Should relic blades be nerfed for style?

By Mjoellnir, in Deathwatch

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Siranui said:

BS? A comment about a way to manage the situation with minimum negative impact on the player? How so? It's far more disheartening for a player to be essentially told that 'X doesn't work because of plot protection' than it is for the issue to be avoided by...well; avoiding the issue in a literal sense by having the protagonist dodge, rather than parry, and to feint. I think you missed my point.

And I think you missed mine. Not your comment was BS, but the idea of humanity having the most awesome power field technology is. Especially if power-fielded relics are somehow immune to it while the only lists of relics provided are again only human technology. Or to make it short: I can legally confront your Marine with a former Space Wolf Chaos Lord who wields a frostblade. You will be unable to shatter his weapon. Regardless what kind of ancient, well-equipped xenos champion I throw at you his weapon will break before the epic superiority of human great crusade era engineering.

Siranui said:

But... at least there are fairly easy ways to mitigate the relic blade, and even the TH's stun. The knockdown though is a hard issue to deal with, unless the party are facing giant space slugs.

Mitigating the hammer's stun? That seems more like a matter of luck or did I miss a vital piece of errata?

Siranui said:

Even with two-handed TH/RB wielding you *can* use a combat shield with any two handed weapons, according to FFG. So it still requires yet another fix.

A two-handed weapon and a shield at the same time... Do I want to imagine that? -_-

Siranui said:

Balanced for the RB is where my feelings lay, coupled with minimising the number of times 'it doesn't work because their weapon is cool, too' is used as much as is humanly possible.

I agree about the Balanced, but I still think that cutting blades is something you should do mainly to goons, not to bosses....

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Mjoellnir said:

... the idea of humanity having the most awesome power field technology is.

Mitigating the hammer's stun? That seems more like a matter of luck or did I miss a vital piece of errata?

A two-handed weapon and a shield at the same time... Do I want to imagine that? -_-

I agree about the Balanced, but I still think that cutting blades is something you should do mainly to goons, not to bosses....

Crossed wires, there. Yes: I agree that it's fairly easy to justify a wide array of foes not having their blade cut by the relic blade. I'd just prefer to avoid doing so as much as humanly possible.

The stun effect is annoying, as the dice rolls required to avoid it are likely to be mooted by the sheer number of attacks. It can be hand-waved aside with combat drugs and the like and warp-traits, but the knock-down is far harder for a GM to work around.

No, probably not, and nor do I. However, that's what the rules say, and it's been confirmed by FFG.

I really have no problem with 80% of bosses having their blade severed in combat with a relic blade. It's 50req, and it's not like the thing is going to last more than three rounds anyway. And it's not like the sunder effect is any real use most of the time anyway, because most things die from one or two blows at most anyway. By having the special effect fail against most bosses, it's removing their greatest use, because sundering Troop and Elite weapons is pretty much pure fluff and coolness, rather than mechanically advantageous to the tune of 50Req (especially with a las-cannon at 30req!)

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Siranui said:

... rather than mechanically advantageous to the tune of 50Req (especially with a las-cannon at 30req!)

Why did FFG decide that a Relic Blade was 50 req and a TH was 20 anyway? In TT (in know, means nothing) they are the same cost (sometimes the TH is more).

I can't help thinking that they got a bit carried away with the 'Relic' part of the name when lots of things are relics. I'd be seriously tempted to drop the req significantly and have the weapon destroying effect as 'cool aside' rather than a 'must have to make it worth it'

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It fills a good gap as a high-cost melee weapon for people who aren't Space Wolves. There's little else out there in that price bracket, and I do think that they are cool.

Given the choice between simply giving it MOAR POWAAAR and damage and a sunder effect, I think that a good choice was made. After all: There are plenty of ways of just doing damage.

I think THs are more than 20Req, but however much they are: It ain't enough!

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Siranui said:

It fills a good gap as a high-cost melee weapon for people who aren't Space Wolves. There's little else out there in that price bracket, and I do think that they are cool.

Given the choice between simply giving it MOAR POWAAAR and damage and a sunder effect, I think that a good choice was made. After all: There are plenty of ways of just doing damage.

I think THs are more than 20Req, but however much they are: It ain't enough!

Yes, TH broken, we've already had a thread on that though.

It's nice having special effects, but knowing how many exceptions I'd make it's not worth it. As for high cost weapons, I've got nothing against making rules up for special weapons if there's none applicable (except to Space Wolves) and players wanting to spend that much req I'm sure would be happier with that than a 'generic' relic blade.

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I'm wondering how many more relics will be out in the new tome. I'm guessing a few, as there are still large gaps (sanctified weapons, stuff for ultramarines that DOESN'T give command bonuses...)

I'm a big fan of giving players their Req-worth, especially when they go off the beaten track. And the relic blade is a little off the beaten track, being a two-hander. I don't want anything cool and unusual to be discarded as a choice in favour of the proverbial lascannon or other strong and obvious choices.

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I guess the problem of the relic blade is that they couldn't find a niche for it after designing all the other good weapons, so it got a special benefit that makes it kind of a must-have. I think more power for a relic isn't a bad thing. I really like the stats of the frost blade, but I neither want to play a Space Wolf nor fight with a chainsaw. For me a relic blade without the sunder and instead Balanced and Felling would be a dream come true, but I guess that's a matter of taste.

Concerning the thunder hammer I don't really get your problem. The hammer does even more damage than the blade, so it shouldn't it's special effects be mostly pure fluff too?

I would really like to see a Dark Angels relic sword made of obsidian. They have enough to equip all the big bosses of their successor chapters with them, they should be able to give one to the Deathwatch.