OrlandotheTechnicoloured wrote:
Rogue Trader core rules

FFG wrote:Into the Dark…
Preview the Dan Abnett Short Story Included in Dark Heresy Second Edition



“They had gone out into the Low Worlds, where death was expecting them. Indeed, of all thing things out there in the dark hoping to make their acquaintance, death was probably the most hospitable.”
–Dan Abnett, Into the Dark…

Dark Heresy Second Edition invites you to join a team of Acolytes, dedicated to exterminating heresy in the Imperium at any cost. You must travel across the innumerable worlds of the galaxy, confronting horrors beyond imagination in the name of shielding humanity from the corruption of Chaos.

For the Dark Heresy Second Edition Core Rulebook, author Dan Abnett wrote a short story entitled Into the Dark…. Dan Abnett is a prolific author within the Warhammer 40,000 universe, having written the Gaunt’s Ghosts series and the Eisenhorn and Ravenor trilogies, among others. In his new short story, players find a taste of what they might expect from their adventures as an Acolyte in an Inquisitor’s service.

Download the first two pages of Into the Dark… (pdf, 2.7 MB) from the support page for Dark Heresy Second Edition, and read Dan’s thoughts on working with the Warhammer 40,000 universe below.



Dan Abnett on the Warhammer 40,000 Universe

FFG: What aspects of the Warhammer 40,000 background appeal to you most as a writer, and what makes Warhammer 40,000 stand out from other science fiction and futuristic settings you've worked with?

Dan Abnett: It’s an incredibly well-developed universe with an unmistakable aesthetic. The tone and atmosphere of Warhammer 40,000 are what truly make the universe memorable. This tone is derived from the art of John Blanche and shows up in the darkly ornate, almost medieval, imagery throughout the Imperium. It depicts a culture in the midst of magnificent decay. Everything within the universe is very well defined, but there’s vast scope for writers’ and artists’ imagination.



FFG: You've been writing about Inquisitors and those who serve them for a while now. What most interests you about Inquisitors, Acolytes, and their adventures?

DA: Warhammer 40,000 is originally a table-top miniatures game focused the battlefront, but Inquisitors give us a way to see the society away from the frontline of battle. That thought really appealed to me when I started writing the Eisenhorn and Ravenor books. The stories of the Inquisitors take us to the darkest depths of the Imperium, into the shadows of everyday life, into the opulent realms of the nobility and the slums of the underclasses. It’s a way to explore the universe that you don’t get from a military angle.

FFG: The villains are often as memorable as the heroes in Warhammer 40,000 stories. Who was your favourite nemesis to write for, both in terms of the character and what he or she offered to the plot?

DA: I’d have to say Pontius Glaw, the villain of the Eisenhorn books, who was a true menace because he was powerful, but also extraordinarily clever. Cherubael stands out as well, although sometimes he’s almost a hero (except that he’s a daemon).

FFG: What games do you play yourself in your free time?

DA: I play all versions of Warhammer 40,000 and Warhammer, both tabletop and roleplay, alongisde other RPG classics, such as Traveller, Dungeons & Dragons, and Call of Cthulhu. That’s when I get the chance, though, which is all too seldom! I like to play anything Warhammer 40,000 when I can, just to stay in the universe. The Horus Heresy board game is also great. It creates a totally different scale of action for the players.

FFG: What was your inspiration for the Into the Dark… short story included in Dark Heresy Second Edition? Without giving too much away, what can players expect from the tale?

DA: The short story really offers an example of how an Inquisitorial team operates, how the characters might interact, and what each Acolyte brings to the table regarding skills. It also illustrates exactly how mysterious things can be in the grim darkness of the far future. Sometimes even the heroes don’t know what they’re doing or why!

Thanks, Dan!



Click the thumbnail on the right to download the first two pages of Dan Abnett’s short story, Into the Dark…, and experience the beginning of the Acolytes’ adventures. Then, prepare to tell your own stories in the darkness of Warhammer 40,000. Preorder Dark Heresy Second Edition at your local retailer today!

 Miss Dee wrote:
Tome of decay arrived on my door mat this morning

FFG wrote:Populate a Universe
Preview the NPCs within Dark Heresy Second Edition



“Look upon the crowd below and know this – for each honest and Emperor-fearing citizen, another harbours discontent and the seed of treachery in his heart. For every two such malcontents, a third plots against his betters. Out of each hundred such plotters, one has the resolve to act. Now realise this – Hive Desoleum is home to billions. How many, then, are there all around us, ready to drag this place into oblivion?”
–Overheard along a midhive habway, from persons unknown

Your investigations as an Acolyte in Dark Heresy Second Edition inevitably bring you into close contact with dozens of strange and exotic beings, ranging from loyal citizens of the Imperium to the blackest spawn of the Warp. Some of these may aid you towards your goals, but others will certainly oppose you with all their might.

Today, contributing writer Tim Cox brings you deeper into the corruption of Hive Desoleum as he describes the exotic people and horrid beasts you may encounter in your adventures across the Askellon sector.



Tim Cox on NPCs in Dark Heresy Second Edition

One of the most exciting things about working on Dark Heresy Second Edition was the opportunity to explore Imperial society. Far from the brutal battlefields of the 41st millennium, strange and bizarre denizens fill the worlds and cities of the Imperium. Each of the Imperium’s million and more worlds is unique, and possesses its own defining characteristics. After all, many worlds were settled before the Age of Strife, and their civilisations developed over tens of thousands of years. When we created the cast of NPCs and adversaries for Dark Heresy, we wanted to highlight the uniqueness of every world and its inhabitants.

Natives of Desoleum

Rather than offering generic NPCs painted in broad strokes, the NPC and Adversary chapter of Dark Heresy primarily focuses on the inhabitants of a single city – Hive Desoleum. In Hive Desoleum, society is dominated by the oath system. Oaths determine social ranking, servitude, and status for every member of the city, from the youngest child in the slums to Lady Desoleum herself. Because the oaths are such an enormous part of life in Hive Desoleum, we worked very hard to incorporate this into the NPCs and adversaries the Acolytes may face in Desoleum.

Although many of the characters described in this chapter are specific to Hive Desoleum, GMs will still find these characters useful for adventures set in other locales. I knew while developing this chapter that the most important thing was to maximize its usefulness to GMs. For me, this meant creating complete game profiles to help GMs run encounters and writing in-depth background descriptions to provide GMs with ideas for fitting these NPCs into other adventures.



To help a GM use these NPCs in any adventure, I endeavoured to make them flexible, while keeping them anchored in the strange and macabre environment of Hive Desoleum. Some NPCs, particularly the members of the Imperial Adeptus such as Astropaths and Tech-Priests, are representative of individuals found on many Imperial worlds. Other characters are more firmly entrenched in the culture of Hive Desoleum. The Involute Cadre Trooper and Officer, for example, represent the military of Desoleum, but GMs can easily modify their profiles or use them as they are to represent the soldiery of another world.

Dread Creatures Await

In addition to the human residents of Hive Desoleum, the NPCs and Adversaries chapter includes several dangerous flora and fauna from across the Askellon Sector. These allow GMs to present their Acolytes with very different types of challenges. Gunfights with cultists are one thing, but how does one fight a plant that drives nearby sentients into homicidal psychosis, or a mind-influencing spoor that exists in reality and the Warp simultaneously? Developing this section was a lot of fun, as it gave me the opportunity to explore the life forms found across the sector and revisit classic beasts like the common grox.

One of my favorite NPCs from the whole chapter – the smelt-rat – appears in this section. An artificial environment like Hive Desoleum is bound to be home to some highly exotic life forms, such as the smelt-rats, cybernetic vermin of unknown origin. Smelt-rats are no simple pests, though. These beasts are drawn to technological systems, infesting them and posing great threats to the hive’s ancient systems. They are also dangerous to any individuals with cybernetic limbs or implants, as smelt-rats are drawn to tech like normal vermin to food. The mere sight of a bionic limb drives smelt-rats into a ravenous feeding frenzy. Even more frightening are the rumoured smelt-rat kings, composed of many individual smelt-rats fused together and displaying a higher intelligence. Springing these beasts on unwary Acolytes reminds them that the lower reaches of Hive Desoleum are just as dangerous as any unexplored planet.



Finally, this chapter explores a few of the foul xenos and denizens of the Warp that the Acolytes might confront. Rather than a random grab-bag of unrelated aliens and Daemons, we focused on distinct groups. This way, GMs find a range of NPCs within each group, including numerous Troops, Elites, and Masters. Within this chapter, you’ll find profiles for the Eldar of Craftworld Miandrothe and the putrescent servitors of Nurgle, opening the way for an array of encounters.

I hope the NPCs and adversaries of the Dark Heresy Second Edition Core Rulebook provide excitement and adventure to players over many campaigns, and that these strange characters and creatures might even inspire GMs to create new adventures!

Start Your Adventure

Thanks, Tim!

Whether you encounter terrifying xenos, confront the spawn of Nurgle, or battle smugglers and cultists within the Imperium, you’ll need a guide to the strange and unknowable ways of your enemies. In the Dark Heresy Second Edition Core Rulebook, GMs find the tools they need to populate the universe of Warhammer 40,000.

Preorder your copy of Dark Hersey Second Edition at your local retailer today!

 Alpharius wrote:
For everything available for Deathwatch, is there anything not worth picking up?

FFG wrote:Building a Hive
Developer Tim Huckelbery on Creating Hive Desoleum for Dark Heresy Second Edition



“They call this the bottom of the hive. Hah! I know for a fact there is a whole lot more even farther down…”
–Omar Endish, Purveyor of Sacrosanct Salvage

Millions of planets fill the galaxy in Warhammer 40,000, and no two are exactly the same. Hive worlds, forge worlds, feral worlds, and death worlds are vastly different from each other, and even within these categories, planets differ massively. In Dark Heresy Second Edition, you and your fellow Acolytes journey to countless unique planets across the Askellon sector, including Hive Desoleum, a decaying hive held together by ancient oaths.

Today, developer Tim Huckelbery explores the process of creating Hive Desoleum and the strange peoples who inhabit it.

Tim Huckelbery on Creating Hive Desoleum

It all started with a hive ganger. Or more precisely, what she looked like.

While creating new art descriptions for The Lathe Worlds, one of the earlier Dark Heresy books, we wanted to include a hive ganger image. Hives and the vicious gangers that inhabit them are an iconic part of Warhammer 40,000, and it was natural to include them. The issue was that a firm description of a hive ganger’s appearance is non-existent. There’s no such thing as “typical” or “normal” in the 41st millennium, so we couldn’t truly say our proposed hive ganger looked typical. Each ganger looks different, depending on the gang she belongs to. Each hive has its own groups of hive gangers, unique to that hive, and each world has unique hives. For us to create a hive ganger and bring her to life properly, we had a bit of work to do – we needed to build a world.

The first thing we did was create a gang for our ganger to walk alongside. Drawing inspiration from films, we decided that most gangs in our new hive would belong to gang affiliations, with each affiliation featuring an iconic fighting method, weapon type, or even clothing style. Our new gang, the Bloodlines, would be one of the Fleshcutter gangs, all obsessed with bladed weapons and ritual scarring. With one gang affiliation down, we went on to create more gang affiliations, such as the Death Masks, Tech-Gangers, Painted Throngs, and Cloudsboys. While the gangs were still rough ideas, we stepped back to create the setting these gangs would inhabit: Hive Desoleum itself.



We wanted to make this hive unique, and we decided that the hive wouldn’t run on cash or hard currency, but instead would rely on an elaborate network of oaths that tied everyone in the hive together in a network of debts and obligations. Every citizen of the hive would carry an oath-cog to track his own oaths. Lower workers wore simple mechanical devices, as their oaths lay predominantly with their overseer. The rulers owned much more elaborate versions, more like a brass snowstorm of tiny, whirring cogs and gears, so large that servitors had to carry the intricate mechanisms. This also led to concepts for normal clothing within the hive, thus leading to refinements in what gangers wore to rebel and stand out from the crowds. The oath-cogs worn by the hive’s Enforcers could even be detached and used as brutal melee weapons. The oath system completely drove the people’s customs and the hive’s operations, adding another wonderful piece to the Warhammer 40,000 setting.

Once the hive started coming together, the planet as a whole was next. We decided Desoleum possessed vast wastelands of irradiated glass and sand, with acidic oceans and gigantic creatures drifting through the abyssal depths. We also included some primordial xenos ruins, buried beneath radioactive sand, but always attracting those who sought alien relics for sale or adoration.

Now that the hive and the planet were complete, it was time for us to return to developing the gangs of Desoleum. Each of the gang affiliations received specific, named gangs and histories, plus a detailed sample ganger to use as a development aid for each gang. We added Chaos cults, mutant enclaves, and religious sects, alongside hive nobles and ancient hive structures like the Spine to add more mystery to the setting. Everything in Desoleum got attention, from the heights of Apex, where the hive rulers lives in opulence, to the deadly ruins and slums of the Underhive. I especially liked working in the depths far beneath the surface, the lawless areas that can seem to stretch on forever. For me, the only thing cooler than a hive is what may lurk beneath it. In these dark reaches, prospectors prowl the shores of underground seas, searching for lost archaeotech amidst mutant settlements and heretical worshippers. Here, wonders and terrors beyond imagining can be found.



It was a lot of work for just one art piece, but it was truly worth it. I really enjoyed developing this wonderful setting, and found myself using it and its peoples in other books as we worked on Dark Heresy Second Edition. Hive Desoleum was our first major location for the Askellon sector, and your Acolytes should have an exciting time exploring this massive hive and rooting out its heresies and dangers!

Enter the Hive

Thanks, Tim!

Your adventures in Dark Heresy Second Edition lead you across the exotic worlds of the Askellon sector to visit worlds ranging from Hive Desoleum to worlds untouched by mankind. Prepare to investigate heresy across the galaxy, and preorder Dark Heresy Second Edition at your local retailer today!

 H.B.M.C. wrote:
And to this day I can't figure out why you get everything first. Does your FLGS exist in some sort of time rift?

 PrimarchX wrote:

 H.B.M.C. wrote:
And to this day I can't figure out why you get everything first. Does your FLGS exist in some sort of time rift?

My FLGS is about 250 miles from Roseville MN and they do pickups from their distributor every day.

FFG wrote:Start Your Inquisition
The Dark Heresy Second Edition Core Rulebook and GM Kit Are Now Available



“All of thy abilities come through the grace of the Emperor, and you must know that their use reflects back upon Him. Do not disappoint the saviour of all humanity.”
–Morticator Siobhan Reichmyn

Take on the mantle of an Acolyte and enter the darkness of the far future! Dark Heresy Second Edition and the Dark Heresy Second Edition Game Master’s Kit are now available, both online through our webstore and at your local retailer.

Enter the Askellon Sector

In Dark Heresy Second Edition, you and your friends play Acolytes in the service of an Inquisitor, bound to travel the galaxy and eradicate heresy wherever you find it. Countless dangers threaten the Imperium from every side, and as servants of the Inquisition, you are Mankind’s last line of defense. Failure to confront the evils that await you could mean damnation and destruction for the entire sector.



With the tools provided in this 448-page, full-colour rulebook, you’ll travel for the first time to the Askellon sector. Here, the corrupting influence of Chaos is strongly felt, and you must battle new threats from within, without, and beyond. Whether you exterminate cults, hunt down marauding xenos, or do battle with Daemonic spawn of the Warp, you’ll find the starting point for all your adventures in the Dark Heresy Second Edition core rulebook.

Your journeys may take you to the decaying hive world of Desoleum, the cemetery shrine world of Thaur, or the lawless asteroids of Port Aquila. Your adventure may begin with the Dark Pursuits adventure, included in the core rulebook. In this adventure, you must trail smugglers moving deadly xenos artefacts in and out of Hive Desoleum. Whether you start with this adventure or invent your own investigations in another part of the Askellon sector, your guiding principle remains the same: to vanquish heresy wherever it may lurk, for the good of all Mankind.



Face Your Fears

The Dark Heresy Second Edition Game Master’s Kit forms the perfect companion to the Dark Heresy Second Edition core rulebook. This kit includes a GM screen that brings dozens of commonly used stats and rules to your fingertips. In this kit, GMs also find everything they need to create memorable Nemeses for players to battle through overarching storylines that can span entire campaigns.

The Dark Heresy Second Edition Game Master’s Kit also includes the Desolation of the Dead adventure, which invites you and your fellow Acolytes to journey deep into Desoleum’s Underhive. There, you must uncover the secret of a xenos relic found at the center of a horrific mass murder, and stop a cult from summoning a Daemon and unleashing hordes of reanimated corpses upon the hive’s inhabitants. This adventure offers another thrilling chapter to your investigations in the Askellon sector

Battle Against Heresy

The countless heresies of the 41st millennium lie before you. You and your friends are all that stands between humanity and utter destruction. Create your Acolytes and enter the grim darkness of the far future to vanquish heresy wherever it lurks.

Head to the support page for Dark Heresy Second Edition to download PC and GM sheets, as well as a Character Creation supplement. Then, pick your copies of Dark Heresy Second Edition and the Dark Heresy Second Edition Game Master’s Kit at your local retailer today!