ak-73 said:

If you want to play TT Marines in balanced one on one Battles, than play the tabletop, if you want to play over-the-top novel Marines, than play DW, if you want to play a scared little individual lost in the dark world of Warkammer40K armed only with his wits, than play DH.

Of course, these are only my suggestions. Play anything you like, the way you like, but don't try to force other people to play what you like by pretending you are the voice of the majority and calling the Optional Rules neccessary.

Someone mentioned an AP Weapon Speciality like the one in Cyberpunk 2020 and other games which halves Armor Ratings. This is the most constructive idea I've read so far. Add only one Weapon speciality (won't be the first) and you solve all weapon issues. And if someone pulls out the Hive Tyrant again: I've never seen an illustration showing marines fighting a single Hive Tyrant, it is always among a host of lesser creatures. If you want the single Overlord Endboss than use a Chaos Warhound Titan. That's the purpose it was designed for. You can't pilot one, you can't requisition one and you can't hurt one! What else should it be good for if not running away from it?

Kain McDogal said:

I didn't read all 7 pages of the 8 threads on this topic, so sorry if I missed this, but have you played with the new rules? I've personally not had a chance to play with them, though hopefully the emergencies, overtime, and illnesses will calm down a bit this weekend and we'll be able to try them out. It just means that instead of having to throw 6 platoons at my group I only have to throw one or two. They're still slaughtering huge numbers of enemies and being epic heroes, but now have to pick and chose their weapons, use tactics, and not just charge into the breach.

As for specifically them being wimps with popguns- with the alternate weapon rules they still have the same armor and toughness bonuses. Their base, standard issue weapon does 15 damage, more than capable of blasting a human in flak armor apart without looking. This is pretty reasonably beyond the scope of hiding in the dark mysteries as per DH. It's probably a little harder to project the same epicness that was in final sanction without more illustration, but the marines are still pretty badass.

I'm not sure the new reuls are perfect, but they certainly (to me and a large number of forumites and their groups) feel better than the RAW on the surface- though perhaps returning some of the ROF to the boltguns to give them their multipliers back. I'm betting the new damage profiles with the prior ROF (though perhaps only a light bump to HBs ROF) would be a compromise between the 'nurf' and the original over the topness.

Kain McDogal said:

What kind of play-style DW supports is a matter for FFG to decide, nobody else. To me, it makes sense to go the mixed ground route because quite a few gamers will not be initimately familiar with the movie marines and the BL novels and only know marines from the TT. They'll be scratching their heads more than a little if you go full movie marine. Besides the middle ground makes it easier for GMs to adapt towards their end of the spectrum be it full TT or full novel-style.

Kain McDogal said:

And how would I force anyone, hmm? As for the optional rules, they are obviously not necessary but will be seen as steps into the right direction by many.

Kain McDogal said:

You are apparently new here and have not heard stories of players one-shotting the Hive Tyrant that appears at the end of extraction either. The storiesd were like "Oh, we're getting extracted, finally, the hordes are advancing. Hey is that a HT over there?! My Dev fires a turn with his Heavy Bolter at it. ... It's dead now? good, I'll jump into the Thunderhawk and - lift off!"

It was just silly. The BBEGs were gone way too easily. Or the Alpha Prime in OE in my game was gone in two actions, didn't last even one round. 100 wounds burnt away just like. One burst with a HB by the Dev, followed by one burst with Hellfire by a Tac.

Alex

Charmander said:

That's right and as for epicness: when fighting hordes the new weapon stats behave nearly the same. Now the nerfing of Unrelenting Devastation that hit everyone by surprise. That's a different story. To be honest I am not quite sure what to make of it. Sure, abilities that give you a factor are always a bit risky because players will try to stack and attain ridiculous numbers. But that nerf has been hard. At least they should ensure that it stacks with Storm of Iron. That way you get at least 2d5 extra damage at higher ranks.

Also modeling damages against creatures and vehicles make everything more complicated.

Alex

ak-73 said:

It feels like they knew Unrelenting Devestation was a bit too over the top so they cut it back pretty seriously, but then that combined with the reduced RoF of the HB in the erata seems hardcore. Though FWIW, the errata pretty clearly states that you would get to stack with 'any other additinoal damage to the horde', it's just a matter of when you apply the 1d5 as was often the case.

But then again if you stack the right things together, something like metal storm rounds and storm of iron, it looks like you could do about 30 mag damage or so with the new HB (figure 6 hits from the heavy bolter, blast quality of 2 means each of those counts as 2, so that's 12 damage. Then Storm of Iron because you're using full auto doubles that to makes that 24 damage, + the 1d5 from Unrelenting Devestation, lucky roll makes that 29, +1 from the explosive damage type).

So given that at mid levels you can take out a platoon or so of guys with one long pull of the trigger. That sounds pretty good to me- it's no killing a division in 6 seconds, but it's definitely killing a division in an extended encounter.

Shaun said:

This was pretty much my feeling. I am not a fan of the changes to the bolter and I don't think I will be using them.

Charmander said:

That was exactly my quote some pages ago. I also lean towards the new Damage, even going so far as to cut the Basic Bolter Damage down to 1D10+8, but the original RoF must be kept except for the HB. Not for the Game itself but every reference in the media (movies, games, novels, background sourcebooks) portrays the Basic Bolter as capable of automatic fire, 4-round bursts to be precise. Taking the RoF away is like designing a Star Wars Game without Lightsabres because it's to powerful in meele!

And ak-73, please no more lonely-Hive-Tyrant-is-blown-to-bits-by-one-Dev-with-a-HB-in-one-turn-stories. We had the same issues when we first played the game, but we changed the tactics of the Hive Tyrant. Give this poor lonely guy some company, he will be happy and brain-blast all your Marines to Hell!

Kain McDogal said:

Heeeeeelloooooo, abstraction, etc, etc...The Autocannon surely shoots more than 10 rounds a round, etc, etc, etc...Come on, it's not because bolters fire a 4 rounds burst that they have to get it exactly in Deathwatch, as all that is relative to what level of abstraction you're on.

Plus full auto is not a 4 round burst. A full auto mode basically means "as long as the finger is on the trigger, rounds are shot". So if you want those 4 rounds, then just change the Semi-Auto of the bolter to 4 instead of 3. Owned.

Now, what about keeping the old RoFs? I'd say this is OK, just be careful that Storm Bolters do no end up owning the HB in the job of killing Hordes, that would be a shame.

And once again, we're not talking "canon" here, as the abstraction only requires that the compared levels of performance are kept (for example, the HB MUST have a higher RoF, etc, etc). We're talking balance, game design and game play.

As for the Hive Tyrant, I'm sorry but a Marine SHOULDN'T be able to kill a Tyrant in one round. Even if the Tyrant is crazy enough to be wandering in the open shouting "SHOOT ME LOLZ!". So the example is relevant.

Stormast said:

Not only that but in the case of Extraction story the Hive Tyrant was accompanied by a swarm that filled the entire scenery so-to-speak. Can't get more company than that. Didn't help him though. In the case of the Alpha Prime, he was accompanied by 3 Hormagaunt hordes. Didn't help him either. Sure the hormagaunts caused some damage when they charged but still.

The HB ROF must get down, that's essential in nerfing the HB into normal usability and out of OP mode. There is little controversy on the HB being overpowered according the original rules.

Alex

Charmander said:

Personally my main concern about the loss of fully-automatic fire (on bolters and autoguns) is the loss of supressive fire. Reducing the rate that even bolters tore through hordes seems ok (ie, by increasing the degrees of success needed for extra hits) to me (especially when combined with the nerf of the heavy bolter), but I feel they should still be able to do suppressive fire. Think I would just house rule that one thing.

I've played about 8 sessions of DW and by now this is my main concern:

- There is no room to dive behind cover

- There are no tactical concerns when you get into rounds

- Golden Rule: If you are in rounds, stand&shoot. Doesn't matter if it's an Emporer Titan or a Gretchin, you're better off shooting it.

On most occasions I like this, you're a marine, you're an Angel of the Emporer, you're made to kick ass and you have a the best weapon on the galaxy: BOLTERS. Sometimes I'd like to "lose" rounds by running to a good position, I'd like to exchange Firepower for efficiency. The issue IMO is not the dmg one shot does but the +20 you get for full-auto, the +20 you get to hit gigantic creatures, +10 you get with a random weapon attachment = a lot of shots hit = dead whatever. Solve the number of shots, not the dmg of 1 shot.

My thoughts so far... avoid stand up fight situations, don't go into boss mode ( meaning the arch-enemy knows Marines are BAAAADDDD and won't go into a straight fight with them ) BUT leave bolters the best all round weapon. Bolters are an essential part of the WH40K universe, there are seen on Marine hands since the 1980's. They are Dirty Harry's Magnum meets AK-47( lasgun ).

Repeat post, sorry.

or keep optional ROF and original damage values for bolters ?

isidro: No room behind cover? That's surely more of something to discuss with the GM, and down to them. Some GMs just seem to hate players using their heads and getting in cover!

You say about solving the massive damage from autofire, and that's exactly what the new rules do. They drop most autofire weapons to semi-auto, which results in only a +10 and only 1 hot per two additional levels of success. It's much better.

Kain McDogal said:

I doubt it, because that's not at all true. Have you played with the new damage rules yet? As regards 4 round burst, that's apparently out the window now, and according to later canon it's now three. Go figure. Not sure that I approve, but it means that FFG aren't 'wrong' to have RoF3.

Marines are still disgustingly powerful. FFG have just fixed a couple of the most obvious breaks in the system, in the same way that 3.5 fixed haste. The UD rules change is something else that I like, as now Devs don't have the choice of 'carry an automatic weapon, or be kinda bad against hordes'. It further widens their weapon choice.

I tend to always play fast and loose with vehicle rules anyway, so I'm not too worried about that. Players get inventive and stick plasma guns into vision ports and things, so I'm not too worried about those rules.

Stormast said:

It's not a matter of abstraction but of properly stat out a object that has been in the lose of the game since the beginning. Imperial forces have been using the bolter since, at least, the 31st millennium. it's like playing a SW game without lightsaber been able to deflect blaster shot. It's not about abstraction but mechani

Stormast said:

Do you realize the storm bolter has to be that good ? in TT they only guys going around with something like that are captains, terminators and all the greyknight. Astartes don't have budgets for they tools of war, if the storm bolter was not that good of a weapon do you really believe the ][ whould have fielded all his grey knight with those weapons ?

That is the problem, the bolter and his variations are not just the basic weapon of the astartes, they are the most effective, devastating anti-infantry weapon ever created and it's the symbol of the emperor's wrath. ALL other weapons are there for tactical reasons and specific purposes like anti-tank/anti-vehicle.

I completely agree, but the other weapons need to be a viable option. I didn't have a problem with bolters trashing my game too much, but I did have a problem with the fact that the SB and HB were the only worthwhile choices 99% of the time. If the rules changes change that to 50% then it's all gravy, as far as I'm concerned.

Siranui said:

Sure, there are plenty of things that need to be fixed, but nerf down the bolter is not the solution. Melta and Plasma do need some rework, an easy fix whould be to add 1d of dmg to those weapons. Missiles on the other hand need a complete rework.

TT and RAW value of the weapons:

Lasscannon STR 9 AP 2 6d10+10 AP 10
multimelta STR 8 AP 1 4d10+6 AP 13
plasmacannon STR 7 AP 2 2d10+11 AP 10

bolter STR 4 AP 5 2d10+5 AP 5
meltagun STR 8 AP 1 2d10+8 AP 13
plasmagun STR 7 AP 2 1d10+9 AP 8

While TT is by far more abstract then the RPG the way dmg has been scaled down in term of dices and AP is kind of funny. for 1 point in STR you lose 2 dices of dmg (with the plasmagun being the more troubled of them all). If tuned up to 1 point of STR to 1 point of DMG the multimelta whould have 5d10 and the plasmacannon 4d10, and I'd give the sama dmg to plasmagun and meltagun because let's face it, the amount of damage this weapons deal is not from the gun itself but the type of matter they shoot at you.

And before you start complaining about what's the point in have a cannon when you can have the gun version of said weapons, as for TT the cannons and guns have difference properties that makes the difference.

Lucius Valerius said:

Lucius Valerius said:

Or anti-infantry like the Heavy Flamer.

Yeah and your storm bolter costs your chapter master 3 pts while a plasma pistol does cost 15 pts. And the Storm Bolter should not own the Heavy Bolter in fighting hordes. If you compare the SB with DH infantry weapons, we can quickly agree that the SB is all that.

The problem is this: the Heavy Bolter was too good. But if you nerf the HB you must nerf the SB too or else the SB will become too good in comparison to the HB. And then you need to nerf the Bolter and Bolt Pistol too. That they nerfed them too hard is something that I could agree to.

Conversely, plasma in particular was not living up to its reputation, not even to its tabletop capabilities. So it needed a boost.

Alex

Lucius Valerius said:

Your analysis is not quite correct because it fails to take into account different properties like plasma maximal fire, melta short range and bolter tearing.
For my previous guesstimation, read here: www.fantasyflightgames.com/edge_foros_discusion.asp

It also explains why, if you are comparing to 40K, the HB should have a ROF of 6. And, like I said, if you nerf the HB, you must nerf the SB and therefore Bolter and Bolt Pistol to keep internal balance intact.

Alex

ak-73 said:

Believe me I know how much it costs and I've been saying that plasma and melta need more dmg since forever. As for the HB vs SB, It does make sense that has a higher dmg potential then an heavy bolter. To make a comparison with current weaponry an m60 has a much lover RoF then 2 m4 strap together and that's what the stormbolter basically is.

Lucius Valerius said:

If bolters weren't nerfed though, then *every* other weapon would need an upgrade. A major one, too. We could all look at weapon lists, and the SB and HB leapt out of the page as being vastly better than anything else, and that was clearly a problem.

I'm not too worried about current TT, to be honest. Even though it's a skirmish wargame, it's still a far more abstract that any RPG is. I'm basing what I want the weapons to do upon distant memories of RT, what their role is, what canon in fiction has dictated, and upon their Req value... all while keeping them different in 'feel'.

As to missiles... maybe. But first things first: The insane cost of grenades and missiles. It's mind-bogglingly high. I'm all for either issuing more for the money, or dropping the Req.

Lucius Valerius said:

The Heavy Bolter in 40K has higher damage, better AP and higher ROF (when stationary) than the Storm Bolter. I think FFG is rather modeling against that than modern day comparisons which may or may not apply. That said, if you follow my suggestion and use the new damage and pen but the old ROF (except for the HB which needs 6 or 7), the Storm Bolter can generate 8 hits, the HB only 6 (or 7).

Alex

From a game point of view, boosting everything except bolters instead of nerfing them brings its own problems. Firstly in balance with pre-written scenarios and with the upcoming MoX (because the problem wasn't that everything else was weak, it was that bolters were strong), and secondly for the sanity of GMs everywhere. It's much easier to plan encounters where the party's damage output is lower. And better and more accurately planned encounters make a better game for everyone.

I admit there is a problem with the Storm Bolter but it started much earlier, when a crazy sculptor at GW thought it would look cool if you put a SB in the hands of a Sororita.

Before that it was only used by Terminators and it should have stayed that way.

If the SB in DW is so much better than a HB why not give it a higher Req of 30 or 40? Then it would be out of reach for normal Signature Wargear but if some Marine needs the SB this much he can have one at Rank 2 and a Terminator Armour 60 and the SB 40 would add up nicely to the 100 min Req you will have to spend.

Someone stated earlier he will rather have a nerfed down SB than go without one, so my advice is to imagine your Basic Bolter under the old Rules has 2 Barrels, a big drum-mag and you can call it Storm Bolter, Susi or whatever you like because to you it's only an abstraction.

Kain McDogal said:

Instead of taking that advice, why not just use the new stats? They work, they're balanced, and they're in reach of signature wargear, along with most of the other iconic weapons.