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I was reading through Codex: Witch Hunters, searching for additional counters to the PBS and found "Hammer of the Witches," a Psyker power for Inquisitors. Now, the questions arise:

How does this interact with the Overseer's "Ultimate Sanction" rule? Hammer of the Witches affects D6 psykers, from the closest to the furthest. Is this resolved separately?

I see this going down one of two ways, at the very least:

1) You resolve each Psyker "test" from Hammer of the Witches separately, so you roll for one psyker: Either he fails, you then lose D3 Psykers because of "Ultimate Sanction" or he passes, you then test for the next psyker - Either he fails, you lose an additional D3 Psykers, or he passes, and you move on until the D6 psykers rolled for by Hammer of the Witches is satisfied.

2) You resolve each Psyker "test" from Hammer of the Witches as a whole, and then apply "Ultimate Sanction" at the end. E.g.: Three psykers in the PBS suffer "Perils of the Warp," at the end of which you lose D3 Psykers to escape the damage.

RAW would suggest 1. before 2. The "Psychic Choir" rule does not appear to apply to how you treat Hammer of the Witches in resolved the PBS as individual psykers or a psyker as a squad whole. "Ultimate Sanction" seems to play to Perils of the Warp attacks in general, regardless of whom afflicted it, so long as it is a Psyker in the PBS squad. Hammer of the Witches seems phrased to apply to each Psyker in turn, separately, ultimately lending credence to number 1 being "correct."

If true, this is, I think, significant. Inquisitor Lords with Hammer of the Witches and Psychic Hoods would effectively completely nullify a PBS, able to single-handedly whittle down their numbers with a liberal application of his Psychic abilities and the Overseer's own zealous protection of his charges, and the Psychic Hood there to help nullify any abilities the PBS might want to try and use. Wrapped in a package that costs, effectively, 85 points, and gives whatever Imperial force using it protection against the PBS, and other witches, the new metagame changes by the PBS might make having this "basic" anti-psyker Inquisitor Lord a more attractive, perhaps even mandatory, option, depending on your local metagame or tournament metagame.

Yeah except if you're playing the Witchhunters Inq. Lord, then you're not playing the Daemonhunters Inq. Lord, who is useful against far more opponents.

The best counter to the PBS is 1. Stubborn, 2. A Ld10 Psychic Hood or the Eldar wards thing, and 3. simply shooting them to death.

It's pretty much #1, which if you think about it makes sense. Daemon Hunters are great against Daemons, Witch Hunters are great against "Witches", or those who they consider witches. So an IG person who brings psychers against the anti-psycher faction may reasonably expect them to have more problems than usual.

Witch Hunters have a version of "Stubborn" through the Sisters' book of St. Lucius, access to an LD 10 Psychic Hood of unlimited range, the Sister's shootiness, and the Sisters' Shielfd of Faith.

I agree that #1 is the proper way to handle this situation with the RAW.

Can you please add this question to the IG FAQ sticky thread at the top of this forum?

Just to add my views on it, you should go for #1

I would go for #1.
As an aside, if you had a spare elite slot, you could take an elite Inq for the ability, if you didn't mind rolling vs Ld8.

Also, does this work if the enemy psykers are in a chimera?

Wehrkind wrote:I would go for #1.
As an aside, if you had a spare elite slot, you could take an elite Inq for the ability, if you didn't mind rolling vs Ld8.

Also, does this work if the enemy psykers are in a chimera?

No, the rulebook FAQ clarified that embarked units are not affected by psychic powers.