I've been reading Dark Heresy and Black Crusade to have a more complete setting to create my campaign of DeathWatch. What I read about power armor power suply puzzled me a little:
On Dark Heresy they say that power armor (both light and normal) have a power suply limited to 5 hours
On Black Crusade they state that all power armors, and terminator armors have a 24 hour limit but on DeathWatch there is no limit, no info about the power suply expect the Critic hit on the backpack.
Any ideas?
In the case of Dark Heresy, whatever Power Armour is available is going to be, by definition, inferior to Astartes Power Armour.
In Black Crusade, most suits of Power Armour are antiquated or damaged in some way, so it makes sense that they would have a time limit on how long the suits can run for.
In Deathwatch, characters are granted access to rigorously maintained sets of the finest Power Armour available. Additionally, Deathwatch missions can often run for days, weeks, or months, in hostile environments with no chance of finding a set of Duracells.
I'm pretty sure this lack of information on power supply information is intentional, since Deathwatch characters are generally assumed to be provided with anything they need to perform in the field. This could include a power pack recharger that just isn't included in your mission loadout.
PrinceOfMadness said:
In the case of Dark Heresy, whatever Power Armour is available is going to be, by definition, inferior to Astartes Power Armour.
In Black Crusade, most suits of Power Armour are antiquated or damaged in some way, so it makes sense that they would have a time limit on how long the suits can run for.
In Deathwatch, characters are granted access to rigorously maintained sets of the finest Power Armour available. Additionally, Deathwatch missions can often run for days, weeks, or months, in hostile environments with no chance of finding a set of Duracells.
I'm pretty sure this lack of information on power supply information is intentional, since Deathwatch characters are generally assumed to be provided with anything they need to perform in the field. This could include a power pack recharger that just isn't included in your mission loadout.
Mmh that make sense
In Black Crusade you get to pick 3 sub systems that still work well and one of those options is the never ending power supply.
According to the fluff, Space Marine power armour's backpack houses a small fussion reactor (I think it's in fact mentioned in the DW rulebook as well, but I don't have it with me ATM), which grants them a virtually infinite supply of power.
As pretty much stated above, there are varying qualities of power armor batteries across the FFG 40k RPG games. The original Dark Heresy power armor (used by normal human mercs and nobles) only has 1d5 hours of juice in its non-military variant (no stats though are given for a military version). Ascension and Daemonhunter (and IIRC Blood of Martyrs) give you higher quality human power armors with 5 day supplies to permanent power ala the Deathwatch marine variant. The Black Crusade book is trying to lump those varying types together into one section with options. Basically, if you're thinking about running a Chaos Marine NPC, I'd definitely invest in the nuke backpack.
Sororitas Power armour lasts forever with the proper care for the machine spirit since it uses a fusion based power supply. Just like DW power armor the power suppply can be damaged if the wearer takes a critical hit to the body from behind.
decPL said:
According to the fluff, Space Marine power armour's backpack houses a small fussion reactor (I think it's in fact mentioned in the DW rulebook as well, but I don't have it with me ATM), which grants them a virtually infinite supply of power.
Just to follow up on this comment, page 163 of the Deathwatch Core Rulebook states, "Astartes power armour uses a fusion generator backpack which can sustain power forever with proper care." Just in case someone needs the exact reference.