Hi there everyone,

i just wanted to know how your acolytes stand in regard to their Lord and Master. Since my Inquisitor is of the deep radical end (A Xanthite actually) i was at first worried that my acolytes would soon rile up against him..not so much..and that after their inquisitor has:

-Sent them repeatedly into demon-infested areas, withholding vital information from them ("It was a test for you, my most loyal Acolytes")

-Sanctioned their use of daemon and xenos weapons and even told them they could use them with his blessing as long as they´d remain "pure"

-Sent them to shut down one of his facilities in which clearly heretical experiments were done in his name

-Let them fight against Witchhunter Rykehuss, who declared their master a heretic (To which their response was boltering down Rykehuss retinue and bloodboiling him for good measure)

For a time some of them indeed questioned his methods, but by now the acolytes (and by extent their players) are so fanatically loyal to their Master that they didn´t even batted an eyelash when he told them kill his own Interrogator while he escorted them on their next mission, since he "wasn´t sure of his loyalty anymore". They visited the poor, unknowing sap in his sleeping chambers aboard the Cygnan Martyr and the Psyker used his constrict power to strangle him in his sleep.

Everyone who even dares to speak against their beloved master gets swift and brutal retribution by now..i´m not even sure the players would go against their Master if he sprouted demon horns and shouted the names of the Chaos-Gods in their faces XD

Has anyone similiar or entirely contrarian experiences he wants to share?

Ah, to be bad-ass antiheroes in the service of Him on Terra... *sigh*

Not yet, but I find it surprising high-level acolytes would be so... mindless in their loyalty. How are their corruption and insanity scores going?

My Acolytes are mostly a bunch or conservative fanatics. They are prepared to do any horrible deed as long as they think it is the Emperors will and for the good of the Imperium. As long as there is the Big I telling them exactly what IS the Emperors will they are loyal to him... But in all reality they are actually loyal to the system and the system only, not any individual.

Hi Kronus,

sounds like a fun campaign...but why is you (and some of the other) bothered/astounded about this? Let´s face it: doing heinous things on orders of someone is a core element of DH! If they would be more puritan, they would slaughter mutants just for being born and burn freethinkers for the idea of equal rights. They are just the other side of the coin; but that does not change the fact that the coin is blood money. And after all, it is all "Nuernberger defense".

I only followed orders; I did it for the good of the course; it needed to be done; it was war; I would have been killed myself if I had rejected;

Back2Topic:
Group A has not meet their Inquisitor yet. They are acutally under command (sworn oathes of loyality to) the Senior-Interrogator of the Inquisitor (Mamsel Ariette Baptist ). From what I pereceived in the last mission, they are loyal and eager to serve. "Sister Danielle" (Battle-Sister) even tries to impress Mamsel Baptist and clearly aims for becoming an Interrogator herself. While her player know what is going to happen, the pc will have to find out that their master is in fact a Xenos-Radical with a view not unlike those of the Oblationists...only that to him it is the use of Xeno Artefacts/weapons and Transgenetic Blashemy.

Group B has meet their master already (Inquisitor Heidrecht). The players where not eager to roleplay the oathes they had to swear and I do not think that they are all to loyal.

Havelok (the Psyker) tried to hide funds they did not needed for their missions
Soman (feralworld guarsman) frowns upon the Ministorum (player-based reaction... I think I will need to find him a suiting background world).
Regis (the Arbitrator) is guilty by being indifferent to those transgressions...but at least he officially disapproves of Somans points of view about the church
And then their is Mae.... what is to be expected from a sinophian cat-burgleress who would try to steal her masters purse if she would not fear his punishment?

No, I think group B has not much of loyalty to their master. At least, not in regard to what they believe to be "minor transgressions".

I´m not bothered, but a bit astounded..i deliberately teased them with their Inquisitor to see how far they would go, and to this hour they seem to follow his path into damnation almost TOO eager. Even after i let them see the price of corruption and sorcery all too clearly..interestingly enough, apart from the Psyker they still see themselves as Puritans, "doing terrible things in the name of HIM on Terra" indeed. The only thing i expected was more resistance along the way, but i don´t mind. i just found it very interesting.

After all, not only Puritans have fanatically loyal retinues.

@Master Zipangu: I´m quite sure that most of my players don´t see themselves as the cool "antiheroes", which is a worn out and boring concept by now. Rather they aren´t heroes at all, just his most loyal servants. Like Gregorius i am a bit dumbfounded by such a response: How are battle hardened acolytes, who by now have seen the terror of the Xenos, the Mutant and the Daemon, expected to behave if not somewhat ruthless? Personally i would find it rather unconvincing if they were still pure and innocent, sparing the possibly guilty. Altough the Arbitrator at least sometimes tries to catch Heretics alive. After all, his Excruciator has to be put to use as well.

I confess that sometimes, i let them be the "Cool Inquisition", if one can call it that. They are Rank 7-8 by now, so nomore are they scum and easily replaceable fodder but highly trusted servants who have proven their worth and merit again and again. So if the mission calls for it and they arrive bombastically with a fat "I" stamped on their armor sometimes, why not? It´s not that it (in my opinion at least) detracts from the Grimdarkness of the setting. They know and see regularly that there are still much bigger fish out there.

@The Shaman: Both are skyrocketing as of lately...all between 40s and 50s. The Feral-World Assasin has developed a craving for fresh blood due to his malignancies and his first mutation to boot, the Psyker and the Arbitrator suffer from strong feelings of invulnerability..after all the Emperor has seen fit to protect them to this day, and cover is clearly for cowards . I expect many fresh insanities und

Sounds like fun. Continue with more insanity and more corruption...And let the story go to its logical conclusion: something terribly horrible, ots of blood, lots of mistakes, and what? Maybe they saved the Imperium better than some monodominant puritans would have.

...

Or not.

Yeah the delusions of their own invulnerability should be quite shattered after this session..a Praetorian Battle-Servitor hit one of them with a Lascannonblast to the Breast. Since he burned a fate point i just ruled that the servitors Lascannon-capacitators were damaged and the acolyte in question fell to ground, his armor molten off his breast and he himself unconscious, but miraculously still alive..

If he interprets this as a new sign of his divine protection or as a failing of it..remains to be seen

Mister Zipangu said:

And here was me thinking that was a core premise of Dark Heresy, you could certainly describe my character that way! Am I doing something wrong, is there something wrong with me?...

Not necessarily, but people can sometimes be so dreadfully over the top in trying to claim badassery and antiheroics... It can get annoying, actually. " Oh, I shall kill however many hundred, even my closest friends, with no regrets, for I am 40Kness incarnate. "

Yeah well..thats GWs 40k for you, always over the top in everything .

Killing your closest friends without regrets is not anti-heroic in my book but downright sociapathic and villainous..and perhaps still necessary..but i cannot recall some of the "coolest" Anti-Heroes like Dante of Devil May Cry ever doing this. Anti-Heroic seems to be more about overly "cool" and "chill" attitude in the face of danger, not doing terrible things because they have to be done.

And for the badassery..yeah any high ranked Acolyte IS an badass..but if one of my players would trie to do something incredibly stupid "Badass", like trying to climb a Warlord-Titan with a pick-axe, or facing aan entire Tyranide Horde with their fists because its cool..they´d just die an ignoble death. Possibly with an humiliating description of their demise.

I know there's nothing wrong with me, I was being sarcastic and trying to highlight that 'roleplaying authenticity' doesn't exclude "bad-ass antiheroes in the service of Him on Terra" especially when the game revolves around exactly that concept.

And my character is a total badass, and that's enirely a function of who he is, his background, and how he fits into the team. He is actually only rank-5, has some stats to be desired, and his toughest weapon only does D10+4, but as far as he is concerned, he is a total badass (he's a feral world assassin who's T is higher than his AG, what do you expect).

EDIT to last post.

First paragraph comes over a bit stronger than intended. No offence intended Kronus and Shaman.

Zakalwe said:

Actually, that's how I see the wargame (at least as far as Space Marines are concerned). That is, indeed, the GW way. However, the FFG perspective is imo slightly different - I imagine a roleplaying game would have more details, nuances and generally portray a more human perspective.

Note that there isn't necessarily something wrong with playing the trope, at least when you do it right and within some limits. I reserve the full right to mock any characters (or players) who try too hard and become something like a caricature of 40k, struggling and scrambling over each other to be the bigger badass.

My PC's are loyal to the Imperium and the Sector. For the most part this means a deep loyalty to the Inquisitor however at least one of them is a pawn of the Eldar/on the brink of becoming Slaneesh cultist.

No stories about acolytes rising from the dead in a thread mentioning undying loyalty ?

You are all puritans.

The_Shaman said:

Actually Shaman I totally agree. I'm an old school RPer. I've liked the 40K setting since 1st ed Rogue Trader, but I never played the TT or read the books (I still believe that a squad of guardsmen should be a serious threat to a space marine). I guess I enjoyed the setting vicariously. I was surprised by the whole (over the top) grim dark thing when I was reaquainted with 40k and preferred it when it was a little 'wackier'.

When I was invited to play DH I was the last to make a character. Being the most experienced RPer I asked what the group needed. They said muscle. Hehe excellent, then I'll be a Feral World Assassin from a Post Apocalypse Mad Max Queensland full of mutated nasties like UltraKangas. I named him Jungo Max and he is a total bad ass in the best possible way. Lots of personality, quite smart, friendly enough, but neverttheless totally aware of his limits (one of his favourite sayings is "Jungo no good to Inquisitor if Jungo dead!").

So I think it is possible to have the best of both worlds, bad-ass antiheroes in the service of Him on Terra on one hand, and great role playing values on the other. We have a really well balanced group and it isn't a pissing contest to see who is the baddest. Hugs all around.

Ironically enough, while in the books and the RPG a Space Marine splats Guardsmen by the dozen, in the TT a Guardsman Squad will eat a Single Battle Brother alive..easily. With their lasguns :> Make of that what you will

In my group my acolytes loyalties to the Inquisitor. Well the guardsmen of our group im pretty sure i loyal to him, the feral world psyker im not sure about becasue if he gets alien tech(especially tau!) he will 'disect'*cough*use*cough* it, our assasin likes the inquisitor and has stated it to the fellow acolytes when he is not around but would kill the acolytes if he gets enough corruption points(which he is trying to do!), our cleric im pretty sure is loyal.

My group is... diverse... My Scum is loyal to whoever is paying the most, the Inquisitor, usually. The psycher, well she is loyal to the Inquisitor, the scum and the arbite are not so sure about her, stability. The Arbite is 100% for the Emperor. The Assassin, he hasn't decided, he is split between the Inquisitor personally and the Empire. The Tech Priest... MWAAHAHAHAHAhahahahahahahaaaaaa... is loyal to the Master of Change, Lord Tzeentch.

Over all they have been VERY efficient at completing objectives for their radical Ordo Xenos Inquisitor. I mean, hey, if its to help the imperium whats wrong with a little xenos tech or dark pact with the master of plans.

My group is diverse as well. The Assassin (Son of Dispater) is loyal to money and the one paying him, which is the Inquisitor at the moment and thus he is really very loyal to him and does everything he orders and even tries to impress him from time to time. The Arbitrator (Warden of the D.I.) is loyal to the Emperor, the Imperial Law and the Inquisition as such (or better what he thinks the Inquisition stands for); he is in a way like Fischig from the Eisenhorn novels and seems to be inspired by him (ie. there is potential for conflict). The Tech-Priest is loyal to the Adeptus Mechanicus and the Ominssiah before all, but in his own sometimes progressive view (also potential for conflict in the future). The Guardsman is only loyal to his melee weapon at hand and sort of loyal (like an attack dog) to the Inquisitor even though he has difficulties in spelling the word "loyal". The Psyker (Legate Investigator) is loyal to the Imperium and so far to the Inquisitor; he maybe even has the most 'undying' loyalty of all and could accustom himself best to a more radical behaviour of their Inquisitor (he is already 'Jaded' after all...).

After the little incident at the end of 'Baron Hopes' our party was pretty much upset about being lied too. Well apart from the schola progenia guardsman, who fancies himself a stormtrooper already, who actually did the dirty work.

Being the cell leader, my adept has had questions about some of our Inquisitor's companions who turned out to be easy pawns or actual agents of chaos. The last one was an interrogator who botched an investigation of a secondary lead during 'Rejoice for you are True!' and then turned out to be an actual agent of the Alpha Legion. Unfortunately one of my staunch allies, the party's techpriest died to a genestealer patriarch so that leaves me with a squad of guardsmen, a PDF depot on Reth, a handfull of contacts and allies and the party's psyker.

And when the opportunity arrises, when evidence and chance combine, I'm going to kill that son of a b*tch. And if that should happen to fuel my ascent to Interrogator or even Inquisitor...then so be it.

Well... umm... I blew the top off the Drusus Shrine on Sentinel while melting our Inquisitor inside his war pulpit using Conflagration.

He was a crazy ass Radical - and I am a servant of the Emperor, and the Emperor alone.

At my tribunal - I gave the speech that's in the Inquisitor's Handbook:

"If I have strayed from the path of obedience it is only to follow the most sacred of all directions, those of the Emperor Himself, for is it not written in the Book of the Astronomican. 'A true servant follows his Master if he listens to the heart and not the head".