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Trading Charts

In most cases, don’t.

Instead, ask PCs what they want to buy. If they know what exists in the 40k universe, they might ask for items by name. Otherwise, they’ll ask by function, as in, ‘A gun that uses these Limax bullets we found.’

Then it’s the GM’s job to see what’s available in that category – revolvers, autoguns and so on.

If the PCs are just browsing, let them see the list and check if any items that catch their interest are available.

Alternatively, if the PCs have encountered a particularly enthusiastic salesman, have him/her offer them various items, regardless of how useful (useless?) they might be, and see how gullible the PCs are.

The trading charts are divided up into categories. The GM should decide which categories of items a visited trading post stocks – e.g. a weapons dealer is unlikely to sell food (unless it is a survivalist shop), while drug dealers may also have a few weapons, but probably not armour or camping equipment.

When spending time generically shopping, it may be easier to assume that virtually everything is available somewhere in the town, and the PCs have access to a wide variety of categories.

The sale of alien weapons is almost unheard of, and very few trading posts specialise in xenos artefacts – such items can occasionally be found amongst the merchandise of black market weapons dealers or smugglers, but often only for ‘special’ customers.

Note that some items are not available for sale and thus are not included on the trading charts. Nobody in their right mind would try and sell a Daemon sword, for example – Daemons don’t understand the concept of currency and would probably not appreciate an ‘owner’ trying to pass its earthly vessel onto another.

Once the GM has decided what categories of equipment are available at a particular trader (or group of traders, if the PCs are wandering around a commercial district or market), they may try to find specific items. Each item on the price chart has a base percentage chance of being present (the Probability column). This is the probability of finding the item at an average-sized Merchants Guild trading post or independent shop.

The quantity of each item is given under the No. Offered column. As with the probability, this is the assumed amount for a typical, generic shop.

Larger suppliers, such as wholesalers, hypermarkets, military armouries (in battlefield-level adventures), and some specialist shops may be assumed to have an unlimited number of any particular item. 

The GM should feel free to ignore the chances of finding an item and just assume that it is there. For example, using dice rolls, it is possible that the PCs could enter a tobacconist and somehow fail to find any tobacco-related products.

Depending on the environment, the PC may decide that some items (most commonly drugs or military weapons, but occasionally civilian weapons, certain books, films, and so on) are prohibited by local or Imperial law. In this case, roll against the probability of finding the item as normal, but if successful, the PC searching for the item must take a Sagacity test, with a +20 bonus if the PC has the Secret Language - Street ability, and –20 if he does not, or is known to be an agent of the authorities.

If the test is passed, the PC manages to locate someone selling the prohibited item. If the test is failed, the item is on sale, but the PC doesn’t find it. A perfect success means that not only does the dealer trade in the searched-for item, but everything else on the same price chart (e.g. all military basic weapons, if originally searching for a silenced autogun) are now counted as legal when the PC tries to find them in this trading session. A critical failure means that not only has the PC failed to find a dealer, but someone has informed on him to the law.

Buying An Item

If a PC finds something he wants to buy then he simply crosses off the appropriate amount of money from his Character Sheet and adds the item to his Equipment list.

PCs can haggle over the cost of an item – see Communication tests, in the Interacting With The Imperium section.

Weapons and ammunition are sold separately. There will always be a single batch of ammunition available at a stockist selling a particular weapon, and all weapons are supplied with a single empty magazine.

Spare magazines will be thrown in for free when enough ammunition is bought to fill them. Some GMs and players may not want to do the extra bookkeeping involved in putting bullets into magazines, and simply assume that there are always sufficient magazines available. This is perfectly understandable and acceptable, even if it does draw away slightly from the realism of the game.

If writing an adventure or designing a settlement, a GM may wish to determine what is available in a specific shop, to save time when the PCs start looking for things to buy during the adventure. The GM can hand over a price and quantity list and remove the need for any dice rolling.

The GM simply decides which types of equipment are available in the shop, and then rolls on the appropriate tables for types and quantities available.

Street corner dealers can also be designed using these guidelines, but will obviously carry far fewer items.

Although these trading charts are long, they are by no means exhaustive. One million worlds, untold billions of people, and only a few pages of trading charts? If a PC wants something that isn’t on the list, or the GM wishes to add a new item, the process is relatively straightforward – find something similar on the charts and work out the stats that seem appropriate.

Also, some of the most specialised equipment (that used by the Officio Assassinorum, for example), is not on the trading charts, because you can’t buy it.

The varying technology levels of the planets within the Imperium means that it can occasionally be difficult to find certain items on sale. These are generalised here:

The basic level of human civilisation. Family groups wander wastelands or through the ruins of earlier civilisations, naked or nearly naked (weather permitting) and using only the most basic of tools and weapons.

Roughly comparable to the Celts or Goths of European history, rather than the more advanced Romans or Greeks (who would probably be in Tech Level 3 or 4). Tribes or clans form villages, and a few small towns, but technology is limited by the people’s understanding of science and the lack of industrial capability.

Humans are beginning to form larger settlements – usually a single planetary capital, or regional capitals – and the first nations are forming (unless the Imperial Commander decides otherwise). Technology is still at the stage where iron, rather than steel, is used.

Basic steel smelting has developed, and cities are starting to develop around a burgeoning trading and manufacturing culture. Businesses are still confined to small, family, workshops, and will be for some time yet.

Although still very agricultural, there is an increasing shift in emphasis towards urban life. Blackpowder weapons are common in the military (unless the Imperial Commander issues the PDF with more advanced rifles or lasguns), and private ownership is sometimes a necessity to deal with bandits. Traders and explorers have developed the compass and basic navigational techniques, and can cross oceans in sail-driven vessels.

Politics has become a case of coalitions of nations and globe-spanning empires, and for the first time, trade has overtaken warfare as the primary means of obtaining new wealth. Previously unpopulated parts of the planet are being colonised by pioneers, who are often heavily armed with projectile weapons to protect against wild creatures, indigenous xenos species or more primitive humans.

Roughly equatable with the late-Victorian era to the first half of the 20^th Century, but where the Imperium is becoming more obvious in its influences. In the changeover from subsistence to commercial farming, agriculture has become less prevalent as an industry, leaving much more room for development in other areas, such as heavy industry. Mills or factories fill the skyline of the increasingly large cities and, on the battlefield, tanks, aircraft and machine guns are just coming into use.

A state of affairs similar to that of the latter half of the 20^th Century and the first half of the 21^st. Worlds have a heavy Imperial cultural influence by now, and this leads to a level of technology marginally in advance of our own. Limited space exploration is possible, although this is mainly used to co-ordinate with inter-system vessels in the form of orbital shuttles and system ships.

This is the default state for Imperial worlds, where las-weapons and bionic technology are familiar to most citizens and space travel, although unknown to most citizens, no longer inspires awe in the populace. Most cultures encountered in Imperium will be of Tech Level 9.

The only worlds that are entirely in this category are the Forgeworlds of the Adeptus Mechanicus. However, every culture of around Tech Level 7 or above will have some kind of access to Tech Level 10 technology (usually via the outposts of the Adeptus Mechanicus, or other galaxy-wide Imperial organisations). This access will normally only be for the privileged or wealthy, and those not of high social status may have difficulty being considered worthy or intellectually capable of using highly advanced technology.

It should be noted that, although certain items are listed as being of a particular Tech Level, it is normal for later Tech Levels to continue producing them until they are made obsolete by future developments. An example would be the Tech Level 1 blanket. Certainly, a Stone Age blanket is going to be little more than a stinking animal fur, but it is comparable in effect to a Tech Level 10 blanket made of artificial fibres and bearing the cog-and-skull heraldry of the Adeptus Mechanicus.

Some items will become obsolete, though in the Imperium, that is fewer than would be expected. The existence of projectile weapons alongside plasma guns is a good example. The popularity of swords and knives as sidearms is another. Cultural preferences and material availability means that various levels of technology can be present at any one time on an Imperial world.

Although the Tech Levels can be applied to entire planets (and should be, by the GM), it is also probable that there are localised variations on each world. This may be as subtle as the example mentioned earlier, where the Romans and Greeks had a Tech Level of 4 in an environment that was otherwise at Tech Level 2, or it could be as drastic as the Space Wolves’ Tech Level 10 Fortress-Monastery on the Tech Level 3 world of Fenris.

To get even more localised, individual organisations will have differing levels of technology as well. The Adeptus Mechanicus, Inquisition and Space Marine Chapters will always be at Tech Level 10, while most other Imperial organisations (whatever world they are on) will be at Tech Level 9.

Note that individuals with equipment of far higher levels than the local norm may be perceived as being magic-users, or even gods, in some primitive cultures. This is not necessarily a good thing, as PCs may eventually discover (particularly if they try and fail to impersonate sorcerers or gods).

Largely this rests on the decision of the GM. Most  items will be impossible to find in a culture of a lower Tech Level, although there can be exceptions to this (e.g. offworld imports of technology, or a culture more advanced in one field of technology than in others).

A good way of simulating this is to reduce the chance of finding an item by 20% for every level below the optimal one. This means that a Mars-pattern lasgun (Tech Level 9, 65% probability) on a Tech Level 3 Medieval World will be reduced to just 5%.

A similar formula could be applied to obsolete items in advanced cultures.

When purchasing items of a higher Tech Level than the local environment, the GM may wish to increase the item’s cost somewhat. The recommended amount is by 10% per Tech Level of difference. The Mars-pattern lasgun described above would therefore cost 60% more, i.e. 240 sestertii rather than 150.

This can be used for primitive items in an advanced environment as well, although this would represent collector’s value more than the desirability of advanced technology.

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