In my campaign the Techmarine is an Iron Hand. As such before every single mission he uses a portion of it to requisition a new bionic limb for himself. So far I have told him that per the rulebook there is recovery time for this. So he has not had any of it actually installed because they have been fighting nonstop. But once we leave this system he is going in for treatment and I think he will now have all four of his limbs as Bionics. How can I simulate the massive effect that this will have on his performance. I feel like there would be an adjustment period per new limb that would take time to full adjust. Would I be out of place to say that each new limb would take like d3 months to fully adjust too, and that during that time he will take a -10 to BS, WS, and AG? Obviously this would be cumulative, one limb had already been taken care of. But the other three he is lopping off would mean that each one will be rolled for separately and all added together. So currently a -30 essentially...I feel like there should be some sort of temporary price that must be paid for the gift of becoming a machine.

My other thought was that instead of the recovery time penalty. Just make him pay an EXP cost per bionic. This represents him spending the time to master it. I hadn't intended for this to take this tone, perhaps this would be better in the houserule section...

Don't be excessive though. Any penalty you apply here will also apply to cybernetics coming out of criticals. Astartes have the best bodies and minds and medical facilities. Personally, I would limit it to one new deliberate cybernetic per sufficient downtime. It's just a better narrative to see an Iron Hand grow slowly into a machine.

Alex

Yeah, I assumed that's how it would work as well. But there isn't anything in the rules to actually make that a thing. That's why I was thinking that allowing it but putting a penalty in place for some time would be good. I had never considered that one of the players would just immediately go nuts with his Requisition in order to become a robot...Realisticly there is no reason he shouldn't be able to do a few at once, it would just make it WAY harder to adjust to it and get comfortable. I agree it is a better narrative, but the player is certainly having fun, and that really is the goal. I am just trying to craft a system that rewards good roleplaying. Ok, here is a new idea.

If you take One Bionic there is a penatly for 1d5 weeks - 1 week per degree of success on a Challenging Toughness Test

- Limb Penalty = -10 On BS, WS, AG

- Other Bionic - -5 STR AND -5 Toughness

If you take Two Bionics there is a penalty for 2d5 Weeks - 1 week Per degree of success on a Difficult Toughness test

- Limb Penalty = -20 On BS, WS, AG

- Other Bionic - -10 STR AND -10 Toughness

If you Take Three Bionics there is a penalty for 3d5 Weeks - 1 Week per degree of success on a Hard Toughness Test

- Limb Penalty = -30 On BS, WS, AG

- Other Bionic - -15 STR AND -15 Toughness

If you take more than three you can do it but you will have to burn a fatepoint, but you can treat it as three Bionics at once essentially.

Thoughts?

If he's electively chopping off arms and using mission requisition for non necessary replacements, then he's breaking the rules.

Here is the clarification from FFG:

"The rules for bionic replacements are not intended to be purchased with requisition unless extenuating circumstances arise that make the replacements necessary. Of course, in the end the Game Master has final say on what is appropriate for their campaign.

Thanks for your question,

Tim"

Extenuating circumstances involve the arm no longer being there. Wanting +2 TB doesn't count as extenuating circumstances. If you want to let him continue to violate the rules that's up to you, but according to the official rules you cannot simply chop off your arms and replace them whenever you want.

If he's electively chopping off arms and using mission requisition for non necessary replacements, then he's breaking the rules.

Here is the clarification from FFG:

"The rules for bionic replacements are not intended to be purchased with requisition unless extenuating circumstances arise that make the replacements necessary. Of course, in the end the Game Master has final say on what is appropriate for their campaign.

Thanks for your question,

Tim"

Extenuating circumstances involve the arm no longer being there. Wanting +2 TB doesn't count as extenuating circumstances. If you want to let him continue to violate the rules that's up to you, but according to the official rules you cannot simply chop off your arms and replace them whenever you want.

Where is this written?!? I would be overjoyed to have an actual official reason for him to not be able to do this!

And I don't mean to come off defensive...but I'm not "Allowing him to break the rules." I am allowing him to play the game the way it was written. If you are telling me that somewhere it is written that this isn't how it works I will be thrilled. I made this post because I don't like the way it currently is, it would be really cool to find out that it isn't the way it appears to be!

Official response to an inquiry via Rules Questions link. Can be considered RAW.

Official response to an inquiry via Rules Questions link. Can be considered RAW.

I totally get that, but how can I find these official responses? Is there a way to sort the forum for only posts that had responses from FFG people?

You can do what I did: search for them in a lengthy process. Fortunately, you don't have to because I already did. I only need to put all of them up on my blog.

http://40kroleplay.weebly.com/40k-roleplay-blog/rule-clarifications-techmarine-cybernetics

Alex

You can do what I did: search for them in a lengthy process. Fortunately, you don't have to because I already did. I only need to put all of them up on my blog.

http://40kroleplay.weebly.com/40k-roleplay-blog/rule-clarifications-techmarine-cybernetics

Alex

My hero!

I also keep an archive of all the answers I get, or others post, from FFG.

Rogal, I'm real big into letting my players stick to the rules, and I do, too, but it sounds like your player is really pushing the limit to abuse. He's using a bionically-centered character from a bionically-centered chapter to what sounds to me from your description as some pretty cheap ends. Sometimes you just have to put the stop to such things. I always ask myself this key question. Does this player take the fun from other players?

I disagree, EK. That Techmarine needs bionics to unlock the higher rank Iron Hand Solo Mode abilities. No other chapter has to do this, so it's only fair to be fairly liberal with bionic requisitioning there.

Alex

Start including some haywire grenades and see how thrilled he is about all those bionics.

An Iron Hand Techmarine? Very, regardless of what happens!

Alex

Rogal, I'm real big into letting my players stick to the rules, and I do, too, but it sounds like your player is really pushing the limit to abuse. He's using a bionically-centered character from a bionically-centered chapter to what sounds to me from your description as some pretty cheap ends. Sometimes you just have to put the stop to such things. I always ask myself this key question. Does this player take the fun from other players?

To answer this question. No everyone loves this player and expects this type of behavior, it causes ZERO conflict. It goes not take away from the fun at all, I just wanted him to have to work harder to do the things he wants to do!

With that in mind I am allowing him to take a bionic with each rank of "The Flesh is Weak" and I am still going to force him to make rolls to account for getting used to parts of your body being replaced. So we retconned his previous selections in order to make it fit better. Being an Iron Hands marine will give him a jump start, but it will take him slightly longer now to become all the machine he wants to be. He is happy with it.

Alex, the Solo Modes can be unlocked with any cybernetics, not just bionic limbs.

And Rogal, if no one else is being shut down in the game, then I let the players go with it. I do think he'd find better upgrades, though, than bionic limbs, but hey, that's a personal choice.

He is mostly going for the bionic limbs because he knows that the most flesh he can replace with the blessed machine the closer he can come to purging all weakness from him form. It's kind of a big deal to him...but i'm sure the toughness bonus doesn't hurt!

Just be sure to throw some "only affects bionics stuff" at him. A sentient warp created rust demon for instance!

Just be sure to throw some "only affects bionics stuff" at him. A sentient warp created rust demon for instance!

That would be viscous of me! I like it!

There is a psionic outside of deathwatch (i want to say dark heresy) where the it affects bionics. A player was telling me how he nearly killed his ally standing nearby using it recklessly.

Oh jeez that would be monstrous to use against him....I love it!

There is a psionic outside of deathwatch (i want to say dark heresy) where the it affects bionics. A player was telling me how he nearly killed his ally standing nearby using it recklessly.

I like how, at first, it seemed like a player just being an ass, and unnecessarily, but then it gets to feeling more like he's instead just playing the character right, and that's what the Chapter does. I find the Iron Hands sort of silly, NOI, and imagine the others having to keep an eye on one, lest he start quietly removing bits of the Rhino, and trying to integrate them into his body. It was always an odd, if interesting Chapter flaw, with all that goes into making Space Marine super-flesh, and these nut-and-bolt jobs wanting to hack it off, and replace it with more "mundane" technology. Wonder if, in fluff, there is a cut-off point of how much they can replace? I've heard of Magos that are only slightly less mechanical than the characters from Ghost in the Shell, and they are basically a handful of brain cells, interred inside attractive human-simulating robot bodies. There are lots of extra bits that go into making a Space Marine, and once you've taken out their special blood, redundant organs, Black Carapace in large segments (can't integrate with your armor so easy now, can you?), and such, they really shouldn't still be Astartes, just really well trained soldiers who long to be the next Men of Iron.

As for downtime, between excessive training, wide adaptability, and hardy construction, I'd imagine the cybernetics not taking too long to acclimatize to, but that's just me.

Start including some haywire grenades and see how thrilled he is about all those bionics.

My Forge Master knew that all too well.

Just be sure to throw some "only affects bionics stuff" at him. A sentient warp created rust demon for instance!

That's where teamwork comes into play and you hope your allies can help you out. Going off on your own is easily a no-no.

He is mostly going for the bionic limbs because he knows that the most flesh he can replace with the blessed machine the closer he can come to purging all weakness from him form. It's kind of a big deal to him...but i'm sure the toughness bonus doesn't hurt!

To me, that's just the general view a Techmarine would have as their talents all lead down that kind of path. Towards the end of my Forge Master's life, I became lost a fair amount of mobility in exchance for increased armor and mass. In my artificier armor + toughness bonus there was little that could hurt me unless they had high Pen, as my total value was around 25 in each slot. Basically I was a damage soak, and there's even a Dark Angel Class Advance that would give me terminator armor as standard and an ability that I could Test to have enemies target me instead of allies. Given my character I chose Forge Master instead.

Yeah I am VERY glad there are no Dark Angels in my party! That is a gross ability for sure