all players in my DW campaigns will be required to recite an oath at the start to get it;s benefits, and if they want to use it's benefits in the game, they need to call on the oath.

I expect my first full fat session to have a substantial debate on what oath will be used for the mission.

HI all,

Unless I am mistaken I think there is a talent to give the option to the player when they are leader to share their squad mode ability(chapter) to all is kill team, i do not have my book with me and i do not remember the name of the talent. But this should solve all the questions concerning the squad mode(chapter).

thanks

Lordes

Lordes said:

There is no such talent, there is however theTactical Expertise Ability of the Tactical marine (one of the two possible Abilities)

I have confirmed the following as the intended use/rules:

1. The available Squad Mode abilities you Kill Team has access to is limited by the Oath you take plus your Chapter specific abilities.

2. Chapter specific Squad Mode abilities only affect characters from the same Chapter. (exceptions apply, Tactical Marine ability as example)

3. Cohesion costs are paid each time the ability is activated. Sustained ability only pay once regardless how long its sustained. Non-Sustained pay for it when the ability is used. But as soon as you stop sustaining it or back to Solo-Mode then you have to pay Cohesion to start it again.

kenshin138 said:

Your wording isn't crystal-clear though - a brother can his own chapter-specific squad mode ability irrespective of who is team leader? Is that correct?

Alex

ak-73 said:

Son of a...forgot to include that to get some kind of response...my bad! #1 was from the earlier discussion in this thread.

kenshin138 said:

That's why the thread is titled squad mode confusion. Everything's totally confusing.

Alex

I've asked Ross if:

1) Only one Squad Ability can be active at a time, or if different parts of the squad can have different Squad Abilities running at the same time (so, basically, could the two Devastators be off using one Squad Ability, whilst the Tactical Marine and Assault Marine are in close combat using another Squad Ability); and

2) If anyone can activate a Squad Ability, or if it is just the Squad Leader that activates them.

One additional question would be , whether only squad leaders and members of their chapter may activate their chapter specifics, as the leader and therefore oath dictate the ability loadout for the mission.

MILLANDSON said:

While you're asking him, can we get clarification whether Pistols can be used in Full-Auto in Melee? I'd say no but I don't see any rules regarding this.

Alex

They could in Dark Heresy and Rogue Trader from what I remember, so sure, you can go full-auto with them in close combat.

This was brought up in our first game as something my players "can do in RT". I need to check my RT rules, but in DW this is not allowed:

Page 247 - Engaged in Melee: "can only make attack actions with the melee subtype".

Page 242 - Semi-Auto Burst: "Subtype: Attack, Ranged"

Semi and Full do not have Melee listed for subtype, so no, when engaged in Melee they cannot use the Semi or Full-Auto Burst action

this thread gives me an odd sense of satisfaction, as its gone 3 pages and we're still not quite sure

to sum up, heres a worked example.

the squad: ultramarine tactical squad leader, an ultramarine tactical marine with tactical expertise, dark angel tactical marine with tactical expertise, blood angel assault marine.

Oaths: may choose from Oath of the Astartes, Oath to the Emperor, Oath of Glory, or Oath of Loyalty. going for flexibility, he chooses the Oath of the Astartes.

Squad Mode Abilities: Tactical Advance, Bolter Assault, Tactical Spacing, Lead by Example, Rally Cry

any member of the team in squad mode may activate tactical advance, bolter assault, or tactical spacing. the squad leader may use either of the ultramarine specific abilities, but only the other ultramarine may take part. the UM tactical marine may also use both these abilities, but may also share them with the DA and BA with a -20 command check. the DA may not use his tac. expertise ability, as his chapter squad abilities are not available. if everyone is in squad mode, the BA may initiate a tactical advance with anyone in support range who wants to joining in, and at the same time the UM can lead everyone else by example. as long as noone benefits from more than one ability per turn, we're golden.

all present and correct?

it seems to me if this is the case, the tactical expertise ability (usually) will be wasted if youre not the leader. it also implies that if everyone is of the same chapter, they have a big advantage in squad combat - which shouldnt be a big surprise i suppose. due to the extra abilities, a team that doesnt take an ultramarine tactical with expertise is missing out big time, as the sheer number of cohesion bonuses and abilities piles up. this being ofcourse, the point. a UM tactical marine who maxes out on fellowship could have a bonus of 6, add to that 2 from an Oath of Astartes, 1 from command skill, 1 from power armour, and thats 9 cohesion without any bonuses from his fellows. give him a back banner and the fancy UM sword, and you can just spam LEad by Example and Rallying cry while everyone else sits in a circle of awesomeness around you.
it also occurs that if you are not a tactical marine with expertise, you are unlikely to become squad leader unless most of your team are the same chapter as you. the only exception that occurs to me is the oath of knowledge which has very defensive abilities associated with it.

so to keep this simple for my players, i think printing out a few Oath Sheets (with a red seal and everything) with the stuff on would be handy, as would a summary of each chapter's squad abilities to be added to the bottom.

A good interpretation I think. However it does leave me with the following thoughts

with 4-5 players, the chances are you will have at best 2 marines from the same chapter. Add the expansion sourcebook that introdcues new chapters and the chances are you will not have any marines of the same chapter.

This means if you want specific squad abilities you will need to have the appropriate chapter tac marine with tac expertise within every group.

To me this seems that in most cases the oath will be the same (or sameish) and that many of the squad abilities simply won't get used.

Perhaps a house rule that the leader's chapter squad abilities (oath permitting) can be called upon at the cost of 1 cohesion per non-chapter based marine.

At renown rank 3 this cohesion loss can be countered by a command -20, and at renown 7 is a straight command roll to avoid the loss. (either roll once for the entire cost, or once per marine).

This does cut into tactical expertise somewhat, but they can allow marines to use the ability at the start without cost and no cohesion costs.

However I genuinely feel that without this flexibility (and isn't that the point of the DW KT) is always going to look to the same leader and the same oath, otherwise the game will generate into 1 oath and 2 squad mode abilities.

I'm still suggesting a rule that allows players to learn squad mode abilities from other chapters over time. That represents both the growing together as a team as well as the unique standing that the DW hold.

Alex

I think Fatpob has a very good idea there with the 0-3-7 rank increments for chapter abilities. After all, there things come from the constant training with battlebrothers from the same chapter and over time, the kill-team will create their own little 'mini-chapter' in terms of being able to blindly count on the actions of the brother next to you. makes perfect sens and allows for those chapter abilities to be actually used in game.

ak-73 said:

After rank 5 or 6 I'm just going to wave this rule to represent them coming together as a team. Anyone designated as a leader will be able to activate a chapter specific mode they have and affect the whole party with a -20 Command test. Tactical Marines doing this do the Commadn test at +0.

Questionable Methods said:

I would exclude characters though who joined later (because their predecessor got killed, for example). Also I might aim at lowers ranks because we don't play that often DW.

Alex

I thought about the excluding people who haven't been around that long, but felt it might be a bit unfair to those people who just joined the group or their last characters died. I think just saying Rank "X+" works fine.

If the GM allows a player to bring in a character of equal rank/renown to the previous character then they will already have worked with the Deathwatch enough to quickly adapt to the ways of other Chapters.

If the GM makes new players or replacement characters come in at Rank 1 then they will have to play 'catch up' and get used to working with the varied talents and mentalities of Astartes outside their own Chapter before they get this benefit.+

And the reason I say rank 5ish is that breaking the habits of your last Chapter (built up over centuries in some cases), will be a bit of a pain to break. Even with the renowned focus and mental prowess of an Astartes 50 years of work habits will take some time to break.

Maybe I read it wrong, but the Tactical Marine ability appeared to me to work regardless of if the Tac Marine was squad leader.

This would put considerable oomph in bringing along two tac marines from different chapters, adding a squad option for each one if they can make the LD test.

Lucky_Strike said:

Yeah, the squad mode ability doesn't say anything about having to be the leader, it just says whenever the tactical marine uses a squad mode ability, he can share it... That being said, it also requires a command check, which might piss off the squad leader, as I would assume you would have to be in command to command someone?

If you are trying to find the answer using the spirit of the rule, you may look to actual military squads, which are made up usually of a number of 2 man fire teams. You have teams, then squads, then platoons, etc.

If you take into account that there is a leader who can use the varied talents of the differing members of the squad by ordering them into teams, does that keep cohesion (in spirit) or does having a couple of smaller groups using their specialties to benefit the mission as a whole break cohesion down to fire team cohesion, which would break overall squad cohesion. I know this is not the rules per se, but I thought about the spirit of the rules regardless of the concequences. It may make it very easy to slip into UM Tactical leader every time, but that's not my point with this reply. My point is, regardless of whether it is a good rule or bad, it needs to be understood how it was intended before it can be house ruled out so we know what we are trying to fix.

It's kinda like replacing the alternator in your car if it stops running only to find out you were actually out of gas, if that makes any sense at all.

@KellonBane

That being said, it also requires a command check, which might piss off the squad leader, as I would assume you would have to be in command to command someone?

It shouldn't and you wouldn't. It's made clear that the squad leader is not a tyrant (or a modern commanding officer), but a kind of first-among-equals, the tie-breaker in case the squad can't decide on a course of action. I theory, we're still talking highly trained professionals here - in 90% of all situations, they should know what they're doing without constant supervision.

Cifer said:

I'll let my kill-team decide how they are going to handle leadership. If they want to, they can make it pretty hierarchical. Or they can debate/vote ooc and have the team leader have to accept that as his estimation of the situation. Whatever floats their boat.

Alex