I just wonder.

Is Rogue trader using the exact same system as Dark heresy?

If not.....why?

If yes....whay is rogue trader not a expansion for Dark heresy, slik inquisitors handbook?

My presumption is that it will use pretty much the same system, so that it can link with Dark Heresy - and characters will be interchangeable between the two games, I guess. However, this is not a supplement, but a whole new RP experience within the 40K universe. Rogue Traders will no doubt act as the sponsors of the PCs, so being a little like Inquisitors in status. However, here the game will depart, as the role of the Rogue Trader will take the PCs out into uncharted space and like Star Trek, only a million times darker, be about "boldly going..."

Think on a par with humans stepping forward to meet unknown horrors, on par with the Great Old Ones, and I think you'll probably have the idea!

Additionally, I always knew that BI had intended to release a third 'sub-genre' of the game, with players taking on the role of Space Marines. Now that Rogue Trader is on the horizon, this too could come to pass...

Ahem... I have realised that another thread provides you all the answers you were probably looking for!

Just to repeat...

Yes the system is similiar if not the same... why its not an Expansion is because Rogue Traders exist outside of the Imperium, while Dark Heresy default system is the Calixis Sector. While the games are based on the same universe, you're talking about two completely different premises (ie the Inquisition and Rogue Traders) who work on two completely different levels and premises within Imperial Society.

Alcolytes do not go on to become Rogue Traders, Alcolytes go on to become Interrogators and then Inquisitors (sometimes and usually). Rogue Traders are a very rare breed, given special dispensation from the Emperor, or the High Lords to act in certain ways and interact with certain peoples for completely different reasons then the Inquisition.

Basically the Inquisitions powerbase exists within Imperium space itself, while a Rogue Traders powerbase exists outside of Imperium space, and both become significantly weaker in the other area (at least socially). An Inquisitors Seal means nothing on a world outside of the Imperium, and certain actions by a Rogue Trader that outside the Imperium are acceptable will get the Rogue Trader burnt for heresy within the Imperium.

Now that said, the reason they use the same system is so that a) you can do a crossover campaign if you want and b) its a somewhat proven system since its based upon the WHFRP system as well.

have to say, what your'e describing still sounds like a new campaign setting to me, and not a "new game" New PC classes, new background, but mechanics are all the same? Unless the rules have changed, I'd have called it a new campaign release or something.

It would be like saying "Bretonnia!" is the newest game set in the WFRP universe. We've got Grail Knights, and Grail Pilgrims! its a whole new game!

Depends on how you call it, really. Rogue Trader is a "new game" in that, while the system is compatible, the classes and backgrounds are different as is the "field of play" and the scope of the game. It takes place on a different level, in a different place, with totally different characters available, and with a different set of activities written in. Is that a "new setting" or a "new game"? I suppose you could equally ask if D20 Modern is a "different setting" or a "different game" from D&D 3.5?

Note, I'm not saying you're wrong, I'm just pointing out that the matter of definition is hard because it falls into the grey between definitions.

Chernobyl said:

I can see your point, and yes it can be done that way, but doesn't have to be. See its all Warhammer 40k, and the galaxy is a very large place, which means you literally have millions of worlds you can play with. But yet, if you wanted to you could still confine your game, even technically your Rogue Trader game and your Dark Heresy game, to a single Hive if you really wanted to.

So yes, it is in a way a new compaign setting, as much as you can go in totally different directions then your Dark Heresy game is... OR its just an expansion and you combine your Dark Heresy and Rogue Trader games into the same game in which case your expanding your already existing game.

So I guess technically it is a new compaign, still set in the same Warhammer 40k universe and set around the exact same dates, with the very high potential of crossovers and expansions if you'd like.

This is all very interesting. I just got the DH book and Inq hand book. NOW RT is being introduced. I am going to get it as well. I have been craving some RT source material for a long time. I am looking foward to it,

Corporal Chaos said:

You'll want to pick up Disciples of the Dark Gods and I'm going to assume Creatures Anathema. I haven't received my copy of Creatures yet, but Disciples had some really good stuff in it, even as a player, and I'm going to assume that Creatures is just as good.

I´m just confussed in one thing: what´s the power level of RT? It seems to me that everybody assume that it will be "higher" than current Dark Heresy, but is there any proof, with exception of interpretation of original BI plans? I couldn´t find any official statement about higher power level. I´m not utterly against it, but I would rather see RT to be more or less equal to DH as I´d like to use it mostly as new great sourcebook for Inquisition campaign (big =I= is for me a bit more intresting than travelers behind the borders of Imperial space), so I could have fair group of assasin, arch-militant, arbitrator and astropath starting at same level. Could anybody clarify it for me, please?

TorogTarkdacil said:

Actually just after Rogue Trader is released, Ascention for Dark Heresy is coming out, which will raise Alcolytes to about the same power level as Rogue Trader. While we know that Rogue Traders will start at higher levels then a beginning level Dark Heresy Character, there is nothing that says exactly how high in power level a starting Rogue Trader character will be.

Ascension says nothing about "taking Dark Heresy characters to Rogue Trader levels".

yes...and on that note, I probably would have prefered "Warhammer 40K Roleplay" to "dark heresy" because that's essentially what it is. Then you would have had a campaign guide to "dark heresy" campaign and "rogue trader" campaign.

Chernobyl said:

Ive been saying that since Dark Heresy was released last year. You could have put all the rules in one book, the calixis sector in another and what makes Dark Heresy "Dark Heresy" in a third book. That way you could have put the vehicle rules and the GM's kit xenos generator and what not all in one book, not leafing through 5 books and 2 pdfs for all the rules.

Xathess Wolfe said:

Sorry, this just bugs me.

Its Acension not Acention.

Its Acolytes, not Alcolytes.

Just nit picking,

Peacekeeper_b said:

Oh you can nit pick all you want, isn't going to change anything, my college years were definatly not spent learning grammer, and the rest of my years since then hasn't helped.

from france

hello, the way i understant it the best comparison for me will be with the world of darknes from whitewolf. rules are compatible, generics but you have wraith, changeling, vampire, werewolf and some stand alone. same "universe", same rules but differentes games with few possibilities for a cross over.

this is how i undertstand the division beetween rogue trader, dark heresy and the last one. what in espect from the game are "culturale books" about xenos like the scaven book for warhammer rpg

Xathess Wolfe said:

Well at least you are modest about it.

Xathess Wolfe said:

Well at least you are modest about it.

Peacekeeper_b said:

Am I the only one that finds it funny that your name is Peacekeeper and yet here....not so much.

Rogue Trader should have rules for Navigators, Astropaths and Rogue Traders. It has been stated that it contains starship construction, task resolution and space combat. New xenos, conversion guides for characters and tons of new options are also likely. Now, could this have been a separate, campaign book tacked onto the Dark Heresy "system?"

Sure.

But that's not how it was first presented Way Back When . 2006? 2005? Was it that long ago? It has always been marketed as "Warhammer 40,000 Roleplay" We've had time to complain, but nothing's changed. I for one like the presentation. When we're in the middle of a big space battle, with panels eploding and red-shirted servitors dying left, right and center, I do not want to look up what someone's talent from DH does. Let me flip through RT real quick and be done with it.

One hopes that people can see the distinction between what people would have liked to have seen and what they feel is the more likely scenario as to what we are going to get . My personal preference is for a core rulebook with supplements that I can add on to that, partially because that's what happens in my system of choice. It's not happening that way, but I would have preferred it to happen that way. (I tend to feel that you get a more solid, integral system, and a more information in the themed supplements that way. Over the long term you end up with rules bloat [and book bloat!], but that's why you have electronic copies of your fields... Or not, in the case of Dark Heresy .)

Again, just to be clear, that is a preference of mine. What we are likely to see is what we all know about, i.e. the release information that BI and FFG have separately mentioned. Preference =/= reality.

Kage

Just had a quick look through the Dark Heresy book and picked out the following sections that could be kept

Skills 9 Pages

Talents 10 Pages

Armoury 30 Pages

Playing the Game 34 Pages

For a total of 85 Pages out of the 395 total page count. While I would expect large sections of the above to remain the same I would also expect lots of change as Dark Heresy is the Cthulhu of 40k while I would expect Rogue Trader to be more the Traveller of 40k! New skills, different talents for the new classes, lots of new guns and weapons and a large new section on crazy stuff like the rules for crashing spaceships into moons and other such rogue trader activities.

I can understand why people would feel a book repeating material would be a poor move but personally I feel the two games should be different enough to warrant their own books and consider the compatability a bonus. Sales wise it also seems a smart move allow players who are interested in Rogue Trader but not so much in Dark Heresy's Cthulhu in space.

Bazleebub said:

I agree. The CORE books should remain seperate. Its the fluff supporting books that could be combined. If I only want to play Deathwatch later on, I shouldn't be forced to buy the Dark heresy or Rogue Trader core books just for the 85 pages. What I think I'm saying is that the fluff splat books should and could be combined.

I would be very upset with FFG is I spen $40 on the Rogue Trader Xenos Splatbook and got a reprint of Orcs that I got in Creatures Anathema, when one book would have sufficed.

If I were to put on my hopeful cap once more, I would hope that the background would be developed in more detail in additional supplements. While people might find jumping from one book to another for rules as frustrating and a product of rules bloat, the same can be said for the 'fluff' itself. So, erm, I'm agreeing with the last post as well, but asking for a bit more information in that the material that we were presented with in Dark Heresy was not exactly substantial, even if it was appropriately sized and themed for the product in question.

Kage