[There are spoilers below, don't read if you intend to take part in Forgotten Gods as a player!]

Dear fellow GMs, I currently run the Forgotten Gods adventure from FFG. Our group already played two sessions and next time we will probably start "Into the Wastes".

I have read the relevant sections of the book and a few questions came into mind:

• Why does D'Layne Travers (p. 46) have the Independent Targeting talent? As far as I know this only brings advantages in connection with Two Weapon Wielder, which he does not have.
• Why does none of the Red Walk (p. 44ff) gangers (not even Vornas) have the Parry skill? As bad-ass sword fighters they should be able to parry an incoming blow, no? Would make more sense to me to give them Parry than to give all of them Combat Master.
• Same holds for Frohrn the Slayer. Why give him a Balanced weapon and then Dodge +20 instead of Parry? The mountain of a man which is depicted in the book should not be able to nimbly move out of the way of an incoming attack. AND all of his people (the Gwydrae), even the Shaman, DO have Parry +10.
• Frohrn detests religion, spirituality AND sorcery. Then why does the Gwydrae Shaman have an effect like the Inferno Pyromancy psychic power? This smells like sorcery to anybody who will witness its use.

1. He probably had more talents at some point, and somebody didn't pay attention when they stripped him down for the book.

2. They're not 'bad-ass sword fighters,' they're a brutal gang of people who like to kill people and melee and show off the scars afterwards. Blocking an attack would mean you don't have a scar at that point.

3. I assume the change is a mixture of mechanics (his Agility is slightly lower) and the utility of Dodge. Not to mention just because your weapon is Balanced, doesn't mean you need to parry with it.

4. It explicitly mentions Frohrn accuses other religions of trying to tempt his people from the purity of their 'natural path.' It could be he makes an exception for his tribe's shaman.

Thanks for the reply MijRai! So it is correct that Independent Targetingon its own is of no use?

Concerning the Red Walk you are probably right. I just interpreted it wrongly, I guess.

I just thought that a good fighter as Frohrn uses the weapon he is most proficient with and if this weapon is a sword then he should also be able to parry with it. But that's just me.

I'm still not convinced by the Shaman. The description of Frohrn and the Gwydrae does not sound like their 'natural way' would include sorcery to me.

In the end those are all just minor things I was wondering about. Again, thank you very much for your input.

An other thing:

Can anybody who already GMed the Gwydrae Raid talk about how it went? At the moment I'm not quite sure how to handle my warband, consisting of a pyrokine, a telepath, and a sniper.

Well, my players and I had a lot of fun with how I handled the attack; because my group took up two Viator Sand-Crawlers, I rejinked the balance.

The Gwydrae came in on either side using two vehicles, shooting up with one rig while the other started sending boarders across; it was a running vehicle battle, where the Outcast Warrior rammed one and Righteous Fury'd the motive system, and the sniper dropped a grenade into the hatch of another. Both of the Gwydrae vehicles were totaled in the end (close-range salvos from the pintle-mounts, grenades and ram attacks tend to do some damage), and the group's Viators both needed field repairs. It slowed them down just in time to get hit by the sandstorm, which necessitated more repairs!

Sounds great! I also was thinking about a second vehicle to attack them from both sides simultaneously. And I really want to bring in some Fury Road style

It is, in my opinion, always ultimately the GM's call on what abilities an NPC has, regardless of what a book says. If you feel a character should have a certain Talent, give it to them! Even if it doesn't match the authors' original vision of the character or their fighting style, what's important is that it fits your interpretation and how you plan to run the character/combat in your game.

Of course, you are completely right spaceratcatcher. I only feel that if I start tweaking talents/skills in the heat of battle I'm going to break any balance which maybe was intended by the authors and I hope they put a lot of thought into.

That's why I try to plan ahead this time

How has Forgotten Gods gone for you so far? I'm going to be running it next as we've just finished Desolation of the Dead. I'm starting to prep it now and was wondering how people got on with it, it looks pretty **** good from reading through it! I've got a bit of time to prepare, one of my players is running an Only War campaign in the mean time to give me time to recover

Hi Gregor! So far it was pretty much fun. My warband values high subtlety (or that's what they claim, anyway) and so they decided to forge oath-cogs to appear as a Consortium Special Investigation Task Force (in fact they already created this cover during Desolation of the Dead). They first visited their old "friend" Oath-Captain Nils in the Purity Gate and had the Necropsy with Sanctionary-Medicae Tomas Scarun. Of course they were expecting something bad to happen and so were not very surprised by the seemingly dead mutant getting up and attacking Tomas. Well, all members of our warband have Jaded or better and pretty high Willpower, so it is not so easy to shock them anymore. They disposed of the mutant quickly and our team's telepath erased Nil's and Scarun's memories of the incident. After that they went on to the actual crime scene. Although they have two psykers in the team they did not manage to find the psychic trail and so ended up following the blood and the silicate footsteps out into the surrounding area. They did some inquiring on local dregs and neighbors to keep the right direction. In a dark alley they were jumped by four Mournful Songers and forced to take cover because of the suppressing fire. Unfortunately (for the Songers) the pyrokine was not pinned because of his Adamantium Faith and grilled two of the attackers in a fireball (Inferno I think). The other two were taken alive by the rest of the warband after the telepath "convinced" them to throw away their weapons. The Interrogation was a lot of fun, the cultists pretty much enjoying the infliction of pain by their captors . In the end the warband could not gain much useful information out of them. On a crowded square the warband approached the Bondless Dealer (forgot the name) and got the information that the smugglers were heading to a certain lift plat. The warband arrived in time for their arbitor to get into a higher position with her long-las and the rest carefully approached the smugglers who were waiting for the descending platform and shooting the service-servitor. One of the smugglers got lucky on an Awareness test and started shooting at a member of the warband and basically into the crowd. A lot of screaming, shouting, and running away started. The telepath inflicted Hallucinations upon Jarrik Tyrnel. He started to sneak around his people completely convinced that they could not see him anymore Since our telepath is such a nondescript and unremarkable bastard the smugglers never noticed him within the moving crowd while he used several Hallucinations and mind-control (always forget the name of this power were you can issue a single telepathic command). In the meantime the sniper took them apart one by one. The warband went through the whole episode unscathed. They took Jarrik Tyrnel alive and convinced him that it was in his best interest if he cooperates with them. After the big shootout on the busy square in front of the lift plat their subtlety did drop significantly.

tl;dr

Did go really well. A lot of nice rollplaying but the martial challenges were not very hard for our warband. They emerged almost unscathed.

Oh, boy ! So we had our "Into the Wastes" session yesterday. The warband (consisting of Cutter the telepath, Harlon the pyrokine, and Alicia the Arbitress) is pretty much ******-up. But first things first.

They started out well enough leaving the hive and hiring D'Layne Travers and his Sand-Lynx as well as the waster-guide Lano. Because of the heat (I think the Fatigue-rules for survival in the wastes in FG are rather nice) none of the acolytes are wearing any armor anymore. The warband weathered a glass-storm and met Hashian Trels, who rather surprisingly gave them a voidsuit.

Then Lano led them into a trap.

The Black Reaver of Frohrn attacked coming over a sand dune out of the setting sun and ramming the Sand-Lynx in the side. The Sand-Lynx was shoved into the opposing sand dune and toppled over on the side. The Reaver set back and Gwydrae started circling the broken autocarriage with Frohrn loudly demanding the warband to come out and surrender. D'Layne had Lano's Knive in the shoulder and was unconscious. Also the traitor Lano lay forgotten in some corner of the autocarriage. Cutter could see two wasters through the top-hatch and forced one to shoot the other. The Gwydrae opened fire on the car, bullets ricocheting everywhere. A big glass-shard from Frohrn's Hand Cannon ripping through the roof and smashing against the car's floor. Miraculously none of the warband got hit. Harlon, still hanging in the safety belts on the co-driver's seat, threw an Inferno against a bunch of Gwydrae he could see through the top-hatch. One burned to ash. Alicia remembered the Hallucination Grenade she took from Jarrik Tyrnel and threw it out of the hatch. The gas spread, two Gwydrae collapsing thinking it was poison gas and they are dead, a third shooting at an imagined big worm on his leg and thereby shooting himself severely in the leg. Other Gwydrae running away to evade the supposed poison gas. Along Frohrn and his champion the shaman stood his ground and brought down the wrath of his ancestors on the Sand-Lynx, an Inferno manifesting inside the autocarriage. Cutter with his clairvoyant powers got out in time through the side-door (now on top of the wreck). Harlon spending a Fate Point on his dodge and rolling 01 also got out of the car. Alicia dove for the top-hatch, shooting out of the carriage in a flash, rolling to the ground in front of Frohrn burning (not yet in the crits). The Sand-Lynx engulfed in flames. Frohrn smashing down the pommel of his sword on the Arbitress' head (Fatigue, sweet Fatigue). Harlon shoots the champion with a molten beam, but he lives and charges at the witch! On the other end of the car the shaman strikes at Cutter with his xenos blade. Alicia, still burning, leaps up and shoots Frohrn in the face with her boltpistol. He is not down. The pyrokine bursts into flames on purpose thereby scaring away the champion. Cutter forces the shaman to attack Frohrn. Alicia finally lays down, rolling around, trying to extinguish the flames (more Fatigue and now in the crits). Frohrn wants to finish her off, but is struck by his shaman in the back, grunting angrily. Harlon has mercy on his colleague and manipulates the flames on Alicia to go out. Cutter forces Frohrn to shoot at his champion who is just turning around and taking aim at Harlon. The champion is hit, looses both legs and goes down screaming. Alicia runs for the doubtful safety of the wreck. Harlon throws another Inferno at Frohrn and his shaman. The shaman goes down burning. Meanwhile Cutter notices that the previously fled Gwydrae have taken the Reaver and are training one of the big cannons at them. He forces the driver to accelerate and turn away from them at full throttle. The cannon's shot goes wide. Frohrn looking at his three opponents, his dead champion, the burning shaman on the ground, and his retreating Reaver takes to his heels after the Viator. Harlon mercilessly hits him with Assail, throwing him through the air, ripping free his arm, and Frohrn goes down screaming in a spray of blood and gore. Alicia shoots at the retreating Reaver with her boltpistol only hitting solid armor. Cutter starts running after the transport waving his arms and daring them to stop. Finally, Harlon lands a very lucky Flamebreath hit on one of the back-tires causing it to catch fire and break. The Reaver gets out of control ramming a sand dune and the warband can defeat the rest of the Gwydrae and take over the Reaver. Of course, their own transport, containing their driver and almost all of their gear and supplies is still on fire. In the middle of the Wastes. At Nightfall.

Looks like a great opportunity to bring in the Kreaytex ...

Next time ...

Edit:

I almost forgot the most important thing: Fury Road Soundtrack was playing in the background all the time. Nice!

The Brothers In Arms track from Fury Road is so epic and perfect for just such a battle as you described. I always have it ready for a battle like that.

~ alemander

And Spikey Cars . I used Immortan's Citadel for the first time our hiver (Alicia) and our voidborn (Cutter) stepped out of the darkness of the hive into the blinding light ...

Thanks for the write ups Elton, they're very entertaining! I hope you keep posting more in the future It's good to know that the combat encounters are a bit of a breeze for your guys, I have a similar problem with my group; a problem which will only get worse since the medic is who is pretty much good at everything is now looking for a powersword...

On the other hand my groups subtlety is awful, so much so that combined with the fact Desoleum and Askellon in general is rife with heresy, their Inquisitor has decided his hand is forced and is in the process of setting up an Inqusitorial Bastion on Desoleum and is helping a contigent of Adeptus Soritas from Juno set up a new Order on Desoleum. Then there's the public burnings which will begin soon...

I'm thinking that in response to this, the trade sable are going to be a lot more cautious and their operatives are going to begin packing serious heat. At the very least I'm considering giving the head of the smugglers the acolytes tail at the beginning a plasma pistol and some frag grenades to the rest. What does everyone think?

I don't know the particulars of your warband. Against our warband Tyrnel did not get to fire a single shot from his bolt pistol or use his hallucination grenade. So a plasma pistol and frags would not have helped him much either ...

With a mighty pyrokine AND a mighty telepath in the warband it becomes increasingly difficult for me as a GM to properly challenge the warband in combat.

From what I remember, you've got a possible encounter coming up onboard the Oath Unspoken. A brief interruption in the Gellar Field when the ship is in the warp causes Khorne Aligned Furies to manifest and try and seize the Xenos artifacts (coz: Tzeentch). You could always up the anté, throw in some of the khornate daemons from Enemies Beyond who specifically hunt your psykers down, after all psykers as powerful as them possibly getting involved in interrupting Khorne's plan is something which would displease the Blood God greatly...

Or, just throw a brass collar or three on the Furies, complete with name-tags in Chaos runes. Immunity to the Pysk will make them flail a bit, eh?

Those are both sound plans. But I fear that I will wipe the party with them. I always tell the psykers they also should invest in mundane fighting skills, but they just won't listen. Maybe a wipe-out would make my point ;-)

Thanks for the tips. Will have another look at this chaos fury encounter in Forgotten Gods and Khorne daemons in Enemies Beyond. Though it could take some time to get there. Already had 3 sessions á 6 hours and they are not even at the smugglers camp. Forgotten Gods is very rich.