I am pretty satisfied with Into the Storm so far, except for two issues that are not just minor nitpicks, or just matters of taste to me:

The Ork player character career is, in my opinion, a bad idea. While it is only slightly more powerful, or about equal, to a well-optimized vanilla career character, the issue I have with it is two-fold, and entirely different:

First of all, it requires too much special rules, special skills, special weapons, special somethings. It adds a lot of overhead time to work with, it takes a lot of spotlight due to its special nature, and keeping your Ork equipped, orky and up to date eats up more attention from the GM and players than any other class. In a game which in my experience is already rather heavy on the talking, upkeep, maintenance and organization stuff, the ork career eats up a little too much more time than, say, a void master. Mind you, the Explorater with his bionic gimmicks has that issue to a lesser degree... lots of time went into all those Trade(Armorer) rolls and discussions what to build.

Second problem is the roleplaying part. And no, not the "He so orky!" fun stuff, I am talking about the ork not really fitting society very well, and when roleplayed even remotely orky, the constant need to account for the ork player, the GM having to custom tailor reactions of the world around it, the players having to make sure he doesnt show up at the admirals dinner, and so on. Basically, the ork eats up a lot of attention and forces a lot of roleplaying from the entire group to make up for its alien factor. It complicates roleplaying in a non-rulesy way, and all that for something thats a mix of Conan the Barbarian and a comic relief.

IMO, we would have been better off with an Eldar and either Kroot, or a special non-tabletop alien career. Or, if it HAS to be a greenskin, I d actually advise for a gretchin At least hes easier to hide.

The other issue I have with Into the Storm is the, once again, too roughshod and unprecise acquisition rules, and profit factor. For a mechanic that is absolutely crucial and important to the entire flair of the game, it still leaves too many questions up the GM, easily making the players feel as if its just arbitrary how many acquisition rolls they can make, where they can find what, and so on.

IMO, Into the Storm takes one step into the right direction, but still fails to adress a few issues that plague the core game still:

How many acquisition rolls can a dynasty make within, say, a month? Can every player make one? Can every player run several acquisitions side to side? How much time of the time needed to acquire the item is actually filled with, welll, searching? Can you buy anything anywhere, or are certain items restricted to certain places?

And, most importantly, is there nothing that is too expensive to get, provided to get a lucky roll?

All these questions CAN be answered with a bit of imagination and tinkering, but there is no definite statement on them.

Other than that, I am loving the book

Regarding acquisition rolls, I let each explorer make one at each significant port...however I only allow one roll for each type of item. If the Rogue Trader can't find a harlequin's kiss on Footfall, then neither can any of the other explorers in the party. It's either available at that time or it's not.

How many acquisition rolls can a dynasty make within, say, a month? Can every player make one? Can every player run several acquisitions side to side? How much time of the time needed to acquire the item is actually filled with, welll, searching? Can you buy anything anywhere, or are certain items restricted to certain places?

Now I might have imagined this, but IIRC there was a paragraph detailing that for every acquisition made after the first one in a session, the explorer gets a -10. And that the GM can deem certain things just plain unavailable shouldn't need explaining (meltagun on a feral world -> yeah, right)

IMO, we would have been better off with an Eldar and either Kroot, or a special non-tabletop alien career. Or, if it HAS to be a greenskin, I d actually advise for a gretchin At least hes easier to hide.

Um... there is a Kroot career.

First of all, it requires too much special rules, special skills, special weapons, special somethings. It adds a lot of overhead time to work with, it takes a lot of spotlight due to its special nature, and keeping your Ork equipped, orky and up to date eats up more attention from the GM and players than any other class. In a game which in my experience is already rather heavy on the talking, upkeep, maintenance and organization stuff, the ork career eats up a little too much more time than, say, a void master. Mind you, the Explorater with his bionic gimmicks has that issue to a lesser degree... lots of time went into all those Trade(Armorer) rolls and discussions what to build.

Second problem is the roleplaying part. And no, not the "He so orky!" fun stuff, I am talking about the ork not really fitting society very well, and when roleplayed even remotely orky, the constant need to account for the ork player, the GM having to custom tailor reactions of the world around it, the players having to make sure he doesnt show up at the admirals dinner, and so on. Basically, the ork eats up a lot of attention and forces a lot of roleplaying from the entire group to make up for its alien factor. It complicates roleplaying in a non-rulesy way, and all that for something thats a mix of Conan the Barbarian and a comic relief.

The Ork has some Special Snowflake Syndrome alright (and it's warned about in the opening paragraphs), but every character can be built that way, starting with Mutations. I'd say focusing a bit on your characters rather than purely on your plot is entirely fine - and if the Ork's time in the spotlight is mainly his search for More Dakka, that's his choice.

from france

no it just sound cannot be disarm. and the idea comme from a sf book i read some 20 years ago. i stumble on this son i wonder if the rules alows it.

Long time coming, but thank goodness its here at last as I was wondering just how well RT would fare with ongoing DH material and DW on the way. Being it is the most open of the trio, it is also my favorite in that PC’s power the game direction for the most part and enjoy a comparatively large amount of freedom.
I’m not widely known as being a creature of subtlety, I just say it how I see it and there’s no personal maliciousness involved if it comes across as being a bit mean. I am actually very happy to own this book.

Advanced Origins
Not a lot here for the existing characters in-play since the game was released, but it’ll make the next lot more interesting and diverse, for the life of me as an experienced role player, I just can’t seem to like the Origin Path system in its current form. Mostly because lives aren’t linear things but it’ll be useful for elementary players and the uncreative.
But yeah, nothing here for an existing game, we’ll use it next game.

Koronus Careers
I like the fact that if you are a xeno, you’ll always look like a filthy xeno and not be able to hide anywhere in human society- that is a must have, otherwise you’re just another ‘human’ analogue that might get a free pass once in a while.
Nuh-uh! If someone doesn’t try to burn, hang or shoot the xeno at least once a game session in civilized society I reckon you’re going too easy on them.
Alternate career ranks are good, it would have been nice to see a few more that are generalized ones that aren’t career dependant but overall I think they’re a good lateral addition to a characters development, rather than a linear power up.
For the life of me, I couldn’t find one I’d use on either of my 2 current characters though.

Extended Armoury
Some more guns. Nothing in there to make me jump up and down ‘wanting one’, same with the armour, its just more armour, its not bad, I just don’t see it contributing much more to what’s already in the game.
Exotic weapons, really mediocre and uninteresting, unless there is absolutely no other recourse, you need an NPC to have something weird and mostly useless or have run out of otherwise interesting characterisations for a PC. It’s not that they’re bad, they’re just not very exotic enough to warrant spending a proficiency on.
Upgrades through to Xeno-gear though is all good, lots there to add value to the game.

Starships Expanded
Yay! Aside from a couple of minor errors, it should make most people very happy with these additions.
Giving us example vessels with torpedo’s in them is really annoying with the continuing omission of torpedos as a game mechanic.
Yeah I know, they’re complicated and in another book…

Vehicles
I think theres a collective woohoo! from everyone whos ever had to adjudicate and amend the old apocrypha rules into something workable, these are simple enough to use and not dominate a game mechanically…now I have to ret-con my vehicle list from the old rules. :/

Expanded Psy powers
-Navigators
I can has stuff to do in speeseship combat now! Happy navigators!
Just a slight comment here if I might… you’ve essentially added about another 3 or 4 slightly different ways of blowing the absolute living **** out of people with a warp eye and some other stuff which was actually really good.
Corrupting the flesh, Immolate the soul, Scourge the red tide, Stripping the husk, Stupefy the soul
My correction, “5” slightly different ways of blowing utter **** out of people with a warp eye if you ever got bored with blowing the living **** out of people with the good old fashioned Lidless Stare, that you already get for free. Umm, there’s not a lot of thought gone into this! Navis do just a little bit more than just look at people and blow them up, well at least mine does.
-Astropaths
I dunno, there isn’t a lot to like about the Astropath to begin with and you almost feel bad about treating them as a combo of walking mobile phone, dirty mutant, liability of daemonic incursion and mental rapists.
No wonder in civilized places they lock them up and burn any that manage to crawl out.
In my opinion, the Astropath is entirely too subtle a creature for the 40K playable class, it definitely needs some love as a career… like, pyromancy being available.

Enhanced Game Mechanics
This seemingly innocuous 25 odd pages is compulsory reading for GM’s and to some extent rogue traders everywhere.

Port Wander
A lot of this kind of stuff, just looking at it from a space perspective of filling pages, really needs to go in separate books or web-enhancements as I’m not sure if it warrants being in a book which is otherwise an expansion on the game, its equipment, mechanics and leaving out other things (like torpedoes… yes I know, but I figure if I nag enough it’ll sink in)
It is good material, I like it
It needs to be in a “Planets of Koronus” book, not in a “Stuff PC’s and GM’s need now” book which is essentially what Into the Storm is- its full of things we need to inject some life into the game and cover things which are missing. 20 Pages or so that could have been used for something else more pertinent, even if its quick and dirty NPC stats, few more vehicles and rules.

signoftheserpent said:

Look at it from another perspective; why would some of us want stuff that's been portrayed sufficiently well in the rest of 40k cannon? Do we have official stats? No. But many game masters (such as myself) feel perfectly at ease to generate our own, should we need them. What many people are interested in (or at least what I'm interested in) is the fluff, the ideas that can spark new directions for our games. And also crunchy bits on elements of the game that would be tricky to hammer out on our own, such as vehicle rules, equipment rules, and new careers. The things that I want official rules on are things that will be so ubiquitous in the game that they demand a greater level of balance than any individual monster or adventure element would.

I suppose I'm really echoing the words of previous posters by this point, but the point still stands.

N0-1_H3r3 said:

1. a space hulk that the crew learn is full of treasure. They set out to find it only to discover it's full of tyrannids. No tyrannids in the rogue trader book. Very few spaceship rules (which is unforgiveable).

2. a planet the crew learn has lots of treasure. They set out to find it only to discover said riches are stored within a necron tomb they risk unwittingly activating.

Both necrons and tyrannids are core 40k antagonists. Why are they not properly covered? How can it make any sense to prioritise FFG's own creations over canon elements? If we don't need Necrons in our game then we need FFG's own ideas even less surely? On top of that the random nature by which info is portioned out is ridiculous: one Eldar stat in the mainbook (useless, frankly), a couple in the screen and scattered elsewhere. How can that make any sense? It's not convenioent from the point of view of referencing stuff - why not do an Eldar sourcebook? They've had enough time to put one out? It's hardly as if Eldar are a minority canon element.

This is the problem. Rogue Trader is a mess. The book is all over the place, covers nothing in enough detail and leaves out huge swathes of canon detail. FFG seem to have gone out their way to create something that ignores most of what's actually in the setting with the argument that it's up to me to fill int he blanks.

Well why bother wihth the game at all?

1. a space hulk that the crew learn is full of treasure. They set out to find it only to discover it's full of tyrannids. No tyrannids in the rogue trader book. Very few spaceship rules (which is unforgiveable).

Tyranids are primarily located in the eastern parts of the galaxy, with only the merest splinters moving into Segmentum Obscurus As for the spaceship rules... you did notice they got their own chapter? Which was IIRC about as long as the chapter on general game mechanics? With a whole book purely on spaceships waiting in the wings?

2. a planet the crew learn has lots of treasure. They set out to find it only to discover said riches are stored within a necron tomb they risk unwittingly activating.

That one is pretty easy as well: you don't need stats for sleeping necrons which happens to cover pretty much all of them as of the time of RT. As soon as they wake up and the explorers don't immediately get back to base, you don't need stats to say "Gauss-beams fall, you all die" either.

Both necrons and tyrannids are core 40k antagonists. Why are they not properly covered? How can it make any sense to prioritise FFG's own creations over canon elements? If we don't need Necrons in our game then we need FFG's own ideas even less surely? On top of that the random nature by which info is portioned out is ridiculous: one Eldar stat in the mainbook (useless, frankly), a couple in the screen and scattered elsewhere. How can that make any sense? It's not convenioent from the point of view of referencing stuff - why not do an Eldar sourcebook? They've had enough time to put one out? It's hardly as if Eldar are a minority canon element.

You might not have noticed, but apart from the GM screen and the first published adventure (which has quite a few Eldar inside), there is a grand total of one (1) sourcebook published. Fanboys may disagree, but I consider Into The Storm a better choice for that one book than The Book Of Pansy Space-elves.

Of course, having a single corebook with the size of the Encyclopedia Britannica would have been interesting too, but then again... I both preferred it to come out in this decade and below a few thousand dollars. But maybe that's just me.

Cifer said:

So, because of the arcane decision making of FFG i'm not entitled to include Tyrannids because Rogue Traders are only allowed to go into the Koronus Expanse which, conveniently, happens to be nowhere near ANY tyrnaid threat atl, despite Tyrands being a popular part of canon i would think a lot of prospective 40k players would liek to use. Extraordinary.

Spaceship rules don't cover enough and it's going to be almost 2 years before enough is provided - for a game based around starship travel.

YOU might not need stats, doesn't mean that I won't or that anyone else wanting to use the Necrons won't. RT covers NOTHING about the Necrons. No information on any aspect of their culture, never mind stats.

Your attitude in referring to a major part of the game's canon as pansy space elves misses the point so thoroughly as to be embarassing. NO one is suggesting you use Eldar, just that you have the option to use established parts of 40k canon without them being relegated to some bonus that few are entitled to.

So, because of the arcane decision making of FFG i'm not entitled to include Tyrannids because Rogue Traders are only allowed to go into the Koronus Expanse which, conveniently, happens to be nowhere near ANY tyrnaid threat atl, despite Tyrands being a popular part of canon i would think a lot of prospective 40k players would liek to use. Extraordinary.

Well, they could have made the arcane decision to set the whole game in the eastern parts, in which case you wouldn't have had much chance of interaction with the Eye of Terror. There is no setting within 40k which has all the popular stuff.

Spaceship rules don't cover enough and it's going to be almost 2 years before enough is provided - for a game based around starship travel.

Ok, I'm curious - what else would you have included in the Core rules and what would you have thrown out to make space for it?

YOU might not need stats, doesn't mean that I won't or that anyone else wanting to use the Necrons won't. RT covers NOTHING about the Necrons. No information on any aspect of their culture, never mind stats.

Didn't you just say you didn't like how little of the Eldar was presented in the Core book? Now they're supposed to include yet another Xeno race? Or are you just peeved that they didn't include the specific two xeno races you wanted them to?

Your attitude in referring to a major part of the game's canon as pansy space elves misses the point so thoroughly as to be embarassing. NO one is suggesting you use Eldar, just that you have the option to use established parts of 40k canon without them being relegated to some bonus that few are entitled to.

Er... where have I suggested that anyone has suggested that I should use Eldar? You may have misread that as I've said that I prefer the contents of Into The Storm to the contents of a hypothetical Book Of Pansy Space-Elves. Yes, should I run a campaign that is exclusively focused on Eldar, the latter would have been more useful, but for the majority of campaigns, I'll take Into the Storm, thankyouverymuch.

N0-1_H3r3 said:

Hear hear. Very well put. This is exactly where I come from with 40k RPG. I want a specific, innovative setting. I want to see something new brought to the 40k table.

It's understandable that not everyone will be satisfied with the direction FFG have taken, but personally I couldn't be happier. Rogue Trader is an outstanding game which doesn't pander to the player's intelligence, but which takes it for granted. Complaining about a lack of guidance or a failure to cover specific aspects of the background is to some extent to miss the point, in my view. Rogue Trader is designed around taking aspects of the 40k setting and then taking them outside the 40k galaxy, to the wilderness beyond. This wilderness should only be limited by the imagination of the GM and the players.

It is, in that respect, the most demanding and intelligent of the 40k RPG trilogy. DH needs very detailed setting and background information. DW demands excellent combat rules. And RT, of the three, requires the best GMs. It's the hardest game to get right, because it's consciously a sandbox where anything can happen. And although I love DH, and am really enjoying DW, RT, it has to be said, is my favourite of the trilogy so far.

(Oh, and by the way, Into the Storm is the best supplement for any of the three 40k RPGs yet released, (core rulebooks aside) I reckon. It's got the same level of detail as the Inquisitor's Handobook (my previous favourite) but goes further. It lacks the slightly jumbled "mixed bag" feel of IH (which is to some extent a shame, as I found that rather endearing) and replaces this with a more focussed and logical suite of compelling rules and character options. And some great background, too.)

signoftheserpent said:

Technically, the Necrons aren't even a major power in the galaxy during 816.M41, which is the current time period for Rogue Trader. Sanctuary 101 wasn't raided until 897.M41, for example.

Ok, I'm curious - what else would you have included in the Core rules and what would you have thrown out to make space for it?

Personally, if I were the designer, in DH there were 50 pages that could have been cut from the book easily and replaced with like 5-6 pages. The career/rank system. If the game had a free-form character generations/career/class system (like D6 or CoC) where you get X points to spend on skills/talents that cost X points each, you would free up some pages.

That would have added 10 pages of critters, 10 pages of vehicles rules, 10 pages of background and so forth and so on.

Im not going to say Signoftheserpent is wrong completely here. He has a point that I supported when Dark Heresy first came out (no Orks, no Eldar). But he has more room to complain. The bestiary in Rogue Trader is very thin and weak. But not horrible for those of us who have Dark Heresy (core, creatures anathema) as we have a supply of other stats to fall back on.

However, I have bigger issues with Rogue Trader (I just think, overall, it bleeds of the word FAIL), but within the context of the larger 40K RPG books, it fits in fairly nice. I dont think the RT core book is nearly as good of complete as the DH core book, I think there are rather gamist concepts in the game (Endeavor System, Profit Factor, and so on) and too many unclear issues (how many landers do I have, how many storm troopers, how many orbital bombardments, any torpedos?).

But I dont think FFG needs to cover every aspect of the setting in the core book. I do think they should cover more then just one entry when introducing a race/xeno. Or at least the classic "advance schemes" used in Warhammer Fantasy Role Play 2nd Edition The Old World Bestiary so you could easily apply what a Boss Eldar looks like.

In the end however, the core books are just that, core. You can play the game with them as they are. If you want to play outside the setting, material, fluff and stats presented, then you better be willing to do some writing and creating on your own. Or just wait.

So IMHO (which is often not humble) Rogue Trader failed as a stand alone game, but excels as a Dark Heresy supplement. But thats just from my view.

i'm totally with you on these points, and hence i too is quite dissapointed with i.t.s! i guess Deathwatch will just bring up more of the same crazyness,, alot of the same arguments where raised (by me! in another tread that suddenly died out :

http://www.fantasyflightgames.com/edge_foros_discusion.asp?efid=123&efcid=3&efidt=375831

! : ?

alot of the same arguments where raised (by me! in another tread that suddenly died out :

And after reading that thread, I really can't imagine why...

N0-1_H3r3 said:

By parity of reasoning, the same could be said about FFG's approach. It's a single opinion, and how much of a majority opinion it is is anyone's guess. Take myself. I rarely write on these forums because nothing FFG did with Rogue Trader beyond the (frankly, incomplete) core rulebook ever raised my interest again. Don't expect people like me to turn up in huge numbers on these boards - we'd rather vote with our wallets. I would like to thank signofserpent though for putting the opinion of that silent customer segment so succinctly.

And oh, before I forget - your reply distorts the issue by going for extremes ("worthwhile" vs. "useless") when the issue is one of comparative merit:
signoftheserpent said:

signoftheserpent said:

Oh Dear Lord.

You're playing the wrong game, methinks. I humbly recommend you look at Deathwatch which has stats for loads of Tyranids, a large chunk of their weapons and more stuff to come.

Deathwatch also has stuff for: Daemon Princes, Chaos Space Marines (with rules for Marks of Chaos), Lots of Tau and their weapons (and some vehicles too in the GM screen booklet). All of this will apparently be expanded on with the Xenos book due out next year sometime. Deathwatch is set out on the Eastern Fringe where all this stuff is easily found.

I'm not exactly stuck for Eldar or Ork stuff either with Creatures Anathema, Rogue Trader Core book, Lure of the Expanse and Into the Storm. I'm personally not bothered about Necrons but I have enough info to stat them up with appropriate rules if I really wanted them. Example, and i'm coming up with this as I type.

Gauss Flayer: Basic; Range 90m: S/2/-; 2D10+8E; Pen 6, Clip -; Rld -; Reliable, Disintegrate, Special.

Special: If a 10 is rolled for damage, confirm as for Righteous Fury. However, if confirmed, the Gauss Flayer ignores Armour and Toughness completely, destroying all armour at the location. The Disintegrate quality can be found in DotDG and Radical's Handbook.

The Gauss Flayer also counts as a Mono Great Axe (Two handed weapon) with the Unwieldy quality.

Tah Dah!

Most of the stuff you want is out there, just not concentrated in one RPG and, GMing Deathwatch at the moment, I can honestly say that Tyranids belong in Deathwatch, not Rogue Trader.

Were we really expecting a universe as vast as the 40K universe to be condensed into a handful of books?

You want to know about Necron - grab the Codex - the information is the same. You can even use the powers - stats - etc. of all the various Necron, Tyrannids, etc. as inspiration for the Rogue Trader conversions.

Gauss Flayer and Bolt Gun are the same in 3rd Edition Necron Codex/5 Edition Space Marine Codex...

SO - there you go - that's a start. Use the bolter stats.

Then add: Gauss Technology as a Special.

Gauss Technology: Weapon Ignores Armor Rating (if that's too strong - adjust accordingly - and yes, it makes the Bolt Gun's AP useless - but I think we're all smart enough to just remove AP from Gauss Weapons if we do this)

====

There you have it.. a deadly new weapon that will terrify your players.

So - who holds this thing? That's even easier -

3rd Edition Necron Warrior Stats

WS: 4 BS: 4 S: 4 T: 4 W: 1 I: 2

=====

SO -

Weapon Skill: (4)5

Ballistic Skill: (4)5

Strength: (4)0 (to even out what I'll do with Toughness)

Toughness: (4)9 (they're robots)

Willpower: (1)0 (biggest weakness is Warp-based powers)

Agility (2)0 (based off Initiative)

And if you really need Perception and Fellowship - we can just fudge them.

Perception (3)0 (nice base score)

Fellowership: (1)0 (robots again)

Wounds: How does - 20 sound? With the "Regeneration" property?

====

If it perfect? No - I'd put more work into it (and will) - but for 15 minutes at work - I think it's usable.

Didn't even need a book.

P.S. : Yes, I know the argument (to nobody in general) - and if you don't have time to be creative - that's nobodies fault but your own. Nobody made you have other obligations - cake and eat it too syndrome.

How do i run a game such as the two examples I gave?

How do I run a game where the players face off against Dark Eldar pirates? How about dealing with Comorragh?

How do i run a game where the players face Chaos sorcerers?

How do i deal with the Tau?

Medhia Nox said:

Er, yes. An RPG is exactly that - a handful of books. Any more and you are expecting me to lug several kilos of information to game sessions which I then have to cross reference. That's not good design.

If it's unreasonable to expect the 40k universe to be represented appropriately in rpg form then don't try it.

I don't want to know about the Necrons; i want to know about the Necrons in RT/DW/DH. Why should I buy a codex for the wargame how will that help me? It would be a pointless exercise that would yeild the same results as houseruling from scratch. That's FFG's job. If YOU want to house rule your own Necrons, good luck to you. I don't buy rpg's so major elements/parts/factions from the setting in hand are ignored wholesale. There is absolutely no word from FFG as to when Necrons etc will be properly treated if at all. At best the books cover bits and pieces of info in a random and wholly impractical fashion - am i going to buy Lure of the Expanse just for the snippets of eldar stuff? No, it makes no sense financially. Perhaps if money were no obkect i'd have the luxury to indulge. But that still doesn't change the core problem. At best Xeno Compendium is a year away and that's assuming it's better than CA. Really that is beyond stupid - a book covering antagonists not released until 2 years after the corebook. Inexcusable.

OMG dude, in the time and effort you've been harping on this, you could've easily made up stats for the various xenos/items you're complaining about being left out of the game. Endless harping is pointless.

Was the starship section in the main book a little underwhelming? Yes. There's a book coming out for that. Xenos a little sparse? Yeah. Go pick up creatures anathema or make things up yourself.

Endless bitching isn't productive. If things aren't represented in the official source material, use fan made supplements, make things up yourself, and do your job as a GM. FFG doesn't have the time or resources to spoon-feed every single person every single item they want in a universe as vast as the 40k one.

You obviously have a lot of time and energy on your hands to consistently post these huge whines... turn that time and energy into something productive. Or just find a new game if you think this one sucks so much.

-Thulis

signoftheserpent said:

Thulis said:

signoftheserpent said:

Use your imagination, like everyone else.

And before you start spouting that tired and flimsy "I might as well just make the whole thing up from scratch" argument again, I'll point out that it completely overlooks everything but the extremes. It is far, far easier to create something based upon a pre-existing framework than it is to create that framework in the first place, and far easier to share the fruits of those labours with others if there is a common foundation upon which everything is built. The matter is far more than the two extremes of "make your own system and do everything yourself" and "only do things/use materials published in official books".

This hobby requires the active and extensive use of imagination; being creative is not only recommended, but required. If you are unwilling or unable to make something up, then I really can't help.

signoftheserpent said:

Wow, you really do need everything spoonfed.

YES

-Thulis