Ive read the books and checked the associated costs ( aquisition tests, difficulties etc..) and Ive found one thing. Nothing hard and fast that sounds decent. Just the aquisition checks...well those are fine and dandy for most other common things but when it comes to the atomics the aquisition check..falls on its face. One check for one shot from one cannon/torpedo ( and unless i missed it it didnt even give a rarity/frequency for a target penalty etc )

I also noticed in reading that the same materials are used in power plants etc etc...things needed for infrastructure upgrades to colonies...so it isnt just for weapons.

From the tidbits the books allude to when it comes to the Mechanicums willingness to pay very high for their aquisition and the actual rarity of their refinement into weapons....( especially since most places wont have the necessary skill TO weaponize it ) I was thinking of the equivalent PF value of a shipment of it to the mechanicum to be based on 3 things.

1) How good a negotiation is made ( cant push them too much or they get pissy and simply TAKE what they want unless youve got some powerful friends to make them pause

2) The size of the shipment ( what size cargo transport is used and how full are its holds )

3) Is the material to be sold simply the mined raw ores or are they the refined finished products ( IE useable fuel rods for power plants or warheads etc )

Im currently leaning towards 1PF per weapon/shot ( to keep the PCs VERY limited on their use ) and perhaps 1PF per small cargo transport for the raw unrefined materials themselves ( but 2PF if they are refined and suitable for immediate use ( IE fuel rods etc etc for power plants and the like )

Also as a side note i was considering that any Trader that has the mining colony getting the radioactives AND has the suitable industrial upgrades for a manufactorum etc etc...should be able to create a finished product for industrial/colonial use in terms of fuel rods for power plants ( as well as being able to create any further power based infrastructure upgrades to the same colony for free ( IF they also have another manufactorum upgrade to create the rest of the building materials already created )

SO. what do you all think? What should the associated value of aquiring atomics be and in what volume do you think it would be accurate? Given the information that it does have on the use and availability of atomics in the gamebooks ( and the mechanicums overzealous ( as usual ) approach to aquiring the materials for them or getting the materials themselves as well as what they will pay to gain said items.....) Ideas?

Here's my approach. As Atomics are Near Unique they're already attempting a -50 acquisition for a single use not affected by size, so it's already not easy to get these. Have them define at the beginning how many they want to acquire, and for each additional shot add a cumulative -20. They have to burn Profit Factor beforehand and can't boost or re-roll afterwards. They get one chance on one roll, and if they fail someone else has outbid them and the chance for Atomics are lost.

Your question seems to wander a little bit so I'm not sure what the rest of it is asking. If they're wondering whether or not they can use atomics individually if they make an acquisition I'd say no, and explain that the Mechanicus don't understand the question. The book even notes that Atomics aren't produced very much because they're an inefficient and expensive method of mass destruction, and telling the authorities that you're looking for a weapon that can devastate planets faster is probably not a good enough way to get one.

If you want to know whether or not Rogue Traders can manufacture their own Atomics then I would say sure, but not on a Manufactorum, and I would be constantly rolling to see if there was an industrial accident and everyone's dead.

I've never really understood why atomics are so **** rare... they're the obvious go-to ammo for macrocannon weaponry, and they are LUDICROUSLY simple to make by 40k standards, even relatively high yield nukes.

Think about it. Rather than launching big old building sized ammo at a target, you're launching nukes with time delays on their activation. They get within a certain range and then BOOM. If they hit directly, fantastic, but even if they don't, the close range high spectrum radiation and thermal radiation will toast a good deal of a ship that was too close.

Even if we assume lower yield nukes, you can package them inside of a shapped shell, which fragments from the blast and smashes into anything near by.

The Imperium uses plasma fusion, not nuclear fission, for it's power generation purposes, so it makes no sense for them to be using fissionable materials for anything EXCEPT weaponry, and fissionable materials are NOT hard to come by. They'd exist on most planets, especially when you get towards the inner rings of the galaxy like the galactic core where star formation and death happens so fast that you will get a large amount of heavier elements concentrated in a single part of the galaxy.

even if they are inefficient, they're probably cheaper to make for the purposes of macrocannon ammo than just smelting a giant iron bullet.

You can come up with a couple of reasons why the Imperium doesn't do it. Also keep in mind that Chaos doesn't do it, and they are the innovative ones in the setting.

1) Given the cost of firing hundreds of macrocannon shells at the enemy it's preferable to have an ammo type that's quick to produce and easy to store, rather than nuclear missiles that could require constant maintenance and are vulnerable to dramatic sabotage that would rapidly destroy your own vessel.

2) The Imperium can't do shaped charges, or reliably birth a machine spirit that can detect when you are "close enough" to an enemy vessel to detonate in the correct fashion.

3) The energy requirements to produce atomics, while feasible, are so much greater than producing shells for macrocannons it's not an efficient return on time investment.

4) The Mechanicus knows it's a great idea, and hordes this secret to itself, deliberately outfitting the Imperium with equipment substandard to its own.

Perhaps there are few Standard Templates for nuclear weapons. Calibrating that stuff from scratch might be beyond most Tech-Priests. After all, one would think that auto-loading macrocannons would be simple enough for the Imperium, but pictures I've seen show hundreds of guys dragging shells with chains.

Nuclear warheads also have a very short lifespan, particularly by 40k standards. The american nuclear arsenal is showing signs of reaching non-functioning status without removing and adjusting the nuclear cores. In a universe where munitions might be stored for centuries before being fired, one just can't rely on conventional nuclear fission/fusion. Melta weapons however, which are directed, magnetically induced, fusion blasts, are far more common and reliable.

Nuclear warheads also have a very short lifespan, particularly by 40k standards. The american nuclear arsenal is showing signs of reaching non-functioning status without removing and adjusting the nuclear cores. In a universe where munitions might be stored for centuries before being fired, one just can't rely on conventional nuclear fission/fusion. Melta weapons however, which are directed, magnetically induced, fusion blasts, are far more common and reliable.

Out of every answer given, this one makes the most sense to me by far. Stasis equipment of the variety required to store such things is better used elsewhere and no where near as common.

Perhaps there are few Standard Templates for nuclear weapons. Calibrating that stuff from scratch might be beyond most Tech-Priests. After all, one would think that auto-loading macrocannons would be simple enough for the Imperium, but pictures I've seen show hundreds of guys dragging shells with chains.

This one has always been easy for me to explain away. The Imperium has a vast dislike of automation. Built in from it's core due to the fear of AI. It makes sense to me that they'd avoid it at every chance. Heck, I've always sorta imagined at least half of the dudes hauling on chains in those situations were servitors.

Also it's probably due to the incomplete nature of STC files they have. Part of the reason there's so much variation in designs from one forge world to another is access to different combinations of STCs. Sure, everyone has the design for say, the Chimera, but a Lathe Pattern Chimera is different from a Riza Pattern Chimera because while everyone has the Chimera's STC, it has big gaping holes in it, and they have to fill those in with 'make due' parts drawn from other STCs. So a Lathe Chimera is using the engine couplings of a Rhino, while the Riza pattern's pistons and spark plugs were originally intended for use in a Land Raider, and the Tech Priests just don't know because they just know they've got the STC for spark plugs for SOME sort of vehicle, and they fit into both the Land Raider and the Chimera so they use it in both because they have to make due.

Same basic deal with the auto-loader systems for macrocannons. They PROBABLY exist, but only a few forge worlds got them, and don't realize they're part of the original design for the macrocannons commonly distributed throughout the imperium.

Automation and AI are two very different beasts.

Automation is to smart:intelligent what amoral is to good:evil.

Automation and AI are two very different beasts.

Automation is to smart:intelligent what amoral is to good:evil.

Yeah but consider how hard core religious people look upon ostensibly 'amoral' actions today. I'm pretty sure that it's a fine line and most tech preists prefer not to walk it at all if it can be helped. Better to just hand do it than risk potentially having machines doing things by themselves except when absolutely necessary!

Mostly, it's that Tech-Priests don't want to admit, if they even realize it themselves, that their understanding level of the things they make might not be considerably more than the menials doing that grunt-labor. Always remember, in a universe where new technology is outlawed, and old technology is forgotten by bits and pieces, the most abundant resource is Man. Why build an auto-loader that might break down, or from the Tech-Priest's perception, get fidgety, and not want to work, unless you slowly rub it with unguents and incense, while whispering sweet nothings into its ear, and it feels appreciated, again, when you can just have 200 people who have no other job to do work themselves to death. Something broke? Well, we either need to take the cannon off-line, disassemble it, and fix it (there's lots of asking it, apologizing to it, sucking up to it, and such, on the part of the AdMech, there, as well as remembering what these three little bolts and springs are even there for), or just call in the next 73 guys you have in stock, in case some got blown up, or smashed. The "machine component" that is disposable manpower is always the easiest one to fix, and you aren't too likely to forget how .

Could also be because atomics are not very good?

Remember, detonation in space means no blast wave. A nuke going off in space is like a soap bubble bursting. Sucks to be inside it, but if your outside it (in a spacecraft designed to withstand the energy output from stars, with energy shielding, etc) it's noy going to do a whole lot. Whereas macro cannon shells are cheaper and increase your chances of hitting by chucking out huge bits of shrapnel that will blanket a much larger area.

In fact, atomics are absolutely awesome, especially for smaller ships. An atomics strike will make somebody's day truly awful, considering they do 1d5+4 hits of 1d10+6 each. A good hit could potentially cripple a cruiser, and makes short work of anything smaller. The only negative is that you have to hit with the blasted thing. Oh, and any loot that survives will be highly radioactive. That too.

I have used atomics extensively, as a GM. I've tele-nuked one of my players' ship, and lone of of their arch-rivals use them extensively, by full broadsides.... I do use though the mathammer fixe, thus a nuke for each hit will face the target armor.

thus, against a Lunar hull with 20 armor, each hit will do between 0 and 6 pts of damage.

Less deadly than standard, but still potent.

Atomics have a few caveats:

- Can't be used by any macro batteries, it needs to launch projectiles. Sunsears thus are out, you can argue perhaps for plasma batteries, hot launching a nuke. Solid ammo batteries (Mars, Thunderstrike, Jovian missile batteries, Melta batteries, and others) are ok. Bombardment canons are good too for them, though it's a downgrade in damage, for an upgrade in number of hits.

- you have to hit with them. So you have to choose in your volley which is standard ammo or the nuke. First one ? uyou hit the ennemies shields. Further on the line ? you might lost it if you have not enough DoS.

- Remember the "if detonated inside a ship, it auto kills it' ? what happens if someone targets your munitorium or your battery? Or, if your use of atomics become known, a hit and run targetting the nuke to activate it inside your own ship ?

- the Telenuke attack, aka " I teleport a nuke inside my ennemy ship, kabloie, cg all". First, you have to lower your target shields for the teleportation to be able to enter it. if the Geller fields are up, you can't. and a live nuke through your Tp is a dangerous proccedure than can blow you up as well.

My players, who are even more cunningly brutal than standard PCs, won't even try this, and the God-Emperor knows they have tried crazy shenanigans.

The Telenuke which happened against them was feasible only because one of my PC boarded the nuke happy rival flaghsip, that their nemesis wasn't on board and that said flagship got both nukes and a teleportarium... and a crew fanatical enough to risk their own annihilation trying to nuke the other throguh this method after hitting down her shields. Scorched earth tactics and all that.

Atomics are useful in fact against target with a lot of shields -as one hit blow down at least 1d5+4 shields) and easy to hit. you don't nuke an eldar ship, it's a waste. Rak'gol, Stryxis or Orks ? Go ahead ! And Nurgle affilitated demon-ships. You won't have boarded this anyway.

On a small ship, it is your joker against a heavily armored target you don't have lances against, and that you want down quickly.

With standards rules, they do wonders to one shot something, but it's not like you can already one shot most of your targets with batteries and a good Master of Ordinance.

With Mathammer fixes, it basically doubles your macrobattery volleys, if you have to punch out something nasty.

in both cases, remind your players of the atomic costs, that one Hit& Run can doom them all, that they are facing the auto-kill all the time the nuke is on board, and setting it on up on an ennemy ship is very hazardous.

Hello Venkelos its been awhile. Thank you ( and everyone else as well ) for your input ( even if some wasnt answering the actual question ) I had forgotten about the "shelf-life" aspect of it all...and i also read about the Imperiums preference for its Exterminatus weapons doing a much more thorough job of elimanating the enemies of the Emperor ( on the ground ) than nukes do...But what i was going to use them for was to be for spaceborn combat given their damage as accurately put can cripple a cruiser ( or even bigger especially with A good damage rolls and B a well designed/made nuke since the BQ version gets an automatic 10 hits at 1d10+6 each for a damage range of 70-160 points with a median of around 110ish which is more than enough to slag ( not just cripple ) a BATTLESHIP with ONE shot THIS is why im interested ( that and my group are scurrying around to try and aquire the necessary plans/schematics and gradient materials and facilities to produce some of these to obliterate their enemies ( right now those would be the eldar/dark eldar/chaos raider groups that keep pestering their shipping lanes and affiliated planets ( so radiation isnt a consideration with anything surviving ) Hence why ive been looking at a reasonable PF cost for them to be aquired.

Im not worried about the radiation issues...ive already considered those and decided on a suitable deal for those. Its simply the associated cost of each warhead im looking at ( both to be realistic due to their limited creation ability for it ( most forgeworlds simply dont build them even if they know how ) but if they were to get something suitable in return..... ;P

Thanks for the input Mordechai...I only saw 2 problems with the info given..lol

1) I havent seen the mathammer fixes you mentioned...( though for these macrobattery fixes i admit i am quite curious indeed now ) Im always open to perusing new rules for potential gems.

2) I do not allow targeting of ANY areas INSIDE the ship ( if you want to target the auger arrays or torpedoe tubes or lances/macrobatteries...thats cool...if your using bombers/fighters..you can even go after their turret rating by taking out the turrets as per standard game rules) BUT i never allow completely interior components to be targeted nor will i ( i only allow them hit on a critical due to a random roll after a hit penetrates armour--exception being lances of course ) So there isnt any such thing as a hit and run that targets a munitorium or an Apothecarium, etc...Yes the ships bridge is still viable for fighters/bombers and ramming actions but not at range strikes...its simply TOO SMALL unless on a random hit critical its number is up...In mine we only allow targeting of something that is showing on the outer hull ( like weapons ports/batteries/bay doors/even observation domes and engines ) but not anything totally inside without a random critical hit rolled. I may be cheap but im not THAT cheap..lol

the Mathammer fixes can be found in the thread of the same same name, but namely :

- reduce the armor of all ships by twelve OR add 12 to all macracannons damage.

- in a macrocanon salvo, deduce the target armor for each hit.

-halve the strengh rating of all broadside, give them Storm.

As for targeting components, I was talking about Hit&Run and boarding parties, not a good old bombardment. And in all cases, it can be done :

- if you know such component is there ( Focused Augury needed before hand)

- there are penalties depending on the target,as usually, they are heavily defended.

Moreover, I was especially talking about Hit& Runs done as the GM on the players ship. Nothing stops you to scare them with a suicid raid of Murder servitors going straight to their Munitorium, doesn't it ?

HEHEHE...an interesting idea indeed. As well as the ideas about reducing armour value due to macrocannon ( ballistic ) damage. I have considered it before. I dont agree with reducing the ships armour value to begin with however ( but reduction due to battle damage is something ive been contemplating seriously of late )

Instead of reducing all ships armour to fit the macros...or seriously adjusting the macros Strength rating or giving them Storm Quality ( cute but unfeasible idea by normal game dynamics ) Meaning the ships round/turn is 30 minutes during which time the cannons can each fire ONE time...that doesnt qualify for the storm quality ( Now i do admit i use the Turbo upgrade differently IE ANY weapon can utilize it ( except for torpedoes and nova cannons etc..the BIG guns cannot ) THAT would allow the macros to fire twice but still...thats only once every 15min...thats Turbo NOT Storm. ( even though technically the result would be the same...IE 2x damage rolls ).

I wont redo everything just because anyone doesnt like the damage potential of macrocannons...i dont see an issue with it since you can mass them to overwhelm your targets. As for the armour reduction due to damage...yes i think i will roll with that one but likely not as inferred....I will reduce the ships armour in the hit location by 1 for each salvo/battery/broadside strike against it ( so over time the enemy will be worn down ) I also dont allow criticals at all UNLESS the lance is used and scores hull damage OR someone uses a EM type warhead and hits the ship ( potentially shorting out electrical components ) but even then i require a point of hull damage ( representing a hull breach in that area ) Otherwise it could simply knock out the auger array etc...On the good side..it means the PCs ship is more survivable too ( especially from the failed defensive checks ) giving them a chance to recover...and making the ship-ship combat more memorable. I dont try to one shot kill my PCs OR let them do same to enemies ive devised for them...I want them to gain more XP from a harder longer fight as well as handicap them with more damage to be repaired and the potential for more salvage.

But again. What im seeking here is a cost per shot idea ( can be different for different weapons/Strengths etc ) AND a suitable reasonable availability rating ( again could be different for different weapons ) but just something simplistic. I am thinking of something along these lines ( but not limited to )

WEAPON TYPE: PF COST/PER STRENGTH/PER SHOT: AVAILABILITY:

MACROCANNON 1/1 EXTREMELY RARE

BOMBARDMENT CANNON 2/1 NEAR UNIQUE

Obviously the availability will vary from area to area and most simply wont be able to supply/resupply the PCs with initial/replacement nuke ammo. Likewise the quality will affect the ending price AND availability. For these weapons i am strongly leaning towards an aquisition test ( to LOCATE a supplier ) and then a suitable commerce test ( to determine the actual PF cost of the ammo ) Given the usual penalties for a ship weapon of war ( starting penalty of -30) and the fact that i would assign a scale of significant ( penalty of -20 ) to the effort to LOCATE a supplier ( total penalty of -50 so far ) just to find someone to buy it from....then there is the matter of the quality ( you dont want a poor qality nuke jamming and detonating in your ships barrel when you try to fire it now do you ) a further penalty could easily be assigned if you wished.

By making them so difficult to get it helps keep some game balance as well as giving them the potential for the weapons ( if they are willing to dedicate the resources and time to their procurement )

Atomics shouldn't cost PF in the normal course of things.

Frankly, the raw materials are probably less than an hour's worth of a RT's income. The issue is that finding someone in the AdMech who's high enough rank to have access to the necessary patterns and is also willing to spend the time away from their research/other pursuits in order to make atomics, even for a fairly inflated price, is difficult at best. In addition, nukes are usually going to be made more or less by hand, at most levels. Instead of modern, or even Cold War-era capabilities in refining/producing the nuclear materials, you're probably looking at WW2-era Manhattan Project (and the Axis equivalents) style production. And someone in the AdMech who is capable of and willing to make atomics for sale is more likely interested in things other than bags o'money - they're going to want something in exchange, information, favors, services, examples of xenos and/or xenos technology to study, samples of archeotech, etc.

It might be possible to acquire the licenses to produce atomics for personal use, and establish a facility to produce them. However ... this is going to be a hugely valuable asset. The licenses will be expensive, even by the standards of the AdMech and Rogue Traders, and you're going to need to ensure the facility's security, and you're probably going to want to keep it a secret as well, because it's going to be a very high value target for raiders. Doing this will cost PF to set up and secure. And the secret that you have such a facility will eventually get out, but hopefully you were clever when you set it up and set up the protocols for resupplying it and picking up shipments of atomics, and found sufficiently trustworthy/loyal people to run and guard it, and keep the secret.

Very nice javcs. I like it. As for the PF etc etc....I was giving that the raw materials are purified and weaponized and the subsequent warhead is placed into the shell ( IE finished product ) As for the task of finding someone who can ( and will ) do the work...yes it will be difficult, time consuming, and expensive (spread the money to get the intel)

I very much like and agree with the idea of the Ad Mech wanting something more than just cash in return for their work...perhaps a trade agreement of some sort for transporting ....things...that the Ad Mech might want ( and that includes the extra Ad mech staff to handle the...cargo. They would almost certainly want something extra like favors for later or some such ( especially if they were more akin to hereteks than not and wanted to secure a potential mobile safe haven in the event the Inquisition came sniffing around too closely.

I disagree with the shelf-life argument. that's a limitation of modern nukes.

STC nukes will be made differently, more efficiently and account for that.

So you're suggesting that the STC contains a secondary device that suspends nuclear decay?

I suppose it's within the reach of Age of Magic Technology, but then puts us right back at square one.

That's actually still a reason to NOT use nukes.

You don't need to build a stasis chamber for every single macrocannon shell.

Depends on the kind of nuke, I think.

Fission, or fission-fusion weapons would have to worry about half life and the side effects of radioactive decay, or the means to counter/compensate. Although, I'm pretty sure that it's the triggers that go first, and the nuclear material actually stays viable for a fair while, and storing the triggers separately would up their longevity as well. But then you need qualified personnel to take care of them, and prep them, because they wouldn't be ready to fire at a moment's notice

However, pure fusion devices would not. This would require another way to induce fusion, however. This would not be out of the bounds of possibility, since STC plasma weapons use flasks of pre-made plasma, and the flasks can somehow contain and maintain the raw plasma as plasma for extended periods of time, rather than employing fuel (prolly hydrogen) in a more easily stored state and then inducing a plasma state in the weapon. The same goes for plasma grenades. This probably has something to do with why they're rare and a pain to acquire.

Again, though, sufficient macrocannon shells to cause the same amount of damage as a single nuke, of whatever kind, are no doubt orders of magnitude cheaper, and much easier to produce. And, sure, they're a lot bulkier and take longer to have the same effect, but you can't have everything.

True, but we already have plasma warheads as a standard weapon, as well as controlled fusion blasts (Melta). Atomics are something a category again higher. It's possible the reaction isn't even nuclear, but something even more esoteric.