OK I'm on a budget and giving DW a try late in the piece, I've played through and GM'ed Final Sanction & Oblivions Edge a couple of times in the past few years. My budget precludes DTF especially in my part of the world. so I'm going PDF and saving myself APX 75%, my budget for RPG's in the upcoming pay cycle is 50-60 OZ bucks. Driethrough RPG has the Core Book for $30, what one other (non Adventure) book would folks recommend? and why?

If you write your own missions and have trouble (or are too lazy for) transcribing 40K xenos to DW, buy Mark of the Xenos.

If you want to run in the default DW setting, the Jericho Reach, then buy Achilus Assault.

If you care about neither and just want more options for your players, then either Rites of Battle (which has more gear, vehicle rules and a bunch of other bigger and smaller stuff that can be useful) or Honour the Chapter - which quite simply offers more (later founding) chapters for your players to choose from. RoB has more all-around utility, I think.

Get into DW only if you have players who you think are naturally enthusiastic about playing a Space Marine or if you are prepared to give it extra-thought on how to lure the less enthusiastic players in.

Alex

We all have at least 5K in Marines in a garage somewhere, we are having a brake from other systems and playing a few games of DH but want something else different in feel from DH for our alternative weeks and want to give DW a try. it will be at least one and a half to three pay cycles before we work through Final Sanction, Oblivion's edge and whatever adventure is in the Core Book using original characters, I'm looking for Character Options to start.

Rites of Battle in some way has the best character options, in that it has a ton more all-purpose gear (weapons, war gear, relics), rules for generating your own home-brew Chapter, Imperial Fists rules ( awful ), Advanced Specialty rules for characters (becoming a Chaplain, Epistolary, Watch-Captain, Forge-Master, etc), and vehicle rules and stats for both Imperial and enemy vehicles. All in all a pretty great sourcebook, Imperial Fists rules notwithstanding.

First Founding and Honour the Chapter both have a lot of player options, namely new Chapters in both (FF, unsurprisingly, stats out the remaining First Founding chapters not included in the core), expanded options for all the Core book chapters between them (new Chapter-only Squad Modes and gear). Both contain a couple pieces of "generalist" gear that anyone can take, and a lot of Chapter-specific gear (which, I mean, you could always refluff say the Hawk Lords' Devastator ammo backpack + jump pack thing to be used by the Blood Angels or Raven Guard too, if you wanted to). But aside from that you're not going to get much additional GMing stuff from either FF or HtC, except FF has some info on the Traitor Legions and their presence in the Jericho Reach.

First Founding also includes an adventure module, though it requires more GM work than some of the dedicated module trilogies (as it lacks maps). Though that module does provide some interesting interaction with other SM chapters. I liked reading through it but when I tried to run it, it was somewhat problematic.

I would say Rites of Battle is the best option for your second book.

Rites of Battle and Mark of the Xenos are the two must-haves; everything else is pretty much optional.

Here's the thing: if you want extended player gen options, RoB offers you custom-made chapters (which is cool), simplified rules for recreating existing chapters (meh) and more equipment (cool). First Founding does not offer that much in char gen options (the missing 4 first foundings), while Honour the Chapter offers a lot in chapter choice. If you want a broad range of chapters, go HtC. If you look for general utility, pick RoB.

If you primarily run pregen missions, you don't need Mark of the Xenos.

Alex

so Rites of Battle, then next pay Mark of the Xenos and a 2nd book, likely Honor the Chapter. what about the GM's Screen it's going for like 10 bucks as a PDF, is it worth it to throw in to the cart to round out the Gaming Stipend I give my self, or should I save my cash for petrol money to make it to games or to pick up some premeim Munchies when I'm not GMing?

Forget about the gm kit unless you can pay for it without missing the money.

Alex