…or “How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Jungle.”

On Saturday, June 28, the 3-D Roleplay Club in Portland, OR, had a swap meet. So far, our swap meets have been very low-key – folks bring a small selection of items and some very chill trading ensues. This particular swap meet hit the calendar after two of the fellas found a couple of great deals on Facebook Marketplace. Both of them kindly decided to let the crew have their pick from the lots (good ol’ metal minis). As is tradition for the 3-DRC swap meets, a game was planned. And who volunteered to plan and run it?

This guy!

I wrote a Warhammer 40,000: Rogue Trader scenario for five players and a GM. You can check out the PDF containing all of the documents here. As usual for these things, it’s done and not perfect. You’ll notice the “Victory Points” reference at the end has no actual points values in place (all are simply notated as “X VP”). There are likely holes in the explanations/rules changes, but if you decide to run this scenario or have a friend run it for you, just have the GM make the calls as issues arise and focus on having a great time.

The first consideration I needed to make was altering the default “I-go-you-go” turn order rules to better accommodate five players. If each player is required to run through the “Move/Shoot/Hand-to-Hand/Reserves/Psionics/Rally” phases before the next player takes their turn, you can imagine how long Player 5 will be stuck waiting to take their turn. In an attempt to keep everyone constantly engaged, I opted to split apart the turns and have all players move, then all players shoot, then all players resolve hand-to-hand combats, etc. This is not a novel idea – a similar change is suggested in the “Advanced Rules” section toward the back of the Rogue Trader rule book.

The second major change I made was Hand-to-Hand combat resolution. Rolling on both the “To Hit” and “To Wound” chart every time – with constant modifiers to both – gets pretty long in the tooth, especially in a five player game. Instead, I did away with the “To Hit” roll completely and substituted most of the combat sequence from Games Workshop’s Middle-earth Strategy Battle Game (MESBG). In essence, it works a lot like combat in Space Hulk – players in combat roll a number of D6s (in this case, equal to their Attacks stat), and the player that rolls the highest value on a single die wins the combat. In the event of a tie, the model with the higher Weapon Skill stat wins. If there is still a tie, the players randomly determine a winner. The loser(s) is pushed back 1″, and the winner then resolves their attacks using the “To Wound” chart as usual.

Without getting too deep into it, winning the Priority Roll in MESBG is a very big deal. It allows the winner to choose who activates first, to “pair off” combats in whatever way they deem most advantageous, and to choose in what order those combats are resolved. How do I simulate this for a 5 player game? I decided to use playing cards. I dealt 4 (alter this number as appropriate to your particular scenario/game) to each player at the top of every new round. Then at the top of each phase (Move, Shoot, HTH, etc.) asked them all to choose one of their cards and give it to me. Turn order was then resolved in order of descending card value. The players did not receive any new cards until the start of the following round, when any unused cards were returned to me, the deck shuffled, and new hands given out.

This had the added benefit of giving players a sense of agency in when they might make their actions in each phase. It really worked quite well.

I had plenty of other surprises in store, but many of them remained unexplored secrets due to the way the game unfolded (for another game, perhaps)…

The Battle Report (Massively Abbreviated)

So how did the game go? First thing I will say is don’t read any further if you are planning on running this scenario or want me to run it for you (locals take note). There are spoilers.

SLICK COBRA (Michael) led the Mercenary force and took command of Scaly Steve, armed with a terrifying plasma gun, and Bighorn Joe, beastman bounty hunter, plus a motley crew of five pirate scum. Their ship had been forced to crash land on this backwater jungle planet – JOOPBARG VI -, and they needed to find a new transport and to grab some exotic critter eggs to fence on the intergalactic black market.

GHAR’GOIL LIVERSLICER, Ork Warlord (Mike), commanded three beefy orks in powered armor and ten boyz, squad name HUNKEE PUNKZ. Ghar’goil has laid claim to this world, so he and his krew have shuttled to the surface to strut around, plant a flag, and tell everyone who’s boss.

DOCTOR NEDRY (Evan) directed his science team to collect biological samples in order to advance his lifelong dream of opening an alien creature zoo. His team was made up of assistant HOAGIE HOWSER, doctor ELLIE SATELLITE, robot HAL 9001, and three well-equipped bodyguards. For the doctor, this was to be a grab-and-go operation.

SLIPDEW CROAKSWALLOW (Tyler W), esteemed Slann warchief, was to continue the ruse started by the supreme ruler of Joopbarg VI (he had “surrendered” the planet to Ghar’goil Liverslicer), and to then disable the ork shuttle and repel any other invaders on his precious planet. Slipdew was served by Slann Mage Pimbu Ono, three terrifying Slann Warriors in Terminator armor, and ten Slann Braves.

Finally, ARNOLD STALLONE (Tyler H) commandeered the Catachan force, who had (unhelpfully) been ordered by their superiors to “neutralize the threat” to Joopbarg VI and that they would “know it when they see it.” Arnold and his soldiers – co-commandeered by the hunky Harker – were allowed to start in hiding and in “blip form” if they desired. Most of the force deployed around the table perimeter, with a small squad hidden inside the comms building near the center of the table.

Slick Cobra and the orks had a bit of a scrum before the two parties secretly forged an alliance. Later, Ghar’goil’s crew betrayed the mercs and shoved two of them off of the spaceport building, killing them both.

Ghar’goil successfully planted his flag atop the spaceport building while shouting his proclamation of rule. In the end, Ghar’goil even managed to best Arnold Stallone in a thrilling combat atop the spaceport building as the flag behind them rippled in the jungle breeze.

Nedry’s science team was doing fine until their collection of TIGERAPTOR EGGS caused three Tigeraptors to charge in on their location. They were nasty and managed to avoid injury even from Stallone’s snipers! HAL 9001 eventually did them in and pummeled them into a pulp or sent them scurrying away in fear. ELLIE SATELLITE turned out to actually be a colleague of SLICK COBRA, and turned on the science team! She successfully lunged for the Tigeraptor eggs that had been dropped in combat, fired a few pot shots at Doctor Nedry (she missed!), and ran off with the sample. Very sneaky indeed.

The Slann fought bravely. The Braves were relatively ineffective with their blowguns, but managed to distract the orks long enough for two of them to board the ork shuttle. The two braves chewed on wires and yanked at cables but only managed to start the shuttle stereo system and cause the lights to flicker. Slann dance party! Slipdew showed up, kicked out the technologically-incompentent Braves, and disabled the shuttle himself. Meanwhile, the Slann Terminators fired at the orks standing atop the spaceport building, and managed to burn one of them to a crisp with a dead-on heavy flamer shot. Pimbu stood by and attempted to steal the mind of Ghar’goil with foul magic, but only succeeded in giving the ork a killer migraine. Oh well!

Stallone’s Catachans waited in hiding until the optimal moment, then came out with guns blazing. Harker lit up the mercenary team with his heavy bolter and laid waste to three or four of its members all in one hail of fire. The soldiers were picked off by merc and ork blasts, but Stallone and his men held out in the center of the battlefield. The squad that emerged from the comms tower took everyone off-guard – it was very good.

I think that about wraps it up. If you want to see the full scenario packet complete with player handouts, find it here. If you run it let me know how it goes.