Editing Dark Heresy Second Edition (section)

== So, what's new? ==
In Dark Heresy Second Edition, a number of game mechanics have been overhauled from the first edition. If you've played Only War, you'll be familiar with some of these changes;
*'''Character Creation''': Character creation has been significantly changed, with career paths and ranks being replaced with backgrounds and roles. Unlike before, where each home world limited your career choices, an acolyte has the freedom to select whichever world, background, and role they want. Rank advancement has been removed and replaced with "aptitudes" that affect how much skills and talents cost. This means that while it is possible to build an adept sniper, it will be much easier to have him focus on knowledge and investigation skills.
*'''Aptitudes''': These things govern how much xp everything costs. You can only get them at character creation (or if your GM lets you buy the psyker elite advance in-game for some reason), so choose carefully! Note that if you manage to get a duplicate somehow, you can instead choose any Aptitude with the same name as a characteristic (like "Weapon Skill" or "Fellowship").
*'''Skills and Talents''': Skills are basically the same as in Only War, so there is quite a bit less bloat than in 1E. Talents are still talents. Moving rapidly on...  
*'''Psychic Abilities''': The psychic system is much like that of Black Crusade, Only War, Deathwatch, and Rogue Trader - it's based on characteristic tests (generally Willpower or Perception) or skill tests (Psyniscience for Divination) to activate powers. However, while it is possible to "push" to increase your psy rating (and the horrible consequences of gazing into the warp), it is not possible to cast at the "fettered" power level: every single power used now has a chance of causing deadly perils! Furthermore, note that each point of Psy Rating no longer gives you a +5 on the Focus power test, so powers are a bit harder to cast than before. The capabilities of these powers have also been nerfed: a psyker is now less useful/overpowered than in Only War or Black Crusade.
*'''Influence and Subtlety''': Influence takes the place of Thrones as the equivalent of currency; rather than corresponding to material goods it represents the party's ability to control others and generally get what they want, whether it's getting new equipment delivered, pulling strings to speed up an investigation, or getting an advantage in social interactions by dropping the right names. Subtlety is an entirely new addition, reflecting how good the party is at keeping its presence a secret- the higher it is, the less likely it'll be that others will know who the party is and the less transparent their actions will be. The GM is the only one who knows the party's exact Subtlety score (although they can try to find out what the score is, usually by way of Awareness or Inquiry tests), but as a rule anything that conceals the party's identities will increase their Subtlety and more overt actions will decrease it. High Subtlety isn't always a good thing, however- getting your allies to help you will be a problem if they don't even know what you're up to, and the same cover story that keeps local authorities from interfering with an investigation can backfire on you if those same authorities catch you trying to break into a corrupt noble's mansion. 
*'''Righteous Fury''': Continues the tendency of the game line to reduce how overpowered Righteous Fury is as new games are released. When a die rolls a 10 to damage, you have achieved righteous fury. Roll 1d5 on the appropriate critical hit chart, and the target suffers its effects (without actually immediately going into negative hit points). If the target would have taken 0 damage from the hit, it instead takes 1 point of damage but no mini-crit. Heavy burst weapons with Tearing can now easily inflict 2 or 3 mini-crits with each volley to "stunlock" enemies while dealing massive damage.