Specifically the 10% penalty for consecutive rolls per session...

Does anyone actually use that modifier? It seems rather harsh. The GM in the game Im in has been using it and we end up spending more time trying to use charm and trade rolls (or convincing merchants to get into drinking contests with the Ork) trying to overcome it than we actually do, like getting stuff done.

I understand the spirit of it, but for things like say my Explorator who wants to get multiple sets of parts so he can craft some armor. It almost isnt worth bothering with the crafting side. I may as well just look for the armor with the mods I want and combine it into one roll. I havent done the actual math, but Im pretty sure its a much higher success rate.

Trying to grok a middle ground here that isnt abusive but at the same time doesnt feel so prohibitive.

*shrug*

Maybe I'm just nuts, or we need a higher profit factor. Maybe both.

Unless I'm completely mistaken, it sounds to me like you're complaining about house rules making your game problematic. I've never heard of armor being purchased bit by bit for crafting purposes before. If the books don't have rules for this but the GM requires multiple Acquisition tests, then I'd venture a guess that the GM isn't doing things right. You're not supposed to roll for every single thing you purchase. If a player wants a lasgun, he gets a lasgun. No roll needed.

You also seem to be complaining about doing a whole lot of unnecessary roleplaying in order to improve your Acquisition rolls. Why? There's no need to roleplay these things if you don't want to. You can make one commerce/barter/charm roll (or similar) to improve your Profit Factor for one roll, and that's it. You don't have to roleplay that if you don't want to, and you clearly don't want to. I mostly just gloss over these things, giving the players a brief summary of their negotiations if I feel like it, allowing them to spend their time doing fun stuff.

So to answer your question: No, I don't think the 10% penalty is harsh, but this assumes the GM realizes that the players are roleplaying really, really, REALLY rich people who don't need to be bothered with small expenses. Let them worry about that power armor they want, or that digital weapon. Not a piece of a suit of armor. The GM would be better off combining those pieces into one, single Acquisition test.

I do mostly base the number of purchases without penalty on my group's "financial" success. They get one "free" acquisition token per session. This token allows them to do an acquisition roll without the penalty. They can spend it immediately or save it for one of the next sessions.
In addition, for every two points of Profit Factor their last Endeavour created, they gain one extra acquisition token that they may only spend immediately that evening. This represents the increase in influence they receive. Naturally, these acquisition tokens may be counteracted by Misfortunes (it's quite fun to roll for them every session... sometimes even lead to some really interesting side adventures).

I guess that's where I'm asking for clarification then. As of yet, I haven't seen anything that specifically in no uncertain terms defines what should and shouldn't be rolled for. There is a lot of hyperbole all over the place, but no hard and fast set of rules on - roll for this, don't roll for this.

In my case, my Explorator wants a suit of Augmetic Engine Plate +Power Assisted +Servo Manipulators. (Yes I'm trying to create a dodgy suit of Power Armor)

So by combining the rolls into one check, assuming the most populated site with the bonus for a individual Acquisition I'm at a +10 roll at 3x the time spent looking if I go for best quality for the armor. That's fine, I get all that and its all well and good, but it isn't very much in character for my guy to go buy it, he's a tech priest, he would be down in his workshop fiddling with things, ripping up deck plating and making himself something spiffy.

So... if I want to go the crafting route. As I understand it, I should be rolling separately for the components to make the armor, plus the components for each mod separately, with the scarcity lowered by one step since I'm getting parts and not complete pieces of gear.

Is that wrong? Should I be just combining all the parts into one acquisition roll?

Note, I'm using the Black Crusade crafting guidelines since the ones in the RT core book are... well, not all that useful as actual mechanics.

Brother_Trahaerne said:

So if they havent completed an endeavour before pulling into port somewhere they get the flat one purchase plus any others they have stored up?

That makes sense.

I guess the reason I am questioning the cumulative -10 is, for a group of characters pulling into port, 1 acquisition without penalty seems harsh.

Plus I did the math on the parts acquisitions the way I understand it to work and its almost a wash on the rolls at the end of the day, and then I could spend up to a year actually building the armor which seems kinda out of whack to me.

*shrug* maybe I'm doing it wrong.

CaptainStabby said:

There's no hard and fast rule for this, and as you noted, the crafting rules in RT leave quite a bit up in the air. As a GM, if one of my players wanted to do something similar, I'd have them make the acquisition as normal with an additional +10 to represent the need for extra time and a skill roll after the acquisition is made.

But lets look at it another way. The Acquisition roll represents not only money, but favors and influence as well. So you could claim to have been working on the armour for a while and are nearing completion. Queue the Acquisition roll but using Trade (Armourer) or Tech-Use to modify the final roll (as per Commerce/etc). This represents foresight to get the parts together, hard work on your character's part, as well as assistance of of Tech-Priests to bring it to final fruition.

If your GM is forcing you to make individual rolls per part, he's not understanding the background of RT honestly.