Following up on the feedback and playtesting from Dark Sphere:
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For melee, it seems to be a case of rebalancing.
The current plan is to reduce the attack penalties (possibly to be renamed "attack modifier") by about 10 points, so many weapons will (again) have a modifier of 0. Quick, agile weapons might now get +5 or +10, slow cumbersome weapons might be -5 or -10.
This somewhat simplifies interaction with old character sheets (where weapons don't have an attack penalty, minimising the need to look up new profiles or have the GM wing it), but as far as balance, it will mean that by making it harder to beat the attacker in the opposed roll, it will somewhat reduce the number of counter-attacks a defender can get; although I am very happy with the kind of back-and-forth trading of blows that allows, the balance probably does need to be shifted slightly more to the attacker.
I may also give Dodging a slight bonus to its roll again. Although I nerfed that because Dodging was overly dominant as a reaction in 1stE, I underestimated the extent to which IRE allowing parries to counter-attack against missed attacks was a boost to parrying, so the balance needs to be redressed.
Maybe not the full +20 of before, but +10 is certainly viable.
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The stunning on falling has been reduced from D3 turns to one turn. Most likely a character who's taken a really serious fall will be stunned by the injury tables anyway; any fall more minor than that shouldn't be taking characters out for several turns.
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When it comes to psychic powers, I'm inclined to agree with Cortez's point. Although Isabella is supposed to be a very powerful psyker, she didn't actually break much of a sweat to manage everything she did in the playtest games.
I think the main issue comes from IRE no longer automatically cancelling powers when there's a Risky Action; That choice
is deliberate, as Risky Actions always felt like a very tedious way to fail a psychic power; it also meant that even the most skilled psykers couldn't rely on their powers unless they had some form of special rule that stopped them failing roughly a third of their attempts before the Wp test was even taken.
However, it has upset things.
I think I will have to fix it by making Perils of the Warp again automatically cancel the power. Psychic Phenomena
won't cancel the power though, so the Perils of the Warp test will act as something of a save for skilled psykers to not automatically fluff their power in the same "because frak you that's why" kind of failure as the Risky Action used to be.
That said, I also plan to have any Psychic test modifiers also apply to the Perils test (previously, it was unmodified Wp). This will make Psykers have to think slightly more carefully about taking complete "long shots" with their powers. It kind of makes sense that a psyker is more likely to royally screw up if he's trying to do something really difficult - I just don't want that to be in the same way as before, where any failure weakened a psyker.
Cortez did also suggest that there needs to be more use for Psy Rating for existing powers that I've yet to update. I'm not sure what my answer to that is yet, but it is a valid point.
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Also, some of the IRE armoury.
As I've said
before, I've said that I find the current daemon weapon mechanic to be fairly basic. The user is usually given a Wp just slightly higher than their weapon, so they generally just end up as pretty powerful weapons that are only dangerous to their user if they fluff a psychic power.
The IRE rules make it so that daemon weapons are now no longer a binary question of whose Wp is higher - instead, they capitalise on their master's moments of weakness, such that even a high Wp user has to be somewhat careful about carrying a daemon weapon.
This version, although not finalised (some modifiers may get changed), incorporates some of Raghnall's suggestions from the thread, although slightly streamlined.
Daemon weapons
Daemon weapons have had the spirit of a daemon bound into them, imbuing them with some of the daemon's unnatural power. Daemon weapons can be truly powerful weapons, but using one can cost a man his soul...
Daemon weapons will have one or more special properties, depending on the power of the entity bound to the weapon.
Entity Warp Power Daemon's Willpower
Daemonic Servant 1 55+D10
Daemonic Beast 2 60+D10
Lesser Daemon 3 65+2D10
Daemonic Herald 4 70+2D10
Daemon Prince 5 75+3D10
Greater Daemon 6 80+3D10
Warp Power defines the number of daemonic traits that the weapon may have. A daemon weapon may have any combination of traits costing up to their total Warp Power, as long as no single trait requires more than half of the daemon's Warp Power (rounding up).
Daemon weapons, as sentient entities, also have their own Willpower value, which may influence the effectiveness of some of its traits.
Daemon weapons also have a Possession Modifier, equal to the Sagacity of the character who bound the daemon, minus the Daemon's Willpower. For example, if a character with Sg 78 had bound a daemonic beast with Wp 66, then the weapon would have a Possession Modifier of +12 (Sg 78 - Wp 66 = +12).
Make a note of this value on the weapon's profile.
The cost of power
At the start of each of their turns, any character carrying a daemon weapon must test against daemonic possession.
This is a Willpower test, modified by the weapon's Possession modifier. There may also be additional modifiers depending on the character's status.
A character is weakened if they are Pinned, Stunned, Fleeing, or wielding an unfamiliar daemon weapon. Weakened characters take no additional modifier.
A character is vulnerable if they are Out of Action, on Fire, or suffered Perils of the Warp last turn. Vulnerable characters test on a -30 modifier.
If a character is neither weakened or vulnerable, then they test with a +30 modifier, and will not automatically fail their test on a roll of 96-00. (If this should make a character's Willpower 100 or more, it is not necessary to roll for the test).
If this Possession test is failed, then the character succumbs to the daemon within their weapon and is possessed.
The character must pass their Possession test at the start of any subsequent turn to regain control. They are automatically deemed to be at least weakened while possessed.
In the event that a character needs to test for carrying more than one daemon weapon, roll in order of the daemon's willpower values, starting with the highest.
Daemonic Traits
List is work in progress
Possession rules aren't set in stone yet, but I plan on having those as a standard framework, as they'll also come into play during certain Perils of the Warp results.