Karnak the Conqueror

BS: 41
WS: 46
S: 35
T: 47
Ag: 41
Int: 40
Per: 43
Will: 45
Fel: 35

16 wounds

is what I have for the Chaos Lord(the guy me and my group is after) he also has Terminator Armor on, a Combi Bolter, and a Power Axe.

is he good, or too OP? he was literally at the end of the story, which will be long, so I'm assuming players combined can defeat him.

Well, a Chaos Marine would have unnatural Strength and Toughness both at x2 (at least), bringing his Damage Reduction to 22 (at least).

His characteristics and wounds are much too low for a high ranking traitor marine.

An honest to throne Chaos Lord should eat a band of non-Ascension acolytes for lunch without breaking a sweat.

I'm trying to make him powerful, but not on par with a Daemon prince(I only have experience with regular 40K, not so much with the RP where I'd see wounds above 1 for a Guardsmen/Acolyte way too high)

Any suggestions?

I was wanting to power him up that early/mid level Acolytes(or even Acolytes at late level with just 2) will have difficulty beating him, this guy is the last boss and that's why I asked for help on generating his stats.

If this IS to be a traitor marine, have a look at the "Black Crusade" section this website and download the freebee adventure "Broken Chains". It features Traitor Marines as pc. This will give you a good start for your work (those featured are BEGINNERS).

In regard to your concept, this one will be torn to shredds in now time. In order to be a formidable opponent, a npc needs at least 24 wounds (the suggested human maximum from "Ascension"), a lot of combat related talents (because the TALENTS make the n/pc good fighters! Stats alone will not help).

And last but NOT least, the npc needs a fitting retinue/entourage/group of henchmen. Whenever I threw -one- opponent at a group of three to four pc and this one opponent was not a monster beyound the "Hulking" trait or some extraordinary daemon/xenos/artefact-thing, my pc chewed said opponenet up within 3 to 5 rounds without breaking into sweat or panic.

My recommendation would be to not have this guy be a Chaos Lord, but some sorta cult leader or the like. A Chaos Lord is not a proper antagonist for a band of mid-level Acolytes. Someone like one of the False Prophets of the Pilgrims of Hayte from DotDG would be a better fit, and still be a challenge..

The idea behind him was he is who we were hunting, but I guess I could use a Cult leader, and this guy did have 4 Chaos Marine bodyguards, which you had 2 options when you got to him, you could either attempt a distraction(luring 2 of his 4 Bodyguards away if distraction was successful) or face him and his 4 bodyguards head on.

my goru is comprised of 1 Adepts, 1 Guardsman, 1 Techpriest and 2 Assassin's

DotDG what's that?

GeneralSturnn said:

Okay I can appreciate the desire to include things like Chaos Marines in your game, but even a single Chaos Marine is going to be a huge challenge worthy of a campaign in and of itself. But I'm not sure I'd use them for something like a mid-level Dark Heresy game.

I feel kind of (very) stupid for trying to tell someone what they should do in their game, but what I would do is use some sort of creepy cult leader as mentioned above, and have his body guards be I dunno big Chaos Mutants, or couple of lesser daemons, or combat servitors, or Ogryns. Sure they're not Chaos Marines, but they will still put the hurt on a band of Acolytes without devastating them outright like Astartes would.

Oh and DotDG is Disciples of the Dark Gods, a book of heretical cults and antagonists. A very good book actually, with things like how to make daemon weapons, sorcery, and threats heretical, alien, and daemonic

I had plans on turning this into a huge campaign also lol, 5 planets, 50 NPC's each, each planet has it;s own secrets leading to the final battle(of course, how would 5 Acolytes fare against a Bloodthirster? that is IF they failed to prevent it's summoning(basically kill the cult leader before he was finished) at that he'd also have several Renegade Guardsmen protecting him.

This was instead of the Chaos Lord with 4 Chaos Marine bodyguards.

and the Bloodthirster was only if you failed to kill the cult leader in time.

Blood Thirster; just a quick rundown

192 wounds, 31 points of damage reduction, weapon skill of 99, Fear 4, undodgeable/unparryable All Out Attacks that deal 3d10+10 R Damage

An that's not even including the rest of his talents, skills and traits. I doubt thinka band of mid-rank acolytes could even hur tthe damned thing.

You're thinking a bit big for Dark Heresy. All the stuff you're describing would be Ascension level for ranks 9+.

Oh, lol... I honestly had plans on ending this over the period of a week(or a couple weeks) I see the Bloodthirster would rip us a new *******, so, what would the big bad guy be? I want him to be a challenge for 2-3 Acolytes, but 4-4 would be able to handle him with all effort.

Should I just stick to the Chaos Lord/distraction bits? or what else could I do? I want to have "the worst the galaxy can throw at us" but only in a means that it will be difficult yet doable for us.

A chaos lord marine? vs acolytes?

Uhh no. Fluff wise, he wouldn't bat an eyelash and all your PCs would be smears of blood and feces laying across the room.

If you want to give them something to think about, toss 30ish low level cultists at them at the same time and sprinkle a few very minor daemons for an extra scare, then at the end just have a weak-ish daemon pop out of said ritual if they are not succesful with an interruption.

GeneralSturnn said:

One possibility would be to start out the bad guy as an Aspiring Champion- an above-average CSM, comparable to a loyalist Veteran Sergeant- and have him progress in power parallel with the PCs, so that, by Ascention level, he has become a full-fledged Chaos Lord.

Hi Sturnn,

what Rank are your acolythes? What equipment do they carry /will they be likely to carry when they meet "your final"? Are their any special talents
of theirs one would need to have in mind (both tending to and to beware of) in order to give them a fullfilling experience?

Gregorius21778 said:

The Acolytes start as level 1, and I had plans on this being a long campaign, of finding clues to the big baddie's hideout(some un named world, that's "hidden" until you find all 10 pieces of the puzzle, ofcourse, alot of looking is to be done, and ofcourse, his henchment dont' want you snooping, so you'll be facing alot of Scum/Renegades, maybe a Chaos Marine or two when you get to the 9th piece(which won't be for a couple weeks) one of the worlds we visit, will be in stalemate with Orks for about a week, then that world will be overrun, and that world becomes a stealth type mission(you can go in guns blazing, but, Orks now populate the world remember)

GeneralSturnn said:

Forgot to mention this: I DID tell them we were after a Chaos Lord, I plan on sing a Heavy Stubber down the line til we go meet him, then I'm upgrading to something with more punch.

@...a long campaign

Well, if this is the case and you are still far far away from the final with the Chaos Lord, it is a little early to stat him now.

Wait with this till it is two session till confrontation. Everything else will make you end up re-statting this one to match your pc´s power level

For the most part we're fighting Chaos Renegades/Scum/Criminals/Orks(can choose to fight or not fight) but early in the campaign, one of the worlds will witness a WAAAGH! and it will be in a stalemate until mid campaign, at that point, the WAAAGH! will overrun the world(whether the PC's are on the world or not) and it can turn into a stealth mission, I never saw anything for generating low class criminals or anything like that either, and like I mentioned, I'm more of a 40K player, just getting into RP, so anything about 10 is kinda high to me for most characters, lol... not sure what's what.

GeneralSturnn said:

The average low class criminal is roughly as effective as a level 1 acolyte in their appropriate path. For example, a hive ganger is going to be pretty good at keeping themselves alive, so either their WS or BS is going to keeping up with a level 1 PC and probably their perception or agility too. They aren't going to be very smart however.

Orks are going to decimate the players so make sure they understand the value of running away! Personally if your new to this, start something small, you can always get bigger later and go onto a grand scheme. Like a previous poster, I hate the idea of telling someone how to play the game as ultimately the only goal is that you and your players enjoy yourselves buuuut:

Maybe run a game on a hiveworld, theres some disappearances that for whatever reason your assigned to. Slowly investigating the dangers of the underhive until you come upon a cult and eventually the players work to put a stop to it. Though in the ruins of their base you find your plot hook to your grander campaign. Maybe something as simple as a message from the Chaos Marine you want your players to eventually face.

Take it or ignore it, just my 2c.