ghost protocol....taking ideas

[psycho]

Ok so i recently watched MI 4 and loved the ideas behind it (even if the acting is somewhat lacking).

So the idea of a cell that an inquisitor started years before has been carrying out his missions for him. Said inquisitor is killed, meaning the cell is disavowed, but they choose to continue their late masters wishes.

I will then come up with missions that puts them in danger every time...mortal danger, my opponent will play the adversaries.

My problem is i dont know what missions etc to give them or even who will make up the cell.

[MarcoSkoll]

I like the core idea. Characters outliving their Inquisitor and being disavowed is roughly the concept I'm using for "Ad Vitam Aeternam" (although very much turned up to eleven, as Jax is near-immortal).

I think your main problem is very much the structure you're planning to inflict on their story. I can't see there needs to be a specific plan for exactly what missions they will be completing or who they'll play against, any more than is needed for any other Inquisitor warband.
Sure, maybe have a concept for what their long term goals might be, but there's no need that every scenario is working towards that.

As for who'll make up the cell... well, I can't tell you what to do there. Dark Heresy archetypes might give you a starting point, but that's by no means a limit.
Remember that this is an excommunicated cell. The only people they can rely on are themselves, so self-sufficiency is fairly important. They'll need a full spectrum of talents to survive, and even then they're going to be in pretty deep dooberries - a medicae can only do so much without specialised equipment, for example.

This could drive parts of the story. If one does get themselves seriously injured, how can they deal with this? Stealing bionics? Faking authority and gatecrashing a hive spire hospital? Long recuperation in a rotting safehouse, constantly hoping their pursuers don't realise before they can move on?

There's a lot of interesting ideas to be had without railroading the story from the start.

[Koval]

This is more or less exactly what happened with my own Pinion cell -- they outlived their Inquisitor and kept on going.

The twist there was that they were still getting orders with that Inquisitor's name on them, but they weren't from him.

In general, the idea's not a bad one, but you'll have to keep in mind all the things Marco mentioned, and indeed all of those things will actually help to drive an interesting story-driven campaign rather than "who can we kill today". They may be in the field more or less constantly, but they're going to be completely outside the system and the Inquisition probably won't want anything to do with them anymore. While one of them may have a little badge or piece of paper denoting their authority, that authority won't actually be there and they'll have to more or less make do with whatever they can afford. They'll have to rely on unconventional methods or sheer stubborn willpower to achieve their goals.

It's worth having a good old think about "what can possibly go wrong", because by the end of it you'll have a much stronger concept.

[psycho]

Its not so much a "who can we kill today" thing, more of a "inquisitor X told us to carry on his legacy. To do that we need to X.
I understand that it could become messy early on but hopefully between us we can keep ot at least a little realistic.

I wanted a team comprised of the best of the best...but now a year after theyve been left alone their skills havent so much as changed but honed themselves to other aspects...such as the sniper that was a crackshot with a long rifle having to re train to use a pistol for his kills as ammo is getting scarce.

[Koval]

The easy way around the ammunition thing is to give that dude a las weapon.

(Also, in the interests of heading off anything from Marco, do you actually mean sniper, or do you just mean marksman?)

[Kaled]

My thought was he could be making his own ammunition (which would of course depend on the facilities he has available). Or, as Koval says, he could just get a lasgun. Switching to operating up close with a pistol seems a fairly drastic change for someone whose training and experience is in using a rifle at long range.

As a slight aside, I don't think I've ever seen a good depiction of a sniper in a game of Inquisitor, which is surprising given its popularity as an archetype. I've seen lots of characters who are good at shooting and have a rifle, and some of them have camouflage skills, but I can't think I've ever seen one actually acting as a sniper. Normally they just take a few snap shots at an enemy then start running around like everyone else and never bother with concealment. Although to be fair, given that Inquisitor scenarios are short ranged affairs due to the size of the table, any sniper will likely be operating out of his element anyway. I sometimes wonder about having a spotter character who calls in shots from a sniper operating off the table.

[psycho]

I quite like the idea of larkin when hes on gheryon or sarakota (of redemption corps fame) when hes on board the ship using a autopisto....on singlr obviously

[MarcoSkoll]

"Inquisitor X told us to carry on his legacy. To do that we need to X."

Yes, but it doesn't need to be limited to that.

To take my earlier example, Jax Lynn has outlived her Inquisitor by two millennia or more. (As currently penned, the story is deliberately ambiguous about the date and cause of Inquisitor Skoll's death). By that point, she's utterly exhausted everything that Skoll was working towards at his death - those tales are long since become ancient anecdote for her. (Unlike many fictional immortals, she does still see even a year as a relatively long time. She's the mind of a twenty year old with the memories of a 2408 year old.)

By M44, she's taking her own initiative. Even if a given threat wasn't specifically on her original to-do list, that's no excuse to leave it to fester.

Similarly, this applies to many of my "current-day" characters (particularly when IGT time rolls around) - there's a peak in the Xenos cold trade? Well, it's not my speciality, but we can't have that going on.

such as the sniper that was a crackshot with a long rifle having to re train to use a pistol for his kills as ammo is getting scarce.

I doubt an Inquisition cell would be so lacking in initiative that they couldn't find an arms dealer (legal or illegal) and pick up another few thousand rounds.
Heck, even if it was an irreplaceable calibre (which, as has been suggested, is unlikely - forming cases and casting bullets is not an arcane art), a new rifle and some ammo to go with that.

Or Koval says, get a long-las (even if you have to steal it - after all, you are doing the Inquisition's work. Worst case, if you have moral concerns about stealing from loyal servants, "shut down" a black market dealer and take what you want). That'll give you ammo until doomsday.

I'd say a better excuse for him also serving as a pistol marksman would be the cell's dwindling numbers and lack of exterior support - as they can only rely on themselves, they've all had to diversify.
Sniper support would be useless if they're dealing with a cult down in a hive sump where there's no line of fire longer than 30 metres - but with no-one else to help, there's not a chance he can afford to sit this one out. He's going to have to get hands on and help at shorter range.

As a slight aside, I don't think I've ever seen a good depiction of a sniper in a game of Inquisitor, which is surprising given its popularity as an archetype.

A fully realistic depiction of a sniper wouldn't actually be that fun in Inquisitor.

Aside from their actions being terminally boring, an accurate version would be "Hooray, you're being shot from half a mile away by someone you haven't a whelk's chance in a supernova of even finding, let alone fighting. Bet you feel glad you've got that power hammer and vow to only purge heretics face to face now."

An adapted version might have merit, but unfortunately there's seldom the time to pull that kind of thing off in many 'Clave games. If you're not going for the objective from turn one, you'll probably miss out.

[Koval]

Even if a given threat wasn't specifically on her original to-do list, that's no excuse to leave it to fester.

Similarly, this applies to many of my "current-day" characters (particularly when IGT time rolls around) - there's a peak in the Xenos cold trade? Well, it's not my speciality, but we can't have that going on.

This exactly -- one of my characters' backgrounds even has him changing Ordos, because he kept on running into things that weren't (originally) his stock in trade. It's not like you get Ordo Malleus Inquisitors turning round and going "whoopsie daisy, that's a Tyranid invasion, better leave that to my friend in the Ordo Xenos who's thirty light years away while I find me some daemons to banish".

A fully realistic depiction of a sniper wouldn't actually be that fun in Inquisitor.

Aside from their actions being terminally boring, an accurate version would be "Hooray, you're being shot from half a mile away by someone you haven't a whelk's chance in a supernova of even finding, let alone fighting. Bet you feel glad you've got that power hammer and vow to only purge heretics face to face now."

I forget whom I've told about this guy I bumped into on another gaming forum who claimed to be a sniper in the US Army. Apparently, with a Barrett M82, you make yourself comfortable and obliterate things from about a mile away; given the operational range of the M82, this sort of makes sense, meaning that most of a game will probably be spent wondering what that sniper's up to.

In any case, even in a 28mm game, you're probably looking at parking that sniper about 300 metres or so away from the gaming table and completely rewriting the shooting rules.

[MarcoSkoll]

It's not like you get Ordo Malleus Inquisitors turning round and going "whoopsie daisy, that's a Tyranid invasion"

I'm sure I've waffled about this kind of thing before....

... ah. There we go - conversation starts here and involves me talking about how Ordos mean Inquisition tech support can help you if your shed's on fire. Or something.

If anything, considering the thoughts I had about how Inquisitors can focus on the threats that (appear to) fit their specialities (large networks feeding any number of leads that the Inquisitor can take their pick of, including stuff forwarded from their Ordo) would translate into a disavowed cell having to be a lot less picky.

[Ynek]

On the subject of snipers in games of Inquisitor, I ran a scenario a while back about trying to stop a pair of snipers from assassinating a governor. I originally had a huge big post describing the mission set-up and so on, but I'm now thinking that instead of posting that here, I'll actually write it up properly and throw it into it's own thread, so as to not derail this one.

The short version is that a sniper can be elegantly incorporated into a game of Inquisitor, but in order to do that, they do kinda need to be the focal point of the scenario.

And now to go write up that scenario...

[greenstuff_gav]

a skill i give my snipers runs like this;

practised aimwhen taking an Aim action, this character may declare either +20% to hit or + / - 10% to the location roll.
aims may be mixed between providing they are declared

i.e. khisanith declares her actions
i'll take one Standard aim, two Location Aims and then fire as many times as i can...
this will give her +20% to hit and then she can modify her Location roll by up to 20 either way (head or legs depending if she wants the killshot or to wing the target!

[Koval]

Do you mind if that goes in the Carthax Wiki, Gav?

[greenstuff_gav]

not at all 

did you se the.rules for conversations? id link but posting from the phone :-(

[Koval]

I did indeed, but seeing as that's a whole new game mechanic, it can't really go into the Special Abilities section.