In the description of the talent crack shot, it states "when the character's ranged damage causes Critical Damage, add +2 to the Damage." is that to the Critical Damage or to the damage of the weapon? I would read that as to apply to the Critical Damage. Am I reading that correctly?

Lets assume a shot from a bolter. If that shot did 10 damage, 3 of it critical, you would add 2 more critical damage, for a total of 5. If you didn't do critical damage, the talent does nothing. You could just say this: "When you deal critical damage you add 2 damage." Since that is same as saying you add 2 more critical damage.

Is the question in this case how it interfaces with True Grit (character suffers 1/2 critical damage)? In this case, I generally rule that the Crack Shot damage is actually applied to the weapon, and is appropriately halved. Not that the final crit damage is just two higher after all is said and done.

...Which is fair enough and I totally agree with your logic; but makes the talent very poor value.

+2 *Damage* is great, because if affects every blow AND adds to critical hits, by extension.

Crack Shot is a poor buy in comparison, given that it is useless in Horde fights, and even excluding those, only a small proportion of hits that land will critical, and that 2 points on those rarely makes a difference. It becomes a little more worthwhile if it adds after the halving. After all: poor mechanical options cease to be options.

You can beefen it slightly up by house ruling that the +2 gets applied after crit damage reduction by a target's True Grit talent.

Alex

Siranui said:

If you want a +2 to damage with ALL ranged attacks, take the Mighty Shot talent. Adding Crack Shot along with that makes killing easier.

-=Brother Praetus=-

Crack Shot will be worth something if you rolled Death is Joy on the Power Armour History table which grants you an additional +2 to any (meele or ranged) critical damage which will stack with Crack Shot. So this will give you +4 critical damage and with the Explosive Damage Type of a Bolter this can be the crucial factor in gunning down an Elite adversary. But first comes mighty shot!

Suddenly becomes very good if you use the BC RF replacement btw.

Face Eater said:

No, they don't - effects that modify Critical Damage do not affect the Zealous Hatred roll, as noted in the Black Crusade rulebook.

Brother Praetus said:

Yes, I got that.

My point is that the talent is poor value mechanically, and that can be moderated by allowing the +2 to add after any critical-reducing effects.

N0-1_H3r3 said:

I stand corrected, it's still rubbish.

It's more powerful if you play it the way I intend to next mission onwards: WFRP-style (1E). Critical Damage isn't cumulative anymore, you just receive various wounds, depening on how low below 0 the next attack hits you. All I need to do is figure out how to balance True Grit.

Alex

ak-73 said:

Sounds like for some epic dismemberment, let us know how that works out

Well, it's less deadly because it works like the present system only that you look up damage without adding previous critical damage to the currently received one. Thus you need to get 6 to 9 points (or so) beyond a critters soak to kill it. More with True Grit.

Alex

Right, it's less deadly, but I imagine more limbs are removed and things like skin completely burnt off, as the first hit makes you drop your gun, the second fall to the ground, the third doesn't kill you gut it burns all your skin off .

True Grit is a tricky one, I agree, but I'm not sure that if you've managed to get a marine to zero, doing another hit that goes does 14 or so damage isn't too hard. You do eliminate the death from 1,000 cuts scenario though, which could be good or bad depending on the theme you're going for.

Marines don't die from a 1,000 cuts. Alternatively, you can make every critical wound as a whole count as 1 Critical Damage point. Quite elegant. True Grit could allow for suspension of that rule. Sounds good on paper.

Alex