Dark Heresy (40K RPG) Review

[Imperial Overlord]

My group played the game for the first time and had a blast. Below is my review in detail

Art: The usual mix of new and old art that one expects from a Games Workshop product. Overall: Quite good.

Organization: Good. Index in the back.

The Meat: The game uses a modified version of the Warhammer Fantasy Role Playing Game mechanics. Characters play agents of the Inquisition, essentially combination troubleshooters/investigators that get in over their heads all over human space. The mechanics are easy to use and work pretty well. Easy for a novice to learn quickly.

They really nailed the feel of the game. There's lots of little details that help convey the universe from quotes at the beginning of sections to the art to little details in the starting gear and character generation that help convey what kind of universe they players will be playing in.

Characters start in one of several career paths: adept, arbitrator, assassin, guardsman, imperial psyker, priest, scum, and tech priest. At higher levels the careers branch into more specialized roles: for example, guardsman can lead to shock trooper. In addition the the talents and skills players learn along their career paths there are rules for picking up abilities that you may be exposed to in play (for example the language of the horse barbarians you've been spending months with).

Overall: Very good. Two of our group were 40K noobs (although they did know Warhammer Fantasy) and picked up the flavor and the nature of the setting right away. The mechanics do a good job. Players are skilled agents, not well equipped super soldiers although they might be that near the end of the career path. Lasguns and autoguns do a good job of killing most heretics, but mutants in carapace armour are harder nuts to crack.

[Brother-Captain Gaius]

Kick ass. So it's out then? I can't wait to get my hands on this baby, especially after playing the Shattered Hope demo.

Is there a given storyline/adventure to follow, or does it provide tools for the GM to create a custom campaign, like d20?

[Imperial Overlord]

Kick ass. So it's out then? I can't wait to get my hands on this baby, especially after playing the Shattered Hope demo.

Is there a given storyline/adventure to follow, or does it provide tools for the GM to create a custom campaign, like d20?

The Collector's Edition is out and was an early Christmas present to Dana, courtesy of Tania, who went through considerable effort to get her hands of one of the limited number of copies. We all love her for her successful efforts to acquire "The Precious". Long live all gamer geek girls. The ordinary edition will be out at the end of January.

There is an adventure provided in the book as well as material to support a campaign in the Callixus Subsector, which is the region that Black Industries is using for its base setting. There is plenty of material and suggestions to support a campaign elsewhere in the Imperium if the GM wants to do something else.

[Aaron]

What do you get if your scum? Sounds like an interesting choice, and can you start as a Guardsman from a penal legion?

[Feil]

Is it something a person who doesn't know much at all about pen and paper RPGs (read, me) could pick up and learn well enough to GM from in a reasonable timeframe? There's a group on campus that several of my friends are in who play Dungeons and Dragons fairly fanatically, and I might be able to sway some of them to the Darkest Millennium if I had the ability to GM it. I can handle presiding over a rp story and guiding people through a plot, but huge pages full of numbers and special rules scare me

[Gunhead]

If they're using a modified WHFRP system I'd like to know a bit what they've done. Specially regarding skills and ranged combat.
I'm thinking about getting this, but I'm not at all convinced they can pull of a working ranged combat system based on WHFRP.
It could be worth just for the background. Amazon is selling it for 30$ which is dirt cheap for a rpg book.

-Gunhead

[andrewgpaul]

Is it something a person who doesn't know much at all about pen and paper RPGs (read, me) could pick up and learn well enough to GM from in a reasonable timeframe? There's a group on campus that several of my friends are in who play Dungeons and Dragons fairly fanatically, and I might be able to sway some of them to the Darkest Millennium if I had the ability to GM it. I can handle presiding over a rp story and guiding people through a plot, but huge pages full of numbers and special rules scare me

Ignore them, then Heck, if you have a good plot, you could use the Warhammer 40,000 tabletop rules if you wanted If you're introducing the game to them, you have the adcantage; you can ignore all the bits you don't like, and add them in piecemeal later. From what I recall, WFRP is a bit easier to learn than D20 (at least in my case; the myriad of bonuses, feats, class abilities, equipment, etc, in D&D still baffles me).

[andrewgpaul]

Kick ass. So it's out then? I can't wait to get my hands on this baby, especially after playing the Shattered Hope demo.

Is there a given storyline/adventure to follow, or does it provide tools for the GM to create a custom campaign, like d20?

The Collector's Edition is out and was an early Christmas present to Dana, courtesy of Tania, who went through considerable effort to get her hands of one of the limited number of copies. We all love her for her successful efforts to acquire "The Precious". Long live all gamer geek girls. The ordinary edition will be out at the end of January.

What's different about it? Extra material, or simply better presentation?

[Gunhead]

Is it something a person who doesn't know much at all about pen and paper RPGs (read, me) could pick up and learn well enough to GM from in a reasonable timeframe? There's a group on campus that several of my friends are in who play Dungeons and Dragons fairly fanatically, and I might be able to sway some of them to the Darkest Millennium if I had the ability to GM it. I can handle presiding over a rp story and guiding people through a plot, but huge pages full of numbers and special rules scare me

If the WH40K system is similar to WHFRP, then I'd say you should have no problems. WHFRP is a straight percentage system meaning all skills and abilities are represented by a number from 1-99 and then you just roll a D100. If the result is lower than the ability score you succeed, if over you don't.
Not the brightest beacon in the history of rpg systems but very simple. Far simpler than D20 even when taking into account all the special rules and exceptions.
But I'm still hoping I. Overlord can give us more on how the 40K is different from the WHFRP.

-Gunhead

[Umbras]

1) Fancier presentation from what I can tell. It is gorgeous.

2) The game mechanics are easy to learn, by RPG standards. It's fairly easy to pick up.

3) Ranged combat worked out pretty well. We did a lot of shooting with lasguns, laspistols, shotguns, and autopistols. It is different from WFRP, but not too different that it will make it hard to do. Auto and semi-auto fire is handled in a manner that makes it fairly simple, fast to use, and deadly.

4) Guardsman is a generic soldier class, typified by the members of the Imperial Guard. It includes members of penal legions. An attached explosive collar is one of the starting options.

5) Scum is the criminal type background. Smugglers, bounty hunters, stick up men, hive gangers, etcetera. Potentially very useful people. Everyone starts with useful starting skills and gear. Like WFRP, its designed for quick character creation and start of play, especially if you're familiar with the material.

[Imperial Overlord]

Umbras is one of the guys I game with. Fear the mighty arbitrator and his shotgun.

[Connor MacLeod]

*makes note to torture IO over the Fluff*

[Imperial Overlord]

There's lots of fluff material in the game that I will dish on as I get more time with Dana's copy or I get one of my own (come out quickly regular edition, I command it!). There's lots of little touches scattered through the game, from the psykanna mercy blade (for psykers to suicide with when they go too warpy) and descriptors of food stuffs.

There's lots of minor changes to game mechanics from WFRP. There's a new attribute Perception. Every stat has a bonus number equal to the tens digit of the stat, except for Weapon Skill and Ballistic Skill, not just Strength and Toughness. Agility bonus is used to calculate initiative, Willpower is added to psychic power rolls and so on and so forth.

Combat is changed to deal with the universe that has chainmail armour and lasguns. Primitive weapons and armour are less effective against their technological counter parts with carapace armour making the wearer almost immune to primitive weapons. Imperial Guard flak gives good protection from common slug throwers and simple lases and even more so from cruder weapons. Gear quality matters as does specialty ammo and modifications, moreso than in WFRP. A best quality sword with a monoedge is a fearsome weapon in skilled hands and a poor quality stub revolver is a poor choice of weapon against a man wearing flak armour.

Melee has been slightly redone and ranged combat is significantly different. Close and point blank ranges give bonuses to hit as does rapid fire semi-auto or full auto shots. Multiple levels of success indicate additional hits on semi-auto and full auto. Dodging, a staple of WFRP, works against ranged attacks, but is less effective against full auto and semi-auto fire. It's fast and easy to resolve and potentially very lethal.

There isn't an Attacks stat anymore, although there are advanced Talents that give multiple melee attacks. A character only gets one reaction action a round, which can be a dodge or a parry if armed with a melee weapon. The critical hit system is simplified and a little bit more lethal. Combat is similar enough to WFRP to make the transition easy, but produces a more range centered game.

Psyker abilities are simlar to WFRP, with psykers starting with minor powers and then developing disciplines. Psy Ratings go up to six and any dice that comes up a 9 sends to you to the psychic phenomena table. The minor powers are useful and the discipline powers are potent. Psykers nicely fall into the powerful and dangerous niche that 40K puts them into.

The game also has stats for antagonists including servitors, cultists, xenos attack beasts, daemons, and daemonhosts. Insanity points (now on a 100 point scale) and corruption points await to tear the minds of investigators if they manage to survive in body.

[Hawkwings]

Damn, I really want to play this now... Would it be possible to play this game online?

[Feil]

Any rpg can be played by IRC/IM/email/post. The GM does all the rolling, obviously, and in stead of talking you type.

[andrewgpaul]

There's lots of minor changes to game mechanics from WFRP. There's a new attribute Perception. Every stat has a bonus number equal to the tens digit of the stat, ... Agility bonus is used to calculate initiative.

The critical hit system is simplified and a little bit more lethal. Combat is similar enough to WFRP to make the transition easy, but produces a more range centered game.

... any dice that comes up a 9 sends to you to the psychic phenomena table.

Insanity points (now on a 100 point scale) and corruption points await to tear the minds of investigators if they manage to survive in body.

I wonder why they changed the Initiative roll? Ag+D10 seemed good enough.

The Critical Hit system being more lethal is a bit scary. Is a type 10 critical still "GM makes up something gory"?

I take it the "roll a 9 and bad stuff happens" is because 9 is the number of Tzeentch? Has anyone crunched the odds to see how this differs from WFRP's "don't roll a double"?

Weren't Insanity Points always in a 1-100 point scale? I mus admit, we never really paid attention to them (except the Wizard, obviously).

[Feil]

There's a 1/10 probability of rolling a double, obviously. For a first role of 1-8, there's a 1/10 probability of rolling a 9; for a first role of 9 or 10 there's a 0 probability of rolling a 9; therefore the probability of rolling a 9 is (8/10)(1/10)=8/100.

8/100<10/100.

If the crit system is the same as in Shattered Hope, which I read yesterday, you roll 1d10+x for damage, and roll again if you get a 10+x, and roll again if you get another 10, and so on until you don't get a 10 or the enemy is dead.

[Imperial Overlord]

If the crit system is the same as in Shattered Hope, which I read yesterday, you roll 1d10+x for damage, and roll again if you get a 10+x, and roll again if you get another 10, and so on until you don't get a 10 or the enemy is dead.

That's righteous fury, which is the equivalent of WFRP's Ulric's Fury. Not a critical hit.

WFRP critical hit system:

Hit does x amount of damage passed zero. Roll on critical hit chart for x + modifiers to determine severity of critical hit.

40K

Hit does x amount of damage passed zero. Add to amount of damage already sustained passed zero (y). x+y=z. Apply critical z of the appropriate damage type. Energy and explosive weapons are particular nasty.

So one set of rolling and chart checking is removed, streamlining the system. Also in WFRP, it is possible for a tough, heavily armoured target to take several minor critical and keep on fighting (although it doesn't happen very often). In 40k, they add up to a big scary number very quickly and something ugly happens.

Insanity points in WFRP was after 6 points you started making willpower tests every time you gained a point to see if you gained an insanity. If you did, you lost six insanity points. In 40K, every time you hit an increment of ten, you make checks. The higher the number, the harder the checks. If you reach 100, the character is no longer sane enough to be a PC.

[andrewgpaul]

Ah, thanks for that. Sadly, my WFRP campaign imploded due to interpersonal ... issues. So, looks like Ill be buying this for the background, and it can sit on the shelf next to Cyberpunk v3 and the Serenity RPG.

[Imperial Overlord]

One note: although the weapons list is similar to that found in Inquisitor and there is the RPG edging away from one hit lethality, don't get hit with the lascannon.

Those familiar with WFRP will recognize the killing power of 5d10+10 damage, ignoring up to 10 points of armour. For those who aren't as familiar, its about as much damage as you would expect an antitank weapon would do to a person.

[Vehrec]

You know, this does sound suitably dark and gritty. One wants to play a game now. Scum is always a fun role to play. Now if only I could Play it.

[Brother-Captain Gaius]

One note: although the weapons list is similar to that found in Inquisitor and there is the RPG edging away from one hit lethality, don't get hit with the lascannon.

Those familiar with WFRP will recognize the killing power of 5d10+10 damage, ignoring up to 10 points of armour. For those who aren't as familiar, its about as much damage as you would expect an antitank weapon would do to a person.

Is my understanding correct, though, in that one could theoretically use a Fate Point to survive a lascannon hit?

[Imperial Overlord]

Is my understanding correct, though, in that one could theoretically use a Fate Point to survive a lascannon hit?

The Fate Point turns the hit into a miss or a graze, but yes.

[Imperial Overlord]

Had our second session this weekend.

It's quite fun, even with a rusty (but not unskilled) GM.

The minor psychic powers that psykers start off with do look a little on the anemic side on paper, but come in quite useful in game.

Chain axes are scary, as they should be. Combat servitors die very, very hard when you're armed with lasguns and autoguns and not nearly close to enough grenades and no armour piercing ammo. Bolter lust was very, very strong at that point.

Shotguns are vicious at close range.

Frag grenading a cluster of psyker-witches before they can fry you is good. So is shooting the telekine with the bullet catching powers with a lasguns.

[Ritterin Sophia]

Only two hundred copies of the deluxe collectors edition in the world? Why didn't I expect something like this from Games 'Screw Over Our Fan Base' Workshop? Please tell me I'm reading that wrong.