One of the changes I liked about the previous beta was that evasion skills (dodge/parry) were opposed rolls against the attack. This meant that at higher levels the skill of the attacker still mattered as it'd made it that much harder for the opponent to dodge. It would also stop high level games being just about removing all the evasions from a skilful opponent before you could hurt them.

Changing this in the current system would lead to more brutal fights (as without giving dodge an additional bonus characters would dodge less than they currently do) and would make cover more important, but I don't see these as necessarily bad things.

Do people here think this would be a positive change to the rules?

One one hand, that's good for those high-skill attackers.

On the other hand, that's bad news for the not-combat-optimized Adept trying to get out of harms way. And it adds to the calculation complexity during combat, which is not good.

All in all... haven't made up my mind yet

I think this was possibly the most obvious "good thing" in the old beta. I've house-ruled something similar for ages.

I can't imagine why it didn't make the cut. I don't recall a single post saying they didn't like it.

I think this was possibly the most obvious "good thing" in the old beta. I've house-ruled something similar for ages.

I can't imagine why it didn't make the cut. I don't recall a single post saying they didn't like it.

This. One of my biggest complaints in the older games is that dodge/parry are binary - you roll well, attack misses. One of my players rolled up a beastly stormtrooper and hit a mook with something like 7 DoS. The thing rolled a success on its dodge check with the bare minimum and, RAW, attack misses. Ughh.

Dodge in DH2.2 is a little better, but Parry is still binary. In my view, they should both be "subtract the DoS you roll on dodge/parry from the DoS the attacker scored before resolving damage." If the dodge/parry scored more DoS than the attacker, attack missed.

Sounds like, from the comments here and others I've seen around the forums, most people are in favour of this.

I guess the next step is for all of us to provide this feedback to FFG through the beta address.

Yeah, like I have voiced several times and may as well repeat here - Dodge being binary is terrible.

I totally agree on this issue.

I think that dodge/parry may become a bit too weak if it requires more DoS than the attacker in order to successfully avoid an attack. As I remember it, it is a lot easier to get bonuses on attack rolls (from equipment, aiming, and so on) than on dodge rolls. On the other hand it is way too powerful with non-opposed defense

I would prefer some middle ground where defense is not completely unopposed, but does not have to score more DoS than the attacker either.

One way could be to introduce more talents making ones attack harder to dodge or parry.

I think that dodge/parry may become a bit too weak

God bless that outcome! No more blindly running into the enemy line of fire with a "LOL, I are Dodgin'!" - and Agility would take some nerf finally.

I think that dodge/parry may become a bit too weak

God bless that outcome! No more blindly running into the enemy line of fire with a "LOL, I are Dodgin'!" - and Agility would take some nerf finally.

I think that dodge/parry may become a bit too weak

God bless that outcome! No more blindly running into the enemy line of fire with a "LOL, I are Dodgin'!" - and Agility would take some nerf finally.

Well too weak would by definition be taking it too far. Personally I'm unsure about this change. I agree dodge becomes too powerful late game but early game it's not too bad. I would certainly look at other options. Remember in beta 1 characteristics went a lot higher so it was possible to dodge at over 100 whereas that is not the case in this version.

I agree that there is a danger of making the early game too dangerous, given the bonuses to attacks. Maybe something as simple as making the dodge always +10 or having 1 DoS cancel 2 from the attack would work (clunky though those examples are).

That said, with the devastating assault and killing strike talents, at least there are more options than dark heresy to alter the way dodges work.

Maybe go further on this route and have the following talents:-

Combat Targeting - Any attempt to dodge/parry this characters attacks suffer a penalty equal to 5 times the attackers degrees of success. This talent may only be used on attacks that can generate only one hit, semi auto ranged attacks and swift melee attacks.

Skilful Targeting - Any attempt to dodge/parry this characters attacks suffer a penalty equal to 10 times the attackers degrees of success. This talent may only be used on attacks that can generate only one hit.

Allows for the early game to operate as it does at the moment, but allows a level of scaling once it hits the mid and late game.

This is kind of an annoying problem because if you attack dodges too much you really punish people who don't invest in them but also create situations where the players don't feel like they get any better because enemies just get proportionally harder. For this reason I would prefer a talent based approach because it gives GMs control over what NPCs can reliably defeat defences

Due to the fact that hit chances scale up faster than dodge chances (unless you go into them really fast) I would suggest something along the lines of a -10 for every 2 degrees of success talent. I also like the idea that against ranged attacks dodges make you either hit the ground or run for cover (up to your Ag bonus meters like a blast weapon) as the guy dodging 6 machine gun bullets while standing in the same bit of open ground always seemed weird to me.

I lean toward making Dodge and Parry opposed, but there is this:

On the other hand, that's bad news for the not-combat-optimized Adept trying to get out of harms way. And it adds to the calculation complexity during combat, which is not good.

-The one saving grace is that in the newer systems, characters can spend Fate Points to buy DoS after the roll, unlike in DH1 . So that helps a bit.

So as non-beta tester just wanted to ask one question, possibly two.

Did they change the dodge/parry test from BC/OW mechanism to old DH/RT/DW mechanism in DH 2nd?

As I get the impression, reading your posts, that they have gone back to one dodge/parry test means, if you succeed, you're out of the frying pan.

So no comparing Attackers DoS (to see how many times he might have hit) and subtract defenders DoS from those (to see how many he dodged/parried)?

As far as I know the change is basically related to how it treats single shots.

In the original DH2 beta, DoS was always factored in, even when firing a single shot. So, if you got five DoS on that single shot? Your opponent would have to nullify all five DoS to evade your hit.

Essentially, you roll to attack, calculate your DoS, then you subtract your opponent's DoS on their evasion test. That's your end result, and number of hits are determined for that.

Whereas in the current system, a single shot is evaded with a simple flat test, and each DoS on your evasion roll always cancels out a hit from a multiple attack weapon.

As far as I know the change is basically related to how it treats single shots.

In the original DH2 beta, DoS was always factored in, even when firing a single shot. So, if you got five DoS on that single shot? Your opponent would have to nullify all five DoS to evade your hit.

Essentially, you roll to attack, calculate your DoS, then you subtract your opponent's DoS on their evasion test. That's your end result, and number of hits are determined for that.

Whereas in the current system, a single shot is evaded with a simple flat test, and each DoS on your evasion roll always cancels out a hit from a multiple attack weapon.

OK, thanks for quick reply.

Never came into my mind to use DoS in single attack action and to see how good even that was, might be interesting to make few test scenarios with that modification

I think that dodge/parry may become a bit too weak

God bless that outcome! No more blindly running into the enemy line of fire with a "LOL, I are Dodgin'!" - and Agility would take some nerf finally.

Well too weak would by definition be taking it too far. Personally I'm unsure about this change. I agree dodge becomes too powerful late game but early game it's not too bad. I would certainly look at other options. Remember in beta 1 characteristics went a lot higher so it was possible to dodge at over 100 whereas that is not the case in this version.

I agree that there is a danger of making the early game too dangerous, given the bonuses to attacks. Maybe something as simple as making the dodge always +10 or having 1 DoS cancel 2 from the attack would work (clunky though those examples are).

That said, with the devastating assault and killing strike talents, at least there are more options than dark heresy to alter the way dodges work.

Maybe go further on this route and have the following talents:-

Combat Targeting - Any attempt to dodge/parry this characters attacks suffer a penalty equal to 5 times the attackers degrees of success. This talent may only be used on attacks that can generate only one hit, semi auto ranged attacks and swift melee attacks.

Skilful Targeting - Any attempt to dodge/parry this characters attacks suffer a penalty equal to 10 times the attackers degrees of success. This talent may only be used on attacks that can generate only one hit.

Allows for the early game to operate as it does at the moment, but allows a level of scaling once it hits the mid and late game.

We could just remove dodge as a skill and use strait agility.

I can see some downsides to this but it might work.

We could just remove dodge as a skill and use strait agility.

I can see some downsides to this but it might work.

That's a solid idea, as it would stop it scaling too much at higher levels without changing the low levels (especially in the new system with +30s available) and is a simple solution (always a good one for RPGs).

That said, that's pretty much the same as parry in DH 1 (minus stuff like balanced), which can still be pretty annoying and it would be nice to make low rolls on the attack feel better than just passing.

We could just remove dodge as a skill and use straight Agility.

Oh yeah, because Agility isn't the single most important Characteristic yet...

Newsflash: it is .

It's still just as important regardless of if skill factors in though, really. The Dodge skill just gives it a boost.

It's still just as important regardless of if skill factors in though, really. The Dodge skill just gives it a boost.

With the Dodge Skill, you can leave Agility on a relatively low level and make up the rest with the Skill Rank. This can be quite important, especially with the Aptitudes system.

Seriously - opposed Evasion has to return !

It is there against auto-shots anyway, so removing it now only is a penalty for single shots that have high DoS !

I do not understand the issue,

As you advance you find it easier to land attacks, it doesnt meant you landed some super special killer combo hit, this is a basic attack move, so what justification is there for penalizing people who go the extra and spend in dodge? you want the bonus going one way, but not the other, and that is no fair or balanced.

Penalties to dodge roll should only come from special attack types, grapple, called shot, etc etc then it makes sense to make them opposed rolls.

That means the Sniper type who spent an absolute ton of EXP on all the ranged talents to be able to called shot at max range with no penalty gets the benefit over basic grunts shooting basic attacks.

As you advance you find it easier to land attacks, it doesn't meant you landed some super special killer combo hit

Well, if you scored 4+ DoS, then your attack was a super special killer execution even with the normal melee attack action. That's why we have the DoS system after all.

And by not comparing DoS you would penaltize those who improved their BS/WS.

Most importantly: why should it be opposed against auto attacks and non-opposed against single-shot-DoS ?