Since the above chapters did not get advanced specialtiesof thier own, I was curious if anybody had any ideas of thier own for them.

For Raven Guard I thought maybe a Raven Talon as some sort of veteran warrior with paired Lighting Claws similar to the old Shrike's Talons and for the White Scar the Huntsman who was a veteran chosen to take part in one the White Scar's famous Hunts. I'm not sure what skills I woudl give either to be honest to differentiate them from other specialties, but it would have been nice to get the full treatment in First Founding that the other chapters did. Anybody else have any other ideas for the other two or any of them.

I would like to know if Sword Brethren will be treated as just straight up veterans, or something sort of like Tempest Blades.

I'd like rules for an Emperor's Champion.

Kshatriya said:

I imagine in that next supplement about successor chapters this will all be covered for the Storm Wardens and Black Templars at the very least. First Foudning doesn't have anything for the 4 chapters I mentioned.

Salamanders: Fire Drake.
White Scars: Storm Seer.
Iron Hands: Ironclad Dreadnought.
Raven Guard: No idea…

BYE

I'd like to get something for them in Honour the Chapter, but I'm not going to get my hopes up.

And I can see Stormseer for the White Scars, though a 'Huntsman' type specialty would be nice too. Sounds like that'd be kinda like a scout-biker (which would fit a character of mine, perfectly).

The Raven Guard are a tough one. The Assault Marine really covers their basic theme, with the right talents and skills. I could see them creating a more advanced version of the basic theme (1st Company, guerilla specialists, etc.). Iron Hands might get their Iron Fathers, as cool as the Dreadnought would be, a Techmarine-Chaplain is just as cool and quite a bit easier to include in to a game. Fire Drakes sounds about right for the Salamanders.

Rites of Battle did provide some rules for an Emperor's Champion, which I'm inclined to favour. Unless the specialty was open to all available classes. Sword Brethren would be nice too, I could see a lot of things they could do that fits the whole knightly zealotry of the Templars.

I hope they put out some more previews soon.

Iron Fathers definitely need their own write up as well.

Nathiel said:

Certainly do, in many cases special troops can make do (not saying they should have to, but I at least appreciate that FFG don't really have the space) with First company vet, honor guards etc, but Iron Fathers aren't easily represented. Unless you just let a tech marine take the Chaplin AS.

If there's a special table/rules for Stormseers, then there really should be a special table/rules for Rune Priests. And IIRC Emperor's Champion isn't specialty-based - anyone of any specialty can have the visions and become one for the upcoming battle. I think it'd be harder to model it as a long-term specialty rather than as just something that occurs for one major mission.

Honestly I know it's hard but not every Chapter needs to have a super-special rank. It's inappropriate for a lot of Codex chapters to have a more specialized advanced specialty aside from Honor Guard. Look at how big of a deal it was for the Ultramarines to create Tyrannic War Veterans, since the Codex doesn't mention them in its organization chart. Really if you're trying to invent something whole cloth and it seems off, chances are it's superfluous, doesn't fit, and shouldn't be added.

Firedrakes are pretty much "just" First Company Vets, for example.

Contrast this to, say, Silver Skulls Prognosticators, who are Librarian/Chaplains, or Iron Fathers, who are Techmarine/Chaplains, each of which fulfill a very nice role in their chapter.

Some of the Deathwatch-specific ranks (Forgemaster, Epistolary, Chaplain, Dreadnought) could be more generalized (as in less Deathwatch-specific) and used by any chapter as just part of the Codex as well.

Face Eater said:

I really wish they'd have written up the Advanced Specialties and the extra Squad Mode and such for these 4 instead of doing the big adventure in the back of First Founding. Would have been a better use of the space, IMHO - especially since I see First Founding as something of a "Players Book" instead of one only the GM would need. So most players are going to have easy access to knowing what the adventure is.

Sure it is just as possible for anyone to buy an adventure. But in general, this is a book players will want a lot more because it has toys in it.

Dulahan said:

Hmm, I think I agree with there. I've not even read the adventure, I've no doubt it's good but it doesn't strike me a significant enough niche to warrant missing out on what would otherwise seem to be pretty much completion on the subject.

After all, their are plenty of adventure seeds but if you want a specific First Founding themed adventure I would have through that you'd want it to be more specific to your campaign than you can really publish.

The adventure is good but…brief in the book. It's more of an extended framework than a true module like TEP or even Extraction in the core. No maps, few transitional suggestions, just the big points of something like a choose your own adventure. Which is a shame because the plot is really cool but it's definitely not a situation where you can just pick up the book and do a blind run of the adventure an hour later.

I will say I am consistently disappointed with the maps or lack thereof or the quality in DW adventures. DH has done a much better job with this.

Talking about Raven Guard, have they ever given information about the passive stealth systems used in their armor? I note the masking screen in the core book, but it seems to recent and doesn't match the almost undetectability the Raven Guard showed in their fluff apearances, especially in The Chapter's Due.

I only have the core book for equipment and wondered if there was something about them elsewhere.

Honestly, more fully on topic, I can certainly see an advanced stealth specialist of some sort coming from the Raven Guard, their capacity for getting into places seems all but obscene, and beyond anything I've so far read in the Deathwatch books I have.

Maybe Advanced Artificer for Salamanders eh? With their preponderance of master crafted weapons and artificer armors? Might conflict or overlap with iron hands, but they're more specialized in bionics than equipment refinements.

Advanced artificer is covered by Deathwatch Forge-Master from Rites of Battle. A very easy port if you're running a solo-Chapter game instead of mixed-Chapter. Actually, virtually all of the Advanced Specialties in RoB work well for solo-Chapter games.

Space Wolves have a pretty groovy stealth specialist in the form of First Founding's Wolf Scouts.

Fact is these Chapters don't really have special formations even if they have special naming conventions. In some cases they have overall special Chapter attributes - focusing on tech and stealth, for example. Doesn't really translate into a special squad inside the Chapter, and shoehorning becomes painfully obvious when it's attempted.

Sorry if I'm buzzkilling.

Chapter exclusive talents, which we've already seen in First Founding, are one way to go as an alternative to advanced specialties.

The buzzkill raises a valid point.

I confess I've just stopped caring about chapter pre-reqs for advanced specialties. How to I make a White Scar biker? I use Ravenwing rules. Salamander master artificer? Wolf Guard? Deathwing by any other name. Sanginary Guard? Well, that just looks like an Honour Guard with wings and a fancy-pants helmet. I doubt there are many character concepts you couldn't make work with the currently available advanced specialties.

professor_kylan said:

I seriously considered just modifying the Tempest Guard Adv Specialty for my Raven Guard idea. The White Scar Huntsman I thought I would just tweak the Ravenwing. I just little idea what I would do for Salamanders (though the Fire Drakes really did come to my mind so a retooled 1st Company Veteran or Deathwing), but that seemed to be to simple of a rehash. The Iron Hands just escaped me as I had no real knowledge of what they are about other acccepting no weakness. I was a little suprised when First Founding came out that they gave nothing to the Imperial Fists for an Advanced Specialty.

For the Salamanders, I think some sort of Advance Specialty involving being part of the retinue of a Forgefather would be pretty neat. Probably an overhaul of a Kill-Marine or something like that, though.

andrewm9 said:

Possibly for the best given the, erm, "quality" of about 85% of what the Imperial Fists have gotten so far.

Kshatriya said:

Wait… there's 15% of the Imperial Fists that's good in Deathwatch? Because I keep having the impression they are hands down the worst of all the Chapters right now… by a rather wide margin. Even Create-a-Chapters are likely to be a touch better. Which is a real shame for one of the most famous of the Primogenitures. .

Dulahan said:

They are by far the worst, but they have a couple good Psychic Powers (Regeneration 5 anyone?), the TB-booster from First Founding makes then ded 'ard-er, and having one Modal effect that completely negates Fear and/or Pinning is nice…too bad they have three of those, can we say REDUNDANT.

So there is some good stuff, just not much of it.

Kshatriya said:

Honestly, it feels to me that the Fists suffered from "Oh… crap. We sorta made the Dark Angels what the Fists are. The Preeminent defenders…"