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With the release of the recent codexes there have been more and more psykers.

Space Marines Librarians with Null Zone, Avenger and Gateway.

Imperial Guard has Psyker Battle Squads with Weaken Resolve and the big template.

Space Wolves has Rune Priests with Jaws of the Warp Wolf, Tempests Wrath, Murderous Huricane, Living Lightning.

Tryanids has Zoanthropes Warp blast, Tyrant Paroxyn, Tervigon Catalyst.

Then there is good old Chaos Marines and their Dual Lash.

Rumors are that Blood Angels will get some decent psyker powers.

In some armies its either really cheap or comes with the choices you would take anyway.

Eldar Runes of Warding is cheap enough to add to your Farseer which most Eldar players have a far seer or Eldrad who comes with Runes of Warding.

Space Marines + Space Wolves have it good since the same Librarian or Rune Priest that gives you the wonderous psyker powers also gives you a Psychic hood or Runic Weapon for Psyker defense.

Tyranids most of the Psykers come with Shadows of the Warp which isn't the greatest due to its short range but provides you some defense against opposing psykers.

The big question is psyker defense worth taking with other Imperium armies like Imperial Guard, Witch Hunters etc can take allied Daemon Hunter units that can take the Psychic Hood at least until the next Inquisition update. The choices here are either:
Inquisitor Lord with Psychic Hood and minimum retinue of 3 Mystics (cheapest henchmen and give anti deepstrike) for 83 points but you might as well throw in the Emperor's Tarot for a +1 to go first 5/6 of the time to bring it up to 98 pts. Problems with this unit is its pretty expensive, is two kill points, has no offense unless you want to spend more points and takes an HQ slot which matters if you want to take 2 Company Commands or two Jump Pack Cannoness. You can add some pretty good offense options like psycannon for the inquisitor, bolter servitors or plasma warriors but then this squad becomes really expensive.
Brother Captain with Psychic Hood for 81 points. Not much cheaper then the Inquisitor Lord. As an IC he can join another squad but he only has 1 wound and it costs a bit in points to give him a retinue of terminators. Again takes an HQ slot.
Grey Knight Terminators with Hood. This takes an Elite slot but you have to buy a whole bunch of terminators which is expensive.

Is it worth it to take one of the above choices in IG or WH and which would you take?

Psykers have definitely been getting stronger with the last few codices (SM, IG, SW) but are still not game-dominatingly-autowin. Part of the reason is that psychic defenses have also gotten better (Looking at you, Mr. Runic Staff).

Honestly I think Space Wolves, due to their prevalence and the quality of the Rune Priest, are countering the Psychic meta by simply existing. Psykers are generally willing to go up against a psychic hood because they've got better than even odds of beating it. Against a Runic Staff, however, a 50/50 to lose a game-changing power like Fortune is no longer as viable.

"Is Psyker defense necessary in armies that can get it with recent armies getting good psykers?"

to me, yes. i play IG and always seem to face Eldar or Chaos. to me having the Inquisitor ally is priceless.
what i'm worried about is what happens when the DH/WH Inquisitors get their rewrite? IG has the ability
to be offensive, but no defense. so once the Inquisitor with his/her mystics and Psychic hood go, then what?

I'm torn too. I keep debating about taking an Inquisitor ally in my Vanilla SM force. For 55 points you get;

33% denial on all psychic powers, all over the board.
84% of the time, a +1 to going first...which will be key against alpha strike IG style lists.


Honestly, for that I don't care if he does anything else.

Short answer: yes.

Long answer:

There's a list of things that modern 5th edition armies need to be able to do to be truly competitive, in my opinion. They need:

Psychic defense

Flexibility - everything in your army needs to be able to do more than one thing

The ability to play reserves if necessary

Mobility

Some form of deep strike defense - this isn't always necessary, especially with armies who can play the reserves game very well

(You'll notice that every single one of the codex books released in 5th edition has all of these things. There's a reason for that. )

These are the pillars of a list that will never be stonewalled by a gimmicky army that happens to exploit a particular weakness (to the detriment of its own strength in other areas). Some armies can sacrifice one or two of these qualities and still be successful, but most of the time I don't feel comfortable playing a list without all of the above.

Doesn't it just suck to draw a seer council and have nothing that can stop him from casting fortune every turn?

AgeofEgoes
How is it 55 pts? I count 98 pts for Inquisitor Lord with Psychic Hood, Tarot and 3 Mystics?

alarmingrick
Dunno what to do if they do take out daemonhunter allies actually.

grankobot
IG lacks 2 of those without Daemon Hunter Inquisitor Ally with for Psyker defense and deepstrike defense. I guess you can reserve everything with a +1 to reserves from an Astropath for deepstrike defense.

Facing Eldar with fortune and a seer council is rough without psyker defense but the allied Inquisitor Inquisitor Lord with Psychic Hood, Tarot and 3 Mystics package costs 98 pts which is as much as a librarian but with no offense. This is a 51 pt premium to add the hood over the Elite Inquisitor with 2 mystics and Tarot. This almost pays for a Chimera.

At the 1850 level I can fit in the Inquisitor Lord for psyker defense but below that its so tight for points.

Re: Age of Egos' point value:

Can't you just take the 20pt Elite inquisitor, give him a hood, a couple of +1LD minions, and the tarot? Does that come out to 55?

Oddly enough, I play WH/DH and never really bother to take a hood. I find local players mainly run Warp Time in their CSM lists, and the Sisters's 5+ chance to silence offensive powers covers the rest.

If I were to run a hood though, and wanted it on the cheap, I would tack it onto my Inquisitor with Heavy Bolter/Plasma Cannon servitors and scribes I run pretty often. Alternately, an InqLord with hood, 3 plasma vets and 2 mystics in a rhino can make a decent anti psyker, anti deepstrike unit that can then plasma bomb a likely target.

A Brother captain with hood isn't a terrible way to go, perhaps with a psycannon in a unit of retributors, but the total points cost is pretty high.

Since you seem to be a Sister's player, I will offer my experience with Seer councils: a Cannoness with 2+ armor save can hold them up for a LONG time. Toss in a seperate unit of seraphim or something and some Spirit of the Martyr until you can kill the power weapon wielders and you can tie up the unit pretty much all game. Wounding on a 2+ isn't as scary with a 2+ armor save, and those jet'lock's are a huge points investment.

Manahnin
No you can't. The hierophant only raises your leadership to 9 and do not stack so you need the Inquisitor lord who costs 25 pts more then the elite for a leadership 10 hood.

Wehrkind
I haven't bothered with a hood in my witch hunters lists either.

I run the inquisitor with psycannon, 2 mystics, sage, 3 heavy bolter servitors or sometimes run a plasma cannon servitor pretty good unit might add a hood to it but unit is already expensive enough.

Fortune is really annoying but Jetseer really isn't that popular due to the conversion being an obstacle. I know only 3 people and of a 4th who have Jetseers converted and none of us play them right now other then the 4th person I met at Conflict GT. This might change after chapterhouse has their converson out.

in response to the question: it really depends on the local meta-game. if there are alot of psykers floating around in your opponents lists i would say yes

But let's ask the question, what do you mean by "Psyker defense"? do you mean a way to block opponents psychic powers? or simply being able to throw powers back at him

unless you are playing Eldar or Space Marines there won't be a whole lot of Psyker on Psyker action.

granted IG can borrow Hoods(better then spess mureen hoods ) from the Inquisition codexs, but who knows how long that will last.

Most psychic powers are shooting attacks and should be treated as such. Eldar have buff spells and SMs have a few too, but beyond that most (90%) powers will take the form of shooting.


my final say is, No psyker defence isn't nessary, but rather situational. but that could change

Yeah I forgot that the elite Inquisitor started at Ld. 8...so it's 80ish for that setup.

Kirika wrote:
grankobot
IG lacks 2 of those without Daemon Hunter Inquisitor Ally with for Psyker defense and deepstrike defense. I guess you can reserve everything with a +1 to reserves from an Astropath for deepstrike defense.

My point was that all of the 5th ed armies have all of those things available to them in standard games. Guard don't actually need allies for deep strike defense (no army does), since like you said, you can either play reserves or you can saturate the board with less valuable targets and block your opponent off from DSing in close to the things he actually wants to hit.

Basically, either control the board, or take the initiative back. Almost any army book in the game can do one of these things by itself.

grankobot wrote:
Guard don't actually need allies for deep strike defense (no army does), since like you said, you can either play reserves or you can saturate the board with less valuable targets and block your opponent off from DSing in close to the things he actually wants to hit.

This really depends on what you mean by deep strike defense. With drop pods and spores there is little risk in aiming for a small hole.

The main issue isn't that there are so many psykers out there, its that a few of them are so completely game changing. There is a big difference in a power that can (for abstract example) kill 100 points a turn and a power that can kill 600 points 1/6 of the turns.

It all depends on your local metagame or if you are a tournament player. In a tournament anti psychic defense can win a game simply by preventing you from losing. Some armies don't have access to psychic defense so it's not an issue and we can look at those armies as an example to determine if it's absolutely necessay to have psychic defense. Orks don't have but still tend to win a lot. Dark eldar don't have and in the hands of an experienced player they also seem to win a lot. Tau don't have it but can counter many psychic shooting attacks by running a mech list (same thing for orks). So by simply running mech you are fairly safe. If you do have access to psychic defense then it can allow you to play more aggressively.

G