I for one am so happy they included official stats for the older patterns of power armour. Now I can finally run my 30k Space Marine campaign . My favorite are Maximus and Iron. They look so badass. Sorry, not a constructive answer to OP's question, but I just wanted to state my excitement.

My home chapter has always been the Raptor Legion (see Badab War) and as such I've always had them favor Mark VI armor. (Raptors have beaks, right?) So when I play I want to be a Raptor marine in Mark VI armor. I'm disappointed that it feels like powergaming to take that option. I would have been perfectly happy if there were another drawback or two for the older armors. I will likely tweak the numbers for my own home game. Like I already did with most of the Astartes weapons anyway.

I definitely like the idea of being able to use the rules for an older time period. Horus Heresy anyone?

Working on Heresy Era adventure

Howdy!

I very much enjoy the vast amount of material in Rites of Battle. Yes as a fan boy I wish it was 2,000 pages long and contained every chapter every mentioned in the almost 30 years of WH40k history. But the homebrew rules with a reasonable player and GM can cover most of the chapters fairly well, until your favorite chapter gets fully flushed out. Also please remember that the game setting is Jerico reach and the Deathwatch. As far as the marks of armours, I am confused where it says characters can swap armours and and trade out locations after they roll up their starting armour. I see it as a great way to differentiate your character, and give them...well...er character. My experience is that most foes the Deathwatch characters will face fall into 1 of 2 broad catagories. Either the SM armour renders their attack almost moot or they penetrate most or all of the armor as though it was not even there. The termagaunt vs. genestealer analogy.

major shultz said:

It's part of one of the new Armour Histories, called Skill of the Artificer. Rolling on this table allows a suit of power armour to have a piece from another mark, or it could have been a suit that was rebuilt after suffering massive damage, or my personal favorite: special relic pieces that have different bonuses beyond their armour protection value.

Skill of the Artificer is random....right?

And has to be rolled as one of the histories randomly?

Does it allow you to pick and choose what you want at each location?

major shultz said:

#1: Yes

#2: Yes

#3: No, the mix and match armour pieces are chosen randomly by way of a die roll. And you only get on piece from a particular mark of armour. The rest of the armour is standard for a suit of its type.

So yes: People are indeed complaining that a random table is not completely balanced. Go figure. Apparently if I roll '10,10' for every statistic, my character will be better than everyone else's. OMG: The system is OP.

Siranui said:

There are people that prefer not to use random generation for character creation. Characteristics can be done this way, but unfortunately other things (like power armour and armour histories) require either randomness or more work on the part of the GM and players.

Daisuke said:

Howdy!

Thank you for answering my questions. I hope you realize I asked them to point out the silliness of the OP armour marks comment.

HappyDaze said:

If you as a GM let them custom pick an uber munchkin armour then please dont complain on the boards it is OP.

major shultz said:

its not silly when you have a 40% chance of getting a markedly better armor than others RAW and when you can simply pick ANY armor history with a 300xp deed.

Sanguinary Priest said:

First off, it's only 30%.

Secondly, if a player wants a Corvus Suit with two very specific Armour Histories they only have a 0.75% chance of actually getting that specific result. This is of course not counting the numerous variable results for each of the first 6 results on the Skill of the Artificer table.

Third, there are things that a player might consider more important to spend their one and only deed on than getting one specific Armour History.

Daisuke said:

That's the chance assuming that they don't follow the book's advice and ask the gamemaster. If it fits the character concept, I'd rather give them something the want rather than something random that doesn't fit what the player wants to portray.

HappyDaze said:

This is true. I was merely illustrating the point of the sheer unlikeliness of this happening by mere chance as a response to Sanguinary Priest's comment.

GMs can also just say 'no'.

I'm really not sold on Corvus being the be-all-and-end-all. Armour's job is to stop damage. Bigger AV=more damage stopped. Additional Agility and Awareness is nice, but ultimately it's pretty peripheral to the core task of the equipment.

double post... sorry

Daisuke said:

it's a 40% chance to get a mk6 or mk8 armor which are the ones being singled out in this thread as markedly better.

Ah, pardon me, but a player has just as great a chance of just starting with Aquilla armour. However, I'm not sure I can really agree with you on the subject of the Corvus and Errant both being markedly better than the Aquilla in practice. Theory maybe, but not practice.

I have found that in practice, anything that can get through the armour protection of the Aquilla Armour and the Space Marines Unnatural Toughness will usually kill outright or cripple them with one shot. Anything else will just bounce off the character. There just doesn't seem to be much of a middle ground here, and a few points of difference in armour protection isn't going to change that.

On the subject of the command bonus granted by some armours, it is rather situational. That bonus really only applies to space marines in most cases, and in the case of the Heresy armour it actually caries a penalty in interactions with the Inquisition.

All of this takes a backseat in importance to the fact that these rules are not set in stone. As the person running the game, you can veto anything a player wants to have. And a good player will not throw a hissy fit about it, provided you're not doing something unreasonable like making them wake up naked in a dungeon and not giving them a shot at getting replacement gear, if not the character's old stuff. Also I don't really think that one player having Corvus or Errant armour when the others have Aquilla is going to unbalance things as greatly as you claim. And the players in Aquilla armour might not really care, either.

I finally managed to find a shop where I can order RoB (and since Saturday it says that I can't change my order anymore because they will send it out "soon".... ) and I can't wait anymore because I made the armour for a Watch Captain from different parts that looked good and would really like to know if it falls under OP or the opposite. I think the helm is from a Mk IV Maximus suit, the rest is from the Space Wolf sprue, so it's not that easy to identify.

After leafing through the power armour section of RoB, it seems weird to me that the older models are specifically left out of the random table but the supposedly rare Errant (intended for command roles) hasn't been. That and the Corvus armour somehow gets another power history roll over the Aquila armour (whose design also dates back to the Heresy days). I quickly mentioned the new power armour rules to my space marine players (characters were made before I could get RoB) to little interest, but I'll mention it again to make sure of their opinions on the matter.

I'd make the following changes to the random table:

1. Remove Errant armour altogether as a random choice. The statistics are fine by background but it's availability is not (too easy). I've no problem with it being a reward for in game acts of command brilliance.

2. Cut a power armour history from the Corvus armour.

Edit: 3. Allow that nifty idea of allowing +/-2 on Aquila armour if players want the random table.

If players want a specific armour and/or history, I'd discuss that with them.

Mk's I-III are left off the table because they are so rare that the majority of space marines will never see one in their entire lifetime, even if they survive for quite a few centuries. Not to mention the fact that the Thunder is practically only good as a museum piece; what with the fact that it had no environmental seals, no life support systems, no power to the legs, more oft than not the legs didn't even have armour plating, probably no mag-boots either. All three of them are also so old that even if suits of them were found, there is likely no one in the Imperium who even knows how to repair or maintain them.

Now, none of these things are true of the Errant, and its rarity is reflected quite well by the table. There is a one in ten chance of getting it. Like I was iterating for Sanguinary Priest, a player has a greater chance of getting an Aquila armour than any other on the table.

On the subject of the Corvus armour, two Armour Histories don't necessarily mean it is going to be more powerful than any other suit. If the histories are being rolled for, a player could get something that serves no purpose for their character, or worse they could get something that is completely counter-intuitive.

I'm willing to agree with the +/- 2 fudging rule on the Aquila, just because it's throwing a bone to folks who might feel a bit sour about not having much luck with the random generation method.

Again, all of this is quite academic, however. If the GM does not wish the players to have any armour other than a MK VII or wants the players to have to earn a different MK, that is their perogative. A GM can veto some, all, or none of the rules for the players' use at his or her discretion.

Just had a quick look though the forum. So its time for my two cents.

I have to say that the reason there is the tables for random armor and histories just for that reason. For it to be random.

Also, the stats of the armor seems fine to me as long as you can justify why you have them. the example is as follows;

I recently played a one off game as a sanguinary priest in beeky armor with the blood of a battle brother history. The way I justified this was that the reason that i had the agility an extra sensors was that they were to get me to injured marines faster and to help find out what was up with them, the blood was because he didn't wash off the blood to honour those who had died under his care.

Sometimes you have to ask what is better. Giving everyone the armor that they say is balanced (and anybody could say that anything is OP if they think it gives something they think you shouldn't have) or having a good reason for explaining why you have what you have.

Tarquin Faquar said:

What you consider a feature, i consider a bug. I don't like randomness in character creation, and for Deathwatch characters, the Armour History is still a part of character creation. Beyond that, a player can rationalize anything if he wants it bad enough, and he'll not bother to try to do so with something he doesn't want.

HappyDaze said:

I always thought thats since power armor was handed down marines got what they got. including its history. Also about the rationalizing isn't that where the GM comes in in saying what is possible and what is just too far fetched.