My friends and I ran our first session of Deathwatch. The ending was so epic, I promised I would forum post it. It's worth noting that one of our players was uncertain as to whether he really wanted to play, being more a roleplay than a dungeon-runner - he wound up playing a Salamander Tech-Marine (thanks to Direach's custom build). So the GM set up a clever adventure where a hive spire which had been used by the Inquisition to experiment on a Xeno artifact had gone silent.

Our objectives were:
1) Secure the spire, kill everything alive in it.

2) Retrieve the artifact.

3) Put the Hive under it in the control of someone competent.

We had the option of being inserted at the top of the spire, at the base of the spire/top of the hive, or at the underhive. We unanimously voted to hit the base of the spire and work our way up. Our GM immediately wrung his hands because he'd had all these social things to work through in the hive (we get to those next session).

So we (with some local help) moved to the nearest entrance to the spire. Our Tech-Marine's auspex picked up lots of people on the other side. Our GM assumed we would roleplay first interactions with human inhabitants of the spire, possibly trying to learn from them. I however (being the Librarian and voted squad leader for the mission), turned to the Tech-Marine and simply said "SUPPRESSIVE FIRE BROTHER". Our Tech-Marine pulls his heavy flamer out, opens the door and kills 25 of 30 genestealer-infected guards. One of the guards manages to actually hit the Tech-Marine with a return shot (the other four missed), but his lasrifle did little more than a flashlight. The five survivors did not make it to the next round of combat.

Moving along, we encountered a lictor (nasty, but quick to be put down) and then some hormagaunts (who were incapable of harming us as it turned out), before finding a room that read on the auspex as being full of pure humans. Our GM's eyes glimmer with hope at this next social interaction he'd put in our path. Our Tech-Marine however, already knowing his orders, moved into position and annihilated everyone in the room with single burst of righteous flame. Searching the room, we discovered amongst the corpses an Inquisitorial rosette, and the artifact on a central pedestal. Our Apothecary simply remarked "PITY THIS WAS NOT A RESCUE MISSION. THE INQUISITION WILL PROBABLY BE GIVING US MORE SPECIFIC ORDERS NEXT TIME" to which my Librarian responded "AT LEAST WE SHALL HAVE THE HONOUR OF RETURNING THEM AN INQUISITOR ALONG WITH THE ARTIFACT" and placed both the rosette and the artifact (a Necrontyr sphere of some sort) in a belt-pouch.

After a reasonably difficult battle between our intrepid heroes and a horde of genestealers and three Tyranid warriors which nearly killed both the Librarian and the Apothecary and went for over an hour, we cleared our way to the final fight - the Hive Tyrant.

We could see (using the auspex) that the HT was on the floor above us already headed our way, and since we'd already shut down the power there was only one path for it to come down to us by - a flight of stairs. Our Assault Marine pulled out his two meltabombs and placed them on the stairs, and my Librarian readied an Astartes missile launcher to hit the HT with a krak missile. The HT, however, surprised us all by pre-empting the trap and ripping through the ceiling behind us, putting us between it and the stairs.

As the Librarian's battle-brothers turned, startled, the Librarian had a flash of insight! "UP THE STAIRS BROTHERS! FORCE IT TO FOLLOW!"

The Assault Marine acted first - using his jump pack to fly through the hole the HT had made and dropping a krak grenade on its head. The Hive Tyrant fired off a psychic scream, but our Stoic Defense meant that we only took 1 wound we'd keep by the fight's end. The rest of us ran up the stairs, and waited. Having no choice now but to follow, the HT walked into our trap. The stairs flash-vapourised under the heat of the meltabombs they were never made to withstand and the HT took a whopping 60-something damage, but managed to grab the edge of our floor and began to scramble up. The Assault Marine managed to shove a krak grenade in its mouth and my Librarian fired off the krak missile he'd been saving.

Worse was yet to come for the Tyrant however, because as he pulled himself up, the Tech-Marine used the prodigious strength of his two mechadendrites (rated somewhere a bit over 100 Strength when unnaturals were factored in) to shove it back down the hole. The HT didn't even have the chance to dodge, because it had used all its action getting up in the first place.

Another krak grenade went down its throat, another krak missile into its face, it managed to get back up again, only to be shoved back down the hole once more. Another grenade and missile and the Tyrant's body exploded in a shower of gore and ichor, having dealt only three of us any wounds at all (and only 1 wound at that) and having only survived four rounds of combat.

The GM was silent, being unable to speak after having his ultimate boss so badly beaten at so little risk.

I did the only thing I could do. I pulled out my phone, flipped it off silent, searched through my music library and played a soundbyte I'd saved for just such an occasion:

"HUMILIATION"

And it looks like our Tech-Marine is gonna stay. He found it awesome.

I'm glad my kit-bashed Salamander build helped your Techmarine player have a good time. Sounds like the whole mission was pretty exciting!

Zahaqiel said:

Unable to be hurt by the gaunts because of bad dice or because of not understanding the rules?

Gaunts are meant to be played as a Horde and a small Horde of magnitude 30 deal 3d10+5, pen 3 with 2 attacks against every marine in melee. If your DM played the Gaunts as individuals, then yea, that is a waste of time.

Regardless, good game against the HT.

CptCaine said:

Actually, Hormagaunts are Overwhelming when in a Horde, so a Mag 30+ horde will do 4d10+5 Pen 3 and get 2 attacks per marine in melee. They are plenty nasty.

As for your story, I'm glad you had fun, but I have some questions (and I'm probably going to rip this as playing the HT wrong).

If I were the GM, I'd have had your heavy flamer just roast a bunch of helpless civilians, cuz assuming there are massive enemies back there is all kinds of metagamey. For shame. Not sure how a single heavy flamer killed 25 Genestealers. Unless you hit RF on every one, they shouldn't have been dead. Was he using the Horde rules for 'stealers? Seems an odd choice.

The techmarine Grappled the HT and you gave him a Str value of > 100? A Servo arm has a Str of 75 with Unnatural Str. A HT has 60 Str w/ Unnatural x3. It also is Massive, gaining +2 DoS from size. A Grapple test would give 2 free DoS to the Tech and 5 to the HT. Ties would be won by the HT due to the higher Unnatural multiplier. From your description, it seems like you either allowed him to add the strength of two arms or doubled it for Unnatural. Neither of those are correct, according to RAW. The Tech is unlikely to beat the HT, especially multiple times. Although not specified per RAW, with Multiple Arms and Improved Natural weapons, I'd probably allow the tyrant to have a melee attack during the Grapple.

Grappling would also put the Tech in Melee, making shooting or putting Grenades in mouths likely to hit him as well (especially the missile with Blast(1)). Speaking of missiles, why was your librarian carrying a launcher? No attack psychic powers or something? Was your Assault marine carrying an assault cannon too, or were you limited to just the two heavy weapons.

While climbing, the HT would be able to dodge as the Reaction is not used for movement. I'd probably apply the Prone penalty, making it unlikely, but still possible. With Str 60 and Unnatural x3, he'd be pretty good at climbing.

Hive tyrants are fairly smart guys (int 45), so I'd say it would probably learn its lesson after getting knocked down once, but that's a personal thing. If the KT did that, the Tyrant would be likely to Psychic scream until a few are stunned and then get up.

Grenade in the mouth is certainly cinematic, but it's your GMs fault for allowing it.

A HT completely on its own, chilling in a location very disadvantageous to its massive size is also odd.

Again, glad you had fun, but I wouldn't be too happy about 'beating' the GM's clear inexperience and lack of rule knowledge.

Radomo said:

This is the reason that you and I, Radomo, should probably never game together.

Also, just to point out a quick mention, he said they were genestealer infected guardsmen. Not genestealers. While they were on their way to becoming genestealers, they weren't quite there yet.

To the OP, it sounds like it was a fun experience! I'm glad that things went well for you and your group.

SpawnoChaos said:

Probably true, but I'd feel a bit let down by a climactic encounter that made the Big Bad completely bumbling and ineffectual. It's one thing to get extremely lucky or have some amazing plan, but 'the tyrant was too dumb to use his abilities and the GM let us get away with all kinds of stuff' makes it seem like there really wasn't that much danger in the first place.

The GM can kill the players whenever he wants ('the world is suddenly pulled into the warp. you all die'), but, in my opinion, there has to some sense of danger for their to be an accomplishment. What the OP described is, to me, equivalent to shooting fish in a barrel, once the tyrant was able to simply be dropped into a hole.

Again, glad they had fun, to each his own, YMMV, etc.

@CpnCaine:
Ah, that would have been a rules misunderstanding then. He was using their base statline, and yeah, they basically had to roll a 10 to do any damage at all with that rating.

@Radomo:
Facing actual stealers was pretty nasty. The flamer-takes-25 was against humans, as SpawnofChaos said. Infected humans are still humans and die just as fast.

As for the HT vs Tech-Marine, the HT did some awful rolls. It didn't dodge the Grapple attempts, and it failed the opposed strength tests. They did the math on the servo-arm strength, not sure why the rated strength was different but the Tech-Marine was also pretty heavily loaded with cybernetics, so it may have been valid. He also ceased to be in melee the instant he threw the HT down the hole, so no issue there with the grenade and missiles - since those were while the HT was climbing back up.

And the Librarian was using missiles because Smite doesn't compare favourably against creatures with 18+ armour ratings, especially since the Fear rating dropped his effective WP to somewhere around 10. It was more effective to stick to missiles and his force sword. The assault marine was using chainswords and grenades, and the Space Wolf with the other missile launcher left early.

As for the grenade in its mouth - it was busy climbing at the time and again, had already used its Reaction attempting to dodge the missile. Quite literally, it was "reach down, shove grenade".

Your GM also seems to have forgotten (as did you) about vertical leaps... from a standstill a Hive Tyrant can jump 3.6m... a running vertical jump would be 12.6 odd meters assuming the HT makes its agility test...

All of which means it could essentially have just popped back up the hole it came down through.

Zahaqiel said:

isn't there a penalty for attacking a specific body point or did your friend just keep rolling the head on the random location table?

Zahaqiel said:

A Servo-Arm's Strength of 75 is not modifiable by anything, exactly as it says in the description. It's possible for the HT to fail, but rather unlikely, as he gets 2 DoS just from size. But, you did mention he got dropped twice.

So, you had two missile launchers and a heavy flamer? Odd choices. My groups have always loaded down with specialty bolter ammo instead of 'everyone grabs a heavy.' Could also have to do with limiting the amount of gear they can carry. Every game I've played has limited you to a heavy OR basic, not both. And since bolters are ridiculously good, there's not much reason to give that up for a marginal utility missile launcher.

As said, a 'called shot' to the mouth/head would be at a -20, and what you're describing is using a grenade in melee, which is not allowed per RAW (some people HR though, so...).

Again, it's just my opinion, but a HT should be much more dangerous and, more specifically, intelligent than you described. Multiple arms and natural weapons should have allowed it to make some attacks while Grappled (it does have 5 attacks and 4 arms, so simply grabbing it shouldn't prevent it from smashing you). Losing the Grapple would be really unlikely, assuming you used the Servo-arm correctly. It should have easily climbed or jumped up the hole, went arround, or just psychic horrored you into submission. Bodyguard creatures or picking a better ambush spot than a stairwell. Your version seemed to be a mindless beast that couldn't work out that it had options other than climbing through a hole in the floor.

As for your WP issue, being in squad mode would have prevented that (should be the default mode, unless you really need to to solo). Although, I suppose you may not have had the cohesion left, assuming the leader failed the test against Fear damage, which is quite likely vs Fear 4.

I'm just sad that your player that didn't want to dungeon crawl entered an adventure where the GM had put in some RP opportunities and the group turned them all into charcoal. But as one of your players pointed out, the objective should've been more specific than 'kill everything that lives'

Not to add to the fire or toss an insult, but has your group played Dark Heresy or Rogue Trader at all? It seems to me that Deathwatch is the more 'advanced' of the three (starting at 13k DH xp)- a lot of the little nits and picks people seem to have with your encounter (which does sound hilariously fun by the way) stem from an unfamiliarity with the rules. There are a TON of nuance rules in DW, even more than in the other games; from the bonus Degrees of Success from unnatural strength to the way enemy encounters usually go go the 'standard' marine loadout to whether or not you have unlimited ammo. Don't let them get you down, keep playing, keep reading, and you and your group will start course correcting bits at a time.

To help with the WP/Fear rule, there is another thread on this ("they shall know no fear" or something) that goes over the vaisc, but you need to roll fear, fail it, then you either get your WP or cohesion affected. You don't just automatically take the penalty.

And yeah, called shots are at a base of -20, unless your GM invoked the rule of cool and just decided it was the HT's time (as in Necropolis when the commisar got his arms bit off- silly? maybe. cool? absolutely!)

Even with the 'kill everything' orders, which I agree are a bit silly for the GM to have given if he wanted to have roleplaying/talky encounters as he seemed to, I question whether Space Marines would thoughtlessly and ruthlessly obey those orders when meeting 'pure' and untainted humans.

Aside from anything else, leaving aside all moral questions (which Space Marines wouldn't necessarily do without questioning or at least feeling bad about obeying), pure humans might be potential allies, they might have valuable information on what happened in the spire, where the enemy are, who the enemy are, how strong are the enemy etc etc.

That aside, perhaps because of the 'kill everything' orders, the adventure comes across to me as more or less just a string of linked table top combats. Sorry if that sounds harsh or dismissive, but I don't see how that adventure couldn't have been replicated using the old Inquisitor tt rules for example.

@Sanguinary Priest:
There is a penalty on called shots. But not enough to counter rolls of 3 and 9 to hit when your BS and WS are both in the high 40s/low 50s. Our Assault Marine in particular was having pretty insane luck all night actually. Most of his rolls were under 30, and a statistically significant number were under 10. He just has that effect on dice, it's kind of insane.

@Charmander:
Yes, we've played both.

And the objective was actually pretty justified. Mysterious artifact, lost communications with that outpost, and the stormtrooper force sent in before us stopped responding. The Ordo Xenos basically expected everything in there to be outright corrupted or antithetical to the Imperium.

@Adam France:
It's actually pretty well-noted in lore that people infected by Genestealers show up as pure human on auspex. And the Librarian had already picked up that there was some Tyranid influence present. Plus, the Librarian is also a Dark Angel, so...

We're getting to dealing with the rest of the hive next session, which will be roleplaying more than combat - we just figured it was best to deal with the imminent threat first.

Oh, and it seems my GM caught that the servo-arms were only 75 str with unnaturals, I didn't catch that he corrected the Tech-Marine's player.

on FS the group i ran it with smashed the HT in 2 rounds with little trouble. Devestator, 2 tac marines on full auto, followed by a charge from the assault marine.

Even with prodigious agility it was nailed, mostly because one tac marine got FR and a total damage of 60+ damage after armour and toughness.

Overall my thoughts are that even the toughest opponents get nailed in single combat when your looking at 4 marines goint "at em" in squad mode.

The other side of the coin is that the "Boss Mobs" hit so hard that they can 1 shot the marines creating a kill or be killed situation.

Hordes are great for attrition on the marines, but with the silly amount of Req the marines get for a mission and the ammo mods, and once they start advancing ranks, the marines get really really tough.

In many ways it's munchkin power gaming, and as a GM you have to really think on how to incorporate the "Key Enemies", and mostly they need to get in with surprise to stand a chance.

Adam France said:

Depends on chapter, plenty of marines would kill them without a thought. Some would hesitate, some wouldnt do it at all. 40k being grimdark, the default is to just roast em. This is a setting where entire worlds have been exterminatus'ed due to rounding errors.

Nothing wrong with a hack-n-slash adventure in my book, sometimes talking gets old and it is fun to just punch it in the face.

I dunno where you found a hive tyrant alone with his **** completely hanging out somewhere that just let you shoot him.

But hey, it ain't my game, if it was up against a psy-rating 8 critter with a WP bonus of 14 that can Push its powers every round and never suffer perils of the warp. In short, your arseholes would have been destroyed by ranged damage that makes a melta bomb look like a pop-rock, long before this beastie ever had to bother getting his claws in you. Not to mention, its a hive tyrant, it commands a battlegroup sized force of 'nids you would have had to deal with first... Not "gee, I'll hang around up the top of this here tower like the proverbial evil D&D wizard until some heros bumble in and casually let them wreck me with heavy weapons fire" ...hmmm no.... wouldn't happen.

Sippin said:

...and just combat gets equally old, equally fast. I prefer rounded and balanced adventures that feature both interactive (roleplaying) encounters and tasks, as well as some combat.

The reason I was rude enough to cast judgement here on someone elses adventure is that from day 1 we were being told this game wouldn't just be a combat game. I haven't really seen much (any) evidence for how it fares with a less combat focused style of play. Also, what's the point of even using an rpg just to fight strings of combat encounters anyway? The tt game is probably better suited for that.

Adam France said:

Well, you need a narrative, of course. In my case, I'll run the first session of Oblivion's Edge tomorrow which is very combat-heavy. So my plan is this:

You have a new kill-team, made up of marines from all different chapters. They are all used to their way of doing things - Ultramarines going by the book, Storm Wardens seeking debate and being otherwise rather quiet, Space Wolves being dominant and manly , etc... This is bound to create interesting inner group interaction - if all goes well according plan, that is.

Not only that but I am going to fuel some rivalries (Dark Angels vs Space Wolves, the Space Wolves' dominant personalities clashing with the leadership expectations of the Ultramarine, etc.), I will nurture the impetus to seek glory for one's own chapter. And here's where the narrative comes in - it's all (well, not all but much) about team-building in the campaign. The growing together of vastly different, heroic individuals into a unit. (Of course some competition for glory is intended to remain, as I see that as a central theme too.)

If you want to bring more roleplay into it, the idea is this: let the Watch Commander assign them to a world (or a sector region or the Crusade) and have them develop standing relations with various people, especially if they have no direct authority over them. This fits with my general idea which turn the campaign should take at higher levels (err, ranks) - a more strategic level with the kill-team having higher responsibilities.

Being a small kill-team that gets send all around the sector like firemen isn't role-playing heavy and it's also a step back in comparison to Rogue Trader.

Back to the topic.

Alex

ak-73 said:

I don't think the 'small team of SM firemen' concept prevents roleplaying opportunities necessarily. It just takes a GM coming up with plausible reasons for interaction and roleplaying inside that structure.

The world-politics idea is certainly one possibility, there are plenty of others. I just am not sure the game itself encourages a more rpg game, as opposed to a combat heavy semi-tt game.

I actually am playing a SM campaign at the mo, using a different rpg system, but I'm always looking for fresh and new ideas, setting, characters, monsters, weapons, vehicles etc etc. My campaign is still on it's first adventure, with the three SM characters undercover on a Shrine World (yes ... SMs undercover!? - there are ways to do this) backing up an Officio Assassinorum assassin in accordance with an ancient pact their Chapter has. I have mapped out the next few adventures, each of which will feature at least as much roleplaying challenges and tasks as combat, probably more of the former in fact.

The second adventure, set on Acreage, will start with the pcs putting down offworld arms smugglers in a bit of a battle, then while awaiting extraction from the world (after presumably winning the battle) a local noble will approach the pcs asking for their expertise and knowledge of xenos. This will lead to a mystery that the pcs will be drawn into.

The third, set on Vraks (see the Forge World books) prior to the Imperial deployment onto the planet, features the pcs sent in special forces style to retrieve a data ark that contains charts showing the restructured defences of Cadia after the most recent Black Crusade, which cannot be allowed to fall into the hands of the heretic forces that have siezed the depot world. This will be a sandbox adventure with the pcs interacting with groups of loyalist survivors (Sororitas, pilgrim, Arbites), and defeating or sneaking through enemy groups to get to the hidden bunker containing the Ark. I envisage the pcs trying to bind the scattered Imperial groups together into a more organised Vraksian resistance while getting nearer to their ultimate goal.

The fourth, set on Prol, sees the pcs deployed to attempt to quell the escalating feud between the two main factions of the warring Decatalogues (see DH), but learning there is more going on behind one of the factions (I can't say what here as my players read these boards), and will end in a quest through the lower vaults of a vast data templum seeking a book that contains predictions of the future appearances of the Space Hulk Twilight.

The fifth, will see the pcs rushing to intercept the Twilight, board it, and battle through it's maze of corridors and chambers to find the sword and the book (see Purge the Unclean), before an enemy reaches the book. This will be a major dungeon, unlike the module I plan to allow the pcs to go whichever way they choose through the hulk, with rolls to navigate and find their way etc.

It's a myth SM games mean adventures just need to be a linked string of combats and horde fights. That's a weakness of the system, if that's all DW is.

All these adventures, and others I have less thought out, will allow plenty of non-combat, as well as a deal of combat too.