Dark Heresy roleplay resources?

[Lissibith]

I'm brand new to Warhammer 40K in general and Dark Heresy in specific as of this past weekend. I rolled a character for our first game completely cold, and I have a core rulebook on order whose shipping date keeps getting pushed back, but in the meantime I'm working on rounding my guy out a bit for backstory/RP purposes.

I'm looking for some resources on what life would be like (for instance, how young would people in the lower Hive vs the upper Hive start working?), what sorts of actions would be acceptable (for instance, if a person's relative is an accused heretic, would they get in trouble for killing them? Would they be killed as well for being related to a heretic? etc) and other such detaily stuff.

I've been hitting the Warhammer40k wikia pretty hard, but was thinking people here might have some good ideas for other research sites. Many thanks in advance!

[hamishspence]

In the Arbites-centric Dark Heresy splatbook it does say that for the more serious crimes it's Execution, not just for the individual but their relatives to within one or two generations

[GolemsVoice]

Well, much of it runs on the basis that whatever you want to be true IS true. Things will generally be pretty bad, but exactly HOW bad, and how they are handled is up to you. Various splatbooks can give you additional info, such as Creatures Anathema for other races and beasts, or Disciples of the Dark Gods for heretical factions and cults within the Imperium.

You could also read the Imperial Infantryman's Uplifting Primer and the Munitorum Manual, which "in-game" books handed out to soldiers, or supply officers in the case of the Munitorum Manual. They're pretty propaganda-heavy, especially the Primer, but you can gain much valuable information from there, as well as a feel for the general tone of the universe.

Furthermore, I'd suggest reading up on various dictatorships in the real world, especially communist rulership under Stalin, for example, and pick out what you find sufficiently horrifying, or amp it up to 11 if it isn't.

[Lanaya]

Keep in mind, the warhammer 40K universe invented the term 'grimdark'. It's not a nice place. You certainly wouldn't be punished for killing a relative who was a heretic, heretics deserve only death. However, you would probably be executed anyway simply because you're related to a heretic so you're probably corrupted too. Can't take any chances, eh?

[GolemsVoice]

The Astartes and/or the Inquisiton might get miffe if somebody did their work for them and ruined any chances of investigating further, but yeah, you likely did good.

Although it's more "Watch your neighbour and report them!"

[Terumitsu]

If it helps, play it like some strange mixture of 1984, A Canticle For Leibowitz, and Metalocolypse. The two former are going to be much moreso than the latter given that this is DH but they'll all crop up in some form or another.

[xilokix]

I've been running an irl session of DH for about a year and a half now, this is literally the grim dark future. Everything horrible exists. It is like Gary Gygax and H.P. Lovecraft got together and rolled up an adventure game.

[Soylent Dave]

Most answers in 40k depend on the planet and the class of the citizenry you're talking about.


for instance, how young would people in the lower Hive vs the upper Hive start working

Lower hive (Hive City) inhabitants would start working as adolescents, maybe younger depending on what the Hive produces (the hive city is all the worst bits of the worst industrial hell you can imagine, so child labour seems likely).

The upper hive is where the nobles and guilders (bankers) live, so they are likely get to have a normal education (or 'an education' if the Hive is especially brutal).

The scions of the especially rich noble houses probably go on hunting trips down into the underhive (below the hive city), as a cross-between coming-of-age trials and upper-class brutality (a bit like fox hunting, only with poor people as the prey).



what sorts of actions would be acceptable

Freedom in the Imperium basically comes down to social class.

Imperial Nobles and members of the Adeptus Terra (that's not necessarily the game class 'adept', btw) are the highest ranking, with the Adeptus Ministorum and Mechanicum having supreme authority within their own priesthoods in a sideways-sort-of-way.

This may sometimes translate to being above the law (although not for things like witchcraft, mutation (exception for Noble House Navigators, who are sanctioned mutants) and heresy (exception for the Mechanicum, who are basically allowed to be heretics)), again depending on the world in question.

Bog-standard Imperial citizens have whatever rights their planetary governor allows. They're probably required to work, pray and keep out of the way of more important citizens.

Drugs may be legal or illegal. (non-chaos) mutants may be legal or illegal. Unemployment may be legal or illegal. Murder may be legal or illegal...

You get the idea.

And the Inquisition is always a little bit above and outside everyone else, of course.

If in doubt, err on the side of the worst and most oppressive possible outcome.

-

I can't point to an online resource, but the novel Ravenor by Dan Abnett has some excellent depictions of Imperial society - and an Inquisitorial warband (it's a pseudo-sequel to the Eisenhorn trilogy which you can pick up as an omnibus nowadays, but it's not essential to have read the first. They're all good, though)

[shadow_archmagi]

For a sense of Hive life, you might want to play Knights of the Old Republic 1, since the first level is a long and exhausting trek through a city planet. Of course, Taris is still probably upper-class by 40k standards.

[Leon]

The scions of the especially rich noble houses probably go on hunting trips down into the underhive (below the hive city), as a cross-between coming-of-age trials and upper-class brutality (a bit like fox hunting, only with poor people as the prey).


This is what Spryers are from Necromunda.

[Soylent Dave]

This is what Spryers are from Necromunda.

Which actually provides quite a good example of the sort of behaviour Imperial Nobles can get away with.

Necromundan Spyrers openly wear Xenos battlesuits (even if some might not necessarily realise that's what they are, as they've been handed down through the generations for a while), but don't get prosecuted.

Partly because they're doing it in the Underhive, which nobody really cares about, and partly because they're in charge so they're not getting investigated anyway (not unless they do something stupid and draw attention from offworld authorities).

[holywhippet]

40K doesn't have to be grimdark, it's lightened up a bit after recent novels like the Gaunt's Ghosts and Ciaphas Cain series. Still, you can generally assume life isn't going to be so great but your mileage may vary from planet to planet. Keep in mind that each world in the Imperium has varying technology levels. In some cases they are advanced in some areas but lacking in others.

Hive worlds are generally fairly unsafe places with most of the population being armed and gangs being quite common. The Imperium turns somewhat of a blind eye to all the firearms because they migjht need people they can recruit as guardsmen so they want people with combat and survival skills.

The term hive is a bit vague though, really it just refers to a world where there are a lot of people packed close together. Other than that, you could make up your own details about the hive world. Maybe the place has a giant arena where people earn fame and money through combat. Or it could be under the sway of a powerful church faction which ensures all of the citizens are devout worshippers of the Emperor. Given the number and variety of worlds in the Imperium you can pretty much justify and kind of setting for your homeworld.

[Lanaya]

40K doesn't have to be grimdark, it's lightened up a bit after recent novels like the Gaunt's Ghosts and Ciaphas Cain series. Still, you can generally assume life isn't going to be so great but your mileage may vary from planet to planet. Keep in mind that each world in the Imperium has varying technology levels. In some cases they are advanced in some areas but lacking in others.

This is an important point. While 40K is renowned for its GRIMDARKness, the Imperium is absolutely huge. If you want to make a planet where everybody is nice to each other all the time and praise the Emperor by helping their fellow humans and they all have pet penguins and candy is free then you can absolutely justify that. (Well, that's a bit of an exaggerated example, but you get the point.) It certainly wouldn't be common, or representative of the Imperium as a whole, but with that many people spread across that many planets some of them are bound to end up actually being quite nice.

[Soylent Dave]

with that many people spread across that many planets some of them are bound to end up actually being quite nice.

Those are the planets that get eaten by Tyranids.

(unless the inhabitants are really nice to each other. In that case it's only a matter of time before people start getting possessed by Slaanesh daemons and the whole planet gets sucked into the warp... :smalltongue:)

[Lanaya]

Those are the planets that get eaten by Tyranids.

(unless the inhabitants are really nice to each other. In that case it's only a matter of time before people start getting possessed by Slaanesh daemons and the whole planet gets sucked into the warp... :smalltongue:)

Either that or the Inquisition decides that nobody is ever that nice unless they're hiding something, and calls in an Exterminatus. You can never be too careful.

[Andrewmoreton]

I find the Eisenhorn and Ravenor Novels from Black Library inform how my Dark Heresy universe works