Hi. I decided that it's time to end war with dominate since we played few campiangs in the setting and now i want to provide players some closure. I came up with this idea. Players are part of strike force attacking dominate capital city on Kulth. Their first objective is to destroy one of the gigantic plasma reactors powering up orbital shield so the navy can strike at city then move up to the palace to kill duke Severus. I already have enough ideas for the first part but not so much what should happen after they destroy plasma reactor. I thought that good idea if they move up on palace via some sort of underground tunnels but what then? What opposition should they encouter, how duke would be guarded and how to resolve final fight with duke so they would have chance but it should not be too easy and no brainer like we shoot him until he is dead. So i ask you guys and girls do you have any epic ideas that would help me with this?

Good luck. Even if I look past what I often see as FFG's/GW's ways of writing things "so they will stalemate forever", what you propose is the big issue of Only War. Duke Severus XIII would have ALL his resources there. Hordes of his best-trained troops, war vehicles protecting the city, and an entire ant hill's worth of men in those very tunnels you mentioned. Also, said plasma reactors are, if my guess is right, buried deep beneath the earth the castle fortification sits upon, allowing the very rock to protect the equipment from bombardments, so you might need to get in before you can arrange for problems, and with several reactors, the shield might not stay off long enough for the ships in question to achieve a firing solution; if they are already in position, they are already taking hits from planetside macrocannons, missile silos, and other defense emplacements, so those Navy ships might get hurt pretty bad. Lastly, Severus might have any number of secret boltholes, from a ship in orbit, using tech and silent running, just waiting to teleport him out, other tunnels to run through, and any number of body doubles you might think were him, and stop to kill, but were wrong. Please consider, the army has been there all this time, and not succeeded. I've often envisioned a Callidus Assassin killing him, but one hasn't yet, so he must be a truly tricky target. If you actually let the party get him, you need to be careful, because with so many options, lame or legit, at his disposal, "getting him" will feel like a handout, if they didn't do something truly awesome to stop him.

Wherever he is, the Duke is probably guarded at all times by a large unit of soldiery. I can't grab my Ascension book, at the moment, but they have a write-up for Planetary Governor Malaki Vess, and he has some assortment of guards, so that might be a good intro. He probably has BQ carapace under his clothes, and a refractor, or better, if not a room-based shield generator. His men will all be well-armed, armored, and might have weapon emplacements. He could have Rogue Psykers, Chaos, a few of the last "loyal" Dark Eldar, if he has any sway with them, anymore. If the inside of his castle is anything like the Lycurgos, he could have TANKS in hallways, to slow you down. Honestly, little is "too ridiculous" once you get to cutting off the Dominate's head. I know I didn't tell you anything you don't already know, sorry. Just remember, though, that he is like the worst crimeboss ever; he always has several escape plans, and they can easily be grandiose, "impossible for anyone else" affairs.

Were it so easy to blow up the generators, why hasn't the Imperium done it already? I think the biggest hurdle for you will be coming up with a way to get to the Duke that the Imperium hasn't tried already.

The case with generators were that between imperium and generators was army of orks and dominate soldiers trying to kill each other. Since my players already liberated few planets over the span of almost 30 years. Imperium could have moved more resources to finish dominate. I realize that this is almost imposibble task considering that ffg wanted constant stalemate. But i thought that after a few years of constantly harrasing and pushing dominate back they would have chance to finish it. It's kinda ridicoulus when tyranid fleet with countless bioforms can be destroyed in just few months/years and something like dominate can hold out against imperium for more than 100 years. As i try to build living world when actions of players previous characters shape universe in which they play i think it would be stupid when they saved lycurgos, hervara, vibrius and few other planets and dominate still stands without any difficulty.

Of course it's not like the players gonna be alone in all this but i want to focus on player role and try to put them in the middle of duke throne room. I try to imagine that it would look like battle of stalingrad when all this will take a few months.

Venkelos have some very good points about this. I have'nt thought about scale of his defences before. Hovewer i see it that no matter how big army he have they won't hold without supplies, ammo, food and water. Of course they can have their own proccesing plant to make food and water, some factories to make ammo, tanks and such but maybe they already have rebellion among them fueled by imperium spies. Or something like that which make explanation believable. Or maybe Duke is already death, i mean how long can he live? In core rulebook it's stated that war is on at least one hundred years and i belevie that severus was older than 20 before war started. I just need something to push my thinking into right direction since i don't want it to be cheap like in low budget action movie but also not impossible like FFG want.

Well, he can live upwards of 200-300 years, with liberal rejuvenants, if he has access to them. As for the war still going,, one must remember that, in some ways, the Imperium doesn't actually care about this war. I'm not saying they're okay with Severus seceding, because we all know how the Imperium views that, but they refuse to give the Dominate and Orks of the Spinward Front their due response, because they have committed so much effort to the Jericho Reach fiasco, where really no amount of player victories is likely to shift that one. The fight against Severus is a good image to show that the troops they borrowed ARE fighting here, rather than the other side of the galaxy, leaving the Koronus Expanse and Calixis Sectors understaffed.

Tyranid Hive Fleets get taken out quick because they HAVE to. They always seem to have full battlefleets to throw at them, and whole Chapters of Space Marines to Mary Sue in the way, and win the day. They'll even lure the Nids to actual planets, let them start eating, and then raze the planet, just to cost the Swarm biomass, and servants. Since these Separatists, and the Orks, aren't viewed as a real threat (there are plenty more of both of them plenty of other places), such assets aren't allocated to the Front. If the Imperium could realize that this is a lost cause (taking down the Hive Fleet? Hah! Chaos going anywhere? Nope. Tau? Maybe. The Necrons? They don't even know what they are in for, yet.), and re-withdraw from the Reach (they did it once), THEN they could commit the forces and oust the Dominate.

And even if they did kill the Duke, it doesn't stop the war. How many of those people do you need to kill. Many of them have broken their faith with the Adeptus Terra, if not the God-Emperor, and it isn't so likely that they'll just "switch back", or even be allowed to; only in death can the Emperor pardon those who break faith with Him. Thus, they'll have all the more reason to keep on fighting.

I think you need to capture the scale of this; though the players are the ones who might deal the final blow to the boss, have THOUSANDS of men attack his castle. literally, have hundres of tanks on each side and god knows how many men. one of the many things that sets 40k apart from other settings i think is the scale, so have like 10 strike teams all try different ways into the castle and have the PCs be the only/ one of the only strike teams that makes it in. use narrative to capture the idea that a whole army is going in: the PCs aren't doing the whole thing: that doesn't fit the spirit of only war. but the players might be the one strike team that gets through: clambouring over the bodies of thousands of men to get to this boss.

scale my friend. that will make the end of this campaign a big one.

also, remember the imperium has orbital weapons that can destroy all life on a planet, use that. have multiple strike teams (the PCs included) set up relays around teh city that together can punch a whole in the shield protecting his castle.

in terms of defenders: this guy could have a personal guard of like 50 storm troopers ? the players would have to use their wits, plus support from other squads, to evade/pick off squads to get there

I almost totally forgot about 40k scale. So i think 500k men on each side supported by a few thousand tanks, artillery pieces, air support should be ok to show the scale of this encouter. So when they charge trough front lines in their tauros they will be just one of many squads that participate in this operation but only one that make it into generator. After that they face encouters with dominate few which can be done by brute force but few when enemies will be in full platoons so they have to use their wits not firepower. After that when they move into the city i think that this should be prolonged fighting when thousands of men kill each other and they must evade enemies/ think outside the box to infiltrate the palace. I was also thinking that maybe use tech assasin to stalk the squad when they get to close to duke since from what i remember he have few hereteks at his disposal so one of them might have created that kind of machine for duke. And maybe some kind of massive battle when succes battle maneuvers test will give them hints how to proceed. After few things pointed out here i am not sure that they could make it but if things go grim (as they always do) and they screw this (as they always do ) orks can crash the party and add some chaos.

For my groups I set up a task force which was created by the lord militant as a Mini crusade to end most of the conflict in the spinward front. It's a good setting to swap regiments and players in and out, when players get bored, with the excuse that the regiment is now involved in a policing action on the world, while the task force is reinforced with new regiments and moves on., but keep a over all focused setting. It also allows me to bring in the orks, and chaos and the supplement story books, as part of the hole setting. I can link it here if one requires.

I almost totally forgot about 40k scale. So i think 500k men on each side supported by a few thousand tanks, artillery pieces, air support should be ok to show the scale of this encouter. So when they charge trough front lines in their tauros they will be just one of many squads that participate in this operation but only one that make it into generator. After that they face encouters with dominate few which can be done by brute force but few when enemies will be in full platoons so they have to use their wits not firepower. After that when they move into the city i think that this should be prolonged fighting when thousands of men kill each other and they must evade enemies/ think outside the box to infiltrate the palace. I was also thinking that maybe use tech assasin to stalk the squad when they get to close to duke since from what i remember he have few hereteks at his disposal so one of them might have created that kind of machine for duke. And maybe some kind of massive battle when succes battle maneuvers test will give them hints how to proceed. After few things pointed out here i am not sure that they could make it but if things go grim (as they always do) and they screw this (as they always do ) orks can crash the party and add some chaos.

yeah man the scale sounds good. the tricky part is communicating this scale to your players. i had my friend GM and we were on a ship kilometres wide and another giant ship crashed into ours and i really got a sense of the holy **** that was happening, but i've done some large scale battles and got a really small response from my group. i think the key is pace: don't just say "there are lots and lots and lots of men!!!!", embellish it a bit, but at the same time don't drag it out, you don't want players to feel like ants who have no control over the giant kid coming to fry them with a magnifying glass. take time to hit home the scale, but not too much time you

My 2 cent because I don't feel it has been covered so far. Yes scale, pacing and difficulty are really important. So too is the reward and sense of achievement, not just interms of XP, medals and logistics rating. The PCs should come across evidence of how much of a B****** the duke is and how damming his rule would have been for the sector.

EGs

Documents that show he has signed over planets to the dark eldar.

Evidence that he has left human planets to the orks because it will slow the imperials

Proof that he had no intention of giving his subjects the freedoms he promised them and in fact welcomed how the dark eldar treated them

Grounds to incriminate Severus of partaking in some of the pleasures of the Dark Eldar

A drawer full of the skulls of children... Maybe that's to far!

Anyway you got the idea. If in the end the duke turns on his own people for his own survival, perhaps in an attempt to escape with the dark eldar, that would validate everything the players have done for their entire campaign.

Also all the evidence will help ensure that it is in fact the end of the war, giving the Imperial preachers the ammunition they need to turn the masses against the old regime and back to the Imperium.

Ok so a quick summary of the last game. It was not epic as i thought it would be. Players treated it just like another mission. Get in,stay alive, get out. After a frontline battle where they tried to stay alive and drive trough the enemy lines to get to the one of enemy void shield generators they stopped at maglev station near entry to the generator.

Our Heavy gunner thought that if he has 4 TB and a storm trooper carapace he is invincible. After 3 crits from overloaded lasguns he know that staying in the open was a mistake. So he was slowing them down and said " I can;t go any further i must stay" sergant reply "Your sacrifice will be honored". Player face was priceless

So they did a sneak entry trough service tunnels , battled a few servitors, sneak past enemy platoon. Killed so more servitors, failed to plant a bomb so instead of 30 minutes they got 15. Most epic was their escape from generator which was fast, dangerous and narrow. I need to mention that heavy gunner form earlier who tried desperatly to stay alive, with broken leg, burned face and one arm he crawled trough the vents, all the way to their tauros. Without operate skill he tried to drive away, he broke clutch and gearbox but get away right before generator was destroyed. Other players had other problems in tunnels while escaping the generator but after everyone got out orbital strike took down the city.

There was no epic battle with duke, no city fight. Duke escaped and war will continue but player characters won't participate in this any longer because they got new orders (and i got a new campiang ) After a quick talk we all agreed that they got enough of the dominate and big orbital strike is good enough finnish for them.

I have played post-dominate campaigns. Yep, the duke is dead, the dominate is no more, but the greenskins captured half of the periphery, dark eldar are killing and enslaving the settlements far drom the frontline, there are still plenty of guerillas loyal to the Dominate fighting a losing battle or (rightfully) believing there's no coming back to Imperium for them, new Lord-Subsector is not particulary fond of his not-long-ago disloyal subjects and arranges a network of concentration camps to "re-educate" anyone who could be branded as ex-supporter of Severan, and among the sheer misery, poverty, hunger and destruction chaos cults fester and grow, offering salvation to the desperate masses.

My 2 cent because I don't feel it has been covered so far. Yes scale, pacing and difficulty are really important. So too is the reward and sense of achievement, not just interms of XP, medals and logistics rating. The PCs should come across evidence of how much of a B****** the duke is and how damming his rule would have been for the sector.

EGs

Documents that show he has signed over planets to the dark eldar.

Evidence that he has left human planets to the orks because it will slow the imperials

Proof that he had no intention of giving his subjects the freedoms he promised them and in fact welcomed how the dark eldar treated them

Grounds to incriminate Severus of partaking in some of the pleasures of the Dark Eldar

A drawn full of the skulls of children... Maybe that's to far!

Anyway you got the idea. If in the end the duke turns on his own people for his own survival, perhaps in an attempt to escape with the dark eldar, that would validate everything the players have done for their entire campaign.

Also all the evidence will help ensure that it is in fact the end of the war, giving the Imperial preachers the ammunition they need to turn the masses against the old regime and back to the Imperium.

I don't entirely see your point. While the Duke is a total jackass, and a traitorous, heretic secessionist, to boot, you are asking people to "learn things about him" that were already true for the previous regime. The Dark Eldar thing? That I'll grant, but the Imperium frequently sacrifices whole worlds, and often their populations, to slow down an enemy advance; that's mostly how the Tyranids are fought. The Imperium is no freedom-loving gov't, often only seeing the people, and worlds, under its thrall as mere resources to be used, so they really weren't getting any better, and traitor worlds probably won't. If Kreig hadn't already been blown to bits, I believe the Imperium was coming to virus bomb the planet, and only after seeing that they had "cleansed" themselves did they permit the survivors to "earn their place with the Emperor" back, by sending their fragged soldiers to the worst warzones there are. not sure how many people they would let live, and can see the above, where the new Lord Subsector would be a total ass to them.

I have played post-dominate campaigns. Yep, the duke is dead, the dominate is no more, but the greenskins captured half of the periphery, dark eldar are killing and enslaving the settlements far drom the frontline, there are still plenty of guerillas loyal to the Dominate fighting a losing battle or (rightfully) believing there's no coming back to Imperium for them, new Lord-Subsector is not particulary fond of his not-long-ago disloyal subjects and arranges a network of concentration camps to "re-educate" anyone who could be branded as ex-supporter of Severan, and among the sheer misery, poverty, hunger and destruction chaos cults fester and grow, offering salvation to the desperate masses.

Yeah, I can see this all happening. Much like their other writings, they do a pretty good job of making sure there is no "end", really no matter what you do; that way, you've always got some other material to use, in the next game, and buy their next book.

It's down to the PCs perception. If they started saying that what the Dominate was doing wasn't any different to what the Imperium does, I'd add worst stuff. They were only examples.

I can see that. I think, for me, one of the big issues with the Imperium is it's a sort of a shock to me that more areas DON'T try to secede. The Imperium is a cold, heartless, uncaring monster, so vast that it can't manage its own holdings, and only just barely able to legislate its laws on the vaguest of levels, leaving day-to-day things to lesser people, who maybe answer to them. They don't know their people, they don't really care about their people, and they'll so willingly eradicate whole planets, even, of their own people, that no one should be able to love them, except that they are raised to venerate the Emperor, and it is said He proclaimed them the right governance. One of my favorite little things is in the Ascension book, for DH1, where we meet Malaki Vess, Planetary Governor of Zweihan's World. The man is a decent human being, all around, and rather involved with his own people, who are very devoted to him.Problem happens when it is determined that his world's tithe grade was erroneously set, and the Lord Sector plans to fix that, but the planet's corrected tithe grade will butcher his people, and their way of life, as its rings are decimated, its lads strip-mined, and its people either conscripted into the work crews to do that, or seconded into various Guard units. He knows it's his responsibility to make this work, but he knows his people will suffer grievously for it, and the Imperium, on the whole, will not care, as no world is meant to prosper, when they could do more, and toil.

In this environment, it's a marvel that more worlds don't try to break away. If the Spinward Front is a good indicator, many sectors are overtaxed, with the Imperium's always-growing list of never-ending wars, so any battlefleet response might be slow to come, though I suppose it will. It is only the fear of this response, that if the Imperium can't have you, to squeeze the vitality out of slowly, till you are trash, they'll do it quickly, in one go, to show others the error of your ways, that prevents many from seeing the Imperium as corrupt behemoth, stepping on its own people mindlessy, and only noticing them when they accidentally cut it, and it beats them with a hose.

Imperium is grimdark for the sake of being grimdark I agree that no human civilization can prosper in such conditions but this is why imperium crumbles. Anyway since FFG did not want to advance storyline in spinward front (for example by making another campaing book or something) we players had to do it. In previous campaing my players hated imperium when they realize they fight for nobles who sits in their spire while common people died. So they became renegades. Anyway back to the topic. I think that ending the war with big bang on dominate capital was a good thing since i can always later get back to it (like duke survived, dominate won't surrender to imperium, some random general takes duke place etc.) or i can drop this and move on to other sectors and never mention dominate again.

What do you think would happen if the reverse were true: the Dominate discovers some weapon or ally that turns the tide in their favor, and the Imperium is on the retreat. Maybe they are able to create/clone/summon soldiers with some dark technology and are able to overwhelm the IG, then invading the Calixis Sector.

>> I can see that. I think, for me, one of the big issues with the Imperium is it's a sort of a shock to me that more areas DON'T try to secede.

Simple enough, Imperium offers at least some protection agains even more uncaring, dangerous and bloodthirsty things lurking across the galaxy. So uncaring, dangerous and bloodthirsty that it is rational to endure imperial tithes, laws and drafts for even a tiny chance that when those things come knocking at your door the Imperium will send help.