Warhammer Warhammer 40,000: Rogue Trader Pre-Release Thread [GAME RELEASED, GO TO NEW THREAD]

[Reinhardt]

who cares.
reason begets doubt. doubt begets heresy. heresy begets retribution.
kill spehs elves.

 

[Tyranicon]

Imagine being eldar. Created by literal gods to be the perfect psychic weapon. The most powerful race in the galaxy. Fuck it all up by being such degenerates you actually create a god of degeneracy that nukes 99% of your species.

Now imagine being human. You're born into a galaxy of untold suffering, just one among uncounted trillions. The only gods still alive are evil and want to eat your soul. The only person keeping you and the rest of your species from extinction and worse is a mummy on a fancy chair that's about to break.

Do you give up? Fuck no, you grab a lasgun and start shooting.

 

[mediocrepoet]

Imagine being eldar. Created by literal gods to be the perfect psychic weapon. The most powerful race in the galaxy. Fuck it all up by being such degenerates you actually create a god of degeneracy that nukes 99% of your species.

Unfortunately, we don't have to imagine very hard to see this. This just isn't normally what I imagine elves to look like, but it all makes sense now.

Edit: Pic should be there now, was having some technical difficulties.

Spoiler

 

[Reinhardt]

perfect commissar rt

 

[S.H.O.D.A.N.]

Now you're telling me, that some of them are mad enough to worship chaos, and not getting instantly eaten by Slaanesh? How does that work in their very special case?

For strictly core publications, 8th edition had an image of what seems to be an Eldar mutated by Slaanesh, possibly from one of the Crone Worlds. DE Codex had a bunch of Haemonculi claimed by Khorne, so we know other gods can own Eldar souls. On the Black Library front, one of the Phoenix Lord novels has Slaanesh worshipping Eldar. There were some Mandrakes tainted by Tzeentch I think? Then again, it's Mandrakes, so maybe a bad example.

As I said, not much, but it can happen; it just takes extraordinary circumstances. Sort of like a SoB falling to corruption.

 

[Sarathiour]

Fetish mods are mostly poor quality

lmao at implying that the fetish OC story from wotr were any better.

 

[Jaedar]

Game could definitely use a willpower-focused support class

What psychic powers do psykers get in this?
Admittedly a lot of the psychic powers in the TT were self-only buffs, but there were normal debuffs/buffs as well.

 

[Longes]

Game could definitely use a willpower-focused support class

What psychic powers do psykers get in this?
Admittedly a lot of the psychic powers in the TT were self-only buffs, but there were normal debuffs/buffs as well.

https://rpgcodex.net/forums/threads...ames-now-in-beta.143159/page-200#post-8506623

 

[La vie sexuelle]

Fetish mods are mostly poor quality

lmao at implying that the fetish OC story from wotr were any better.

Well, it should be. Modders are amateurs. Professional writers are professionals, which means they they were checked before being hired etc.

 

[Jaedar]

Game could definitely use a willpower-focused support class

What psychic powers do psykers get in this?
Admittedly a lot of the psychic powers in the TT were self-only buffs, but there were normal debuffs/buffs as well.

https://rpgcodex.net/forums/threads...ames-now-in-beta.143159/page-200#post-8506623

Not sure why there's such a random selection of scaling via wpb or psy rating, but that's a decent selection of combat spells (at least for some of the schools). I guess spell failure and negative effects of casting are not in the game? And no out of combat spells as well.

Smells like decline.

 

[InD_ImaginE]

And no out of combat spells as well.

Game is basically massive dungeon crawler from one dungeon to another

Frankly after playing two PF games vs KOTC and this, I prefer to not have out side combat prebuffing. Makes action economy actually matter. If anything pre-buffing everything seems much more of a decline in combat perspective

 

[Longes]

I guess spell failure and negative effects of casting are not in the game?

You don't just randomly blow up on every cast, but every cast from every psyker in the battle builds up a communal veil breach bar, and when it gets full something happens. What happens? I don't know, I only had one psyker on my team and quickly shot enemy psykers, so it never got filled.

 

[La vie sexuelle]

I guess spell failure and negative effects of casting are not in the game?

You don't just randomly blow up on every cast, but every cast from every psyker in the battle builds up a communal veil breach bar, and when it gets full something happens. What happens? I don't know, I only had one psyker on my team and quickly shot enemy psykers, so it never got filled.

I know its a bit noob question, but how works abilities? We have melee, shooting, psyker...something more? There also should be others, non combat, like opening locks etc.How that's work in Beta?

 

[InD_ImaginE]

I guess spell failure and negative effects of casting are not in the game?

You don't just randomly blow up on every cast, but every cast from every psyker in the battle builds up a communal veil breach bar, and when it gets full something happens. What happens? I don't know, I only had one psyker on my team and quickly shot enemy psykers, so it never got filled.

I know its a bit noob question, but how works abilities? We have melee, shooting, psyker...something more? There also should be others, non combat, like opening locks etc.How that's work in Beta?

Most locks are opened by either Mechanic or Explosive skills. If you fails without using item the door can get locked (usually just optionals doors/chest)

 

[Maculo]

What talents or abilities do you guys view as essential? So far, the talent that grants wounds based on level seems liken a must. Another must-have imo is the biomancer heal.

This thread is so positive and heartwarming!

It must be purged.

Haha, okay. Then... tell me how you liked the first encounter with the (spoiler) Chaos Space Marine after Act I? If you've played the beta already.

Spoiler tags don't work for me for some reason...

It's an interesting encounter. I hope we can become buds with Word Bearers on Hereticus, Word Bearers are cool.

Difficulty level and your build affect it a lot. On Normal it's pretty easy, on Core it's brutal.
Build-wise, an Adept MC can wipe single-target enemies no problem by stacking Insight turn 1, and doing big burst fire turn 2. Idira and Pasqal are bad at this, so if you are not an Adept yourself boss fights get a lot harder.

I finished the World Bearer fight on Core last night. It took a couple of tries but it was satisfying. The sniper and goon waves did not feel excessive either.

The plasma weapon you find just before this fight made a huge difference against the enemy waves and the CSM in later rounds. Also, I couldn't tell whether my debuffs were stacking, or whether the CSM took progressively more damager with each ship he destroyed. Towards the end, the plasma weapon did 20-30+ damage per shot. Otherwise, the number one priority was keeping enough party members alive into the later rounds for when the CSM took more damage. Biomancer heal on both my MC and the inquisitor and medkits on the Navy Officer felt essential.

If the penalties for spamming psyker powers were more severe, this fight would have been incredibly difficult though. I was spamming the Navigator buffs like Fist of the North Star.

 

[La vie sexuelle]

I guess spell failure and negative effects of casting are not in the game?

You don't just randomly blow up on every cast, but every cast from every psyker in the battle builds up a communal veil breach bar, and when it gets full something happens. What happens? I don't know, I only had one psyker on my team and quickly shot enemy psykers, so it never got filled.

I know its a bit noob question, but how works abilities? We have melee, shooting, psyker...something more? There also should be others, non combat, like opening locks etc.How that's work in Beta?

Most locks are opened by either Mechanic or Explosive skills. If you fails without using item the door can get locked (usually just optionals doors/chest)

Sounds nice. But it also could be trapped for Owlcat (in longer perspective). They don't have resources to check every possibility that more frisky gamers could to do. I hope that abilities-possibilities balance don't end in overcontrol.

 

[Longes]

If the penalties for spamming psyker powers were more severe, this fight would have been incredibly difficult though. I was spamming the Navigator buffs like Fist of the North Star.

I don't think Navigator skills count for the warp breach?

 

[Maculo]

If the penalties for spamming psyker powers were more severe, this fight would have been incredibly difficult though. I was spamming the Navigator buffs like Fist of the North Star.

I don't think Navigator skills count for the warp breach?

I'll double check later today, but one or more of her abilities seemed to shift the meter on the CSM fight.

 

[Jaedar]

And no out of combat spells as well.

Game is basically massive dungeon crawler from one dungeon to another

Frankly after playing two PF games vs KOTC and this, I prefer to not have out side combat prebuffing. Makes action economy actually matter. If anything pre-buffing everything seems much more of a decline in combat perspective

In the TT the reason you would not do this is every active spell needs to be maintained and makes further casting harder, so even at a reasonable best you could prebuff very few things. And because every cast has a chance to trigger bad things, doing the prebuff could easily foil your ambush.

I guess spell failure and negative effects of casting are not in the game?

You don't just randomly blow up on every cast, but every cast from every psyker in the battle builds up a communal veil breach bar, and when it gets full something happens. What happens? I don't know, I only had one psyker on my team and quickly shot enemy psykers, so it never got filled.

Sounds a bit lame.

 

[CthuluIsSpy]

Fetish mods are mostly poor quality

lmao at implying that the fetish OC story from wotr were any better.

Well, it should be. Modders are amateurs. Professional writers are professionals, which means they they were checked before being hired etc.

The current edition of Pathfinder and DnD are written by "professional" writers. Most of WoTR is based on that, including Irabeth and Anevia which are canonical characters.
Professional in the entertainment industry, especially the more "geeky" stuff does not mean competent or good in these days, it just means they are getting paid.

Just look at the current state of AAA games. Unfinished, poorly written, ugly schlock.

 

[La vie sexuelle]

Fetish mods are mostly poor quality

lmao at implying that the fetish OC story from wotr were any better.

Well, it should be. Modders are amateurs. Professional writers are professionals, which means they they were checked before being hired etc.

The current edition of Pathfinder and DnD are written by "professional" writers. Most of WoTR is based on that, including Irabeth and Anevia which are canonical characters.
Professional in the entertainment industry, especially the more "geeky" stuff does not mean competent or good in these days, it just means they are getting paid.

Just look at the current state of AAA games. Unfinished, poorly written, ugly schlock.

Yes, I know. It's even more terrifying if you know how old are WotR books are and in what place now Paizo is.
But still, there is some kind of editing. The text isn't good, but in some frames. Let's call that "calculated cringe". In mods world there is much more...room to move.

 

[Longes]

and in what place now Paizo is

What, California?

 

[La vie sexuelle]

and in what place now Paizo is

What, California?

I thought about socio-political change, but word "California" alfo fit there.

 

[Parsimonious cook]

Alright M80s, time to look at the space combat and other space related stuff - but first lets see the ending of the act I:

The search for Heinrix takes you to an Ad Mech monastery overrun by the heretics who are apparently trying to blow up a relic reactor that is located there. As you make your way through, you encounter a tech priest infested with a schizmatical (another example of good use of the lore - schizmaticals are mentioned in one of the source books for Dark Heresy, they are basicaly malware that can infect tech priests, cogitators, servitors and other machines, really cool seeing such tidbits in the game).

You can approach the situation in several ways...

The tech priest can be saved with a series of successfull skill tests...

... and if you manage it he quickly bro-ups with Pasqual and becomes his assistant on the bridge, while compossing poetry on the side. I am sure he will play some role later on, but lets not get ahead of ourselves.

Once you solve the situation at the monastery, you finaly get to meet Heinrix...

... and it appears that things are finaly settling down. The chaos rebellion seems to be defeated and its leader slain. Time for a little party:

The devs basically decided to recreate the Thracian atrocity from the Eisenhorn books though, so things go to shit rather quickly and the Dark Eldar show up to steal the planet´s sun (!) as well (this is obviously a main story related stuff). Party is over and you find yourself in some deep shit. Time to leave.

As you fight your way to the space port through several fairly intense encounters, things get even worse though:

This is a huge difficulty spike right here. In the alpha I didnt see the chaoz space muhreens as too much of a threat (high level characters + high level gear), but here (at least on Core difficulty) things get realy baaaad. At this point I had two chain swords, a bolter and a bolt pistol, with the rest of the party carrying just lasguns and solid projectile weapons, so the standard attacks felt like throwing stones at a tank.

Its a well designed fight - you get wawes of mooks, an extremely dangerous sniper on the far side of the map AND the spehz muhreen with a multimelta and chain sword, who can easily one shot characters. Fortunately he is busy wrecking shuttles to keep you from flying away, but even so, he is a major threat. The fight requires heavy use of skills and talents to buff your characters and debuff the muhreen and good tactics to deal with the sniper too, while working on him.

Once you make it off-world, you get to decide what to do with the planet, which is now obviously falling to chaos, but after that there comes a really cool sequence regarding your first warp jump and the drive malfunction that happens as you launch it.

Its fully done through dialogue and skill checks, but it is really tense (especially coming on the heels of the difficult fight at the space port) and helping Pasqual to solve the problem felt p. satisfying tbh fam. Good shit.

Once you exit the warp at Footfall, the next act begins - there are a few new things since the alpha, like this part of Argenta´s personal quest...

... though basicaly its the stuff I covered a while back in the alpha-releted posts.


Onto the space stuff then.

There are some interface changes noticeble right off the bat, for example on the star map:

Alpha

Beta

Combat in Alpha

Combat in Beta

Things look more polished now, the really big addition to combat is the posibility to ram enemy ships. Eldar ships can now be fired upon even when cloaked (IIRC this wasnt the case in the alpha), though with lower chance to hit. I wonder if the starfighters will be added at some point...

The ship management is a thing now and a trader with ship components was added to the Furibunds system (where Footfall is located).

Plenty of stuff is not yet implemented, but in general I like what I see. The ship is basically another character in the PnP Rogue Trader and the game is definitely moving in that direction now.

The colony management also got a facelift...

Alpha

Beta

... again, looks better, though there dont seem to be that many changes in terms of functionality so far.


In any case, shit is sooo cash tbh fam. So far I played the beta for 30 hours, made it through the first act and now I explored like five systems after the game opened up.

 

[Aarwolf]

Imperialis is still superior path, you can get her to help you kill xenos from her craftworld and then after that you can just execute her on the spot.

I am pleasantly surprised by reactivity you have if you try to kill her on spot on Janus the first time you see her. If you side with her, she shows you everything, but if you try to kill her, you have to uncover everything yourself, by storybook event, or rather three staged big event, when you can have different approaches backed by your officers and correspodning skill checks. To me it was very satisfying roleplay wise, because I had to carefully choose what skills I will use and what outcomes it can end up with. In the end I felt rewarded, because tracking the rebel base was full my agency, not Yrliet's.