Some Rules clarifications from FFG

By Spehktre, in Black Crusade Rules Questions

Thought I'd post these in case other people were interested:

I wrote:

I have 2 questions for Black Crusade:

1) The Talent "Ancient Warrior". Is the rarity reduction for "Legion" items intended to apply to Legion armour as well?

2) The Character background "Wealth" says you get to make an *additional* acquisition roll at +20 during character creation. However, there are no acquisition "rolls" made at creation, the acquisition is automatic. Is this intended to be an extra creation acquisition at +20, or is it supposed to be an actual roll? (A roll would mean that the background might actually do nothing at all).

Thanks!

FFG Responded:

Hello Nathan,

1. Yes.

2. It is not a roll, it is an additional acquisition.

Well I could contribute with some more.

I asked the following Questions:

1.The Apostate archetype gets a Mesh Armour or a Flak Armour, but there is no armour that explicitly designated as such. What should he get?

2. The Renegade gets Weapon Training (SP) twice. Should he receive any other Weapon Training instead? He also gets Weapon Training (Heavy), but the Talent description is unclear regarding Weapon Training (Heavy). The Talent states that the Heretic can use all Weapon classes of the category he has selected. However no Heavy basic or pistol or throwing or melee weapons exist. Heavy heavy Weapons do not make sense either. Should he therefore learn to use all heavy weapons of every category instead? The Renegade also gets a Carapace Armour, which needs a narrower specification like the Mes h Armour of Flak Armour of the Apostate. Which is the right one?

3. The last paragraph under Psychic Strength states that if a psyker uses the push strength he rolls twice on the psychic phenomena Table and applies one or both results according to his nature as per table 6-1 Psychic Strength. However the table lacks any information on this topic, so how should I determine if I should apply one or both results?

4. I have a questions regarding attacking hordes in melee. The Book states that a Space Marine inflicts one hit per two Degrees of Success. Does this really only count for Chaos Space Marines? And if the Character has the talent swift attack does he inflict two hits per two Degrees of Success? With Lightning Attack one hit per Degree of Success with an additional hit per every two Degrees of Success?

The answers were:

1. He should get a Mesh Combat Cloak or Guard Flak Armour

2. The heavy weapon issue will be addressed in a forthcoming FAQ. He should receive Heavy Carapace.

3. This is a mistype that will be clarified in a forthcoming FAQ/Errata. You should use Table 6–1: Psychic Strength, as that information is accurate.

4. The GM's chapter about fighting Hordes with non-Chaos Space Marines handles rules for humans fighting Hordes. Humans can interact with Hordes very differently. As for Swift Attack and Lightning Attack when attacking Hordes, these do stack with the general Horde rules.

Both answered by Sam Stewart by the way.

Spehktre said:

1) The Talent "Ancient Warrior". Is the rarity reduction for "Legion" items intended to apply to Legion armour as well?

Hello Nathan,

1. Yes.

holy crap terminatorpalooza

Luther Engelsnot said:

2. The heavy weapon issue will be addressed in a forthcoming FAQ.

...

Both answered by Sam Stewart by the way.

Is there any news on when this FAQ/errata is coming out? There are a couple of clarifications that aren't being answered that are kind of a big deal.

Another Question Answered:

Rule Question:
Terminator Armour gives the wearer a -20 to agility when worn. It is entirely possible that this might bring a character to 0 or less agility. This, according to page 256 renders the character paralysed and unable to act.

This seems silly, as wearing the armour renders the wearer paralysed even though it makes them stronger. Is this penalty supposed to be a -20 to Agility *tests*, or is there some other rule I've missed.

Perhaps the penalty does not count for the purposes of characteristic damage?

FFG Answer:
The dropping Agility to zero and being paralyzed is only from Characteristic damage, not temporary penalties. Although it could drop one's Speed to zero (although this should be partially offset by one being Hulking) it does not paralyze them. Remember, Tests can apply all sorts of penalties or benefits, and this is just one more penalty to apply to any Agility Test. If the Test was normally easy (+30), you'd still be making it at a +10.

One of mine!


Rule Question:
I have a question regarding the Tzeentch-aligned psychic power Flicker.

The description for the power mentions the character counts his psy rating as his agility bonus for the purpose of movement, and may move as easily vertically as horizontally.

The incorporeal trait, however, which the power also grants, says it grants hoverer 6, which overrides agility for movement speed.

How is this intended to interact? Can the character move upwards as much as he wants (as implied by the power description) or is he limited to a ceiling of 2 meters, as per the hoverer description?

Likewise, what is his movement rate?

FFG Answer:

The psyker may use whichever option is more appropriate at the time. The psyker still has to obey all the rules for the Hover Trait, so using it only allows him to move horizontally. Therefore the psyker must rely on his Psy Rating to actually "fly." In addition, the psyker's psy rating may be greater than 6, allowing him to move faster.

In essence, the Hover 6 Trait establishes a baseline of speed that low Psy Rating psykers can fall back on.

I got a few answers about the Apostate class and the Peer talent. FFG answers in bold.

> Rule Question:
> A few questions on starting Apostates:
>
> 1. Apostates can choose between a best craftsmanship sword or a common power blade. Should they get the Weapon Training (power) talent or is it intentional they start untrained with the power blade?

That is actually intentional. Some Apostates may prefer not to be combat focused, and may even want to trade away their power weapon.


> 2. If the good craftmanship laspistol is fired on Overload mode (p153), does it now count as unreliable or does the second reliable trait from good craftmanship (p147) cancel this out?

No, Reliable Quality doesn't stack.

>
> 3. Which armour are referred to by "flak armour or mesh armour" since neither are in the list of available armours?

Flak Armour is Guard Flak Armour, and Mesh Armour is a Mesh Combat Cloak.

[i sent two messages, the second inquiring whether "Planetary Governors or Warlords," was a single choice for the Peer talent or two]

Also, the other question you sent in:
It's a single option for leader types.

Rule Question:
Does a successful use of the "Serpent's Tongue" Apostate special ability on p62 of the core book stack with existing levels of the Peer talent?

For example, if I have Peer (heretics) can I use Serpent's Tongue to increase it to Peer 2 (or Peer 3 with 55 Fellowship)?

Yes it does (insert name here)!

Got this a few days ago. Since I just generated this mutation, and I play a character with force weapon unarmed attacks, this will most likely get house-ruled in our current game.

Rule Question:

How is two-weapon fighting with the multiple arms trait meant to be handled? Does every extra pair of limbs allow an additional single hit attack, or an entirely new attack roll, that can be combined with Lightning attack etc?

Also, the tail mutation grants an additional attack. How exactly does this work? Is this too an additional attack roll that can be used with lightning attack or something more limited?

Lastly, how are you supposed to handle evasions with this? This seems like it could quickly generate a multitude of attack rolls. Would they all require separate reactions to be spent to evade each one, thus running the very real risk that the target runs out of reactions rather quickly?

FFG Answer:
The latter (new attack roll)
The former (additional attack roll).
Yes, separate reactions. Some warriors can generate more attacks than even the swiftest foe can evade!

Rule Question:


If a heretic gains a talent from a cybernetic does that talent count as an advance for the purpose of checking alignment?

For example, if my heretic has five Slaanesh advances but obtains Skeletal Petrification, will the newly acquired Iron Jaw and Bulging Biceps talents count against aligning with Slaanesh?


FFG Answer:

Hi [x]!

No, those don't count. Generally, you can assume that only ones you purchase will count, not ones that come with augmentations like this.

Hope this helps and thanks for playing!

Found the paragraph he mentioned a bit unclear, so I thought I'd get some verification. This makes a character with Fear and Winds of Chaos rather nasty. Or host of fiends. Or both! Make lots of willpower tests, fail and die from corruption, random NPC!

Rule Question:
How is fear tests (for both enemies and heretics) treated in combat? Do you simply roll for each source once per encounter, or do you roll for the highest source every round until it goes away?

FFG Answer:
You only make one roll each round against the most Fear-causing source (see page 277, bottom right paragraph).

Hope this helps and thanks for playing!

I received a response regarding a couple of questions I asked.

Regarding delay action.

1: does this allow a character to use a second attack action if they have already attacked in their turn ?
ie full auto attack, followed by delaying an action. when the delayed action is used making another full auto attack

Not really, as the Delay takes a Half Action. So unless your attack is a Free Action, you would not have any Actions left after doing an attack (even at Half Action), then Delay (a Half Action).

2: when using a delayed action to make an attack does this allow the attacked character to make a dodge/parry roll or is this unavoidable?
Yes, you can Dodge and whatnot as normal.

Reverend mort said:

Found the paragraph he mentioned a bit unclear, so I thought I'd get some verification. This makes a character with Fear and Winds of Chaos rather nasty. Or host of fiends. Or both! Make lots of willpower tests, fail and die from corruption, random NPC!

Rule Question:
How is fear tests (for both enemies and heretics) treated in combat? Do you simply roll for each source once per encounter, or do you roll for the highest source every round until it goes away?

FFG Answer:
You only make one roll each round against the most Fear-causing source (see page 277, bottom right paragraph).

Hope this helps and thanks for playing!

Unfortunately the answer only rewrote what was in the book without further clarifying it. I wish they provided an example. The consensus in this thread on fear http://www.fantasyflightgames.com/edge_foros_discusion.asp?efid=231&efcid=3&efidt=567442

was that you only make one fear test for each source, and the 'only one roll' part was meant to clarify that if two fearful monsters show up in the same round, you only roll fear against highest fear rating. It didn't have a FFG ruling in it, however.

Yeah, it wasn't the most helpful answer, but still, reading that entire sentence... I have to disagree. It seems, for better or worse, that you test fear every round, even if there is simply one source. However, multiple sources does not cause multiple fear tests per round, you only count the highest.

Spehktre said:

2) The Character background "Wealth" says you get to make an *additional* acquisition roll at +20 during character creation. However, there are no acquisition "rolls" made at creation, the acquisition is automatic. Is this intended to be an extra creation acquisition at +20, or is it supposed to be an actual roll? (A roll would mean that the background might actually do nothing at all).

2. It is not a roll, it is an additional acquisition.

Could someone open what this actually means to me? I see that there are three possibilities what this could mean:

1) You get an extra acquisition where the item could have the maximum availability of +20.

2) You get an extra normal acquisition where the item can have maximum availability of -10 modified upwards by the +20 modifier to final maximum availability of +10.

3) You get an extra normal acquisition where the item can have maximum availability of -10 modified downwards by the +20 modifier to final maximum availability of -30.

How have you played it? This is important in the sense that it could be almost useless or very powerful depending on how you play it.

Option 3. You get an additional automatic acquisition, as per the rules, but it gets +20. So a final modifier of -30.

Whoa that's hardcore. Like Termintator Armour/Poor Quality Power Field/Best Quality Synthmuscles hardcore. Figured it should be as such but still pretty **** powerful.

Rule Question:
With the Power Fist is Unnatural Strength doubled as well, or just natural? Example standard Chaos Marine with Strengh 40 has a Strength bonus of 10 including armour and Unnatural Strength. How much does he do with a Power Fist (or other weapons that double strength bonus)?

Answer:" You double for the Power Fist, then add the Unnatural bonus. That's kind of a golden rule in all the games :)

Hope this helps and thanks for playing!

Tim Huckelbery"

With the comment about the other games I'll have to assume you don't include the bonus from armour in the doubling either. Good to know for those who bought BC first.

Nathiel said:

Rule Question:
With the Power Fist is Unnatural Strength doubled as well, or just natural? Example standard Chaos Marine with Strengh 40 has a Strength bonus of 10 including armour and Unnatural Strength. How much does he do with a Power Fist (or other weapons that double strength bonus)?

Answer:" You double for the Power Fist, then add the Unnatural bonus. That's kind of a golden rule in all the games :)

Hope this helps and thanks for playing!

Tim Huckelbery"

With the comment about the other games I'll have to assume you don't include the bonus from armour in the doubling either. Good to know for those who bought BC first.

Is the bonus from armor not doubled in the other games or something? Otherwise, I see no reason to not double it. It isn't an unnatural characteristic.

Correct. In the other systems Unnatural Characteristics were a multiplier on the natural characteristic then any bonuses were added after. The Power Fist doubled your natural SB or added one to the multiplier of your Unnatural you already had, then you add the bonus from your Power Armour.

The + instead of x of unnaturals in BC makes many things more straight forward, but made the power fist need more clarification. That's why I asked the question.

Nathiel said:

Correct. In the other systems Unnatural Characteristics were a multiplier on the natural characteristic then any bonuses were added after. The Power Fist doubled your natural SB or added one to the multiplier of your Unnatural you already had, then you add the bonus from your Power Armour.

The + instead of x of unnaturals in BC makes many things more straight forward, but made the power fist need more clarification. That's why I asked the question.

Hmm, it's kinda a whole different situation then. I'm going to keep playing that you do double the strength from armor for now. Just because you don't in another version that handles things differently isn't a reason to doubt the current one. And fluff-wise, i don't see that it makes sense to double only the strength of the meat of your arm, but not the strength added by the armor supporting that meat and muscle.

CSM have a starting strength bonus in the range of 3 to 5, with Unnatural 4 on top of that. Armour adds an extra 2, or 3 in the case of terminator armour. This gives a starting CSM a strength bonus range of 9 to 12. A starting human in comparison only has a strength bonus range of 3 to 5, iirc.

Now if you treat the powerfist as a multiplier on top of all other bonuses, that gives a CSM a strength bonus range of 18 to 24 which to my mind sounds stupid. Dreadnoughts, super heavy tanks and titans have strength bonuses in this region if you check other books in the 40k line so i doubt this is as intended.

Most RP systems will have you operate on the maths rule of BODMAS (brackets of division multiplication addition subtraction). In this instance you multiply the base number by 2 then add the Unnatural 4 and the 2 or 3 from armour, for a total of 12 to 17 (3 to 5, x2 = 6 to 10, + 6 to 7 = 12 to 17). This range is much more reasonable yet retains some of the power you'd expect from 8 foot tall super human warriors wearing power armour and strength enhancing battle gauntlets.

I am however willing to bet that the powerfist as stands is simply a cut and paste job from Deathwatch or another supplement and fully expect to see it being errata'd to be an Unnatural Strength addition, as the system now treats it. As marines used to get Unnatural x2 and now get +4, it'd make sense for a power fist to also give +4 for a total of +8, in which case it'd look to be a strength bonus range of 13 to 16 (3 to 5 +4 unnatural +4 power fist +2 to 3 armour = 13 to 16). As you can see this change would actually make CSM with powerfists stronger on average yet gets rid of any unsightly rules-lawyering or anything a munchkin could pounce upon.

Hopefully we'll also see something on synthetic muscle grafts and their compatibility with marines too. happy.gif

Best to just get rid of the weird SB adjustments on the power fist and instead just up its damage by 4. Makes things so much easier all around.

Honestly it's not that hard to just remove the unnatural stat adjustment, double what's left, then add the unnatural stat back in. If you just up its damage by 4 it removes quite a bit of what's good about the powerfist.

HappyDaze said:

Best to just get rid of the weird SB adjustments on the power fist and instead just up its damage by 4. Makes things so much easier all around.

Larkin said:


Honestly it's not that hard to just remove the unnatural stat adjustment, double what's left, then add the unnatural stat back in. If you just up its damage by 4 it removes quite a bit of what's good about the powerfist.

Or that! Sometimes i go into maths-mode and stop thinking sensibly. I think i helped prove the point about correct application of modifiers though.