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  1. - Top - End - #1
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    Default Warhammer 40k port

    good morning all,

    I'm assisting in a campaign creation that involves porting Warhammer 40k characters and creatures into a Dungeons and Dragons 3.5. I'm a little short on the list of creatures that needs to be ported this is what I have and this is what I need. if anybody feels like helping that would be great. I'm looking for creatures or races with or without templates.
    Eldar- elf
    Dark eldar- drow
    Ork- feral orc
    Blood thirster- pit fiend
    Tyranid- kython
    Necron- warforged

    I still need the Chaos Marines of each Legion \ God, Grey Knights, Blood Angels and a great unclean 1. if anyone has any better ideas please let me know much obliged

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    Default Re: Warhammer 40k port

    Why 3.5? It's going to be difficult to transfer Space Marines, so why not convert the D&D parts into W40kRP?

    For Space Marines, you'll probably want a race similar to the following:
    -+10 Strength, +6 Con, Space Marines are very strong and tough.
    -Third lung, +X bonus to resisting poisons and can breath with two crippled lungs (but not well).
    -Second heart, can function with a crippled heart.
    -Acute senses? I can't remember all of a Space Marine's enhancements.
    ...
    -Level Adjustment: +5 or more. Probably also some racial hit dice in there.

    Flavour to tastechapter.

    Again, probably easier to convert D&D elements to W40kRP than the other way around.
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    Quote Originally Posted by Zelphas View Post
    So here I am, trapped in my laboratory, trying to create a Mechabeast that's powerful enough to take down the howling horde outside my door, but also won't join them once it realizes what I've done...twentieth time's the charm, right?
    Quote Originally Posted by Lord Raziere View Post
    How about a Jovian Uplift stuck in a Case morph? it makes so little sense.

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    Default Re: Warhammer 40k port

    we have all the materials needed for 3.5 so unfortunately we have only ever played 3.5. I wouldn't know where to begin to for source books or anything like that for tabletop Warhammer 40k RPG.

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    Quote Originally Posted by Anonymouswizard View Post
    Why 3.5? It's going to be difficult to transfer Space Marines, so why not convert the D&D parts into W40kRP?

    For Space Marines, you'll probably want a race similar to the following:
    -+10 Strength, +6 Con, Space Marines are very strong and tough.
    -Third lung, +X bonus to resisting poisons and can breath with two crippled lungs (but not well).
    -Second heart, can function with a crippled heart.
    -Acute senses? I can't remember all of a Space Marine's enhancements.
    ...
    -Level Adjustment: +5 or more. Probably also some racial hit dice in there.

    Flavour to tastechapter.

    Again, probably easier to convert D&D elements to W40kRP than the other way around.
    Are we basing this on crunch or fluff (and which edition)? Based on what I recall of crunch, the Strength bonus should be either +2 or +4. Based on fluff, a plus few gazillion.

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    Quote Originally Posted by nintendoh View Post
    we have all the materials needed for 3.5 so unfortunately we have only ever played 3.5. I wouldn't know where to begin to for source books or anything like that for tabletop Warhammer 40k RPG.
    Fantasy Flight Games does the official licensed 40k RPGs Dark Heresy, Rogue Trader, Deathwatch, Black Crusade, Only War and Dark Heresy 2nd edition. All very good RPGs functioning on a d% system.



    On the 3.5ification of 40k stuff I'd probably use Balors rather than Pit Fiends for Bloodthirsters by the way. Balors capabilities better resemble those of 'thirsters with their Vorpal Blades being a good analogue for the weapons of Bloodthirsters.
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    Quote Originally Posted by Ashtagon View Post
    Are we basing this on crunch or fluff (and which edition)? Based on what I recall of crunch, the Strength bonus should be either +2 or +4. Based on fluff, a plus few gazillion.
    I was trying to adjust from Deathwatch, which gives a SM unnatural Strength 2 (in this case a x2 multiplication of your strength bonus), and trying to represent the fact that they are supposed to be as strong as the strongest man. Sort of trying to take a Deathwatch approach where they are so much better than a normal person unless they are extremely unlucky roll wise.
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    Quote Originally Posted by Zelphas View Post
    So here I am, trapped in my laboratory, trying to create a Mechabeast that's powerful enough to take down the howling horde outside my door, but also won't join them once it realizes what I've done...twentieth time's the charm, right?
    Quote Originally Posted by Lord Raziere View Post
    How about a Jovian Uplift stuck in a Case morph? it makes so little sense.

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    Default Re: Warhammer 40k port

    This may sound strange at first, but...our group is actually having a ton of success with Shadowrun 4e.

    The magic system is easily reconfigured to be psychic stuff, the cybernetics can be modified to reflect the Mechanicus' crazy stuff, rules for abhuman races exist neatly, etc. etc.

    The only major tweak we've decided to do is up the caps on attributes/abilities to 8 base, because augmentation (be it psychic or cybernetic) is rather rare in the 40k verse, but totally badass normals are not.


    Also, on the 40k tabletops...I'm a fan of FFG, I really am. But I'm not the only person who says that the 40k games specifically are not all that good. In fact they're FFG's lowest rated product line. I couldn't put my finger on what it was about them (probably in retrospect the fact that we were playing it with a total munchkin, who has since been ejected from the group), but I didn't care for it. It just felt like a lot of design choices were just mediocre or underwhelming.
    Last edited by Milodiah; 2015-12-17 at 03:08 PM.
    Quote Originally Posted by Honest Tiefling View Post
    Do not try a linear campaign, without some discussion with them. Players very often look at your hooks and then try to accomplish it in a different way, not touch it, try to do the complete opposite, or somehow set it on fire.

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    Default Re: Warhammer 40k port

    You're welcome. (Check out the source files for stat blocks).

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    Quote Originally Posted by Anonymouswizard View Post
    I was trying to adjust from Deathwatch, which gives a SM unnatural Strength 2 (in this case a x2 multiplication of your strength bonus), and trying to represent the fact that they are supposed to be as strong as the strongest man. Sort of trying to take a Deathwatch approach where they are so much better than a normal person unless they are extremely unlucky roll wise.
    tbh, I'd be cautious of using the RPG crunch, or any fluff, as the basis for making a conversion.

    GW's fluff, in every book and every edition, takes a partisan in-universe author as its viewpoint for fluff. As such, every fluff piece will embiggen the subject race/empire of the sourcebook (or chapter where the book covers multiple races/empires) in question.

    The RPG crunch is written from the assumption that players will be playing the main race/empire covered by that sourcebook. To be sure, that is also true in the wargames. However, the key difference is that the wargame needs to take into account that there will be another human player for the other side, whilst the RPG can assume a GM is present to play any mooks and ubers on the other side; no attempt to make the rules present anything other than high drama exists in the RPG, whereas it does in the wargame.

    Importantly, space marine fluff will often depict them mowing through orks like a knife through hot butter. Ork fluff often depicts the exact opposite scenario. Unreliable narrator bias.
    Last edited by Ashtagon; 2015-12-17 at 03:30 PM.

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    Quote Originally Posted by Ashtagon View Post
    tbh, I'd be cautious of using the RPG crunch, or any fluff, as the basis for making a conversion.

    GW's fluff, in every book and every edition, takes a partisan in-universe author as its viewpoint for fluff. As such, every fluff piece will embiggen the subject race/empire of the sourcebook (or chapter where the book covers multiple races/empires) in question.

    The RPG crunch is written from the assumption that players will be playing the main race/empire covered by that sourcebook. To be sure, that is also true in the wargames. However, the key difference is that the wargame needs to take into account that there will be another human player for the other side, whilst the RPG can assume a GM is present to play any mooks and ubers on the other side; no attempt to make the rules present anything other than high drama exists in the RPG, whereas it does in the wargame.

    Importantly, space marine fluff will often depict them mowing through orks like a knife through hot butter. Ork fluff often depicts the exact opposite scenario. Unreliable narrator bias.
    The RPGs are a lot closer to the truth than the wargame. In favorable conditions (corridor-to-corridor fighting, sabotaging supply trucks or factories, using their experience to tell the guardsmen what to do), a squad of standard Ultramarine Tacticals can take down hundreds of enemies in a "horde" army, meaning traitor guardsmen, orks or tyranids without losing a single man. In unfavorable conditions (defense against mechanized forces, defense against tyranids... basically any pitched battle), they will still destroy many, many enemies before falling, it's just really cost-ineffective to waste Space Marines that way.
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    Default Re: Warhammer 40k port

    Do not ever use the actual tabletop as a basis for this. Take it from a player of it.

    Because as of 8th edition, Space Marines are one of the weakest forces in the entire game. A single Eversor assassin can easily kill any Space Marine Primarch in hand-to-hand combat. A single Tau Fire Warrior will beat a Space Marine in a shootout about 70% of the time; the Tau infantry rifle outranges and outdamages bolters, and can penetrate the armor of almost all Space Marine vehicles save the Land Raider. This is their basic rifle. Crisis Suits can easily beat Terminators even though they're allegedly their equals. Riptides rip Dreadnoughts apart.

    And the Tau aren't even the most powerful faction as of now; they're in the upper echelons, but not the top.

    The Orks got it worst, a Guardsman can kill an Ork with no problem, using only his lasgun. Ork Boyz currently have no armor save. Their guns are as weak as lasguns, they're less accurate than a Guardsman, and are all-around horrible.
    Last edited by Milodiah; 2015-12-17 at 05:30 PM.
    Quote Originally Posted by Honest Tiefling View Post
    Do not try a linear campaign, without some discussion with them. Players very often look at your hooks and then try to accomplish it in a different way, not touch it, try to do the complete opposite, or somehow set it on fire.

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    Quote Originally Posted by Hiro Protagonest View Post
    The RPGs are a lot closer to the truth than the wargame. In favorable conditions (corridor-to-corridor fighting, sabotaging supply trucks or factories, using their experience to tell the guardsmen what to do), a squad of standard Ultramarine Tacticals can take down hundreds of enemies in a "horde" army, meaning traitor guardsmen, orks or tyranids without losing a single man. In unfavorable conditions (defense against mechanized forces, defense against tyranids... basically any pitched battle), they will still destroy many, many enemies before falling, it's just really cost-ineffective to waste Space Marines that way.
    The "truth"?



    The truth is that the Empire of Man has one of the most over-active propaganda ministries in any fictional dystopia ever. When you see fluff in the game, the only thing you can really be sure of is that someone in the setting actually said that.

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    Quote Originally Posted by Ashtagon View Post
    The "truth"?



    The truth is that the Empire of Man has one of the most over-active propaganda ministries in any fictional dystopia ever. When you see fluff in the game, the only thing you can really be sure of is that someone in the setting actually said that.
    The truth is also that the very nature of the universe itself is mutable because Games Workshop is horrible at managing both crunch AND fluff. Things will be retconned, forces will be buffed and nerfed arbitrarily (from a gameplay perspective, the business reason I'm fairly certain is to make players of formerly-popular armies go out and buy a new one because theirs is now unplayable). Even individual events will be fundamentally altered; the story of Ollanius Pius standing between Horus and the Emperor, for example, has been retconned three (or more) times.

    But that's the Doylist perspective on things, whereas the above poster was using the Watsonian.


    But this is a dumb argument, one which I've had multiple times with my salty, salty Space Marine playing friend.

    I've concluded that one must treat WH40k as we treat D&D. It's a general setting with all these races, factions, lores, and equipment, and you combine them all together to create "your" interpretation. You can't really expect to get the exact strength of a Space Marine "right", because the writers have refused to agree on even the length of specific voidships. If you feel happy with what you've put together, and people agree with it, you got it right. Which is more than one can say for the actual writers.
    Last edited by Milodiah; 2015-12-17 at 05:49 PM.
    Quote Originally Posted by Honest Tiefling View Post
    Do not try a linear campaign, without some discussion with them. Players very often look at your hooks and then try to accomplish it in a different way, not touch it, try to do the complete opposite, or somehow set it on fire.

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    Default Re: Warhammer 40k port

    Bah, who'd trust the GW writers to know what 40k is like?

    To be honest, I don't, Space Marines are far too influential. There's less than one per world in the Imperium, and that I'm supposed to believe that they travel the Imperium liberally fighting invasions? At least some realise that a few squads of Marines just can't win a war, and will point out that most of the time the IG do most of the work with the SMs concentrating more on hitting important targets.

    I also have some versions of units I just like better. My Riptide? It's just a next-gen Crisis with better tech, only very slightly bigger to accommodate it. Space Marine Centurions? A shieldwall to protect their fellows (Storm Shields and Bolt Pistols instead of Bolters, just Power Armour so they don't slow the force). And so on.

    (I also have Imperial Guard Marauders, who use Light Power Armour, Heavy Weapons, and Jump Packs to act as support, inspired by the Space Marine Centurion and Starship Troopers)
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    Quote Originally Posted by Zelphas View Post
    So here I am, trapped in my laboratory, trying to create a Mechabeast that's powerful enough to take down the howling horde outside my door, but also won't join them once it realizes what I've done...twentieth time's the charm, right?
    Quote Originally Posted by Lord Raziere View Post
    How about a Jovian Uplift stuck in a Case morph? it makes so little sense.

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    Quote Originally Posted by Anonymouswizard View Post
    Bah, who'd trust the GW writers to know what 40k is like?

    To be honest, I don't, Space Marines are far too influential. There's less than one per world in the Imperium, and that I'm supposed to believe that they travel the Imperium liberally fighting invasions?

    My friend plays the Salamanders chapter of SM. If I remember what he told me correctly, the Salamander online community's count of the 40K literature says approximately 120,000 Salamanders have died in various battles over the last two hundred years.

    The fighting strength of the Salamanders chapter is supposedly 2,200 (they're not a Codex-compliant chapter).

    It's not a problem that there are only supposed to be around 20,000 Space Marines when you can just keep writing that they're there and your pen doesn't stand up to slap you. It just goes to illustrate that GW's writers don't give two ****s about keeping a reasonable canon, and the mind-bending impossibility of trying to say what is and isn't canon when the writers themselves don't care.
    Last edited by Milodiah; 2015-12-17 at 10:19 PM.
    Quote Originally Posted by Honest Tiefling View Post
    Do not try a linear campaign, without some discussion with them. Players very often look at your hooks and then try to accomplish it in a different way, not touch it, try to do the complete opposite, or somehow set it on fire.

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    Default Re: Warhammer 40k port

    So.... Games Workshop's 40k lore is just like the Imperium? A mass of convoluted, contradictory information that lurches forward under its own undaunted ignorance & its fanatical followers, progressively loosing it's ground to chaos & uncertainty?


    The Imperium has gone meta.

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    This is a very interesting discussion. I actually learned a bit. What i was trying to accomplish though was building a few iconic characters using the dnd 3.5 engine. A space wolf wouldnt be a marine. It would be a shifter barbarian with heavy armor prof. The talk about the tau was very disheartening. I dont play the table top because of what i heard. I have read and loved all the novel in the hersey and most by dan abnett. Thats why we wanted to port a few.

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    The Gibbering Mouther, by the way, absolutely screams "Chaos spawn".
    Quote Originally Posted by Honest Tiefling View Post
    Do not try a linear campaign, without some discussion with them. Players very often look at your hooks and then try to accomplish it in a different way, not touch it, try to do the complete opposite, or somehow set it on fire.

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    Thats what i mean. Perfect. Just perfect. Dark eldar homoculi is a drow fleshwarper right?

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    Default Re: Warhammer 40k port

    @milodiah:
    This is exactly why I stopped playing 40K after 2nd edition.
    It just seems to go from bad to worse with every single edition.
    It is really a damn shame, because the universe itself is very cool.

    But I wonder if it would be possible to use d20 rules to re-create a kind of space crusade or space hulk kinda game?

    A player could create a squad of 3 level 3 characters (marine/ork warrior/etc...) and a single level 5 character (sergent/nob/etc..)

    Then the DM should provide suitable NPC's and might even be able to follow some of the official space crusade missions and reusble parts of that game such as the 4 board pieces ?

    But it would require that all players play the same faction, orks, space marines, chaos or some other faction...

    Maybe it could even be possible to "buy" a unit based on the TIER of its class... but the problems would be...

    a) asses the tier of sci fi classes like tech priest and the other sci fi classes
    b) assign a reasonable "cost" to each TIER
    c) adapt d20 vehicle rules and determine their "cost"
    d) create VDR for d20 vehicles, complete with "cost" calculations
    e) how to do special charecters and their "cost"
    f) support for large creatures, a "creature design rules" set and their "cost" calculations

    the end result? a hopefully far more fair table top wargame, though very detailed and time consuming...

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    Quote Originally Posted by tsj View Post
    But it would require that all players play the same faction, orks, space marines, chaos or some other faction...
    This is pretty much baked into the lore anyway.
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    Default Re: Warhammer 40k port

    if I recall correctly rouge traders can get kroot and orks to work for them as mercenaries so there is a little lee way in party development

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    Default Re: Warhammer 40k port

    Rouge Traiders only get a Discount at Slaanesh-brothels. :P


    @ Topic: I say go and compare the in World Fluff for the Factions INTERNALLY, then look how strong various Sources made them, then try to apply a (slightly overdone because its 40k^^) Fitting Bonus.

    Personally I`d stat the regular Ork Boy around the Regular D&D Ork.
    larger Orks/Nobz/Bosses should not be more than 75% stronger without Artifice, so maybe take that as baseline and try to adapt the others.

    Regular Marines maybe around +6.8 inS tr and COn, +4 in Int, somesuch. And a BIG Armor Bonus of course. ^^

    Overall though D&D as a level based Zero t hero System is around the worst point to try and make 40k work, as internally it does not offer the same feel in any way.

    I would go with Savage Worlds and LOTS of Edges or the Shadowrun System personally.
    Or do a Homebrow from the start. ;)

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    I'm gonna say again, use Shadowrun 4e. It meshes up unusually nicely.

    To expand on the above poster's statement, 3.5 creates the whole 'zero-to-hero' aspect no matter how hard you try to avoid it. Even in stuff like d20 Modern, a second-level automotive mechanic can take twice as many stabs to the gut as a first-level automotive mechanic, which simply doesn't make sense.

    Shadowrun, however, allows you to very meticulously tailor characters to have the strengths and weaknesses you want. A Cadian veteran will probably roll 12 dice for firing his lasgun, while a Catachan recruit might only roll 7; however, the Catachan recruit may have 11 physical damage boxes due to a higher Body score inherent to being from ****ing Catachan, while the Cadian veteran may only have 10.

    Not to mention the fact that Shadowrun's archetypal characters mesh in well too; magicians -> psykers, riggers/deckers -> techpriests, and so on.
    Quote Originally Posted by Honest Tiefling View Post
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    40K is an hilarious game world, the way the writers crank the grimdark up to 11 and then rip the knobs off is highly entertaining, for a while. However, the fluff is a complete mess, the crunch is just outright bad and the entire thing is a mechanism for selling overpriced models. That's why new rules are released as often as possible, you need to keep the plebs buying the product.
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    93. No matter what the character sheet say, there are only 3 PC alignments: Lawful Snotty, Neutral Greedy, and Chaotic Backstabbing.

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    Alas then it is not meant to be. No incarnate construct necropolitan warlock for a deathguard . sad day.

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