Editing Deathwatch (RPG) (section)

==System==
Identical to the companion games published by Fantasy Flight Games (see below under See Also), Deathwatch uses a roll-under-or-equal 1d100 system. Also unchanged are the 9 primary stats, similar in range to those in [[Warhammer 40,000]], which you roll against when making tests. The lethal combat of the other 40K RPGs is preserved, but at a much higher scale; players may pick weapons that deal far more damage than human-standard ones, but enemies are now more powerful, cunning, and rules now exist for enemies to come in large Hordes capable of pulling down a Space Marine through sheer numbers.

The core rulebook states that [[Dark Heresy]] characters with 12000 XP are roughly equal to starting-level Deathwatch characters, but despite what the rulebooks say while this is ''fair'' based on the value of the Astartes inherent abilities granted from their gene-seed organs and power armour traits it is not necessarily equal, as such high-level human characters will have highly increased stats, talents and skills far outside of the reach of many Astartes players as well as gear appropriate to their level, so a human character at that amount of XP could run rings around a starting-level Space Marine character.

Weapons and gear are requisitioned in Deathwatch, rather than bought. Each mission assigned to the kill-team comes with a certain number of points for each marine, and each piece of the Deathwatch's armory (apart from their standard gear depending on their Specialization) comes with a points cost. At the end of the mission the requisitioned equipment is returned to the armory, and the players requisition new gear at the start of the next one. This is extremely helpful to the [[GM]] as he has less need to worry about players looting everything in sight either to [[munchkin|keep for themselves]] or sell to [[15,000,000 Gold a Day|break in-game economies]] as in most cases each player will have exactly the equipment they need to do their jobs which is likely better than their opponents, and can also choose to get a different loadout appropriate for each mission.

The game also promotes good team co-operation with the unique addition of Solo/Squad modes. Players in solo mode get a nice bonus (many based on their origin Chapter) as they can focus doing their jobs alone, but if the character joins Squad Mode they can collectively learn and use a range of tactical abilities that benefit the entire group, often in a much more significant way than Solo Mode abilities. As characters in the squad progress from experience, they can learn the unique tactical abilities of other members from other Chapters and benefit from them too, which is very much in the fluffy spirit of the Deathwatch.