I came up with these a while ago, and they've worked so far. Any input would be appreciated.

Lord Munchkin Presents...

An Admiral’s Guide to Acquisition

I created this guide in order to recreate not only the scale of 40k but to communicate the theme of Rogue Trader. You aren’t adventurers, you’re the leader’s of an immense dynasty that has weathered the ages. You seek to sharpen your teeth on the universe’s hide, carving away vast wealth. To do this you need ships, and lots of them. Thus the acquisition of a fleet is amongst a Rogue Trader’s prime concerns.

1. Salvage Pool (SP): This represents the amount of material available for salvage. In order to use the SP, you must allocate the point’s toward a vessel. The SP cost for them are as follows; System Ship (1), Transport(2), Raider(3), Frigate(4), Light Cruiser(5), Cruiser(6), Battlecruiser(7), Grand Cruiser(8), and Battleship(9). Alternatively, SP can translate directly into PF.

2. Facilities: These are the tools the players use to salvage. They are as listed here; Legendary Shipyard, Greater Shipyard, Lesser Shipyard, Voidfarer Station, and Breaker Yard. The multiplier for each is 1-5 in reference to their order. Each facility can salvage a number of vessels equal to their multiplier.

3. Crew: These are the individuals working on the salvage. They are as listed here; Elite, Veteran, Competent, and Incompetent. The multiplier for each 1-4 in reference to their order.

4. Difficulty: This is how hard it is to accomplish your goal. These are your options; System Ship, Transport, Raider, Frigate, Light Cruiser, Cruiser, Battlecruiser, Grand Cruiser, and Battleship. The multiplier for each is 1-9 in reference to their order.

5. Result: Finally you work you multipliers together get a number that equals the number of months need for completion.

Sources of SP

1. Thematic Wrecks: Named wrecks always start with full SP for their class. These can be moved.

2. Ship Graveyards: Usually in the background, these massive fields of steel may be exploited by the clever Rogue Trader. Though they may have any number of vessels, the SP is decided by the GM. Ship Graveyards are permanent fixtures and may not be moved.

3. Fresh Kills : When a vessel is destroyed, roll against Hull Integrity. If it passes, the vessels survives with full SP. If it fails, it loses SP per degree of failure. The lose of all SP indicates the complete and utter destruction of the vessel.

Examples From Play

1. The Emperor's Bounty has a total of 5 SP points. It is repaired at a Greater Shipyard by a Elite AdMech crew. That means it takes 5x2x1=10M. The Lords of Mars favor you.

2. The Penitent Traveler has a total of 2 SP points. It is repaired at a Greater Shipyard by a Elite AdMech crew. That means it takes 2x2x1=4M. Mighty is the Machine.

3. The freshly slain Stygian Reaver has a total of 2 SP points left. It is repaired at a Greater Shipyard by a Elite AdMech crew. That means it takes 2x2x1=4M. The Machine is innocent of it’s fleshy sins.

4. The Righteous Path has a total of 8 SP points. It is repaired at a Greater Shipyard by a Elite AdMech crew. That means it takes 8x2x1=16/12=1Y/4M. Behold the Machine God’s might!

5. SG1 has a total of 8 SP. The RT decides to build 2 Frigates. This happens at a Voidfarer Station crewed by Veteran mutants. This means it takes 3x4x2=12/12=2Y for the first 2 Frigates. In the Expanse, a good mechanic is worth more than their weight in gold.

6. SG2 has a total of 4 SP. The RT decides to build 1 Frigate. This happens at a Breaker Yard crewed by Incompetent dregs. That means it takes 4x6x5=120/12=10Y. You pay these people?

7. SG3 has a total of 12 SP. The RT decides to build 3 Frigates. This happens at a Lesser Shipyard crewed by Competent professionals. That means it takes 4x3x3=36/12=3Y. Slow, but well worth it in the future.

8. The Light of Terra has 9 SP. It is repaired at a Legendary Shipyard by a Elite AdMech crew. That means it takes 9x1x1=9M. Whatever you did to land yourself such a deal must have been legendary indeed!

LordMunchkin said:

I like it over all but you might consider limiting the sources of SP a little more?

1. Most of the Thematic Wrecks have been floating in space for years (or centuries). I am not sure they would have the amount of material it would take to build a fresh one.

2. Eventually, you run out of useful parts and now you are just harvesting raw materials that need to be re-formed into useful parts. (IE. You can only part out a car so much before it is worth more as chunks of scrap iron) maybe set a maximum amount of SP and vary what they actually get on the harvest crew? A foolish man can destroy a part a mechanic can use. You are also going to lose the Archeotech since only the Adeptus Mechanicus understand them well enough to fix and would probably claim (By Emperor's Decree) all instances of Archeotech that you come across. Unless you have a deal in place, of course.

3. I would modify if you have destroyed "major" components such as the Engines (Warp and Plasma).

Lastly, your time factors might be a bit off? According to fluff, building these ships can take decades or centuries to build. Refits probably have a shorter duration, completely new builds might need a 10x multiplier. Don't know. GM decision, I guess.

These rules make more sense to me, except I would rework the SP system so that each SP is only suitable for the same size ship it originally came from or maybe one size smaller. Cause it doesn't really make sense to have one SP from a raider and combine it for building a cruiser. Also, I would say that the SP themselves represent the bare chassis, no systems. These must either be acquired or salvaged via the salvage systems in BFK. Otherwise, I kinda like it. The problem comes with the transporting of a cruiser chassis. It would be easy to move, say, an Orion class star clipper in the hold of you Universe-class mass conveyer, and possible to move pieces of a frigate in a Star Galleons two cargo bays, but It would be very difficult to salvage larger ships. Though arguably, the largest ship a rogue trader would generally need is a cruiser.

I've decided that the salvage system from BFK can latch onto hulls and transport them (provided you have enough possible engine power).

For instance, When you fit the salvage system, it represents a number of clamps based off the hull size:

1 for small transports <50 space, 2 for larger transports

1 for Raiders/frigates (See below)

2 for Light cruisers/cruisers

4 for Battlecruisers/Grand Cruisers

8 for Battleships

This also represents the number of clamps needed to move said vessel safely, but results in the ship moving at half speed (in realspace and in the warp!). Gellar fields overlap provided you have enough clamps present, but void shields do not work while engaged. Also the clamps are distributed evenly on the Dorsal and Keel sections of the ship (top and bottom) so 1 Grand cruiser cannot safely move another, you'd need at least 1 more salvage equipped vessel.

In my mind it represents a large investment if you want to salvage anything worthwhile and offers a decent balance.

Interesting, I like the detail that went into it.

One questions and two suggestions though.

First when salvaged do you just get the hull (what I would suggest) or do you also get components with it, and if so how do you determine what they are?

Next you might want to consider when piecing together multiple pieces especially from different sized ships having it take longer or perhaps not be possible at all. It may not matter how many raiders you have getting a battleship out of them may be impossible.

Also as an alternative use for hulks I allow raw hulls to have an achievement point value = millions of tons x2 so a 6 mil ton ship sold as scrap is worth 12 achievement points. You might want to assign a point value to a SP if the players are more interested in profit than a new ship.

The only ship they've salvaged in that manner was the Righteous Path so far, and I let them pick the essential components that they wanted, picked out which ones were "new" to the ship (aka, what they would need to acquire) and then let the build the ship the way they wanted it. We just finished it today, and for the fit they wanted the group ended up burning 21 PF (1/10th of the SP of the ship + additional PF to guarantee acquisition roles on certain key pieces of equipment). I viewed this a a success on my part, and the group viewed as a success on their. They are quite happy with their new ship.

As far as piecing ships together, they need the correct sized components. So if they pull a barracks out of another ship, they can put it in any sized ship, but if they pull a frigate engine, they can't place it in a cruiser. Building a bigger ship out of smaller ones is definitely not Imperial, though tearing ships apart to repair a larger ship is doable (as in armour plates, turrets, smaller guns smaller components). The rules for the Salvage Clamps in BFK are really good for this actually.

I've also made it clear that they can at any point sell a hull or an entire ship for 1/10th of it's total SP converted to PF. In fact they sold off one of the Unknown-class raiders they had captured to help refit the ship.

Assigning AP values to hulks that they're just salvaging for scrap is a perfect way to do it as well, as it can benefit an entire endevour. Make a note though that ship parts are quite large, so corresponding transport capabilities are called for.

Man, I wrote this way back!

The version posted here is the old one. Looking at it now, I changed the SP to Salvage Score (SS), added the Crack (3) Crew level to the system, and made Fresh Kills moveable.

Now to answer some questions.

This system is only meant for salvaging the hulls of ships which I take to be the most valuable portion of a ship. I believe the salvage system in BFK handles components.

Also while the repair time may seem short for some of the examples, this is because they are happening under extraordinary circumstances. The service of a Elite Legendary Shipyard would be the equivalent of having the entire Lathes at your beck and call. Not something most can or care to purchase. Instead, most civilians get by with Competent Voidfarer Stations, but the local Imperial Navy MIGHT have a Crack Lesser Shipyard. Using these options, it would take 2.25 years to make a single Cobra Class Destroyer if done by a Crack Lesser Shipyard.

As for combining Salvage Points, I reasoned that Imperial hulls aren't made from nonscalable parts and thus can combined to make larger ones. Of course this doesn't apply to Xeno or Heretek ships so, as always, use GM discretion.

Anyway, thanks for the feedback, looking forward to more.