I am writing an intro scenario to basically get my players used to the new rules and to give me practice writing scenarios for Rogue Trader before I let them free to do what they want. Please feel free to criticise and give suggestions on what to add. Also any little details that can flesh the whole thing out would be much apprecieated.

The Rogue Traders background means they start with him taking over after his mother, the previous Rogue Trader, has died. They have just returned to Port Wander after returning her body to her homeworld where they get a request to meet from one of his mothers old friends willing to give them a head start (that will prove profitable for him). For this I will be using Jonquin Saul pg 362

He has acquired some old maps that show some worlds that are unexplored and one has been noted as having potentially abundant resources and no habitation. The idea is that the players explore it, make it safe for mining, set up a warp route and then use a mining company mostly owned by Saul to do the work, that way they both win.

The map is out of date though and since it was created a group of Enoullians from DH’s Creatures Anathema have moved in and set up their own mining operation mining obsidian for a chaos group plans on using to build massive cathedrals in the name of the Chaos gods, on some unidentified planet in the expanse. Enoullians are slipping to chaos worship due to their hatred of the Imperium.

When the players arrive in system they find a small ship, only 700m in length, in geostationary orbit which is obviously a mismatch of many different races and styles. I’m not sure how the first encounter will pan out but most likely they will attack unless the players can convince them to back down (very hard charm tests).

Once they have driven off the Enoullian ship then they can land their prospectors at likely locations shown by the scanners and begin the survey. The largest likely deposits are located near the Enoullians site.

The Enoullians are all gone from their mining operation but in reality have gone to ground in the forests surrounding their dig site awaiting the moment to strike. They are co-ordinating with a chaos transport approaching from the other side of the planet (staying out of site due to warning and position data from the Enoullians) and will attack when it arrives in orbit 2 days into the survey with the Enoullian ship returning to help.

The players will then have to try and salvage the operation by driving off the enemy ships and getting the survey teams out safely.

What I don’t know is how I should classify the endeavour and how I should split and award the achievement points.

Also ideas on other things the players could pick up as a result of the endeavour would be great.

Kaihlik

Greetings,

well. I would say while your basic "start outlay" sounded a lot like like a classic exploration objective , the actions performed are more military i n style.

I would suggest some changes, so.

Access to the planet
If the planet would be easy to access/reach, he would have been plundered by others a long long time ago. How about making the journey different? Your pc could have to find a secure (or "more secure") warp route to the planet. Make the initial course harsh, with the pc loosing a lot of time in the warp. Perhaps a journey of 4 weeks or more. Come up with some need ideas what could happen there. I wrote up something my own for an introduction adventure I will likely never use (my group will stick to DH). Please see attached link & ****** what you like. I would say getting to the system could be worth 100 ap total, into the system another 50 ap and getting a save route another 100 or 200.

http://rapidshare.com/files/294946057/SomeHelp.pdf

The resources of the planet
While building material is quiet fine, how about something explosive? Good old Promethium, perhaps? There is one sole reason for this: keeping your pc from just bombing the Enoulian site from Low Orbit. Macro Batteries could be fine for this. But, if the "prize" (the natural resources) are flammeable and/or explosive, they would cut down their own profits with laying such a bombardment. To stop an oil field from burning is something very very difficult and costly...

The Enoulian Ship
700m in lenght. Make them attack the pc for only three rounds of space combat as they approach. They Enoulian Ship will be no match for that of the pc (unless they have a freighter) and the Enoulian will know that. The only thing they want to do is buy there brethern on the ground some time so they can evacuated. After three rounds, they will disengange. Make the ship quick enough to get away ,but do not make them jump. They will simply go for the deep void...to replot a course and re-appear later in the system.

Anyway, do not allow for any conversation with the Enoulian. They HATE the imperium. They won´t talk to humans, they won´t negotiate.

The Enoulian Sites
Investigating the Site could give some hints about whom they are up against (Chaos Worshippers / Enoulians). For a blast, trap the sites with explosives. Make these a little easy to find since the Enoulians have been in a haste. It MIGHT damage the pc (or more likely, the crew with them) but is more imortant to set the tune.

Military Objective
From there on, it is defending the secured sites (200 extra ap if achieved), driving off the Enoulians in the jungle (do not use wood... use jungle ^^) (200 ap) and do battle with the chaos transporter (200 ap). But only make them chaos worshippers, not CSM. Perhaps a CSM as the captain. And he could teleport down to the planet if his ship goes down arms blazing...

And now...?
Your pc crew is far from home. You found the planet, but a lot of trouble as well. And the sites established by the Enoulians might have been damaged/blow up. Even if not, you might need at least two additional sites to come up with the profit your partners want. That means exploration (from orbit and if a source is found, on the planet) and securing these sites (native wildlife in the form of dog sized aggressive intelligent hornets and/or giant lizards? Further raids from the Chaos renegads and/or the Enoulians? Some human tribe from a crash a thousand years ago, now gone native? Are they to be re-integrated...or just to be awed and tamed as a usefull work force)

Thanks, here is some more info and incorpirating some of your ideas as well.

Sorry I forgot to enclude the Journey in my original post, I had it in but then my browser crashed and I had to start again. It was always going to be a difficult journey although I hadn't decided how difficult.

Dont worry I never planned on including CSM. This is a simple supply vessel from a world where the population worships chaos, they have never ever seen a Chaos Space Marine.

For the resources thing, the planet has many different resouces on it but the Enoullians are mining Obsidian half way up some dormant volcanoes, also in the same area are deposits of Titanium and other ores some of them worth alot of money. This area is the richest mineral concentration that can be detected from space although Promethium fields are likely to be found in the ocean areas or the very large equitorial deserts. The area that the Enoullians are mining is worth a small fortune but bombarding the area from orbit could cause the volcanos to become active and make the area unsafe to work in without much greater additional expense. There is also no way of knowing if there is a supervolcano that could become active with a bombardment although a chain reaction of activity may pollute the air around it for years causing the expense of needing sealed units for doing mining. The Enoullian operation is not particularly labour intensive as they are using thier advanced technology to do most of the prospecting and mining with the number of guards protecting the camp from indigeouness life outweighing the number of miners.

They will booby trap and sabotage their equiptment though as it is important to them that they retain exclusive access to their technology as it gives them a strong bartering position with their chaos allies (who simply dont have the capability to do this scale of operation off world).

While Enoullians hate the Imperium they can and will talk to humans although probably only long enough to establish that they hate them. The players can convince them that they do not have any respect for the Imperium then they will not attack and request that they "withdraw their people", which is all a ruse to make them think the Enoullians have left the planet. The Enoullians will speak with the PC's but only to hurl curses at them and thier scum Emperor. This is in fact to distract them from the real reason for attacking which is to give the miners and thier guards time to blend into thier pre-prepared hideouts that are shielded from orbital scanners.

I dont want to portray the Enoullians as irrational bad guys who refuse to listen to reason or use intelligent tactics to deal with thier enemies.

I will put some runes around the dig sites that will hurt anyones eyes to look upon them and anyone with a relivent forbidden lore can dicern some information from them. They are part of the mining process and are used to make sure the obsidian is of a suitable psionic resonance for the purpose of creating the cathedral.

Kaihlik

i agree with the previous posting about making sure the Enoulian sites aren't susceptible to Lance Strikes from orbit. My suggestion is power fields protecting them, or even electronic confusion of the Vox system making precise targetting impossible, and random lance bombardment would likely destroy the ore fields.

As I said ground scans will show dormant volcanoes and a high chance of them becoming active if hit by orbital weapons and bombarding it will make the job of prospecting and mining much harder. Also that the dig sites are abandoned so there should be no reason to bombard them from orbit.

Kaihlik