I'm sort of falling back into the habit of being a GM once again. Sad to say, however, is I'm suffering from a lack of confidence in my work lately. The last game I GM'd was a WHFRP for 2nd Edition. That was several years ago before one of our usual group bought Pathfinder (which I consider to be the root of all heresy compared to any other game) and we went to play that. Having gone out and bought Dark Heresy, Rites of Battle, Rogue Trader, Deathwatch and now Black Crusade for all sorts of information to be at my disposal. I have two CSM's and two Cultists, which I thought was rather fitting, but unknowingly, they all ended up wanting to support a different side of Chaos. It's great when they come together and they really, really balance each other out and being put on the spot (as they came over and said 'We want to play!!!') I simply went with the adventure path "Temple of Lies" in the back of the BC book. Despite the lack of information on several characters that they had given, I wrote "supplemented" the lack of information with ideas formed from reading several Warhammer and 40k books. (Mainly Malus Darkblade series, Nagash The Sorc series and Eisenhorn.) The NPC Theron was given the barge/hotel that I promptly named "The Marred Flesh", though they gave him a little bit of a back story, he ended up being the most talked to and sought after NPC. So I promptly gave him a background and a reason behind his "pathological loathing of those his senior" and his "staff is youthful and many seem unnaturally so". Mainly being that he creates an anti-aging wine, though with potent (and sometimes horrid side-effects). Theron being actually just a minor foot-note actually held more memory than the Mendacious Oracle, I was thinking of capitolizing on that as well as the new found "alliance" with the Prophets of the Blighted Path. I was thinking of two possible routes that I could use at the moment and here is what I've got so far:

The Heretics join the three remaining Prophet Marines from the desolate world of Kymerus and to their Master, the Dark Apostle Naberus. Though the journey from the planets surface to the orbiting fortress of The Flaming Tomb . Upon landing the Heretics and the Marines are greeted by a small band of Marines as well. Amongst them is a foreboding figure, clad in darkened plate with gold trim. In his hand he grasps an old gnarled staff, with a ruby gem inserted into the mouth of the skull that has been carved to be the head of the staff. The arrayed spikes on his shoulders and knee pads coupled with the long billowing black cloak with red lining, gives the Heretics the impression that they are in the presence of the Dark Apostle.

" I see you have managed to make it off of Kymerus alive, Corvis. I see that you are one Marine shy and four Outsiders heavy... Are they, the supposed, 'Prophosised' ones that Copax had called for? What events transpired upon the planet's surface?" Naberus disregards the party for the time being, wishing to be given a full report then and there.

"Yes, Master. These are the ones that you sought to keep out of harms way. Copax had summoned them to an ambush, not so much of the reading. We went to the Temple of Lies once reaching planet side and we were greeted by Copax at the front gate, though we thought nothing of it. We began to question him about these fellow disciples. Copax stated that he had summoned them and they had been killed en route to Kymerus, as you can see, Dark Lord. This not the case. Copax willed his body guards upon us, and they dispatched of the Oracle and his abomination. Our new allies joined us here to seek meaning of the prophecy and answers to their many questions." Corvis speaks to his master and gestures to the party occasionally on their parts, before stepping to the side to allow his Master discussion with the party.

"I see..." Naberus looks the party over and nods in approval. "Two fellow marines and two cultists. I imagine that dispatching of Copax was not an easy task. The Oracle was quite the potent psyker... For a human. I have a question for you before, I will answer yours. Did you happen to gain access to the Torestus? " Naberus speaks calmly to them judging them with respect and seems to be quite polite.

After the debriefing the party is given a few days off and where things can change. They can go their own route if they wish, but I had two ideas. I was thinking that perhaps Theron is granted communication with the party and asks to gather some items to make his ritual for "blessing" the wine more potent with less side-effects that can be gathered on one of the nearby planets, that he hasn't the fund nor access to get. Or Naberus calls them to a sort of Mournival and offers them a mission to go to a planet where there have been rumors of Necron re-awakenings though in a miniscule number. Seeming as I have a Heretek amongst them, I thought this would be a good idea for him to shine a little seeming as his calling, really is the technology part of the missions. Here's what would transpire either way:

Theron:
The party is summoned to the bridge of the Fortress and given their own private communication room for the long-distance call being made by Theron and asking for the party members by name. The call is patched through on the monitor and the young face of Theron is stretched and made impossibly large on the huge screen. He wears a vox-set so the party can hear him.

"Ah, gentleman. It has come to my attention that you left the planet in a hurry and we could not discuss the finer details of the conversation we had. I was wondering, seeming as we had such a good time, if you could possibly do me a favour." A devious and hellish smile grows upon Theron's face. "I was thinking of attempting to "spice" the wine further, however, I need some ingredients from (insert planet here). I haven't been able to find an affordable price on these goods and was wondering if you could possibly procure some for me. If you were to do this for me, perhaps I could pull some strings for you on this planet and see about getting you more of what you may need."

Naberus:
The party is summoned to the War Council room of the Fortress and are guided there by one of the Prophets. Inside the room sits, Naberus at the head, Corvis and the two other marines that escorted the Heretics off world. Naberus is the first to react, gesturing with his hand to the seats.

"Please, sit. I called you here to discuss the latest news that has been brought to my attention." Naberus pours himself a glass of wine from a very familiar looking bottle, takes a long sip before continuing. "I speak of a greater foe than the Imperium and the False Emperor, during this gathering. I speak of something far older as well. There have been sightings of Necron and their foul energies upon (insert planet name). If my resent gaze into the Warp is correct, then there is cause for alarm. For the Necron seek to destroy all sentient life as we all know. However, they are on a Forge World that is of great use to this system and if it were to fall, then most of the system would surely be unable to defend itself. As of now, it is little more than the occasional scarab and lurking Wraith upon the planet. Intelligence suggests that the Necron only number in the double digits and most of my Marines are being called for a Crusade into Uncharted Territory. I ask you to go to the planets and eliminate the few Necron. I will send you with a landing ship and a pilot. However, I cannot spare more."

I figure if the party needs to know why the Imperium isn't the great "threat" here, is because the Imperium is on the defensive since Abaddon has started another Black Crusade. Though, Naberus is being called for another's Crusade into Eldar territory and the party is needed on the home-front. For the most part this is what I have written and gathered from the pits of my brain. Feel free to use for your own games and such. Suggestions and thoughts would be greatly helpful. Thank you all.

Very interesting, and well written.

I'm sure you've considered it, but as a player looking forward to playing the baddies in Black Crusade I would feel somewhat disappointed if the GM decided the campaign would be focussed on fighting the 'greater evil' of the Necrons; making what should be a new experience into essentially Dark Heresy/Black Crusade in different outfits.

Just my opinion, and I'm sure you've discussed the campaign to come with your players.

That should have read Dark Heresy/Deathwatch.....

Love the inability to edit posts.

The difference between Dark Heresy/Deathwatch and Black Crusade is that the players get to choose whom they worship as well as where a majority of the game play goes. I'm just creating a few instances where, if they run out of ideas or have no "motivation" to keep the story moving, I've got plots and ploys to keep them focused on doing something rather than letting the game go stagnant and dying off. The Necron being the greater foe for the time being as the Imperium doesn't have the resources to launch an invasion into the Screaming Vortex and this also allows the players to contact more prominent figures in the sector. Essentially earning either respect or loathing depending on their actions and words. That's what Black Crusade really comes down too. Not so much of just constantly bashing the Imperium. For instance. All the hated enemies: Chaos, Eldar, Dark Eldar and Imperium will side with either of each other if Necron or Tyranid are on the same planet and present a much larger force to be reckoned with. Though Chaos may not side with the Imperium and visa versa. Eldar and the Imperium are more likely. Dark Eldar and Chaos are likely to join forces as well. Seeming as both the Tyranid and Necron are more likely to just atomize or consume everything in their path while the others are looking for total galactic domination. As the saying goes: "The enemy of my enemy is my friend." This is true in certain cases it's all situational alliances and betrayals. So Heretics going after Necron for technology and favor with the Dark Apostle is very possible.

I put the party to the test last night, that is for sure. They decided to take the work of the Dark Apostle feeling that Theron's quest was more of a "side-quest" and felt that, indeed, the Necron are the bigger threat. However, they deduced on their own, that Eldar might be on the planet as well. (One of the characters has a background where he openly worked with them in the past.) So it started off as from said posts before and starting planet-side of Meris Verduna V:

The heretics find the week long journey to the Forge World of Meris Verduna V rather dull, as it is just the heretics and the lone pilot. Upon landing on the planet, and docking is completed the group is greeted by several Dark Tech-Priests. Each have the same expressionless face of robotic design and each have several mechadendrites at their disposal each equipped with a different setup. The heretics learned why this Forge World was so important from the briefing that Naberus gave you. It contains large manifactorums that produce Defilers, Titans and large Voidships to be manned and used against the Imperium during the Long War. However, if it were to fall into Necron hands, it would be a devastating blow to the production power of this sector and would surely fall into something much worse than the powers of Chaos.

The more mechanical Tech-Priest greets the party with a genderless voice that's more computer than man. "We have been waiting on you, Dark Lords, and have found the remains of a Necron Wraith. However, it was none of us on the planet that put the creation down. We shall lead you to it's location."

The planet itself is polluted from the constant burning of old fossil fuels. The smog coats the sky so the stars are barely visible even on the clearest of nights. The constant drone of a hundred thousand machine whirring and working tirelessly on their programmed schedules. As the party rounds the last corner (you can decide what direction they were heading, though I said they were heading North-East of their PoO: Point of Origin. And had the Eldar headquarters on the southern-half of the map. The Monolith on the Northern Half. The Eldar artefact however, was directly East of the PoO. This way everything was sort of spread out and I could add encounters if I felt that the party had too easily dispatched of the previous encounter). Arriving to where the wraith lay, there are tell-tale signs of the battle. A challenging Awareness Test will suffice for the details of the battle. Two Eldar Guardians had found this Wraith and had simply had the high ground. One proceeded into Melee while the other was armed with a Shuriken Rifle. The Wraith quickly fell, but not before drawing blood. An Ordinary Tracking Test will give you the trail of the Wraith, while a Difficult Tracking Test will give you the trail from the Eldar blood even after it disappears. My party was unable to pick up on the Eldar trail and this is where the tracker decided it was a good idea to go too far too fast. So I had an Eldar Harlequin ambush him (if this happens, try to pick something that won't single-handedly dispatch of your "curious george".) Meanwhile, my Heretek was looking the Necron and copying notes into his Data-Slate about "descriptions and attributes that he could find out about the creature". Which, I thought was rather interesting that he actually used his data-slate. Shortly after this, the party came back together before continuing on.

Whether or not your party finds either trail, I would say have them lead a back to the same focal point. Down towards one of the void ship factories, there is a tear in the wall (as if something had merely thrust it's claws into the metal and peeled it back toward the creature, away from the party.) At this point, I had a slight trap set up for them. Inside the building that was torn open, the machinery is damaged severely, and cannot be repaired by a single Tech-Priest. However, who ever decides to take point into the building, make their awareness test looking for a trip-wire at the bottom of the opening. Decide the difficulty on this, as I could not find stats for Eldar explosives, so I merely used the stats for a Krak Grenade. With that in mind, it would probably hurt whoever is unfortunate enough to not find it a LOT and put that particular individual at a disadvantage for the upcoming encounter. Someways into the building, between the destroyed machines and the like, there are three Wraiths. (You can use the stats for the Spectral Harbingers, but dull them down as Unnatural Stats have been nerfed/errata'd. Otherwise, they'll be hitting for 1d10+15 Pen 9 I believe and have the Phase Strike ability. Quite nasty if your melee combatant is in Termy armour already. As if they score a hit with three or more degrees of success their attacks cannot be parried and must be dodged.) Other than that, the heretics should take a few nips and scrapes, probably a more serious bruise, but if the party has a Medic it shouldn't be too damaging to the party. At this point if you have a Psyker with the Child of the Warp and a few other talents, make their psyniscience for them and see if they detect the casting of a spell. The distance they can sense powers being cast is 1 KM per Psy Rating, so if their Psy rating is at least a three (which I assume should be the case) they would sense the disturbance in the warp so the speak. Hopefully, the party will get the hint and go in the direction of the disturbance.

Here you can throw in another encounter, several Necron Warriors depending on player wounds, strength, and number. I used 6 Necron Warriors as I had 4 relatively well-balance party and two of the four had Medicae. But if those Wraiths were rather hard or the party's luck with the Dice Gods is not with them this encounter is optional.

Half way to the point of the disturbance, after coming out of a tunnel, the party is surrounded by twice their number in Eldar Guardians, who have the high ground. If they pass a Difficult Awareness test, they are aware that they are surrounded. If they fail, have them keep going and meet with the Shadowseer (who is obviously the cause of the disturbance and the party-lead amongst the Eldar).

The party is approached in a cautious manner by an Eldar (a Forbidden Knowledge: Xenos test will let them know it's a Shadowseer) who seems to be a prominent figure. "I come to you to ask you to leave this planet and leave the Necron to us. For we are their Harbingers of Destruction. We do not seek to invade this planet, but rather relieve it of it's dark secret."

Here the party can make several different tests. I would say a Charm or Fellowship test at a difficulty that would be best set by you. If met with some hostility and the party doesn't know about the Guardians tailing them. Reveal them now. This may add weight to the Shadowseer's argument that if he/she wanted the part dead, they would be (or at least attempted). After the Fellowship test is made, have them work with the Eldar a bit. Have the Shadowseer escort them to their base of operations. Little more than a semi-destroyed factory with a large map of the planet indicating the important points. If you feel the need have another small encounter. Here you can show them how potent the Shadowseer is in combat if they need convincing (or if they decide that it might be a good idea to attempt to shoot the him/her in the back.)

Once getting to the base of operations have the Shadowseer explain that they are here for two reasons. A.) To extract an artefact of great significance to the Eldar as it was created "in an age where man did not know the stars". B.) Destroy the Necron Monolith. After some diliberation, inform them that the Shadowseer will send a majority of his troops to engage the Necron surge and he/she will go to the Artefact with the party. Once at the site of the artefact, have four Eldar Bonesingers there (I didn't even need to use their stats). Should have questions and have them explained away by the reason the Shadowseer was needed to help "lift" the artefact. However, that is not the case. Should it be discovered that the Artefact is really Necron in nature and needs to be kept "in check". As they leave the site, have a Tomb Stalker approach, (from where ever the Shadowseer has been positioned) and kill two of the Bone Singers with the Gauss Flayers (Gotta love multi-targeting protocol). The Tomb Stalker came with a butt-load of scarabs in my game. I knew that my party couldn't take it on their own, but I knew that the Shadowseer was WAY too powerful to use to combat it. So what I did was have a lot of scarabs and had the Eldar Shadowseer push the Force Storm power effectively giving him an 11 psy rating. So each missile did effectively 1d10 (+3 static damage per psy rating). Effectively the Shadowseer kills all of the Scarabs and barrels down on the Tombstalker before succumbing to "pyschic fatigue" and being useless for the remainder of combat and I had him generate the Warp Whispers Peril due to the fact that it drains his Willpower, the willpower of everyone around him and gives corruption points. Depending on how your party is, that should be the relative wounds left on the Stalker. I had mine set to 1 Scarab with the Tomb Stalker for a little added potency. Giving the Stalker Regeneration 10 and around 45 wounds. So about half and he was still a relatively decent challenge. Though I did have him Phase Tunnel every two turns to give him a chance to keep his wounds (kinda) high after the scarab was killed.

After this I had the party go back to the Eldar Base of Operations and the Shadowseer said it would take time to regain his strength and to acquire more troops as he lost contact with the main host of his Guardians. This is the half-way point and could take up to thirteen hours to complete. (That's how long it took us but we got off track a lot last night.) If you'd like continue onward to the Monolith without him, or wait. I haven't made anything up beyond this point. So I gave them experience and such. Where they promptly left off on the note that EVERYONE had rolled on the rewards table and got a Daemon Weapon.... So now I gotta tweek everything again at this point to make things a lot more difficult.

Comment/Suggestions are welcome. Feel free to use these ideas or build upon them in your own games.

You are playing with Heretics right? If that is so, then why Harlequins of all people (or Xenos) would cooperate with them? These are the Eldar who dedicate their lives to warn and teach the other Eldars of the dangers of Chaos, and every single Eldar knows of this. No living Eldar would ever willingly associate with human Chaos worshippers. They would rather die, and Harlequins even more so. Even Necrons, I think, Eldar see as a better alternative than what they call THE PRIMORDIAL ANNIHILATOR and to which their SOULS are forfeit when they die unprotected and which slew their GODS (except Harlequins, and Cegorach, but that still isn't a good reason). If you want to put some Eldars in, I would suggest the Dark variety, otherwise it doesn't make much sense (to me, at least).

K0balt said:

Even Dark Eldar hate chaos. In fact the Dark Eldar have had their psychic powers atrophy because they are forbidden from using them inside Cammorgah. The Dark Eldar will actually team up with other Eldar to defeat Chaos, because they know that when they die their souls go straight to she who thirsts. I don't honestly think that any non-insane Eldar would ever help a Chaos worshiper.

Even if eldars won't ever associate with Chaos, they can (and have often) acted bheind teh scene to drive two of their ennemies into butting head and destroying each other. In that case that would be probably be by leaving a breadcrumb trail and hints of something juicy at it's end to goad the Chaos forces into fighting the necrons. The eldar would certainly prefer nicers pawns (orks or imperials), but if the Chaos is all that's available, luring them into a fight with the Necrons is defintievely a possibility. Along with getting ready to finish the winner before it can recover and reinforce.

wha they won't do is to come out in the open and fofer even a temporary alliance.