Darq said:
Phil73805 said:
I ran a Dark Heresy campaign, two in fact, that fell apart after a few sessions when my players realised that with the rules as they're written in the book they failed at everything. Veteran Guardsman who couldn't hit a barn door while standing in the doorway and other guys who were useless at what they did until reaching a theoretical level of competence. I say theoretical because they never got there. Why? Well, they died. A lot. Eventually I figured out ways of bypassing the rules but was then left with the question of what was the point of buying the book if I was forced to ignore the rules.
To be clear, these were veteran roleplayers and I myself no noob GM and yet...
So, Deathwatch. I thought, well they'll have sorted out any rules issues by now and I bought it as soon as it came out in my local store, Leisure Games in Finchley for any other local boys.
The same problems remain, a Space Marine with a maximum starting ballistic skill of 50?!
What. The. Hell?!
What part of genetically engineered superhuman was unclear. What part of training for 10 years followed by a couple of hundred years experience confused them? These aren't mediocre grunts who spray and pray...okay they probably pray to their guns but that's hardly the point now is it. I suspect that the rules would state that I give them +20's to everything because they're easy tests to pass for a Space Marine, that's cool but then what are the point of the stats in the first place. They do not reflect the abilities of the character they represent. For me, the most truly reflective stat line for a space marine was in Inquisitor. This was a guy who could kill a human by throwing a grenade at him . With the 'pin' still in place.
Before anyone comes up with the whole "but if they're so awesome they'll always win" argument. Nonsense, it is the job of any competent GM to provide a suitably challenging encounter for a group of post-human super soldiers carrying rapid firing-armour piercing-rocket launchers (boltguns in effect). Think up the sort of thing that would annihilate a human group of hardcore Inquisition agents and stand back as your marines figure out how to use they superhuman physique and weapons to sort it out.
My solution at the moment is, during character creation, change the stat equation by making it 2D10+50. I think this will create a stat line more akin to a Space Marine. It will also completely unbalance the game system.
I reckon I've missed something fundamental here in the rules (which, by the by, strike me as supremely cumbersome) so could any of you guys clear this up for me? What am I missing?
A big mistake people make with DH, even veteran RPG'rs is treating it like other games. DH IS an angry dangerous nasty place. Your group needs to AVOID getting killed and AVOID getting shot at because lets face it, getting shot is bad not good. DH is an investigation game, not a combat game.
Not nastier than many other RPGs I've played though. Cyberpunk is nastier because you're not a marine. Paranoia is nastier for different reasons. Cthulhu is very nasty in its own right. Heck, even Recon can be **** cruel for a player.
Darq said:
Now there are mechanisms to help them like fate points. With fate points its impossible to get killed (You can burn one to avoid it) So they are evidently getting killed a LOT or not using fate points.
What about Dodge / Parry - are they using those? They get that EVERY combat round.
I think the misconception lies elsewhere. Take melee combat for example. Even striking aimed with a standard attack, a super-hero Marine has sth like a 55% of hitting. New players tend to interpret that literally and it makes them think the system sucks because a marine can't even hit an opponent.
The truth is that he likely will have hit but the opponent will have parried or dodged. That is incorporated in/abstracted into the attack role. The Dodge Reaction represents an additional last ditch saving effort by those who have been trained in that.
Likewise an attack that fails to do damage due to Toughness does damage. It causes scratches and minor wounds, which may hurt slightly and have otherwise no effect worth mentioning.
Alex
