The Govannon War
I'm preparing to GM a campaign of Warhammer 40,000: Rogue Trader for my friends in my local gaming group. It was a bit of a challenge to prepare background that could fit all of the forces we wanted to use, so that players could all use their models and I had plenty of monsters or NPC threats to use. I wanted to channel as much as I could the energy of Rogue Trader. I took inspiration from the rulebook's Helsreach scenario and the original White Dwarf Badab War articles, and Bryan Ansell's Confrontation. I also drew on some later sources such as the specialist game Inquisitor and the Warhamemr 40,000 3rd Edition Codex: Daemonhunters. This is what I came up with.
The Govannon War
In the grim darkness of the 41st Millennium, there is only war. The world of Govannon Prime, the only habitable world in the Govannon system, is consumed by conflict.
The Planet
Archaeological surveys show that Govannon was once a verdant temperate planet with swelling oceans and lush forests. Something of this survives in the northern polar region. This region is hard to navigate and inhabited by unknown fauna. It is the location of the secret fortress of the space marine garrison, called Eden Base.
The vast majority of the planet’s surface is a martian desert, choked by iron oxide. This was brought about by millennia of industry for imperial war efforts, warming the planet’s atmosphere to an almost uninhabitable point.
Seas have receded from the shore, leaving in their wake vast salt flats. Alien cacti, brush, and tall leafy plants are all that grow for the most part, although in the northern regions some grassy steppes can be found.
The southern hemisphere is an unknown quantity. The equator is too hot to traverse and storms make it very difficult to travel there by air or space. Many stories circulate about the mysterious region, rumours of hardy human inhabitants or strange aliens.
Fauna
In terms of animal life, small arthropods are the most numerous, but some larger species survive.
The Spotted Ferrophage is an insect the size of a large dog with a robust black exoskeleton with blue and yellow spots. It has evolved to feed on the energy released by oxidising reactions, which it can accelerate with a special secretion that can turn iron to dust in less than a minute and can also oxidise materials that usually take many years to tarnish.
Large reptiles thrive on the burning-hot surface. Most species are about the size of a large dog up to the size of a horse, resembling smaller dinosaurs like raptors. Some species are bigger and resemble tyrannosaurs. Most species have a more serpentine appearance than old earth’s dinosaurs.
There is also a “wild” strain of tyranids, the remnants of a defeated invasion fleet. The creatures reverted to a bestial instinct in the absence of psychic link to their hive-mind. They are terrors of the wastes.
Settlements
The planet is host to a singular hive-city, referred to as (The) Hive, or more properly the Palatinate. Smaller cities are scattered across the surface nucleated around factory complexes.
Wasteland townships vary hugely as do their populations. Many are frontier trading towns, with rough saloons and frequent gunfights. Usually some form of mutualist network provides social support in townships. Many wastelanders are fervent ideological anarchists. Some are organised into nomadic gangs which travel between towns.
Industrial Militia
Six years ago an industrial rebellion took place. Factory workers seized arms and seceded from the imperium in the cities, organising an ad-hoc revolutionary council by establishing communications between one another. The Palatinate hive had and has a strong revolutionary undercurrent but as the centre of imperial rule on the planet it could not be overcome. The hive focused on protecting itself from its enemy within. Relations between wastelanders and the industrial militia are mixed; some see them as no better than the imperials and will not compromise on their individual freedom.
Space Marines
A force of space marines under Commander Ishmael of the Dark Angels chapter was dispatched quickly after the uprising and established supremacy in the Hive. They number about 100 operatives in total but have also organised irregular volunteer brigades. In recent months Commander Ishmael has ignored orders from imperial high command and is believed to have gone rogue. Unaccountable as space marine forces are, it is understood that the Commander pursues the chapter’s own secretive objectives.
The Second Invasion
In response to space marine insubordination, imperial high command has deployed a regiment of the regular army, namely the Necromundan 12th. These hivers and ash waste nomads are tough, and the environments of Govannon are not unfamiliar to them. For unknown reasons, this invasion is led by an agent of the Ordo Malleus, Lady Inquisitress Jayne Vasilissa. She is known as a radical and has been known to undertake sinister black ops in pursuit of esoteric relics and information.
Other Forces
The Deathwatch. The war on Govannon has brought attention to the strange feral tyranids on the planet within the Ordo Xenos. A death watch kill team led by Antor Delassio of the Blood Angels chapter has been deployed to both capture and destroy these aliens as well as the genestealer threat.
Ordo Hereticus. A rival inquisitor opposed to Lady Vasilissa is operating on the planet with a small detachment of Sisters of Battle and household troops. Their objectives are mysterious but they have in the past sought to arrest the radical.
The Stay-Behinds. When the industrial rebellion took hold, imperial forces fled most of the planet and retreated to the Palatinate. One force of elite secret operatives led by a Rogue Trader active on the world, integrated with wastelander nomads, simply laid low and is now an active force behind enemy lines.
Genestealers. Genestealer infestations have been documented across the planet over the years, always resulting in horror but eventually being addressed. The threat has never been fully stamped out, and urban legends circulate of a growing infestation in the lower hive.