Can someone explain....

[Summer-Knight925]

now I do feel rather stupid for this, but I have been studying the Deathwatch corebook and still cannot figure out how to attack, let alone play.

the local game store's deathwatch group no longer gets together (at least not the public one, there is an after hours group for the people who work there and friends of the store, something I am not) so getting a demo is hard, but I really do want to play this...anyone help?

 

[MerricB]

Not a clue, myself, but here are the official forums:
Fantasy Flight Games [Forum Deathwatch] - Leading publisher of board, card, and roleplaying games.

Someone here might help first, though.

Cheers!

 

[Is_907]

now I do feel rather stupid for this, but I have been studying the Deathwatch corebook and still cannot figure out how to attack, let alone play.

the local game store's deathwatch group no longer gets together (at least not the public one, there is an after hours group for the people who work there and friends of the store, something I am not) so getting a demo is hard, but I really do want to play this...anyone help?

Roll d100 (or d% or 2d10 or however you want to do it) and if you rolled UNDER your stat (Weapon Skill or Ballistics Skill), it's a successful attack.
Then you have to roll damage, compare to target's armour and defenses, etc.

I'm not sure about the Deathwatch book, as I don't have it, but I'm pretty sure the Dark Heresy one had sample combat in the combat chapter.


Ultimately, I HIGHLY recommend finding a live demo of the game. It's much easier to learn by playing ,especially if your background is D&D/d20 games.
I absolutely love the 40k RPG system, but it's a bit counter-intuitive if you're coming from D&D territory, like I did.

 

[RainOfSteel]

I was thinking that 40K's RPG combat was a great deal like d20.

Both have full and half actions, and both have a list of various combat maneuvers that can be performed that grant various bonuses and/or penalties.

I was right at home reading through it.

 

[RangerWickett]

Yeah, the 40k rules are a bit more Zen than D&D. Instead of attacking someone else's AC, you just test against your own skill. Am I good enough to hit? Roll d% and get under your Weapon Skill or Ballistic Skill. (Modified by range, auto-fire, and a few other things.)

Cover doesn't make it harder to hit; it just provides extra 'armor' if your attack would have hit a location protected by the cover. What location did you hit? Take your d% roll, invert the numbers (so 62 becomes 26) and look at the hit location chart. Basically, the last digit in your d% determines which body part you hit.

The GM of my Rogue Trader game made a handy cheat sheet of all the various combat modifiers, but he's on his way to Gen Con, so I don't think he'll be able to post it here.

 

[Is_907]

Yeah, the 40k rules are a bit more Zen than D&D. Instead of attacking someone else's AC, you just test against your own skill. Am I good enough to hit? Roll d% and get under your Weapon Skill or Ballistic Skill. (Modified by range, auto-fire, and a few other things.)

That, right there, is exactly why I love the system.

The system is not only great, but it fits the game style, too. (I crave Dark Heresy...)