Actually Eldars ARE evil race, especially in the eyes of the Empire, i.e. look at DoW2 story. (warning, minor spoiler)
When they are trying to stop a Tyranid invasion, they are fueling Orkish Waaagh on human worlds so the greenskins could be at peek of their abilities, when time to face hive fleet comes. Off course it’s a good plan, but not exactly “good”, especially in the eyes of humans ;)
Off course Empire is evil in the eyes of Eldars, it works in both ways.

BTW “Corsair” is not equivalent to “pirate”.
 

Hakken said:

Wikipedia has spoken!

Peacekeeper_b said:

Off course it has. Wiki is powerful, especially, when one is to lazy to write ;)

So the difference is a corsair is a pirate who has been given permission from his crown/state/government to engage in acts of piracy, much like a privateer.

This fits in well with eldar, of both flavours, although there is a distinct difference to how you will be treated depending it they are dark eldar or regular ones.

It is not beyond the realm of possibility that an eldar ranger or pathfinder, or indeed exodite, is travelling with a rogue trader, especially if he needs transportation to a world without webway access.  Perhaps he owes a member of the crew a personal debt, and is honouring it.  Admittedly Eldar are quite capricious, but they do generally do things to benefit the galaxy/eldar race [often seen as the same thing] so turning one race on another to save eldar lives is seen as perfectly sensible.

I have no doubt the imperium, if it had access to similar knowledge of future threats would turn orks on the eldar first, if they had the ways and means to do so.

Hakken said:

Wikipedia is the modern substitute for actually knowing things, just like TvTropes.org is the modern substitute for having your own opinions.

Peacekeeper_b said:

Actually those were Dark Eldar (same physiology, WAAAAAY different technology) although granted, good players wouldn't let their characters know the difference.

And I agree with the sentiment that xeno characters should wait for their own supplement.  I do not own but I have seen and read Dark Heresy and it is a thick book.  It also takes you by the hand and assumes you have no idea what 40k is; going to great lengths to describe a particular spit of space and getting you into the Imperium mindset.  It can be assumed that Rogue Trader is the same case; a weighty tome that covers pages upon pages of weapons (many which are likely to be repeats of DH,) character options, gear (again, some repeats,) combat rules, environmental hazards, and I'm sure there's going to be a section for Rogue Traders on dealing with what might end up becoming the most alien of all societies they run into; the Imperium itself.

Holding off for a seperate book might be better off, especially to answer interesting questions such as the Tau (just how does a "Rogue Trader" work in their society, which has five genetically different castes and at least two client species?)

On the subject of the Tau, it seems unlikely FFG would produce rules for them as PCs, given the distance between Calixis and the Tau Empire - having said that 'Ravenor' featured a Kroot mercanary operating with some badass Rogue Trader types, and I might be right in saying that that was set in the nearby Scarus Sector.  

I would love the inclusion of xenos races as PCs - not in some cheap attempt to imitate WFRP in space, but with a chunky supplement to introduce them I think for an experienced RPer this could be an excellent chance to play an unusual character type - with goals and drives different to a human. 

RedMike said:

Has it been said where RT will be set in?  I mean it's likely they won't get much more then a footnote mention but I wouldn't rule out anything yet.

N0-1_H3r3 said:

Just like books :P

I'm sorry if I offended somebody giving links to wiki instead of writing long post myself...

Is there any problem with that?

Just to reply to your point...

It's just my assumption that RT will be in the same general location as DH, with the Halo Stars literally on the doorstep, and a ready made setting in the Calixis Sector.  It would seem a natural link with the previous game as well, without having to decamp halfway across the Imperium.

Obviously, that wouldn't stop anyone from doing that anyway if they wanted!

Based on how the book adventures have been going for Dark Heresy, I would say the Haarlock books lead straight into Rogue Trader, so probably 816M41 or so.

I recall Tau being mentioned in the Scourge the Heretic novel, while that may be author error, it gives a precendent for Tau in Calixis.

But mark my words, Rogue Trader will be set in the Calixis Sector/Halo Stars, and it will be set in the same time as the Dark Heresy setting. Most likely those two games are going to meta plot to Death Watch, with some sort of Tyrant Star Crusade.

I disagree.  They're all evil.  Even the Imperium is evil.  I didn't realize it until I completed the Dawn of War campaign, but even the Tau are evil (and racist).

Just cause you dig 'em doesn't mean they're not evil.  Just means you're biased   Nuthin' wrong with that.

As for playing Eldar pirates...

Why not?  Critter's Anathema has the basic stats.  Hopefully RT will give stats for their ships...  All you have to do is create some character progression charts.

If you wait until something "official" is printed before you include it in your game, you're missing out on 90% of the 40k Universe.

Well, actually, I believe the only reason the Imperium hates Xenos is because if one planet allies with Xenos, then another allies, then another, then another, then a sector, then A SEGMENTUM unrealistically. Then the Xenos have access to Imperial space, Weapons, Troops, Equipment, and they can Invade Imperial space easily.

Xenos takeover... Not good. That's why the Imperium fools it's citizens into thinking all Xenos are evil... Well... they all wan't to kill us anyway.

Maxim C. Gatling said:

LOL.  Nothing better than getting "in character" for the Imperium. 

Maxim C. Gatling said:

Amen to that.  It's amazing how reticent people are to express their creativity in the fear that they are at some point or other going to be contradicted.  Who cares about that?

Kage

I've had to put quite a bit of thought into "Piracy" in the 40k'verse for reasons of my own and I think the scope of it would be quite broader and different than what was adressed in this thread so far...

First, of course, there would be the Eldar Corsairs (yes, I'd rather use that word --but then I'm French ;) ), aka semi-exiled Craftworlders who prey upon non-eldar vessels (and/or vessels from other Craftworlds) for their own alien reasons... And there would be Eldar Pirates, aka Dark Eldar, the "evil" ones who simply attack vessels because it's "fun", and because they need souls/slaves of course.
And that's more or less what has been covered here...
There would of course also be other xenos types who would commit acts of piracy, some with "good" reasons, others just "for fun". The Ork Freebootaz of old are the first example that comes to my mind but would clearly not be the only ones...

But those would only be NPCs in any of my campaigns, simply because I'm not keen on letting my players' characters be of xenos origin, for a simple reason: because none of my players (currently) has what it takes to correctly play a xenos. Eldar, for example, don't think like humans and thus don't act like humans. But because of anthropomorphism issues, it would be hard for most players (and for most GMs too actually) to correctly incarnate such alien creatures.

However, human pirates are very interesting IMHO. If you leave aside all Chaos-affiliated raiders, they would be of 3 kinds:

1. First, those without Warp-capable vessels, which I nicknamed "Spacegulls", because like their avian counterparts you only encounter them when you're close enough to "land". Those would roam the neighborhood of Warp jump-points to attack vessels about to leave the system or just entering it... They at first seem to be likely to be the most frequent but actually it'd probably be the contrary. The existence of Spacegulls would require systems which would be "backwater" enough for the Navy to be quite absent (because the Spacegulls' small intrasystem vessels wouldn't be able to survive in a Navy-rich environment) but technologically advanced enough that "human-scum" can get their hands on any kind of space-worthy vessel to begin with. And such environments aren't really the norm in the 40k'verse.
   The most likely situation in which Spacegulls could exist would be in systems where the Imperial Governor (or anyone with high-enough authority) is corrupt and has become the patron of such lowly scavengers... After all, if the local Adeptus' records say a shipment never made it planetside because of pirates, there would be no tithe to pay, hence more money for the Guilds/Governor to make in the end.
2. Then, the "Opportunists", those would actually be merchantmen, Rogue Traders and lesser "sanctionned merchantmen", which would, once in while, get the opportunity to "salvage" goods from other merchantmen. That they had to kill the whole crew of the other merchantman's vessel first is just a "detail"... I'd say these would be the most current simply because getting a space-worthy vessel, and even more a Warp-able one, would require to be "sanctionned" in some way... These would also include Navy vessels, not unlike the [i]Relentless[/i] at a certain point in its history, who would use the Imperial authority they are supposed to represent for their own purpose. But the Opportunists would obviously put the blame on either "Spacegulls" or upon the last group of pirates...
3. The last group would be Renegades, not Chaos-affiliated but rather "separatists"... The Imperium doesn't have the ressources to crush all the separatists "in the egg" and, while it will sooner or later send a force to deal with any such "threat", there would still be a place for those separatists to use their temporary freedom to prey upon Imperial shipping lanes. There would also be forces of former Navy vessels, which once were in the Opportunist category but were "uncovered" and had to flee to a more remote place, further from Imperial-controlled space (some Renegade SM Chapters may even fall into this category). But this last type of pirates would probably be most quickly dealt with by the Imperial authorities because of the moral threat they represent... Can't let the separatists survive or the neighboring system/sub-sector might get bad ideas.

And of course there's also the question of "fake pirates" to keep in mind, even if it would be of less interest in the RPG (or would it?): Merchants clearly have to pay tithes upon what they transport, the Adeptus would perhaps (yes, that's not even sure) accept that they don't pay tithes upon stuff that was stolen by pirates and thus some merchantmen might be tempted to invent an attack of pirates to make a part of their cargo "dissapear from the records"... I don't think the Adeptus would like it very much (<--big euphemism) and such liars would probably find themselves in big trouble if the Adeptus got any clue that the so-called "pirates" never existed.
Some players could be tempted to try such a trick, even if on a lower scale, telling their "patron" RT that they have been attacked while they sold the goods on the black market, but, since the patron would then have to report the attack to the Adeptus to get his "tax-cut" and would thus take the risk of Imperial retribution in the case of a "fake report of piracy", he would probably not be kind upon his subordinates if he has the very-slightest doubt... 

Well, I've only brushed the surface but I think I've covered the basics.