So, I was wondering if someone might assist me? See, I'm occasionally a twinker soul, who likes to take the rules of the book and say "nah, I'll...anyway." In this case, I am thinking of getting a battleship. I know that the books don't give stats for them, but that's what websites are for. So, I know that the Imperium won't just give a new RT one; they'll have to acquire one, and probably by finding it derelict, but how might one get it? Say I love the Planetbound for Ages background, or whatever it's called (I do, rather). Say I found a wrecked Imperial battleship on some lost moon, how would I get it off the ground, to get it fixed? Would these all be Endeavors?

As a second, what's the chances you'd get to keep it? I assume that, being an Imperial Battleship, the Imperium can just say "that's mine." Is there anyway you could get to keep it? For that matter, how might they get to keep most recovered ships? They would mostly all either be property of the Imperium, who can always use more ships, or tainted by vile Chaos/Ork/Eldar/other xenos tech. How do I get to keep my mighty, cheesy toy, after I do the work the Imperium didn't want to do to get it? I like the rundown for repairing the Light of Terra, found elsewhere, but right now, I don't even know how I'd get a harvested battleship into a position where it could be fixed (the Light is, conveniently, already in space). Any ideas would be much appreciated. Thanks.

for something that is planetbound, an endever to get a writ of salvage would make it yours.

depending on the size of the moon would be a factor on how to get it off the surface. extensive mining of the moon might do it. you don't pick it up you carve off the moon. another would be very long chains and pull it up from orbit with tugs. lots and lots of rockets/small ships pulling it up. somehow standing it on it's end and having it take off like the space suttle. all ideas.

good luck with the cash to restore it. and it's probably infested with something nasty, weather the decendents of the crew or worse. if it's an inhabited planet the locals might not like you "stealing" their holy temple. who else wants it, just because you have the writ, doesn't mean someone else doesn't want that ship. rival RTs, Chaos revers, ork mekboys, tech priests, or those crazies that don't think the imperium should rule them. how long do you have to salvage it? is the star close to going nova? when you get it how do you explain to the inquisition that "no i don't intend to suceed from the imperium."

just some ideas.

Trader Austin said:

If I'm willing to diminish this by shaving off some of the really good plot hooks, if we say that it crashed on an uninhabited, forest-covered world, out in the boonies of not-yet-Imperial space, and the party found it when one of their minions discovered it, while cataloqing the planet for resources (maybe coal isn't important in 40k, but I bet EVERY empire can use more lumber, or such, and that much plant growth might add up to large water-reserves), after they recently claimed it. So, very few individuals know about it, until the writ's paperwork gets leaked to several interested parties, but what's the likelihood of the Imperium signing that writ? I don't imagine they like the idea of putting a battleship into anyone else's hands, especially with many Rogue Traders being one bad business deal away from being declared well-supplied heretics with lots-a-help. The Navy would probably always fall on the side of "thanks for our long lost ship back, oh, and here's some money, or maybe a Peer/Good Rep (IN). While I understand that especially that latter one can be a very nice Talent to get, and not as easy as "spend ### XP", I might rather have a battleship.

Could anyone who is good at such things maybe be willing to spell out, at least a little, what the endeavors might look like? (To get it up, off of the planet, and maybe to acquire the writ). I figure someone has to have had a ship that uses Planetbound for Millennia, and maybe had to have their players go through the hoops of acquiring that ship. Here's hoping someone feels like telling a story.

While it's not exactly the same, I wrote up a large endeavour for restoring a certain canonical hulked battleship that could probably be adapted. I'd personally throw things in like angry natives (perhaps the locals might be a xenos species that have to be wiped out/beaten into submission first - perhaps they are the mutated remainants of the crew who have been... changed... after several thousand years of exposure to a leaking reactor core), potential pirates, that sort of thing. As for taking off, you could LEAVE an atmosphere, I just wouldn't recommend returning.

Here are my notes:

http://www.fantasyflightgames.com/edge_foros_discusion.asp?efid=159&efcid=3&efidt=610162&efpag=0#612764

Well getting the writ probably wouldn't be easy, but not impossible. the navy doesn't have to know you intend to salvage the ship as in put it back in working order. all you have to do is ask for salvage rights and let them assume you are going to chop it up for parts/raid it's holds. so an intermediate adminastradum official or navy officer sells you the writ for x amount of PF or has you do some mission for their organization (with some side mission associated with the main mission). like hunting down a certain pirate band who's leader has a set of books full of secrets (including the one the captain was using to blackmail the official) that the official wants. then he signs your writ of salvage. now you get the battleship back into space and rebuild it, making the official look like a fool and close to a traitor. the players gain an unknown enemy, since the official blames them for his problems (and being a admiral's son saves him from too much punishment but ends his upward career.) the navy may try to claim the ship but you have your ever so legal writ saying they signed it over to you and have a legion of lawyers argue it in court. making several high ranking navy officers none too happy with you. (though they gain a friend that don't like those officers)

in the case you spelled out, you run into several problems. 1. battleships are huge! and you have no local workforce. you need atleast twice the number of crew you would need to crew the battleship. objective 1: is getting that many people, the red shola maybe? objective 2: getting them to the planet. maybe a deal with the saul trader house. objective 3: keeping them supplied. they are digging out your ship not growing food. again a deal with Saul might be in order. objective 4: because i like the visual we'll go with getting the ship pointed up and using it's own drive with several booster rockets attached to it to get it up. soo A: the equipment to get the ship up and held pointed up. zyanth has experence with big land equipment B: the tech priests to get the drives running and build the rockets, herateks or the lathes C: get the fuel for the rockets. winterscale or corda. pick your trouble. 5: keeping the Fel dynasty (insert other enemy here) from sabotaging your operation. since it's easy he is raiding your food shipments. 6: defeat the orks that have shown up just cause. 7: get your ship into space, several tech use, command, and pilot tests. 8: now you have the ship in space, keep the saynay clan from stealing it. 9: get the ships to tow it to a shipyard. either you have them or you have to beg borrow or steal them. 10: you got it to port wander, keep the navy from sabotaging it, commandos try to sneak aboard a vortex torp warhead. it's better to destroy it than let some crazy RT have it. 11: get a legal team to help you keep the hulk. 12: how much are you going to have to borrow (and from whom. Krin?) to get the ship fixed. what do you have to do to get the loan? 13: what are you going to have to do to pay the money back? (insert whole new adventure).

that help?

First, I'll assume the Rogue Trader in question has found a salvageable battleship and has the PFs to do this. Endeavor etc. being irrelevant.

The question of legal ownership is a simple one as long as you assume certain similarities to the main inspiration for the Imperial Navy, namely the British Fleet during the Age of Sail. If you do then you have a whole world of legal possibilities to lay claim to that ship. Let's start easy with explaining how a fleet registry works:

A fleet registry contains all the naval squadrons compiled in lists by region of deployment (I'm using the late 18th century British Navy definition). The list has ships sorted by type/class and name, with entries for the captain, first officer etc. The list is kept up-to-date as much as possible, because mistakes will lead to false assumptions and assumptions lead to defeats. Having a ship in the registry that has been lost is worse than not having a ship at all, because the admirals making the deployment choices will assume the ship is there and can be used. So, any ship lost due to any circumstance is officially stricken from the list, and this means that the navy says "the ship is gone, and we don't have it." Ships that aren't in the registry theoretically do not exist anymore, their names can be given to new ships, their place in the registry will be filled with another ship. By striking a ship from it the ship ceases to be owned property and becomes lost property.

Assuming you salvage the vessel the customary law says that you have to be fully reimbursed and rewarded for returning a ship back to it's owner. And it's here where the fun part begins, because as a Rogue Trader you have what the Germans call a "Gummibefehl" (elastic order/instruction), you have rights and prerogatives others don't. What you claim is yours, STC fragments, archeotech, worlds, you name it they have it (save for things the big "I" wants, they will take them away from you) . Your Warrant of Trade might bear the signature of Sebastian Thor, Leman Russ, Malcador or even the Emperor himself. No Admiral will be stupid enough to say that the ship you claimed by the rights of your warrant is the property of the navy, to say so would be akin to saying the warrant is wrong, and you don't want to go there due to accusations of heresy that would follow. So the Imperial navy would try to bribe/buy the ship back from you by offering things in return, while you are free to say "no." Of course the navy could petition the High Lords of Terra for the ship, they might even get it in a few hundred years to about a millenium if you have good lawyers and many friends. So the navy can't really go out and hurt you, because even if they try, they will have to deal with obstacles that aren't really pretty, starting with the Inquisition taking an interest in people who meddle with their indirect allies (Rogue Traders share many traits with Inquisitors, like freedom of action etc.), moving to the friends of the dynasty and ending with the dynasty itself (if you can salvage and maintain a battleship you are powerful enough to be a potent enemy). So legally you are covered by your warrant from the get go.

professor_kylan said:

Yep, that's the one I referenced; one of the coolest things I've read in a long while, here, and also one of the things that prompted this thread. My problem was that the Light, as i said, was already spaceborne, while my example, or any example using the Planet-Bound for Millennia background, had to be sitting on a planet, under all that gravity, so I wasn't sure how one could get such a vast, massive chunk was going to get up there, again; ships are built in space for a reason. That example, however, doesn't mention how the crew got to keep the Light, after killing the Lord-Captain, Rothe, and starting fixing it up. Thus, here's this thread.

Trader Austin said:

I don't know; while I like the idea, I'd almost have to think that any official would be required to write the writ as REQUIRING the ship be stripped for parts, making sure no intact battleship is waiting to be used, and likely, only a high-ranking officer could sign it, when the ship shows up in the registry as a battleship. I do definitely like the numerous RP options from it, though, getting several options for Enemy and Peer, and a slightly inept, buried in endless work functionary is probably the only hope of getting that signature, short of a terminally bribed one.

For getting it off the ground, it's my understanding that a battleship is 12 km long (7.5 miles, I believe, for those of us in America), and a mile across. In that case, I don't believe any force could lift that up, to stand on an end, and then strap rockets to it, and make it take off; physics don't work that way. I'm pretty sure something from outside the gravity well will have to lift/pull it up, and even that will be hard. A Star Destroyer on a planet stays on a planet, unless the Emperor (Palpatine) wiggles his fingers, and lifts it up, off of the planet.

For fixing it up, I wouldn't have a clue, and my experience with 40k doesn't extend to all the little names in these books, but luckily, the "retrieving the Light of Terra" thread covers that, even with the names, of groups I've never heard of . I'd be relatively confident of getting it fixed, and losing 10 PF, or so, and wipe out any pirates, Orks, and other RTs who come to fight, to get a battleship, if I was just certain that the Navy wouldn't seize it.

Arag said:

Yeah, I'm assuming that the crew finds a mostly intact battleship, and that it they can afford to lose 10 PF, or so, if it means sporting one of the biggest ships around. For the claiming, I believe (not sure) that the Navy plays on the "what's ours is ours forever, until we give it up, so no one can legally salvage it; it's Navy property. If the Warrant is signed by the Lords of Terra, they can say "give it up", and the Navy can probably get them to say it, to keep the Emperor's Fleet mighty, and to keep the RT from outgrowing his loyalty. With the Royal Navy, the ship belonged to the King, forever, so I don't believe you could salvage his property. As for paying it off, the problem is usually that a battleship is unnecessarily hard to build in 40k. They have made it a habit of saying "is it cool? Then only 3 planets out of the Imperium's million have the knowledge to make them, and it takes years. This is a nation where whole world-populations can be press-ganged into making stuff, and it still takes longer to build one battleship than to make the Pyramids, or much of the Great Wall. Due to this, a battleship might be worth more than a planet, so they can't write that check. Peer and Good Rep are nice, but they still aren't a priceless battleship. The Inquisition would probably prefer they don't get it, either, as Rogue Traders can be the worst heretics, GIVEN a mighty voidship, able to siege a world, and constantly exposing himself to numerous warp/xeno travesties, ready to fall to darkness for wealth. Better such a risky investment not be given such a mighty weapon.

I don't know; I'm assuming I just sound like I'm complaining, but it's good to weed out all of these possibilities; if I ever run a game of RT, I assume my players, who ever they might be, will want to claim the Light, or something, once they find it. "Oh, we can't stay here, since the Dread Pearl is on a timetable, but we've got people for this. Let's have them come in, flag the ship for us, and we'll get back to this, after all the money the Dread Pearl will be worth is in the bank. " I don't know if a battleship is really claimable, and that might be one reason for the writers to not put such Hulls in the books; you can't have one, and this is one way.

Besides the fortune needed to refit a battleship even in mild disrepair, running costs would be fearsome. These ships are meant to be supported by the resources of battlefleets, not solo operators. A sole battleship won't pay for it's own running costs. It'll eat a lot of income coming in from elsewhere. Perhaps best represented by less profit factor from endeavours or more misfortunes?

And there the possibility the Imperial Navy will resort to less open and less honourable methods of acquiring a battleship. A ruthless admiral likely has a lot of personal pull and more than a few allies to call on to cause "accidents" and trouble for a stubborn rogue trader dynasty.

If your players pull it off, fair play to them but obtaining and keeping a battleship should not be a pushover.

Decessor said:

While I confess that, yes, it could, would, and SHOULD cost a fortune, I can imagine a few players willing to say it's worth paying the PF. If the ship was yours, and being rebuilt in the background, by your support NPCs, with you performing the big missions to earn PF, and then spend fractions of that toward the refurbishment, along with some of the more important RP moments, interacting with the big people you need to talk to to get some of the parts/work, it wouldn't even slow down the game much, and the pay out, a mighty warship that could scare even the Orks of the Blood Axe Clan's Deathburna. Every once in a while, they might just say "forget the PF, we have enough, for right now (slap for blasphemy), and just want one hell of a bragging chip.

I've never completely understood the stuff of "needing a support fleet". Nothing in the book says, "one reason few rich Rogue Traders often look past the Grand Cruiser Hulls is the need to have an escort fleet of support ships, carrying food, water, resources, and stuff." To me, a Battleship is still just a ship, a big ship, practically a mobile starbase, but still a ship, and one with plenty of room to store stuff. Certainly, with such a massive crew, the need to pull into port might be more common, limiting its time abroad, but tons of in-story battleships head out alone, and no one expected anything bad to happen. It often feels like a bit more of another excuse to keep the biggest ships with the NPCs, so that the Battlefleet can still have something bigger than "these silly space privateers." Besides, if I ever incorporated a salvageable battleship in a game, and it wouldn't be every game, much more rare, it would be near the end of the levels (7 or 8), and by that point, the party could easily have a ridiculous Profit Factor, and have already looted/purchased several "smaller" vessels, thus enabling the support fleet, if the party chose to plan smart. Certain threads here seem to say that enemy ships are often captured all the time, giving many Rogue Traders their own little fleets. Many of them act like their own Battlefleet, so I could see it, even if they might not make friends, that way. The number of other people who say their parties attempted it shows that it could have been done, so...

Now, the military being devious a-holes, and trying to do bad stuff, that I can see, and like. It makes going to the legit ports a risk, and that can make keeping a battleship less attractive. I rather work on the plan of there are no good people in 40k, so the military could easily say "sneak in a saboteur, and to hell with that writ we signed." It could open up a fair number of fun RP options, and possibly help the party see a need to go Hostile Acquisitions route, once the legit channels are shown to have sharks, too.

Despite how this reads, I don't want this to be easy. I want the party to have to work for it (even though my own knowledge would be hard-pressed to cover in-game what they would need to do (but that's what other people's posts, here and elsewhere, are for), and spend money in the tons, while fending off another interested RT, maybe some Orks, or whatever, and having to wait a good amount of time (not a quick process, rebuilding a battleship), but I'd like for it to be doable. Say, for instance, my party reached Lvl 7, and had done much of the stuff in the Expanse; while there will always be an infinite number of other things they could do. At this point, they sit down and say, "hey, let's leave this place, and go somewhere where the pickings are better. We're heading out to the Reach, to "assist in the Angeivan Crusade". There are numerous worlds there, where no person of our persuasion has been in ages, and the threats are much bigger, to reflect that the profits are, too." If they went there, the threats would be different, and much bigger. Tau Fleets, Tyranid Hive Splinter Fleets, some Orks and Eldar, the forces of Chaos with fleets, they all have more ships, bigger ships, and bigger guns, and this is where a truly massive ship could help you. The Crusade has bogged down for ages, and even just one Rogue Trader, with a big ship, and a decent fleet, not bound by their supply chains or command structure, could go a long way toward freeing up the Crusade forces to get moving again. Then, they could spend 1 1/2 to 2 levels tooling around in the Reach, make a ton of money, see how bad stuff there might be (it's made for Space Marines to be challenged), and head back to the Expanse, or retire. This could also open them up to wanting to play Deathwatch, once they can't level up in RT anymore.

As for upkeep of the battleship, I don't completely know how the game uses upkeep, but I'm sure that would be spendy, too. Luckily, the one thing most Rogue Traders are never in short supply of is money. Frequentish trips to worlds, for shore-leave, crew rotation/refreshing, and supply restocking should make even a battleship an ownable asset.

As a last little bit, I feel that if you did, say, find the Light of Terra, and you never did get the ship up and running enough to allow L-C Rothe to make his mad, misguided warp jump, say you killed him out of fear, if you told the Navy where their precious hulk was, they wouldn't do anything to go get it. They don't have the time. or resources, doing all of their military stuff, and they wouldn't want to pay to rebuild it, either; much less liquid assets than a Rogue Trader dynasty. That leaves it open to pirates, who might turn it into a space station, a place to store their loot, and launch their smaller ships from (sort of an island command center for the fleet) or, heaven help us, Orks. I can only imagine if a band of Orks found it. They'd have enough guys to swarm through it, kill all of the Tribesmen, eventually, and Orky tech the ship back into a semblance of functionality, at a much cheaper cost, and then the Imperium has to deal with an Ork fleet led by the Worldstompa. Better it be that Imperial assets retrieve it, especially at their own cost, and it stay with the Imperium. If the Trader goes heretic, at least his usual stops will be places where the military also has eyes, and they might be able to do something.

Well starting from behind, the burning of PF represents setting up a support system for a Battleship (and it's not like they eat so much more than a Grand Cruiser or a Battlecruiser). An RT is not a solo operator, he's the master of a vast trade empire that can support a whole fleet of ships from small transports up to an impressive flagship.

If the navy resorts to less honorable actions, well there's always the arbites. The second Shira Calpurnia novel clearly shows that RTs are legally in the domain of the arbites, so any foul play from the Adepta and the arbites get in.

I also find it interesting that there is an idea that the RT is a push over that can be hit upon with impunity. Talents like Peer and Good Rep mean that a RT can expect favors from the mightiest representatives of the Adepta around, from a private audience with a cardinal to a friendly round of regicide and amasec with a planetary governor. He's part of the elite and he's sanctioned by the High Lords. The navy can't just say "gimme!" when they see RT property, there's a whole set of laws and rituals concerning RT <-> Adepta interaction and there would be hell to pay if force is used.

About the possible reimbursement, there is a story in Abnetts First and Only about an STC blueprint for a combat knife, the two scouts that discovered it were given a planet each . So let's not assume that the Adepta cannot write such checks, they own 3/4 of the galaxy.

The inquisition can just send a constant representative to the RT in question, in fact they might consider him a possible future ally because he's able to act as a strong arm support in the future. Not every RT is a future heretic or traitor, some were Inquisitors in the past.

Venkelos is also right about the support fleet, it's not needed. A battleship can safely transport all of it's supplies on board. They are after all designed like the First Rates of the 18th century.

I was less talking about escort vessels (as useful as they are for covering the rear of a huge and unmaneuverable vessel) but more about the resource base needed to maintain a battleship. The Rogue Trader book describes even cruisers as needing resources to maintain so those issues would logically scale upwards with the ship size. The navy battlefleets have access to the huge Imperial tax base and can afford to throw money into pure warships. Even the largest rogue trader dynasty fortune would pale in comparison. This is not to say that a battleship is impossible to maintain by a dynasty, just that it should be no casual or cheap undertaking and generally restricted to the larger and more affluent dynasties. And certainly rogue traders have their own influence, hence opportunities to play the political game and (hopefully) come out ahead.

in any case refiting a battleship that was crashed can take 100 of years. They are so massive that you need hundred of thousands of workers and raw materials, etc.

It sounds like a ship you would not use for a long long time...

Given the ground based nature, I'd go with this multi-parter, with a new name cause I'm ripping this off for my own game now :

****

Restoring the Spear of Tartarus
Meta Endeavour
-15 Profit factor

PART ONE: PREPARATION WORKS

OBJECTIVE 1: Obtaining a workforce
Theme: Trade
A sufficiently large workforce must be gathered to repair and crew the Light of Terra. Tech-adepts in the tens of thousands, trustworthy Magi, hundreds of thousands of ratings (and sufficient security personel to keep them in line), fifty thousand or more servitors and hundreds of shuttle pilots all need to be sourced, just to have the craft repaired.

OBJECTIVE 2: Gathering Transport Vessels
Theme: Trade
Transporting the workforce and sufficient raw material to the Light of Terra will require a large number of transport ships. At least four transport ships will be required, although more would be a significant boon. The greater the number of transports, the greater the risk of pirates, so a frigate or two to guard the convoy may be helpful.

OBJECTIVE 3: Gathering raw materials
Theme: Criminal, Trade

The Spear of Tartarus needs millions of tons of raw materials of various types. From ceramite cogicator components, to adamantium bulkheads, to photonic hydrogen for the reactors, material must be found and processed. A supply must be negotiated with the largest material traders in the clusters in order to fill your holds.
OBJECTIVE 4: Setting up void docks
Theme: Military, Trade

The Spear of Tartarus is simply too big to repair on the planets surface and lift off again. Void docks will need to be prepared so the components of the great ship, and eventually the superstructure, can be hauled into orbit, repaired, and refitted. While a standard void station could work, for the best results a Battlefleet structure, such as a Ramilles-class Starfort would be ideal. Negotiating such a thing with the Battlefleet could be troublesome, however.

PART TWO: TWO MILLION TONNES OF BLOOD AND SWEAT

OBJECTIVE 4: Locate the Godhand
Theme: None

The tribesmen of the long abandoned world of Ttaras speak of a god who resided amongst the stars since the beginning of time. Whenever the moons of Ttaras aligned, this god would reach down from the heavens to accept his tribute of raw ores, lumber and meat harvested from local fauna. While the tribe was eventually destroyed, its beliefs anathema to the Ecclesiarchy, and Ttaras is lost, cut off from the expanse from a minor warpstorm, legends of the orbital Rogue Trader operator voidstation with its archeotech space elevator still exist. The Godhand station could haul even starship components into the void... perhaps it still can - if it can be found. Old maps, diaries of long forgotten journeys and psychic divination may once again locate the system.
OBJECTIVE 5: Clear out the Ttaras orbital station
Theme: Military

Once Ttaras is found, the station is not so easily looted. Xenos, mutants and unclean things fester in the depths of the long abandoned station, and rot fills it like pus in a corpse. The station will have to be cleansed and sanctified before the Godhand can be removed. The unstable nature of the station makes this more difficult - even a small explosion might be enough to set the infrastructure to collapse. The station will have to be cleared of the things that infect it with blades, spears and boarding pikes - even a chainsword might be too loud.
OBJECTIVE 6: Cleanse the Void
Theme: Military

The station is not the only infected part of space and the void docks are not unused. Pirates, raiders and slavetakers all converge on the stable parts of the station as a meeting point, and the incursion of the Imperium is not wanted nor unnoticed. Packs of raiders, xenos frigates and other more deadly ships are converging on the station and they are more than willing to open fire on their own docks rather than let it fall into Imperial hands. While the Rogue Trader's ship would certainly be able to take these vessels on their own, can they stop the incoming torpedoes fired at long range in time?

PART THREE: RAISING THE SPEAR

OBJECTIVE 7: Pacify the Locals
Theme: Military

The descendants of the original crew of the Spear of Tartarus barely pass as human. Mutated wracks, tortured by the radiation and toxins that leak from the Spear's ruined engines and weapon systems, they view the hulk as a holy site and will hunt any who try to take it from them. While most of the tribes could be cowed into obedience with a suitable display of strength, the inhabitants of the Deep Hulk are mutated beyond believe, twisted in mind, body and soul, and nothing human remains.
OBJECTIVE 8: Activate the Godhand
Theme: None

Once the ruin is pacified, the final stages of the recovery can be put into action. Gundecks, engine housings, reactor cores and many other parts of the ship can be cut free of the hull and hauled into low orbit by the Godhand. There, they can be stripped and resorted to use in the void docks, awaiting the super-structure of the great ship to be returned to orbit.
OBJECTIVE 9: Raise the Spear
Theme: None
Eventually comes the most dangerous part of the procedure. With the local atmosphere whipped into thunderous fury from the Godhand and transport vessels, the Godhand must descend once more into the tempestuous cauldron of secure itself to the Spear of Tartarus. No less than four transports will need to perform an atmospheric insertion, throwing down long chains, grav-grapnels, and boarding hooks to secure the Spear and start hauling it out of the gravity well. This procedure will require four pilots of exceptional skill - if even one pilot makes an error, it could spell disaster for everyone involved. Should the pilots succeed, they will drag the miles long superstructure into orbit. Should they fail, four more hulks will litter the surface of the atmospherically ruined world.
OBJECTIVE 10: What is ours is ours!
Theme: None
Once the rebuilding of the Spear is underway, the final steps to secure the ship must be undertaken. The Administratum must be made aware of the discovery, the Imperial Navy must be placated from simply taking the ship away. The Adeptus Mechanicus must be allowed to bless the vessel without claiming its many archeotect systems for their own. A dozen factions of the Imperium will each present why they have the rights to this vessel - they must be bribed, convinced, intimidated or somehow otherwise be kept away from the slowly rebuilding ship.

professor_kylan said:

I must confess, I never imagined the use of a space elevator; I didn't think that the Imperium could have such a device. If the ship landed on a planet that didn't just happen to have an orbiting station, equipped with such an apparatus, getting a hold of one could be troubling, but hey, that's what the role-playing aspect is all about. I also like how, even with that device, getting a battleship hull up isn't easy, and other ships, pulling it up to support the elevator, is a nice touch, and a good, fair risk. Thank you also for mentioning the vultures circling, waiting to lodge their claims. I'm not sure how you get the use of a space station, rigged with the necessary facilities, from the Navy, but again, it could be a fun dance to get them to sign off on it.

It's a shame that, with the specialized natures of many of the Imperium's agencies, it would be very hard to make the ideal scenario. If a RT could own his own planet (can), and it happened to have an orbital drydock; nothing that could manufacture a big ship from scratch (and piss off the AM), but a big station with the mining rig, manufactoria, and spacedock piers upgrades; a station truly able to refurbish such a vessel, after all of the other work to get the parts and resources. Above their world, guarding the ship would be much easier, and make for a steadily simpler project. Sadly, I don't know how one would get the two objects near each other; a warp jump with a rickety hulk, even one with a functional engine/warpengine/gellar field assembly seems chancy, and hauling a space station is no cake walk, not to mention losing the world below as defense.

Anyway, thank you for info on potentially hauling up a lost wreck; very informative. Setting it up endeavor-fashion helps, too. I might have to make that station, now (figure use a cruiser hull, with the station options from main book; shame no other book extrapolates on such things)

Remeber the golden rule: If it exists, there is probably archeotech for it Hope it helps and, should you run through it, make sure you let me know how it goes!

Ive got a slightly shorter list for you my friend when it comes to worrying about a group trying to steal or fight with you over the rights to the ship. Afterall Everyone so far has forgotten the cardial rule of naval treatise and trade....Salvage rights are AUTOMATIC!..if you find it its YOURS! PERIOD!...what you do with it however..is up to you..

But anyway..as for the less headache...youve forgotten the best of the best when it comes to machine anythings..and it AINT the ad mech retards...( i dont even ALLOW them in group anymore ) The race that was stricken from the lists BUT simply integrated the survivors into the Imperium folds...the Squats...they can get it done faster and better and with less hassle than any ad mech idiot..and they can handle the issues that will arise with fixing and dealing with the whole thing better as well. And they are available for a price....you dont gotta have the whole race crew it...just a few in key places of supervision and oversight to ensure it gets done right...

As for your labor force as well as security..ok go rip off ( buy ) a crapton of servitors from the ad mech...lol..cheap easy and loyal..not gonna talk about it either...and ALOT cheaper than any reglar salvage crews...with the dwarf engineers to oversee things...they can get it done cheaper easier and faster than regular crews can. Best of al...an all servitor workbase has NO union to worry bout..lol that will save you alot of PF right out the gate

As for telling whoever needed about the find..you actually DONT have to tell anyone crap. again salvage rights and what you do with your property is your business ( as long as you DONT go off fighting anyone else in the imperium .lol )

As for others showing up to take it or simply mess with you..thats up to the GM....and how secretive you can be with the find..the less who know...the less likely you are to being attacked by those who want it from you....and if so...then you simply survive the fight..then go have a nice long painful chat with the poor SOB that opened their mouth.

As for the administratum if you simply want to get it all legalized etc...simple...you tell them the estimated gross weight ...not its class or anything...not needed as it is considered SALVAGE..NOT a ship ( especially if its been planetbound for millenia...) chances are they will have lost records of its name ( especially since it wont be on the hull anymore to read..lol )...you simply tell them youve found a planetwrecked shiphulk that has been claimed for salvage ( that is what your senechal is for anyway..to handle all this paperwork detail crap...lol ) and that the salvage your taking from it will be approx X tonnes worth of whatever etc...The rest by rule is still your property to do with as you please...

You could easily run into natives who arent exactly nice...and xenos who want to fight you just because..as well as whatever indigenous lifeforms are on planet...lol

Remember ive done the exact thing and laid out the full storyline..and it took years of time in game to get the ship salvaged and operational again...my RT dynasty had direct ties to the Ordo Hereticus to assist in direct open paperwork as well as defensive operations against any who would threaten it..(But the RT dynasty has entered a contract with the ordos as a condition to have the ship utilized BY the ordos as one of their special operations blackships ) And they did have to deal with several Xenos issues. The methods above are the ones I used to get it done with minimal issues from imperium side...even the ad mech gets to kick rocks when faced off against the inquisition The RT dynasty got a new lucrative writ of trade with the Imperium Navy and administratum for trade as well as consideration for better hulls for future fleet ships at reduced pricing as a result of some good check rolls when bargaining with the relevant authorities ( having the inquisition arrange the meets didnt hurt either...hehe ) What did they get in exchange you ask...simple...The Inquisition got use of the new battleship and the RT dynasty and allies that crew it get access to potential new unrestricted trade routes wherever that ship goes to..they get first ( and likely last ) crack at them..they get access to all the intel from the entire sector as far as pirate activities and who is needing what and how desperately they need it ( all things that help a RT increase his PF ! ) By getting use of the battleship the Inquisition doesnt have to rely on the navy or the warmaster nearly as much to get support when needed and its always there faster....The navy in turn gets an extra ace up the sleeve so to speak...having a msyterious blackship BATTLESHIP show up with heavier and longer ranged weaponry than your enemies do...can seriously cause a routing fast and save the emperors ships of the fleet to fight on. Yes it means the new blackship has to answer naval distress signals unless on a much more important mission...but oh well..small price to pay...The ship uses squat teams and specially trained tech-servitors to handle most repairs....thereby mitigating the need for ad-mech to even set foot onboard the ship...as a result..the ship runs smoother and is repaired faster and works better than equivalent naval service ones with ad mech handling it..lol

Hope you can use any/all of the rundown for ways around things...enjoy

a lot of this depends on the level of realism you put in your fantasy...