[Other] Rogue Trader: Voided Warranty

[Talissen70]

@Spatula, also, thankyou for the feedback. I am thinking of modifying to Catachan Jungle Fighter. I like the bodyguard/hunter idea and remember reading that they often compared other dangerous worlds to a walk in the park compared to theirs.
Will work this through and see how that changes things.
Also, if noone chooses RT as a career, how were you thinking of playing them? (Early days yet though, but curious)
@Mitsubachi, hi again!, do you know if your character will be more melee or ranged focussed so we're not doubling up on the same one?

[Mitsubachi]

Hi Talissen! Together again huh?

I think melee, but I have no issue you taking the same focus - side-by-side fighting will be fun for such an odd couple.

[Talissen70]

Absolutely!
I'm going to adjust a few stats and see where it goes.

[psuedenim]

@SoD

Thanks
- Background: I will endeavour to flex my writing skills some more
- Demise: All Navigators seem to succumb to death either from their mutations or from the Inquisition hunting filthy heretical muties
- Rolls: removed, copy paste all was too easy

[XQbitor]

@Mitsubachi: You should look up Orders Sabine to give Gianna some extra background

[Mitsubachi]

@XQbitor Hmmm yes that is exactly the kind of reasoning behind her joining the voyage, though it is a whole order that would go and do that sort of activity... I'm not sure... I quite like the idea of this voyage being her banishment and punishment.

[XQbitor]

@Mitsubachi NP, just wanted to flaunt my huge 40K knowledge I very much like your app.

I might consider posting a Rogue Trader app.

[SpatulaOdoom]

We could use one.

[psuedenim]

Vignette posted

[mightymconeshot]

Cool. Well if you don't, I will make one. Otherwise thinking Tech Priest or Void Master.

[Mitsubachi]

Originally Posted by XQbitor

@Mitsubachi NP, just wanted to flaunt my huge 40K knowledge I very much like your app.

I might consider posting a Rogue Trader app.

Ah I see! Well, I shall need some help with the lore (and my character sheet. )

It would good to have a roguish rogue trader, (and a tech priest!)

@Everyone; I found an image with a sword for my app.

[mightymconeshot]

Name: Magos Genetus Kelbus Cycerov, Esteemed Calibrator of the Partitioned Helix

Career:Explorator- To Beast Master Possibly, Generator at Rank 3

Description: Magos Kelbus has few similar similarities with the average Red Priest, preferring to augment his own natural genetics over the cold strength of steel. He of course has augmented and enhanced his own body with abilities that exist outside the current human genetic spectrum but he firmly believes that such thing may not be needed in the future. Plenty of animals, both Terran and Xenos are capable of doing extraordinary things from generating electricity to growing bone denser and more powerful than ceramite.

Kelbus is an unanimated man or at least he tries to contain it within. With more organics than most, he struggles to project the unflinching man of pure data as many of the others of his order. Well working on particularly challenging and esoteric problems, he tends to lose control and become more animated as he moves around his workshop. He is extremely secretive beyond even the norm for his order for he knows full well that many might see his work as pure heresy and see everything he has worked for destroyed. It is one of the many reasons that he desires to serve the Rogue Traders and explorers where he will be removed from prying eyes and nosy spies.

Background:

 

Death World, Unnatural Origin- False Man, Tainted, Darkness- Forbidden Knowledge, Fortune, Explorator

Kelbus was a failed experiment, discarded and left to die. Taken as a young child from a world where the only currency was death, his people had little in the way of formal schooling and even less contact with the greater imperium. Once every half decade they would trade with the Captain of the transport ship for essentials to survive another 5 years. He was sold off with a dozen other children to the Red Priests and was brought in and taught their secrets in an attempt to form a new form. His training was similar to that of a Space Marine, intensive study, knowledge transference, and training all the while undergoing horrific genetic and graft work in an attempt to alter and improve his body. Many of the other children did not survive the procedures and the few who did wish they hadn't.

Still, he struggled and managed to live and survive. As puberty approached the Magos in charge decided that he had gathered the knowledge needed and dumped Kelbus on the slums of the Forge World to survive. Despite all that was set against him, Kelbus managed to join and become an acolyte of the Red Priesthood and started to climb the ranks slowly but surely. Of course the genetic manipulation and experiments left their marks as his body started to twist and evolve beyond the confines of the laboratory, but he used his knowledge gained to stabilize his body and mind. As he reached being a full priest, he choose to specialize in the Field of Genetor, both in a self serving attempt to stabilize his own DNA as well as to further explore and show those that had abandoned him the waste of potential they had made by ending the project. However as his projects were closed, edged out, or sidelined by more prominent Magos scared of his brilliance and drive, he eventually started to work to secure passage away from the amble and secured laboratories of the Forge-World for those of freedom. Well his inquiries were pending, he took a leave of absence to make a pilgrimage to Mars and Holy Terra. Well returning from his pilgrimage he got an impossible opening. The ships navigator started to devolve and mutate. The family fearing to lose a prominent and venerable member of their clan turned to his services in an attempt to save his life. In doing so, Kelbus got a first hand look at the closely guarded genetic sequences designed by the God-Emperor himself. He quickly stole terrabytes of data well performing his work before leaving the ship at the next port of call and fleeing to the Calixius sector. Studying and decrypting it, he worked even more fervently in being hired by a Rogue Trader for few would be able to protect him from the wrath of a navigator family if the lost data was ever discovered.


Vignette: Kelbus leaned over the table as the creature squirmed and shrieked in rage at being bound and stuck to the bed. Slowing grabbing another vial of liquid, he slots it into a syringe and presses it against the creature's neck. As the isotopes started to spread, he waved a mechadendrite lazily at a servitor by the lights and gave his eyes a second to adjust. Turning on the scanner he started to calculate just how fast the creature's immune system was fighting against the modified bacteria and viruses he had injected it with. Taking notes, he audibly sighed when the comm light started to flash on the panel. Ignoring it as long as he can, he knew only the senior command staff would bother him against his orders so it had to be important.

Checking the vid feed was recording, he jabbed at the button, "Magos Kelbus here. I am in the middle of a series of sensitive trials. Interruption would delay my work by 10.43 hours and the perishing of 3 rare test subjects. I assume this is important?" he queried with a tone bordering on the annoyed and sarcastic that he knew most humans would barely detect.

"Honored Magos, this is the Command Deck. We are arriving out of warp and the Captain has asked you to attend a meeting. There is a new planet according to our charts and he wants an orbital survey completed with a day of reaching. "

Looking over at the time in the corner, he quickly worked on calculating what exactly that meant for his experiment. Yes, yes. He could finish testing the immune system but he would need to calculate the data later.

"Very well Bridge. I will arrive at the appropriate time. "

Turning back to the creature, he watched as it finished twitching and moving as the viruses finally finished overwhelming its body. Sending its body over to the servitors waiting by the dissection and disposal table, he gestured for the next servitor to bring the creature over. Spraying it with a tranquillizer, he watched its eyes glaze over before undoing the lock and grabbing it with a metal hand. Resuming his work, he quickly was lost in the reams of data.

[SpatulaOdoom]

Of note. If you've got skill gaps, say for example no character with decent medicae, there's nothing stopping you from hiring competent NPC's to fill those gaps. In fact, you might want those competent NPC's to have skills that overlap with your own PC's.

EG: What happens when you need to take the Gun-cutter down to a storm tossed planet on an away mission, but you also know there are pirate forces lurking about this region of space? You're normal crew rating is just 30. Do you take all your competent crew (the PC's) down to the planet and risk your ship being jumped, or keep some of them back. Fortunately, you've got Mr. Christainson, the old navy salt and career Lt., who's pretty good at command (50) and piloting (40), and can watch the home fires while the PC's are all off doing an adventure. He's not outshining any PC, and he's not going to be covering every base, but he can likely keep your ship safe while you're away.

I've added an application tracker to the bottom of my first post. Just because an application says complete, doesn't mean I think it's the final form, just that you have completed/given all the information I specifically asked for.

[SpatulaOdoom]

I continue to work in the background.

Negotiations The sector capital Scintilla, Hive Sibellus, The Lucid Palace. It's the home of sector lord Marius Hax seat of power for the entire sector. It's sparking brain and beating heart. The stark white palace rises directly from the waves of the Great Garieux sea, a great artistic flower of marble sitting atop a squat pillar, looking somewhat at odds with the stark unsmiling reputation of it's current lord. You arrived via ferry as required, giving you plenty of time to observe the tower as water lubs against the small boat's gunwales. By this point you can pick out the well concealed void shield emitters and pop-out flak turrets that will open up without warning and fire on any flying object larger than a seagull that intrudes on the palace's airspace. Rumour has it, that the palace even houses a powerful archaeotech lance weapon that is part of the planetary defence grid, but no record of it ever being fired, or even visual evidence of it's existence, can be found. You're not here to see lord Hax. Despite having come here nearly every day for the last few months, you've yet to even catch a glimpse of the man on the throne. You're here to continue the process of negotiating your Warrant of Trade. The idea of negotiating such a thing seems absurd to those in the know, but apparently Hax is trying something new with this latest batch of prospective Rogue Traders. New is not a thing that most in the Imperium of man feel particularly comfortable with, and not a thing that you would expect from the rigidly orderly hardliner sector lord. The last few months have shown a certain method to his madness though. For each resource and power that you negotiate for, you're required to take up a carefully equalized obligation that works towards the stated goal of pacifying and taming the Koronus Expanse. Rogue Traders that yearn for complete freedom, or at least as much freedom as the basic Warrant allows, will find themselves at a serious disadvantage to their compatriots who are more willing to toe the line and put their shoulder to the wheel. Worse yet, some of those options have disappeared over time as the other prospective Rogue Traders have taken them up. It seems this is being set up, at least in part, to spark a sense of competition between the soon to be newly minted Rogue Traders. Stepping off the boat you find the wizened but smiling form of Adept Krieger waiting for you. Well over a century old, Margrave Krieger's position as one of Hax's more capable functionaries is solidly established, and the woman's friendly and good natured, if somewhat stiff, demeanour is one of the few things making this whole process bearable. “Ensuring that everyone having perfect understanding of what they are agreeing to, and attitude and capability to accomplish those things, is to the benefit of all parties, so you need fear no deception from myself or Lord Sector Hax on the particulars of your Warrant.” Is what she had said on first meeting her. While seeming all rather logical, you once again remind yourself that the matronly woman is not your friend, and has survived longer than most in an extraordinarily cutthroat school of sharks.

The above is a glimpse at things that or will happen if the players wish to RP it outhave happened to set up the launch point of your dynasty. One of the premises of this game is that you get to decide the level of obligation or freedom you start with. The more obligation you take on, the more resources you are given. At highest freedom level, your dynasty will be a little bit resource poor, meaning your PF+Ship points will be at 80 rather than the usual 90. But by taking on additional obligations, you can gain additional resources.

-If for example you take on an “observer” in the employ of the Calixian Administratum and his small retinue, you'll get an additional +6 profit factor, but expect him to be reporting back to Scintilla on your activities.

-Agree to set up a trade route between Port Wander and a struggling colony, you might get occasional use of a basic transport ship. A more capable Carrack class transport might be available if you agree to re-establish a lost colony or establish and support an entirely new one in the name of the Imperium.

-An entire regiment of Luggnum Sewer Rats might be made available if you agree to hunt down a particular pirate that's been targeting vessels and routes cleaving closer to Imperial interests.

-The cardinal of the sector synod is willing to arrange your ship be provided with a Warpsbane Hull, certain concessions and favors (+2PF), and a modest supply of sanctified ammunition. You just have to agree to have his hand picked confessor and contingent aboard your ship to ensure your faith remains true and proselytize to spread the Imperial Truth wherever you might go.

-A skilled Magos of the Adeptus Mechanicus might agree to accompany you for a few years if you agree to make a side trip to study an interesting stellar phenomenon for a few months. Another Magos might be interested in having you search out a lost Thulian Explorator vessel and the trove of data it is believed to contain, and willing to not only provide a platoon of skitarri, but a rare or high craftsmanship ship component as payment for services.

These are just examples, and part of what I'm doing is trying to see what sort of game YOU the players want. Consider, or suggest, the sorts of things you'd like to do.

[SpatulaOdoom]

Both Sister Gianna/Mitsubachi and Mendaric/pseudenim have excellent vignettes, and I feel that Gianna's naivete and fire and Mendaric's jaded worldview will play off each other wonderfully.

You can consider yourselves both hired on as crew.

The game forum is very much a WIP, but feel free to poke your head in whenever you like.