You became an adult amidst the yearning and poverty of the least of the God-Emperor’s flock, one soul amongst countless underhivers, renegades, bonepickers, and a thousand other outcast castes that exist on the fringes of the Imperium, scavenging what they can to survive. All that you owned was claimed from the wastes of those far above you in the Imperial hierarchy or gleaned from the wreckage and ashes of past war and catastrophe—at least, everything that wasn’t taken from the bodies of your peers and rivals, of course. Yours was a hard life lived upon a knife-edge: the dark abyss of starvation on one side and death or worse on the other. A childhood where each day of survival was a triumph has hardened and honed you, but left its scars on your soul.
Effect: You gain the Unremarkable Talent or the
Resistance (Fear) Talent, plus you gain a + 3 bonus to your choice of Willpower or Agility. You suffer your choice of 1d5 Corruption Points or 1d5 Insanity Points.
An orphan of the borderland between light and dark, you spent years living by your wits as a scapegrace amidst entertainers, gangers, reclaimators, and other ne’er-do-wells on the fringes of Imperial society. Your youth was spent in a grey borderland where the near-outcast mingled with shadowed figures risen from the depths and thrill-seekers come down from safer climes. A good scapegrace knows that the law only applies to those caught by the enforcers, that a life is worth only as much as is spent on keeping it. You’ve carried these hard earned lessons on into later life. Survival is best thought of as a game, with pleasure and ease the rewards along the way. A body must eat, drink, and live well, for death can come calling when it pleases.
Effect: You gain Sleight of Hand as a trained Basic Skill, plus a bonus of + 3 to your choice of Intelligence or Perception. You suffer your choice of 1d5 Corruption Points or 1d5 Insanity Points.
You were born to violence. It has surrounded you your whole life, and you’ve had a weapon in easy reach ever since you were strong enough to grip one. You could have joined the PDF or even become a Guardsman, but what sort of life is that? Joining a regiment means orders here, orders there, and none that make any sense. It was clear to you that fighting for Thrones as a mercenary was the best way for a warrior to become rich in his trade and still escape with his skin. You’ve seen death, victory, and most of the ugly things that lie inbetween, but as long as there is always a fat purse waiting on the far side of the battlefield that’s fine with you. As for the dead, the Emperor will know his own.
Effect: You gain the Quick Draw Talent and gain Intimidate as a trained Basic Skill. You gain a bonus of + 5 to your choice of Weapon Skill or Ballistic Skill, but you suffer both – 5 Fellowship and 1d5 Insanity Points.
Child of the Creed
It was not until comparatively late in your youth that you set foot in a room in which the stern gaze of the God-Emperor was absent, and during your impressionable years, you were shielded by the enfolding arms of the Ministorum from much of the hardship and uncertainty so many must endure. The unyielding visage of His statues was as much a part of your upbringing as the zealous, pure faith of those closest to you. Scripture, ritual, lessons, and priestly exhortations fill your memories, rising unbidden in every quiet moment—as though the aged, white-haired clerics who taught you still remain by your shoulder in spirit, jealously guarding over your soul. All men hear the God-Emperor’s holy words if they are born under His rule, but you heard more than most before even reaching adulthood.
Effect: You gain the Unshakeable Faith Talent and a bonus of either + 3 Willpower or + 3 Fellowship (your choice), but you suffer – 3 Weapon Skill.
To the scholar’s ear, there is no worse sound than the tearing of parchment. It always marks a desecration of one sort or another, be it a priceless work lost or a savant destroying his own flawed labours in disgust. You know this because the murmuring of savants, clicking of lexmachinery, and scent of ink and dust have been a part of your life for as long as you can recall. Apprentices are brought young into the Adept’s trade, for there is much to learn and the human span holds little time to learn it in. Apprentices sit in attendance at meeting after meeting between elder savants, bathed in the exchange of knowledge until they know how to learn and the correct knowledge has been drilled into them. All the galaxy is packed with knowledge, and even the smallest drop of it would fill the minds of a world of savants to bursting. Yet you derive much comfort from learning—even though you could never personally know more than a miniscule fraction of all there is to know.
Effect: You gain your choice of Logic (Int) as a trained Basic skill or the Peer (Academic) Talent. You also gain your choice of + 3 Intelligence or + 3 Fellowship, but you suffer – 3 Toughness.
You grew to adulthood upon the spire of wealth and privilege that towers, in some cases literally, high above the common Imperial masses. You expected their obedience and lived upon the fruits of their toil, surrendered to your extended family in solemn fealty. It was an upbringing amidst proud scions, wastrel lords, and high-priced retainers of silent, watchful competence. All the distractions available to the wealthy, bored elite were arrayed before you for the taking, day after day—a panoply of decadence to enervate the body and transport the mind. Those were years of fantastical exhibitions, sordid entanglements, strange drugs, conspiracies for the sake of show, mindless rivalries, and carefully hidden violence.
Effect: You gain the Decadence Talent and a bonus of + 3 to Agility or Fellowship (your choice). You suffer – 3 Perception and 1d5 Corruption Points.
A character may select Fringe Survivor instead of the Scavenger or Savant entry on the Standard Origin Path table.
Life in the Imperium of Man is constrictive and stifling. You and your family did whatever it took to survive in this regime by living out on the fringes of society. Each day was a struggle, but somehow, against all odds, they found a way so you could go on and realise the destiny the God-Emperor had entrusted in you.
Perhaps you come from a long line of hereteks, steeped in the dark arts of tech-reclamation; salvaging whatever scraps you could get your hands on in order to turn them into something a bit more useful, ever-fearful of discovery by the Adeptus Mechanicus. Or, your family might have travelled from place to place as traders, miners, or some other nomadic profession, never settling in one area for very long, but teaching you how to get by in nearly any environment and climate.
Many worlds in the Calixis Sector and Koronus Expanse have legitimate and underground blood sport arenas where death is dealt out to the delight of screaming crowds and jaded nobility. In many places throughout the sector, these fighters are highly respected and arena combat is considered a time-honoured tradition. Perhaps such a place is where you grew up—with pit-fighters and arena gladiators to keep you company and teach you to fight for coin and the entertainment of the crowds.
Select one of the following options:
There are those who, for whatever reason, move about from place to place, never staying in one spot for very long. Some are nomadic families and tribes who move about their world’s continents following herds or other resources. Some are miners or merchants who go about plying their trade or wares. There are others who not only move about across the land, but also go from system to system—and beyond! Whatever background your family has, this is the life you were born into. Your life is that of a nomadic wanderer, with little permanence. But you do have skills and honed instincts that keep you alive in the most hostile of climates. You are alert for danger and know how to survive in the galaxy’s myriad wildernesses. However, you have also witnessed many horrors of this galaxy through you travels as there are places in this universe that man was not meant to go. The nightmares still haunt you to this day.
Effect: Gain + 3 Toughness or + 3 Perception. Additionally, gain the Survival (Int) skill as a trained Basic skill. Also, gain 1 additional Fate Point and 1d5 + 1 Insanity points.
Those known as tech-heretics, or “hereteks,” are often branded as criminals. As technology is little understood and rightly feared for the troubles it has caused in mankind’s past, these blasphemers are often hunted down by the Adeptus Mechanicus. If caught, they face the prospect of being “recycled” into a servitor—mind-wiped and slaved to serve the Priesthood of Mars. Hereteks are versed in the dark arts of technology, and typically gained their knowledge outside the Priesthood of Mars. Many gained their “dark” powers through the application of intuitive leaps of logic. Some of them are nothing more than scavengers who dwell in the dregs of society. Others are more dangerous, supplying the underworld and black markets with prohibited technology,
drugs, chems, and even weaponry. A few tales whispered in the dark shadows tell of those hereteks who have crossed over into greater tech-heresy and delve into things best not spoken of. Like any subculture within the Imperium, hereteks are often drawn to those of like mind and those that can
survive on the fringes of society.
Effect: Gain + 3 Intelligence. Additionally, the character may select two skills from the following list; these skills are untrained Basic skills: Chem-Use (Int), Common Lore (Tech) (Int), Forbidden Lore (Archeotech) (Int), Tech-Use (Int), Medicae (Int), Scholastic Lore (any) (Int). In addition, gain + 1d5 Corruption points. The Adeptus Mechanicus does make it a point to hunt down and eliminate hereteks.
Across the Calixis Sector, there are numerous underground blood-sport arenas and fighting pits where barbaric gladiators fight for glory and the entertainment of the masses; this is your world. Thriving amid the lower castes of society, gladiatorial combat is a staple of many Imperial cultures. Here, men and women fight for glory and wealth; there are a few, however, who
have been sentenced to the pits for their crimes. Many of the fighters are hereditary combatants; their parents fought, their grandparents fought, and so on back through the generations. In the Calixis Sector, names like “Red Hook,” “Killer Kane,” and “The Butcher” are infamous within the arenas.
You have been training and honing your body since birth, and you have been champion more than once. You have studied at the feet of great pugilists and sword-masters. Some of the depraved and jaded nobility crave exotic fights and thus you have been pitted against grotesque xenos and mutants with awful mind-powers. But your abilities have not gone unnoticed and you know soon enough you will again feel the rush and clarity of mind that can only come from mortal combat.
Effect: Gain + 3 Toughness or + 3 Strength, and + 3 Weapon Skill. In addition, gain the Rival (Underworld) Trait and 1 Corruption Point.
A character may select An Unnatural Origin instead of the Scapegrace or Stubjack entries on the standard Origin Path table.
There are many in the Imperium whose existence is not kind; indeed, there are few for whom the Imperium is anything other than a distant and uncaring master. For some, however, existence is something to be suffered and endured. For these wretched few, life is a twisted and unnatural thing, and such men and women either find release in an early death or rise above their abhorrent origins. Some are cursed by a polluted environment, others doomed by the taint of the Warp, while others still are false-men, wrought or remade in flesh-vats and genetic vaults, their lives and bodies as clay to the whims of others. Those who endure their bleak existence are hardened by it, made resolute by an unrelenting desire to leave their past behind. In either case, it is said in hushed tones that these men and women may be something less than human.
Select one of the following options:
The industry of man leaves entire worlds choking on acrid fumes and drowning in noxious effluvia. On innumerable worlds, and hive worlds in particular, chemicals flood from manufactoriums, research stations, starports, and all manner of other locations, leaving the world poisoned. Such places are toxic to human life, yet humans may still exist there, the dregs of society forced into the most inhospitable places imaginable. Amidst polluted water and foul vapours, these people endure horrific lives, and as generations pass the poisons that suffuse their erstwhile homes taint their very nature, scarring their genes and rendering their very humanity a flawed and deformed thing. You may bear this contamination openly, your form twisted and mutated, or you may simply appear unhealthy.
Effects: Gain the Peer (Mutants) and Resistance (Poisons) Talents. Also gain +3 to either Toughness or Willpower, but suffer – 3 Fellowship. For an additional 100xp, the character may roll once on Table 14-3:Mutation on page 369 of the ROGUE TRADER Core Rulebook, re-rolling any results of 75 or higher.
Your life is not your own. It is the product of an arcane science only barely understood by those that wield it, who seek to emulate the Emperor’s mastery of genetics. Your form and your nature are manufactured, the result of tampering by those who seek to make men more able to perform certain tasks. You are a rarity in the Imperium and beyond it, a human being wrought by artificial means, and whether you embrace the purpose of your creation or deny it, the fact that you may not be entirely human is still weighs heavily upon you. One thing you do know is that you are still human in part—their science cannot create new life, it can only change that which already exists. However small a comfort that may be, even if it provides only solace through hatred, it is something.
Effects: Gain the Ambidextrous, Autosanguine and Chem- Geld Talents. Additionally, select two characteristics: They are both increased by +3. However, select one characteristic and reduce it by –3, and either gain 2d10 Insanity Points or lose one Fate Point permanently.
Tainted by the Warp
Whatever the reason, you have been irrevocably tainted by contact with the Immaterium, your soul scarred by a malign exposure that was present since you were very young. To you the material world feels static and unyielding, pale and cold compared to the barely-imaginable churning of the Warp. You are distant from his fellow man, for their world feels so small and confining compared to the infinite reaches your instincts tell you lay beyond reality’s walls, and little can scare you; the horrors of the Warp have lingered in swiftly-forgotten dreams, lurking behind your conscious mind for most of your life, and no mortal concern can compare with that.
Effects: Gain the Dark Soul and Jaded talents, and Forbidden Lore (Warp) as an untrained Basic Skill. Further, gain + 3 to Perception or Willpower. However, suffer – 3 to Fellowship and gain 1d10 Corruption Points. For an additional 300xp, the character may purchase the Favoured by the Warp talent, gaining an additional 1d10 Corruption Points in the process.
IN SERVICE TO THE THRONE
A character may select In Service to the Throne instead of the Child of the Creed or Vaunted entries on the standard Origin Path table.
The Imperium is built upon the toil of untold trillions of men and women, and the blood and bones of countless generations form its foundations. Your life was spent as one in the Emperor’s service, destined to sacrifice yourself to the greater glories of His Empire. Some choose to serve; others find their service forced upon them, chosen to be one more cog within a machine of bewildering proportions.
To serve the Emperor is to serve the ideal of conquest. Mankind is destined to rule the stars, so the preachers and missionaries say, and to reclaim worlds from the darkness between the stars is a bloody task indeed. In some way, shape or form, all who serve the Imperium directly contribute to its ongoing war of conquest and reclamation, a war that began a hundred centuries before and which has never truly ceased, though its form and pace have changed much with the ages.
Select one of the following options:
Human life is the single most abundant resource in the Imperium of Man, and yours is no different. Dragged from the life you seemed destined to lead so that you might serve the Emperor in some other capacity, your years were spent in the company of those like yourself, people of many worlds given up as a tithe to the Imperium. You may have served in the Imperial Guard or been conscripted into the Imperial Navy. You may even have been a conscript-colonist for a newly-settled world, a menial for the city-offices of the Administratum, or something else entirely. Whatever the case, your life of service helped you escape from the life you might have lead, providing you with a broader knowledge of the Imperium and the rare opportunity to see things you
might never have even heard of had you not been taken from your home.
Effect: Gain a single Common Lore skill as a trained Skill, chosen from the following list: Adeptus Astra Telepathica, Administratum, Imperial Creed, Imperial Guard, Imperial Navy, Imperium or War. In addition, select any two choices from the following list of skills and talents. Skills chosen are gained as trained Skills: Drive (any one), Literacy, Medicae,Navigation (surface), Survival, Tech-Use, Basic Weapon Training (Las), Basic Weapon Training (SP), Pistol Weapon Training (Las), Pistol Weapon Training (SP). Finally, gain +3 Willpower or Ballistic Skill.
Born to Lead
With status comes responsibility, though some of high birth may dispute it. To be born above others is to lead them, and your life has been directed to that end for as long as you can remember. All branches and departments of the Adeptus Terra require those who can command others with a clear head and an iron will, and your adult life has been spent in one of those departments, be it the Imperial Guard, the Ministorum, the Administratum or something else besides. With this life comes the resolve and dedication of those with power earned, and the confidence to lead without doubt or hesitation. Men and women such as you are a valuable asset to
the Imperium, and those who thrive in their duties are often well-rewarded.
Effects: Gain Command, Literacy and any one of Scholastic Lore (Bureaucracy, Imperial Creed, Judgement or Tactica Imperialis) as Trained Skills. In addition, gain + 3 Intelligence or Fellowship, but suffer – 3 Toughness.
One Amongst Billions
Your early life was unremarkable, merely a single face amongst the teeming masses of humanity. Of no importance to the hierarchy of the Imperium, nor cast out beyond the fringes of society, you seemed doomed to a life of mediocrity and anonymity. Through ceaseless toil to improve your lot in life, you learned quickly the politics of the common man, of preserving your own meagre interests with a wary eye cast to the efforts of your peers. Through these methods, you clawed your way from amongst the masses to make something of yourself.
Effects: Gain the Paranoia and Unremarkable Talents, and any one Trade or Common Lore as a trained Skill. Additionally, gain + 3 Perception or Intelligence, but suffer – 3 Strength.