You(erl) Make The Call - Rogue Trader Battle Report

Orks defend their captured Imperial astropathic tower

On February 20th we resumed our casual 40k Rogue Trader campaign set during the Ork invasion of Rynn's World, a plot derived from the original "Warhammer 40,000 - Rogue Trader" rule book. We kicked this off back in the spring of 2012, at the time of the 25th Anniversary of Warhammer 40k.  To recap...

• Pedro Cantor and the Crimson Fist survivors barely escape the "Battle at the Farm".
• Cantor and his Marines try to break through the Ork lines around New Rynn City ; he barely staggers through into the Imperial lines, a moral victory for the Orks.
• Cantor rests up in the medical bays, and is pleased to find a number of additional survivors from the Chapter are present in the New Rynn City garrison, together with Imperial Army and militia units.
• While Cantor is getting his various super-organs treated in hospital, the Orks make a major push against the lines - the Imperials hold them off.

The next chapter in the story would involve a call for help.  The New Rynn City garrison is strong enough to hold the defences, but not strong enough to push the Orks off of Rynn's world. The planetary governor's astropath, Yerl, is located among the survivors, found healing in the medical bays along with Cantor. To make a astropathic distress call, he needs to get back to his designated astropath facility - which happens to be behind the Ork lines. 

Dallas' boyz await the Marine attack

The Imperial garrison sallies forth - the objective is to get Yerl into the tower, get the message out, and get back to friendly lines.  The longer he stays in the tower, the stronger the message will be and the more likelier it will be received by the right Imperial government people elsewhere in the sector.  But Yerl is a VIP - the 40k equivalent of an intergalactic iPhone5S - you need that dude to survive. The Imperials would enter from a short table edge. They had ten turns to get the job done, and get him back off the table.

Love these old RT-era Orks!

The Imperial force was substantial - two squads of Marines, a Predator and a dreadnought.  The Marines were accompanied by a Medic (mostly to protect Yerl) and a Librarian, and led by a kick-ass officer represented on the table by the RT anniversary figure.  Indo and Byron took the Imperial side.

The guys listen to me blab on about the rules - they are thankfully very patient fellows

For their part, the Orks were not sure what the Imperials were up to, but figured it was not good.  They noted the breakout towards the building behind their lines, the building with weird psyker vibes.  A small garrison of two squads of boyz and a Killa Kan was in place to try and hold the Imperials back.  A Wartrack, more boyz squads, and a squad of armoured boyz and a looted Rhino would be the reserve force. The Orks also had a weird boy. Jim and Dallas took command of the Orks.

Marine column approaches

We played pretty close the main Rogue Trader rules for this game - including the Compendium-era vehicle rules (although we ignored the "TRR" - the turning radius - to this day I don't understand how that one actually works).  With these older rules, the Rhinos were tough - like, really, really, really tough. And also very fast. So the Marines rolled up and got down to work.

Dallas' Killa Kan sets off to deal with Indo's Marine squad

Indo was set up to overwhelm an Ork squad with close shooting, but the dice were not with him.  Dallas sent the Killa Kan into them, and it went very, very bad for the Marines, with a number of Crimson Fists ending up as food for the "power klawz" on the Kan.  Ouch! Combined fire from the Predator and the Marine dreadnought eventually hit the Kan critically.  Remember the old critical damage tables? They could be quite funny (at least, when it's not your vehicle involved).  Dallas had seen off Indo's squad, but the damaged Kan turned around an ran wild, opening fire on its own boyz.  Dallas' foot sloggers got BBQ'd by their own Kan!

Byron's Marines deploy from their impervious Rhino

Byron formed his squad with black-powder-era precision out of his Rhino and began a steady march to the "facility".  They took quite a lot of fire as Jim's defenders and Ork reinforcements tried to engage them, and many Marines fell, but at this point my "scenario design", such as it was, hit a pretty big pothole.

Predator and Dreadnought covering the Marine action

The Marine Commander was a serious bad-ass - a minor hero, meant to represent the commander of one of the Companies, sent by Cantor to lead a detachment to bolster New Rynn City, before the Ork attack hit the planet.  Given the catastrophe at the Crimson Fist monastery, he would be one of the only senior officers left in the Chapter. This guy had a BS of '6', so he almost never missed (especially with Byron rolling).  Here is the catch - he had a plasma gun, and a plasma gun is rated "following fire" - remember that rule?

Indo's squad is noticeably smaller after the visit from the Killa Kan

The Marine Commander was a killing machine!  Following fire weapons allowed you to keep shooting as long as you hit and caused a wound, and there were other targets within 4" of the original one. Well, with a BS of '6', this guy almost never missed, and the plasma gun is killer, so it almost always caused a wound.  This guy was scything down whole Ork squads.  Thematically, this matches well with the fluff (especially as the model in question was inspired by the Crimson Fist commander on the cover of the original rule book!).  But it was not fun for the Ork players (although the Marine players found it fantastic, of course).

Byron's Marines unleash the flamer on Jim's Ork boyz

Even with Commander Killing Machine mowing down every Ork he could see, the aliens put up a very, very stubborn resistance.  Jim's boyz extracted a heavy toll, despite being on the receiving end of flamer shots and bolter fire.  As the Space Marine numbers dwindled we discovered another fun and long lost part of the RT vehicle rules - collisions!  In RT, you can speed up or slow down only a certain amount, so if you are going too fast, you will hit stuff - buildings, dreadnoughts, infantry...

Burn baby burn! The Rhino is poised to run down any survivors...

The Marine Rhinos began to run into all sorts of stuff, I would about 30% on purpose and the rest just by accident. The Ork psyker was squished against the building. Ork infantry were run over. The second Ork Kan was rammed. The Rhinos were damaged bit by bit, but the original Rhinos were super-tough APCs, and it showed in the game.

Ork squad cut to ribbons by the Marine Commander and his following-fire Plasma Gun - ouch

The Ork players returned the favour, running over some Marines with their looted Rhino, and ramming the Marine dreadnought into out-of-control movement (again, hilarious unless it is your dreadnought). In the midst of this chaotic battle, Yerl managed to enter the building and spend two turns calling for help.  But he was not able to escape the table before the game ended!

A second Killa Kan tries to hurry into the action

So the game was a draw!  The Imperials side got a distress call sent, but the fate of their Astropath is unknown.  And the Marines got a bloody nose (they were T '3' - a rude shock for Byron and Indo!), not that "Commander Plasma Gun" would have noticed as he waged a lone war against the Orks.

Dallas' damaged Kan is going bonkers, firing the flamer on the nearest target - his own boyz!

Rogue Trader is so much fun, and it was great to play again.  But the game was also a good dose of reality on some aspects of the rules, particularly the old vehicle rules.  We have previously played Rogue Trader in a hybrid fashion, incorporating 5th edition vehicle rules, and that is something we will go back to.  The original vehicle rules, with their great detail, can be a lot of fun for very small games, but are a bit too wacky to have more than one vehicle on the table. Same goes for the dreadnoughts.  The psykers were also kind of useless, so I'll need to do some better planning there to set it up so there is a reason to use them. 

Finally the Marine Commander was out of control...need to be more careful with his weapons next time, or perhaps have some sort of cap on "following fire" - he was a one-man army!

Collisions galore! One Rhino hits the Ork Kan, the other collides with the fence.

Will Yerl's call for help make it through? Will the Imperial Administration receive the call, and send a relief force? Would nearby patrolling elements of another Space Marine chapter perhaps pick up the distress signal and investigate? Or did the message end up getting filed under "low priority random transmissions" at the desk of some colon servitor at the sector capital? Stay tuned for the continuing campaign in the Battle for Rynn's World!

A big thank you to Dallas for hosting, and to Dallas, Jim, Indo and Byron for their patience and light-hearted spirit with all the Rogue Trader craziness.  It was a fun game, I'm looking forward to the next chapter!

Crimson Fist "Beakie" Tactical Squad and Rhino

Crimson Fist tactical squad and a new ride

 More Crimson Fists from the Analogue Hobbies Painting Challenge. This is a squad of "beakie" style Rogue Trader era Space Marines.  It is a 10-man tactical squad, led by a kick-ass sergeant and featuring some hard hitting support in the form of a melta gun and, for those enemies of the Emperor that really need a good cooking, a multi-melta. They also have a Rhino to drive around in.

Mix of RT-era metals and RTB-01 plastics

The squad is a mix of metal RT-era sculpts and good old, classic, RTB-01 plastics.  It was really, really fun to build them and paint them. A great nostalgia exercise. Boy I wish I had another few boxes of those things.  When I think of all the plastic ones I ruined when I first started out...

That melta gunner looks serious

The Chapter symbols are all freehand painting, which is why they look a little all over the place.  The decals do not work at all on these old figures - they are too big, and too fiddly to cut.  So freehand scratching it is!

Who would mess with that Sergeant?

The officer has "Terminator Honours", a power fist and a bolt pistol.  I generally dislike Space Marine figures without helmets (you have power armour - WEAR IT), but it's a cool figure, and he has his helmet handy - I like that they at least thought to sculpt it on to the model's gear.

Multi-melta gunner is second from the right - love that figure

The special weapon figures are two more RT-era favourites.  Both the melta and multi-melta gunners look like they mean business.

These guys would actually fit in the newer Rhino!

I have been using plastic vehicle kits from the contemporary GW range for both the Crimson Fists (as well as my Rogue Trader guardsmen).  The old models are expensive and hard to find, but I have to admit I really prefer the newer models - they are really, really sharp.  Plus they look more in scale!

Rhino has a bit of weathering to show some time in the field

The newer Rhino kits are bigger than the old ones. Of course the Space Marine sculpts themselves grew in size thanks to scale creep, but when you put a new Rhino next to a unit of RT-era figures, the Rhino looks like it might actually carry 10 troops!

Helpful symbol adorns the top access hatches

Pedro Cantor's original command of 15 survivors has now expanded to a 40-man detachment - three tactical squads and one devastator squad, as well as some affiliated command models, a Predator and even a fancy company commander. Sadly this squad represents the final reserves of my hoard of Rogue Trader era marines, originally acquired for the Rogue Trader Anniversary Project. 

Techmarine near the beginnings of a Crimson Fist armoured column

The original plastic "beakies" are getting harder and harder to come by on eBay, and the metal ones are not much more common.  I hopeful of finding one or two final "scores", and in the interim I will continue to add things like more vehicles, a dreadnought, and maybe even some Terminators for support. Stay tuned!

Crimson Fist Command Elements - Rogue Trader

Continuing with the Rogue Trader-themed entries to Curt's Analogue Hobbies Painting Challenge here are some Crimson Fist command elements.  There is a Chaplain, a Medic, a Librarian, some comms guys, at Techmarine and an Astropath. These guys will help the Crimson Fist Commander run his Company.

The Chaplain encourages you to have faith, or get a smack in the head

Up first is the Chaplain - back in the time when GW was much more selective with skulls (now found on every surface), the Chaplain was the exception.  Chaplains are meant to bring spiritual comfort and guidance to the soldiers. A Space Marine chaplain, on the other hand, is a grim spectre of death, with skull everything - helmet, shoulder plates, etc. If this is what gives comfort to Space Marines, no wonder they are stuck in so many pointless last stands.  And of course the Chaplain is a kick-ass fighter, hammering the Emperor's enemies with his arcane weapons and motivating the battle brothers around him.

 

Obamacare in the 41st millennium is mostly the "Emperor's Mercy"...

Up next, the Medic, another role distorted in the grim darkness of the far future.  Although the Marine Medic can sometimes treat wounded battle brothers, mostly he goes around the battlefield putting the wounded ones out of their misery with an "Emperor's Mercy" - essentially a bolt to the head!  He then recovers genetic material so a new Marine can be created.  Ah - the Emperor's circle of life…

 

I like the bling on the old RT Librarian - note the "Force Sword", ready to smite those who are asking for it...

He has some kind of inspirational script on his shoulder pad, and a scroll on the back hip.

The (very spooky) Librarian.  I find it very telling that in the Warhammer 40,000 setting, the gathering, storing and organizing of knowledge (something we take much too for granted these days) is an activity that is regarded as mystic, arcane, dangerous and even grounds for suspicion.  Only the rare trusted psychics - who weren't fed to the Emperor, and were tough enough to become Space Marines - carry out these duties in the Space Marine Chapter.  And, as with the Chaplain, it's no staff function - this fellow can kick ass with his funky "force sword", psychic powers, and guns. 

 

"After I finished blessing the brake pads, we found another problem..."

The Techmarine. Mechanics today are already suspicious and somewhat arcane; in the Warhammer 40,000 setting, who knows how weird they would be? This fellow mends the vehicles of his Company with a mix of prayer and a huge wrench-spanner thingy…these old Rogue Trader-era Techmarines are the best! 

The guy on the left is reviewing orders on his Chapter Approved iPad, while the one on the right bellows orders into his bluetooth headset...

There are two command-type models, one with a communicator and the other with some kind of data slate. I put an antenna in the one fellow, and see these two guys as either crew for an emplaced weapon, or maybe an artillery spotting team. 

Image from "Warhammer 40,000 - Rogue Trader" rule book

"I don't get outside much..."

The Astropath - this figure, "Yerl" from the old Citadel range, is based on an image from the Rogue Trader rulebook.  Astropaths are the 4G-LTE wireless communication devices of the 41st millennium, passing messages back and forth through the warp and allowing the Imperium of Man to (mostly) stay in touch across the vast distances of the galaxy.  The Astropath lives a crummy, weird-genes-and-odd-looks, who-said-you-could-leave-your-chamber life in Warhammer 40,000, so I painted his skin tone to match. This figure will be a good objective marker or model for Rogue Trader games.

Stay tuned for more Crimson Fists - a mix of golden oldies and contemporaries...

Rogue Trader Anniversary Figure - Finally Painted!

Rogue Trader 25th Anniversary figure...painted two years later (ahem)

As I mentioned with this recent submission to Curt's Analogue Hobbies Painting Challenge, time sure flies!. The 25th Anniversary of "Warhammer 40,000 - Rogue Trader" seems relatively recent to me, but it was actually in 2012, just about two years ago.  In keeping with GW's sure-fire tin ear and clueless lack of self-awareness, the company celebrated this significant anniversary with a special White Dwarf featuring Gandalf on the cover. But they also released a special figure to commemorate the occasion - a figure inspired by the Crimson First leading a doomed last stand from the cover of the rulebook.  These were limited edition models issued at the time and I picked a couple up because I am a shameless fanboy, and I love Rogue Trader.

Will always love this cover!

He's pretty close to that dude in the middle...

This has been sitting primed since February 2012…thank goodness for Curt's painting challenges that encourage to get these kind of projects finished!  For whatever reason I have been on a Rogue Trader kick during this painting challenge, and this figure was the latest.

The scenic base has...you guessed it..skulls! Three of them!

You have the option of mounting it directly on the scenic base beside the standard, or mounting the officer on a smaller base separately.  I went with a separate base for the Commander, leaving the banner to be a piece of scenery, and objective or terrain. 

Why use that plasma pistol, when you can chuck an Ork head at the enemies of the Emperor?

It's a really, really nice figure and a nice souvenir. GW, though, it can't take two steps forward without taking one-and-a-half (or three) back.  The problem in this case? The figure was made of "Finecast" instead of proper metal. Finecast is not new anymore, but this is the first Finecast figure I have worked with. "Finecast" combines the issues of resin with the floppiness of soft plastic - all of the price of gold, a combo only GW could master. I was pretty concerned based on what I was reading about Finecast online, but fortunately I was spared many of the more serious problems (holes, deformed casting etc) this crap medium seems to present to many other gamers.  

The banner literally flopped around while painting it, but you can't fault the detail

Although I was lucky, I can see why people think Finecast sucks.  The detail on the figure is really something, but the banner in particular was tricky to paint as Finecast has all of the tensile strength of a wet noodle - even my 8/0 brush caused it to bend! The experience did not pump me up to seek out other Finecast figures, although GW seems to be out of the metal business so more and more of its products are cast in this medium. Let's hope the rumours I have seen online are true, and that Finecast is truly toast.  Resin figures are bad enough - Finecast can just rot.

Bring on the Red Star Orks!

Anyway, for all that nerd rage, the figure was still fun to paint and I'm glad to have it done.  The sculpt is very loyal to the inspiration of the image on the Rogue Trader book cover, right down to the ominous Ork head being waved around in his right hand. As I continue to build up my little collection of Crimson Fist troops this fellow will fit right in.  Dallas and I have been pondering a Rogue Trader game for a while, so who knows? This guy could get capped very soon on the table.  Would be fitting if he went down in style, as the fellows on the old Rogue Trader cover do.

Crimson Fist Reinforcements

More survivors on Rynn's World

 When they last saw action, my collection of Crimson Fists was a pretty small detachment.  They had to be bolstered by some Imperial Guardsmen in their second game. Of course they represented the survivors of the catastrophe on Rynn's World, so of course they were small.  But I want to expand the collection - both to reflect our occasional campaign (Pedro Cantor and his survivors ultimately encountered other members of the Chapter who were not killed in the explosion) and for use in other settings.

New Predator, old marines

 I've been using the motivation of Curt's Analogue Hobbies Painting Challenge to start bulking the force up a little.  This was a submission for the Challenge, and it includes a mix of new and old - a Predator from GW's current model lineup, and a group of RTB01 "Beakie" marines.

The Predator is one of GW's best vehicle kits - love the look of it

I love nearly all things Rogue Trader, but when it comes to vehicles, generally speaking, the newer model line is much, much improved.  The current Space Marine Predator is a beautiful model (and I've used one for my Guardsmen) so I wanted one for the Crimson Fists.  As always with models, I made several assembly mistakes (look closely and try to see which side sponson is mounted with the bracket upside-down!) but overall it turned out great.  The weapon load is configured to match the original Rogue Trader vehicle (an autocannon in the turret and two lascannons on the sides), but this can easily be swapped/ignored for a "current" 40k game.

I also like how the "new" vehicles are actually much closer to the right size in comparison to the older figures

These old marines are a lot of fun to paint, but one part I don't enjoy is trying to bodge the Chapter symbol on to the shoulder plate. For my initial slate of 15 marines I used metal "vanity" shoulder plates with the icon sculpted directly on (a brilliant notion that I wish GW would make a more consistent effort with - anyway).  This took some doing as the plates, sized to fit the newer, larger line of models, were awkward fits with the old Rogue Trader plastics.  Plus, they were pricey - fine for a small project, but not sustainable for an expanded collection. 

RTB01 plastic marines with vaguely shaped red smudges on their should plates

I tried to use the decals that are available (again, a great thing that I wish GW would make a little more of a consistent effort on) but again the size defeated me - they are designed for the larger, current models (obviously!) and won't sit on the old should plates without a huge air bubble.  That left freehand painting as the only option - not something I will be hired to do! So some of the marines look like they are part of the "Crimson Blobs" or "Crimson Paws"...but at least, in a group, their chapter identity is pretty much clear.

I think in RT the Predator could even carry five troops, right? Who needs Razorbacks?

Overall the original Crimson Fist detachment has expanded from the group of 15 survivors to about 30 troops in three squads now - with a vehicle to boot.  Hoping to get these on the table soon.