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In Final Sanction, a rebellion has broken out on the agri-world of Avalos and its society threatens to tip over into anarchy. The Inquisition suspects that an alien intelligence lies behind the unrest and has requested that the Deathwatch investigate and deal with any Xeno presence on the world. In Deathwatch, the players can take the roles of members of the Adeptus Atsartes – each a bio-engineered super-soldier loyal only to the Emperor. From the ranks of the Adeptus Astartes and the various marines are drawn only the exceptional candidates who become members of the Deathwatch, a secret organisation dedicated to hunting down and burning out Xeno incursions, all heretical activity, and the foulness that seeps in from beyond the Warp. Each wears the distinctive Mark VII Power Armour and carries weapons such as the bolt pistol, the bolter, the heavy bolter, the powerfist, and the chainsword.
Deathwatch: Final Sanction comes with four ready-to-play space marines, one each from the Blood Angels, the Dark Angels, the Space Wolves, and the Ultramarines Chapters. They are in turn a Blood Angels Devastator Marine with a heavy bolter, a Dark Angels Assault Marine with a jump pack, a Space Wolves Tactical Marine, and an Ultramarines Apothecary. If more than four players are involved, it is suggested that the Space Wolves Tactical Marine be replicated for the new players. Whatever the number of Space Marines playing through Final Sanction, they form part of a Deathwatch Kill-Team.
Mechanically, these Deathwatch characters will be familiar to anyone who has played any Warhammer 40,000 Roleplay. The attributes are same, but as expected, their numbers are higher than in say, Dark Heresy, each attribute usually possessing a value between forty and fifty. All marines possess unnatural characteristics, in particular, for their Strength and Toughness factors. In Warhammer 40,000 Roleplay a character with a Toughness of 47 would normally have a Toughness characteristic bonus of 4, but in Deathwatch this can be doubled or more, giving a bonus of 8! This in addition to a Marine’s high Wounds and the extra armour protection that comes with wearing Mark VII Power Armour.
What is interesting is that each Marine comes with two of what Deathwatch calls Demeanours, one personal and one related to his Chapter. Triggered once per session, each Demeanour grants a Marine the same effects as a Fate Point – these work as in other Warhammer 40,000 Roleplay titles, plus a special effect that reflects a strongly held belief, the legacy of geneseed, or the honours and creed of his Chapter. For example, the Dark Angels Assault Marine has “Stoic Defense” as his Chapter Demeanour which grants him extra Wounds when defending a chosen location, and the more personal “Son of the Lion,” which marks the Marine as being particularly secretive and distrusting of others. The aim of each Demeanour is to give a Space Marine a moment to be more than mere Battle-Brother, to truly shine at a moment of adversity.
Combat in Deathwatch looks to work as in other Warhammer 40,000 Roleplay titles, except that as you would expect, Space Marines are expected to be able to deal with hordes -- whether that be hordes of Xenos, hordes of heretics, or hordes of daemons. In terms of raw attributes, a horde in Deathwatch is treated like any other character, except that instead of Wounds, a Horde has Magnitude, a number that represents both the actual numbers in the Horde and the determination of the Horde. A Horde will have its numbers or Magnitude reduced when taking damage from the sustained firepower of the Marines’ weaponry with greater damage inflicted by weapons that do blast damage. A Horde can do melee and ranged attacks, but the melee attacks cannot be dodged. Eventually a Horde can be destroyed, broken, or driven off...
The scenario, Final Sanction, takes up less than the forty pages that make up Deathwatch: Final Sanction. It sees the Deathwatch Kill-Team land on Avalos with relatively little ammunition and equipment, at first forced to hold off several Hordes before striking out into the city of Landsholm to locate a missing Inquisitor, more equipment, get a message off world, and perhaps locate the intelligence behind the rebel activities in the city. It is organised into a series of mission based objectives – major and minor, plus turning points and targets of opportunity. Achieving and overcoming these will gain the characters Experience Points and Renown if they finally successful.
The missions will take the Marines to various locations across the city, facing numerous Hordes and other threats along the way. There is also staging advice for many of these locations, though maps of both these and the city of Landsholm would have been helpful. The scenario itself is understandably combat heavy and while there is advice on making the various combats more interesting, a GM will still have to work hard to stop them from becoming boring and repetitive.
As with many other releases on Free RPG Day, Deathwatch: Final Sanction is designed to showcase various aspects of a forthcoming RPG, and this it does rather well. At this stage and only from looking at this preview, I have to wonder how much variation the Deathwatch Roleplaying Game is going to allow in terms of both characters and play. How different is one Space Marine going to be from another and how difficult is it going to be to come up with interesting missions? Of course, such questions will have to wait until the release of the book itself, but as to Deathwatch: Final Sanction itself, it provides a nicely presented, full colour package that gives the players a chance to really take the battle to the enemies of the Emperor’s will. With prejudice and all playable in about two good sessions.
