/40krpg/ 40k RPG General

Oh God Emperor the entire crew is Robots Edition

For all your questions on Dark Heresy (1st and 2nd Editions), Rogue Trader, Deathwatch, Black Crusade, and Only War.
Not the wargame. Not Chapter Master. Or Space Hulk.

Not sure between starting Dark Heresy 1e and 2e? Pick 2e.

Book Repositories (If you're planning to download any Rogue Trader materials, read the .txt file in the RT directory)
mega.nz/#F!Pl0UgbJa!vDtTXMKnvZ26fUbuw4X9tg

There is a new Homebrew Megafolder option in above MEGA directory containing several things.

40K RPG tools, a site that contains stats or references for almost all weapons, armor and NPCs/adversaries. Not updated past DH2 core.
40krpgtools.com/

40k RPG Combined Armory (v6.45.160417), containing every piece of gear in all five lines. Now containing some of the DH2 content up to the first supplement.
mediafire.com/folder/i3akv9qx9q05z

Mars Needs Women! (v1.2.10) (Mechanicus Skitarii and Taghmata for Only War)
mediafire.com/file/lfbawnl8buxaoc3

Fear and Loathing in the Eastern Fringe (V1.6.4) (Playable Xenos for Rogue Trader)
mediafire.com/download/fjhddohpscx1d7x

The Fringe is Yours! (v1.8.4) (More Xenos, Knights, and Horus Heresy gear for Rogue Trader)
mediafire.com/file/vyv56zze9m828d2

"The right tool for the right job." What is it about this concept that attracts powergamers?

Old thread: Purposefully omitted to spite that one autist

It's basically a way to say "I wanna do everyone's job better". It doesn't win you any friends.

How to derail a train on the same scale as the one in Space Marine as a squad of guardsmen with nothing above small arms as support?

Get creative.

If there's a switch somewhere along those rails, it's piss easy.

Well, the current plan is to board the train and set off its defensive car's ammunition. Easier than trying to catch it at the right time down the line, paradoxically enough. The issue is that we have to be *aboard* when it happens.

Remember in Goldeneye 007, how James Bond shot all the brake boxes on the train level so the train would emergency halt? Do that. The 40k train is bigger so you'll get a derail easier.

Staunus Mobile Artillery regiments specialize in travelling with armoured battlegroups across desolate wastelands, preferring to keep their vehicles sealed and their Armageddon-pattern gas masks secured if they have to be exposed to local atmosphere. Tauroses and Salamanders range ahead, providing reconnaisance, while the main force consists of Basilisks and Manticores. When enemies are sighted, the battlegroup quickly establishes concealment, using the landscape as best they can, before unleashing downright unfair barrages of firepower. Their close ties to the Omnissiah (their planet's primary export is initiates to the Tech-Priesthood) let them field otherwise rare equipment, so they are sometimes known to supplement their artillery with Veteran Squads of plasma gunners in Chimeras or Leman Russes, typically Executioner or Vanquisher pattern, but occasionally Punishers or MBTs. These forces are used infrequently, and expected to hold the line and guard the artillery in the event of outflanking or ambush by hostile forces. Attached Enginseers also often accompany in Trojan Support Tanks.
Their home planet's entire surface is a dusty gray desert since it was bombed on a whim by a passing World Eaters Strike Cruiser in M33, and the PDF from whom Guard regiments are raised by lottery get plenty of practice at abusing terrain to fight the mutated, aggressive wildlife that travel the surface in packs and herds, preying on one another and on any humans foolhardy enough to leave the subterranean vault-cities without an armoured vehicle and a battlegroup backing them up. Recruitment to the PDF is mandatory at the age of 13 for all citizens not selected as Mechanicus initiates, so the underground settlements are populated largely by viciously competing child gangs. The Mechanicus' rediscovery of the world and contribution of holy technology has made things better, but the gangs are still in the habit of hoarding food to themselves.

I probably botched the description, but hopefully I got the gist across.
Fething hell, I forgot how bad that scheme is. The fatigues are supposed to be a pale, faded gray with just a hint of lavender, not actually purple. At least the rust-orange is about right.

Qadeshi Outriders

Qadesh is a world where a man lives by his horse and his pistol - this is reflected in the regiments the frontier world produces. Led by its two maverick Lord-Commanders Colt and Browning, the Outriders function as a rough rider skirmishing force, their las-revolvers and lever-las rifles bringing death to the enemies of man. The Qadeshi Wild Mustang, a horse known for both its temper and its loyalty, is the perfect mount for these regiments of cowboys and florists.

They're basically carbine cavalry, highly mobile on horses and based off all the old cowboy movies and stereotypes. Pic quite related.

There's also the Qadeshi Chargers, a super-heavy regiment from the world (as in, there is only one), who drive a Glaive special weapons tank, but I like the Outriders a hell of a lot more. By far my favorite regiment I've ever made.

this is gonna sound nuts, but hear me out:
Tyranid and Daemon player characters

>Tyranid player characters
No.
>Daemon player characters
Maybe?

>Daemon player characters
...Go on?

>Daemon player characters
Rules to make a Possessed are in Tome of Nurgle, Black Crusade. To play a daemon itself would be exceedingly difficult. It would be more akin to Deathwatch where you are summoned by some schmucks for specific missions and whatnot, while you wait in the Watch Forte...ah, Warp in the meantime.

>Tyranid Player Characters
This would be an interesting thought experiment. It's certainly possible if everyone plays an alpha or synapse creature. XP is spent when you're reborn on a new battlefield, and adaptive metamorphs to further improve you and your future strains / incarnations. I was considering making a Tyranid book once but I decided not to. Don't care enough for it.

>It would be more akin to Deathwatch where you are summoned by some schmucks for specific missions and whatnot, while you wait in the Watch Forte...ah, Warp in the meantime.
theoretically, whatever heretics or unscrupulous traders willing to keep a daemon with them 24/7 could probably find a weapon, machine, or poor bastard for it to possess when it's not murdertime so it could stick around.

Keeping a pure daemon about 24/7 is hard though. It usually only happens on Daemon Worlds because the warp needs to be thick that way. And Daemonhosts are usually bound so the daemon inside don't explode their host and wreak havoc before fucking off to watch Happy Days. And being bound to a weapon is allegedly NOT fun for the daemon.

I don't get this image, what is it saying?

It's the story that explains how the Ultramarines accidentally summoned the Tyranids to the galaxy. Uh oh Spaghettios.

>Tyranid and Daemon player characters
Possessed Ymgarl Genestealer PCs?

I was invited to a DH 2E game just now. I have never done any RPG other than a simple homebrew with a bunch of fa/tg/uys and a Pathfinder game that dissolved after 2 sessions.

My 40k lore knowledge extends only as far as reading the wikis like an autist and having played a couple of video games adapted to the 40k setting. I know the general gist of how the world works, and how most of the main establishments of the Imperium came to be. But pretty much anything past the Horus Heresy, I don't know jack.

How fucked am I?

Not at all as long as your GM is cool

put all your grenades on a string and arm them at once, then toss them at some thing important.

You're fine. DH2 is less low-powered than DH1, and if you're GM doesn't suck then there'll be lots of investigation and narrative and stuff.

You'll be fine, just pick a homeworld that wouldn't be expected to know more than you do, or have a decent GM and invest in Lore skills.
But I don't see why you'd want Lore skills when you could play a Feudal Worlder running around in full plate, screaming in Latin while hitting things with a hammer.

Is there any place I can find a 40k game? I have been looking for so long.

What character are you looking to play?

I have a lot of Guardsmen type characters, some for only war, some for Dark heresy, I am working on one for Rouge trader at the moment but I am honestly flexible.

>What is it about this concept that attracts powergamers?
It does?
But by the phrase, that makes no sense.
In most games, you can be very good at a handful of things, but you can't, by dint of design principles like xp, do everything with excellence, unless you have access to a power set that allows you to do so with minimal cost, such as magic in 3.pf D&D.

Is weapon tech in DH2e worth it, compared to earlier iterations?
Bumping a weapon up once per fight seems a bit of a waste for the xp cost it has.

Most of the time you wouldn't use it. The time you would is when you really want it.

Thanks much, gents. Added to the list.

Anyone else feel free to get in on this action. Want the warm fuzzy of the knowledge that some user has your regiment in line for a cameo or supporting role in one of his games? Give 'em to me!

Help me out Veeky Forums, I'm gonna GM Only War for a couple of players completely new both to roleplaying and 40k. They've already created their regiment of sneaky, Sniper Rifle-toting Death Worlders, and I've become a bit stumped... What should be the introductory mission given to such a regiment?

Large scale assassination of a planets PDF force starting with its leadership, simple mission that could be something to cut the players teeth on or could become a larger story if the players fail.

You can do sniper missions, spec ops style combat, skirmishes all the way up to open warfare if things go south.

Counter intelligence op.
Infiltrate, on foot, behind enemy lines, take stock of their arms and any possible armor, report back.
Secondary objective, eliminate/capture enemy officers for interrogation.
Tertiary objective, destroy their ammo dump with the 2 provided demo charges.

Depends. Do you have more information on the unit?

Do they deploy in full Regimental force, or are they parceled out by platoon or company to Imperial battle-groups to act as scout-snipers? Are they meant to be assassins, counter-snipers, designated marksmen given to other infantry platoons, or do they report enemy positions to artillery and air assets? Do they operate behind enemy lines, or are they expected to support the main line of battle? If the former, how do they get there? Are the expected to sneak in themselves when the foe is distracted, or are they inserted sneaky-deaky like through a night-time HALO drop?

Gotta give me something to work with, famalamadingdong.

>most proud of raiding cavalry
I know the feel, mang. The cavalry half of this infantry-cavalry Regiment was probably one of my favorite things to write in any Imperial Guard unit I've done.

Well, the regiment ended up being geared towards sneaking behind enemy lines with no Drop Troopers shenanigans. They've got Synskin, Preysense Goggles, and are very lightly armored.

They also have a Regimental Rivalry going, so I'll have to figure out what kind of regiment they're the rivals of.

Keeping track of what the enemy has, where troops are going, possible assassination of small squads that leave and of important people.

Something I like to do is give the Rival Regiment some quirk like all being blond or using a flashy bit of uniform so they can be identified at a distance as "The bloody wankers from X Regiment!"

I've actually been thinking of making their rivals a Nobleborn regiment. What better bunch to contrast with Death Worlders?

If you are going with that you could emphasis the slightly better quality of gear or the better food and treatment they get despite doing slightly less then other regiments.

Don't fall into the trap of making the regiment become a paper tiger, despite being insufferable lazy rich kids they are still a deadly regiment and should be used as such.

The class divide is a very easy one to play off of as chances are your players are not hugely rich and are automatically slightly annoyed at rich snobby people. (I know I am)

Assassinations, scouting from the backfield (what would be more irritating than someone calling in artillery or air strikes from behind you?), occasional guerrilla raids where they go after supplies or poorly-defended depots or weak installations like AA or indirect batteries, the possibilities are pretty high.

And occasionally--when a Lord Commander fucks up or just doesn't care that much--give them a bit of line infantry duty to make them really appreciate how much leeway being what are effectively The White Feather special forces gives them.

I know for a fact that I will definitely have a mission down the line where the players will have to cover the advance of their very rival regiment.

Work work

>I know the feel, mang. The cavalry half of this infantry-cavalry Regiment was probably one of my favorite things to write in any Imperial Guard unit I've done.

Shiet, I'm having about as much fun writing a space lizard riding Dragoon/Recon regiment from the post-apocalyptic ash wastes of a hive world. The combination of carbine armed cavalry and heavy weapon toting Sentinels is pretty hilarious and cool, imo.

Pic related is a strong inspiration.

The thing to remember about Regimental rivalries are that they are inconvenient for commissars and lord commanders, they won't like them and like all good political soldiers they like the rich nice smelling lads better than the alternatives despite how effective they may be.


Officers and commanders in a regiment cannot get involved in minor rival disputes due to the commissat and the overall commanders but will often discreetly support their men and women.


Any conflict that happens between the regiments will see the officers mysteriously disappear for the actual conflict and reappear when it's over or will offer the officer deniability of any involvement, if they don't have deniability they could find a bolt round with there name on it thanks to the lovely commissars.


Here are a few situations I have used in the past in my own only war games.


Privet Larry got his teeth knocked out while on the loo and he says it was X regiment, how do the players get even (Moral loss if they fail to get even)


X Regiment have policed a shipment of X (make it something rather nice to have like krak grenades) marked for the players regiment, how do the players react.


The players regiment have not gotten their food rations and rumour is that X regiment have gotten double rations, what do the players do. (You can get sneaky with this one and have it so X regiment did not get any extra rations or even any rations at all and have the players put themselves in a very sticky situation.)

Dark Heresy 2e : Tech Priest : Replace the weak flesh. All cybernetics are two more available.

One of my players is asking if he can let the player with high influence roll for his cybernetics acquisition while benefiting from this tech priest ability.

I'm thinking NO, but what do you guys think?

No. The techpriest could roll for cybernetics for others perhaps.

>the better food and treatment they get despite doing slightly less then other regiments.
I get so much mileage out of this it's hilarious
>You guys are eating enriched pressed kelp bars, all the nutrients you need and, unfortunately, all the taste of kelp
>The nobleborn are eating bacon mac and cheese MREs and complaining about it
>What will you do?

Short form: No.
Long form: Nooooooooooooooooo.
Actual explanation: The techpriest gets bionics and such cheaper because he is a member in good standing with the priesthood of Mars and gets priority on bionics orders. The nobleborn administratum commerce and influence monkey is not and does not benefit from such. At most, he could Commerce-Fu the Techpriest's own Influence roll, bargaining for him.

Perhaps you could play Hybrids in a genestealer cult, working to prepare for the great uprising you will cause right before the Hive Fleet arrives? You'd get orders from the Broodlord or his Magi, and you could give out leaflets for your totally on-the-level social club or Imperial Faith bible study club. Assassinate authority figures growing suspicious of all the creepy looking bald people. Acquire high quality wigs and spirit gum to help infiltrators stay hidden. Etc.

Which system would be best for this? DH2.0 or Only War?

Do eldar use cybernetics?

Wraithbone?

Hypothetically they'd use wraithbone if they were forced to, but they have the technology and psychic shenanigans to re-grow lost limbs, organs and the like. It's a lot harder to make cybernetics 'worth it' for Eldar as their biologies are already bullshittingly good at what they're designed for.

I guess some suffer from battle-caused amputations. Wonder what would be their society's stance on it, though.
Also, isn't there art of eldars with bionic eyes?

Yes, they're a lot sleeker and more "organic" looking than human ones, though.

>daemon PCs
It could work; it would probably work far better if every PC was a daemon, though.

Would it make sense if I made an offer to a player in my DH2e game to change things about his character, like background or role, if they don't apply anymore, or the circumstances of their character growth makes the ones they have nonapplicable?
Such as someone whose background was Adeptus Ministorum, role Heirophant, but has broken away from the Ecclesiarchy or become disillusioned taking up the Outcast or Penitent background/roles?

I say no. The background is where they started from. the base upon which the character is built. After the beginning, no amount of development erases the past.

>no amount of development erases the past.
My ministorum character underwent mind cleansing and was given the memories and personality of Gang Xiangbang Wu, an underhive gangster rapist with a murder problem. Do I still use the Ministorum background then?

No, you use no background because I'd kick you out for trying edgy bullshit

Did this rewrite erase the Characteristic bonuses and starting skills you had? If not, then the background remains.

>>I'd kick you out for trying edgy bullshit
>punishing edginess in a 40K game

I've been wanting to play a game of Deathwatch with people, but I always have a hard time with either "railroading" my players or allowing them too much player agency. For Deathwatch I thought I'd get a good balance, but it seems that players tend to think that they have to go on the tactical advice of their Deathwatch captain no matter what, and despite only giving them that advice when they ask for it I run into roadblocks. I'm told the games are fun, but still. I also have a big problem with making missions way above or below somebody's rank. Like taking out an etherreal for rank 1s, or extracting an inquisitor for rank 3s.

The next campaign I want to run involves extracting an inquisitor from a zombie apocalypse on a hive world. The zombies are running fungal daemonspawn, caused by a nurgle uprising. There are hundreds of thousands of these things running around, and they're only just beginning to hit the outlying supercity from the main hive, Spira Majoris. The hive is huge in comparison to other hives, holding several trillion people who then relocate to the outer supercities (of which there are 6) which house manufactorums for assorted goods which are then sent off on the Hive spaceport, located towards its apex.

The inquisitor is in his office in a manufactorum for titan weapons. This planet is of huge importance and has a Space Marine chapter with a full deployment there, as well as a few Blood Ravens to "support". I don't know what space marine chapter it is though, could use some help on where to locate a Hive like this. There are also hydroponic jungles located across the manufactories and supercities, as this planet is mostly a desert. These hydroponic jungles are an old-war artifact, as they're supposed to be used for terraforming (but now make oxygen fuel for production).

I was thinking the SM's would airdrop onto a hydroponic jungle observation area and then move for the inquisitor, only to not be able to be picked up...

...because Heretics have made AA in the surrounding area. Communications would also become jammed (maybe I should put this on a timer instead of having it directly after the inquisitor is picked up?) and thunderbirds wouldn't be available for pickup unless they're closer to the top of the spire (1/2 of the way up). The source of the jamming would be coming from the underhive, so that's also a solution to get out of there. But I'd like some help in finding things they'd find on the way there, and where major fronts would be in the Hive. I imagine since the Hive is mostly meant for recreation (consumer goods and stores) and housing, the main fight would be in the manufactories for the SMs with the underhive mostly unlooked at.

>Rouge Trader has plenty of homebrew material for various needs
>so does Deathwatch, Only War, and Dark Heresy
>but not Black Crusade
why are we cursed so?

What needs do you have?


Black Crusade RAW is pretty flexible

>fungal daemonspawn
>planet has hydroponic jungles
This can't end well

I suggest you look at as much necromunda material as possible. They got great fluff and plothooks for hives. And gangers are bound to be tough as nails in a hive city where a chapters recruits from.

Having chapters recruit from this hive makes me think it'd be a lot more interesting, and would explain why a lot of the gangers in the underhive fell to various chaos influences during the takeover. Should I make it so that a core founding recruits, or should I just consider a smaller space marine chapter or subchapter?

And yes, the players should see their hydroponic jungles start to turn against them, which is really unfortunate as they're one of the only areas that is mostly untouched, as they're the farthest from the Hive.

Is there any rules on drugs and consumables craftsmanship?

Only on what is listed in the drug entries themselves.

I'm going to run a Black Crusade game for the first time soon as my first time GMing at all, and I was hoping to fill out a nice supply of homebrew to patch any hole or give any content my players might like to use.

Just use equipment from other lines and the OW Hammer of the Emperor variant pattern rules.

Are there any rules for playing a Space Marine Scout anywhere?

As in a new Scout or Scout loadout?

Either really. I'm using Deathwatch as a system but this section will revolve around a relevant chapter's scouts while the Deathwatch characters are elsewhere (Players delegated it), and I'd like to have it a playable session instead of descriptor because there will be some juicy plot hints that may or may not be revealed to said scouts.

Just look through the equipment section of the splat books. I think Rites of Battle had the armor.

Do we have any homebrew pdfs, or offical materials about vehicles? I only know about what is listed in RT's Into the storm, and I am suprised that it has the Rhino APC, but not your average chimera among the example vehicles.

Only War and Shield of Humanity is your best bet.

Only War has tons of vehicles.

Deathwatch has spessmuhreen vehicles in Rites of Battle

If you're looking for the Valkyrie, the only one in the entire 40k rpg line is in a RT premade adventure and it is a cargo variant.

So, what's the verdict, when a player in Only War switches to an Advanced Specialty, do they get the talents under "New Talents" as compensation for the +5 characteristic they miss out on? The book doesn't make a damn peep about the issue, only Aptitudes and Specialist Gear.

If they didn't, why would it be listed?

Yes.

Played a good chunk of onlywar and DH 1.0 inbetween d&D 3.5 to 5. This was around 2012-2013 a cool "Cinematic" shot of the crew

Our chainsmoking lasgun specialist with a fear of climbing - died killing a dozen bloodpact like goddamn Rambo round after round rolling like a champ as the DM tried to railroad him an escape he refused (climbing a ladder).
A mumbling operator that went blind from a friendly fire incident and had bionic eyes. Kills himself using plasma weapons – DM intervention made him mostly bionic. Died from drowning and some hilarious rolls
The clumsy stormtrooper that was never in the right place to use the damn flamethrower. PC could not comprehend positioning. Tanked grenades and a missile launcher shot from encamped cultists and then forgot he was equipped with a flamethrower. Made a famous hellpistol shot that shouldn't have hit in pitch darkness, and 1v1'd our friendly NPC Inquisitor guide in a fist fight. Died to being left by the party in an underground lab and killed by nurgle zombies.
Breacher operator (Tallarn) that demo charged himself - rerolled and killed himself the next TWO sessions in a less than heroic deaths. Piloted a Sentinel when dropping into zones. Has never sustained a hit from anything but his own doings – except the grot that crit him with a pistol when attempting to sneak in.
Sharpshooter aka the TF2 Sniper and about as much consistency showing up late as Larkin's mental state. Didn’t make some sessions, had the chainsmoker take his place and control him.
Field medic that RP'd being afraid of chaos dreams - rerolled as a psyker – died, and we got the field medic's brother back with the same stat sheet.

When does the background bonus of the Abeptus Sororitas come into effect? If I made a Demon World, Sororitas, Mystic (I blame the GM if they let you do this) do I take the 1d10+5 Corruption Points for my choice of homeworld as I don't yet have a background but take Insanity Points instead of the 1d10+3 for being a non AAT Psyker? Is it all one or the other?
Note: I do not recommend this build. Obviously Garden World offers much better synergy.

Only insanity points.

Does anyone know how sector maps like this one were made? Is there a program everyone uses, or is it just photoshop? It needs edits bad, and I don't know how to fix it.

I unfortunately don't know, but there is something else.
I've checked the "Spess Mareen Republican Commando Distribution Document" you posted a while back, and noticed two things.
Since you usually take things that already exist in the tabletop, there is already a laser destroyer in the lathe worlds supplement for DH1. And also I think the Heavy Beam Rule for the Glaive is a very bad representation from the tabletop.

>tabletop
RPG, I meant RPG

Probably done with photoshop originally, icons might've been made with illustrator. Pretty simple to do.

Fuck. I don't have photoshop. MSPaint it is.

I didn't see any laser destroyers in the weapons section. Is it wielded by an enemy?

I've been giving the Glaive some thought for a while now. I think I might end up changing it similar to what I did for the Ordinatus Ulator, a wide blast for the entire range.

Craftworlders, yes. There's art. It looks appropriately Eldaresque.

Dark Eldar don't use cybernetics if they can help it. They strongly prefer getting a replacement vat-grown for them. A deldar with a robot arm is a deldar without money or connections.

> First time running
> Wants even more shit to keep track of
concern.pxr

I just built mine in Powerpoint

Scout Armor is in the Deathwatch Core rulebook. Fancy Deathwatch scout armor and equipment is in Rites of Battle.

> Great big mega
> Crowdsourced combined armory
> Nobody fucking uses them

>I didn't see any laser destroyers in the weapons section.
Because it is listed under Rapier on pg. 63, it's the Het-pattern Rapier Laser Destroyer.

>Glaive
That sounds way better.

I know about the armor, but I'm more interested in general loadout or talent sets.

They declared the weapon and platform as the same construct instead of modular swapping? What an absolute hassle that causes.

It was first edition, lots of things were improved since then. Also the way it is handled in 40k it's probably just this pattern of rapier that works like that.