they have 100 000 people on their ship? I know most of those people are non-combatants and are essential to the ship's operation, but with this big a crew you would reasonably need at least a few thousand strong security detail, just to keep the crew in check if anything went wrong.

So, let's say some local planetbound trading guy / mobster gives the PCs some troubles. If it was just a party of 6 people, he would most definitely pose a threat, but if the PCs can send 200 soldiers to just raid his outpost and kill anything that moves... you can go around it by using various GM tricks and make up reasonable reasons why they can't do it now (or warn them against the potential consequences this would have), but if they run into similar situations often (and some players tend to), sooner or later you'll run out of excuses or it will start harming the credibility of your game. I know this is W40k, but still, 100 000 people at their disposal...

- in FB there is this Writ of Claim that is the main reason for the Rogue Trader to go in personally instead of sending NPC henchmen to do all the hard work. The GM is supposed to remind players that they are bound by its terms because... well, why? How will the Administratum ever know if the Captain simply decides to ignore the terms and sends red shirts to Bounty in force, while drinking amasec and watching the debris field from the observation deck? Why is he so hellbent on following the rules anyway, I mean, he is a ROGUE Trader, right? They do operate in a grey moral and legal area quite often from what I've read.

Your thoughts on this?

It the adventure man! Sure you can get your crew to go on and clear it for you and bring home the prize, but that's boring! Besides would ye trust yer scurvy dogs to bring back everything?

Like I said though it does pretty much read as a DH adventure with cool equipment & skills. I'll echo the wish for even a brief space battle. That said it is top quality and gives you the basic ideas behind the game but let's face it, it's only a brief taster.

Darkshroud said:

Yeah I know, I just don't like the idea of players ultimately outgunning most foes when the shove comes to push. I like forcing them to think creatively if they want to get out of a colossal mess, not just pick up the vox and say "XO, send another three guncutters full of security guys and make sure they bring some heavy firepower".

Ofc the GM can say it's not possible because [insert vox malfunction/not enough guncutters/any other reason why not] but ultimately, it will have to break in one of two ways - a] you will let players throw their weight around with orbital bombardment threats, raiding parties and their 100 000 potential redshirts or b] the players will start to feel like you're cheating them out of their mighty army and nuclear warheads and will be dissatisfied with how they have to do everything themselves.

I'm not saying it's impossible to work around and make everyone happy. I'm mastering games for almost 15 years now and I think I've got enough experience to handle pretty much any player ideas without railroading the story, but this is not going to be easy, especially if some players try to exploit it.

Honestly, I think the issue of a ship and crew is biggest challenge for Rogue Trader as an RPG, and the big thing that will separate it from most RPGs. A Rogue Trader crew starts out with a powerful ship and thousands of minions. Blasting a threat from orbit is an available tactic. Deploying hundreds of trained solders, themselves the equal of a rank 1 Dark Hersey character is an available tactic. How the RPG deals with that will, IMO, define it.

That last thing I want to see is a list of ways to avoid, bypass or otherwise neutralize these tactics. I hope to see ideas for building adventures that encourage, even require, making good use of the massive resources available to a Rogue Trader.

Of course, that would be too much to fit in a quick teaser like Forsaken Bounty.

LuciusT said:

I think we've already seen a glimpse of how these tactics will be available but not necessarily the best course of action, and that is the endeavour mechanic.

LuciusT said:

I'm pretty sure a good GM/referee/whatever can make an adventure that deals with using the above tactics, but the MUST be balanced in a way that is mentioned above. Blasting the crap out of an enemy ship and salvaging the hulk for scraps is not going to be as profitably as bluffing the enemy ship into letting you board so you can kill the command crew and claim it as your own.

Hello to all. I'm new here, but I've been running DH as a GM for about 2 years, and I have most of the books published so far. As you can imagine, I am very much interested in the upcoming RT pnp game. That been said, I do have a 'small' concern.

While the basic adventure (haven't played it yet) is ok, nothing that much exciting, but a nice intro, I guess, the thing that is bugging me is the following:

Ok, one of the player is a RT and the charter from the Emperor and the ship are his. So, basically, he can go wherever he wants, right? Which is just fine, but the problem I see is, how the hell am I going to give players scenarios, campaign and adventures with all that randomness? The game will just be sandboxing all the time. I mean, you can go around this problem, but frankly, I don't like it that much.

Can any one of you give some advice as to how to avoid this problem effectively and not antagonize anyone? I don't want to took all control from players hands, but it seems that they control the nature of the misson quite more now. Please correct me and cure my insanity points if am wrong )

Emperor protects <o

The intro adventure offers some advice on how this scenario might crop up in a campaign: the players would pick up rumours through their network of contacts about the salvation signal from the Bounty. Any Rouges looking for Profit would seize upon these rumours, probing further to see about possibilities for easy pickings.

If your players don't respond to those kind of plot hooks you should get new players. Or play a different game

For most of you who are worried about the overall number of personnel on any of the imperial type ships here are some of the basics of why things shouldn't be a problem:

Imperial warships have 100k plus crew because they need that many to function. Almost all the ratings on any imperial ship are individuals forcefully gained through enforcers stealing them from their homes, bars and what now and forced into the service of the Emperor against their will. This is followed by being shoved into a small or large room and being told that this is where you will spend the rest of your life doing a set of specific tasks with little or no chance of being more than slave labor. In some minor cases their is the promise of the Emperor's grace and retirement on some nice world or even back home. No matter what promises or threats they recieve this still makes for a very unhappy deck crew in almost all cases.

This crew is forced to keep at their tasks by enforcers/security on the ship who make up a very small portion of the ship. Who are in turn watched over by the officers of the ship who make up the smallest portion. I say you should warn your players about the problems of owning the big strong ships in this regard if they plan to overwhelm with bodies an objective. If they are using their security who are dying in droves or just missing from their posts, it will mean weaker control of the crew. Any creative GM should be able to make something out of this issue from a mass mutiny, to an unexpected attack where the weapon crews are not firing their weapons, to the ship randomly losing out on other ships.

This opens additional plot devices such as replacing lost crew and dealing with unrest on the ship. Having a rogue trader and his team act as the governing council of a city but at the same time balance the desire to go and claim the treasure of the universe.

Their are other options: Making your players work on a smaller picket ship or frigate with a crew of only a few hundred. Replacing the crew with servitors which was mentioned in some of the 40k novels (but has a whole list of its own problems to deal with). Having ships run by other/alien means (look out for inquisitors and arbites).

I can't wait to see what happens: Like building your own flotilla and running an actual rogue trader empire. Taking part in epic space warfare. Exploring the limits beyond the empire.

Despite all this I know that the game I run for my players will be challenging and fun for them and luckily for me the 40k universe is filled with more than enough fluff to keep the characters entertained and if needed scary enough to put them back in their place if needed.

That Blasted Samophlange said:

Exactly! The Endeavor/Profit mechanic is what is constricting the RT the most. The loss of crew and equipment coudl easily outweigh the benefits of conquering/overcoming the opposition. If this is what the RT decides to do, then by all means they can do that. However, their influence/wealth/etc has been damaged.

There are a few other things a GM can do. Such militaristic actions could impact other diplomatic relationships in the area, "hey... didn't your ship eterminate the Ewoks on Endor?!", or bring local military onto the scene. It is also quite possible to have that gangster to have his own small fleet, or at least guncutters or transports and attempt to board/steal the RT's own ship. The RT could merely be a younger son of a RT family that owns several ships. The parents of the RT captain could frown upon excessive use of force, damage to the familiy name, or at least the loss of Profit.

Personally, though, I think Profit is probably the easiest, and clearest motivation for players to understand. Most like the idea of getting rich and becoming influential. If you don't want the PCs to use force to accomplish their goals, make it clear that it will be a huge investment in money, equipment, and personnel, that are not easily replaced. Talk about the fanaticism of the enemy, or their superior skills despite fewer numbers. Talk about damage that could be done to the RT's limited guncutters (where are they going to get replacements if they're on the far reaches of the Empire?), as well as damage to resources/goods that the RT hopes to acquire ("the enemy is likely to blow up the oil fields rather than let you have them", etc). Put into a perspective of Gain/Loss you can make military actions sound quite unappetizing. In fact, most military actions should lose money. It should be rare to have a "Pirates" type action where they can board a ship filled with easily disposable gold/trade goods and press prisoners into service on their ship to replace losses.

As far as the question about the Writ needing the RT to be the first to step on the derelict ship ... as a GM you can come with all sorts of reasons. Just off the top of my head:

1) When the RT gets back into Imperial space, and the RT officially reports the completed Writ, an Imperial Psyker is used to gauge the truth.

2) The Writ itself (or the dataslate/etc it is contained on) has some sort of recording device built in that is able to verify the moment that the RT sets foot onto the derelict in question.

Personally, I like #1 and would probably go with that.