[BC] A Vulgar Display of Power: OOC/Discussion Thread

[Lord_Ikka]

Abraxus waits with cold patience. His skills remain untested, his goals unknown.

[Mazer Rackham]

13 hours ago, Necronaut said:

...we could conceivably kick this off sometime this summer, presumably after the conclusion of Mazer's hair-raising Damocles Contingency (which would be useful for setting myself a semi-solid deadline).

 

Well that's easy! You can start tomorrow, because you all die tonight! 

 

Wait.

 

Spoilers.

 

13 hours ago, Necronaut said:

If any of my original conscripts are still interested in participating in this endeavour, please reply in here with any questions/comments/concerns, etc. 

 

Afraid I may sit this one out. Didn't want to mention it here or this soon, but once Damocles is completed I'm considering taking a break. The B&C has been good to keep my writing flowing, but I am wondering if it is stifling my creative efforts on other fronts. I need to get another book out this year, but I can't get behind the ball, and this might be why. Watch this space.

 

12 hours ago, Lysimachus said:

Amazing, I was wondering what we'd do once Damocles finishes, wonderful! 

 

Edit: should give Mazer plenty of time to write another DH adventure, am I right...? 

 

Somebody ^ , I can't remember who  ^, suggested Rogue Trader, but Black Crusade is about the right speed for you deviants! 

 

12 hours ago, Necronaut said:

For the record, I'm not holding @Mazer Rackham to any sort of deadline, just making an educated guess as to when we might begin our collective descent into heresy. Our intrepid GM from the slightly-less-morally-dubious end of the campaign spectrum can comment further. 

 

Seriously, this time: Depending on how much chicanery the Players get up to, I can get it finished in 6-8ish weeks.

 

12 hours ago, Machine God said:

Or  another Space Hulk Mission.

 

Sorry man, turns out that DW: Space Hulk is just too time-consuming. Once the maps are set up, it's easier, but it's finding/building and prepping them properly, then everything on top. It was designed so any GM can pick it up, however, so it's 'open source' for a GM that wants to carry it on.

 

[Xin Ceithan]

For the Glory of Chaos Undecided! 
 

Glad  to hear you are doing better, and don’t worry. Wylie sort of expect someone to drop away torporosly now and then who calls himself a Necronaut 
 

I am so down for this -it’s obviously a sign from the Gods that this resurfaces now when I have a few days off so I can dig out my notes and finally ( mostly ) settle on a character.

 

And while it’s sad not be performing as brain-in-a-jar alongside Mazer, that at least narrows down my list of possible character builds 

[Mazer Rackham]

Xin has answered that age-old question:

 

Yes, he would, indeed, jump in your grave that quickly...

[Xin Ceithan]

34 minutes ago, Mazer Rackham said:

Xin has answered that age-old question:

 

Yes, he would, indeed, jump in your grave that quickly...

I used to do autopsies for a living, so, well, yes…

[Machine God]

1 hour ago, Mazer Rackham said:

 

Sorry man, turns out that DW: Space Hulk is just too time-consuming. Once the maps are set up, it's easier, but it's finding/building and prepping them properly, then everything on top. It was designed so any GM can pick it up, however, so it's 'open source' for a GM that wants to carry it on.

 

@Mazer Rackham - Good luck in your authoring.

 

As for games there is Vulgar and Archeotech. 

 

Unless Episode IV of Plunder comes along... 

[Lysimachus]

27 minutes ago, Machine God said:

Unless Episode IV of Plunder comes along... 

 

Unlikely, I'm afraid. But as Mazer said, I did suggest doing a RT game...

 

But that would probably be a long way in the future, after Damocles and Vulgar, as I don't currently have any storyline for it in mind.

 

(Currently trying to get ready for Ep3 of my in-person family and friends Star Wars game, so that's taking up most of my creative juices - taking it on a slightly different tack and doing a murder mystery this time!)

[Mazer Rackham]

1 hour ago, Xin Ceithan said:

I used to do autopsies for a living, so, well, yes…

 

That's no way to talk about your stand-up routines, man.

 

I love your jokes. Even when you corpse on stage...

 

Spoiler

...and unlike the army, you don't get a barking heckler or cough...

 

Pew, pew!

 

[Petragor]

18 hours ago, Necronaut said:

I have been giving serious thought to starting equipment, and I have reconsidered my previous position as being needlessly restrictive, concluding I may have been a bit too eager to tell people "no" with regard to things their characters might have on hand, and tweaking equipment available to the various character archetypes in the book. I am happy to work with each of you to have semi-customized kits (within reason) for your characters as befits villains of your stature and resources.

Regarding this, would you mind if I exchanged Ollkyrax' Best-Quality Lascarbine for something a little more Close-Range? Khorne isn't really too fond of attacking from far away, and neither is the Battlesmith! Maybe replace it with a flamer or even a Pistol weapon for his Ballistic Mechadendrite?

[Necronaut]

@Petragor we can certainly cook up something more to your liking. The las-pistol attachment for the ballistic mechadendrite always felt a bit lacklustre to me too.

[Lysimachus]

Having checked my sheet, I think I'm happy with Oswyld's gear

 

Unless I could swap a few of those 10 Frags he's carrying for Kraks? I know I wouldn't get as many of those, but I'd be happy to do a 2 (or even 3 if necessary) for 1 swap or something?

 

 

 

The only other thing I really want is to upgrade his Lesser Minion to a more useful Minion, but that requires quite a few extras (extra Infamy, Fel, XP) so I think that will have to wait for the game to progress.

 

 

[Necronaut]

@Lysimachus yeah I should actually do something about the availability of grenades. In a prior Black Crusade game that I played in, by trading some stolen wargear, my character was able to acquire a near-infinite quantity of hallucinogen grenades, which if you've never used before are just about the most amazing weapon ever conceived of in an RPG. Also we were practically swimming in other incendiaries. I will most likely be modifying general wargear availability on an arbitrary  and case-by-case basis so things don't get too out of hand.

 

However, to your question about Krak and Frag 'nades, I'll grant you a one-time offer of a 3-for-1 exchange rate of frag grenades for krak grenades, since thy cup overfloweth. ;)

 

 

Edit: regarding your minion, be careful what you wish for. 

Edited May 2, 2023 by Necronaut

[Necronaut]

One other (minor) thing, for all parties involved: Black Crusade builds upon the general weapon customization rules of the previous titles in fun and somewhat extreme ways. Since you're all going to be operating on the ragged edges of civilization, and in places that make some modern inner-cities look like vacation destinations, I would like to encourage each or any of you to be thinking long-term about how your character uses and maintains their weapons and other personal effects, as we can, together, create some rather interesting and very personalized personal accoutrements which reflect the various idiosyncrasies of your characters and what they're willing to do to survive and win.

 

Black Crusade, once wealth and power starts flowing in, may present opportunities to discard venerable and well-loved pieces of equipment for the latest and greatest in mass-murder, particularly if they are claimed from the charred corpses of your foes, but I believe we can create deeper and more meaningful attachments for our cast of heroes/villains. 

 

Edit: of course I'm not going to tell you how to play your characters, I'm just spelling out alternative paths to unnatural power. 

Edited May 2, 2023 by Necronaut

[Lysimachus]

30 minutes ago, Necronaut said:

However, to your question about Krak and Frag 'nades, I'll grant you a one-time offer of a 3-for-1 exchange rate of frag grenades for krak grenades, since thy cup overfloweth. ;)

 

Very kind of you, sir. I will therefore swap 6 Frags for 2 Kraks, giving me 4 Frags and 2 Kraks, a much more balanced and reasonable load out. Will mod my sheet to that effect. 

 

30 minutes ago, Necronaut said:

Edit: regarding your minion, be careful what you wish for. 

Edited 23 minutes ago by Necronaut

 

 

 

[Lord_Ikka]

Sounds good- Abraxus really wants to upgrade/customize his bolter into a supreme sniping weapon, and is still looking for a replacement for his lost power blade. A chainsword is nice, but rather loud for a stealth specialist, and a simple combat knife is so declassee... 

Edited May 2, 2023 by Lord_Ikka

[Necronaut]

@Lord_Ikka feel free to shoot me a DM. I have been giving ol' Abraxus some necessary consideration. 

[Trokair]

On 5/2/2023 at 3:41 PM, Necronaut said:

One other (minor) thing, for all parties involved: Black Crusade builds upon the general weapon customization rules of the previous titles in fun and somewhat extreme ways. Since you're all going to be operating on the ragged edges of civilization, and in places that make some modern inner-cities look like vacation destinations, I would like to encourage each or any of you to be thinking long-term about how your character uses and maintains their weapons and other personal effects, as we can, together, create some rather interesting and very personalized personal accoutrements which reflect the various idiosyncrasies of your characters and what they're willing to do to survive and win.

 

Black Crusade, once wealth and power starts flowing in, may present opportunities to discard venerable and well-loved pieces of equipment for the latest and greatest in mass-murder, particularly if they are claimed from the charred corpses of your foes, but I believe we can create deeper and more meaningful attachments for our cast of heroes/villains. 

 

Edit: of course I'm not going to tell you how to play your characters, I'm just spelling out alternative paths to unnatural power. 

 

I have gone over Sakal's sheet and I think I am happy and good with where he is at.

 

He has Medicae and a Medkit to take care of himself, Survival to live of the land, Tech-Use and Trade (Armourer) to take care of his armour and the Plasmagun, the aforesaid Plasmagun to take care of enemies and a laspistol and chainsword because well, just because.

 

That said, in the company of CSM that all may mean rather little.  

[Necronaut]

Well you're currently (as far as I know) the only person in this merry band of villains with the wherewithal to bring any healing equipment so good on you for coming prepared.

 

Make sure to charge everyone the necessary co-pay fee before administering aid. ;)

 

Edit: don't underestimate the capabilities of the noble plasmagun. Many a veteran of the long war has met an ignominious and unscheduled end thanks to a sun-gun. If you're especially worried about putting people in the ground, meltaguns are a decent alternative, but in my experience the plasmagun is an absolute unit and an excellent workhorse weapon. 

 

Edit 2: but if we're honest, the be-all-end-all in reducing things into tiny bits, ruined slag and meaty chunks is the M34 autocannon and its older, meaner, pipe-hitting brother, the Reaper Autocannon. In practice, both are premier infantry and light-to-medium armor mulching machines. 

Edited May 3, 2023 by Necronaut

[Trokair]

5 hours ago, Necronaut said:

Make sure to charge everyone the necessary co-pay fee before administering aid. ;)

Plasma gun ammunition clips accepted, purified plasma gun ammunition clips get preferential treatment.

[Lysimachus]

On 5/2/2023 at 3:28 PM, Lysimachus said:

Having checked my sheet, I think I'm happy with Oswyld's gear

 

Hey GM, I was just reading through the BC book and I spotted one little thing I'd really like, if you are allowing people any extra bits of kit?

 

The weapon upgrade 'Duellist's Grip' adds +5 to Parry Tests, not a huge boost but is something that I think would be very fitting and fluffy for Oswyld's Power Sword (IF descendant, Feast of Blades, etc)

 

But it's a piece of his starting kit (as Champion archetype) rather than one of his Infamy picks so I'm not sure how to go about adding it? Is there any way to do this?

[Necronaut]

@Lysimachus I'd be fine with that, though I will mandate an exchange-in-kind: your power sword was constructed with a duellist's grip, an elegant weapon forged during a more civilized era, however it bears a dark aura, with some of those who possess the witch's sight claiming that it contains a budding vile and malign presence. Your sword gains the "Bloodthirsty" trait (per the cursed heirloom talent, because I am a cruel and unfair GM). Your sword seems to have an unnatural taste for blood, and whenever your character strikes down an opponent with your fell blade, you must make a +0 willpower test to avoid spending your attack action slashing/stabbing your slain enemy's fresh corpse. 

 

I am kind of doing this on an ad-hoc basis without much consideration for internal balance across characters. Things will work themselves out as the game progresses, I suspect. Or they won't and we'll have internal disagreements and power struggles (oh wait) and things will sort themselves out through violence (evil cackling).

 

One other thing: for all Astartes players, I'm happy to support the different marks of power armor and their various stat and armor profiles and what-not, but in the interest of simplifying our book-keeping and not letting you combat monsters get too far ahead of the humies in the group, let's drop the power armor histories. The new setup (for Astartes) will be to roll for your power armor mark and then roll for your power armor customization per the standard BC rules. The general idea behind this is we're not playing a high-space-fantasy game like Deathwatch, with its implicit and explicit regal finery and feudal heraldry and what-not. When we are first introduced to your characters, your armor and wargear are effectively held together with duct tape and bailing wire, and your armor's machine spirit(s) has/have been driven mad or possibly fled entirely due to the irregular and generally shoddy maintenance routine. Feel free to include or ignore that as you see fit. 

 

Two themes I am hoping to explore and play with in this are dark majesty and corroded/tarnished glory. I'll let you each meditate upon the meanings of these phrases and what they would mean for your characters. 

Edited May 8, 2023 by Necronaut

[Machine God]

2 hours ago, Necronaut said:

@Lysimachus I'd be fine with that, though I will mandate an exchange-in-kind: your power sword was constructed with a duellist's grip, an elegant weapon forged during a more civilized era, however it bears a dark aura, with some of those who possess the witch's sight claiming that it contains a budding vile and malign presence. Your sword gains the "Bloodthirsty" trait (per the cursed heirloom talent, because I am a cruel and unfair GM). Your sword seems to have an unnatural taste for blood, and whenever your character strikes down an opponent with your fell blade, you must make a +0 willpower test to avoid spending your attack action slashing/stabbing your slain enemy's fresh corpse. 

 

I am kind of doing this on an ad-hoc basis without much consideration for internal balance across characters. Things will work themselves out as the game progresses, I suspect. Or they won't and we'll have internal disagreements and power struggles (oh wait) and things will sort themselves out through violence (evil cackling).

 

One other thing: for all Astartes players, I'm happy to support the different marks of power armor and their various stat and armor profiles and what-not, but in the interest of simplifying our book-keeping and not letting you combat monsters get too far ahead of the humies in the group, let's drop the power armor histories. The new setup (for Astartes) will be to roll for your power armor mark and then roll for your power armor customization per the standard BC rules. The general idea behind this is we're not playing a high-space-fantasy game like Deathwatch, with its implicit and explicit regal finery and feudal heraldry and what-not. When we are first introduced to your characters, your armor and wargear are effectively held together with duct tape and bailing wire, and your armor's machine spirit(s) has/have been driven mad or possibly fled entirely due to the irregular and generally shoddy maintenance routine. Feel free to include or ignore that as you see fit. 

 

Two themes I am hoping to explore and play with in this are dark majesty and corroded/tarnished glory. I'll let you each meditate upon the meanings of these phrases and what they would mean for your characters. 

 

@Necronaut I'm not a Happy Evil Bunny then!!!

 

Dropping the Armour History's means that whilst the others in Post Above got cool things added or modified for their characters, I lose 10 Corruption Pts and a Gift From the Gods!

 

 

 

[Necronaut]

@Machine God Please send me a DM so we can discuss this; my intent was to make things more streamlined, and more in keeping with the spirit of Black Crusade. I'm not interested in taking anything away from anyone. 

Edited May 8, 2023 by Necronaut

[Lysimachus]

5 hours ago, Necronaut said:

I'd be fine with that, though I will mandate an exchange-in-kind: your power sword was constructed with a duellist's grip, an elegant weapon forged during a more civilized era, however it bears a dark aura, with some of those who possess the witch's sight claiming that it contains a budding vile and malign presence. Your sword gains the "Bloodthirsty" trait (per the cursed heirloom talent, because I am a cruel and unfair GM). Your sword seems to have an unnatural taste for blood, and whenever your character strikes down an opponent with your fell blade, you must make a +0 willpower test to avoid spending your attack action slashing/stabbing your slain enemy's fresh corpse. 

 

I'm cool with that. Is it ok if I say that the effect is more of a psychological thing (of Oswyld's own rage, the very first hints of his fall to Khorne, etc) rather than being about the sword itself? I just picture his gear as being pretty 'standard' Imperial as he is a very new renegade?

 

Speaking of...

 

5 hours ago, Necronaut said:

The new setup (for Astartes) will be to roll for your power armor mark and then roll for your power armor customization per the standard BC rules. The general idea behind this is we're not playing a high-space-fantasy game like Deathwatch, with its implicit and explicit regal finery and feudal heraldry and what-not. When we are first introduced to your characters, your armor and wargear are effectively held together with duct tape and bailing wire, and your armor's machine spirit(s) has/have been driven mad or possibly fled entirely due to the irregular and generally shoddy maintenance routine. Feel free to include or ignore that as you see fit. 

 

So I am still ok that I rolled Mk8 and then the customization was 2 extra working Subsystems? I was really happy with those rolls, as again it felt fitting that his armour is still much closer to 'factory standard' than a typical renegade's suit? No worries about losing the History, had rolled a Mk6 Greave for +5Ag but will take that off.  

[Necronaut]

@Lysimachus maybe it's the sword, maybe it's Oswyld's own character flaws coming to bear -- who's to say, really? Maybe one of his brethren (loyalist or otherwise) cursed Oswyld or his sword at the lethal conclusion of an honour duel with his dying breath. As Oswyld drove the blade home the first affects of capitol-c Corruption took root, in effect christening this dark warrior and/or his weapon. Or maybe the blood of innocents he has shed on his ruinous path have baptized his blade a hundred or thousand times over, acting as a locus to the Blood God and the daemonic spirits in his thrall since his chapter's chaplains and tech-marines no longer enjoy the blessings of the Emperor or Omnissiah. Who's to say in a realm that is the dying scream of material reality as it is broken, warped, remade and ravaged by the entropic powers from beyond space and time?

 

And yes you're good to go with the Mk VIII armor with the careful maintenance customization (what lucky players I have!). Feel free to flavor how it looks to taste, which goes for everyone. If you want a few bits and bobs to be taken from other armor suits (which is de rigeur in Chaos-land) then feel free to embellish that a bit. Obviously suits with the Scavenged Reconstruction customization will look much more piecemeal and deranged, with loyalist color schemes either burned or scraped off or hastily painted over, and Imperial symbols only partially defaced, or not at all. Expect a lot of prying and jealous eyes regardless, since you're wearing the latest and greatest in power armour. 

 

 

Edited May 8, 2023 by Necronaut