Sure does, most of time you're IG soldiers are giving away size to the bag guys so giving away more size and being even sneakier is just playing to strengths. Bilbo Baggins would have had a lot more street cred if he'd been blowing peoples heads off. Hopefully they are going to be more than one trick ponies (albiet with a really good trick). There's potentially there for any sneaky or non-direct shootout roles, divers, sappers etc.

For Ogryns, and I've said this before, they are a head ache to balance, especially early game. A big factor later is ensure that they are prevented from keeping up with gear upgrades. They aren't supposed to be smart enough to figure out most standard IG gear. Them being strong as bull isn't quite as a good the benefit if you are hulking catachan with a powerfist. Being as tough as house is good but if you can't get the good carapace armour that fits, or the refractor fields.

If they can use all the same gear then you might as well play the ogryn all the time. If they can use auto-cannons then the Ogryns gonna carry it easier and be harder to put down, if they can't then there's a pretty good reason to play something else right there.

Ogryns will have distinct limits on their skills - remember, a 'bonehead' is one that has been cybernetically enhanced to bring him up to an intellect level where he can understand intellectual concepts (dimly) more complex than "eat," "hit," "um, pull trigga?" and, of course, "fart." In the old ork books, ogryns were considered inferior to the boys in 'finky bitz," which is saying something! Face it, Ogryns are thick. They're not gonna have many skills beyond basic Speak Low Gothic (Literacy will literally be beyond them), Awareness, and maybe Trade: Cook. And their Int score will probably be 2D10+5, at the most.

As for ratlings, c'mon, who doesn't see the potential for playing the 'little guy' from war stories? There's plenty of room for the Tough Scrapper, the Sneaky Git, the Deadly Nutbar (I keep thinking the knife-wielding guy from Stripes), and, of course, the Wheeler-Dealer.

Face Eater said:

Reaper Autocannons are evil… they'll just be crap shots.

Also, no Carpace armor? Who cares, the likely Unnatural Toughness plus a base toughness of 5+ is going to more than make the difference, especially when combined with likely far more wounds. Plus, they tend to have some armor too, big metal plates.

Energy shields, ok, I'll grant you that.

Yer, da big pinkies is surposed ter be too fick ter use a bolta, see? So day got dese big shotty-guns called 'rippas.' Easy ter use, 'n fun! (And the stats already exist in the game: Introduced in Rogue Trader as the deck sweeper heavy weapon.)

I will try to get back to the topic:

'Classes' still missing in my opinion:

Sniper/stealth oriented person

Demolition specialist - for all your fireworks

Driver/Pilot - someone who can drive/hotwire anything. and i mean anything.

Any thoughts on how they might be running Commissars? I can't imagine most players would enjoy getting one-shotted for a single mistake, but that might be what a Commissar does, as a morale officer. It just seems odd to me to make one of the available PC options the character who makes a living out of party member kills. Sure, they can be "your friend" to a point, and they do want you to stay alive, to fight for the Emperor, so I understand they have more potential than "cap the officer", "it's for your own good, psyker", and "if it keeps us here, I WILL kill one of you". Maybe the RPG will change it to maiming shots; pain is a great motivator, and "seeing the Emperor's glory within you pain-addled brain" could keep you fighting.

On the other hand, good access to carapace armor (while TT Commissars don't start with it, some of them do pick it up), earlier access to power swords (possibly), and a bolt pistol with a steady supply of ammo would be nice.

Comissars and Abhumans are all in the Eleventh Hour character supplement now available in the FFG web site.

Well there we go – Ogryn and Ratlings officially confirmed. Sure was frustrating watching people guess Ratlings and not guess Ratlings and not being able to say anything.

Not many more to be revealed now.

BYE

@venkelos

Any thoughts on how they might be running Commissars?

Regarding the demo adventure, that's easy - the Commissar is attached to a Catachan squad. If she's not completely green, that means she knows what happens to Commissars throwing their weight around too much.

And especially what happens when they throw their weight around in Catachan regiments. Unpopular Commissars tend to have ‘unfortunate accidents’ in regiments like that.

And at the end of the day her life is on the line as much as everyone else is. She can rant and scream about cowardice all she likes – won’t make a bit of difference when the bombardment starts!

BYE

I have to admit the fact the Commissar is obviously the 'leader' sort has me a touch worried. Mostly since they are… and in many other ways aren't such. Though given the limitations of the system the crossover was probably inevitable.

I just hope there's a genuine Commissioned Officer sort as well now.

Dulahan said:

I don't think we have anything to worry about there. Commissars are useful, but they aren't tactical, and try to be your friend first as they might, you know that, if it comes to it, he'll shoot you dead renders any trust between them a bit strained. I think Officer was on the list. You will probably start as a Lieutenant, or some such, a Junior Officer working through the ranks, but still an Officer, a soldier driven by Intelligence and Fellowship. I just hope that they incorporate something extra in to work like IG tactics from the Codex. While I know it has its uses, and there are a couple Talents that benefit from it, Command often left me feeling like they didn't do as much with it as they could have. Some tactics abilities, to get some party use out of that skill, and bring an edge and cohesiveness to the squad, would be very nice, and help justify playing that Officer.

I'm pretty sure the confirmed Sergeant, and it might just be the progression for them, to go from lead grunt to unit lead, someday up to Major, Colonel, or even General. While it might not be the most accurate to real life thing (I don't know if Sergeants can become Lieutenants, and on), it could help to foster the connection, and faith, between the Guard and their Commanders; these leaders do, or not to long ago did, fight on the front lines, bleeding with the rest of us. Sure, you might hit a cap, beyond which your character would be promoted to a Proteus-class Command bunker, or the observation room of an orbiting ship, taking them out of the PC's range of combat, becoming NPC, but it seems like the logical plan for the RPG, IMHO.

I notice that Ogryns don't have Unnatural stats in the end. Or I guess it might be that they have just amalgamated them into the Size thing for the write up for the Free RPG thing, but even if they have they are not nearly as tough or strong as Marines… which is interesting.

I am also wondering why the Ratling has a base move of 4. His agility Bonus is 3 and I can't see any special rules that give him +1 to movement.

venkelos said:

That does nothing to make me confident.

First, what we can see about the commissar is that it IS more than just charismatic. She has those other skills too. So it's worrisome. Granted, with 12 different archetypes, it's nice if there's some overlap just to make sure roles get covered in a group.

However, the sergeant thing? I HOPE that Sergeant can NOT get promoted to Officer as part of some arbitrary advance scheme. (Admittedly, I still hold out hope that 'role' isn't just a Dark Heresy like rank advance scheme and instead just a starting set of skills and MAYBE some sort of initial advance table or discounts, but I hope to god it isn't 8 ranks like DH that hammer you in and declare what rank and title you are) NCOs are a very different thing from Commissioned Officers. Different skill sets and rarely go that way. (Though I will concede apparently some Guard Regiments do, like the Death Korps of Krieg). I'd rather see the option, rank and all, of someone starting as the wet behind the ears Lieutenant for a group, especially now that we've confirmed it's Dark Heresy level of start.

@borithan

I would assume that Unnaturals and Size simply got shortened into one trait.

@dulahan

Actually, there have been no specific rank titles since Dark Heresy, apart from Alternative Ranks. I'd assume this remains the case here as well, meaning a NCO who remains one can simply climb his own advancement tree and refrain from taking anything that reeks too much of officer status. Problem solved?

We'll know when we see it. I suppose.

AKA, I'll hopefully know Thursday at Gen Con if my plans don't fall through (losing my roomates faster than a Space Marine drops mooks… currently at unaffordable room price levels. x.x )

Still, I continue to hold out hope it's just starting package and maybe something else, but doesn't prevent other starts from becoming Sergeants or whatever.

I dont have a Problem with NCO's becomeing CO's some of the best CO's that i know of have been previous enlisted. Now i understand that not all NCO's become CO's but it souldn't be out of the question.

mrady said:

Exactly. Nor should it be for your starting Heavy Weapons guy to become a Sergeant either. Like I said, my ideal world is all of these things are starting points, not rigid never change things. Something, somehow, more akin to Black Crusade's system. I love how it handles stuff, just hate having to play a villain. So hoping this will give the good guys a less rigid, class dictated option.

I havent played DH or BC only RT and DW, but for all of them the career paths were a more different and specific then what you'ed expect in an army. like you said there would be a little more veriaty in what you could do. but the nice thing in RT and DW is the alterent careers, in which you could take to branch out and either make your guy more a melee beast or give him a little more variaty

I noticed lots of Ratling characters which are like hobbits. Kinda like the fellowship of the Ring in space.

peterstepon said:

Which is why I dislike them. But I can see their appeal, so "different folks, different strokes" as they say. lol

The Russian said:

A swift one at shoulder height typically suffices. That said, I don't mind ratlings.

So, we have…

Weapon Specialist

Heavy Gunner

Storm Trooper

Comissar

Ratling

Orgryn

Ministorum Priest

Battle Pysker

Tech-Priest Enginseer

What's left?

I do hope that playing a Ratling isn't the only way to be a viable Sniper Character, or even necessarily the best way. Tied for best, ok, but I hope there's human options for Stealthy Snipers too.

EDIT: Or at least, not the only 'good' one. I'd definitely prefer if each one has advantages, but I REALLY hope that Target Selection thing isn't a Ratling only thing. Otherwise they will become the only good sniper option.

Plushy said:

Medic is confirmed as is Sergeant in the earliest advertisements.