The first edition of Warhammer 40k, not the yet-to-be-released CRPG by Owlcat.
I’m a sucker for game history, and recently that has extended to Tabletop Gaming history. Case in point, while I couldn’t care less about Dungeons and Dragons as a product and IP, it’s so intrinsically essential to TTRPG history that I find myself with way more material about D&D in my house than I would probably have otherwise.
So when I learned that GW sold replicas of their first 40k books, and moreover that the Warhammer Cafe in Tokyo had them on stock I was over the moon.
40k was originally… effectively a variant of Warhammer Fantasy but in Space, it was the sci-fi mishmash counterpart to Fantasy’s… fantasy mish-mash.
At this point things like the Space Marines, Tyranids, Orks, and Eldar were already a thing; but the current tone wasn’t there quite yet.
Perhaps the best example is the Space Marines. In current 40k the Space Marines are effectively Murder Monks. They have a very monastic aesthetic and way of doing things… but in Rogue Trader they’re very much technologically enhanced savages that are zero finesse all brutality.
Here’s the funny thing though, these proto-Astartes still exist in current 40k, not only that but in current 40k lore they’re ALSO proto-Astartes.
You see, before Space Marines became a thing, The Emperor had the Thunder Warriors, effectively savages taken from the most violent people of earth that he proceeded to enhance with both implants and technology and are described as constantly getting lost in their own maelstrom of violence.
The similarities don’t stop there either. Please look at current Primarch fratboy Leman Russ.
And compare him with Rogue Trader’s Leman Russ.
First of all, it’s really neat how they kept the general shape of his face down to the hair evoking the shape of the augmetics… but anyways!
At this point the concept of a “Primarch” wasn’t established like it is in the current lore. Instead of being the base from which a whole legion is made, born transhuman instead of turned transhuman, they were just… exemplar warriors.
And as it turns out, the Thunder Warriors had a bunch of Primarchs, which were basically exemplar generals.
Another interesting detail is that Rogue Trader was more of a narrative game. While 40k has many options for narrative gameplay to this day, it’s still a game with scores and wins, but this version not only requires a Game Master of sorts to set things (rather than being a judge, basically) but it also asks you to use dice other than a D6.
And not gonna lie, Warhammer without a pall full of D6s feels WRONG.