I want peoples advice/opinions or simply pointing to a book with them in. How would you go about constructing Orgyns or Ratlings?

For those that don't know what an Ogryn is, it's an accepted mutation of the Human genome producing a sub-race that serves in the Imperial Guard as elite soldiers and bodyguards. They are hulking, strong, tough and durable but not too intelligent, and loyal like a dog.

Any suggestion of Carrer's other than Guardsmen?

Ratlings are another Elite Trooper with the Imperial Guard, these to are a mutation of the human genome that has produced a sub race of child-like agile, nimble sharpshooters.

And yet again any Suggestions on carrer's other than Guardsmen and Assassin?

Off the top of my head...

Ogryns

I'd swap Feral world with Imperial world on Table 1.1: Random homeworld (p13) (making feral world the most common option).

+10 S, +10 T, -10 Ag, -10 Int

Irrspective of career, INT advances will always cost 500/1000/1500/3000 xp.

I'd also consider very carefully giving Unnatural Toughness (x1)

Size: Hulking

Wounds 1d10+12

You'll need some bonus talents and skills. At least;

Intimidate, Survival, Bulging biceps, Crushing blow, Hardy, Resistance (cold) and Resistance (ingested toxins).

They should also get the feral world traits of Iron stomach and Primitive irrespective of their homeworld.

Suitable carrers would be: Arbitrator, Assassin, Cleric, Guardsman, Scum.

Valdek said:

They were the first things I ever wrote for Dark Heresy; head to my webpage and look for a file called "Something Other Than Human". It contains rules for Ogryns, Ratlings and Squats (in this case, survivors of their Tyranid-ravaged species).

N0-1_H3r3 said:

I like abhumans, I wish they'd incorperated in DH from the start, even if it wasn't the traditional Ogryns, ratlings and squats the planets they used could have had weird native populations, the only example I can think of is a little note on the planet Dreah where the people (and indeed everything) is the colour grey. It gives a great feeling that even within humanity that they've become so different from each other over time. Even It could have been used to add varity in the same way that other sci-fi francises use aliens. Hell it could have been pretty much as varied as Star Trek where most the aliens are humans with funny bits on them.

But anywho, nice work again Mr NO-1. Ogryns are brutes plane and simple, if you let someone play one it's going to severly limit the style of adventure they can take part in. In a way they are similar to SoB in that respect. And the remaining adventure style they are good theres a risk that they wil dominate.

One thing to bere in mind, which might help, is that traditionally Ogryns are soo stupid that they have problems working out how to use weapons. At one point they needed the Bone-ead upgrade before they could even use a ripper gun but they've sine dropped that. I don't know how youd use that in game, possible say that without the Bone-ead upgrade they are limited to primitive and sp weapons talents and can get chain and shock once they have it. At least in that way non ogryn players will have a weapon damage bonus.

Also, my moneys on Ogryns and Ratlings being included as playable characters in the upcoming book Only War.

Face Eater said:

I agree.

In my own 40k RPG work done well before Dark Heresy was released (using the Interlock system), i had various 'classifications' of human, according to the Adeptus Mechanicus Biologis genetic purity index (adopted by the rest of the Adeptus Terra as a social classification and staus/heirarchy system).

Human - pure-gene humans typically derived from one of the four great races originating on Holy Terra.

Peri-human - colonial humans cosmetically different to the pure-strain but exhibiting only minor genetic differences (blue skin, excessive hair, different morphology like three fingers or elongated skulls etc., but exhibiting core stable genetics.

Ultra-human - those stable strains of Adeptus Mechanicus genetically modified or enhanced humans, typically established during the Dark Age of Technology. The two main surviving strains are the Adeptus Astartes space marines and the Navis Nobilite navigators. Psykers are also classed as ultra-humans, although their status is akin to the mutant breed until they have been assessed, sanctioned and indentured into Imperial service. I also have rare surviving examples like the gill-enhanced 'aqua men', and the void-adapted 'grey men'.

Abhuman - colonial humans exhibiting significant but stable genetic variation, typically as an evolutionary response to alien environments. Well known examples include ogryns, squats, and ratlings.

Sub-human ('gene filth') - humans mutated by environmental or industrial toxic damage. Typically genetically unstable, including pollution of progeny, and exhibiting cancers, genetic disease, deformities and other maladies. Often used as slave labour in dangerous industries or shunned and ghettoised.

Mutant - humans corrupted and mutated by the Warp. Unstable and reviled, they are subject to immediate extermination.

I believe Disciples of the Dark Gods has stats on Ogryn beast keepers, part of the Beast House.

The Laughing God said:

Who are ridiculously too powerful and too stupid to make a PC. It has a TB of 10, 30 Wounds, and an Int of 15.

If we use the TT as any kind of guide at all, Ogryns are considerably physically tougher than Astartes. They do not belong as Dark Heresy characters in anything resembling a normal (= the kinds of adventures that have been published) game. Maybe you could use them in Deathwatch, but considering they seem as smart as or slightly smarter than gorillas, roleplaying possibilities would be limited.

Ratlings might work though if you want to do no undercover work at all.

Sorry for posting two in a row, but I can't get the edit functionto work.

Even Bone' eads are described as having subhuman intelligence. Let me repeat: "subhuman." Not "a little dumb," but "dumber than the stupidest of human beings."

Ogryns have animal intelligence, at the upper end of the spectrum (like gorillas, who can also be taught language).

Role-playing an Ogryn is going to be like, "I stand, wait for little master to come out. I good Ogryn, hit things that hurt little master. Here smell bad. I see loud noise, hear bright light! What that? What that? I scared!"

It would be like playing a servitor.

Ogryn is about as smart as an Ork comparing what few stats we have for Ogryn. It would be low end scale intelligence, but he'd be about the same as any other fighter that used INT as the dump stat. Ratlings and Squats would be very doable, I'd love to play a space biker.

Scum would be a natural class for Ratlings- especially considering their description from the 2003 Imperial Guard Codex, and the accompanying White Dwarf articles...

The Glen said:

I don't have Creatures Anathema handy, but the Freebooter in Rogue Trader has an Int of 26. Orks aren't dumb, just blunt.

For reference, a Grox has an Int of 12. A dog has an Int of 15. The same as an Ogryn, assuming the one in DotDG is representative (admittedly it's probably stronger and tougher than average considering its job, but I don't see any reason why it would be unusually stupid).

Then again, a Fanatic Voicer per the errata has an Int of 16.

According to the IG codex, a Bone 'Ead -- an augmented Ogryn -- has the intelligence of an eight-year-old child .

For all intents and purposes, normal, unaugmented Ogryns are animals.

Inquisitor sapiens potensque said:

Bone'eads are described as having a child-like intelligence (current Codex: Imperial Guard, page 42), and having a basic grasp of strategy and tactics. There's a difference. Even normal Ogryns can be taught to operate simple firearms, and Ogryn culture (on their own worlds) has been known to be equivalent to a feudal world (original Ogryn background in White Dwarf, when they first appeared, had the typical Ogryn as being from a medieval-equivalent culture).

An Ogryn player character is going to be one of those rarities whose intellect is high enough to consider for Bionic Ogryn Neural Enhancement augmentation, and while hardly the sharpest pencil in the box, they're not brain-dead morons either.

Now, the rules I've written for Abhumans, I've used in-game - I had a player using an Ogryn for a while (went by the name of Rhino, "because he could carry ten men into battle"). Yes, he was stronger and tougher than anyone else the rest of the group. Yes, he had the mental sophistication of a small child. However, his presence didn't disrupt the game or particularly interfere with the investigation (Abhumans are part of the Imperium, so its not like having one around is a huge impediment to undercover work), so long as the Ogryn had appropriate supervision. The biggest hindrance was his size (around 3m tall) and claustrophobia rather than anything else.

N0-1_H3r3 said:

"Intelligence of an eight-year old child." That's a Bone 'Ead.

Dogs have a basic grasp of strategy and tactics.

Also of course Ogryns are going to be an impediment to undercover work. They are RARE. They don't exist natively anywhere in the Calixis Sector that I can recall (assuming this is being used as the campaign setting), and no way in hell is anybody going to let a giant, hugely powerful and potentially destructive 8-year-old wander around through an Imperial settlement anyway for the same reason we don't have mountain gorillas and bears walking around in cities. As well as being really really bad at lying and pretending to be things they aren't. Are there many 10-foot-tall 8-year-olds out there capable of infilitrating criminal organizations?

Inquisitor sapiens potensque said:

Actually, according to the old entries we used to have on the planets of the calixis sector, the Pearl Moon of Karrik is home to both Ratlings and Ogryns, so there are communities of these Abhumans in the Calixis sector. Further more Ogryns are employed and trained to help with the fiching economy.

The reason why the Ogryns in DotDG have such a low INT is that 1) They are ogryns, which by nature are fairly dimwitted and 2) they are more feral andsavage by thier treatment and upbringing.

Now I am not going to say a Ogryn is going to be a astrophysicist or anthing, but the biggest difference between a ogryn and a "dog" is that a ogryn is still descended from humans. Plus the ogryns Ive seen in GW related novels have not been just "big dumb dogs" heck, even Nork Deddog isnt portrayed like that.

N0-1-H3R3's rules for abhumans are excellent and I only hope he is invited in as a writer when FFG finally gives us PC stats for these interesting creatures of the GW verse.

Peacekeeper_b said:

Nork Deddog is a Bone 'Ead, isn't he? A genius.

I said normal Ogryns were probably like gorillas, or slightly smarter. It's the published FFG material that gives them the same Int as dogs. (Could you teach a gorilla to use a firearm? Probably.) The DH system has problems with subhuman stats since the range from 00 to 19 isn't very large. I would probably put dogs at 10, keep Ogryns at 15, and make Bone' eads 20.

Anyway, even leaving the intelligence issues to one side, the things are tougher than Space Marines (in both TT and the one published example we have of one), creating a slight balance problem for a typical DH game.

If you want to play a huge, tough freakish dumb bruiser who sticks out in a crowd, I say play a mutant, or invent some kind of big tough dumb abhuman that isn't as extreme as an Ogryn. They must be out there; Ratlings and Ogryns aren't the only kind.

(I stand corrected on their presence in the Calixis Sector.)

Inquisitor sapiens potensque said:

Sure they have more wounds then Space Marines, but they are not tougher then those wacko militant space devil dogs, but they are not tougher then existing space marines.

WS, Agility, Talents, Skills and gear alone make Space Marines far tougher. The average space marine in the RPG is going to be at least 10 points better in WS, possibly even 20 or so. With the talents to back it up. And they are more then likely going to get initiative. Lets not foget the ogryn is probably only wearing 4 or 5 points of armour as opposed to the marines 8-10APs.

As for table top, what makes them so deadly is their T and S 5 and 3 wounds, but lack of any real armour will cost them fast.

But back to Ogryns in the RPG. I think they would fit better in Rogue Trader as far as power level goes, and may be a fun alternative in Deathwatch (give them some flak armour or carapace armour and the B.O.N.E. head implant) but they would also fit well in a Ascension level game or a Radicals themed game.

And ogryns can go undercover. With clever techpriest implants (cameras, microphones, vox systems) I could imagine an inquistor having no issue with sending a ogryn to infiltrate on karrik or in the Gorgonid mines or on Tranch or use them whenever investigating on a deathworld.

Inquisitor sapiens potensque said:

Any balance problem is irrelevant when the game is handled by any half-way competent GM. I regard it as a non-issue, personally.

As I've noted, I've run games that included Ogryns. They have involved undercover investigations (because being undercover doesn't inherently mean "draw no attention to yourself", because if nobody notices you, it's difficult to actually accomplish anything). Those sessions went well. Consequently, the issues you bring up are not insurmountable as you seem to be implying, and thus the matter should be left to the individual GM as to whether or not they're a viable addition.

You may not like the notion of their inclusion... fine, but others are allowed to disagree with you. You shouldn't be attempting to tell people that they're having badwrongfun by allowing Ogryns in their games, particularly as not every Dark Heresy game is an Inquisitorial investigation (something that FFG are making allowances for in books like Blood of Martyrs, which provides tools for Ecclesiarchy-themed games)

N0-1_H3r3 said:

You can do anything you want. I didn't mean to come across as abrasive -- I blame the Internet.

Although I did specifically say the game as intended (= the published adventures), not any variant of the rules.

Peacekeeper_b said:

Really, an Ogryn, should have access to Unnaturaly Strength and Toughness X2 and a load of wounds. Obviously that doesn't nescesarily mean from character gen (asenscion transition package maybe?). But I still wouldn't want an ogryn character to be doing that with a powerfist and power armour.

thanks guys for all the responses, I orginally intended to have an Ogryn as one of the PC's inquistor's cadre, the more stero-typical big dumb brute of a meat shield for an aging former arbiter. So not designing for a player, I just wanted other peoples opinions and/or direction to any books which you have posted.

Thanks for the website with the abhuman stuff, very interesting.

Here's hoping the FFG do release something.

As for Ogryn's being unbalanced for DH, with a high toughness and maybe the unnatural trait and plenty of wounds as well as not being the brightest induviduals can be quite fun, but would generally end up you being the target of massive amounts of damage being bigger and therefore a more obvious threat. Also the Inquistion only recruits the best of best or so the fluff goes, and PC's by the fact they are PC's are better than that.

I think the idea for a squad of Ogryn Arbiters "The Problem Solvers" could be quite amusing, a 5 man Arbiter extreme suppression force. A last resort option even for arbiters.

As a GM i think I will keep them to an NPC capacity for the moment until i get a better feel for the game balance with them forfilling their store-typical role as body guards.

Thanks again

Face Eater said:

Ogryn Power Armour or Ogryn Power Fists would have to be custome made, so very unlikely they would have one.

Peacekeeper_b said:

Clearly you don't subscibe to the idea that Space Marines are as big as Ogryns :s

But yes, I did pick the most ridiculous gear specifically for that example but I do see the ability to use to much higher tech weaponry as the advantage that humans have over Ogryns in combat situations.

Face Eater said:

SM power armor is custom made and cannot be used by anyone that isn't a SM, since it requires things like black carapace. So it would still have to be custom made, even if they are as big as Space Marines. The Space Marines sure as hell wouldn't give them power armor even if they could just throw it on.

Rakiel said:

I did mean that as a joke, the last figures official figures I saw had your average Ogryn as over 3 foot taller than a space marine and much more heavily set.

Face Eater said:

A LOT more heavily set. They're usually depicted as nearly as round as they are tall, and pretty much all of that is assumed to be dense muscle with a hefty protective layer of fat.

They should be tougher than most space marines, at least as strong, and very, very much stupid. But NOT naive - they're bred for combat, and the most important instincts are not going to be governed by intelligence except for rare situations (Treat him something like a family pet - quick to pick up on emotional reactions from other party members (things like fear, hatred, contempt, happiness would be evoke appropriate action, tempered by operant conditioning on occasion). I'd expect an Ogryn with a BONE'ead implant (I'd call that a requirement for PC Ogryns) to be able to act like a gene-enhanced bodyguard and tell friend from foe. They won't be dancing at any noble's ball, of course, nor should we expect them to. They will NOT be balanced against similar-ranked acolytes, which is why one might consider giving them a base XP (2000? 4000?) that the player must be at (perhaps after an advanced character is killed) before they are allowed in game? Only a high-ranked acolyte group would be trusted in the keeping of an Ogryn anyway, right?).

Power Armor to fit their frame would simply HAVE to be a custom job (I'd double costs, minimum), and the Ogryn is unlikely to be willing to go against instinct enough to wear a helmet, nor will the condition of such armor be kept particularly high. They have to build Ogryn weapons insanely tough to withstand their treatment, remember.