FATE warhammer 40K hack WIP

At the moment in-between re-organising my notes for my FATE powered Rogue Trader campaign i've also, on and off, been working on assembling the collection of rules and hacks that I use into something vaguely resembling an organised document so that I can have all of the information in one place and make it available to other people.

Currently the hack focuses on the most pressing issues in my own game:

• Purchasing items.
• Space combat.
• Travel through the warp.

I plan to add to the hack in the future as I go along, eventually making it into a useful reference for people who want to play 40K RPGs using the FATE rules system.

The current hack is available here.

Planet and NPC sheets

Having created my system sheets to record information in my game, ran a short session yesterday that seemed to go fairly well (will be posting a write-up once i've had chance to listen to the session recording); i've now had time to create my planet and NPC worksheets.

You can find links to them below:

• Planet worksheet
• NPC worksheet

Format of Information

So last night I sat down, having already done most of the system generation in the FFG "Stars of Iniquity" rulebook and with my notes in hand ready to write them up in a more formal fashion so that I could put them in the box file that is going to be housing all of my session notes henceforth; some sort of standard layout would make it easier to record information, so I eventually decided that I would need the following sheets.

• A star system sheet - this would contain details of features in the system, along with basic details of any threats and planets.
• A planet sheet - this would contain detailed information on the various planets (plus any moons orbiting them), resources and territories to be found there and basic information about what civilisations could be found on them (if any).
• An NPC sheet - this would hold detailed information on an NPC, including their stats, there homeworld and any forces under their command, it would also contain details about their personality, like and dislikes.

After a few minutes of tinkering I had a suitable star system sheet prepared, you can find a version of it here.

A couple of hours later i'd detailed the Ariadne, Catan, Coppernicus, Decusis, Endeavour and Footfall systems using the sheet that I had designed; a filled in version of the sheet for the Catan system can be found here.

I'm pretty happy with the systems at the moment, i'm hoping to get the rest of them written up over the weekend and make any final tweaks, alterations that I think the game calls for.

Stars of Inequity

Okay, so tonight i'm going to be putting down on paper as many details as I can for the main NPCs of my game; inspired by a number of youtube videos/channels that I have seen on the subject (including woodwwad's channel and others) and the free-flowing explorative nature of the Rogue Trader game I have decided to detail out as many of the core systems (the basics of which were already generated as described in my post on system design using the Disapora rules) in the sector of space where our game takes place as possible.

Some of the planets in the system have already been detailed (see my Hiveworld Scelus Prime and Catan II posts earlier in the blog) but this still leaves vast swathes of the gaming area either very loosely defined or not at all; recently reading Fantasy Flight Games Stars of Inequity book for the Rogue Trader system has spurred me into wanting to define these areas in more detail since it provides detailed systems for using this that will allow me to create worlds and detail the star systems more closely (although i'm sure that I will tweak them to fit the tone and established "facts" of the campaign). The charts in the book are largely system independent or can be used quite easily with a few little alterations, so that it won't take a great deal of struggle to port these details over to the FATEcore rules system that we are currently using in the game.

One thing that I have also gained from watching woodwwad's youtube channel is an appreciation of the fact that, paradoxically, in order for the game to give the players a sense of freedom and the ability to explore as their whims dictate, it is very much necessary for a gamesmaster to have put a lot of work in detailing the sort of people and societies that they are likely to meet, in order to convincingly and consistently portray these non-player characters in the game. Whilst I have been enjoying the game tremendously and the players seem to be doing likewise, most of the action has, at the moment focussed around a couple of key areas, not really capturing the exploring, go anyway, feel of default Rogue Trader; my plan to help deal with this is to detail as many of the key-NPCs that the players are going to meet as possible, providing them with character sheets, backgrounds and goals (a lot of this work has already been done on key npcs already but i'm planning to standardise my NPC information).

Having located at home a large box folder my plan is to generate (or note down) the following:

• Character sheets & backgrounds for the named NPCs encountered so far
• These will also contain details of the NPC goals plus any fleets or forces that they command along with their strengths and weaknesses.
• A one page write-up for each system containing details on the planets and any other astronomical anomalies in the star system.
• Currently I am also considering adding some areas of unexplored or wild space to the map where there are no established warp routes but that players can explore if they wish, there would be a small chance of the players encountering a habitable system (that would then be randomly generated).
• This does pose the issue of how to prepare for these random systems, however, no more than one is likely to be explored per session so it would be easy to prepare a number of NPCs that could be bought in when an appropriate star system was discovered.
• A one page write-up for each planet of interest containing details of the prevalent societies or main dangers and encounters likely on those planets.

Next session I intend to begin with the Eldar envoy Da Duith Iath giving a small briefing containing the details that his race are willing to share about the ancient enemy that has returned, then I intend to pretty much hand the session over to the players and let them do what they want; with all of the NPC and star system/planet information that I have generated, it should be easy for me to respond to whatever they want to do.

Recording Game Sessions

As stated in my previous posts, I made a recording of my previous session; just to clarify for anyone who may be concerned

• NO video recording of the players was made
• Once the recording had been made the audio file was stripped out and the video (which mostly showed me since the laptop was facing me during the session) was deleted
• The recording WILL NOT be used in any way beyond assessing ways to improve the session and enhancing my note taking ability.
• Any recordings made WILL NOT appear on this blog or any other set up by myself.
• The ONLY session reports that will appear in this blog or on any other I set up will be written reports that do NOT feature the names of the players.

My main purpose of recording my sessions is because I don't want to hold up the action whilst I furiously scribble notes and (unfortunately) my memory isn't all that great, however making skeletal notes and listening to the sound file afterwards has already enabled me to write a much fuller report of last session.

It has also enabled me to highlight areas of possible improvement for the game.

• OOC chatter: An awful lot of OOC chatter went on during the session (I myself was as guilty of this), I intend to re-organise the playing space and have a couple of breaks so that we can confine OOC chatter to these breaks and keep more IC during the sessions.
• Rewarding good RP/selling other characters: The sound file makes it easier for me to pinpoint areas of exceptional RP that deserve reward.
• More detail required: It has become obvious that I need to put more detail into the areas and NPCs to give them more verisimilitude, it is my intent to begin this as soon as possible.

Rogue Trader Campaign Log - Session 11 : An Ancient Enemy

A week after the wedding of Lord Admiral Black to Lady Dominique Decusis the celebrations had finally died down on the Hive World and life was slowly beginning to return to normal; with the blessing of the Imperially appointed rules of the planet Lord Corith Decusis enough additional crew members had been recruited from the hive city to provide the refitted Venerus with something approaching a full compliment of crew. Enginseer Prime Pak and Confessor Cornelius were placed on the Venerus (under the command of Lord Captain Polaris Black) and took it back to the Imperial port of Wander, on their way the Enginseer took the time to examine the scarab like creature that he had captured down on the hive city and had held in isolation every since; although the creature stubbornly refused to give up many of it's secrets the Enginseer was able to establish that the creature seemed to be made of some sort of metallic alloy that shared several similarities with living tissue and that it could interface with/control mechanical apparatus using twin wire-like proboscis that it could project from the "head" end of the creature.

Upon their arrival at Port Wander, Confessor Cornelius, pleased that Lord Black was now Admiral of a fleet (albeit a small fleet of two ships) decided that it was only appropriate that the occasion be celebrated, purchasing two bottles of rare terran vintage wine, a box of cigars and commissioning an especially fine black and purple suit with silver embroidered trim; in addition he collaberated with the Enginseer to obtain a swagger stick topped with an Imperial Eagle and containing a shock capacitor (provided by the Enginseer) built into the other end to act as a surprise weapon. Following his work on the swagger stick Pak visited the Adeptus Mechanicus outpost on the station and was met by senior techpriest Rha-Haz, the same member of the order who originally recruited him into the mysteries of the Omnissiah; he explained about the almost unstoppable meldings of dead flesh and machinery that they had faced on Hiveworld Decusis and about the heretical xenos technology encountered, in response Rha-Haz showed Pak footage from one of their monitoring posts on the outskirts of the sector of an unknown vessel moving towards the rim at tremendous speeds, Pak recognised the same ship that he had witnessed leaving the Sycorax system.

Enginseer Prime Pak discussed the possible setting up of a Mechanicus outpost on Hiveworld Decusis, he was also asked by Rha-Haz to enquire about whether or not Lord Admiral Black would investigate whatever remained of the old Mechanicus base in the Sycorax system, since most of the explorator fleet were on deep patrol searching for the xenos vessel. Rha-Haz strongly hinted to Pak that in return, the order would ensure that Pak's request for additional shuttle and landing craft would be pushed through the system.

Meanwhile the Lunatic Pandora was still in orbit around Hiveworld Decusis, Lord Admiral Black was showing his new bride Dominique around the ship, she seemed thrilled by the image of her husband, the brave Rogue Trader exploring the stars with his fleet, however a meeting between the two nobles and the surly Navigator York Benetec threatened to sour the situation when Lady Dominique took a clear disliking to the mutants lack of manners and appropriate etiquette; despite Lord Black's best efforts to smooth over the friction, it was clear that the Lady had already developed a strong dislike of the twisted, hulking Navigator. Escorting his wife to their quarters, Admiral Black bid his Navigator make the ship ready for their journey to the Sycorax system. Upon arrival in the system they were able to navigate the Sycorax warp storm using the knowledge that they possessed from their previous trip of a safe route through, along with York Benetec's ability to factor in the warpspace drifts over time; an automated probe was launched to scan Caliban II whilst the ship itself continued into orbit around the jungle planet of Caliban IV.

Taking a squadron of troopers and his Navigator, Lord Admiral Black took a small landing craft and began to skim the surface, searching for the area where they had previously encountered the strange almost human xenos creature; unfortunately the area that they had cleared of vegetation had grown back making it almost impossible to locate, however, something just beyond the physical tugged at Fortunus Black's awareness and he was eventually able to guide the lander to roughly the same area that they had journeyed to previously. Using his ability to peer into the warp Navigator Benetec was able to see that the huge double tree at the centre of the clearing was actually some kind of artificially made entrance into the immaterium that was surrounded by strange, elegant symbols - they appeared to be of the same construction as the symbols seen on the metal xenos creatures although obviously not actually the same language.

In a small cantina on Port Wander, Enginseer Prime Pak was approached by the grimey, dirty figure of the criminal Thomas Vitanteur; tensing slightly (Pak had hoped that they had seen the last of the criminal when they had dropped him and his accomplice the rogue-tech Vorl on Port Wander) the Enginseer felt a thrill of fear when Vitanteur admitted that he had recognised Pak as a person who had double crossed the syndicate prior to his induction to the Adeptus Mechanicus. Vitanteur made Pak an offer, his rogue-tech Vorl had located a potentially new source of technology on a world in the system, technology that a Rogue Trader could legitmately claim as salvage, in return for a share of the profit Vitanteur would provide the coordinates and would forget to report Pak's identity and whereabouts to his superiors in the Syndicate; Pak agreed to take the idea to Lord Admiral Black.

Meanwhile Confessor Cornelius had visited one of the many cathedrals in Port Wander that issued forth praises to the Emperor, he was surprised at the level of bustle going on in there as people rushed around preparing provisions and items for some sort of expedition; introduced to Deacon Kiril, Cornelius discovered that the old Deacon and some of his congregation were making a missionary expedition to the Endeavour system, a violent and primitive world that did not know the Emperor's light. The two priests briefly gossiped about scandal in the past of the Black noble family, although Cornelius was careful to play up the virtues of Fortunus Black by comparison to some of his more infamous relatives and parted on good terms with the Deacon, promising to look in on the Endeavour system if he could during his travels.

Deciding that it was time to rendezvous with the Lunatic Pandor at the Sycorax system, Navigator Passacaglia Belisarius charted a course through the immaterium and over the next three months they travelled through the warp to their destination; during these three months Lord Admiral Black had his men survey the planet and had, amongst other things discovered a tree sap with a potential anaesthetic properties that was potential harvestable.

About a month and half into their stay Navigator Benetec began to experience chronic headaches, as did the young girl Dana who had joined them on the planet to advise them on the native animal life, these headaches culminated when Dana appeared to go into violent spasms and had to be restrained by the huge bulk of Navigator Benetec. Outside, Lord Admiral Black and the troops had surrounded the strange "tree" when it had begun to glow, faintly pulsing at first and then bursting into a blinding flash that, when fading, revealed an armoured troup of slender figures lead by an enigmatic individual in some sort of ceremonial robes and helmet, each of the aliens wore figure hugging armour studded with gems and carried strange rifle-like weapons. Lord Admiral Black's initial attempts at friendly conversation were rebuffed in halting common tongue when the leader of the aliens stepped forward (removing it's helmet to reveal a pale, chiselled, beautiful face) and laid the blame for the awakening of an ancient evil squarely on the bumbling interference of the original Adeptus Mechanicus explorers of the system, claiming that the only reason this sector still existing was because the enemy had not truly awakened.

Offering to help against the ancient foe, Lord Admiral Black persuaded the aliens to send an observer/advisor to one of his ships, an Eldar called Da Duith Iath was chosen for the mission; although the news of a xenos advisor onboard did not go down particularly well with Confessor Cornelius.

Using FATE Core Rules 31-03-13

Overview

The 31st March session was my first Rogue Trader system (using the FATEcore rules) to have all of the players present; following a discussion on one of the G+ RPG communities that I am signed up for, I used my laptops webcam to record the audio from the session, this has (as well as being great fun to listen to) helped a lot with filling in some of the gaps in my written notes. A write-up of the actual session events will go up on the blog in the next few days, but I thought it worth putting up a post about how the FATE rules worked within the game.

Overall the rules seemed to work really well, there was an initial few minutes with me explaining the basics of the rules and handing out character sheets to people - for the sake of jumping into the game quickly, I had translated the players characters from the Rogue Trader rules to FATEcore myself with the proviso that the players could tweak them as they saw fit (with my approval) after they'd seen how the translated characters played under the new rules set. For the first session with the full player complement I wanted to ease the players into the new rules so it was kept fairly combat-lite and had plenty of opportunity for the players to make basic skill tests, become familiar with fate points and get used to how aspects work.

Aspects & Fate Points

Most of the players seemed to have no problems getting to grips with this and were soon spending fate points with merry abandon to utilise their aspects, the discussion about tagged aspects onto scenes and gaining fate points for having plot-complications arise connected with aspects was a little longer, after a short while though the players got the hang of it and were soon suggesting complications to earn fate points (two of which lead to the new wife of Captain Black taking a strong dislike to the socially crude Navigator York Benetec and to the final session encounter with the Eldar guardians of Caliban IV).

Skill rolls

This seemed to go fine, the game using words to represent different levels of skill seemed in particular to be enjoyed.

Stunts

Generally worked very well, with the player of the Navigator making use of his psychic stunt (allowing him to substitute in his Will score in certain tests) at various points to increase his chances of success, as yet the Enginseer has not really made use of his stunt (that works in a similar way).

Additional

One other aspect of the game that worked far better than I could have hoped was the use of the time scale taken from Diaspora to determine travel times through the warp (as discussed here), this particularly highlighted problems with having a fleet (albeit a small fleet of two vessels in this case) travel in convoy through the warp. Our player character Navigator York Benetec was at one point able (due to his high skill and good roll) to cut the travel time of the ship he was on down to three hours, however the NPC Navigator with a slightly lower skill was only able to cut their trip down to three months creating some interesting interpersonal RP whilst the players discussed what they were going to do as the second ship caught up to them.

Next session

Next session i'm planning to start bringing in the combat rules to introduce players to those, and also to start exploring the advancement system listed in the FATEcore rules.