Medicae is the signature skill of the Apothecary. However, the healer role is generally a less popular choice in RPG (in my experience). Given the nature of the Deathwatch game the role becomes both less attractive to individuals and more important to the team.

Medicae is a Rank 8 General Space Marine Advance (800 point), so by RAW it is out of scope for any non-Apothecary (less than Rank 8!). However, why is basic training in Medicae so rare amongst general Space Marines? It could be argued that it might be SM tradition, but I don't know if there is any canon on it. It seems to me that a Killteam without an Apothecary is at quite a disadvantage - they have no method to recovery any wounds. Also geneseed cannot be recovered.

An option for the GM could be to allow another specialist to spend 800 points on Medicae at character generation. If he has 10 req point to spend on a mission, he can even equip an Narthecium. He doesn't get the special bonuses for an Apothecary of course, so he is not as good. He cannot train it further (without GM agreement) either. However, having this character about will allow some recovery between combat encounters.

I gave Medicae (First Aid) as a basic skill (half Int), no Narthecium, and the full skill is trainable at Rank 2.

I too have found "healers" to be less fun to play; but it is detrimental to the party if a healer is not available during missions/quests. Before I settled on playing a Librarian, I was going to play an Apothecary (to ensure the party had a healer). So in order to enhance my fun, the weapon of choice was going to be a missile launcher. Fortunately another player wanted to play an Apothecary, so I was able to switch to a Librarian.

Dan.

Yeah, I find no reason why first aid would not be a part of the space marine training.

I made medicae a general table rank 1 skill, for 500xp.

None of my players bought it though, and now the group is getting an apothecary, so its kinda a moot point now.

On narthecium: I'm not sure if I would allow it to be requisitioned by anyone but an apothecary. It seems similar to how a conversion beamer is techmarine only. There are just some things reserved for particularly specialized individuals. Because really, with medicae, all that really matters is IB, not so much actual bonus to skill (although passing the check is good).

Wouldn't it be a bit strange for a Marine to be raised to the Apothecary while in the Deathwatch? They'd have to take time to "earn their degrees," as it were, and get biological and medical training. Indeed, it strikes me that if no-one wants to be an Apothecary then throwing it onto another "package" might be in background terms... a bit off.

Apothecaries are counted amongst the "elite warriors" of their Chapter, a distinction which is unfortunately not really done justice in Deathwatch. If this were a Chapter-specific game, one might imagine that the character would be at least level 3/4 before they were even allowed to the Medicae skill...

Kage

Personally, I've found from play experience that Space Marines wouldn't normally train in Medicae because they don't need to. The average Marine can shrug off most injuries, or ignore them completely. In our games, we have yet to encounter an enemy so deadly that it put any of our Marines out of commission (which I'm OK with). Apothecaries exist to prevent Marines from dying of injuries horrible enough to incapacitate a Marine, which is always more than enough to kill several normal people (and to recover gene-seed, yes).

If you want to involve fluff (and there's VERY little in 40K that doesn't tie into fluff), it's not just a matter of "knowing the skill"... Medicae is at least as steeped in ritual as any tech-related skill, probably more so because it deals (quite literally) with the lifeblood of the Chapter. A boltgun or land raider, while treasured, can be replaced in less time than it takes to replace a dead Marine. It takes an exceptional Marine with a gifted mind to master Medicae while at the same time progressing as a combat-ready battle brother, hence Apothecaries.

And if you don't want to involve fluff, there's an even more simple explanation: if you let anyone take Medicae, even from Rank 2, there is no reason to ever have an Apothecary on a kill-team.

If you need supplemental healing for your team but don't want to make Apothecaries irrelevant, you can always house-rule an emergency med-kit for 20 Req that can heal 1d5 Wounds up to 10 times before it's empty. That way you have a resource to manage, and you don't completely step on the Apothecary's role.

Isn't there a reason why fate points can be used to remove 1d10 damage?

Direach said:

Wait a minute.

Doesn't the armour include what is in essence a med kit? Or was that considered to be cutting into the awesomeness?

Kage

Kage2020 said:

"Apothecaries are counted amongst the "elite warriors" of their Chapter, a distinction which is unfortunately not really done justice in Deathwatch."

It needed to be repeated in bold and italics. None of my players has made an Apothecary. Which is a real shame. An Apothecary deserves much more love than given by the rulebook and I suggest at least Wisdom of the Ancients at an affordable cost at low rank. I also suggest the same for Duty Unto Death for the importance of their duty. Other suggestions could include Fearless, Foresight, Resistance (Psychic Powers), Stalwart Defense.

That would make the specialty interesting to play, experienced and tough. But RAW it's fairly bland.

Alex

Apothecaries are trusted with the deepest, darkest secrets of their Chapters gene seed. To keep heretical secrets about how far mutated their chapter is, is a grave responsibility and burden which would not be given or taken lightly.

A DW Apothecary is in a unique position to be given access to the dark heart of many other Chapters and be trusted never to speak of what he knows. I think this aspect of Apothecaries is understated in the book.

ItsUncertainWho said:

That's an issue worthy of its own thread.

Alex

ItsUncertainWho said:

Perhaps, but the issue here is a team-member with training in battlefield first aid - they are not maintaining/monitoring the teams implants. That job is still with the true Apothecaries. Digging out a heavy slugga round and reattaching a torn muscle doesn't (normally) require such secrets.

Fresnel said:

It does require such secrets when you have to dig through a physiology that the Mechanicus only holds a tenuous understanding of, with several inhuman organs which have unknown and often undesired effects. Could YOU dig through a space marine's torso with lifeguard training from your local Red Cross?

Fresnel said:

Deathwatch is certainly non-traditional when it comes to the "Healer" role. Does the stigma really exist in this game? Apothecaries kick ass with the rest of them.

Magos Militant Arcturus said:

This of course takes a minimalist approach to the knowledge held by the Imperium and its organisations, which is not necessarily the same as the obvious retrotech imagery and approaches. In short, YMMV is going to vary on this, but it seems fairly clear from the 'fluff' that "Medicae" is not too rarefied a skill...

Kage

Kage2020 said:

A lot depends on how you handle skills. If you think anyone with Medicae is qualified to treat an Astartes without penalty then that is your belief. Personally, unless a trained medicae has Forbidden Lore Astartes also, I would give hellish penalties to their medicae tests to treat a space marine. I doubt most medicae facilities have best quality chain scalples lying around with personell trained to use them. Normal surgical tools aren't going to make much of a dent in the Black Carapace.

ItsUncertainWho said:

When it comes to the 40k universe, as witnessed in the forum and the published materials, at lot depends on how you handle many things.

ItsUncertainWho said:

I will presume that this is directed at me? If that is the case, I do not claim otherwise. Indeed, for me it is a matter of familiarity to the accomplished physician/surgeon, one that is most certainly going to hamper them. Hellish penalties, though? I would imagine that depends on the specific circumstance.

ItsUncertainWho said:

And we're back to it depending on how you treat "skills," or in this case Marine physiology. On my part, or at least my interpretation if I were to be more honest, "normal surgical tools" will make it through the Black Carapace, and even the "ceramic" hardened bone (which is actually on the "cutting edge" of public medical science, out of interest). It might put greater wear-and-tear on the relevant tool, but call it a "chain scalpel" or a "rotary saw" it makes little difference.

Diamond and tungsten carbide cutting blades will go through quite a bit... YMMV, though.

Kage

I advise adamantite blades.

Alex

Magos Militant Arcturus said:

Very poor analogy.

We are discussing a Space Marine trained to perform battlefield first aid on space marines. Invasive surgery does require detailed knowledge of the subjects anatony - which would only be an issue for some Chapters, not all. However, the issue at hand is First Aid.

In the extraction mission- two med kits are available within Central Control. The advanced version of these, according to the RT book give a +20 to all medicae skill tests, and allow the user to perform the action even if he isn't trained in them. I'd say that kill teams without an apothecary can use these instead of getting the medicae skill.

The normal versions only grants +20 medicae, but the advanced let the space marine use it without even having the trained skill.

The Advanced Medkit weighs 5kg, and is Rare (Meaning ~15-20 Req per according to the Req chart.). Slap on the Astartes brandname- Astartes Advanced Medkit and you have yourself a decent solution to having no apothecary. Give it a certain number of uses so it doesn't outright replace the Apothecary, as well as not allowing it to be used for extended medical care and it might be a half decent thing to include when your game is lacking an apothecary.

Tidomann said:

Or you could just have them Requisition a Medicae Servo Skull or two.

Minor point, but the idea of Marines being trained to perform emergency first aid on their brethren is not entirely without precedent - two distinct stories, by two different authors that I've read in the last month both present the idea, the first being the first two books of the Tome of Fire/Salamanders trilogy by Nick Kyme (where a battle-brother trained in basic field medicine assists the company Apothecary, who is later chosen to become a full Apothecary himself), and the second being the Silver Skulls short story in the first (and free) issue of Hammer and Bolter (available from the Black Library website here), where a member of the protagonists' squad is trained in field medicine in the absence of an Apothecary.

Another minor point is that non-Apothacary's training Medicae is specifically allowed in the RAW - both as a general space marine advance and as an Elite advance.

Tidomann said:

True, but what does the untrained character use for his roll? Half intelligence plus 20?

Dan.

CptCaine said:

Yes, that is how that would work. So the majority of marines doing this would have in the Mid thirties at least.