My group and I have kicked off 2015 with a new game and its Black Crusade.

So far we've had one 'in person' session and a fair bit of play via social media to carry on and clear up the loose ends. Session two in a couple of days.

We've been sent into Calixis as a vanguard for a coming Crusade, essentially to sow seeds of corruption and do what we can to cause trouble.

We know little about each other's characters, but so far from the others i've gleaned:

Sereena

An insanely beautiful pirate captain with her own raider starship. She is clearly possessed of fleshy appetites and skilled at getting others to do as she wishes.

Kalros

A fallen angel, a chaos marine. He is devious, ambitious, and a lumbering monster of war.

And i'm playing:

Ramihrdus 'the doctor'

An Idolitrex magos biologis; a master of chemical and medical sculpting, and a skilled corrupter of technology. He is dominated by logic, betrayal, and innovation and seeks...well...that is his secret. He is more machine than man...

So far we have set footfall on 41 Pry and proceeded to cull the station master and usurp control over the place. I have reconstructed his flesh and brain around a servitor as a living maquette in my thrall. NExt we must deal with those councillors who remain loyal to him, and suppress any faction that would cause us trouble.

We intend to make this our 'home base' for our actions to come, which are:

1. Remove Marius Hax (sector governor)
2. Throw Scintilla into disarray
3. Corrupt the Inquisitors of Scintilla
4. Sabotage all Imperial Guard on Scintilla
5. Find hidden staging posts for Chaos forces
6. Recover archaeotech / xenos tech of use

Lofty tasks given to us, which i doubt we shall even pursue, let alone achieve!

We pretty much ignored the GM's plot and plans from the get-go, and have embarked on our own agenda! Hehe...its cool through as we tend to have a very blurred line between GM and player, and our games are often collaborative. Chaotic, but collaborative!

Its been a good fun start to the campaign and i'm enjoying Black Crusade more than any of the other 40k lines so far.

Ooh, yes, i suppose one of the benefits of mixing online and live-session RP is that i can capture the online interactions. Here's the pre-game 'recruiting scene' between me and the GM.

(GM text in italics, mine in bold)

Current location: Screaming Vortex, Forge Castir, Makeshift lab up on the edge of the Mechmoor toxin swamps

Where The Doctor spend my time recovering the battle debris and shattered skitarii of that battlezone, looking for toxin or warp-mutated genetic codes among the fallen.

Prologue: The current year is 816. M41, on no particularly abnormal day during your experiments on your abominable subjects you start getting manic panic, followed by blurred visions of fire, decay, blood, and ultimately the end. These visions quickly subside, and you're left with a feeling of wanting. For what you are not entirely sure. These visions even haunt your dreams at night, and continue for three weeks. Ramihrdus Channard is busy at work, when suddenly your lab's perimeter alarms suddenly start flaring. You understand that there is an intruder entering your claimed area of the swamps. Pict displays are distorted, and all auspex and sensor arrays start to act up. Effectively rendering your senses outside of your lab blind.

I squint at the alarms, somewhat annoyed at the disturbance. 'That's odd', I think, before retracting my blade tines from the lymbic system of the restrained skitarii groaning on my operating table. I take up my power axe and flick on my holstered plasma pistol before marching out of the lab-structure into the emerald light of the toxic filth swamp outside.

'Who goes there?!' I bellow. 'Show yourself and let us parley'.

A small creature of humanoid appearance enters your field of vision, slowly approaching, often looking back the way it came. It's physique is small, that of a human child, but on closer inspection the figure looks more like a hunched and malnourished male. Its features are ugly by human standards, with rubbery skin and bulbous eyes, and a tiny slitted mouth filled with tiny barbed teeth.

It approaches you with a nervous smile, and rasping noises from its mouth, with can only suggest it has no vocal chords. It approaches with an even more nervous wave and what appears to be a scroll clutched in its hands.

I peer out into the chemical fug for a moment, and then extend my mechadendrite to take the scroll.

With extreme hesitation it offers the scroll into the leering mechandrite. The scroll appears archaic, brown and decaying with age, bound around an ornate golden rod with mysteriously seducing symbols. The man-creature-thing nods at you enthusiastically, and then turns its head the way it came and beckons with his hand at something within the fog.

Another figure approaches, this time hulking in appearance, wide and imposingly tall. As it approaches closer the figure can be identified as a crimson clad Astartes. An unholy astartes.

'Greetings, Magos.'

'Ahh, gene-soldier. Rare is it to see your kind out here. My surgery is open if you require treatment; an amputation perhaps? Or new eyes?' I stare up at him impassive for a moment, and then say, 'What brings you to Mechmoor?'

The Word Bearer Space Marine finally approaches the Magos. A fixed grin on his face, one that seems surgically permanent to his face. His face is marked completely in unholy words, and symbols, that seem sickening to stare upon, but also alluring.

'Thank you, but no thank you. However, I do require another kind of service from you.' The unholy warrior motions with his hand to the scroll clutched in your mechandrite. 'This is what brings me to this... humble swamp-land. And this is what brings me to you.'

I glare at the warmonger and read the scroll.

'As you will read it is a summons, of sorts. I am privy to knowing that you have already experienced the calling of the Gods in the passing weeks.' As you scan the scroll it is decorated in even more ruinous symbols, and written in text that seems to dance on the parchment. It reads as a summons to partake in the Calixis Crusade as one of the Gods' Chosen Ones. The warrior offers his hand out of politeness.

'I am the envoy of our Warmaster Voik'Seth, who is the writer of your summons. A blessed being who answers to the calls of our true Gods, to stamp out the false God. He writes to you for you have been chosen, just as he.' 'My apologies, I have seemed to have forgotten my manners. I am Father Kallous Wrex, Dark Apostle of the Word Bearers legion, and devoted disciple to the speaker of truths, Lorgar.'

I close up the scroll and regard the hulk before me. 'Strange that one of your chapter speaks of the gods.' I conceal the summons beneath my robes and stand pensive for a moment. 'I know nothing of this Voik'Seth you speak of, envoy Kallous Wrex, nor do I see purpose in following him on some damned foolish crusade.'

I scan his rictus face for signs of reaction. 'More, I am unsure as to your provenance for assuming that I have received a 'calling from the Gods'. Tell me, child of battle, why should I enslave myself to the will and whim of this Voik'Seth?'

The Word Bearer begins to laugh, almost hysterically, withdrawing his proffered hand. The cur starts at the Space Marine's laughter, and soils itself out of fear.

'My dear Magos, I do not assume. I know. The dreams? The visions? The blood of Imperials spilling? I am not telling you, for I am just a messenger from Voik'Seth who speaks for the Gods, for the Gods speak through him as an ascended being. He wishes for you to join him in his crusade as a Chosen One. You- chosen of Voik'Seth, and through him, chosen of the Gods. Don't you wish to ascend and leave behind the cursed shackles of mortality?'

'Dreams of death, decay, and oblivion; these are not visions that inspire me. But...' Ramihrdus' tines flensh tight around the haft of his dread axe. '...but...my research here is all but done. Perhaps I could find fruitful information veins to tap for the blood of data elsewhere. And it has been much time since I walked the worlds of Calixis.'

I glance back at the facility that had been my home for six months. The shattered and broken skitarii writhed impotently against its bonds. 'Very well Father Kallous Wrex, Dark Apostle of the Word Bearers, I shall take to the stars and join your crusade; but know this...I serve no master, nor bend my knee to any overlord. I am Magos Ramihrdus Channard, Dread Biologis. I come for my own ends'.

I let out a burst of binary chatter and a lumpen servitor emerges and hands me a wooden box filled with data crystals. I take it silently, turn to the Word Bearer and say, 'where then is the muster point for this crusade of yours?'

The Word Bearer's perma-grin impossibly widens even further. 'Good, as it has been foretold. I would not expect a Chosen One to bend to the will of mortals.' Kallous Wrex turns his head and looks down at the soiled mess that is the slave, and addresses it.

'My dear servant Kilbern, please go send word that we are ready to depart with our new friend Magos Ramihrdus Channard.'

The wretched cur Kilbern nods and scurries off back into the fog from where it came.

'Well met Magos, we will first head way to meet the Warmaster's other Lieutenants, whom I am among. We will then take part in a compact to unite the four Ruinous Powers, where you will meet the rest of the Chosen of Voik'Seth. Then we head for a sub-system which I am sure you are all too familiar with, where a planet you once called home resides.'

'I bend to the will of none, herald, mortal or otherwise; nor take bindings nor limitations, nor make contracts, nor swear oaths. Such petty dalliances have no value in the face of betrayal. You should know that more than most'.

I watch him closely for a clue as to his thoughts and feelings. 'If this Voik'Seth has 'chosen me', then it is for my quality and qualities as they are.' 'So lead on 'Dark Apostle', for I would meet these others of whom you speak. Be quick about it though, as my mind is now set on new operations and procedures, on explorations and biopsies of the future unknown.'

I stand ready to follow the Word Bearer.

'Very well, Chosen of Voik'Seth. Please, follow me.' Out from the skies the hum of engines come, with bright lights and the screams of exhausts. Kilbern returns, and followed behind him flies a shuttle from out of the fog, which deftly lands right in front of the Dark Apostle and the Magos.

sounds good so far

OK, so, session 2 didn't go too well.

We discovered some sort of ancient temple on Iocanthus.

Surrounded by dead bodies? Check

Massive guardian gargoyles? Check

Beating heart on a plinth surrounded by arcane circle? Check

Did we leave it alone or try to take the heart?

We took it of course, and one TPK later (crushed by the guardians), we spent the infamy and awoke, having been recovered and returned to our orbiting ship by our minions.

Lesson learned there i think...Still, my gift of the gods added to my machine trait so that wasn't too bad. Infamy's collapsed though...

1. Throw Scintilla into disarray
2. Sabotage all Imperial Guard on Scintilla
3. Find hidden staging posts for Chaos forces

I know a way that you can do all three of these things at once. Somewhat simple to do as well.

Find out who and where the various links in the chain of supply and logistics are and either corrupt the people already in those positions or replace them with your own people.

In order to function, the Imperial war machine needs to have a strong supply chain. The people you should be targeting for corruption are the people who grow the food the Imperial Guard eats, the people who create the various weapons, ammunition and equipment required for the Imperial Guard to function, the people who transport said goods around so that they can be used instead of rotting in some warehouse somewhere and most importantly of all; the people in charge of recording all of this and sending that information upwards.

I'm sure you can work out plenty of nasty things to do once you've gotten these people under your thrall.

Session 3 - Things go better. Nobody dies.

So, Sereena has a raider ship. She is in effect a pirate princess. This means our game is basically a cross between Rogue Trader and Black Crusade, which is working out to be very interesting.

So, following our failure in 'going in the front door' on the temple (to retrieve 'The Obsidian Tome' (whatever it turns out to be) we hooked up with a corrupt Inquisitor (Mokartus) who promised us some information we need in return for rescuing one of her acolytes from a tribe of feral orks on Iocanthos' southern continent.

So...we need an army.

A plan is hatched. We investigate the 5 Vai (kings) to find the weakest. He has a son who is weak and crippled.

We make him an offer - he gives us his current stock of Ghostfire, and in return we weaken his enemies and I genetically enhance his feeble son, so that his dynasty will become the most powerful in the future. (My character is a Genetor Magos with amazing genetic engineering and medical skills). He agrees. Short term pain for long term game - and his still has a few years until the next tithe to replenish his stocks.

We plan to use his Ghostfire to trade an army from the Vervai (high king) to take on the feral orks and allow us to get the Inquisitor's acolyte out...

Plans are coming together.