Some of my friends asked if I could create a series of small campaigns, as we barely have enough time to play a full fledged campaign as we meet every other Thursday. So I started coming up with campaigns that would last maybe an hour or so. My first idea was this:

1. The acolytes are just coming back from a mission involving the toppling of a slaneeshi cult that was gaining momentum. They board a ship and begin heading to [insert name of choice planet] to meet up with their inquisitor. Everything is going well until a loud screach fills the hallway where the acolytes rooms are. If they choose to head outside, they see citizens and crew members engaging in vulgar actions. A citizen sees the acolytes and charges with the group. It's obvious the these citizens are being heavily influenced by a daemon. If the ship reaches their destination and the planet finds out about the influence of chaos upon the ship, the acolytes know that the planet will open fire upon the ship. The acolytes goal: find whatever is tainting the ship and destroy it, inform the planet that there are members of the inquisition on board that are not tainted, and find a way off the ship before the daemons of chaos rip them to shreds.

2. The investigation of a large cathedral on a hive world turns into a large game of cat and mouse as the acolytes and a squad of storm troopers and sisters of battle discover that an extremely large labyrinth is under the cathedral and is home to a devote follower of Nurgle. Their only guide is a very suspicious man wit a harlequin mask and calls himself The Guide.

That's all for now and that's all I can think of at the moment. Please give me some critisim and some tips. Please remember that these campaigns are also supposed to be short games, not extremely large games.

Demonlord24 said:

I would probably combine the two and make it so that the Slaaneshi cultists have sneaked aboard the ship to get out and when in space they start to try and take over the ship, and they could have members among the crew for some extra paranoia. If its a large ship there might also be Ghiliam on it that can either come out to capitalize on the carnage or come unde the thrall of the cultists and be used as cannon fodder. That could even make for a pretty cool ending scene: the Acolytes come the an old storeroam and there find a Chaos magos seated on a throne made from corpses with a court of degenerated Slaaneshi cultists and half-sane and half-human ghouls around him trying to win his favor.

Try giving the cultists some higher purpose, so the players will feel they've accomplished something important other than simply surviving:

1. The cultists are adherents of the St.Welter's creed. St. Welter is known as the Parton of the Void-born, Spirit of the Infinite Voyage, Eternal Captain… and less known as the Keeper of Secrets Ezkier (only the first part of the daemon's true name is provided for sanity's sake). He travels the dark paths of the warp with his fleet of warp-tainted starships fused into a single insane dimension, always eager to add a new vessel to his already considerable collection.

The low-ranking cultists aboard the starship are seemingly content on raising hell and goofing around while in warp-transit, but the goal of their hidden masters is much more sinister. The Warpgazer (a patriarch of sorts) of the cult wants to capture and sacrifice ship's navigator, thus sealing his pact with Ezkier and sending the ship straight into his unholy fleet.

2. The mayhem acolytes see is actually the battle between two cults:

First one is the (relatively) harmless cult of darkholders not so dissimilar from an imperial death-cult (ie its members like to kill and make a show out of it), the second one - the Slaaneshi cult brought onboard by some miraculously surviving sorcerer of this fell deity. While it is clear the daemon-worshippers must be wiped out with extreme prejudice, just what to do with the darkholders is up to PC's. Will they cleanse everything in righteous flames or will actually win the darkholders over to their inquisitor's cause?

3. The insanity is a result of a demented tech-priest's ongoing experiment. The charming fellow built a great device which can capture and replay the "music of the warp". Just what the tech-priest wants to achieve with the ungodly device is unclear, but the madman must clearly be stopped.

Well, that's the practical jokes my characters played upon the unsuspecting starships anyway

There are some mini-mission ideas here and here . One hour sessions, though? I don't think that's realistic- I can't imagine getting through even a short mission in less than 3 hours…

Well, I mean like an hour session or so, as they have other events to go to. Sorry if that was misleading…

One HOUR only? Man, you'll be happy if they get to start with that limit. Just go with the ship and be ready to railroad them straight to the finish but you don't get much time for RPing or even rolliing die in just one hour.