Ever wanted to play a Warhammer 40,000 game that focuses slightly more on the bureaucratic organization of the Adeptus Administratum? It's finally your time to rejoice, as the focus of Lex Imperialis, the second DLC for Owlcat's Rogue Trader, is on the Imperium's wider administrative presence in the Koronus Expanse. Most of the additions introduced in the DLC run along the thematic axis of Imperial bureaucracy and its institutions, with a particular focus on the justice sector and the instruments called upon to enforce the Law on the God-Emperor's subjects.
Starting with character development, Lex Imperialis introduces a new Origin, that of the Arbitrator. Arbitrators, or Adeptus Arbites, are literally space cops, as they are the Imperium's police force. Three specializations are also introduced for them: Vigilant (emphasis on medium range weapons, with a specialty in Shotguns), Castigator (an officer who uses Fellowship and Willpower stats to apply debuffs to enemies) and Subductor (a frontline melee warrior, with a specialty in using the new item the DLC introduces, Shields). Making a new Arbitrator - Subductor character for the purposes of this review, and given that I've been playing ranged characters almost exclusively up until now, I have to say that I found the whole shield melee fighter style of play and the offensive and defensive bonuses offered by his skill tree to be highly entertaining and powerful, as he's essentially a mobile tank that can also do extremely high damage.
As was the case with the corresponding new class introduced in the Void Shadows DLC, Lex Imperialis also introduces a new companion NPC implementing the new Arbitrator Origin (with a Vigilant specialization), a space Judge-Dreddish character named Solomorne Anthar. He appears in the game on the planet Rykad Minoris in Chapter 1 and becomes recruitable shortly afterwards upon completion of a quest (which, among other things, serves a bit as an informal tutorial for the three Arbitrator subclasses' abilities). In a setting that seems almost straight out of 80s buddy cop action movies, Solomorne also features a robot dog as a companion, a Cyber-Mastiff named Glato (a name that, as Solomorne himself explains, is simply based on the dog's... factory designation. GL-8-0).
The cyberdog is one of the four new Familiars introduced in the DLC, which are selected once you've leveled up a character enough and choose to spec towards the new Advanced Archetype called Overseer. These work exactly as you'd imagine, following their masters around the map like a pet and participating in combat with special abilities. It's worth noting that Familiars can also equip special gear that further customizes their abilities by offering various bonuses.
As part of Solomorne's personal questline (which, inevitably, ends up involving our Rogue Trader character and his trading dynasty) we will be asked to visit 4 new star systems and 2 new planets, along with new locations on existing planets such as Dargonus. I have to mention the first of these new planets, which is classified as a “Feudal World” and is literally a medieval 40K world (castles, horses, kings, court jesters, etc.), almost seeming like a crossover with Owlcat's Pathfinder games. Either way, the design of the new worlds and the quests we'll be asked to complete in them are of the highest quality. In particular, the quest involving our visit to the Feudal World could easily rank among the best and most memorable that the entire game has to offer so far.
In general I would say that Lex Imperialis is a great DLC, but not as great as Void Shadows. This is probably due to Solomorne Anthar, who is clearly a more “one-dimensional” (even boring, one might say) character, both compared to the existing super-bros of the base game like the amazing Pasqal, and especially compared to Void Shadows' Kibellah, who struck me as an exceptionally deeper character with a more interesting personal questline (and who, of course, as a Bladedancer, is still fully OP in combat and mows down entire populations with her Death From Above ability). Even writing-wise, I could point out 1-2 things that felt like a step backwards - when, for example, we first meet Solomorne in a situation that involves dangerous combat long before he becomes a recruitable companion himself, and literally the #1 choices in dialogues with him involve hitting on him with comically written and almost Marvel-esque lines, well, I can't help but cringe a bit at the violent immersion-breaking.
But, as I wrote above, this in no way undermines the overall quality of Lex Imperialis. Like Void Shadows, the new DLC introduces a total of about 15 hours of new content, and the high-quality new quests and well-designed locations blend seamlessly with the base game's content. It's still a question whether a returning player will have the desire to do a whole new playthrough of the game just to see the new quests (which are spread over Chapters 1 to 4), especially considering the fact that Owlcat has recently announced a Season 2 of DLCs that will be released in 2026, so the game is still not “complete” in terms of content and will be enriched even more in the future. But that's another issue entirely that has nothing to do with a review that deals with the quality of these DLCs. Ultimately, the conclusion is that an excellent game like Rogue Trader is still being and will continue to be enriched with high quality extra content. And that's anything but a negative.
This review for Lex Imperialis was written using a season pass code provided by Owlcat Games, which we would like to thank.
RANKING - 85%
85%
I Am The Law
Lex Imperialis feels inferior to Void Shadows even by just a tiny bit, but that doesn't negate the fact that it still introduces high quality new content to a great base game.
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