TL;DR
Sixteen characters can join the von Valancius retinue: ten on the main path, three from the expansions, and three late joiners who arrive with almost no runway left to build them. You take five of them into a fight alongside your Rogue Trader, so eleven sit on the bench at any moment. Recruit everything you can, then run Cassia, Argenta, and Heinrix as the core and rotate the last two slots between Kibellah, Jae, and a late-game Idira.
Every companion arrives locked into an Archetype you cannot reclass. Talents, skills, and the specialization that follows are yours to spend, but the foundation never moves, so who you recruit decides as much about your party as how you build it.
The full roster
Thirteen companions are worth planning a party around. Three more arrive too late to matter mechanically and are covered separately below.
| Companion | Archetype | Role | Joins | Source |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Abelard Werserian | Warrior | Melee tank | Prologue, automatic (first) | Base game |
| Idira Tlass | Operative | Psyker damage, late-game control | Prologue, automatic (second) | Base game |
| Sister Argenta | Soldier | Ranged carry | Prologue, automatic (third) | Base game |
| Cassia Orsellio | Officer | Navigator AoE and party buffs | Chapter 1, "Secrets of the Navis Nobilite" | Base game |
| Pasqal Haneumann | Operative | Ranged utility, tech skills | Chapter 1, "Machine Spirit Keeper" | Base game |
| Heinrix van Calox | Warrior | Melee and psyker hybrid | Chapter 1, "Looking for Trouble" | Base game |
| Jae Heydari | Officer | Officer buffs or personal damage | Chapter 2, "Wanted on Footfall" | Base game |
| Yrliet Lanaevyss | Operative | Sniper | Chapter 2, "World Shapers" | Base game |
| Ulfar | Soldier | Heavy bruiser | Chapter 3, "Fury in Chains" | Base game |
| Marazhai Aezyrraesh | Warrior | Melee assassin | Chapter 3, "The Chasm" | Base game |
| Kibellah | Assassin | Mobile melee burst | Void Shadows quest "To Become the Flagship's Blood" | Void Shadows |
| Solomorne Anthar | Overseer | Support with a cyber-mastiff familiar | Chapter 2 at Footfall, base level 24 | Lex Imperialis |
| Eogunn Februs | Officer | Battlefield support, galvanic buffs | Quest "Broken Relic," Act 2 through Act 4 | The Infinite Museion |
The prologue three
Abelard, Idira, and Argenta join on rails. item:abelard is a item:navy-officer turned Seneschal and the first person to swear to the dynasty, a item:warrior built to stand in front of things. item:idira follows, an unsanctioned psyker whose warp powers carry Perils of the Warp risk every time she casts. item:argenta is rescued at Footfall after a Chaos ambush, a Sister of Battle whose item:heavy-bolter becomes the most reliable damage in the game for the next forty hours.
None of the three can be missed, which makes them the only companions you can build a plan around before you know how your campaign goes.
Chapter 1: the power spike
item:cassia is the recruitment that changes your difficulty setting. She joins during "Secrets of the Navis Nobilite," after a showdown separates her from her home aboard Eurac V and you broker the deal that makes her your item:navigator. Her warp-eye powers, the item:lidless-stare line in particular, clear random encounters in one or two casts. The talent order that gets her there fastest is in our Cassia build guide.
item:pasqal is a Tech-Priest of the Adeptus Mechanicus, met on Rykad Minoris while hunting for his missing mentor. Complete "Machine Spirit Keeper" and he signs on as prime enginseer. His personal damage stays modest for an item:operative; his tech and skill coverage is what earns the slot.
item:heinrix joins during "Looking for Trouble," a item:sanctioned-psyker serving the Inquisition as an Interrogator and the game's only real Warrior-plus-psyker hybrid. He walks out at the start of Chapter 2 and comes back at the end of "Tattered Spirit." Players panic about this every playthrough. He is not lost.
Chapters 2 and 3: the flexible ones and the stragglers
item:jae, a Cold Trader, first appears at Footfall arguing with the Liege of Footfall, who hands you "Persona Non Grata." Track her down in the Shadow Quarters bar to finish "Wanted on Footfall" and she joins. Her origin bonuses stack into something far above what a second item:officer should be worth.
item:yrliet is an Aeldari Ranger who covers you from a vantage point during "World Shapers" on Janus. After you speak with the governor, walk outside to the red gazebo and ask her to join. That last step is on you; nobody prompts it.
item:ulfar arrives in Chapter 3 through the Errand "Fury in Chains," jailed in the Anatomical Opera by Terventias until you talk the Haemonculus into releasing him. He is a Space Marine and he hits like one, but he lands with specific equipment needs at a point where you already have a frontline.
item:marazhai joins during "The Chasm," and his recruitment is dialogue, not combat. Propose an alliance to him alongside the Bloodstained Proselytes, then insist to him that the offer still stands during the arena fight against the Wych Cult. That second line is the one that matters. He turns on the Wych Cult mid-fight and joins after the battle at level 29.
The expansion companions
item:kibellah comes from Void Shadows, a Death Cult Assassin who pledges her life to the dynasty. Her arc opens on its own as you travel between systems with the DLC's first quest, "To Become the Flagship's Blood," followed by the errand "Ritual of Binding." She plays as a mobile melee killer who crosses the field and deletes a target, and she is the best melee companion in the game.
item:solomorne comes from Lex Imperialis, a Proctor-Exactant of the Adeptus Arbites who fights with the cyber-mastiff Glaito and the item:overseer Archetype the expansion introduced. You meet him earlier at Rykad Minoris, but recruitment lands in Chapter 2: clear Janus or another main world, take his message, then pick him up at Footfall at base level 24.
Eogunn Februs is the newest addition, from The Infinite Museion. He is a Tech-Priest Manipulus and Genetor Extremis of the secretive Xenarite sect, traveling with a servo-skull named Nuncius. The quest "Broken Relic" can fire as early as Act 2, and he joins no later than Act 4. Mechanically he is an Officer who bends the Motive Force through his galvani cell to buff allies and himself, running Galvanic Field, Echopulse, and an arc rifle. Patch 1.6.1 tuned him: his Charge Distribution explosion now scales from three times his Intelligence Bonus rather than raw Intelligence, and several friendly-fire interactions between his kit and Galvanic Field were removed.
Which expansion carries which recruit, and what else each one buys you, is laid out in our Rogue Trader DLC guide.
The three late-campaign joiners
item:uralon, item:incendia, and item:calligos-winterscale round out the roster late in the campaign. They exist for players who want the complete retinue. By the time they show up your party is geared and specced, and none of them has the runway to catch up, so treat them as story payoff rather than build material.
Five slots, sixteen names
Combat deploys six characters: your Rogue Trader plus five companions. That number does not grow. Everyone else waits on the ship, keeps gaining levels, and stays available for a swap between fights.
The practical effect is that recruitment and party building are separate problems. Recruit everyone, because companions off the bench still feed you quests, dialogue, and skill checks outside combat, and because a few of them carry story content you cannot get any other way. Then pick your five for what the encounter needs rather than out of loyalty. Two Officers is a real option on the hardest difficulty; two tanks will cost you the fight.
Who earns a slot
Cassia is the uncontested first pick. Two Lidless Stares clear most random encounters outright, and she scales into the hardest fights either as item:grand-strategist for party-wide buffs or item:master-tactician for personal damage. Argenta is the second lock, stacking heavy bolter rate of fire into Righteous Fury turns that end encounters, with Priest buffing layered on top. Heinrix takes the third seat on flexibility, though the Warrior and psyker split punishes an unfocused build.
The next tier is where your composition actually gets decided. Kibellah is elite melee burst and the answer whenever something needs to die on turn one. Jae is absurd once her Cold Trader bonuses are built around, and she is the ranged equal of what Kibellah does in melee. Idira starts weak and finishes as one of the best support casters in the game, largely on item:rewind-time undoing damage an ally has already taken.
Kibellah's turn-one burst rotation, down to which talents to take and when, is in our Kibellah build guide.
Below that, Yrliet is excellent in a dedicated sniper seat through Operative into item:bounty-hunter and replaceable outside it. Abelard never lets you down and never wins a fight by himself. Pasqal is utility. Marazhai and Ulfar both arrive late into roles the party has already solved, which is the same reason the tank slot quietly stops mattering by Chapter 3. Solomorne's story integration outclasses his combat kit; a straightforward item:soldier into item:arch-militant outperforms his Overseer package. Eogunn is competing for the same buff seat Cassia and Jae already own, and the 1.6.1 nerf to Charge Distribution took some of the edge off his blast damage.
Who you can romance
Cassia is available to a male Rogue Trader only and Heinrix to a female Rogue Trader only. Jae, Yrliet, Marazhai, Kibellah, and Solomorne are open regardless of gender. You can run several romances in parallel up to the quest "The Lord Inquisitor and The Lord Captain," at which point you commit to one. Yrliet is the route that punishes any early physical advance hard enough to close it permanently, and Cassia walks away if you push intimacy too early or joke twice about ending things.
Every route has its own flag checks and its own way to fail early. All seven are walked through in our romance options guide.