Hey guys! Just about to get started GMing our first ever Rogue Trader campaign and I'm super excited. My buddies and I have done a lot of D&D 3.5 but I did 40k wargaming in high school and I have a lot of love for the universe so I convinced our group to branch out Super excited.

Anyway, we just got the party's first starship put together—a nice little frigate. I've been trying to get everyone pumped by showing them lots of pictures and having them describe what the frigate will look like. I also told the Rogue Trader that along with his house name I expect him to come up with a house crest and oath. This friend of mine really likes elephants, and so he was telling me the other day that the ship is going to have a huge elephant head on the helm. I was a little hestitant at first but he drew up a quick sketch and it actually looked really cool.

However, this seems a little unorthodox for a servant of the Imperium. I think I count on one hand the number of ships ship I've seen without an aquila spread-eagle all over the helm. So I've been trying to think of some interesting consequences for such a flamboyant display of self-heraldy. I was thinking of something like giving them a slight interaction penalty with eclesiarchy or the imperial navy, but then giving them some bonuses (like a ramming bonus, ramming with an elephant head seems pretty awesome to me) and maybe interaction bonuses with some less zealous faction that I haven't thought of yet.

What are your thoughts?

Private ships can have their own figureheads as far as I know. The penalties would only MAYBE come across if there was no devotional items anywhere and they acted untrue to the creed, but a Rogue Trader is a force to himself (though more so outside the imperium, in it he/she is a small fish in an ocean filled with sharks).

Instead of bonuses, why not suggest the various types of prows? I think a power ram would be the neatest kind, simple and decorative normally, flip of the switch makes it pretty tough (and doesnt take up a weapon slot either)

As a fellow RT GM, I agree 100% with Cymbel. Whatever the RT has on the hull of his ship should only effect other groups if it is renowned. Example: One of the ship packages has this effect. If the player has made an awesome background story then you can reward him for that (xp is recommended, but maybe something else), but for something as little as a hulls figure head, simple ornaments throughout the ship, or even banners with the RT's emblem, just let him have it for no effect/cost.

Hmm. After thinking about it I'm gonna have to agree with you. However, maybe I'll decide to incorporate it somehow with the "Turbulent Past" History that we rolled for the ship. Or maybe I'll just leave it totally unrelated. Thanks for the feedback, I'll give this some more thought.

Histories and Background Packages really are the best way to go

and don't forget

ELEPHANT POWER RAM

MAKE IT PART OF THE SHIP

IT WILL BE AWESOME

Cymbel said:

Power Rams cannot be fitted to a frigate.

Reinforced prows can though.

Sorry about that…..

Gilded hull would be a nice way to put a giant elephant head on the front. doesnt affect much, has a consequense of an easy space or armor or sp or whatever it is (no book here) and definitely shows the houses pride

Cornwallis said:

Yea, but Gilded Hull lowers you Armour on the ship. I don't like the trade off. Of course, if you want it to be flamboyant and be part of a story plot, then all enjoy it. If I was GMing I would give some bonuses to Social Tests while on the ship interacting with dignitaries/VIP's, if a detailed story went with it.

Where is the gilded hull?

Don't have my books with me, but it is either in BFK or HA. I think BFK for some odd reason.

Gilded Hull is in Lure of the Expanse along with Excess Void Armor and the Dragon's Breath Lance Weapon.

What Larkin said.

No, I wasn't slick, like a wet bar of soap?….. Dang.

One of the Rival RT ships from Lure of the expanse has a chinese Dragon figure head, the whole ship has an Asian theme.

Hunterindarkness said:

But, but… In the grim darkness of the 41st millennium there are only white people!

I think in one 40k book they were called easterners (asian), westerners (anglo saxon stuff)and southerners (african) but no northerners. I may be wrong on that, HOWEVER. I remember in the Cain books there are some asian and african heritage (even a dark skinned valhallan) present, but the majority is white.

Side Note: Isn't the EMPRAH turkish?

Cymbel said:

It wouldn't matter. Much like Jesus, he just has to be white and English-speaking or everything will just go straight to… Oh. Yeah… Chaos.

Well while she has an Asian Name, Asian themed armor and weapons and even an Asian themed ship. She sure looked non-Asian to me.

the emperor's enthnicity is confused by being born in what would later become Turkey, but doing so before the Turks arrived. Those illustrations of him that exist seem to be dark haired and with a skin colour somewhere between tanned and north African.

Darth Fanboy said:

Haha. I'm really glad my questions has turned from starships to race in the 41st millennium.

All my players are new to the 40k universe and when I first showed them pictures of the emperor in the rule book they asked me if he was Cherokee.

jarsen said:

Heh. You can confuse them even more by telling them (accurately) that he is truly Caucasian (i.e. from the Caucasus region, not generically white: for that I prefer 'caucasid'), as if you plot his birthplace (not given particularly precisely, as it's usually given as Central Anatolia, although at least one source has placed it on the lower slopes of Mt Ararat, which is hardly central), it's almost slap in the middle of the transcaucasus region (southern caucasus).

Ethnically speaking? Well, pre-historic near-east cultures are hardly my speciality, but a browse through the Wiki articles on peoples of the caucasus suggests that Nakh or Maykop would be the most likely. I'd prefer to say Maykop, as that'd make him from one of the kurgan cultures, but Nakh looks a little more likely to have held that region of Anatolia at the time. I'm most definitely not an expert though.

With regard to the original question, however: there are a number of Imperial Navy ships mounting a plain (or wreathed) skull as decoration on the fo'c'sle and prow, shown mostly in the Battlefleet Gothic BBB (although there were some notable conversions in WD which replaced the prow with the skull head/bridge from the Epic Imperator Titan model). Admittedly, the high-sided armoured sheer-prow the Navy currently favours seems to naturally suggest wings of some sort (originally, Lunar and Gothic cruisers, seen bow-on, were supposed to look just like aquilae), making winged skulls, and aquilae (both single and double-headed) pretty inevitable as figureheads and prow decoration.
There are also a number of examples of a robed (potentially angelic) figure being mounted as a figurehead, most prominently the HDMS Indomitable Retribution (IIRC. It was almost definitely a Retribution-class Battleship).

It's also worth remembering the current trend in prow designs is comparatively recent, with examples of ships built using a tumblehome clipper design, and even straight bows still showing up in Naval Reserve fleets… and the hands of pirates, renegade and Rogue Traders. Sources such as Inferno! magazine and Warhammer Monthly show that fitting ships of classes that normally use the tumblehome clipper prow (like a Slaughter or Canrage-class) with a large decorative monster's head instead (replacing, or occasionally in addition to the pronounced fo'c'sle) is far from unknown (and the Infidel raider is notable for actually having almost a trimaran prow design, with the centre often being replaced with a skull).

In other words: go crazy. Ain't no-one gonna stop you unless your figurehead or prow design is actively blasphemous (say… a gigantic daemon's head, or a bust of Horus).

I wish to see the drawing of THE EMPEROR: EMPEROR OF THE IMPERIUM in a Fez

Cymbel said:

And a bow tie.

jarsen said:

Because bow ties are cool.