Kill Team (Tabletop)

[ChrisNihilus]

1) I've always been a Master for rpg.
It's been like 12 years of mastering, tons of games, awesome stories.

2) I love Warhammer 40k setting.

3) I see battle reports on Youtube for the TT, but i never played myself or have an army.
Some of my friend did, though.

4) I've read about Kill Team.
Basically there are rules for TT for playing with 200 points of army; basically a small team.

My idea is to make a narrative campaign with several players, each with a story, an objective, playing in different locations and maybe add some RPG elements in them.

Did some of you ever tried KillTeam? It's fun?
Is Wh40k tabletop too random for a masterful planned narrative campaign?

[Swift]

Well 40k is random, but it doesn't mean that the individual games are not narrative. Of course strange things happen, but often situations arise where something both funny and stupid happens in a combat: Your Guardsmen shoots a terminator through the eye piece and fells him (not literally); your bolt pistol hits the zooming Storm Talon and explodes it, your Archon tanks a Punisher cannon with his Shadow Field by never rolling a single one...

There are very narrative moments too, where the Chaos Lord and the Captain face off, so you can make narrative campaigns, just the opponent will have to see it that way, meaning you both end up with very narrative lists, playstyles, you often say things like "Don't shoot my Chaos Lord because I am going to challenge your Captain next turn"

I played the old style of Kill Team, where it is a 160point force versus some grunts, but not the new kind. I imagine it could be really entertaining, your mismatched band of two Nobs, a couple of Grotz, three bomb squigs and a tooled up Flash Git. You may even find yourselves making new rules before games to add certain narrative, things like if you roll a 6 before battle, your bomb squigs have been fed some strong squig curry, causing them to move 2D6 in any direction unless at least one Grot is alive.

40k can make for some very interesting stuff.

[ChrisNihilus]

My first rule will surely be to double all the wounds.

The game is too shooty-based on small scale, doubling the wounds will make assaults more interesting.
And will make the game less random, and that's something i like.

[Dark Riku]

I would be interested. But I don't see how any of this will be done...

[Swift]

I think it was moe about advice than playing online.




?

[ChrisNihilus]

Yes, it was for advice. I don't really know the system all that much, and expecially i don't know how well it work on small scale.
If someone did actually play KillTeam and have suggestions to make it more stable and fun it will be wonderful.

For players and the game itself, it will be live of course.
One friend is in, and he will play a small squad of Chosen Space Marines, and borrow me his tyranids to use as neutral enemies.

I didn't talk about this to anybody else, and i will probably start on september and film it for Youtube.
I hope to find another 3 players.

[Swift]

Glad to be of service.

[ChrisNihilus]

Glad to be of service.

You helped a lot ^^

But let me write better my ideas. I'm a little busy right now, but i'll write my full idea as soon as i can.

[Dark Riku]

/derp

[ChrisNihilus]

I have, let's say, 4 players. All of different races, all of them in command of a small team and with a different objective.
So, i have 2 main ways in which i can play this.

Example of Story.
The Space Marine player is looking for a monastery of which they lost all contacts. Their quest is to find what happened.
They began in the jungle near the monastery, and after defeating in the first day a tribe of Orks that lived there, they reach the monastery on day 2.
In there, all is empty. There was surely some battle inside.
While in there they reach the deep halls of the monastery, only to find out that a squad of Eldar in there. No words exchanged. Purging them, the Space Marine found out that, in the verge of defeat, the chapter master of the monastery send away all the geneseed he can collect and send it into space, where it can be found by his brothers and keep the chapter alive.
But something is wrong here... after checking with the orbital station and the cogitators on land, the ship with the geenseed seems to be stuck in a forest 3 days away. Their quest just switched to retreive the precious cargo.

They reach it, in the night, and find that the cargo is beign taken down by some weapon. But there is no time to check now, because they can hear some noise in the forest, and eyes observe them. Tyranids approach...
Now, here is how i can do it:

1) Campaign mode.
I create a planet, and divide it in different zones.
Each zone have different characteristics; one in urban, one is jungle based, etc.
Each zone have different enemies and missions; often unknown.
Each zone have some sort of reward, and the players must complete specific missions in specific zones in specific order to win.

So the Space Marine player actually play ever day and get reward and sidequest to empower his squad.
In the monastery he can find some relics of the chapters, for example.
In a abandoned city in the middle of his journey to the cargoship, his squad meet with a Techpriest that guide some imperial citizen in these wastelands. They fight renegades and thugs on the daily basis, but if the Space Marine can help them he will gladly give them special ammunition and granades. Etc.

2) Narrative mode.
There is no exploration. Only different scenarios.
Each player will face a specific ammount of missions.

In that case the first may be vs Orks that are neutral, but the Eldar is another of the player.
The Eldars where there to retreive a relic that the Space Marines believe to he holy but in reality is some kind of lost alien technology the Eldar wish to have. They have nothing to do with the death of the Space Marine in the monastery. If they win and defeat the newly arrived Space Marine they will find what they are looking for, only to discover, thanks to the runes on this artefact, that there is an ancient city hidden in this land, something of a race long lost, and that become their new objective.
Otherwise the Space Marine will go on and the Eldar player will play neutral armies from now on.

These are the 2 methods of which i can't decide.

[Swift]

Cor, this sounds really role play like, never gone quite this far before. Sounds fun, but I can see it might get too complex and become overly difficult.

1) Sounds like Planetary Empires, but you can easily make maps for campaigns on card without shelling out money to GW.

2) Sounds more feasible. What do you mean by "neutral" Orks? Controlled by what? Random rules pre determined, all down to dice rolls?

[Barrogh]

I'll just leave it here:
http://heralds-of-ruin.blogspot.ru/p/kill-team-rules.html

These rules seem to be heavily redone compared to GW rules, but while they look more complicated, it seems that they also solve some problems, for example those that arise when you try to use anything that is intended to affect a squad in TT, yet there are no real squads in kill team.

[ChrisNihilus]

I'll just leave it here:
http://heralds-of-ruin.blogspot.ru/p/kill-team-rules.html

These rules seem to be heavily redone compared to GW rules, but while they look more complicated, it seems that they also solve some problems, for example those that arise when you try to use anything that is intended to affect a squad in TT, yet there are no real squads in kill team.

Those Campaign rules are exactly what i needed. Thank you!

So much good stuff!

[ChrisNihilus]

Found the players, bought and started paiting my first miniatures, written the story.

We start at October.

[Swift]

Pics and info please.

PLEASE.

[ChrisNihilus]

This is my first miniature ever painted. I know it's not the top of the class, but I like it.

His name is Belisarius the Prohibited, and he command a small company of Emperor's Childrens made of mostly Noise Marines and some Chosen. I've bought pre-heresy helmets for everyone, to give them a more classic looks on the Noise Marines, and i'll use the Dark Vengeance Chosens.

In my city there is a huge Campaign/Tournament that all the players play (now they are more than 20), and is going on for several years with different "seasons".
When I started to find players, i meet the big guy behind this huge campaign and he offer me to play in his universe and comunicate the results for he can change the story behind it a little, in exchange of names of players. He say that it will be nice to "shake things a little" and that many of his players like new things.

Example. If an Ork player win an important objective in my Kill Team story, he can have a moderate advantage in the standard games in the Tournament.

Cool idea.

STORY FOR THE PLAYERS:
While the battles between all the races go on in the earliest planets of the system, a moon of a Gas Giants stand silent.
This place, called Sertum, was called exterminatus upon, several centuries ago, but, strangely, a little region is still habitable.
A Chapter of Space Marines, in a patrol of the system, find out about this. They tried to check datas but unfortunately not much was found.
The Imperial Register only say that exterminatus was call, not saying by whom or which kind, or even why, only talking about a very generic Xeno presence that needed to be purge.

The moon show several cities almost intact, if not for the time and strong winds. The only habitable region show some vegetation (that should not be there), and then they found out that there are actually forms of life.
Some Orks, Tyranids and even Humans.

The strategical position and hidden nature of the place will make it a perfect place for a monastery; a place where they can prepare and build new equipment, support nearby planets in constant fight and a safe refugee for the chapter.
They do not care about what lies there, Orks and Tyranids are not a problem in such small number, and the humans are alone since centuries, almost barbaric. They are called the Sertii.

They decided to continue, and build the monastery, Speranza, in a remote portion of the region, where they can easily see and defend from every menace, and keeping only minimal contact with the Sertii. They could save those men from this place, but saving the life of those 300 souls was not worth the risk to being discovered from the other enemies that fight in the inner system.
This was a quiet place after all, and the only reason to ever go in the city was to scavenger some old equipment (this place was the theatre of an ancient battle afterall, and the humans here still use the small weapons they can figure out) and to give some support to the natives to fight the perils of the place.

And support they need, because while the Sertii live in superstitions and only know legends about the old days and what's behind the stars, a small portion of them is actually very religious... in a dark way.
Puter Cult as they call themself, is a fanatical cult of the Sertii that didn't quite have followers in the past.
The arrival of the Space Marines was use by this group to instil fear in the simple mind of the natives, and in time, a good number of them switch to this cult.

That was 3 years ago.

Suddently the comunications with this monastery stops, to leave place only to a beacon that the Chapter use for calling help. An old beacon, one that some of the other factions are capable of noticing, and all starship nearby have now access to data about this place.

Here is where the story begins.
The Space Marines player is a Sergeant that lead an investigation squad, of the same Chapter that build Speranza, and his purpose is to find out what happened to his brothers, rescue who may have survived and expecially find the geneseeds, that in a time of war are important.

The Chaos Space Marines player is the leader of small warband that live in the sector and orbit the major forces, acting around but indipendently from the core of the Chaos armies in the planets near there. This is their chance to replenish their rank with cultists. Their mission is to learn about this cult and eventually convert all the human population to Chaos. They may not seems like a worthy army in the big picture, a few hundred new cultists for a minor warband is a big deal.
And while they are there, stealing weapons and armors from the monastery would be nice.

How foolish are the humans, trying to keep this place hidden from the Eldars. They of course know about this place way before the beacon was activated. For a year they lived in the moon, hidden, and they discovered that the Marines in this place actually found some relics from the past, some kind of new tools that, once activated correctly, can change the conflict in the other planets.
The squad of Eldars ambush the marines in their own fortress, interrupt their comunication, and defeat them in a day of combat. But Marines had time to destroy some relics and hide the others, and use an old comunication system to call for help. Anything not to let the Eldar take possess of this ancient weapons. Something Eldar didn't expected.
Now Eldars know that others are coming, and the small squad in the planet asked for help. That will be the Eldar player, the leader of an armed platoon, ready to complete their mission with the force if necessary.

Orks player is a Boss seeking fortune and looting whatever possible.
A monastery, old cities, old weapons. That's good. But the real occasion is the clan of feral Orks on the planet.
He think that if he gets some fancy loot, maybe from the Space Marines, or killing the Tyranids or the hummies, he can impress the feral orks to fight with him.

Tyranids are a heavily wounded fleet that need biomass to go back to the fight, but are too few to stand a real combat. A small moon with few people but pratically undefended is the only chance for them to gain enough energy to replenish their losses.

Imperial Guard players is a commander that was send to take possess of a Super Heavy Tank that the Space Marine reports say to be in the middle of the city, and, in the meantime, try to support the Sertii to take control of the moon, in the name of the Imperium.

6 players, many factions, different objective.

What do you think of the setting? Is it interesting?
Some suggestion? Questions?

SPOILER
The exterminatus was order by a General, almost a millennium ago.
As the other planets of the system, this was a place of war, mostly with Tyranids (and that is way before the official discovery). Orks where also on the planet for a long time, a constant menace, but were never a big deal.
But and instead of keep fighting, he choose to kill everything. Toxic bombs where launch on the moon.
The only reason why there is a region with life on it, it is because one of the bomb didn't explode.

The action was impulsive and cowardly, so minimal data was stored about the event, and they begone as soon as possible, not noticing or caring that the exterminatus was not complete.

This bomb is actually under the city now, and the Puter cult adores it. They don't know what it is, but its toxic miasma added with a touch of Nurgle Worship, makes it a source of power and mutations.
The bomb is still usable, so he can be made explode or, if someone manage to defeat the cultists, they can use it on the war in the inner planets.

[Swift]

Amazing for a first paint, love that you use purple not pink and you do edge highlighting, something I don't do

Nice story, but one thing, Eldar si the plural not Eldars

[ChrisNihilus]

Thanks, but i had a big help from a friend.
We where working at the beach and started raining for days, so we started painting and he teached me.

I like this Pre-heresy look.
Purple as a base color, pre-heresy helmets but actual Chaos Armors.
For the chosens i'll go for gold for the lines of the armor, exactly like pre-heresy, while for regular troops i'll go for pink, but always with purple as primary colour.

Nice story

Now that i read it again, i don't like this story so much.
I'll rewrite it completely if needed.
I'm open for suggestion.

Nice story, but one thing, Eldar si the plural not Eldars

Uhm... ok.

[Swift]

Pre Heresy is the best era I find, it has loads of really interesting things.

[Barrogh]

I actually think that the general idea behind the story is fine for what it is. I'd even say that it's better than background stories used for campaigns on average because of element of mystery in it.

That part about shady call for exterminatus, for one. I imagine it has quite a potential if players are actually willing to ask themselves "What's going on? Why?". Bonus points for pieces of truth being discovered by local faction leaders as they complete mission goals, making decisions based on that and this giving other players a clue on what's up.

Will IG commander find out the truth? Will he attempt to hide it by all means necessary if such reveal means that the regiment will lose the trust of imperial higher-up, potentially leading to, let's say it, rather grim future for it?

What will marines do if they figure it out and realize that they have to chose between turning against imperial military and endangering honor of the chapter - which is vital should the chapter be put under trial for whatever reason in the future - if they don't, and somebody else find out?

What assets will be lost if they turn on each other? And what will have to be sacrificed if they will co-operate and decide to destroy any evidence? Who will be able to pick up what remains in any case?..

I admit that it's probably an idea for another campaign, and it's important to be able to figure out balanced scheme of gains and losses per faction (because you said it's going to affect local major), but IMO stories like that is what makes 40k cool and spicy - what is the truth when you have dozens of points of view on it? What is the difference between friend and foe? What are you in the dark?



Tl;dr: some inspiring, if simple, stuff right there, so I like it. I should think of it a bit more. Meanwhile, good luck with your campaign. Although I couldn't take a look at that pic because I'm too lazy to fix encryption issues on this PC, I'll see it later.

[ChrisNihilus]

We will see how it builds up. I'm not going to say how the exterminatus was called, they are going to find out near the end of the campaing.

I'll leave the players free to interpret the leader of their kill team and take some degree of choices in what they want to do.

Things i'm thinking about changing:

1) I want only one ship in orbit. I want that to be a key point in the campaing, as the players may want to conquest it, sabotage it or use their weapons against some critical target on the planet.

For sure the ship will be the Space Marine one, but how will the other race arrive?
Chaos Space Marines from a portal/warp maybe?
Eldars player? A gateway? Make sense that a gateway is on the planet? Any other way?
The Orks player i will probably say that he is a warboss of the orks that are already on the planet, but not the mayor one.
Same for the Tyranids.
But what about Imperial Guard? No ideas for now.

2) If the Space Marines start with a Ship in orbit, did i need to give some kind of assets (with some effect on the games) to the other players?
That will be cool, so players may want to steal these from the other players or use assets on the map that are neutral.
Or they can be only interpretative, and only count toward the narrative (like, there is a fortress of feral Orks that can only be assault weakening their defence with orbital blasts or ally with another player, otherwise that will be a garantee slaughter, so you can start the mission only with those circumstances).

[ChrisNihilus]

My Emperor's Children are complete!

[Swift]

Really nicely done. I would have done gold shoulder trims myself. I like the near seem less head conversion on the chosen.

[Atlas]

How effing badass. I really don't have enough good things to say about that paint job so I'll just let you imagine all of them

[ChrisNihilus]

Thank you. ^^

The colour scheme is the Emperor's Children that Forge World use.
That pauldrons with black border, white core and golden symbols make them so much more interesting than just plain gold/purple or pink/black.


On these ones, with mutations and the unique pauldron of the Sonic Blaster, it doesn't come out as much, but when i'll finish the regular guys i'll show you.

Of two of the chosens were missing pieces, so i had to sculpt.
The one with the axe and one of the rifle guys that became the blastmaster one.
I had to remove big parts, replace them and work with green matter.
Now i'm glad those parts where missing.

[Swift]

You can do green stuff? :O I have been at that for years and I can't do it.

[ChrisNihilus]

I have to thank this two friends that follow me step by step and help me with most of the more complex details and that know all the techniques.
I'm still new to this.

Anyway we played a few games in this days.
One was me and a friend against a 400 point army.
My Emperor's Children plus Black Legion (all terminators) against a mixed army of Word Bearers.
We were winning until my ally get a plasma cannon in the face and lose 3 termies in a single shot.

Second, my army against an army of Night Lords, with raptors and two termies, twice.
I lost that one, it was objective game and my army is pretty immobile and have no real answer to terminators.

Needs to work on it. Chosens are doing poorly.
I have lots of cultists, probably i will paint and deploy them in the future, or going for CSM instead of Chosens, or again, deploy only one Chosen but with powersword or claws.

[Swift]

Psst, Chosen are a bit shit Termies are the way to go with Chaos.