Doesn't this encounter seem incredibly deadly for what supposed to be an introductory adventure? If the enemy uses even half-competent tactics like using compel to have a weak willed arch militant shoot himself in the head (will quite likely fail even with the +20 vs. her WP 55+30) and the servitors shooting the lightly armoured low-dodge characters like navigators with their heavy bolters or plasma cannons?

It just seems designed for TPK.

I'd rather use Compel to shoot other crew so the Arch Militant do not gain a bonus to WP test.

But yeah I think I can see the point. Do not have the book right now, but it really sounds dangerous.

Oh wait I'm stupid, a just friend pointed out that the bonus from Psy Rating only says it adds to the focus power tests and not to the opposed willpower test, that makes it a bit more survivable.

Edit: or maybe it does, the description is a mess.

Double Edit: yeah it seems it actually does add....

Actually, looking up the eldar psyker in Lure of the Expanse he's even worse. With his average 7 successes for his mind war power he'll just instantly kill any and all PC who havent maxed willpower + taken resistance (psychic techniques) + Strong Mindend. Have the people who designed these NPCs not even read the psychic rules? Or are they just the kind of GMs who like to kill players for ***** and giggles?

It's really pretty goddamn simple; if the players die the game ends, so all battles must really be largely in their favor

Honestly I've just started getting into RT but if this sort of stuff is considered normal I think I'm going to quit.

Go back to D&D if you want a hand-holding balanced encounter. Eldar Farseers are supposed to be horrifyingly powerful psykers that can explode your head with a thought. Besides, where are the Rogue Trader's personal bodyguards? The dozens of redshirt militia? The voidmaster's personal guncutter, scything in to take the witch's head off with a few dozen bolter rounds?

Also. The players have Fate Points. That's an instant deus-ex-machina survival for anything short of a titan stepping on your head, and even then you could make a case for falling into a previously-unfound bunker exposed by the earthquake footsteps of the machine god.

Learn to think bigger.

I enjoy challanging encounters. For a an average WP character, the Farseer is not challanging, he's just instadeath and there is nothing you as a player can do about it.

-His unnatural Agility + 5 fate points means he automatically goes before the players.

-He gets seven successes on an average roll, even someone who has taken WP 50 + resistance and spends 2 fate points to improve the roll is probably only going to get like 3.

-Character takes 5d10+5 damage to head after reducing it with WP bonus, and dies (or has to burn a fate point, but to be honest id probably let the char die and quit the game at this point).

This is not satisfying gameplay.

Errant said:

Even if they're there, the eldar has little reason to target anyone but the leader (the RT) or the heaviest hitter (the Arch Militant) first.

Errant said:

Go back to D&D if you want a hand-holding balanced encounter.

Actually I prefer gurps and WoD but whatever.

Don't fight the Eldar head on?

You have resources, sending a few relatively expendable scouts ahead so the Holder of the Warrant doesn't die by mistake will let you know that something is there, even if it's just the death screams of the scouts.

Fighting psykers up close is a good way to die, because most psychic powers are close ranged, and force weapons exist.

RT fights are won in the planning stages, rolling dice and fighting is just the end result. It's important because RT is the most lethal of the 40k RPG's

Average rolls don't exist with a D% system.

That doesn't really sound much fun, we got the game to play larger-than-life dashing space privateers who charge into battle with a power sword cutlass in one hand and a plasma pistol in the other. Leading a huge flying space-cathedral city yeah, but always leading from the front.

SomVone said:

Is this actually true? I thought RT was about playing some of the few shiny bastards floating on top of the rest of the grimdark setting.

/pedantic: Battling on a bride seems disrespectful

Joking aside, Farseers are hideously powerfull, something the player characters should really be aware off.

My group 'solved' this in Lure of the Expanse by having their Fury do a strafing run on the seer with its lascannon and missiles, worked like a charm.

Hell, mine dropped a frigate on her.

@limxophobiac: Ehhhh. It depends on your GM, really. I find myself regularly putting the players up against opponents that would be a TPK in Dak Heresy, only to watch them wade out of combat three turns later wondering when I'm going to send them a challenge. Particularly in space combat. That said, it's actually easier to kill space marines in Deathwatch with falling damage than it is in combat with a greater daemon so, eh. YMMV.

Errant said:

PC Valkyrie/Guncutter.

Eldar Farseer is toast. Lure of the expanse is a good runner up for the MOST anticlimatic boss battle in history. And yes the Farseer is crazy, but as many have already pointed out, its far too easy to avoid the TPK situation.

If a GM ever pulled a Mindwr on my char (of those proportions/roll vs death) Id smile at him and let the char die without burning a fate point, just to see what the GM does.

In regards to that boss battle on the bridge. In the fight just before you did save that with, or not (unsanctioned psyker etc). If she is still alive, you can also put 8 Storm bolter rounds to her head before she can act (who lets a door unguarded). Plasmaguns take care of any servitors.

BossTroll said:

This might be part of the problem, I dont really have any prior knowledge/interest in 40k beside rogue trader. So I take it the farseer's just stated as overpowered because that's what they're 'supposed' to be in the lore and the players are assumed to know that?

One wonders why they've gone to all the trouble of making up new psychic powers for it if they're not supposed to be used.

The Farseer can easily handle one flyer or tank, its more problematic with several (Telekinesis ftw).

My players had 2 units of soldiers with them in the Farseer-battle, one of the teams with heavy weaponry and the other with assorted guardsmen gear, which helped alot. With the psychic powers I managed to roll ridiculously bad, and my players rolled like under 10, so they survived the mind-squashing. One of the arch-militants charged Serranon with powerfist held high, only to be stabbed in the heart and exploded on the crit-table. The RT ordered a planetary bombardment far away so only the shockwave would wash over the Farseer. It was complete chaos, but they managed to win it mostly because the sniper-character critted and critted and critted.

In the end one pc dead and everyone else needed medical care for weeks and months. Everyone spent fatepoint(s) to survive.

Actually, I had to beef up the Farseer in LotE to make that fight a challenge! The PC's went in on foot, personally leading an elite strike team. It was a tough fight, but they won. And, the Farseer didn't kill anyone with Mind War, despite three attempts. (Good rolls plus spending fate points on the PC's part.)

Don't underestimate the value of the uber gear the PC's get. They can dish out an enormous amount of damage very quickly, and things like "the entire command staff has a conversion field" also help. In Dark Heresy, for example, a combat shotgun is a great weapon.* In Rogue Trader, that's what the low grade armsmen carry. A single tough opponent won't last long. Rogue Trader is the exact opposite of D&D; a horde of semi-competent goons is actually a much bigger threat than one elite monster.

* I know of one GM who took a combat shotgun away from a DH character because it was 'too powerful'. Cue PC whining.

Cheers,

- V.

Reading all the posts, i am getting the feeling alot depends on the age of the gaming group/warrant. (Following are musings with potential cliche ideas)

Those thinking of the old days (played lots oftabletop, knows older fluff) RTs have near limiltess power and get the best of the best gear. Mastercrafted carapace if not power armour and conversion fields, coupled with plasma/melta weapons and toting power weapons. Potentially having a few aces up their sleeve with digiweapons and other archeotech items.

Then there are RTs with suicide notes (has learned 40k lore from DH) and thus the full range of weaponry isnt used to the fullest.

Hence why i believe the farseer stands a chance or none at all depends so much on the feel of 40k or the gaming group. The Dread Pearl itself warrants the deployment of everything the RT can spare. So depending upon your group, everything can be anything from you plus a platoon of armsmen, to you plus 1-10 divisions of troops.

You are also forgetting that the group can also reach the ship before Fel. group could set up an ambush near the crash site. so if the GM just has lady Ash and 2 servitor, nothing a well placed mortar shell and sniper fire can't handle. Depends on the group, are they do it your selfers or do they always travel with a platoon of armsmen.

My group skipped the bridge encounter entirely. They figured out where the Fell Hand was hiding and proceeded to ambush it (some stellar rolls on their part). The Fell Hand was trashed but they allowed Fel to withdraw and to retrieve Lady Ash. They didn't even fire on her fleeing shuttle, they already had their victory (tonnes of loot).

why not hit both, it's about 300 xp if you beat both characters. The other thing is, why not take the whole treasure ship. it has a posted sign " free Grand Cruiser". Think a Mass conveyer has the space for that. but hey, we can't all be that ambitious. Right?

Well for one the poor thing's had her spine broken and she's trapped inside an ice-moon.

A little love and care, few years in dry dock. Machine spirit might be a mess. Besides, might make a good endeavor.

limxophobiac said:

I actually meant that the characters should know this, there's a big difference between player knowledge and characters knowledge. My group who ran the Dread Pearl are experienced 40k players, one of them plays Eldar (for 2 decades tbe), so they knew how nasty it would get when a Seer/Aspect Warrior/etc shows up. If your group doesnt know these things, have them make forbidden lore: xenos tests, and drop hints based on their MoS.

Void_onion213 said:

Fixing that grand cruiser will probably require more resources than buying a mothballed one. It's possible but from a financial point of view wow that's expensive and probably cheaper to get another one. Lets see you have to remove it from the ice moon, get enough of those warp tug boats to drag it back to a dry dock... both are going to require a lot of money to make happen but possible but the repairs seem incredibly expensive. However I do agree for a starting out rogue trader dynasty it might be something they could work on as an endeavour to get it repaired since they outright couldn't afford the hull, just keep chipping away at it. It would take decades likely but with warp time dilation and them zipping around the expanse the gm could wait until they are of a higher level assuming they keep working on it. On the other hand they could repair the plasma drive and shore up holes to use it as a secret base in the expanse.

As for the bridge fight I only got to play in it once and already wanted to kill Lady Ash from her mind control earlier in the adventure. With two arch militants in our group she couldn't stop both! One mono grox whip to the face and a few bolter shells took her down.

The Farseer for our group was a bit of a challenge, our GM had our NPC elite soldiers the "Myrmidions" (we hand picked the best guys equiped them with chainswords, bolt pistols, boltguns and at the time light enforcer carapace... since improved further... they all have power swords I think and stormtrooper carapace and an array of special weapons) fighting some wraithguard off screen, sadly half of these hundred guys died versus the five wraithguard because the GM was using horde rules for them *cries* meaning that our npcs didn't want to join the suicide squad, who rarely ever actually had to do anything and got early retirement on a pleasure world! So it was us versus him and his wraithguard. Thankfully we had acquired five storm bolters for our party to augment the arch militants starting acquisition of a good quality one. Massed bolter fire helped take out the rangers and hurt him a bit with the retribution rounds loaded into the arch militants gun. We all had refractor shields which helped though mine got overloaded and I almost went down. In the end the guy who did the most damage was Helix our hexamagramically power armoured engine of destruction with his power fist... He did horrendous amounts of damage when he hit the farseer and the farseer had to out of necessity focus on him! We almost all died and yes refractor shields overloaded, faith powers were used and some fate points were burned.

Thankfully the GM did feel that this fight of epic proportions and our long journey warranted a fate point since we had sunk many gaming hours into this adventure. Also I think he felt a bit bad because the scenario is very mean at the end and we outright refused to leave because some xenos filth wanted us to. I think we burned all his fate points and he ran through the eldar webway in terror. Other Eldar we have met have heard of us since... sometimes this is to our advantage!

Do you really have to fight the farseer. It just seems that fights of that scale can be avoided. Besides, how would you get a Grand cruiser off the imperial navy with out an endeavor attached. also we were not going to use Tugs, we were going to either buy or rent a Mass conveyor. In short we were going to simply lift up the entire ship. Counting the craft is almost twice the length of the grand cruiser it should fit inside the hull of the conveyor, count it as heavily modified.