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What's the LD? LD9 warrants some mastery level 2.

Belly wrote:
You know you have a 1/6 chance of rolling perils, right?

1/18, There are 36 possible rolls with 2d6 (6*6=36) and 2 of them result in perils. 2/36 = 1/18.

Still risky if they only have 1 wound. In casual games I play with 3 to 5 warlocks and usually lose at least 1 over the course of the game due to perils.

Making them ML 2 would double the odds to 1/9 per turn if you cast 2 powers per turn.

And if you're using 3 of these guys... you'll probably lose 1 to perils every game.

11% chance a turn?

It's not awful...it's almost guaranteed to give up a killpoint or 2 every game.

4 turns is 16 powers with 2 ML2s.

Just as a counter point to those mentioning that paying so much for prescience is barely worth it. 4 words for you my friends: Foreboding (on a blob squad), forewarning (on any blob squad, tank squadron, artillery squadron you want to keep alive), misfortune (on anything you are shooting), and best of all- Perfect timing (hello russes, basilisks, manticores etc)... AND THEN they get to cast prescience...
If rolling on divination 8 times do you really think you will roll precognition and scyers gaze 8 times (10 with an allied in BA, DA or matis warrior libby if you really want to)? Really?
If prescience made them 'barely worth it', prescience, ld 9, and a very high chance for one out of the above 4 surely puts them into the 'worth it' category.

If not playing against meq, a perfect timing, prescienced manticore would be devastating!

 Raxmei wrote:

 Ailaros wrote:
And think about it like this. You spend 50 points to get 10 lasgun hits. If you spent another 75 points to get another 5 lasguns hits, sometimes, then you'd still be faced with the fact that you could have spent 50 points for 10 more lasgun hits.

It's the classic guard doctrine - it's better to just take more stuff than to try and make the stuff you brought better.

Yeah, in some armies all it does is increase force concentration at cost to the total size of the force. Can take it or leave it. It gets more interesting in armies that are built diversely since then it lets you decide during the game which part of your firepower you want to increase. With multiple types of offensive units you don't normally know in advance what you'll need the most and you can't cheaply expand everything, so being able to flexibly apply buffs might be more useful. Of course that isn't how my army is laid out so I think I just talked myself out of using psykers.

This guy gets it. Tau were my second army after Guard, and one of the things that was really neat about them (before they sucked in 5th or were absurd in 6th) is that you don't need enough stuff to kill everything, because pathfinders could make good the unit that you really needed to be good that particular turn. Enter Divination Inquisitors and Primaris Psykers. They're cheap, easy to hide, and while it is arguably better to take more units for the points than to buff them, but with Div Psykers, you're buffing the thing you need most in a given turn. Need to kill troops? Buff the Punisher or blob. Need to kill tanks? Buff the Vanquisher. The increased power is useful, the increased power wherever you need it in a given turn is really the best thing about it. This utility is increased even more when you get a chance at Misfortune or Forwarning.

Makes one think the Divination powers probably are going to get a bit of a haircut in 7th.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Also for the Perils conversation, Primaris Psykers have 2 wounds. So if you have three at level 2 casting 2 powers each a turn, you'll probably get 2 Perils over the course of the game. If it's the same guy, then it's a kill point, if it's not, it probably won't matter. After the first Perils, you can always cut back on casting from the wounded Psyker if you think one kill point is going to decide the game. You'd still have a lot of psykers still working.

Poly Ranger wrote:
Just as a counter point to those mentioning that paying so much for prescience is barely worth it. 4 words for you my friends: Foreboding (on a blob squad), forewarning (on any blob squad, tank squadron, artillery squadron you want to keep alive), misfortune (on anything you are shooting), and best of all- Perfect timing (hello russes, basilisks, manticores etc)... AND THEN they get to cast prescience...
If rolling on divination 8 times do you really think you will roll precognition and scyers gaze 8 times (10 with an allied in BA, DA or matis warrior libby if you really want to)? Really?
If prescience made them 'barely worth it', prescience, ld 9, and a very high chance for one out of the above 4 surely puts them into the 'worth it' category.

If not playing against meq, a perfect timing, prescienced manticore would be devastating!

I don't have the book on me, but out of curiosity, what is the warp charge cost of those powers?

Everything in divination is WC1

Biophysical wrote:

Automatically Appended Next Post:
Also for the Perils conversation, Primaris Psykers have 2 wounds. So if you have three at level 2 casting 2 powers each a turn, you'll probably get 2 Perils over the course of the game. If it's the same guy, then it's a kill point, if it's not, it probably won't matter. After the first Perils, you can always cut back on casting from the wounded Psyker if you think one kill point is going to decide the game. You'd still have a lot of psykers still working.

Ah well that changes things. Perils isn't an issue if they have 2 wounds. So as long as you have something worth buffing, these guys are useful.

Hollismason wrote:

Biophysical wrote:

Hollismason wrote:
I've said it before and I will say it again It's borken

Primaris Psyker Level 2 75 Points
Primaris Pskyer Level 2 75 Points
Primaris Psyker Level 2 75 Points
Inquisitor w/ Servo Skull 56 points
Inquisitor w/ Servo Skull 56 points


Total : 256 Points ,

Err... 75 +75 +75 + 58 + 58 (25 + 30 + 3 = 58) = 341
You're a little off.

I know!! So embarrassed it's what I get for doing it in my head really fast!


Seriously , their really broken. Now that's just messing around. What happens when you start showing up with 3 Wyverns 2 Manticores and 3 Primaris Psykers. That's really nasty.

Basically, with some good rolling AM can alpha strike you first turn with templates.

That isn't threatening because Wyverns are already twin-linked, any wyverns and manticores have poor AP. I mean I guess if anyone takes blobs of Orks or Tyranids you will destroy them, but manticores and wyverns are hardly broken with or without the help of psykers.

If you are going to twin-link anything twin-link something useful like 50 guardsmen with plasma guns and lascannons given the FRFSRF with a priest using his chants to get rerolls to hit. 505 for the whole unit (not including the PCS) which gets 60 lasgun shots, 5 plasma gun shots, and 5 lascannon shots at 24" which all reroll hits and wounds. At 12" you get 95 lasgun/laspistol shots, 10 plasma gun shots, and 5 lascannon shots. With that firepower you can kill like 18 marines or two and a half riptides in a single turn, it is pretty much point, click, and remove the enemy unit, although I would probably change out the lascannons for autocannons dropping the price by 50 points, and maybe drop a few plasma guns for grenade launchers. That might be a bit overkill, but the general point is twin-link useful stuff, especially stuff that might kill itself a lot like plasma.

When compared strictly to Inquisitors, the Primaris Psykers aren't as good IMO due to the lack of wargear options, LD10, and servo skulls. They do get the ML2 though which is nice.

When you combine the two, however, you can have up to 3 prescience psykers along with up to 3 more that have hammerhand, rad grenades, servo skulls, daemon hammers/psycannons, liber heresius, etc...

If I'm playing a 40+ defensive blob, a Priest, Primaris, and Inquisitor with hammerhand, rad grenades (and psyk-out grenades which are pretty sweet), and servo skulls is pretty hilarious when you get assaulted by some Marines and re-roll to hit and then wound them on 3's.

I'm just waiting for 7th to take prescience out of the primaris.

That seems pretty likely to me.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Makes me want to not rely on it too much in the next few months so it hurts less when it's gone.

When is 7th suupposed to be coming out?

Poly Ranger wrote:
When is 7th suupposed to be coming out?

According to rumors, in the summer.

According to what I think? Two years. If there is a rules update it won't be half as big as the rumors are saying. A 6.5e at most, likely bundling Escalation and Stronghold assault in and GW making pointless "fixes" that solve nothing.

In any case, as all these rumors lack any consistency beyond other people regurgitating what they found earlier I'm not going to put any stock into any of the rumored rules shifts.

We had a good and consistent idea of many rule mechanics and some of the new additions to the lore in 6e by about this time two years ago in the last two months or so of 5e.

I see none of that now.

Don't plan around these rumors, you'll likely be disappointed.

Buttons wrote:

Hollismason wrote:

Biophysical wrote:

Hollismason wrote:
I've said it before and I will say it again It's borken

Primaris Psyker Level 2 75 Points
Primaris Pskyer Level 2 75 Points
Primaris Psyker Level 2 75 Points
Inquisitor w/ Servo Skull 56 points
Inquisitor w/ Servo Skull 56 points


Total : 256 Points ,

Err... 75 +75 +75 + 58 + 58 (25 + 30 + 3 = 58) = 341
You're a little off.

I know!! So embarrassed it's what I get for doing it in my head really fast!


Seriously , their really broken. Now that's just messing around. What happens when you start showing up with 3 Wyverns 2 Manticores and 3 Primaris Psykers. That's really nasty.

Basically, with some good rolling AM can alpha strike you first turn with templates.

That isn't threatening because Wyverns are already twin-linked, any wyverns and manticores have poor AP. I mean I guess if anyone takes blobs of Orks or Tyranids you will destroy them, but manticores and wyverns are hardly broken with or without the help of psykers.

If you are going to twin-link anything twin-link something useful like 50 guardsmen with plasma guns and lascannons given the FRFSRF with a priest using his chants to get rerolls to hit. 505 for the whole unit (not including the PCS) which gets 60 lasgun shots, 5 plasma gun shots, and 5 lascannon shots at 24" which all reroll hits and wounds. At 12" you get 95 lasgun/laspistol shots, 10 plasma gun shots, and 5 lascannon shots. With that firepower you can kill like 18 marines or two and a half riptides in a single turn, it is pretty much point, click, and remove the enemy unit, although I would probably change out the lascannons for autocannons dropping the price by 50 points, and maybe drop a few plasma guns for grenade launchers. That might be a bit overkill, but the general point is twin-link useful stuff, especially stuff that might kill itself a lot like plasma.

THIS ^ is how I run my guard platoons. I have one 50 man (can be blobbed) with 5 lascannons and 5 plasmaguns and a 30 man blob with 3 lascannons and 3 plasmaguns. These groups will be benefiting from orders and Prescienced Psykers. Alairos keeps mentioning lasguns, lasguns... who cares about the prescienced lasguns... unless i am targeting sternguard that just dropped in my face the lasguns are just bodies to protect the special and heavy weapons, twin linking will reduce my casualties to Gets Hot (i usually loose 3 guys at least over the course of a game). It means that I can effectively target anything. These guys will be able to do work!

 ductvader wrote:
I'm just waiting for 7th to take prescience out of the primaris.

^This. Prescience is too good to be a primaris power. It should also be 2 warp charges.

 Ailaros wrote:
If you need a concrete example, compare these two things:

Eradicator - lascannon/multimeltas
Eradicator - lascannon/multimeltas
Eradicator - lascannon/multimeltas

and

Eradicator - lascannon/multimeltas
Eradicator - lascannon/multimeltas
Primaris - lvl 2
Primaris - lvl 2

Even if you assume that you get prescience off every turn (which you won't), they have the same amount of firepower, except the top list has three pieces of AV14, while the second only has two and two squishy psykers. The first list is still better.

And then when you remember that prescience doesn't always go off, and sometimes it just causes the psyker's brain to explode, then the distinction becomes even more obvious.

You're probably not going to see the benefit of a prescience psyker in a guard army until you start talking about units that cost more than ~250 points. Buffing a big blob or a 3x squad of russes, perhaps its worth it, but they're not just always worth it all the time, and they're definitely not grossly overpowered.

You are purposefully making a poor comparison on the psyker side to underline your point. Let's take a normal non-HQ LR Punisher instead, to do the number crunching.

So you are looking at a 75 point investment to make your big gun and all your HBs to re-roll failed shots, compared to paying twice as much to get two of everything and another tank on the battlefield. In lists where you dont have a spare 75 points left, this is a nice way of improving your LR firepower from 1 to 1.5 by only paying 50% of what would be required to increase your LR firepower from 1 to 2. Except for one small caveat there. Twin-linking BS3 doesnt raise firepower from 1 to 1.5, but to 1.66. And in reality, if just 1 tank needs a buff, then it will usually be a level 1 psyker, which is 25 points cheaper. So you're only paying 33% and boosting your tank's output from 1 to 1.66. I call that a deal.

But if you insist on level 2 psykers, remember that they have a 1 in 6 chance to roll Forewarning as secondary power, and giving your russ a 4+ invulnerable save definitely adds to its survivability (just think what it does to a squadron of 3 russes). So its not just an increase in firepower here. Or how about that 1 in 6 chance of rolling Misfortune as secondary power? Yeah, now you get to make your Punisher TL, and enemies passing armor saves have to re-roll succesful ones. I dont even want to do the math on how devastating that volley will be. If your primaris is attached to a MOO and 4 Lascannon toting CCS instead, then Perfect Timing is what you're hoping to get and it'll be a field day hunting enemy tanks that arent completely out of LoS. Only Foreboding and Precognition suck, and even scrier's gaze is useful in allowing you to keep your valkyries from entering the board while the enemy still has a lot of skyfire/interceptor weapons active.

 herpguy wrote:

 ductvader wrote:
I'm just waiting for 7th to take prescience out of the primaris.

^This. Prescience is too good to be a primaris power. It should also be 2 warp charges.

maybe they will make Pyromancy good.

nah probably not.

Zimko wrote:

Belly wrote:
You know you have a 1/6 chance of rolling perils, right?

1/18, There are 36 possible rolls with 2d6 (6*6=36) and 2 of them result in perils. 2/36 = 1/18.

Still risky if they only have 1 wound. In casual games I play with 3 to 5 warlocks and usually lose at least 1 over the course of the game due to perils.

Making them ML 2 would double the odds to 1/9 per turn if you cast 2 powers per turn.

And if you're using 3 of these guys... you'll probably lose 1 to perils every game.

If he suffers a perils, unlike a warlock, the primaris psyker is not removed as a casualty.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Poly Ranger wrote:
and best of all- Perfect timing (hello russes, basilisks, manticores etc)... AND THEN they get to cast prescience...

umm no thats not gonna work. It says "the psyker and his unit". Not "a friendly unit within X inches"

I’m not sure about additional psychic levels on a Primaris. Let’s look at how the community rates divination powers by popularity.

Top tier: Prescience, Forewarning, Misfortune, Perfect timing.
Mid tier: Foreboding Precognition
Bottom tier: Scrier’s gaze

Because ½ the powers are top tier and there is only 1 scrub power it almost always makes sense to take additional powers.

Conventional perceptions of the tiers get turned around a bit for AM

Top tier: Prescience, Forewarning, Misfortune
Mid Tier: Scrier’s gaze, Foreboding
Bottom Tier: Precognition, Perfect timing.

Now only 1/3 of the powers are top tier and 1/3 are scrub powers. Let’s look at the powers as they apply to IG.

1) Foreboding is useful for a blob or plasma vets, but the psyker needs to be in the squad and most IG players don’t want to be charged. Overall it’s not that great of a power for most IG players.
2) Forewarning is what IG players are fishing for with a 4+ invo on any unit. Top tier
3) Misfortune is also a good power, but the psyker has to start his turn 24” from the target and outside a vehicle. Top tier
4) Perfect timing causes the psyker and his unit to ignore cover. It can’ only effect the psyker’s unit and thus can not effect vehicles. It’s super awesome in other armies but in AM it does the exact same thing as orders from a senior officer who doesn’t have to fish for it making it redundant and possibly not needed. If you have 2 senior officers this is a scrub power.
5) Precognition is uber on a Tzeenth deamon prince, pretty good on Coteaz, but totally craptastic on a psyker with the stat profile of a primaris .
6) Scriers’s gaze is the least popular psychic power, but It’s very important to AM who are likely to have MSU camping an objective. With 2/3 of the rolls on a mysterious objective being good rolling 3 times gives good certainty that they will benefit your backfield objective holders. Also in a non forge world meta prescience and bring it down will cause regular platoon infantry squads will murder flyers if they get a skyfire nexus That’s needed because AM now has weak anti air in a non forge world meta.

Sir Arun wrote:You are purposefully making a poor comparison on the psyker side to underline your point. Let's take a normal non-HQ LR Punisher instead, to do the number crunching.

Well, make it more abstract, then.

If we use your heavy bolter punisher as an example, the tank costs 160 points to put down 29 S5 shots. That's 160 points for 14.5 hits, under normal circumstances, which means that you pay 11 points per hit.

Now, add in a psyker, who costs 50 points and adds 7.25 hits, which is 7 points per hit.

So yes, the psyker does save you nearly 30 points (unless he's level 2, in which case, you basically break even). But that efficiency is nearly all you get from the psyker here. You don't get the extra durability that investing in 30 points worth of AV14 gets you, for example. Furthermore, the psyker has that magic 1 in 6 chance of failing his psychic test.

If you multiply the chance of failure back into that efficiency equation, it's 50 points for (7.25 x 5/6) which is 8.2 points per hit, but since you have fewer hits, the end result comes in at 50.02. Put another way, it's the exact same to spend points to give the tanks prescience with a primaris as it is to invest those points in more tanks.

tldr: there is no benefit exceeding the points cost of the psyker to taking the psyker. It's virtually perfectly balanced. At least, when talking about something as expensive as a heavy bolter punisher. For anything that costs less, it's just straight worse.


And yeah, it wouldn't surprise me if prescience got removed from primaris and put into the general pool... but it also wouldn't surprise me if it just got left in as-is either...

 schadenfreude wrote:
I’m not sure about additional psychic levels on a Primaris. Let’s look at how the community rates divination powers by popularity.

Top tier: Prescience, Forewarning, Misfortune, Perfect timing.
Mid tier: Foreboding Precognition
Bottom tier: Scrier’s gaze

Because ½ the powers are top tier and there is only 1 scrub power it almost always makes sense to take additional powers.

Conventional perceptions of the tiers get turned around a bit for AM

Top tier: Prescience, Forewarning, Misfortune
Mid Tier: Scrier’s gaze, Foreboding
Bottom Tier: Precognition, Perfect timing.

Now only 1/3 of the powers are top tier and 1/3 are scrub powers. Let’s look at the powers as they apply to IG.

1) Foreboding is useful for a blob or plasma vets, but the psyker needs to be in the squad and most IG players don’t want to be charged. Overall it’s not that great of a power for most IG players.
2) Forewarning is what IG players are fishing for with a 4+ invo on any unit. Top tier
3) Misfortune is also a good power, but the psyker has to start his turn 24” from the target and outside a vehicle. Top tier
4) Perfect timing causes the psyker and his unit to ignore cover. It can’ only effect the psyker’s unit and thus can not effect vehicles. It’s super awesome in other armies but in AM it does the exact same thing as orders from a senior officer who doesn’t have to fish for it making it redundant and possibly not needed. If you have 2 senior officers this is a scrub power.
5) Precognition is uber on a Tzeenth deamon prince, pretty good on Coteaz, but totally craptastic on a psyker with the stat profile of a primaris .
6) Scriers’s gaze is the least popular psychic power, but It’s very important to AM who are likely to have MSU camping an objective. With 2/3 of the rolls on a mysterious objective being good rolling 3 times gives good certainty that they will benefit your backfield objective holders. Also in a non forge world meta prescience and bring it down will cause regular platoon infantry squads will murder flyers if they get a skyfire nexus That’s needed because AM now has weak anti air in a non forge world meta.

Exalted for username.

 Sir Arun wrote:

You are purposefully making a poor comparison on the psyker side to underline your point. Let's take a normal non-HQ LR Punisher instead, to do the number crunching.

So you are looking at a 75 point investment to make your big gun and all your HBs to re-roll failed shots, compared to paying twice as much to get two of everything and another tank on the battlefield. In lists where you dont have a spare 75 points left, this is a nice way of improving your LR firepower from 1 to 1.5 by only paying 50% of what would be required to increase your LR firepower from 1 to 2. Except for one small caveat there. Twin-linking BS3 doesnt raise firepower from 1 to 1.5, but to 1.66. And in reality, if just 1 tank needs a buff, then it will usually be a level 1 psyker, which is 25 points cheaper. So you're only paying 33% and boosting your tank's output from 1 to 1.66. I call that a deal.

But if you insist on level 2 psykers, remember that they have a 1 in 6 chance to roll Forewarning as secondary power, and giving your russ a 4+ invulnerable save definitely adds to its survivability (just think what it does to a squadron of 3 russes). So its not just an increase in firepower here. Or how about that 1 in 6 chance of rolling Misfortune as secondary power? Yeah, now you get to make your Punisher TL, and enemies passing armor saves have to re-roll succesful ones. I dont even want to do the math on how devastating that volley will be. If your primaris is attached to a MOO and 4 Lascannon toting CCS instead, then Perfect Timing is what you're hoping to get and it'll be a field day hunting enemy tanks that arent completely out of LoS. Only Foreboding and Precognition suck, and even scrier's gaze is useful in allowing you to keep your valkyries from entering the board while the enemy still has a lot of skyfire/interceptor weapons active.

I ran the Punisher number crunch for you already, in terms of points spent per shot of main cannon. The psyker is a value is 5pts/shot, the tank is 7pts/shot. Barely worth it, if you don't consider the Russ chassis itself to be a value. I agree that lasguns are a poor point of comparison, but you have to work to find a value for guardsmen that isn't better to just double it than TLing it.

HWS w/ 3 Lascannons, 105pts. Three shots, land 1.5. 70pts/shot
Primaris ML1 TLs, adding .75 shots to the squad. 50/.75 = 66.667pts/shot.

On paper, seems good. Bump him ML 2, though, and you're no longer points efficient to TL the firepower. Consider as well that the maximum number of shots a psyker + unit can land is 3, versus two units which is 6. Again, Prescience is good, and Primaris Psykers are good. Not OP though, and not to be spammed because you may well just get more value by adding more units. For example, in the above, another HWS adds more wounds, another scoring group, and increases the total number of potential shots hit, as well as letting you fire from two different angles. The Psyker, meanwhile, is a secure TL (as long as he hides in a blob) and at ML2 may give them a 4++ (or Perfect Timing if he is, in fact, in the HWS). Perks to both, but the safest bet for Guard imo is to just buy more guns rather than have better guns.

And with level 2, you do get a second power, but you have to roll for it, which makes it super unreliable. Who knows if what you're going to get is particularly useful this game?

The only way to fix this is if you want to get two primaris powers, prescience to make his points back and then... smite? A 25 point soulblaze heavy flamer?

Is there a divination power that isn't "particularly useful"?

1. Allows full BS overwatch and gives counter-attack. Brutal for guard blobs with lascannons and plasma guns out the ass.

2. 4+ invuln. Speaks for itself.

3. Enemies re-roll saving throws. Suddenly, lasguns are terrifying.

4. Ignores cover. Frees up an order for something else. That platoon with the lascannons and plasma guns out the butt? It's ignoring cover and also has precision shots.

5. Only targets the psyker. Dud.

6. Manipulates reserves. Dud.

So, with divination alone you're looking at a 4/6 chance for getting something incredibly useful in almost any situation.

I agree that primaris psykers are hardly "broken", and frankly, taking three all at mastery level 2 is probably unnecessary. But I wouldn't use "super unreliable" to describe them either.

 Ailaros wrote:
And with level 2, you do get a second power, but you have to roll for it, which makes it super unreliable. Who knows if what you're going to get is particularly useful this game?

The only way to fix this is if you want to get two primaris powers, prescience to make his points back and then... smite? A 25 point soulblaze heavy flamer?

That and when dealing with a lvl 1 purely for prescience it's worth spending the extra 5 points for an inquisitor gives LD10 and stubborn to a unit. Plus access to servo skulls. Inquisitors are still better, but the lvl 1 primaris still has things going for him.

Many tournaments have a 2 FOC restriction and do now allow inquisitorial detachments + a regular ally. It's one or the other. That means if you want allies other than inquisition then you have to take primaris instead of inquisitors.

You want a 3rd prescience.

The primaris boosts squad LD to 9 for the purpose of orders while squads can't use the inquisitor's ld10 for orders.

7th ed rumors include a 25% allies restriction. If that pans out then the 25% might become very tight.

 Ailaros wrote:

Sir Arun wrote:You are purposefully making a poor comparison on the psyker side to underline your point. Let's take a normal non-HQ LR Punisher instead, to do the number crunching.

Well, make it more abstract, then.

If we use your heavy bolter punisher as an example, the tank costs 160 points to put down 29 S5 shots. That's 160 points for 14.5 hits, under normal circumstances, which means that you pay 11 points per hit.

Now, add in a psyker, who costs 50 points and adds 7.25 hits, which is 7 points per hit.

So yes, the psyker does save you nearly 30 points (unless he's level 2, in which case, you basically break even). But that efficiency is nearly all you get from the psyker here. You don't get the extra durability that investing in 30 points worth of AV14 gets you, for example. Furthermore, the psyker has that magic 1 in 6 chance of failing his psychic test.

If you multiply the chance of failure back into that efficiency equation, it's 50 points for (7.25 x 5/6) which is 8.2 points per hit, but since you have fewer hits, the end result comes in at 50.02. Put another way, it's the exact same to spend points to give the tanks prescience with a primaris as it is to invest those points in more tanks.

tldr: there is no benefit exceeding the points cost of the psyker to taking the psyker. It's virtually perfectly balanced. At least, when talking about something as expensive as a heavy bolter punisher. For anything that costs less, it's just straight worse.


And yeah, it wouldn't surprise me if prescience got removed from primaris and put into the general pool... but it also wouldn't surprise me if it just got left in as-is either...

Ugg, Prescience is better than this because you get to choose where it goes. You add force multiplication where you want it each turn. It is not an upgrade that sticks with one unit each turn. Giving 1 squad 50% more shooting power as an upgrade would be good, but how good is questionable. First turn they might not get to shoot something. Last turn they might be dead. Turns 2-4 they might be shooting something they aren't suited for.

Prescience gets delivered where you want. So if you have some lascannons taking shots at meq in cover, A heavy bolterful tank glancing the side of an empty chimera, and a squad of plasma vets rapid firing some TAC TDA you get 50% more of the plasma vets usually. next turn when your targets change and the plasma vets are shooting at long range against Geq in cover, the lascannons are going after a dreadnaught behind a wall and the heavy bolters are shooting at lootas out of cover you probably go for the lootas. Next turn the vets rapid firing some meq in cover, the heavy bolters are trying to pick off the surivors of a squad and the las cannons are trying to kill a vindicator that otherwise would have a great shot next turn you use it on the lascannons.

It isnt 50% more firepower, it is 50% more firepower where you need it each and every turn.

I dont know if running 3 primus and 2 inquisitors is the best build. You are going to run out of things that really take advantage of the firepower each turn.

That is also what makes orders so powerful. They aren't just 1 unit ignores cover, each and every turn. it's the unit that could most benefit from ignoring cover this turn, ignores cover. Opportunity makes all the difference.

I view the Primaris as something I'll add in after I've built the core of my list. I generally try and fit in the most amount of actual bodies/hulls first, and then spend that leftover ~100pts on support stuff or upgrades.

My current theoretical 1500pts will likely run either 2x ML1 Primaris, or a single ML2 Primaris because I have either 100 or 75pts leftover depending on the russes I take.

But I wouldn't start my list building with psykers.

That, and I actually like the GW model for the Primaris.

Hollismason wrote:
I don't think they're as good as Warlocks. I mean they get a Invulnerable but it's 5+ and their 50 points but they get to roll on 3 really good charts.

Warlocks Ld 8 is a let down, and to be stuck with one special list of powers (with lame primaris), unable to get level 2.
And they are by fluff better than any human psycher.
But hey, jetbikes!

Edit: oh, and no force weapon, just shred for a feller that die if he/she even think about assault.

PLEASE FEEL FREE TO CORRECT ANY MATH , I AM A NUMBERS GUY BUT THIS SPECIFICALLY I DO NOT WORK WITH.

I'm not a numbers guy by any means when it comes to 40k ( in real life I am though) ; but your examples of 1 single Punisher is flawed because of the following reasons. You are inputting the data at a 1:1 ratio when in fact the PPS lowers exponentially based on how many shots is fire in a game. If you average the turns to 3 or even two it increases it vastly. It also makes it exponentially cheaper when in squadrons of three and a pysker.

Looking at your math it is correct, but when you actually add up the PPS of a full squad it lowers the PPS when you have a psyker.

So let's look at the numbers again and go over a actual I think better comparison. Again, I am not super familiar with these formulae. So please feel free to correct me.

Let's look at the Punisher PPS

Punisher 140 Points Base / 20 Shots , pretty easy to figure that out. Divide the number of points by the amount of shots.

So 7 PPS

Now it recieves at minimum 0 turns meaning at your 1:1 ration, but this increases exponentially when you add in game turns. So let's say you average just 3 turns of firing with that 1 Punisher.

Now it's PPS 2.333

Now let's look at a Squadron

Total Base Cost : 420 points / 60 shots

PPS : Same 7.0

Let's say you only get two turns with that Squad.

PPS. 3.5

Still Pretty Good

Now for our purposes let's say we have a Primaris Level 1, who succeeds only 2/3 of the time.

For purposes of Twinlinked it let's say 50 percent as that comes out at litlle bit easier even though the number is not actually exact. As someone stated I think it's 1.66

Single Punisher w/ Primaris : 190 / 30

PPS : 6.333 not that great

Let's Say though it get's 3 turns of shooting with the psyker casting it 2 of those 3.

190 / ( 30 + 30 + 20) = 2.71

That's pretty good. Now let's look at a squadron of 3.

470 / 60 = 7.8333

Not that great.

3 Turns of Shooting though, with it working 2 out of the 3 times.

470 / ( 60 + 90 + 90) = 1.95

Here's where it get's interesting, what if you did make that roll?

470 / ( 90 + 90 + 90 ) = 1.74

What it it went 4 turns and 3/4?

470 / (90 + 90 + 90 + 60) = 1.4 PPS

This is where is starts breaking down at around the 2nd turn to 3rd turn it starts becoming exponentially more efficient.

I was going to do a PPS w/ additional Leman Russes vs PPS w/ Psyker ,but there's no way to effectively do that? Because it's not a really great comparison.

Two additional Leman Russes though will never reach the point efficiency or PPS or whatever you want to call it. I'm sure someone can work that forumlae out for ST5 vs AVG Toughness but I am unsure of that formulae.

I will say since I like math this is pretty funny

5 Squads of 10 Men w/ = 300 Points 50 ST3
PPS = 6

w/ Pskyer
PPS = 4.666

w/ Psyker FRFSRF
PPS = 3.888

within 12 with Psyker
PPS = 1.555555

Just weird.