So say that I have either boarded an enemy ship and got lucky and he failed his morale test so that his crew hands the ship over to me, or I fired a couple salvos of Virus torpedoes and killed off 100% of the enemy ship's crew. Now I have a (almost) completely unharmed vessel under my control. If I don't plan on keeping it, how do I go about selling it? I mean I don't see it being too hard to find a buyer for it, but how much profit factor would I gain from selling an entire functional ship? If the ship and its components totals out at 50 ship points, exactly how much PF should I gain from pawning the ship?

Well you have to be able to crew it to move it to port OR tow it (no rules make your own) OR part it out (see BFK salvage systems and ship stores). One possibility is to send it off with a push into an orbit (round a planet or a sun) only you know about and sell the location to an entity like the admech or imperial navy. I don't think you'll get full price. For selling the location of a ship I use the following PF boost if sold to admech or navy and they actually recover it:

-------

During the course of play the Explorers might disable or capture an 'enemy' vessel. Should they tow it back (a feat in itself without a Greathold vessel) to a port with a Naval presence they may claim a prize purse for the vessel itself, its crew and whatever is within its holds (assuming all three are offered up to the Navy). Assuming the vessel is a recognized 'enemy' of the Imperium the reward is not hard to come by. If the vessel belonged to an agent of the Imperium or a sanctioned Rogue Trader the reward might be several months of interrogations or a running battle as the Explorers seek to escape their fate. In return for the prize money the Navy is taking responsibility for clearing the vessel and having it made ready for refit and use by the Navy at some later date. In other words it is worth it to Battlefleet Gades to acquire vessels in this manner so they pay well.

Base PF Reward per Prize by Class

Prize vessels brought to a Navy Base are paid for within 1d5 weeks.

• Transport (0.5)
• Raider, Frigate (0.5)
• Light Cruiser (1)
• Cruiser (1.5)
• Battlecruiser, Grand Cruiser (2)
• Battleship (3)

Modifiers

Adrift, Location Only

• If the Explorers can't or won't tow the vessel(s) they can sell the knowledge of their location. If the Navy recovers them they will pay a bounty but only at one tenth (1/10) of the going rate of a delivered prize vessel. Rewards take 2d5 months to accumulate.

Stripped

• GM's discretion. If the Explorers have stripped the vessel subtract half the prize bounty. Removing even one weapon system qualifies a vessel a stripped unless another replacement is added back to the vessel (not just provided with the prize).

Damaged

• Reduce the prize money if the vessel is heavily damaged by dropping down one on the Class table (BB to BC or C to CL).

Example:

If a Battleship was heavily damaged and adrift when discovered by the explorers they could report its location to the Navy for prize consideration when it is recovered. Roll 1d5 for the number of months it takes to be secured by the Navy and another 1d5 for the number of months for the reward to be issued. In 1d5+1d5 months the groups PF will increase by 0.2 points.

If the group found a derelict Destroyer (Raider Class) and towed it to a Navy base claiming prize rights the would receive 0.5 PF within 1d5 weeks.

Such increases in PF are permanent.

sure you can tow it, but wouldn't you need to have at least a skeleton crew to work the gellar field. If it is fully functional and still of human design you should be able to fly it back. just make sure it is out fitted with a house signal transponder or other obvious forms of physical or electronic forms of identification to keep the navy from treating your prize as a hostile target.

WhiteLycan said:

As much as the GM wants to give. That really is the only answer. Could be 1 PF, could be 10 PF.

I think that most captured ships would be worth achievement points instead of straight up PF, in that the ship was probably captured while doing some sort of endeavour. I would do anywhere from 100 to 500 points depending on the type and quality of ship.

On the other hand, if capturing the ship is the objective of an endeavour, then it may not be worth any PF past the endeavour's PF.

There is a conspicuous (and annoying) lack of rules for ship salvage, despite published adventures being dotted with dead ships in various states of repair, and ship battles likely to lead to salvage opportunities.

Stripping the "small battered transport vessel" from Into the Maw (adventure from the Core Rulebook) gets the PCs +400 Achievement Points. That's without getting the ship back to port or using specialized equipment like Salvage Systems. That adventure is extremely generous with APs though.

bobh, your rules make no sense to me. 0.2 PF for getting the navy a new battleship?! Just the logbooks from the Light of Terra (from Lure of the Expanse) are worth +2 PF and "the Imperial Navy’s willing assistance in a future venture of the Explorers".

I think its another case of bad scaling.

For Cobras and Swords it might be ok. The Navy has many of them lying around and they get built within a year or two, but cruisers and bigger vessels take ALOT longer to build. Yes the Navy can lose a cruiser or two without caring about it, but still it takes a decade to build one. Getting the Navy a functiuonal (let us assume it is weaponless) cruiser saves it a waiting time of around a decade and replaces it with a single year of refitting and consecrating the ship to Imperial service.

Battleships is basically saving the Navy a century if not multiple of waiting for the Adeptus Mechanicus to get their metal asses to build one, and all they need to do is wait a year or 5 to get the correct weapons and reconsecrate it in holy Imperial Service. Id suggest 10+ PF for getting the Navy a functional Battleship. And probably the talent Peer(Imperial Navy) for everyone. Battlefleet Koronus doesnt even possess a battleship. Getting their hands on one, would be the RT basically handing them their best and consequently most holy ship.

OTOH let me make my disdain for transport vessels heard as well. Getting one operational again, is what i would consider a really, really nice boost for the budding RT (Asteroid mining component from Into the Storm), but an Imperial organization would rather go MEH at it. They would need to find a crew, including a captain and a set of navigators and techpriests for it. Potentially worth more of a hassle than a solution. Better sell it to someone like a private enterpreneur in Footfall or Port Wander. Id hand out 1 PF for a current endeavour if theyd get a functional transport vessel sold to someone. But theyd need to work the extra time for it.

Salvaging the graveyard in the passage of the Maw is for poor and downtrodden RTs after all. Cruisers and bigger ships are vessels of renown that would do even a better off RT dynasty some honor.

Ahh double post.....

I don't have my books with me at the moment, but doesn't the core book say in the chapter about the Imperium that technically each and every ship that is not a navy ship is owned by the Adeptus Administratum? In other words: you don't own the the ships you capture, you merely retrieve them for the Administratum to redistribute again. So your options are basically: return it to the Administratum OR loot the parts OR have an illegal vessel in your fleet (i.e. a pirate vessel). Of course returning a ship will definitely increase your reputation with the Adeptus Terra and its further organizations, but I think this will more likely be an achievement point increase and/or a peer talent (or something like it). Now if the RT lost his vessel while capturing another, I - as the GM - would make up a nautical rule entitling him to claim the ship as his own.

What Voronesh said about Battleships is absolutely true, I again wouldn't give out PF for it, but the reputation with the navy you would get for doing this would be phenomenal (or with the AdMech for that matter). I however do not share his idea about transports. Yes, the navy might have a rather dismissing view of transports, but the Administratum probably would think them the most valuable vessels around (them being the "liveblood"of the empire in their eyes).

Ahh i very much share your thoughts. Although the RT is the law outside the IMperium, so if he wants a ship he just captured, he should be allowed to do so. But the Administratum might view the RT rather differently, if he just keeps piling up warhips.

Chartist ships are certainly the lifeblood of the Imperium. But then again who cares about losing a single drop of blood, where the Imperium is concerned. Or rather i meant all this slander against transport ships in terms of, dont give out even a single PF, unless the RT is handing over a dozen transports to an Imperial organisation.

So on the low end of the spectrum i wouldnt give out PF, simply because a single transport is never that important. (if it is filled with adamantium id rate it differently ). The Batleship could give otu PF or not. Probably depending how i would build it into the adventure. Probably none, since the battleship itself is a grand endeavour by itself. The group would be able to get quite a few PF on the side probably ^^.

10 PF would be the value id give for a totally unplanned battleship. But how that would show up when i am the GM i dont know.

Well, you are definitely right in that the RT is the law on the fringes of the Empire and would certainly not be squeamish about taking what is "owned" to him. However, I do think each "drop of blood" is tied in name to a group of obnoxiously bureaucratic Administratum scribes somewhere who think the universe revolves around them and their ship(s). All in all its a balance between the two rules that the GM can (ab)use. Let the RT take all the ships he want and then suddenly an Administratum official appear: "Thank you for retrieving our vessel. It wasn't necessary to upgrade it with all that fancy new technology, but we can hardly leave that behind now, can we."

Red Bart said:

No.

Most ships are owned by the Administratum, and all ships must be registered by the Administratum, but you can still have privately owned vessels (page 310 and 313).

Red Bart said:

The Imperium is known for losing data.

The iMperial Guard codex had an example of a Catachan company ending up on a river transport vessel far from any warzone, because some clerk lost a sheet of paper.

Sure at some point the Administratum might show up and claim a vessel. but then:

1. Misfortunes represent just that.

2. Most RTs will probably use Footfall as their base of operations for tranports. Why risk your own ships through the Maw when other traders can handle that. Unless you make a good deal with a Forge World for refined metals of course. And that place should not be frequented by Clerks overly much.

3. Cruisers would be the realm of the Imperial Navy, and most RTs will porbably buy Peer(Imperial Navy), simply because there are so many nice applications. That talent alone, should handle most problems, if you manage so salvage a cruiser. If its your third one, ofc the Navy might want it back.

Voronesh said:

You are right, but if you are calling a misfortune every time you want to keep the players from salvaging a ship you're not making them happy. If it is imperial policy however then things are merely as they are supposed to be. However I do see your point and normally it probably wouldn't be that far fetched for a RT to keep the ships he captures/salvages. I am just trying to think up ways for a GM to limit the acquisition of too many ships by the players.

Peer(Imperial Navy) would be a very handy talent to have, to talk them into letting you keep that fancy ship you found. However I would not consider it a free pass, as the navy sure can make use of all the ships they themselves can get their hands on. So a lot of talks and possibly a favor or two would be necessary for them to let you keep it (in other words: turn it into an endeavor).

Iku Rex said:

I wanted to look this up in the core rules but I didn't get around to it. Didn't the core rules imply that the private ownership of vessels was limited to persons with a warrant of trade? Or was that my own imagination (or perhaps some malign influence from the warp)?

Nah i wouldnt let them have a misfortune every time they salvage a ship. Only sometimes (well half the time according to the core rulebook table).

Plus i wouldnt stand in the way of mighty player fleets being amassed. Once their PF hits 60+ itd be perfectly OK for them tro have a fleet of a dozen or more ships. At least thats ok for me, not implying everybody should play like that.

Rather once you start having a fleet, that fleet needs to do something, or they will simply drain your coffers. WIth the Asteroid mining facility alone i could imagine lots of ships being tied up in a mining operation devouring a system of all its recources. 1 ship actually mining. 1 ship storing the masses of metals and crystals gained. 2 escort vessels flying cover of that operation. 1-3 transport vessels getting everything back to Footfall or Port Wander, those vessels also having a few escort ships. So you can end up with more than half a dozen vessels doing everything they can to pay for themselves and gain the RT a few PF. If the exploration found really rare metals, it could even be a 4-8 PF for that alone. Random thought: Heck i could even imagine a random endeavour to aquire a planetkiller warhead so the RT can break up a moon along with the dead world to mine the planet directly instead of bringing additional conventional miners into the system.

One just needs to find ways to represent all those PF actually working for the RT. It isnt a stash of money, but a stash of money that actually works. Plus thats alot of stuff where a misfortune can actually strike. Maybe Ork pirates show up all of the sudden. The RT has to play a dangerous naval campaign to defeat the Ork Freebooter threat to make sure his mining operation/archeotech dig/trade interest stays safe. Gaining potential loot from the ork vessels etc.

The Peer talents arent "get out of jail free" cards. But they certainly help. The Navy can look the other way when they know that dynasties transport bring loads of precious resources back to a naval base or a Mechanicus forge world, which willbe simply turned into mroe ships and more ammunition for the Imperial war effort. If the dynasty is known for a cold trade here or there, they might feel differently inclined though.

I also like the idea of my players having a moderate sized fleet one day (say 6 or 7 ships). But I fear that it might break the game simply because it hasn't really been designed for it. For example having two additional transports, each with two main cargo holds will net you 500 additional achievement points every trade objective. If you go with the +1 PF per 100 achievement points over the stated goal, this means that each trade objective will net the players an additional +5 PF. The player's PF will start rising exponentially the more ships they get and get to extreme heights quickly. Sure you could hit them with extreme misfortunes, but this would feel like punishing the players.

An idea I read somewhere on this forum (I forgot where) was to have ships cost a fixed amount of PF when you acquire them, just to reign in the player's PF a little. You can also make this a running cost so the players have to actually use the ships or lose money (e.g. if the afformentioned transports cost 2 PF each, you kinda have to make those trade objectives or otherwise you'd better get rid of them). It makes the game more complex, but perhaps it's better than having player's with 300 PF who score an additional +30 PF each time they succeed in an endeavor.

I would do something like that.

Primarily i would allow aquisition of ships for actual work. In my previous example youd buy a transport, fit it with 2 asteroid mining facilities and have a single cargo hold for storage. As a second ship youd have factory ship (for fuel mining) with additional cargo holds. Add 2 Iconoclasts for defense.

1 or 2 Orion clippers will be used to transport the rare metals and crystals back to safety somewhere else, they also carry many cargo holds and are accompanied by 2 cobras for safety.

Total of 8 ships working hard to get back 6 PF. Any components they have would be used as PF boosters for this trade endeavour. But they must be used for this endeavour, once they stop strip mining the system the PF goes away, and returns to potential PF if you were to start mining elsewhere.

Having a fleet of ships that continually add to PF is strange. Calligos Winterscale has a PF of 100 i think, and he doesnt get +100 PF for every trade objective simply because he has 50 transports working for him.

Basically id houserule that the bonus achievement points are used as PF generators for a permanent endeavour somewhere. But they are applied once, and not every single time the PCs complete an objective.

That is the bonus that components on the PCs ship provide. Turning every vessel except the flagship into a supporting cast role.

Voronesh said:

I like the idea of the permanent endeavor, but I would houserule it slightly different. You can either choose to make the ship a part of the fleet (helping the player's current endeavor), or charter a captain to make his own fortune in name of your dynasty (the permanent endeavor). If it's part of the fleet you get full benefits of all components, but it will drain your coffers at the rate of 'total SP cost divided by 20' in PF (about 1 or 2 for a transport and about 4 for for a cruiser). It will force the players to make use of the ships or suffer a loss in PF. If it's "let loose" so to speak, the players will have to make some interaction skill rolls to find a suitable captain. The better the success of those rolls, the more profitable the captain will be, adding a (one time) bonus to the PF (i.e. turning a potential PF loss into a steady income). Of course if the players ever loose their own vessel they can take command of the independent vessel again, but loose the PF bonus.

Jupp sounds good.

I totally forgot about the human resource again.

Deeply ingrained Adeptus Mechanicus attitude i guess.

I like your ide about letting other ships accompany the RT ship. Kinda like escorts etc. Are you a warseeking RT? Need an extra transport vessel for all the troops. Etc.

You don't deserve the title of warseeking unless you have a universal-class mass conveyor following you around filled to the brim with crack troops

Iku Rex said:

Assuming ALL they did was report its location, yeah the reward is LOW.

We simply applied the standard upkeep rules to every ship after the very first. That already put a little damper on our ship-greed.

Plus as soon as you fly around with a whole fleet of ships, there are no "small" endeavours anymore. Or rather even short and small endeavours like "Establish a trade line for food to this planet!" should need some additional achievement points to be solved to represent the bigger scale of operations. Not to forget that a successfully established new trade line will probably mean that you'll have to 'sacrifice' a transport ship in your possession, that from now on simply flies that route, netting you the PF you gained with the endeavour. (Which is about what was mentioned before as "permanent endeavour".)

This problem is made worse by the mini endeavour where the Navy allows the party to claim captured or wrecked ships out of hand. I had actually hoped that BFK would contain something on rules for ownership of captured ships.