It is quite feasible (and relatively inexpensive) to create a Vindicare with Agility 70. Add to this Dodge +20 and the additional +10 to Dodge granted by their Stealth Suit. Finish with Unnatural Agility at Rank 9, and you have 14 dodges a turn at 100%.

The first threat that comes to mind is a weapon with a high rate of fire, but even then you're automatically dodging and then gaining an additional degree of success for the unnatural stat (and if you roll reasonably well, you could dodge a lot of those bullets. Those that do hit you might not wound given the Unnatural Toughness at Rank 11).

This makes life hard for a GM to say the least. Does anyone have any thoughts on dealing with it?

Niqvah said:

Concede. Admit to the player that his character has indeed won the game and as such, it might be time to try a new character, one that's not a Vindicare. Failing that, attack things the character cares about (if a temple assassin is able to feel things about stuff) instead of the character perhaps?

Niqvah said:

Nerf his amount of reactions, it's broken as hell. Temple Assassin trait should give one extra reaction, perhaps a second one once he gets Unnatural Agility.

Barring that, Overwatch action - he can't use Reactions when it's his turn, and Overwatch lets you fire in the middle of his turn.

Nowhere does it say that the extra Reactions are per round. Make them per session (like so many other Ascended traits like treating rolls as 01) and suddenly it's not nearly as powerful. This way Step Aside and Wall of Steel keep their usefulness as well.

Oh and Feint.

Niqvah said:

You want to challenge a Vindicare? Chaos Terminators with Assault Cannons.

Alex

Bring on the weird stuff. Gas-grenades, psychic powers, radiation, people armed with flamers and the Cleanse and Purify, Blessed Flame trait coupled with an Astartes Incinerator.

At Ascension-level, you can expect the PCs to be hard enough that conventional ways of hurting them - like, say aiming a gun at them and pulling the trigger - might not have the desired effect. If all else fails, bring in a team of havoc chaos space marines. Three heavy bolters, fired at high BS, and a couple of multi-meltas is sure to hurt.

I'm not arguing that Vindicares aren't OP. But if you're not prepared to change their rules, be prepared to bring on some major ****.

Adding high rate of fire enemies is definitely an option, but I would always be worried about making the enemies so hard they insta-kill the rest of the team (if the vindicare falls it's a bit harsh for it to be game over for everyone else).

One option could be to add a penalty to each reaction for each one thats already occured, so the first is at 100, then 90, then 80 and so on. This would still be a bit unbalanced though as the vindicare would be virtually unkillable against a single opponent but a horde of average guys could bring him down.

Ultimately though, making it just a single additional reaction that can be spent on anything (making it better than step aside and wall of steel) seems like the only fair way.

It would be great if FFG could errata this class officially to make it balanced with the rest of accension.

I feel the inclusion of the Vindicare in Ascension as a PC was a grave mistake. It's the stealthy sniper that is also the best as tanking damage and is quite good at melee as well. He's really got no drawbacks. Therefore, my main suggestion would be "do not allow players to play Temple Assassins under any circumstances."

However, it's in the book. Therefore, throw undodgeable stuff and large volumes of fire. Hordes from Deathwatch work. No dodging their attacks because they represent curtains of lead being fired by many soldiers. Poison gas has already been mentioned but is always a good option.

Also, if he kills someone with an Exitus round have every heretic group on the planet scatter. At least one foe of theirs should be able to recognize the work of a Vindcare, and the group will suddenly see all their contacts dry up.

And you can always use the brokenness of the Ascension rules against him. "Uh oh, it looks like your group can't actually afford new ammo for your fancy rifle and will not be able to do so for some time. Tough luck."

As most others have noted, the Vindicare class is wickedly broken. Rather than address the symptoms of the brokeness, address the cause.

Fix Temple Assassin, nerfing it to either 1 Additional Reaction a Turn or AB Reactions per Session. If the player complains too much, he likes the class for its power and not its fluff, and probably shouldn't be playing it anyway.

Your describing a very clever player that has thought about what they are doing. He's gone for a massive dodge, but you still fail most things on a roll of a 100 and he can only apply one dodge to any one attack. After a while the cell's opponents will realise that direct confrontation is pointless, so they will target other members of the cell instead and their influence

As for gettting hold of Ammo it's an influence roll, nothing more at Ascension, so limiting anything becomes somewhat more difficult and the specialised rounds aren't actually that great.

Naviward said:

That's essentially why I don't let PC's play them in DH.

If it was Deathwatch I'd probably let one run around due to mechanical, fluff-background reasons and game play differences.

MKX said:

The discussion was actually sparked by creating one for a Deathwatch game (yes, that was me making an Assassin with 100% dodge, but to be fair I think most players who know the game would get there pretty quickly).

In single combat, the Vindicare can't be hit (unless up against a tentacle-beast of Tzeentch with 20 attacks) and even at range, as discussed, they're doing pretty well for themselves.

Hordes. Now, there's a thing. Can't dodge a horde...

Just use psy attacks that can't be dodged.

Just like the simple spasm. If it works he's lying on the floor spasming in pain (which makes dodging rather hard) and he has to shoot his gun at the nearest person, most likely another player.

And there are lots of other psypowers perfect for taking out assassins. (unless they're untouchables)

1 Word: Psyker

(Sorcerer also works ;-) ) There are many Psy Powers that do not interact with Dodge. And at Ascension level you can expect an enemy Psyker to have several of these.

P.S.

Yes the core problem is the broken class "Vindicare Assassin" in player hands. Would be okay if they would have stuck to the fluff that these are only send out on special missions by order of the High Lords of Terra. And need an order for every mission they do. The background of this class is totally unfitting for simply being a member of an Inquisitor´s Retinue.

As an NSC such power is okay, but as a PC its overpowered. It gets ridicolous fast if every other fight has an enemy Psyker in it just so that the Vindicare doesnt solo everything. Its very scarce that i personally would use the Banhammer, but this class needs it (Crunch + Fluff broken), especially as the ascended Assassin position is already filled adequately by the Death Cult Assassin, which is not broken.

2 cents: They, FFG, recommends that he may be able to dodge all kinds of attacks... I'd go for it.

Temple assassin is super-powerfull combatant and limited. According to almost 100% of the cannon those dudes are used for missions and the rest of the time they are waiting for the next one, doing nothing. I don't see the any of the temple assassins with a family and personal interestes of any kind.

If you making an adventure for Rank16 ascention toons... well... Go for Epic stuff, REALLY epic stuff. Think Ravenor/Eisenhorn book stuff... Else call it a night and start over

Ideas:

- Marine talent killing strike

- Feint

- Death Cult assassin

- Nuke?

Isidro

The consensus seems to leave us with two points.

1. The Vindicare class is so broken that, unless you want to bring in some special threats that (a) get boring when repeated and (b) TPK the group once their assassin has gone down, it simply has to be banned.
2. The fluff doesn't support having a Vindicare permanently attached to a team (be it Inquisition or Deathwatch), inherently making them an uncomfortable fit in prolonged campaigns.

This is clearly wrong. There simply shouldn't be a class that breaks the system to the point where they are unplayable. It makes the player sad because they can't ascend to the class they want, and it's hard on the GM to lay down laws that contradict what's written in the rulebook.

I'm with Naviward. I think the least FFG might consider is putting out an official line on how the class mechanics could be altered, if a GM desired, to make them a little more balanced. It shouldn't be the GM's job to fix fundamental game elements like this.

Primaris Psyker, Ghost in the Warp, Force Barrage.

That at least 7 1d10+7 shots hitting on a 70+ coming his way that he can in no way detect and if he cant detect the attack, he can not dodge it.

Everyday psyker with blood boil or crush, he cant dodge when he is knocked out.

Have enemies with big guns hidden on the battle field, when they open fire he wont get any of his reactions against them because of him being unaware of the attack.

from france

flamethrower a lot can dodge flame eternally.

bombs in a closed cell

create a mission where his skill aren't use but the skill of a savant are required. what good is dodge abilty is if the only answwer is a riddle to decipher?

It seems to me that short of outright killing them with some cheap-shot mental powers or bomb or something, vindicares are impossible to beat.

just throw in a Nice Eldar Farseer and you're set.

Ah, yes, Ghost in the Warp does permit one undetectable attack. Still, you don't want to play that card too often because it would get repetitive. Also, it's rather all or nothing.

Vindicare dodges all attacks and wins at everything.

OR

Vindicare is not allowed to dodge attacks and gets insta-flattened by a bad guy honed to destroy him.

I'm still not convinced that makes for a fun game, either for the Vindicare's player or their beleaguered GM.

Vindicare is broken, news at 11.

Seriously, though, you either nerf the crud out of him or have to rely on cheap shots and dogpiling enemies to ever threaten him.

Use template weaponry - dodge moves you a number of metres out of the blast equal to your AG bonus per degree you passed your dodge by iirc. Have some ordnance thrown his way and he'll soon be injured.

Morangias said:

The Vindicare isn't broken, it's a Temple Assassin. There is a difference and that fact needs to be taken into account.

It's the GM's responsibility to understand what things are and how they will impact their game. If a GM allows a player to take something, a class, weapon, etcetera, that is "broken" in relation to their game, because said GM doesn't know how to deal with it, then it is their fault to begin with.

ItsUncertainWho said:

This is so wrong it hurts... The GM is another guy around the table doing something for fun. It's a shared responsability amongst all players to make for a fun, entertaining, challenging game.

This said, if a group as a clear majority doesn't want anything in the game then it shouldn't be there. Be it an inquisitor, Vindicare or any other class/skill/talent.

Stop blaming the GM, if you're a player HELP the GM. It's not a battle of GM vs Players.

Isidro

isidro said:

This.

The GM is jsut another player who play with diffrent a ruleset. sure the vindicare might be 'broken' and 'crazy ass powerful' but it all falls down to the player who can either 'abuse' the vindicare's abilites to the max, up to the point that we got the old "mooks for everyone, big monster for that single super-powerful PC' encounters just to have everyone to do something.

That old phrase "With Great powers comes grest responsibilitites" comes to mind: You can go batcrap crazy with your vindicare, making it a one-man party killing machine, or use it sporadically, when it is required.