Salutations,

Hopefully you fine upstanding servitors can enlighten me ?

We've just picked up Deathwatch and the six of us are looking at selecting various chapters and specialties.

My confusion arises around Squad mode and each chapter.

How do I as GM stop the wasting of Cohesion by each player by using it to fuel Squad mode abilities .. which are essentially Solo mode as he has no chapter mates in the kill team?

it's confusing the hell out of me.

I realise that the Kill team Leader can, if he is Tactical Marine and has a talent, share his ability.

But the others can just activate their own chapter ones and burn through cohesion.

Thanks in advance

V

Well I would recommend putting a foe out there that will require them to behave like a team of brothers in arms. If they fail to confront it like a group and make use of their abilities...they will probably die!

For six players at Rank one I would suggest the following!

Assuming Tyranids:

Winged Hive Tyrant - Close Combat geared - 400 Meters away

Two 50 Hordes of Termagaunts - Starting 300 meters away

Two 50 Hordes of Hormagaunts - Starting 300 meters away

Four Shrikes - Starting Two hundred meters away

Then as soon as the Hive Tyrant makes contact...two Ravenors show up to ruin their day!

That SHOULD make them get creative and stop acting like they are still in solo mode!

Or it will be a short campaign, which is also cool...

Another idea would be a training chamber at the Watch Fortress where you can pit them against foes but take away thier weapons and power armor. Leave them with Faith in eachother and the Emperor! Then scatter weapons around the arena. I did this and had them fight some lictors and a carnifex...called it the Rite of Binding

This is one of the roleplaying aspects of the game. You cannot stop them from doing it.

There are things which can cause a lot of problems for space marines though.

1: Astartes are immune to all effects of fear while in squad mode, except the leader must take a willpower test when the squad confronts a fear causing enemy. Failure means lost cohesion.

2: Astartes out of squad mode suffer WP penalties equal to the fear rating of their enemies.

3: Devastating weapons cause cohesion damage.

4: When you run out of cohesion, ALL squad mode abilities cease functioning immediately and all marines immediately switch to solo mode.

So, let your players eat up all their cohesion in a mission. Then throw fear causing enemy after fear causing enemy or devastating weapons at them until the little cohesion they have left is burned away (probably shouldn't take much) then throw a psychic hive tyrant or daemon at them with WP based powers. That should teach them a valuable lesson.

Just because your mission as a GM is not to kill the party, doesn't mean the bad guys you role play don't want to do that.

Well you've hit "Cohesion" right on its head. Story Wise, these are all different fighting styles being forced to work together hence the game mechanic cohesion. As long as they keep fighting as individuals next to each other instead of a close knit group, they'll run out of cohesion and miss out on squad mode abilities.

While the squad tactics seem like an after thought starting out, they are really powerful. Bolter assault and fire for effect both slaughter bad guys before they ever get a chance to attack.

I recommend large numbers of genestealers as way to teach them how to act as a team. If they're rank 1, i'd use 1.5 GS per marine and ambust within one charge distance.

Once they learn to work as a team, there is a deed in RoB that lets them use cross chapter tactics.

Cheers,

this is the answer(s) I was looking for,

We've played a lot of other RPG's where teamwork and tactics are not really rewarded or penalised ..

I need them to understand that in DW that this is HERESY and they will be branded cowards and executed if they do it!

Hopefully it all works out ... or they all die horrible painful deaths ... regardless, I'll be having fun

Well, I think Squad Mode abilities can only be used unanimously. If one was to use them against player consent, that would incur additional cohesion loss.

Alex

Well, I think Squad Mode abilities can only be used unanimously. If one was to use them against player consent, that would incur additional cohesion loss.

Alex

Not quite, the penalty is already baked in. You can only use 1 sustain power at a time so one person would activate the first power and everyone starts using it. Then the second player activates a second power and uses it but no one else does essentially wasting the cohesion points.

Or to use an actual example: I forget the name of the power off the top of my head where you can have one marine remain stationary who can call a target and get +20% for everyone shooting it, as well as the ability to use a reaction to shoot it. Our techmarine paid the cohesion and called a target. Later that turn the devastator named himself the stationary guy and called a different target using more cohesion. Next turn the techmarine re-called his original target spending cohesion again. Had we worked together we would have spent 3 cohesion instead of 9.

I think you are just a little off. Either that or your players are just shooting themselves in the foot.

A kill-team may have more than 1 sustained power active at one time with the following limitations.

An Astartes may only sustain 1 sustained squad mode ability at a time.

An Astartes may only ever benefit from 1 sustained squad mode ability at any point.

An Astartes may only recieve 1 extra out-of-activation action each turn.

If an Astartes calls and sustains a sustained ability, then later joins in on an ability activated by another Astartes, or activates another sustained ability himself, the ability he first activated immediately expires. If he wishes to reactivate it he must first leave, or deactivate, the new ability and reactivate the other with full cohesion cost.

In your example above, the techmarine activated Strong Point and called his target. Other Astartes in the group then gain the benefit. Later the Devastator also activates Strong Point and called his target. The other Astartes in the kill-team must then decide to participate in the techmarine's or the devastator's sustained ability, they can not participate in both at the same time. If the Techmarine joins in on the devastator's ability, his sustained ability expires; but if he doesn't, the techmarine may continue to sustain his ability without penalty. So unless the Techmarine swithed to the devastator's ability, they would have only spent 6 cohesion and would have had two sustained abilities active.

If an Astartes calls and sustains a sustained ability, then later joins in on an ability activated by another Astartes, or activates another sustained ability himself, the ability he first activated immediately expires. If he wishes to reactivate it he must first leave, or deactivate, the new ability and reactivate the other with full cohesion cost.

That has been changed:

" The Battle-Brother may choose to stop sustaining an ability (possibly to activate a new Squad Mode ability or benefit from another active Squad Mode ability) as a Free Action at the start of any of his Turns, but does not need to pay the Cohesion cost of the sustained ability if he wants to reactivate it later on in the Mission. A Battle-Brother may only sustain or benefit from one Squad Mode ability at a time.”

I will say with an ultramarine in the group, cohesion tends not to be much of issue since he spent 800xp on exemplar of honor. Getting 5 (his Fel bonus) cohesion per fate point spent on top of the 5 from the UM passive. Even the lost relic, shamed, low fellowship techmarine looks like a primarch out there.

If an Astartes calls and sustains a sustained ability, then later joins in on an ability activated by another Astartes, or activates another sustained ability himself, the ability he first activated immediately expires. If he wishes to reactivate it he must first leave, or deactivate, the new ability and reactivate the other with full cohesion cost.

That has been changed:

" The Battle-Brother may choose to stop sustaining an ability (possibly to activate a new Squad Mode ability or benefit from another active Squad Mode ability) as a Free Action at the start of any of his Turns, but does not need to pay the Cohesion cost of the sustained ability if he wants to reactivate it later on in the Mission. A Battle-Brother may only sustain or benefit from one Squad Mode ability at a time.”

No it hasn't.

From FFG:

"Sorry for the confusion as to your question. In answer to your actual question, in the event that you leave squad mode for any reason, you do, in fact, have to pay the Cohesion cost again when you choose to reactivate the Squad Mode Ability.

One clarification should be made about the current errata for "Sustaining Squad Mode Abilities (page 220)" on page 5 of the Errata v1.1 document. The sentence "The Battle-Brother may choose to stop sustaining and ability (possibly to activate a new Squad Mode ability) as a Free Action at the start of any of his Turns" should change to "The Battle-Brother may choose to stop sustaining an ability (possibly to activate a new Squad Mode ability or benefit from another active Squad Mode ability) as a Free Action at the start of any of his Turns and must pay the Cohesion cost of the sustained ability if he wants to reactivate it at later time ." The following sentence should be added to the end of the description: "A Battle-Brother may only sustain or benefit from one Squad Mode ability at a time."

Keep an eye out for a future Errata and FAQ for the above clarification.

Thank you for your diligence and your questions,

Tim"

So, basically, they've just rephrased the original rule which means that the Mandatory Ultramarine is back in action.
Wonderful.

Nope. The rule says Cohesion must be paid again if the power is not sustained and the power can only be sustained by the marine who triggered it. So your Ultramarine must be held in Squad Mode at all times. Which means there must be at least one other Astartes in Squad Mode within support range at all times, including between combats.

For a comprehensive overview, see here:

http://40kroleplay.weebly.com/40k-roleplay-blog/rule-clarifications-squad-mode

Attack Patterns normally don't give bonuses outside of combat (it's an Attack Pattern after all), so a house rule that limits its effects to combat situations might make sense.

Alex

No argument there but I was reffering to Ultramarines unique abilities for recovering lost cohesion. Rules revision from Errata v1.1 lowered the general cohesion tax somewhat for the no-Ultramarine Kill-teams. With that out of the window, not having an Ultramarine in a Kill-team is just playing Deathwatch on Nightmare mode.

@ak-73

The following statement on your blog post:

"Each Battle-Brother may benefit from only one Squad Mode ( or Solo Mode ) ability during a given turn. Activating a a Squad Mode ability does not require another Battle-Brother joining the ability."

Where can I find the rule that says that you can only benefit from one Solo Mode?

Page 5 of the errata. First column, last sentance under "Sustaining Squad Mode Abilities".

There was a clarification from FFG stating characters can benefit from only a single 'out of action' ability a turn. i.e. free actions granted by solo/squad modes. I can not find it in my documentation but its out there. Hopefully someone has it and will put it up.

Passive solo modes (like those air sniffing doggies) would ignore such "single solo mode a turn" limitations as they always function.

Thank you!