Dark Heresy 2E Adventure: The Path of Exuberance (WIP)

Path of Exuberance

Table of Contents

Children of the Exuberant Being 2

Inquisitor Fidele Cavello 4

A Requiem for Sister Rosali 5

Children of the Exuberant Being

Group Marked for Extermination

Cult Designation: Hereticus Minoris

Forbidden Worship: The Emperor of Mankind is the only god acknowledged in the Imperial Creed. All others are seen as primitive deviancy at best, and Daemons or echoes of the Warp at worst. On some planets, proscribed rites still thrive, and ancient powers or xenos races are worshipped in the Emperor’s place.

Demagogue: The cult is held together by the personal magnetism of a central figure. He may be a particularly driven madman or a charming orator, but in either case, it is his words that hold his power.

Charismatic: Through force of personality or sheer charm, the cult leader is universally revered by his followers. His influence is felt even when he is physically absent.

Heavy Firepower: For a shadowy cabal or coven, the cultists have far bigger guns than might be expected. They make frequent use of powerful weapons in their battles, such as heavy stubbers, grenade launchers, or more devastating devices.

Marked Flesh + Hidden Sign: A rune or other visual motif identifies the cultists. They might wear the sign on hidden pendants, hide it amidst other signs at businesses they control, or otherwise display it to those who know where to look. The perfidy of the cultists is worn on their very flesh. They may bear a hidden brand or tattoo declaring their membership, or a worse deformity might mark them as among the ranks of an inhuman throng.

Purpose:  Some citizens of the Imperium find themselves yearning for something more fulfilling than endless labour to support a war machine they never see. These empty souls often turn to cults that claim to provide meaning or purpose to an otherwise pointless existence.

Flesh Twisting: Most common as a ritual of initiation or advancement, the deliberate mutilation or mutation of a cultist’s flesh is often seen as a show of dedication.

Nurgle: Morbid enthusiasms about death, but also rebirth, anchor the cult’s beliefs. Its members thrive on disease and decay, their appalling forms energetically eager to share their blessings with everyone around them.

Hereticus Minoris: Even the smallest Inquests represent heresies worthy of the focused attentions of an Inquisitor and his Acolytes. Inquests of Minoris scope are relatively straightforward (as such matters go), and the Inquisitor and Acolytes might even know the approximate whereabouts of the target. An Inquest Minoris requires 600 Investigation points to complete and includes 1 to 3 Confrontations.

Enemy types: The Children fit well with the profiles of the enemies from the Callers of Sorrow and mutants in the Dark Heresy 2E core rulebook. Unlike the Callers of Sorrow, however, the Children use their gifts from Nurgle to openly practice their heresy when their group is threatened. Their troops are mainly tough, muscled mooks wielding an assortment of heavy weaponry, melee and ranged. Their unnatural toughness carries them through fights moreso than their armour which consists mainly of hive leathers and maybe the odd flak vest.

Melee weapon preferences: Chainaxes, great weapons, warhammers.

Ranged weapon preferences: Autoguns, heavy stubbers, shotguns.

Armour preferences: Flak, Leathers

(Special Rule) Blessed by Exuberance- The Children are given blessings by the exuberant being that increase their overall resilience and strength. These are in the forms of serums and potions for possible recruits. For those initiated without fear of the Exuberant Being or the Corpse God there are rituals beseeching immaterial patrons including complex rites.

All troop type NPCs of the Children gain the Unnatural Strength (1) and Unnatural Toughness (1) talents.

All elite type NPCs of the Children gain the Unnatural Strength (2) and Unnatural Toughness (2) talents and Sturdy and Undying traits

All master type NPCs of the Children gain the Unnatural Strength (4) and Unnatural Toughness (4) talents and Sturdy, Toxic (1), Undying, and Touched by the Fates (1) traits.

Being a minor cult without the resources of grander conspiracies, they use what they can get.

 

Introduction

Introduction: Inquisitor Cavello has built a contact network in Askellon and the sectors around it. The PCs have been taken to the Wick, Cavello’s fortress located within the capital hive on Juno. Its name comes from the overall cathedral-like design and the many sets of candles that are lit by clergy that Cavello has gathered. The candles serve a spiritual purpose and are also believed by Don Cavello and others to keep evils away. Its winding halls are built to be defended from attack, and holds armouries, garages, medicae clinics, barracks, musterhalls, messes, and other facilities needed to allow the Ordo Hereticus to pursue their duty on Juno. The PCs have been given an autocarriage, a domestic Model M Tirelli, and are gathered at one of the garages which opens up to Juno.

This garage is an underground complex of rockcrete that mainly has civilian vehicles. It is guarded by levy troops wearing blackened flack armour, red fatigues, and inquisitorial rosette patches. They are from a variety of worlds in the Imperium. They man a checkpoint with a building that contains the controls and pict feeds of the garage. They take account of what vehicles are signed in or out.

The PC’s autocarriage is being driven by one Confessor Maxim Letov, a veteran of the Valhallan Ice Fighters. He is utterly loyal to Don Cavello, and follows his orders to the letter. He is a brawny, short man, with close shaved dark brown hair, fair skin, wearing a black leather coat, dark green fatigue tops and pants, black boots, and white socks. He often has a very serious disposition, but is not abusive or belittling. He is not one to crack a joke, nor laugh.

The PCs start play out on the road. Their mission briefing: 

Dark Heresy 2E Malice Campaigns Setting Cast: Inquisitor Rondos and the Straussheim Cell (WIP)

These are the profiles and the common cast of allies and fellow Inquisitorial agents used in my series of Malice campaigns on the blog. Refer to this page when I mention a character from it.

Inquisitor: Korudon Rondos
Overseer: Harkonn Straussheim
Acolytes: Connor Gallach the Highlander, Samael the Untouchable, Colastia Myri the Ace, Veljack the Manhound, Titus Andron the Bard.

Allies: The Warband (Players), Togo Katoichi the last Flame of Yaketsuku, Ibram Ali the Firebrand, "Yankee" Rose the Bounty Hunter, Lady Aya Rosa of Great House Rosa, Balthazar Surena, Tracius Geneon, and Rosa Initiative Sanctionary Lieutenant Benjamin Breeg.

Persons of Interest: The Harlequin known as the Argent Mask, Rosco "Oz" Tyruss the Rook, "Big Smile" Siggy of the Joy Troupe cloudboy gang, Zel Franz the Rat King, Magos Kaecipher of Selvanus Binary, Inquisitor Eldrus Ivo the Ordo Xenos radical, and Inquisitor Fidele Cavello the Ordo Hereticus puritan.

Enemies: The Tarot, the Serrata Dark Eldar Kabal, the Bilious Legions Nurgle collective, and the Callers of Sorrow Nurgle cult.

Profiles and descriptions to come later

Korudon Rondos: Inquisitor Rondos weaves a web of intrigue throughout Askellon and reaching farther sectors. Born a native of Maccabea, Rondos was discovered as a potent Psyker early in his life. He survived the sanctioning on Terra and became a primaris psyker. He was immediately requisitioned by the revered and venerable Inquisitor Monitore Ritornello. Korudon grew to be an extremely powerful psyker that could hold the influence of the Immaterium in check while unleashing devastating power. He had an almost meme virus-like thirst for knowledge pouring over countless tomes, volunteering for dangerous missions into strange places, and being the face for warband groups when inquiry, interrogation, and an investigation was needed just to learn and discover things. This led him to impress Inquisitor Ritornello and led him into Ritornello's inner circle to be given the title of interrogator and later uplifted to inquisitor.

One of Korudon's defining characteristic as an acolyte was an intense curiosity for the strange and esoteric. Curiosity is seen as a dangerous thing in the Imperium of Man, and his master trained his acolyte to temper his knowledge seeking lest he falls down the path of many whose innocent thirsts for knowledge lead them to Chaos. Korudon heeded his master's words but never gave up his inquiring spirit. Korudon possesses abounding charisma and a calculating mind. Korudon prefers to fight his wars by proxy. Manipulation and intrigue are his bread and butter. He can talk a loyal bodyguard into stabbing his master in the back. He can destroy a cult through its rivals or plant the seeds of betrayal from within without lifting a finger or wasting his resources. As an inquisitor, Korudon disdains the brimstone and hellfire approach that is used by inquisitors like Fyodor Karamazov. He prefers to weave his intrigue through the use of many individual cells of trusted handlers commanding and looking over operations of their own acolytes. He values subtlety and covert action. He does understand when a certain volume of action is needed but prefers it to be at the climactic crescendo of the Imperium's many enemies' downfall rather than the useless barking that he finds loud, pontificating, and flamboyant inquisitors to employ. Inquisitor Rondos is not a believer in the credo of killing millions to save billions. He believes such widespread styles of witch hunts are inefficient and wasteful of the Emperor's resources. A scalpel does better to cut out affliction where the commonly used hammer would bludgeon cancer but leaves it to spread. Rondos employs covert investigation and infiltration along with garnering alliances with the powers in Askellon and quick surgical purges to defend humanity

Inquisitor Rondos's current goal is to destroy the pandaemonium and eliminate its threat to Askellon and the surrounding sectors. He is labeled Ordo Xenos but he also fights daemons and heretics in his current missions as these are all linked.

Korudon would most likely be generalized as a radical by puritans, but it is closer to truth that he lands somewhere in the middle of puritanism and radicalism in terms of ideology and utility. He dislikes the use of Xenos weaponry, mercenaries, and alliances but mainly due to pragmatism. He knows the dangerous and perfidious nature of xenos species but he mainly does not draw upon xenos personnel or tech to keep out of the eye of puritan inquisitors that would impair his work. Short term he would employ species he deems uncorrupted such as the kroot. He would never deal with the Dark Eldar, Orks, or Tau and would be extremely reluctant to interact with craftworld Eldar. Tyranids and Necrons are also right out. He does rarely choose to use xenos materials such as the Rythi Victus, a psychically linked tome that is important to his current mission to destroy the pandaemonium. He has a zero-tolerance policy for any materials related to Chaos. The most he may allow is an aetheroscope and only in trusted hands. He would immediately personally execute or call for the purge of any acolytes trying to create daemonic weapons, forming daemonhosts, summoning daemons, or attempting to make sincere deals with factions of Chaos. Any unsanctioned psykers he finds will go to the Black Ships. However, he is known to train unbound psykers at times to increase the chances of them receiving primaris status if he finds that he could requisition them after sanctioning. To this end, he will delay sending them to the Astra Telepathica. A puritan discovering this would find this absolutely heretical, but Korudon believes the risk is worth the reward.

Inquisitor Rondos has a somewhat detached personality. He has an inner circle of trusted lieutenants and only of a fraction of them could he call a friend. He does not see his underlings as disposable resources but he definitely keeps distance personally due to the nature of his work and officially as he often works through a large network of cells and assets. He looks at them in a sense of respecting their usefulness as tools in his war. He would not disrespect them as individuals or see them as beneath him in stature but often keeps the big picture in mind in his work thus does not form any other relationships other than professional ones. His interactions with the immaterium as a very powerful psyker may contribute to his detachedness. The fact that the Inquisition's work is deadly does not help either. His life is the job. It is what interests him and feeds his curiosity.

GM Note: Rondos has a tenor pitch to his voice with a Mediterranean accent from his home planet of Maccabea. I believe it has been portrayed differently but I'm going with this. Also, he will often be absent with Straussheim as the acolyte's handler in the first two campaigns.




Harkonn Straussheim: Cell Leader and veteran of the Armageddon Steel Legion. Once a bookish universitariate student of the Helsreach minor house Straussheim, events were set in play that would lead Straussheim to join the Steel Legion as a commissioned officer and cross paths with Inquisitor Rondos on the planet of Ozymandias II. Rumors about him have never been solidified, however, there is one that has stuck longer than most that the man is a patricide. On Ozymandias II Rondos would also briefly meet Erioch Karpath, now the traitor general known as Rainmaker. Harkonn's studies before his military career were based on greater Imperial and military history, a tough subject to for any scholar in the Imperium, and he combined his insight along with a fierce determination based on a solemn promise to someone important to him to bring to his duties as an officer. He excelled as a leader and eventually became a colonel in the Legion before being levied by the Inquisition. Harkonn is an intelligent, analytical, calm, collected man with a warm disposition. He knows when to get serious and when levity is required. He treats the acolytes he commands as colleagues rather than tools. He is very honest with them, however. He does keep secrets but only those personal to him or important to keep hidden for his inquisitor. He is often found at the hideout he heads poring over countless notes and data slates while taking notes of his own. He is also of found with a bottle and a glass of Aldermann brandy, an amasec domestic to Desoleum made by House Aldermann. He is no slouch, however. He can command and hold his own in a fight with the experience he gained with the legion. He has a friendship with Inquisitor Rondos and is part of the inquisitor's inner circle. He has no intention of following his master's path as an interrogator. By his words, the responsibility would be too much for him.
GM Note: Straussheim has an accent similar to Hugo Weaving's character Red Skull.




Connor Gallach: Sacrisian Highlander. Once a candidate for the Storm Wardens chapter of the Adeptus Astartes, Connor Gallach wandered Sacris fighting the strongest fighters and monsters he could find in his shame of not being chosen to become a Space Marine. He killed a high king's son in a duel, and while awaiting execution he was saved by Inquisitor Rondos. He now owes a debt to him, and he takes the skills he learned to serve the Inquisition. The initiate he lost to is now the Deathwatch Seargent Duncan MacGhoil. Surviving the final trial of the candidate process, he was given mercy by Duncan. Connor felt further shame at not being good enough to become a chapter serf for the Storm Wardens as well. The astartes that was overlooking the trials had the logic that Connor would be more useful in becoming a warlord on Sacris thus training a whole bevy of candidates for the chapter. This did not happen. Connor returned home to a feast by his clan honoring his attempt at demi-godhood. Connor read this as his family being ashamed of him. They were the opposite. He never reconciled what he thought with the truth. In his shame, he decided to travel the lands. The aforementioned event occurred while Inquisitor Rondos was active on Sacris for a short period. Connor Gallach is an angry, boastful, and daring man. He is extremely sarcastic. He follows his commands to the letter and with gusto. He is often found screaming the name of his rival as a battle cry as he charges into battle feeling the memory makes him a better fighter through his anger. He has still never given up his grudge.
GM Note: His voice and mannerisms are pretty close to the Scotsman from Samurai Jack.



Samael: A young Desoleum Primus street tough and powerful untouchable. Once a street rat, Samael was taken by the heretek Somnius Halbrel to clear a path through the Pristine City, a cursed place inhabited by warp perception linked xenos mutants. He was saved by the acolytes working under the service of Straussheim, and is now being trained to become an acolyte where he can use his nature to ward off the powers of psykers and fiends from the warp. He is from a sector of Desoleum Primus known as the Roost for its being a center of butcheries. He is a cocksure and confident teenager with a daredevil attitude and loves to show off his street smarts. He also has internal issues with the knowledge that he lacks a soul and that it explains how he was treated for most of his life.
GM notes: Samael speaks in a cockney accent using cockney slang. (Do you get it? The Roos- okay) 



Colastia Myri: Pilot. Veteran of the "Decaps", the Cadian survivors of the Cilleathe campaign. She flew a valkryie for transport and support missions. Her ground combat experience is small, having only once needed to fight on the ground when her bird was shout out of the air and she was forced to trudge back to a FOB with the survivng platoon with their only consistent light being a flamer spout while attacked by exodite warriors in a dark jungle. She often piloted in missions dropping Kasrkin and built a rapport with a major Tyruss. Colastia has purple eyes befitting a Cadian trueborn and medium length brown hair. She is a mother and wife. She loves dancing. She goes to pict shows regularly with her husband. To the cell she puts on cold front due to being impressed into surface in a very short period of time. She is paid and she has a special status with being the one domestically based and recruited acolytes. She can put on a calm stoic persona but is passionate and excitable. She can warm up to others. After Cilleathe, she flew commercial aerolines for merchants. Her oath belonged to House Grym-Zollern 
Husband: Erick Jann, foreman of a lasgun manufactorum.

Sons: Dan, Quint

Veljack the Manhound: Dog(?). She changes between bipedal to quadrupedal being built to act as bodyguard and look like an above-average sized dog standing at seven feet when bipedal and four when quadrupedal. She looks like an ancient Terran German Shepard. Trained in melee weaponry. She is a good girl. Veljack is a Manhound, a genetically and physically restructured canine whose body is rebuilt to be a novel bodyguard for merchants and rogue traders. She cannot speak Gothic but she has a near human understanding of language. She was part of a batch of bringing Elquon Manhounds to Desoleum Primus. The program was abandoned due to lower forecasts of profit than the people helming it thought was worth trouble for. The litter was left in the underhive and abandoned. Veljack was one of the few that survived and were rescued by the acolytes (see Polonaise of Pestilence). She is very good at chases and subduing along with having a powerful bite and skill with a chainsword. She was built to follow orders and builds loyalty to masters who treat her well easily. She often engages in dog social dynamics with other humanoids who have not made their station in the pack clear. (Gm note: One of the acolytes in my campaigns is treated like a beta by her because they did not understand a contest)

This manhound profile is based on a homebrew profile made by Lightbringer on the FFG forums, link here:https://community.fantasyflightgames.com/topic/15601-elquon-manhound-a-new-type-of-familiar/

Titus Andron the Bard: Titus is one of the few Desoleum natives that lacked an oath at birth. He took up what many oathless do, performancy. He is a traveling troubadour by trade playing his guitar and singing for food and scrip. One day, he got a look in the inner chambers of a Joy Troupe hideout at something he shouldn't have seen. They hounded him and he fled to the underhive spurred on by an offer from a ganglord. After being ripped off, Titus helped the acolytes bring down the Storm King (See Polonaise of Pestilence) and earned a ride back to the mainhive where he planned to find a way off-planet. Unfortunately, Titus's other side came out in the climactic showdown between the Storm King and the warband. His name is Castorius, and he is the ethereal incarnation of Titus. His soul. When Titus was born he suffered a strange phenomenon where in impossible odds he had a sort of incomplete making of an untouchable. Rather than being born without a soul and a soul-sucking presence in the warp, he was split into two. Titus, the physical form, and Castorius, the immaterial form. Castorius is summoned involuntarily during times of great emotional stress to Titus. Titus is the reserved, kind, thoughtful personality while Castorius is the brazen, danger-seeking, id-driven personality. Titus can be seen as the superego of the whole being while Castorius is the id of the whole being. He was taken to Straussheim and under advisement by Inquisitor Rondos, was given one year to create a controlled combination of id and superego into a sustainable ego. Titus cannot use psychic powers, but Castorius is a powerful psyker. He uses his guitar as a psy-focus and specializes in telepathic and concussion-based power. Until he is taken to the Black Ships, he is an asset to the Straussheim cell.

d

Dark Heresy 2E Damage Modification

(By the co-writer and editor known as Tanta Formidda)

Overview

One of my biggest personal gripes about Dark Heresy, Only War, etc. is the damage; it just feels too random to me. A normal human should not be able to survive a hit from a plasma gun, but a normal street thug (wounds 9 TB 3) has a 40% chance of doing so. In addition to this, I personally really like the damage system in FFG's Star Wars line, where each weapon has a base damage that is increased by rolling successfully. In light of these two things, I decided to make a conversion mod for making Dark Heresy's damage system function in a similar way.

Basics

Each weapon changes its damage profile from Xd10+Y to Y + (4 * X)- In less math-y terms, each weapon has a base damage rating of its original damage modifier plus 4 per d10; as examples, a human sized bolter would have a base damage of 9 (5 + (4 * 1)), while a melta gun would have a base damage of 18 (10 + (4 * 2)). I chose 4 because after about an hour of testing I felt that 5 was a bit TOO lethal, but that is of course a matter of personal taste; one of Dark Heresy's selling points is how deadly the combat is, after all. Pen is unaffected.

Once an attack is successfully resolved against a target, it's time to calculate damage. This is simply the weapon's base damage plus the Degrees of Success on the attack. As an example, if an acolyte fires a stub revolver (base damage 7) at a cultist and scores 3 degrees of success, the attack would hit for a total of 10 damage. 

Weapons also have a multiplier rating equal to the number of d10s they would roll (e.g. a lasgun has 1, a frag grenade has 2, an autocannon has 3, etc.). This rating multiplies the degrees of success by X; in the example above, if the acolyte fired a melta gun instead, they would add 18 (base damage) to 6 (2 * DoS), reaching a total of 24 damage.

Since weapons no longer roll d10s, Righteous Fury is instead generated by the attack role when the attack roll results in consecutive numbers (e.g. 01, 12, 23, 34, etc.).

Traits and other things

Accurate - Instead of giving a weapon additional d10s, accurate increases damage by 2 per DoS rather than 1.

Being on Fire - Fire does 4 damage per round + the Degrees of Failure on the agility test to put it out. If a character chooses not to make an agility test to put out the fire (or is unable to make the test at all), they count as having rolled a 100. An alternative is to simply use Degrees of Failure, if you feel that this is too punishing to characters with mediocre agility or willpower.

Toxic - Instead of a d10, Toxic does 4 damage + 1 damage per degree of failure on the test to resist it. If you would prefer a more set damage, I think that 4 + the toxic rating is a decent alternative.

Force - Similarly to Accurate, each Degree of Success on the Focus Power test increases the multiplier rating by 1. Also, like accurate, this is somewhat less powerful than the base game, but the same modification of +4 damage per DoS should undo that if desired.

Maximal - Instead of adding a d10 to damage, increase the base damage by 4 and the multiplier rating by 1.

Overheats - Use Degrees of Failure for determining the damage to the arm.

Primitive - Weapons with this primitive X cannot benefit from more than X Degrees of Success on the Attack. As an example, a bow (primitive 6) could never do more than 10 damage (4 base + limit of 6 DoS). I'd also personally suggest lowering the primitive rating of all weapons that have it by 1 or 2 to reflect this change in function.

Proven (x) - Weapons with proven x count Degrees of Success as x if they would otherwise be lower for the purposes of damage.

Spray - Since the attacker does not make any attack roll on Spray weapons, they use the Degrees of Failure on the agility test to avoid the attack in place of the non-existent Degrees of Success.

Tearing - Tearing weapons may use any pen leftover after armor reduction to reduce unnatural toughness (but not normal toughness bonus or the bonus from daemonic). 

Vengeful (x) - Weapons with Vengeful (x) generate righteous fury on any roll where the 1s digit is equal to or greater than x (e.g. a weapon with vengeful 8 would generate righteous fury on any roll that ends in 8 or 9, such as 38 or 29)

Multiple Hits and Righteous Fury - If you generate righteous fury on an attack that also generates multiple hits (such as full-auto attack), you only generate one Righteous Fury roll by default, on the first hit. However, you can decrease the number of hits you deal by one to get an additional righteous fury roll, as long as that would not result in rolling more righteous fury rolls than total hits. For example, if you rolled righteous fury on an attack that would result in 5 hits, you could choose to get 5 hits and 1 righteous fury roll, 4 hits and 2 righteous fury rolls, or 3 hits and 3 righteous fury rolls, but could not choose to get 2 hits and 4 righteous fury rolls.

Multiple Hit Damage(optional) - If you feel that the damage increase from multiple Degrees of Success combined with the fact that increased DoS mean more hits are overly strong, you can choose to make each Degree of Success either increase damage by one OR grant another hit. For example, if a base damage 8 weapon gets 4 DoS on a full-auto attack, you could choose 4 hits of 8 damage, 3 hits of 9 damage, 2 hits of 10 damage, etc. If the hit results in righteous fury, you have three choices on where to spend DoS - hits, damage, or righteous fury rolls. This is a pretty specific scenario for an already extremely specific mod, but I thought I might as well include it.  

Final Thoughts

These changes have a few major effects - low level weapons are far less likely to wound very high durability targets such as space marines and vehicles, high level weapons are very rarely going to fail to wound more vulnerable targets, like gangers and PCs; in short, damage is going to be much more in the middle.

Whether this is a good thing is mostly a matter of taste, but I think it makes for a fun change of pace from the d10 damage system.

(Editor's note: this mainly changes how damage is done, weapon qualities, and righteous fury. If a change not mentioned, follow the rules of the core rulebook for multiple hits, calculating DoS, and so on.)

Dark Heresy 2E Villain Cast and Profiles: The Tarot: The Hands of Fate

This is the summary of the main antagonist group of my Malice series of campaigns set in my Chains of Malice interpretation and continuity of Dark Heresy 2E's Askellon sector.

The Tarot, the Hands of Fate, are a grand Chaotic conspiracy entrenched in the Askellon sector. They are made up of four charismatic and powerful heads that lead multitudes of lieutenants and cells across the sector. They are entrenched in nearly every planet and settlement in the sector from hive criminal underworlds to the highest thrones.

The leaders of the Tarot are four men that call themselves the Hands. They lead lieutenants known as the fingers whom lead those lower in the conspiracy collectively known as suites. These are who they are:

Happy Jack, The Living Masquerade: an enigmatic and terrifying figure, the Masque is a being of indeterminate shape or age, but controls a bevy of strange and terrible powers gained by his many travels and exploits. He coordinates the Hands and controls his own fingers and suites outside of any standard pattern of Chaos. Not pledging himself to one god, the Masque is odd as a leader of Chaos where he seemingly holds no patronage not even to the idea of Chaos Undivided. He is completely his own man, in his words. His wants are completely selfish, and he pulls the strings of his "equals" in order to gain his ultimate reward.

The Masque's Known Fingers:
-Sirgev Gach, rising criminal kingpin of Askellon gifted with the umbra malefica, a relic that allows him to form from darkness whatever he wants in his imagination but is slowly corrupting him to its will.

Correction, fire is a weakness per the flamer weakness I listedWeakness as in it takes away the 10 armour away from him in all locations given to him by the Umbra Malefica and not the mesh armour he wears all the time.

-Uriah Davrus, the Matchstick Man or the Showstopper, ex-performancer and now explosive firebrand sorcerer with the smug flair for the dramatic. Uriah grew to two parents under the oaths of lord Richter Struckwell, a merchant prince invested in courier services, commodity transport, and a smaller interest in performancy. Uriah grew to have a natural talent for performancy including pyrotechnic work along with card and magic tricks. His performances were fueled, unknown to him, by his psychic ability to control fire. Lord Richter witnessed him perform by himself one day and immediately wanted to capitalize on him. He took him under his wing to groom him to be a great spectacle and showman. This came a short time after Uriah's parents had died in an accident during courier work. Uriah received the education a member of the gentry would along with knowing the finer things in life. He increased his skill exponentially and was able to keep his pyromancy under wraps once he realized he was the one controlling it. He made his debut is a grand show to the audience of hundreds. He excelled in entertaining the nobility and merchants of Desoleum Primus. After the show, stumbling to his home drunk after a very good show, Uriah came upon a transcript of the assassination of his parents. Blinded by rage, Uriah destroyed his master and the manse he was gifted. Having survived the fiery blast, he ran. He survived on the streets for a short time but he was not a very good vagabond. That is when a hand was extended to him by the living masquerade to put his talents to good use. Now he is fanatically loyal to the Masque and eagerly acts in the name of Chaos. He seeks general revenge on the ruling class of Desoleum, seeing them all as just like  his manipulative master.



-Anaesthesia, the iron clad mistress of screams. The bad kind. Trapped in the invasive and brain-altering iron maiden suit, Anaesthesia lacks the ability to feel. Having been given purpose by the Masque, she now serves as an expert torturer and professional sedation master. Her unknown past seems to have been the source for her ways of extracting information. She believes she was flayed by an inquisitor but knows nothing else. Built into her abdomen is the Machina Penumbra, a haywire arc device that she uses against those of the machine cult and machine spirits alike. She lives to hear the screams of her victims, referring to it as singing. It's one of the only stimuli she has left to her.

Yoshihiro Takane, the traitor Librarian known as Oniboshi: Oniboshi is an extremely powerful sorcerer that was once of the loyalist White Scars successor chapter known as the Emperor's Flames. Due to his works, the chapter was destroyed along with his homeworld. He now commands those who owe their loyalty to Tzeentch along with rebels that do not fall under military renegades. He seeks to rid the galaxy of the Imperium so that the will of its individual inhabitants may cause change rather than an aging tyrannical edifice.
(Has his own profile underneath Last Flames of Yaketsuku)

Oniboshi has a motif: Sonaiyo by Jeff van Dyck https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nzt_6YeINF8

Oniboshi's Known Fingers:
-Dorian Glaw, traitor rogue trader and last scion of the wretched Glaw family.
-Wight Osprey (codename), mysterious and devastating pilot of the archaeotech Aerial Weapons Platform mechanized flying suit.

-"The Child", unknown except for this name. Possible source of the Tarot's mysterious archaeotech and the daemonic constructs serving them.
-Mugon no Otoko, the construct of the dead of night.

Erioch Karpath, codename Rainmaker: General Karpath was once an officer of the Harakoni Warhawks. He earned his name with the pacification of a frontier world that he incited with the deaths of the inhabitant human population's children. He leads those heretics of Khorne's persuasion, although his methods change from Tzeentchian power plays to raw brutal Khornate warring. Karpath believes that even in the 41st Millenium, humanity has grown too soft and has not evolved into a form that would survive the everlasting war of the age. He incites and leads conflict wherever he goes to free the wolves from the influence of the sheep and force humanity to ascend like minerals pressurized into diamonds. Along with Khornate warmongerers, he is in charge of recruiting and leading military renegades and mercenaries to fight for the Tarot's cause.

Rainmaker's Known Fingers:
-Finn Greely, traitor guardsman an ex-NCO of the Cadian Shock Troopers.

-Wu Tang, deadly mercenary and master of martial arts and gunslinging that brims with gangster bravado. (More information on the page with his name)


-Cao Wei, the Jiangshi, assassin and witch with blood-curdling powers.

-Mallaithe the Tempest, a berserking body possessed and puppeted by ancient daemon possessed arcane armour and devastating weaponry. Once a warrior of Kul, the possessed body of Mallaithe came upon a weapon and suit of armour of arcane power. Unfortunately, giving into the boon for too long locked the possessed in a permanent and insane servitude to the daemons that inhabit the sword Kheshral and the armour Kashran. The daemons do not fully control his behavior and as such they have to act indirectly while giving him commands to carry out. Mallaithe was put under the thrall of General Karpath by the sorcerer Oniboshi. Karpath carries with him a rune-encrusted calling stone that allows him to control Oniboshi. Along with this control, he can cause the beast to unleash its true power and give the daemons in his gear more control along with sprouting horrid wings, a pincer-like tail, and horns on his head. The warrior inside is in a permanent primal state

(Don't give him Blade Master if you're feeling merciful to your players)

-Howl Bloodthresh, Khornate Berserker Marine: Howl is not complicated. He is an asshole who loves to maim and kill. He often finds himself loathing the company he keeps around him that seem to be able to segue into a monologue about ideology, motivations, and the like at the drop of a hat. He just wants to murder. Just shut up.


-Rhioghain, Prophet of the Brass Prince and Chosen of Khorne: Rhioghain was once a knight of Wylde. He was corrupted over time through talks with the beastmen mutants his fellow knights slaughtered. Along with his heretical talks, he observed the relationship Wylde had with the rest of the Imperium and found an absurdity to it draped with pretentious pageantry. The Imperium is clearly capable of destroying the two forces on Wylde permanently, even with fears of permanently scarring the planet. It keeps the planet in its conflict because it leads to training veteran rough riders for their wars elsewhere. When he left Wylde, he found the planet to just be a microcosm of what the Imperium does in the rest of the galaxy. His vindication came in the form of the death of his daughter. A fellow knight, she attempted to convince him to not leave the planet with a warband of corrupted warriors and beastmen on a flyer that was to smuggle them aboard a visiting voidship. She was shot down with arrows and bolts, an investigating force confusing her presence at the escape from the planet for compliance in her father's plan. This was the beginning of Rhioghain's tempered rage and a step towards his worship of Khorne. He gave up his birth name and took upon a name resembling a vengeful spirit of war from Wyldian mythology. Decades later, Rhioghain would amass such skill, willpower, and favour from his patron daemon, the Brass Prince, that he would walk in the warp to the lair of the Count of Slights. The Count was a greater daemon of Tzeentch, and Rhioghain's trial was to pluck the Count's eye from its socket. He succeeded and was granted the boon of becoming a chosen of Khorne. Not a daemon prince, but an avatar and prophet of the god of war. He has joined the Tarot under the view of Karpath for his own reasons along with wanting challenges from the Imperium's mightiest fighters. He truly believes that the Tarot's plan of harnessing the power of Malal will fail, and he is there to witness it all while using the Tarot's resources for his own means. He believes he would serve as a better hand than Karpath but he is happy to kill and slaughter using the claw of his patron shaped into a halberd. He wears the eye of the Count on a shield, harnessing its power to defend what the Count hates most of all.

Lascivious, the Sonic Sorcerer: Lascivious has no known true name. Even his past as a possible loyalist astartes is shrouded. What is known is that he was once of the Emperor's Children. Disagreeing with their form of Slaaneshi worship, finding it trite and boring, he left for the planet Guelph and gained mastery over his powers with the help of his favoured psy-focus, an ancient model Blastmaster operated by strings. Lascivious leads the Slaaneshi cultists under the Tarot's influence, and has several dalliances with Slaaneshi cult leaders. This, along with dark sorcery, has led to the creation of the Mirror Guard, literal sons that mirror his visage with their features and their expertly crafted weapons and armor. Lascivious's want is simple. A galaxy-wide sanguinalia where he and his lovers may live in constant ecstasy.

-Luxa Tentare, matriarch and masterful temptress of the Slaaneshi cult the Incandescent.


-Ivory, Mirror Guard and a favored son of Lascivious and lady Tentare inheriting his father's razor sharp fighting skills and inhuman boon of speed along with an archaeotech gift granting instant teleportation shift.

-Alabaster "Crimson", Mirror Guard and less favored son of Lascivious and the Khornate aspiring champion Queen Crimson of the Obsidian Maw.

Together, they are the instigators of the sector-changing event known as the Catalyst, which was secretly a great ritual that affected the Pandaemonium and caused the separation of the materium and immaterium to narrow. They seek to use the Pandaemonium to further their goals.