Great news, Ross!

Really looking forward to what you come up with. For all you guys moaning that there still isn't a scheduled 'guide to Caiixis' all I can say is give it a chance. The best ever campaign (The Enemy Within if you were wondering) contained in part one, a full town supplement and info on the dress of the times etc. Part two brought in river trade and loads of other stuff was provided- it didn't just give you an adventure to run, it gave you a fully functioning society! Everything that came next fleshed this out beautifully. Hopefully, the planned campaign for DH will go some way to providing these answers. Hell, part one is coming out by the end of March , according to the release schedule so we wil soon find out!

@ Serbitar

I'm thinking some of these questions will be interested with Rogue Trader since had their large fleets. Some of the questions have already been answered some what in the other books. Here is a kinda 40 K wiki. I hope it helps flesh out your background more for you. If anyone else want to have a good at the answers, go right ahead. http://wh40k.lexicanum.com/wiki/Main_Page

From my opinion I would perfer to see the Calixis sector returned to user content supported web system as opposed to a smaller book. I really think a set up like here eruvian.com would be great. It would allow for GM and player information and continue to allow Ross to guide the sectors development

Salcor

All these new supplements sound very interesting, and I can just see my wallet shuddering in horror. Most other posters have already said things I'd like to say, so I'll just second their opinions.

There is however one more thing: one piece of artwork in the preview has really caught my eye, that is the corseted woman sitting on some couch on the fifth page. Most of the cool artwork so far was reprinted from previous publications, especially Inquisitor, and the new original while nice, wasn't very evocative of 41st Millennium(besides maybe Andrea Uderzo's black and white sketches). Here's my hope, that all new artwork in this year's publications will keep up to that standard.

seppun1 said:

I know the wiki. But its the job of the developers to bring a universe to life, and, most important, make it a litte bit more consistent. I furthermore do not think that FFG has yet delivered an in depth, consice, and consistent view of the Dark Heresy game world, a thing which is essential for role playing and game mastering. FFG should thus focus on backround books and not more variants of the same items and skills that are already there.

Serbitar said:

Interstellar communication within the Imperium of man work by an astropathic relay system. On one end we have the message author, he (or she) blabbers the message to an astropath who in turn transmit the message psychically to a recipient astropath, who in turn relays this message to another astropath until the message ends up in the mind of an astropath close to the message recipient. It is the only functional way mankind have when it comes to interstellar communication due to the fact that psychically transmitted messages travels through the warp (in other words, fate than the speed of light).

Serbitar said:

A starship activates its warp drive engines, effectively opening a rift in realspace to warp space and enters this rift. Then whilst in the warp the ships controls is taken over by the ship's navigator (a psyker who is able to navigate through the warp relatively safe, by triangulating the ships position in warp space with the Astronomican on Terra, and the destination). If the ship manages to "warp" its way unharmed, it will emerge after some time on the "other end" of realspace (hopefully close to the destination, and with marginally space/time error).

Serbitar said:

Not a second class citizen but more of a 63rd class citizen. They are often chased by religious groups (like the Redemptionists), but are sometimes employed as a workforce by certain houses or corporations (usually treated far worse than indentured labour).

Serbitar said:

Because it is impossible to monitor such a vast place as the Imperium of Man (even the small Calixis sector is HUGE and populated by an uncountable amount of people) And the fact that both the religious dogma (of different religious groups) and the Imperial Law is contradictorial, arbitrary and differing from world to world, its impossible to enforce a standard way of using technosorcery.

Lars said:

The "holy forces" is essntially warp forces (their "holy" nature i just a concept invented by the Adeptus Ministorum). Since the warp is essentially Chaos built by forces that evens itself out, there are certain forces (the so called "holy" forces) that counteract other forces (for example, the Daemonic) very well. Remember that the warp is essentially another form of reality (or unreality) a roiling sea of energy influenced by real world emotion. A sort of powerplant for "supernatural occurences" in the real world. Sometimes the power manifests in hideous ways (mutations, daemons etc.) and sometimes it can be made to manifest in more "holy" ways (Living Saints, Psycannon bolts, acts of faith etc.). Its a question of faith, quite simply.

Lars said:

That one I cannot answer properly (since the economy in DH doesnt have much to do with the rest of Warhammer 40.000 Lore). My take on currency is that it varies from world to world within the Calixis Sector, but for the more civilised worlds there is a standard currency known as Throne Gelts, though its not so commonly used in day to day life, it is accepted almost on every world (except for the most primitive ones, where item trading is propably more common). FOr a real world analogy, Throne Gelts are for the common Calixian, as US Dollars are for a commoner in Somalia.

But thats just my interpertation.

Lars said:

The contested "War worlds" on the Calixis sector map is fighting in open confict with someone (or something). However what or who is probably up to the GM to decide. Lets say you want to run a campaign situated on the front lines of a war against Orks, then it would be appropriate to run that particular campaing on one of these War worlds. Use your imagination!

Lars said:

Usually none (unless the planet is involved in a war of course). Guardsmen most oftenly travel with the war fleets of the Imperium. Any given planets "standing army" is usually referred to as a Planetary Defense Force (from which the Imperial Guard usually drafts their regiments from). The exact number of a planets PDF force differs from world to world, but usually it comprises about one fifth of the entire population (from what I've understood from the Gaunts Ghosts novels). However, there are usually alot of exceptions to this. Take Cadia for instance, which is amost completely militarized (due to its close proximity to the Eye of Terror). Being the first line of defense against Chaos incursions, effectively every child born on Cadia is destined to become a soldier. In contrast to this, a "paradise world" (like Quaddis in Dark Heresy) probably dont keep a particularly large PDF force, due to the entire world just being a holiday resort to a very small social elite who can afford to travel there (but thats just my speculations).

Lars said:

The technology levels in daily life varies from world to world. Sepheris Secundus is involved in heavy mining industry, but they still use an army of serf with pickaes to mine the ore. On a Forge World they probably employ more sophisticated mining equipment (mining servitors with mining helot augmetics, advanced explosives, Thermite Burrowing vehicles etc.). You gotta love the variation!

Cogitators (as I have understood them) are basically computers, but with another name (and probaly a few fleshy components). Like Vox-sets are the equivalent of radio-equipment.

The Tech priest powers are not "magical" per se, but they seem to ordinary people like they are magical (remember, technology is not a "science" in the forty first millenium, its more of a religion). But I have to say that I really dont see why the game master have to know the exact workings of Techpriest powers. The more "magical" and fantastic their powers seem, the better. Why break the immersion? :/

I mean, if you can suspend your disbelief to a point where warp spawned daemons can jump out from a corner and go: "boogabooga! I will eat your soul!", whats the problem with just accepting that Techpriests can unjam guns with murmurs of binary chatter and emmitting static electricity?

Lars said:

That is more of a game master question in my opinion. If im GM:ing i would definetly say that planet specific equipment is NOT available on other planets, or AT MOST its available but very rare and the cost is greatly inflated (depending on what item it is). Therefore i dont really care if a player is whining that he wants to buy a specific gun that is only produced on Fenksworld while his PC is on Sepheris Secundus. The gun is just not available at the current location, either pick something that you can buy on the current world or go unarmed (or at least with the guns that you carry with you from planet to planet that is).

Lars said:

As much as I like reading about those topics too, I must admit that trying to write in such a speciifc way that you seem to want would take years and years, and it would fill several phonebooks worth of pages and once that is done, FFG would have probably only covered one hive city, maybe to at the most.

Economics, sociology and politics in the Imperium of Man is so differing from world to world (and sometimes even from hive city to hive city) that its imposible to create a catalouge that covers it all in such detail. Therefore the only functional way as I see it is to write books with a pretty broad perspective with minor detailwork, and let individual game masters fill out the gaps with their imagination. And i think that creators of DH think the same way.

I have read my fair share of Warhammer 40.000 litterature (rulebooks for the table-top game, and Black Library novels). I have also scoured wikipedia and other WH40K-specific wikis. And the only grand impression i got is that the Warhammer 40.000 universe is an enormous sci-fi/sci-fantasy setting with lots of room for individual imagination. It has to be, because it would be nigh impossible to cover every detail, even of such a small corner of the galaxy like the Calixis Sector.

However, I hope some of my answers could help you out a little, but I must ask you: why not just invent stuff yourself? : / (that is of course a general question to all who demands the same kind of answers to similar questions)

EDIT: uhm seems like i dont really grasp the quote function on this forum. All of my quotes are meant to be from Serbitar...

Serbitar:

I'm not sure about you, but I kind of feel like there needs to be a core book, a players book with lots of gear and some rules that didn't fit into the main book, and a game master's screen for a game to start. To me, those are the only things that are "essential for role playing and gamemastering".We have those. We have a book of scenarios that detail some of the different feels you can go for with your games, at a basic level. Now, we have DotDG, which contains vastly more information than rules, and also contains a scenario that is yet another way you can take your games. After this, we have coming up a book of nasties, which, based on the clips we've seen, also contains a ton of backbround for each beast (which translates to more background for the setting)...after that, we have a radicals book, which, who knows what that will bring...information on the different radical factions probably?

I don't think there is any need for FFG to put out any pure background books...there should be ways to integrate the concepts explored into your games. Besides, BL has an entire library of setting and background books, full of history, society, technology, and religion. I feel like it's pretty clear what things are available to the different planets based on the availability values and the time charts for acquiring them. There are several items that are available only on certain worlds, or at a vastly easier to obtain availability. On top of that, they pretty specifically state that these things have different examples from other planets, and if you want to apply them specifically to your setting, change the name and call it a day.

It's a tall order for FFG to put out an "in depth, consice, and consistent view of the Dark Heresy game world", when really, it's not a game world at all...it's a game of scores of solar systems loosly arranged in the same vague section of space, and controlled by barely organized monolithic organizations which is run by countless people, all with varying philosophies and motivations, and populated by innumerable masses of ignorant drones, ranging from barely evolved savage tribesmen to sophisticated socialites experimenting with the limits of the human experience...secretely, everyone is watched by a shadowy organization that is, in comparison, infinitesimally small. This organization, in fact, has precious little organization, and, in point of truth, is able to function precisely because its members are individuals. These individuals wield absolute power over life and death and their command is irrefutable law, and every single one of them is a shadowy, lying, headstrong, dogmatic, violent and powerful agent of interrogation, torture, murder, discord, verging on insanity, and skirting the line between the blessed and the irrevocably damned. And those are the middle of the road, average Inquisitors, not even the extremists that fall on both sides of the fence, which can go from either summoning daemons or purging an entire planet because they thought there might have been some bad stuff going on down there.

The only consistency I have ever seen from a 40k setting book throughout the 15 years that I've been involved in this hobby is this: Everyone (everyone) is screwed. That's it. The whole universe is a writhing, seething, horrific mess of violence, insanity, confusion, ignorance, greed, and more violence. The Calixis sector is no different.

What's their society like? Depressing and fethed up, led by tyrants, maniacs, demagogues, or fools.

What's their technology like? Incomprehensible and backwards. No one knows how the hell anything works, and the ones who do, really dont.

What's space travel like? Long and greulling. Your best case is that it takes a long time and doesn't involve you being ripped to pieces for eternity.

What's it like being a mutant? Like being a cockroach.

Saying that there isn't enough background in this game is like admitting you aren't reading the books. For instance, even though there is very little mention of it in the main book, there is a huge amount of information available on Fenksworld. In the IH, there are a ton of weapons whos descriptions detail the horrific life that people lead there, plus there is a sidebar detailing each of the hives in a fairly in depth way. Add to that the mention of the Feknsworld Gene Atrocity in DotDG, and the preview of the Fenksworld Pit Thing, and you have a pretty full picture of the planet. There are lots of things like this scattered throughout the books, and you'll find that as they've been coming out, they've been referencing eachother. Tranch, Iocanthos, the Lathes and Solomon are all worlds that also have little gems scattered about the line so far, and my guess is that they keep going like this. I'm sure the Haarlock books will explain the hell out of some things, as well.

Ultimately, I'd rather watch the movie and pick things up about the background, history, and way of life, (and get new things out of it every time I watch it) than listen to a voice over exposition at the beginning for half an hour explaining it all to me .

Well I can see where my money is going to end up this year...

I'm really interested in Ascension and hope it will be well done and not an über-power-up book.

Im hoping the rules for Ascension and Radicals can both be plugged into any ongoing Dark Heresy game and not just "you must have this many XP to ride this ride" type games.

Im also hoping Ascension will finally have real Commissars in it, not just the chaliced variety. After finally reading First and Only and a few other novels for 40K (Cain novels, Rebel Winter, Relentless, Fifteen Hours, Bringers of Death and so forth) it has occured to me that Commissars are often involved in secretive missions, investigations, research and inquisitorial actions that make them very useful to a Inquisitor.

So, Ross, when do we get a preview of Radicals and Ascension?

Oh, and throw my hat into the ring for a definative GM/Background guide.

Peacekeeper_b said:

Amen to that! That I would actually buy. In hardcopy nonetheless.

Kage

wow! Many thanks Ross & FFG. This is a far more ambitious publishing schedule than I had expected.

My credit card lies in wait like a genstealer cult!

Thank you!

Varnias Tybalt said:

I Know that. I am talking about times, impact of communications times on sociology and economy. I want them and I want them thought through.

Varnias Tybalt said:

I also know that. I am again talking about travelling times, thought through costs and impact on economy and sociology.

Varnias Tybalt said:

Give me 5-10 pages on that. I want details, world views, impact on social life, differences depending on planets and social system and so on.

Varnias Tybalt said:

Thats not a satisfactory answer. In fact, there is only one organisation that is producing the high tech stuff, and this is the one that is most fanatical abouts ticking to the rules. The adeptus mechanicus.

Varnias Tybalt said:

Thats your interpretation. Why is there no offical one?

Varnias Tybalt said:

I am not talking about currency, I am talking about economy. How dependent is economy on astropathy, interstellar trevel. What is imported, what not. What fraction of planets is self sufficient, how many are dependet on others, and so on. Economy. In depth.

Varnias Tybalt said:

The contested "War worlds" on the Calixis sector map is fighting in open confict with someone (or something). However what or who is probably up to the GM to decide. Lets say you want to run a campaign situated on the front lines of a war against Orks, then it would be appropriate to run that particular campaing on one of these War worlds. Use your imagination!

I dont want imagination I want a source book with numbers and a consistens universe. I dont have to pay for a RPG where I have to do everything myself.

Varnias Tybalt said:

I want number wich are thought through. Not some numbers some guy writing a novel invented (without thinking about consequences, Abnett has no Idea about economy, sociaology and, especially physics, his mumblings about the lasgun in the gaunts ghost series are ridiculous). An if a planet really has 1/5h PFG why is the IG not attacking biwth billions but only with some millions? As I said, I want this to be thought through.

Varnias Tybalt said:

The technology levels in daily life varies from world to world. Sepheris Secundus is involved in heavy mining industry, but they still use an army of serf with pickaes to mine the ore. On a Forge World they probably employ more sophisticated mining equipment (mining servitors with mining helot augmetics, advanced explosives, Thermite Burrowing vehicles etc.). You gotta love the variation!

Thats just another way of saying: Invent it yourself.

Varnias Tybalt said:

I want hard explanations for "magical" powers in DH. THe game amster should know howthey work so he can extrapolate. Players and ingame characters do not need to know.
DH desperatley needs more information about day to day technologies. Several pages are needed about that topic.

Varnias Tybalt said:

So a huge fraction of items are only available on one planet? Why even bother writing them in a sourcebook then?

Varnias Tybalt said:

As much as I like reading about those topics too, I must admit that trying to write in such a speciifc way that you seem to want would take years and years, and it would fill several phonebooks worth of pages and once that is done, FFG would have probably only covered one hive city, maybe to at the most.

Strange, other RPG systems can do it. Why cant DH?

Varnias Tybalt said:

At the moment I see zero sourcebooks about standard world background. Not even very broad ones. Thats what I am criticising.

Varnias Tybalt said:

I am not talking about every detial. I am talking about a general picture of the WH40k world, which DH does not deliver.

Varnias Tybalt said:

Because I am a customer. And customers do not do the stuff themselves but pay for it.

Serbitar said:

While I agree with some of your points, a 'general picture' of the WH40k world is exactly what we have at the moment. What you're asking for is like a 'general picture' of earth. What can you say? Earth is inhabited by a vast array of cultures with vastly different cultures, religions, technology levels and much more. The same applies to the WH40k universe. 'Thrones' are merely a handy denomination based on tithes, each world (Or each continent of each world) has its own currency. On one world, criminals jack themselves into computers and wage binary warfare, while on others, the village elder is regarded with awe as he operates a tape-fed hymn-engine which is two hundred years old.

Unless each planet is detailed specifically, the broadest of strokes is all we're going to get.

Not that I would mind further detail on the planets and space travel. Quite the opposite.

While it might be hard to produce a detailed picture, what about a "framework of interpretation?" That is, enough information to be able to reasonably extrapolate to other worlds of the Imperium...?

Kage

Tybalt answered Serbitar's questions very well. "Holy" powers are clearly warp based abilities (they don't work around Pariahs, for example) and this has clearly been established in the fluff. Categories like "Death World" and "Hive World" are broad and travel time, because of the vagarities of the warp, can vary tremendously. I'm not unsympathetic to Serbitar's questions, as I realize I already have all this information burned into the back of my mind because of a long history of following 40K fluff and the accumulation of lots of little answers. A general over view of a sprawling, loosely tide together, million world plus Imperium is difficult. I think DH did the right thing by giving a rough guide to the Imperium and then focusing on a single sector.

A general fact "fluff" book about the Imperium would probably be very helpful and popular-and probably something that GW won't let anyone else do. It would be nice to get a sampling of different death worlds, civilized worls, etcetera, but I'm a junky for that kind of stuff.

As for Ascension, I'm really looking forward to it. Dark Heresy is the lowest powered of the three planned 40K RPGs and as such if it can't scale up into the higher power levels, then the other two games are going to be in trouble. I'm fairly sure it can.

The Radical's Handbook also looks tasty. As Puritan careers and gear have already been well covered, the Radicals definitely need some attention. For Puritan fluff, I suggest everyone check out Games Workshop's Specialist Games section and download a legal and free copy of the Thorian sourcebook.. It's pure fluff on one of the most important Puritan factions and the other faction, Puritan and Radical, that are descended from it.

Because I am a customer. And customers do not do the stuff themselves but pay for it.

Role playing games invole the use of imagination and creativity, making things up and describing only the things that are immediately important to the players. A good GM doesn't need to have every little thing spelled out for him in detail, just enough to have an idea how it is supposed to work so that he can expand on it and make it interesting for the players.

If you want a game where everything you need to play is spelled out in detail and no imagination or creativity is required, than maybe role playing isn't for you.

And it's not like you have to do everything yourself, you have all the skills, abilities, psychic powers, weapons, armor, etc.all spelled out for you in the right amount of detail needed to play the game. You don't have to make your own rules, or create your own technologies, or anything like that. All the stuff you need to play the game IS being given to you. All you're being asked to do is create a bit of the background. Who cares if there is no information about how many hive-cities are on the planet Klophon III, or how large the planetary defense force of Hestiax IV is? None of that has anything to do with how the game is actually played. You can make it up as you go along and as long as the GM remembers the answer he came up with, it doesn't really matter if there is no official answer.

Serbitar said:

If you have that mindset, then I think that a standard computer RPG would satisfy you better than classic pen and paper RPG's would do. Even since the first edition of Dungeouns and Dragons, RPGs has excplicitly been about imagination and inventing things yourself, while sourcebooks always have been about facilitating the game masters train of thought (as you may know, the game masters word is law when playing roleplaying games and it is completely within his power to just disregard certain aspects in any rulebook or sourcebook as he/she sees fit). So with this particular hobby, costumers REALLY DO things themselves. And if they dont, they seem to have missed a few major points about what a pen and paper RPG is all about. (and i suspect that it would be a little boring playing an RPG with a game master who needs everythin cut out for him)

Just out of curiosity: why do you shy away from inventing gap-fillers yourself? Are you just lazy, or is there some other reason?

Its not that I cant cleary see that you want all the work cut out for you (and certain RPGs come to mind that you would probably like). But then I would have to say that many of those RPGs have not appealed to me at all, simply because they dont leave enough room for my own machinations, and it would be a pain in the ass trying to change something because the whole world would tumble like a jenga tower if I did.

So you and I are completely diffrent customers. The problem is: which customer is FFG supposed to cater to? Is the money you pay for sourcebooks any more valuable than mine?

Its not that I am against your critizism (any critizim is good critizism). The problem is that the way you present it doesn't seem to achieve any change that you would want. And no RPG will ever cover every angle in any given game world. GMs will just have to accept that somwhere down the line they will have to invent things for themselves. The only question I have is: why does some people think this is a bad thing? Where is your creativity? Why play RPGs at all if you dont want to be creative? (thats three questions, but what the hell)

Quick Question: Is it realistic to expect that the first part of the Haarlock trilogy will be out in march? Since Creatures Anathema was severely delayed (we're still waiting for it over here in Sweden). I am not particurlarly inclined to trust the "Q1" statment in knowledge is power, but perhaps i could be pleasantly surprised for once?

By the God-Emperor! I....Must.....Obtain....all.....of.....these! thx for the wonderful post! great to see whats coming out!

Serbitar said:

Serbitar said:

See previous answer. It takes as long as the GM says it takes.

Serbitar said:

See the description of the Pale Throng in DotDG. It covers the place of mutants in 40k.

Serbitar said:

It is a perfectly satisfactory answer. The Imperium is vast. The Adeptus Mechanicus produces high tech stuff, but illegal, small scale groups do the same all the time. The Ad Mech ignore what they consider 'lesser tech heresy' because they don't have the manpower to root it all out. They concentrate their ire upon the greater heresies, as described (again) in DotDG. What's more, even the Ad Mech don't have a uniform outlook on what is tech heresy or not. One tech priest might gladly produce tech that another considers the greatest of heresies.

Serbitar said:

Because it's a secret. Also, it's not important, unless your GM wants it to be, in which case the answer is whatever your GM wants it to be.

Serbitar said:

I am not talking about currency, I am talking about economy. How dependent is economy on astropathy, interstellar trevel. What is imported, what not. What fraction of planets is self sufficient, how many are dependet on others, and so on. Economy. In depth.

Why? Again, not important for DH. If it is important to your campaign, then the answer is whatever your GM wants it to be.

In fact, this answer pretty much applies to just about all of your questions. Of course, considering your below comment...

Serbitar said:

You clearly have a preference for a certain type of game and supplement. DH is not going to supply you with that. DH focuses on inspiration-based products. They don't bother giving you every detail of every world, because those details aren't important for the kind of game DH is trying to be. Those details may make an interesting read for some people, but as GM tools they aren't nearly as useful as the description of a new kind of alien, cult, weapon, nemises, planet etc. DH provides GMs with story hooks, not the statistics for how much food Scintilla imports every day to feed it's population. And DH isn't unusual in this. Most RPGs these days take this approach. All the things you are asking for = wasted page space for most people. I understand you might have an interest in it, but most people don't.

No one expects the inquisition, not even my credit card which is cowering in a corner fearing starvation this coming year.

And I really must throw myself amongst the crowd saying that you can't expect every little detail about everything, you have come up with some stuff yourself, if not, what are you gonna do when you've played through all the written campaigns etc? just stop playing and wait for the next one to come out?

One thing I noticed is that someone said that other RPGs does give much more info about the gameworld, well, how many RPGs have a gameworld the size of Dark Heresy (or 40k in general for that matter), the amount of fluff and material is insane and I would rather have them explaining the overall feel and look of the game (which they have) than go into detail, as it will take some getting used to for people who know nothing of this gameworld to understand how it all works...I experienced this firsthand at our first DH session this weekend.

Ripper.McGuirl said:

I've snipped out the middle of this post in my quote, and left in just the first and last sentences. As a totality, though, it's probably the best post I've ever read on any forum ever.

Just to make sure there's been no change, anyone know if RT is still slated to come out at GenCon (August) ?

Also, I had heard that Ascension is coming out before RT. Was this ever true? Is it still true?

Thanks for your help.

I never knew a woman with cables sticking out of her could be sexy ... page five proves how small minded I've been.

Deffinately looking forward to all of the above.

Am i the only one wondering why FFG is still giving Dates for their publications ? I've not seen one Game/product/wahtever not at least one Q too late.

dont get me wrong , the stuff is great but im just a little bit upset about their "liberal" use of releasedates ...

p.s. maybe its the little german in me that im the only one to noticq this