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Hello there,

I was playing a game against Tyranids yesterday. I was fielding Abaddon and my opponent had the Swarmlord. Abaddon and the Swarmlord wound up in combat. The Swarmlord used the psychic power Paralysis? that drops his opponents weapon skill and Initiative to 1. Needless to say, Abaddon bit the dust. This was fair enough, after all, them's the rules.

However, this got me thinking, surely a character like Abaddon should have a shot at resisting the effects of this kind of psychic power? After all, he has all four of the Chaos gods watching him! I think characters and HQ models should have a shot at resisting as they are meant to be the commanders of their army and have strong wills. Would it be interesting to have some form of test to resist this kind of effect for HQ slots, for example take a ld test at half the models ld value?

I'd be interested to hear your thoughts and opinions!

In the leaked "6th edition codex" all units get a minimum of 6+ to resist any psychic power, and ICs get a 5+.

Psychic hoods let you get to 4+ as an IC and you can only make one resist attempt per power.

i agree with you here

though it would make certain characters less powerful but thats not all that bad *looks at super OP swarmlord

Or maybe instead of the Swarmlord being called OP, you should look at how you're pitting one of the weakest 40k 4th edition Characters against a very strong 40k 5th edition monster.

You know, perspective and all that jazz.

Chowderhead wrote:Or maybe instead of the Swarmlord being called OP, you should look at how you're pitting one of the weakest 40k 4th edition Characters against a very strong 40k 5th edition monster.

You know, perspective and all that jazz.

good point i see what you mean

but the swarmlord is a bit OP i mean c'mon making anybody I 1 against it is pretty much a death sentence you must admit that that is really powerful, though i only said swarmlord because that was the one in my head there are others that would not benefit from this rule.

JamesMclaren123 wrote:

Chowderhead wrote:Or maybe instead of the Swarmlord being called OP, you should look at how you're pitting one of the weakest 40k 4th edition Characters against a very strong 40k 5th edition monster.

You know, perspective and all that jazz.

good point i see what you mean

but the swarmlord is a bit OP i mean c'mon making anybody I 1 against it is pretty much a death sentence you must admit that that is really powerful, though i only said swarmlord because that was the one in my head there are others that would not benefit from this rule.

How much does he cost ejem..ejem. Just because it has powerful rules it doesn't mean it's OP, it's OP if it doesn't pay the right price for those rules

jgehunter wrote:

JamesMclaren123 wrote:

Chowderhead wrote:Or maybe instead of the Swarmlord being called OP, you should look at how you're pitting one of the weakest 40k 4th edition Characters against a very strong 40k 5th edition monster.

You know, perspective and all that jazz.

good point i see what you mean

but the swarmlord is a bit OP i mean c'mon making anybody I 1 against it is pretty much a death sentence you must admit that that is really powerful, though i only said swarmlord because that was the one in my head there are others that would not benefit from this rule.

How much does he cost ejem..ejem. Just because it has powerful rules it doesn't mean it's OP, it's OP if it doesn't pay the right price for those rules

good point :|

1. Swarmlord DOES NOT make you intiative one.
2. he CANNOT cast any of his Pyscic Powers into Combat.


Those 2 Key points may make your OP Creature seem little more than some guy playing it wrongly

I just want to clarify that I'm not whining or calling the Swarmlord OP, he paid the points and that is what the rules say so its all fair. The power was cast before the Swarmlord charged Abaddon. I'm more basing this on fluff reasons than anything else. There was just something that seemed wrong about having one of the best warriors in the galaxy reduced to a helpless shivering wreck without a chance to resist it.

It will be interesting to see if what blaktoof said comes to pass in 6th.

Castiel wrote:I just want to clarify that I'm not whining or calling the Swarmlord OP, he paid the points and that is what the rules say so its all fair. The power was cast before the Swarmlord charged Abaddon. I'm more basing this on fluff reasons than anything else. There was just something that seemed wrong about having one of the best warriors in the galaxy reduced to a helpless shivering wreck without a chance to resist it.

It will be interesting to see if what blaktoof said comes to pass in 6th.

You know the Swarmlord is probably THE best warrior in the galaxy bar primarchs et al, I do hope that if that comes to pass Eldar get some more powers because otherwise this can be a bit of a nerf.

I understand that, but at the same time Abaddon is kind of a mini-Primarch himself. I have no complaints about the Swarmlords stats or the effects of the power, I just feel that a character of Abaddon's calibre should have a shot at resisting it's effects.

You just feel that despite paying the points for the swarmlord to deserve the good model they get, you should make their model less good against your good model?

And think of how this applies to any other army with psychic defences already. Not to mention, because of paying those point as has already been said the tyranid powers also have a deficiency of being shooting attacks, can't cast them in combat.

So you want to create this new houserule, so one character benefits from it, that's a "problem" with the chaos codex, not the game. Let's not forget while you could consider only hitting on 5's bad, that doesn't stop him having eternal warriors with a large number of S8 power weapon attacks.

Stay out of range of the power, or just jump out of landraider, go into cover and make the swarmlord go last. But new houserules, this does not need.

lord_bobbington wrote:You just feel that despite paying the points for the swarmlord to deserve the good model they get, you should make their model less good against your good model?

And think of how this applies to any other army with psychic defences already. Not to mention, because of paying those point as has already been said the tyranid powers also have a deficiency of being shooting attacks, can't cast them in combat.

So you want to create this new houserule, so one character benefits from it, that's a "problem" with the chaos codex, not the game. Let's not forget while you could consider only hitting on 5's bad, that doesn't stop him having eternal warriors with a large number of S8 power weapon attacks.

Stay out of range of the power, or just jump out of landraider, go into cover and make the swarmlord go last. But new houserules, this does not need.

You have missed my point I think. I have no problems with the costs or effects of the power and character. What I mean is that I feel, from a fluff point of view, that a character like Abaddon should have a shot at resisting being turned into a helpless sack of meat on the battlefield. He has been waging war and leading the Chaos Legions in battle for over 10,000 years, has launched 13 Black Crusades and he has the backing and blessings of all 4 of the Chaos Gods behind him. Seeing him cut down like he wasn't there. not even getting the chance to strike a blow in anger just seems wrong. I feel that a character like Abaddon should at least have a chance of resisting the effects of a power like that. The same goes for Dante or Calgar or Lysande or even Creed. Its not a case of the game being unbalanced, so much as a desire to see these characters actually be able to show their history and background by being able to attempt to resist the power rather than just being swatted aside like they weren't there.

Also, I don't think that they should be able to resist psychic shooting attacks. I'm talking about ones that affect their stats, where the psyker has to reach into their minds. I would think breaking into the minds of these characters would be difficult, they must have weathered hundreds of psychic attacks and have strong mental defenses, making it harder to affect them..