Hey all,

I'm running a DW campaign and I'm a new DM. I'm using Tyranids as the main aggressor since I play them in 40k.

Going through the different tyranid pages in Mark of the Xenosand the main rulebook, each tyranid has at least 3 dozen skills / traits / feats / etc. What is the best way to keep track of this for someone new to the game? I wish there was a creature creator, or a list of talents and all that, or something. I don't want to have to refer to the book in every combat to find out what LIGHTNING RELFEXES does or something like that.

The obvious answer would probably be to write a quick-sheet for yourself with the name and a short summery of what it does. Then you print it out and have it ready next to you when you play.

Gurkhal said:

Probably this. Once you get some experience with the system, you'll likely be able to recognize most of the Talents like Lightning Attack immediately and won't have to worry about looking up much. Also, running through a few mock battles or even letting the fights play out in your head can help you see which Talents are most likely to come into play so you can focus on those ahead of time.

Gurkhal said:

I would try this and number the talents, works out well when you play orks and you want them to act stupid and do random stuff its kind of funny.

Yeah, I guess I'll just have to type some stuff up tonight.

Also, keep in mind that some of a creature's skills, talents, etc. are just going to define it as a perfectly normal critter.

You just need to pick out the ones that are actual special abilities of some sort, instead of 'it's a Tyranid. Yeah.'

When I'm preparing an encounter, I always write up the opponent's stats in a spiral notebook, and refer to that during the encounter, rather than try to hold a big rulebook open to the relevant pages all through the encounter. The Skills/Talents/Traits I have memorized just get listed by name, while the ones I suspect I won't remember get brief synopses.

If you are less of a Luddite than me, I suppose you could use a laptop...