First Inquisitor game

[Dvil]

Hi guys, first post on this forum.

I recently got a .pdf of the Inquisitor rules from the GW website, and I've organised a test game between myself and two friends, with me as the GM. What I want to know is are these two sides balanced?

Here are the two forces I'm using (it's a bit large):

Eisenhorn's band attempt to prevent Glaw's family from recieving the Necroteuch.

Eisenhorn
Eisenhorn is right-handed
Equipment: Power sword; rune staff; duelling pistol with reload; haywire grenade; flak armour on all locations except head; de-tox injector implants (10 doses).
Abilities: Feint, Force of Will, Leader
Psychic powers: Enforce will, mesmerism, telepathy, terrify, sanctuary, vortex of chaos

Aemos
Aemos is right-handed
Equipment: Average bionics for all body parts except senses and organs; advanced bionic eyes; armoured gauntlet; heavy coat
Abilities: medic, nerves of steel

Bequin
Bequin is right-handed
Equipment: Psychic hood; laspistol; sword
Abilities: Deadeye shot

Fischig
Fischig is right-handed
Equipment: Flak armour everywhere except head; heavy stubber; sword; 2 frag grenades
Abilities: Rock Steady Aim, nerves of steel

Code: [Select]

          WS BS S  T  I  WP SG NV LD
Eisenhorn 74 48 60 68 69 92 91 89 91
Aemos     55 50 65 65 65 70 85 65 60
Bequin    45 70 55 55 70 90 60 45 50
Fischig   75 75 60 60 55 60 60 70 65


Locke
Locke is right-handed
Equipment: Heavy coat; laspistol; dark eldar agoniser
Abilities: Fearsome; frenzy

Dazzo
Dazzo is right-handed
Equipment: Robes; Laspistol; knife
Abilities: Force of will
Psychic powers: Choke; psy-track; telekinesis, psychic impel

Mandragore
Mandragore is right-handed
Equipment: Bolt pistol; chain-axe; ceramite power armour with a closed helm
Abilities: terrifying, regenerate, frenzy

Code: [Select]

           WS BS S   T   I  WP SG NV LD
Locke      65 55 60  50  65 60 60 80 75
Dazzo      55 55 50  50  65 80 70 75 60
Mandragore 78 77 209 145 92 77 82 89 74


[Kaled]

What I want to know is are these two sides balanced?

Does it matter?

Inquisitor is not 40k; it's not a game of balanced armies; it's not necessarily fair - sometimes you're the underdog and are totally outclassed by your opponent.  It's about telling a story, or in your case, re-telling a story.  You as GM are there to make sure both players have fun so don't be afraid to ignore the rules if it'll make for a more interesting story and/or game.

That all said, a couple of things that jump out at me.  Firstly, Bequin should have the Pariah ability, it's in the Sergeant Black article which you can find a copy of if you look at MarcoSkoll's sig on Warseer (you'll also find that Warseer has a more active Inquisitor community than here).  Secondly Mandragore could probably take on Eisenhorn's warband in a straight fight with one hand tied behind his back - this is as it should be, and figuring out how to deal with Mandragore will be the real challenge for whoever plays Eisenhorn - so much so that I suggest you play the scenario through a couple of times, taking it in turns to play each side and GM.

I would be tempted though to play a more simple game first - perhaps a gunfighter like Slick vs an enforcer like Barbaretta, just to get used to the rules and how actions, shooting, combat and injuries work.  As it is, you're jumping in at the deep end a little with some powerful characters with quite a few special rules and it might be too much to take in in one go.  After a 1v1 I'd try a scenario something like Slick and Barbaretta vs a GM controlled marine to give you a chance to see just how powerful marines are.

Any other questions, let me know.

- Dave

[Dvil]

Well, as I didn't have that article, I just figured a Wp of 90 and a psychic hood would do it. I'll try and find the Priah ability though, see if it's any better. Yes, it does in fact seem as though it should be replaced. We'll have approximately 1 day to do this match, and since some Warseer people seem to believe a campaign is possible in that time, I reckon we'll probably be able to figure out the rules by then.

[Kaled]

Yeah, in a day you can play half a dozen games and still get a break for lunch, so if I were you I'd suggest playing a couple of warm up games in the morning and then launch into the big scenario in the afternoon.  That way the big scenario is likely to run much smoother and be more fun for all concerned.

When are you planning to play?  Do you have models for the characters or are you going to use proxies?  I look forwards to hearing how you get on.

[Dvil]

We'll be using proxes, with 40k figures. It might be worth doing as you suggest with the warm up games, so I'll probably try that out.

[Kaled]

Issue 1 of Dark Magenta* has some good warm up scenarios designed to help new players learn the rules - it might be worth giving these a try as you could play them all in a couple of hours and then should know the basics ready for the big game.


* Hackers recently killed the site (and everything else hosted by the same company), but I think it's back up and running now.

[Dvil]

Marvellous, thank you. I haven't read the article yet, but I've just downloaded the issue to find it.

By the way, are we the only two Inquisitor players on this site? It just seems odd to have an internet conversation between only two people!

[Kaled]

Quite possibly.  The old SG forum got a bit of activity, but almost everyone interested in Inquisitor gravitates to The Conclave.  Unfortunately the 'Clave is down at the moment (it was on the same server as DM, but is taking longer to resurrect) - it should be back soon.  In the meantime, most of the Conclave regulars are camped out at Warseer.

[Dvil]

How does this alternate idea sound? It's a bit short notice (as the game's going on tomorrow), but if I make a scenario based upon a scene from First and Only (where Rawne and 4 other Ghosts are ambushed by some Jantine on the spaceship), with specific sub-objectives for the players.
For example, maybe a jantine has to take a Sg test to unlock a door to reach them, and one section involves a shootout between the first two opposing troops to spot each other (to let them into shooting rules gently), and maybe introduce them to awareness by seeing if the Ghosts know who's there, etc. Sound wise?

[Kaled]

Personally, I still think using the DM scenarios to start and following up with the Eisenhorn game is a better introduction to the game.  An Eisenhorn themed scenario is thematically closer to the spirit of Inquisitor than a Gaunt's Ghosts one (the Ghosts are more suited to something like Killteam).  Also, you have a nice mix of archetypes in your first post - it'd be a shame to replace all that with two groups of guardsmen.

Also, I was thinking, there's nothing to stop you dressing the DM scenarios up a bit if you think that's necessary to keep your players interested, and it would be worth letting the players use different characters from the final game in each of the warm up ones so they have chance to get used to their profiles.

Anyway, whatever you decide, make sure you let us know how it goes and how you find the game/rules/etc.

[Dvil]

Well, i tried out the Ghosts scenario. Introduced them to movement (including sneaking, running, evading and sprinting), shooting, combat, and awareness. Eventually they grasped the basic rules and I was able to stop taking them through it and tell them that they could attempt all sorts of crazy things. I even suggested that trooper Lonegin attempt to do a cartwheel away from some particularly aggressive Jantine! He didn't...

[Kaled]

And what did they think of the game?  It can be quite a paradigm shift from things like 40k...

[Dvil]

Overall, they seemed to enjoy it! On the forum that our little group use to plan things I've started a poll about what the next campaign should be, and of the four of us, three have voted with 66% in favour of Inquisitor.

[Kaled]

Excellent.  What scenarios did you play in the end?  How did you find the rules?  Fairly intuitive?  Or were you constantly having to take time out to figure out what was going on and how things were supposed to work?  Personally I think they're generally pretty good, but I do find myself forgetting half the modifiers in the heat of battle.  I particularly like the idea of rolling Actions - it makes the game very tense as you're never entirely sure how much your character is going to be able to do in one turn, and it means you often have those 'oh no!' moments where a character is left stranded in the open because he didn't roll enough actions to finish whatever he was doing.

Are you going to play your campaign at 28mm or 54?  There's a debate going on at Warseer about the pros and cons of each that you might find interesting.

[Dvil]

Thanks for the link. Probably 28mm, as that's what we're used to, and everything. The rules worked fairly well. I was often checking modifiers, but the summary sections at the end of each 'chapter' meant that this didn't slow the game down too much. I think with 28mm though we may reduce the scale somewhat. We had 1"=1yard, but even with pistols there were no range modifiers at all coming into use. Maybe 1cm/yard might work better.