Ok so I'm playing faster than light and thought can we teleport huge bombs on the enemy ship or maybe just a chemical weapon and voila free ship

...what?

You'll have to elaborate on that one, I think.

The power of a Teleportarium is vaguely defined, and prone to exploitation. While certainly you can teleport bombs over to enemy vessels, the mechanics of 40K makes it tricky because a "timer" must be set pretty exactly or else your enemies will potentially have time to disarm it, or it could go off on your own bay while you're closing to enter teleporter range.

Assuming you do get the bomb over and time it perfectly, one single load of viral warfare is unlikely to just wipe out the ship instantly. The Imperium's ship designs are terrbile and confusing, but two things they have never failed on is redundancy, and vast reserves of extraneous crew members to replace the fallen.

I would say a successful attack this way would be equivalent to using a Virus Torpedo from Battlefleet Koronus, which deals quite a lot of crew population damage - though it will almost certainly not wipe out a ship in one volley.

I didn't mean 1 volley I meant at the helm of the ship so the ship is immobile long enough for a boarding party or something

Even if you take out the bridge that doesn't cripple the ship. Most control thrones would have command codes in them, the ability to detect that the command staff has been incapacitated, and an Enginarium full of angry Tech-Priests (with artificial lungs) who would be able to override your command.

Vessels have tens of thousands of crew members on them most times, so taking over the command staff still means you can get Zerg rushed (Tyranid rushed?) by hordes of crew members who would probably go down by the dozens from your firepower, but then pile on you in the hundreds to take you down.

Even if you take out the bridge that doesn't cripple the ship. Most control thrones would have command codes in them, the ability to detect that the command staff has been incapacitated, and an Enginarium full of angry Tech-Priests (with artificial lungs) who would be able to override your command.

If you want to immobilize a ship, forget about this bridge. Take out the engines.

But that's kinda risky in itself if you're close by

Even if you take out the bridge that doesn't cripple the ship. Most control thrones would have command codes in them, the ability to detect that the command staff has been incapacitated, and an Enginarium full of angry Tech-Priests (with artificial lungs) who would be able to override your command.

If you want to immobilize a ship, forget about this bridge. Take out the engines.

But that's kinda risky in itself if you're close by

I agree, although the inability to stop during ship combat is difficult, though not impossible. Especially if your Explorator confidently declares "I sabotage our own engines!" to make sure you are now parked behind the immobile enemy vessel.

Sadly destroying the engines makes it harder to steal the ship for yourself, and also they tend to be annoyingly immune to viruses.

It's pretty simple. Either you allow it, ban it or complicate it.

Personally, I find the teleportarium to be overwhelmingly powerful even without the old tele-nuke trick, so I just say no.

If it ever comes up in my game I have a plan:

1.Tech use test to arm and set a timer/detonator on the bomb

2. Enemy shields must be brought down

3. A second tech use test to operate the teleportarium

Failing either tech use test will result in the sort of things you'd think might happen when mishandling a nuke or mishandling a nuke AND the warp at the same time.

In fact to keep a teleportarium balanced I suggest two things, the first always being that the shields and geller fields of your ship and the target can't be active and that using it under any but totally ideal circumstances requires a tech use test.

Edit: Never mind me. That was stupid and wrong.

I allow it, with much the same rules as Larry.

My players usually rely on their ready supply of murder servitors, but have used the Nuke trick on Korad Vall's flagship. They also have a Melta Warhead for the same reason. Nukes are instant kills, but very hard to find and expensive. The Melta Warhead just does damage as if the ship had no armor (1d10+4) and causes a fire. This is actually less damaging than their typical Hit and Run, as the RT has a Command of 94 before all the ship bonuses.

They have an Eversor Assassin in his Stasis Pod (Korad Vall's treasure trove) that they haven't figured out what to do with. They are thinking of using it against a rival trader in port by quietly slipping it on his ship. They can't control the Assassin, so they figure to just let it do its thing. Not sure what kind of effect I will have that do yet.

1VU = 10k km

So, my nerfing of this tactic starts there.

You have to be within the same VU as the enemy ship to use the teleportarium.

Then, you can freely setup the bomb ONCE enemy shields are down.

Yep, enemy ship is completely destroyed. BUT, warp drive or plasma drive are surely to collapse and suck your ship into the warp or else deal horrible damage due to the huge debris launched at many km/s.

Note that the above is valid for huge bombs.

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For smaller bombs, I just roll them like critical hits depending on what the players come up with.
And critical components like the Bridge and Plasma Drives have "jammers" which are small shields that protect them both against teleportariums and most critical hits (ever noted only big crits can actually touch the engines?).

I believe the range of a Teleportarium is 5 VU (not sure where it is stated, but Hit and Runs are normally 5 VU as well). You need the shields down, and should require a Tech Use check. 5 VU is reasonably safe, most of the time.

Note that only an Atomic is an automatic kill. Anything else I usually have it do damage similar to a single Macrocannon hit (1d10+2 to 1d10+4) that bypasses armour and automatically damages a component (or starts a fire for Melta Warheads). It is actually less effective than sending Stormtroopers or Murder Servitors over for my players. I require a Focused Augury of the ships to hit any component that isn't obvious from the outside, and allow Tenbro Mazes to work normally too. The tactic can be effective, but not a one shot kill unless they are throwing Near Unique ammunition into the mix.

Unless you let them put the bomb in the Warp Engine or Plasma Drive, then you are only looking at a 30% chance of a drive explosion. Note that smaller bombs are pretty much what the basic action is supposed to simulate.

I believe the range of a Teleportarium is 5 VU (not sure where it is stated, but Hit and Runs are normally 5 VU as well). You need the shields down, and should require a Tech Use check. 5 VU is reasonably safe, most of the time.

It's not stated. You can only extrapolate from the range of H&Rs and the fact that the teleportarium can be used for them. There're also no rules about Tech-Use checks or needing the shields down, aside from a suggestion box in Into the Storm.

If I'm not misremebering, you do need your opponent's void shield to be down to perform a teleportation Hit-and-Run in Battlefleet Gothic, which the starship battles are based on.

Of course, that isn't in Rogue Trader, but it would make sense to rule it that way.

Besides, letting your players have a Teleportarium is like asking for your campaign to be broken in pieces. It's one of the most broken pieces of gear in the game, and that's saying something.

A lot of the in-setting fluff requires the void shields to be down for one to teleport onto a ship (including the end of the Battle of Terra, with Emperor vs Horus goodness) so I was quite shocked when that requirement was not put into the actual rules of RT.

A lot of the in-setting fluff requires the void shields to be down for one to teleport onto a ship (including the end of the Battle of Terra, with Emperor vs Horus goodness) so I was quite shocked when that requirement was not put into the actual rules of RT.

I've always considered that an oversight that should've been errata'd

I'm pretty sure this was all discussed in other threads in the use of a Teleportarium, but I guess I can repost it here all again.

Pg 150, ItS, has some guidelines on its use. I may be used once per space combat round or once per session, via one way trip, if not in combat. Void shields of the opponents must be down in order for it to work. Finally, its primary function is hit and run attacks, though the attacking force must find other means of escaping unless used in conjuction with a homing beacon.

As for other RAW... There are none. Other stipulations have been recommended, some of which I agree upon and have added below.

1. If teleporting to a location, that location must be known or the target must be wearing a homing beacon. Say if it's to a ship, a successful Focused Augury action must be completed prior to the teleportation action.

2. Range is limited. Max is 5 VUs, as in the Hit and Run action, pg 218 RT.

3. Some people say a Challenging (+0) Tech Use skill should be combined with the Command Skill. Just like in the Hit and Run action, a Challenging Space Craft skill is used.

4. The target area being teleported to must be clear of obstacles. Meaning, you cannot teleport a missile sized bomb into a broom closet, unless your intent was to send a bomb that doesn't work. If an object is in target area of the teleported device/person, then all of them are now fused/cut in half/desolved into atoms/destroyed/dying with a object sticking out of him/her.

For example: You teleport a bomb with some henchmen onto an enemy vessels bridge. A servitor happens to walk into the path of the bomb as it is teleported in. The bottem half of the servitor is now fused to the underside of the bomb, while the top half of it is inside the bomb. The henchmen arm the 5 sec countdown before they are mowed down, but the device does not detonate.

5. Some areas have their own force fields. Like a Lathe pattern Landing bay. These locations need to be unpowered or shields disabled, in order to teleport to and from them. As a GM, I have assumed most Plasma Drives have some sort of low powered shielding to keep radiation and such contained, ad as such a Teleportarium cannot be used to teleport inside of it. Though u can teleport to the front door.

6. Some people have mentioned that the Teleportarium works by linking into the warp, and as such Gellar Fields will negate its attacks unless unpowered, turned off, or otherwise inoperable. I somewhat agree with this because.... That's how it really works fluff wise.

7. Other ideas as people have mentioned above.

Edit: I'm posting from my phone, so pardon my grammatical errors.

50 000 km for a tremendously precise teleportation into an enemy voidship specific compartment, voidship which is moving at thousands of km/h.

Nah, I am house-ruling that to same VU to say the least.

And the tech use test will be pretty hard either.

If the test is failed the boarding party will become parts of the walls/teleport into a torpedo tube/barracks component/sewage tanks/plasma-filled void a hundred km behind the ship/void right in front of the ship and about to be rammed by it.

Yea, there was some house rules someone wrote which denoted within 1 VU the test was Challenging, and every VU after the test became 1 step harder. Movement of either ship wasn't factored in, I guess to keep things simple. Someone's going to have to search the forums for it if they want more detail. I'm 1) to lazy to do it. 2) typing from my phone doesn't allow me to insert hyperlinks. Mostly I'm too lazy.

Same VU seems really underpowered. What's the advantage there over a standard boarding? Certainly quite inferior to assault boats at that point.

I also don't consider a Lathe launch bay's magnetic pressurization field to be on the same "density" level as a void shield to prevent teleportation. The whole point of it is to keep the component pressurized with air to allow craft to enter/exit without having a physical hangar door. That field has no ablative effect to counter attacks, or even entry/exit, so I wouldn't say it interferes with teleporting like a void shield would.

While I will be keeping my rules, I find the note about the Gellar Field causing problems with the teleport interesting. While things do get through Gellar Fields, even when they stay up, it does seem that it would make it more difficult. I may apply a -30 modifier if the Gellar Field is up. The only question then becomes, what takes down a Gellar Field other than destroying the component?

While I will be keeping my rules, I find the note about the Gellar Field causing problems with the teleport interesting. While things do get through Gellar Fields, even when they stay up, it does seem that it would make it more difficult. I may apply a -30 modifier if the Gellar Field is up. The only question then becomes, what takes down a Gellar Field other than destroying the component?

That's pretty much it. The Imperium may be terrible about a lot of things, but they understand the importance of keeping Gellar Fields operational. I seem to recall that there was a piece of gear somewhere that would sabotage a ship to bring down its Gellar Field in the Warp, but I can't find it now.

I think that Gellar Fields aren't meant to be active when not in the Warp though. The Forsaken Bounty confirms it's not standard practice for it to be active in realspace, so I suspect that it's an either/or thing with Void Shields.

Well fluff wise, the Gellar Field is only activated upon entering the warp. Hence, why they have the Emergency Gellar Field in ITS, pg 156. RAW, there is no reason why you would ever turn your Gellar Field off because the power output of it is already taken into account upon void ship creation. And there are no RAW on the effects of it being active all the time. Fluff wise there is, but RAW there is not.

Can a gellar field and void shields be active at the same time? If so what is the point of the consolidated voidshield/gellar unit from Hostile Acquisitions? A slight reduction in size/power consumed? Doesn't seem much worth it. I'd think if they were mutually exclusive typically, the HA component might be worth it.

In any case needing the gellar to be off to teleport has never been part of the fluff. Just void shields.