I've run a few DH games so far and we've come across a few questions that the books don't really seem to answer. They may seem a bit odd but we have a deep roleplay group and these the types of questions that arise.

1, What exactly denotes Xenos? Do we mean alien as in not from terra? Does it require sentience? In essence after reading though the books I can't grasp it. For instanc,e we'll say a cow. Well a cow is what we call a bovine tasty creature on earth, but I assume cows are endemic to terra so thus one will not find a cow on Scintilla but I'm sure there is an analog. Since said analog is not a cow and comes from the stars it is technically xenos and thereby heretical. I cannot assume the empire must place cows all about the cosmos for people to eat so as not to consume xenos. I would assume that people tame whatever creature is tasty and not likely to put up a fight that is endemic to there system. Basically where does the line fall? To me if is not self aware or inherently dangerous (eg. a predatory creature) it is not Xenos.

2. Sin. Without attempting any sort of insult my group has taken the approach that the empire, and the ecclesiarchy are very similar to the Catholic Church in the middle ages. That said what many of us consider sin may differ very much from Imperial sin. what it comes down to is does the empire have a take on what we consider the seven deadly sins? Do they even matter at all?

3. Celebacy and the Ecclesiarchy. Although this may seem juvinile its an issue my team faces. One hears of the Sisters of Battle and one assumes they are celebate as they are married to the Emporer, and this would also apply to other members of the church. Can a SoB or other member of the eccleshiarchy engage in personal relationships?

Thanks.

1. Generally any sentient non-human species is considered bad and to be feared, hated and exterminated, but there are exceptions. Non-Terran animal life is another matter. If it is dangerous to humans, kill it. If they are not harmful figure out how to exploit it. In a lot of cases most unique animal life is wiped out by human colonization due to humans bringing their preferred animals into the ecosystem. The Imperium of Man has no compunction against decimating a planets ecosystem.

2. Sin is really open to interpretation. Consorting with xenos, warp dabbling, harming the Imperium, harboring a witch, being a witch, being a mutant, are all sins. Excesses in anything can be considered a sin. It is all relative to you and your groups attitude, and it is open to a lot of gray area.

3. This is open to a great bit of debate. Most of the Ecclesiarchy will be bound by the dictates of their version of the Imperial Creed, and these will vary wildly. Some will be celibate, some won't be. The Imperium consists of over a million worlds, so you will find ten million different answers. SoB are also debatable, but I would lean toward celibacy.

Ultimately it's up to you what version of the Imperium you want to present.

1: as above, he pretty much nailed it. Xenos denotes sentient non-terrian life. Non-sentient non-terrain life is usually refereed to as indignan (which is usually ok, unless it's not). And there is an almost universal cow analog used by the Imperium -the noble Grox who's incredible fortitude and adaptability insures it can be found on most any plaint within the Imperium. You can find them in DH pg 347

2: That's a tough one. Universally speaking, the only true sins are violating the big mandates of Imperial Law (consorting with the enemies of mankind, harboring the witch or the mutant, failing to honor your tithe, worshiping other gods not the Emperor). Beyond that, it would really depend on what sect you were dealing with as minutia can very greatly from one church to the next (and many a bloody skirmish and out right war is fought over such minutia regularly)

3: There's no mentioning of celibacy so, again, for clerics, that would depend on their church. Instead of thinking of the Ecclesearchy as the Catholic Church, think of them as the entirety of Judaio-Christian religions Catholicism included, but also Judaism, Lutherans, Southern Baptists, Mormons, 7th day Adventists, Evangelical churches, eastern orthodox, Zionists, Muslims, and on and on and on. The one thing they agree on, the Emperor is god, beyond that, it gets kind of dicey.

As the SoB are concerned, they aren't married to the Emperor. They were known as the Brides of the Emperor during the Reign of Blood when Vandire tricked them into serving his agenda ()and harem). They are the daughters of the Emperor now (as they were before Vandire) and calling them Brides of the Emperor, insinuating such, or even making a casual passing reference in a book that they might read is a burnable offense as far as they are concerned. They don't like being reminded of some parts of the past ;-) Whether they are celibate of not is a debated topic.

Short answer: It varies from place to place. Tailor the local rules to whatever you think will make a better game for your players.

1 - Any sentient species that is not derived from humans.

Also, Grox are the 40k cow equivalent.

2 - The basic rules of the Imperial creed are:

- Worship the God Emperor in a sanctioned way. Generally, anything goes as long as the God Emperor is the only god and they aren't worshiping chaos disguised as the God Emperor.

- Hate the xeno/mutant/witch.

- The planet must pay the tithe demanded by the Adminstratum without fail.

Everything else, including the details on how these rules are followed, varies from planet to planet. There are wars about the fine details, with neither side being considered heretics by the Imperium at large. The Imperium only intervenes if the war is starting to disrupt other loyal planets.

3 - One of the Caiphas Cain novels mentions* that, while many humans think that the SOB take vows of celibacy, the truth is that they don't (meaning that there are parts of their vows that prevent them having sex most of the time, without specifically banning it). Though, like most of the Imperium, it will vary from one order to another. That variation will only get larger when talking about the Ecclesiarchy at large.

*The narration of the Cain stories is done from the perspective of the characters involved, not by an omniscient narrator. This particular piece comes from a footnote added by the Inquisitor Amberley Vail, meaning that all it says is that Amberley thinks it to be the truth.

As everything else is already said:

Become comfortable with making up your own religious "does & do nots". Since "Blood of Martyrers" (the book covering the topic) did not even come up with a bulletpoint list of the most comen virtues in the diverse but-all-so-narrow imperial creeds, do not expect anything official soon.

Thanks guys. Our group has a puritanical priest who if he had his way would want exterminatus on just about everything and everyone and trying to determine the heretical from the non is a close call. I love the character as hes the team's "jerk" but he and I wondered how far to take it. It got down to since most humans are not born on terra they are technically xenos and then there is the green bean debate. Green beans may only be able to grow on earth so consumption of a plant on another planet is heretical because they are not the same green beans the Emporer would imbibe etc.

I guess the same applies to mineral and plant life. If humans control it and can use it it is not heretical, unless it controls humans or was made by xenos hands. I suppose intoxicants are the grey area. Eldar wine (or whatever) is made by the Eldar, but say a human crushes the same berries and ferments them in the same fashion it may be heresy to the absolute puritan but to most others its not. Most of it come down to black and white vs. greys.

kloked1 said:

Indeed there are many basic questions you won't find answered in the book, nor indeed out of it. there are lots of decisions you will need to make for yourself.

kloked1 said:

No, it means not genetically human. There are a million 'human' worlds. While all ultimately descending from Terran stock, humans from Holy Terra are still human and not xenos.

Xenos breeds are aliens of different genetic stock.

kloked1 said:

In general it does refer to the sentient aliens such as Eldar, Orks, Tau, Kroot, etc. However, it can also be applied to other types of creature.

The odd Jokaero for example, seemingly unintelligent 'space orangutans', who none-the-less exhibit an intutive grasp of technology far in advance of Humanity.

The term then can be used in a rather more flexible manner. Although in general it refers to sentient species/

kloked1 said:

Yep, as mentioned the Imperial 'cow' is the grox. http://wh40k.lexicanum.com/wiki/Grox

kloked1 said:

Its not explicitely stated anywhere. The concept of 'sin' isn't even really a part of the Imperial Faith, since there isn't really a concept of imperial Morailty for a sinner to transgress against..

Heresy is the main transgression - that is not the pollution of one's 'soul' through moral transgression but a simple disloyalty against the diktats of the Adeptus Ministorum. and we're not really told what those diktats are either. 'It depends' being the ususal response.

If you want to take the Catholic model to frame your understanding of Imperial faith and sin, its as good a model as anything. Simply consider the 'soul' as the 40k 'warp presence' and away you go.

kloked1 said:

There's nothing really about celibacy in the Ministorum. Given the sanctity of Imperial genetics and the lack of the context of 'sin', i personally would say part of the Imperial Faith will be to procreate as much as possible (particularly on frontier worlds). I see no reason why SoBs or the priest of the Ministorum would be celibate.

And to add to it since the debate is going, every current religion shares a few tenents, do not murder, do not steal, adultery, etc. These are not sins if commited against xenos (well except adultery) but what of against other humans? Do these fall more in with local secular law and is not something the cult of the emporer covers? For us most "sins" are crimes too, but say adultery and blasphemy are sins but not crimes ( in most places). Is it the other way around in DH? Adultery is a crime not a sin and such as for murder, theft etc.

A lot of our team issues come from what we face now as humans and our tendancies and transgressions. To continue the cow analogy, buggering a cow is illegal and a sin in the western world (and I hope everywhere) but is it in the world of 40k? Some of my team say no, unless said cow is a xenos then its not the buggering thats the crime but the consorting with xenos that is.

kloked1 said:

Eradicating the xenos is rarely if ever bad. Allowing it to live or worse, conspiring with, cavorting with, or to be infected mentally, emotionally, or physically by one is. Either way, most of the sins/crimes you list would , again, vary from location to location. Whether the local arm of the Minstorium gets involved with such things would depend on the way that particular arm interprets the Imperial Creed. Adultery might not exist in some places, and in others, it, due to some event 650 years ago and a radical interpretation of a saints teachings, might be the worst crime and sin one could commit and tantamount to betraying the Imperium.

Murder, I believe, is a sin / crime in the Imperial eyes (it's been listed as a heresy that a heretic was guilty of). However, what constitutes murder might differ from location to location -in one place killing an unarmed man could be a good thing for it fallows some part of the Creed that advocates a strengthening of the genetic stock of humanity where it could be abhorred in another location. And, of course, who get's killed and who did the killing would be very important in determining whether it was murder or justifiable homicide. Generally speaking, the lower in station the victim is and the higher in station the killer is, the higher the chance that the action is justifiable homicide and not murder. It should also be noted that servants of the Emperor (those of the Adaptus Terra, Minstorium, etc) will sit much higher on that spectrum then most anyone else.

It has also been established in various places (I can't remember exactly where now though, sorry) that the Adaptus Arbites view the destruction of Imperial property as an Imperial Crime... killing a servant of the Emperor is, at the very least, destruction of Imperial property. Likewise, impeding a servant of the Emperor about their sacred duties is likewise an Imperial crime, and there's no greater way to impede someones duties then killing them.

Something that might interest you is some write-ups on some of the Calixis Sector's most wanted. On each dossier is a list of heresies that each is accused of. You can download it HERE . Slavery is mentioned on one of them even though, on planets like Sepherus Secundus (and many other places) slavery is a viable economic tool. Heresy really dose come down to who sees it, how they interpret it, and the amount of clout that individual has.

Again, many many religious wars are fought between various churches, each declaring the other heretical due to different interpretations of the Creed. Usually you don't know who the true heretics in such conflicts are until one side wins (then, of course, the other side were the heretics). In one place, buggering Grox might be seen as a right good thing (St. Santificus did preach that one should love, cherish, and care for the noble Grox as one would their most cherished person for through it's flesh did the 22nd PDF reserve wing find the strength to hold off the green tide for 2 score and a fortnight!) and refusing to "love" the Grox might be seen as one who believes the green-skins should have slaughtered all the Imperial settlers -a true traitor fit only to be hung!

kloked1 said:

That won't work at all. The vast majority (>99%) of humans never leave the world they are born on. So anyone with that belief in a position to act on it would have to put themself on the list of people to purge, as well as becoming an enemy and/or useful pawn of almost everyone who hears of him.

Chances are that the psyker (if you have one) is the only player character that has ever visited Holy Terra. Everyone else has probably never left the Calixis sector, including the void born (and they only travel because their 'homeworld' is a ship travelling between various planets).

1 & 2 seem to be covered but I´d like to point out that in Dark Heresy canon SoBs are indeed chaste.

Inquisitor´s Handbook, Page 41, under "Sororitas Characters", first sentence:

"Adepta Sororitas are courageous, pious, self-sacrificing, chaste and faithful."

As for clerics, it would probably depend but I would say that the catholic church is a good inspiration.

1: Xenos by definition comes from Greek which means "Stranger or Alien", it has since been heavily robbed by dozens of science fiction writers to refer to extraterrestrial life forms. Its probably a matter of conjecture really depending where you come from, technically if you're born on a planet far from Earth, probably lived their all your life- anything not from that planet is a Xenos! In the context of pragmatic, ill-educated inhabitants of 40K- it mostly refers to Alien organisms and their associated ecosytems, for same said people they take what they want, disregard and usually destroy the rest.

2: Insult your groups sensibilities often, it builds character Remember, you are the GM and you set the standard (fiat: you dont even have to be right )- if the player's character wants to deviate, burn the little bastard for daring to be different and challenging the status quo. Theres a big list of laws of the Imperium which range from the obvious cavorting with warp entities, dealing with xenos... all the way down to not paying the planetary Tithe, dodging the draft and ***** slapping an Adeptus, which are all Sins. So, molesting the party Adeptus (Arbite, Administratum or Mechanicus) is technically comitting a sin and you will at the very least end up in a Penal Regiment or be turned into a Servitor.

3: Interesting how often people refer to the Middle Ages Catholic Church as the basis for their games religious systems BUT leave out one of the most important events of the time- the Protestent Reformation and the other schism's of christianity leading up to that paticular time. The Middle ages where not so much a case of the Catholic Church being the be-all power. It wasnt, in fact it was heavily under siege from all sides for its multitude of "hypocritical" activities of its leading memebers that was politically exploited in much the same way as a tabloid does today to affect public opinion. Not the least of which, was the fact the clergy where stabbing their ***** in anything with a pulse which was quite sensational, (edit- ok thats a bad pun!) but mostly they where just very disliked by a lot of people for having to tithe ones way into heaven and the endless stream of cash going into the church coffers... and not the Royalty or State!

So remember, just like the Middle Ages- fairly much everyone believed in God, they just never agreed how it should be done or just quite how much it should cost.

MKX said:

Uhm no the reformation came about in the Rennaissance (about 1517) and generally attributed a certain Martin Luther.

Before this there were other Hereies of course, but nothing dominated religion in europe the way the Catholic Church did. The Reformation, counter Reformation etc. unleashed countles wars of religion and split europe.

40k religion is more consistent to the actual middle ages where the Catholic Church was dominant, where heresies were put down mericlessly, where the Inquisition and their secular allies burnt people at the stake for disagreeing with their interpretation of the bible and holy edicts of Rome. Now take reality and excaggerate it tenfold, and remove any understanding and tolerance that may have existed, and we are getting close to the Ecclesiarchy.

As a 40K table-top player i've struggled with some of these as most of my group have no idea about the 40K universe. I have read, re-read and made my own group of notes, for what I can gather every planet or system has it's own faith. Before you quote and counter that let me explain.

Take a non imperial human world with it's own culture and faith that does not include the empourer as God.

Enter the Imperial Guard, Navy and any other arm of the military to claim said world.

Enter the Adptus to adminstrate the world include doctoring it's faith to the Imperial Creed. Hey presto a new version of the Imperial Faith making it a different to another world or system depending on the influence. The Ministorum keep track of all these different methods, which is how world do not go to war for differences in worship as it's sanctioned but sometime more deviant version exsist and have to be removed these would fall into the category of heresy.

As for Sin, it would be different on every world, ship and may even change on the same world.

As someone has posted above if SoB are celebate is a matter of great debate, it's not something take you'd talk about with a SoB, she's likely to purge you with bolter and or flamer depending on her mood.

Valdek said:

You are roughly correct in this, the only point I'll nitpick is who does the conversion. Some of it will be done by Rogue Trader fleets.

In fact, converting the population is one of the defined tasks of the Missionary class in Rogue Trader.

So most monothestic religions would work. Polytheistic religions will be a problem to convert, as only religions that recognise the God Emperor as the only god are acceptable.

Bilateralrope said:

Polytheistic religions are usually altered and the lesser gods turned into saints while the greater one (Zeus, Jupiter, Odin) are turned into the Emperor. This is of course IF the native population accepts this subtle change.....

I only have to step in here as I beleive that the vast majority of those within the Ecclesiarchy, and those who serve it, are not celibate. This is in regards to using the word chaste and inferring celibacy. This is not so. Chastity is sexual behavior of a man or woman acceptable to the ethical norms and guidelines of a culture, civilization, or religion. In the medieval era, a chaste woman was one who acted as a lady in court and the public eye, but may have been an absolute ***** in her husband's bedchambers, and in fact was encouraged thus. Therefore, I would surmise that the word chaste used for the IHB version of the SOB would be more to hint that they do not engage in lewd or reckless behavior in regards to a woman who would be viewed by society in such an honored role as the SOB.

Thanks Graver for the link, OK so in a way one must not consider heresy to be just in the religious sense, heresy is the by-word for crime. The idea of a crime on one planet and not another is similar to modern countries. Drug possession ok here but not here, and the idea of how forcefully the Cult of the Emporer is enforced has to do with said planet being more secular or religious, similar to Islamic countries and Sharia law and most of the west were blasphemy, etc is legal. And again with the middle ages analogy, the higher the standing the less likely you will be punished for it. That does not always apply, as your run of the mill serf had little chance of being individually excommunicated but several Holy Roman Emporers were. But you also have the sins of the father too, all of England was excommunicated under Henry VIII.

One would expect there would be a book of law that holds throughout the Imperium. Arbites, being Judge Dredds, carry a book of law. Now is that law planetary or Imperium wide? Since the Arbites are the FBI of the Empire there has to be Imperial law, then I suppose Sector law, system law and then planetary law, and further down as the planet's leadership goes. I figure an Arbite has little interest in a case of a Grox thief, unless he moves hundreds of stolen Grox across the sector. Similar to the FBI, unless you cross state lines with most crimes there isn't much they'll do, which then it falls on local (planetary) forces to handle.

As our team is in the Inqusition, what law are they to follow? The Inqusition fights both a secular and religious fight. I realize the huge beauracracy but there has to be a defined point, if not the system would fall apart. Law without order is a greater danger than order without law I believe the Jefferson quote goes, and the Imperium is Jefferson's worst nightmare. I guess what all my rambling gets to it what law does an Acolyte contend with? Even with all the vastness of the Imperium there must be some hard and fast laws that everyone know and everyone must follow or am I thinking to modern for all this? If a king kills a man its not murder, a man kills a king its regicide and that whole schtick. Really, are the Inquisitors just kind of making it up as they go along?

I figure an Arbite has little interest in a case of a Grox thief, unless he moves hundreds of stolen Grox across the sector.

The DH core rulebook has this to say: The Adeptus Arbites ... has little interest in petty crimes such as theft, murder or tax evasion.

They only care about keeping the planet loyal to the Imperium, making sure the Tithe is paid and the planet doesn't aid any of the enemies of man.

Similar to the FBI, unless you cross state lines with most crimes there isn't much they'll do, which then it falls on local (planetary) forces to handle.

If someone flees from one planet to escape punishment for crimes the Arbites don't care about, the Arbites would still not care about him, unless he threatens the loyalty of one or more planets.

As our team is in the Inqusition, what law are they to follow?

The word of the Inquisitor they work for. Nothing more, nothing less.

Inquisitors do disagree with each other quite often, starting with the Radical/Puritan split. It often gets violent.

As posted the Arbiter's don't deal with local crime that's done by local law enforcement/enforcers or pdf depending of the governor, they are more like the KGB or the Gastapo than the FBI. They make sure the planet pays it's tithe, has no dealings with enemies of man, and the imperial creed is kept, they also make sure the world stays in the imperium. As they are from different world to the one they are serving on they have no compuntion to deal with anything else, how ever many Arbiter teams may form Special Task units of local law enforcement, much like SWAT, if local couldn't deal with a problem that would say threaten production and therefore the tithe they would act.

Are the Inquistor's making it up as they are going along? Simple answer, YES. They have an unlimited remit, with more enemies than allies, absolute power and the ability to destroy worlds, the only thing keeping them in check is each other and sometimes that doesn't work.

As for the Players, what laws they choose to follow is up to them, they must completet that tasks set by their inquistor, if they wish to remain covert then they will abide local law (mostly), and keep to the Imperial Creed until it serves them not to, and therefore passing down the road of Puritan to Radical and maybe back again, but for every player it will be different. The only person the players will have to answer to most of the time is thier inquistor, but likewise he will have to answer to other inquistor's for the actions of his acolytes if they are to radical and too open about it.