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First time GM- Inquisitor campaign.

Started by Crystal-Maze, November 03, 2012, 02:48:50 PM

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Crystal-Maze

First of all, hello one and all, this is my first time posting on The Conclave, but you appear to have a marvellous website going here.
I should point out, as it says in the title, that I am a first time GM, and that neither I nor my players have ever played inquisitor before. Basically, we are a gaming group who play all kinds of stuff; warhammer 40k, DnD, even a bit of dark heresy and necromunda etc. We're looking for something a bit different, and I was looking to GM something for a change, so we settled on trying out a campaign in inquisitor.

I've asked each of my four players to create an inquisitor and 3 or 4 followers. Not all of the players will be present every game, so we can vary the number of followers in each game to keep it flowing. I don't plan on having the players fight each other in many games, as they will be playing as the individual members of a conclave, but rather throwing some GM controlled baddies at them fairly often a la DnD. I'm out for any advice I can get really as we are all complete noobs, particularly on whether the game will be fun to play in this fashion or if I need to go back to the drawing board.

I've sketched a vague outline for the campaign scenarios (subject to change at the whims of the players) and would like some feedback on what I have so far:
1. A space hulk arrives without warning on the edge of the sector that our conclave controls. When one of the inquisitors investigates, they find they have been pipped to the post by a small, strange looking vessel. Upon boarding the hulk they find it full of dead tyranid organisms with marks from laserburns. After some searching they will encounter a dark mechanicus warband, the magos of which will run off with a piece of tech (if he survives, but I plan on giving him gear to make sure he does) from the heart of the hulk, a vessel that appears eldar in origin.
2. On the planet Apollos, the inquisitors investigate a farm plagued by grox mutilations, to find that a rogue trader has been running an arms smuggling operation under their very noses. (scenario idea from the inq rulebook)
3. A mutant uprising takes place in a nearby hive, the mutants being equipped with better than their usual shovels and lumps of rock (apparently this is who the RT was supplying, but who was financing it?)
4. After interrogating (fatally) several muties, the inquisitors make their way to a blasphemous temple hidden beneath the hive city. Here, as well as the usual cultists and mutants they encounter the Magos from the first game. He is apparently handing over the tech to a Dark Apostle Chaos Marine. (hopefully, the group will get the picture that getting out of there is a better idea than tackling a magos and a marine and their followers)
5.A Sslyth bounty hunter attempts to kidnap the cell leader.
6. After breaking more fingers, the group has to rescue the eejit that got kidnapped from the bounty hunter and a few desperados he has hired on. If they play their cards right, they may be able to find out that he was hired by the Apostle to take down the inquisitors whilst the apostle completes his nefarious plans. They might even get the bounty hunter to join them by offering more money...
7. Portents point to dire happenings at a previously hidden eldar gateway on the far side of apollos. Upon arriving, the inquisitors see that the gateway was hidden because it was deactivated due to corruption. However, the Apostle and his cultists are using the piece of tech (from the magos) to re-open it. A pathfinder set to guard the gateway may turn up to help?
8. Turns out the section of the webway was sealed off because formed the prison of an immensely powerful daemon (possible a herald or a prince, I want something very scary). If they can't stop the ritual then they will have to try to banish the daemon once again. However, if they can stop the ritual, then they have a gateway into the webway binding a powerful daemon. Here I'd like to split the party as the puritans and the radicals fight over binding the daemon to a host/weapon, or nuking the planet from orbit to prevent it from ever being released.

What do you guys think, are there holes in my campaign/ problems with they style I want to run with? Any and all help would be greatly appreciated :)

seaglen

Seems pretty solid.

On a practical note, that's a lot of minis needed!! NPCs, Marines, tech priests, Inquisitors plus warbands...
Lots of models! Would love to see how this turns out and see pics of characters if possible!

Crystal-Maze

The practical note isn't really a concern, I'm running the campaign in 28mm scale for monetary reasons, so I have most of the bits for the models already :)

Adlan

Quote from: Crystal-Maze on November 03, 2012, 02:48:50 PM
First of all, hello one and all, this is my first time posting on The Conclave, but you appear to have a marvellous website going here...

...What do you guys think, are there holes in my campaign/ problems with they style I want to run with? Any and all help would be greatly appreciated :)

WELCOME to the Conclave, glad you could join us. I'll do my best to give feed back below:

Quote from: Crystal-Maze on November 03, 2012, 02:48:50 PM
I should point out, as it says in the title, that I am a first time GM, and that neither I nor my players have ever played inquisitor before. Basically, we are a gaming group who play all kinds of stuff; warhammer 40k, DnD, even a bit of dark heresy and necromunda etc. We're looking for something a bit different, and I was looking to GM something for a change, so we settled on trying out a campaign in inquisitor.

I've asked each of my four players to create an inquisitor and 3 or 4 followers. Not all of the players will be present every game, so we can vary the number of followers in each game to keep it flowing. I don't plan on having the players fight each other in many games, as they will be playing as the individual members of a conclave, but rather throwing some GM controlled baddies at them fairly often a la DnD. I'm out for any advice I can get really as we are all complete noobs, particularly on whether the game will be fun to play in this fashion or if I need to go back to the drawing board.

I can see this working, especially for the start of a campaign. However, 3-4 Characters + an inquisitor is too many, when you start with new players and a new GM, too many figures really gets confusing and in this sort of situation I'd say start them off with an Inquisitor and sidekick. You'd also have to be pretty confident in your ability to keep the games interesting without it just being 'And this week I grab X from the Army Box, try and kill it', which I could see the vs DM game turning into, and Inquisitor is about so much more than that.

Going with your basic approach, if you start with your players fighting off against you as a DM, you can then later turn them on each other, give the radical the choice between becomming/revealed as a heretic and saving a world, let the Puritan find clues about the others heresy that sort of thing, and then transition from Fighting you as a GM to you being a plot generator and intermediate begins.


Quote from: Crystal-Maze on November 03, 2012, 02:48:50 PM
I've sketched a vague outline for the campaign scenarios (subject to change at the whims of the players) and would like some feedback on what I have so far:
1. A space hulk arrives without warning on the edge of the sector that our conclave controls. When one of the inquisitors investigates, they find they have been pipped to the post by a small, strange looking vessel. Upon boarding the hulk they find it full of dead tyranid organisms with marks from laserburns. After some searching they will encounter a dark mechanicus warband, the magos of which will run off with a piece of tech (if he survives, but I plan on giving him gear to make sure he does) from the heart of the hulk, a vessel that appears eldar in origin.
2. On the planet Apollos, the inquisitors investigate a farm plagued by grox mutilations, to find that a rogue trader has been running an arms smuggling operation under their very noses. (scenario idea from the inq rulebook)
3. A mutant uprising takes place in a nearby hive, the mutants being equipped with better than their usual shovels and lumps of rock (apparently this is who the RT was supplying, but who was financing it?)
4. After interrogating (fatally) several muties, the inquisitors make their way to a blasphemous temple hidden beneath the hive city. Here, as well as the usual cultists and mutants they encounter the Magos from the first game. He is apparently handing over the tech to a Dark Apostle Chaos Marine. (hopefully, the group will get the picture that getting out of there is a better idea than tackling a magos and a marine and their followers)
5.A Sslyth bounty hunter attempts to kidnap the cell leader.
6. After breaking more fingers, the group has to rescue the eejit that got kidnapped from the bounty hunter and a few desperados he has hired on. If they play their cards right, they may be able to find out that he was hired by the Apostle to take down the inquisitors whilst the apostle completes his nefarious plans. They might even get the bounty hunter to join them by offering more money...
7. Portents point to dire happenings at a previously hidden eldar gateway on the far side of apollos. Upon arriving, the inquisitors see that the gateway was hidden because it was deactivated due to corruption. However, the Apostle and his cultists are using the piece of tech (from the magos) to re-open it. A pathfinder set to guard the gateway may turn up to help?
8. Turns out the section of the webway was sealed off because formed the prison of an immensely powerful daemon (possible a herald or a prince, I want something very scary). If they can't stop the ritual then they will have to try to banish the daemon once again. However, if they can stop the ritual, then they have a gateway into the webway binding a powerful daemon. Here I'd like to split the party as the puritans and the radicals fight over binding the daemon to a host/weapon, or nuking the planet from orbit to prevent it from ever being released.

Lots of these sound great as the start of an overall campaign, but less ideal for single scenarios. It sounds like your experience is mostly with D&D style Campaigns. This leads lots of people to think of a game like Inquisitor, where the players 'fight' as a confrontational game, when it's a lot more collaborative than that, and it's entirely possible to play in a more story telling mode.

If the Concept is a gameplay with more opportunity for co-operation, running with the idea that all players control a part of a conclave, I think it's still entirely possible to have the players 'fight' each other. Preventing messages reaching each other, or concealing their own activities don't have to mean that they aren't part of the same conclave.

I think it's a great start to a campaign, but I'd advise trawling through the archives of the conclave, as well as the fantastic Introductory articles avilaible through the Conclave Frontpage.