I snagged a copy a few days ago and got enough time to read through it, though that wasn't hard seeing how slim the book is. Anyway, these are my initial impressions, take them with a pound of salt, etc etc etc. Oh and warning - spoilers ahead!

The setup of the adventure is simple and familiar to anyone who's watched Magnificent Seven, or Seven Samurai, or played any Bioware game from KOTOR to Mass Effect 2. A fairly peaceful, prosperous planet is in trouble, the PCs must unite the bickering factions, prepare their defenses, and stop the invading orks. It consists of three parts: 1) getting to know the major NPCs and winning their support, 2) preparing defenses and beating back three waves of invading orks, 3) finding the true source of the orkish threat and dealing with it. The adventure and the plot is not very original, and cliches actually abound (the honour-bound maverick navy captain, the scheming military junta commander, the ineffectual governor who eventually rises to the occasion, etc.) and the villains are virtually non-existent (most of the time the PCs are fighting faceless hordes of orks, and only get to interact - i.e. kill - the ork Warboss at the very end). Nonetheless, I could see this being a pretty fun adventure with a pretty epic scope to it, and there are a number of ways in which it improves on previous FFG 40k adventures.

The good:

- The gazetteer for the world of Damaris (the focus of the adventure) is well written, plenty of information on what the world is like, where and what the major locations are

- Because the bulk of the adventure is about the PCs socializing and playing intrigue with several major NPCs and their henchmen, there is an extensive writeup for every somewhat important NPC, plus a very handy chart for the GM that shows how different NPCs interact with each other and what do they think of each other. Very very good tool, I wish more adventures (FFG and other companies) would make use of charts like that.

- The adventure actually contains extensive rules and advice on running something as sweeping as a planetary invasion. It uses a system where everything (space ships, locations, and military units) is assigned a special Strength score that can be affected by the PCs' actions and decisions. The Strength scores of the defendants and the invading orks are then compared with the results being determined on whose Strength score is higher and by how much. There are many handy charts to tell the GM at a glance the Strength scores of pretty much everything, how to describe the Strength scores to the PCs (more on that later), and what the outcomes of each fight are depending on the Strength score outcomes. Pretty cool, but it has a few problems which I'll cover in a bit.

- During the invasion there's a bunch of mandatory and optional missions that the PCs have to get personally involved in to swing the tide of battle. These involve raids and repelling raids, chases, space battles, and even a few social challenges (like giving a speech or dealing with certain NPCs). What I particularly like about this adventure is that it: a) makes extensive use of space battles (which is something that other RT adventures don't really focus on), b) makes use of Mass Combat rules from Rogue Trader core rulebook (either the complex or the simple method, though I'm personally planning on using Horde rules from Deathwatch), c) makes use of "Into the Storm" vehicle rules and new Social Challenges rules, however, the ownership of that book is not required as "The Frozen Reaches" provides barebones rules for thoseGMs who don't have "Into the Storm". Kudos to the authors - very thoughtful.

- Final battle is suitably climactic - a massive space battle in the middle of an asteroid field around a gas giant, culminating with personally slaying a massive Warboss on the bridge of his ship.

- There's an Achievement Point Tracker thoughtfully included with the adventure (similar to the one used in Lure of the Expanse), which is very handy.

- The artwork is gorgeous, I love it!

The bad:

- OK, this is seriously starting to annoy me, but would it kill to include more maps in published adventures? There's literally ONE map in the entire adventure (of the capital city). How about a map for the ork Kroozer's bridge for the final fight? Or a map or two for some of the major groundside missions?

- Also a matter of some annoyance, but once again proofreading can be better. Nothing serious (except the weapon stats of the Ork Kroozer), but fairly obvious even on the first read through.

- NPCs are pretty boring with one or two exceptions. I liked the Rogue Trader Elizabeth Orleans, and Jeremiah Blitz makes another appearance (and he's just as rakish and roguish as ever), and the Eldar corsairs are described well, but the natives of Damaris are pretty bland and cliche'd.

- Speaking of Damaris, while the world definitely presents a lucrative venture for the PCs and definitely makes them interested in defending it, it's pretty bland as well. What do I mean by it? Well, it seems almost a typical Imperial world, although unusually almost idyllic. By 'typical' I mean that there's a bit of everything: there's The Palace, The Forge, The not-quite Arbites, The not-quite Imperial Guard-esque PDF, The Space Station, etc. Seems like the author decided to just include everything for everyone, but in the process the world just sounds very boring. That's just like my opinion however.

- The invasion is run using a fairly simple and interesting system, but the author stresses multiple times how the PCs should be kept in the dark regarding the mechanics, and should make decisions based purely on their gut feeling, GM's fluff descriptions, and skill rolls (like War, Tactica Imperialis, Command, etc.). I could see this quickly becoming a source of frustration for both the players (who have a tough time gauging the likely outcomes of their actions) and the GM (having to constantly translate the mechanics into deliberately vaguely fluff descriptions for the PCs). But again, that's just my opinion, and it's not based on having run the adventure yet.

- Finally, there's a MacGuffin (a relic of St. Drusus) that ties this adventure to the next two adventures in the Warpstorm Trilogy, but there's damnably very little about this mysterious relic and why it should be important to the players (aside from some vague hints that the PCs might easily miss). I would have appreciated a bit more background information on both the relic and the overall storyline of the trilogy (in a similar manner that Haarlock Trilogy did it) so that I could plan ahead on how to tie this adventure into my ongoing campaign.

Anyway, as is, it seems like a solid adventure that finally gives the players a chance for more space combat and vehicle combat, and a mix between heavy social RPing and heavy combat RPing. It's got some rough edges that I think I'll have to homebrew to fix, but I'm looking forward to running it starting next week.

Was hoping for more ork stats, but it seemed to be important to not refer to other books other then the core book so some of the stats are repeated form other books, or slightly tweaked (example, grots and squigs) instead of "see into the storm page#". Does have a new big bad ork and ork bosses, but i would like to have seen normal ork boy stats (I do have Creatures Anathema, but still) and do not think using the ork freebooter from rogue trader represents boys, but freebooters.

However, on that same note, the obviously expect you to have and use Into the Storm, as they have stats for vehicles based on Into the Storm's rules for such.

The biggest surprise for me was Skitarrii stats. Now they are also in The Emperor Protects, but as corrupted choas versions. So now we can see how that corruption is affecting them (note: Chaos Skitarrii are more likable with higher Fellowships).

I would rather have less stats for characters (NPCs) that are not needed to be statted (the Cardinal/Bishop, various officials) and more for who the PCs may fight (different kroozers instead of one, more ork stats and so forth).

Overall I really like the book though.

Excellent points about the stats Peacekeeper. I agree wholeheartedly; the bishop totally does not need stats (he's not a combatant, not going to lie to the players, or anything of the sort), and neither do several other NPCs. However, I could see why the author would reprint stats for grots and squigs for the benefit of GMs without "Into the Storm" (even if it is virtually a mandatory book for an RT game in my opinion). I was also a little baffled as to the lack of the Eldar corsair and Farseer stats (though I suppose I could use the ones from RT core and "Lure of the Expanse"). I don't think, though, that the adventure needed more different Ork ship stats, as there are already plenty between the stats for an Ork Rok, Kill Kroozer and Ork space station in this adventure, and Ork Onslaught Raider in RT core. The decision to represent the Imperial system ships with a Wolfpack raider is a bit baffling, as the Wolfpack raiders are very capable adversaries and could probably beat back the orks on their own (since there are apparently so many of them in the Damaris Flotilla - speaking of which, why are there no hard numbers of the amount of ships in the Flotilla? It seems like there's a lot, but I'd like a definitive hard number). I could see that the PCs might need a lot of help in some of the space battles, but I was under the impression that system ships (other than the Ironclads from BFG) were rather crappy and underarmed compared to Warp-capable ships. I'd just use the system ships from the "Whispers" GM Kit adventure myself.

The listed number of system defense ships was four, as listed on p.34 under General Dante's troops. I was surprised that the book said to use the stats for a Wolfpack Raider from the main rulebook for them, because I was also under the impression that they were under-armed and better represented by the GM Kit stats as well. The fact that they have a Strength of only 4 each in the Space Combat campaign rules and inflict less damage than other ship when supporting via orbital bombardment also suggests these should be used.

The book is like most FFG adventure sources- flaws and gems mixed together in a proportion that still makes it good overall. My personal favorite is the military campaign rules, Rogue Trader has been crying out for something like this. The blurb for Battlefleet Koronus says it'll have rules for fighting ground campaigns such as planetary invasions in them. I'm guessing that with both coming out so close together these will be a (hopefully expanded) version of what The Frozen Reaches uses. If nothing else, some hard numbers on what size of force a Barracks component can transport will be useful. My own interpretation would have the PCs carrying a force that pretty much doubles the size of the Damaris PDF when deployed.

Which brings me to the other point to raise, the GM will have to calculate exactly what effect his players resources will have on the campaign. A typical Frigate or Light Cruiser with a few thousand light infantry to use in ground combat should make the battle for Damaris hang in the balance, with the PCs able to keep the Orks from overrunning the city by the skin of their teeth and lots of Fate Points. If the PCs have more or less than this, it becomes problematic. A Trade Ship with no ground troops to spare might find the Orks winning. At the other extreme, a party with multiple combat vessels and/or significant troop transports loaded with Imperial Guard-equivalent troops will simply shrug off the Ork incursions as written. The GM will need to adjust things to make the fight challenging but not impossible, and the adventure provides no help with this.

I kind of wonder if the reason that there arent any suggestions for different PC assets is that not enough people have played RT enough to have any idea on what a standard group of level 3 players will have.

Tantavalist said:

No matter how many troops they bring, the adventure should always hinge on the PC's failure or victory. A WAAAAAAGGGHHH! is so contingent upon the warboss tear-assing through the streets that killing him should end the threat, and failing to kill him means that killing the Orks will only make them mad and attract more Orkz to a "bigga foight".

As an aside though, this is one reason why I don't buy or run written modules. (No offense FFG, I still buy the rest of your splatbooks)

That being said, at a discount I might be willing to take a look at this one for both the planetary invasion rules and the backstory on Damaris.

Tantavalist said:

Ah, thank you for pointing out where the page number is. Barracks adds thousands of troops (how many exactly though...?), but if we can assume that at least an IG regiment size can fit into the Barracks component, and if we go by the 5th edition IG codex, that would give a rough estimate of between 5000-10000 troops (average IG regiment size, though some are quite small - only a thousand like Cain's Valhallan regiment, while others are huge - a hundred thousand and up like the Vostroyan regiments), support personnel, necessary supplies, vehicles, and all other things that a regiment might need. In Strength terms ("Frozen Reaches" Strength that is), it would amount to approximately 8 Infantry Battalions (Strength 16 each), and maybe some Armoured Companies (depending on what the PCs acquired previously). If "Frozen Reaches" is an indication of the ground war rules from "Battlefleet Koronus" then I can't wait to sink my teeth into it.

Just got this book and I love it. Well thought out with vastly more pros than cons and in my humble opinion the cons are minor.

Pros:

1. The adventure contains plenty to due for every type of character and play style. Everything from smoozing nobles to gutting orks. Keeping all the different character types interested is always a chore and this is really well done.

2. By the inclusion of many optional missions the GM has a lot of options on what to do if players are getting kicked around or if they are having a cake walk. It is rare that a adventure has good options like this and it is extremely helpful when it does.

3. Good story with a good ending and the NPCs actions are fairly well thought out and reasonable.

4. Nifty system for handling mass combat and planetary invasions.

Cons:

1. Scale of the defense forces easily fixed but this is a world of 3 billion they would have more than a few thousand troops and 80 tanks to spare for the biggest city on the planet (it has 1 billion people). Even counting int he "static" forces it is still way low, no doubt so that the RTs forces will be a significant influence. For the fix just add a few more and see number 2 plus scale the ork forces especially in the offensive region.

2. Scale of the forces in general, ties in with number 1. In the adventure companies ~100-200 men were very viable combat formations and contributed significant value to battle resolution. Yes skitari and house troops I am talking to you (there is even one platoon sized force, and no they are not SM or BS). Easily fixed though. Simply up the unit size companies become battalions, battalions become regiments. I usually go with ~125 men to a company 4 companies to a battalion 5 battalions to a regiment (on average).

3. Missed out on a few force types that occurred to me the second I finished reading what was available. Militia/Conscripts this situation is perfect for them and raising these unit types is one way I am going to allow the players to use profit factor. Religious zealots is another, the missionary will feel left out if he does not get to lead a screaming horde of zealots Air units, fury and guncutter squadrons, use them in a manner similar to orbital bombardment? I am guessing though that they did not want to reprint battlefleet koronus

On the whole I heartily recommend this to anyone and I do not usually like published adventures. It is very flexible and even when you find a problem or need to customize it to your players it is set up in such a way that it is exceptionally easy modify.

<SPOILERS!> I agree with the OP on most points, except for the "boring" space station. It's a hollowed out moon, with complete battle stats. I thought it was very cool.

One con I didn't see mentioned is the players are supposed to pick up that the forces of Chaos are behind this Ork menace. Then, in the last battle, there is a Chaos ship that is barely covered. If the players don't notice it nothing changes. At the very least it should take off for a jump point, making the players wonder what the heck it was doing there.

SPOILER

Nojo509 said:

The ship is mentioned in the scripted text, so they probably will notice it. They get a clue as to what it is doing there with the info gained from the bosses ship.

/SPOILER

Razorboy said:

Yeah, that's one of my main complaints with most of FFG's modules. The main reason why I buy pre-made adventures is to have someone else do the grunt work of drawing up the maps...

Because decent maps actually cost quite a lot to commission?

Because lots of people (including myself) never actually use them?

Because they'd prefer to have fluff/rules/setting info/etc in the book rather than maps?

Lots of reasons really, mostly down to what FFG probably think their main target audience want, as well as taking costs into account.

@Millandson & Maps
I think in some cases players would be happy with "non-artwork" maps. You no, more like Icon and less like "beautiful picture". Thinks like this help in tactical situations. I guess that maps like i.e. the City-Map of "Port Suffering" or the Cathedral of Stern (both DH core rules) are not THAT expensiv. If so, simply but one one-page Artwork less into each book. Still enough. But again, these could be just my opinion.

@The Frozen Reaches
So, there are rules for huge military conflict? GRRRRRRRR. Seems I just might end up buying the PDF. I somehow guess that these might come handy in DH... and I do not want to wait till "Only war..." is out as a PDF.

Gregorius21778 said:

This is what Im concerned about. I am worried that Only War will become the dumoing ground for rules taken from other books and put into dark heresy. Land and ship combat from Rogue Trader and Battlefleet Calixis and Frozen Reaches, Squad/Solo mode variants from Deathwatch, Vehicle rules from RT/DW, Create your own Guard a variant of Create your own Chapter. And I will be disappointed of Only War turns into the Galaxy of Guns Book (with 70 pages of variant guns).

But I am for the more maps in advantures as well. Less superficial secondary NPCs, in the Haarlock Legacy and now in Frozen reaches each book seems to have like 10 pages of pure text of individuals that will probably never see use.

Not used or not... I think there's something to be said for the "Maps = Gamer Porn" thing.

I love maps in games, myself. Whatever they're for. I'll look over them over and over again.