Hey, so my current plan for the campaign puts the players in a situation where three sessions from now they

1. Only have four ships with them (a pair of raiders and a pair of sprint traders)
2. One of the ships they do have has blown its warp drive
3. They should be trying to breach the stasis shielded armoury that contains, among other things, enough volkite weaponry to fully equip a newly founded Space Marine Chapter
4. And get informed that a battlecruiser that was last seen four millennia ago is barreling down on their position

Is this to much for a group of Rank 2 PCs or is it just one of those times where they need to know when to cut and run?

4 ships is a pretty decent force.

That said, a battlecruiser is...well....a battlecruiser, and two sprint traders ain't gonna contribute much in a fight.

I suspect they probably couldn't take the capital ship, if it's well equipped and commanded. But a thousand plus archaeotech weapons is one hell of a prize. Whether it's a sufficiently attractive prize to risk putting up a fight to buy time....not sure.

I would suggest that the ship which cannot make warp is probably dead....so might be profitably employed 'distracting' the battlecruiser. Two of the others run, whilst the last one hides in silent running (assuming the Battlecruiser isn't aware it's there) and the explorers continue to try and smash and grab until the last possible minute before running like hell for the Mandeville point.

Sure four ships seems like a decent force, but then you realize that it is actually a third of the dynasty's fleet!

Other ships they have are a transport that's providing most of your income with it's food runs to Winterscales Realm

Six transports still moving to the rendezvous and, assuming that none of them break apart trying to cross both warp storms to get to it, parts from half of them will need to be used to patch up the other half

The pirate vessel they still need to salvage after they melted to bridge

And a bulk hauler that is still planetbound after it translated out of the warp and into a planet's atmosphere

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And a bulk hauler that is still planetbound after it translated out of the warp and into a planet's atmosphere

I'm impressed that one survived at all. Warp translation that far inside a Mandeville point is normally not just certain death, it is (this being the warp) uncertain death*.

There must have been one hell of a navigator on that thing.

I wasn't commenting on the size of the dynasty fleet; but four ships in one place is a decent force by anyone's standards, just not enough to consider taking on the battlecruiser in a fair fight unless it's seriously damaged or otherwise reduced in fighting power.

* As in; you'll die. Eventually .

Yeah well I had a new player and couldn't think of a better way to introduce his character (who had been in hiding for the last decade or so) than with a few multi-meltas and a battle cannon.