Warhammer 40K: Rogue Trader Tips and Tricks

Owlcat Games first earned their spurs in the CRPG genre with the Pathfinder series. Now they’ve proven their expertise with the latest adaptation of the most popular tabletop game. Our Warhammer 40K: Rogue Trader tips and tricks will show you how combat works, how to handle the character editor, and what newcomers to the genre need to know.

1) Character creation tips

Character creation is one of the first things you do in Rogue Trader. This is so complex and multilayered that you can create an avatar entirely to your liking. If this is too time-consuming for you and you want to start the game right away, simply choose one of the pre-built characters. Hecata is good for ranged combat, Bahardor is a good melee fighter, and Darrius is a good middle ground between the two.

Homeworld

Choosing your homeworld in Rogue Trader adds talents and abilities to your skill tree specific to your species. As a Voidborn, you have increased willpower and intelligence and are well suited to training as a Psyker. The downside is that your strength score is reduced. It’s best to choose this world if you want to use magic rather than force of arms.

If you want advantages in melee combat, choose the Death World, and if you want skills for ranged combat, the world of Bulwark is a good choice. The Imperial World and Macropolis World are good choices if you want to keep your options open. The Factory World opens up options for special ranged weapons and heavy armor.

Origin

Origin determines your avatar’s career path in Rogue Trader. You should choose the Sanctioned Psyker if you’ve chosen the Voidborn world, and the Navy Officer will harmonize well with the Macropolis world. The Crime Lord is generally good for all worlds, the Commissar for the Death World, and the Ministorum Priest for the Bulwark World. Almost any origin is compatible with the Imperial World.

Archetypes

Your archetype determines the class of your character. As a warrior, you have an advantage in strength, agility, and toughness. This makes them a good choice for melee combat. As an officer, you will excel in fellowship, ballistics, weaponry, willpower, and tenacity. The operative’s main strengths are perception and intelligence. The soldier is an ideal choice if you prefer ranged combat.

Appearance

Your character’s appearance does not affect your skill stats in Rogue Trader. So you can go wild and customize everything you want without any disadvantages. You can choose from hair colors, beards, tattoos, facial features, implants, and more. Even the three pre-made avatars are customizable.

2) Stay together while exploring

As you explore the game world, make sure your party members don’t stray too far from each other. This is one of our top Rogue Trader tips for beginners: It’s best to tag all of your party members and have them explore new areas together. While exploring, only the characters that are actively tagged will go.

Even if you want to interact with the environment, it’s not a bad idea to tell everyone in your party at the same time. If the object requires a skill check, the person with the best skill for the action will automatically do it.

3) Check the map for missed loot

And one more exploration tip: Any loot containers that you or your allies have seen will show up on the map, even if you haven’t actively marked them. So before you leave an area in Rogue Trader, take a look to see where there is still loot for you to collect. Each area has mission clues, equipment, or cargo that you can bring back to your ship.

There is no limit to the amount of loot you can collect and killed enemies are also worth a look. They often have better weapons that you can use to replace your old ones. Duplicate or excess items can later be sold to space merchants.

4) Rogue Trader tips for your crew

Here are our most important Warhammer 40K: Rogue Trader tips and tricks. Make sure your party is as diverse as possible. None of your characters can do everything, and if you want to use them to their full potential, you need to specialize them as much as possible. Your party can consist of up to six people. Ideally, each member of your party should be a different archetype. There are eleven different archetypes, and once you’ve leveled a character far enough, you can specialize in another archetype.

You need a melee fighter who can act as a tank, take damage, and keep enemies away from your guys with weaker armor. You also need at least one long-ranged character in the party. In addition to armed units, you should also train a good Psyker and have a leader with high intelligence and fellowship.

Make sure your squad members’ skills complement each other and create synergy. Especially in difficult boss fights, the tactical interplay of different maneuvers and talents is extremely important to win. You’ll also encounter numerous types of enemies in the universe. The more diverse your party in Rogue Trader, the more likely it is that at least one member of your party will have a particularly effective attack.

5) Use both weapon slots

Most characters in Warhammer 40K: Rogue Trader have slots for two weapons that they can use at the same time. They are divided into one-handed (e.g. pistols) and two-handed (e.g. the Psychic staff) weapons. In the game, you can switch between the weapons your avatar can use at will. You should do this depending on the situation.

It’s best to have at least one set of melee weapons and one set of ranged weapons for each of your people. If you want to be prepared for everything or want to use the full range of abilities, you can nuance the sets and have, for example, several staff constellations for a Psyker, each of which addresses different talents.

6) Rogue Trader combat tips

Warhammer 40K: Rogue Trader is a war game. You’ll spend a large part of your time in combat. Like many isometric RPGs, combat is turn-based. We’ll now explain what you need to be aware of as a beginner to this system.

Use all your AP in each turn

A character can use four AP (action points) per turn. This doesn’t mean that you can perform exactly four actions. Usually, you can perform exactly one attack. However, there is a small amount left over, and in a roleplaying game like Warhammer 40,000: Rogue Trader, there is nothing worse than leaving it unused. So use it for buffs, debuffs, and items.

Find cover and return fire

You’ll be outnumbered in most fights in Warhammer 40K: Rogue Trader. After all, there are only six people in your party, and if you face a horde of 30 cultists, there will be five enemies for every person in your party. Make sure your units that aren’t suited for melee combat keep their distance and find suitable cover for them. Let them decimate your enemies from afar, round after round.

At the same time, you can send your melee units forward to pressure the enemy’s ranged units. To gain a positional advantage in the combat system, you should generally take a cautious approach. Let the enemies come to you. The fact that they have to regroup after advancing makes them an easy target for you.

What is momentum?

You may have noticed a purple bar at the bottom right of the screen, just above the skill bar. This is your Momentum. It fills up as the battle goes well or badly, and once it reaches a certain threshold, special abilities are unlocked. If the battle is going well, these are heroic deeds, and if you’re backed into a corner, they are acts of desperation.

If your character can perform these skills, they can turn the tide of battle and bring victory from a seemingly hopeless situation. So keep an eye on this bar and use your Momentum at the right time.

Pay attention to the veil

On the left side of the screen in Rogue Trader is the veil meter. The higher it is, the more likely it is that a psychic force will trigger the dangers of the warp. What happens next is unpredictable, but in the vast majority of cases, it’s not a good thing. Keep in mind that the veil indicator only increases the odds, but doesn’t tell you exactly when something will be triggered.

Warp Danger can remain disabled when the indicator is already very high, but it can also be enabled when the indicator is low. That’s the thing about using psychic powers: the consequences are hard to predict. However, the advantages of these attacks usually outweigh the disadvantages. Only if you’re already seeing ghostly apparitions on the battlefield should you stop using them. Otherwise, you might accidentally cast a demon.

Use grenades

Grenades have several advantages. First, they can be used to bypass line-of-sight restrictions. This means that you can attack enemies that are out of your line of sight, such as behind cover or an obstacle. The second benefit is area damage. If you throw a grenade into a group of enemies, every unit within the radius will take damage.

Especially if you’re facing numerical superiority, grenades are a great way to thin out the enemy mass and level the playing field. Take advantage of enemy groupings to place a frag effectively.

Space combat tips

From time to time, you’ll find yourself in space battles. However, these are different from land battles. Your movements will depend on your ship’s rotors, and you’ll also have to consider the direction you’re facing. Your weapons are determined by the ship you choose at the beginning of the game. There are four bars around your ship, representing your shield. Move the mouse over them to see their status.

Assign your characters to the stations in the ship that best suit their abilities, and don’t be afraid to ram an enemy to inflict damage. You should also keep in mind that some enemy ships can attack twice because they have two weapon slots.

Damage your allies

Attacks in Rogue Trader can not only hit enemy troops, they can also damage allied units. In general, it’s important to avoid friendly fire, but there are situations where a little friendly damage is okay. For example, if you have the opportunity to cast a powerful AoE attack that sends several enemies to the afterlife, but also hurts one of your units because it’s in the area of effect (e.g., a melee unit), then you have to weigh things up.

At the end of each battle, your units are fully healed. So if you need to inflict damage on your own units to end the battle quickly and to your advantage, this can be a good strategy.

Face your enemies with PLITCH!

With our Warhammer 40K: Rogue Trader tips and tricks, you’ll be well prepared for the battles in the game and know what’s important when creating characters. To give your luck in battle a little boost, PLITCH offers Warhammer 40K: Rogue Trader cheats. Our single-player trainer allows you to add as many experience points as you like to your units to level them up.

You can also give your troops extra movement and action points in battle to perform multiple attacks and cover greater distances. Godmode makes even the toughest bosses a breeze to defeat, so you can focus on the story and not on repeating the same battle over and over again.

To learn more about PLITCH and our mods, visit this blog or watch this video to see our Rogue Trader cheats in-game.

Happy Gaming!