[Other] WH40K Wrath and Glory: Litanies of the Lost

[Axiom]

UPDATE: Game is currently full but feel free to send me a PM if you are interested in playing. If I get enough interest I might decide to run a second group.

CLICK HERE FOR AMBIENT SOUND (Open in a new window for best results) The Forge World Avachrus ...is a barren planet of vast mineral wealth wreathed in storms of toxic clouds and corrosive acid rain, Avachrus is locked in close orbit of the Gilead star. The force of gravity keeps one side of Avachrus facing the system's sun, its blazing heat reducing simple metals to slag in seconds. The other side, a crystallized tundra, is bound in perpetual night. Foundry forges dot the world, protecting its citizens from the elements with sheathes of iron. The forge cities that burst upward through the shifting, boiling fields of sun scorched mineral wastelands spiral into the midst of those sheathes. The cities themselves, a nucleus of industry within the chaos of constant solar exposure. Eternal Engines... Relics from the Dark Age of Technology recovered and repurposed by the Magos of the Cult Mechanicus power these cities and their bustling activities. Manifold networks of machinery and massive industrial complexes scatter across raised platforms interconnected by heavily reinforced transport rails. Surrounding the planet is an orbital ring of shipyards and space-docks through which the wealth of Avachrus flows. Spacecraft is not allowed below a certain altitude for fear of it interfering with the protections granted by the Eternal Engines. Access to the forge cities is attained only through elaborate atmospherically protected elevators which deliver both product and people from the surface to the orbital ring and vice versa. The protocols involved in sustaining the operation of these elevators is only secondary to the sacred rites performed religiously upon the sustenance of the Eternal Engines themselves. All organic life below the orbital ring depends entirely on the operation of both the engines and the elevators. If the engine fails millions will die within a millisecond. Incinerated to ash before the screams can even echo within the metallic chambers where they toil. If the elevator fails the population is put on emergency rationing, productions are locked down and every available resource is forced into repairing access to the orbital dock. Only once has an Eternal Engine failed. The tragedy of the forge city Illiarch is well documented in the mechanicus records. It is now a barren shell and a bleak reminder of what can happen to other forge cites if the duty of any single component is neglected. This lesson perseveres within the data-vaults maintained by both the Adeptus Administratum and the Cult Mechanicus. While often at odds when it comes to the prioritization of operations and procedures they come together in tight unison whenever a report surfaces of any breach in protocol. When reports first surfaced of strange occurrences at a major servitor factorum in the forge city Belaxia, teams were immediately scrambled by both Imperial factions to investigate. Before any information could be formally reported by these teams, the facility locked down internally and all communication to them was lost. The entire sector block has since been put on strict quarantine by the planetary government with enforcer squads deployed to fortified emplacements all around the structure. All attempts to breach the building have been met with fierce resistance from rogue servitors and the standoff has since been classified critica defectum. The Astra Militarum is now suggesting that the facility be decimated by a concentrated artillery strike for fear of whatever rogue element is at work spreading to other operations. All other departmentos outright reject this escalation. The manufactorum is the leading contributor of bio-machination to the Imperium war effort and is too highly valued of an asset to destroy. If there is heresy involved, it must be discovered and rooted out. Even a single thread of heresy can be quickly woven into a cloak of shadow that seeks only to snuff the holy light of Terra out from every crevice that mankind occupies. We must guard carefully from that shadow for it is always waiting... always searching for it's chance to strike. Those of us that live to see the light prevail must spread the word, embolden our brothers to face down those threats where the light has yet to reach... or somehow starts to fade. For if we do not.... we are doomed to repeat.... The Litanies of the Lost

DETAILS SETTING: Warhammer 40k SYSTEM: Originally Designed by Ulisses North America, Cubicle 7 picked up the license and republished the Wrath & Glory rulebook fairly recently. It is a bit more polished than the actual mess that was put out back in 2018 but still not without flaws. I try to mitigate these flaws with a bit of common sense house rules, love for the WH40K universe, and effort as a GM who thinks applying the "failing forward" mechanic is just as useful in real life as it is in this game.Wrath & Glory Release v2.1 August 2020 "Litanies of the Lost" is a collection of published scenarios designed to be run with the Cubicle 7 W&G core rules. It is not fully released yet. The preorder comes with the first scenario "Death Beyond Duty" which this game will use as the framework for it's playthrough. I have read through it several times and am very enthusiastic about running it. It is in my own humble opinion, a fantastically well written scenario and I have tried my best to spruce it up with my own flavours including adding a ton of fleshy details, creating custom sound clips like the one above and finding immersive non-copyrighted images to bolster the horror/survival themes through which the game is designed to thrive in. My initial research seems to indicate that while there is a WH40K fan base on this site, it is not very prolific and I haven't seen any indication of there being other active W&G games. I still feel like it is worth taking a shot and if I can find 4 to 5 interested players I will consider that a massive win. Your character will be part of a specialized team scrambled together for an emergency insertion op. Jointly directed by both the Administratum and Mechanicus figureheads, your primary directive will be to identify and eliminate the rogue element within the Prakthertius Manufactorum and restore it to functional order. The difficulty in your task comes from there being very little information sourced from all previous attempts at intel. The facility is a dead-zone... anything that comes within a certain range takes intense and immediate fire. The ground forces believe they have a reliable breach point for a small team capable of securing themselves within post-entry. Once inside, your team is on your own. I do use a variety of house rules and game mechanics that I've assembled over various games on VTT so please take a look at them and make sure that you agree with them. I am of course always eager to respond to questions/feedback on them. CHARACTER RULES AVAILABLE RESOURCES Wrath and Glory Core Rulebook There are a few options I will consider from An Abundance of Apocrypha which are included below. SPECIES ALLOWED Humans or Adeptus Astartes only Variant Humans such as beastmen and pariahs won't work with this scenario but may be in later scenarios. Human characters may choose homeworld options from An Abundance of Apocrypha Adeptus Astartes characters may choose Chapter options from An Abundance of Apocrypha FACTION Restricted to the Imperium ARCHETYPE Tier 2 only (Or Tier 1 with an Ascension package) IMPERIUM Keyword is required. Please note this rules out most SCUM archetypes unless you take the Agent of the Inquisition ascension package from An Abundance of Apocrypha and begin with the Ganger archetype. ASCENSION Only one ascension package may be purchased with starting xp at creation You must select a tier 1 archetype and ascend to tier 2 at the noted xp cost (Note: The multiplier is 2 as you will be ascending upward to 2) The package must fit the Imperium requirements. The only package I will consider from AoA is the Agent of the Inquisition.   House Rules The 5B Rule: The basic idea is that I typically do not share all information to the group as a whole. If you have insight on a particular subject or point of interest that others might not have ready access to then I will only provide that information to you using the 5B Rule explained below. It is then up to you to convey that information through RP as you see fit. 5B stands for 5 Bullet Points Each bullet contains a line of information that starts off more generalized with the first line and gradually becomes more specific by the 5th. How well you succeed on a roll or what level your expertise/familiarity is with the subject determines how many bullets are initially given. Further successes and/or investigation into the subject can produce more bullets in later attempts. Not every bullet is going to be 100% accurate and again this is determined by a variety of factors including rolls and decisions made in RP that have possibly produced invalid leads. I try to be careful with how I construct the 5Bs for both relevancy to the content and utility for your ability to problem solve. THE CORE MECHANIC: Original Rule: Whenever your character does something and the outcome is unclear or dramatically significant you should make a Test. New Rule: Outside of a time critical scene where you don't need to worry about action economy only one Test should apply to determine an outcome until something significantly changes to warrant a new Test. If the Test fails, the Fail Forward mechanic will be in play. LONG RANGE MODIFIERS: Original Rule: If your target is beyond Medium Range, they gain +2 Defence when you make a Ballistic Skill Test. New Rule: If your target is in Long Range, add +2 DN to your Ballistic Skill Test. For each increment of Long Range (or part thereof), add +2 DN to you Ballistic Skill Test. FULL DEFENCE: Original Rule: The duration of the benefit gained from using a full round action for defense is stated as lasting to the end of your turn. This is very impractical. New Rule: The bonus lasts until the start of your next turn. CRITICAL HITS: There is a very glaring contradiction in how critical hits are explained in the rule book and it comes down to these two statements. Point A: If you roll a Critical Hit but your total damage does not exceed the target's resilience, you still inflict the effects of the critical hit. Point B: Critical Hits that do not exceed the target's Resilience still inflict 1 Wound to the target but no other effects. These rules cannot both exist and work together. The way I handle this is to omit Point A entirely. So the New Rule consists only of the following: Point B: Critical Hits that do not exceed the target's Resilience still inflict 1 Wound to the target but no other effects. SAVED BY THE HELM: This is not a change to any rule, I just think it's a cool twist to add realism and flavour. If an enemy or PC is wearing a helm with functioning built-in tech and is struck by a successful headshot they may ignore the effects of that headshot and replace with the following: The helmet becomes non-functioning until repaired and causes the Hindered(1) Condition while worn.

Submission Game =Closed If you are posting interest please follow the format below for the type of character you would like to play. NAME: SPECIES: ARCHETYPE: ASCENSION (If any): BACKGROUND: ADDITIONAL: Think about a reason or reason(s) why your character might be hand picked to be involved in a hastily thrown together task force assigned to breach, investigate and remove an unknown threat within a non-compliant, highly volatile servitor manufactorum. Keep in mind the Inquisition and the Militarum are being pushed out for the time being (more like they are both tolerating being pushed out for the time being) due to the fact that the administratum/mechanicus factions want this place to stay functional afterward. The expectation behind your selection for this insertion team is that jointly you are all able to see the job done without blowing massive sections of the building to absolute bits. Of course, who said there were ever any guarantees right? Summing up though, I want to present that information as a resource for ideas to determine your own narrative as this is the sort of thing that will set up objectives which eventually earn those wonderful wrath tokens.

[Howling Winds of]

First, Axiom, just wanted to say, bravo on this ad! It is true, that WH40K games don't come up that often on this site, but you'e done a fantastic job with this ad. From the images, to the music (which gave me chills, btw) to the writing. I found myself genuinely interested in this world and the story! So, hats off to you. Hopefully, anyone with enough time (and love for the series) will at least drop by and apply!

Second, I am going to see what I can come up wih for this game!

[Axiom]

Thank you Howling! I appreciate the kind words, putting together the ad was a labour of love much like the game itself will be. I think it's pretty common for the average sized RPG site to have a very small niche of WH40k or even WHF fans but among those you can count a very strong and dedicated base that is always hungry for a game since they pop up and/or disappear so infrequently.

I can't take the credit for all of the writing, some of it is taken directly from the flavour text of Avachrus in the core rulebook but I blended it into my own narrative to setup the game story after the third paragraph roughly. I feel like I rewrite every sentence 3 or 4 times after reading it.

I'm also so glad you liked the soundclip! Chills is exactly the intent - I just think an ambient track adds so much to the immersion of a theme and it's easy to do. I've been using soundclips for virtual table top for a while now.

In any case, let me know if you have any questions, I'm happy to respond and if you do put something together I look forward to seeing it!

[thawizkid]

I’m definitely interested, here is my placeholder. I will complete the application today or tomorrow.

Application NAME: Xanthus SPECIES: Adeptus Astartes ARCHETYPE: Space Marine Scout ASCENSION (If any): None BACKGROUND: Xanthus grew up on the planet of Ostia as a farmer's son. When he was young, one of his jobs on the farm was to take out varmints so as to protect the crops. He did this with an old-style rifle that used a .30 caliber round while being perched up in a tower that was built into the middle of the family's farming fields. He had no problems hitting a small target at 500 yards. When he was 16, the local government had a long-distance shooting competition which was presided over by the local Space Marines chapter. Sure enough, Xanthus outshot everyone in his age group and even one of the newest Space Marine Scouts. He was brought before the local chapter’s Captain after the competition and offered a spot as a Space Marine Scout. He accepted and has been going through his training and participating in actual missions for the last five years. In that training, he has furthered his training as a marksman and is known for his long-range abilities, he has also learned to infiltrate into any situation or environment without being detected, and lastly, he has more recently learned the art of explosive and entry into occupied buildings. Xanthus is an all-around expert in the art of getting things done the fast, yet quiet way. Since his training began, he has learned all of these skills in training environments and in practical situations in the field.

[kdtompos]

Apologies. I'm removing my application, but honestly hope this takes off and is the fantastic game it has the potential to be. Goodluck!

[SinnerBeta]

I'm interested, grabbing this spot for my app.

WIP NAME: [REDACTED], Callsign: Green SPECIES: Human ARCHETYPE: Tempestus Scion ASCENSION (If any): None BACKGROUND: S O O N ADDITIONAL:

[Howling Winds of]

Application NAME: Cydosios Falaris SPECIES: Black Templar ChapterAdeptus Astartes ARCHETYPE: Space Marine Scout ASCENSION (If any): None BACKGROUND: Growing up on Astaramis, Cydosios, felt crushed. Crushed by the sheer mass of people, crushed by the monotony. The reverence for The Emperor was also a big part of his life. The one positive? There were plenty of people to draft into the armies of The Imperium when the Chaos heretics arrived. While there more than enough willing volunteers; most of them simply picked up the first Laser rifle they saw and started firing. But, something stirred inside; a fervor he hadn't realized he felt before. An anger, a rage that these so called Chaos troops could just come to his world and invade; taking as many lives (and worse) in the name of whatever Heretical God they believed in. This anger and fury led him to purge the heretics off of his planet. His heroics (or bravery or stupidity, whatever you want to call it), along with a few Space Marine deaths mean taht Cydosios was drafted into the planet's Space Marine chapter. He underwent training for about six years, including the "art" of the purge of said Heretics, which sometimes involved breaching enclosed spaces, clearing them out with a few good shots or a mighty charge and slash from a power sword,while at the same time, learning a little stealth movement and concurrence, too. After all, no use blowing open the doors of a building if you have no clue who or what is inside. What most shown through his training exercises was his skills with weaponry, but also his righteous zeal and willingness to take the point position and charge straight into the action. At first, Cydosios feared thatHe has yet to actually embark on a Crusade, but he is sure taht some mission will come along his actions would be seen as foolish and reckless, but in fact, a Black Templar company had been keeping tabs on his training scores and when the Company felt the time was right, it's Captain tapped him to join their ranks.

[PopCultureBard]

Having run W&G for a fair stretch on here before COVID destroyed my site functionality, I have to say I really love to see this getting more attention. My own situation with free time is still in pretty rough flux so I'm reluctant to take on anything else right now but this game existing is definitely a good thing. I'm unfamiliar with Litanies beyond simply knowing it exists but I'll be following this game with great affection.

[PainterOfMinis]

Posting my interest. Probably a Sororitas or a Skitarii (or maybe a rogue trader, ships be fun...)

[ElderOblex]

What a glorious ad! Always liked the flavor and art of Warhammer 40k; never played it though.

Sadly I don't think I have the time and space for this, but definitely going to read along!

Props to you, @Axiom!

[Ysolde]

Application NAME: Sister Israe Rose SPECIES: Human ARCHETYPE: Sister Hospitaller (Order of The Sacred Rose) ASCENSION (If any): Stay the Course BACKGROUND: Israe is one of the “lucky” ones. She knew her parents, felt their love, had ten short years of life with them. They were not in the ranks of nobility on their Hive World and yet not at the deepest parts either. They worked hard building important machines for the Empire all of her world did. The disease that came to them killed without a care. Men, women, old, and young alike. Few were spared the weeping sores and flesh that seemed to decay on their bodies. Along with the disease came foul agents of Chaos. They tore into the Hive World and killed with abandon. Between the Chaos marauders and the disease it seemed all hope was lost. Then on shining beacons of light they came down. The Sisters of Battle along with the Sisters Hospitallar. The blessed women fought Chaos Marines and won! They healed the sick and tended to the Hive World. They were a healing balm on the world and they took many of the orphans with them. Orphans like Israe who had seen them for true angels and whose deepest wish was to be one of them. Since that time Sister Israe has been a Sisterhood aspirant, then become a Hospitallar herself. She feels the power of her faith in her god as a holy shield against disease and a balm for the wounded. She has fought in battles and worked on plague stricken worlds herself. All knowing that what she does is true good in this Universe.

[PainterOfMinis]

Anesidora-Reductus   NAME: Anesidora-Reductus SPECIES: Human ARCHETYPE: Skitarius BACKGROUND: Born as part of the pet project of a Magos Biologis, Anesidora was raised from birth to have a devout faith in the Omnissiah and his truths in competition with several other children born within the same week whilst completely separated from her birth parents, the Magos acting as mother, father, and everything in-between. It was quite the project - some of the children being taught only through texts, others through speech alone, some with a mix. Some received beatings for their failures, some rewards for their success, but never both. It was their idea to find their replacement in whichever child came out the strongest, it would be they who they took under their wing to develop into a tech-priest. Anesidora was not this lucky one - discarded when she reached the age of 16. She always resented that choice to discard her, to be denied the chance to revel in the teachings of the Omnissiah from a heightened view. These thoughts stayed with her throughout her fate as one of the failures - to be made into a Skitarius. She went willingly, she went quietly, she went to further the goals of the Omnissiah with gentle thanks in her breath that she was not doomed to become a Kataphron or a servitor. Whilst cold logic was all that she had been brought up to understand, it was inevitable that emotions manifested. And that emotion was spite - the desire to show that she should have been the choice. Whilst she knows not the fate of her tutor and parent, the small part of burning emotion deep within her mind that the augments and wires did not reach still hopes that they might hear her name once more and feel the bitter sting of regret at what they might have been able to create had they not... Had they not abandoned her.

[Axiom]

So just a general update to the original post: I moved the date up from the 25th to the 22nd. I feel like that's a good enough cushion to get used to the boards and tools and set everything up the way I like it. Also, the 25th is a Monday. Nothing fun ever starts on a Monday!

Guess what day the 22nd is....

 

@kdtompos - No problem, I appreciate your interest and respect the heads up on withdrawing. Hope to cross paths with you again sometime.

@PopCultureBard - Really great to hear from another W&G GM! I hope you don't mind but I tracked down your game and I loved reading through it. Has all the narrative elements that I look forward to seeing in this kind of game. If you are open to it I would love to talk shop in PM sometime.

@ElderOblex - No worries at all, thank you the encouragement. That is always appreciated!

So on to the submissions so far:

thawizkid	Xanthus	Space Marine Scout
SinnerBeta	Undecided	Undecided
Howling Winds of	Cydosios Falaris	Space Marine Scout
Ysolde	Sister Israe Rose	Sister Hospitaller (Order of The Sacred Rose)
PainterOfMinis	Anesidora-Reductus	Skitarius

I know most of you are still WIP but since I didn't include it in the original post I just want to ask you to think about a reason or reason(s) why your character might be hand picked to be involved in a hastily thrown together task force assigned to breach, investigate and remove an unknown threat within a non-compliant, highly volatile servitor manufactorum.

Keep in mind the Inquisition and the Militarum are being pushed out for the time being (more like they are both tolerating being pushed out for the time being) due to the fact that the administratum/mechanicus factions want this place to stay functional afterward. The expectation behind your selection for this insertion team is that jointly you are all able to see the job done without blowing massive sections of the building to absolute bits. Of course, who said there were ever any guarantees right?

Summing up though, I want to present that information as a resource for ideas to determine your own narrative as this is the sort of thing that will set up objectives which eventually earn those wonderful wrath tokens.

[Ysolde]

Israe ought to be finished.

[thawizkid]

Updated my background.