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 Backspacehacker wrote:
Assassins are incredibly powerful. I would wage that an assassin could go toe to toe with a custode and be evenly matched.

In the book Nemisis an evesor assassin was killing space marines pretty effortlessly, and ended up killing several dozen before he suicide bombed a bunch of them.

Caldus and celuxus are the same.

Yeah, no. Custodes are a not space marines in Gold, they are more than capable of defeating assassins.

FezzikDaBullgryn wrote:

 Backspacehacker wrote:
Assassins are incredibly powerful. I would wage that an assassin could go toe to toe with a custode and be evenly matched.

In the book Nemisis an evesor assassin was killing space marines pretty effortlessly, and ended up killing several dozen before he suicide bombed a bunch of them.

Caldus and celuxus are the same.

Yeah, no. Custodes are a not space marines in Gold, they are more than capable of defeating assassins.

The stats say otherwise, Custodes and Assassins look pretty evenly matched.

Assasins are pretty much the peak of IOM bio engineering... Apart from named charecters, perhaps only custodes can match them.

FezzikDaBullgryn wrote:

 Backspacehacker wrote:
Assassins are incredibly powerful. I would wage that an assassin could go toe to toe with a custode and be evenly matched.

In the book Nemisis an evesor assassin was killing space marines pretty effortlessly, and ended up killing several dozen before he suicide bombed a bunch of them.

Caldus and celuxus are the same.

Yeah, no. Custodes are a not space marines in Gold, they are more than capable of defeating assassins.

Other than your head canon, you're going to need to provide some evidence for this - and it is worth noting that the performance between a Custodes and assassins from different Temples is going to differ.

Though I do think it would be odd for an Imperial Assassin to be dispatched after a Custodes in the first place.

Off the top of my head...

- Callidus - Close, but I probably give it to the Custodes. Strong enough will to resist the neural shredder, but the Callidus' phase blade probably gets through Custodes armour reasonably well.
- Culexus - Off the top of my head, there aren't psychic Custodes, so there's little reason to deploy a Culexus against them. The amped-up Pariah/Null gene of the Culexus probably allows them to evade the Custodes , but on the flip side, the Animus Speculum is never going to get powered up by the target being a psyker. I suspect that this fight just doesn't end up happening.
- Eversor - Score draw? Everybody dies, I reckon.
- Vanus - As I've mentioned before, I don't know enough about how they operate to speculate on this.
- Venenum - Certainly possible that they could have poisons that work on the Custodes, but this is also an area that falls into "Who knows?"
- Vindicare - Super-patient master snipers with access to custom rounds depending on the target? I give this one to the Vindicare, as it will be nothing like a 1-on-1 duel - but I accept it may well need to be "1 shot, 1 kill"

 Insectum7 wrote:
The stats say otherwise, Custodes and Assassins look pretty evenly matched.

I thought we all agreed, for the purposes of this thread, that in-game stats are not necessarily a reflection of actual combat ability in the fluff. If that were the case, individual Marines would be worth 20 guardsmen, not 3. Thing is, a game where one side outnumbers the other 20 to 1 wouldn't be fun for either player, even if it were balanced.


I'm curious how a Callidus would fare against a Solitaire or a Succubus in a fair fight... but then again, the whole purpose of an assassin is to avoid fair fights.

.

-Guardsman- wrote:

 Insectum7 wrote:
The stats say otherwise, Custodes and Assassins look pretty evenly matched.

I thought we all agreed, for the purposes of this thread, that in-game stats are not necessarily a reflection of actual combat ability in the fluff. If that were the case, individual Marines would be worth 20 guardsmen, not 3. Thing is, a game where one side outnumbers the other 20 to 1 wouldn't be fun for either player, even if it were balanced.


I'm curious how a Callidus would fare against a Solitaire or a Succubus in a fair fight... but then again, the whole purpose of an assassin is to avoid fair fights.

.

Solitaires would be an equal fight probably; the solitaire is faster but weaker while the Callidus has weapons based on C’tan necrodermis so it probably hates Eldar on a molecular level. Any succubus other than the Dark Muse herself should be paste though.

-Guardsman- wrote:

 Insectum7 wrote:
The stats say otherwise, Custodes and Assassins look pretty evenly matched.

I thought we all agreed, for the purposes of this thread, that in-game stats are not necessarily a reflection of actual combat ability in the fluff. If that were the case, individual Marines would be worth 20 guardsmen, not 3. Thing is, a game where one side outnumbers the other 20 to 1 wouldn't be fun for either player, even if it were balanced.

Well, I for one do not agree.

Also, I'd argue that in many cases the stats are more reflective of combat ability than many people think of them, although it waxes and wanes a bit from edition to edition. When you say 20-1 Marines vs. Guard is right, first, how do you come to that conclusion? 2nd, how does the context of that statement reflect itself on the tabletop? Has it changed over time in any way? Are you looking at points comparisons or other comparisons?

Did you know that it currently takes (prior to whatever their recent dumb buff was) about 20 Guardsmen, Rapid Firing, to kill a Marine? How does that reflect 20-1? If that Marine is in cover, the number is closer to 40.

Many people absolutely love how Marines were portrayed in Astartes. However, note that in Astartes Marines were shown taking on hordes of GEQs. . . mostly only by engaging them in small groups at a time, in the dark and often concealed with some smoke (which Marines can see clearly in-through). 5 Marines weren't just standing in a field and moving down (by your 20-1 number) 100 GEQs and coming out victorious, now were they?

In past editions, when Morale rules were being used, it was possible (and I have done) to have 5 Marines defeat 30 Guardsmen in a single turn, through using the right equipment and being in the right place at the right time. But does this mean those Marines should have been each priced at eight times what a single Guardsman cost?

Marines in the fluff do what they do because for narrative purposes, the author essentially gets to choose the context of each engagement, and what the dice rolls are. These "20-1 Marines" are acting on their initiative, defining the context of the engagement, engaging armies from advantageous positions or engaging small portions of the enemy at a time. More importantly, they're not starting their engagement parked in front of a half company of anti-MEQ specialized main battle tanks with plasma-toting Stormtroopers in drop-reserve (for example). A LOT of what's been written about how awesome Marines are is actually quite doable with the relative stats on the tabletop. The issue on the table is that the player is not the sole author, and the tabletop scenarios are just generally contrived.

While editions of the game change the balances of things somewhat, when you have a whole history of stat-relationships that goes back a couple decades, the case for the applicable use of stats gets stronger. Stat-wise, an Assassin has always been Space Marine Captain level or rough equivalent (or even better). Peak-modded-human levels.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Dysartes wrote:

- Eversor - Score draw? Everybody dies, I reckon.

Eversor wins, no question about it. The Eversor is specifically engineered to be a combat monster, and will just stim up himself with drug implants to get the job done if it has to.

Assassin vs Custodes is just….never going to happen.

Remember not just who, but what Custodes are. The hand, voice and bodyguard of The Emperor.

The Master of Assassins is a High Lord of Terra. So hardly likely to sanction such a hit. On account there are lots of Custodes, who would want……ah…..a “polite word”, even if the Assassin succeeds. That could bring down not just that High Lord, but the Temples as a whole. On account Custards don’t take kindly to treachery.

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
Assassin vs Custodes is just….never going to happen.

Remember not just who, but what Custodes are. The hand, voice and bodyguard of The Emperor.

The Master of Assassins is a High Lord of Terra. So hardly likely to sanction such a hit. On account there are lots of Custodes, who would want……ah…..a “polite word”, even if the Assassin succeeds. That could bring down not just that High Lord, but the Temples as a whole. On account Custards don’t take kindly to treachery.

Counterpoint: Eversors in particular are noted to be a bit "unhinged". If a Custodes was somehow in between an eversor and its target . . .

Then whomever authorised the deployment of the Eversor is still in for a bad day.

They’re doomsday weapons, one you unleash, cross fingers and hope for the best with.

It’s also possible part of their hypno-indoctrination includes some form of IFF for just such eventualities. After all, should their deployment pod be off target, or friendlies advance faster than expected, you’d rather the Eversor kept at the enemy, and didn’t go on a little rampage through your own lines. Not because your men aren’t disposable. But because you’d always wants the Eversor kicking the right arses.

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
Then whomever authorised the deployment of the Eversor is still in for a bad day.

They’re doomsday weapons, one you unleash, cross fingers and hope for the best with.

It’s also possible part of their hypno-indoctrination includes some form of IFF for just such eventualities. After all, should their deployment pod be off target, or friendlies advance faster than expected, you’d rather the Eversor kept at the enemy, and didn’t go on a little rampage through your own lines. Not because your men aren’t disposable. But because you’d always wants the Eversor kicking the right arses.

Oh come now, Grotsnik. What's more grimdark than your super assassin accidentally working it's way through allied lines? 40k at it's finest Imo.

The one key psychological affect that gets you, junior Assassin cadet, shunted into the Eversor Programme, is fanatical devotion to the Emperor - mad lads they might be, but they are the special kind of mad you only get with religion. I suspect that even in the depths of a Frenzon rage, finding themselves in the presence of any being that’s spent a century or so in the personal presence of Him on Terra would stop them in their tracks. Possibly even without IFF tags or the iconic armour.

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
Assassin vs Custodes is just….never going to happen.

Remember not just who, but what Custodes are. The hand, voice and bodyguard of The Emperor.

The Master of Assassins is a High Lord of Terra. So hardly likely to sanction such a hit. On account there are lots of Custodes, who would want……ah…..a “polite word”, even if the Assassin succeeds. That could bring down not just that High Lord, but the Temples as a whole. On account Custards don’t take kindly to treachery.

Isn’t this assuming a series amount of loyalty, togetherness and patriotism. Where as the high lords of terror are manipulative, selfish, power seeking psychos who have no sense of patriotism or concern for others and will happily turn on each other if it’s in their benefit.

I like to imagine the inner chambers of the imperium as working a bit like the wizards in the early dis world books where assassination of one’s superiors is usual as long as you aren’t crude enough to get caught. But sci do and grim dark

The difference between manipulating the other High Lords or Imperial nobility and the Custodes is quite big.
The High Lords and nobles of the Imperium bicker, fight, and plot against each other all the time. That is an accepted fact. In fact, they all like it and see it as a distraction to their actual jobs.
Plotting or fighting against the guardians and companions of the Emperor is a big no-no, not just from a political standpoint but a religious standpoint as well. They're the companions of the God Emperor, His confidants, and most ardent defenders. Attacking the Custodes is akin to attacking the Emperor. The thing is, the Custodes generally don't care about what the Imperium does. Unless Terra is really threatened by an outside power they're content to just let the wheels turn. They didn't act during the Beheading or its aftermath and only got involved with the Age of Apostasy at the last minute when things got quite out of hand.

It's funny. Countless times we are shown that an astartes can move faster than a base human can react. Like, the Video series Astartes as an example. Which is canon fluff now. Given that Custodes are an order of magnitude beyond that in terms of speed, skill, and strength, it seems they would eclipse even the most well designed and fluffed out human without even a second's thought. Hell, Valaryian takes down a couple Primaris in the span of several heart beats, about 2-3 seconds. With out even breaking a sweat. That means he's moving too fast for even them to react.

And about the Succubus vs whatever, doesn't the Dark Eldar Drazhaar(sp) guy have a literal throne made of Custodes skin or body parts?

 Mr_Rose wrote:
The one key psychological affect that gets you, junior Assassin cadet, shunted into the Eversor Programme, is fanatical devotion to the Emperor - mad lads they might be, but they are the special kind of mad you only get with religion. I suspect that even in the depths of a Frenzon rage, finding themselves in the presence of any being that’s spent a century or so in the personal presence of Him on Terra would stop them in their tracks. Possibly even without IFF tags or the iconic armour.

Source?

FezzikDaBullgryn wrote:
It's funny. Countless times we are shown that an astartes can move faster than a base human can react. Like, the Video series Astartes as an example. Which is canon fluff now. Given that Custodes are an order of magnitude beyond that in terms of speed, skill, and strength, it seems they would eclipse even the most well designed and fluffed out human without even a second's thought. Hell, Valaryian takes down a couple Primaris in the span of several heart beats, about 2-3 seconds. With out even breaking a sweat. That means he's moving too fast for even them to react.

And about the Succubus vs whatever, doesn't the Dark Eldar Drazhaar(sp) guy have a literal throne made of Custodes skin or body parts?

Custodes are also "well designed and fluffed out humans". As are Astartes. As are Assassins.

So we are either doing stats or not. But to imply a custodian is just the same as an astartes or an assassin is odd and wrong. Custodes are a breed of being singularly created by the Emperor to guard him and be his friend. You cannot say the same about Assassins or Astartes. Even Primarchs don't have that claim. Primarchs were never his friend, they were his tools. Custodians were his "bodymen" to put it crudely. There to be able to meet his wants and needs for anything, but also capable of discussing theory, philosophy, lore, and strategy at his level. To think that a Eversor could hold a conversation with the emperor is laughable.

I thought this thread was about the combat abilities of assassins, not whether they could talk a Custard into bed…

Although I wouldn’t put it past a Callidus to be able to, as infiltration is kind of what they are for.

FezzikDaBullgryn wrote:
So we are either doing stats or not. But to imply a custodian is just the same as an astartes or an assassin is odd and wrong. Custodes are a breed of being singularly created by the Emperor to guard him and be his friend. You cannot say the same about Assassins or Astartes. Even Primarchs don't have that claim. Primarchs were never his friend, they were his tools. Custodians were his "bodymen" to put it crudely. There to be able to meet his wants and needs for anything, but also capable of discussing theory, philosophy, lore, and strategy at his level. To think that a Eversor could hold a conversation with the emperor is laughable.

None of that is addressing the point, which is that all of them are modified humans. They may be modified differently, to different extents and for different purposes, and one can flourish the language about the "Emperors friends" the Custodes all you like, but they are still all modified humans.

And yes I'm going to use stats because they are still a data point.

 Insectum7 wrote:
None of that is addressing the point, which is that all of them are modified humans. They may be modified differently, to different extents and for different purposes, and one can flourish the language about the "Emperors friends" the Custodes all you like, but they are still all modified humans.

Modified humans that are vastly superior to all the other modified humans. A Guardsman with a bionic arm is a modified human but they are nowhere near the equal of a Custodian, which I believe is the point Fezz is trying to make. Assassins are genetically engineered killers, yes, but a one-on-one with a Custodian would be a serious challenge despite gene enhancements, shapeshifting abilities, or anti-Psyker powers. I mean for the Culexeus especially its abilities are going to be far more useless when fighting a warrior from an organisation that is paired to fight alongside large groups of Pariahs.

And yes I'm going to use stats because they are still a data point.

In-game stats routinely don't align with the background. For 8 editions of 40k Space Marines were the same wounds characteristic as Guardsmen despite being much tougher and less likely to take serious damage in the background. They are also only one Toughness point higher as well. If you really want to use stats then you'd be better off using the stat lines and character profiles from something like Dark Heresy where Marines actually do feel that massive step up from baseline humans.

The same Dark Heresy game where one can tank an autocanon round to the face as a regular human and live? Or get headshotted by a Multi-Melta and live?

Meh. TT stats are good enough to draw broad comparision. Marines are better than Guardsmen, but they're far from an unbeatable foe. The numbers might not align perfectly, but they're good enough.

 Bobthehero wrote:
The same Dark Heresy game where one can tank an autocanon round to the face as a regular human and live? Or get headshotted by a Multi-Melta and live?

Things that did not happen for a thousand.

The Multi-Melta with 4d10+12 Pen 12 will go through every suit of armor in the game and with most characters having maybe a 3 for their toughness bonus means they will only be shrugging off 3 damage. 3 damage on an average roll of 22+12. Most human characters will probably never get over 15 wounds.

The Autocannon, having 3 shots at 3d10+8 Pen 6 is also pretty much guaranteed to completely delete the normal human it shoots at.



*Unless you burnt those fate points to not die.

The only way a Dark Heresy character can survive a hit from either of those weapons is if they are in Power armor, have a refractor field, and/or most critically the weapon rolls really really badly for damage. And even minimum damage of 16 for the MM is going to at least drop a full health character down to very low if not drop them into critical damage. Good luck for even a max level Adept to survive that.

You CAN get over 20 wounds for certain careers, but only for nearly maxed out characters. Starting characters are not going to have anywhere close to that. Autocannons will one-shot nearly all characters below rank 4 assuming you didn't somehow get power armor or a refractor field.

Well it was in Only War, but I did the math, and it checked out, for the Multi-Melta, anyway (2d10+16 Pen 12). The Autocannon shot actually happened, the same character also took a Krak Grenade and lived.

I assumed both systems were close enough. My character had 50 Toughness with a bunch of talents that helped with damage mitigation

Weapons are mostly* all the same across the systems, they're totally interchangable.

50 toughness does help a lot, but again I suspect the Autocannon rolled really badly for damage. Even with damage mitigating talents a full damage autocannon hit would splat you. Which is fine, it was just a glancing hit that barely touched the skull. Still left the character on barely any wounds I suspect.

Krak Grenades are only 2D10+4, so they are lot more survivable. You're not going to be feeling very well, and there is still the very high probability of you going from full to critical damage. So lets not pretend like you can shrug these off like its nothing. .

50 T, Wounds in the 20's (I want to say 25, but it's been a while). An autocannon rolling average damage would put you in critical, but not out of action.

All this to say, Only War/DH gets silly too, with stats, and taking that and claiming it's a better representation of lore than the TT is silly.

Yes, exactly. You can survive an autocannon hit, but its never going to be nothing. You're not shrugging it off like a lasgun hit.

But I suspect your character might have been an Ogryn unless you were all extremely high level.

Noone should walk off a direct autocanon hit is my point, it's an issue on the TT, too, granted, but an average roll with the gun will kill folks.

High level Stormtrooper. The Heavy Weapon guy was tougher, even. To the the point where Orks couldn't hurt him at all after he got hit carapace armor. Maybe the DM was too generous with XP, maybe we did something wrong, but we became pretty strong as a group.

 Gert wrote:

 Insectum7 wrote:
None of that is addressing the point, which is that all of them are modified humans. They may be modified differently, to different extents and for different purposes, and one can flourish the language about the "Emperors friends" the Custodes all you like, but they are still all modified humans.

Modified humans that are vastly superior to all the other modified humans. A Guardsman with a bionic arm is a modified human but they are nowhere near the equal of a Custodian, which I believe is the point Fezz is trying to make. Assassins are genetically engineered killers, yes, but a one-on-one with a Custodian would be a serious challenge despite gene enhancements, shapeshifting abilities, or anti-Psyker powers. I mean for the Culexeus especially its abilities are going to be far more useless when fighting a warrior from an organisation that is paired to fight alongside large groups of Pariahs.

Assassins are also modified humans which are vastly superior to other humans, and have been since at least 2nd edition. The Custodes might be a challenging target, sure, but the Assassin will also be a challenging target for the Custodes, and I'd probably give the edge to the Assassin in most cases. If they're both stuck in a small room, the I'd say the Custodes has an advantage, since the Assassin won't be able to use their greater speed to full advantage. This is the unequipped cage match scenario. Once the Custodes get's their armor and weapons, that's a huge boost to the Custodes obviously, and then it'll depend on how the Assassin themselves is geared up.

But the above is excluding the Eversor. Imo Everson wins pretty easily.

 Gert wrote:

And yes I'm going to use stats because they are still a data point.

In-game stats routinely don't align with the background. For 8 editions of 40k Space Marines were the same wounds characteristic as Guardsmen despite being much tougher and less likely to take serious damage in the background. They are also only one Toughness point higher as well. If you really want to use stats then you'd be better off using the stat lines and character profiles from something like Dark Heresy where Marines actually do feel that massive step up from baseline humans.

In game 1w Marines have been much tougher than Guardsmen as well. The reason you may not feel it's the case is because people stack their armies with lots of anti-MEQ firepower, because they expect to be fighting against Space Marines. Even in the 1W days, it took 18 Lasgun shots to down a Marine, and I think that lines up with the background just fine. If you step it back to the AP days, as soon as you hit AP5 or better, you'll find that the toughness of Guardsmen in comparison to Space Marines goes way down even further, until you get up to specifically anti-MEQ weapons which treat both targets the same because they're so powerful. Also, reminder that in-game casualties do not necessarily mean dead. A Marine is far more likely to survive many injuries over a guardsman. So even though a Plasmagun might have incapacitated a Marine, he might be able to pick himself up after the battle is over while the Guardsman might be a pile of ash and goo.

 Insectum7 wrote:

 Gert wrote:

 Insectum7 wrote:
None of that is addressing the point, which is that all of them are modified humans. They may be modified differently, to different extents and for different purposes, and one can flourish the language about the "Emperors friends" the Custodes all you like, but they are still all modified humans.

Modified humans that are vastly superior to all the other modified humans. A Guardsman with a bionic arm is a modified human but they are nowhere near the equal of a Custodian, which I believe is the point Fezz is trying to make. Assassins are genetically engineered killers, yes, but a one-on-one with a Custodian would be a serious challenge despite gene enhancements, shapeshifting abilities, or anti-Psyker powers. I mean for the Culexeus especially its abilities are going to be far more useless when fighting a warrior from an organisation that is paired to fight alongside large groups of Pariahs.

Assassins are also modified humans which are vastly superior to other humans, and have been since at least 2nd edition. The Custodes might be a challenging target, sure, but the Assassin will also be a challenging target for the Custodes, and I'd probably give the edge to the Assassin in most cases. If they're both stuck in a small room, the I'd say the Custodes has an advantage, since the Assassin won't be able to use their greater speed to full advantage. This is the unequipped cage match scenario. Once the Custodes get's their armor and weapons, that's a huge boost to the Custodes obviously, and then it'll depend on how the Assassin themselves is geared up.

But the above is excluding the Eversor. Imo Everson wins pretty easily.

 Gert wrote:

And yes I'm going to use stats because they are still a data point.

In-game stats routinely don't align with the background. For 8 editions of 40k Space Marines were the same wounds characteristic as Guardsmen despite being much tougher and less likely to take serious damage in the background. They are also only one Toughness point higher as well. If you really want to use stats then you'd be better off using the stat lines and character profiles from something like Dark Heresy where Marines actually do feel that massive step up from baseline humans.

In game 1w Marines have been much tougher than Guardsmen as well. The reason you may not feel it's the case is because people stack their armies with lots of anti-MEQ firepower, because they expect to be fighting against Space Marines. Even in the 1W days, it took 18 Lasgun shots to down a Marine, and I think that lines up with the background just fine. If you step it back to the AP days, as soon as you hit AP5 or better, you'll find that the toughness of Guardsmen in comparison to Space Marines goes way down even further, until you get up to specifically anti-MEQ weapons which treat both targets the same because they're so powerful. Also, reminder that in-game casualties do not necessarily mean dead. A Marine is far more likely to survive many injuries over a guardsman. So even though a Plasmagun might have incapacitated a Marine, he might be able to pick himself up after the battle is over while the Guardsman might be a pile of ash and goo.

So I seriously thought it was a rule that no stats or ingame performance be used on this sub forum. I apologize for my misunderstanding.

As to your point regarding their level of "modification" that's like saying a Ford Fiesta is the same as a Maserati F1 race car because they "doors and wheels". The fact that the assassins have modifications is not in question. It's the state to which those modifications allow them to perform. A single Custodian is literally a match for most things in the galaxy, including heavy vehicles. It's never been revealed except in the barest rumors and head canon what assassins are capable of. We don't know if the Exitus Rifle needs to be re-tooled after every 13th shot, or if Executioner rounds literally make the weapon impossible to fire after 3 shots. We don't know if "bio-meltdown" takes 10-20 seconds, or if it's instantaneous. We don't know if the Calladius needs time to shift form, or if doing it multiple times quickly causes them to literally turn to goo. We do know that a single squad Custodians were literally capable of taking on and defeating a Chaos band in one of the new DoW books, essentially without support. We know that a single group with a band of sisters stormed and killed almost the entire heretic astartes crew of a Battleship. We know that they are capable of defeating blood thirsters, and Daemon princes.

I feel like you are just doing this to hate on a single faction.