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I'm not sure if this is the right place for this, but I wanted to ask some general question about the system. The dark Heresy community here seems to be fairly supportive, which I greatly appreciate.

Question 1
My players have requested that I run a game at the ascension level. I hands gotten a chance to really explore the system until this last week when I finally got my hands on the books. I have almost a decade of experience with TTRPGS and being a DM/GM so i'm confident in my ability to run the story part of the game, and the player who is the other GM for our group has played dark heresy since launch, so I will have a tutor on mechanics and expect to have them down fairly quickly. (our group has a more collaborative style than an antagonistic one when it come to DM and player interactions, and we all value a good narrative). My question is, is the game different at the ascension level? and if so in what ways. I have played a dark heresy character (I played through the first five ranks of adept and was going into a scholar/interrogator role but its been almost 4 years.) so I have a feel for the game a lower levels. In D&D epic or paragon play (depending on edition) does change the game quite a bit and as I am guessing ascension is DH's version of Epic, I just wanted to know how much it would change it.

question 2:
The game group I plan on running this game with has been playing together for 5+ years and some of the original have been together almost 10. we have a fairly good feel for each other's styles. as of right now the party make up seems to be a junior inquisitor (remember we are supposedly starting at the first rank of the ascension level), who was previously a guardsman. I have a player who is playing a sister of battle, and I believe there are continuation rules for those after rank 9, two people will play assassin, one vindicare and the other, a non assasnorum assassin, so basically a really high level death cult assassin, he is planning on going melee. My last for sure player is going to play a Techpriest skinned as a jakero.. I have two other players who are maybes, one wants to be a space marine and the other wants to be a high level arbite. Form a game play perspective, what type of enemies would this level, and I guess composition have more trouble with, Big gribblies like tyanids, daemons and mutated creatures, or MSU things like other parties of equal levels or hordes of cultists? The bad guy in the campaign is a phaenite inquisitor so he is into warp sorcery and technology so I can realistically bring anything to bear against the party,

Question 3:
I intend to run a very RP and storyline heavy game, which is one reason I'm choosing dark heresy and not deathwatch. I gathered from the system that it lends itself more to RP than outright combat because of the skills system, but how does that ranking system translate into the actual game play as far as power levels go. specifically in combat. If I am interpreting this correctly, it looks like your combat power level is a combination of gear( mainly weapon or armor), governing stat, and skill, and because there is no set progression per level beyond what you choose to buy (Like a base attack bonus form a D&D game) your combat effectiveness would depend entirely on your skill and stat build. I’m just making sure I’m interpreting that correctly.

Question 4:
If it is possible, how does one break the Dark heresy system? Does a space marine among mortals do it simply by the variance in stats? Would allowing a player to be the rogue trader captain in possession of his ship break it because the ship is too big of a possession and would unbalance party power? Or is this ship not really that big a deal? How does psyker powers balance the game compared to high level weapons and gear? I know these questions can largely be mitigated by the situation I create with the story, but maybe some hard and fast game balance rules and tips are what I’m looking for. Any help at all with this would be helpful.

Again I apologize if any of this is obvious but I would appreciate any light yall can shed because the less I have to go to my other players with questions, the less storyline I reveal to them. Thank in advance

Haven't played at ascension level, so I'm going to pass on Q's 1 &2.

3) Short answer: yes. You can build your characters to specialize in all sorts of things based on their gear, stats, and skills. You could build a lightning fast melee attacker, someone who shoots big guns, or someone who mucks about with psychic powers.

4) Space Marines, loyalist or Chaos, are pretty broken compared to human characters. If you have a gang of well equipped human characters against a Space Marine, they may have a chance, and that could be a cool final boss for a campaign, but generally Space Marines curb stomp normies. It doesn't even try to be balanced, which I actually kind of appreciate, because if it was it would blatantly disregard fluff.

A Rogue Trader having a ship isn't necessarily OP, because ifor instance, his ship gets boarded, or he's stranded on a planet, he's going to have to rely on his own strength. You could also give enemies ships as well. Having a ship really just opens up larger campaign possibilities.

The main difference is in how NPCs will view the party. In standard Dark Heresy, the party is representing essentially cannon fodder for the Inquisition. NPCs may or may not care that an acolyte is trying to bargain with them for information on a local cult. In Ascension-level games, the party represents up-and-coming members of the Inquisition who have every right and authority to *blam* that same NPC for heresy if he doesn't give them the information they are looking for. That NPC is fully aware of this fact.

The best enemies for Ascension games are rival Inquisitors, especially if you are following a more narrative/RP driven game.

Space Marines can present a real balance issue if they aren't kept in check. If you have even the slightest inkling that the player might be TFG, ask him to roll something else. The thing about Astartes in DH, and even in Deathwatch, is that they are insanely effective at combat, but they aren't much for investigation. If your campaign is heavy on investigations, the SM player may quickly become a non-factor. Make sure he is aware of the fact that he may be relegated to the role of "brute" of the party just by virtue of necessity.

Also take note that the Astartes has access to wargear FAR beyond what most members of the party will ever be able to use. My previous point about him being a combat-oriented character and thus weakened in a non-combat-heavy game will mitigate this.

A Space Marine, played correctly, will have almost nothing to do in a Dark Heresy campaign, no matter the level.

They just can't do anything with subtlety, and Dark Heresy is mostly a game of intrigue. They will always stick out. Thus they can't really "investigate" things, and their presence will color the reactions of everyone around them. Nobody fails to miss the seven and a half foot tall, hulking giant in the back of the room. Especially if he's armored.

So, mechanics-wise, it will be easy to scale a Space Marine to the level of your other characters, but roleplaying wise, he's going to be fairly world-breaking. Mostly, because Space Marines exist to break worlds, often literally. Even with the Deathwatch, the Inquisition just points them at things the already know are bad, and then has the Deathwatch destroy them. However, any undiscovered badness is certainly going to scurry to the darkest corners if a Space Marine in a giant, lumpy trenchcoat and broad-brimmed hat is seen in the area.

As a side note, an armored Sister of Battle is liable to do the same thing too. They're pretty short on subtlety as well.

 Veteran Sergeant wrote:
A Space Marine, played correctly, will have almost nothing to do in a Dark Heresy campaign, no matter the level.

They just can't do anything with subtlety, and Dark Heresy is mostly a game of intrigue. They will always stick out. Thus they can't really "investigate" things, and their presence will color the reactions of everyone around them. Nobody fails to miss the seven and a half foot tall, hulking giant in the back of the room. Especially if he's armored.

So, mechanics-wise, it will be easy to scale a Space Marine to the level of your other characters, but roleplaying wise, he's going to be fairly world-breaking. Mostly, because Space Marines exist to break worlds, often literally. Even with the Deathwatch, the Inquisition just points them at things the already know are bad, and then has the Deathwatch destroy them. However, any undiscovered badness is certainly going to scurry to the darkest corners if a Space Marine in a giant, lumpy trenchcoat and broad-brimmed hat is seen in the area.

As a side note, an armored Sister of Battle is liable to do the same thing too. They're pretty short on subtlety as well.

SoBs can take off their power armour and look normal underneath it though, so SoBs are a little more capable of infiltration. Also, less absurdly good at combat if they don't have their cool equipment. Basically, Battle Sisters are more versatile, less specialized roleplaying characters.

Vindicare Assassins are widely deemed as essentially breaking the system largely due to "Temple Assassin" trait (can dodge normally undodgeable attacks and dodge a number of times equal to their agility bonus per round (and re-roll Acrobatics, Climb, Contortionist and Swim tests)). That combined with Unnatural Agility x2 (especially in 1st Edition Dark Heresy) leads to a large number of very easy-to-pass dodges. Supposedly they can become basically unkillable without sending such enemies that most other PCs will get slaughtered by.

Space Marines can do the same especially if you use the "Space Marine equipment is better than anyone else's equipment" stuff they added in.

That said Primaris Psykers are generally considered the most overpowered of any characters and can fetter their powers so as to no longer risk perils.

Techpriests can get to ludicrously high levels of AP and toughness but a large chunk of the AP depends on a type of shield IIRC so it can be circumvented. Plus if the guy's playing as a Jokaero he probably won't be making himself too tanky.

I'd say the ship is fine albeit depending on size. If the crew on it isn't too large (especially security forces) it should alright.

If you are running a very RP heavy and storyline focused campaign, the Space Marine may not be a problem--assuming that your storyline assumes it has a space marine in it.

For many things that are challenging to any normal humans, the Space Marine can safely kill them without a sweat, and for many of the things that will be a threat to a space marine, those things will smear normal characters across a wall. On top of that, many 'typical' inquisitorial missions will just be incredibly inappropriate for a Marine.

On the other hand, if you design the adventure assuming that the Inquisition has secured the cooperation of a Space Marine--then the mission should 'realistically' be one that would benefit from having a SM along. I can't tell you precisely what that mission would be, but if I were writing it, there would be opposition that is unpredictable (so you might need a marine even when you might not expect to, so he comes along most of the time). The opposition should be largely 'uninteresting' (a lot of people you don't need to capture and question) and unthreatening to people in power armor (if they can all penetrate power armor, the marine's not much more useful than anyone else). This would allow you to have the marine 'take out' the minor opposition without the need to stage battles where other people take shelter and he rolls dice.

This could actually work well for your play style. Instead of having to game out a lot of fights, you can handle them narratively, as the Marine should be able to paste these guys, and you can save important, detailed combats for climactic scenes that actually matter. For instance, a well-hidden, entrenched cult could be a good storyline. The inquisitor and his allies have to be able to investigate, but they also know that there's a chance that almost anywhere they go might be infiltrated by cultists, or attacked by groups of suicide cultists. Plus, there's someone on the inside, so their movements and safe houses are compromised. Thus, they can't afford to just go around stealthily. Someone knows where they are, and someone might attack at any moment.

On the other hand, I'm not sure what kind of mission needs two assassins and two people in power armor. It seems kind of schizophrenic. Assassins are kind of stealthy by definition, and SOB and SM tend not to be, and I can't see what mission would request BOTH. Maybe you can work out some reason why the SOB and the SM need to be included that has nothing to do with their capacities as warriors? Perhaps its an investigation on a Space Marine recruiting world, and it involves some sort of corruption within the Ecclesiarchy? That way the Sister and the Marine are involved as a political gesture to their orders, rather than as mission specialists.

Also in regards to infiltration with the Space Marine not sticking out like a gigantic pus-infected thumb trapped in a door, him being veteran Raven Guard or a Librarian spec'd in mindfething could work out. Although you'll still have the problem with a Space Marine just being out of the main party's league unless they're assassins.

In no particular order...

Vindicare are glass cannons. Yes, they can dodge a lot, but there's lots of things that cannot be dodged (which is different from "normally undodgeable"). Most Psychic attacks, for example, have no Dodge test to resist.

Space Marines are a Deathwatch/Black Crusade class (and appear as resources in DH2.0) but are not intended to be PCs in Dark Heresy, for reasons stated above. They really do not mesh well with a typical DH party. The stats and traits they get make them absolute combat monsters, and Astartes wargear is superior to everything else anyone is permitted to use (even Inquisitors). Anything that is a challenge to a Space Marine will mop the floor with most DH characters, even Ascended ones.

Sisters don't, either, as it so happens, since the party is going to be slightly heretical at times. However, if the party is faithful enough, Sisters are fine as members of the party, though be aware that the Faith powers present in Blood of Martyrs basically makes them space-wizards.

Jokaero are... an interesting species. Most people do not understand how they work, and so don't play them correctly. Jokaero do not speak or understand Gothic. You cannot tell a Jokaero "build me a plasma pistol" and expect him to have it done by the end of the day. What you do with Jokaero is you give them a pile of random tech, and wait for them to build something from it. What you end up with will most certainly be interesting, maybe even downright amazing, it just might not be useful to you right now... or ever.

Yes, Jokaero build digi-weapons and such. Eventually. Provided they have enough tech-scrap and parts sitting around to work through the five thousand other (useless-as-far-as-you're-concerned) designs and projects before they eventually construct a digi-melta for you... by pure luck of the draw. Jokaero are the "infinite monkeys at typewriters" of the tech of 40k. Get enough Jokaero with enough parts and they will eventually build you something cool.

Also, again, they don't speak. They're animals. They are space-apes.

With the party as described, you have a pretty good TAC group... to an extent. What you're lacking is a Psyker, most of which get pushed into being Biomancers because they can heal people. Aside from that, 2 Sisters and a Vindicare have ranged combat taken care of, with the Sisters being decent in close-combat. The DCA is monstrous in close combat, especially if h/she takes the Moritat Reaper side-class. Those people decimate hordes. They lack any ability in ranged combat to speak of, however.

A Rogue Trader having a ship is not so imbalanced, really, especially if you build them off the Scum template from Dark Heresy, and not the actual RT class from the Rogue Trader game (in which case it's a different game using a similar system as DH, but not intended to blend together). Since there is an Inquisitor present, the worst excesses of the class can be curtailed.

 Psienesis wrote:
In no particular order...

Spoiler:

Vindicare are glass cannons. Yes, they can dodge a lot, but there's lots of things that cannot be dodged (which is different from "normally undodgeable"). Most Psychic attacks, for example, have no Dodge test to resist.

Space Marines are a Deathwatch/Black Crusade class (and appear as resources in DH2.0) but are not intended to be PCs in Dark Heresy, for reasons stated above. They really do not mesh well with a typical DH party. The stats and traits they get make them absolute combat monsters, and Astartes wargear is superior to everything else anyone is permitted to use (even Inquisitors). Anything that is a challenge to a Space Marine will mop the floor with most DH characters, even Ascended ones.

Sisters don't, either, as it so happens, since the party is going to be slightly heretical at times. However, if the party is faithful enough, Sisters are fine as members of the party, though be aware that the Faith powers present in Blood of Martyrs basically makes them space-wizards.

Jokaero are... an interesting species. Most people do not understand how they work, and so don't play them correctly. Jokaero do not speak or understand Gothic. You cannot tell a Jokaero "build me a plasma pistol" and expect him to have it done by the end of the day. What you do with Jokaero is you give them a pile of random tech, and wait for them to build something from it. What you end up with will most certainly be interesting, maybe even downright amazing, it just might not be useful to you right now... or ever.

Yes, Jokaero build digi-weapons and such. Eventually. Provided they have enough tech-scrap and parts sitting around to work through the five thousand other (useless-as-far-as-you're-concerned) designs and projects before they eventually construct a digi-melta for you... by pure luck of the draw. Jokaero are the "infinite monkeys at typewriters" of the tech of 40k. Get enough Jokaero with enough parts and they will eventually build you something cool.

Also, again, they don't speak. They're animals. They are space-apes.

With the party as described, you have a pretty good TAC group... to an extent. What you're lacking is a Psyker, most of which get pushed into being Biomancers because they can heal people. Aside from that, 2 Sisters and a Vindicare have ranged combat taken care of, with the Sisters being decent in close-combat. The DCA is monstrous in close combat, especially if h/she takes the Moritat Reaper side-class. Those people decimate hordes. They lack any ability in ranged combat to speak of, however.

A Rogue Trader having a ship is not so imbalanced, really, especially if you build them off the Scum template from Dark Heresy, and not the actual RT class from the Rogue Trader game (in which case it's a different game using a similar system as DH, but not intended to blend together). Since there is an Inquisitor present, the worst excesses of the class can be curtailed.

Well, I told the party that I'm not allowing space marines, and it went over well, so that inst really a problem. As far as the Jokaero, the guy who want to play him is our normal paladin, and he wanted to play something less upfront and faith based, so what we agreed on was he will basically be a tech priest with altered physical stats. He will have a device that allows for communication, but he is severely restricted on the armor he can make for himself adn the outlandish weapons he can produce. He wanted to play a tech priest that wasn't loyal to mars above the inquisitor and who could basically be the technology guy becasue no one else had tried to fill that slot, so while it may not reflect the exact lore of the Jokaero, it will work for our campaign, and afaik, there are no rules for Jokaero in DH.

The party was cemented yesterday as 1 inquisitor, 1 interrogator acting as the inquisitor's apprentice, 1 sister of battle (she is not a typical sister of battle. Her order is part of the group that policies the ecclisarchy for heresy, and has been seconded to the inquisitor for a while, the players are husband and wife,) one Jokaero, (who will be essentially a magos who can't build himself into a tank), One Judge, One vindicare Assassin, and one Death Cult Assassin. ( I outlawed the primaris psyker because i thought it would be game breaking and the NPC inquisitor lord who is directing the party deeply mistrusts psykers in general.)

The inquisitor is the clandestine apprentice of the Malleus inquisitor lord of the sector. While the have combated daemons before, the party's main function is to track down and kill rogue inquisitors. Basically the NPC inquisitor lord accused and executed the previous lord of heresy. when that happened he founded a conclave to rule the sector's inquisitors but in reality he controls the conclave. when he became the clandestine lord of the sector he elevated his former apprentice to full inquisitor, but saw no real change in their relationship, so while the inquisitor character is a full inquisitor he still sees himself under the tutelage of the NPC lord. the rest of the party is largely unaware of this relationship or that the NPC inquisitor is anything more than a senior inquisitor in the conclave who previously sponsored their inquisitor.

The party makeup itself lends to the tracking and eliminating of inquisitors and henchmen, so that is what the actual work of the party will primarily be comprised of, but there is an underlying plot that heavily involves daemons. The game will have them mostly tracking down people and interacting with high level personnel from different organizations, some of which they can pull rank on and other they can't, plus there will be competing inquisitorial plots going on that they will have to mitigate.

All that being said, could a party like this take on a space marine or two or should I keep this primarily in the region of mortals and lesser daemon's?

Taking on a Space Marine will depend very largely on their wargear and how well their dice roll. Unless they are, themselves, packing bolters, plasma weapons, meltas and/or hellguns, the average Space Marine from Deathwatch will wipe the floor with the entire party, if you transfer one directly into Dark Heresy.

The reason for this is found in the way the Unnatural Attribute talents work in DH vs how they work in DW. In DH, Unnatural Toughness x2 gives you a bonus +1 success on any Toughness-based test, and doubles your Toughness bonus when resisting damage. So someone with a 45 Toughness, and Unnatural Toughness x2, soaks 8 points of damage (rather than 4) in combat, on top of whatever their armor absorbs. Same thing with Unnatural Strength and the tests based on that attribute.

So a Space Marine with a 60 Strength and 60 Toughness, Unnatural Strength x3 and Unnatural Toughness x3 is tanking 18 points of damage naked, and his naked fist is dealing something like 1d5+18 points of damage, using the Dark Heresy variants of the Unnatural Attributes. An Astartes combat knife bumps that to something like 1d10+2 + 18, with a Penetration of 2 (thus ignoring 2 points of the target's armor).

A Marine's bolter does more damage than any carried by non-Marines, and his power armor is (by the book) superior to that worn even by that Sister of Battle, with more options for add-on systems and armor legacies. He also has, on average, twice the Wounds of any human opponent.

All that said? I have seen crafty Inquisitorial bands take out Space Marines, provided they have the right equipment and think tactically. Lascannons in the hands of a Vindicare are deadly. Space Marines only get so many dodges/parries a round, let the DCA force him to use those (provided s/he is equipped with a power sword, which will ignore a significant portion of the Marine's armor) before the Vindicare takes the shot. Haywire grenades can be used against power armor (this is where the Jokaero comes in), and the various Faith powers available to the Sister can grant some pretty amazing bonuses in combat to her and her party.

Of course, as with anything else in DH, the dice rolls will be the most important factor... if one side's dice are white-hot and the other cannot roll for crap? Then that combat is just not going to go well. It might go hilariously, but not well.

All this being said, Deathwatch campaigns can be incredibly fun. I'm glad that your player agreed not to play an Astartes, but it could be fun to follow this campaign with a Deathwatch campaign.

 Psienesis wrote:


So a Space Marine with a 60 Strength and 60 Toughness, Unnatural Strength x3 and Unnatural Toughness x3 is tanking 18 points of damage naked, and his naked fist is dealing something like 1d5+18 points of damage, using the Dark Heresy variants of the Unnatural Attributes. An Astartes combat knife bumps that to something like 1d10+2 + 18, with a Penetration of 2 (thus ignoring 2 points of the target's armor).

Worth remembering: Marines cannot get x3 on their unnatural statistics without temporary buffs like Feat of Strength or bionics or the like.

On the other hand, they have Unarmed Master as standard, so even their fist will deal something like 1d10+12 non-Primitive damage, more than enough to strip the wounds from a Guardsman in full armour in a single punch.

My RT party had an NPC Techmarine help them in one of their campaigns, and it was nice to see them back each other up - the Marine slaughtering countless enemies and doing techy stuff with the Explorator while the Explorers did diplomacy, investigation, and similar less blunt work, which actually turned out to tbe the most important stuff in the end.

I seem to recall my Raven Guard Marine, who stacked various self-buffs to make his Stalker Bolter hit like a Multi-Melta from a kilometer away, while simultanously getting all but gauranteed Concealment and Silent Move tests with his ~80 agility and plentiful bonuses.

Marines are fun.

 Ashiraya wrote:

 Psienesis wrote:


So a Space Marine with a 60 Strength and 60 Toughness, Unnatural Strength x3 and Unnatural Toughness x3 is tanking 18 points of damage naked, and his naked fist is dealing something like 1d5+18 points of damage, using the Dark Heresy variants of the Unnatural Attributes. An Astartes combat knife bumps that to something like 1d10+2 + 18, with a Penetration of 2 (thus ignoring 2 points of the target's armor).

Worth remembering: Marines cannot get x3 on their unnatural statistics without temporary buffs like Feat of Strength or bionics or the like.

On the other hand, they have Unarmed Master as standard, so even their fist will deal something like 1d10+12 non-Primitive damage, more than enough to strip the wounds from a Guardsman in full armour in a single punch.

My RT party had an NPC Techmarine help them in one of their campaigns, and it was nice to see them back each other up - the Marine slaughtering countless enemies and doing techy stuff with the Explorator while the Explorers did diplomacy, investigation, and similar less blunt work, which actually turned out to tbe the most important stuff in the end.

I seem to recall my Raven Guard Marine, who stacked various self-buffs to make his Stalker Bolter hit like a Multi-Melta from a kilometer away, while simultanously getting all but gauranteed Concealment and Silent Move tests with his ~80 agility and plentiful bonuses.

Marines are fun.

Ya Marines are nuts. Our fresh out of Char Gen Tyrannic War Vet one shotted a Lictor with Kracken Round from his bolter cuz of all the various bonuses it got him

Big changes in Ascension - Influence is VERY important. The party's influence stat can, in many ways, substitute for just about any skill they don't have - because it can be used to 'hire' minions with skills, or to lean on an individual or organisation in place of fellowship abilities.

Where it is limited, though, is in precisely the setting you're using; using influence involves telling someone you work for the Inquisition - if you're 'after' a rogue =][= yourself, you're warning him off, and remember he has the same authority himself....

That's the main restriction - once you hit ascension level, you're swimming in the big pool - you have essentially unlimited authority, but if you want to use it you become 'visible' to Rogue Traders, Planetary Governors and Ecclesiarch Cardinals, who have their own sphere's of effectively unlimited authority and political leanings, allies, etc.

The other advantage of this kind of setting is that it gives you an 'emergency brake' on your player's wargear. Yes, they can with little effort acquire a suit of powered plate and an assault cannon. But they are NOT going to be allowed to enter an up-hive noble's palace with it unless they're prepared to throw their weight around or shoot their way in. And if they attack this sort of individual openly, they're going to be facing bodyguards by the platoon at a bare minimum.

Taking out marines is a lot easier in Black Crusade, but it can be done in Dark Heresy, too. Expect a lot of the party to need Righteous Fury to actually do damage, but you can help a lot of the time regardless. Defensive Stance, Suppressive fire and so on are your friends. Accept that the people who can't hurt him can't hurt him and figure out what they can do.

Provided you start with a 'generic' marine - stats of straight 45, unnatural S and T x2, 20 wounds, power armour, and an astartes bolter (which as noted is closer to a slow-firing heavy bolter by anyone else's standards) and chainsword, you've got a threat they should be able to handle. Hell, a turbo-penetrator shell has a decent chance of taking an uninjured marine's arm straight off.

Avoiding the Primaris was a good idea. The Dark Heresy psyker abilities go a bit nuts at higher levels.

The main restriction I'd put on the vindicere is that if he wears armour he's going to lose Temple Assassin. The ability is amazing and he shouldn't be encouraged to try and wear power armour with it or something equally silly.

 GKTiberius wrote:
The party was cemented yesterday as 1 inquisitor, 1 interrogator acting as the inquisitor's apprentice, 1 sister of battle (she is not a typical sister of battle. Her order is part of the group that policies the ecclisarchy for heresy, and has been seconded to the inquisitor for a while, the players are husband and wife,)

lol, how is that not a typical Sister of Battle?

 Furyou Miko wrote:

 GKTiberius wrote:
The party was cemented yesterday as 1 inquisitor, 1 interrogator acting as the inquisitor's apprentice, 1 sister of battle (she is not a typical sister of battle. Her order is part of the group that policies the ecclisarchy for heresy, and has been seconded to the inquisitor for a while, the players are husband and wife,)

lol, how is that not a typical Sister of Battle?

We went in another direction. she is going to be a palatine on loan to the inquisition. She is officially the Ecclesiastical liaison to the conclave that runs this sector, but she is really on loan to the Ordo Malleus because she is a specialized Daemon Hunter. Im allowing her to take some of the advances from the Daemon hunters book, specifically the daemonyn seeker caeer.

 GKTiberius wrote:
My players have requested that I run a game at the ascension level.

Whilst I doubt you can change the minds of your players, I would caution against this. To me it'd almost be like starting with Deathwatch. Your players will get so used to using what are essentially super-humans that they won't respect (and eventually resent) the lower level play.

 GKTiberius wrote:
... two people will play assassin, one vindicare and the other, a non assasnorum assassin, so basically a really high level death cult assassin, he is planning on going melee. My last for sure player is going to play a Techpriest skinned as a jakero.. I have two other players who are maybes, one wants to be a space marine and the other wants to be a high level arbite.

As others mentioned, Marines are a no-go. It's not that type of game, and they'd just be too powerful for it, even with the nutcase stuff that a Vindicare can do.

As far as the Jokaero, as people have said, they're just not the type of thing you can roleplay. They're an unknowable alien, something that does what it does for its own reasons and can't really be ordered, spoken to, or compelled into doing things it doesn't want to do. Does your player intend to stay silent the whole time, randomly getting involved and occasionally building things?

The only Jokaero "rules", such as they are, are in Enemies Without, the second Ordo book for Dark Heresy 2.0. They are a type of service that allows you to modify weapons and equipment, but in keeping with the way Jokaero work, the effects are random and might not even be useful. That's how they operate. Just having a Tech-Priest pretending to be a Jokaero wouldn't really work. You have to have, for lack of a better term, more 'human-minded' aliens (Orks, Eldar, Tau, etc.).

 GKTiberius wrote:
Form a game play perspective, what type of enemies would this level, and I guess composition have more trouble with, Big gribblies like tyanids, daemons and mutated creatures, or MSU things like other parties of equal levels or hordes of cultists? The bad guy in the campaign is a phaenite inquisitor so he is into warp sorcery and technology so I can realistically bring anything to bear against the party,

It's going to have to be serious opposition, so the "Elite" style adversaries become the cannon fodder, whereas the master types are more common. Less Cultist rabble and more "Oh, look, another 8 Bloodletters!". That sort of thing.

 GKTiberius wrote:
Question 3:
I intend to run a very RP and storyline heavy game, which is one reason I'm choosing dark heresy and not deathwatch. I gathered from the system that it lends itself more to RP than outright combat because of the skills system, but how does that ranking system translate into the actual game play as far as power levels go. specifically in combat. If I am interpreting this correctly, it looks like your combat power level is a combination of gear( mainly weapon or armor), governing stat, and skill, and because there is no set progression per level beyond what you choose to buy (Like a base attack bonus form a D&D game) your combat effectiveness would depend entirely on your skill and stat build. I’m just making sure I’m interpreting that correctly.

You're pretty much got that right, although I'd be careful about party composition if you're going the heavy RP/not heavy combat route. The Assassins in particular might end up being fifth wheels a lot of the time, and that could frustrate players.

 GKTiberius wrote:
Question 4:
If it is possible, how does one break the Dark heresy system? Does a space marine among mortals do it simply by the variance in stats? Would allowing a player to be the rogue trader captain in possession of his ship break it because the ship is too big of a possession and would unbalance party power? Or is this ship not really that big a deal? How does psyker powers balance the game compared to high level weapons and gear? I know these questions can largely be mitigated by the situation I create with the story, but maybe some hard and fast game balance rules and tips are what I’m looking for. Any help at all with this would be helpful.

The aforementioned Vindicare's super-dodge does that. So does the Primaris Powers (the power number requirements are too low for those Primaris powers, IMO - add 15-20 to all of them and it becomes a bigger deal). Space Marines as well. Any time you can get a character that can Parry almost all the time, and has counter-attack, that can break things. I've had games where a Keeper of Secrets was actually more liable to get itself killed when attacking my character than when attacking the NPC guys that were helping us.

 Ashiraya wrote:
My RT party had an NPC Techmarine help them in one of their campaigns, and it was nice to see them back each other up - the Marine slaughtering countless enemies and doing techy stuff with the Explorator while the Explorers did diplomacy, investigation, and similar less blunt work, which actually turned out to tbe the most important stuff in the end.

I had an NPC Tech-marine (technically 2 NPC Tech-Marines) in our Dark Heresy campaign, but I put a very big leash on him. The group encountered him whilst trying to escape a Forge World corrupted by a Genestealer Cult, and the 2 Tech-Marines happened to be on the Forge World as part of their training to become Tech-Marines. One had been injured before the group got there, so the other Tech-Marine could help out fighting when possible, but had to carry his brother Marine the whole time (not like the rest of the group could life a Marine in full armour!).

Later on in the campaign he got involved, but he did the "I'll hold them here whilst you go ahead" thing, so whilst he was around he was completely lethal but I purposefully invented reasons why he either had to stay put, or couldn't go on with the party.

It helped create a balance of "Wow. This Marine is dangerous! We should be friends with him!" and "Oh, the Marine killed everyone again... yay...".

 H.B.M.C. wrote:

 GKTiberius wrote:
My players have requested that I run a game at the ascension level.

Whilst I doubt you can change the minds of your players, I would caution against this. To me it'd almost be like starting with Deathwatch. Your players will get so used to using what are essentially super-humans that they won't respect (and eventually resent) the lower level play.

Some of the other players have played before and that is why they have asked to play ascencion. I'm pretty much the only player, besides the jakero player, who haven't played the game a lot. I like the universe and the guy playing the inquisitor had been dming dark heresy for a long time. Also this isn't out normal game, so I'm not sure how much if a problem this will be.

 GKTiberius wrote:
... two people will play assassin, one vindicare and the other, a non assasnorum assassin, so basically a really high level death cult assassin, he is planning on going melee. My last for sure player is going to play a Techpriest skinned as a jakero.. I have two other players who are maybes, one wants to be a space marine and the other wants to be a high level arbite.

As others mentioned, Marines are a no-go. It's not that type of game, and they'd just be too powerful for it, even with the nutcase stuff that a Vindicare can do.

As far as the Jokaero, as people have said, they're just not the type of thing you can roleplay. They're an unknowable alien, something that does what it does for its own reasons and can't really be ordered, spoken to, or compelled into doing things it doesn't want to do. Does your player intend to stay silent the whole time, randomly getting involved and occasionally building things?

The only Jokaero "rules", such as they are, are in Enemies Without, the second Ordo book for Dark Heresy 2.0. They are a type of service that allows you to modify weapons and equipment, but in keeping with the way Jokaero work, the effects are random and might not even be useful. That's how they operate. Just having a Tech-Priest pretending to be a Jokaero wouldn't really work. You have to have, for lack of a better term, more 'human-minded' aliens (Orks, Eldar, Tau, etc.).

I have already discussed it. The Jakero was found by the inquisitor as an infant. The inquisitor had a device buily that allowes the jakero to communicate but it communicates in a form similar to binary from starwars. It is a specific language the party has to take to understand him. The surgery that implanted the device altered the monkeys brain so he thinks more like a human with the aid of a cogitator. This diminishes some of his tech prowess but allows him to create things with intent. Also as a side thing I'm severely limiting the types of augments he can take and limiting them mainly to small implants. His fellowship will still be 0.

 GKTiberius wrote:
Form a game play perspective, what type of enemies would this level, and I guess composition have more trouble with, Big gribblies like tyanids, daemons and mutated creatures, or MSU things like other parties of equal levels or hordes of cultists? The bad guy in the campaign is a phaenite inquisitor so he is into warp sorcery and technology so I can realistically bring anything to bear against the party,

It's going to have to be serious opposition, so the "Elite" style adversaries become the cannon fodder, whereas the master types are more common. Less Cultist rabble and more "Oh, look, another 8 Bloodletters!". That sort of thing.

As I am building the story and setting it's looking like they will be facing daemons, psykers/sorcerers' some heretechs with forbidden tech. All accompanied by hordes of cultists with weapons. But like I said, the actual fighting won't happen all that often. Usually at the climax of the adventure.

 GKTiberius wrote:
Question 3:
I intend to run a very RP and storyline heavy game, which is one reason I'm choosing dark heresy and not deathwatch. I gathered from the system that it lends itself more to RP than outright combat because of the skills system, but how does that ranking system translate into the actual game play as far as power levels go. specifically in combat. If I am interpreting this correctly, it looks like your combat power level is a combination of gear( mainly weapon or armor), governing stat, and skill, and because there is no set progression per level beyond what you choose to buy (Like a base attack bonus form a D&D game) your combat effectiveness would depend entirely on your skill and stat build. I’m just making sure I’m interpreting that correctly.

You're pretty much got that right, although I'd be careful about party composition if you're going the heavy RP/not heavy combat route. The Assassins in particular might end up being fifth wheels a lot of the time, and that could frustrate players.

I expect that the assassins will use thier skill sets I'm tracking and shadowing. Also I'm building in some specific assassin side missions to take place simultaneous to the other story so the party will be split but completely engaged.

 GKTiberius wrote:
Question 4:
If it is possible, how does one break the Dark heresy system? Does a space marine among mortals do it simply by the variance in stats? Would allowing a player to be the rogue trader captain in possession of his ship break it because the ship is too big of a possession and would unbalance party power? Or is this ship not really that big a deal? How does psyker powers balance the game compared to high level weapons and gear? I know these questions can largely be mitigated by the situation I create with the story, but maybe some hard and fast game balance rules and tips are what I’m looking for. Any help at all with this would be helpful.

The aforementioned Vindicare's super-dodge does that. So does the Primaris Powers (the power number requirements are too low for those Primaris powers, IMO - add 15-20 to all of them and it becomes a bigger deal). Space Marines as well. Any time you can get a character that can Parry almost all the time, and has counter-attack, that can break things. I've had games where a Keeper of Secrets was actually more liable to get itself killed when attacking my character than when attacking the NPC guys that were helping us.

I have taken some steps to mitigate that. If the assassin is wearing armor his temple assassin ability is negated. Also I am limiting unnatural attributes to one per rank tgat they are offered on. Meaning they can be bought once per rank only if that specific rank offers it. Also the only psykers I'm allowing are minor psyker powers bought during the progression of a career, and no one can be an imperial psyker or a Primaris psyker.

 Ashiraya wrote:
My RT party had an NPC Techmarine help them in one of their campaigns, and it was nice to see them back each other up - the Marine slaughtering countless enemies and doing techy stuff with the Explorator while the Explorers did diplomacy, investigation, and similar less blunt work, which actually turned out to tbe the most important stuff in the end.

I had an NPC Tech-marine (technically 2 NPC Tech-Marines) in our Dark Heresy campaign, but I put a very big leash on him. The group encountered him whilst trying to escape a Forge World corrupted by a Genestealer Cult, and the 2 Tech-Marines happened to be on the Forge World as part of their training to become Tech-Marines. One had been injured before the group got there, so the other Tech-Marine could help out fighting when possible, but had to carry his brother Marine the whole time (not like the rest of the group could life a Marine in full armour!).

Later on in the campaign he got involved, but he did the "I'll hold them here whilst you go ahead" thing, so whilst he was around he was completely lethal but I purposefully invented reasons why he either had to stay put, or couldn't go on with the party.

It helped create a balance of "Wow. This Marine is dangerous! We should be friends with him!" and "Oh, the Marine killed everyone again... yay...".

If you are bringing in enemy Psykers/Sorcerers, one thing I would suggest is permitting a successful WP test to dodge/avoid/resist 1 shard of Soul Killer per success.

Without a way to resist that power, it is disgustingly OP for a relatively low Manifestation threshold, especially at the Ascended ranks.

That said, a powerful Psyker with Soul Killer is one dangerous mofo.

Just on a rules level, DH is a quite complicated rules system and I really do not recommend people starting it at Ascension level, in which every character will have loads and loads of special rules-changing talents.

Ascension is also a much different game genrewise. "Vanilla" DH is more or less a horror game. Ascension gets into pulp action territory because the PCs are so powerful.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
EDIT: OK they have played the game before, so ignore my first post.

We have been discussing the game in our group over the weekend. We are looking to start in about 3 weeks, and everyone seems to be fine with having compartmentalized roles. They are looking at it sort of like the avengers, they each are awesome at their chosen skill set, but none, will be bale to accomplish all facets of the the mission alone.

That being said having created two characters that are going to be npc's I have come across 2 observations,
1) Psykers are incredibly broken if employed correctly, especially against low WP characters. this will be my equalizer as the party isn't really allowed to be imperial or primaris psykers.

2.) The ascension end of things will necessitate an even heavier emphasis on RP over combat, because at the ascension level, with the exception of assassins, the other classes don't really gain new combat abilities so much as augment what they have built up by this point. I have found the paragon talents to be wasteful compared to the costs of pre-ascension talents, although some are cost effective. I see real growth in the skill mastery areas as well as the amount of XP to shore up missing components from lower ranks. The big emphasis seems to be on influence and the talents associated with it, and I intend to make the game be about influence and using it effectively specifically by making influence tests and requisition requirements for key parts of missions and to adjust rewards for accomplishing objective reward different amounts of influence to try to nudge the party in specific directions
In addition, I am setting them up to find and capture a rogue inquisitor with some popular appeal, so the party wont be able to really rely on the "Respect my inquisitional authority" button without tipping their quarry off and him escaping. As a result they will operate largely as a Ministorum, arbites, or ecclesiastical delegation of mid-level authority. Their enemies will almost always have equal if not grater influence ratings, and the NPC inquisitor lord they are taking orders from is big on discretion and working from the shadows, and he sort of expects the party to do the same. So i am putting parameters that encourage subtly, covertness, and subterfuge, as opposed to brute force on the party and forcing them to operate within those parameters unless they want to face an ever increasing tide of resistance should they pursue the overt path.



Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Psienesis wrote:
If you are bringing in enemy Psykers/Sorcerers, one thing I would suggest is permitting a successful WP test to dodge/avoid/resist 1 shard of Soul Killer per success.

Without a way to resist that power, it is disgustingly OP for a relatively low Manifestation threshold, especially at the Ascended ranks.

That said, a powerful Psyker with Soul Killer is one dangerous mofo.

So for the sake of understanding how this works, If i took a rank 14 primaris psyker with Unnatural Willpower x2, and the full psy rating to that level and fully progressed will power (as the NPC would be focused on being a powerful psyker above all else), they would have 9d10+21 to manifest the power, which has a thresh hold of 25. I rolled at I got 77 total, with no 9's so I fully manifest the power and I had 52 over the threshold which means, I generate an additional 5 shards. So I deal 1d10+28 (as the power says double your will power bonus which is 21 with unnatural willpower. Doubling it again would just add another 7 as per the doubling rules listed in unnatural willpower), 6 times so that 6d10 +168 damage that ignores armor. I can divide that up, among 6 targets. Am I following that correctly?

Each Shard of Soul Killer deals 1d10 X (meaning Explosive, which affects what types of Critical Effects it may inflict) damage, + double the Psyker's WP bonus.

The Psyker generates 1 shard for every 10 points by which his Manifestation Test exceeds the Threshold of 25. So if you rolled a 77, you'd get a total of 6 shards (1 for 25-34, 2 for 35-44, 3 for 45-54, 4 for 55-64, 5 for 65-74, 6 for 75-84).

Each of those Shards deals (using the Psyker in your example), assuming a 70-something WP, 1d10 + 28 (7 x 2 + 7 + 7 since we have stacking multipliers here) points of armor-ignoring damage. Critical Hits are determined on the Explosive Critical Effects table in the DH main book, and applied to both the Head and Body (though Crit Damage is not doubled). Explosive Criticals to the Head are lethal at 6 points, 8 point Explosive Criticals to the Body are lethal.

The Psyker may elect to throw the shards at the same target or split them between all available targets in range (5m x WP Bonus, or 70m in this case).

That is a *fethload* of damage in DH.

Assuming average roll of 5 on the d10, that's 33 Wounds dealt, mitigated by 0 Armor (psychically-warded armor is rare) and the average Toughness bonus of 6, the target takes 27 Wounds. Most characters at this Rank will have about 20 Wounds, so the first Shard kills them with a 7 point Critical to the head (and it is one of the most-hilarious Explosive Critical deaths, potentially a TPK from that first shard).