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 Soladrin wrote:

Unless Eldar can somehow get their hands on the Avatar.

That'd be awesome! Although to keep it fluffy, it should be that one player can sacrifice their character to become the Avatar for one battle (and they have to have a minimum level to be the avatar so you can't just make one specifically to be the avatar). After that, its start again time

Maybe they're keeping Daemon Princes to Daemons to keep each faction unique? Otherwise you'd have Daemon Princes running around on both sides, could get confusing.

[wrong thread]

 DemetriDominov wrote:
Radioactive fallout can mean only one thing... and I approve.

Radioactive spiders that lead to spider bites, which lead to..Space Marine Spiderman?

Deamon princes would be the perfect balance to the SoB.... anyone thought that might be the reason yet?

Well if SoB got extra damage bonuses or damage resistance from daemonic attacks or against daemonic enemies it might help a fair amount.

official website of the chaos warband, thanks to Ifepy for his work! http://thefirstfounding.enjin.com/

 purplefood wrote:
Well if SoB got extra damage bonuses or damage resistance from daemonic attacks or against daemonic enemies it might help a fair amount.

As much as I'd probably enjoy that, could be a bit unfair on the Daemon players. Though the resistance part would certainly be in keeping with the fluff.

Just give them Acts of Faith similar to what they have on the tabletop. Faith-fueled feats that give short bursts of much improved performance. Would tie in well with one of Miguel's earlier posts about wanting to make them a more skillful faction.

 Troike wrote:

 purplefood wrote:
Well if SoB got extra damage bonuses or damage resistance from daemonic attacks or against daemonic enemies it might help a fair amount.

As much as I'd probably enjoy that, could be a bit unfair on the Daemon players. Though the resistance part would certainly be in keeping with the fluff.

Just give them Acts of Faith similar to what they have on the tabletop. Faith-fueled feats that give short bursts of much improved performance. Would tie in well with one of Miguels earlier postsm about wanting to make them a more skillful faction.

The maybe give Sister's attacks a small faith based damage component which ignores any armour a daemon player has.
Like 10% damage done straight to the daemon. Daemon's get extra natural armour against regular attacks in return.

 The Dark Apostle wrote:
official website of the chaos warband, thanks to Ifepy for his work! http://thefirstfounding.enjin.com/

I look forward to meeting them on the field.

In the early versions of World of Warcraft (alpha or beta, not sure), the Undead race had a ton of bonuses from immunity to fear to unlimited underwater breathing and damage resistance. They were extremely powerful against any other type of character ... except paladins, whose healing spells would cause considerable damage to them and who had the ability to shakle or let them run away in fear. A dynamic that was very much in line with the background at the time, and even represented in the pen&paper RPG.

However, it was eventually decided that this was undesirable in a massive PvP environment, as battles started to get disproportinally influenced by whether "that one class/race was present or not". And as much as I disagree with the later dilution of important tenets of the setting's background just to support a new gameplay element, I think this decision was unfortunate but necessary. Too much focus on a specific combination of two types of characters fighting each other can wreak havoc of how well they fit in with the rest.

Don't get me wrong, if the Sisters of Battle, like the Imperial Guard, should end up as a sub-faction of the Imperial forces, I could well see them assuming a specialist role. Ideally, you'd have Marines particularly good against one type of enemy, Guard against another, and Sisters yet another, with some overlap in-between so that they do not rely overly much on the activity of their allies.
I'd never recommend making an independent faction focused on a specific enemy, though, as this would necessitate penalties elsewhere, which would result in the players actively seeking out or avoiding other armies, depending on whether they receive a bonus or suffer a drawback against them. This in turn breeds a "this wasn't a fair fight" mentality in the disadvantaged faction, and would have too many players being busy with repositioning (to avoid or hunt an enemy) than actually fighting.

Plus, whilst the Sisters would indeed fight the daemon, I think there's a certain expectation in the fanbase that it should be the Grey Knights who are presented as the daemons' counterpart.


Now, as far as Acts of Faith are concerned, I'm with Troike in that the tabletop would be a good inspiration - also because it would retain the "ambiguous" nature of the Sisters' abilities rather than going WHEE SPACE MAGIC like Dawn of War did (as much as I enjoyed it). Here's a rough draft:

Hand of the Emperor - Increased close combat damage
Divine Guidance - Slight increase in ranged combat accuracy, increased chance of critical hits in ranged combat
The Passion - Slight increase to running and melee attack speed
Light of the Emperor - Bonus to resist certain willpower-based debuffs such as Pinning or Psychic Attacks
Spirit of the Martyr - Gain +50% temporary hitpoints. These HP are removed again when the effect runs out (may result in character dying)

You'd have to unlock these over time, possibly selecting a new Act of Faith every X levels (so that only really experienced players would have access to all of them simultaneously). Oh, and you'd generate the necessary "Faith" resource to trigger these abilities by staying alive and killing enemies. A small fraction of Faith gained by killing an enemy is shared with other Sisters characters in your proximity. Nearby relics such as holy ground (specially designated mission objectives) or wargear/banners carried by veteran players may confer a +X% bonus to Faith generation (cumulative up three times that value).
Also, triggering any Act of Faith places all abilities of this class on a 3 minute cooldown.

Just a quick idea, mind you. I realise all of that is fairly pointless at this time.

 Lynata wrote:
Don't get me wrong, if the Sisters of Battle, like the Imperial Guard, should end up as a sub-faction of the Imperial forces, I could well see them assuming a specialist role. Ideally, you'd have Marines particularly good against one type of enemy, Guard against another, and Sisters yet another, with some overlap in-between so that they do not rely overly much on the activity of their allies.

Fairly sure that's not what they're currently planning. Miguel did seem to refer to the Sisters as a standalone race when he talked about possibly adding them and the Necrons. Plus, having one big Imperial faction runs into the problem I mentioned earlier of creating a way bigger faction than any of the others, which is rather unfair. Would be damn expansive too, having the Imperials able to field so much variety would make other races seem limited in comparison,

 Lynata wrote:
Hand of the Emperor - Increased close combat damage
Divine Guidance - Slight increase in ranged combat accuracy, increased chance of critical hits in ranged combat
The Passion - Slight increase to running and melee attack speed
Light of the Emperor - Bonus to resist certain willpower-based debuffs such as Pinning or Psychic Attacks
Spirit of the Martyr - Gain +50% temporary hitpoints. These HP are removed again when the effect runs out (may result in character dying)

You'd have to unlock these over time, possibly selecting a new Act of Faith every X levels (so that only really experienced players would have access to all of them simultaneously). Oh, and you'd generate the necessary "Faith" resource to trigger these abilities by staying alive and killing enemies. A small fraction of Faith gained by killing an enemy is shared with other Sisters characters in your proximity. Nearby relics such as holy ground (specially designated mission objectives) or wargear/banners carried by veteran players may confer a +X% bonus to Faith generation (cumulative up three times that value).
Also, triggering any Act of Faith places all abilities of this class on a 3 minute cooldown.

I like the sound of it! To add to this, maybe each class could also have their own specific AoF. For example, Rets could get something that ups their armour penetration and a Canoness could have something that gives a slight buff to all nearby Sisters. Just to make each one feel more unique.

Troike wrote:I like the sound of it! To add to this, maybe each class could also have their own specific AoF. For example, Rets could get something that ups their armour penetration and a Canoness could have something that gives a slight buff to all nearby Sisters. Just to make each one feel more unique.

Ugh, one of my criticisms on the 5E Codex - AoF suddenly becoming unit-bound instead of being a pool you'd have to choose from.

Naw, I think I would really prefer them being open to all classes. It'd add something for people to work towards (-> every X levels you get to add a new one), it makes the individual Sister slightly more versatile, and the player would have to choose not only when to trigger an AoF but also which one. However, perhaps the individual classes could have a slight tendency to a specific favoured Act, represented by a slightly longer duration or an efficiency bonus?
The Canoness shouldn't be a class, though, but rather a character upgrade. Or is the Space Marine Chapter Master his own class, too? I confess I have heard little about this aspect so far.

What might be real cool for Canoness characters, maybe also Sisters Superior, is when they would have an ability related to the "Sacred Rites" from the old 2nd edition 'dex. Long cooldown, confers some sort of buff on every SoB character that is within 20 meters when this ability is triggered. Has all affected characters kneel before the Canoness/Superior as she emotes some sort of fiery speech.
A similar mechanic could also be present in other armies, with the Chaplain for the Space Marines, a Confessor for the Guard, an Ethereal for the Tau ...

 Lynata wrote:
Now, as far as Acts of Faith are concerned, I'm with Troike in that the tabletop would be a good inspiration - also because it would retain the "ambiguous" nature of the Sisters' abilities rather than going WHEE SPACE MAGIC like Dawn of War did (as much as I enjoyed it). Here's a rough draft:

Hand of the Emperor - Increased close combat damage
Divine Guidance - Slight increase in ranged combat accuracy, increased chance of critical hits in ranged combat
The Passion - Slight increase to running and melee attack speed
Light of the Emperor - Bonus to resist certain willpower-based debuffs such as Pinning or Psychic Attacks
Spirit of the Martyr - Gain +50% temporary hitpoints. These HP are removed again when the effect runs out (may result in character dying)

I had a better idea, I think, earlier in this thread.

 Melissia wrote:

 Lynata wrote:
*snip*

I had a better idea, I think, earlier in this thread.

Yes, I liked your idea as well to be honest. It provides some burst (damage) when needed and lets the user decide when they are in the best position to do so. I'm not positive about the specific mechanics (because I have no way of knowing how these interact within the game itself), but I really like the mechanic of a pool of faith that can be spent. I feel there should also be a way to recharge it though

For the people that missed it, here is Melissa's idea:

I think it might be best to represent Sisters as very similar in statistics to Space Marines (not as durable and not as strong in melee), but to allow them to have "battle prayers" and the like which they can activate to spend a sort of pool of "Faith". But only one "battle prayer" can be active at any given time, and they drain the "Faith" pool while active. So for example, Divine Retribution might be translated as giving the Sisters' bolters a very high chance of a "critical hit" while active, but drains the "Faith" pool quite rapidly whenever their bolters fire (ensuring that you still reward people for landing numerous hits on the target), with "critical hits" ignoring mundane armor entirely. Meanwhile, The Passion could translate as the Sister moving faster (including both walking and sprinting speed) and striking faster in melee, perhaps not draining it quite as fast-- and Hand of hte Emperor could translate to them striking slower in melee but also doing massive amounts of damage. Shield of Faith / Spirit of the Martyr would probably best be translated as a flat reduction in all damage taken, even though that's not entirely accurate I suppose.

This would allow Sisters to be competent normally, a bit weaker than Space Marines, but capable of short, intense time periods where they perform better than Space Marines-- if they're used wisely.

Ah - indeed I have not read the first twenty or so pages of this thread and largely ignored it after the first one was closed. Thanks for reposting, Milkshaker!

It sounds fairly similar to what I proposed above, the difference being that Acts of Faith in Melissia's system exert a constant drain on the Faith pool for as long as a power is active, whereas mine just subtracts a solid value and confers the bonus for a set amount of time. The former is undoubtedly more adaptable as it allows a player to quickly switch between the various effects, if I understand it correctly.

That said, I think I prefer the simpler approach in that it also comes with more responsibility, as a player would have to think twice if triggering a specific AoF would really pay off now. I also believe a system that allows switching back and forth would risk specific Acts of Faith becoming more of a "default choice" in certain circumstances than with the alternative - for example, "Spirit of the Martyr" becomes a no-brainer and everybody with sufficient Faith left would just trigger it when their health gets low, instead of having to decide upon whether or not they'd use it before it actually becomes necessary.

This is largely a matter of personal preferences, though. I think both systems have their individual cons and pros, dependent on how we like the combat mechanics in the games we play in terms of factors such as ease of use versus complexity, or adaptability versus tough choices, or even just temp buffs vs a "stance".

Listen up, boyz! We’z da Orks, and next week we’z gonna show you runty humies what we’z made of. Waaagh!!

Glad to hear it! I await to see what you reveal.

miguelcaron wrote:
Listen up, boyz! We’z da Orks, and next week we’z gonna show you runty humies what we’z made of. Waaagh!!

Sounds good! Let's see how they like my Bolter fire

Or better yet, how they look on my trophy rack

miguelcaron wrote:
Listen up, boyz! We’z da Orks, and next week we’z gonna show you runty humies what we’z made of. Waaagh!!

Good! Good! Good!

Cheers

I honestly can't remember a game I've been more excited for than this. fingers crossed that it's decent. Prayers to Nurgle for this. lol

YIPPIE!!! ORKS!!!!!!!

Looks like Phase 4 is the Ork Clans, then. Have to say, Orks are a tempting choice. Them or Eldar, I think I'll go for.

 Lynata wrote:
Ugh, one of my criticisms on the 5E Codex - AoF suddenly becoming unit-bound instead of being a pool you'd have to choose from.

Eh, suppose we'll just have to agree to disagree there. I like the idea of each class getting one or two specific AoFs, to better suit them in their given role.

 Lynata wrote:
The Canoness shouldn't be a class, though, but rather a character upgrade. Or is the Space Marine Chapter Master his own class, too? I confess I have heard little about this aspect so far.

Yeah, I can't recall the specifics of that either, if it's even come up. On the one hand, it'd go against the fluff to have, for example, hundreds of Space Marine Captains running around (when only four chapters are present) but on the other, closing off an entire class to only ten (or however many are the faction's leadership) seems a bit restrictive. Maybe we'll get a commander-lite for the regular players.

Milkshaker wrote:

 Melissia wrote:

 Lynata wrote:
*snip*

I had a better idea, I think, earlier in this thread.

Yes, I liked your idea as well to be honest. It provides some burst (damage) when needed and lets the user decide when they are in the best position to do so. I'm not positive about the specific mechanics (because I have no way of knowing how these interact within the game itself), but I really like the mechanic of a pool of faith that can be spent. I feel there should also be a way to recharge it though

For the people that missed it, here is Melissa's idea:

I think it might be best to represent Sisters as very similar in statistics to Space Marines (not as durable and not as strong in melee), but to allow them to have "battle prayers" and the like which they can activate to spend a sort of pool of "Faith". But only one "battle prayer" can be active at any given time, and they drain the "Faith" pool while active. So for example, Divine Retribution might be translated as giving the Sisters' bolters a very high chance of a "critical hit" while active, but drains the "Faith" pool quite rapidly whenever their bolters fire (ensuring that you still reward people for landing numerous hits on the target), with "critical hits" ignoring mundane armor entirely. Meanwhile, The Passion could translate as the Sister moving faster (including both walking and sprinting speed) and striking faster in melee, perhaps not draining it quite as fast-- and Hand of hte Emperor could translate to them striking slower in melee but also doing massive amounts of damage. Shield of Faith / Spirit of the Martyr would probably best be translated as a flat reduction in all damage taken, even though that's not entirely accurate I suppose.

This would allow Sisters to be competent normally, a bit weaker than Space Marines, but capable of short, intense time periods where they perform better than Space Marines-- if they're used wisely.

Personally I think that Marines and Sisters need to simply be equals. It doesn't jive with the fluff really, but for game balance purposes I really don't see a way around it if they want to go for broad appeal. I don't mean that they need to be mechanically identical, just that they shouldn't be gimped in certain ways and buffed in other ways disproportionate to the other classes in the game. Every class needs strengths and weaknesses, but to make one faction have more glaring weaknesses or strengths, even if only in "certain situations" is asking for trouble. If the Sisters are extremely strong in certain situations, they will only want to fight in those situations, and it will break the game for others.

BrotherVord wrote:Personally I think that Marines and Sisters need to simply be equals. It doesn't jive with the fluff really, but for game balance purposes I really don't see a way around it if they want to go for broad appeal. I don't mean that they need to be mechanically identical, just that they shouldn't be gimped in certain ways and buffed in other ways disproportionate to the other classes in the game. Every class needs strengths and weaknesses, but to make one faction have more glaring weaknesses or strengths, even if only in "certain situations" is asking for trouble. If the Sisters are extremely strong in certain situations, they will only want to fight in those situations, and it will break the game for others.

Going by GW's own description, Sisters and Marines are equal - but it is the Sisters' faith and willpower that enables them to keep pace with the genetically enhanced Astartes, represented by a somewhat inferior general statline that can be temporarily augmented via Acts of Faith.

I know we're way off from even being supposed to discuss SoB in this game, but I'm still somewhat curious as to what exactly you mean with "not mechanically identical, but not gimped in certain ways and buffed in others". Without further clarification, this sounds a bit contradictory. Isn't the only way to avoid appearing identical (in terms of mechanics, not visuals) the use of specific advantages and disadvantages compared to the other force?

Also, yay Orks!

Orks! (to be rather honest I'm enjoying the SoB posts personally. Certainly a unique mechanic and I hope that they can put it into the game sometime and it be a successful addition).

Orks orks orks orks orks orks orks orks! We is de best at the dakka and hitten em ummies.

 Troike wrote:
Eh, suppose we'll just have to agree to disagree there. I like the idea of each class getting one or two specific AoFs, to better suit them in their given role.

Oh that's what they were trying to do?

They failed.

Miserably.

But let's not get too deep in to a talk about tabletop. This game doesn't have to follow the failures of the TT developers exactly, after all. It can go its own direction, while still being faithful to the source material.

 Melissia wrote:
Oh that's what they were trying to do?

They failed.

Miserably.

But let's not get too deep in to a talk about tabletop. This game doesn't have to follow the failures of the TT developers exactly, after all. It can go its own direction, while still being faithful to the source material.

I'm talking about the concept of class-specific AoF ingame, not how well this concept did on the tabletop. Like you said, since they don't have to confrom too rigidly to the tabletop, they could do a better job.

I still think that there should be some available to any Sister.

If they don't, it'll probably end up "don't pick [x] class, it's AoF sucks".