I'm new to the game and have some questions about melee combat. First, how effective is it? It seems to me that having to actually get toe to toe with your opponent is a huge liability. Also, which classes are the most effective at it? It seems like the assassin is the most effective at this, but I was wondering if the guardsman was good at it too.

Just like real life, ranged combat is better, and IMO Dark Heresy bends over backward it order to make it more viable.

HOWEVER, this is very situational. If you are somewhere indoors, melee combat is obviously much more effective. And one of the main advantages of it is precisely that it denies the enemy the ability to use ranged combat. Pistols are much less effective in melee combat and rifles totally useless, so the best way to take out somebody with superior ranged firepower is to get in really close. Melee combat does in general also tend to do more damage per hit.

I don't think that straight melee combat specialists work very well in general (just like real life), but the best one is the Moritat Assassin from the Inquisitor's Handbook.

bogi_khaosa said:

...besides Templar Calyx.

I think straight melee combat specialists work rather well, even though it is mostly as bogi described. So, charging through an open gun-fight is often not the best option. Still, Assassins generally have the best potential to be melee specialists and can combine it with good sneak- and dodge-abilities to reach an enemy combatant in one piece. Guardsmen also can become monsters in melee and often are rather tough and well armoured to survive a few bullets, while trying to engage the enemy.

In my group the Assassin decided to be more a ranged combat and sneak specialists, whereas our Guardsman is the hardcore hatchet man...

I've found in my group that while the melee combatant (me) tends not to deal out as much damage as the missile weapon guys, the missle guys tend to notice when the melee man is not around to ties up enemies, especially when we're dealing with a mixed group of baddies with different armour and toughness values, powers, etc. In addition to myself (playing a Moritat Assassin), we have a Sanctioned Psyker with Force Barrage and a Tech-Priest who loves high explosive, Botlguns and heavy weapons. So in a really nice way, we have very compementary skills and weapon styles.

When you add in Assassin Strike and high Agility (movement rate), and Lightning Attack together, you end up with someone who can be really helpful for controlling the battlefield, which is never a bad thing. Especially when you factor in bad guys with basic weapons who all of a sudden can't do anything dangerous because they're engaged by the melee fighters. Clearly, however, you want to be able to close to melee as quickly as possible to start controlling and dealing damage ASAP. Also, make sure you have a missile weapon around just in case (I carry a composite bow with some mono arrows and a few throwing knives).

But, having said all of that, if you play a melee character don't expect to be the guy dishing out the most damage (though the Talents Two Weapon Weilder, Ambidexterity, Swift/Lighting Attack, Counter Attack, Blademaster and a couple of Power Swords can be a pretty scarry opponent even against heavily armoured opponents!)

Luthor Harkon said:

Theirs a lot to be said for having a tank style character to tie people up in melee. To a degree a melee Arbite works in that way, they just don't throw out the insane damage that a guardsmen does.

Even though there are some drawbacks, Scum characters also can become surprisingly able melee fighters. And then there's the psyker biomancer... The only reason my Ascension Stormtrooper is able to dish out the same amount of damage in close combat as our interrogator/psyker is thanks to having bought them all. Death blow, Storm of blows and Unarmed Ascendant Mastery plus the Blackbone Bracing implant. And usually wielding two energy swords (one Mordian and one Loi pattern), with a best craftsmanship mono grox whip and a Lathe works blessed bolo knife as alternatives. Long story short: Never underestimate the psyker!

Luthor Harkon said:

Not to mention the Acrobat-skill, which may enable you to do some nifty almost Matrix-like stunts that involve jumping over tables etc to close in on the opponent. Throwing in a smoke grenade or shooting out the lights whilst wearing nightvision also enable a melee combatant to become quite dangerous to unprepared opponents!

As for careers - the Assassin is obviously the most viable melee fighter, though Guardsmen, Scum and Arbites (suppression shields ftw!) can become quite able in this regard as well, depending on what kind of gear they use. Seraphim should , too (jump-pack = awesome), but sadly their current rules in BoM do not quite reflect the fluff, so that would have to be houseruled. Other than that, I believe that Tech-Priests also have some special side-career (Secutor?) that can make them quite nasty, especially when you consider that they can get a whole lot of upgrades for their body.

In the end, I'd make career selection depend on what kind of fighting style you want to employ, less on what is most efficient.

Excluding alternate ranks, which actually makes the psyker the best melee character in the game (psychic blade + lightning attack + crushing blow + the capacity to have a willpower bonus of 7 = death), I would say that the guardsman is the best for melee combat as he gets cheep strength increases and access crushing blow which means the guardsman will do serious damage when he hits. Sure his his dodge is a little lower but he will kill what he hits unlike the assassin and on a plus side the guardsman gets full flak armour and lots of cheap sound consitution.

Macharias the Mendicant said:

Mono-arrows. How cool.

Alpha Chaos 13 said:

Mono-arrows. How cool.

Not exactly RAW, but it should be possible and certainly has style.

Lynata said:

Alpha Chaos 13 said:

Mono-arrows. How cool.

+1

Not exactly RAW, but it should be possible and certainly has style.

Absolutely! I really like this idea.

Alpha Chaos 13 said:

Lynata said:

Alpha Chaos 13 said:

Mono-arrows. How cool.

+1

Not exactly RAW, but it should be possible and certainly has style.

Absolutely! I really like this idea.

lol! I'm surprised that the mono-arrow isn't in everybody Moritat's quiver! With a compsosite bow, you get the Accurate quality also, which can come in handy when you can't quite close the distance in hand to hand!.

You would logically have to mono each arrow separately, making them more expensive than bolt ammo.

Well, "mono'ing" a weapon costs 40 Thrones. When you already allow this upgrade to work on ammunition (which isn't in the RAW) then you may just as well apply common sense and assume that upgrading a "blade" that has a fraction of a sword's size would cost considerably less.

Or you could argue that the mono cost of 40 applies to the item as you buy it - and given that the rules in the book have you get your arrows in packs of 20 (unlike individually purchased bolt shells), this would mean that you get 20 mono arrows for the price of 1 upgrade. Which would come down to a price of 2.05 Thrones per individual arrow.

Lynata said:

You pay the same 40 Thrones for a mono knife, not hugely larger than an arrowhead.

bogi_khaosa said:

You also pay that same 40 thrones for a sword or greatsword which would be significantly larger than an arrowhead. Frankly, I wouldn't find it a bit surprising if the cost for the upgrades was less about production costs and more about cost of labor, at least in some situations.

bogi_khaosa said:

And there too I could perfectly see a reason to lower the upgrade costs (50%?), whereas I'd think that a greatsword could cost more (150%?). It's just "less important" there (read: negligible) because you at least get to keep the knife/greatsword. One may try to recover the arrows as well, but a certain degree of loss would likely be inevitable.

GM call, and personal preference. I for one do not believe in the idea of an artisan making absolutely no price difference between taking one or ten hours to work on an item.

I think we ruled that 40 throne = 10 arrows or something like that. I haven't had to buy some in a while so I don't recall!

But even if I only get one arrow for 40 thrones, I use them only for specific situations... situations in which I try my darndest to get a bunch of successes!

At topic: I feel that melee combat is rediculously strong but I have reasons to be biased in the games I'm GMing we have a guardsman with a power sword, crushing blows and 60 strength and a psyker with telekinetic blade and a WB of 6 its a little annoying finding them melee combatants that they can't tear to pieces in a couple of turns

Back on topic - awesome.

@ chieflazyarse

I don't think melee is unbalanced per se, but some characters can be. The general feeling I'm picking up on these forums is that psykers can be a bit OTT with all their WP based damage bonuses.

As for your 'problem children', send in an IMPERATOR MORTIS or two! (Wall of Steel, Battle Rage, Precise Blow, Crippling Strike, Combat Master, Blademaster, Assassin Strike, Step Aside, Lightning attack, Lightning Relefexes, and a massive dodge).

Add the Moritat package to the 'Lord of Death' and your blade based attacks become tearing - OUCH! And don't think that they have to wear light armour either, strap on some carapace. Should have them messing their pants.

Or you could just shoot them.

p.s. How good a title is IMPERATOR MORTIS anyway? I love it!

Zakalwe said:

The titles are the best part! Good enough that I invented some for Rogue Trader, even if they mean nothing.

Re: Melee combat - As Zakalwe said: just shoot at them! You can easily prevent melee by setting up combat in an area where terrain features make it impossible (or difficult/problematic) to get to the shooters: cliff faces, canyons, allayways where gunmen shoot from the windows down at the characters who then have to make it through booby-trapped stairs and ladders. By the time they get to the shooters, they will probably kill them in a round or two, but they'll have a heck of a time getting to them!

Macharias the Mendicant said:

You could further annoy them by giving the shooter an alternate means of transportation. They climb all the way to the top of the cliff, only to have the baddy jump pack/teleport/fly to the other side. Years ago I played a character in Rifts whose race was essentially a hawk/human hybrid with arms & full wings at the shoulder blades. He could make diving melee attacks with his talons (which I did a lot as I'm a melee guy at heart), but was especially effective (annoying) when he flew about with his full-auto laser rifle.