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Ashiraya wrote:It is an unfair argument to make. You assert that immersion and very mighty Marines are mutually exclusive. I question this.

Well, "immersion" is subjective, so I suppose your immersion just has different requirements than mine. Like I said, when I'm looking at 90% of the Space Marine fluff, I'm seeing fairytales similar to ye olde stories of knights heroically slaying the big dragon or repelling entire armies on their own. Not only is this just too much for my personal thresholds regarding "suspension of disbelief", I also feel it undermines the coherence of the greater setting ("wait, there's more than space marines?") and wastes a lot of potential of the IP. It comes down to whether you want to see everything in the setting as a puzzle piece of some greater whole, or rather some army being front and centre and everything else just existing to support them.

It's absolutely okay for you to prefer plasma-immune 9 feet giants with 125mm rifles who pwn everything they meet. For me, that just doesn't work, and so I'll stick with the mortal 7 feet superhumans carrying cal .75 guns I've read about when I started getting interested in this franchise.

Ashiraya wrote:You are free to hold your own opinion, but by dismissing the opposition's opinion as 'fairytales', you imply your own opinions are objectively better.

Unlike many Marine fans I know, I am not ignoring anyone's preferred interpretation just because it doesn't appeal to me. My opinions are certainly not objectively better. What they are, though, is being closer to the original source material. Whether this is of any value or not is up to the individual reader/gamer, but it should at least explain why I'm feeling the way I do.

gruntl wrote:And if you complain that the main character has plot immunity, maybe you should go read something else, main characters dying in low-budget scifi just doesn't happen. At least not until they've fulfilled their "destiny".

Agreed, it's an established cliché.

Though I would say that it only really becomes a problem if the main character/s are accomplishing stuff that is just TOO unbelievable, especially if they do it on a regular basis. At some point, you're invariably delving into comicbook superhero territory where you're just along for the ride, munching popcorn and laughing about how they kick someone's arse.
Nobody's going to bat an eyelid if the hero wins by shooting some human with a gun. The hero punching a three storey high intergalactic monster to death, on the other hand? After being electrocuted, stabbed with a five foot tentacle, and squashed by a car? That's a whole different story.

It really depends on how hard the challenge for the protagonist is presented.
But again, everyone will have their own thresholds there.

gruntl wrote:From my point of view I think that there are too many marines that gets killed of in the stories (and a lot of them don't even get their geneseeds recovered). With the rate of attrition pictured in the stories I'm amazed there are any marines left at all...

That's just because those stories aren't meant to tie into one another, though.

But to avoid a misunderstanding: Marines not dying in a fight is not a problem. Marines not dying in a fight where they should is. They were created with the express purpose to resist a considerable amount of damage, and (in GW fluff) are deployed in ways where they can easily overpower an unprepared opponent. Unfortunately, a Company of Space Marines routing an entire regiment of PDF who were utterly unprepared for fighting them doesn't make an exciting read, and so authors tend to ramp up the threat level by dialing down the protagonists' numbers and creating more challenging encounters. Terrible enemies where the reader goes "uh oh, how will they get out of that!" ... yet then failing to add what I'd consider appropriate consequences. Certainly, there are some Guard novels where the very same holds true (then again, how many novels about the IG are there ).

Psienesis wrote:The studio fluff positions Power Armor as "effective at stopping up to 85% of attacks from weapons found on the battlefield", or words to that effect.

Aye, almost. In the codex it said it reduces the chance of injury by between 50-85% for most small arms, and that it offers "some" protection against all other weapons except the most powerful ones. I'm not sure if this was intended or not, but I found it lined up nicely with the tabletop values.

On a sidenote, I think in DW Marines are actually entirely immune to lasfire unless you allow NPCs to roll crits. Lasguns there have 1d10+3 against 8 Toughness + 8 Armour, so without Righteous Fury you might have a problem.

There's a reason FFG came up with the Felling trait and two different tiers of Horde rules (you know something is iffy once your game includes rules that treat people differently based on their race alone), but I maintain that it would have been a lot cleaner to just fix things at the roots. Most of DW's "problems" (provided you regard them as such) seems to stem from the system just not scaling very well with higher values. I mean, even normal humans can become immune to lasguns. It's why I am intrigued by Games Workshop's own d100 game, where Toughness did not outright negate damage, but just made injuries less worse - an important difference, because it meant that lasguns, just like in the TT, could still harm the Marine. You'd just need to hit him often enough.
Personally, I found that injury system a lot more appealing also because it made Space Marines more gritty and badass - instead of just shrugging off bullets as if they were Superman, they'd get injured, but still keep moving, soldiering through. His combat efficiency would drop with each attack that got through the armour, but he's just so tough that you need several shots to put him down. Kind of like the Blood Ravens banner bearer in the intro cinematic of the first Dawn of War.

Psienesis wrote:An Ascended Character from DH (that would be Rank 9+) would probably be statted/geared appropriately to hang with the Death Watch, provided s/he didn't get stupid and try to match the Marine in combat.

I hear Ascended Psykers and Vindicare are so OP that they could actually keep up with a Marine in combat. Not sure if that's true (especially since reading that lulzworthy "1 vs 1 against a Bloodthirster" thread), but perhaps this could be something worth investigating?

 Lynata wrote:
Because there's an actual reason that I don't read much BL. It's not like I "boycotted" it from day 1 - I just don't know why I should keep buying that stuff if I don't like it, hoping for a miracle with every purchase.

I understand that, but the reasons don't really change the fact that if you're not knowledgeable about something than you're not an authority on it.

It's strange that you know almost nothing about the BL beyond hear-say and whatever you read on 4chan etc, but you try to use it in your arguments anyway.

Case in point: "I don't read much BL at all, but Space Marines have more instances of plot-armor in it."

What makes that statement at all credible if you don't read Black Library?

It's why I am intrigued by Games Workshop's own d100 game, where Toughness did not outright negate damage, but just made injuries less worse - an important difference, because it meant that lasguns, just like in the TT, could still harm the Marine. You'd just need to hit him often enough.

Well, sort of. In WHFRP 1st Ed, your Toughness *did* work exactly as the Toughness Bonus does in FFG's games. And, since armor had a ceiling of, like 5 AP, but Toughness capped at 10, you could be better-armored naked than a less-tough character in full plate. Dwarves, especially, were tough as hell in FRP 1E.

I hear Ascended Psykers and Vindicare are so OP that they could actually keep up with a Marine in combat. Not sure if that's true (especially since reading that lulzworthy "1 vs 1 against a Bloodthirster" thread), but perhaps this could be something worth investigating?

The Vindicare is in certain circumstances. The rifle is, as expected, hell on wheels, and the pistol isn't bad, either (but only holds 3 bullets), and they are Dodge monkies (but so are Space Marines). But the Vindicare is definitely at a disadvantage against pretty much anything in close-combat. They're snipers, and if you tried to go down both sides of the line and be both melee and sniper-assassin, you'd really gimp yourself. Of course, from a fluff perspective, if you need to execute a Space Marine and the Sisters aren't available, you send someone from the Officio Assassinorum.

The Vindicare *is* a badass, make no mistake, but they're supposed to be... but in hand to hand they often get their asses handed to them. There's nothing other than Fate Points that allow you to re-roll a failed Dodge, and even on the high-end, you tend to cap out at around a 75% Dodge chance... against something with 4 attacks in a round, you're going to get hit once (on average), and if that once is by a Space Marine, you die, because he does 1d10+3 +17 damage... and, as an Assassin, you are lucky if you have 18W. So his average damage of 25 (roll of 5+3, +5 SB (x3 Unnatural) +2 for Mighty Blow), minus your TB of 4 leaves you at a -3 Critical, which is generally a Stun effect, and so he just crushes your skull under his power armor's boot at his next initiative.

The Psyker is OP *if* you take a few specific Disciplines. Pyromancy, amazingly, is not that OP. Perhaps the most-broken is Time Manipulation (just trapping fools in stasis-bubbles, or using one as cover)... but, on the other hand, there's always the risks of Perils (and Ascended powers often have high Thresholds) and, as well, they tend to be low-W characters... and a bolter is not much bothered by your carapace armor. In my current Ascended DH game, one of the Psykers is a Biomancy/Telekine build. She's primarily a healer, but the Telekine powers grant her some utility and defensive measures in combat, but to inflict appreciable damage, she has to close to melee with Psychic Blade... which, for a mostly-naked barbarian witch who is a member of an Imperial Pleasure Cult, that's risky as hell.

Funny enough, the most-broken powers from core DH are all found in Divination and Telepathy. That includes the ones from Disciples of the Dark Gods and Radical's Handbook. FFG has the same problem that WotC did: they don't playtest their own games with an objective eye.

 Psienesis wrote:

. It's not like Deathwatch Marines wouldn't elicit some suspicion if they were trying to infiltrate/locate a local gang, which is one of the guardsman's strengths. Being able to actually gather intel is something the Deathwatch Marines can't do to the same extend without arousing suspicion.

Though, to be fair, that is entirely *not* what the Death Watch is for. The Death Watch are Xeno hunters. They are the heavy-hitters the Ordo Xenos calls upon when, after years of their mundane-mortal servants doing the painstaking investigations and research required to uncover the plot to trade Xenos artifacts and cross-breed genegineered specimens with the humans of an Agri-World, all under the direction of a traitorous Rogue Trader... *that* is when the Death Watch is called in to bring the hammer down on the Xenos.

All the stuff leading up to that point is a job for the Inquisition (and the RPG Dark Heresy). DW Marines are not supposed to be infiltrating human gangs. They have absolutely no need to. If they need to learn something about this gang's activities, they would be better off kicking down the front door, killing everyone there and then eating their brains. The omophagae will give them the data they need.

Of course, but I'm trying to find a solution to something he can do that the Deathwatch can't.

 Lynata wrote:
See, that's the problem discussed in the thread I linked.

If you send that Guardsman in to RP recon/infiltration ... what exactly are your Marine players doing in the meantime?
And once the Marines move in, how exactly will the Guardsman participate?

One solution for this dilemma that seemed fairly popular on the DH forums was that players basically ran two different interconnected campaigns. Everyone would have a normal Human Acolyte in a Dark Heresy game and they'd investigate and uncover stuff - and if they found something they'd whip out their Deathwatch characters and pwn the enemies of mankind as Space Marines.
I have a feeling this compromise of sorts might not really apply here, though, as you'd essentially force different characters on a group that is already fully absorbed in a DW-exclusive campaign, not to mention that you would still have to play a Marine from time to time.

Yes, I'm aware of the problems, but it's about giving everyone their moment to shine. Hell, even bards are allowed to shine once in a while.

 Swastakowey wrote:
In the guard roleplay I always load up as a demolition scout.

Camelioline, bullpup lascarbines, jump pack landing chute thing, scouty camo stuff, explosives.

Camelioline is like a -30 to hit if you stay still. Get your stealth up and it gets better as you can simply lay your explosives somewhere (and hopefully live) and simply take cover in the firefight. Load up on grenades.

I have never played with Space Marines in a RolePlay because nobody where I am likes Space Marines either (I am truly thankful for this). But I found myself to be very survivable like that.

The blow up crap and hide guy. For mushy enemies use your highly efficient Lascarbine thats small and light.

Or go storm trooper. My friend does well as storm trooper sometimes.

Other than that, the roleplay doesnt sound very fun if you arent into Space Marines.

That seems like quite a good idea actually! He could maybe even be a tech-specialist of sorts. Tech/demolitions with some ability to socialise.

BlaxicanX wrote:What makes that statement at all credible if you don't read Black Library?

I *do* read Black Library, just not every book, or even half of them - that isn't really necessary to put forward the notion that there is a trend, though.
Again: are you claiming that somehow I just managed to grab all the "bad" books? Are you really suggesting that the majority of Black Library books is different? Because I'd say this could be grounds for an interesting discussion - and I'd be more than willing to bring more versed novel readers into it (although a dedicated thread would probably be better than hijacking this one).

See, the irony is that my arguments are half based on what I've read myself, and half based on what I'm hearing from the most vocal Marine players themselves. I'm listening to their descriptions of how awesome their heroes are in this book or that, and how they'd totally survive this and that because it happened in such and such book. I'm basically getting my ammunition delivered free of charge by their own fans.
So either said fans have a very bad and selective memory (which is possible, I suppose, considering how many of them don't seem to know the contents of their own codex), or those novels really are that ridiculous. Both possibilities would have the very same effect on perception by the wider community.

As Ashiraya put it: you reap what you sow.

I do not see how my arguments are working against me.

Of course, but I'm trying to find a solution to something he can do that the Deathwatch can't.

I understand that, I just don't think that it really has a place in a DW game. Now, if it were a combined DH/DW game, then definitely...

... but this application is like the Netrunner from Cyberpunk. It's a specialized role that, when used effectively, is awesome, but requires that the rest of the party sit around for 3 hours while the Netrunner does his thing.

 Psienesis wrote:

Of course, but I'm trying to find a solution to something he can do that the Deathwatch can't.

I understand that, I just don't think that it really has a place in a DW game. Now, if it were a combined DH/DW game, then definitely...

... but this application is like the Netrunner from Cyberpunk. It's a specialized role that, when used effectively, is awesome, but requires that the rest of the party sit around for 3 hours while the Netrunner does his thing.

The problem is that Guard and Marines do different things, so you do not send them on the same missions. If you do, you waste the specialisation of one part.

 Ashiraya wrote:

 Psienesis wrote:

Of course, but I'm trying to find a solution to something he can do that the Deathwatch can't.

I understand that, I just don't think that it really has a place in a DW game. Now, if it were a combined DH/DW game, then definitely...

... but this application is like the Netrunner from Cyberpunk. It's a specialized role that, when used effectively, is awesome, but requires that the rest of the party sit around for 3 hours while the Netrunner does his thing.

The problem is that Guard and Marines do different things, so you do not send them on the same missions. If you do, you waste the specialisation of one part.

Um, yes, but, specifically for this thread, we're talking about the Deathwatch RPG, and a player who wants to play something other than a Deathwatch Marine, so we need to find a happy medium for all involved.

 Psienesis wrote:

 Ashiraya wrote:

 Psienesis wrote:

Of course, but I'm trying to find a solution to something he can do that the Deathwatch can't.

I understand that, I just don't think that it really has a place in a DW game. Now, if it were a combined DH/DW game, then definitely...

... but this application is like the Netrunner from Cyberpunk. It's a specialized role that, when used effectively, is awesome, but requires that the rest of the party sit around for 3 hours while the Netrunner does his thing.

The problem is that Guard and Marines do different things, so you do not send them on the same missions. If you do, you waste the specialisation of one part.

Um, yes, but, specifically for this thread, we're talking about the Deathwatch RPG, and a player who wants to play something other than a Deathwatch Marine, so we need to find a happy medium for all involved.

I am aware. I was just stressing the difficulty of doing this.

Well, thanks for the help gents. I'll just pass on DW all together -- but I'll keep that info in mind if I ever pick up Only War/Dark Heresy or something of that caliber.