So I just saw that deeds dont count towards rank progression, yeah I know late to the party. That said, my question now becomes do advanced specialties count against your rank? I could see it going both ways...

option A, it does and it should since it doesnt say otherwise and the costs for most being as high as they are require you to bypass an entire rank to get an addtional table and keep power down.

option B, it doenst and it allows the players a longer toon/game life span but also requires several sessions of "non advancement" to obtain all that awesome that the advanced specialty entails.

did i miss something that says either way or was that a GM prefrence thing?

Arguyle said:

Option A but this can only happen for Furioso Dreadnaughts (6000XP) because all the other specialities cost less than it would cost to bypass an entire rank.

For example: You are Rank 6 Ultramarine Tac have 39999 XP (very unlikely, but maybe your GM will award small pockets of XP's) and you decide to become a Honour Guard which will cost you 5000XP then you would still reach only Rank 7 having 44999XP and won't bypass Rank 7 entirely.

Kain McDogal said:

umm isnt the difference between levels/ranks as listed below? so like DW champ bascially makes rank 4 non existent? and dreads blank levels (both kinds i checked). I mean, I'm just not sure that seems "right" has anyone tested this at all? like DW champ is 4k xp for 2 signature wargear masters the toxic trait a taunt, and a new table. if you meet all the requirements at rank 4 you basically trade away the level for what ill agree is some really cool **** but maybe im thinking way to much like DnD and that it should be a sink of XP like creating magical weapons.

1-2= 4k / 2-3= 4k / 3-4 4k / 4-5 5k / 5-6 5k / 6-7 5k / 7-8 5k

Arguyle said:

I don't know if I get you right on this but you can still select all the Talents and Skills which are available for Rank 4, this is not an alternate carrer Rank like in Dark Heresy, but of course you loose 4000XP just for becoming a DW Champion and getting acces to its table, special abilities and wargear . This was discussed latley in another thread on this forum, but to make things short it's not very beneficial to take DW Champ if you are an AM already. The high cost is the tribute you have to pay for getting access to a lot of meele talents despite being a shooter like Dev or Tac for example which normally have far less meele potential.

Kain McDogal said:

You're correct. For, say, a Rank 4 Tacmarine buying in to Deathwatch Champion, it's not "get Deathwatch Champion table access instead of Tactical Marine Rank 4 table access." It's "get Deathwatch Champion table access in addition to Tactical Marine Rank 4 table access."

I disagree that it's not worth it for Assault Marine though. The Dodge advances are nice. Some things you can get much earlier than waiting in your native table. And the pesudo-Toxic effect is great. I think the instakill kinda sucks for everyone though, I might change it to trigger a save-or-die on every hit, not just Righteous Fury hits. Also I don't think the Intimidate new use is supposed to be restricted specifically to the Champion. I can see how it thematically works for them but the text (unfortunately) doesn't indicate that it either is or isn't supposed to be a bonus for buying in. Personally I think a 3rd bonus on top of good wargear and a table that's very good for most specialties would be too much for 4000 XP. The pseudo-Toxic thing is worth a lot just on its own.

As an aside, where does it say that XP spent on Deeds doesn't go towards Rank? Does this hold true with Distinctions as well? That's a bookkeeping nightmare...

Kshatriya said:

Oh I must have overlooked the part on XP spent on Deeds doesn't go towards Rank by Arguyle. Of course this is a misinterpretation of the rules.

First the XP spent on deeds don't count towards Rank indeed but you have to pay for it anyway because deeds can only be chosen during character creation and so can only be paid by the 1000XP you get for free when you start as a DW SM. Only after you have spent this 1000XP the Rank progression begins at 13000XP and of course these XP don't have to be spent on deeds alone but on every Talent and Skill which will be avaiable at Rank1 but remember you haven't really started Rank 1!

Second what the description of deeds really means is that every advancement bonus (WS +3 for example), every Talent and every Skill awarded by this deeds doesn't have to be paid for separately at the cost for which it might appear in any future Rank table the charakter may choose from but this goes without saying because some Talents and Skills you get from Deeds don't show up in any table which you can choose from so how could you determine the cost. You only have to pay the cost for the Deed alone.

One more thing. You can only choose ONE Deed.

Kshatriya said:

at the begining of the deeds, you pay for them with xp but it doesnt count towards rank. distinctions do count i dont know why. In all seriousness deeds should and distinctions should not since deeds are player chosen and part of the back story for creation while distinctions are GM awarded.

im pretty sure the advanced specialties dont replace tables you can draw from just adds an extra bucket of goodies to pull from. if im wrong that may be where im drawing my confusion with the limitation of xp expendature by having the purchase of the classes count towards advancement...

Arguyle said:

Please read my last post carefully and then remember Distincions are some kind of special Talents which aren't offered on any Career table and are offered by the GM. They are like an Elite Advance the other way round. If you take the Distinctions you have been offered then you must pay their costs which count towards Rank like everything which has an XP associated to it and is taken AFTER you have started the game beginning at 13000 XP.A Deed is chosen BEFORE the actual game starts and is paid by the 1000XP you get for free at character creation.

In an abstract way you can say Rank 1 starts actually at 12000XP and you get an 1000XP award from which you can build up your character and then it's clear that even Deeds count towards Rank but not the Skills and Talents they offer. The reason why this misleading phrase "Any adjustments made to the character by selecting a Deed do not count as advancements for the purpose to increasing your Rank" isn't repeated for Distinctions is because Distintions have no Skills, Talents or Characteristic Advances integrated like Deeds. "Any adjustment" means the integrated Skills, Talents or Characteristic Advances and not the Deed itself!

I really don't know how I can explain it more precisley.

Kain McDogal said:

i did read it, less condesention please. also, the post you quoted was a response to the question of where the rules question was drawn from and then a personal opinion, not fact. also whats really misleading is that "Any adjustments made to the character by selecting a Deed do not count as advancements for the purpose to increasing your Rank" is followed by "nor do increases or reductions toward the improvement of your characteristics through normal means."
As I and the others at my table read that characteristic advances dont count towards xp expended for ranking up, though no mention of this is found anywhere else in the core book.

Arguyle said:

This only refers to the benefits you gain from your Chapter or some Specialties you can take not to characteristic advances.

Sorry, I didn't wanted to offend you but at first it looked like you have overread my last post and I only wanted to help.