I"m wondering how boarding parties work- not the rules , but in narative terms. I never got onto Battlefleet Gothic , none of the Black Library novels I've read feature boarding actions, and the section on boarding parties in the RT Rulebook only provides an abstract formula. But how do I describe it to my players? Do ships have special extending docking clamps that latch onto enemy vessels and cut holes in their hulls? Do void-suited troops "spacewalk" over and enter through rents gouged by ramming? Are there purpose-built shuttles that dock on the enemy's airlocks and force them open? Something else?

In BFK the Lathe Pattern Assault Boat is described as a breaching vehicle. It has powerful boarding clamps and melta-charges near the vehicle's prow. The pilot can affix a Shark to the side of a spacecraft, and burn through the hull using the las-breacher and melta-charges.

Troops can then board the ship, do their job, and return to the "docked" craft for evac. Presumably, the troops should be wearing some sort of voidsuits. Probably, boarding armour or better to increase odds of success.

In fact I would recommend any voidsuit over armour for anyone leaving a ship via small craft during a combat engagement. The risk is too great not to be wearing one with all the options out there. We recently upgraded our personal guard with best carapace incorporating void suits, blast googles, and encrypted vox-beads for just such encounters.

It depends - are you talking about "Hit and Run" attacks, or full-on boarding?

Hit and Run attacks are as NGL describes

Boarding involves the two ships nearly crashing side-on into each other, with large hooks and harpoons the size of buildings being fired at each other, binding them together, as troops jet across in void-suits and storm the enemy through the void, whilst boarding tubes are extended with melta-charges on the end, blowing through the hull to allow hundreds of crew-men to pile across, pistols, shotguns, and even just manual tools being used to take the fight to the foe.

For Boarding actions its like what you see in the Old Pirate movies. You get close enough to the enemy ship to throw grapnels and get aboard. Describe the intense battles as loyal crew surge forth to dislodge the attackers, Armsmen and Rating fighting tooth and nail in the corradors, Commanding officers screaming orders and firing wildly into the on rushing hords. Fire, death, insanity, CARANAGE! acts of bravery and cowardace, desperate last stands for crew cut off form the rest of the ship. For The God Emperor, For Man, FOR THE SHIP! Fight ON AND CARRY THE DAY!

As for Hit and Run thats more Action/Military. a "small" team of hand picked troopers armed to the teeth punching their way onto the enemy ship, blowing something important up and RUNNING LIKE HELL.

My copy of Battlefleet Gothic (the original 40K space combat game) has the following as the intro to the boarding actions section:

"Boarding actions are bloody, desperate battles between ships at very close range. The boarding vessel manoeuvres close to an enemy ship and sends a wave of armed crewmen across via teleporters, shuttles, life pods and in pressure suits to grab a foothold on the outer hull of the enemy vessel. The attackers then blow breaches in the hull and swarm in to try and overcome the defending crew in vicious firefights and hand-to-hand combat. Boarding actions are dangerous for both sides: even a victorious ship may suffer critical damage in the fighting or a prospective victim may explode with catastrophic results."

In other words, what the other posters said. As an aside, the original Battlefleet Gothic rules were available online as a free .pdf download, the last time I checked.

And, I totally agree that you should get armoured void suits. There is nothing in the rules that says a void suit can be worn with armour; given the grim dark and clunky-tech of the 40K universe, I've assumed that they cannot be worn together unless the armour is skintight (mesh or armoured bodyglove.) That said, it is possible to acquire armour that incorporates a void suit, just like it is possible to acquire a gun that incorporates a sight. My players have not yet attempted to get armoured void suits, despite repeated opportunities to do so. Idiots. They've a space hulk in their future, and will regret that decision.

Cheers,

- V.

This is only Firewarrior. (Get this filth away from me, but the cutscenes are good)

Main reason why you should always have a few dozen spacecraft ready of varying types.

Otherwise i guess alot has already been said.

BTW The Firewarrior ending cutscene has an Exterminatus by bombardement cannons. Also fun watching.

I've always done it as (for warships at least) that they had boarding systems that would shoot out and physically pierce the enemy hull holding the two ships together and allowing hundreds/thousands of boarders to swarm over, this means that the crew wouldn't need the expensive and prone to damage voidsuits. However I'm influenced by napolionic naval fiction like the Aubrey Maturin, Hornblower, Ramage, midshipmen Quin and even Fox series mashed up with things my dad has told me about being trained for boarding actions and training for fighting on land when he was in the navy post war (I don't know why he was trained in these as he was a biologist but meh) so my boarding actions are a mix of the two, close combat melee and close in gun play maybe the odd grenade. But its up to you really, how boarding or even hit and run missions will vary across the imperium as technology and doctrine about everything does. However the above mentioned sources make good inspiration as imperial ships are based on the napolionic and post napolionic periods in naval warfare.

BTW something else to remember, in 40k fluff, many boarding actions are started by ramming the enemy ship. Last ditch effort etc.

Although how a frigate every wins against a cruiser in a boarding action is beyong my understanding ^^. At least when you up the crew numbers to comparable numbers relative to the size of the ships.

Voronesh said:

In fact, because the max bonus on a Test is +60 it is a simple matter to make a raider that has a significant advantage (if led by a high Per PC) over a grand cruiser in a boarding action.

Thanks for all of the responses- very helpful.

Iku Rex said:

(Correction: High Fel PC. I blame Alternity.)

Iku Rex said:

Alternity, nice rules ^^.

Yes, I am currently on a trip to turn every boarding action with PC involvement into a warzone on a small scale. Maybe whip out the BFK ground war rules and apply them to the boarding actions.

Youre frigate with 10k troops gets around 20 detatchments of 10k troops to defeat. They cant attack all at once, but still ^^, it should be far more realistic and feel far better to win a boarding action as opposed to the simple opposed test of 70+Fel +30 to command +various boni vs random pirate dude. Not every Rogue Trader is Rommel/Patton/Macharius after all......