Okay so being a SW player since 3rd edition it breaks my heart to see how they a portrayed in the corebook. we do alil more then drink wrestle wolves and the like. so a friend and i sat down and did a new work up for them. Before i show it to my players i figured i would run it past you fine men and women and collect some thoughts.

Space Wolves

+5 WS and +5 Perc. also heightened sense (smell)

Reason:i cant think of a wolf whose bad at melee

Solo Ability: Counter-Attack ( i know there is an ability already called this)

Once per combat, for a number of rounds equal to the SW rank, they may make a standard attack as a Reaction. This consumed the SW reaction for the round.

Squad Mode ability: I didnt really see a huge need to change this one.

Advances:

Tracking 200

Tracking +10 200

Tracking +20 200

Intimidate 200

Intimidate +10 200

Intimidate +20 200

Berserker Charge 600

Combat Sense 500

Hardy 400

Iron Jaw 500

Resistance (cold) 200

Hatred (CSM) 500

Talented (tracking) 500

Wisdom of the Ancients 1500

So thoughts, feed back, comments? all welcomed

I certainly like it much better and think it is far more indicative of the Wolves, but just a few nit-picks.

First: I don't really think the solo-mode ability is a good idea. A Solo-Mode Ability should not be rendered obsolete by taking a talent. Granted said talent is normally restricted to Assault Marines, but even so. Wolf Senses is much better considering it can't be replicated by any old marine with the Assault Specialty.

Second: This is quite minor, but, I'm a little disappointed that Mark of the Wulfen (Which I think is best represented by Frenzy & Battle Rage, but that's just my opinion) is still not covered by this Chapter Advance Scheme. Like I said this is minor but some of us would like to play a Space Wolf with the Mark, particularly if we are playing an Assault Marine.

Edit: And you're right about Wolves and melee, they rise through the ranks by being good at melee and surviving.

Well definitely thanks for the input its much appricated. and i do see where your coming from on ur points. so the solo ability, i really like the idea but im open to different ways to do it and/or retool it. counter attack is probably one of the biggest things the wolves have going for them in TT so i wanted that to be in the RPG in someway shape or form.

As far as the Mark goes, i didnt include frenzy in the list for a couple reasons. Number one is that in all honesty most space wolves arent frenzying monsters in combat. most people just have that idea cuz the space wolves novels are based on ragnar who is know for his amazing frenzied combat. Second, the mark of wulfen is actually a pretty rare thing since it is a flaw in the geneseed. also on the mark it is nothing to really be proud of, it is not a blessing in any way. but i do see where your coming from with that because for RPG it would be a blast to work with. Third, when i was coming up with the advances i noticed at certain points i was really getting into blood angels territory so to speak. and they are more known for their red thrist then we are as berzerkers.

once again thanks for the input and i would really like to hear some other ideas

I've read the novels and like your build but I was really hoping someone would retool more for the "Pack" aspect the Space Wolves have. When they lose a pack member they are never happy about it and just as much when they have their pack or squad with them they tend to work a lot better than people let on. Everyone says Wolf Scout solo whatever is what the chapter does but when you get down to the core of what the wolves are about its really about the pack and the brotherhood those marine share, on and off the battlefield and I just don't see it in their playstyle at all.

I was honestly thinking of some of the group cohesion talents to boost the overall chapters ability to provide cohesion or the ability for the group to work well together. Any solo marine can take on whatever they need to alone but as far as the book goes so far the ultramarines are really the only chapter that can hold a group together well.

Just my take on the chapter as a whole, and maybe you'll disagree but I figured I'd share my viewpoint of what I got from the chapter.

I very much like the build, and this is coming from someone who isnt nearly as dissapointed in the corebook's build as many other Wolves out there. I agree that the solo-ability shouldn't be Counter-attack (as you could always include this in the Chapter Advance Scheme).

The hard part of working on a Space Wolf advance scheme is that they are so very different from the typical Codex Space Marine.

Try this as a Space Wolves Solo Mode Ability:

Sagas

The people of Fenris have a long and proud tradition of storytelling, recounting their history in the tales of their heroes, and the Space Wolves are no different, with every Battle Brother seeking to forge a great saga of triumph, honour and heroism over the course of their long lives.

When taking an Oath with his Kill-Team before a new mission, a Space Wolf may swear his own oath, a promise of his future accomplishments. While under this oath, the Battle Brother will strive all the harder to achieve his personal goal. The oaths that a Space Wolf may swear are listed below - one, and only one, should be chosen before each mission. Each oath grants a benefit, but also comes with a requirement, and if this is not fulfilled, the Battle Brother's honour and skill will be in question, tarring his reputation with failure and reducing his Renown by 5 at the end of the mission.

Saga of the Bear

The Battle Brother has the determination and endurance of the great Cave Bears of Fenris; even the mightiest of blows cannot lay him low. A number of times during the mission equal to half the Battle Brother's rank (rounding up), he may reduce the amount of damage suffered from a single hit, after deductions from Toughness Bonus and Armour, by half, rounding up.

Visit Fury Upon The Evil Ones: The might of the Sons of Russ must be demonstrated for all to see; during the mission, the Battle Brother must deal the killing blow to a single Master creature, or slay single-handed three Elite creatures.

Saga of Majesty

The Battle Brother has the stature of kings and his voice resounds with an ageless commanding presence. This Saga may only be chosen if the Space Wolf is chosen as Squad Leader. A number of times during the mission equal to the Battle Brother's rank, he may re-roll any failed Fellowship or Command Test to avoid suffering Cohesion Damage. In addition, the squad gains +1 starting Cohesion. Unlike most Solo Mode abilities, the Saga of Majesty remains in effect even if the character is in Squad Mode.

Lead by Example: A true hero does not cower behind walls or flee from his enemies. The Battle Brother loses Renown at the end of the mission if, at any point during the Mission, he takes cover or retreats from combat.

Saga of the Hunter

The Battle Brother prowls like the hunting wolf, slipping unseen past enemies before striking from the shadows. The Battle Brother may not wear a Jump Pack or Terminator Armour if he chooses this Saga. A number of times equal to the Battle Brother's rank, he may ignore the normal penalties to Silent Move and Concealment Tests imposed by his size and his armour.

Attack Unseen : The greatest hunters attack from unexpected angles and at times of their own choosing. At least once during the mission, the Battle Brother must attack an enemy unaware of his presence.

Saga of the Warrior Born

The Battle Brother slays with unrelenting fury, the blood coating his blade only inspiring greater ferocity. A number of times equal to the Battle Brother's rank, he may gain a +10 bonus to hit in Melee for every enemy he slew in the previous turn, and a +5 bonus to hit for every point of Magnitude he removed from an enemy Horde.

Reap a Great Tally : Many foes should fall to the Battle Brother's blade. The Battle Brother must slay at least 10 individual enemies, or inflict at least 30 points of Magnitude damage (or some combination of the two; 3 magnitude is, in this case, counted as equal to a single enemy slain), and these kills must occur in melee.

Saga of the Beastslayer

Many tales have been told of heroes triumphing against monstrous foes, and many Space Wolves seek out such prey to prove their might. A number of times equal to the Battle Brother's rank, he may re-roll an attack roll made against a target (creature or vehicle) that is Enormous or larger or which has a Toughness Bonus of 10 or higher. This does not have to be a failed attack roll - the Battle Brother could re-roll a successful roll in the hopes of scoring more Degrees of Success.

Fear Not The Beast: To demonstrate that he does not fear such mighty foes, the Battle Brother must deal the killing blow to at least one enemy that is Enormous or larger or which has a Toughness Bonus of 10 or higher.

SonofRuss said:

Yes. FFG SW's do have 18 picks, yours have 14. I would recommend putting the Carousing skills back in for role-playing flavour. Also, while I doubt that many of the Space Wolves performances can be considered High Art, keeping Performer (any) at trained level (+0) would be nice. The +10/20 advances are unnecessary and can be taken as elite advances.

Likewise I'd try to squeeze Wrangling+0 in there. Again, higher advances can be taken as elite advances. If necessary, take out one level of Intimidate? Once more - the highest level can still be picked as elite advance? Also Iron Jaw is totally fitting but I wouldn't consider it an absolute must . After all one could also add Resistance (Heat) given the conditions on Fenris and I am sure many more talents could be added... one has to filter out the core traits.

Other than that your ideas fit mine pretty much precisely . +5 WS is a must as the Space Wolves are described in the latest Codex (and all previous ones) as Close Combat chapter.

All SWs pick up Berserker Charge as Blood Claws. Combat Sense seems to be a must, as the wolves are intuitive fighters.

Seriously though, I would retain the FFG Solo Mode ability, if for no other reason than to make the changes not too extensive. If necessary, give the Space Wolves the talents Furious Assault (all-out attacks fighting style!) and/or Counter-Attack.

I gave my players one of these for free even but that's in the context of giving every player one free starting talent of my choosing (the DA librarian of the Inner Circle had been given Forbidden Lore(Astartes), for example, or the Tyranid War Vet has been assigned Hatred(Nids)).

Alex

PS And for the sake of completeness: my player's chars are from the Sven Bloodhowl company. I took the liberty to house rule that they don't spit acid, when they use Betcher's Gland, they spit fire instead. (Remove Toxic quality but a target hit by the attack counts as being on fire.)

SonofRuss said:

While I do admit that it is rare and that it is a flaw are both true, I have to disagree on it not being a blessing. Bran Red Maw's Great Company is quite well known for the Mark and for their savagery. Also unlike the Blood Angels with the Death Company, the Space Wolves do not put down pack members with the Mark, they allow them to serve the chapter. Besides, in TT the Mark potentially gives them two to three times their normal close-combat attacks and these are made with the Rending special rule, I don't see how this is a bad thing, the restriction on special weapons was a balancing factor introduced in light of the fact that Marked Wolves can now be in packs as opposed to being lone, single model squads like the Lone Wolves.

Perhaps making it a background package then?

Alright so first off i like the idea of the sagas but im afraid that it may be too much and alil too involved. But definitely an awesome idea.

As far as the reason i went with 14 advances instead of the 18 is for the fact that it is the average of advances between the chapters. Most of the time if they do go above that its due to a large amount of skills (lores, etc). I took out wrangling for the sole reason of after wrestling with a fenrisian wolf this would rarely get used. Im open to a good reason to include this but i just dont really see one. Im afraid Im going to have to say the same with performing and carousing. Carousing i could see for drunken war stories and so on but i dont see a wolf putting on a play or juggling for performing. but once again my mind may be swade (sp) with a good reasoning. I went with iron jaw just for balancing, I really wanted to do fearless but i thought that might be a tad bit OP.

I do like the idea of furious assault and counter attack. so i will most likely take out the resistance and add those two. Im still torn with the solo ability. Im not a fan of the no helmet just to use and with the exception to the reroll on perc checks every marine can have dark vision but wearing their helm if im not mistaken.

Once again thanks for all the feed back please keep it coming i would really like to hear peoples opinions.

I use my Performer for Storytelling, being that my character is a skald/leader. He would use a rousing story to improve the moral of nearby troops and/or get them to stand their ground in the face of overwhelming odds.

muzzyman1981 said:

Alright see thats what im talking about i would have never thought to use performer to tell stories i thought that would have just been curousing.

SonofRuss said:

Thing is, though, just because you can't see a use for them, doesn't mean the character should have access to them. Skill with wild animals (and there are a lot of very large, very dangerous wild animals on Fenris) and an inclination towards drunken feasting and storytelling are all parts of the Space Wolves background. Perform (Storyteller) in particular should be a must-have for Space Wolves Rune Priests, because they don't have a Librarius like other Chapters do, but rather recount all the lore and legends of their Chapter through the sagas that comprise their vast oral tradition. Those advances are representative of the background, no less than the Blood Angel's access to Talented (Trade [Artisan]).

The background is more than a justification for characters to be good at particular kinds of fighting.

N0-1_H3r3 said:

Yes, but Space Wolves aren't any good at fighting unless it's against Chaos Space Marines. And I think that's pretty situational, don't you? Besides the book even says they "excel at close-quarters fighting". How could that possibly be construed so that they have no combat related advances save Hatred (Chaos Space Marines)?

That is the point of threads like this

I think the major problem is that in the current "careers" there really is no good fit for the Space Wolves. Outside of the Blood Angels, and they more beserker/"blood high" kind of fighters, the Space Wolves are the close combat Chapter of the Space Marines. The problem with that is there are already 3 close combat focused Chapters in the Deathwatch corebook and if they made the Space Wolves like that then it would be really un-balanced.

I personally love my Space Wolf Tactical Marine and so far he has worked out very well.

Daisuke said:

Have you ever seen a Space Marine that didn't?

No, the problem is that Space Wolves aren't being represented properly in the abilities they are given relative to the background given in the fething rule book.

The Wolves should not be getting a Fellowship bonus as none of them are socialites, heck, depending on what great company they belong to they outright hate their own chapter brothers. Only a minority would have high Fellowship scores and those would only be the leaders of the companies. They also only have one, count them one, combat related talent.

If FFG was really interested in balance they would have included something exclusive on the Space Wolf Scheme, like all the other chapters have, instead of a bunch of random stuff that's freely available on the General Space Marine Advance Scheme.

N0-1_H3r3 said:

I'm not talking about a natural talent for it, I'm talking about chapters that focus on it. Most chapters are codex adherents, meaning they favor ranged combat over melee.

Daisuke, i think your kinda of missing the point of the discussion. we have all come to terms that no one is very thrilled with the core books take on SW but there are dozens of threads already discussing that point alone. i started this one to get points and tips on a variant that i thought would be alil more true to the wolves we know and love.

Alright so this is the updated version of the original post i made.

Space Wolves

+5 WS and +5 Perc. also heightened sense (smell)

Solo Ability: Saga of the Warrior Born

The Battle Brother slays with unrelenting fury, the blood coating his blade only inspiring greater ferocity. A number of times equal to the Battle Brother's rank, he may gain a +10 bonus to hit in Melee for every enemy he slew in the previous turn, and a +5 bonus to hit for every point of Magnitude he removed from an enemy Horde. (thanks for this one N0-1_H3r3)

The solo ability i borrowed from N0-1 and i like it the only thing im worried about is if it would be alil OP

Squad Mode ability: I didnt really see a huge need to change this one.

Advances:

Tracking 200

Tracking +10 200

Tracking +20 200

Intimidate 200

Intimidate +10 200

Performer 200

Berserker Charge 600

Combat Sense 500

Hardy 400

Iron Jaw 500

Furious Assault 600

Hatred (CSM) 500

Talented (tracking) 500

Counter - Attack 800

Wisdom of the Ancients 1500

Sorry, this is a subject I get passionate over. I'll just be off to cool myself down and work on my own Space Wolves projects.

N0-1_H3r3, muzzyman1981,

I would like to apologize for giving the two of you so much attitude in my posts, it was uncalled for. Please forgive me.

N0-1_H3r3 said:

In the context of a book about Space Marine I think that cannot really be interpreted other than "excel even in comparison to vanilla chapters". To say, that this isn't something that Space Wolves love and prefer (more so than ranged combat, which they naturally are also capable of) is probably going to be a tough sell.

Alex

ak-73 said:

Personally, I don't think anyone should have gotten bonuses to WS or BS as part of their chapter bonuses, both because inclination and personal/traditional preference have little to do with skill (if you want a character more focussed on melee, choose an Assault Marine or otherwise buy WS advances), and because from a meta-game perspective, a bonus to WS or BS results in characters being typecast into particular roles, which reduces the number of actual character options (as opposed to potential ones, because an option that everyone ignores isn't really an option at all).

N0-1_H3r3 said:

From an RPG company's perspective this holds true though too - if many Space Wolves fans don't feel "their" chapter properly represented and retool it to make it more close combat-oriented, the designer's have to ask themselves if they have made the right decision. An advancement scheme that everyone ignores isn't one at all. And if a chapter gets a kick out of combat, I think it means that its devastators, techmarines, etc. are probably more apt at close combat than those from other chapters.

That player's resort to cliche is often not to be prevented. I have an Ultramarine Tactical in my group after all. That is just as typecasting as giving the WS/BS bonus.

Alex

ak-73 said:

Thing is, though, that an Ultramarine isn't particularly 'missing out' if he chooses a different speciality - Ultramarines are good squad leaders in any speciality, due to their flexible characteristic bonuses and easy access to Command (the only thing they lose, really, is the advantage of their Chapter squad attack - because the squad defence doesn't actually care if the squad consists of Ultramarines or not, as it just replenishes Cohesion).

Give a character a WS bonus, then they'll pick Assault Marine more often than not. Give a character a BS bonus, they'll pick Devastator more often than not. In either case, choosing a role that doesn't take advantage of their inherent characteristic advantage will frequently be seen as 'wasting' it. Given that, Black Templars aside, we know that these chapters have the full range of Assault, Devastator and Tactical marines (or equivalents), why should the rules so strongly encourage players to go for self-imposed stereotypes because they think of their chapter as "the melee chapter"?

If you want to represent inclinations, use Demeanours and mode abilities.