Hi all,

One of my player would really enjoy playing a Plague Marine of sort. But as you all know, book of Nurgle is not available, not even upcoming.

So, I took on myself to figure some experimental rules for it, and wanted the community opinion about it.

I inspired myself with the other advanced space marines archetypes appearing in Tome of Fate, Tome of Blood and Tome of Excess.

Here we go:

Plague Marine, Advanced Archetype

+5 Toughness, +5 Willpower, +15 Corruption, +9 Infamy

Skills:

Survival

Medicae

Medicae +10

Intimidate

Intimidate +10

Common Lore: any

Forbidden Lore: Daemonology OR Forbidden Lore: Heresy

Scholastic Lore: Chymistry OR Trade: Chymist

Scholastic Lore: Chymistry +10 OR Trade: Chymist +10

Talents:

Jaded

Cold Hearted

Ancient Warrior

Deadeye Shot OR Sure Strike

Iron Jaw

Hardy

Fearless

Traits:

Nurgle's Blessing: the character gains "The Stuff of Nightmares" and "Unnatural Toughness +2" (That's basically the effects of the Mark of Nurgle)

Child of Toxicity: All the melee attacks from the characters benefit of the "Toxic (+0)" Quality.

Aligned with Nurgle.

So, what do you think about it? Would you make any adjustment? I'd like to add the "Regeneration" trait, but i'm afraid it would make it too powerful.

Doesn't "The Stuff of Nightmares" make Jaded, Fearless and Coldhearted irrelevant? Possibly Iron Jaw as well?

I don't have my books with me right now, so asking.

Well, after checking, "The Stuff of NIghtmares" does make Iron Jaw irrelevant. But not Jaded, Fearless and Coldhearted.

Also, Fearless makes Jaded irrelevant. But Nerves of Steal is missing as a prerequisite for Fearless.

So, here is a new attempt:

Plague Marine, Advanced Archetype

+5 Toughness, +5 Willpower, +15 Corruption, +9 Infamy

Skills:

Survival

Medicae

Medicae +10

Intimidate

Intimidate +10

Common Lore: any

Forbidden Lore: Daemonology OR Forbidden Lore: Heresy

Scholastic Lore: Chymistry OR Trade: Chymist

Scholastic Lore: Chymistry +10 OR Trade: Chymist +10

Talents:

Cold Hearted

Ancient Warrior

Deadeye Shot OR Sure Strike

Hardy

Nerves of Steal

Fearless

Traits:

Nurgle's Blessing: the character gains "The Stuff of Nightmares" and "Unnatural Toughness +2" (That's basically the effects of the Mark of Nurgle)

Child of Toxicity: All the melee attacks from the characters benefit of the "Toxic (+0)" Quality.

Aligned with Nurgle.

This one is only 6 Talents, but Hardy and Nerves of Steal are talents level 2 and Fearless is level 3, so, it seems reasonnable to me.

Well, after checking, "The Stuff of NIghtmares" does make Iron Jaw irrelevant. But not Jaded, Fearless and Coldhearted.

Also, Fearless makes Jaded irrelevant. But Nerves of Steal is missing as a prerequisite for Fearless.

My bad. As mentioned, currently without my book

All CSMs have Nerves of Steel, I think.

All CSMs have Nerves of Steel, I think.

Oh, yes, you're right. This is actually the reason why i didn't put it on my first essay!

So, here's another try:

Plague Marine, Advanced Archetype

+5 Toughness, +5 Willpower, +15 Corruption, +9 Infamy

Skills:

Survival

Medicae

Medicae +10

Intimidate

Intimidate +10

Common Lore: any

Forbidden Lore: Daemonology OR Forbidden Lore: Heresy

Scholastic Lore: Chymistry OR Trade: Chymist

Scholastic Lore: Chymistry +10 OR Trade: Chymist +10

Talents:

Cold Hearted

Ancient Warrior

Deadeye Shot OR Sure Strike

Hardy

Counter-Attack OR Hip Shooting

Fearless

Traits:

Nurgle's Blessing: the character gains "The Stuff of Nightmares" and "Unnatural Toughness +2" (That's basically the effects of the Mark of Nurgle)

Child of Toxicity: All the melee attacks from the characters benefit of the "Toxic (+0)" Quality.

Aligned with Nurgle.

Nurgle's Blessing is too good, making Mark of Nurgle redundant. Overpowered archetype in other words.

I'd consider an agility drop perhaps. Nurgle tends to make his marines bloated and this often affects their manoeuvrability.

Agility drop is something interesting that i'll consider.

Nurgle's Blessing is too good, making Mark of Nurgle redundant. Overpowered archetype in other words.

Well, ok, but could you suggest anything else fitting the concept of Plague Marine? Moreover, it appears that the Mark of Nurgle as stated in Black Crusade fits perfectly with the very concept of Plague Marine. The bonus to Toughness and "The Stuff of NIghtmare" couldn't be better to describe a Plague Marine, imho.

So, what do you think? Surely you cannot criticize without proposiing something constructive in turn

I believe (unsure if there's any exception) the standard Special Ability pattern for advanced archetypes is at least 1 Infamy Point ability. Sometimes both are that. Just passive bonuses with no 'active' component is a little boring.

And I'm not familiar enough with Plague Marines you give you a suggestion on what that might be. I can only point out that the current SAs is bad design.

Instead of having the "Scholastic Lore (Chymistry) +10 OR Trade (Chymist)", might I suggest simply making it a duplicate of the preceding choice?

That way, it's possible to take Scholastic Lore (Chymistry) first, and then Trade (Chymist), which is what I would want to do if I was the one playing.

I'm also not so sure about the +5 Willpower. Bake it into Toughness and apply -5 Agility, for a total of +10 To/-5 Ag?

Also, while I'm unsure what else to suggest, I agree that Nurgle's Blessing is too powerful, and it is bad design that it should basically replace the Mark of Nurgle. Do not forget that the character, although unlikely since this is a custom career for a specific player, could potentially change loyalty away from Nurgle. So there's at least three big issues I see with Nurgle's Blessing.

Maybe an Aura that makes everyone that takes damage within range automatically Diseases and/or Poisoned? Or maybe a protective buff that sprays anyone piercing the skin in a cone of disease, pus and toxic stews?

Going back over all this again:

Can you explain why as a talent they get Dead Eye or Sure Strike? I don't think this quite suits a Nurgle like character. I'd also drop the Counter Attack and Hip Shooting. Also not sure on the WP Bonus. WP not their speciality (unless they are a psyker). Nurgle units tend to end up like slow walking tanks. Able to endure hellish firepower and put out a normal amount in return with blighted ammo.

---

My thoughts would be to absolutely hammer their Agility into the floor, Fellowship should also take a dive, as it's hardly going to make them look appealing to normal humans. Drop it by a decent number (maybe 10 ish?). I understand Plague marines were usually slow, enduring and consistent damage outputters.

In return, as well as some of the other upgrades, grant them a number of bonus wounds (say 1D5 or something?) and possibly at your discretion and their continued devotion to Nurgle, allow them to purchase Regenerate (X) for an amount of XP and corruption. Then for added fluffy bonus (at your discretion) give them some sort of cloud of flies or decay which they can use as an ability for a number of rounds, perhaps treating it as a smoke screen centred on the marine imposing a small -10 penalty to incoming shots or attacks as they just cant quite see them amidst the cloud of decay.

But thats just my idea.

I'm not really sure I like the idea of negative characteristics modifiers. There's no precedent for that, and it wouldn't happen if you created a Plaguemarine from any of the standard archetypes.

Higher than Chosen starting Wounds is probably a good idea. Something like 18+1d5.

I'd replace Fearless with True Grit.

Having thought about it a little, I'd say you could keep the Toxic Special Ability if you want, but I'd change the overpowered one to this:

Blessed Corpulence: Within their corpulent and disgusting Power Armour their bodies are bloated with disease, swollen with corruption and rank with decay even as they no longer are capable of feeling pain, the greatest mutational "gift" given to them by the Plague Lord. The Plague Marine gets Unnatural Toughness (+1) trait and once per combat encounter, a Plague Marine may spend an Infamy Point to get the Regeneration (5) trait for 4 Rounds.

I think that SA works a little better. Potential +20 Wounds over 4 rounds for 1 IP should be sufficient, I believe. Assuming all tests are successful, it's 3.8 and 2 times better than the IP wound recover amount of tier 2 and tier 3 infamy point uses for Nurgle aligned characters. Of course, there is some overlap with the wound recovery part of Nurgle characters, but it becomes a tradeoff between "I want it now" vs. "I want more over time assuming I make the tests". At tier 3 it's automatic 10 wounds vs 0-20.

Thanks all for your answers.

Here is another attempt:

Plague Marine, Advanced Archetype

+10 Toughness, -5 Agility, +15 Corruption, +9 Infamy

Wounds: 19+1d5

Skills:

Survival

Medicae

Medicae +10

Intimidate

Intimidate +10

Common Lore: any

Forbidden Lore: Daemonology OR Forbidden Lore: Heresy

Scholastic Lore: Chymistry

Trade: Chymist

Scholastic Lore: Chymistry +10 OR Trade: Chymist +10

Talents:

Cold Hearted

Ancient Warrior

Hardy

True Grit

Fearless

Traits:

Nurgle's Blessing: Within their massive and disgusting Power Armour their bodies are bloated with disease, swollen with corruption and rank with decay even as they no longer are capable of feeling pain, the greatest mutational "gift" given to them by the Plague Lord. The Plague Marine gets Unnatural Toughness (+1) trait and once per combat encounter, a Plague Marine may spend an Infamy Point to get the Regeneration (4) trait for 4 Rounds. Moreover, the character cannot be harmed by diseases, poisons or toxic effects.

Child of Toxicity: The body and armor of the Plague Marine is filled with toxins, diseases, poisons and bacillus. At the cost of one Infamy Point, the character can exude the toxic properties of its own body during its melee attacks. All his melee attacks benefit of the "Toxic (+0)" Quality for the duration of the combat. The character can spend up to 2 additionnal Infamy Points to gain the "Toxic (1)" or "Toxic (2)" Quality, for respectively 1 and 2 Infamy Points.

Aligned with Nurgle.

Comments:

I first added a willpower bonus because Plague Marines are Fearless in the tabletop game. But the Talent Fearless works better so i can skip the willpower.

Then, a +10 bonus to Toughness seems appropriate, but since it's, imho, more powerfull than 2 boni in 2 different characteristics, i would put a -5 in Agility. There might be no precedent for that, but in the tabletop game, Plague Marines have an initiative of 3 instead of 4. So, it seems appropriate.

More wounds seems to be on the right way. I put 19+1d5. Maybe too much?

I slightly adjusted skills (now has both Scholastic Lore: Chymistry and Trade: Chymist, and has one at +10).

For talents, i kicked out the fighting talents and added True Grit. I think it's important to keep Fearless if i wanna mmake the plague marine on part with its tabletop equivalent. But True Grit fits the concept very well too. So, it's down to only 5 talents, but 2 of them are rank 3, so it should make it ok. Any thought?

Now, the most difficult part is the special abilities.

I think an ability making the Plague Marine immune to diseases and poisons is mandatory. I considered to give him the Trait "Undying", but it's slighty out of concept, with the ability not to need breathing.

So, i just give him an ability inspired by the first part of the trait Undying.

I like the suggestion of BrotharTearer, and used it, just reducing the regenaration amount, to compensate for the immunity to diseases and poisons.

I modified the "Child of Toxicity" ability to make it requests the use of Infamy point(s).

Any opinion on this new version?

I'm not really sure I like the idea of negative characteristics modifiers. There's no precedent for that, and it wouldn't happen if you created a Plaguemarine from any of the standard archetypes.

You are correct there are no obvious examples. However in the DH books, there is something similar whereby those from certain worlds receive less points on a certain skill area, which could be considered a slight penalty during the process. It's an abstract use though. I was considering Plague Marine to be almost like an Elite advancement, taken after character creation etc and Agility is reduced after they take it. If taken at creation though, reduce the 2D10+30 that CSM get for stats and make it 2D10+20. However this is just a thought of course.

RE: Child of Toxicity, like it. You mention though that the armour and body are filled with toxins and such. Instead of granting them bonus damage on melee attacks, have you considered something similar to one of the Blessings of the Gods "Blood Substitution" but using the Nurgle aligned effect (spills toxic on blood loss etc). I do like both though, just throwing another idea out.

I likes it though.

Instead of granting them bonus damage on melee attacks, have you considered something similar to one of the Blessings of the Gods "Blood Substitution" but using the Nurgle aligned effect (spills toxic on blood loss etc). I do like both though, just throwing another idea out.

Well, yes, i did, but Blood Loss rules are very situational and rather rare occurence. It's interesting on a visual and narrative point of view, but less on a mechanic point of view. Although i'm trying to make a balanced advanced archetype, i think the Blood Substitution is less than interesting for such archetype. Now, that's just my opinion

I am not sold on the stat allocation. Yes +10 toughness is a lot but you are then penalized 5 to your agility, overall you are getting only bonus of 5 to your stats and others are getting 10.

I would personally go with +5 toughness and +5 willpower.

Thanks all for your answers.

Here is another attempt:

Plague Marine, Advanced Archetype

+10 Toughness, -5 Agility, +15 Corruption, +9 Infamy

Wounds: 19+1d5

Skills:

Survival

Medicae

Medicae +10

Intimidate

Intimidate +10

Common Lore: any

Forbidden Lore: Daemonology OR Forbidden Lore: Heresy

Scholastic Lore: Chymistry

Trade: Chymist

Scholastic Lore: Chymistry +10 OR Trade: Chymist +10

Talents:

Cold Hearted

Ancient Warrior

Hardy

True Grit

Fearless

Traits:

Nurgle's Blessing: Within their massive and disgusting Power Armour their bodies are bloated with disease, swollen with corruption and rank with decay even as they no longer are capable of feeling pain, the greatest mutational "gift" given to them by the Plague Lord. The Plague Marine gets Unnatural Toughness (+1) trait and once per combat encounter, a Plague Marine may spend an Infamy Point to get the Regeneration (4) trait for 4 Rounds. Moreover, the character cannot be harmed by diseases, poisons or toxic effects.

Child of Toxicity: The body and armor of the Plague Marine is filled with toxins, diseases, poisons and bacillus. At the cost of one Infamy Point, the character can exude the toxic properties of its own body during its melee attacks. All his melee attacks benefit of the "Toxic (+0)" Quality for the duration of the combat. The character can spend up to 2 additionnal Infamy Points to gain the "Toxic (1)" or "Toxic (2)" Quality, for respectively 1 and 2 Infamy Points.

Aligned with Nurgle.

Considering that Trade skills are pointless in BC since they are all subsumed by Tech Use, Medicae and Survival... Skip em and take something else.

What i'd consider is making them not gain the effects of their Black Carapace due to their possible immensity and slowness... Not all Plague Marines are actually bloated bags of pus though, some are the very opposite due to their various afflictions. Ie instead of the negative to agility. +5 T and +5 WP is how I designed mine.

Actually rather have +10 Survival than +10 Medicae, fits better with most "soldier" types anyway.

Could also consider adding "Storm of Iron" talent to represent their favored style of advance, and Hip-Shooting as well.

Nurgle's Blessing is nice... Child of Toxicity maybe not so much. Give em a Plague Knife instead of a Legion Combat Blade, ie a Combat Blade with Toxic(2).

Miasma of Pestilence: Grants all attacks made by the Plague Marine Toxic(0) quality and imposes a -10 WS and BS penalty to anyone fighting the Plague Marine at Short or shorter ranges unless they are wearing a sealed armor, or have the Machine or Daemonic traits.

//wondering why everything is a quote... these forums behave strangely at times.

Feels No Pain: The Plague Marine gains Unnatural Toughness +1 and does not receive negative effects from Fatigue, but still loses consciousness when he goes above his threshold. In addition a Plague Marine may spend 1 Infamy Point to halve the amount of Wounds received, after accounting for Armor and Toughness Bonus, for an encounter.

According to the news post, Tome of Decay will finally include these things we can see how close to the mark we were/weren't with this.