Review RPG Codex Review: WH40k - Dark Heresy, 2nd Edition

[Darth Roxor]

Yes, rerolls are the most common use for fate points. That does not mean that additional uses for fate points is in any way automatically half-assed.

No, additional use for fate points are not automatically half-assed. However, making fate points into auto-succeed AWESOME! buttons is the very definition of half-assed, and it's also stupid design all around. Even something like the talent letting you fate with a bonus would be less absurd.

In fact, they were in many ways pretty much the same shit as the career advancement tables from DH1 as you yourself admitted later on:

That would be true if you didn't have the alternate careers that allowed you to spend xp on different shit and avoid the necessity of getting advancements you didn't want.

The beta's wound tables were not particularly any more trouble to work with than the basic critical damage charts already present in every 40k RPG.

Wut, of course they are more trouble. The critical damage charts you use only, as the name implies, on critical damage, so every once in a while, not as a result of every damage roll inflicted. You can also just assume sudden death at -6 or something and ignore them completely if you so wish. The beta only skipped the wound tables for mooks, everyone else had to roll, sift through the book and compare results, I have no idea how you can say it's the exact same thing.

That, I think, would be far more worthy of mention than such a petty complaint.

I didn't remember the specifics and didn't feel like investigating in detail since the beta chapter was a 'side blurb' anyway. It's what I meant under the 'inherent problem with the wound system' that I mentioned at the end of action points.

Not most of them.

BC + OW + DH2 > RT + DW = most of them

Add in the usual bonuses you almost always get for ranged combat (+10 for short range) and even with an assumed base ballistic skill of 35 for Only War (which would be boosted to 40 thanks to comrade orders) and 40 for Black Crusade, you're still working with a coin toss and up to five total hits depending on how well you roll and the rate of fire on your gun. A waste of bullets it is not.

So you still end up with just +10 on a ~40 roll, in other words a 50% chance to miss outright, and it is still a waste of bullets for everything better than normal SP weapons where you have to count the ammo. I remember when we played OW and Deso had a HW dude starting with a heavy bolter. IF he lucked out and roll 10 on the roll, sure, it turned everything it encountered into minced meat. But more often than not he'd just miss or hit once, while still spewing out 6 bullets a burst - meanwhile, single shots would get both the aforementioned bonuses, and the inherent +10 of a normal attack to a total of +30 that would usually hit.

Accurate... a certain level of balance

Yes, yes, houserules will fix it. Just like mods will fix Skyrim. Oh wait.

I'm not advocating house rules as something good, which I think I've specified clearly in the review's ending - if you need house rules, odds are your system is flawed. What I meant in that line was that everything in stuff like Blood of Martyrs should be taken as it is and thrown out the window, preferably followed by some serious book burning.

Dat big juicy opinion.

FORSOOTH, NOT TEH OPINIONZ

Now this is just lies. Background gives you a package of gear, skills/talents, a special ability such as all cybernetics counting as being two degrees less rare, and sometimes even an aptitude (which is serious shit), very similar to the starter packages you hailed so warmly not so long ago.

FFS NIGGER

the game didn’t really recognise your background from now on mechanically.

Does it look like I'm talking about the goddamn starting shit?

Also funny that you are comparing these backgrounds to starting packages of DH1's supplements because this is not nearly the case. The backgrounds of DH2 give relatively the same amount of starting skills and talents as the ones you get at the start in DH1. But DH1 would ALSO give you the starting packages on top, with more stuff and some penalties.

You might have been an arbitrator once, but now you're an agent of the Throne

You never stop being an arbitrator on a daily basis, you only become the agent of the Throne when you are called upon.

Very sophisticated. This is truly the next level of review-writing.

Next time I'll make sure to include doritos.

I should point out that there was absolutely nothing wrong with Only War's version of the aptitude system

I don't think there was a single player in the group that I GM'd for that wouldn't whine constantly about the aptitudes in OW being terrible. Reject commented once that this IG character development scheme in this IG-themed game is so terrible, we'd be better off playing DH with all characters as guardsmen instead.

That was never the point of the aptitude system.

Thank you for this priceless insight, oh FFG lead designer.

Your starting aptitudes are pretty much a non-issue

ORLY

All I wanted to do was get an arbitrator with high Per and Fel so I could larp a private dick. Soon enough I found out that not only is it downright impossible for me to start with both Fel+Social (for all assorted charms) and Per+Fieldcraft (for all assorted awarenesses), but that both Per and Fel would end up with me gimping myself horribly (Per for Hive World that gimps your WP or Fel for Highborn that gimps T, which is better and why? Discuss!!!). But 'okay, whatever', I thought, surely having just one matching aptitude would make it manageable. And it was then that I noticed that getting a 2nd Per advancement with 1 aptitude would cost me 500 xp, Awareness+10 would be 400, and getting any non-shit talent would cost 450+. A whole session's worth of xp just to get a talent, WHY THIS SOUNDS LIKE AN EXCELLENT DEAL.

I also loved that while I initially considered either Hierophant or Seeker as the role, after Hive World start gimped my WP to a majestic 26 I was forced to take Hierophant just so I could have that WP aptitude and not start with sub 30 WP.

As mentioned above several times, there is a specialty swap system in the first supplement for Only War.

And yet it is not present in DH2. Are you saying perchance that house rules will fix it? Or do you mean players should wait for DLC with shit that has already been designed once?

Why would your character's style be so very different from the specialty or role he chose in the first place?

Let's follow the arbitrator again. The disarm talent - one would assume that disarming a perp would be the first thing a grimdark copper would be taught to do at grimdark copper academy. Surely enough, in DH1 that disarm costs 100 xp and is available at rank 1. Meanwhile DH2, it needs Defence + Weapon Skill, which is not exactly possible to get for a face-ish arbitrator in DH2 (you'll get Defence at best).

Delving even deeper into the Arbitrator advancement tables, you can find that they also remove most of my woes concerning chargen - sure, Per and Fel cost 250/500/750 to raise. But getting, charm, scrutiny, awareness, deceive, inquiry all cost 100, as well as their respective +10s and even +20s. Specialising in skills instead of attributes. Something which is IMPOSSIBLE in DH2 with the aptitudes.

What, did you fucking expect them to cram the piles of chaff content that took nine books to contain into a single goddamn core rulebook? Are you daft? Are you seriously comparing the amount of content produced over several years for one edition to the content available for a new edition of a game a few months after its release?

No, I didn't expect them to put all that shit in - I expected them to put at least 1 or 2 sidegrades of SOME KIND for every character, especially considering they had most of them already done before, conceptually and somewhat mechanically. All it would need would be some two tables with sidegrades per role, most of which could be transplanted from earlier supplements.

You would expect to see psykers, untouchables, and yes, Inquisitors in the Inquisition.

You sure would!

But would you expect to see a PSYKER TECHPRIEST INQUISITOR?

literally anyone can be a psyker, even a latent one

The chargen is abstracted that your dude is already a veteran of some sort of his starting career background. Do you really find it that likely that you could have a wyrd guardsman, techpriest or cleric with nobody ever stumbling upon it?

That's a fallacy. DH2 characters are broadly more capable than DH1 characters from the get-go.

They aren't. They start with the same stats and roughly the same amount of skills and talents. Some of them only have slightly better gear and 1 or 2 more fate points.

That's not true in the least. "Slightest knowledge" my ass. The quality of a PDF varies about as much as the quality of life itself does in the Imperium.

You are comparing ULTRAMAR dudes to the militia of a BACKWATER SECTOR that is GOING TO SHIT?

Complaining that a military force is actually competent and would, in fact, slaughter a ragtag bunch of investigators when you're low-level is nonsense.

"Ragtag bunch of investigators" thanks for proving my point and successfully assessing the power level of an Inquisitorial Warband (TM). Do you also find it completely reasonable that these PDF troopers are more powerful than PCs who start from the Imperial Guard background?

They're just chainaxes, dude.

"just" chainaxes

What? Daemons are deadly monsters that could slaughter common men like animals? Color me surprised, I thought they were all supposed to be cannon fodder, especially the small ones!

Daemons that are pint sized and which can be torn apart by a single bullet? Hello?

Oh, and again, acolytes are "common men that can be slaughtered like animals", THANKS BRUV.

Also,

When their host or master engages in battle, they swarm at the enemy, making up for their lack of strength and size with raw numbers and highly infectious claws and bites.

Though individually weak, in groups they can overwhelm and drag down foes many times their own size. (...) Being so small in stature and power (...) Tiny daemons

I advise you to check the profile of these 'tiny, individually weak, small in stature and power' daemons and compare them to the Desoleum PDF troopers. Or are the PDF troopers also common men that can be slaughtered like animals now?

The old divination tables had plenty of chances to hurt your character. Specifically all the results below 11 on the table

Yeah, but to get that you really had to have rotten luck - plus, all of them were just "gain corruption or insanity" points, barring 01. Otoh, many of the silver linings behind the new divinations are completely worthless - my poor arbitrator, for instance, got a -3 AG (which is very bad) penalty and a 10% save vs the first critical damage taken during a session. Is that a fair trade?

Everyone who didn't roll a noble just bought an Ironclaw or that excessively broken Arbites shotty before the first mission.

Ironclaw Basic 30m S/2/– 1d10+4 I 0 12 Full Reliable, Scatter

Is this supposed to be a very good gun?

Idk what 'broken Arbites shotty' you mean, I'll assume it was in Book of Judgement (which follows the same rules as I mentioned for Blood of Martyrs).

GMs had the power to increase or decrease the rarity of items based on circumstances as well as decide how many requisition attempts each party member could make at a time.

Those are house rules, my good man! How very Skyrim of you! In theory the players would be allowed to roll as many reqs as they wanted.

There was nothing clunky or vague about them

You mean except the fact that mechanics-wise, the only way they were described was "roll [x] to get item! Apply availability mod! HF!' ?

Who the fuck cares about managing your pocket cash? You work for the Inquisition, or you're a Rogue Trader, or you're the goddamn motherfucking Deathwatch.

Funny you should mention Deathwatch because IIRC it was literally the only offshoot where the requisitions made any sort of sense mechanically.

Nobody intelligent would spam requisition attempts in DH2, because that's one of the many things that reduces your subtlety. Someone running around willy-nilly trying to buy a hellgun would attract a lot of attention.

Hellgun - sure. Tools and gear, on the other hand?

And when WOULD you roll all them requisitions then?

As for chargen, you aren't supposed to be completely geared up from the start. That's silly. There's supposed to be progression character and equipment wise.

You shouldn't be completely geared-up, no, but you should at least have the bare necessities like commbeads, tools and basic protective gear. You can't get the bare necessities with 3 starting requisitions.

And you can't get the good guns with only Scarce rarity available.

Long las + sniper rifle

Why would you be able to raise it with xp? Did you expect that for some reason?

Learn to read, that was not my point at all.

you're supposed to earn Influence by being good at the game

Or by apprehending 6 minor hereteks each time you accidentally wipe out a planet with exterminatus!

You keep expecting a core rulebook to somehow contain the equivalent of an entire series of rulebooks

No, I keep expecting a Second Edition to take at least some elements from an entire series of supplements to a First Edition.

You complain about content being consolidated as if it's been removed, then you complain that content hasn't been consolidated?

I complain about everything being ass backwards and shit that shouldn't be consolidated being consolidated instead of stuff that should be. IF you keep pruning skills and talents like you do, what is the POINT of keeping all the SLores? Where's the logic? Where's the vision?

The reason why they abandoned pretty much all of the changes they made in the beta is because of grognards like you complaining that they made it too different from DH1 in the first place.

In which case they are fucking stupid and an insecure band of retards instead of designers. When "grognards like me" complained about the stupid implementation of systems in the Beta, I'm sure that what they meant was "this better be fixed into proper shape" and not "WHOA GET RID OF THIS ASAP". I literally can't think of a single development process like that - when whining about the beta I'd never, ever think that they'd just go ahead and scrap EVERYTHING COMPLETELY.

You're a goddamn SJW in everything but name.

stop triggering me

I think everyone can agree that the party medic botching a critical medicae test to save the life of a planetary governor would be pretty shitty, especially if they rerolled and failed again. It's literally their job to be good at it.

Accidents will happen. Accidents and randomness are a part of the PnP experience. If you don't agree with this, you might as well go play Bioware games. The party medic botching a critical medicae test to save the life of a governor could lead to some very interesting outcomes and later adventures if your GM is competent, it's anything but shitty.

Frankly, as someone who has actually played OW extensively rather than playing it once and declaring it to be shit

I see what you did there. Sorry to disappoint you, but we played a rather long OW campaign.

First of all, the penalty already represents recoil. It's an abstraction, it's not trying to be hyper-realistic. Get over it.

It's a terrible abstraction that could be abstracted better. Especially in a game like DH that actually has fairly complex and tactical combat systems, it is completely retarded that burst fire rules are still so stupidly basic, and because of which they do nothing but cause controversy all the fucking time.

lots of lies about autofire being better than accurate

For starters, you talk of 'lightly armoured' opponents, when these hardly even exist in DH2 barring shitty gangers. Most of the enemies have very conveniently high toughness going just above 40 to give them TB 4 + usually armour giving them 4 AP. Even nurglings have 8 daemonic TB.

Let us compare a long las (scarce) hitting a Hive Desoleum trooper, a nurgling and a theoretical TB3 AP2 ganger to an autogun (average) and a heavy stubber (rare, unavailable at start). Our shooter is a stereotypical dude with BS 40, assuming aim + short range.

Long las does 1d10+3 damage, has 1 armour pen, and felling 4. It can also be fired at maximal for 1d10+5, pen 3. It can (and usually will) also have a red-dot sight.
Autogun has 1d10+3, pen 0, 10 bullets per burst
Heavy stubber has 1d10+4, pen 3, 8 bullets.

With aim + short range, the long las will have an effective BS score of 80 (90 with red-dot sight). The shooter has a 40% chance to inflict 3d10+5 pen 3 with it, 50% with a red-dot sight. 50% is the average on a d100 roll. He can inflict 2d10+5 pen 3 even on a 60 (70) roll.

Both the heavy stubber and the autogun will have an effective BS of 50. The shooter has a 50% chance to hit only once, 40% to hit twice, etc. 50% is the average on a d100 roll.

Lets assume the shooter hits three times with the autogun and heavy stubber because I'm feeling generous. If that happens, however, the long las shoots at max DoS.

a) vs a Desoleum trooper (DR 8, ap4/tb4)

- To even do damage at all, the autogun will have to roll 6+ on every hit, which is a 50% chance, and even then, the maximum damage it can do is 15, assuming all 3 hits come out as 10 (unlikely).
- To do damage, the heavy stubber needs to roll above 1. Certainly, this is likely. Maximal damage is 27. "Average" damage (5 on all d10) would be 12.
- The long las always does damage. Minimal damage done is 3, maximal is 30. "Average" would be 15. Even with just 2d10+5 the average would be 10.

b) vs a nurgling (TB 4 + unnatural TB 4)

- The autogun doesn't change. The only difference is the nurgling is at -3 assuming maximum damage.
- The heavy stubber, on the other hand, changes significantly. Pen doesn't matter now, so to do damage at all, it needs to roll 5+. Maximum damage on 3 hits would be 18, average would be 3. Not very good odds against a fucking nurgling.
- The Long Las, however, is even more effective because of Felling. It always strikes true, does a minimum damage of 4, maximum of 31 and an average of 16.

c) vs a random ganger (ap 2/tb3)

- Autogun is at least a bit better now - to do damage it needs to roll 3. Average damage is 12, maximum is 27.
- Heavy stubber always does damage. Minimal is 6, average is 18, maximum is 33.
- Long las always does damage. Minimal is 5, average is 17, maximum is 32.

Weren't you saying autofire is significantly better against lightly armoured dudes? And this is a Rare heavy stubber vs a Scarce long las.

And mind you, these calculations are true for the autofire shooter if he rolls sub 20 on his roll. For the long-las dude it's sub 40 (or sub 50 if he has red-dot sight).

As for allocating hits to different dudes - this is usually worth it only if you have a killing machine like a heavy bolter.
Overwatch? Only useful vs melee, and is even less likely to succeed cuz of the lack of aiming.
I'll give you suppressing fire, though, but only because the pinning mechanics have always been ridiculously broken.
Highly agile targets often don't care about autofire just the same as they don't care about accurate because they can just about dodge everything.

As you can see, autofire remains fucking baller, while accurate is still extremely one-note.

All you need in your entire posse of acolytes is one (1) dude with an autogun to keep everything suppressed while everyone else pops moles with accurate guns. And the autogun shooter doesn't even need to shoot it well because pinning happens no matter if there's a hit or not.

Psykers getting their psy rating times five as a bonus to all of their focus power tests made their test values ridiculous and virtually impossible to resist for opposed contests unless you were also a psyker and had Bastion of Iron Will.

It's like the change of power focusing from DH1's PRxd10 to WP + PRx5 was a bad idea!

And thank fucking God for that, the minor powers were the worst part about DH1's psykers. Enjoy having DnD 3.5e Wizards doing everything better than everyone else!

They hardly did everything better than everyone else.

And yes, I'd prefer them to be more like DnD 3.5 wizards with more flexibility than what their current state is.

the risks for using minor powers were, well, minor at worst.

They were the same as for every other power, wtf are you talking about. Rolled a 9 on the focus roll? PERILS! Minor and major had no difference in this regard.

You know, I didn't think you could sink to new levels of retardation, but I have been proven wrong. Clearly, abandoning any semblances of balance in favor of psykers ruling everything forever is the wise move to make here. "Probably the worst thing about guns that actually do damage is that all of them can be dodged. That's right, you can dodge bullets. Do I even have to comment on this?"

Are you fucking stupid? Do you really see nothing wrong in being able to DODGE spontaneous combustion? Or a fire shield engulfing the psyker? There are a multitude of other ways that could be implemented to protect yourself from these, but of course FFG being FFG, they had to go for the easiest and least sensible way out, aka 'just dodge!'

You say that, but we both know that you barely touched Only War to begin with.

Then 'we both' know wrong. Or do you want me to upload my scenario.txts, all combat maps and player character sheets? IIRC we played it for like half a year.

Sure, let's just ignore all the horrible problems with the original DH.

Right. Because I completely ignore all of them! ALL OF THEM!


Your counterreview is shit, your opinions are shit and you are shit. Kill yourself. Dickhead.

Jesus Christ, I spent way too much time on this crap.

 

[Grunker]

this discussion feels strangely codexian

 

[Jaedar]

I wish to applaud roxor for using math to make his point! But next time include some graphs

I should also like to note that the reason requisition made sense and was nice mechanically in DW is that iirc it wasn't a roll, you had a set amount of points that got deducted/reducted as you cashed out/in gear, and high tier gear had "fame" requirements before you could check them out.

This is in stark contrast to a fresh off the boat acolyte requesting power armor and succeeding cause he got a lucky roll. Or said acolyte failing to requisition a commbead due to a bad roll. If dh2 actaully used a system like I described above, I would not mind it was throneless.

 

[Random]

I don't have the strength left to do a review of a review of a review. However there's one issue in particular that I can't let go, so I'll address the argument about autofire guns:

For starters, you talk of 'lightly armoured' opponents, when these hardly even exist in DH2 barring shitty gangers. Most of the enemies have very conveniently high toughness going just above 40 to give them TB 4 + usually armour giving them 4 AP. Even nurglings have 8 daemonic TB.

The vast majority of enemies seen by players are not going to be from the book, they'll be created by the GM, but let's just ignore that to make your argument look better.

Let us compare a long las (scarce) hitting a Hive Desoleum trooper, a nurgling and a theoretical TB3 AP2 ganger to an autogun (average) and a heavy stubber (rare, unavailable at start). Our shooter is a stereotypical dude with BS 40, assuming aim + short range.

Long las does 1d10+3 damage, has 1 armour pen, and felling 4. It can also be fired at maximal for 1d10+5, pen 3. It can (and usually will) also have a red-dot sight.
Autogun has 1d10+3, pen 0, 10 bullets per burst
Heavy stubber has 1d10+4, pen 3, 8 bullets.

So a long las can have a red dot sight and you're going to use it on overload, but you're just going to ignore that it is just as trivially easy to apply special ammo to an autogun? Not stacking your argument at all, no sirree.

With aim + short range, the long las will have an effective BS score of 80 (90 with red-dot sight). The shooter has a 40% chance to inflict 3d10+5 pen 3 with it, 50% with a red-dot sight. 50% is the average on a d100 roll. He can inflict 2d10+5 pen 3 even on a 60 (70) roll.

Both the heavy stubber and the autogun will have an effective BS of 50. The shooter has a 50% chance to hit only once, 40% to hit twice, etc. 50% is the average on a d100 roll.

Yes.

Lets assume the shooter hits three times with the autogun and heavy stubber because I'm feeling generous. If that happens, however, the long las shoots at max DoS.

Okay.

a) vs a Desoleum trooper (DR 8, ap4/tb4)

- To even do damage at all, the autogun will have to roll 6+ on every hit, which is a 50% chance, and even then, the maximum damage it can do is 15, assuming all 3 hits come out as 10 (unlikely).
- To do damage, the heavy stubber needs to roll above 1. Certainly, this is likely. Maximal damage is 27. "Average" damage (5 on all d10) would be 12.
- The long las always does damage. Minimal damage done is 3, maximal is 30. "Average" would be 15. Even with just 2d10+5 the average would be 10.

Assuming manstopper rounds, the autogun's maximum damage would be 21. The minimum roll required to deal damage is instead 3+, which greatly increases the reliability of the damage overall, and the average damage would be 9 instead.

Using the longlas on overload is by no means something you'll always be doing, either. Unreliable is a bitch and the 4x ammo consumption could screw you over in the long term. Your minimal damage in normal circumstances is actually zero, though you only have to roll over two 1s and a 2 to deal damage. However, this means that the maximum damage is 28, and the average is 13, only one point higher than a heavy stubber in both categories.

As for the heavy stubber, since it has decent penetration without having to apply manstoppers, there is another option. Tox rounds are scarce, and reduce the damage per hit by 2 in exchange for granting the gun Toxic (1). Every hit that causes damage forces the enemy to test toughness at a -10 penalty or suffer 1d10 additional damage that ignores toughness and armor. Even with base toughness around 40, there's about a 70% chance that additional damage will be caused. With this, the maximum damage is actually 51, and the average damage (assuming all the toughness tests are failed) is 21. If one or two or all three of the toughness tests are passed, then the average damage drops to 16 and 11 and 6 respectively. I should reiterate that the odds of a Desoleum trooper passing any of the tests are slim, though. The downside is that you have to roll above a 3 for a hit to deal damage and force the toughness tests, and the toughness tests can be passed. That being said, I'd take this over a longlas any day.

b) vs a nurgling (TB 4 + unnatural TB 4)

- The autogun doesn't change. The only difference is the nurgling is at -3 assuming maximum damage.
- The heavy stubber, on the other hand, changes significantly. Pen doesn't matter now, so to do damage at all, it needs to roll 5+. Maximum damage on 3 hits would be 18, average would be 3. Not very good odds against a fucking nurgling.
- The Long Las, however, is even more effective because of Felling. It always strikes true, does a minimum damage of 4, maximum of 31 and an average of 16.

Here, manstoppers won't improve the autogun, no. Instead, they can use dumdum bullets, which are also scarce. That's +2 damage, which does change their statistics. The minimum roll to deal damage is a 4+, and their overall maximum damage in a burst is 18. Their average damage is 6. But Nurglings aren't what anyone would call squishy, now are they? I never claimed autofire weapons would do better against these sorts in the first place. That is, of course, unless you're using an actually good autofire gun, unlike the autogun and the heavy stubber.

Your math on the longlas is faulty. Nurglings have Unnatural Toughness (2), and Daemonic (2), but Felling only applies to the Unnatural Toughness trait. The basic soak on a longlas hit would be 6, which means that the minimum damage is two, the maximum is 29, and the average is 14. I will go ahead and assume that no player would be dumb enough to shoot at a Nurgling on any fire setting lower than overload.

Tox rounds have no effect against creatures with Daemonic, so we'll ignore them. The heavy stubber, ironically, is worse than an autogun with the appropriate special ammo against nurglings.

c) vs a random ganger (ap 2/tb3)

- Autogun is at least a bit better now - to do damage it needs to roll 3. Average damage is 12, maximum is 27.
- Heavy stubber always does damage. Minimal is 6, average is 18, maximum is 33.
- Long las always does damage. Minimal is 5, average is 17, maximum is 32.

Weren't you saying autofire is significantly better against lightly armoured dudes? And this is a Rare heavy stubber vs a Scarce long las.

With manstoppers applied, the autogun always damages, and the average damage would be 15, with the maximum being 30. Autoguns are average and manstoppers are scarce.

And you're probably not going to be using overload mode against gangers, so the maximum damage of the longlas is actually 29, with the average at 15, and a minimum of 2. Same as using overload against a Nurgling.

Tox rounds are even more effective here, actually. Not only does the ganger have a much lower toughness characteristic which increases the odds of him failing Toxic tests, but his TB is smaller and his armor doesn't get in the way unlike with the trooper above. So a heavy stubber with tox rounds only needs to roll above a 1 to deal damage and force the toughness test each time. Here the maximum damage is 57, with an average of 27, which drops by five for each toxic test that the ganger actually passes, which won't be many.

And mind you, these calculations are true for the autofire shooter if he rolls sub 20 on his roll. For the long-las dude it's sub 40 (or sub 50 if he has red-dot sight).

Yes, yes, accurate weapons are more reliable in terms of hit accuracy and damage potential.

But what happens if we take the same scenarios and apply a roll of natural 1 to them? The accurate gun does the same damage as before (it peaked ages ago), but autofire guns suddenly hit two more times.

d) vs a Desoleum trooper (DR 8, ap4/tb4)

- To do damage, the autogun with manstoppers will have to roll above 2 on each hit. The maximum damage it can do is 35. The average damage is 15.
- To do damage, the heavy stubber needs to roll above 1. Maximum damage is 45. The average damage is 20.
- The long las always does damage. Minimal damage done is 3, maximal is 30. "Average" would be 15. Even with just 2d10+5 the average would be 10.
- Tox bullets in a heavy stubber are now absurd. Maximum damage is now 85, and the average damage even assuming only three tox tests are failed is 25.

e) vs a nurgling (TB 4 + unnatural TB 4)

- The autogun with dum-dums is dealing a maximum of 30 damage with an average of 10.
- The heavy stubber needs to roll 5+ to deal damage. Maximum damage on 5 hits is 25, average would be 5.
- The Long Las performs well. It always does a minimum damage of 2, maximum of 29 and an average of 14.

f) vs a random ganger (ap 2/tb3)

- The autogun with manstoppers is murder. Average damage of 25, maximum damage of 50, and minimum damage of 5.
- Heavy stubber is even more impressive. Average damage of 30, maximum damage of 60, and a minimum of 10.
- Longlas always does damage. Average is 14, maximum is 29, and a minimum of 2.
- Tox round loaded heavy stubber blows everything else away. Maximum damage of 95, with an average of 35 (assuming three failed tox tests) and a minimum of zero if all five shots roll a one.


It's foolish to attempt to compare these weapons with a roll of 100, since they would all jam. Any rolls above 50 would, of course, result in a miss for the autogun and heavy stubber, but any rolls above 50 would not give you full damage for a longlas (2d10+3 at 69 and below, 3d10+3 at 49 and below). A single hit (roll of 40-50) with an autogun or heavy stubber would give the longlas maximum damage. But that's it for the longlas, and every additional hit the autofire scores allows it to close the gap and eventually surpass the longlas, depending on how tough and armored the enemy is.

Yes, at a standard starting score of BS 40, autofire is far from the optimal option unless you're hoping to roll big. Even at this point, though, you can see that it has some pretty hefty advantages. As you increase your ballistic skill and acquire better guns and gear, autofire gets better and better while accurate stagnates at the same level of usefulness as before. Adding ten or twenty points to your target number for firing your longlas won't make a very large difference at all, and once you hit TN 95, any further growth is pretty pointless. That's at Ballistic Skill 45 with a red dot sight on your longlas. 96-100 is always a failure, and all you'll be able to improve is the number that you have to roll to score extra damage. But it's already absurdly high and probable even at the start.

On the other hand, you significantly improve A) your chance of hitting, B) the number of hits you score on average, and C) the amount of damage you're dealing with those hits with character progression. BS 50 is about where a veteran would be, and a marksman type would probably end up with BS 60. You'll acquire a motion predictor, which is the same thing as a red dot sight except for autofire, which is a free +10 to your to-hit roll. You'll get a heavy bolter, which is 1d10+8 pen 5 Tearing. You will outgun the scrubs still clinging to their precious cuddly longlases handily. You'll have a TN to hit for the heavy bolter of about 70 with BS 50 and 80 with BS 60 in most circumstances.

There are some other things that autofire can do that accurate cannot. First of all, accurate bonus damage dice cannot invoke Righteous Fury even on a 10. Every 10 scored with autofire does. As mentioned before, Righteous Fury is not as powerful as in older editions, but perhaps that is a good thing, considering you have up to twelve chances to score it depending on rolls and thanks to Tearing when you full auto burst with a heavy bolter.

Secondly, you have to use the aim action for accurate's bonus damage and to-hit bonus to kick in. If you half move to get a better vantage point, you cannot benefit from accurate that turn. If you do any half action that turn other than aim + shoot, you cannot benefit from accurate. Then all you've got is a piece of junk in your hands. On the other hand, you can half move or ready your weapon or do any half action and still full auto burst that turn, though your TN will be 10 lower than it would otherwise be. But which weapon loses more from not aiming? The accurate gun will lose 20 points of bonus to hit and will have zero chance of scoring more damage. You will still be more likely to hit the target with the accurate gun thanks to using a standard attack and not a full auto burst, but you could just standard attack with an autogun, too.

As for allocating hits to different dudes - this is usually worth it only if you have a killing machine like a heavy bolter.

But it is still something that accurate guns cannot do, and it is pretty nifty from time to time.

Overwatch? Only useful vs melee, and is even less likely to succeed cuz of the lack of aiming.

Yes, because having a killzone where you shoot everything in it and nothing can dodge you is so very useless. In exchange for not getting to aim, you instead get to make as many bursts as enemies enter or act inside your killzone until you run out of ammo. That's serious crowd control, ideal for point defense.

Highly agile targets often don't care about autofire just the same as they don't care about accurate because they can just about dodge everything.

No, dude, just no. Please stop. You can roll as well as you want with an accurate weapon and be dodged if the enemy just barely passes. Get a good roll with an autofire gun, though, and even if the enemy barely passes they're still gonna suck the majority of the hits. It changes the effect of evasion reactions from binary (hit or miss) to linear (miss miss hit hit hit).


You can stack the math all you want, you can dismiss and misrepresent the myriad advantages an autofire weapon has over an accurate weapon, but you cannot pull the wool over my eyes. You don't know shit about the shit you think you know.

 

[Jaedar]

TLDR:

Yes, yes, accurate weapons are more reliable in terms of hit accuracy and damage potential.

I don't even know why you bothered to write the rest of the post, since you admit you agree with roxor in that accurate is better than full auto

 

[Darth Roxor]

I really don't feel like replying to you again concerning something we've already discuss!!!ed to death in the dh2 thread back in the day.

How about we both agree that we are cumslurping dickbags who don't know what they don't know and perform reconciliatory telakoituminen?

 

[Brotherman Bill]

But what happens if we take the same scenarios and apply a roll of natural 1 to them? The accurate gun does the same damage as before (it peaked ages ago), but autofire guns suddenly hit two more times.

So, given that this will happen, well, one out of hundred times, that's a rather... Specific situation now isn't it? Then you spend half your post on it....

And you ignore the fact that as you face tougher enemies, the score is gonna get more and more lopsided in favour of accurate as the enemy DR increases. Just do your numbers if the enemy DR increases by just two, certainly something that happens by the time you've increased your accuracy to around 50 and aquired all that sweet gear.

Using the longlas on overload is by no means something you'll always be doing, either. Unreliable is a bitch and the 4x ammo consumption could screw you over in the long term.

If using 4 long las charges (out of a 40 magazine) is gonna screw you up, what the hell are we gonna say about using manstoppers and toxic bullets on full auto (10 shots) out of a 30 magazine, like an autogun? I'd say it's like pouring thrones into your magazine, but they removed that. With the new req mechanics it's dubious whether you'll even get them.

You aren't for real dude.

 

[desocupado]

Trivially easy to apply special ammo to a gun?

Dude, OW made me rely only on the starting equipment and whatever I found as loot. Tools? Special ammo?

Good luck with the requisition roll.

Also, good comparison, a heavy bolter against a longlas. Pretty much the same level of weapon here, yep.

 

[Random]

I really don't feel like replying to you again concerning something we've already discuss!!!ed to death in the dh2 thread back in the day.

How about we both agree that we are cumslurping dickbags who don't know what they don't know and perform reconciliatory telakoituminen?

Fair enough. Now drop your trousers.

I don't even know why you bothered to write the rest of the post, since you admit you agree with roxor in that accurate is better than full auto

Nice job taking that one line out of context.

So, given that this will happen, well, one out of hundred times, that's a rather... Specific situation now isn't it? Then you spend half your post on it....

Don't play stupid, you know full well that a 1 and a 10 and everything in between would give you the same result as a natural one. I only chose that as the ultimate extreme.

And you ignore the fact that as you face tougher enemies, the score is gonna get more and more lopsided in favour of accurate as the enemy DR increases. Just do your numbers if the enemy DR increases by just two, certainly something that happens by the time you've increased your accuracy to around 50 and aquired all that sweet gear.

I did point out that accurate guns will have better damage against tougher enemies, but that is only true for the bad autofire weapons like the autogun and heavy stubber. The autocannon in particular will easily outdamage any longlas even against heavily armored enemies.

If using 4 long las charges (out of a 40 magazine) is gonna screw you up, what the hell are we gonna say about using manstoppers and toxic bullets on full auto (10 shots) out of a 30 magazine, like an autogun? I'd say it's like pouring thrones into your magazine, but they removed that. With the new req mechanics it's dubious whether you'll even get them.

You aren't for real dude.

It's not hard by any metric to get your hands on a scarce item. Again, I question if you people have ever actually played any 40k RPGs outside of the original DH. You like to boast like you have, but I don't believe it.

Trivially easy to apply special ammo to a gun?

Dude, OW made me rely only on the starting equipment and whatever I found as loot. Tools? Special ammo?

Good luck with the requisition roll.

Yes, you can requisition both of those things, and quite easily.

Also, good comparison, a heavy bolter against a longlas. Pretty much the same level of weapon here, yep.

There is no better accurate gun in DH2 than the longlas. On the flip side, there are plenty of better guns that have semi-auto and full-auto capability. I would hardly think that a weapon quality is overpowered and unbalanced if the only guns it can outdo are the lowest of the low.

 

[GarfunkeL]

Great rewview. Great counter-review. Great anti-counter-review. Great thread, very Codexian, bravo to all participants!

 

[Brotherman Bill]

Garfunkel do you measure "great" by the word count or something? That dude spends five or six times as many words as he has to and splits each post into a hundred quotes, I have no idea how it can be described as anything but harrowing, like a mix between VD and Raghar.

It's not hard by any metric to get your hands on a scarce item.

Then certainly shooting long las on overload is even less of a problem!

Don't play stupid, you know full well that a 1 and a 10 and everything in between would give you the same result as a natural one. I only chose that as the ultimate extreme.

Right, an ultimate extreme situation vs JUST THE RIGHT ENEMIES and tons of gear, full auto is competitive with long las. That doesn't support your argument much however.

 

[tuluse]

The vast majority of enemies seen by players are not going to be from the book, they'll be created by the GM, but let's just ignore that to make your argument look better.

Wait what.

Most of pnp experience is D&D and derivatives, but the whole point of buying a game is that is has stuff ready to go. Oh, I need a dude with a gun here let me find one in the bestiary who approximately matches what I what.

 

[Grunker]

Great rewview. Great counter-review. Great anti-counter-review. Great thread, very Codexian, bravo to all participants!

I agree. Equal measures of actual arguments and senseless 'sperging. What is the nature of the Codex? This thread.

 

[GarfunkeL]

Garfunkel do you measure "great" by the word count or something? That dude spends five or six times as many words as he has to and splits each post into a hundred quotes, I have no idea how it can be described as anything but harrowing, like a mix between VD and Raghar.

Exactly, it reminded me of some of the best works by VD. Made me all nostalgic and shit.

 

[Random]

Wait what.

Most of pnp experience is D&D and derivatives, but the whole point of buying a game is that is has stuff ready to go. Oh, I need a dude with a gun here let me find one in the bestiary who approximately matches what I what.

The 40k RPGs don't work like that. The core rulebooks contain all the rules you need to create NPCs and enemies, and a small selection of premade characters and adversaries to look at and use if you want. There's always a generic gunman type enemy you can throw at the players if you want, but a lot of learning how to GM these games lies in learning how to create enemies balanced against your players that aren't a complete pushover and aren't totally impossible to defeat. More profiles are included in pretty much every supplement, slowly building a sort of comprehensive selection of enemies and NPCs, with one of the supplements (usually the third or fourth one they put out) being outright dedicated to housing a huge selection of enemies.

This isn't like D&D, where you have to buy three books just to be able to play the fucking game.

Garfunkel do you measure "great" by the word count or something? That dude spends five or six times as many words as he has to and splits each post into a hundred quotes, I have no idea how it can be described as anything but harrowing, like a mix between VD and Raghar.

I'm sure a plebeian like you would think that I used too many words because all those words make your head hurt.

I had no intention of giving a half-assed breakdown of Roxor's review and my problems with it. Complaining that it was too comprehensive is retarded.

Then certainly shooting long las on overload is even less of a problem!

There's a difference between the ease of acquiring equipment and running out of said equipment in the field. That being said, yes, charge packs are common as fuck and it is not hard to find or acquire them in the least. Consider this point yours.

Right, an ultimate extreme situation vs JUST THE RIGHT ENEMIES and tons of gear, full auto is competitive with long las. That doesn't support your argument much however.

Longlases are pretty shitty versus Eldar, Dark Eldar, assassins, and Kroot, too, since they're so easy to dodge. Those happen to be exactly the enemy types that auto fire is best at dispatching. If you want to talk about elites with tons of armor and toughness, no, autofire won't be very effective against them, as I have said repeatedly.

But let's be honest here, the core of this argument lies in the fact that both accurate and autofire as weapon traits are only as good as the base weapons themselves. Accurate turns a 1d10+3 Pen 1 rifle into a 3d10+3 Pen 1 murdertool. Autofire turns a 3d10+8 Pen 6 autocannon that is already better than a longlas in the best of situations into a 3d10+8x3 Pen 6 ultimate death machine that has been the bane of countless GMs.

Longlases (and sniper rifles, actually) are no doubt ridiculously good for their rarity and the level at which you'd get them, but nobody would be dumb enough to call them better than a lascannon, autocannon, heavy bolter, or storm bolter, for example. Autoguns are pretty crappy in general and only become useful with special ammo, heavy stubbers are way better than autoguns and in many cases, longlases since you can load them with tox rounds and rape face. Would I take a longlas as a starting character over an autogun? Yes.

But you know, I just now realized what bothered me so much about the review. It wasn't the things I disagree with, though those certainly didn't help. It's because Roxor never tried to talk about the good things about DH2. You don't talk about the new weapon qualities, the majorly overhauled grappling rules, or really anything to suggest that it is a step up from DH1 in even the slightest of ways. You mention some things you liked about the beta, only to use them as further evidence against the quality of DH2. It's infuriating.

 

[desocupado]

There were new weapon qualities? I remember looking at the weapons table and finding it very, very limited, and with nothing new over the previous ffg games. Compared to dh1, yes, there were some changes in stuff, but from OW it was pretty much the same, but cut down in size.

Also, dude, put some breaks on the sperg. Nobody is saying accurate is the best option EVER. But consider a starting character, with 35 BS. You wanna try a shot at -10 or at +10, or whatever the mods are in this version, to do worse damage with the autogun than the longlas?

Of course a heavy bolter will outdamage a longlas after a few upgrades in BS, and you acquire some tools. Derp.

Also, I don't know how the requisition system in dh2 works, but in OW which is quite similar, I spent like three sessions to request one fucking tripod. Which is scarce. I don't even remember if I got it or gave up. In fact, gimme a second and I'll look it up how acquiring shit works in dh2.

I'm not sure it was mentioned on the review, but with geld, you could load up on tools and shit. Like auspexes and red dots and scopes and whatever to tilt the d100 in your favour. In dh2, the fact you can't reliably acquire your shit makes the failcolyte aspect much worse.

EDIT: I checked out the influence test. It seems you roll the d100 and compare it to the influence stat (in OW it was the same, but you used FEL). And scarce is a -10 modifier.

So yeah, I dunno where you got the idea that rolling d100, and getting less than 20 on the roll (assuming 30 influence) is "quite easy".

 

[Ackermanus]

Great rewview. Great counter-review. Great anti-counter-review. Great thread, very Codexian, bravo to all participants!

Seconded.

Since we're on the topic of autofire and accurate, how do talents affect each of them? For example, inescapable attack is fairly easy to get even for a starting character (provided you are a dedicated gunman) and goes a long way towards countering the usual weakness of accurate (enemies with good dodge). On the other hand, things like mighty shot could become deadly real quick with dual wielding pistols (autopistols or others in higher tiers) when coupled with special ammo.

As for the review itself, can't comment much more before my group finally gets around to playing the game, but one thing that stuck me as extremely odd is that some role/background aptitudes seem nonsentical. For example, warriors lack finess, which is required for quite a lot of talents and for ranged combat, as well as for dodging (so you're stuck with building a high toughness melee guy and hoping you don't encounter enemies dealing massive damage).

Likewise, desperados seem extremely deadly at combat, and I would argue are better than assassins unless you plan on going melee (and even then...), because the latter can't have both the offense and defense apittudes, while desperados can with the right background. The only edge assassins always have is their ability to spend fate points for more damage.

 

[Xathrodox86]

Oh, fuck right off. DH1 fanboys are the absolute worst. That system was full of so much shit it's not even funny. If you can't accept that DH2 resolves the vast majority of the problems that persisted even in OW, you have a problem.

At least you fucking realized that the beta for DH2 was potentially better than what we got. Potentially.

Both systems are shit but DH 1 with its Crimson Guards and Mettalican Buttfuckers really takes the cake. I loved how a single dood could easily suppress 12+ guys without breaking a sweat, or how Psykers were able to instagib anyone they faced.

Darth Roxxor: the review is awesome, however I have to call you out on the subject of Calixis being a "big and influental sector". It's located on Imperium's borders where nothing ever happens. Yet somehow we have an army of Inquisitors and their butt-buddies stationed there, where most imperial sectors are "lucky" to recive a visit from a single =I= member.

As a long term GM I've felt that you captured the spirit of this turd magnificently.

 

[Darth Roxor]

Darth Roxxor: the review is awesome, however I have to call you out on the subject of Calixis being a "big and influental sector".

Yeah, brainfart. I meant to say that it's relatively prosperous, stable and civilised, not important and influential.

where nothing ever happens. Yet somehow we have an army of Inquisitors and their butt-buddies stationed there, where most imperial sectors are "lucky" to recive a visit from a single =I= member.

Tyrant Star

 

[Xathrodox86]

Darth Roxxor: the review is awesome, however I have to call you out on the subject of Calixis being a "big and influental sector".

Yeah, brainfart. I meant to say that it's relatively prosperous, stable and civilised, not important and influential.

where nothing ever happens. Yet somehow we have an army of Inquisitors and their butt-buddies stationed there, where most imperial sectors are "lucky" to recive a visit from a single =I= member.

Tyrant Star

Fair point, but Calixis is being portrayed on a level with fucking Cadia, which IMO is a stretch. Tyrant Star or not, I'm pretty sure that all those Inquisitors could find more viable assignments near Maelstrom, the Eye or even Tau space, which is expanding quite fast. I wouldn't have problem with Komus, if the sector it was spotted in, was less backwater.

 

[Azael]

Brofisting this entire thread. Playing DH with Codexers is my favorite PnP memory. Despite all the flaws of the system.

 

[Random]

Since we're on the topic of autofire and accurate, how do talents affect each of them? For example, inescapable attack is fairly easy to get even for a starting character (provided you are a dedicated gunman) and goes a long way towards countering the usual weakness of accurate (enemies with good dodge). On the other hand, things like mighty shot could become deadly real quick with dual wielding pistols (autopistols or others in higher tiers) when coupled with special ammo.

Inescapable attack is a grievously balanced talent that tries to do too much at one time. It does make All Out Attacks worth using and it makes charges quite good, but standard attacks and called shots really did not need a buff, especially not one this good. Moreover, the penalty per DoS should be reduced to 5 points per DoS rather than 10, with an upper cap of something like -20 to the evade roll, and maybe even a bump up to Tier 3. I wouldn't remove standard attacks and called shots from the talent entirely, but there must be a better way to deal with those that doesn't grossly improve the usefulness of accurate weapons beyond what they're already at.

Mighty Shot definitely improves autofire or just multiple attacks quite a bit, and if you intend to be using anything with semi-auto or full-auto capability or dual wielding pistols, it's a great choice to rush for to maximize your damage potential.

Early game you can expect to use and abuse longlases and sniper rifles all day erry day with the exception of heavy stubbers loaded with tox rounds for crowd control.

However, at upper tier gameplay you probably won't be using an accurate weapon like a longlas simply because there are more powerful options unless you're trying to go incognito and don't want to draw too much attention by using flashier guns. Keep that in mind.

As for the review itself, can't comment much more before my group finally gets around to playing the game, but one thing that stuck me as extremely odd is that some role/background aptitudes seem nonsentical. For example, warriors lack finess, which is required for quite a lot of talents and for ranged combat, as well as for dodging (so you're stuck with building a high toughness melee guy and hoping you don't encounter enemies dealing massive damage).

The thing about finesse is that it's probably the very best aptitude in the game. It's linked to agility and ballistic skill advances, governs pretty much all of the most important melee talents like swift attack and lightning attack, and a lot of the ranged combat talents, and so on. But don't think that it's by any means essential, or required. Single linked talents and such are really not that bad, honest.

Warriors get offense and defense instead, which are the second and third best non-characteristic aptitudes, respectively (offense covers weapon skill, along with all of the offensive combat talents that finesse doesn't govern (including some pretty good ones like mighty shot!*, hammer blow, preternatural speed!, crushing blow!, bulging biceps!!, and unarmed specialist) while defense covers toughness, toughness talents (true grit, iron jaw!, never die, counter attack!!, combat master, step aside!!!), each of the defensive willpower talents (like resistance, jaded, adamantium faith!) dodge, and parry). They cover almost every other aspect of battle that finesse doesn't, and then you also get weapon skill and ballistic skill and strength, which means you'll be at least single-linked for pretty much every combat-related talent, skill, and characteristic advance (you can also get ambidextrous super cheap if you're looking to dual-wield). Warriors are less specialized than the assassin or the desperado, but in return they're pretty much huge badasses both in melee and ranged combat. Picking up agility and/or toughness from the background and homeworld will pretty much set you up forever.

*exclamation points indicate value and general usefulness of a talent, more means it's even better, your mileage may vary

A feral worlder is probably the best homeworld for a warrior due to picking up toughness aptitude and high wounds as well as higher strength and toughness. A background either as a guardsman (for fieldcraft as a means of gaining versatility as a character, leadership is only useful if you pick up fellowship from being highborn) or an adeptus arbites (for aptitude overlap) would do nicely. If you pick a background aptitude that overlaps with an aptitude you already have from your role or vice versa, you get one free characteristic aptitude as a refund of sorts. So no matter which arbites aptitude you pick, you can take any characteristic aptitude you want as a refund, and some good choices would be agility, willpower, and perception (in order of overall usefulness to a warrior).

Likewise, desperados seem extremely deadly at combat, and I would argue are better than assassins unless you plan on going melee (and even then...), because the latter can't have both the offense and defense apittudes, while desperados can with the right background. The only edge assassins always have is their ability to spend fate points for more damage.

Yeah, assassins are assassins, not really combat maestros, though they're pretty decent at it anyways. Desperados I think are a bit too good as a role since you can pick up offense as an arbites, giving them the holy trinity of non-characteristic combat aptitudes, even if they can't get weapon skill. Still, they aren't going to be using heavy weapons (the real rulers of the battlefield) much at all unlike a warrior, especially if you enforce the actual weight limits to make it so that characters actually have to pump strength and toughness to use heavy guns properly, so there's that.


But really, the balance between roles in terms of aptitude spreads is doomed to get properly fucked when the next supplement comes out with the inevitable rules for cross or prestige classing. So you've been warned.

 

[Random]

There were new weapon qualities? I remember looking at the weapons table and finding it very, very limited, and with nothing new over the previous ffg games. Compared to dh1, yes, there were some changes in stuff, but from OW it was pretty much the same, but cut down in size.

Also, dude, put some breaks on the sperg. Nobody is saying accurate is the best option EVER. But consider a starting character, with 35 BS. You wanna try a shot at -10 or at +10, or whatever the mods are in this version, to do worse damage with the autogun than the longlas?

Yes, there are new weapon qualities that even OW didn't have. Try actually reading the book next time.

Also, try actually reading my posts next time. This is old ground.

Of course a heavy bolter will outdamage a longlas after a few upgrades in BS, and you acquire some tools. Derp.

A heavy bolter will outdamage a longlas pretty much before you get BS or weapon upgrades. It's just a better weapon overall.

Also, I don't know how the requisition system in dh2 works, but in OW which is quite similar, I spent like three sessions to request one fucking tripod. Which is scarce. I don't even remember if I got it or gave up. In fact, gimme a second and I'll look it up how acquiring shit works in dh2.

I'm not sure it was mentioned on the review, but with geld, you could load up on tools and shit. Like auspexes and red dots and scopes and whatever to tilt the d100 in your favour. In dh2, the fact you can't reliably acquire your shit makes the failcolyte aspect much worse.

I don't understand you people's fascination with thrones, aside from it basically functioning like DnD so you could horde dosh and treasures like true murderhobos. Moreover, the way your supply of them was handled was pretty unbalanced, with noble born characters getting an insane lead in thrones started with and earned over other characters. Oh, and encouraging players to gather up all the guns the enemies drop so that they can sell them for easy thrones.

EDIT: I checked out the influence test. It seems you roll the d100 and compare it to the influence stat (in OW it was the same, but you used FEL). And scarce is a -10 modifier.

So yeah, I dunno where you got the idea that rolling d100, and getting less than 20 on the roll (assuming 30 influence) is "quite easy".

I've never had a problem getting anything under Very Rare in OW. Acquisiton tests don't use Fellowship, they use a different stat which is shared amongst the party called logistics. First of all, you're supposed to be assigned gear based on the mission and objective you get, AKA receive appropriate gear for whatever mission you're doing (like chameleoline cloaks for recon missions, preysense goggles for night missions, etc.) which admittedly has a chance to misroll, but the misrolls are fun even when they do happen. There's also rules for battlefield conditions and regiment conditions that can help or hurt your chances. Having multiple regiments around shunts the rarity of all items up by two places over having only a company or less of troops around, while the time you personally spend in a battlefront, how well the war is going, and how long the front has been active all adds potentially massive bonuses (up to +80 if all conditions are ideal). On top of that, you can test commerce to get a +10 bonus to your requisition test for every DoS you score on the commerce test, and on top of THAT, you can use your regimental favored weapons to reduce the rarity of any basic and any heavy weapon by one degree, so yeah, if you actually know the rules, it's not hard at all to acquire shit, especially anything merely scarce.

In DH2, though, each acolyte has his own separate influence rating that governs how easy or hard it is to get shit. The game encourages at least one party member to be a highborn adeptus administratum alumni (who treats the rarities of all items as one step less rare and loses influence slower than other characters) playing a Hierophant or Seeker who will hoard influence and use and abuse it not just to acquire equipment for the party, but to call on connections and investigate using it. They can test commerce to get a bonus of +10 to their next acquisition test for every degree of success they score, which can lead to huge bonuses to said tests. But acolytes have other options than that, too.

While there is no mission assigned gear like in OW, instead acolytes can, at any time, choose to use the influence rating of their Inquisitor (at least 75, most likely higher than that, could be lower, depends on GM discretion). Invoking it at any time reduces the group's subtlety by 2 (in addition to the subtlety penalty caused by acquiring an item with a rarity penalty), however. It's a pretty useful trick as long as you're careful about how much subtlety you lose at a time by invoking your Inquisitor's name (don't announce it on broadcast vox channels, for example).

And on top of that, you get two or three or maybe four free acquisitions at character generation (equal to your influence bonus) up to scarce rarity, so you can still quite easily load up on the essentials without much trouble at chargen. That's enough for everyone to get a longlas and something else at the very least. Well, that is, if everyone's a huge bitch and intends to spam longlases.

So no, I don't think it's a problem in the least. Get good, faggot.

 

[Ackermanus]

Lots of stuff

Thanks, might just use that inescapable attack fix when the group finally gets to play. One thing about Desperados though: If you pick Highborn, you get fellowship twice, which means you can have all those awesome aptitudes plus either weapon skill or strength. Granted, you'll take a hit to toughness, which is bad, but you also get influence and maximum hit points and fate points. Since a desperado using a heavy weapon seems kind of silly conceptually, I went for Willpower instead (since I'm certain our GM will throw daemons at us from the get go), but it seems a desperado can go for any combat style you want: heck, you can even tank if you pick Feral Worlder (Toughness + Defense).

 

[Random]

Thanks, might just use that inescapable attack fix when the group finally gets to play. One thing about Desperados though: If you pick Highborn, you get fellowship twice, which means you can have all those awesome aptitudes plus either weapon skill or strength. Granted, you'll take a hit to toughness, which is bad, but you also get influence and maximum hit points and fate points. Since a desperado using a heavy weapon seems kind of silly conceptually, I went for Willpower instead (since I'm certain our GM will throw daemons at us from the get go), but it seems a desperado can go for any combat style you want: heck, you can even tank if you pick Feral Worlder (Toughness + Defense).

Hmmm, yeah, you're right about that. I guess Desperados are just poorly balanced overall.

Willpower is pretty much always a good aptitude to have, it's always nice when you're the sole motherfucker in the party aside from the psyker who can keep from shitting themselves the second fear tests start flying at you. Jaded is generally something to shoot for at eary levels, too, though if it's gonna be daemons all day erry day like you say, then you should just skip it and go straight to adamantium faith, I think.