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I have a real problem with how psychic powers are handled in 40K for two big reasons:


A) certain armies have really great psychic defense that basically shuts down the entire ability of the opponent while other armies are completely devoid of any psychic protection. I get that a lot of this is based in both the fluff and army balance (i.e. Daemons are supposed to be vulnerable to psychic attacks, Orks and Chaos are too offensively minded to worry about psychic defense and Tau are just clueless when it comes to the Warp, etc), I can totally accept all that.

What I can't accept is that for the psychic defense that *does* exist, there is little tactical play involved. You either have this great psychic defense or you don't. But once you've got the models on the table besides making sure your psychic hood is within range of the enemy psyker (for example) you don't have make any tough choices...and a good game should be all about tough tactical choices!


B) The psychic defense that exists currently in the game in many cases is really, really ambiguous as to what powers it effects or not. Some of these rules say they work against powers that the unit is in the 'area of effect' of (what does that mean exactly and how does that work against powers that continually function without any psychic test?), while others say they ignore the effects of all psychic powers (again, what does that mean, exactly?).


So if I were writing 6th edition 40K, what would I change on the game-scale to make psychic powers both more fun, more tactical and more balanced? At first I was thinking that every psyker should have an extra default power called 'psychic defense' that they could use once in each of their opponent's turns. It was thinking it would basically work like a psychic hood (and actual psychic hoods would just boost this rule). But then it occurred to me, the game lalready has a mechanism in place for psychic defense that doesn't require any additional rolls to be made. That is, the 'psychic test' (the Ld test to cast a power).

Basically, all you have to do is allow units and rules to put negative modifiers onto this psychic test and it perfectly represents someone 'blocking' a psychic power from being used. And the great thing about this method is that you don't have to build in extra things like making more powerful Ld10 psykers being 'better' at blocking than Ld9 psykers because that's naturally incorporated into the system. A -1 Ld modifier is going to be a lot more painful to a Ld9 psyker than the same -1 Ld modifier is to a Ld10 psyker (thanks to the bell curve).

Of course, the tricky thing is, you can't allow too many negative modifiers to be present in the game or else all of a sudden people just won't want to take psykers anymore (which defeats the whole point of this proposed rule). As the vast, vast majority of pyskers are Ld10, a -1 modifier is a slight annoyance, a -2 modifier is something you'd probably try to avoid if possible, a -3 modifier would make using the power downright risky, and a -4 modifier would make using the power a big gamble.

So that's really the target here: In most cases, the modifiers should stay between -1 to -2 with a -3 or -4 being available only in extreme situations and no more than a -4 should *ever* be allowed.

Here's the proposed 'general' game-wide rule, followed by specific notes about how I'd 'FAQ' the current codices and/or plan for this rule to be incorporated into future codices:




PSYCHIC RESISTANCE
There are many ancient relics or downright oddities in the 41st millenium that have the strange effect of dampening the effects of the aether. A psyker attempting to cast an ability at such a target often finds the power mysteriously draining away from his fingertips.


A psyker (or a unit containing one or more psykers) has the psychic resistance special rule. Some units also naturally have the ability or get it granted to them via a piece of wargear, etc.

Enemy psykers specifically targeting a unit that has psychic resistance (or targeting a specific model within that unit) with a psychic power that requires a psychic test suffer a -1 Ld modifier to their psychic test. This effect is cumulative with the negative modifier from battle of wills (see below).


Note: The psychic resistance rules means if a psychic power requires a target, the player must nominate that target before attempting the psychic test (which is a change to the rules).



BATTLE OF WILLS
All psykers have the innate ability to feel the presence of other nearby who can channel the winds of Chaos. As the enemy begins to coalesce energy to unleash a deadly attack, psykers will often use their own innate gifts to put pressure on the enemy and attempt to block them from releasing their deadly payload.

All psykers have the battle of wills special rule (unless specified otherwise), which may be used once per player turn provided the psyker currently hasn't 'gone to ground'. Battle of wills has a range of 24" and may be used when an enemy psyker attempts to utilize a psychic power that requires a psychic test (range is measured to the hull/wall of a transport/building if either psyker is inside one). If the enemy psyker is found to be out of range then that battle of wills is wasted for the turn.

If the enemy psyker is found to be within range, then he suffers a -1 Ld modifier on the psychic test to use the power. Up to two psykers can attempt to use their battle of wills against a single enemy psychic power attempt and if both are found to be within range, then the casting psyker suffers a -1 Ld modifier for each (i.e. a -2 Ld modifier).

If a unit contains more than one non-Independent character psyker, it gets only a single battle of wills attempt per player turn, but this attempt automatically counts as being made by 2 psykers (a -2 Ld modifier and cannot be combined with any other psyker's battle of wills). Measure range for this attempt from the closest psyker in the unit to the enemy psyker. An Independent Character psyker who is joined to a unit containing non-Independent Character psykers still makes their own separate battle of wills attempt, which can be against a totally different enemy power.



PSYCHIC SAVES
Some models and units have a psychic save, which is an invulnerable save that can only be used against wounds caused by psychic powers.



PSYCHIC IMMUNITY
Some units have the psychic immunity special rule, which means models in the unit cannot be wounded or otherwise removed from the table by a psychic power. In addition, the unit automatically counts as having the psychic resistance special rule (see above). Besides these two protections, the unit is otherwise affected normally by psychic powers.



PSYCHIC HOODS & OTHER NULLIFICATION BOOSTERS
All Psychic Hoods and any other wargear noted below as being a 'nullification booster' now use the following rule (instead of whatever is printed in their codex): A model with a psychic hood/nullification booster can choose to use battle of wills once on a given player turn with a bonus -1 Ld modifier (a total of -2 Ld) or he can make two separate battle of wills attempts on a given player turn against two different enemy powers, each with the normal -1 Ld modifier. Note: only a single psychic hood/nullificiation booster may add their bonus -1 Ld modifier against any one enemy psychic power attempt.



EXAMPLE:

If a psyker uses a power and targets an enemy unit that contains a psyker (which makes that unit 'psychic resistant'), then his psychic test to use that power will be at -1 Ld.

However, if the enemy psyker in that unit decides to also use his one 'battle of wills' for that turn on that same power (and he is found to be within 24" of the casting enemy psyker), then an additional -1 Ld modifier is added, for a total of -2 Ld.

If the enemy psyker in that unit had a psychic hood, and decided he wanted to utilize its benefit on only a single battle of wills attempt for the turn, then a further -1 Ld modifier would be added (for a grand total of -3 Ld).

If an enemy psyker in ANOTHER unit also decided that he wanted to use his one battle of wills on that same power (and was also found to be within 24" of the enemy psyker) then a further -1 Ld modifier would be added (for a grand total of -4 Ld).

ARMY SPECIFIC CHANGES


Black Templars

Black Templar 'Abhor the Witch, Destroy the Witch' would provide psychic resistance to all Templar units and characters (instead of the 5+ save).

Templars don't benefit much from these new rules as they don't have any psykers to provide them defense (and that's actually how they are currently, pretty much). With that said, taking the 'Abhor the Witch, Destroy the Witch' vow does give basically puts a -1 Ld penalty on all psychic attempts targeting one of their units, which isn't horrible. However, as they can't take any psykers to supplement this, I wouldn't even mind making that a permanent rule (i.e. not needing to take the vow to get it) and maybe even giving them some piece of wargear that squads can take to increase this penalty up to -2 (or even -3) when targeting those specific squads. Another option would be to give those units a 5+ psychic save on top of being psychic resistant.

Blood Angels

Psychic Hood uses the rules presented above.

For psychic resistance purposes, the player using Blood Lance must nominate which unit he intends target (hit first) before attempting the psychic test to use the power.

As with most Marine armies, Blood Angels psychic defense relies on the inclusion of Librarians. The Psychic Hood allows a marine army with only 1 psyker to still be relatively protected because they have a psychic hood (which allows them to try to stop a single power at an extra -1 Ld, or try to stop two powers a turn).

Although I think it certainly wouldn't hurt to allow some wargear to be taken for ICs that provides the units they join with psychic resistance similar to Wolf Tail Talismans in Space Wolf armies. Ultimately this gear should be kept fairly rare so that EVERY unit in the army doesn't end up being protected.

Chaos Daemons

Blessing of the Blood God gives a 2+ psychic save.

Perhaps all models with the Mark of Khorne should have psychic resistance? I almost think yes, but that would definitely be a big change for the army. However, Daemons are supposed to be vulnerable to psychic attacks so its probably a good thing they don't have anything to prevent psychic powers from working.

With that said, it should be really dangerous for psykers to use their powers when battling Daemons, so I think a great rule to represent this would be that ANY double rolled on their psychic test would inflict a 'perils of the warp' attack to represent this danger.

Chaos Space Marines

Kharn's Blessing of the Blood God gives him psychic immunity.

Even moreso than with Daemons, it seems like it would be really appropriate to give all models with the Mark of Khorne psychic resistance.

However, CSM can take a Sorceror and a Daemon Prince along with units of Thousand Sons (which each contain a psyker) and have a TON of psychic defense. What they lack in the psychic hoods of the loyalists, they make up for with Psykers built into Thousand Sons units. In fact, Thousand Sons themed armies become really good at psychic defense (which is both appropriate and awesome IMHO).

Daemonhunters

The Aegis gives all Grey Knight units psychic resistance and Grey Knight Terminator units count as having a psyker (so can use battle of wills).

Inquisitors only count as a psyker if they actually take a psychic power.

Null Rod grants the unit with it psychic immunity.

Psychic Hood uses the rules presented above.

Unguents of Warding provide the character's unit with psychic resistance and a 4+ psychic save.

Daemonhosts would ignore psychic resistance, battle of wills & psychic hoods because they auto-pass their psychic tests (but DO count as psykers and so can utilize battle of wills themselves.

Daemonhunters would be (rightly so) really good at psychic defense as they can take a bunch of psykers AND they have access to psychic hoods. In fact, the Grey Knights rumors currently point to the Aegis actually being a -1 Ld modifier to psychic tests, so it appears that someone at GW is maybe considering the same things I am!

Dark Angels

Psychic Hood uses the rules presented above.

Their Librarians should be changed to Ld10 to match other Marine codices.

Same notes as for Blood Angels.

Eldar

Runes of Warding: Any enemy psychic power targeting a Farseer with Runes of Warding (or the unit he's joined to) OR an enemy psychic power the Farseer uses his battle of wills against would make their psychic test on 3D6 and use the two highest results.

Warlocks and Shadowseers are immune to psychic resistance and battle of wills as they do not take psychic tests, but do count as psykers themselves (so they do use these special rules).

Eldar would also be quite good at psychic defense provided they take some units that contain Warlocks. Runes of Warding becomes even more powerful with all the negative modifiers now in the game, but having its effectiveness reduced to being used on battle of wills (24" range) or at the unit the Farseer is actually in ends up making it overall much less potent (and more tactical).

Imperial Gaurd

Psychic Battle squads (as they contain more than one non-IC psyker) make the enemy test at -2 Ld when using battle of wills.

IG would be affected by these rules quite a bit as they are one of the few armies with Ld 9 psykers. However, psyker battle squads are nice for defense as they always get -2 Ld for their battle of wills.

As with Blood Angels, Dark Angels and Space Marines, it might not be a bad idea to give them a couple items of psychic protection that are only available to (perhaps) command squads?

Orks

Wierdboys and Warpheads benefit from the Mob Rule and so have their Ld boosted to the number of Orks in the unit at the time (to a maximum of 10), and THEN any negative modifiers are applied.

Orks, being more concerned with offense than defense make sense to have little psychic defense, but adding this rule would definitely make taking a Wierdboy/Warphead a tiny bit more desirable.

As with IG, BA, DA & Space Marines, it could be a good idea to give them a little item that provides psychic resistance to an IC, perhaps some sort of 'good luck' token for Warbosses to carry? Or maybe saying Ork mobs over a certain size (like 12 or over) gain psychic resistance due to the energy they latently build up when so many Orks are together?

Space Marines

Psychic Hood uses the rules presented above.

Same notes as for Blood Angels.

Space Wolves

Runic Weapon is a 'Nullification Booster' using the rules presented above.

Wolf Tail Talisman gives the unit psychic resistance.

Space Wolves are quite nicely set up for psychic defense with the Wolf Tail Talisman accessible for characters and with the ability to take a bunch of Rune Priests each with their (effectively) psychic hoods. As with the Templar vow, you could say that the Wolf Tail Talisman should also grant the unit a 5+ psychic save, but given the amount of Rune Priest love the army can also take, I'd be inclined to leave the Talisman as just providing psychic resistance.

Tau

Ehtereals, although not actually psykers, should probably count as psykers for the purposes of psychic resistance and battle of wills only.

Although Tau are supposed to be really vulnerable to psychics (being ignorant about them), giving Ethereals the ability to defend against psychics as if they're a psyker would give a nice reason to take Ethereals and would also help to represent the magical 'protection' that Ethereals seem to provide the Tau. Beyond that, including a piece of advanced anti-psychic 'special issue' wargear that would give a character (and the squad he's with) psychic immunity would also be a great idea and would fit the fluff of the Tau always coming up with new technology to supplement their weaknesses.

Tyranids

Shadow in the Warp works as stated in the codex.

With these rules in place, a Tyranid army built with a bunch of Psykers would definitely be one of the best armies for psychic defense (especially including Shadow in the Warp), which only makes sense given the fluff that a Hive Fleet cuts psykers off from their powers in the warp to a large degree.

Space Wolves

Runic Weapon is a 'Nullification Booster' using the rules presented above.

Wolf Tail Talisman gives the unit psychic resistance.

Space Wolves are quite nicely set up for psychic defense with the Wolf Tail Talisman accessible for characters and with the ability to take a bunch of Rune Priests each with their (effectively) psychic hoods. As with the Templar vow, you could say that the Wolf Tail Talisman should also grant the unit a 5+ psychic save, but given the amount of Rune Priest love the army can also take, I'd be inclined to leave the Talisman as just providing psychic resistance.

Witch Hunters

A single Penitent in a retinue gives the unit psychic resistance and a 5+ psychic save. If two Penitents are taken then the unit has psychic immunity.

Inquisitors only count as a psyker if they actually take a psychic power.

Hexagrammic Wards would be removed (as their function is effectively replaced by both Penitents and when an Inquisitor is a psyker).

Psychic Hood uses the rules presented above.

Shield of Faith would provide psychic resistance.

Witch Hunters would be another great psychically defensive army as every Sisters of Battle squad would have psychic immunity thanks to Shield of Faith as well as the defense provided by any Inquisitors with Psychic Hoods in the army.

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So why would this system be better then what we have now? Again, the issue with psychic defense currently is that some armies have it while others don't and that psychic defense that does exist tends to be way too powerful and doesn't actually force the player to use much of any tactics to utilize the defense.

This system not only gives every single army some form of psychic defense (even Chaos Daemons) but also in general weakens the existing psychic defense in the game (such as the ubiquitous psychic hood). While several armies can get 'psychic resistance' on a bunch of their units, the -1 Ld penalty this provides isn't really too nasty against most Ld10 psykers. The real defense kicks in when one (or two) psykers throw in their 'battle of wills' negative modifiers on top of this. But Battle of wills is only usable against a single power per turn (or two if you have a psychic hood) which means if the enemy is able to cast more than one psychic power you actually have to *choose* which power you want to use Battle of Wills against, instead of every single power within range being affected as with the current incarnation of the psychic hood.

Also, as the player USING a psychic power you know which units have psychic resistance and you know if an enemy psyker is within 24" of your psyker. So you have to make choices on which target to go after with your power and whether or not it is worth coming within 24" of the enemy psyker to do so. This again adds a tactical element to psychic use that currently doesn't exist.

Finally, uniforming how psychic defense works also means that every player can KNOW with certainty exactly which powers can be defended against. While limiting psychic defense (besides psychic saves) only against powers that require a psychic test AND a target does mean a few powers slip through the cracks (like Nurgle's Rot, for example, that doesn't have a target), I think it is worth it to have a very, very clear system in place.


So what do you think? Is there a big flaw I'm missing? Would this ruin the game or make you no longer take psykers in your army?

All comments and criticisms are welcome!

On first thought, I like it.

On second thought, I believe that the entire system of psychic powers needs an overhaul. I'm talking 2nd edition to 3rd edition rehaul, it needs to be completely redone.

Personally I really like how WHFB does magic, with power and dispel dice. Just have "Force" dice and "Nullify" dice.

And have a 7th edition WHFB magic system. Collar of Khorne would give Magic Resistance, Psychic Hoods generate additional "Nullify Dice" that only that psyker can use, etc.

The game would be a lot better for it, especially with a dedicated psionic phase unlike the bs, half-assed psychic powers we have now. Then we could have different schools of psionics. Astartes, Eldar, Inquisition, Tzeentch, Nurgle, Slaanesh, and so on.

Would it take a lot of time? Sure. But the game would be the better for it.

But for example, you could have a Librarian be a Level 2 Psyker, with the ability to take up to 2 additional levels. Then you roll on the Astartes power chart (or Space Wolves if it is a Rune Priest, etc).

For example, you could have more powerful psychic powers like JotWW and Lash of Submission have higher casting costs, like 11+. Again, like the WFB magic system. The randomness and the higher casting cost would balance them out.

I definitely like both ideas, as I think psykers are the most broken part of the current game - I think Vlad's idea would be better if GW got on board; Since that undoubtedly won't happen I think the OP rules are a great way to make some needed changes within the rules that we currently have. Maybe a little more variety to spice things up some. Like the idea to give Khorne marked units psychic resistance is a great idea. Maybe give them a -3, and for every unit in the army that has the psyker rule reduce it by one (as Khorne withdraws his favor)? That way it's a good buff for a Khorne specific army, while not allowing both that benefit as well as boatloads of yer own psykers.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
- note that that was intended more for marines than daemons.

The math on these rules just doesn't pan out. The rich get richer and the poor stay the same. By that, I mean armies who already have good psychic protection (Eldar, Tyranids, etc) are going to shut down opposing psykers even more than they do now.

For example, people like to complain about my Runes of Warding now, but if my 5 psykers are applying a -6 penalty to their one psychic power a turn, that's even worse than taking a test on 3d6.

In short, people who feel slighted by current psychic defenses will only be punished more under this system.

Max modifier is -4. It's at the top. And the runes would only work for the one your're BoW'ing or if they are targetting you.

So yes, Eldar would be good, but it isn't OTT.

I tend to think that not allowing psychic defenses to work while the wearer is in a transport vehicle would be enough.

I like the idea, i really do. The whole 'battle of wills' idea really appeals to me. You can see it as something that would happen on the battlefield and it's similar to the 'psychic duel' i've always wanted in WHFB.

DarknessEternal wrote:The math on these rules just doesn't pan out. The rich get richer and the poor stay the same. By that, I mean armies who already have good psychic protection (Eldar, Tyranids, etc) are going to shut down opposing psykers even more than they do now.

For example, people like to complain about my Runes of Warding now, but if my 5 psykers are applying a -6 penalty to their one psychic power a turn, that's even worse than taking a test on 3d6.

In short, people who feel slighted by current psychic defenses will only be punished more under this system.

I disagree with you, everyone benefits from this rule. Yes, armies like eldar will get stronger but so will armies with low psychic defense, as just taking a psyker will boost thier psychic defense.

Arleucs wrote:I tend to think that not allowing psychic defenses to work while the wearer is in a transport vehicle would be enough.

I think you'll find that Yak is trying to make it more dynamic and less:

Did you bring Psy Defense? Yes/No:
Yes - You win.
No - You eat a lot of Jaws.

I like that it adds an element of tactics. I almost want there to be a penalty for failing in a BoW. My kneejerk for some things is that I don't like them, but that's because they nerf my army. lol.

Also, I'm not a fan of Psychic Saves being added. Either resistance or immunity should be okay. If nothing else, why not just go to Psy Resist levels? Easier mechanic and less die rolls. Then you can have some pretty severe restrictions and still just easily classify everything in the game as Imm or PR.

Bloodthirster with BotBG or Kharn? PR 4
Mark of Khorne? PR 1
SoB? PR 1 or 2
Wolf Tail? PR 1
Null Rod? Psy Imm
Pariahs? Psy Imm and existing aura

etc so on.

Also, maybe for the next codex Tau will get some natural resistance to psyker powers as they have 'no warp presence'. Or we'll find out that was a lie and Ethereals are super psykers since always.

1 reason i ike 40k is cuz its so simple, sometimes i like to play WHFB cuz its more complicated (i hope im saying that right).
So i think psychic powers work fine as they do now, in WHFB im always worried that my plan doesnt work cuz my spells might be dispelled.
I dont have that problem in 40k.... exept the psychic hoods...... THEM PSYCHIC HOODS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Arleucs wrote:I tend to think that not allowing psychic defenses to work while the wearer is in a transport vehicle would be enough.

I'd be more inclined to say that psychic powers don't work while in a vehicle, or can't be used on anything that isn't in there with you. Psychic powers tend to be a bit potent by themselves, without putting the bearer in a mobile bunker.

Noticed the list at the top didn't include Necrons. Currently, bring pariahs and get them close, and all of a sudden psykers are having a risky time of it. In the future, I'd sort of propose it be similar to what you proposed for daemons, perils on and doubles when in range of a pariah. But that's just me.

yakface wrote:
A) certain armies have really great psychic defense that basically shuts down the entire ability of the opponent while other armies are completely devoid of any psychic protection. I get that a lot of this is based in both the fluff and army balance (i.e. Daemons are supposed to be vulnerable to psychic attacks, Orks and Chaos are too offensively minded to worry about psychic defense and Tau are just clueless when it comes to the Warp, etc), I can totally accept all that.

I like the idea of negative modifiers. But I think it's what you say above that strikes me as the bigger problem of psychic powers in 40k.

40k, like many wargames, is based on the idea that an equal number of points per side creates a balanced game. But when some armies can completely shut-down another's psychic powers (which had points spent on them), while other armies are completely at the mercy of any psychic abilities, it quickly becomes obvious that this isn't true in the case of psychic powers.

All other main game rules impact all armies equally. Only psychic powers exist as a game-wide rule that only half the game can defend against. This might make sense fluffwise, but fluffwise, orks are stronger than humans (but not in the game), and one marine is worth 10 guardsmen (he's definitely not in the game).

I think that fantasy handles magic, as a game, far better than 40k handles psychic powers. A fantasy army that did not bring a wizard is still given a token defense against magics. It may not be a lot, but it's something. And, magic is so central to the game that even armies without wizards have access to items that help them avoid the worst effects of enemy magic.

I think one of the big problems with the current system is that psychic powers are too easy to use. How many models that take psychic tests can you name that are not Ld10? I can think of the psyker battle squad off the top of my head. That means that the average psychic power succeeds eleven out of twelve times. Psychic powers are supposed to require intense concentration, and here they are, in combat, succeeding almost all the time. Again, in fantasy, all magic carries inherent, serious, risk, and only the most powerful of wizards, who frequently cost several hundred points, can be assured of using the more powerful spells with any sort of reliability at all.

A -1 modifier, assuming your opponent has a psyker in their army, doesn't make a huge dent in those numbers, and requires some armies (orks, tau) to take significantly suboptimal choices in order to effect even this minimal defense. I don't think this addresses the problem.

As 40k's psychic powers have been getting more and more game-impacting, the division between the haves and have-nots has grown. If anything, I think a general reigning-in of power success rates (make all psychic tests have a -2Ld effect, right off the bat) is needed. Furthermore, as the impact that a given power has on the game increases, the chance to successfully use that power needs to decrease. No one takes powers like smite because, wow, it's a psychic stormbolter. Instead, you get Null Zone, Fear of the Darkness, Jaws of the World Wolf, and Lash of Submission.

Want to make psychic powers a difficult choice? Make those good powers risky to use. Allow the psyker's controller to choose an easy-to-use, reliable smite, and a might-work-1-time-in-4 Lash, and we'll see more people bring smite.

Those armies that are currently have-nots need to be given access to tools that can help them resist these powers. Fluff can adjust. Orks have a forcefield, why shouldn't a big mek hammer together a dampening field? Chaos Marines are, afterall, renegades. Why would a renegade librarian leave his hood behind? Tau are a young, creative race, and could also easily justify a dampening field of some sort. Even if they don't understand warp energies, they could employ technologies, or a new empire-race to allow them to adjust to this tactic. Chaos daemons could have defenses of varying sorts, to outright immunity for khorne's minions, to chances to pevert their use for tzeentch, or even just something that draws all daemons to a psyker as a general effect.


Do something like that, and then apply the changes that you're suggesting, and the game will become a lot more fair. Just making your proposed changes may introduce a little more tactical depth, but it won't help those races that most need helping, while creating the illusion that they have been.

I think it would be most fair to make the races that aren't allowed psykers or psychic defenses (bar pariahs..) immune to psychic powers

Tau and Necrons have litte (tau) or no (necron) presence in the warp, so why not make it that the Warp has no effect on them?

I know this will get flamestormed by those with psychic powers now, so i'll shrug into my Nomex...

Thinking about this a little more, I think a difficulty rating on psychic powers would open up an additional level of creativity for designers too.

Right now, we're told that the Eldar are the best psykers in the galaxy, but we have nothing that makes a farseer any better at using his psychic powers than anyone else. The distinction, currently, is limited to what powers are available, and if you have wargear that gives you a re-roll of some sort.

So, if, in 6th ed, they went to a system where every power was assigned a difficulty rating, that was a direct negative modifier to the psyker's leadership then they went to use their power, not only could they provide a balance for the widely variant game-impact of the various powers, but they'd have another number to manipulate further.

Smite: Difficulty 1. So, the librarian using this is testing on a 9.
Use Force Weapon: Difficulty 1
Gate of Infinity: Difficulty 2.
Null Zone: Difficulty 3

Now, your choice of powers is a lot more interesting. Is Null Zone the auto-include when it's only a little better than 50/50 to cast at all? Are the shots from Smite more valuable as they're fairly dependable?

Taking it a step further, now our Eldar, the "best psykers in the universe", all get a standard +1 to cast their powers.

And this can all work within Yakface's initial proposal for other psykers to be able to exert further penalties on invoking powers, or units with psychic defenses.

In 3rd edition they toned psykers way way down and it was good. Who cared if the systems was awful and some armies didnt have psykic defense because they were merely an afterthought.

Personally I dont think there should be ANY psykic defense. All armies have 1 way to deal with psykers, kill them! That should be it. Equal and brutal.

Some armies are somehwat dependent on psyker powers.

Nids in particular kinda *need* warp blast to deal with AV 14.

Not to nit-pick, but you have Space Wolves listed twice, I know I love my puppies too, just don't want people thinking there's favoritism. heh

I like the idea of the negative modifiers reminds me of Battletech to some extent with firing mods and all.

However, when you think about it, there really aren't that many Psykers on the board. (Usually...) The biggest possible Psyker army fieldable is what, Tyranids and then Space Wolves with 4 possible Rune Priests on the table.

I don't know all the other armies that well, but most are limited to 2 max aren't they? Since most Psykers are Special/Independent Characters.

Some of the current psychic defence is simply playing around with what you can do with the dice without a proper afterthought to it's consequences. It's simply too much of a hard-counter which means tactical decisions/gameplay suffer for it.

On the other end of the scale is how ridiculous psychic powers are becoming. For each new Space Marine equivalent codex there is a new power that removes an increasing number of models with no saves allowed.

I think the current system has it's merits if you cut some of the crap (Hoods and Jaws, for instance), but bar that you need an advanced magic system with difficulty thrown in.

Fexor wrote:However, when you think about it, there really aren't that many Psykers on the board. (Usually...) The biggest possible Psyker army fieldable is what, Tyranids and then Space Wolves with 4 possible Rune Priests on the table.

I don't know all the other armies that well, but most are limited to 2 max aren't they? Since most Psykers are Special/Independent Characters.

Depends on how you count Warlocks, whom are listed as psychers and as such Eldar can field over 20 per FOC (2 Farseers, 6 Warlocks in troop, 3 Warlocks in Elite, 3 Warlocks in Heavy, and 2 units of several Warlocks.).

While I'm not sure about this particular change, I do agree that psychic powers in general need a do-over. They feel like they're just a half-assed leftover from the days when it was a WFB in space clone, and it really shouldn't feel that way-- if it felt like an in depth and properly done clone that'd be okay, but a half-assed one is not.

Redbeard wrote:Thinking about this a little more, I think a difficulty rating on psychic powers would open up an additional level of creativity for designers too.

Right now, we're told that the Eldar are the best psykers in the galaxy, but we have nothing that makes a farseer any better at using his psychic powers than anyone else. The distinction, currently, is limited to what powers are available, and if you have wargear that gives you a re-roll of some sort.

So, if, in 6th ed, they went to a system where every power was assigned a difficulty rating, that was a direct negative modifier to the psyker's leadership then they went to use their power, not only could they provide a balance for the widely variant game-impact of the various powers, but they'd have another number to manipulate further.

Smite: Difficulty 1. So, the librarian using this is testing on a 9.
Use Force Weapon: Difficulty 1
Gate of Infinity: Difficulty 2.
Null Zone: Difficulty 3

Now, your choice of powers is a lot more interesting. Is Null Zone the auto-include when it's only a little better than 50/50 to cast at all? Are the shots from Smite more valuable as they're fairly dependable?

Taking it a step further, now our Eldar, the "best psykers in the universe", all get a standard +1 to cast their powers.

And this can all work within Yakface's initial proposal for other psykers to be able to exert further penalties on invoking powers, or units with psychic defenses.

This!

All you'd have to do for Eldar is make their spells 1 less difficult than the equivalent non-eldar ones.

Orks could get pretty insane, though, with their leadership rules...

bthom37 wrote:
Orks could get pretty insane, though, with their leadership rules...

And that's a good thing! After all, weirdboyz are SUPPOSED to do insane stuff, like summoning the foot of Gork (or is it Mork? Who knows?) to stomp their foes! I guess what I'm saying is, on a "good day", there's NO ONE who can best the psychic power controlled by the Orkish weirdboyz save the four gods of chaos and the Emperor himself. Oh, and Gork and Mork of course, but dey no count!

And on a bad day.. gork help da ladz dat foots gunna land on insted...

Ork psi-powers are random as hell, and unreliable

From what I understood, psychic powers were too powerful in 2nd edition: nobody would go to war without a terminator librarian or such.

In 3rd edition, as it was already said, psychic powers were toned down and became a secondary aspect of the game.
If you remember well, in the army lists at the back of the rule book, the only psychic power available was some kind of lascannon!

The problem I think we now face is that psychic powers have stayed as a secondary aspect rules wise in the rule book and at the same time have very much increased in importance in the army books!
Only one page in the rule book is devoted to psychic powers.

As such, every army book has it's own rules, particularities on psychic powers, etc ...

All this to say that it needs to get back it's place in the rule book!


I find Redbeard's casting difficulty proposition and Yakface's psychic defences (somewhat resembling WHFB's dispel dice system I think) very interesting!

M'Kachen's Nemesis wrote:From what I understood, psychic powers were too powerful in 2nd edition: nobody would go to war without a terminator librarian or such.

In 3rd edition, as it was already said, psychic powers were toned down and became a secondary aspect of the game.
If you remember well, in the army lists at the back of the rule book, the only psychic power available was some kind of lascannon!

The problem I think we now face is that psychic powers have stayed as a secondary aspect rules wise in the rule book and at the same time have very much increased in importance in the army books!
Only one page in the rule book is devoted to psychic powers.

As such, every army book has it's own rules, particularities on psychic powers, etc ...

All this to say that it needs to get back it's place in the rule book!

I find Redbeard's casting difficulty proposition and Yakface's psychic defences (somewhat resembling WHFB's dispel dice system I think) very interesting!

2nd ed psychic powers weren't even in the main rules - you had to buy the Dark Millennium supplement box to get them (along with wargear). 2nd ed psychic rules were more similar to 5th ed WHFB magic rules - power cards, Ultimate Power, etc.

3rd ed nerfed psykers to the point of uselessness - I don't want to go back to those days, when Librarians had 2 powers, both of which were pointless. To put it in perspective, as useless as many people consider Chaplains nowadays, that's how useless Librarians were in 3rd ed. But as M'kachen points out, codex creep seems to have really knocked psychic powers into a position of being imbalanced. Psychic powers follow more or less the rules as 3rd ed - but Jaws is a lot different and more powerful than any power available in 3rd ed.

To fix it, obviously I agree with the increased difficulty rules - how to implement that? Either a WD update, laying out the different difficulties for each power for each army, or a Dark Millennium type supplement to update everyone.

What do you mean go BACK to those days? We're still there if you play Imperial Guard, what with Primaris Psykers being unreasonably weak and limited even though they are by far the most varied psykers in the galaxy outside of the myriad Chaos sorcerers, and certainly compete with Sorcerers, Farseers, and Librarians as far as power and skill go.

Melissia wrote:What do you mean go BACK to those days? We're still there if you play Imperial Guard, what with Primaris Psykers being unreasonably weak and limited even though they are by far the most varied psykers in the galaxy outside of the myriad Chaos sorcerers, and certainly compete with Sorcerers, Farseers, and Librarians as far as power and skill go.

Everyone in 3rd ed was gimped. At least now some people aren't gimped - just need to get everyone brought into line. FWIW, I play Traitor Guard, and I run a Primaris - fluffy! Not terribly useful, but fluffy!

Don't forget, DA are still gimped as well.

I'm speaking of fifth ed Guard, not third.

Melissia wrote:I'm speaking of fifth ed Guard, not third.

Me too. I play Traitor Guard using the current codex 'counts as'. I also just started a Tau army - which has bitchin psykers!

I have always disliked the use of "space magic" in 40K . I reckon if people want to play a company level skirmish game involving shooting, melee and magic, they should play WHFB, which has a well developed magic system.

However, if space magic absolutely must be included in the game then (a) it should not be just a variation on shooting attacks and (b) it should be fair.

I agree that the current system is unfair and needs a complete redesign. I also believe it would be far more fluffy and interesting if psionics were used for psychological purposes, rather than as a kind of heavy artillery.

For example, the Tyranid power "Catalyst" is like making a unit berserk for a turn. That is a very good concept for a psionic power.

Hrm, I kinda like that. How to apply Kilkrazy's idea to my own regarding the psykers...

These powers are intended for the Primaris Psyker. Other races' psykers would have a similar setup. At the start of the player turn, the controlling player choose whether or not the psyker is manifesting a psychic power. For each psyker manifesting a psychic power, roll d6 once to determine success, then choose which power is used and name a target.

On a roll of 1, roll another D6. On a 4+, the psyker takes a wound. If killed this way, explodes from the warp's energy being sucked into them. Place a small blast template with the center over the psyker-- all units touched by that template suffer an S5 hit with no armor save allowed, against the rear armor of vehicles if the psyker is in a transport. If the psyker survives, a roll of one may still manifest a power.

Primaris Psyker Psychic Powers:

Force Bolt: Always succeeds. Target enemy unit within 24" suffers S3 AP- hits equal to half the psyker's current leadership value rounded down.

Implant Courage: Success on a 2+. Target friendly unit within 24" automatically regroups and passes all leadership checks for the rest of the player turn.

Barrier: Success on a 3+. Target friendly unit within 24" gains a 5+ cover save for one game turn. This also effects assault, requiring assault grenades to strike at initiative.

His Will Be Done: Success on a 4+. Target friendly infantry unit within 24" gains Fleet and Furious Assault, if they did already have it.

Purgatus: Success on a 5+. Target enemy unit within 24" is pinned. Units with Feel No Pain may roll that as a save against this power.

Word of the Emperor: Success on a 6. Target enemy unit within 24" is takes a leadership test at -2 to leadership (fearless units take it at 8). The unit takes d3 S7 AP- hits, +1 more for every degree by which this test is failed. These hits ignore invulnerable saves.


Just a rough draft mind you. This would also require a rebalancing of points cost of course. Certain units would potentially have bonuses-- such as a Weirdboy purchasing Warp'Ead being able to re-roll any 1s.

M: Would you do away with Psychic Defense in this case or would there be modifiers? Because this goes from a good chance of making their psychic check (75%) to at a variable of ~85% to ~15%. The good powers are 50% or less.

This doesn't take into account Psychic hoods which already shut down the Ld9 psykers pretty effectively. Maybe with a drastic point reduction for the Primaris.

I think you are headed in the direction of Fantasy's magic. I.e. Each psychic power has a score that you need to roll higher than and each mage/psyker gets X dice that they get to roll plus a couple for the army itself.