Hi everybody,

the topic says it all. Does anybody knows the approximate distance between the two (in Kilometer)?

The Ordo Malleus page speaks of 26.000km... but I hope that this is not true.

Background: I would like to have some acolythes "shadowing" some Macro-Hauler travelling from one city to the other. But if a Macrohauler would travel about 50 kph (which I think would be quiet good "offroad") the cargo haul would take 520h which is about 22 days if the crew changes seats and drive the behemoth 24h a day.

I skipped through the material in the core rules book, but I was not able to find a distance.

Does anyone know a distance & is able to quote the source? Thank you!

Personally when I dealt with the issue, I just dropped a zero. 2600 km is much less daunting!

Yep, but before I am going to houserule something, I want to ensure that there is no fluff-source contradicting me.

nightspearD said:

Wouldn't that be a bit extreme, though? The city of Berlin has a size of ~900 km² already, and we're talking about Hive cities here. I don't think the distance between them should be smaller than the actual cities themselves (although that is an interesting concept as well and not even unthinkable so take this with a grain of salt).

Perhaps it would help to see the task of shadowing something for 22 days not as a problem but as a challenge? It's not like your players would have to RP each and every day, after all. Perhaps the Acolytes even find ways to make it easier on them, such as hitching a ride (those vehicles can be **** large, after all) or installing electronic surveillance. Or have them come up with some sort of "watch plan" and see if they can plan ahead. Assign mild Perception penalties to the appropriate tests after several days because the characters get bored and less attentive. See how good they can manage their rations for such a long trip... create a few distractions and incidents on the way ...

The PC's can move at the Speed of Plot. A three day roadtrip is mind numbing enough. take a brief poll of what the PC's are going to do any given day and dilate time/distance to serve your plot or any subplot you may throw at them, Like the macro-hauler breaking an axle or something..

just my 2 quincunx

Gregorius21778 said:

I don't know about official sorces, but the 26,000 km distance feels right to me. It's crazyu and over to top large as all things in 40k should be.

And it's not that bad once tyou really start thinking anout it. Sure, it results in a mear meager 22 day journy, but remimber, tis is mobving from one place to a far reaching other place on a planitary scale..,. it's not like visiting relitives who live in the hills. You are commiting to going to the other side of the damned palnit for all intents and purposes, a massive journy to say the least.l I'd say 22 days is a nice figure for such an odasy.

Beyond that, I know your great with coming up with random type encounters. You don't need to play out each and every day, just take it week by week with one encounter per week (to help make them feel like they've been journeying for a while and to add local flavor of where every they are now to things) with the rest described by the players in how they'd like things to proceed with you altering/changing/elaborating on their input to come up with how each week went. In the end, they will truly feel like they've been on a long journey to the other side of the world and the massive difference between the two hives would be that much more pronounced and accepted -it'd be like taking a road-trip from Dayton Ohio USA to Hong Kong China, a world of difference and really far apart to boot.

Remember, when doing 40k, bigger is always better. ALWAYS and to a ridiculous degree!

As someone who hates giving precise numbers because they might turn out wrong, I would go with a time frame rather then a distance.

Abstract it out, decide that you think a week or two weeks or whatever is about the appropriate time for the macro-hauler to get from point A to point B and leave it at that. At least that's what I would do.

Gregorius21778 said:

Well, I think there is no official source in regard to this distance. Even then, DH (and maybe all of 40K) is known for weird scales and numbers, which don't make any sense (e.g. size compared to population in hive cities) at all. In my opinion though, 26,000 km sounds about right as does a 22 day trip (everything in the Imperium takes long and 22 days is rather short if you ask me). If you want to change it somehow, I would increase the speed of the Macro-Hauler. Let it be some kind of special high-speed Marco-Hauler (>100 km/h) for extremely valuable cargo. This way it seems even as a more action-oriented setting with possible fire-fights and close-combat on the roof as well as Mad-Max-esque wreckers on hover-bikes and buggies assualting it while the Marco-Hauler thunders with high speed through the desert...

I am the Humungus!

Remember that Hive Sibellus is 8 000 Km across ....

*sigh*
So, no official distance available. But what transpires is that the Malleus-26.000 km might be right.

Where is my problem with the 22 day journey?
The question of fuel. Please allow me to get lost in the details.

My plan for the adventure (where I do not intend play out each day, but my group and me
is not to found of "speed of plot") is that they follow a macrohauler which they know (from previous
check of containers in a warehouse) to be smuggling contraband (xenocreatures in cryostasis).
Their mission is to find out where these beasts are going.

For this, they are inteded to follow the macro hauler with a small vehicle (there are now passengers
allowed on the hollower itself). At some point (preferable "in the middle of nowhere, during an Ashstorm so satelites are
blind") the Hauler will have a meeting with a group of small vehicles (some transport-truck-thing and perhaps two escort vehicles)
themselves. They exchange containers.

While I already planned to have some "fuel stations / fuel forts" and mercenary settlements in the relative
vicinity of the two hives, I envisioned a large stretch between the hives to be wasteland. While it is believable for a
train-like construct like a macro-crawler to transport it´s on fuel for the journey (...somehow...), smaller vehicles might have
a much harder time to go without any fuel for days.

I have to think about some vehicle that allows them to store enough extra fuel (or "energy") to go
through the wastes. The "buggy"-option is out for sure. Perhaps something like a Chimera, but smaller
and on huge monster-truck wheels instead of tracks... 2/3 of the transport compartment cramped with fuel and/or motor-cells
..yes, that should be believeable...

Anyway, thanks for the constructive input!

During the trip through the waste, have regular "fueling" stations comprised of heavily guarded Ad Mech solar farms that supply the juice for such trains.

The macro hauler itself might also have some high quality solar cells to help supplement the fossil fuel or battery supplies they carry on board. Considering that Scintilla is not known as a prometheum refinery planet (of course some takes place and Ambulon provides a lot of the locally procured resources in this regard), I would think that high capacity batteries or possibly even a small plasma generator would provide most of the power, possibly with some prometheum burning engines for backup and the hauler's outrider vehicles.

You could go so far as to call the above mentioned fueling stations Oasis, and make them a combination of high tech security (ad mech presence) and an almost wild west/pioneer atmosphere from the various services and entertainments provided for the macro hauler crews + the merc guars. That almost makes me want to have a WH40K saloon shoot out...

Hallo,

sorry for going off the rails but in my opinion fuel isn’t your only problem in this chase: in fact your group’s characters will need to sleep and from time to time stretch their legs in the open (though unhealthly) air. True, a person can sleep in a car, but after a travel on a car or bus (even a quite short travel) he feels crampy as well: imagine how they’ll feel at the end of a full day or after a whole week they passed seated in a small vehicle, with short and uncomfortable sleeps.

I think they’ll need to stop once or twice per day, at least for a handful of hours. And, to prevent the Macro Hauler from going too far, you could have these stops tally with the Hauler’s stops (to load or unload bits of its cargo in halfway stations or to perform a mandatory daily maintenance which lasts hours): in these stations or small Adeptus Mechanicus’ settlements the character could stretch their legs and refuel while keeping an eye on the Hauler.
This way, if the Hauler is a liner (and therefore its timetable and route are already known), the characters will know how long the next leg is and load the necessary fuel (or fill extra tanks, but I don’t think there’s so many of them needed to stuff the vehicle from leg to leg).

And about the refueling, what about an energy engine that can be recharged with photovoltaic cells too, yet allowing a limited speed?

Ops, I see Bladehate already suggested something similar to my previous post. I came late.

Someone already suggested having your players stow away on that hauler, just becuase there are no passengers doesn't mean they can't stow away or even better such haulers would require guards for crossing the wastes as such places are dangerous, it may be possible with some planning and some great amount of skill for your players to get themselves "assigned" to the hauler's journey, this of course may leave them with a problem when the cargo is off loaded as they will then have to follow them either on foot or with a vehiecle that they have hidden away but that would leave the hauler unprotected. This would give the players a choice between following the cargo and leaving the hualer undefended or sticking with the hauler to make sure it gets where it's going.

It much be asked why your players if they got into the warehouse siply didn't attach some sort of homing beacon to the cargo so they could just follow it at there leisure?

Gregorius21778 said:

With all of the pollution on a typical hive world, I don't think that solar power would be terribly efficient. If the hauler is on a rail, then the rail could provide power directly, just like a modern train. The PCs could use that same energy by aquiring a small vehicle designed to ride the rail & tap in to the rail's power supply. I started thinking of the "pump carts" from the old west & then moved on to the modifications that were made to the delorian in Back to the Future III. The hauler rail system would probably be enormous, but the small vehicle would not necessarily have to use the whole thing. Picture a monorail engine component zipping along one of the massive rails.

HI GUYS!

First, thanks for your constant input, but to be honest, I already got everything I need

Do not get me wrong, feel free to discuss the topic of Solarpower on Macro-Haulers or anything else releated.

Just don´t wonder that I do not participate any longer, your provided input already helped me to solve my problems.

Again, thanks to you!