So my players are quickly approaching the point where they will max out their DH characters and we'll want to move on to Ascension. However it's quickly become obvious that some of the rules are simply too broken, resulting in careers that pwn everything. I haven't had a chance to read through the whole thing, nevermind trying to figure out the impact every special ability and talent will have on gameplay, so I'm looking for advice on how to use Ascension without completely ruining the game. I think removing Vindicaire as an option is a good start - they start off at indestructible and just get more problematic as time goes by. Primaris Pyskers have similar issues, but I'm not sure what other valid option I can give the pysker player. Are there any other problematic issues I need to look out for?

macd21 said:

The biggest issues, as far as I can tell, with psykers and Ascension is twofold: access to Unnatural Willpower and the way many psychic powers scale by WP Bonus. Resolving that issue can be as simple as capping the amount of WP Bonus or Overbleed a power can use, or as involved as rebuilding the powers to scale off of Psy Rating (as they do in Rogue Trader), which makes things more reasonable and makes the Fettered/Unfettered/Push rules for power manifestation even more significant (a Psy Rating 10 psyker, as it stands, will almost never want to do anything but use powers fettered, as 5d10+WPB with no risk of phenomena is more than sufficient for most powers). Sometimes, though, the issue people have with Primaris Psykers is that they're psykers, and there are more than a few DH players I've encountered online and offline who simply don't like psykers anyway.

I'm not personally allowing the Vindicare either - I don't see Temple Assassins as having a purpose within a cadre of Throne Agents, even if an individual Inquisitor could arrange for one to be deployed. They're not team players, but rather living weapons, so I don't allow their inclusion.

In all cases, while I allow Unnatural Characteristics, I require justifications for them. Some are easier than others - a Magos has very easy access to Unnatural Strength and Unnatural Toughness through continual upgrades of his implants and his form, for example.

Or you can modify the unnatural talents to be +3 (or some other fixed number) on the ability bonus instead of doubling. The talent will still be extremely useful and can be balanced with the right xp cost.

In its current state it is almost too good with the high ability scores people can attain. +30 through character progressions and a million different "character packs" that adds stats as well...

There can be plenty of adventures where an Assassin would be useful - infiltration for some, the silent kill, the long shot kill, scouting, plus they have plenty of still in melee so they hold up their own when not specifically on an assassination mission.

My problem with the Vindicare as posted is A) It's too damned powerful with it's two dozen dodges a round AND B) The profession doesn't really reflect the VIndicare which is a sniper and has no justification for the special abilities they gain.

In my opinion they should have had multiple Assassin roles springing from a base "Temple Assassin" profession - each specialized assassin type would then have access to its own special abilities and deviate from the base advancement in defined ways. So, Vindicare would gain a sniping specific power, Calidus would have access to shape shifting drugs, Caluxis would be untouchables (or and I getting those two turned around?) and so forth. Multiple specializations could have easily been built off a core Ascended career.

or the game was meant to be unbalanced and can be left alone. you're a GM do as you please

Jack of Tears said:

Except that they're not only snipers - they're Temple Assassins first and foremost, and there are more than a few baseline abilities common to all the temples - such as being as strong and tough as a Space Marine, for example.

N0-1_H3r3 said:

this is true, it took nearly an entire chapter to kill a temple of assassins protecting the Lord of Terra when he commited the heresy of killing for political gain and even then only one survived...

ThenDoctor said:

It's less a problem of balance (though that is an issue - some of my players don't like feeling completely superfluous) that of being simply broken. The rules for the Vindicaire simply don't work very well with the system. Even without Unnatural Agility they have about half a dozen dodges at 100+% chance of success. Looking at the stats for the antagonists in the book I realised that a VA would beat them automatically simply because they had no chance of hitting him. The Primaris is just ridiculously overpowered and renders any challenge moot.

I think the VA's abilities are fairly appropriate for the career as it has always been described in the fluff. They aren't just excellent shots, but are near impossible to kill etc. It's just that they don't work very well as PCs.

N0-1, thanks for the suggestions on psykers, I think I'll give them a try.

but thats the thing DH was already broken to begin with look at the tech priest for thrones sake. if you know how to use a class to its fullest it can outmatch anything honestly im using the example of DND 3.5 tahts always broken as long as you know how to play the game. its all a matter of manipulation and knowing what you will be up against and how to beat it.

ThenDoctor said:

Which, really, is only an issue in regards to players who're trying to "beat" the game. I've personally never come across those issues in practice, because I've got a group of players who approach the game with a more narrative-focussed mindset which isn't particularly conducive to power-gaming.

exactly so a broken system doesnt really matter, at least to me

ThenDoctor said:

The problem with Ascension is that it doesn't require an active effort by the player to break the game. Any player who chooses Vindicaire automatically has a broken character and someone playing a Primaris Psyker has to actively go out of his way to pick a weak combination of abilities to avoid dominating every encounter. The broken nature of the rules can and will disrupt the narrative flow of the game, which is my biggest problem with them. Having a character who automatically wins in combat means that combat is no longer a useful option for creating tension and drama (you might as well say "the Lord of Change is summoned, you kill it, moving on").

ThenDoctor said:

It's statements like that that annoy the crap out of me.

I know several people who play this way, and they love 4E just because everything is the same for everyone. Character and having fun is more important than winning, beating, or playing the system.

The thing with the Vindicare, and Temple Assassins in general is that nobody seems to pay attention to the fact they are no longer human by any stretch of the imagination. If one was being played in a game I was running there would be major penalties to social interactions just due to what they have been made into. They have been rebuilt genetically, cybernetically and mentally. If an Eldar is disturbing to behold just walking around and Space Marines are awe and fear inducing, how off putting is it to watch a temple assassin just walk across a room knowing they used to be human? Temple Assassins aren't people, they are tools to be used, nothing more.

im not meaning to annoy, i sympathise much with your point, unfortunately the people i play with power play but i prefer broken games if one thing is better than another so be it each class has a specialty and an adept could take down a vindicare you just have to think of a good plan

ThenDoctor said:

A specialty is one thing, being so good you automatically succeed at something is another. Vindicaires are combat specialists - who win every combat. They can't be hurt, unless you engineer every combat to specifically include some contrived method of injuring them. And the odds are that anything that can hurt a Vindicaire will kill any other PC automatically. It's extremely poor game design.

An adept being able to take down a VA (or a PPsy, for that matter) is irrelevant. The players aren't going to be going up against each other. When the adept player comes up against the big bad, sure he can come up with an amazing plan to defeat him - or he could send in Rodd and Todd, the cadre's psyker and assassin. The rest of the team can go home.

or i could make the master villian an adept mad genius to kill rodd and todd...its all about how you play not what you play and if you want a vindicare dead you waste a heavy stubber ammo crate on him...

ThenDoctor said:

That's not very likely to work. Again, it's also irrelevant. Yes, I could come up with some king of contrived scenario to challenge rodd and todd. Unfortunately I would then have to do so every single time. I could also just say "rocks fall, everyone dies" (except the Vindicaire, he'll probably survive). The lengths to which you have to go to challenge a VA or a PPsy are ridiculous and (again) will probably kill another character automatically. A rank 16 Primaris can kill three Lords of Change every turn - minimum. And if every session becomes about challenging rodd and todd the other players are being left out.

Easier answer - fix the problems with those careers.

Looking at the VA, the biggest issue is his abililty to dodge (automatically) anything thrown at him. I think changing the Temple Assassin trait to + 1 reaction instead of AB x reactions would suffice and would still accurately reflect the fluff. Combined with talents like step aside it would make him a very hard target, but he could still be overwhelmed by numbers or sufficient attacks. Having a dodge of 100+ is still a problem though.

macd21 said:

How about 1/2 AB x reactions instead of AB x reactions? Would that still be too much?

N0-1_H3r3 said:

That annoys me.

Should "Overbleed" be removed when manifesting an Unfettered power? Or maybe the psyker could only use a portion of his WPB, say half or his WPB minus his efficient psy rating ?

My own personal fix to the Vindicare would be to give them those extra Reactions per encounter.

It's sad that there are now another 2 pages on topics which have been covered more then once on this forum. Further, to balance the classes just make the game hinge more on investigating. I think a lot of people tend to forget that combat is potentially a very very small part of the equation. In my parties current mission they have shot a grand total of 3 things over 4 hours of play, and had one character have a fist fight not to the death. Right now with a planetary invasion taking place, this is the most combat that they will ever see. Also, a lot of the complaints about how easy it is for one class to kill, or hard for another... one of my guardsman is carrying an autocannon, he is using manstoppers, if he shoots something, it dies, no questions asked with 20d10+25 possible damage and pen 7 on each shot. At the point when he gets a best quality assault cannon, he will have 30d10+5 tearing and reliable to boot. He will have this soon, the other guardsman carries enough rockets and grenades to invade a small country on his own. Both of them can match and/or kill the vindicare in the group, as anything s short of 10 degrees of success will result in damage that punches right through his lack of armor and relatively low wounds. a single assault cannon round having the potential to turn him into pudding. As for psykers, there are actually a few different ways to counter them, least of all is just poison from a needle rifle, most is a blank or equally potent psyker.
Though as a side note, I am more then happy with unbalanced classes in my game because I build my world to cater to players, each player, and not the other way around. Some people in game only respect/deal with the storm troopers, others with the interregator(sp?), and still others the magos. The VA has a hell of a time getting anything done because he has no real contacts.

Cliff notes on what I roughly did to work with Ascension.

I just limited the VA dodge to Base AB (unmodified by unnatural chars).

And I fixed the Primaris with replacing WB X "y" for calculations to Effective Psy Rating Used X "y" and did moved the push and fettered options to later ranks, sort of as another carrot to rank up. People do not learn to avoid the issues of the warp with Fettering until near the end of their career. They learn to Push much earlier.

Players are fine with the changes, and Psykers are still poweful, and Vindicare still nearly impossible to hit. Without the over the top ridiculous totals.

Alexis

*smiles*

macd21 said:

NEVER INVOKE THE NAME OF THE FLANDERSES!

If you succeed at a Feint, then it doesn't matter how many dodges the Assassin has left...

20d10, 30d10, 20+ dodges, seriously what is the point of these numbers? Has anyone actually looked at the system lately? Nothing has remotely enough health to take 1/5th the damage you're looking at here and no strike squad has nearly the firepower to overcome that Assassin ... when did this become RIFTS - all about the big numbers with no sense of what they mean to a setting? By these estimates your characters are literally demigods by the time they hit level 9, what happens when they hit 16th? Do they face armies? Solar systems? Goku, Vegeta?

Or they never lift a weapon again? That's fine with me, I'm the master of running entire campaigns without the need to fire a shot, but my players want combat at least once every couple sessions - but if nothing can beat them I might as well hand wave all the battles in my haste to get away from god wars and back to a plot.

And I don't care what you say about rp vs mechanics, if one character has spent his entire life trying to become a great Arbiter and another character - who has been in the game the same amount of time! - picks up the assassin package and makes the Arbiter look like a child playing at cops it is going to affect the story as much as player#1's enjoyment. It is not appropriate to sideline one character or characters simply because another player chose the uber build - even if he chose it for rp reasons.

What you end up with is a scenario where everyone in the group works at solving the mystery and then send in the Assassin/Primaris combo to do all the actual combat, kill the big bad, etc. Sure they succeed in the end, but the other players are really going to wondering where the closure for them is - where's the emotional and adrenal payoff that an awesome fight could provide? I'll tell you where it is, lying dead at the super duo's feet.