Hi,

I am all new to Dark Heresy and bought everything released except Radicals since it wasn´t available. I am planning a massive campaign including every official adventure released this far. Is it possible and what should be a good sequence to play them in. Thank you very much for taking your time answering this!

HERE is a great thread of how most of the published adventures rate...

In My Humble Opinion

Drop and leave out "Shattered Hopes" & "Maggots in the Meat". Former is a dungeon crawl, latter is pitched for a starter group but the enemies are of a higher level and is a bit linear.

Order to run

1. The Edge of Darkness (great adventure!!!)
2. Illumination
3. Rejoice For You Are True *
4. Shades on Twilight *
5. Baron Hopes *
6. House of Dust and Ash *
7. Tattered Fates
8. -> rest of Haarlock's Legacy

I'd recommend that you consider inserting an odd home grown adventure in, the * shows the points when the flow from one adventure to another can handle an insert. Use some of the ideas from Disciples of the Dark Gods & Creatures Anathema.

Hope that helps...

PS the Gamemasters forum is a great place to ask questions like these...

I agree that "Shattered Hopes" & "Maggots in the Meat" are problematic, and I'd presonally skip them.

Shattered Hope has a number of way for new PCs to die horribly from a simple failed roll, and in one encounter using the wrong weapon type kills everyone. Plus it's a subpar adventure mainly to show case combat. Shattered Hope can be played as is just be sure that every has climbing gear and a non-las/flame weapon. Then be sure to ask, if needed,are you sure you don't want to use the climbing gear? Are you sure you want to shoot the mutant with a las/flame weapon?

Maggots in the Meat is an okay adventure up until the climax. Where the PCs face a Xenos threat they really can't beat without heavy weapons. Maggots isn't bad if you replace the Xenos with something lower ranked PCs can beat.

Dalnor Surloc said:

Yeah, some gear would be nice for the PC's to have in Shattered Hope (although I do believe that they get a decent rope from the quartermaster in the beginning which should work). With teamwork (meaning assisted rolls, and letting the proper character with the proper careerpath do what they're good at) and the odd fate point they should do just fine.

Apart from that, I'd seriously advice any GM to expand the "Shatters" part of the map where that lone tunnel stretches out of view and also place the antithesis stone somewhere deep in that area instead of it's usual spot. I did that and I added some areas that needed a good bit of thinking and problem solving to be able to proceed, and I threw out the nerfed boss plague letter and used the real stats for it, described in the Rule Book and with the errata (the first time around that we played the adventure, the final fight was too anti-climactic because the players shot the mini-bearer to pieces the first combat round). I'd also advice to throw in a few additional mutants in the caves instead of just having the PC's face lone mutants (any lone enemy is too easily defeated when several PC's go up against them at once, regardless of their inhuman stats and bloodthirst).

Also you should arm the mutants with more approriate weapons than actual lasguns and autoguns. Look up some of the weapons described in the Inquisitors Handbook (like the drive nailer, the steam drill, the axe-rake and the gas torch). These improvised weapons makes more sense to be in the hands of indentured mutant rabble rather than having "proper weapons", and it will discourage the players of going into "loot the dead"-mode, because even their basic gear of weapons they start out with will most likely be of better quality and adaption to real combat than the improvised tools used by the mutants.

Also, you should consider having the Plaguebearer be brought fourth by a minor Chaos ritual where the "stone" serves as an altar, rather than just having the stone vomit fourth a daemon at it's own volition. The Chaos ritual could be preformed by a Cult Magus, guarded by a few cult fanatics and cult members as they are described in the rulebook.

While Shattered Hope certainly won't move beyond the realm of "dungeon crawl", most of these changes did make the scenario more enjoyable for both players and me (the GM). But being the dungeon crawl that it is, most interaction skills won't come to much use, but with some thinking and ingenuity you can put a group of PC's to the test trough many uses of other skills, and I would say that this will serve as an enjoyable intro where the primary interaction will occur between PC's and they get a chance to know eachother's quirks, strengths and weaknesses.

Dalnor Surloc said:

Yes, the Xenos threat is very tough indeed. I would try to make sure that the PC's are armed with at least bolter weapons or something of roughly the same strength as bolters, because that's what our group needed to beat the Xenos and we barely triumphed with our lives intact.

Thank you very much!

I appreciate your comments and "advice" to where you ask questions like this

Humbly

/Me

so far I've run 3 official adventures and 6 homemade ones. As a result, now that I'm gearing up to run Purge the Unclean (all three w/ some odds and ends between each) I kind of expect the high rank 7 PC's to blow right through the adventures and mulch them thoroughly. Unless they do something especially stupid....again...

Very good points raised by the guys here. Although, and you'll excuse me for playing devils advocate here, I don't get why you people want to tool up the Acolytes to fight the slaugth? I mean maybe I missed the point here but I thought the mission was a lesson in humility and knowing when you're out of your depth.

As for Shattered Hope and the Edge of Darkness, well they were both demo adventures so really just a rules showcase. Edge of Darkness however is more like a proper adventure and good fun. The first adventure my group went through with their own characters was Illumination but if I was running another where noone had played before i'd certainly start with Edge of Darkness but add the Seer into it from Illumination to build his character.

What I also done was since i'd ran Shattered Hope with the demo characters to my group I ran a sort of sequal and added loads more tunnels including another two levels to the mines investigating the previous team.

Anyway good luck with the adventures!

Darkshroud said:

The problem is the Slaugth are just way over powered, and will simply kill most group. They can one shot the average PC, and most weapons won't hurt them. They have no reason to keep the PCs alive. The PCs are trying to maintain a low profile on the planet, and there is no warning when the adventure goes from laughable human threats to a horrible Xenos threat.

The result is that the PCs just all lose a fate point as the Slaugth simply hunt them down without effort. Now maybe your PCs are running the adventure in power armor and blotguns the like, but my PCs generally operate under cover with lighter armor and las/SP weapons. The only lesson I think most PCs would learn from this is their GM is an ass, or that they need to wander around loaded for Slaugth all the time.

The only reason I can think of to run Maggots in the Meat is that you have foolishly awarded too many Fate Points.

The conclusion of Illumination awards both extra xp and a Fate Point. Unless your players are burning them like crazy, you don't want to do that at the end of every adventure. Extra experience for the climax is fine, but if you end up with players with 5+ Fate Points; that's too many for my taste.

I like Baldrick's order, though I ran Illumination first because it's easier to GM.

If you want more adventures, you can find last year's adventure contest winners here: http://www.fantasyflightgames.com/edge_minisite_sec.asp?eidm=50&esem=4 I'm sure the 2009 winners will be posted there as well. The Dark Reign website has adventures as well.

I ran Scrivner's Star between Shades on Twilight and Baron Hopes, so I was kind of zombied out by the time I ran Baron Hopes and I brought back the Serrated Query for the climax there. I also wanted to create a story arc around the SQ, and tied it up with a big fight with the subsector boss of the SQ. No, they didn't get the Faceless One, but they did get a big fish.

You might want an adventure before Tattered Fates that introduces your acolytes and the Pilgrims of Hayte to each other. It could give TF more resonance.

Baldrick said:

If you were to start a brand new campaign and ran the adventures in this order, how much XP would you start the group off with? The suggested 400, or would you bump them up a bit?

I'd not think they need more XP for Edge, but they need equipment. Be sure that they all have decent armor say guard flak, flak cloak, or a body glove from the IH. Other wise some of your PCs will be dead from the enforcers.

1. Shattered Hopes (where three (of five) of the freshly recruited Acolytes meet number four in my campaign)

2. Edge of Darkness

3. Illumination

4. unofficial adventure (Gateway 17)

5. unofficial adventure (War Wounds)

6. Maggots in the Meat

7. Purge the Unclean - Rejoice for you are True

8. unofficial adventure (Cold Tower I+II)

9. Purge the Unclean - Shades of Twilight

10. House of Dust and Ash

11. Tattered Fates

12. unofficial adventure (Masks of Tzeentch)

Darkshroud said:

/signed

This adventure was a great experience for my group and indeed taught them a lesson in humility. It was the first contact with a Xeno species and they realized rather fast it was not ET trying to phone home or a Vulcan wishing long life and prosperity. My players survived (even though the Guradsman lost a Fate Point after only a single round of close combat with a Slaught Infiltrator), because they persuaded a group of Plumes and their lieutenant to join them in their approach of the weird sky-mill (the lieutenant was the first to have his head desintegrated by the Slaugth weapnry). In the end the few surviving Plumes fled in terror and the PC's being lucky with their dodge rolls set fire to the mill and fled the planet...

Dalnor Surloc said:

Sort of agree with this...

For my players, I emphasised the threat of the enforcers (if they crossed them) plus they were under orders from Interrogator Sand to keep a low profile. When they did have to take on them it was after they had raided the ( secret location not going to spoil it for any players reading ) and by then they had acquired some help from the locals & they were defending the building.

If you have a good bunch of guys then Edge of Darkness can really shine as a team building adventure.

Luthor Harkon said:

Can you please post a link to this adventure?

Mrakvampire said:

Well, it is actually Masks of Nyarlathotep from Callof Cthulhu which I adapted (and am still adapting) for DH (mostly hand-written notes) and I called the working title of the adaption Masks of Tzeentch (not very creative I know...).

I'm running the Adventures as a GM in this order:

1) Edge of Darkness

2) Illuminations

3) Rejoice for you are True

4) Shades of Twilight

5) Baron Hopes (Going to finish this in two or three sessions at the moment)

6) Maggots in the Meat

7) House of Ash and Dust

8) Tattered Fates

9) Fallen Cities

10) Whatever is coming..

I absolutely agree in skipping Shattered Hopes, more or less for the same reasons mentioned above..

But I'm still going to give a chance to Maggots in the Meat: a good adventure for Lev.5 Characters, even if in need of some little custominzation by the GM. Just few examples:

1) To find a good reason for Ordo Hereticus Accolytes to meddle in a typical Ordo Xenos investigation

2) To replace the random Xeno-Beasts with a fair number of Slaught Vassal Constructs.

3) Not to mention the umbelivable XP award, in my own opinion due to a printing error: just 200 XP for surviving 3 Slaught & Co.?!? I suppose it was meant to be 200 XP per session = 600/800 PX at the end of a short and straightforward adventure like Maggots in the Meat.

I personally don't care about balancing powers between the Acolytes and the villains: an happy ending doesn't have to be the rule while running a game as DH, and burning Fate Points is supposed to mean something, least the average Player grows fat and lazy.

Dalnor Surloc said:

As a player, this was certainly my experience with Maggots in the Meat. The only reason that any of us survived, with even a modicum of sanity, was that our GM is irrationally soft-hearted when it comes to permanently retiring player-characters on their first outing. As recommended, our GM ran it as a "starter-adventure", with us at rank 1, with only starting gear. The saving grace was that after an encounter with some Squigs in an alley before getting to the windmill, we had paid a street-urchin to run get the "authorities", and to tell them that there were xenos running around the streets. Instead of the local authorities showing up (which would have done exactly zero good), a Witch-Hunter we had previously befriended showed up in all his bad-ass glory. The sorry bastard even sent a communique to our Inquisitor, saying that we were undeniably brave, but borishly stupid ... which was probably true.

In any case, while I still enjoyed it, I think it would be more appropriate for a rank 3+ group, with at least some upgrade in gear. Just MHO.

Sister Cat said:

I ran it with a high-end rank 2 group, and nobody lost more than a Fate Point in the process. I ran it solely as a lesson in "running away is your friend"; the players weren't meant to triumph (in the traditional "kill it and burn the bodies" sense) against the Slaugth (who really don't care about the fate of the PCs, and are more than smart enough to just leave when the situation ceases to serve their purposes; they aren't trying to fight to the death, merely to dissuade pursuers), but rather to learn that there are things in the galaxy that A: are significantly harder than them and that they should run away from, and B: that even as veteran 40k players without exception, there are still things in the setting unknown to them.

N0-1_H3r3 said:

And I'm sure that is the way it's "supposed" to be run. Unfortunately, this was our group's first foray into DH, for the players as well as the GM. So, things didn't quite work out that way. Of course, it didn't help that we (the players) are a bit hard-headed in that regard, or that my character was a fanatical battle-nun.

So, my main point was, I personally don't think it is appropriate for starting, Rank 1, characters, with only starting equipment. While it was pretty simple and linear in the investigation department, it got very lethal, very quickly. And starting characters have (or think they have) a lot to prove to their Inquisitor. Running away from the enemies of humanity on your first outing just doesn't seem like a very viable option. JMHO.

Ajax-Hesh 60563.3791.34321.B said:

Dead Stars are coming