Xenos-focused RPG setting - what would it look like?

[StratoKhan]

The announcement of a Horus Heresy RPG prompted some discussion in that news post around the fact that that setting is always fundamentally going to be limited to humans and space marines. And due to that, any HH RPG setting might not appeal to those people in the hobby that are more interested in, or exclusively collect/play etc with non-human races.

 

So while HH players will get a new RPG to play with, and I am definitely interested in using it when it comes out - I was reflecting on some of the comments that people made in the other thread and I think my conclusion is that it also makes sense to me, and feels like it would be pretty interesting, to explore the non-human parts of the galaxy for a change, and allowing people to create and interact with interesting Xenos characters, both PCs and NPCs, who might have non-human motivations and goals.
Basically, I think that any product that shifts the focus away from the human side of things for a change, would be a welcome additional to people’s source material.

 

One challenge is how xenophobic the Imperium humans, but also a few of the other races inhabiting the galaxy, are. Which might make it challenging to have a group of PCs with very different origins/races.

 

For example:

- Eldar do not like outsiders and consider themselves superior 

- Orks are not likely to interact with outsiders outside of using violence

- Tyranids are, Tyranids…
 

If anything, the above could translate into more focus on either new, minor, or obscure Xenos races.

 

Other established races seem more open

to outsiders, and so might be easier to make them work in an RPG context.

Such as:

- Votann

- Kroot

- Tau

 

While a lot of human/ork/eldar space would be a no-go zone, there are many potential areas of the galaxy, and connection nodes, where several races could conceivably congregate, and even then, a certain kind of human might still make an appearance in these places so I guess you could even cater to those that simply must run humans.

 

I guess I’d be curious to hear any thoughts from the more Xenos-aligned players out there. What kind of things would you be interested in exploring? Would there be appetite for something  like this?

[ThePenitentOne]

So if I was running a Xenos campaign as a GM, I'd go Craftworld Eldar; the narrative would be told in bursts- five to ten game mini-stories spread out along thousands of years of Eldar lifespans. Like each player pics one episode from their backstory, and then the GM helps the others weave their way into the narrative... And then you end up with pivotal moments where the lives of these characters repeatedly intersect.

 

Some of those events could be tied to the path system- a story arch might be a character's transition from the path of the Warrior to the Outcast, for example.

 

You'd want to give farseers hints about what is to come- dream sequences, vision quests- that sort of thing.

[N1SB]

LONG HAVE I PONDERED THIS, just as a brain exercise to make sure mine was running proper-like (it wasn't).

 

There are actually four (4!) precedents, not merely in game terms, but like scenarios, that could be reproduced.

 

I'm going to go through it because there are common elements throughout that suggest, this is what works.

 

 

+++ 1st, the Rogue Trader scenario +++

 

 

Fantasy Flight Games did the 40k RPGs.  The 1st was Dark Heresy which was Inquisition-based, the 2nd was Rogue Trader.

 

They gave the option to be some Eldar (I think Exodite), Kroot or even an Ork Freebooter aligned with Rogue Traders.

 

Timperial Guard and our D&D Dungeon Master have been actually playing the Rogue Trader computer game, that has this.

 

But this predates even those games.  In 1st ed 40k, even Blood Axe Orks had something similar to the Brood Brothers rules that Genestealer Cult has today, like you can use some Imperial Guard models in your army to show Blood Axes have some agreement with them.  This was pre-Sebastian Yarrick.

 

And on that note of some Ork-'Oomie collaboration...

 

 

+++ GORKAMORKA +++

 

 

Gorkamorka was that Ork-themed game.  I remember it was just a side project by some GW studio guy, before it became so.

 

Orks and humans crashed on some fringe planet awhile back...iirc they were fighting each other in space, that's why they crashed.

 

Centuries later of just surviving, they forgot how they got there, ended up trading and became part of the same setting.

 

The humans lived underground and would paint their faces green, adopt Orky characteristics.  It was a strange time.

 

 

+++ Blackstone Fortress +++

 

 

There was that 40k Warhammer Quest around some ancient Necron Blackstone Fortress.

 

That's probably the most recent and best example.  All these small groups cooperated to loot the Blackstone Fortress.

 

They even formed their own city, practically a Space Hulk, on its edge, appropriately named "Precipice" iirc.

 

(As a D&D player, it reminded me of the campaign setting Planescape, specifically the city of Sigil.)

 

There was this post-game thing where your ship to travel there was your base, you could trade stuff there.

 

This example is the one I think Brother Strato Khan had in mind especially, this was a node.

 

 

+++ Dawn of War II: the Last Stand +++

 

 

You know how Dawn of War II was really a RPG?  It's basically Crusade campaigns, I loved it.

 

There was this horde mode where each player controls 1 player...but from different races:

 

 

It was a Come the Apocalypse situation, as the above video illustrates, united against/by an overwhelming enemy.

 

So in case you were wondering, I always played the Ork Mek with a Teleporter.  I once rezzed my party against a Carnifex by luring it away, teleporting around the map back to each of them, rezzing one then the other.  One introduced the other to the tabletop while waiting for me to rez them, it was awesome.

 

 

+++++

 

 

I listed these out for a reason, and it's because there's always these repeated elements:

 

- SMALL group of humans, Rogue Traders or surviving Guardsmen, not full Imperium

- STRANDED somewhere, like they crash landed are are removed from the Imperium

- Far greater COMMON THREAT or CAUSE, to work together at least temporarily, and...

- ...this is the weird one...the ORK is usually the one that kinda initiates cooperation

 

The last one about Orks being the least obvious yet most likely to bring different groups together gets me, and is uniquely 40k.  Think of D&D, it's usually some elf wizard or half-elf bard, like a Galadriel figure.  In 40k, we just intuit some Ork Blood Axe or Freebooter initiating 1st contact.  I really pondered that and it's like Orks have such a casual relationship to war that they're totally ok with working with an enemy, like a friend is just an enemy I'm not currently hitting.  Like an Ork thinks, I can hit him before, after, but not right now, because we're working together...so we can have a proper fight later.

 

So putting these together...it's easier to show than tell...

 

 

+++ Explanation By Example +++

 

 

A bunch of different factions that could be forced to work together are stranded on a planet.  They could even have been doing some space battle up until that time.  I think I could even make a case for human Chaos cultists that have turned their back on the Imperium, but haven't fully gone daemonic.

 

(Being stranded on a planet is the equivalent of adventurers meeting at a tavern in a 40k RPG, I guess.)

 

If there's no clear peacemaker, like some Tau Ethereal who manipulates the others or some Eldar Psyker that mentally compels people to not fire on sight, it'd be an Ork bellowing, "Oi, you 'Oomie/Stunty/Pansy/Bluey/Krooty dere, you needz me help, we talk now, fight later, but just talk now!"

 

They find they have a shared enemy on this mystery planet not on their star maps.  It might be some Ymargl Genestealer-infested or Chaos-tainted world that has been purged from records for that exact reason, they don't want people even going there.  They're trying to salvage resources to contact their forces or even escape.

 

Turns out, it was some Necron Tomb World.  Necron NPCs pop up, half-awake caretakers who kinda want to just get these unwanted guests to go away or even use them to rid them of whatever Genestealer/Chaos infestation, would kinda work with them, likely even be de facto quest givers.

 

Some quests happen.  They achieve their goal, they signal for help or a means to leave.  Then they're confronted by the REAL enemy...

 

...it was one of THEIR own, like some Radical Inquisitor, a desperate Eldar Farseer, a manipulative Ork Warboss, who had orchestrated their crash on the planet in the 1st place as sacrificial pawns in some weird scheme.  Like the Radical Inquisitor wants to turn to Chaos, they were meant as some sacrifice to a Greater Daemon there.

 

Such a Radical Inquisitor might in fact confess, not by way of admitting wrongdoing, but order the Human to betray/sabotage/kill his newfound allies as part of this scheme, thinking him so loyal to the Imperium against the obviously evil Xenos as part of his obviously necessary plot.

 

(It'd be funny if the Xenos were standing right there listening in, and the Radical Inquisitor is surprised by the sheer fact they can understand Gothic, like he's so xenophobic it never even occurred to him the Ork would reply, "Oi, Mister Big Hat, I'z standing right 'ere, I can 'ear every wurd ye'r sayin'.")

 

And now you have a campaign with an ongoing villain the other characters can unite against for more adventures.

 

 

+++++

 

 

Not so serious, but shows just 1 way it can be done based on common elements I've seen.

 

If there was 1 obvious risk/danger/pitfall, it's not that it's not a purist 40k...40k is very impure, that's fine...is that it just becomes D&D with a 40k skin.  Humans are Humans, Eldars are just Elves, Squats are just Dwarves, Orks are Orcs and Tau are just those exotic races you need to buy an extra splatbook for.  Because at that point it just stops being its own thing and you might as well play a normal campaign setting of D&D, like you might as well play Planescape.

 

(Not a hypothetical.  I DM'd this Spelljammer campaign that was a literal reskin of Star Trek, it even had a holodeck.)

 

So don't worry, I know the spirit of this thread, it's not some debate of pros/cons of a 40k Xenos/Human campaign, it's just, how would it work?  Imho this would be a very, very typical way based on cues, you're all stranded on a planet, "y halo thar," some extreme backstabbing git of one of YOUR factions.

Edited 19 hours ago by N1SB

[Evil Eye]

I feel Commorragh would be the ideal setting for a Xeno-focused RPG. Not only do you have the Dark Eldar of every stripe, you also have various other xenos employed/imprisoned/enslaved/lurking in that vile hellpit of a dimension.

[N1SB]

1 hour ago, ThePenitentOne said:

So if I was running a Xenos campaign as a GM, I'd go Craftworld Eldar; the narrative would be told in bursts- five to ten game mini-stories spread out along thousands of years of Eldar lifespans. Like each player pics one episode from their backstory, and then the GM helps the others weave their way into the narrative... And then you end up with pivotal moments where the lives of these characters repeatedly intersect.

 

Some of those events could be tied to the path system- a story arch might be a character's transition from the path of the Warrior to the Outcast, for example.

 

You'd want to give farseers hints about what is to come- dream sequences, vision quests- that sort of thing.

 

Ok this is WAY better...because it's a way to see the setting of Warhammer from a different set of eyes.

 

Like starting from the Great Crusade: "Flee, you fools, from this Slaanesh we've created...wait, did Monkeighs breed Super Monkeighs!?"

 

To the Horus Heresy: "The Super Monkeighs are slaying each other, excellent...but are under the sway of Chaos.  We must intervene."

 

To the Age of Apostasy: "Now they're making All-Girl Super Monkeighs and are slaying each other again...we must intervene."

 

To the current Dark Imperium: "Aw no...what have you Super Monkeighs done?  Again?  We must intervene...again."

 

And you know how the Craftworld Eldar and the Dark Eldar aren't so opposed to each other, they used to be able to Ally, and they work with Xenos like those Snakey Dudes in Drukhari armies.  This is way more suitable for a tabletop RPG.  Because you know how every RPG is unique...except they're not?  This hits all the marks.

 

So in between adventures, the player characters are just living their lives on their Craftworlds or Commorragh or some Exodite planet, minding their own business, until the stupid Monkeighs do something really stupid again...at which point the must intervene.  It's the most natural RPG campaign there is.

 

The Infinite & the Divine follows this timeskip framework, so that definitely works, and is much fun.  Well done, Brother Penny One.

[LameBeard]

I agree a party of Eldar works well in the 40k theme: they are few in a galaxy of myriad threats. Their response to these threats will not always be direct violence. Instead subterfuge, diplomacy, exploration, assassination, ambush, negotiation are all real roleplay possibilities, actually much more interesting than straight soldiers.  And @ThePenitentOne’s idea of the path system is clever - it could be like careers in the original Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay.

 

I love Horus Heresy and I love space marines and I love RPGs but I’m not especially excited about the middle of that Venn diagram.  Like when I read the Gaunts Ghosts novels, the best bits are when he’s fighting (sometimes through violence, sometimes through politics) other branches of the Imperium. That theme would make a great RPG. I feel like there’s only a narrow window for that sort of thing in the Heresy.

 

A mixed race party is more difficult but I can see (say) a T’au Water caste with a Kroot mercenary and a human who is non-Imperial having some fun adventures on the fringes of Imperial Space - and it’s fun because the Imperium will be generally suspicious but need not be so hostile that violence is the immediate response. For extra fun the human is actually ex-Imperial, but doesn’t reveal that. 

[grailkeeper]

If I was doing a Necron RPG I'd treat it like an ancient Egyptian Political intrigue, filled with competing dynasties, back stabbing and power plays. Other races would be treated like a plague of locusts that needs to be eliminated.

 

Joke answer= All the players just sleep.

[Trokair]

@Mazer Rackham run a Tau centred game (with some players picking Kroot and Gue’vesa human) using the FFG RPG system a while back down in the play by post board here on the forum.

 

While the main rule books are human centric some of the expansion book give a lot of details on various xenos, and while this is mostly as enemy NPC (aside from Rouge Trader as already mentioned by others)  there is enough there that one can kind of make it work, might need some house rules to smooth things along.

 

In fact, following that Tau game, which sadly petered out, I have had in the back of my mind running an Eldar game on the similar principle. Using Dark Heresy as the rule set, and then profiles, equipment and such for Eldar given in some of the expansion (musty RT ones I think)  to for a framework for the players. I’ll get to it one of these years, honest.

 

 

I think there would be appetite for a dedicated Xenos RPG rule set, whether as stand alone or tying into a series of related games the way FFG did humancentric books , Marines centric books , and Chaos (both human and marine) books.

 

Having different Xenos acting together does require more of a specific scenarios, but as others have pointed out there are plenty. Such as in the Tau hegemony, places like Black Stone Fortress and Commorragh. Others that come to mind could be a Eldar Corsair ports*, abord a Hulk that has Orks, human survious, some deamons and Genestelaer and maybe a necron ship somewhere in the hulk, or what about some of the human/xenos intermixed society that formed during the dark age of technology and where being wiped out during the great crusade by the imperium.  

 

*In a Deathwatch game run by @Lysimachus  we recently had to work our way through a Eldar set up, human administered, ork policed bazaar where all sorts of trading and mingeling of species was happening. Sufficed to say some of the player characters were, in character, frothing at the mouth at such a non imperial mindset.

[Mazer Rackham]

4 hours ago, Trokair said:

In fact, following that Tau game, which sadly petered out, I have had in the back of my mind running an Eldar game on the similar principle. Using Dark Heresy as the rule set, and then profiles, equipment and such for Eldar given in some of the expansion (musty RT ones I think)  to for a framework for the players. I’ll get to it one of these years, honest.

 

Do it now..! 

 

I crave my Exodite Warlock with a Carnosaur called Growler McSasquatch. 

 

I think the new HH RPG will be interesting - it might help me resurrect my Knights of The Golden Throne idea, which is Dune, but with IK/TK.

 

Edited 9 hours ago by Mazer Rackham

[grailkeeper]

Tyranid RPG

 

Player 1: Hiss

 

Player 2: Hissssss

 

Player 1: Hiss.

Edited 6 hours ago by grailkeeper

[Teetengee]

From an RPG design perspective, any multi-player game is going to want multiple different classes/archetypes/etc. that players can build their characters to fill, either explicitly or implicitly. Having a variety of options to really push characters apart from each other helps everyone have their moments and keep characters complementary rather than competing. Because of this I think you have two xenos that work best;
1. Eldar. All the different aspect warriors allow for interesting combinations and while aspect warriors typically don't work together, I think most ttrpg players would forgive the forcedness of that situation in order to have all their favorite different characters. Supplements could even be provided for additional classes for non aeldari: corsairs, haemonculus coven, kabbalite warriors, wyches (maybe including hellions as separate), mandrakes, scourges, ynnari, harlequins (and their various classes).

2. Tau. Tau auxiliaries are the key here. You could have any number of minor xenos or mercenaries show up for a special mission.

[grailkeeper]

24 minutes ago, Teetengee said:

2. Tau. Tau auxiliaries are the key here. You could have any number of minor xenos or mercenaries show up for a special mission.

Tau also have 5 different castes and a number of differing ranks within the caste. Just because someone is in the caste doesnt mean they do the same jobs. there's a big difference between an air caste fighter pilot and an air caste member who works on a space station. I think there's a lot of scope for different roles even in the same rank in the same caste. Ethereals might need to be NPCS.

[Mazer Rackham]

46 minutes ago, grailkeeper said:

Tyranid RPG

 

Player 1: Hiss

 

Player 2: Hissssss

 

Player 1: Hiss.

 

Imperial Gaurdsman 1: 'Can I pet that dawg?'

 

40 minutes ago, Teetengee said:

1. Eldar. All the different aspect warriors allow for interesting combinations and while aspect warriors typically don't work together, I think most ttrpg players would forgive the forcedness of that situation in order to have all their favorite different characters.

 

I agree. The template here is to follow the Deathwatch kind of theme where you take specialists and fill out the roles, and it doesn't matter which one turns up. Obviously you can have Warlocks to replace Librarians who could scale up into farseers, etc. The GM would bear quite the brunt of the work in planning and expanding careers. Other templates for Dark Eldar Exist, and these can be found in a few places. My idea with this would be to treat the Dark Kin in the same vein as Black Crusade, where their skills and attributes are supremely flexible, and would allow a better combination than the rigid Craftworld style adversaries.

 

Statblocks exist for both of these in DW and BC, and can be quite easily ported into DW from Rogue Trader.

 

40 minutes ago, Teetengee said:

2. Tau. Tau auxiliaries are the key here. You could have any number of minor xenos or mercenaries show up for a special mission.

 

True, but I think that would depend on what the players wanted, and how things could be communicated. It might work better following the Only War format, as you could have the PC a Vespid with a communion helmet, and he could be in charge of a couple of mooks. Same with the Kroot/Shaper archetype.

 

That is all predicated on the new game looking like Imperium Maledictum, and not W&G, though, of course.

 

Edited 5 hours ago by Mazer Rackham

[Mazer Rackham]

5 minutes ago, grailkeeper said:

Tau also have 5 different castes and a number of differing ranks within the caste. Just because someone is in the caste doesnt mean they do the same jobs. there's a big difference between an air caste fighter pilot and an air caste member who works on a space station. I think there's a lot of scope for different roles even in the same rank in the same caste. Ethereals might need to be NPCS.

 

Just so. It's doable to have a Ethereal as a PC< but he would have to be on or at initiate rank so that he's respected, but at the same time his authority does not overwhelm anyone else's. Again, a Deathwatch style system would work best (as it did in our Tau game Tro mentioned) to represent a special task force, which the ethereal could be the public face of, but Shas'El Brokk Slaughter is truly in command, giving the power dynamic between them.

 

I think in our game we had a Tau Stealthsuit pilot, a Kroot, a Drone Commander and a crazy human journo. It wouldn't take much to fit an Air Caste in there as a pilot or even mechanical aerial engineer, depending on the circumstances and plot - which is where it will live or die.

[Necronaut]

8 hours ago, Trokair said:

 

<snip!>

 

*In a Deathwatch game run by @Lysimachus  we recently had to work our way through a Eldar set up, human administered, ork policed bazaar where all sorts of trading and mingeling of species was happening. Sufficed to say some of the player characters were, in character, frothing at the mouth at such a non imperial mindset.

 

Yes, only in character....

 

Spoiler

 

Edited 5 hours ago by Necronaut

[Xin Ceithan]

I love the idea of „A Game of Tombs“ with Necron PCs and „Gangs of Commorragh“ for Drukhari and associates 
 

Speaking of Aeldari, I‘d imagine a Groupon Corsairs could alsorun the full spectrum of various origins and paths as well as a literally treasure trove of adventure opportunities !

 

Also, as mentioned before I once ran a loosely connected series of adventures following a group of Ork Freebooters using stripped down FFG RT rules so the PCs could be tailored to portray their corresponding  Kultur of Origin ( or in one case I fondly remember as one of the most orkish background stories ever:  having been flattened beneath  a stompa and then being brought back by eksperimental transmogrinfusions  - literally by and with I.v. DribSquig - as sort of half feral Squig/Orc crossbreed mutant berserker pirate 

[sitnam]

6 hours ago, Teetengee said:

1. Eldar. All the different aspect warriors allow for interesting combinations and while aspect warriors typically don't work together, I think most ttrpg players would forgive the forcedness of that situation in order to have all their favorite different characters. Supplements could even be provided for additional classes for non aeldari: corsairs, haemonculus coven, kabbalite warriors, wyches (maybe including hellions as separate), mandrakes, scourges, ynnari, harlequins (and their various classes).

 

I think the Blades of Khia e  Kill Team actually could be a good setup for an Aeldari RPG, as it setups a logical reason disparate aspects  would work together