Ok, I got the endeavor concept. I understand how to break it up into objectives and assign each objective an achievement point threshold to succeed at the objective. What I'm having problems with is assigning possible tasks within each objective and giving them an achievement value. The core rules do a good job of providing basic endeavors but for some reason they don't drill down to the achievement level with the examples. Any resources available to help a newbie out with that?

Edge of the Abyss's adventure at the back of its book breaks the point values down pretty well. I don't personally agree with their methodology, I prefer a more abstract method myself.

Part of the problem is the dueling ideas in an endeavor. An endeavor is supposed to be pass/fail. If you come up 100 points short, you don't get the PF. (and every 100+ points nets you additional PF). Yet the objectives are never pass/fail. It's always a nibbling 50 points for suggesting this, or 100 points for killing this key monster, etc. I'm not against creativity but sometimes the point values try to consider too many opportunities.

Compare this with when FFG was "selling" the Endeavor concept in the dev-blogs, and you'll note that at the end, arguably because the explorers cleaned house on the Orks, the planet they were seeking to trade with decided to take their gesture of good will and immediately enter into a trade agreement with them, no negotiations needed! There was no tallying up and comparison of 295/300. It just flowed logically.

I agree with Fortinbras.

I personally just track AP towards the end of an endeavor and for each 100 points they earned get's them an extra bonus point towards Profit Factor. I don't brother trying to break stuff down by objectives anymore. If they failed the Endeavor they they loose all profit factor and any AP netted get's lost trying to clean up the mess.

I am fairly abstract as well. If they do what I expect them to do to "succeed" then I give them 300/300 (or whatever the required is), then add their bonuses on top of that. If they partially fail at it, but I know their bonus points (for components) would fit the objective at hand, then I might let them pass still.

I do not break it down like FFG does. I think doing so is hard since you can't really plan what craziness the explorers will do.

Too much detail really bogs down the GM and takes away your wiggle room. Get a general idea of what you want to be possible and see what happens. Have a cap of PF total for the adventure/endeavour and see what happens, assigning PF for things they make happen. Its more fun for the GM when you don't have to be a glorified t-crosser.

I was initially very leery of the system as presented, but have grown to like it. I have no problem with the idea that achievement points are somewhat disconnected from the actual objectives -- this just means that the objectives represent the specific tasks the group is initially deciding to undertake, while achievement points calculate their ability to turn their actions into profit. As a result, it is possible to meet all the basic objectives, but fail to turn a profit, or fail to achieve the initial goal but still make a profit along the way.

As the the actual award of achievement points, I give them out for two things: actions that advance the group towards meeting objectives, and actions that could could generate profit in-and-of-themselves. Achievement points are deducted for significant loss or waste of resources, and possibly for failing to grasp opportunities for profit.

I use a scale of diminishing returns for generating bonus PF -- the first 100AP nets +1 PF, 300 is +2, 600 is +3, 1,000 is +4.

I'm running a mixed group, with Dark Heresy and DeathWatch characters as well. In order to give the Space Marines requisition and renown numbers you need to break the mission up into objectives; primary, secondary, and tertiary. This ended up making assigning Achievement points pretty easy as well.

Once you have a good idea of the minimum objectives the group needs to meet in order to complete thier endevour, list all those off first and then assign points among them weighting them as you think apropriate. These should equal between 60-80% of the amount needed to complete the endevour. (You don't do 100% since there is sure to be some bonus points from ship components and some secondary or tertiary objectives completed as well. The first time I did 100% and the group ended up getting 4x the base rewards due to thier maximum overacheivement, which was nuts.) Secondary objectives should be assigned however many points are needed to total 100% of the required acheivement points in total with the primary objectives. If your secondary objectives are mostly things that will logically be done in the process of doing the primary objectives, either because they are prerequisits or becuase they are placed along that path I suggest a 60/40 split between primary and secondary. If they are helpful but not so conveniently placed that you can do them in the process of doing the primary objective an 80/20 split seems better. Then you sprinkle tertiary objectives about totally another 50% of the required Achievement Points. Things that are fun or interesting sidepoints or rewards for going above and beyond on a primary or secondary objective have so far made the best tertiary options for me. Once component bonuses are added in, it shouldn't be hard for your crew to double the basic rewards if they complete nearly all the objectives, maybe even tripple if they do a clean sweep and have large component modifiers.

At least, that's a method and reward level that's worked well for me.