Techmarines:

So let me get this straight. A Techmarine can attack as a Reaction... is this in addition to the normal attack?

Like say my Techmarine player has a Chainsword and his Servo Arm. He can both slice with chainsword and STILL use the Servo arm? Because that's insane. Especially with how brutal the arm is. That's an Armor Pen 10, 2d10 +14 damage weapon. (i -presume- that's including the strength bonus already, because if not...)

My poor Assault Marine player can't hold a -candle- to that and was feeling awfully disheartened after our first session when he got out performed in every way (especially against Elites and Master levels) by a character with LESS Weapon Skill simply because his weapon actually can hurt the big stuff.

Or is there something my Assault Marine player is missing? (He's @60 WS base in armor, IIRC - used initial XP for the WS boosts). He's Carcharodon Chapter, and took the Solo Mode Specialty bonus too, if that helps. Because I want to help the poor guy since so far his experience is charging in to get to the 'Single' opponents first (avoiding the hordes), at which point he proceeds to barely scratch it, get beat on, and then Tech Marine makes to combat and pastes it due to his beastly Penetration value and higher damage.

Again. I note this is raw newbie chars fresh from Chargen. I don't care about 4 ranks down the road. This is an issue now, with a still incomplete first mission due to a short game session by the time we finished last touches and rules teaching. So if it's a 5000 xp later he'll shiine... um... so what?

No, you aren't missing anything. A Techmarine may either 1) spend his reaction to attack with the claw even after attacking with a chainsword in the same round (though he will not be able to dodge or parry) or 2) attack with the claw as his regular attack then attempt to dodge or parry.

There's quite a few things that are unbalanced at Rank 1: the Techmarine's claw, heavy bolters, and force weapons to name a few. But the Assault Marine will outshine a Techmarine at higher ranks and renown values. This is because the Assault specalty will open up a third attack at Rank 2 - and once he gets a power sword he'll be slicing through even Chaos Space Marines.

It also depends what enemy you're throwing at your players. Example; the Assault Marine will do a lot better against cultists, orks, and 'nids because they don't have a lot of armor. BUT if you throw Chaos Space Marines or Tau battlesuits at them, then the Assault Marine will have a hard time wounding things because his weapon is low penetration compared to the servo-arm. And sometimes the dice just don't favor us (as players or GMs); sometimes you just miss a lot even with a high stat value.

If you REALLY want to try and tip things in favor of the Assault Marine, there are a few things you could do (I'm not advocating any; these are just hot-fix ideas):

1. Have more baddies attack the Techmarine; make him spend his reaction to dodge/parry so he can't attack twice per round

2. Change the baddies to things with less armor

3. What's the strength score for your Assault Marine? The difference between 40-something and 50 is 2 damage per hit - and strength is easy to raise for that specalty

4. Does the Assault Marine player have crushing blow?

5. Increase the all the players' rank and renown to rank 2, distinguished (note: this opens the Assault Marine's third attack per round AND he can requisition a power weapon)

6. Fudge dice so that the baddies somehow dodge or parry the claw

7. Remind the players (both as the GM and their NPC handler) that they are a squad; the success of the mission is what matters. Hand out extra xp or renown (be careful with that latter) for team play - example: give the Assault guy a little bit extra xp for tying up X big bad while the rest of the group slaughters baddie minions or something)

8. Remember as well; player rivalries can be an exciting RP feature - especially if the players are from chapters with a history (like Dark Anges/Space Wolves). If chapter history applies, this is a great spot to RP that

Off that top of my head, that's all I can think of without taking something away from the Techmarine, which I don't realy consider viable. For me, Rank 1 is for getting used to system mechanics and feeling the characters out - both individually and squad dynamics. You could decide to advance them quickly or slowly depending on the player's interest and progress

Good luck Marine. Make the Emperor proud!

Well, I'm not sure if it's a good idea to use your reaction to attack against elite oder master level enemys. I see a very obvious option to stop your techmarine from doing that... ^{kill him ; )}

^{kill him ; )}

There's always that! But a good maiming often gets the idea across about the importance of parrying/dodging

So basically, the Assault marine is going to surpass the tech marine pretty soon because they both excel best in their own special tasks.

But in the meantime you could give the Assault marine a power sword or power fist for their next mission (just for the mission because due to enemytype X being present in the target area they will need it.) This will let the ASM a taste of what he can do with those weapons (but take it away after mission so that he will requisition his personal weapons as normally.)

Well, as I said. These are raw newbies. And the Assault Marine put his advances into WS and something else, but no non-starting talents yet.

And trust me, I was having things attack the Tech Marine, they just kept missing so he didn't have to use his reaction. Hell, I quickly House Ruled (thinking that was the way it worked) so he could only do one attack period a round. But seems that was wrong.

As for our enemies, it was just Orks - this was a learning experience for all of them.

I think our AM was terrified of the negatives to make two attacks as well, which might not have helped.

It's a learning exerpeience for everyone, including you.

What I suggest is to fudge the dice when attacking the Techmarine; make him burn his reaction. And advise the Assault Marine to start using the swift attack feature so he can attack twice per round and still have his reaction.

What chapter is the Assault Marine?

Assault Marine is a Carcharodon.

And just because, Techmarine a Salamander. Devastator an Iron Hands. (They'd appreciate advice all the same. )

We hope to get a 4th since our lead fell through due to scheduling issues. But these 3 seem beastly enough for now at least!

I think our AM was terrified of the negatives to make two attacks as well, which might not have helped.

Negatives ? What are you talking about ? I don't remember any 'negatives' for using the Swift Attack Talent :/

Anyway, like other peoples said, throw something that he will need to dodge, or just destroyed his arm. I had this issue, where my techmarine player was feeling invincible because of his high toughness/armor plus his damage output with the arm. I just popped a Chaos champion with Power Sword, and he decided to challenge him :

Charge, power sword attack, miss, servo arm attack, hit, parry from champion --> servo arm destroyed. His expression changed in an instant when he realised he was 'free' for the champion. He nearly died from that (being saved at the last moment by another player), and he is more 'defensive' when it comes to melee, leaving this to the more melee-specialised players.

That is definitely a first issue! I didn't remember the starting talents (trusted him to) and apparently he didn't look closely enough at what he had either!

He was purely thinking he could only make two attacks with his dual Chainswords since with only 36 BS he was allergic to using his pistol or grenades.

Unless the Techmarine has the trait mechadendrite use:weapon I'm not sure they can use it in combat.

I'm looking at DW pg123. if someone else could comment because I'm thinking of making a Techmarine with Sig wargear: Breaching Shears and having it connected to the Harness.

bulkhead shears not breaching shears

I say just put him up against a power weapon, parry the attack from the servo arm and 75% chance of bye bye servo arm, that ought to make him be more careful.

And if he doesn't have a power weapon himself he'll be needing the reaction for dodging attacks.

Give the Techmarine something to occupy his servo-arm? Like holding up a tank for repairs or keeping a big slab of ceramite from crushing the party.

Brand new party - I think Power Weapons are a bit nasty to throw at them yet. We're not even done with the initial mission (two more objectives to go)

The reaction attack is good early on but very quickly gets overshadowed. I don't think you really need to change anything jist watch the PCs progress naturally.

I'd advise to do wgat i was always doing in the battle version of 40k: throw a horde of rippers against them. I wonder how mighty would tm feel while crushing one of them at a time with his seevo arm