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https://drive.google.com/file/d/1okOAOnOq6qd__MIuZaBV16yMd_khGEpX/view?usp=sharing

Hope the link works. Anyway, here's my take on the big man himself. Very powerful, but not necessarily unkillable. Daemons beware!

Some scattered thoughts:

* Kind of against statting out the Emperor for lore reasons. He's kind of a living (well, not any more) Chuck Norris joke. Statting him out puts defined limits on his abilities and presents the opportunity for him to fail at stuff. Which sort of robs him of his lofty, mythical status. Guilliman, Magnus, and Mortarion all created huge balance problems when they were introduced largely because GW wanted to both make them feel suitably powerful for creatures of their stature but also wanted to put them in a game whose scale is probably a mismatch for their own. And the Emperor is to a primarch what a primarch is to a marine.

* Is the idea that these stats would represent a pre-heresy emperor? If yes, I'd almost be more tempted to give him 7th edition compatible stats so he could be used in the Horus Heresy game. If no, it seems like he should have significantly worse physical abilities given that he's an immobile skeleton.

* This one might sound snarky, but it's not intended to be: you could probably streamline some of his special rules by saying that he just automatically succeeds at things. For instance, instead of giving him rerollable, undeniable psychic tests made at +2 to cast, you could just straight up say that he always succeeds on casting psychic powers and counts as having rolled an 11 for psychic powers that care about the exact number rolled (like Smite). This saves your opponent the annoyance of waiting for you to roll an almost unfailable psychic test and also feels more "honest." You and your opponent both know that rolling the psychic test is almost a formality. Making the powers go off automatically makes them feel more like a scripted event in a video game rather than trying to pass off the idea that the ability is actually likely enough to fail to bother rolling for.

Similarly, you could probably save the time and effort of rolling out attacks and instead just say that he does X mortal wounds each time he fights rather than attacking normally. And instead of advance + charge + autoadvance 6" + reroll failed charges, you could probably just up his movement stat and let him auto-succeed on charge rolls.

Again, that's all meant sincerely and not as veiled sarcasm. Mechanically, you simply speed up the game. Narratively, you avoid the awkwardness of the Emperor whiffing his attacks, failing to make a charge, or failing to smite something.

* This might sound odd, but he seems weirdly fragile? Sure, you've made him as Tough as Russ with a 3+ invul and the ability to halve damage, but he's also unscreenable due to his Wound count. He's super fast, super killy, but also super hard to protect. So every game with this guy is going to be your opponent pointing all his guns at the Big E until he dies, at which point you've either won or lost the game based on how much he accomplished before dying.

Basically, he has a lot of the same problems Magnus did in his prime. Your whole army gets built around him, he's probably going to be the first thing to die every game because he's a clear priority for your opponent, and your opponent is probably going to be annoyed when he loses because there isn't much counterplay to be had; you either killed him before he did enough work to win or you didn't.

Compare to Ghazzy who is very strong and very tough, but also slow. So his presence on the table creates this interesting push and pull of needing to stay away from him as long as possible, but also needing to do enough damage to take him out so that you can push up and start scoring.

* If you do want to have the Emperor on the battlefield, consider not giving him a datasheet. Instead, make him a special rule in a mission or even a campaign system. When he's on the battlefield, his model moves across the battlefield, auto-killing enemies that get to close and buffing imperial units near him. You can't kill him. You can't really withstand him. You can only focus on killing the guys around him and completing whatever your mission objectives are.

Kind of against statting out the Emperor for lore reasons.

Fair point. This is only meant to be for funzies.

Is the idea that these stats would represent a pre-heresy emperor?

Technically, yes. I used 9E instead of 7E because the former seems more modern to me.

This one might sound snarky, but it's not intended to be: you could probably streamline some of his special rules by saying that he just automatically succeeds at things.

All good, and you're probably right about this one. I always imagined Him as never suffering Perils, but auto-casting powers seemed a tad unfair at the time. Then again, maybe it isn't. I can see how such a change would streamline/accelerate the game.

Similarly, you could probably save the time and effort of rolling out attacks and instead just say that he does X mortal wounds each time he fights rather than attacking normally. And instead of advance + charge + autoadvance 6" + reroll failed charges, you could probably just up his movement stat and let him auto-succeed on charge rolls.

So both his weapons would, in your concept, always deal mortal wounds regardless of the target? I'm not against it, I'm just thinking about balance. The Master of Mankind novel did confirm that daemons fear him and are almost always insta-killed by his sword. His claw was a bit tougher to work out; not a lot of detail on it. As for the movement thing, I could up his move statistic to 14" (8" normally plus 6" from an advance) and have him auto-succeed on charge rolls like you suggested.

This might sound odd, but he seems weirdly fragile?

Originally I had him at 9 wounds (to avoid what I believe you're referring to), but someone on a Discord channel suggested I up the number. I settled on 12, but you're saying that perhaps I shouldn't have done that? "Super hard to protect" sounds fine, but if anything, everything else needs protecting from Him! Maybe I could give him a feel no pain and the "ignore wound rolls of 1-3" ability?

Again, that's all meant sincerely and not as veiled sarcasm. Mechanically, you simply speed up the game. Narratively, you avoid the awkwardness of the Emperor whiffing his attacks, failing to make a charge, or failing to smite something.

It's all good. I'm not a Karen and I won't be offended by criticism. The intent of statting the big man himself was purely for fun.

I like it. Powerful as it should be.

A few thoughts:

One of the reasons that most characters are 9 wounds or less is that, as an unwritten rule, anything with a wounds of 10 or more has a degrading profile. If you did it with him I would recommend move, ws and attacks.

If you feel he is still too fragile you could give him the ability that limits the number of lost wounds per phase, though I am not a big fan of that rule myslef.

https://drive.google.com/file/d/147qCWuLs-7QhTGBw-Ky-g8YkNUfkajWi/view?usp=sharing

I uploaded an altered version of the datasheet per Wyldhunt's suggestions:

Added auto-manifesting of psychic powers.

Added auto-Advance and auto-success for Charge.

Added additional defenses to The One True Armour.