Hey all I''m hoping to set up a DH campaign for my RP society but having never GMed before I could do with a great deal of help and suggestions.

The premise for the campaign is that a planetary governor on the border between Tau and Imperial space is allowing the Tau to have a presence on his world, albeit a small one. He's managed to persaude enough of the local powers in the Imperium that it's to their benefit to have some of the Tau there, as it can be used to covertly gather information on the Empire and their movements. Despite this, the Inquistion is, naturally, keeping a very close eye on the man and the planet in case things get out of hand and the Eccleshiary is up in arms.

The situaton is highly tense and volalite, with mobs of humans frequently attacking the Tau compound, resulting in the Xenos setting up a highly effective defense. Any human believed to have Tau sympathies is usually found murdered in the morning and the Arbites are facing an increasingly unstable situation. To add to that, despite the best efforts of vigilanties, many humans have settled into the Tau compound and it is slowly growing.

On an offical level, both Tau and Imperial agents are fighting a shadowy war to try and influence important officals and orgainsations, and highly skilled and loyal humans that the Tau have bought in from elsewhere allow them to hold their own in these conflicts. While the struggle is not openly spoken of, the signs of it are quite evident and vicious.

The Throne agents sent in are newly recruited and fresh to the Inqustion, their Inquistor has several teams on the planet already (that they know nothing of) and he wishes for them to simply gather information, believing it to be a good test of their abilites. Obivously, it's not a good idea for them to openly fight the Tau and so they'll have the IDs of normal workers and citizens (to be created depending on what careers and backgrounds my players pick up).

I'd love for ideas to flesh my campaign out and to start writing it up properly. Also bear in mind that I'm a brand new GM, so more general advice on putting a campaign together and running it would also be welcome.

BurpsPyscho said:

First of all, remember that your acolytes don't have to have aliases that reflect their careers- it helps them use their skills, yes, but it can also be a detriment to the mission in general. It can also help, for example: Say you have a tech-priest or a noble-born or priest in the group. Their status makes it plausible for them to have bodyguards, and appears to be non-militant enough to allow their presence to be less closely-watched by the Tau. As such, you could have an entire team go in under the guise of servants and bodyguards. Not all have to be visibly armed or strong, either. An adept or priest or other acolyte bearing a concealed weapon could easily pass for an unarmed servant, preacher, etc. I'm probably ranting a bit, though, but I've had this idea stuck in my head for a while.

Second, think of spies and whatnot being everywhere. As the Tau allow Humans to join their empire, the forces there would no doubt have humans (both local and off-world) who have joined their ranks to be used as emissaries, bodyguards, servants, soldiers, you name it. Perhaps another of the Inquisitor's teams have infiltrated the Tau's ranks with spies who are sabotaging shipments, gathering knowledge, and noting enemy troop placements in case the metaphorical gak hits the figurative fan (which it no doubt will, since it'd be hard to dislodge the Tau without use of military force). Furthermore, the Tau may have its own human spies amongst the nobility and worker class, influencing key targets or the general populous to their side or leaking information to the Tau. This could lead to some interesting events- Discovering the Tau, the acolytes may decide to keep quiet and suppress the traitors or they may simply purge them from the government. Furthermore, when it all goes south, it'll give you some interesting ideas: Characters, especially nobles- or the Planetary Governor himself- may reveal themselves as a Tau supporter.

In such an environment as this, assassination attempts on both sides (sanctioned or unsanctioned) would also be rife, and the acolytes may find themselves stopping such attempts or carrying them out.

As for GMing, I've found that the single most important rule of GMing (besides having fun) is this: Actions have consequences. Not all consequences are bad, but not all are good. Depending on how an acolyte can assess and handle a situation makes the game. As such, make your missions flexible. If your acolyte comes up with an inventive way of completing the objective, reward them. If they go in guns-blazing, punish them for it (not too much though, that lessens the fun of the game). So, say a player finds a way to bypass an encounter completely through a creative use of resources. Either reschedule said encounter for later or, better yet, have a few extra, unused encounters to replace it.

Sweet! For some reason I had to think of "Casablanca" as I read this.

Personally, what I "feel" is missing would be the threat of Imperial retaliation. Even if that Governor has managed to convince local forces and gather support, the Imperium as a whole would not condone such treason - in fact, this Governor having managed to sway nearby systems could well make him appear even more dangerous, with the Inquisition fearing the affected systems may soon secede from the Imperium, perhaps even going over straight to the Tau instead of becoming independent.

This does not mean that there has to be some crusading force already on its way - in the Imperium it often takes years to mount such a response - but I could see this being some sort of Damocles Sword hanging above the affected colonies. If your players or at least some of their characters are of the conscious sort, you could use this as a kind of pressure. "Get this right or you will see these worlds burn. The clock is ticking."

Whats in orbit around this planet? A space station, or any naval assests? Do the tau have anything in orbit around the planet or close? Answering these questions might help get a bigger picture on the type of intelligence avalible to your acolytes. If you want to require that they only gain intelligence from more face to face means, then you could of corse have nothing in orbit. It sounds like arbites are on the planet, are there anyother rescources like a regement of storm-trooper guardsmen for the acolytes to call upon if needed or just a PDF?

Also you would want to flesh out they type of world, feral ect.

Lastly what are the Tau here for? Are they mining rescources? Does the Govenor have some back dealings with them or is he truly just condoning there pressence for intelligence gathering?

First of all, thank you to everyone who's posted here with suggestions. I'm going to write a far more detail response with fleshed out thoughts and ideas for the campaign, but my time's quite limited tonight, so I'll focus on answering Nimon's questions.

The planet is a fairly recent hive world, it's only been populated for about five hundred years or so. In terms of orbit, it has a single small sacestation, mostly used in connection with transferring people and supplies to and from the surface. The Tau don't keep a regular orbit, they bring a single small frigate in every six months or so to pick up and drop things (and people) off.

The planet will get fleshed out with who and what is there, I need to give that more thought as well. The main reason the Tau are there is to convert more humans, a hive world would be a significant achievement for them.

The acolytes won't have any resources to call on (unless they manage something of their own initiative), the Inquistor is treating this as a testing ground, a harsh one of course. He has other, more experienced teams in place, so it'll cause him no trouble if the new one fails, but it'll be very useful if they do well on their mission.

One important thing- how deeply rooted are the Tau? If a ship is coming in every six months, then I'd gather that it's either very early in the 'insurgency' or late enough that they have the vast majority of resources they feel they need.

Also, having read the Ciaphas Cain books, I feel that the Munitorum would not hesitate to station one or more Imperial units on the planet for the purposes of being able to respond quickly if it gets serious (which it did in said series). In fact, they'd probably station several there, although, knowing the Munitorum, they might also ignore the threat completely. There is a problem I see with your setting though: Unless you mean to say that a single frigate arrives every few months AND the Tau have a small fleet (nothing too large, mind you), the Tau would be at a serious disadvantage, since that would mean chances of using air assets (such as dropships, gunboats, etc.), especially if the Munitorum has a fleet in-system and it decides to throw ordinance at Tau strongpoints. Perhaps even a few small frigates holding orbit would be sufficient for the Tau, jumping out of system as a new group are brought in.

A thought that recently occoured to me is that it might be best to set this campaign to be before the Damolces Crusade, when the Imperium is not yet truly aware of the Tau and they are quietly inflrating worlds and allying themselves with various leaders.

This does change the name of the game quite a lot, as the majority of the population would likely know nothing about them as yet, the governor would not want it to be public knowldge that he's in diplomatic contact with Xenos. It'd become an investigation into reports that the governor is in contact with someone unknown to the Imperium, and that a number of strange, small cults are appearing on the planet before everyone involved vanishes.

I like the idea of having everyone centered around a single member of the team and that their cover is based on that, it'd be a far more effective way, and reason, for them to be in contact with one another. I'll ask my players for one of them to play a noble born character, because that'll be extremely important in dealing with the planet's upper class and the Inqusitor would make sure to recruit one of them for the cell.

There would still be an awful lot of inflitration and spying going on, the Tau would have bought a fair number of human allies with them (though there obivously won't be as many as there would be later in the timeline) and they'd be seeking quiet influence over various authorites while they cotninue diplomatic relations with the governor.

With this being set before the Crusade, Imperial retribution is certain, and the acolytes will be heavily involved in learning the details that lead to the Imperium realising just how widespread Tau infleunce is becoming in the region.