Hi all, please use this thread for feedback on Update #2. Thanks in advance!

http://www.fantasyflightgames.com/edge_news.asp?eidn=4539

-Tim

Am I missing something? I'm not seeing the second update on the Beta News Feed.

YOU JUMPED THE GUN, TIM

Its like going into a space hulk full of genestealers, while forgetting power armour and boltgun...not that it would have helped though ;D

Hi all, yes the gun is jumped. It should be going up within an hour or so though.

-Tim

I'll just say that the lack of a change to the skill system is pretty disappointing. I miss the consolidated Lores from the first beta. I think I read maybe a couple of people complaining about them ("oh but characters will be too powerful...") and dozens of people on this forum who support the consolidated skills.

I'll just say that the lack of a change to the skill system is pretty disappointing. I miss the consolidated Lores from the first beta. I think I read maybe a couple of people complaining about them ("oh but characters will be too powerful...") and dozens of people on this forum who support the consolidated skills.

This. I can't personally recall seeing anyone who thought that change was a bad idea.

Also, the update refers to the Psyker role on page 45. I'm guessing by the text it should be "Mystic Role". Typos in your own errata, FFG?

I can't help but feel the new Talent Inescapable Attack should be redundant, but sadly, isn't. That should be mostly how dodge/parry works in the first place. Unfortunately, the only change to the combat section has nothing to do with undoing the reversion to binary dodge.

edit; oh and for some reason the Allocating Characteristics sidebar doesn't render in pdf.js in Firefox.

I agree on cps (weird world).

The Remembrance + Specialist Talents are something I think a lot of people would like to see.

Inescapable attack is a compromise, if opposed evading should not return. Better than nothing...but I'd also still prefer regular opposed tests for evading in general.

I am very glad that the fans suggestion for a choice between +20 and +25 characteristics was integrated. This shows that you indeed do read the feedback well - thank you for this one.

As far as I see, the point buy system would also need the side option for +25 regarding the upper limit though (which then would be 45 instead of 40).

Shouldnt the number of characteristic increases be 5 instead of 4 to allow for acolytes to still achieve a higher status during their career ?

The buff on coordinated interrogation is very welcome; I'd give the basic +10 only though if at least 2 acoyltes are present ("coordinated"), even if the other one doesnt have the talent (he still can be instructed by the one who has to play his role).

Mayb a handful of non-combat talents in addition would have been nice (some of the classics like Armour of contempt)

I posted this in the other thread before seeing this one so I will just repost here.

Trade is still not the crafting skill, come on guys you describe it as the crafting skill so make it actually work, we had a whole thread of this and no reason not to make this change. Tech Use is the Ag of skills, it is far too useful compared to others.

I would like more Tier 1 talents, in general I'd like more talents in the core rules because any talents you include in supplements will generally not get used in other supplements so NPC stats will often feel incomplete.

Please put more stuff in the initial character creation choices. More skills and talents in role and homeworld. Make it more interesting and don't drop the starting experience to compensate, we don't need groups that can't do basic tasks because they have so few skills to go on. Stick linguistic skills in homeworld for example.

Findings on our playtesting this weekend. Please let me know if this is not the type of feedback you are looking for, as this is just stuff important to us.

CHARACTER CREATION

-Most of the group liked the lower stats. Penalties at this level of certain stats can be brutal though, such as willpower considering how unbelievably important it is to avoid having your character taken out of the fight.

-We prefer the consolidation of lore skills from beta 1 considering the XP cost involved currently.

EQUIPMENT

-Requisition test: As written, it looks like you can burn 1d5 influence to gain whatever piece of equipment you want. Is it supposed to be limited to whatever the player stood a chance of getting? (net 1% chance on the influence roll)

-Is there no "primitive" drawback to old armors? We could only find primitive notes for weapons, causing a highborn to walk around in best quality chainmail with his mechanicus bodyguard decked out in feudal plate. I am not objecting, but would like to know if it was intentional.

-Flame: We were disappointed in the reversion back to DH1 for flame weapons. They were so unbelievably effective in first edition that we had to call a truce: If we wouldn't use them, then the GM wouldn't use them. Nothing kills the fun for a player when he cant do anything on his turn, and this version of flame makes it so easy for that to happen in a system where there are already so many ways.

-In our games, it seemed that the way to go with armament was this: Automatic weapons are better. Dual wielding is better. Do what you can to get one or both of these (in that order) to be at least moderately effective in combat, for both combat and non-combat focused characters. For the most part, single-shot weapons are taken only as a gimick for style. We make the most of them as far as build goes, but they are consistently outshined by filling the air with lead/micromissiles/incandescent energy.

COMBAT

-We were disappointed to see the old fear back. It never seems fun for a common mechanic have a decent chance of having significant portions of the party have to go get some popcorn, or a drink, because they are not going to be doing anything. The varied fear types were more interesting, to boot.

-We like opposed DoS evasion tests for all attack types, as discussed many places elsewhere. -We like the built-in bonus to single attacks and the subsequent penalty to full auto, with semi being in the middle.

-There is no difference in hits scored between semi-auto and full-auto until 3 or more successes are scored, and semi-auto will hit more often. Is this intentional? -Melee survival seems to have decreased with the lowering of starting stats and the introduction of ranged attack bonuses such as scatter, point-blank, and short range.

FINAL THOUGHS Generally our discussions revolve around how the design team thinks Dark Heresy is being played, or how they intend it to be played. Has there been a blog posted on the subject or a rundown on a game played by FFG?

Our impression is that DH2 Beta 2 is a gritty high stakes game where you must dive for cover or die, the two-gun maniac is king, and acolytes are expected to run around in common equipment for most if not all of their lives, while staring wistfully at tables full of equipment they will never have.

The interesting thing is we are ok with this if it is on purpose, as we know that that is what the system supports the best and dont want to pile on feedback saying "this doesnt work" if it is working like FFG wants.

Having tried out the character generation with my group, we are great fans of the +25 char generation (we dont like amateur acolytes).

Thanks a lot for still offering both options !

FINAL THOUGHS Generally our discussions revolve around how the design team thinks Dark Heresy is being played, or how they intend it to be played. Has there been a blog posted on the subject or a rundown on a game played by FFG?

Our impression is that DH2 Beta 2 is a gritty high stakes game where you must dive for cover or die, the two-gun maniac is king, and acolytes are expected to run around in common equipment for most if not all of their lives, while staring wistfully at tables full of equipment they will never have.

The interesting thing is we are ok with this if it is on purpose, as we know that that is what the system supports the best and dont want to pile on feedback saying "this doesnt work" if it is working like FFG wants.

Maybe FFG should post some of their games.

FINAL THOUGHS Generally our discussions revolve around how the design team thinks Dark Heresy is being played, or how they intend it to be played. Has there been a blog posted on the subject or a rundown on a game played by FFG?

Our impression is that DH2 Beta 2 is a gritty high stakes game where you must dive for cover or die, the two-gun maniac is king, and acolytes are expected to run around in common equipment for most if not all of their lives, while staring wistfully at tables full of equipment they will never have.

The interesting thing is we are ok with this if it is on purpose, as we know that that is what the system supports the best and dont want to pile on feedback saying "this doesnt work" if it is working like FFG wants.

I think this is a big problem in many aspects of the game.

For me the problem is most pronounced regarding character generation. The text and basic premise of the setting tells the players that their characters have been chosen among billions and are a cut above the rest of humanity. The mechanics of the game produce somewhat unimpressive characters when they are compared to many of the NPCs from chapter 12. This is also true when creating experienced acolytes (using the 2d10+25 option), though not to as big a degree.

The shift from +25 to +20 as the basic option for character generation indicates that the low power of the starting characters is on purpose, but it is really confusing when the text of the book contradicts the mechanics. Especially for new players that may not have a firm grasp of the mechanics and could feel cheated when their characters perform much worse than they would expect from the descriptions.

I agree - but as long as both options are still valid and official, its ok for me.

Here is my impression of stuff in our first playtest of the Beta 2 update 2.

Combat goes like this: miss, miss, miss, miss, dead

Since full and semi auto are objectively better in all circumstances than single shots, The room is filled with bullets spraying wildly around (suprisingly with no chance of hitting your allies in melee), but the chances to hit are so bad that you mostly miss. When you do hit, you are dodged about a third of the time. Combat ends when someone rolls less than 10%, and the multiple hits destroy your opponent.

Character creation commentary.

I understand why the stats were lowered for game balance, but PC's are now significantly inferior to common thugs in the back of the book, and worse than any "troop" in the npc section.

This problem is only an issue because you went back to 1st edition mechanics and got rid of the opposed test rules. Under beta 1, who cared if you had a 90% chance to do something, because if was always opposed by someone with an 80% chance of stopping you. The only time it broke down was in those cases like step aside, where the roll was not opposed.

Under beta 1 the PC felt competent, but didn't succeed because they were opposed by the enemy. In beta 2, the PC feels incompetent because their chances of success are poor.

Social interactions commentary.

I would appreciate some hard examples of where subtlety works. If a group has a subtlety score of 0, how does that influence skill checks? If 100? Is it all up to the DM? Without a game mechanic behind it, many dm's will simply ignore subtlety except for some basic flavor roleplaying.

There is a disconnect between the descriptions of what gains influence and the reality of the adventure in the beta. With moderately good roleplaying, you can gain 9 influence in the little end of book adventure. By the chapter on influence, this is the equivalent of personally saving the emperor and leading the charge to beat back the Eldar invasion. (5 IP is saving a sector capital in the descriptions!).

Since full and semi auto are objectively better in all circumstances than single shots, The room is filled with bullets spraying wildly around (suprisingly with no chance of hitting your allies in melee), but the chances to hit are so bad that you mostly miss. When you do hit, you are dodged about a third of the time. Combat ends when someone rolls less than 10%, and the multiple hits destroy your opponent.

Full Auto and Semi Auto sure are better at everything except hitting targets. Maybe your players would miss less if they took advantage of that +10.

Since full and semi auto are objectively better in all circumstances than single shots, The room is filled with bullets spraying wildly around (suprisingly with no chance of hitting your allies in melee), but the chances to hit are so bad that you mostly miss. When you do hit, you are dodged about a third of the time. Combat ends when someone rolls less than 10%, and the multiple hits destroy your opponent.

Full Auto and Semi Auto sure are better at everything except hitting targets. Maybe your players would miss less if they took advantage of that +10.

Add this to the +10 to hit on single shots from the red-dot sight (available at character creation) and the +10 to hit at short range (not difficult to achieve with a Basic weapon in Dark Heresy) and you have a pretty reliable +30 to hit on single shots. That gives an average DH2 character a 65% chance to hit. This is substantially better than starting DH1 characters could manage.

Do red-dots help with Called shots ? I think RAW they do not - but it would make sense that they did.

Since full and semi auto are objectively better in all circumstances than single shots, The room is filled with bullets spraying wildly around (suprisingly with no chance of hitting your allies in melee), but the chances to hit are so bad that you mostly miss. When you do hit, you are dodged about a third of the time. Combat ends when someone rolls less than 10%, and the multiple hits destroy your opponent.

Full Auto and Semi Auto sure are better at everything except hitting targets. Maybe your players would miss less if they took advantage of that +10.

So to back up my assertion, I asked a mathematician friend to calculate just how much better full auto is than a single shot using an autogun with expander ammo. Base conditions: 70% net chance for single shot, 50% for full auto (close range, single aim, 40 BS). I didn't add a red dot or a targeter since they would cancel out each other in the calculations.

"

This puts full auto at 2.8x better."

I then posed the question of how dodge factors in to the equation, since it requires a degree of success to stop each bullet using autofire. I assumed a 40 AG and the dodge skill. His answer (which only took into account the four hits possible to dodge, since there is a 19% chance that full auto will hit twice that is undodgeable):

"As for your dodge question, that makes it a bit more complicated.

This makes full auto 3.38 times better after dodge is factored in, though auto fire loses far more in average damage to the dodge roll."

Since full and semi auto are objectively better in all circumstances than single shots, The room is filled with bullets spraying wildly around (suprisingly with no chance of hitting your allies in melee), but the chances to hit are so bad that you mostly miss. When you do hit, you are dodged about a third of the time. Combat ends when someone rolls less than 10%, and the multiple hits destroy your opponent.

Full Auto and Semi Auto sure are better at everything except hitting targets. Maybe your players would miss less if they took advantage of that +10.

So to back up my assertion, I asked a mathematician friend to calculate just how much better full auto is than a single shot using an autogun with expander ammo. Base conditions: 70% net chance for single shot, 50% for full auto (close range, single aim, 40 BS). I didn't add a red dot or a targeter since they would cancel out each other in the calculations.

"

Original problem:

d10+4 is average of 9.5 dmg (5.5 for 1d10, +4).

The single shot has an expected value (going to use EV from here on) of .7*9.5+.3*0=6.65

For the autofire, there's a 50% chance of missing, 1% chance of 1 hit, 10% of 2 hits, 10% of 3 hits, 10% 4 hits, 10% 5hits, 9% chance of 6 hits.

So this is .5*0+.01*9.5+.1*19+.1*28.5+.1*38+.1*47.5+.09*57=18.525 ( http://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=.5*0%2B.01*9.5%2B.1*19%2B.1*28.5%2B.1*38%2B.1*47.5%2B.09*57 )

This puts full auto at 2.8x better."

I then posed the question of how dodge factors in to the equation, since it requires a degree of success to stop each bullet using autofire. I assumed a 40 AG and the dodge skill. His answer (which only took into account the four hits possible to dodge, since there is a 19% chance that full auto will hit twice that is undodgeable):

"As for your dodge question, that makes it a bit more complicated.

Since we're using a relatively small # of possible outcomes, I'm just brute forcing it rather than figuring out an algorithm, but the brute force method is to take each possibility for # of shots. I'm going to start leaving out the 0 bullets land also. Basically, break down "4 hits" into the chance, assuming 4 hits were rolled, that 4, 3, 2, 1 actually land.

1 hit rolled becomes .01*9.5*.6 = .057

2 hits rolled becomes .1*19*.6 + .1*9.5*.01 = 1.1495

3 hits rolled becomes .1*28.5*.6 + .1*19*.01+.1*9.5*.1 = 1.824

4 hits rolled becomes .1*38*.6 + .1*28.5*.01 + .1*19*.1 + .1* 9.5*.1 = 2.5935

5 hits rolled becomes .1*47.5*.6 + .1*38*.01 + .1*28.5*.1 + .1*19*.1 + .1* 9.5*.1 = 3.458

6 hits rolled becomes .1*57*.6 + .1*47.5*.01 + .1*38*.1 + .1*28.5*.1 + .1*19*.1 + .1* 9.5*.1 = 4.4175

This makes the post-dodge EV for full auto at 13.4995. ( http://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=.057%2B1.1495%2B1.824%2B2.5935%2B3.458%2B4.4175 )

Post-dodge EV for single shot is simply .6*6.65=3.99

This makes full auto 3.38 times better after dodge is factored in, though auto fire loses far more in average damage to the dodge roll."

This is spectacular. I have an excel sheet I've been messing with that I'm trying to set up to compare weapon values and its been a slog. I've been trying to take into account differing toughness and armor, and ended up taking the average damage of each gun's damage across anything from 0-20 armor and 1-20 toughness. I also based the effects of single shot versus multiple shots by adding the average chance of 1hit through 10 hits for anything from 10-100 BS or WS. Basically I end up working with a lot of small fractions. I haven't taken dodge into account, though.

Honestly, trying to run the numbers has been a huge headache, and my desire to continue doing so has kind of gone down given how FFG seems to be running this beta.

Great job, though. The forum needs more of this.

I'm curious how the extra damage from Accurate buffs single shot.

Also you should probably email that excel sheet or whatever so they can do this math.

I have suggestions on how to make single fire more attractive.

1) Each degree of success with the attack adds one point of damage to the attack when doing a single shot.

2) Crushing blow and mighty shot only work when making a single shot/swing. (I.e. they do not stack with auto fire or swift attack).

3) Full or semi auto firing into melee targets a friendly on a miss. If the shooter misses, roll the attack again against the friendly closest to the original target.

Is the (fairly considerable) nerf to Allocated Points characters intentional? They used to start at 30 and get 60 points to distribute, enough to raise all stats to 36, same as the average for a rolled character (excluding the single reroll which seemed a fair trade for the randomness compared to allocated).

However, while rolled characters have dropped by 5 points across the board (by default, with the option to go back to 25 if you want), allocated points characters have dropped 10 points across the board, starting at 20 with 60 points to assign. And if you bring the rolled characters back up to 25, the assigned points characters only go back up to 25, so they are now consistently 5 points-per-stat behind rolled characters on average.

I'm not really complaining, just wondering if it's intentional. If it is intentional, it's a hell of an incentive to roll rather than allocate.

We'll be increasing the values for point allocation to 30(+) and 20(–) in Update #3. It was a mistake in #3 to take them too low.

Side note, we're strongly thinking about adding a 5th level for characteristic advances too. Thoughts?

–Tim

I'd say it might be worth increasing the amount of advances, but only if you were to reduce the value of each one. Maybe consider +3? I'm not a big fan of DH characters getting their stats too high, they are only human after all. Or relatively close to it at least.