SO my gaming group is a mixed bunch, we started out with 7ish players with dark heresy (i say 7 ish because my group never shows up on average i run a game with 3 people at a time and loads of NPC's), then some of the players saw the rules for rouge trader (and i saw the rules for powerfists) and we created a game where we had 2 ships each captianed by 1 Rouge Trader Character, one ship with a second in command Rouge trader character, then one Dark hersey character, the other ship has 3 dark heresy characters, plus the 4 NPC's that i made to be on board crew/navigators, now one of the captians has decided to go radical and turn to chaos his crew agrees, and we are going to do a giant civil war, and i have one new character joining who hasn't yet decided what he is going to play,

my question to you my associates,

How the heck do i deal with the craziness of different economies, character progression and abilities...

i have been running this for a while, and so far i have let the rouge trader characters control ship finaces, while paying thier dark heresy characters for services rendered, but i haven't gotten a hold on xp progression, i give out very small bubbles of xp (say 10 to 40 xp a session) then after beating the final segment of my long arching plot details (i will post more about those later) i give them large chunks (like 500-600 xp) however rouge trader characters are starting at first rank, while the dark heresy characters started at relativly similar xp levels, 5th rank i think, and i want to prevent one from outgrowing the other, should i worry about that?? am i crazy for doing this?? should i let my players buy space marine armor for thier entire ship??

what are your thoughts??

This sounds like a pretty difficult situation! I haven't personally run characters from outside a system (yet) so I don't know how balanced it is. My gut tells me to stick with the rules. Are you actually using one ruleset as 'the one we are actually playing with' whilst character progression is from wherever? I.e are you player DH with RT characters or vice-versa?

As for the final question - if they are astartes they should get it. If they are not astartes there is no way they should be able to buy it. Each suit of astartes armour is a priceless relic of a chapter. If someone bought a whole ships worth any astartes they ever came across should, in my opinion, instantly attack!

If you are talking about plain ol' normal power armour then yes if they can afford it but I expect it will dent their profit factor!

well, i actually use both rulebooks, usually the rouge trader one while in a spaceship, and then the Dark Heresy one while on a planet/mission...they are preety similar...luckily i only have one psyker so i dodged that bullet there.. as for the power armor, well one of the captians hobnobbed with every official in the system until the mechanicus was willing to sell him special power armor from thier vaults, now i have 2 characters in power armor and the rest are significantly less armored... how do i fix??

My own group has characters ranging from a Noble-born Cleric to a Feral World Scummer. They are currenty 5th-ish level, and so far, the different income levels haven't been a problem. Sure, the other players frequently rib the "rich boy", but, since most of their income and gear comes from looting the bodies of those they kill, there is not a huge gulf in equipment levels within the party. At first I was worried that the Noble would buy power armour at the first opportunity, but by keeping a steady stream of temptations in his path- namely high-end quarters and gourmet meals- he hasn't been able to save up an excessive amount of coin...

well the issue is that rouge traders don't really lose profit factor they just use it, and although i impose limits the dark heresy characters can only buy so much and although i do let them take from the shps armory according to what the RT characters buy it still has little to no benefit to them, and the levels between the DH characters is not problematic i just can't justify the 2 different economies and i can't find a way to make it work.. any suggestions?

Sorry I'm a bi confused. Which characters have the power armour? It sounds to me like it is two of the RT characters that have it and some DH characters are hoping to get some?

If this is the case and the Rogue Trader himself is happy to work to get some for his crewmembers that would be fine by me. I think the way this game would work if I was running it is as a RT game that happens to have some Dark Heresey characters in it. They therefore are still operating at a priviliged level. It should be every bit as hard to get more power armour as it was to get the original sets. Looking at the Rogue Trader rules to get a few sets it would be a +0 acquisition test. So if they have the profit factor I would just let them buy it. If you personally are not sure that letting the characers run around in power armour is good idea then it should be dent in the profit facteor to get it. Then the captain has to make a choice, look after his crew but lose money or keep the money.

yeah thats preety much what happened, one Dh and one RT character has power armor, one is a sister of battle and the other is a arch millitant, now they both have paraded thorugh most of my missions, and the other players have struggled, now i have solved this by having special duels between some enemies and players in power armor, and now the other players want power armor too, however i don't think that would be a good idea but how to deal with the two i have now??