In the living errata it says that a player can not aquire terminator armor because of its requision cost. I don't understand how a player would loose the prior 60 pts of requision that they would spend prior to gaining the hreoic tier access. If a player has already taken (for example) a power sword and a storm bolter why would they not be able to take the armor?
My question is more is it a rules/ ballance issue or a requition spending issue?
I think it was partly a balance issue and partly the idea that TDA is too rare and precious to give it to just one person.
The balance/req arguments both loose ground with the inclusion of the Deathwing in First Founding.
As someone who's always loved the Dark Angels I had been thinking along the same lines as you before the new book. Now I'll just play one properly and be even more powerful begause of the special stuff I get along with the TDA.
The Deathwing also approaches termie use different from every other First Company. Deploying exclusively as termies is something only they do. Other First Companies mix it up depending on the mission.
There is the question of DA sucessor chapters. it is said many times how they seem to act like one larger legion at times and if the successor follows the same formation patterns as the DAs then do they also field 1st company in TDA all the time?
One thing that wasn't realy covered in First Founding is how to handle the successors. they all say 'follow the rules for the main chapter with these changes.' does that mean that they also use an equivalent for these new rules? solo and squad modes? specialties? wargear? I know someone else brought this up but we never realy discussed it then.
Remember whenever you requisition terminator armour you MUST spend at least 100 requisition on it. The 60 for terminator armour does not include the wargear with it, that is where the other 40 comes from. Sure you may be able to use your power sword with your terminator armour, but you still need to requisition 40 more points of wargear to take the armour.
Remember as well, you can only take gear allowed for terminators when wearing terminators. Which means, no heavy bolter, lascannon, relic bolter, etc.
Since you can't get something worth 100 req with any signature wargear, you cannot use any sig wargear advance to take terminator armour.
The addition of the Deathwing makes this kind of weird though. With the DW you get the TDA as standard gear. It notes that you must requisition or use signature wargear to get at least two weapons to arm it from the accepted Terminator equipment list. (slightly different than saying you must spend 40 req but not significantly.)
I guess the question here is why is this so different from using sig wargear: hero for the armour (60 req) sig wargear (standard) for a Storm Bolter (20 req) and sig wargear (standard) for a Power Sword (20 req)?
It falls into the other question of what happens to your other gear when you get signature wargear. Does your other gear go away or can you choose to leave the signature wargear behind in preference for the standarg gear or other req'd gear.
Nathiel said:
The addition of the Deathwing makes this kind of weird though. With the DW you get the TDA as standard gear. It notes that you must requisition or use signature wargear to get at least two weapons to arm it from the accepted Terminator equipment list. (slightly different than saying you must spend 40 req but not significantly.)
I guess the question here is why is this so different from using sig wargear: hero for the armour (60 req) sig wargear (standard) for a Storm Bolter (20 req) and sig wargear (standard) for a Power Sword (20 req)?
Deathwing is a unique case of Chapter doctrine overriding standard procedure. The Deathwing member is going to be bringing his personal suit of TDA with him from his chapter. All other marines are going to be requisitioning suits from the Deathwatch armory. TDA, being as rare as it is, is something I imagine the keepers of the armory being unwilling to loan out on a semi-permanent basis.
Nathiel said:
It falls into the other question of what happens to your other gear when you get signature wargear. Does your other gear go away or can you choose to leave the signature wargear behind in preference for the standarg gear or other req'd gear.
The standard, starting gear is what you brought with you from your chapter. This gear would never go away, it would merely be left in your arming chamber when not in use. If you successfully petition the armory to allow you to keep a particular piece of equipment on extended loan (Sig. Wargear) then that would also be kept in your arming chamber, until you left the Deathwatch.
They're not loaning this out to just anyone. To get this you are at least a Champion or rank 7+, Famed, with the Crux Terminatus.
And, yes, TDA is rare and special. But more rare and special than one of a kind relics you could get with Sig Wargear: Hero? the AdMech still makes suits of TDA just not very quickly.
Point is per RAW (plus errata) you cannot take Terminator armor with any signature wargear talent. This was likely originally done for some fluff and for some balance issues, as Nathiel says a while back.
Now that the Deathwing popped up, we've got some power creep. As per RAW they're the only ones that get it, and it's probably to make them feel special. If you don't particularly like that, it's farily easy to HR it. The one thing I would make sure you're doing is balancing the XP cost of signature wargearing a suit of Terminator Armor and make it close to the XP cost of the Deathwing class, simply because of all the neat bells and whistles that come with terminator armor.