At the end of this week I am planning to start a Rogue Trader game which will include some players that have never played it before. To make it easier for them, I would like to have a list of recommended items to take as their free acquisition if they don't want to spend the time looking through all the gear available across RT and DH.

Some other points to consider

- If they want an item that isn't on the recommendation list, they will be allowed it.

- The acquisition will be for a single item, not for consumables (eg no drugs, ammo or grenades).

- Grenade and Missile launchers will need their ammo supply acquired separately*.

- I would prefer it to be an item they will keep for a while, not something they will discard when they can afford one of higher quality.

- I'm after items useful to everybody, as well as items that are only a good recommendation for one carrier.

- Cybernetics are allowed and will be installed without problems.

*In a previous game I had one player who owned a grenade launcher, but kept failing the test to acquire grenades for it. I do not plan to do anything to prevent this happening again.

So far I've only these items:

- Best Quality Flamer for Missionary characters.

- Utility Mecadendrite for Explorators.

- Best quality photo visors for everyone but astropaths. I'll be using a house rule that means best quality provide photon flash immunity* and can be fashioned into a pair of glasses or contact lenses (along with some other parts hidden under clothing).

*Guess what grenade enemy NPCs will never use.

Good Quality M.I.U. for the Void Master

Best Craftsmanship Powersword for the Rogue Trader if he discards his normal power sword

Good Quality Lath Pattern Force Field for the Seneschal

Good Craftsmanship Dragon Scale for Explorator

Light Power Armour with better powersource for the Arch Militant

Good Quality Navis Prima for the Navigator

Santiago said:

I don't think I'll allow trading up for personal gear so that power sword, being the only one that doesn't fit my interpretation*, is out. Especially since the next step after the free acquisition is letting them make a large number of acquisition tests using the groups profit factor.

Why are you saying that the Force Field and Light Power Armour should be career specific suggestions ?

Grabbing solid protection is a good idea for those that start with flak or mesh armour because it means that they aren't as screwed if they fail the acquisition tests.

Now that I think about it, the general suggestions should at least include a pistol, a basic weapon, a melee weapon, armour and some utility items. A best quality long las or hunting rifle would make a good basic weapon, photo visors are a good utility item. Not sure about the rest.

*I took "they may chose a single item with a total acquisition modifier of +0 or more" as referring only to the modifier and ignoring their starting profit factor, which means that with the scale modifier (+30) they can have items up to:

- Common quality (+0) items up to extremely rare (-30).

- Good quality (-10) items up to very rare (-20).

- Best quality (-30) items up to scarce (+0)

I just found a melee weapon to recommend:

- Take a best quality chain axe or sword (average rarity, so they have a modifier of +10)

- Apply a sanctified weapon upgrade (IH pg 191. On its own the upgrade is very rare, meaning it also has a modifier of +10).

Combining acquisitions means I take the availability that gives the greatest penalty. I don't know if I need to add quality to this modifier, but it doesn't matter in this case.

- Apply a -5 penalty for having the items combined.

This gives a best quality chain axe or chainsword that is sanctified and with a total modifier of +5, there is room for another upgrade. An Exterminator upgrade is the only other melee mod I know about and it would be useful on the axe, but I'm not going to advise removing the balanced quality on the chainsword.

Sure, a chain weapon does less damage than a power weapon (especially against armoured foes). But power weapons cause targets to catch fire and/or have their ammo explode.

Actually, purely from a mechanics/utility point of view, I would actually recommend flamers (or hand-flamers) for everyone. Reasonable range (in terms of the average shoot-out range, at least), has some of the lowest drawbacks to firing it untrained, and it is the only set of weapons which can hit multiple targets on a Half Action. And that quite leaves out the possibility of continuing damage from setting stuff on fire.

Actually, there's even a way to deal with the lack of flame training in the early ranks for other careers: if they get a good-quality Combat Shotgun (ported from DH- scarce availability), with a fire selector (scarce), and possibly an extended mag of some description (either the duplux mag from the IH- rare or the backpack supply -rare). Either way that provides an awesome basic weapon for room clearing. Then for their rolled acquisitions, they start grabbing some consumables in the form of special ammo supplies (personally, I'd recommend a loadout of standard, inferno and blazer (from the IH - common)).

The Blazer is particularly fun as it can be used to turn your shotgun into a flamer which still uses Basic Weapon Training (SP or Universal).

Oh, and the quality modifier does matter- in the case of the chain-weapon above the net modifier would be -25 (very rare gives a modifier of -20, average is +10, but you take the worse, so -25 after combining the two. For a single person, that means it's Negligible scale so the +30 from that gives a net of +5, but Best Quality is -30, which negates the scale modifier entirely)

Alasseo said:

- Flamers for everyone is an interesting idea.

- Grenade launchers are also a half action AOE weapon and as both are scarce, they can be best quality from the free acquisition (they have a good chance of getting at least one grenade type for it). The voss pattern is even inaccurate, meaning they won't be taking the aim action with it.

- If I was going to recommend a shotgun, it would be a best quality combat shotgun that they can upgrade later. But I won't recommend a shotgun because I don't want to recommend gear they will replace later on. If they like scatter weapons, they will be aiming for the crux beam gun. If they don't, there are other weapons they will head towards.

- The blazer rounds are primitive damage and single shot only, making them a pretty terrible ammo.

I can see how your calculations differ from mine:

- I added the rarity and quality modifiers together for each component, took the worst of them, then applied the scale and combining modifiers.

- You took the component with the highest rarity, added the other modifiers, then added the highest quality.

I will be sticking with my method because the spreadsheet I use for calculating the modified profit factor for each item makes mine easier.

Bilae, I think you are unreasonably cruel as a GM.

Giving them an oppotion you plan to NEVER EVER come into game & making them role for ammo seperately FOR JUST ONE WEAPON TYPE is something I would sneer upon as player.

Anyway, back to your question:
I assume that it will be an ongoing game.

I would offer one of them to role for a strange talisman [unique] that gives him the same "Charm"-Ability as a void born..or raise that ability to "8&9" if he IS a void born.

For RogueTraders; a tailored set of very outlandish and fine clothing giving him +10 in interaction skills with people not that well travelled as him (i.e. other RogueTraders) or simply "Jaded" [Very Rare]

For a pios character; a "Sins releaf" tatooed on his back which was made by monks in response to a royal donation he made to their temple. They assured him that after his death, the emporer will look with mercy upon him (+3 against Fright Checks; loses effect if more then 10 cp are accumulated)[Very Rare]

For an Arch-Militant: a pair of mastercrafted weapon-carriage servitor dogs. They´ll carry 4 long weapons in total and follow the pc along. They will not fight, but provide the pc with a called weapon via spring load and "catch" thrown/dropped weapons and store them. They do not reload, but carry ammo as well [One Step beyound unique, does count as "2-4" in numbers]

For a Seneschall: A Lexicar Servo Skull counting as "assisting" him in up to three Lore Skills [Very Rare; each Skill above the first raises the difficulty by 10 and a Forbidden Lore does raise it by 20]

I actually like the Maccabian Rosarius Field Generator at common quality over the Lathe-Pattern at best quality. It doesn't last nearly as long, and needs a lot more maintenance, but I also tend to avoid protracted firefights so the increased protection is a worthwhile tradeoff for me.

My party has also found that you can never go wrong with an Inferno pistol, and Plasma's fairly popular. Quality carpace is also fairly popular choice. It seems to me that making the 'free' aquasition something of importance is difficult if they're going to be rolling Aquasition again right after, particularly if they have a decent starting profit.

I actually found in my group that most of us were perfectly satisfied with the starting gear choices and did not feel it necessary to buy weapons and armour.

As I recall, the arch-militant of the group didn't even get anything (or if he did, it must not have been significant as I can't recall what it might be. Maybe recoil gloves? Anyhow.) The Rogue Trader got permission to trade up to a better quality Power Sword which he then named "The Response."

I actually used my free acquisition to get myself a Servitor. Basically, he's a toned down version of the combat servitor / Janus Simulacrum (from IH) who has training in the Trade (Valet) skill. I consider him something akin to equal parts bodyguard, smart phone and manservant. He takes care of cleaning my chambers, organisng my files and such. He serves tea to my guests, polishes my boots and files my claws. He also helps apply my "special" facial creams and dresses me in the morning. He also keeps things running smoothly in my little petty illegal trading empire by makng deliveries in his concealed compartment. And he is equiped with a shoulder-mounted lasgun. Nothing crazy but just enough to scare away the dirtier elements of the the Underdeck when I go sluming.

I think the best use of the initial acquisition is to use it to get something that serves the story and background of your character. After we worked out all the details, I think we agreed he was a Good Quality Multi-task servitor or somesuch. And he's essentially useless for combat (and too valuable to my character to bring on missions with him.) But I don't regret my choice for a second! It adds so much to the game!

(We built in some story arc where my scum-y Navigator was the reason we have murder-servitors on board... and I worked out a deal with the chief Explorator who made me a custom servitor. She's a little too happy to make new murder servitor. And we've sort of struck a deal whereby I've been able to get my own enemies quietly "reconiditionned". I've eliminted a few of the more vocal elements who dissagree with our new captain's rule as well, but he a Navy man and doesn't really appreciate my vigilante,pro-bono work. But seeing as our seneschal is a useles drunk and I'm the only competent Navigator on board. lol!)

Bilateralrope said:

Oh I see where I went wrong, these were the choices my group made, save for the AM who went for a custom stub pistol seeing he is a bodyguard.

For my Rogue Trader I went for a Good-Quality Refractor Field from the Inquisitors Handbook, since I rolled up an Ancestral Seal as part of my Origin path, I asked the GM if the Refractor could be built into the seal, to which he said yes. A Refractor field never hurts.

For another character concept I had, a Praetorian Big-Game Hunter (Arch-Militant), I would've picked up a Fykos Forge Nomad Hunting Insturment (Inquisitors' handbook again) with a Red-Dot sight and Bleeder rounds upgrades. (Very Rare -20, Single Item +30, two upgrades -10). It'd be a fine weapon for someone who prefers elegant precision over heavier weapons and staccato autofire.

You'll be glad to know then that Refractor Fields and several other Force Fields are in "Into the Storm", so you'll be able to use the updated forcefield rules (like the ones in Ascension) for it. Personally, I think the new rules are a lot better than the Inquisitor's Handbook rules for them.

My explorator ("Magos Militant") took BQ Dragonscale Armour from Inquisitor's Handbook.

For the record, I've switched my RT campaign over to the Ascension rules for fields. Much better IMO.

Our group basically went with weapons and armour.

Good quality stormtrooper carapace is a very popular choice.

For weapons, the following three choices have proven horrifyingly effective: 1. Xenofilament grenades plus grenade launcher. This works if you buy the grenades with the free acquisition, and then buy a grenade launcher with the first acquisition roll. 2. Storm bolter with motion tracker. 3. Inferno pistol.