Curious about rogue trader

I've been curious about the Warhammer 40k games lately. Anyone have any experience running this? Is it any good? Is the system complicated? I'm kind of intimidated

Which ones? I think they're all a bit interesting. Played in a one shot to determine our annual campaign. Most didn't like progress cost and branching for dark heresy.

Rogue trader specifically

Rogue Trader the FFG RPG?

Like the rest of the Wh40k RPGs, it's crunch as heck, especially with the extra expansions. However, it's probably got the most class diversity out of any of the other 40k RPGs, as it allows for you to play as Dark Eldar or Tau characters with their appropriate tech, plus the rules for customizing your vessel are really cool.

Ugh, I was just reading Dark Herasy today...now I'm interested in Rogue Trader too, but I'm so loaded up with games....

The percentile system for skills does seem uber crunch...but at the same time it's not as confusing to me as Shadowrun still is. I finally just learned how to shoot someone in that game. Probably still did it wrong.

Playing a WH40K RPG has been something I've wanted to do for a very long time (as a long-time fan of the games). However, I don't have the rulebook and it seems as if you really would need one for these games. One of these days I'll get the system.

just curious if anyone has played it. maybe one day it'll be run on this site (probably not by me, I don't knows squat about the lore) after some of us drop a few games.

I've played a bit of Dark Heresy, but never Rogue Trader or Death Watch (I kinda wanna try Death Watch...)

Death Watch is on the other end of the spectrum from Only War. One you're a guardmen and death seems pretty easy, the other the party is sent on a suicide mission to defend a planet for the most part on their own but they're like the 0.001% of Spacemarines across different chapters...

Ugh, you know I'm going to have to run this. Since I'm on the demo team for FFG now there is always the possibility of working other events, so knowing their core three systems is something I need to do for more availability to help with events. I know Star Wars and End of the Workd well enough, WH40K is the new white whale.

Honestly though if I can stumble through character creation for Shadowrun, I think I can figure or anything. :)

Hopefully you don't get stuck with Anima or trying to make a flexbot/multiple body for Eclipse Phase (they're the most broken).

Alright, jerks. I'm going to start reading the Rogue Trader corebook. I'm overrun with games for now, but I think a few should be wrapping soon, so that will give me some time to read it. I'll let everyone know when I go to get a game up and running.

I've played some RT, and yes, it's crunchy as all get out, but there's a fair bit of diversity in the classes and between members of classes. I ran a Seneschal, built as a Master of Secrets, I had more spies than the Arch Militant had bolter rounds, both within the ship and within other organizations. I could have just as easily built a highly efficient merchant.
Fun system, I'd be inclined to run it at some point in the future, though not right now.

I'll have to track down a cheap copy of the PDF

Thinking of running the intro scenario that is in the corebook. So if anyone has interest and wants to play it, if you are obtaining the corebook, don't read through that adventure. :P

gonna have to wait till payday on that one...

I'm waiting for at least one other game I'm in to wrap up, then I'll probably be looking into this one.

so I'm reading up on some of the lore thanks to the internet, and for some reason tech priest appeals to me. is this a feasible character in rogue trader?

Tech Priests are amazing! However, I think they serve under the Machine God... I can't think of a good reason for one of them to become a 'rogue trader" (space pirate).

the search for more knowledge?

Actually the tech priests are indeed included in Rogue Trader and it makes sense why they would. In the book it describes them more as even more zealous and rogue members of the Machine Cult that seek out new machine technology from the ancient civilizations. They seek out these things much like religious artifacts.

Their tech lust seems to drive them to this, though again the ones that would travel with a Rogue Trader are probably ones that are less comfortable with the stagnant beliefs of the tech cult who seem to look down on those that try to innovate and create new tech. They think these ones have massive hubris to think they imagine themselves as more wise than the ancients.

Also they themselves would not be a Rogue Trader, which seem more the captains of a ship rather than just a "space pirate". The Rogue Trader is the one who commands the fleet of his Trading House. The tech priest would be more an advisor and asset to the Rogue Trader with his knowledge of technology. In return the Tech Priest gains the chance to help find new and undiscovered ancient tech to bring back to the Machine Cult.

...I've been reading a lot of the Rogue Trader book in the last few days, and I'm not even to the MASSIVE lore section just yet. That's just all from the character creation and Career Path sections.

yeah, that sounds good to me

In Rogue Trader the Career Path it is called 'Explorator', in case searching that on Google might turn up more info.

I Played a total of 2h of Rogue Trader : We explore some ruins of an ancient civilization, a 100 on the Warp table and paf half a planet destroyed.

That only makes me want to play more. I've gotten through the first portion of the book and I'm like, oh, this percentile system is pretty easy. Then I flipped the page and ran headlong into the crunch of the system. There are so many secondary systems, crafting, ships, house management, etc. After that is a massive section on the lore of the system. Suddenly I'm swimming in an ocean.

If I start up a game no doubt it will start small in scope, using the intro adventure for sure. After that I'll worry about the rest. Definitely if I run a game of this players will be required to have a corebook or corebook PDF. I can't summarize enough of this stuff in How To forums.

that shouldn't be a problem. do you think you need to have a small group of players too?

On average I go with 4 players for my games. Very manageable. I could kick it up to 5 if need be.

The game does encourage a lot of player input : The captain of our ship spends hours with the gm designing the ship and the history of the family.

That idea I like, giving more of the autonomy over that to the players. That is one of my favorite parts of systems based off the Apocalypse World RPG.

An other point i have talked about with a friend : Is it better to know the universe or to let the Gm make us do discoveries. Like in Cthulu : if you can have the best experience if you don't have any knowledge of the universe. It keeps the weird part weird.

I think like Cthulu it would be cool to have players not knowing as much, but rank and file will also let people know how much they should know going in.

Reading some of the Dark Heresy book there are those that know of the horrors of the void, because they are far above the average grunt on planet who only looks to the stars with a frightened sort of religious view of the area outside the dominion of man, but people like a Rogue Trader crew would know these horrors way more because they live and breath on the fringes of the Dominion of Man. They have to be tougher and more aware of what could await them in the swirling voids.

So I think it depends on what your character's history will and should be. A Rogue Trader crew should know more about the dangers in and out of the Imperium, but even then they are those that arrive into places uncharted by the Imperium first, so they are also the ones discovering new threats that even the higher in the Imperium may not know or understand.

so I've been reading up on rogue trader and the techpriest and I'm really starting to love the concept

*prays to the computer and burns incense*
"smacks the side*
*turns it on*

Reading part of Dark Heresy and now Rogue Trader, I'm falling in love with the concept in general. A galaxy where we use incredible technologies that we can't even begin to understand, and we basically see it all as a crazy religion. Did I mention that space is basically a Lovecraftian horror?

Not to mention our God-Emporer is basically a living raisin corpse. Yeah...don't ask, it's a whole thing.

It's all so dreary and drab and gothic, and somehow that is just incredibly unique. I love how on top of all that though the Rogue Trader steps in and he is basically somehow still the foppish swashbuckling captain of a ship. It feels like it is throwing a whole pirates layer on top of the WH40k series.

I'm imagining a really grim dark version of this

From my reading so far...not far off.

so I've started reading the lore... and holy shit... how have I not gotten into this before?

I KNOW RIGHT!!!

Oh, that's right, I wasn't about to spend thousands of dollars on miniatures.

I absolutely LOVE the 40k universe/lore.

And that's why I played on digital tools.

Are there Warhammer character sheets?

On GP? No.

40K's universe is a lot of fun. I never got into the miniatures, but I did manage to play various W40K games on my computer (Space Marines, Dawn of War series, Gothic Armada, etc.). So I have enough of an understanding of the universe to enjoy it and find it compelling.

Space Marine, the third person shooter they did was great.

I've been spending my 4th of july weekend nights watching youtube videos of various 40k video games. holy. shit.

The player who chooses the Rogue Trader is the Captain of the ship and the group as a whole usually has to explain why a core group of his top men(the XO, Chief Engineer, and Chief Security Officer for example) would want to go exploring the planet/interact with npcs/etc. The great thing about Rogue Trader that seperates it from the others in the WH40K line is the "mini-game" of managing your Profit Factor and Endeavors. Basically, you make loose objectives to accomplish in a sector of space to build your status and wealth.

sounds cool

...and I jus picked up the crb from an Amazon seller.

Did you use my link...? :p

I have the PDF, but I may end up buying a hard-copy. I'll make sure to use your link if I do. :)

Admittedly, no. I worked for Amazon for 12 years so www.amazon.com is muscle memory. That said I do have a PayPal subscription that I recommend everyone do. :)

smile.amazon.com should be muscle memory! And either way, I'm just messing about. I appreciate people just being on the site!

=)

smile.amazon.com was, as it turns out, launched after I left. :)

I hear you also get to yell "die, xenos!" and "for the emperor!" a lot

Depends on what world you come from. Outside the Imperium they may not even know of the glory of the God Emporer. They shall soon come to learn the light of the corpse emperor.

Oh, did I mention you have to sacrifice 1000 psykers to him a day to keep him alive?

I read that.. this game is metal as fuck

Part of me wants to just start it up and have a really long onboarding process for the character creation, just to get things moving. Though I would love for there to be character sheets. *wink wink nudge nudge @Keleth*

One of the first games on a previous iteration of GP was a Dark Heresy game with 3 players, each of us having 3 characters in a stable, wherein we brought one character to each mission. It inspired me to have people apply to games as a player then submit a number of characters equal to what the GM set, rather than just apply to a game as a single character.

well, like I said, I set on playing a techpriest, so i'll be yelling "heresy!" a lot

You might actually be thinking of a Missionary. They are the ones that expouse the word of the God-Emperor to the unwashed masses. They try to bring such savage worlds to the fold.

The tech priest, at least those of the order that would strike off with a rogue trader seem to expouse word of the Machine God and worship the guns and technology around. Of course some in your order would consider an Explorator to be on the verge of heresy with their ideas of exploring and digging up new tech and improvising their own new tech.

no, I was thinking of a techpriest. I just want to shout "heresy!" a lot.

explorators aren't known for being entirely mentally stable and are a necessary evil in the eyes of the Adeptus Mechanicus

Man I can't wait to get this game going someday. :)

hmm.. I start the game with a servo skull companion. maybe I'll name him Heresy

There are Techpriests who explore to find the lost machines of previous ages, like mass fabricators.

The sad part is I want to PLAY in it, but I'll probably end up running it. Unless someone else wants to take up the call.

yes, I was totally thinking of that. find lost technology and knowledge, probably end up having to use it to save our lives, and be really odd to talk to at the same time

well, we're getting new people from the modifier podcast, maybe one of them wants to run.

Heresy!

Heresy!

Die for the God Emporer foul xenos!

blessed is the mind too small for doubt!