Rogue Trader is the Warhammer 40k CRPG game from Owlcat, offering its Pathfinder fanbase a totally new setting and system to sink their teeth into. While there are certainly Owlcat traditions going over, the class system in Rogue Trader is taking on a different form. The character creation doesn’t have a typical class system and will have more of an in-depth character creator screen.

The Rogue Trader class system instead uses a concept of an Origin and a Doctrine. The Origin essentially offers as your starting background, with the Doctrines essentially serving as the Base and Advanced Classes that come later. As you play the game, your class and playstyle will slowly develop greatly, and as a result, the game will show you how deep the Rogue Trader Class System can go.

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Here is a closer look at the Rogue Trader Class system and a list of possible classes, origins, and Doctrines you can use to build your characters. Image via Owlcat Games.

Rogue Trader Class List¶

To summarize, the Rogue Trader class system uses Origins to generate starting talents, skills, and stats. At the same time, the Archetypes offer the core class gameplay, with advanced classes adding even more specialization and further enhancement to playstyles. However, the class system in the game works by allowing certain base Archetypes morph into advanced Archetypes. You can expect them as follows using this image as a flow chart reference.

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You pick a base Archetype on the left in Character Creator, and then your chosen starting class will allow you to become on of three archetypes to define your class further.

Each Archetype has its own theme and playstyles meaning you can create a lot of varieties for your builds. We’ll give you a summary of what each one is about:

Base Classes and Archetypes:

• Officer: All about granting buffs, giving allies an extra 2 AP to perform a few quick moves, and other turn granting bonuses and buffs.
• Operator: A class designed for debuffing enemies via analyzing weakness stacks. Players can either Exploit Weaknesses converting those stacks into debuffs on an opponents armor and doge chance, making them more susceptible to damage, or build stacks to add bonus damage to your’s an allies attacks.
• Soldier: A class that specializes in ranged damage and being able to run and gun. There are further builds to help you with your AOE, burst fire or single target type damage roles on weapons.
• Warrior: A class that specializes in melee combat, offering tank or melee DPS type builds.

Each base Archetype will allow you to level to 15, with you then unlocking Tier 2 Archetypes. The Tier 2 Archetypes are meant to specialize your playstyle a little more. Assassin are great for melee DPS focused Warriors, while tank Warriors are likely to get huge benefits from Vanguard. Arch militant players are likely to enjoy closer range weapons with a variety of attack patterns for different jobs, while pure supports can use Grand Strategist, or Master Tactician for buffs and resource management.
Tier 2 Archetypes:

• Assassin: Mobile and doge focused melee DPS, capable of dealing strong attacks.
• Arch-Militant: Crit guaranteeing class that award players and builds using different types of melee and ranged weapon attacks, granting buffs for doing so.
• Bounty-Hunter - A class designed for marking key targets and getting bonuses for killing them. There are support melee and ranged sniper type playstyles for this archetype.
• Grand Strategist: A support class designed for granting buffs in specific region you place, aiming to debuff enemies and buff allies with more damage, or defensive capabilities.
• Master Tactician: A Support DPS class designed for either ranged or melee characters who build stacks to convert in Temporary Wounds, or bonus damage when required. It also awards a lot of ultimate generation via Momentum and Resolve bonuses.
• Vanguard: A melee tank designed for taking hits and getting enemies to attack them.

Exemplar is a final archetype that all classes get upon reaching level 36. This merely grants some other high level buffs, and other talents you didn’t take while leveling your first and second archetype.

Rogue Trader Origins¶

Here is a list of all the Origins you can take in Rogue Trader, followed by more information on the differences you can expect.

• Astra Militarum Commander
• Commissar
• Vagabond
• Ministorum Priest
• Navy Officer
• Noble
• Sanctioned Psyker

For the most part, the Origin is your base character. Selecting one awards different Attribute Modifiers, Skills Modifiers, and a unique skill or two to buff your party in a variety of ways.

For example, an Astra Military Commander is your army leader type base character. Meanwhile, a Navy Officer is more of a support leader type class that does a lot of shouting and Ally buffs in battle. In contrast, the Commissar is a sergeant-type class that gives orders, and following those kill orders grants better action economy buffs. So, there are certainly different types of leadership roles and niches within leadership and combat-focused roles. Meanwhile, a Psyker is your mage-type class, with the Diviner being more traditional holy-type magic. At the same time, Biomancers use powers to target life and biology to deal and inflict damage, with a slight twist to melee battle mage-type roles.

This about concludes the rough outlines of the Rogue Trader Classes and how the class system works. You should now know what the Origins do and alter playstyles, with the Doctrines being your main bread and butter for creating your role in the game. Again, the class system in the game is giving you many niche tools to build a squad any way you want and has done a solid job of separating support and damage-themed roles through origins and the doctrines. So, creating a perfect class is a good idea.