Hail!

Well, I've been playing a lot of "Battlefleet Gothic: Armada" on the PC. And since I GM "Warhammer 40k RPGs" every now and then, I thought the "Rogue Trader community" might know the answer to my question.

So, how long does it take for the navigator to enter the Warp? In the game, there is a lot of "emergency jumping" away from the battle. I was wondering how long would it take for a ship to enter the Immaterium in the middle of combat.

Thank you in advance for any input you can provide!

The Emperor Protects!

At the speed of plot.

Preparations take a while. Charging the warp engine, raising the protective Gellar field, preparing the crew and sealing breaches and whatnot. The thing is, time is abstracted away, even in BFG: Armada.

That said, those emergency blinks and short-ranged warp relocations shouldn't be too common. At the very least it should have a chance to fail, scatter, or destroy the ship due to the nature of the Warp. Also, you don't need a Navigator to enter the Warp, only to steer you once you're in it.

Yes, emergency warp jumps are as overpowered in that game as the warp phasing is in this RPG. Navigator powers OP forever.

I rule it at one strategic round. My players have only tried warping out once when the Dark Eldar were absolutely destroying them, and they had their Astropath spend all his fate to boost his WP for the focus test to boost their shields as high as possible to survive.

Mmmmmm... I see...So, there are "rulings" for it in RT, not rules?

Mmmmmm... I see...So, there are "rulings" for it in RT, not rules?

Yes. Someone posted a house rule for Warp Jump, which I pilfered and added to my collection. Please see my link below, and you can find it under the folder "House Rules" file name "Emergency Warp Jump." It's actually pretty interesting.

Mmmmmm... I see...So, there are "rulings" for it in RT, not rules?

Yes. Someone posted a house rule for Warp Jump, which I pilfered and added to my collection. Please see my link below, and you can find it under the folder "House Rules" file name "Emergency Warp Jump." It's actually pretty interesting.

jesus that kneecaps the power i mean holy crap no player would ever use it like that

Its almost like Emergency Warp Jumps are incredibly dangerous and should be avoided unless under the most dire of circumstances.

Who knew, ey?

Its almost like Emergency Warp Jumps are incredibly dangerous and should be avoided unless under the most dire of circumstances.

Who knew, ey?

that doesnt make it something you use in dire circumstances it just makes it something you are never going to use... also i read the rest of his house rules on navigation and honestly while some of it is kinda interesting, it mainly just means the navigator will never be leaving the ship because hes NEVER gonna have skills other then what he needs to pass those checks because my god that **** is way to hardcore

Its almost like the engineered mutant subrace designed specifically to do one thing and one thing only is only good at that one thing that noone else is good at.

Ok I'm going to stop with the snarkiness, but honestly these Houserules are fine considering some others I have seen not just on this forum but throughout the RT community. Warp Travel by its very concept is supposed to be a dangerous, barely understood art and something akin to an emergency jump should be a harrowing experience for any party.

Navigators are just that, navigators. They need to specialize in what they're doing because guess what, noone else can do what they do. This is one of the reasons I don't even allow Navigators as a PC class because of how integral they are to the functioning of a ship. A Navigator should never be going down to the surface and fighting Genestealers in some cave, or take that shuttle to the pirate-held fortress to run-and-gun it with the rest because if he gets even scratched, if he is put out of commission in any way its not just him that's screwed, its the tens of thousands of lives aboard even the smallest frigate that are now royally screwed as well. Even then, if he makes a single error during a Warp Jump most likely that doesn't just lead to an "oops, hehe my bad" moment, it leads to thousands of people dying, becoming possessed, mutating beyond recognition, etc.

And that's on a good day!

well in that case why even bother with the house rules just say nobodys allowed to play a navigator and send them where ever the **** you want and dont write several pages worth of house rules for a class your never gonna allow anyone to ever play, also one error and 10k lives are put in danger? wtf are you talking about, unless your balls deep in a warp turbulent area you shouldnt be getting lost EVER, i get the fact that some ships are lost in the fluff i do but come on

Well let me start by saying these are not my houserules and in my own game I got like... 2 paragraphs for the NPC navigator that I roll beforehand and then just have the players react to the happenings should something go awry. Beyond that, the normal setting of Rogue Trader is pretty turbulent when it comes to its Warp lanes, in fact the Koronus Expanse is judged as being more dangerous compared to normal frontier space because of the amount of nearby Warpstorms. Hell there are 4 major ones that dominate their own areas of space and dozens of smaller storms dotting the rest of the Expanse.

There are reasons why only the brave and foolhardy dare even venture into the Koronus Expanse to begin with.

Also concerning the "one error, 10k lives die", that's being generous. If you look at even the base rules in Core and Navis Primer the chance for some Crew Population loss during even a routine Warp Jump is pretty **** high, and that's even if the Navigator gets everything right!

in all honestly it just feels like those house rules are punishing people who would play navigators and i always took it as the navigation checks already included the increased difficulty from being in the expanse, i mean after all if the imperium was losing that many people and ships whenever you enter the warp it would fold overnight

Given that Navigators are intended to be Player Characters and that they're also intended to be in command of huge resources I'd be inclined to say that the Navigators that PCs can be are not the primary Navigator for a ship but an assistant or backup Navigator. Instead their main role is to get out in the galaxy and spread the influence of their house/learn how to manage vast resources.

Sure they have a few neat Navigator powers and in a pinch they could navigate a ship but they're more valuable for their genes. They're breeding stock.

Mmmmm, interesting discussion. Incidently, that was also a thing I was wondering: how many navigators are common on an imperial ship?

It would seem near madness to travel the Warp with only one Navigator. Sure, run of the mill void travellers should only get access to "one", but mighty imperial battleships thousands of years old? Do you really want to travel with no "backup" for your "space fantasy hyperdrive"?

Just as bigger vessels (or perhaps, more important vessels) will usually have astropathic choirs to ensure good communication, it would seem prudent to have at least three navigators in that irreplaceable ship of yours...

Do you guys have any info on this?

I actually rule the opposite as Weedy. Our PC Navigator was the "Primary" Navigator, and he went along on missions because he wanted to confident that people would die to protect him. His Navigation skill got very, very high, and when he got inevitably shot in the head I didn't want my players complaining that the NPC Navigator should be "better" than the PC was. He was not.

I usually have major vessels have three. One for Navigating, one for backup, one for emergencies. A PC Navigator has an "apprentice" who is very quiet and does nothing unless it becomes absolutely necessary.

I thought the smallest number was 2, a breeding pair of navigators in order to help ensure large numbers

Oh dear god no, Navigators would never, ever perform their breeding on board a starship that did not directly belong to the House. Even then most Houses do it (heh) in secret locations scattered across their myriad estates.

Don't forget that Navigator marriages and breeding contracts are increeibly convoluted and rife with political and diplomatic maneuvering. Furthermore the Navis have ancient ties with the Biologis for the finest Genetors to facilitate the birth of even one new Navigator. When it comes to Magesterial Houses they can plan the course of a specific bloodline generations in advance.

With that level of scrutiny, to have a breeding pair aboard a vessel not of the House would be inconceivable for any Navis, save perhaps the most desperate of Renegade or Shrouded Houses.

My Navigator PC and I had a lot of fun deciding just how weird and messed up his line was. We decided that his house, due to millennia of inbreeding, could no longer produce Navigator females - instead producing Psykers of such prodigious strength that they're inevitably drawn into the Inquisition or the Black Ships to never be seen from again.

Also roughly 90% of Navigator "births" result in the child being born without eyelids meaning their head is basically an instant-death portal into the Warp that would kill everyone, and requires immediate putting down before the Enslavers come through and doom an entire world.

Navigators are weiiiiiiird.

Oh dear god no, Navigators would never, ever perform their breeding on board a starship that did not directly belong to the House. Even then most Houses do it (heh) in secret locations scattered across their myriad estates.

Don't forget that Navigator marriages and breeding contracts are increeibly convoluted and rife with political and diplomatic maneuvering. Furthermore the Navis have ancient ties with the Biologis for the finest Genetors to facilitate the birth of even one new Navigator. When it comes to Magesterial Houses they can plan the course of a specific bloodline generations in advance.

With that level of scrutiny, to have a breeding pair aboard a vessel not of the House would be inconceivable for any Navis, save perhaps the most desperate of Renegade or Shrouded Houses.

I never meant to imply that the ship was where they did breeding. In fact apart from renegade or shrouded houses I believe most Navis don't engage in breeding directly. I imagine they use artificial insemination and the children are carried to term in non-Navigators (birthing servators perhaps) so that there is less chance of the child being influenced by the warp during navigation.

However being on board a starship gives the breeding stock mobility to make contacts with other houses in person and negotiate said marriages and breeding contracts. Maintaining fleets is expensive and while many Navigator houses can afford to do so why bother when people will literally pay you to take their fleets wherever you need to go. I imagine all rogue traders with Navigators have to make side missions for the Navigator's house... probably far more regularly than they'd like.

In my mind the PC Navigators are these guys. The ones who may not be the absolute best at navigating but have to be mobile to negotiate the delicate web of breeding contracts and constantly shifting house alliances. Not to mention there might be a few who are just expert duelists whose only real job is to be available for duels when required.

Ah, I did not realise this was how you were spinning the concept. I have to say, that's a pretty elegant solution you cooked up there. While for myself, I haven't found a compelling reason to allow Navigators in my own campaigns so far (divergent themes from what a Navis character would fit into alongside the fact that none of my players want to be one either ) this does represent one way to incorporate a sort of Navis Scion type character into a game.

Mmm, all interesting perspectives. Thank you for your discussion!

Feel free to continue to talk, but I think this was all the help I needed... Time to go back to the Warp, for me...

In the campaign I ran, the ship had 3 navigators. The PC navigator was the main one, and she (and her companions) came from a pretty powerful house. The reason the captain took her with him on ground missions was because... well, because she insisted, and he didn't want to piss off her family. He just smiled and agreed and did his absolute best to keep her alive when the proverbial poo hit the fan.

I'd be willing to believe that, along with the classic "because they CAN" excuse, the first reason I can come up with for why the Navigator is coming along on the ground mission is to keep the Rogue Trader honest, with their family. In some respects, I see the individual Navigators aboard your ship as sort of business partners, and while it is their job to guide the ship through the Sea of Souls, it's what they are for, they do this on the plan that the Rogue Trader will find valuable stuff, and the Navigator's House will get a cut of those profits, if you will. So, the Navigator goes down with the rest, and ensures the Rogue Trader's report on profit gained is accurate, and can claim whatever share their family is owed for having gotten the ship there, in the first place. They're honestly not much less durable than lots of the other character options, and I can entirely see them making sure the Rogue Trader doesn't skimp on their rewards, and those of the House, by making sure to go along, and see all the same things.

People who argue that the Navigator has no business going down have some merit, but that same logic should almost keep most of the Explorer team aboard ship, and just send down wave after wave of your own mooks, perhaps with an expensive specialist you appropriated, and leave it at that. My opinion, at least.